John Arnold: ‘Blackas’, Christy Ring... words of wisdom in a book of poetry

Monday was November 2, All Souls Day - the day when we remember all those family members, relations, and friends who have died.

As our priest Fr Joe reminded us at 9.30 Mass in Bartlemy, it’s also a day to recall and pray for those who have no-one left to speak their name.

All Souls Day is usually the day I’d visit as many cemeteries as possible to pray at the gravesides of loved ones.

I know, I know, our Christian faith tells us that their souls, spirits or whatever name we choose, are gone, but it is still nice to visit final resting places.

Just to read out loud the names inscribed in stone - and think also of the myriads of others who, for one reason or another, are not chiselled on memorials, gives me a sense of fellowship with past generations.

Many years ago, Mona Tierney penned a lovely poem which she gave to her friend Edel Quinn. Entitled Oh What Is It All When All Is Told?, it’s a quiet reflection on life, death, and hope.

The late Dick Barry - born here in Bartlemy - had a most brilliant speaking voice and always eloquently delivered these lines.

What is all, just passing through,

A cross for me, and a cross for you.

Ours seem heavy while others seem light

But God in the end makes all things right.

He ‘tempers the wind’ with such loving care,

He knows the burden that each can bear.

Then changes life’s gray into heavenly gold.

Ah! That is all when all is told.

Anytime I hear that poem recited, it just stops me in my tracks - it’s so apt for this first week of November, which in olden times was regarded as the ‘Month of the Holy Souls’.

In truth, myself and two friends have spent a lot of time in the old cemetery in Rathcormac over the last year and a half as we try and record fully all the inscriptions on nearly 400 headstones therein.

Bishops, lords, priests, artists, musicians are all buried there. Regardless of title, occupation, wealth or property, the cemetery or the graveyard is a great leveller. We hope to have the fruits of our research in print soon.

My cemetery visitation on Monday last, however, had to be cancelled until later this week.

After Mass and a quick bite, we headed to sunny Páirc Uí Chaoimh. Our local National School, Bishop O’Brien NS, were playing in a Sciath na Scoil football final.

It was a marvellous occasion but our boys and girls had to give way to a superb team from Rusheen.

In the afternoon, I had an appointment in a Cork Hospital for a bi-monthly procedure. It’s working well and, you know, when one is in a medical ward, alone, all alone it gives you time to reflect.

For a person like me who is absolutely ignorant about science, research and medicine, I really can marvel at the progress in health-care in recent years. I read a little, wrote a little, and slept a lot in the afternoon and into the dark of the evening.

On discharge, I was fine though tired and a bit drained. I slept well on Monday night!

On Tuesday morning, I was moving the cattle from the Boiler House Field across the road to the Long Field. Before the round-up, I’d walked over to the Bottom Bog to close the gate and check the fence wire.

I’m not addicted to the phone, but lads, I do love the radio! Doing any farm work not involving the tractor, I always have my little radio in my shirt pocket as I go.

I’d be fairly conservative now and rarely move the dial from Radio Éireann - after all, it’s 100 years old in this year of 2026.

Anyway, on Tuesday I was engrossed and enthralled to hear Paddy Joe Burke on with Oliver Callan. I’ve often heard the same Paddy Joe on the wireless, talking from, as he calls it, ‘the city of Roscommon’. After a lifetime cutting hai,r Paddy Joe has retired as a barber. He is undoubtedly the No 1 Roscommon/Rossie supporter of all times. A mighty man, he can talk for Ireland - and he does!

He’s followed his beloved Roscommon team to every county in Ireland -and further afield too.

At 70, he decided to retire and get even more enjoyment out of life.

On Tuesday morning, he’d taken the train from Sligo to RTÉ in Dublin. His interview with Oliver was all about his life, his love of Gaelic football, his addiction to alcohol and his recovery. All of this and much, much more is related in his recently published book, Kindness Has A Long Memory.

A pure tonic to hear, Paddy Joe is one of life’s great colourful characters. He told stories of hilarity and sadness. Like customers coming into his shop for a haircut - with little or no hair - just wanting to talk to someone for ten minutes.

Twenty minutes later, with the cattle in their new grazing, I was still glued to my earpiece.

So many callers to RTÉ compared the indomitable Paddy Joe with Michael Harding the writer. Truly the voices - wisdom, rural wit and common sense of the Roscommon native and the Cavan poet, priest, Buddhist and writer - are very similar. I’ve seen the Cavan man on stage and obviously on TV and read several of his books.

By the time I got back to the haggard, the postman had come and gone. I was kinda gobsmacked when I saw a bulky brown envelope on the kitchen table. Addressed to me as ‘Farmer and Writer’, I opened it to find a book of poetry.

I recalled that earlier this summer I’d got an email from someone inviting me to a book launch in Cork City Library, but on the date in question I couldn’t make it.

I’d been listening to Paddy Joe and thinking of Michael Harding and now - surprise, surprise - here was a book of poems from another Harding - George!

I’m not certain if I ever met this George - maybe our paths crossed sometime, somewhere. George signed the book, Footprints On The Moon, with the words ‘To John, Man of the Soil & Hurler’. Well now, I said to myself, there’s a compliment!

Whatever my proficiency was at farming, my skill as a hurler was less than existent. Then there’s an old saying, ‘You don’t have to be good at something to like it’ - well, George, like me, you love hurling and admire the skills, history, and culture of the fastest game in the world.

Hardings of Cork I would have associated with bicycles down the decades. Published by Revival Press, this is a gem of a book.

Many years ago, I wrote of my father and grandfather: ‘Who was your father and his father too?/ Death decreed I never knew / Different men yet they walked the same path / father and grandfather Dan and Batt.’

George has a good recall of his own father: I watched you dying / on your feet / a once lucid man trying / desperately to greet / the clear friends of life / the dear friends of life.

That’s a tough but lovingly moving poem.

Like me, George picked blackberries - ‘blackas’ he calls them – a word we never used. He looks forward to the joys of home-made blackberry jam, ‘layer upon layer on hot brown crust / on some iced January morning’.

I’m a hoarder and there’s a great poem about the collecting of... words; ‘and when I need them/they are not there upon the shelf/to take down, to pluck from the ether’.

Yeah, it’s often hard to find just exactly the perfect word to describe a person, place or thing.

There’s a poem, The Ringer, which quotes Christy’s own words: “It’s time they stopped talking about me/the best hurlers are yet to come”/But, of course they didn’t.’

Of the Antrim hurler Terence ‘Sambo’ McNaughton, he tells us his speaking ‘shall be the language/of a hurley stick / seeking a stricken net’.

Often when I get a ‘new’ book, I’ll read it immediately from cover to cover. Sometimes also I keep one as a special treat for a special occasion -books like Footprints On The Moon.