The Manse Gate Poem by Bernard Kennedy

At a wave of his hand, with his eye on the traffic,
Underneath his yellow helmet head,
the bulldozer, lifting its beak
Came down upon the old Manse gate,
And in a second, with its pillars
And walls, were rubble for the road,
foundation.
Contributing to its raiso d'etre, passe.

you leave Marlay Park, on the Grange Road side,
the exit gate, facing what was a Manse,
you could have seen it,
a status of Gentry.

Those walls kept in an ethos,
those gate let in a class,
of carriages and conversation.

To a long, winding, Elms driveway,
the Manse well gone.

And now the gates too,
at the dropp of a hand, the wave,
of a young man, helmetted in yellow,
And a cigarette swinging in the spare hand,
as the clear road allows the beak of progress
move away a century of style.

Then he looks to wave me on,
And holding in his hand, pulling on the
smoke,
nods the beak towards the wall,
the highways now ready for foundation.
History is history at a glance.