"The Cave of the Cat":

Ownee na Gat - entrance to the Otherworld for the ancient Gaels - is perhaps the strangest place in Ireland; a complete enigma, a place beyond comprehension! On the Plains of Cruachan in the townland of the same name, county Roscommon, the demesne of the Connacht royals, it would seem to be aligned to Rath Cruachan itself - the principal Rath of the Connacht Royals! But it's more than just a souterrain, it goes right down into the subterranean chasms, as if some snake plunging headfirst through the Roscommon earth.

Ownee na Gat - Entrance to the Otherworld

But it's its contents, its composition, which is the first of its wide-eyed cornucopia. It seems to hit one in the gut, as if something visceral is at work - as 'though the resonant rapture of wisdom ancient is being illuminated and echoed in the walls. It seemed on one level, not only were the entrails of Mother Earth being shaken and poured from some invisible goblet, as being drained from a tin can, but also my adult consciousness, and hence I had returned to the larvae or bubble and was in my mother's womb again! As if I were floating in water - pacific and tranquil waters of purity, so much so. I had no feeling of claustrophia and indeed didn't want to leave.

The structure and topography of the Cave is most unusual and is another Iris in the wider-eyed cornucopia; the walls, for instance, are layered and textured like the pipes of an organ or like a series of fluted canisters or tubular bells. Could the walls have been stripped by mortals in ancient times, or is it something otherworldly or at least a cameo kaleidoscope of the otherworld! On the ground, I found a stone - not embedded in the ground - but loose - sitting on its side which was either a carving of a Pig, a Cat or a Bull! And then there was the strange mist that appeared in the first picture, I took inside, which appeared to trace the outline and shape of a human!

Outline or body shape? This image was taken  when I was looking down the passage from the end of it. I had just sung a song and recited a poem. My friend was at much further down. 

Could the cave represent a kind of re-birth, re-generation of the individual? A parallel with one interpretation of the Lazarus story - that when going in there, one was metaphorically dead, and when one came out, one was re-born, born again, renewed? The Folklore of Ireland's Saint Patrick, in his cave on Station Island is slightly similiar. (This concept, having been perpetuated from Pre-Christian belief systems). The idea of being plunged into something - full imersion - could also be signified, much like the penitent being plunged into the baptismal waters of renewal (perhaps I touched on that, in my feeling of 'Floating in water'?).

But it would be amiss of me, to not consider the possiblity of it, being a place of initiation and entry for the Royals, given its not more than 100 metres from Rath Croghan. The High King of Ireland, when crowned at Tara, was deemed to be wed to the Mother - the earth. Could the same thing have been at work here for the Connacht Royals? (It's interesting to note there are possibly more Raths in Roscommon, than any other part of Ireland!).

The Cave of Ownnee na Gat is one of the strangest, most curious and logic defying places in Ireland. If one throws into the melting pot, the likelihood that the epic tale from Gaelic mythology 'The Tain' (the 'Cattle raid of Cooley', featuring the Queen of Connacht, Queen Maeve, and the legendary Cu Chulainn) started around here, it's easy to conclude that this was a very important and special area. The Cave of Ownee na Gat could be a real candidate for the erstwhile TV series 'Ripley's believe it or not!'

In the heart of the souterrain - is that an orb?

"The Oarsman":

The oar's angle skimming
the lake's azure pure marble;
As a Barber clip clop trimming
trough swishing - sighs his warble.
Oarsman rowing, ring running,
round ripples as laying corbels
Strokes sighing, sounds punning
cultivating acts with cunning.

Rowing Boat swaying on its back
as clutching the banner spangled
in blue and silver, making track,
as 'though the lake nymph ogled
Oarsman raking hay to sack
the oath Olympic horn bugled!

No flailing arms or wings dishevelled
as music and sport he pulls
From a crowd of waves revelled
his double entendres, nimbly culls!
No time to double O'ER and hunch
as the beams he jousts inch by inch........