Static

Sundays in summer, my father took me with him to hear the Gaelic
Games -
Hurling, of course, a Tipperary man's birthright and delight.

Since radio reception of RTE - which on the old valve box still read 'Athlone' was poor
and filled with a blizzard of wordless static we'd take the car - a Hillman Imp -
up the vertiginous alp of Harrow on the Hill and park next to a telegraph pole,
in search of a perfect signal

As if by magic through the air came the alternating anguished and ecstatic tones
of Michael O'Hehir - his voice slicing through the miles like the sliothair splitting the posts
for a marvellous point

Listening rapt, willing victory, the match would pass in what seemed minutes
After we'd sit in easeful silence as the evening became itself
And we were simply ourselves
A father and a son at one
Listening on a clear channel.

By Thom Hickey
8th September 2004