GREGORY O'BRIEN - Malachi
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GREGORY O'BRIEN - Malachi
Gregory O'Brien
It was early when they descended
on the town
in search of hats. As Malachi would
have said, ëEverything
proceeds reasonably,í the blue
Renault travelling
upcountry, the air grown colder
thinner
the problem of ice at this
altitude.
It was still morning, a pale
rehearsal
for the afternoon that would carry
Malachiís body
past the tiny shrines nailed
to trees, the plaster
hands outstretched, towards
the monksí cemetery.
The nuns breathing icy steam
the Sorrowful Mysteries
a trail of murmuring behind
the car
undulating across the hillcountry.
Sister Leon
on account of her long legs
sat in the front.
The hats were her idea. The car
eased to the roadside
a town of only four shops, one a
converted cinema
now a department store. Frozen
hands concealed
within their habits, the nuns
darted through the door.
When asked what hats in particular
Sister Bernard said
they required ëRussian Hatsí
the type
made of small animals or, preferably
the imitation
of small animals (as they were
themselves
devoted to the imitation of a life
not their own).
They told the shopkeeper they were
travelling to a funeral
and were expecting snow.
He said he was
ëa religious man but not a holy maní
and would, in this instance
refund their money less ten per cent
if they returned
the hats in perfect condition on
their way back.
As the nuns left the shop, after
several fittings
and refittings, the fur pulled hard
down over
the blue linen of their veils
the shopkeeper said he was
ëa holy man but not a religious maní
and wished them well.
To stretch their legs, the nuns
strolled
along the verge of the highway
that bisected
the town. ëI heard Malachi once
granted hearing
to a deaf person,í Sister Jacques
related
ëhis fingers on the boyís ears
he felt two things
like piglets coming out of them
and the boy
could hear like nobody else, went on
to become a composer
but died, tragically, twenty years
later, after
locking himself out of his house
one winter night
and catching pneumonia.í They
could hear
a radio blaring from the open door
of a hardware store nearby
Tom Jones singing ëHelp yourself
to my lips . . .í
And from another doorway
ëIt feels
like love when
the radioís
on . . .í As they walked
a conversation
preceded them along the roadside
and into a dairy
where the nuns were to buy
provisions
for the rest of their journey.
Two local women
were discussing a recent arrival
in the town:
ëHeís an artist, and his wife
ìMartheî, well
her real name is Maria Boursin
although she prefers
the stylish Marthe De Merigny.
Iíve heard
he adores her despite her reclusive
neurotic nature
which, over the years, has driven his friends
away.í
ëWhat does he paint?í
ëStrange paintings
without plots . . .
based
on ìthe direct observation of
imaginary gardensî.í
ëYouíve lost me there.í
The two women
noticed the group of nuns behind
them, paused
then continued undeterred:
ëApparently
the artist drove his wife
to distraction
following her around the house
sketching her
constantly.í ëIf the train still
went through here
the artists wouldnít,í the other
commented.
ëShe could not even fall asleep
without
an uncomfortable feeling she was
being drawn
by him. So she would make certain
he fell asleep first
then remove the pencil from
his hand.í
ëI thought you said he painted gardens?í
the other asked.
ëHe does. He places her in
the garden . . .
He has never allowed her to age
in his paintings
although they have been together for
thirty years.
She was described to me
the other day
as ìa nagging, neurotic shrew who
made life
miserable for him, knew nothing
about Art
and could not even cookî. Iíve seen them
in the garden
once or twice, wet with rain . . .í
The nuns left
the shop as swiftly as their habits
would fly them.
ëAs reality passes us by, so
depictions
of reality pass us by,í Bernard
mused.
Walking back to the car they discussed
ëthe love of the manyí
of the late Malachi for the world.
ëAs the love
of the many will keep adding
to its number
so the love of one leads only
to loss,í Bernard said.
They passed a billboard outside
the newsagentís:
ëTRAWLER NETS
NAKED GIRL
ìI fled orgy and swam
with sharks!îí
Then an old man on a bicycle
pulled over
to the kerb beside them and insisted
he show the Sisters ësomethingí.
They followed him across the road to
an empty section
which must have, until recently, had
a building on it
a floorplan could be traced
on the soil.
The old man pointed out a plaque on
the footpath
in front of the section:
ëMAURICE PERET
WAS CONVERTED TO JESUS IN A
SHOESTORE
ON THIS PLACE . . .í
followed by an illegible date.
