The Fingers in the Greasy Till are Greasy Still

It used to be a blessed virgin and her black-robed sooth sayers that kept us in check. Now, it's the economy, its very name blackened by bailouts, emergencies, and wars. The heaviness of the Troika boots still rests on our crooked necks. There appears to be no escape. They have us everywhere we turn. Nowhere to run. They have broken us. Nowhere to hide. They have rendered us meaningless in our minds. They have taken our hopes and dreams and laid them to waste. We watch idly by as Dublin burns. The buses and trams burned by a disaffected undercurrent of rage. We're a strange bunch, amenable to every rough brutish kick that rains down on us. We wait patiently for the resurrection to come. Nothing uttered. Nothing said. Everything lost. Nothing gained. We sleep in our beds and wait. There are so many red flags. But still, we stumble on to the dying notes of a soldier's song that has long since lost its meaning. It seems that nothing matters except for the hauntings in our heads. We are amongst fools. We have forgotten who we are. Our spirit is extinguished.

We are poets of the spoken word, tellers of stories at the front gate, or in the pubs where we congregate to let ourselves bleed. A seanchaí on every corner, on every barstool, in every house, and every home. Literary giants and musical prophets are hidden in the hedgerows for fear of being seen. We are the sun, moon, and stars. We are the fortune tellers of our destiny if only we would realize it. Everything we need is right here inside us. In the immortal words of Bob Marley, we just need to stir it up, little darling. This pot of hope was filled to the brim with divilment once. Dulled by dope it still is. In the name of the father, in the name of the son. Forgotten moments from our glorious past when our spirit raged to infinity. The Hill of Tara and other sacred places remain, left untouched by Rome. Greed wasn't even a word back then until it took hold of our precious nature.

The fingers in the greasy till are greasy still. Yeats's immortal words are written in the stony grey soil of Monaghan. It's a story with no happy ending, yet. But where there is sin, there is always a way in. We have our distractions to keep us sane. Despite everything, we still have hope. The landscape has changed. The pilgrims climb less steeply and a lot closer to the sky. The vestments hanging limp on a dusty peg. The old priests are even older now. The river has become a trickle as the flock grazes in other places. The darkness within holding us back from what is rightfully ours. The light was blocked by tradition and trauma of what was and continues to be done in our name. They tell us it’s good for us. They say they know better. They deflect us from what is important. They ignore us. And we let them. Like turkeys voting for Christmas every time we think it is time to have our say. A system that is broken beyond repair leads the way. It has no kindness, no feeling, no compassion, and no hope, and still, it holds sway through the corruptions of power, the greed of self-righteousness, and the patterns woven into our delicate psyche.

We carry with us a raging heart, ready to burst apart at the seams. We are the beggars on the street, the busker looking for their fix in the melody of their favorite song, the junkies looking for a golden thread to put an end to the hypnotic misery of the everyday routine we endure so that we can just stand still. But still, we are sailing against the wind. It feels like we are constantly swimming against the tide. Untethered. Floating towards the abyss. Not knowing where it will all end. We are sleepwalkers about to be swept over the waterfall. We will fall, arms stretching outwards before we finally hit rock bottom. We are the lost sheep waiting to be found. Full of sexual energy waiting to be unleashed from the chains of guilt bound up in a merciless theology. Catholic guilt mixed with the Protestant work ethic has turned out to be a potent mix. We wriggle free of our history now and again to land a blow, but it never lasts.

There are too many bitter pills to swallow. There is too much pain to overcome. Instead, we lock it away and pretend it's not there, that it never existed. Instead, we turn to the pints of black or the ginger lady by our bed. We have never grieved. We have never lifted the mask. We have never cried. We hold our sadness still. We constantly need to be told by others how great we are because we don't believe it ourselves. We lose, but we still win even when we don't. We pretend. We are dead before we have even died. Ghosts in a lifetime filled with regret. We like to think it doesn't matter, but it does. We need wild thinkers to lead us onward. Purveyors of a terrible truth. Unblemished. Untouched by what was and what will be. For the people, by the people. The bullshit they use to feed our insecurities through media and education. Ancient words that no longer carry any weight. Real or imagined. The cinders all but extinguished in the lukewarm grate of history and now. They fucking hate us. They use fear like it’s going out of fashion. These so-called figures of authority.  

I prefer to worship at the altar of the common man.

Here and now is all there is.

And hope.

Despite everything, there’s always hope.

Roll on 2024.

Farewell to these streets of sorrow.

Farewell to Shane MacGowan, Sinéad O’Connor, Christy Dignam, and Mark Sheehan.

Farewell to war and suffering.

Farewell to power and corruption.

Farewell to shame.