From Bath to Cork with Baby Grace

CANTO VIII (continued)

The procession of the Chieftains
measures the cold of flagstones,
sliced from Liscannor
before the Protestants came.

Through the fog of incense
rose the chant of sinners.
Down from the Mount of Fianna Fail
strode the five hundred

candidates for the honour of redemption
in the Oireachtas.  Bertie Ahern,
christened in St Eamon’s parish
Patrick Bartholomew Drumcondra

Dig-out O’hEachthain,
Son of Con, begot of Julia Hourihane,
Ballyfeard genes from the Battle of Kinsale,
he holds the key of a Vincentian

Ghost who left the priesthood
before he could transubstantiate,
locked fingertips with a particular Reynolds
in front of the lesser nobles.

Dev would have been here,
Lemass wouldn’t have missed it,
Lynch never lost an opportunity
for a smoke.

Sean T O’Kelly, Childers, Hillery 
McAleese, all there in spirit.
The Judas Haughey, sackclothed,
teeth scrubbed with ashes,

he is gone to his island,
repentant, resplendent in sin,
bare-soled on granite shards
around the holy-of-holies 

on Lough Derg,
his other islands abandoned -
the one absolutely dishonest man
is doing his Purgatory on earth

among the memories of tribespeople
who voted for his style,
so he’ll not walk this church
until purged.

It’s said he’ll suffer silence
until NAMA has come and gone
and the pestilences are passed,
lanced, festered, and turned to leprosy. 

C J Hee Haw, Lord HawHaw,
Ard Ri that was,
is still confessing
as the Charlie is benedicted,

the monstrance set aside,
a ciborium uber alles,
and the Gospel is read,
without credibility,

because there is no good news
in all these fields
since Flight of the Earls of Power:
Carroll, Cleary, Doyle and Hegarty

O’Callaghan, O’Flynn, Murtagh
and their Generals,
all vanquished gone,
returned to spend more time

with their family,
leaving their faithful
wrapt roofless
in negative equity.

(end of Canto  

If I don’t share my report on the NSUE launch (by Minister for Mental Health John Moloney) on Monday, I might get distracted. I better crack on with telling you what happened…

Of course, hardly anyone knows what NSUE is. It’s an organisation that’s meant to give voice to Irish users of mental health services.  There is an international movement of users.  It’s growing more powerful.  Ireland is catching up with Scotland, for example, and parts of America. NSUE stands for National Service Users Executive. Isn’t that a catchy name! Rolls off the tongue eh.  But at least it sounds serious.

NSUE represents me.  
I’m a big user of the Irish mental health services.  I go to my doctor (GP) when I’ve worried I might be getting anxiety or depression.  I’m entitled to be a member of NSUE.  I voted in the elections NSUE held in the south of RoI.  If you think you might ever need to go to your doctor with anxiety or depression or any sort of mental stress, you’re entitled to join NSUE, and vote for people to represent you on the Executive of NSUE.  It’s important to say NSUE is not a new idea.  It was proposed years ago by the government-backed "A Vision for Change" group.  The "Vision" report said an organisation to represent users should be set up.  It’s been slow, hard work but NSUE is  getting there. There will be elections in the West soon.  There will be two elections in the East of Ireland after that: that includes Dublin. NSUE has two employees - all the rest are volunteers. The good news is that NSUE is getting itself into the conversations among policy makers.  The people who are making mental health service policy and performance review now have NSUE people involved.  The Users’ Movement will grow and grow…

Why say all this?
Since most people reading this won’t know about NSUE  I felt I had to  put Monday’s launch of a Survey of Users’ Views on Irish Mental Health in context.  At the same time, NSUE launched its Strategic Plan for 2010-2012.

Report on the day:

I went by train from Cork to Dublin. Met John Kidney and Declan Gould at we got off at Heuston Station. We were the Cork gang heading for Buswell’s Hotel across the road from the Irish Parliament, the Dail - a hotel used to holding famous press conferences.

I met all sorts of interesting and interested people. Jenny Kelly, chair of NSUE, arrived with a heavy bag of reports.  John Redican, chief executive (or whatever his job title is) was in splendid coat & hat. Liz Donovan, development officer of NSUE, asked me to take a few background photographs. There was a professional press photographer from Irish Independent. There was a TV crew. Tim O’Malley was there and I met him for the first time. Martin Rogan, the new mental health supremo for HSE (my phrase) spoke, and gave me his email and phone number. Jim Walsh from DCU (which has a great mental health change course) gave me his email.  Alan Malone (Clonmel), who was a candidate in the NSUE elections, Collette Dalgarno (who was elected) gave me her email. Charlotte Frorath (who works as treasurer for NSUE), Ted O’Shea from Killarney (already elected to NSUE exec)… and Marcus Hanratty, who chairs the consumer council at St Patrick’s Mental Hospital, spoke strongly from the floor of the meeting.

I put these few names down here so that I’ll be able to look back and remind myself what it was like. I’ll add some photographs, and in another post I’ll offer my analysis of what went on at the meeting.  I met the Minister.  I recorded all he said off the cuff on my iPhone and I hope to transcribe that too.

But now I have to rush off to a meeting and deal with other matters, like earning my living. 

CANTO VIII  (begins here)

Gay Byrne’s buried here.
For years, he sat where you’re sitting now,
till road rage got him.
When you’re on television like Gaybo,
do you think of the same things?
How long the Nun’s habit?
The cost of a burning bra?
The cost of a genuine smile?

48 degrees longitude, 30 degrees latitude,
as an Irish treasure island
wakes to the realisation that this is 
an immaculate country,
where the Garda count 50,000,
and Organised Labour makes it 150.
There’s a national dispute over time.
One side wants debt for four years,
the other between more and infinity.
We’re used to the clash of the ash
in our back garden.

"Bridging measures on their way,
Social Partnership’s had its day.
Croake Park Box is up for sale,
‘Budget’s fair’ cries out e-mail.

24/7 is on the march,
Dublin Diocese ever so Arch.
Chirac’s memoirs in the wings,
Tysan Property no longer sings.

The Arts gather in Parnell Square,
a Manifesto written there.
In the bloody red of Liverpool,
Benitez appeals against the fool.
No country for young men,
Emigrate - the question when?"

This ends our review of the daily papers,
in stunted metre, conventional couplets.
Fourteen lines don’t make a sonnet ring.
Gold in the mountain’s, Armagh’s died.
Cashel too, Clonmacnoise, Louis McNeece,
The Book of Lists.
Weekend is the time for sanctity,
going to Mass, dusting off the missal,
join the community in psalm.
I remember community, ELEPHANT,
Guru of Gurus, Our Father,
‘Introibo ad altare Dei
A Deum qui laetificat
Juventutem meam.’
Perchance there is one honest man at Church,
let’s search the pews.
Go out into the highways and byways,
find those who loiter by the back door,
modesty of men who know they’re unwashed,
excluded from the feast,
incapable of drinking the water
- lest it turn to wine -
and lead them into temptation,
and a failed breathalyser.
Come past those bent on another prayer.
One who fills his obligation, 
by hanging out under the eaves
on eve of Sabbath,
is unlikely to join the host
willingly.
Would an honest man hold back
when invited to eternal life?
Or would he hold the door
until all the just were through to the other side?

Namesta, how’s your Da?
You brought me keys of the Kingdom,
and I thought you were only supporting Kerry.
Holy, Holy, Holy,
Lord God of Toasts,
raise your glass and be upstanding,
the Chief is on his way…

(to be continued)