Sean Walsh

Celine… wee recall.

Fifty years a religious, Sister C. ‘Calls for a celebration, no? My wife and I among the favoured few. Several days before the event the good lady handed me a page or two of typescript. Would I read it aloud in place of the communion verse at the celebration Mass? Of course I would. . .

‘Read it… mulled over it… rehearsed it… A poem unlike many another… The more I read it, the more I got into it – and the more it got into me… Begin by Brendan Kennelly…

Came the day, the morning, the mass celebrating the life of a religious who had given herself to others – in Africa and here at home… who never, ever, stayed down… if ever… whenever…

And when I came to read the final verse I sensed a hush…
as if those present were somehow aware of greatness:

“Though we live in a world that dreams of ending
that always seems about to give in
something that will not acknowledge conclusion
insists that we forever begin.”