Brother Gerry

(North Earl Street Series). 

I remember you preaching in the dark on Henry Street,

shouting the word of God
into that echoing alley by the GPO,
as if one lost soul might hear.

I remember you spotting me
sitting in the shadows.

"A ghost," you called me.

Perhaps I was.

People hugged you,
kissed you,
heckled you,
argued with you,
but you never seemed to mind.

You told them of salvation.

I watched.

We became friends gradually,
you unsure,
me wary,
talking a little more each time
our paths happened to cross—

me scuttling about
on mysterious errands,
you proclaiming God's love
to anyone who would listen,
and many who wouldn't.

We spoke of faith,
of Dublin,
of the desperate state of the State.

We sat on steps
and put the world to rights.

It nearly ended
when you asked me out.

I loved you as a brother,
never as a lover,
and it could never be.

Yet somehow
we carried on.

And then one evening,
without expecting it,
we found ourselves holding a life together.

A desperate stranger.
A sudden crisis.

We sat beside them,
talked,
listened,
stayed,

until the sirens came
and others took over.

After that,
life moved on.

You went back to Sligo.

We still crossed paths sometimes,
old friends recognising each other
in the flow of years.

But whenever I return to Dublin,
I find myself looking down that alley.

The dark one by the GPO.

The place where a preacher
once called me a ghost.

I still half expect to see you there,
a small light in the darkness,
telling the world about God.

And somehow I know

that one day

you will be.