Irish president’s poetry is trashed by top British academic

Don’t forget you’re Irish With your mortgage through the ceiling In negativity equity With banking gone all pear shaped And ditto property Your stocks and shares have tumbled Your politicians a disgrace Your wife is drinking porter And you’re in a desperate place Don’t forget you’re Irish And sing ‘twill do, ‘twill do. When your neighbour Buys a telly, of quality HD And his daughter becomes a doctor With a mighty fine degree When jealousy n’ begrudgery Overcome you totally too Don’t forget you’re Irish And sing ‘twill do, ‘twill do. When taxes they are climbing And your dole is cut in half And your best friend steals your Mrs And they run off for a laugh When you’ve lost your shirt On horses And your car’s* a zero-two Don’t forget you’re Irish And sing ‘twill do, ‘twill do. When your teanga’s undervalued And the kids say “Tá sé fear” And copious translations Continue much to jar When an Béarla usurps Gaeilge And cows only in English “moo” Don’t forget you’re Irish And sing ‘twill do, ‘twill do. Saint Peter’s on his day off And you’re at the pearly gates And St. Patrick checks the records For your eternal fate Don’t forget He’s Irish By a little more than half As he sneaks you* in the back door Just give a little laugh And sing ye both in harmony Without much more ado (sung) Don’t forget you’re Irish And sing ‘twill do, ‘twill do.

Had a teary eye listening to MDH talking about his father reminded me of my father who was interned in the Curragh.I wonder if they knew each other.Dan reminds of another poet,Full many a flower is born to blush unseen/and waste it's sweetness on the desert air....(Grey)

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate. Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, and summer's lease hath all too short a date.... When forty winters shall besiege thy brow, and dig deep trenches in thy beauty's field, Thy youth's proud livery so gazed on now, Will be a tattered weed of small worth held... Yes…no more of this overrated rubbish!!

poetry is beautifull,not all that many people read it or quote it,i think anything that makes people think about it or read it,even when its bad is a good thing,mostly nobody has much to say about it,it never hits the news big time.shakespear,he,s probably put more people of poetry than any other,seriously overated boring ,except for mcbeth whom he probably didnt write,that was rabbie burns,,only joking you dick head before you start,it was roger bacon..

@cillowen – get a grip, man (or woman?). Shakespeare, the most revered and performed playwright in the world…translated into every major language…still inspiring actors; directors etc. etc. you cannot be serious??

Will Dance and Tell Jokes for Guinness and Chips ! Every Good Bar needs a Clown ...Faces along the bar Cling to their average day: The lights must never go out, The music must always play, All the conventions conspire To make this fort assume The furniture of home; Lest we should see where we are, Lost in a haunted wood, Children afraid of the night Who have never been happy or good. W,H, Auden

I liked listening to Higgins on the video - it captured much for me. This Brit flake should enlighten us on Shakespeare "all the world's a stage" inanity. If such be true then were does the audience sit to take it all in.

Rumens is entitled to her ignorant opinion.

If she was any good ,she'd be a Oxford. The leading University of the World ( Official!) ... so where is she teaching? ... Wales! Enough said! ~~~ Having read her 'article' in which she hints at admired views of Northern (Irish) poets, perhaps she betrays a little bigotry from her work in Belfast! In the readers Comments on her article, both she and The Guardian get a good roasting!

What a cheek has she ever read her own garbage

Since when is poetry writing a must-have requirement for a state office holder? So he's no poet by Rumen's lights / Still he is well within his rights / To run for Pres in the land of Eire / Where neither poets nor statemen have ever been rare.

By the way Kelly, it`s not "it’s metaphors". Go call your high school English teacher and ask her to refresh your memory on the difference between its and it's. As to Higgins' poetry, I suspect every foreign dignitary and accrediting diplomat will be presented with a signed copy of the Complete Works of MDH. No soon have they left the Aras in Phoenix Park, the signed volume will wind up in the nearest trash can: Where it belongs.

Carol Rumens (searched the net and found this on her) CR. I am a disappointed romantic. Not very original – many poets are, I think. I have had many imaginary love-affairs, and behaved very foolishly in sometimes not realising how very imaginary they were – but they gave me poems and perhaps that was what I really wanted. This so-called love has been a great energy source for my poetry. LV. You claim, ‘I’ll/ author an honest tear.’ So you do. Your poetry is honest and what we are left with is a tear. You also claim you ‘open the veins of speech.’ One other, more recent poem states, ‘I’m a woman, English, not young.’ Desperado poetry always carries a burden, and this burden is another one for each poet, of course. Which burden is yours? What don’t you want to state in verse, so that the reader may infer and be sucked into it? CR. My burden is me! ---------------------------------------------- so says she - HER BURDEN IS HER - Another trying to ride on the back of new Prez Higgins. She and partner been to Russia brilliant a holes.

"decent poems" who is this women? She should google Seamus Heaney.How many Nobels has she won?I's just another example of british middle class lingering bigotry.

America must bare it's Cross Obama. Now Ireland has the Cross of Higgens to Bare. Prays in America brought America the Tea Party. I only pray that Ireland finds something to protect itself.