Remembering Margaret

The dream always the same: I'm listening to
The latest CD you sent – Matt Cranitch,
Or Ó Riada, or Mná an Oileáin'.
I want to ring to thank you; but I can't
Find your number anywhere. And then
I remember: you changed your mobile
The week before you died, so now of course
I can't get through. And - something I hadn't
Noticed before - this CD's defective.
I take it out and rinse it under the tap,
But it doesn't make any difference.
It still judders at the same point, just before
Séamus Begley starts on 'Aisling Ghéar'.

Bernard O'Donoghue's most recent collection, The Seasons of Cullen Church (Faber), was nominated for the 2016 T S Eliot Poetry Award