Forest could keep secrets
Forest could keep secrets

It's New Year, 1979, at Funderland in the RDS in Dublin. 
In the cold calculation of the January air, a young girl tries to talk 

Nobody can see my name on me.
My name is inside
and all over me, unseen
like other people also keep it.
Isn't my name magical?

The jellyfish
dances through the water
waving its frilly underwear.

We found one on the beach.

It had become a polythene bag
full of water.

Here now skyline assembles fire.
The sun collects up to leave.
Its bright following paled,
suddenly all goes. Dusk rushes
in, like door closed on windowless room.

In our flat
faces speak
of places across the sea.

In our flat
voices walk in
talking, but not like me.

A queen in a palace, slumped on a throne,
Surrounded by servants but all alone.
Heavy with handshakes, bunches of flowers,
jewels, crowns, grinning for hours.

I am a crocodile who lost my smile in the turbulent waters of the Nile.
When I was very small, trapped inside my crocodile egg, 

The sea lays big glass hands on the sand,
spreading its fingers out as if new
to the shore. It can’t quite believe in it.
It wants to hold on before the glass breaks.

The phone rings
But never long enough
For the Slow Man.

By the time
The set’s switched on
His favourite programme’s over.