Red Moon

Conversation carries us along the
Dark backroads of Portmarnock, and with no
Lights to guide us home we jog the whole way,
Not in fear but lost in freedom only
Solitude can bring. A glance to our left
Shows a big red orb hanging in the sky,
The moon watching tenderly over us
In its unusual shade; a glance to
Our right shows a field with once endless
Expanse now slowly dwindling as
Empty apartments creep closer to these
Narrow, pathless roads. Yet the changing scene
Does not bother us as we run, for in
These moments the tedious, painful words
We exchanged about a past resting in
Futility and a future that could
Be just the same fall away. We run in
A different time, seeing the pitch where we
Grew up together, defender and goal-
Keeper, protecting the honour of a
Team that never had one to begin with.
We recall the old man with his Sunday
Finest and his cigarette addiction,
Memory lapses, temper tantrums and
Unbelievable passion for a game
That eventually attacked his heart,
Ending their love affair. The liberty
Of youth on this nostalgia run takes us
All the way to Donaghmede, where, once the
Running ceases, all the complications
Of the present catch up to us again,
And you vomit, mostly from drunkenness,
But partly in disgust, as the truth that
Those days are over hits again under
The glare of the ever watchful red moon,
Bloody with pity for our blissful plight.


(running home along isolated and empty backroads in the dark with a friend brings a freedom unattainable elsewhere - but it was only a brief reprieve as you cannot outrun life)