Maggie O'Dwyer | Global Irish Family

Maggie O’Dwyer’s first poetry pamphlet, Yes, I’d Love to Dance (Templar Poetry) was followed by her first collection, Laughter Heard from the Road (Templar Poetry), shortlisted in 2010 for the Rupert and Eithne Strong award for Best First Collection.

She lives and works in Dublin where she teaches Creative Writing and works as a visual artist

The Wire Heart

The heart is something
I’m not sure of.
I made it long ago.
The face of a fox lies there,
his carved mouth red and open,
a tin frog from Mexico
and gift tags that say,
drink me, eat me.

This heart is crooked.
I pulled and stretched the wire.
I made it what it is.
I know an unexpected breeze
can shake it
and when the door is open
everything falls.

A Country Girl

Through slats of sunlight
I see my father’s leg thrown over
the arm of his chair
in our suburban house.
I sit on the floor so close to him,
I smell the smoke from his cigarette,
the weave and heat of tweed.

He is lost in this quiet light, in memories
before me. The first night they made love
over and over. The look of her.

My mother sits in her dressing gown
fading to the blue of late summer hydrangeas.
A pink corset sits on the kitchen table.

She thinks of a girl
who sank into haystacks, who loved
to tease and be teased, her body then
shifting in her summer dress.
The air sweet with meadow.
I see them in a black Ford car
a small white box between them.

Next door our neighbours,
plain as brown paper, watch our pear trees
shade their loganberries and their lawn.
They listen to The Archers and take
homemade lemonade and biscuits
out on the grass at eleven.

Out front in winter and summer
our cherry tree sprinkles white
on the road, our dog Darkey small as a rat
chases the tyres of cars.

I take off my tights.
I take off my knickers and walk
down to the village
in my bare feet.