Parental life lesson poetry

Sir — As we parents sit in the empty nest, I must congratulate Brendan O’Connor (Mid-life Crisis, Living, Sunday Independent, January 17) on a powerful piece on his moment. No need to go to classes on mindfulness, he said it all.

I immediately reflected on the poem Subh Milis by Seamus O Neill.

I taught this poem in school for many years, but it wasn’t until my children were reared that I realised how powerful the poem is.

Life and child rearing is only a flash and one day you wake up and they are gone and you wonder: “Where did those years go?”

So, well done Brendan, on getting your priorities right and realising that life cannot be plotted and planned and that you capture every moment of quality time with your children.

Things just happen and it takes our children to teach us this lesson in life. We learn to go with the flow. Nothing stays the same.

So, look after these precious moments with your girls and the “pounds” will look after themselves.

‘Subh Milis’

“Bhi subh milis ar bhaschrann an dorais

Ach mhuch me an corrai ionam d’eirigh,

Mar smaoinigh me ar an la a bheas an baschrann glan, Agus an laimh bheag Ar iarraidh.” Seamus O Neill. Translation (There was jam on the door handle, but I pushed away the annoyance that rose within me, because I thought of the day that the door handle would be clean and the little hand gone.) Anna Casey Donohue,

Kinvara, Co Galway