I am recommending, today a book called No Earthly Estate: God and Patrick Kavanagh, an Anthology, ed Tom Stack, Columba Press 2004.
Excerpted , ‘No Earthly Estate , Kavanagh, Colum and Strong’ (December 2010) .
‘The wordsmiths mentioned above , Kavanagh, Strong, and Colum are but a tiny example of the triumph of art and literature against what amounts to a repressive and regressive approach to the Arts. They are not contemporary poets but provide for the new writer the amazing root-system which forms Irish Literature in all its wonderousness. Would only that those who claim to lead us politically were aware of their cultural heritage , story-telling and indeed the violence of words that make up this rich history of multifaceted voice and poetry !’
The Devil , by Patrick Kavanagh.
‘ I met the devil too,
and the adjectives by which I would describe him are these:
Solemn,
Boring,
Conservative.
He was a man the world would appoint to a Board,
He would be on the list of invitees for a bishop’s garden-party,
He would look like an artist.
He was the fellow who wrote in newspapers about music,
Got into a rage when someone laughed;
He was serious about unserious things;
You had to be careful about his inferiority complex
For he was conscious of being uncreative.”
Chris Murray 
One response to “‘No Earthly Estate’, Patrick Kavanagh”
It was also the anniversary of my brother on May 17th,
though we have never found the little grave in which
he was buried as an infant.
Dominic Murray.
LikeLike