ëThe cultivation of the soil,í
the man said, ëSisters, is all that
should concern us.í
They followed him across a playground
to where a large
wooden crucifix stood. Sister Gabriel
read from a plaque
at the base of the sculpture:
ëJuliet Pepperís
twelve foot Christ on a Cross
was carved
from rimu and was inspired by a
visionary experience.
In 19ó she dreamed that a flood was going
to submerge all of
the central plateau. She built an ark
with room enough
for her husband and nineteen children
and affixed the figure
of Christ to the bow. When the flood
did not come
Juliet Pepper and her obedient family
moved out of the ark
and back into their home.
Shortly afterwards
the creek behind the house
overflowed
and carried the ark away. The sculpture
was the only piece
of the vessel to be recovered and Juliet
Pepper subsequently reworked it
into its present form.í Leon said
the expression
on Christís face was one of
ëI told you soí
Before riding off, the old man
asked if the Sisters
knew where they were going. They replied
that, not having a map
they relied on memories of
such charts
and memories of the region itself.
He pulled a map
from his satchel and passed it to Leon
then bade them farewell.
Leon examined the map and noted that
while it was clearly
of the region they were travelling through
it had been entirely redrawn
cities had been dissembled, their populations
relocated in small communities
denoted on the map by stars. What care
he had put into this
Leon thought, folding the map and
placing it in her pocket.
She was to find, some hours later
at the funeral
the map had vanished just as the
old man had vanished
behind them as they drove off down
the highway.
As the car continued
the nuns continued
the Joyful Mysteries, for a safe
trip along the road
and for the dead manís journey
heavenwards.
ëThat our prayers might fly straight
to heaven
like a dart,í Sister David said.
She later told
how she was converted
to Christianity
by a travelling preacher who
was visiting
the outlying island which her extended
family extended
around. They lived on an
atoll
a crown of palms. The preacher had
presupposed a certain
spirituality of them, living as they did
on a religious symbol
and in the midst of other symbols ó
the formations
of birds over the archipelago
the dogs running
circuits of the island, the fish
circumnavigating
the atoll. David recalled what first
and most
impressed her was the fact that
the preacherís voice
sounded exactly like that of a
transistor radio.
Also, the way his hair grew
outwards from his head
after the manner of the people
from her island
although this preacher was from
far away ó
a retired musician, an ex-member of the
Jimi Hendrix Experience
he had subsequently renounced
bass-guitar
and bell-bottoms to spread
the Faith
in a glass-bottomed boat
travelling from
island to island often for days
on end
on waves that stood the boat
on end. A reformed man
reforming others along
similar lines
he would watch the fishes, the evolving
religious symbolism
beneath his vessel. Supposedly
a legend himself
he set forth in the wake
of other legends
listening to the ringing of more
religious bells
than the ringing in his ears
from misspent nights
in front of a 2000 watt Marshall
Stack.
Now his messages reached as far
as the Marshall
Islands, ëthat others might hear
who care to hearí
and that their hearing might
not be damaged
as his was. David remembered
the preacherís stories
of a guitar that caught fire.
ëDonít you mean a bush
that caught fire?í Bernard
enquired.
Later in the morning the fur hats
still clung
to the heads of the travellers
those in the back seat
nodding towards sleep.
ëMalachi
once split a man in two
with an axe,í
Bernard said matter-of-factly
from the driverís seat.
ëIt was in the early days of
the monastery
with all manner of afflictions
and distractions
afoot in the world. While felling a
tree
around the monastery site
he was
distracted by a passing
sparrow
and his axe fell on his
closest assistant.
But when Malachiís gaze returned
to earth
only the manís clothes had been
sliced down
the middle, his body was
left intact
unscratched. ìUpon this plot
of earth,î
Malachi then prophesied, ìthe bodies
of many saints
will sleep.î And among the new
drops of rain
they rejoiced.í Bernard added
that although Malachi
believed such miracles might leave
the Brothers edified
and render them more cautious
for the future
he said ëit is better to dwell
on things
worth imitating than on those worth
marvelling atí.
The car wound intuitively
around
the small hills, the road losing
the river
for quarter of an hour then
crossing it again
and again, playing with it.
Stephen in the back seat
said she thought it appropriate
that Malachi, an Irishman
died in a shed of potatoes
and the others smiled.
