My granduncle's garden - Gairdín mo sheanuncail

Weren't we the innocent ones
when we believed
that you had counted all the apples
on the single apple tree in your garden.
You were like a conscience or god, or a Garda,
deluding us into accepting your prohibition
- and we were too credulous.
We were always too afraid
to lay a hand on them.

But I didn't worry about the untasted apples:
there was plenty of other wild fruit
- bilberries, raspberries and blackberries -
in plentiful supply in the ditches
or on the mountain.

Your lie is now clear to me
though free from poison -
poison that lurked in the lies
of the guardians of the other Garden.

Nach muidne a bhí go saonta
nuair a cheap muid go raibh
na húlla ar an aon chrann úll
id' ghairdín comhraithe agat.
Bhí tú mar choinsias nó dia nó póilín
ag cur dallamullóg na fainice orainn
- is bhí muidne róchreidmheach.
Bhí faitíos orainn ariamh
lámh a leagadh orthu.

Ach ba chuma liom na húlla nár bhlaiseas:
bhí go leor torthaí eile fiáin
- fraocháin. sútha craobh is sméartha -
le fáil go fairsing cois claí
nó ar dhroim sléibhe.

Is léir dom anois do bhréag
nach raibh aon nimh inti -
nimh a bhí i mbréaga lucht faire an Ghairdín eile.