We had to leave the Hunger
said my Da. We walked
the half of Ireland
trying not to see
what it was we saw. Ditches
filled with bodies
crows and dogs. Potato
patches gone to slime.

We found a ship.
The Hunger came aboard.
The Fever lay in wait
hidden in the holds.
We slept on straw
Ate oatmeal twice a day.

My little brother died
they thew him overboard.
Then I got sick. Clouds covered
all the stars. I saw my Da
no more. We came to land.

They put me in the Quarantine,
My cousin next to me. No one
else we know. The nurse is kind
You’re just a stick, she said. They came
last night and pulled a blanket
over cousin’s eyes and took her out.
I said good bye and slept
and woke in fever dreams.
When you get better you can go
she said. Your Ma is waiting for you
just outside the walls.

*
In all the foolishness and sometimes bacchanalic celebration of St. Patrick’s Day it is good to take a moment to remember the incredible hardship and sacrifice of so many who came to the U.S. from Irish shores, especially in the famine years of the late 1850s.

As a descendant of Murphys, Sullivans, Hogans, McCarthys, McCarvilles, Aherns, Ralleys, Lyons I’ve long had a visceral link to the history of those who got me here. Earlier this year my brother, Larry Kirkland, a widely known and admired public artist, was in the final four of a competition for a memorial to the dead at the Staten Island Quarantine Station — the predecessor of Ellis Island. His concept was a series of marble monuments with draped figures resting on top and text engraved on the sides, entering into and conveying their hopes, dreams, sorrows and lives. I worked with him to provide the text.

We weren’t chosen, as perhaps too somber for what the city fathers had in mind — a pleasant tourist destination. But we are proud of what we tried to do. The text above is one of about 10 I did. Others follow, down the page…

By the way, Thomas Cahill, author of How the Irish Saved Civilization, [well worth reading] has a very nice opinion piece in the NY Times today. Read a book!

Here are some of the other texts that might have gone with the marble. None are finished in the sense that finishing would have been when the chisel hit the stone. They are indications of the way my channeling was going…. wbk

And we endured the loss of green
and we endured the howling wind
and we sold everything we had, the dog
the door, the awl.
To come to this.

New York is that, they say,
a daub across the water.
We’re behind the walls,
nothing in the belly but a knot.
That’s all we started with
but us. Now
not that.
A coat, a hat, my pants, my shoes
is all that’s left.

I cannot write the number
but I can say it. Six.
The deaths I’ve heard with my own ears.

Burnt out blue light of her eyes.
Red face gone pale at last
in death as life before we came.
Each cried in her own way,
one gone a week
six weeks across the water and
that left me.

Take this last, this child of mine
sepulcher earth
and have her your way.
To me it doesn’t matter
headstone in the dirt
or headstones in the sea.

I’ll remember them
with every day of work
every shovelful of earth
every sip that takes a thirst.

*

The reference to the fire fighters near the end is to the arson committed on the Quarantine Hospital by citizens of the town outside the gate, terrified at the spread of Yellow Fever, and spreading rumors and fear like the wind. Though an enormous percentage of the Quarantined passengers in the 1880s were Irish, there were others as well, including significant numbers of German and Italians. The Yellow Fever was particularly feared and appeared mostly with ships which had stopped through Cuba and other Caribbean islands before making port in New York.

First he got the chills.
We wrapped him in his rags
as best we could. Then his head took pain,
like a knife pushed through my eyes, he said.

I held him in my arms.
And watched his eyes turn red,
seep bloody tears. Brother, you’ll get better.
We have work, I told him.
He tried to smile. Blood ran from his teeth.
We brought him to the Quarantine.
Carried in a young man’s arms. We cleaned him up.
I bathed his face. He turned
and threw black bile on the floor.

He began to curse a man from long ago.
His skin was yellow, pumpkin yellow.
He stared and saw a man where no man was,
coming at him with a devil’s grin.
He fell into a coma. Then one hundred men
or more with torches in the night began to burn us down.
We got him to the lawn. The hospital went
a scarlet roar. We don’t want the filthy strangers here!
Firefighters ran and sent another building up. My brother died.
We laid him in a common grave.

I went to work the railroads.

*

Other immigrants were hired in Manhattan to come to Staten Island for six month shifts to work the wheel-barrows, carting bodies and belongings off the ships.

I barrow the bodies, day after day, ship into shore.  Ship following ship, forever.  Where are they coming from? Ireland somewhere.  What for?  Women and children too weak to walk.  Men one hundred fifty pounds of helpless weight.  Twenty of a child. I carry three at a time.  Others walking thin so thin, their clothes, their hair a stiffened grime.  We can see the lice run off of them.  Not a sound. Not a sound but shuffling feet. The squeal of barrows.  Those to Ward B says the man.  That one to the morgue.  We wrap our faces in winding cloth to keep the fevers away.   Poor souls says my wife.  Poor your own children if I bring home the fever, say I.  Stop them from coming.  Blow the winds eastward to wherever they come from or let the ocean take them.  God help me.

*
This was a first effort of the one at the top of the list.

