Stephen James Hancock (22 Aug 1961 - 11 Feb 2019)

For my Brother Stephen, A passage from an Irish Poem about our mother’s home land of County Kerry, in Ireland

(written by Sigerson Clifford)

I am Kerry

"I am Kerry like my mother before me,
And my mother’s mother and her man.
Now I sit on an office stool remembering,
And the memory of them like a fan
Soothes the embers into flame.
I am Kerry and proud of my name.

When, soft as lovers’ Gaelic, the rain falls,
Sweeping into silver the lacy mountain walls.

Twas thus I lived, skin to skin with the earth,
Elbowed by the hills, drenched by the billows,
Watching the wild geese making black wedges,
By Skelligs far west and Annascaul of the willows.
Their voices came on every little wind,
Whispering across the half-door of the mind,
For always I am Kerry" ...