Poet Cathal O Searcaigh pronounces English words carefully and deliberately in the distinctive accent of the Donegal Gaeltacht. Preoccupied with sounds, he says poetry should sing darkness into light.
It is an interesting metaphor to use minutes before a raging storm cuts the power supply into his north Donegal home.
His house is the topic of conversation as O Searcaigh, blissfully unconventional in his Nepalese suit and Tibetan hat, goes in search of candles.
Donegal County Council, he explains, has agreed to his "mad plan" to allow him to live in the house rent-free for the rest of his life, as mentioned in yesterday's Arts page.
"Enlightened" is the word he chooses to describe the approach of the council, which will also build an extension onto his small bungalow to cater for the constant stream of Irish language and poetry enthusiasts who seek him out in his secluded retreat four miles from Gortahork.
With a growing reputation in Ireland, and eight collections published, O Searcaigh and his poetry also travel well. His work has been translated into several languages, including Romanian and Hindi, and he has travelled the world giving readings.
A natural talker and joker, it is easy to imagine him mesmerising Nepalese villagers and literary scholars alike.
In a throwback to the system of patronage, O Searcaigh has entered into an exchange with Donegal County Council. He will hand over his archives to the county library rather than opting, as many writers do, to sell them to American universities.
"The arts climate is such in Donegal at the moment that I could approach the council with this mad plan and have it accepted. It is very enlightened now compared to what it was six or seven years ago," he says.
He is concerned that there is no structured approach in Ireland generally to ensure that writers' archives stay in the country. "American universities such as Notre Dame and Boston College have unlimited finance to entice people with," he says.
The archives, including drafts of poems, books and items O Searcaigh has collected, will be catalogued, and many will go on display from next year in the county library in Letterkenny.
In fact O Searchaigh did not ask the council for a great deal. The house is actually his family home, built for his elderly parents in the late 1980s.
It nestles at the side of a hill alongside the thatched cottage he grew up in. Inside, it is alive with colour, with Nepalese rugs on the floors and Mexican tiles on the hob.
Both his parents are now dead and O Searcaigh has also inherited a 30-acre hill farm. His parents lived the life of many of their generation in Donegal, spending periods in Scotland working on farms and in factories.
His mother never learned to read or write, but his father often read aloud the poems of Robbie Burns. He says he is very appreciative that they didn't have any "social aspirations" for him.
He learned to speak English at the age of seven or eight and writes only in Irish because English, for him, is not an "emotional language". But he is not puritanical about translation.
"Native Irish speakers are often not as militant, in perhaps the way people who have learned Irish as a second language can be messianic about it."
His published collections since the first in 1975 include Home- coming and Out In The Open. He is currently working on a travel book about Nepal based on his diaries from frequent trips there.
"It's important to be able to rejuvenate yourself at different stages of your life," he says, before making the tea and poking fun at a fellow Donegal man known for his hospitality.
"With Daniel, it's tea and Mammy. Here, it's tea and metaphysics."