Running late, arriving just in time,
shaking two or three hands
and taking a seat in the back row—
trying to regain breath
while the taxi's engine still
reverberates in my head.

Surrounded by shelves of books;
trying to focus on names,
who is saying what—
half-confused, half-excited
to have arrived in Dublin
after such a long time.

The first poet reads
about a classroom in Belfast,
the second about ships;
a third about the death of a father
and recurring dreams.
Applause follows applause.
Their publisher speaks in between.
An hour later, unobtrusively,
shadows start to creep
along the windows
fronting Dawson Street.

The man in a green suit
next to me folds his arms
and crosses his legs—
peers over his reading glasses.
On the other side,
a bearded man is taking notes
like a reporter, rapidly.
Both are locals, at home,
in their element.

In the Royal Dublin Hotel
my wife sits alone and eats.
Between us runs the Liffey.
On the other side of the world
dawn will soon break
over my home and children asleep—

everything "near and dear" to me
removed by choice, of my own free will,
in the name of poetry, poets
and a strange, unspoken camaraderie
so I might listen to poems about
Belfast, ships, dreams:
sitting among strangers and new friends,
thinking about Ireland and home—
uneasy, comfortable, solitary.