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The belated discovery of a role model: Nessa O’Mahony on Eavan Boland
The month of November, with its decreasing hours of daylight and lengthening nights, offers an opportunity to turn inwards. It is traditionally a month in Ireland when we remember those who have passed on, indeed the 1st and 2nd of November are known respectively as All Saints and All Souls days. On Trasna our focus this month will be on Irish writers who have passed on and who are remembered by contemporary writers and scholars. Our first post this month is by poet Nessa O’Mahony who writes of the influence of the poet Eavan Boland (1944 – 2020) on her own development as a writer, which led to her subsequently…
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“Woodbines and Tall Tales” and “A Christmas Wake”
by Bernie Condon Throughout October, Trasna will focus on the Celtic festival of Samhain, better known to Americans as Halloween. The holiday originated in Ireland and celebrates that time of year when the veil between this world and the next grows thin, and life seems more mysterious. This week we feature two poems by Bernie Condon, as well as her grandmother’s tale of the Banshee which inspired “Woodbines and Tall Tales.” The attached video was produced by Will McLellan of The Wood of O, and features Bernie retelling a family ghost story. Woodbines and Tall Tales My Grandmother smoked a woodbine Every night by the fire. “Tis the only little pleasure I have” She would splutter between puffs. Curled at…
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Rathcroghan, the Irish Otherworld, & the Home of Halloween
Daniel Curley Throughout October, Trasna will focus on the Celtic festival of Samhain, better known to Americans as Halloween. The holiday originated in Ireland and celebrates that time of year when the veil between this world and the next grows thin, and life seems more mysterious. In the medieval village of Tulsk, in County Roscommon is the Rathcroghan Visitor Center. The Center is located in the heart of a rich archeological landscape. This week we feature an essay by archeologist Daniel Curley who explains its connection to Halloween. Rathcroghan, the Irish Otherworld, & the Home of Halloween The Rathcroghan archaeological landscape, Co. Roscommon, Ireland is a collection of 240 identified archaeological sites contained within a 6.5km (725ha) area…
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Celebrating Samhain, by Orla O’Connell from “The Way of the Seabhean”
Throughout October, Trasna will focus on the Celtic festival of Samhain, known better to Americans as Halloween. The holiday originated in Ireland and celebrates that time of year when the veil between this world and the next grows thin, and life seems more mysterious. This week we feature a blog piece by writer Orla O’Connell on The Way of the Seabhean, which she scribed for Amantha Murphy. But first some background from Orla: “My friend Amantha Murphy is an Irish seabhean- a female shaman, healer and visionary. She was schooled in the ways of wise women in Kerry, where her grandmother was a healer and midwife. In Ireland, the tradition of the healer woman has been passed…
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MARK GRANIER reads from Ghostlight: New & Selected Poems
Throughout October, Trasna will focus on the Celtic festival of Samhain, known better to Americans as Halloween. The holiday originated in Ireland and celebrates that time of year when the veil between this world and the next grows thin, and life seems more mysterious. This week we feature award-winning poet, photographer, and filmmaker, Mark Granier. In addition to select readings from his latest collection, Ghostlight: New & Selected Poems, is his film: “Docklands,” which won the Doolin Writers’ Weekend Film-Poem Competition in 2019. Mark and filmmaker Fiachra MacAllister also produced the haunting video for Peter Sirr’s poem “About Ghosts: Whoever You Were,” which was recently featured on Trasna. Mark has published five books of poetry and has exhibited his photographs in…
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“Whatever you were” and Other Poems
Peter Sirr Throughout October, Trasna will focus on the Celtic festival of Samhain, known better to Americans as Halloween. The holiday originated in Ireland and celebrates that time of year when the veil between this world and the next grows thin, and life seems more mysterious. This week we feature Peter Sirr, a well-known poet, and now podcaster. He and his wife, poet Enda Wyley, are hosts of the lively program, Books for Breakfast, which airs every Thursday morning and includes a “Toaster Challenge” in which guests present a favorite book in the time it takes to make toast. In addition to select readings from his…
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“Towards a Wild Ecology of Being”
by Clare Mulvany Located primarily in the northwest of County Clare, the Burren, is one of the world’s most unique landscapes. It means “great rock” in Irish (Boireann), and is dominated by thick successions of sedimentary rocks, often compared to a lunar landscape. In the following essay and series of photographs, Clare Mulvany take readers to this otherworldly place, to a land that, as she puts it, “reads like a sacred text.” “TOWARDS A WILD ECOLOGY OF BEING,” by Clare Mulvany Each step is a careful one, and a miraculous one. At foot level, wild orchids, the Spring gentians in pink and lighter pink, like dreams rising from a dreaming land, are dotted…
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“Rattus, Rattus”
by Joe McGowan Joe McGowan, a native of Mullaghmore, Co. Sligo, is a noted historian, novelist, folklorist, and an acclaimed storyteller. Readers of Trasna will be familiar with his talent as Joe launched our first issue of Trasna with his piece entitled, “May: Mary’s Month or Baal’s?” Joe’s essay thoughtfully explored the “green world’s” connections between the ancient festival called Bealtine, which acknowledged the pagan god Baal, and the celebration of the Blessed Virgin Mary with May altars bedecked with flowers and greenery. The feasts paid homage to the season and welcomed the world to summer. Now, Joe McGowan is back to remind us that autumn is just around the…
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“On the western shore of Lake Turkana” and other poems
by Monica Corish Before a neck injury in 2005 Irish poet Monica Corish spent many years travelling, living and working in Africa. Based now in Co. Leitrim, in her poems here Corish brings the reader from the sublime beauty of a night spent on a mountaintop near Lokichokio in northern Kenya in her poem, “On the western shore of Lake Turkana”, to a meditation on life stages in her poem, “Once I Saw a Lioness”. In the latter poem the narrator leaves behind exotic adventures and appreciates the grace of love, and the beauty of the quotidian, in mid-life. And finally her poem, “Maeve’s Version”, with accompanying video, grows out of Corish’s fascination with Irish…
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“Large Bottles and Sweet Butter Pastry”
by Julie Ward Guinness Storehouse at St. James Gate in Dublin is often listed as Ireland’s number-one tourist attraction; but here on Trasna there’s no admission fee to learn the history of bottling the world’s most famous pint. “Glass on wood is likely among the first sounds I heard,” writes Julie Ward in this rich remembrance of her father, Bob Phelan, the man who, it was said, poured one of the best pints of Guinness in Waterford. The pub was known as Mikey Norris’s, it went back to Ward’s great-grandfather, and is known to this day as Norris’s Corner. As a child Julie also treasured visits to local confectioner Suzie Phelan, a…