MOTHER BERNADINE You could have played Volumnia in Coriolanus Or been a model for a Vermeer portrait As you swept into our classroom Your rosary with beads as big as haws, Slung low about your waist like a cowboy's belt; The yards of Clery's gabardine Making deep pockets at your sides, Into which we aimed paper darts And dreamed that some day We would throw in a lighted match And set a nun on fire. That would have made the front page Of the Evening Herald; 'Pupils set nun ablaze,' But your seagull eyes, your poise And the love of the things you taught Saved you, Mother Bernadine. Tintern Abbey and Paradise Lost, Book I, They and your seagull eyes and your poise, Wordsworth and Milton saved you, Mother Bernadine, >From the distant moment of instant fame. -- Maureen Charlton, "Duet for Two Dubs," Swan Press (Dublin) 1997. Maureen Charlton has written extensively for the stage. Work includes Smock Alley (Gate Theatre), Go Where Glory Waits Thee (Gate Theatre) and Berlioz and The Girl From Ennis (John Field Room, National Concert Hall). Production sof these have been transmitted by Radio Eireann. A frequent broadcaster, she has contributed to the Arts Show, Talking About Poets and Sunday Miscellany. Her book of poetry Lyrics from Nora Barnacle was published in 1991. Her Selected Fables of La Fontaine was published in 1995 and was recommended for the European Translation Prize. She is founder and co-editor of Martello Magazine.