Donall Dempsey

Donall Dempsey May 10

THE CONSTELLATION OF THE GIRL FROM WALLA-WALLA

THE CONSTELLATION OF THE GIRL FROM WALLA-WALLA

I lick her lifeline
"Oh I can see you are
going to have a wet wet life!"

she watches the tip of
my tongue crawl along her heart line
"You will have many many kisses!"

she sips her fine wine
laughs...munches
sweet onions

all I say
comes true right away
guess I got it right

cute girl from
Walla-Wall sleeping
just up against the Pacific Ocean

"Shhhh..!" says the Pacific Ocean
as it watches over
her sleep

I place DayGlo stars
on all her extremities
she becomes her own constellation

the constellation of
the Girl From Walla-Walla
being looked after by a specific Ocean

"Walla-Walla!"
the waves call to her
but she's lost inside a dream

"Are you really a real Walla-Wallan?"
I ask of her
"Yep!" she grins "I'm the real thing!"

"The only Walla-Wallan
I knew before I knew you
was a girl in a book!"

I turn the snow-dome
up-side d-own
watch it snow forever

I remember her
letter telling me
of a snowstorm she once knew

"I took a little of the snowstorm
put it in the fridge so
it could melt in July."

"The snow storm had never met
a July before
so this was its big chance!"

"When the left-over snowstorm
finally got to meet its July
it cried itself into oblivion!"

"...here. . ." her letter
pauses for ever
outside snow falls now

*

Walla Walla is the largest city in and the county seat of Walla Walla County, Washington, United States.A Walla-Wallan is a person from Walla-Walla! You just don't often meet someone who comes from what appears to be a made-up name or a South Seas island. The sound of it is delicious in itself!

Or something a baby would say learning how to talk! Wanted to write it like a little movie excerpt and to play with time and go from remembered snowdome snow to real snow falling outside...from real time to letter time and mix them up like the way they happen in the mind. Probably only ended up confusing folks!

English villages are the same...the most amazing combination of names or sounds. And sounds...I love. Together the villages of Over Wallop, Middle Wallop and Nether Wallop are known as The Wallops and run in a line roughly North to South following the line of the Wallop Brook, which has its source in Over Wallop.

