February’s Poem of the Month comes from John Montague’s forthcoming
collection, Second Childhood which is being published on 28 February 2017 — this would have been John’s 88th birthday. A windfall from one of Ireland’s revered and best loved poets.
Return
for Richard Ryan
And in that instant
did I become a poet?
I was struck down
as by lightning’s
fierce flash,
a savage music.
And all the confusions
of my childhood,
a small boy launched
into the empyrean,
hurtling back
to where we had come from:
a timid deer peering
from the hazel forest
of our holy mountain,
the saddle shape
of Knockmany Hill,
its magic stones.
from Second Childhood (2017)
by John Montague