ëWe can joke about our friends
the dead,í Bernard added
and soon their laughter had become
indistinguishable
from the decades of the rosary
that once again
flooded the blue Renault.
Sister Jacques
related how funerals were conducted
in the village
she came from. On occasion
she had already shown
the others her astonishing ability
at carrying
ëall manner of thingí on her head:
pitchers of water
baskets of eggs, a small
library.
At airports when her arms were
worn out
from carrying a suitcase
she would balance
the case on her head, without
recourse to her hands
to steady it. In her village
the custom was
for coffins to be carried
on the heads
of six of the villagers. Because
she explained, the top
of the head is the part of the
person closest
to heaven. ëHow else to bear
the dead one
heavenwards but in this fashion?í
she asked.
The pallbearers would not so much as
touch the coffin
with their hands. It was necessary
for the bearers to be
roughly the same height
minor adjustments
being made by adding to or
subtracting
from the thickness of the soles
of their shoes
which, it followed, were the part
of the person
furthermost from heaven.
The nuns yawned
in unison as they waited at
a railway crossing
for a train to pass. Bernard
passed a bag of
liquorice allsorts around.
She described
a train journey she would often
make years earlier.
At the time nuns were not
allowed
to eat or drink in public
(even in the homes
of their families, when visiting
they had to take
refreshments in a bedroom with
the door closed).
Bernard knew by heart the length
of all the railway
tunnels and, as the train entered
the darkness
she would eat and drink frantically
and by the time
the carriage had re-entered daylight
be sitting smugly
in her seat, all but the
smallest
crumbs removed from
her veil.
She gave the tunnels
various names:
this one an apple tunnel
this one
a sandwich and biscuit
this a cup
of tea, this a Moro Bar
according
to how much time they allowed
her consumptions.
Bernard said she had wanted
to become a vet
when young, felt a calmness
around animals.
Her favourite trick was to place
a cricket or locust
on her tongue and close her mouth.
When she re-opened it
the insect would just be
sitting
calmly there. Bernard told
the others
how she had found her vocation
one Saturday
afternoon, mid-summer, after
beating
her boyfriend at tennis.
She visited
the Mother Superior after
the match
and realised her vocation
the moment
she walked through the convent
door.
David asked how she met
ëthe maní.
Bernard replied, at the Saint
Augustineís
Singlesí Club, a dating agency
located in
a building the shape of a huge
fish
with disenchanted gulls circling
overhead.
She had read a brochure in a
church foyer
which said ëthe best marriages
imaginable
are arranged by the Saint
Augustineís
Singlesí Club. People with nothing
in common
meet and find each other
irresistible.í
ëAnd what became of ìthe manî?í
Jacques ventured.
Bernard was silent, remembered
lingering
in the hallway, light trickling
through
the skylight as though
from a broken tap . . .
She said she had never questioned
or regretted
her decision for a moment during
all the years
since then ó her eyes fixed on the
road ahead ó
and she had never looked
back.
.
Some sandwiches moved about
the car
and were no more. Leon broke
the silence
saying brightly she had an older
sister, Nathalie
who was a disciple of the
Dalai Lama
and had lived for ten years in
the north of India
or somewhere north of there
in a cave
eating next to nothing and drinking
only water.
ëThe disciples meditate naked
in the snow
evenly spaced, one every
two or three
miles around this particular
mountain,í she said.
ëAfter eight years, my parents
bought my sister
a ticket home for a fortnight.
Upon arrival
she talked of ìenlightenmentî
and the ìfinding of selfî
but within two days was
collapsed
in front of the television. It
was just like
a re-run of her difficult
teenage years
my parents said. Of course
they cried
when she left, but were also left
wondering how
after eight years of meditation
and self-discipline
she could still be the same screaming
bitch!í
Stephen said she also had
a sister
but she didnít see her often
because her sister
was always travelling across Europe
following
touring heavy metal bands.
ëShe attends concerts
equipped with body-tight leotard
and cardboard
guitar. Her passion is for
ìhead-banging
and body-slammingî ó these
she manages
with consummate skill and
dedication.
When otherwise engaged, my sister
is a nurse
at Accident and Emergency
attending
the broken limbs and concussions
of others.
In the midst of such breakages
her name is
Krystal!í Leon suggested that were
her sister
Nathalie, and Krystal ever
to meet ó
spanning the distance between
North Indian
mysticism and Heavy Euro-Rock ó
they might become good friends.
.
