Three Monkeys Online

A Curious, Alternative Magazine

Fred Astaire – a poem

By Tom Brace

Fred Astaire

When I was nineteen I laughed
At what I heard people call your “Art”.
Art! Like Joyce or Jean Paul Sarte?
No. I had you firmly in a bracket.
Somewhere between Elvis Presley
And Bob Cratchet.
But when I was thirty-eight
And it was a wet Sunday afternoon
And the pubs were shut.
And after dinner I watched TV for desert.
I saw you dance, and wondered:
Had your dross turned to gold;
Or was I merely growing old?

Tom Brace was born in Dublin in 1948. He joined the Irish Army in 1968 and served for 21 years and then entered TCD as a mature student in 1989. He graduated with a degree in english literature and history. He then entered the Irish civil service in the Department of Finance. Recently retired and completed a postgrad M.Phil in Modern Irish History in TCD where he currently acts as a research assistant in the History Department. He is a regular contributor to Three Monkeys Online