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Matthew Sweeney is a contemporary Irish poet who writes poetry both for grown-ups and for children. He was born in County Donegal in 1952, went to school in Ireland and to University College, Dublin, then studied English and German in London and Germany. His poetry is  rich with tone and atmosphere, as well as humour, although, rather black humour! An interview with Matthew Sweeney can be found here.

Here are some of his poems that I personally like very much. 
None of them is your typical children's poem, mind you, one needs to read them out loud several times to feel the rhythm, find the rhymes (there are rhymes in them! just look closer!), and finally fall in love with them. They are truly beautiful

Fishbones Dreaming (press the title to hear Matthew Sweeney read it)
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Fishbones lay in the smelly bin.
He was a head, a backbone and a tail.
Soon the cats would be in for him.

He didn’t like to be this way.
He shut his eyes and dreamed back.
 
Back to when he was fat, and hot on a plate.
Beside green beans, with lemon juice
squeezed on him. And a man with a knife
and fork raised, about to eat him.

He didn’t like to be this way.
He shut his eyes and dreamed back.
 
Back to when he was frozen in the freezer.
With lamb cutlets and minced beef and prawns.
Three months he was in there.

He didn’t like to be this way.
He shut his eyes and dreamed back.
 
Back to when he was squirming in a net,
with thousands of other fish, on the deck
of a boat. And the rain falling
wasn’t wet enough to breathe in.

He didn’t like to be this way.
He shut his eyes and dreamed back.
 
Back to when he was darting through the sea,
past crabs and jellyfish, and others
like himself. Or surfacing to jump for flies
and feel the sun on his face.

​He liked to be this way.
He dreamed hard to try and stay there.


THE FIELD

Where the boy sees cattle
there was a battle
but the boy doesn’t know it.
How could he know it?
He sees a field,
no sign of a shield
or an axe, or a sword,
not a cross word,
not a single shout,
just grass on the snout
of a bullock
as he stands on a rock,
chewing,
then mooing
till the boy walks on.
But when the sun
sinks in the sea
the boy would see,
Instead of a farmer,
Ghosts in armour
On ghost-horses.
He’d hear curses,
and the night-sky
miles high
would ring with steel
striking steel,
and the ghostly dead
and the odd head
would lie on the ground,
but not a sound
will the boy hear.
He won’t be near.
He’ll be home in bed,
as good as dead.

It's interesting how easy it is to forget about old times and old fought battles, from centuries ago. English  - and Irish! - soil is full of such places! From the middle ages, with warriors wearing armour, shields, axes (!!!) and swords. It all sounds more like a scene from a fantasy book. But it all happened!

BLUE HAIR
 
In between the dinner ladies
runs the blue-haired boy,
spilling beans and jelly,
and all us kids are yelling
‘Catch him! Catch Blue Hair!’
though mostly we like him,
would like to be like him
but wouldn’t dare. And look,
he’s out front again –
the forks are clattering down –
and haring past our tables,
our laughing, screaming tables,
with five teachers in pursuit
(they’ll never catch Blue Hair!).
And none of us can eat,
we’re banging with our spoons,
blowing with our breaths,
erupting in a roar
as Blue Hair dodges everyone
and bursts out the door.

I just love the lines "though mostly we like him, would like to be like him" with three meanings of the word "like" coming one after another!

СOWS ON THE BEACH
Two cows,
fed-up with grass, field, farmer,
barged through barbed wire
and found the beach.
Each mooed to each:
This is a place to be,
a stretch of sand next to the sea,
this is the place for me.
And they stayed there all day,
strayed this way, that way,
over to rocks,
past discarded socks,
ignoring the few people they met
(it wasn’t high season yet).
They dipped hooves in the sea,
got wet up to the knee,
they swallowed pebbles and sand,
found them a bit bland,
washed them down with sea-water,
decided they really ought  to
rest for an hour.
Both were sure
they’d never leave here.
Imagine, they’d lived so near
and never knew!
With a swapped moo
they sank into sleep,
woke to the yellow jeep
of the farmer
revving there
feet from the incoming sea.
This is no place for cows to be,
he shouted, and slapped them
with seaweed, all the way home.

There's an interesting place here in the 4th line from the end. It takes some effort to grasp the meaning of "feet". 

​Next week the Irish all over the world  will be celebrating their patron saint's day. 
What could be a better reason to resume our study of the British expatriates who lived in Russia at different periods of time - only this time focusing on the Irish, rather than the Scots!

Let's begin with a question: How many Irish composers do we know? Even to say 'not many' would probably be an exaggeration. But there is one composer and a pianist who is at least known to professional musicians. He is considered to be one of the most prominent - if not the most prominent - Irish composers in the history of the country, as well as the creator of nocturne as a genre. His name is John Field and he was a contemporary of Beethoven, Chopin, Liszt, Paganini, Schumann and many others, living in the golden age of romanticism.  

