Live Encounters Poetry & Writing March 2025
The House of Mary in Ephesus, poems by Ron Carey.
The House of Mary in Ephesus
Up the steps of the Temple, Morning carries the sleepy Sun.
The house of the stranger is still in darkness.
Mary, already about her stations, stops to listen to John
Crying in his sleep.
As she moves about the house, her movements are deliberate,
As if every moment on Earth is to be savoured.
A man passes on the Jerusalem Road.
He is young and handsome and carries lightly
The tool-sack of a carpenter.
Mary watches until he is a small speck on the horizon.
When he is gone, she turns again to her chores.
Now, Morning lifts the Sun over the white roses at the window.
Suddenly, the room where Mary kneels is blazing in light.
On Seeing a Digital Map
of the Ancient World
The past is a clever bastard, reaching across time
With words that whisper the exotic, giving a Titian glow
To dead countries and cities that imprison us
Within our own imagination and keep it alive.
I never had to ask where Abyssinia was on any map.
In a moment I could be there, on the hills out of Massawa.
The city glistening in the salt-light of the Red Sea, the dust
Of the caravan in my face and hair, a hundred camels
Bringing coffee, ivory and gold to the Highlands.
And what was Abyssinia but the beautiful, burning
Idea of a place, somewhere on the road to Eden; the same
Fantasy that brought the spear carrying Hittites to Anatolia
And the green fingered Kassites to Babylon.
At the Arkadiko Bridge
Arkadiko Bridge is a 3000-year-old chariot bridge in Greece.
Phaëton was setting the Earth on fire as we parked
Our hired car and walked the Tityn road to the bridge, humped
As it was over the dead river of a long dead people.
We sat on the hillside and looked back across time.
Then came the soundless chariots, carrying
The spear-laden soldiers of someone’s dream, the men
Of Pylos, Midea, Thebes, Athens and Thessaly.
From noon to sunset we watched them cross, fantastic
In their boar-tusk helmets, shields and armour, horseshit everywhere.
And as the sun set, their gangling reins, studded
With ivory and metal, threw up a jewel-like glittering
Until the hillside was butterflied with light, light that lit our faces,
As if we were real and everything was not a dream.
© Ron Carey
Originally from Limerick, Ron Carey lives in Dublin. Ron holds a Diploma in Literature and Creative Writing from the Open University. He received Special Commendation in the Patrick Kavanagh Awards 2015. His poetry collection DISTANCE, (Revival Press) was a shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection UK and Ireland. In 2016 he was awarded a Masters in Creative Writing at the University of South Wales. His critically acclaimed collections, Racing Down the Sun, and Songs for Older Life, were published by Revival Press. His latest collection, A Storm in Arcadia, will be published by Clare Songbirds of New York. Ron is a facilitator of very successful Creative Writing courses in Dublin and Limerick.