Boyne Readings - Willie Hodgins

A good night last Thursday at the Boyne Readings and Open Mic. Usual audience with a good turn out from Meath Writers Circle.

I decided to read the poem I read at the Battle of the Books last year to remind the Circle that we, The Boyne Writers Group, won that epic encounter (OK by one point, but a win is a win). Time to get pieces written for this year's contest which takes place on 4th July. Hmmm something with an American theme might go down well with the judges.

My poem last year was called The Celtic Tiger Recession Blues and the first verse went like this:

We’ve lived an illusion, in a house built of fool’s gold
But the bubble has burst and we’re feeling the cold
The wolf of recession howls in our landscaped avenues
Here comes the Celtic Tiger Recession Blues.

Great fun to write, lists of words that rhyme with Blues. How soon things age! The verse:

Cut the public service is their only prescription
Slash health and education like they were an addiction
We’ll end up illiterate and riddled with strange foreign flu’s
Worse than the Celtic Tiger Recession Blues.

was written in the middle of the Swine Flu scare, now almost completely forgotten.

Anyway to get back to Thursday, Willie Hodgins charmed us with his poems and one story of rural life, the changing seasons, death and new life. Frank Murphy read his wonderfully fantastic poem, recitation, what ever about a leprechaun and Tommy Murray read the poem of his which has been honoured in the Golden Pen competition this year. (Blogger Peter Goulding won this competition.)

Pictured above: Pat Duffy, featured reader Willie Hodgins, Tommy Murray and MC Paddy Smith.