Man and Boy

  Re-enter Patrick Heaney, the disguised Anchises of Golden Bough and the farmer with an eye for straight lines of Markings II.   Heaney describes the impact of his bereavement: My father’s death in October 1986 was the final ‘unroofing’ of the world and I’m certain it affected me in ways that were hidden from me then and now. (DOD p322)  This is helpful: Heaney is not composing a father-dedicated collection as such; Patrick Heaney will emerge from the shadows in poems that ‘came on at unexpected moments’ and threw up powerful associations (look for ‘roof’ and its cognates).          I A poem triggered by memory of a father’s supposed fishing tip (Catch the old one first […]