I never get tired of seeing Seamus Heaney in the top 100 Irish poems list. This one comes in at number 87. I think next time I will have to write about his other poem Digging, which is one of my favourite of his. I send out a new poem from the top 100 list every Friday on my weekly dose of Irish, if you don’t know already. You can get your weekly dose of Irish here for free.
I also found a video of Heaney reading the poem in 2013. You can watch him reading it under the poem. The poem will make you want to take a trip to Clare in September or October. I was there a few years ago, and I can confirm how amazing it is from his descriptions. Of course, he puts the words in a much better way than just “amazing”.
Enjoy this fantastic Irish poem by Seamus Heaney.
Postscript Poem By Seamus Heaney
And some time make the time to drive out west
Into County Clare, along the Flaggy Shore,
In September or October, when the wind
And the light are working off each other
So that the ocean on one side is wild
With foam and glitter, and inland among stones
The surface of a slate-grey lake is lit
By the earthed lightning of a flock of swans,
Their feathers roughed and ruffling, white on white,
Their fully grown headstrong-looking heads
Tucked or cresting or busy underwater.
Useless to think you’ll park and capture it
More thoroughly. You are neither here nor there,
A hurry through which known and strange things pass
As big soft buffetings come at the car sideways
And catch the heart off guard and blow it open.
Enjoyed the poem? Now you can enjoy the great Seamus Heaney reading the poem in 2013.