Lightenings iv
Heaney offered his reader a clue as to how to ‘enter’ the Squarings poems: You could think of every poem in ‘Squarings’ as the peg at the end of a tent-rope reaching up into the airy structure, but still with purchase on something earthier and more obscure (DOD 320). So long for air to brighten, said Fosterling, Time to be dazzled and the heart to lighten. Heaney composes a study in the production, transmission, reception and effects of sound as it impacts on a pleasure moment. The transcendental sounds of a dramatic performance ascend through the roofless structure of an earth-bound arena into infinite space. He is watching an open-air performance in a Roman theatre. As the spectacle develops he becomes […]