The monastery was now visible
in the distance
cars gleaming up the driveway which
extended from the road as far as the chapel where it
ended in a loop
resembling a lasso that had been thrown
at the steeple
but just missed. Stephen said
she had visited
the abbey in her youth, had
hitch-hiked
there, riding most of the way
in a refrigerated
truck full of ice. Each week the driver
took the ice to the coast
where he exchanged it for
a pallet-load
of stingrays which he would take home
and boil up.
He exported them to China where
they were sold
as an aphrodisiac. The other thing
Stephen recalled
from her visit to the abbey
was a bathtub
in the guest-house where you could
put your feet
out the window. As the car
turned into
the long driveway, their thoughts
turned
to the death of Malachi.
ëPerhaps seeing
the abbey was at peace
he got to
thinking of his own peace,í
Jacques said.
Malachi had died on the Sunday
afternoon
having left the refectory
with a basket
to fill with potatoes from the shed
behind the monastery.
ëAs an abbot should,í
Bernard remarked
ëhe embodied that which was good
in the abbey
the love of the many.í At dinner-time
the absence of the abbot
and of potatoes at table
was noticed
and two brothers set forth to
locate Malachi
eventually finding him
half-buried
in the abbeyís vegetable supply
knees tucked up
under his chin, becalmed on an ocean
of potatoes.
As they carried him to the
infirmary
potatoes kept dropping from
the folds in his robe . . .
The morning after Malachiís body
was found
all the sheep in one paddock
were found on the other
side of the river. Somehow overnight
they had crossed the
torrent and now grazed on
the far side . . .
In the midst of their sorrow
Malachiís acolytes
had maintained a vigil in
the chapel
had taken to the milking of cows
the moving from paddock
to paddock of the herd
the feeding out
of hay, and the carrying of lambs
back across the river
. One monk painted watercolours
ëa wisp of cloud
that was Malachiís worldí.
This was how
they managed their loss
of a brother
that it might one day seem
as natural
as a flood on the part of
the river.
.
The nuns left their fur hats
in the car
were greeted by the guest-master
who said David
and Stephen were to sleep
that night
in the house of a Carmelite nun
Beatrice
who lived a short distance
from the abbey.
A frail, elderly figure
Beatrice
sat beside them during
the funeral . . .
Bernard recalled how these monks
were once committed
to silence, had to resort to
sign language
a shrug of the shoulders, tightening
of the lips, gesture
of the palms as a wind among
palm trees, how
they learnt the eloquence
of fewer
and fewer words, until the day
they died
when there would be no more words
and the words
their lives have amassed would
dissolve as a fishing boat
dissolves into a cloud of
gulls over a shoal.
These days they were granted speech
but sparingly.
The abbotís profile was visible
above the coffin's rim
an island floating in an
evening sea
eyes shut as two lakes covered
in ice
hood pulled over his head.
There were chants
and eulogies, the recounting of
a stream of miracles.
Already, it seemed, the stories
of ëour Malachií
were growing around his life
as vines
engulfing a house . . . How
a mute girl
was brought to the anchorite
that she might speak
and he had retreated into a field
where he fell upon
ëreligious yearning and desireí
before returning
to the room where the mute girl
lay sleeping
and blew against the tip of her tongue
as though it were
a flute. The ligament of
her tongue was loosened
and she spoke clearly, although
in a language
no one could understand.
Malachi returned
to the field where, again, he
thrashed about
in prayer before returning.
This time
the girlís voice rattled
furiously
inside her mouth before, with a
violent hiccup
finally coming forth in a manner
both appropriate
and natural. Malachi, spurning
gratitude and gifts
left at once, his parting words:
ëReligion is planted
everywhere, it takes root
and is nursed along . . .í
Malachi said it was only courtesy
that when visiting
the first thing a Christian should do
is ëheal the small son
of your hostí. And so the coffin
was carried from the church.
ëThe love of the many
embodied
in the one we loved,í the celebrant
concluded. At this time
Stephen and David noticed
Sister Beatrice
was starting to weep
bitterly.
ëMedia vita in morte sumus.í
An interlude of
landscape
They carried the blue sky
as far as
the graveyard and buried it
the hills beyond
tracing the dead manís
profile
against a sky of ice
illuminated
by geese circling
the green
of the field, a sign
on the gate:
ëOur Exile Ends
Hereí.
