Once upon a time my undrowned father Walked into our yard. He had gone to spray Potatoes in a field on the riverbank And wouldn't bring me with him. The horse-sprayer Was too big and newfangled, bluestone might Burn me in the eyes, the horse was fresh, I Might scare the horse, and so on. I threw stones At a bird on the shed roof, as much for The clatter of the stones as anything, But when he came back, I was inside the house And saw him out the window, scatter-eyed And daunted, strange without his hat, His step unguided, his ghosthood immanent. When he was turning on the riverbank. The horse had rusted and reared up and pitched Cart and sprayer and everything off balance, So the whole rig went over into a deep Whirlpool, hoofs, chains, shafts, cartwheels, barrel And tackle, all tumbling off the world, And the hat already merrily swept along The quieter reaches. That afternoon I saw him face to face, he came to me With his damp footprints out of the river, And there was nothing between us there That might not still be happily ever after. -- From "Seeing Things" (III) by Seamus Heaney, born Co. Derry 1939