Copihue Poetry

You know you’re Irish if you have one of these,
though you’ll also find you’re Armenian
or Hispanic or Jewish or Czech, because thrift
is universal. What, then, is Irish? Is it Dansk

biscuit tins full of sewing detritus? Not ours
either? Stew is also out—it isn’t really an
innovation to boil all the food that you have left,
or at least not one that one can claim. To ask

an old lad on the road directions, shoot the breeze
and end up drinking with him? #onlyinireland?
The past is better everywhere, and there’s no craft
in protesting so much difference. But there is risk.