A surprising number of horses
dublin – the summer time –
a surprising number of horses.
at sunset you hear them, like someone
is constantly dropping tin cutlery
on dusty thin-carpeted
floors – through windows
come guncracks
of hoofs hitting tarmac.
guys walk with carriages,
trawling for tourists
on thoroughfares
with georgian architecture
and young men engallop
going slower than traffic,
more romantically also,
in tracksuits and bareback –
fast as wild hedges grow
over unused country roads.
the city hides life behind corners
sometimes – these horses,
horseriders, those long bushy plants
with blue flowers which grow
from the fascia and soffit-holes
of wood-guttered grey mossy buildings.
• • •
DS Maolalai has been described by one editor as “a cosmopolitan poet” and another as “prolific, bordering on incontinent”. His work has nominated twelve times for Best of the Net, ten for the Pushcart Prize and once for the Forward Prize, and has been released in three collections; Love is Breaking Plates in the Garden (Encircle Press, 2016), Sad Havoc Among the Birds (Turas Press, 2019) and Noble Rot (Turas Press, 2022).