People of the Wild Atlantic Way – 

Rachel Dare – Bantry, West Cork.

‘My favourite poem is – ‘Wild Geese’ by Mary Oliver. I feel like its something that speaks very directly to me, it goes beyond just reading a page. I have connected to it so many times in my life when I needed to look back and say to myself – learn from your mistakes and that you don’t need to be perfect, its about the journey along the way rather than some kind of aspiration to have something nailed.’

Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscape,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.’