Luke Kelly poetic tribute from Liam Clancy - Luke

Luke

Luke how glad I am that our paths crossed

in that brief window of consciousness

that is given to us between the two great mysteries.

You came into my life through a window, the mens room window,

in the Central Hotel at the Fleadh in Miltown Malbay.

They wouldnt let you in the front door,

because they said it was after hours and you werent a resident –

but it was really because they didnt want a

Dublin Jackeen upsetting the session.

Willie Clancy was there in the parlour, and Jimmy Ward and,

the great Seamus Ennis who shares this piece of ground with you now forever.

You startled us all that night Lukey when you sang,

You were no self effacing rustic

waiting to be coaxed to sing soft sad love songs.

You were as strident as a street in Cricklewood,

You were as brash as a Dubliin Hackney driver

and you took delight in what you sang.

Joy and anger mixed in a powerful blend –

that was your hallmark – then as always –

Joy in the act of singing – anger in the words that spoke of injustice.

You came from the mould of the great commune-ists

who knew it was right to rail against the tyranny of class and privilege.

Look at us now Luke, here in this cemetery,

a small hudlle of the living, amidst a vast throng of the generations

that marched through before us and, coming fast behind,

the generations waiting to be born.

So what signifies Luke?

What signifies is that you fulfilled your destiny

that you did not Stint in the giving of the talent that was uniquely yours.

Had you been a blade of grass you would have been very green and very tall and very pointed

because all things must be what they are to their fullness

Since we laid you down here, how many years ago?

you have been joined in the long silence

by so many of those we knew

by Ciarán Bourke and Seamus Ennis

and Willie Clancy and Joe Heaney –

and by my own brothers, Tom, Paddy and Bobby.

But are you really silenced,

N0! No and and never will be

Its all preserved, isnt it –

in reality as well as in memory.

And when in the future there are those who want to hear,

not the froth of fashon by the pop song of the month,

but the timeless vision of the true story told,

they will listen to you Luke –

you and your likes,

if such there are.

And even though we understand all this with our heads,

we still lament in our hearts, as the song says –

“No nay never, never no more,

will you play the wild rover,

never no more.”