Glanmore Sonnets – 5
v Heaney examines the distinctive textures of the two languages and traditions that shaped his upbringing (MP 169) From his new-found Glanmore location Heaney explores in his mind the properties of a familiar tree first known by its mid Ulster name (boortree). He can still feel its vertically furrowed trunk (soft corrugations), recall its eagerness to grow (green young shoots) and its youngest branches (rods) shining molten silver with dark flecking (freckled solder). Once upon a time the Heaney siblings used it as a hideaway (our bower as children), now in retrospect a tad less appreciated (greenish, dank and snapping memory). Background and education taught him a different name (elderberry I have learned to call it). Heaney had a […]