The Hollow Tree

There is a tree in my memory

Hollowed out of mollusced softness

Black and burnt she felt like a cloak

Where one could hide from others eyes

Seek shelter where no one spoke

The tree was in Moyola Park

Where owls hooted in the dark

And boy scouts climbed the clambered bough

To spool and dive in the Race's stream

And quench the thirst of Summer’s dream

That tree if it were now still there

Would be so small I would not dare

Sit, squat and hunkered in my den

I’d go there now to live my life again

(c) O Derry Boy April 2020