
The Bone Folder by Cait O’Neill McCullagh
The Bone Folder is Cait O’Neill McCullagh’s debut collection of poetry which explores loss, war, illness, the fragility and durability of bone, and so much
The urge to explore and celebrate all the kinds of lives of Planet Earth is stronger than ever, but the environmental and ecological crisis demands we also lift our eyes, and our voices, to species extinction and habitat loss, to what is happening to the forests and hills, the rivers and seas, our streets and gardens. The writer’s instinct to pay attention has never been more vital. Literature can help us to see the natural world – and our place in it – differently.
The Bone Folder is Cait O’Neill McCullagh’s debut collection of poetry which explores loss, war, illness, the fragility and durability of bone, and so much
Is fuath leam, ged as gràdh leam sàl –
’s cruinnichte ann gach deur mo shliochd,
is mi fo sprochd air luime creige
Crescent o cork, new moon, owld
moon, bracket, comma,
oppen or closed speech mark
twice she walks from the far side
see her through the rain window
the male you notice
first his head smashed
to bottle glass
There were none. Just a ten mile
dry stretch all the way to when
50s housewives baked them a la mode.
polar stratospheric clouds (the technical term)
thin and high and carried here
by a dip in the polar vortex
It was the year the humming-bird hawkmoths
never showed up to feast on the waiting banquet
of pink valerian.
A fresh-cut blade of summer grass
blows into the book. The seed head
trembles as it slices the print.
The thing is there was this young man
who saw me in Arlington Place picking up litter –
snickers-duo from amongst the daisies and sticky-willy.
Art Gallery – Orange paint
Be then non-be, that is extinction.
CLIMATE Justice – Climate Justice is unavailable in your region.
– sixteen, counting the baby –
are planting cushioned feet on the white lines
in the road, and making all the traffic stop.
We began wanting their names; the weeds, small accidents of anemochory (sounding so like the name of a loch, but meaning only windblow).
I planted you beside the fence next to the field
that stretched green to the River Glass before
the storm that claimed the barn roof