More Poetry

Poetry, though traditionally the most hallowed of literary forms, is not one which is likely to bring one fame and fortune. Even the most successful poets will struggle to make a living, scrapping up grants, bursaries and teaching jobs wherever they can. Poetry then, is something you have to really want to do, and that goes all the more for the poet writing in a minority language.

It is was therefore a remarkably brave decision by the late Michael Hartnett to limit himself to Irish Language poetry, having already made a name for himself writing in English. when he finally returned to English work ten years later, such international attention as he had gained had dissipated. That Hartnett stood by his artistic decision is testament to his integrity and fidelity to his art. This English poem, “There Will Be A Talking” is from his valedictory collection “A Farewell To English”.

There will be a talking of lovely things
there will be cognisance of the seasons,
there will be men who know the flights of birds,
in new days there will be love for women:
we will walk the balance of artistry.
And things will have a middle and an end,
and be loved because being beautful.
who in a walk will find a lasting vase
depicting dance and hold it in his hands
and sell it then? No man on the new earth
will barter with malice nor make of stone
a hollowed riddle: for art will be art,
the freak, the rare no longer commonplace:
there will be a going back to the laws.

The reader with even a passing knowledge of the Irish language will note how some of the constructions used in the poem seem more naturally Irish than English. The opening line seems in particular to lend itself to ready translation (“Beidh caint faoi rudai alainn“), as does the insistence of “in new days” (“in am nua“) in the fourth line. This sense of writing in translation, or perhaps awaiting translation, somehow adds an archaicism, an otherwoldliness to the piece. This is entirely appropriate, for the poem is a dream of a return to a world of nature and art from the distant, perhaps Celtic past. A harmony with nature is sketched out in the first few lines, most particularly in the wonderful line about “men who know the flights of birds”. Not just nature, but women too, will be loved, but most of all in this paradise there will be art. There will be proportion (“a beginning and an end”) and respect for medium, and a turning away from mere noise-making or self-indulgence (“a hollow riddle”). Art will fulfill it’s purpose in the world, teaching us all to value beauty. Who among us in this new world will see works of art as mere properties, rather than vessels of experience? Finally, art will sanctify our existence by a consecration of the rare and beatiful. Far from representing an idealised state, Hartnett’s vision is of a return to essential truths, and he seals his manifesto with words which, though gentle, brook no denial: “There will be a going back to the laws”