We brought the landlord’s wheat crop in.
He pitched us out, we had no rent.
The potato patch was black with slime.
We had no food. We begged him at the gate.
Here’s passage to America he said.
Be gone. We walked for weeks
with thousands more across
a rain soaked Ireland. Families dropped
in ditches where dogs
compete with crows
for what they find.

We made our way aboard a ship
and then we learned what suffering meant.
Oatmeal porridge once a day.
Water filled with living things.
Storms slammed us day and night.
Water ran through hatches
we were locked below.
No place to lie our bodies
but in filth. The smallest one
went first, then his sister, dragged
on deck with grappling irons
I swear to God and tossed overboard
no man alive would touch her.

And now we’re here. New York
a mile away. We cannot leave.
They put my wife in quarantine.
I held a holy candle over her
and prayed with every breath.
What have I done?
Traded old world grief for new.

*

This is in the form of a letter. Like others there is a sense of matter-of-factness that must have become a part of all those who had to push on, despite sorrows most of us can barely conceive.

My Dr. Brother Frank. This may be the last letter you receive from me. The fever’s got me in its grip., Yesterday I felt pure well. By last night pure hell. Molly didn’t make the trip. We left her mid Atlantic. The ceremony was fine. A song or two from Galway folk. A fellow with a year of seminary said the rites. A man who burned himself in a cooking fire went with her. The children are outside the walls with a woman I met. They were healthy last I heard. She’ll take them to Cleveland to some County Mayo people there. Joseph’s got the money left. He’s quite the man at ten. Ask for Brigitte Murphy when you go. And light a candle for us. Yr loving Brother Brian

*

This was a particular favorite of artist and writer.

So many kinds of red in the world
the red of the old cows udder
we long ago had
spitting it’s warm white milk

The red of the cardinal’s hat
in the coach he drove by in

the red of the wind whipped boy
holding the rail, straining to be
the first to see
America, lifting her bright
green promise above the horizon of blue

The red of the warden’s face
peering down from the wall

The red of the little one
wet with the fever,
red on her cheeks,
red in her eyes, scorched round the blue

red the screams of delirium
dry, oh dry her lips
my little one

Had I known the price of passage
I would never have come.

*
Here is a first try and then a pared down second try. The word limit for any text in marble was to be about 250 — so you’ll see why the longer, first text had to be pared.

1st
First I slept upstairs. The sails were big. The winds were cool. We lit a fire. The sparks flew up and joined the stars. Gone a courtin’ said my Da. He pointed me the evening star. I heard the mothers talking. One was crying. I heard the fathers too. There’s my Da. They talk of home. They talk of where they’re going –Cleveland, Albany, St. Lou, Kansas City. Your Da will have a a farm. One cow? Girl, count ten! The potatoes went all black, like slime. We ate dandelion, cress and garlic ferns. The baby cried a lot, a lot. Then stopped. We had to leave the dog behind. I cried. We’ll get another said my Da.. Then I got sick and came down here. I hear the women whispering. They call it fiabhras dubh. It’s nothing says my Ma. She drips water on my face, my arms. I’m burning Ma. Go get some more she tells my Da. I’m hot, so hot. I cannot cry. You’re a big girl now they say. My stomach hurts. It’s rashed and red. There’s spots upon my hands and legs. I don’t hear my Da no more. My brother brings me stirabout, boiling in an old tin cup. It’s too hot. I can’t sit up. It smells so bad down here I can not breathe. I see them carry bodies out. Just to have a walk says Ma. They cut my hair when I was hot. Pray my darling says my Ma. I pray for water. No one hears. My lips are cracked. They hurt. They hurt. I want to scream. It hurts too much. I cannot breathe. I cannot see. I hear her voice. I feel her hands. It’s dark down here. She tries to clean me up. Then I see my Nana wave. She couldn’t come. We put her in a fever hut in Skibereen. It’s cold down here! I’m cold, Ma, cold! I cannot keep my shoulders still. My teeth are shuddering. I cannot feel my hair. I cannot feel my face. That’s my Da now calling, calling. Ma, I hear him calling.

2nd Try
I’m hot, so hot. I cannot cry. You’re a big girl now they say. My stomach hurts. It’s rashed and red. There’s spots upon my hands and legs. I don’t hear my Da no more. My brother brings me stirabout, boiling in an old tin cup. It’s too hot. I can’t sit up. It smells so bad down here I can not breathe. I see them carry bodies out. Just to have a walk says Ma. They cut my hair when I was hot. Pray my darling says my Ma. I pray for water. No one hears. My lips are cracked. They hurt. I want to scream. It hurts too much. I cannot breathe. I cannot see. I hear her voice. I feel her hands. It’s dark down here. She tries to clean me up. Then I see my Nana wave. She couldn’t come. We put her in a fever hut in Skibereen. It’s cold down here!  I’m cold, Ma, cold! I cannot keep my shoulders still. My teeth are clattering.  I cannot feel my hair.  I cannot feel my face. That’s my Da now calling, calling. Ma, I hear him waiting.