{"id":151047,"date":"2026-02-28T08:00:25","date_gmt":"2026-02-28T13:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=151047"},"modified":"2026-02-28T21:30:37","modified_gmt":"2026-03-01T02:30:37","slug":"its-the-birthday-of-poet-john-montague","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=151047","title":{"rendered":"“I was going upstream, against the current. I was coming from the North before the North had broken\u201d. — John Montague"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\nIt’s his birthday today. <\/p>\n

John Montague has great sentimental value to me. He was one of my father\u2019s favorite poets. I remember being at home – some years ago, it had to be pre-covid (sob) – and Mum pulled out dad\u2019s copy of Montague\u2019s collected poems, and the book fell open \u2013 naturally \u2013 to the poem listed below. Because that was the page my dad turned to so often, the book \u201cremembered.\u201d I almost gasped. Mum has a copy of it taped up over her sink. <\/p>\n

Montague, who died in 2016, was one of the most important poets from Northern Ireland in the 20th century. Montague was born in 1929 and hit his stride in middle-age, which happened to coincide with the explosion of violence in Northern Ireland in the late 60s and 70s. Montague was of Ulster Catholic stock (fascinatingly, though, he was born in Brooklyn: in 1933 his family sent the children back to Ireland to live with relatives). By the time the 60s\/70s rolled around, Montague was published (stories and poems), but the political upheaval put him in the middle of seismic events. It was no time to be an Ivory Tower poet. In 1970, when Northern Ireland seethed with violence, he read one of his poems outside the Armagh Jail. He went to Yale, attended the Iowa Writer\u2019s Workshop, lived in France for a bit, but mostly he lived in America. But he returned to Ireland in the 60s\/70s – he came home in her moment of excruciating trial. Many Irish in exile returned to Ireland during those years – even though it might make more “sense” to stay away so, you know, you don’t get blown up. But I get it. If you live somewhere, you don’t want to be away from it when horrible things happen.<\/p>\n

Montague taught at the University of Cork, and it was there that his influence as a poet started to spread \u2026 and spread \u2026 and spread. An entire generation was inspired by him, not only as a teacher but as a writer. His work is heartbreaking. Like I said, I can\u2019t really speak of him in any way approaching distance, because of how much my father loved him.<\/p>\n

His childhood was filled with a series of cultural\/familial RUPTURES, and this informed his poetry. He spent his early years playing happily on the streets of Brooklyn. He was then sent away by his parents to live with his maiden aunts in Ireland, who remained in the dilapidated ancestral home in County Tyrone. So his first world suddenly vanished, and overnight he was a farm boy in Ulster. All of this gave him a perspective on childhood and memories that make him unique. The world can be lost at any moment. There is no continuity. Continuity is a lie. Familiarity does not exist, or at least it does not last. His childhood in Ireland was spent around elderly people. He lived in an ancient home falling into disrepair, being cared for by elderly aunts, and all of this made him see the past in a tragic and very specifically Irish way. What has been lost? Can it be regained?<\/p>\n

This was my father\u2019s favorite poem. He knew it by heart. It’s the poem the book fell open to naturally.<\/p>\n

\nLike Dolmens Round My Childhood, The Old People<\/big><\/p>\n

Like dolmens round my childhood, the old people.<\/p>\n

Jamie MacCrystal sang to himself,
\nA broken song without tune, without words;
\nHe tipped me a penny every pension day,
\nFed kindly crusts to winter birds.
\nWhen he died his cottage was robbed,
\nMattress and money box torn and searched.
\nOnly the corpse they didn\u2019t disturb.<\/p>\n

Maggie Owens was surrounded by animals,
\nA mongrel bitch and shivering pups,
\nEven in her bedroom a she-goat cried.
\nShe was a well of gossip defiled,
\nFanged chronicler of a whole countryside:
\nReputed a witch, all I could find
\nWas her lonely need to deride.<\/p>\n

The Nialls lived along a mountain lane
\nWhere heather bells bloomed, clumps of foxglove.
\nAll were blind, with Blind Pension and Wireless,
\nDead eyes serpent-flicked as one entered
\nTo shelter from a downpour of mountain rain.
\nCrickets chirped under the rocking hearthstone
\nUntil the muddy sun shone out again.<\/p>\n

Mary Moore lived in a crumbling gatehouse,
\nFamous as Pisa for its leaning gable.
\nBag-apron and boots, she tramped the fields
\nDriving lean cattle from a miry stable.
\nA by-word for fierceness, she fell asleep
\nOver love stories, Red Star and Red Circle,
\nDreamed of gypsy love rites, by firelight sealed.<\/p>\n

Wild Billy Eagleson married a Catholic servant girl
\nWhen all his Loyal family passed on:
\nWe danced round him shouting \u201cTo Hell with King Billy,\u201d
\nAnd dodged from the arc of his flailing blackthorn.
\nForsaken by both creeds, he showed little concern
\nUntil the Orange drums banged past in the summer
\nAnd bowler and sash aggressively shone.<\/p>\n

Curate and doctor trudged to attend them,
\nThrough knee-deep snow, through summer heat,
\nFrom main road to lane to broken path,
\nGulping the mountain air with painful breath.
\nSometimes they were found by neighbours,
\nSilent keepers of a smokeless hearth,
\nSuddenly cast in the mould of death.<\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s his birthday today. John Montague has great sentimental value to me. He was one of my father\u2019s favorite poets. I remember being at home – some years ago, it had to be pre-covid (sob) – and Mum pulled out … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15,39,9],"tags":[35,2629,569,160],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151047"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=151047"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151047\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":152536,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151047\/revisions\/152536"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=151047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=151047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=151047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}