The Fisherman – Poem by William Butler Yeats
The Fisherman – Poem by William Butler Yeats
ALTHOUGH I can see him still.
The freckled man who goes
To a grey place on a hill
In grey Connemara clothes
At dawn to cast his flies,
It’s long since I began
To call up to the eyes
This wise and simple man.
All day I’d looked in the face
What I had hoped ‘twould be
To write for my own race
And the reality;
The living men that I hate,
The dead man that I loved,
The craven man in his seat,
The insolent unreproved,
And no knave brought to book
Who has won a drunken cheer,
The witty man and his joke
Aimed at the commonest ear,
The clever man who cries
The catch-cries of the clown,
The beating down of the wise
And great Art beaten down.
Maybe a twelvemonth since
Suddenly I began,
In scorn of this audience,
Imagining a man,
And his sun-freckled face,
And grey Connemara cloth,
Climbing up to a place
Where stone is dark under froth,
And the down-turn of his wrist
When the flies drop in the stream;
A man who does not exist,
A man who is but a dream;
And cried, ‘Before I am old
I shall have written him one
poem maybe as cold
And passionate as the dawn.’
William Butler Yeats
The Heron by Linda Hogan
A Heron in flight, Galway bay, Ireland
Photography : Nigel Borrington
The Heron
by Linda Hogan
I am always watching
the single heron at its place
alone at water, its open eye,
one leg lifted
or wading without seeming to move.
.
It is a mystery seen
but never touched
until this morning
when I lift it from its side
where it lays breathing.
I know the beak that could attack,
that unwavering golden eye
seeing me, my own saying I am harmless,
but if I had that eye, nothing would be safe.
The claws hold tight my hand,
its dun-brown feathers, and the gray
so perfectly laid down.
.
The bird is more beautiful
than my hand, skin more graceful
than my foot, my own dark eye
so much more vulnerable,
the heart beating quickly,
its own language speaking,
You could kill me or help me.
I know you and I have no choice
but to give myself up
and in whatever supremacy of this moment,
hold your human hand
with my bent claws.
.
– See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/20151#sthash.WSe1sWRE.dpuf
The Herons flight , Galway Bay.
Herons flying above Galway bay
Nature Photography Nigel Borrington
On a very enjoyable visit, I managed to Capture these Herons during a spring time visit to Galway Bay. At this time of year the Local Herons are hunting along the coast line for fish and getting ready to nest build in the spring.
To get these images I stood under some trees along side a beach and captured them as they flew above me.
The Herons flight : Gallery
The fishing boats of Galway bay (Image gallery)
Fishing boats at Galway bay, county Galway
Irish Landscape Photography : Nigel Borrington
The landscape around Galway bay is one of the most beautiful in Ireland , offering long walks along sandy beach’s and scenic fishing bays.
The photographs below are from such a walk I took about two years ago during an Easter holiday in the area.
Fishing boats at Galway bay, Gallery
Sunday evening at Galway bay, a fishing boat.
Images taken using a Nikon D700
A Fishing boat at Galway bay
Irish landscape photography : Nigel Borrington
Sunday evening at Galway bay
One Sunday evening last year while visiting Galway bay, we went for a walk along the shoreline.
We came across this fishing boat resting in a small bay, I felt this image pictures Sunday evening very well.
Rested during the weekend, but ready to start again on Monday morning, just not yet !
The bronze crabs of Galway bay
Nikon D700, 105mm macro lens, iso 400
Crab shell at Galway bay
Nature photography, Kilkenny photographer : Nigel Borrington
I came across these grab shells on a beach at the far end of Galway bay last year and there were hundreds of them, crabs molt their shells every time they have out grown them, some people think that this is at the turn of a new moon.
A Poem :
A Green Crab’s Shell
by Mark Doty
Not, exactly, green:
closer to bronze
preserved in kind brine,
something retrieved
from a Greco-Roman wreck,
patinated and oddly
muscular. We cannot
know what his fantastic
legs were like–
though evidence
suggests eight
complexly folded
scuttling works
of armament, crowned
by the foreclaws’
gesture of menace
and power. A gull’s
gobbled the center,
leaving this chamber
–size of a demitasse–
open to reveal
a shocking, Giotto blue.
Though it smells
of seaweed and ruin,
this little traveling case
comes with such lavish lining!
Imagine breathing
surrounded by
the brilliant rinse
of summer’s firmament.
What color is
the underside of skin?
Not so bad, to die,
if we could be opened
into this–
if the smallest chambers
of ourselves,
similarly,
revealed some sky.
Nikon D700, 105mm macro lens, iso 400
Crab shell at Galway bay
Nature photography : Nigel Borrington
Adult Tanner crab mating
Crabs (and other crustaceans) cannot grow in a linear fashion like most animals. Because they have a hard outer shell (the exoskeleton) that does not grow, they must shed their shells, a process called molting. Just as we outgrow our clothing, crabs outgrow their shells. Prior to molting, a crab reabsorbs some of the calcium carbonate from the old exoskeleton, then secretes enzymes to separate the old shell from the underlying skin (or epidermis). Then, the epidermis secretes a new, soft, paper-like shell beneath the old one. This process can take several weeks.
Galway bay
The old fishing village, Teach mor, County Galway
Fuji X100, Iso 200, 35mm lens
The Area around Teach mor, Galway bay in County Galway is one of the most beautiful in Europe in my own opinion.
I took this shot while we walked our way along the coast road, you can see an old abandoned fishing village on the far shoreline. We had the place to ourselves all afternoon and Molly got to swim with the seals as they came close in just to work out who she was.
I think they got a bit of a shock when she went in with them…
Nigel Borrington 
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