St. Pat's for All Parade 2023

Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Paul Muldoon and Pogues co-founder Cáit O’Riordan will serve as grand marshals for the 23rd annual St. Pat’s for All parade, the inclusive celebration of Irish culture and heritage that will take place on Sunday, March 5, marching through Sunnyside and Woodside, Queens.

A press release offered further details. “Founded by Brendan Fay and other LGBTQ activists in 2000 to respond to exclusion from the St. Patrick’s Day parade on Fifth Avenue, (the parade) has become its own beloved institution, continuing to stand up for queer civil rights, gender equality, racial equality, and immigrant rights. (The Fifth Avenue parade invited LGBTQ+ marchers to participate in 2016.)

“The gathering begins at noon on March 5, at 43rd Street and Skillman Avenue in Sunnyside. The grand marshals will be introduced and will deliver remarks, along with parade organizers, elected officials, and other participants.

"Special guests will include the Irish Consul General in New York Helena Nolan, and the Irish Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration, and Youth, Roderic O’Gorman, who is visiting from Ireland.

“The parade steps off at 1 pm, marching through Sunnyside and Woodside to 58th Street and Woodside Avenue, where informal parties and gatherings continue for the rest of the day, including at local favorites The Beerkeeper and Donovan’s Pub.

“Families and civic groups, pipers and stepdancers, human rights organizations and unions, Girl Scouts, boys and girls clubs, stilt-walkers and Chinese dragons, Brazilian drummers and Irish trad musicians will all turn Skillman Avenue green!"

Parade co-chair Kathleen Walsh D’Arcy, joined this year by co-chair Miranda J. Stinson, said: “Our motto of ‘Cherishing All the Children Equally’ will be represented by the smiles and joy of so many children and families along the route."

St. Pat's For All Parade returns in triumph to Queens

Muldoon was born in County Armagh in 1951. He now lives in New York. A former radio and television producer for the BBC in Belfast, he has taught at Princeton University for 35 years. He is the author of 14 collections of poetry including Moy Sand and Gravel, for which he won the 2003 Pulitzer Prize, and Howdie-Skelp, published by FSG and Faber and Faber in 2021.

O’Riordan is a musician, writer, and broadcaster, as well as a founder member of London-Irish punk band The Pogues, with whom she played and sang on albums including the classic Rum, Sodomy, and the Lash. She moved to Dublin in 1989 and has since played bass for many acclaimed Irish acts including The Radiators from Space, Hothouse Flowers, Mundy, Jerry Fish, and Gavin Friday.

“As well as her musical work, in 2013 Cáit graduated from University College Dublin with a master’s degree in psychological science. In 2016 Cáit was designated an Individual with Extraordinary Ability or Achievement by the United States government and awarded the prestigious O-1 work visa, since when she has been a regular performer at the Irish Arts Center in New York City. In 2020 the Irish band U2 picked Cáit to be the on-air voice of their new SiriusXM channel U2 X-Radio.”