For A Family Saga
They were happy then
his children brought friends
home Mr. Mather would get out a fiddle
they’d roll back the carpet and dance
kindly but strict
great grandfather Mather
managed the rolling stock
at night in the yards
in his spare time
Mather made violins
made music for his family
most able bodied men were then in France
except Brugner with TB
Brugner born but a score and seven
years before young death
had hung his work in an art academy
and was much missed after…
Peggy and Jack he
had them sit for him
Rebecca and Lizzie he
painted their portraits
covering his canvases with varnish
in the manner of the masters
Lizzie told fortunes read palms
read King George’s hand
my grandmother helped her
their profits high in the hundreds
& Brugner dying at twenty seven
had painted fine things
portraits
landscapes Tyne river scenes
nothing uglier than a storm cloud
Of the sisters Lizzie was most fond
but Rebecca lived longest outlived all of them
Donnelly married her
of Donnelly little is known
emigrant Black Irish
came back for the fighting
he had a wife in Canada
unknown to all
my mother brought up by a "widow"
because Rebecca married a bigamist
but her child never knew
lived thinking Donnelly was killed in the First War.
kindly but strict
great grandfather Mather
killed by a train
one night in the yards
the night Donnelly was confronted
that same night
that same night
Mather’s distress left him heedless of danger
worried about his pregnant daughter
he walked into a moving train
of those violins that Mather had made
none were retained
for selling off his father’s fiddles
brother Jack was blamed
when grandmother lived with us
there were two large oil paintings in her room
Peggy and Jack
& two landscapes in water colors
there was also a small oil
of a Tyne river scene
later lent to a friend for safekeeping
destroyed by an IRA bomb.
© Dick Russell, 2013
