Patrick O'Reilly Poems

We took your brother's car
Down the old gravel road
A mile long to Cape Spear
...

Wedding bells are ringing
In the chapel below the town
He’s hiding in the bushes
With a satchel in his hand
...

Hey, Mary, do you want something?
I’m going down to the Esso on the corner.
Won’t be too long, so you can brew a pot of coffee
I’m just going for a walk.
...

Just beyond the mouth of slate fangs
Lies an endless junkyard
Brimming with rusted barrels,
Rusted hooks, rusted traps,
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Kathleen has gotten used to me being sober and mean
Hardly fights back
And that's fine.
...

Lisa stumbles into Charlie
Spills his whiskey down his sleeve
The Legion Hall's still open
But it's quiet for New Year's Eve
...

The fields outside the window are full of brown dust
And the wheat just won't rise
It slumps, withered and exhausted,
Like a man gone down the alley
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Outside my window
The shadows and the footsteps
All belong to you
And the bed I lie on
...

Saul used to talk about the Greeks on our smoke breaks.
He had quite a lot of brains.
And sometimes he'd walk through the warehouse with his head down and you'd have to get out of his way, 'cause he'd be thinking about something and wouldn't see you.
...

Like Jonah's whale
My starving self swallowed you whole
And still
You are digesting in that sloppy, dark pit
...