Poem for Friday and Beltany Stone Circle

Beacons at Bealtaine 

By Seamus Heaney 

Delivered at EU Enlargement Ceremony 

Phoenix Park, May Day, 2004 

Uisce: water. And fionn: the water's clear.

But dip and find this Gaelic water Greek:

A phoenix flames upon fionn uisce here.

Strangers were barbaroi to the Greek ear.

Now let the heirs of all who could not speak

The language, whose ba-babbling was unclear,

Come with their gift of tongues past each frontier

And find the answering voices that they seek

As fionn and uisce answer phoenix here.

The May Day hills were burning, far and near,

When our land's first footers beached boats in the creek

In uisce, fionn, strange words that soon grew clear;

So on a day when newcomers appear

Let it be a homecoming and let us speak

The unstrange word, as it behoves us here,

Move lips, move minds and make new meanings flare

Like ancient beacons signalling, peak to peak,

From middle sea to north sea, shining clear

As phoenix flame upon fionn uisce here. 

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We had nice, chilly weather on Friday, though I first ventured out in it because I needed a fasting blood draw for my semiannual lab work...never my favorite way to start a day. Then I came back, cleaned up, did some chores, and attempted to keep my cats warm in between writing irate letters to The Washington Post and The Los Angeles Times for being willing to let democracy die in darkness and refusing to endorse Harris. My sister is visiting our parents, so we all chatted on Google Meet in the afternoon before Paul and I took a walk to the lake and visit with the waterfowl. 

Our neighborhood had a kids' pumpkin carving event in the late afternoon with mini cupcakes, cinnamon rolls, and coffee cake for the adults, so we stopped by there before coming home for the first game of the World Series, which ended after ten close innings with a spectacular walk-off grand slam by the Dodgers. We ate dinner and watched this week's Disclaimer -- it's time for a non-misogynistic twist already -- and the rest of this season's convoluted Slow Horses. This is Beltany Stone Circle, overlooking a destroyed passage tomb complex in County Donegal: