-for P.G.

​

You made your suited entrance,
clean cut from the peat bog of Allen.
Travelling over twelve hundred miles
to drink lagumbra, corralled by Dead Man’s Corner –
the bulls of Navarre drawing in.
Knowing that if you fall you should never get up.
Unsuppressed like slack draped in Latin sweat
braving your left hand, barrelling down
the wrinkled number of the beast’s back.
This is the legend of Hopper’s Bar,
the early hour snugs of Shinrone,
the mozo limp, unpredictable of step,
a red handkerchief waving from your double breast
and with that, onto the next.