Acock’s Green, Worcestershire, UK
Babes Well, Durham, UK
Bachelors Bump, Essex, UK
Backside Lane, Oxfordshire
***** Green, Kent, England
***** Cross, WestSussex
Bareleg Hill, Staffordshire, UK
Barking, Essex
****** Close, Surrey
Bedlam Bottom, Hampshire, UK
Beef Lane, Oxfordshire
Beer, Devon, UK
Beggars Bush, Sussex passed her prime
Bell End near Lickey End
Bishops Itchington, Staffs, UK
Bitchfield, Lincolnshire
Boggy Bottom, Abbots Langley, Herts, UK
***** Lane, NorthYorkshire
Bottoms Fold, Lancashire
Broadbottom, Cheshire, UK
Brown *****, Cornwall,UK
Bushygap, Northumberland, UK
Catholes, Cumbria
Catsgore, Somerset, UK
Charles Bottom, Devon, UK
Clap Hill, village in Kent, UK
Clay Bottom, Bristol, UK
**** Alley, Calow, UK
**** Bridge, Hope, Derbyshire, UK
**** Green, nr Braintree
**** Lane, Tutts Clump, Berkshire, UK
**** Law, Northumberland, UK
**** and Bell Lane, Suffolk
Cockermouth, Cumbria
Cockernhoe, nr Luton, UK
Cocking, Midhurst, West Sussex, UK
Cockintake, Staffordshire, UK
Cockpit Hill, Derbyshire, UK
Cockplay, Northumberland, UK
*****, Cornwall
Cockshoot Close, Oxfordshire
Cockshot, Northumberland, UK
Cockshutt Wood, Sheffield, UK
Cockup Lake District, Cumbria. UK
Coldwind, Cornwall, UK
Crackington Haven, Cornwall, UK
Crackpot, North Yorkshire, UK
Crapstone, Devon
Crotch Crescent, Oxford
Deans Bottom, Kent, UK
Devil’s Lapful, Northumberland, UK
***** Mount, Suffolk
Drinkstone, Suffolk, UK
******, Northumberland, UK
***** Barks, Durham, UK
***** Avenue, Derbyshire
***** Hands Lane, Lincolnshire
Feltham Close, Hampshire
Feltwell, Norfolk
Fingringhoe, Essex
Flesh Shank, Northumberland, UK
Friars Entry, Oxfordshire
Fruitfall Cove, Cornwall, UK
Fudgepack upon Humber, Humberside
Gay Street, Sussex. UK
Gays Hill, Cornwall, UK
Giggleswick, Staincliffe, Nth. Yorkshire, UK
Golden *****, Oxfordshire, UK
Gravelly Bottom Road, nr Langley Heath, Kent, UK
Great Cockup & Little Cockup, hills in The Lake District, UK
Great Horwood, Bucks, UK
Great Tosson, Northumberland
***** Lane, Shropshire
Hampton Gay, Oxfordshire, UK
Happy Bottom, Dorset
Helstone, Cornwall, UK
Hole Bottom, Yorkshire, UK
Hole of Horcum, North Yorkshire
Holly Bush, Ledbury, Herefordshire, UK
Honey **** Hill, Wiltshire
Honeypot Lane, Leicestershire
****** Road, Norwich
Horncastle, Linconshire
Horneyman, Kent, UK
Hornyold Road, Malvern Wells, UK
Horwood, Devon, UK
Jeffries Passage, Surrey
Jolly’s Bottom, Cornwall, UK
***** Close, EastSussex
Knockerdown, Derbyshire, UK
Letch Lane, Bourton-on-the-Water, The Cotswolds, UK
Lickar Moor, Northumberland, UK
Lickers Lane, Merseyside
Lickey End, Worcestershire, UK
Lickfold, West Sussex
Little Horwood, Bucks, UK
Little Bushey Lane, Hertfordshire
Long Lover Lane, Halifax
Lower Swell, Gloucestershire
Menlove Avenue, Liverpool
***** Lane, Worcestershire
Moisty Lane, Staffordshire
Nether Wallop, Hampshire
*** End, South Lancashire, UK
Nork Rise, Surrey
North Piddle, Worcestershire
Ogle Close, Merseyside
Old Sodbury, Gloucestershire
Old ***** Lane, Wiltshire
Over Peover, Cheshire, UK
Pant, Shropshire
Penistone, Sth Yorkshire, UK
Piddle River, Dorset, UK
Pork Lane, Essex
Pratt’s Bottom, Kent
Prickwillow, Cambridgeshire
Pump Alley, Middlesex
Ram Alley, Wiltshire, UK
Ramsbottom, Lancs, UK
Rimswell, East Riding of Yorkshire
Sandy *****, Hampshire
Scratchy Bottom, Dorset, UK
Shaggs, Dorset, UK
Shingaycum Wendy, Buckinghamshire
Shitlingthorpe, Yorkshire, UK
Shitterton, Dorset
Shittington,, Bedfordshire, UK
Six Mile Bottom, Cambridge, UK
Slackbottom, Yorkshire, UK
**** Lane, Merseyside
Slip End, Beds, UK
Slippery Lane, Staffordshire
Snatchup, Hertfordshire
Spanker Lane, Derbyshire.
Spitalin the Street, Lincolnshire
Splatt, Cornwall, UK
Staines, Surrey
Stow *** Quy, Cambridgeshire, UK
Swell, Somerset
The Blind Fiddler, Cornwall, UK
The Bush, Buckinghamshire
The Furry, Cornwall
The ****, Oxfordshire
Thong, Kent
Tinkerbush Lane, Oxfordshire
Titcomb, near Inkpen, Berkshire, UK
Titlington Mount, Northumberland
***** Hill, Sussex, UK
***** **, Northamptonshire
Tosside, Lancashire
Turkey **** Lane, Colchester, Essex, UK
Ugley, Essex
Upper Bleeding, Sussex, UK
Upper Chute, Hampshire, UK
Upper Dicker & Lower Dicker, East Sussex, UK
Upperthong, West Riding, Yorkshire, UK
Wash ****, Norfolk, UK
Weedon Lois, Northampton
Weedon, in the Parish of Hardwick, Buckinghamshire, UK
Weeford, Staffordshire, UK
Wet Rain, Yorkshire, UK
Wetwang, East Yorkshire
WhamBottomLane, Lancashire
Wideopen, Newcastle, UK
Willey, Warwickshire
Winkle Street, Southampton
Wormegay, Norfolk, UK

Donall Dempsey May 9

BEAUTY O'ERSNOW'D AND BARENESS EVERY WHERE

BEAUTY O'ERSNOW'D AND BARENESS EVERY WHERE

A Christmas
with the Thames

almost freezing, then
thawing & then again

the London of 1598
asleep

under a quietness
of snow

that hides the world
from itself

as some Elizabetheans
go to steal

a theatre
silent now for a brace of years

frozen by bitter
dispute.

The playhouse dismantled
bit by bit

so that when it rises
it will become in time

The Globe
this wooden O.

Will turns his face
up to the stars

laughs
at this theatre theft

snowflakes settling
upon his eyelids

remembering when
he was all of 7

and the Christian tales
told in stained glass

are shattered
for their sins

now only white light
is to be

let in

picking up a shard
of the ****** Mary

here a fragment of
St. George.

He sticks out his tongue
tastes the snow

knows that
all things change to

begin again.

He laughs.

The ****** Mary's smile
still clasped in his hand.

*

Inspired by JAMES SHAPIRO'S COMPELLING 1599 - A YEAR IN THE LIFE OF WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.

