The second collection by Limerick poet and playwright includes ‘Laundry’ about a Mother and Baby Home where the author was born. ‘Laundry’ has had an enormous international readership after being published in the Irish Times in 2017, and in 2021 after the controversial Final Report of the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes was published.
Laundry
My grandfather sent everything to the nuns
for a thorough cleaning,
including my mother.
Fervently they washed every stain away,
held us up to the light
so there’s hardly a trace of me left in her
or her left in me.
Things are forever getting separated in the wash,
a fawn silk stocking,
a tiny pink sock with no matcher,
the price to be paid for getting your laundry done.