Fireman 1o4m2a

Leaving Certificate 2015

Eilean Ni Chuilleanain

Higher Level

Eileann Ní Chuilleanáin

Fireman’s Lift

 The poem was written (1994) in response to the death of her mother.  The poet recalls a visit she made to a cathedral in Parma with her mother in 1963. Both Ní Chuilleanáin and her mother were fascinated by the dome in this cathedral which features Correggio’s fresco of the Virgin’s Assumption into heaven, lifted by the saints and angels. Stanza one:  In a typical narrative style opening, the poet addresses her mother as she recalls a shared memory.  The cupola (dome- like structure) appears to grow like a tree “splits wide open” permitting the earthly to meet the heavenly.  The natural light flooding through the circular windows combined with the light beyond the clouds in the fresco, helps to illuminate the scene “the fall-out of brightness”. Stanza two:  Our attention is drawn to the Virgin rising into heaven. She is being “hauled” at each stage of the ascension by the team of angels.  A series of energetic verbs “heaving, ing, crowding” highlight the tremendous efforts the angels were making in order to ensure a safe age from this life to the next. Collective efforts produce the desired end.  Stanza three:

Leaving Certificate 2015

Eilean Ni Chuilleanain

Higher Level

 Ní Chuilleanáin and her mother could step back and see “the work entire” a vision of the work that the painter may never have seen while he was painting it.  The painting never leaves the poet. Perhaps as she watched her mother fading away she “stepped back” and her mind flashed back to their shared experience in Parma. This memory provided Ní Chuilleanáin with a creative outlet to express her sense of loss of her mother after she died.  Stanza four:  Ní Chuilleanáin describes the effect that the real and depicted light has on the vortex of bodies, feet, elbows and faces populated around the clouds “clear and free as weeds”.  The painting does not contain many whole bodies, but there are lots of body parts. These parts interact and complement each other, giving the impression of weight, power and stress.  The poet has noted that on seeing the fresco she ‘could only concentrate on one aspect, the way it shows bodily effort and the body’s weight’.    Stanzas five and six:  The poet’s point of view becomes more personal. Just like the team of angels who the Virgin from one level to the next, she too must her mother on to eternity.  The language and imagery capture the physicality of the Virgin’s Assumption into heaven and also the struggle that the nurses may have experienced when lifting her dying mother.  Like Correggio’s painting, the body is divided into parts and these parts become metaphors for structure and ; the back is like an arched “roof”, the legs are a “bridge” and the hands can be seen as a “crane” hauling up the body while simultaneously acting as a “cradle” to it: “The back making itself a roof The legs a bridge, the hands

Leaving Certificate 2015

Eilean Ni Chuilleanain

Higher Level

A crane and a cradle”  The image of the tree bearing fruit could be symbolic of her own bond with her mother. She was the fruit of her mother’s womb, as Jesus was the fruit of Mary’s womb: “the branch loaded with fruit”.  The natural cycle involves birth, life and death and the labour to bring a child into the world involves a separation of sorts. In the same way death demands separation and loss.    Stanza seven and eight:  The nurses who cared for her mother have become synonymous with Correggio’s angels and saints. They are attending to the poet’s mother just like the angels attended to Mary.: “she ed through their hands”  While Correggio’s fresco is an artistic re-creation of the Assumption of Mary, Ní Chuilleanáin’s poem may be read as a poetic re-creation of her mother’s spiritual ascent to the place beyond the clouds.  The run on lines of the opening stanza are replaced in the final stanzas by a more disted rhythm as the efforts of the angels are described. Points to Note

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 Themes-loss, death, the afterlife, the relationship between a mother and child.  Again the poet uses a real experience to help her reflect on a deeper, more personal issue. Use of comparison- between the painting and her mother’s final days and death Beautiful, vivid, striking imagery Use of religious imagery Hopeful tone at the end of the poem.

Leaving Certificate 2015

Eilean Ni Chuilleanain

Higher Level

Street

This poem is based on a real girl who worked in a butcher’s shop that the poet saw and never forgot. She was magnificently stunning and the image stirred the poet to write this poem. Stanza one: The poem is written in the third-person narrative and this enables us to take a voyeuristic look at the world of the characters in the poem. We are introduced to a strange and unusual combination of themes: romance, butchery, beauty and danger. We are transported to the moment when the man first saw the butcher’s daughter. Butchery is a male dominated profession and the nature of the work is not one readily associated with women. The verb ‘dangling’ could suggest the blade is uncontrolled and subsequently the knife could be viewed as a threat. The knife also symbolises food death for the animal but food for the townspeople. This duality may suggest the woman with the blade enjoys a degree of power. Her white tros provide the perfect contrasting background to the bloody knife, still dripping with blood. The male character is staring at the ‘shining drops’ as if entranced by what she does for a living. We get the sense that the butcher’s daughter is not aware of his feelings or that she is the object of his attention. An air of mystery prevails and compels the reader to discover more. Stanza two: The mystery intensifies as the man follows her down a lane at the back of the slaughter house. The ‘half-open’ door may illustrate that the man is not a part of her world, he can only glimpse into the unknown. The door is a form of a barrier. The sight that he beholds is ‘clean’ and ‘brushed’, which is not what we might expect to see inside a slaughter house. Having removed her shoes the women leaves the ‘red crescent’ of her heel marks on each step. She is standing in so much gore the blood seeps through her shoes and stains her feet. As she rises up her physical trail vanishes, leaving the man behind. A goddess perhaps? Leaving the physical world?

Leaving Certificate 2015

Eilean Ni Chuilleanain

Higher Level

The narrative ends abruptly; we never discover the identity of the man or woman. We do not know if they met or if he continued to follow her. Ní Chuilleanáin dangles a story before the bewildered eyes of the reader and allows them to ponder its mystery for themselves.