The Boys of Bluehill

Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin is a consummate poet whose revelatory imagery and sensibility are unrivaled in depth and refinement. The Boys of Bluehill displays all of the insight and mystery that characterize her best work (“The forest floats over the land, / the island slides across the sea”, “they are thin as air, as a leaf that has stayed / a century inside a book”). These qualities make the most accessible of poems deeply resonant and the most complex ones worth many readings. The themes of music, religion, art, language, and nature unwind a fable of being and perception which is unmistakably hers. From the memory-laden “An Information” and the visionary Skelligs poems, through the haunting “Who Were Those Travellers,” on to the ars poetica of “Dream Shine” and “The Words Collide,” this volume continually draws us in to its own extraordinary perspectives: ….Along the alleys the wind whispered to me: open your hand, let it fall down, whatever you were holding, let it lie until the day after, let it go, let it lie until it is blown to the river; do not look back to see whose hand finds it, or where it is hidden again when found. These enigmas of hiding and discovery are ours to find and unravel.