Whole and Steaming

Whole and Steaming Dingle, Ireland The bathroom carpet, wall to wall, is blue, the lightest blue, to complement the bowl and ceiling. Apropos the moment: I bend the waist and heave the gristle from last evening's steak. Tomorrow I shall row again to see those ancient men in caps and coveralls stand like statues while they talk and tap gold embers now and then from clay pipes forever glowing. I'll go there at the dinner hour and see them once again fork potatoes, whole and steaming, from big kettles filled at dawn by crones forever kerchiefed and forever bent. At dawn you hear the women like a choir sing their hymns a cappella as they genuflect and dip big black kettles in the sometimes still sometimes foaming sea. Donal Mahoney