The Forge by Seamus Heaney
I used to work in a historical village (I wore a colonial costume and everything). Since I was always giving house tours, I never really visited the blacksmith shop, but I do remember that the “blacksmith” was a huge flirt. That really has nothing whatsoever to do with this poem. This poem seems like what a forge should be.
The Forge
By Seamus Heaney
All I know is a door into the dark.
Outside, old axles and iron hoops rusting;
Inside, the hammered anvil’s short-pitched ring,
The unpredictable fantail of sparks
Or hiss when a new shoe toughens in water.
The anvil must be somewhere in the centre,
Horned as a unicorn, at one end square,
Set there immoveable: an altar
Where he expends himself in shape and music.
Sometimes, leather-aproned, hairs in his nose,
He leans out on the jamb, recalls a clatter
Of hoofs where traffic is flashing in rows;
Then grunts and goes in, with a slam and a flick
To beat real iron out, to work the bellows.
So did the flirty blacksmith have hairs in his nose too?
But apart from these biographical questions, I must say, time for me to go find and read more Heaney. Thanks.