John Field was born in Dublin in 1782 and received an early musical education in his family. Later, when his family moved to London, he became a pupil of Muzio Clementi and remained one for a long time. Together they traveled all over Europe and in 1802 ended up in St. Petersburg, where the 20-year-old Field decided to stay, even after his master had left. In St. Petersburg John Field got to know Griboyedov and Pushkin, and was Mikhail Glinka's teacher. Having become a renowned concert pianist, John Field was enjoying a concert life, giving concerts outside of Russia as well as in Moscow  and St. Petersburg.

​In 1821 he moved to Moscow, which from then until his death in 1837 remained his hometown. John Field died in Moscow and was buried at Vvedenskoye cemetery, where all foreigners were buried.

​There is John Field's bust in the Irish Embassy in Moscow.​
 ​Here's some of his music on the Russian theme. 

This year - 2017 - marks John Field's 235th anniversary and 180 years since his death.  The more reason to celebrate his glorious life this coming week!

           "Once upon a time, sixty years ago, a little girl lived in the Big Woods of Wisconsin, in a little grey house made of logs.
         The great, dark trees of the Big Woods stood all around the house, and beyond them were other trees and beyond them were more trees. As far as a man could go to the north win a day, or week, or a whole month, there was nothing but woods. There were no houses, There were no roads. There were no people. There were only trees and the wild animals who had their homes among them..."
 
This is the beginning of a wonderful 'Little House' series of children's books about the life of a pioneer family in the Wild West written in the 1930s-1940s by Laura Ingalls Wilder. She was describing her own childhood experiences and that's what makes the books especially interesting to read. They are full of humour, many little stories inside the main story and many details of how people lived in that harsh environment: how they celebrated different holidays, how they made maple syrup, what they ate and how they had fun. 

There is no account of what they did for Shrove Tuesday, but there is a description of how their mother made pancakes on other days:

"... For breakfast there were pancakes, and Ma made a pancake man for each one of the children. Ma called each one in turn to bring her plate, and each could stand by the stove and watch, while with the spoonful of batter Ma put on the arms and the legs and the head. It was exciting to watch her turn the whole little man over, quickly and carefully, on a hot griddle. When it was done, she put it smoking hot on the plate ..."
​
I personally found it quite inspirational and for several years while my kids were little made them animal-shaped pancakes. 

2017 is one of those years when Eastern Orthodox (including Russian Orthodox) and Western (not just Catholic!) Christian churches celebrate Easter the same day. So one would think that they would all have their happy pancake time together as well. After all, Lent traditionally should last 40 days - the same number of days that Jesus Christ spent fasting in the wilderness.

But if you look at the calendars you will be surprised to see that  western christians will be having their single pancake day (February 28) when the Orthodox have already had their long pancake week (February 20-26) and are 2 days into Lent! The funny thing is, if we take this year's  Ester day - April 16 - and count 40 days back we will get March 11, which is neither Russian Orthodox, nor Western Christian beginning of Lent. How can that make sense mathematically?

Well, it doesn't.  While maths is important in Christianity, it's not the main thing. That's why it gets a little complicated.

​The Russian Orthodox Lent period lasts 48 days: first, 40 days straight, beginning on Monday after a whole week of Maslenitsa. Divide 40 days of Lent by 7 days of the week and you will get 6 weeks minus 2 days (6x7=42). These two days come at the end of the Lent and are Saturday before Palm Sunday (Lazarus Saturday) and Palm Sunday itself, when there's no fasting. The Holy Week (or Passion Week) that follows has 6 more days of fasting, which is another lent - the Lent of the Passion Week. So, all in all, 40+2+6= 48 days.

The Western Christian Lent period lasts 46 days and begins on Ash Wednesday which comes after Shrove Tuesday or Mardi Gras (the pancake day). Since Sundays - even Sundays in Lent - in the Western Christian tradition are considered to be holidays of Resurrection, when there should be no sorrow and therefore no fasting, the six Sundays in Lent are not counted: 46-6=40.

Isn't that fascinating?

Here are some religious words used in the post! 
to fast = not to eat (поститься). We can see this word in the word 'breakfast'. Since we don't eat at night, we break our fast in the morning by having breakfast!
Lent - пост
Palm Sunday - вербное воскресенье
Shrove Tuesday - прощёный вторник, масленица
Mardi Gras - жирный вторник, масленица (фр.)
Ash Wednesday - пепельная среда, начало Великого поста
Easter - Пасха
Resurrection - воскрешение, воскресение
wilderness = desert. Don't forget that 'wild-' in this world is pronounced with a short monophthong [i] and not a diphthong [ai]!