{"id":520279,"date":"2026-06-05T15:26:11","date_gmt":"2026-06-05T15:26:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/520279\/"},"modified":"2026-06-05T15:26:11","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T15:26:11","slug":"poem-written-by-junior-cert-pupils-mother-appears-in-his-english-paper-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/520279\/","title":{"rendered":"Poem written by Junior Cert pupil\u2019s mother appears in his English paper \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Junior Cycle pupil in Co Galway<\/a> got quite the surprise this week when a poem written by his mother, and inspired by him, came up in the English paper during this year\u2019s State exams. <\/p>\n

Envoi in Chalk, written by Emily Cullen, a poet in residence at the University of Limerick<\/a>, appeared in section D of the higher-level English examination paper. <\/p>\n

Chosen as Poem of the Week<\/a> in The Irish Times in December 2019, it was inspired by her son, Lee Davison, now 15, who sat the exam at Col\u00e1iste \u00c9inde in Salthill<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Cullen said when she collected her son from school after the exam on Wednesday he looked \u201cvery happy\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe said, \u2018Mam, it went great. You won\u2019t believe it, but the poem you wrote about me came up. The one about the chalk\u2019. It was just a surreal moment, priceless really,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

Lee was not sure whether to reveal the poem\u2019s origins when answering the question. \u201cHe decided that the person marking his paper might not believe him, so he answered in the third person,\u201d Cullen said. <\/p>\n

Envoi in Chalk was written in 2019 by the poet when her mother was still alive but in hospital. The Co Leitrim<\/a> native said she took inspiration from her son, who was then aged eight. <\/p>\n

Cullen recalled how she had beckoned Lee in for dinner at their Rahoon home when she saw he had written a message, \u201cThe world is great\u201d, with chalk on a pavement. <\/p>\n

\u201cI just thought, \u2018Wow\u2019. I was having one of those days where nothing was going right. I came in and the poem wrote itself. They\u2019re very rare because most poems take a good bit of revising and redrafting, but that just came out,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

After the exam, Col\u00e1iste \u00c9inde deputy principal Seamus Kelly said it was a \u201clovely coincidence\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe message Lee chalked on the pavement and the message of the poem is so positive and life-affirming, a young boy\u2019s view of the world that gives us all a lift,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Cullen did not know her poem \u2013 which featured in her third poetry collection, Conditional Perfect, by Doire Press \u2013 would appear in the Junior Certificate<\/a> exam. It was \u201can incredible feeling\u201d to learn it featured on the paper, she said. \u201cIt\u2019s a poem that has a bright message in these dark times and it\u2019s all thanks to Lee.\u201d <\/p>\n

Envoi in chalk by Emily Cullen<\/p>\n

I\u2019m calling my son from the end of the estate<\/p>\n

when my eye snags on green pastel words. <\/p>\n

He has chalked on the pavement:<\/p>\n

The world is great<\/p>\n

This is just the line I need to read,<\/p>\n

my mother in hospital, my shoulder inflamed,<\/p>\n

future employment uncertain,<\/p>\n

Earth eyeballing Armageddon.<\/p>\n

Yet how right, his perception.<\/p>\n

He bolts up on his yellow scooter,<\/p>\n

eight-year old fringe quiffed with gel,<\/p>\n

on the cusp of the age of cool.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Junior Cycle pupil in Co Galway got quite the surprise this week when a poem written by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":520280,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[40],"tags":[9,10,18,13,14,1878,6,19,17,111135,11,12,10743,15,16,5,71248,165093,7,8,21349],"class_list":["post-520279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-breaking-news","tag-breakingnews","tag-eire","tag-featured-news","tag-featurednews","tag-galway","tag-headlines","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-junior-cert","tag-latest-news","tag-latestnews","tag-leitrim","tag-main-news","tag-mainnews","tag-news","tag-poems-of-the-week","tag-salthill","tag-top-stories","tag-topstories","tag-university-of-limerick-ul"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/520279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=520279"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/520279\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/520280"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=520279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=520279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=520279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}