As the monksí graveyard is within
the confines of the
living area, so ëin the midst
of life
we are in deathí. Stephen
and David attributed
the elder nunís dizziness to
the thinning
of air, these altitudes of
outstretched hands
as they joined the procession along
the tree-lined path.
The night before his death
Beatrice said
Malachi had dreamed of seagulls
eating stones
and a chalice of fire. ëIt is good
that you have come
from so far away even though
you never met
Malachi,í Beatrice said. ëIt is good
that grief
be spread around so many.í
So it was
with tears the procession
commended Malachi
to heaven. Only when the coffin
had been lowered to the ground was the pillow
beneath Malachiís head removed and his profile dropped
beneath the rim.
The lid was positioned and
amidst prayers
the coffin sunk into
the ground.
Stephen noticed the sky
deepening
as though a great hole had been
dug in it.
She looked at the pallbearers
and thought
they bore the expressions
of men
who had just solved elaborate
crossword puzzles.
Stephen had noticed a sculpture
on the lawn
behind the chapel ó a woman
standing on a cloud ó
only to realise, on her way back
from the cemetery later
it was in fact only a mound
of ice the Brothers
had raked off the lawn. Later
in the day
the mound was demolished by children and
moulded into the projectiles
that describe the distances
between children
on such a lawn
playing.
As the mourners drifted away
from the grave site
the brothers of one of the monks
set upon
the mound of earth beside the grave
and danced about on it
pounding the soil into the hole.
This dance
continued until all the dirt
was flattened
above Malachi and only a small
wooden cross
and the five exhausted bodies
of the brothers
marked the spot, the last location
of Malachi.
.
A cityscape of white loaves
and cakes
awaited the mourners in the
refectory while
outside, the abbey watercolourist
who had recorded
the occasion on a sheet of dampened
paper
unpinned his work from the board
and resumed other aspects
of his work as the monasteryís
Water Engineer ó
this time boiling kettles for
the mourners
serving the tea, attended only by
the clatter of cups.
He told Bernard and Stephen he was
the abbeyís Water Man
his responsibility all manner
of fountains
fonts, irrigation channels
and pipes. Surprisingly
he seemed contented with his work ó
the rules
for plumbing and engineering, he said
being the same
as those for watercolour
painting:
the problem of allotrophy
of ice
at this altitude. He showed
the two nuns
his painting of the funeral
and they nodded
with approval, although Bernard
thought
the sky, perhaps, not quite resolved.
But there was
no question of his having captured
the hills
the features of Malachiís face
staring skywards
seeking a similar resolution.
He said he often
began painting before dawn, the air
so cold
his hair would turn to ice, his beard
might break
into pieces. Stephen wondered how
a water-expert
would manage his tears, imagined him
sitting there
painting the church of ice
contemplating
the appearance and disappearance
of things unseen
how something as immaterial as friendship
could be stolen.
As ëthe mourning of a loved one
is a fountain
pouring forever
upwardsí
so the brothers were restored again
to their familiar tasks
the arrangement of cows on hills
their daily office.
There was one further mystery
that stood out
in this day of mysteries. The night
after the funeral
David and Stephen arrived at
Beatriceís cottage
two miles down the road
from the abbey.
The evening passed in conversation
Beatrice telling them
how she had spent most of her life
a solitary
in Ireland, but had always felt
the need to return here.
Finally the Order granted her
permission
but, upon her homecoming
the bishop
would not authorise a nun
living alone
as an acceptable part of the
diocese
or recognise the prayers
of a woman living
outside a community, tending
her own garden
and that garden which is prayer.
If it hadnít have been
for Malachi she would have
returned to Ireland.
ëMalachi accommodated me in his heart,í
she said.
ëThe day I met him, during the
problems with
the diocese, he came up to meet me
running
with a leap and a
bound
with what glad arms
he embraced me . . .
He petitioned the arch-bishop
on my behalf and
it was only because of his intercession
I was finally accepted.í
Beatrice told them of a dream
she had
the previous night in which ëan altar
caught fire
and Malachi plunged himself
into the flames
remaining there as a child
in a fountain
then he walked back towards me
more ablaze than ever . . .í
She talked of her
aloneness
and of Malachiís need
to be alone
to stand just across the river
from her, knee-deep
and say nothing. ëYou will be leaving
early in the morning
so I expect I will not see you
again,í she said
as the two younger sisters retired
to the only bed in the house.
(Beatrice insisted they have it.)
