This Friday evening sees a benefit concert in The Friary, Ennis at 8pm sharp. Taking part are Clare Music Makers’ Senior Orchestra and Ennis Brass Band. Come along for a great evening’s music and at the same time help a good cause (Clare Haven).

Listowel Writers’ Week 2008 begins this evening and runs until Sunday evening next. I’ll be going for the first time since the early 1980s as I have signed up for the Writing a Novel workshop to which I am really looking forward. It promises to be a very interesting and intense few days.

This evening, coming out of Ennis, I noticed a couple of whitethorn (aka hawthorn, or Maythorn - Crataegus monogyna L.) bushes finally coming into flower. So, given the muggy steamy weather we’re having, I expect the countryside will explode in white blossom in the next few days.

This year it’s 2 weeks late - I recorded first seeing the first hawthorn blossoms in 2007 on 30th April.

Writer and journalist, Nuala O’Faolain, succumbed to her cancer just prior to midnight last night. I remember her from the time she worked for RTE. She was a brilliant and insightful journalist, and an excellent writer - though I have yet to savour her writing. For the past few years we have had a hardback copy of her novel My Dream of You on our bookshelves, thanks to Ana who purchased it. I’ve been meaning to read it but somehow never got round to it, and the book ended up hidden from view on the very top shelf of our living room library. When Nuala announced recently that she had terminal cancer and that she was refusing treatment for it, I made a mental note to start reading the book while she was still alive. Sadly, she has passed on and I still haven’t started it. Now that I have finally got it down from its lofty hiding place, I will read it in memory of her.

The corrupt, vicious and illegal military junta that has Burma in its stranglehold for many years now is deliberately killing thousands of Burmese civilians by refusing to let the International Community distribute aid to the survivors of the recent cyclone. It makes me sick to think that such brutal selfishness still exists on such a massive scale on our world. Watch the video appeal for help from the Burmese Monks.

Tonight’s guest reader at the White House Poetry Revival is Nell Regan. Unfortunately I won’t be able to make it due to other commitments.

Nell Regan’s debut collection Preparing for Spring was published in 2007 by Arlen House in Ireland and will be launched in New York with Syracuse University Press later this year. The collection was shortlisted for the 2007 Glen Dimplex New Writers Awards and she is the recipient of the Dublin City Council Literature Bursary for 2007.

I received a rejection slip from The Stinging Fly last week. It wasn’t my first rejection slip by a long shot, nor, I dare say, will it be my last. I had submitted 4 poems in February for their consideration: Full Moon over America, Resurrection, The Crash, and Morning Fog. I was hopeful - as one always is - of an acceptance. I’ll submit again next year in expectation of a better outcome.

Revival, the poetry journal of the WhiteHousePoets, is calling for submissions from local, national and international poets for the next issue which will be published in Limerick in July 2008. The deadline for receipt of submissions is 31st May 2008. Submission guidelines can be viewed on the Revival Press website.

Bealtaine shona dhíbh uilig!

It’s Beltane today and traditionally the first day of Summer in the ancient Irish and pagan calendar. May we have a good one this year - hopefully we won’t experience the washout we had in July-August 2007 again for many a long year.
The blackthorn (Prunus spinosa) is late in flowering this year - I noticed the first blooms only yesterday (30 April) - due to the unseasonably cold weather we’ve experienced throughout much of April. Last year it started flowering on 5 April 2007 - see here. I recorded first seeing the Whitethorn (aka May Flower, or Hawthorn) - Crataegus monogyna - coming into flower last year on 29 April 2007. This year there is no sign of it yet, though it is sporting a full set of leaves.

Of course today is Samhain and the first day of Winter down under (Australia and New Zealand) according to the pagan calendar. Samhain shona dhíbh uilig ansin! Hope you have a good one.