P.J. Kavanagh: November

I am almost too snobbish to name the commonplace bird,
Elusive as insight, each in the dark of its tree,
Which stitches these dawns and these sunsets with needling phrases
Till beginnings and endings of days seem coloured, embroidered.
Secretive birds: now, in the full light of day,
They flit within shadow, and watch from there, silently,
As though they consider for shrinking days short praises
Sufficient, or insult enough for keeping a rival at bay.

But the sacred is not sentimental. If a man who is lying in bed

Is seeing competitive birdsong as coloured thread

When you call it the sound of the season and time of the day,

Let him. Allow him his human compulsion to say –

Whatever the reason the birds have for briefly singing –

Two robins embroidered this morning, and maybe this evening.


A fascinating poem which chases the elusive robin-like insight along a path of Irish rhythmicality. Kavanagh died last year, having led the kind of life that must have pushed a person like him to steady himself with poetry: soldier, TV comic writer, British Council rep in the Far East. Not to be confused with the fulltime Irish poet Patrick Kavanagh: when P.J. as a youth met the other Kavanagh in a Dublin pub and asked him for advice on poetry, the older man replied, "Change your bloody name for a start!"