While in Dublin recently I stopped into a bookshop to look
for a few gifts. I asked the lady who was running the shop to give me a list of
famous Irish poets. The first name she gave me was Seamus Heaney. Here’s a
beautiful poem from the book I purchased.   I felt it was particularly outstanding.  I hope you like it as much as I did.

The Skylight

You are the one for skylights. I opposed

Cutting into the seasoned tongue and groove

Of pitch pine. I liked it low and closed,

Its claustrophobic, nest-up-in-the-roof

Effect. I liked the snuff-dry feeling,

The perfect, trunk-lid fit of the old ceiling.

Under there, it was all hutch and hatch.

The blue slates kept the heat like midnight thatch.

 

But when the slaves came off, extravagant

Sky entered and held surprise wide-open.

For days I felt like an inhabitant

Of that house for the man sick of the palsy

Was lowered through the roof, had his sins forgiven,

Was healed, took up his bed and walked away.