You Can Touch the Sky, ©John O’Grady 2015
Oil on Panel, 8″ x 10″
A road crosses high over the top of the stark and beautiful lunar landscape of the Burren on the West coast of Ireland.
I was on this road one time and the weather had moved in off the Atlantic.
The rain was coming down hard and heavy, the visibility was terrible and the wipers were slapping back and forth on the windscreen trying to keep up with pushing the water away.
I slowly edged my way to the summit.
The limestone stretched out to the left and right and the grey clouds sent sheets of grey rain sweeping across the road.
As I started my descent the clouds suddenly opened. The sheets of rain kept falling but through the fine veil, I saw the limestone stretching out before me and they were turning light and dark as the clouds moved across it and in the distance, the light was playing off the sea.
This is my memory of that heart stopping moment when the clouds were swirling around me and I felt I could touch the sky.
Seamus Heaney wrote a poem called ‘Postscript’ which mentions the play of light in this part of the world:
And some time make the time to drive out west
Into County Clare, along the Flaggy Shore,
In September or October, when the wind
And the light are working off each other
So that the ocean on one side is wild
With foam and glitter, and inland among stones
The surface of a slate-grey lake is lit
By the earthed lightening of flock of swans,
Their feathers roughed and ruffling, white on white,
Their fully-grown headstrong-looking heads
Tucked or cresting or busy underwater.
Useless to think you’ll park or capture it
More thoroughly. You are neither here nor there,
A hurry through which known and strange things pass
As big soft buffetings come at the car sideways
And catch the heart off guard and blow it open.
I look forward to reading your comment.
How I love that poem.
And your narrative is just as evocative, as is this breathtaking painting, where land, water and sky blur into pure atmosphere.
My eyes widen and my heart races.
Hello Josephine,
yes it is a fabulous poem isn’t it. He really has the atmosphere captured perfectly.Thank you for your kind words on the text and painting, as we know finding the write words to work with a painting can be a fraught experience but this was all memory so it sort of flowed that way.
What a beautiful and atmospheric painting of a wild and exciting place. I can remember the day we visited Aillwee caves nearby and drove back through the Burren. We set off in sunshine but very quickly the weather and the visibility changed to exactly the image you have so beautiful described and depicted. Seamus Heaney describes so eloquently the awesome, exciting beauty and threatening power of this exposed and alien landscape. It was a memorable, otherworldly experience. You have captured it perfectly.
Hello Tisha,
That’s great that it reminds you of there, the weather does change so quickly and Ailwee is very close to where I was thinking of. Yes the landscape is incredible there isn’t it, with its own particular stark beauty. I am glad it brought back some of those memories for you. Thank you for your comment.
Hello John, once again you have used wonderful poetry with your painting which evokes mood, memory an atmosphere. It has an awe inspiring quality creating the feeling that nature can overwhelm at times. I love the wild sense of sweeping movement and looseness in keeping with the unpredictability of the weather. I have never been to that part of Ireland but if ever I do I bet I too would feel like I could touch the sky too on a day such as this.
Hello Christine,
It certainly is a wonderful poem, as always he really captured the essence of that part of the world. Hopefully the painting caught a little bit of that too. Thank you for your thoughtful comment