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Gift
"A cold coming you had of it", my baby brother
Our Mother entered a desperate race on December 29th
The coldest day of that bleak winter
Sailing in a fragile vessel
From Red Island to Argentia
Icebergs chasing her all the way up Placentia Bay
You were born in the darkest hour of that night.
The curling shell pink umbilical cord
Froze into an intricate ice sculpture
After it grew out of the warmth of our Mother
Unfurling to create a gritty monument
Resting atop her now empty belly
Anchored down in frozen placental fluid.
The skiff hit the wharf
They lifted you up,a warm offering
Hands reached to pass you up to hands on the stage
But the boat listed, fingers slipped
And you went flying down
Towards the joyous boiling cold ocean
Fated to spend your future
Forever as a Mer child, lost to us
Whose cries we would hear
Only when foghorns warned us
Of choppy seas such as these ones.
The priest who was sailing with the crew
For fear that his presence might be required
On the voyage, to assist our Mother or you
If needed, to another sphere
Lept up and caught the tumbling bundle
A great save! A tiny miracle!
When they bring you to me; such a precious gift
I, still a baby myself, cover my eyes and cry
"No brother! No brother! No brother!"
Knowing that your comb of shocking red hair
Will put my nose out of joint and break it
Will take all the attention away from me
A pale blond imitation of a real Red Island Barry
But, I should have been slightly more gracious
In my acceptance speech.......
The next winter, a big red rooster
Attacks and knocks our mother over
While she is gathering eggs from under the hen
Killing the little brother still inside of her
Our father laid a lamb in her empty arms to cradle
To comfort her in her grief.
Now, there is only you and me left in this world
To agree and argue over this and the memory
Of when Father Lewis, and his big black dog, Rex
Came down to our house after saying mass
And our Mother spreads the table
With fresh bread and butter,
Opens jars oozing gooseberry jam
And celebratory tins of ham
Trying her best to make a big man even bigger.
by Mary Duffy
*(With reference and homage to T.S. Eliot's first line
from "The Journey of the Magi"
"A cold coming we had of it"
Written as a gift for my brother, Maurice Barry's
birthday in December, 2003,this is an almost
biographical account of his journey.
He made it to Argentia for the birth but was dropped
and caught by "Pa Lewis", as we called him, on the way
home to Red Island. My brother has given me his
permission to take just this little poetic license
with his life.
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