The 'theft" of their former theatre,The Theatre, which dismantled would become the famous wooden O. And Will watching( possibly ) when all of seven. . .the stained glass windows of his 'right goodly chapel" been smashed by a glazier who was paid 23 shillings and 8 pence for his smashing. These two images are what burned on in my mind.

I have often stood in that chapel and seen what remains of the whitewashed paintings now brought back to life. His dad had to order this whitewashing months before Will was born but by 7 Will could have been witness to the death of the coloured glass and all that was to be beheld there.

So this Midsummer's Day madness of 1571 really stated with me and forced the poem upon me.

"Popery may creep in at a glass window as well as at a door" as one William Prynne put it. The English Reformation going about its daily task to the dismay of the common folk who had to put up with the religion changing hands and changing hands yet again all in the little time of just over a quarter of a century.

Being a great lover of stained glass and its beauty this was what got me the most!

The title is from Will's Sonnet no. 5:

Those Hours that with gentle work did frame

"Beauty o'er --snowed, and bareness everywhere.
Then were not summer's distillation left
A liquid prisoner pent in walls of glass, "

Donall Dempsey May 8

YOU TWO!

YOU TWO!

"You two are being quite wonderful
even if I have to say so myself"
says Life

we laugh at Life
"We have our kisses!"
we tell it

fully clothed
in a naked room
well that can be soon altered

fully naked
in a bare room
sleeping on some moonlight

tomorrow
furniture will fill this space
now it's just moonlight & us

we switch off the moon
tuck it
behind some clouds

Donall Dempsey May 8

OVERWHELMED BY LOVE

OVERWHELMED BY LOVE

longing for a world
the soul
puts on its body

here
where flesh & blood conspire
the baby’s cry

locked into its body
the soul cries
at its first taste of sunlight

the soul
made flesh
overwhelmed by love

Love
the gift of being
human

my little girl
her soul still
flickering in her eyes

my God . . my little girl. . .
only just human
still mostly angel

Donall Dempsey May 7

COME AND TALK TO MY FLOWERS

COME AND TALK TO MY FLOWERS

come and talk to my flowers
when my voice is nothing
but the wind

my mind now
a season
season after season

dressed in only birdsong
here I will be
at the edge of summer

the depth of yes winter
here I rest
part of the universe

come
and talk
to my flowers

*

Love everything about Clandon Wood Natural Burial Grounds where I want to be when I run out of breath!

Donall Dempsey May 7

TWAK!

TWAK!

a knife embeds itself
in the space just
by her left ear

as if the wood
gulped it...****** it
in its glint

vibrating still.
In her head
she plans dinner

she stares
at her husband
remembers how

he had come
to court her
...twak!

another knife
flashes spitefully
narrowly missing

her other ear
a little
bubble of blood

like a stud
earring blossoming
on a wobbly earlobe

'Ouch! '
she whispers
to herself guilty

at such
an over
reaction

oh how he had
excited her
her head in a spin

saying he
was in
show business

her world revolves
about him
the next knife

impregnates itself
in the space
between her legs

like a tuning fork
it hums
her excitement builds

a splinter of wood
nestles in her
left inner thigh

'Wow...nice! '
she becomes moist
the shimmy of her

spangles
as the lights catch
her

a little gasp
she faces him
boldly

afraid & un-afraid
upside down now
her world all topsy-turvy

she still so
proud of her
husband's skill

to tantalise her
his unerring
accuracy

the pride of being
(she the knife thrower's
assistant)

as well
as wife
Twak!

Donall Dempsey May 6

"OH POLLYWOG MY POLLYWOG!"

"OH POLLYWOG MY POLLYWOG!"

he was a prince
good as any to be got
in a fairy story book

you couldn't have
written a better man
eyes like emeralds

she was a princess
although to be fair...a frog
beautiful as any green ever seen

it was their greenness
which drew them together
as well as their Irish-ness

"He is just so...ribbit ribbit!"
he blushed
to hear her say so

"****..!" she croaked
"It's just difficult to find
the right human words!"

she told him if
married they were to be
all would be change and change about

she wore his ring
in her bottom lip
he her heart's "...ribbit!"

she tried to brush up
on the lingo
Human for Frogs

come the wedding day
all was not
as it was before

he had been transformed
into the handsomest
bullfrog

and so they live
happy as a story
that needs no book

too busy loving
to be worried
about its telling

why the change
in the how it goes
from the what went before

that's easy to tell
I live under the spell
of a lively little girl

with eyes so so green
and who as it happens
just adores...frogs

*

Pollywog is of course a tadpole which i used to call her because at four she became infatuated with frogs.

She was just utterly fascinated by our frog folk and would sigh "Oh I wish I had been born a frog!" She had never seen a frog only heard of it from my telling it to her at night.
So that the first time she saw one she was amazed...."Oh my god they're real!" I guess it was as if she had met a fairy! After that there was no stopping her and she was proud to be a pollywog!