Ireland Essay Competition Winner: The Bird Cage

THE BRID CAGE

(Na Heinini)

By JANE STANDAGE*

Patrick was in the hallway in full throat when I arrived for work.

"Where dear old Shannon's flowing

Where the three-leaved shamrock grows

Where my heart is I am going to my little Irish Rose

And the moment that I meet her

With a hug and kiss I'll greet her

For there's not a colleen sweeter where the river Shannon flows."

The tenor stretched out his arms to encompass the land of Ireland over the rainbow as the last strains died on his quivering lips. His semi-deaf audience didn't clap as they were dozing in the other room. Unperturbed, Patrick then had a word with the Pope who was hanging on the wall. "It never would've happened if the Black and Tans hadn't come!" Patrick was told to be quiet and was wheeled into the living room of the rest home.

At 4.58 pm the whine of the bell was the starting gun. The squeaking of the chrome frames down the hall signalled the entrance of forty famished pilgrims in search of succour. They trundled along behind their gleaming metal scaffolding - the chrome forest coming to Dunsinane.

I dropped a plate and Patrick uttered a yelp and sat cowering in his chair. Loud bangs always took him this way. His moans were unnoticed by the peroxided nurses, plump and pink in their functional uniforms while they moved amongst the tables with the swishing noise of heavy-duty pantihose. This behaviour of Patrick's was enigmatic and therefore very normal, all the residents had strange "quirks." Exemplified by Aileen, who at this moment was having a polite conversation with a fly. It buzzed around her head and caught her attention. "Here fly fly fly, here fly, come on boy boys, kissy kiss kiss!" she cooed.

The budgies in the cage in the corner of the room eyed me. Too feeble to fly in a confined space they had become watcher birds. Patrick watched me. Dishing out soup is, of course, profoundly interesting. Patrick always sat apart muttering to himself. He melted between Gaelic and English like the butter, which ran slowly down through the hot toast on his plate.

"Black is the colour of my true love's hair ... " he sang and the ascetic face had a faraway look. I knew he had never married ...

One time, a few months back, Paddy let some of the grey budgies out of the cage. The nurses scolded him for "being naughty," but the next day when I talked to him he didn't seem to care. Being free was a tender gift that Paddy gave to the budgies. He dreamed of it himself until the budgies were found dead outside, from hypothermia. When told, all he did was start singing a song "He gave me a Free State that's bound up with Red, White and Blue ... "

"Now, he's really cracked it!" said the nurse.

At the home, there is a special place in the hallway for the photo of the person of the week. Pinned beside it is the death notice, "Dearly beloved wife of ... or husband ... "

This is how I know not to set a place for them at teatime. One day they're complaining about their tea being cold. The next, they themselves are cold. That's how it is.

Patrick died last month. Patrick, Patrick, in the wheelchair, the lover of strong coffee laced with whisky; who always revelled in backing into the dining room.

Every week his wheels bashed into the trolley spilling several teas. He never got full control of it and I always pitied his life in a wheelchair.

About six months before his death, I was clearing Patrick's plates away. I witnessed a miracle. I saw Lazarus rise from his chair and walk out of the room with a walking frame. I asked a nurse what had happened to Paddy. Why was he walking? The nurse replied that he had always been able to walk but was happier in the wheelchair - just as the budgies were probably happier in their cage. He longed for freedom and feared it at the same time.

I think I was his favourite tea girl because Patrick left me a book when he died. Written inside was - "Thank you for not asking."

It was a diary dated April 10, 1922:

"I've popped the question! I asked Bronagh to marry me! I asked her down by the Liffey where we first met as children. I bent down on one knee and sang, 'Black is the colour of my true love's hair."'

June 17, 1922:

"I can hardly remember anything, it's all such a fuzz. Bronagh and I were down at the pub celebrating the Free Staters' win in the Dail Eirann. It seemed that the first breath of lasting peace was filling our green isle. We stepped outside the pub so that I could walk Bronagh home ... I can still hear the last strains of the national anthem being played with joyous abandon ... I heard the report of a bullet too late. The sniper stealthily crept away ...

"I lie awake at night. Every time I hear a bang I freeze, everywhere I look I see Bronagh.

"Bronagh, God, now I know why the meaning of your name is sorrow. The only reason I wasn't killed ... damn I should've been ... is because you took the bullet meant for me.

"Last night I went out with a shotgun. I meant to do some damage, to take a life for the life untimely ripped from me. I spied Ronan Ryan walking down the road. He's an "Irregular" and I trained the gun on him from the tree. The sweat of my hands made my thumb slick on the trigger ... But at the last instant I swore and jumped down heading home, distraught for not having the guts to be a man and avenge a death of one so sorely missed. I guess I just didn't want another death on my hands.

"Tomorrow I'm leaving for the British colony New Zealand. I have heard many terrible stories but I don't believe them and even if I do I'm too grieved to care. I'll make some semblance of life from the ashes I have left behind and maybe one day I'll be able to think about Bronagh without remembering it means sorrow."

Patrick McCormick 1902-1998

* Jane Standage attends St Mary's College in Wellington. As winner of the Ireland Essay Competition for secondary school students (essays must be on an Irish theme), she will attend a four-week summer school at historic St Columba's College in Dublin.