Memo to Bridie Flynn [Terence Winch]

 

My mother's name was Bridget Flynn. One of eleven children, she was born just outside of the town of Loughrea, in county Galway, Ireland, on 23 November 1906. Eight of her siblings stayed in Ireland, so I have many cousins there. The house (greatly modernized) and land are still in the family, owned by my cousin Martin Flynn, with whom I am close. My mother immigrated to New York sometime in the early 1920s. She married my father, Patrick Winch, in 1930. I am the youngest of their five children.

Known as Bridie, my mother died of breast cancer on 14 January 1962, at age 55, after a long illness. I was 16 at the time, and took her death very hard. In many ways that loss has marked me for life, and its aftermath has certainly had an impact on my writing. I had forgotten about the poem included here, which was written in 2005 and never before published.

My mother was funny, smart, and tough, with an endless supply of Irish farmgirl wisdom: you have to eat a pound of dirt before you die, she'd say. Or: you'll be better before you get married. Or: you could talk the cross off an ass. Or: you’re as slow as a snail on the way to Jerusalem. I would guess that the photo above was taken when she was about 17, probably not long after arriving in the U.S. But since she came here as something akin to an indentured servant, I wondered about the stylish outfit she is wearing in the photo. My cousin Mary Winch suggests that the photography studio probably supplied it. She missed Ireland all her life, but she loved New York and hated going beyond the city limits. The photo below is one of the last I have of her, taken by the back door of the Dew Drop Inn on 114th Street in Rockaway Beach, Queens, in the summer of 1960. Rockaway was "The Irish Riviera" in those days, and we spent all or part of the summer there when I was growing up. She was already sick when the photograph was taken, but not yet bedridden.     

 

Memo to Bridie Flynn

Your eldest son says he is dying fast, but he’s been claiming

that for years and still seems solid and hardy. Your middle son’s life

is an ongoing party of which he is the host. Your youngest son

has a job with his own little cubicle. He walks a lot, listens to music.

Makes tea every hour and a half or so, like all the Irish.

For your elder daughter, life is a very happy

social event. She lives in a doublewide in Florida

with her husband, who just turned seventy-five. She loves

to talk, but her health isn’t too good. Your younger daughter,

the family beauty, is also the most spiritual of us all.

You’d be ninety-nine if you were still alive. But you found

it necessary to die in 1962. Jesus, Mom, 1962! Kennedy

was president. I was in high school. Even I, your baby,

am now older than you ever were. I knew there was no God

when you died. I knew there was no afterlife when you

failed to visit me from the beyond. I know there is food,

sex, music, books, sleep, art, movies, friends, talk, love.

Please tell me that’s enough. Just once, pay a little visit.

Tell me what I need to know before you go.

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In 2023, my brother Jesse Winch produced a Winch Family Band CD called The Irish Riviera, the title song of which is a composition of mine. It is sung beautifully by my niece Fiona Winch, Jesse's daughter, with vocal harmonies by the fabulous Eileen Estes. ("Pete on the feet, his mother on the box," a line in the lyrics, refers to Pete and Ma McNulty of the McNulty Family, a hugely popular group among the New York Irish in the mid 20th century; 103rd Street, also evoked in the song, was action central for the Rockaway Irish in those days, with Irish bars featuring live music from the boardwalk to the bay.)  If you go to my website and scroll down, you can listen to Fiona singing the song.

Bridie Flynn, June, 1930, age 23

[Note: this post first appeared on the now defunct Best American Poetry blog on 9 May 2010. It is revised and updated here.]

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Selected Comments on the original post:

Oh, lovely - both the poem and your mom.
    Posted by: Laura Orem | May 12, 2013 at 03:02 PM

Oh, I too wish for a visit. Nothing all these years and now I too am older than my mom when she died. Sigh. Love the older pic of her as a young woman!
    Posted by: Caitlin Hotlaing | May 12, 2013 at 03:30 PM

Wonderful, Terence. I remember your mentioning her and her early death when we worked together. She was a handsome, lovely woman and it's great to see her! My mother died when I was five. She was 39. So, I never really knew her, and have always wondered.
    Posted by: Melinda | May 12, 2013 at 05:44 PM

Tears in my eyes Terence. I heard the poem from you shortly after it was written and am so happy the rest of the world now gets to know it too. It's brilliantly honest and vice versa, as you are, and I know your mother was. I wish I could have known her for just a moment, and though my mother stuck around til I was 23 so I'm more fortunate than you or Cait and Miles, I have felt the same way you do and did all my life as well, thank you for articulating that so perfectly.
    Posted by: Michael Lally | May 15, 2013 at 10:45 AM

You said it for me, Michael. "Brilliantly honest" and honestly brilliant. Just honesty is something to aspire to; brilliance is a bonus. A generous man, our Terence, admirable in his devotion to his earthy muse, unique and inimitable in his voice, and an extraordinary poet of the ordinary. And his mother was a beautiful woman.
    Posted by: William McPherson | May 19, 2013 at 09:44 PM

Wow. That adds a lot of dimension, detail, and perspective to a story that's still playing itself out in us. Thanks for sharing this. I found it deeply meaningful and enriching.
    Posted by: Billy Joe Thorpe | January 14, 2022 at 02:28 PM

Oh how lovely and wonderful - it adds a few more pieces to the pictures of your Mom that I had puzzled together from the book "The Seeing Eye Boy."
    Posted by: Tina | January 14, 2022 at 07:09 PM

I just saw this, coincidentally on the anniversary of my own mother's death. Thank you, Terence. Beautiful.
    Posted by: Gerald Fleming | January 21, 2022 at 12:10 AM

My Irish Mom loved your music and a good celtic evening. I can only wish to live as long as her....she was 100 when covid came in and took her. lovely to remember our Moms on this Mother's Day.
    Posted by: Kelley | May 14, 2024 at 12:41 AM