Boys and Men

On the first day of a year long ago We walked the path to the glazing wood Peter, Michael, Seamus and me We cut hazel wands to swing Severing the tops from offending fern and brier Some spark of our ancestry Made us hunter gatherers As the dogs rose and caught startled rabbits Proudly home, ‘Mam, here is the dinner’ The rest sold to old Mrs Power Six pence each we were rich Every three rabbits bought five cigarettes And a flagon of cheap cider In a fern hid den we sat on damp ground Sucking sweet apple from brown bottles Cupping acrid smoking sticks in children’s hands For a while we were men, our fathers That was a day far off in my youth Before life filled my pockets with stones I was young then