The Parish Carnival

That's Bernie's wife on the carousel

laughing and waving her arms.

Once again she won't get off 

even though Bernie is yelling

next to the concession stand

jumping around in his wheel chair.

He's finished his cotton candy

and wants to go home. 

He probably has to pee.

He never goes anywhere 

except to the parish carnival. 

He loves the cotton candy.

He says it's the same as when 

he was a kid years ago 

before he fell out of the tree. 

He needs Stella more than ever now

to push his wheel chair and she does

except when she comes to the carnival 

and gives old Bernie a big plume 

of cotton candy and hops on the carousel

laughing and waving her arms 

once a summer every year.

Donal Mahoney

The Only Place to Go in Tipperary 

Father Kelly has always claimed

the only place to go in Tipperary

once you're dead is Eagan's Mortuary.

Father Kelly says Eagan lays a client out

as if a body were a mackerel from the sea

glistening in the bottom of a boat 

once the mad thrashing is over.

Father Kelly has always claimed 

a dead mackerel deserves a nap

before the flames of hell take over.

The late Tommy Dugan arrived at Eagan's

a day or so after he'd been shot 

and Eagan laid him out perfectly 

with both eyes open and a plastic 

booger peeking from his nose,

a cosmetic touch Tommy had requested

when he came to Eagan's the week before, 

chomping on an unlit panatela.

Tommy came that day to make 

final arrangements, as they say. 

That same day Tommy asked if he could be 

waked in Eagan's finest casket upside down, 

his pants pulled down around his knees 

and a sign across his arse saying "Kiss this!"

as a final salute to his mother-in-law.

But the law in Tipperary specifies

no sign of any kind in any casket so 

Tommy settled for the plastic booger in his nose.

He knew his mother-in-law would curse it 

at the family viewing prior to the wake.

At Eagan's you can make arrangements 

years before you die and Eagan guarantees 

he'll lay you out the way you specify 

provided everything's within the law, of course.

But Tommy Dugan's widow swears 

Eagan must have been possessed to put 

a plastic booger in a dead man's nose. 

Rosie Dugan can't believe her sober Tommy

would ever ask for anything like that.

But after Mass on Sunday friends remind her

Father Kelly has always claimed

the only place to go in Tipperary

once you're dead is Eagan's Mortuary.

Father Kelly says Eagan lays a client out

as if a body were a mackerel from the sea

glistening in the bottom of a boat 

once the mad thrashing is over.

Father Kelly has always claimed 

a dead mackerel deserves a nap

before the flames of hell take over.

Donal Mahoney