POEMS TO GOODBYE MEADOWS

Poems to Goodbye Meadows is a unique collection of poetry by Lewis Regan. Reflecting his childhood in rural Ireland, the transitions of youth's first loves found and lost and the memories we keep with us and that make us who we are.

 

Regan paints a deeply rich and lyrical portrait of his origins in the Irish parish of Kilcloon, the Gaelic “church of the meadow”, and of the years after he left there. Goodbyes are often forced upon us but how we choose to remember the things we have lost is what we create and live with.

 

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To Goodbye Meadows

Fading colours shade in lightly the twilight round my youth,
And whisper goodbye gently for my love for you is sooth,
I miss with heart’s mixed feelings every moment as you pass,
And while the colours of your meadows change,
All things must, alas!

The innocence of childhood, the credulity of Mass,
The friends who came and played with me and left before I’d ask,
Are visions now more splendid and cherished in my heart,
For I never knew the secret of the present until it passed.

 

All my suffering and laughter from my heart to you do go.
These I’ve moulded into statues, made only of the words I know,
In your wisdom you’ll remember in a way I cannot know,
You will keep them in the present however old they grow.

 

And my refrains you will echo as your winds across me blow,
In you I learned the seasons how to catch the joy that passed,
I shared with you infinity while all things else did pass,
I love you Goodbye Meadows - as I walk before what’s passed,
Goodbye Meadows I go with you, Goodbye Meadows I now pass.

 

 

                                                                                    Lewis Regan