Five Poems by Marguerite Doyle

 

Celtic Night

 

 

Celtic Night, dusted with ice, crystallised, 

Deirdre and Naoise dance, reunited. 

Last rays of Winter’s solstice moon 

reflected in Lough Tay’s quiet pool. 

 

Avoca flows pinched through Glendalough 

where St Kevin’s Kitchen stands cold, 

and the stones of Newgrange 

whisper secrets, centuries old. 

 

Lough Derravaragha’s waters ripple 

and four white crowns appear. 

The Swans of Lir sing Aoife’s song 

and wait nine hundred years. 

 

Beneath a Leinster shore lies wrapped 

the Tara Brooch in filagree, 

while ice Queen Méabh drives 

Cuchulainn’s white horses out to sea. 

  

A shooting star lights the Burren, 

its limestone muffled in snow, 

and deities welcome 

De Dannan’s return to Poulnabrone. 

 

Across bogland, fields and heather,  

loughs and ancient sites, 

Danu leads the dervish 

through Ireland’s Celtic Night. 

 

 

 

 

Blackbird 

 

 

Blackbird in the gloaming 

stirred my restless sleep. 

I stepped outside, 

inhaled cold air deep. 

 

From the fjords and fields 

I felt the sounds 

of anticipated living 

all around. 

 

I listened to his frosted song 

of earth and scented air, 

Notes tumbled silently 

everywhere. 

 

Waiting for an answer, 

a trail of Northern Lights 

I watched the blackbird 

take flight. 

 

 

 

 

Exile 

 

 

Leaving, across the silent courtyard 

and the mute campanile  

in the darkness. 

High windows glinting  

with chandeliers 

echo haloed conversations. 

Past the cold, empty chapel 

and the dripping chains  

of the walkway 

out of the sanctified city. 

Thoughts like gold leaf  

from an icon, falling  

on the cobblestones behind me. 

 

 

 

 

November 

 

 

Mid-November the coldest day, 

Sunshine brushes frost away 

 

And warms the fallen leaves 

Of red and gold beneath my feet 

 

Cobalt sky, delicate moon 

Reflected in the woodland pool. 

 

White swan glides along the way, 

Joyful, this November day. 

 

 

 

 

Winter Beach Walk 

 

 

Crunched footfalls on the road, 

this day of celebration, numbed with cold. 

Solstice sun sinks majestically, 

crowns the dunes with rays of gold. 

 

Figures dance and squall along the shore, 

splintered voices whipped and torn. 

White horses splash their frothy clouds 

crystallize tonight in icy forms. 

 

Tide’s wake offers mirrored pools, 

moon gazes at itself, unmoved. 

Powdered snow, like sand is blown, 

taps gently the fragile marram. 

 

North Star nods to Plough, 

casts a benevolent eye down. 

Too cold to linger, we return, 

past frozen seaweed, flotsam, stone.

Marguerite Doyle holds an M.A. in Creative Writing from Dublin City University. Her poems have been published in Vallum, Reliquiae Journal, The Poetry Bus, The Galway Review, The New Welsh Reader, Dreich and previously in Lothlorien Poetry Journal. Marguerite’s poetry also appears in the Dedalus Anthology, Local Wonders: Poems of Our Immediate Surrounds and The Ireland Chair of Poetry Commemorative Anthology, Hold Open the Door. She has been Winner in Category for the Trócaire / Poetry Ireland Competition and was both shortlisted and highly commended for the Anthology Poetry Award.