Bloom
The Hill of Howth During Horse Show Week 1972
June 16 is Bloomsday when in a world defying time
which stately fat Buck Mulligan starts off with a swim
and Stephen Daedalus feigns teaching and plays with his
senses on the sand and Leopold Bloom goes to Paddy’s fun-
eral at Glasnevin, eats a gorgonzola sandwich, drinks a burgun-
dy, and bu-bu-belches gloriously before Gerty McDowell puts on
a show on a shore and in the afternoon Blazes Boylan gigs gigs gigs
to Molly Bloom to picnic on Plumtree’s potted meat and other comes-
tibles but she the eternal female gets the last words of flowing memory
and desire and yes Leopold may find a new fatherhood which Stephen
more snot than son may still sneer at because it’s already another day
and that’s what you do to time in fiction unleashing again memories
of what books do to readers I wonder, Ron, what’ll you be reading
this year but thinking I’ll skip the cheese and quaff Guinness or
sip bourbon instead but still I will be remembering the Hill of
Howth was magic in the soft evening air of the horse show
when Sally and I rode up there for drinks and a night’s
cup of talkin’ with Charly Stefan and his lovely wife.
|