Poet Des Kavanagh gazes on familiar places

Clonmany native, Des Kavanagh, has published his first anthology of poetry: 'Binnion Road', published by Artisan House.

Des, who now lives in Galway, named the collection after the scenic road that connects his home village with the shore.

The anthology will be launched by Margaret Farren in Clonmany Community Centre on Easter Sunday at 5.30pm and will followed by a reading by Des himself.

There is an eloquent introduction to ‘Binnion Road’ by the late Seamus Deane, a friend of Des’s since their schooldays in St Columb’s College in Derry. Seamus sent Des the introduction just months before his death in May 2021.

In the Introduction to 'Binnion Road', Seamus Deane said: "Des Kavanagh’s poems are full of the names of people and places he knows or has known well.

"Names are great familiarisers and Kavanagh’s Ireland is a close and familiar place. But it also bears within it the ache of absence, not just for specific people, but for the world they inhabited, a world that made them and that they also made.

"Kavanagh’s ancestral Inishowen in Donegal, his family, in it’s old and new generations, often provide the pivot that turns him to the past, although it also allows for glimpses of the future, through children and grandchildren."

Des has retired from his work as an orthodontist and, as he said himself: "Since putting down the drill, I have taken up
the quill.’

Classmates at St Columb's College

Des retained a close friendship over a lifetime with Seamus Heaney as well as Seamus Deane and their influences were probably a subconscious encouragement to him to write in his later years.

In his Introduction to 'Binnion Road', Seamus Deane remarked about Des's writing: "We can see in these poems the charismatic presence of Heaney whose influence is palapble throughout - contemplative, charged, observant."

In the poem 'Far and Near', Des describes a drive along the Fanad Peninsula, looking across at his native Inishowen:

In 'Milk Trail', the boy walked to McCarron’s farm to collect milk,

Des’s father was a schoolteacher who had befriended the seannachaí Charles McGlinchey and in a fortuitous collaboration captured his music and stories in 'The Last of the Name' (edited and introduced by Brian Friel).

Three of McGlinchey’s stories are woven into this collection, including Poll an Phíobaire (The Piper’s
Cave).

The poet Tony Curtis said: "Reading Kavanagh’s poems I am reminded of the best whistle players, who play the essence of the tune, not crowding or smothering the air but letting everything appear as natural and easy as a bird in flight."

Des’s work has been shortlisted in the Cúirt New Writing Competition, The Fish Poetry Competition, Hennessy New Irish Writing / Irish Times, and has been broadcasted on RTÉ’s Radio 1 Sunday Miscellany.

Des Kavanagh was  educated in St Columb’s College, Derry, UCG and UCD. In London he did postgraduate Dental studies and trained as an Orthodontist.

He has always had a strong interest and involvement in the arts. He was co-founder and chairperson of The McGlinchey Summer School in his home place for many years.

Through his association with The Clifden Arts Festival he presents each year, with his friend Pete Mullineaux, an evening entitled: “Reading and Singing in The Bookies’ at Paddy Powers bookies shop, with poems, songs and stories
about horses, ponies and greyhounds.