The 21st birthday of the BAFFLE Poets Festival will be held on the October Bank Holiday weekend in O’Dea’s Hotel, Loughrea.
The heats will be held in The Arch Bar and Harney’s, both in Barracks Street, and this year’s theme is ‘The Long Point’, which is a popular water park in Loughrea, with People’s Choice selecting the finalists.
The BAFFLE Poets Culture Night in the library, September 22, regarded by many as an early starter to the festival, will roll out as a proper BAFFLE night. The theme for this is ‘The Bottom Line’.
If you are lucky enough to get your hands on a copy of “BAFFLE Tour”, mind it. It is part of a currently very limited edition.
For certain, the annual BAFFLE Tour will be different. Ray Gately steps aside as McNally sidles in to be your guide with his own esoteric version of what rocks around Loughrea. “I won’t be making a habit of it,” says McNally.
Come prepared is BAFFLE’s advice to tour participants. How do you prepare for a tour with Eamon McNally? “Pray” is the short answer. From the outset, McNally will surprise or astound you, or not, but there will be no apologies. Imaginatively, his mind is an attic; a rather splendid one as his colourful publication suggests. Forty five minutes or an hour in this man’s company will present ample opportunity to catch a glimpse.
His poetry has never given him a BAFFLE Poets Festival Turnip (first prize ) but many, many of his poems would more than qualify. How the adjudicators overlooked him, time after time, is a source of mystification to BAFFLE fans. It is rumoured that he bribes adjudicators not to pick him but he could have started that one himself.
What no one can deny about Eamon McNally is that, as a founder member of BAFFLE Poets, as a hard working holder in his day, of every position on the BAFFLE Committee, as a pillar of Loughrea Boxing Club for most of his substantial life, as a collector of and a contributor to the culture and folklore of Loughrea.
Definitely there will be a lot of interest so if you want to partake in this unique tour, get your name down early.
For free, regular BAFFLE updates, text your name and email address to 085 723 9561.
