Gogarty and Tim Healy standing in a window of the Vice Regal Lodge
looking out over the deer herd to old Chapelizod and the Liffey valley
Arthur Griffith’s seconder and Parnell’s persecutor
talking about geraniums
after the fighting had died down
Gogarty could think in three dimensions and when he wanted to could fly
he rode like a mad thing across Sandymount strand while all of little Dublin slept
his the first swans on the Liffey
to thank the gods for delivering him from the fanatics
and when he dreamed his imaginings were veiled in the colour of cherry blossom
Gogarty and Tim Healy in the window talking about geraniums
their thoughts were worlds apart
Healy playing at his old endgame
Gogarty thinking about the future
of the pastures running to the hills
What difference he wondered would the Trojan horse of Independence make
what would the town hall rougies do
now that Michael Collins was dead
and what about the plight of Dublin’s tenement poor
the sap of a thousand years all that honey-rich liquor
Revival was in the creamy air
hope breaking out in budding sprouts
wooden handcarts were pushed with a new vigour
their small steel bearing wheels roaring
their wooden handles held high
Talk of clearing the red-curtained nitetown and the kips
damp green-grey bricks moss blossoming an orange furze
grand Georgian square-paned windows bare
coughing children cold to the bone in the permanent shade
praying for deliverance without knowing it by name
When finally the plans for Ballyfermot saw the light of day
maternity decided on the reluctant move
matriarchal orders to roll the bedclothes up
to fill the van with dark plywood and the waxed lampshade
youngsters thrilled with high hopes to be piled upon the lot
Mile after mile of silver pebbledash
the neat hall door the luxury of so many rooms
the garden gate the rubble in the tiny field
the plastered band of ribbon tied around the waist
the privacy the running tap the gas supply the space
The splendid curve of school and church
the phoenix park to dream in
fruits of independence flowering in white-rich pink
the never dreamed-of gentility
of the Cherry Orchard
Long after Gogarty’s and Tim Healy’s bones were stilled
I awoke to see the plum streaked sky of a Ballyfermot dawn
the ice cream ripple bleeding into the frosted cloud
drenching the hills beyond
setting alight the promise of the Cherry Orchard
Out in Ballyfermot village as it were
the mid-morning weave of comings and goings
the pneumatic hammer and the bread delivery van
crossing the road two of those early pioneers
the rounded slow progress of a woman and a man
Their sons and daughters never grew to know the towering damp
the black toll of tuberculosis and the hunger of the strike
they lived instead to build upon the honourable start
they painted pink and brown the gutters and the downpipe down
the plastered cummerbund the ribbon line its crown
Grandchildren born and fed lovingly with this jam and buttered bread
dry warm clothes the knitted gansies and sheets upon the bed
somehow loving ways were hardened and the line of passion stemmed
something breached the thousand years
and drained its honey’d blend
Part II The Wild West
The great expanse of greenery to the Californian hills
inspired the rugged innocents to ponyride for thrills
the piebald flanks the bareback mount the stirrups standing high
all in the pink-soft evening light of the Cherry Orchard sky
The ghosts of St John Gogarty and Healy stand and stare
out their regal windows at the mountains through the glare
the pylons drape their pipelines high the gloom of wonder grows
the setting Cherry Blossom sun on the rooftops warmly glows
The ghosts are not convinced but know from battles lost and won
you cannot win your heart’s desire at the end of the finest gun
and all their comrades dead and lost their wonders ripe or rotten
while Cherry Orchard trees still bloom their work is not forgotten
Terry Browne -- Cowboys - An influence in shaping modern Ireland
The icecap around these parts receded about ten thousand years ago and human habitation from about 3,000 BC has
left its mark on the Irish landscape.
Our history of the past one thousand years has been one of intermittant conflict and temporary respite with the
old Anglo-Norman enemy. Our independence was finally brought about under the leadership of our own
gun-slingin' poets who took to the streets in 1916. There followed a civil war, a literary revival and a
gradual progression to the peace and prosperity we know today.
In the late 1950's television and cinema began to bring images of other civilizations and histories of the
wider world. In the search for an identity in this post-war period, a generation took to the American 'cowboy'
theme with an enthusiasm that was not matched by any of the many other potential influences. In the games they
played, children demonstrated (in their language of play) a leaning towards the western lifestyle. They did
not play Romans and Greeks or Arab and Israelis. Armed instead with apple twig and thrawney twine they lived
an endless game of Cowboys and Indians. They didn't walk or run; they rode imaginary horses and slung their
hurley sticks (gaelic baseball bats) into a makeshift scabbard beside their imaginary saddlebags.
As far as I can recall it was an almost exclusively male pre-occoupation. I also would say the cowboy
influence peaked in the years 1950-1965 and were swept away finally by the music of the Beatles, the influence
of sport and probably the diversity of the new imagery and the variety of Walt Disney and the rest of the
Hollywood machine.
There was still in those years a significant population of horses in the cities of Ireland. A lot of the
transportation was still horsedrawn and cattle were even driven to the city-center markets every Wednesday
right up to the mid sixties.
Television and Cinema had to be the greatest influence; both in terms of the original establishment of the
'cowboy culture' and in its ultimate dilution. A generation watched transfixed the Lone Ranger and Tonto, Batt
Masterson, High Noon, John Wayne, Billy the Kid, Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone. This was probably more an
influence in Dublin on the east coast where early television signals were pirated from the neighbouring
island's BBC.
In latter years we slipped from this more innocent age (if ever an age is innocent) into the shocking modernity
of sprawling housing estates packed with social problems of substance abuse, neglect and unemployment. In the
1980's a social syndrome began to emerge wherein young males in their early teens and even younger took to
riding ponies wildly around Dublin's western suburbs by day and night. These midnight-cowboys grazed their
horses on the public playing fields and the suburban 'long acre' along the roadsides. There are now over one
thousand of these ponies in Dublin's western suburbia alone. In order to harness some of this cowboy energy,
the Irish Government recently granted two million dollars to two local cowboy groups to foster better
conditions in which to keep the ponies.
The horsedrawn buckboards are almost a thing of the past although I can confirm a sighting in Dublin's inner
city about this time last year.
So there you have it folks; a cowboy colony in Ireland you never knew about. I hope you enjoy the verse.
High Country Communications