As they left they heard her say:
ëWhat you might forsake for
a kingdom, a plot of soil . . .í
During the night David awoke
with Stephen clinging
to her arm. They both lay there
listening to the sound
of crying from the living room
the pounding of pillows
groaning of the wooden floor.
They held each other
for an hour until, finally
a door slammed
and the house fell backwards
into silence.
At dawn the following morning
the blue Renault
pulled up outside Beatriceís house.
Silence, too
had fallen over the monastery
and surrounding countryside
and remained there
as the dew
that would remain
late into the day
on the lawn. The sun was just
coming up, the sky comprising
two colours only:
blue and gold.
Beatrice was nowhere to be found
in the house
so the nuns packed their small bags
and drove back
towards the main road. However
as they passed the abbey
they noticed the form of a woman
wading across the stream
habit tucked up, tiny
white legs
reflected in the shallows.
They also noticed
that all the sheep were back on
the far side of the river.
And a silence entered
each one of them.
Although it was still early
other cars
were leaving the monastery as well
and the watercolourist
had installed himself on a rock
to paint
the gleaming forms as they drove
down the tree-lined road.
The cars left as though in a
procession
but gradually the gaps
between them
increased until
they were all
out of sight of each other
and had resumed
their separate journeys.
The blue Renault
resumed its decades of the
rosary
for the decades of Malachiís
life
the Glorious Mysteries. The nuns
contemplated
the returning of Malachi, ëthe one
who loved manyí
to his maker, the returning
of the fur hats
which were once again pulled over
their veils.
Leon wondered where on the
old manís map
they might find themselves now
and how they came
to be here. David and Stephen
didnít mention
the mystery of Beatrice carrying
the sheep across the river or any other mystery for that
matter. They tried
to sleep, to place some distance
between themselves
and Sister Beatriceís
voice
that could no longer
find
Malachi, her voice that could
yield only
grief. And the blue car fell
further and further
beneath the blue sky. And
further grief.
Perhaps darkness, too, will cover us.
Some of the miracles are based on ëThe Life & Death of St Malachy, the Irishmaní by Bernard of Clairvaux. ëMalachií was written while travelling to the funeral of Abbot Hayes at the Southern Star Abbey, Kopua, on the Takapau Plains. I am indebted to Sister Rita and the other Home of Compassion nuns who travelled with me (although this poem is hardly a depiction of our particular journey). The poem is also indebted to Chaucerís ëCanterbury Talesí and to ëThe Ferrara Poemsí by Ken Bolton and John Jenkins (ëstrugglers in the outbackí). In the poem, the boy who is healed and grows into a composer is Henry Purcell (1659 - 1695). The artistís wife who is discussed in the small town episode is Maria Boursin, the painter Pierre Bonnardís life-long partner. The biographical details are from the Australian National Gallery exhibition catalogue í20th Century Masters (from the Metropolitan Museum)í, 1986. The headline ëTRAWLER NETS . . .í is quoted verbatim from ëPeopleí magazine, 1989. The sculpture attributed to Juliet Pepper in the small town is based on a piece by Chester Cornett and exhibited at the American Folk Art Museum, New York. (Cornettís ark was, likewise, carried off in a flood.) The old man who drew up the map of the region had restructured the North Island around two ëspiritual centresí: Parihaka and the Trappist monastery at Kopua. He saw all other settlements in relation to the axis of these two locations. Jimi Hendrixís bass-player, Noel Redding, did renounce his musical past and become a Christian evangelist. The burning guitar referred to is that of Jimi Hendrix. Liz Ardley helped me with the story of the disciple of the Dalai Lama who came home for a fortnight. The episode involving stingrays and truckloads of ice was related to me by Robin Kearns (the only person I know capable of holding living cicadas inside his mouth). The abbeyís watercolourist owes his existence to Brother Damian Woyjeck, although Damianís skies are more resolved than those related in the poem. In wanting to write about ëthe love of the manyí and ëthe love of the oneí, I was hoping the poem might offer certain resolutions just as certain relationships in life resolve themselves. Here, the working of miracles is purely the exteriorisation of some ëinner virtueí. The outward forms of mourning (for instance the sheep crossing the river) are the channelling and manifestation of an inner grief . . . The poem is meant, respectfully, to merge the comic and the spiritual within the realms of a number of fictional characters. The poem is dedicated to my friends and to its characters.
Gregory OíBrien, September 1990