More books are on the agenda when wild women and poets gather in Dun Aimhirgin on Mespil Road to toast the publication of two from poet Paddy Bushe. Beards are big at the launch, the poet himself setting the trend. Witness also Achill man John F. Deane, poet and publisher of Dedalus Press, who is responsible for the launch of Hopkins on Skellig by Bushe, and Padraig O Snodaigh, of Coisceim, who is publisher of In Ainneoin na gCloch, the first collection of Irish poems by Bushe. Ministers Maire Ni Chochlain and Sile de Valera come to officiate at the do.
Up from Waterville in Co Kerry, Bushe is joined by his wife, Fiona Ni Chinnsealaigh, just back from a week in Tripoli. Other family members include his mother, Nuala Bushe, and his daughter and son, Ciairin de Buis and Eanna de Buis. Killarney Labour TD Breda Moynihan-Cronin, resplendent in a pink trouser suit, is also here. Bushe, a long-time friend, is to be her director of elections next time out. "He was a natural choice. He's held in great respect by the members," she says.
Maire Ni Laoi, from Tir an Fhia in Connemara and An Siopa Leabhar on Dublin's Harcourt Street, is busy selling the books to the guests. Poet Celia de Freine, whose own book, Faoi Chabaisti is Rionacha, will be published this week, attends too. Next in out of the rain is the poet and award-winning playwright, Biddy Jenkinson. It's a regular cuirt na bhfili.