Terry McDonagh – Some Never Left

Terry McDonagh Some Never left Live Encounters Magazine May 2015

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Some Never Left, a poem by Terry McDonagh, Irish Poet, Playwright and Writer

I grew up in the west of Ireland and, even though I didn’t live next to the Atlantic Ocean, I would always have been conscious of its power, threat and source of life and energy. Later, studying in Galway and meeting people in daily contact with the Atlantic and literature surrounding it, heightened my awareness of its immensity and dangers. This poem, Some Never Left, is a response to its omnipresence.

Some Never Left

Some never left. They didn’t
need to. They cut and
saved turf, did the hay,
stacked oats or barley and
let sheep up and down hills.

When sons and fathers went
fishing, mothers prayed
behind rocks in howling gales.
They could tell of wind
changing
by the flight of the gulls.

A fisherman’s wife looked hard
at her husband and sons, for
she never knew what way
the sea would bring them home.


© Terry McDonagh

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