When Desmond Kavanagh came to Galway in 1972 to commence an orthodontist practice at the Crescent, not only did he have to apologise for his quiet, lilting Donegal accent, but also for his medical qualification.
There were no other orthodontists between Donegal and Kerry at the time. An orthodontist is a dental speciality, dealing mainly with teeth alignment; but he was constantly being confused with an ornithologist, an expert on birds.
Some squinted at him, when he told them his profession, and asked ‘You mean archaeology?’His wife Mary, from Ahascragh, equally enjoyed the fun; and Des settled down to a successful career here. Almost 50 years later, their son Conal has taken over the practice. Now retired, Des can be seen on his regular walks, and through the gift of poetry, shows us a new Galway many of us have lost sight of.
On the Western Distributor Road, even the name is mundane, Des reminds us that ‘Before the builders came/ farmers toiled and walked this land/ gorse grew where families settle now.’ That house on Bishop O’Donnell Road, we all know it with its iron railings and Victorian style, now invaded by its hedge and untamed trees. But we didn’t know that was where once ‘a doctor practiced/ raised a family here./ Patients came to talk. He listened./ Felt pulses.Tapped backs./ Placed a stethoscope on beating hearts.’Looking up he sees ‘the Shannon to New York/ Aer Lingus jet rise/ over the haze on the Clare Hills…like a wild kite/ in the summer sky,/ its wake /a disintegrating feather.’ Even in this digital age the poet notices the ‘egg-timer on the kitchen wall…Unnoticed until turned upside down/ the two glass lobes come to life./A little rush of streaming sand/ let time fall.’Des grew up ‘along the Swilly shore/ past rocky downslopes/ and strands that reflect/ the coast of Inishowen’.
His father was a schoolteacher who had befriended the seanachaí Charles McGlinchey, and in an fortuitous collaboration captured his music and stories in The Last of the Name.*
On winter evenings the boy walked to McCarron’s farm to collect milk, ‘up past the graveyard/ with its rusting gates/ along the winding lane….’
There were stories from Old Matt Wilson and Hugh McCarron of banshee wails/ a one-eyed lady at the well/ or men from the parish recently deceased / seen selling fish at night…’‘With two quart cans/ I’d head down the dark lane,/ flee past the well,/ creaking gates/ and gravestones that glistened/ trailing milk all the way home.
Des was educated as a boarder at St Columb’s College, Derry. He describes a visit from his parents with all the stiffness and ill at ease that both parents and child suffer on such an occasion:‘In the visitor’s room, we sat on chairs stiff-backed/ pristine sheen under stained glass/ windows, an odour of polish off the floor.Banter from boys echoed along the terrazzo/ corridors. Scales practice played out while/ we talked across the space between us/ learning to let go. News of neighbours/unfolded as the bell for study rang out/ marking our separation. Parried in small talk/not practised in our leaving. I watched them /linked, closer that I had ever seen them,/ head away for home down Bishop Street.’
On his first day at school his mother fell into conversation with a Mrs Heaney, and the two boys, Des and Seamus became firm friends. They shared adjoining cubicles in the dormitory, and the same table at refectory, and shared a similar rural background, a sense of humour and a gift of mimicry. Both of them became poets.
Binnion Road - By Des Kavanagh, with introduction by Seamus Deane, published by Artisan House, Letterfrack, Co Galway, hardback €18. (* Edited and introduced by Brian Friel, published by Blackstaff Press, 1986 ).
