The Penguin Book of Irish Poetry

by Patrick Crotty (ed)

To Connaught went hastily.

  And to Connaught’s king

  Related his shame,

  How the king of Leinster

  Set upon him with force,

  Took away his wife

  And installed her at Ferns.

  To the king of Connaught

  He bitterly complained

  And earnestly pleaded

  For men from that household

  To help him avenge

  His most bitter shame.

  Connaught’s king sent word

  To the king of Ossory

  That he should not fail

  To come to their aid.

  The two men promised

  He’d be king of Leinster

  If they first could expel

  King Dermot so bold.

  Then this man revolted

  Against Dermot, his lord,

  And Melaghlin, the traitor,

  Abandoned him too;

  And Mac Torkil of Dublin

  Also revolted.

  There joined in the treason

  One Murrough O’Brien,

  Later eaten by dogs

  As the song will relate

  All in due course

  Further on in this story.

  Dermot before Henry II

  When Dermot the valiant,

  Before King Henry

  The king of England

  At last had come,

  He courteously saluted

  And finely addressed him:

  ‘May God in Heaven

  Save and protect you

  And give you also

  Courage and will

  To avenge the misfortune

  My people brought on me;

  Hear, great King,

  That I was born a lord,

  In the country of Ireland

  And acknowledged a king;

  But my own people wronged me

  And took away my kingdom.

  To you, Sire, I plead,

  Before your barons and lords.

  Your liege-man I shall be

  All the days of my life,

  If you will help me

  Not to lose all:

  You I shall acknowledge

  My sire and my lord,

  Right here in front of

  Your barons and earls.’

  Then the king told him,

  That great king of England,

  That he would help him

  As soon as he could.

  Richard, Earl of Pembroke at Waterford

  Then before long,

  So the old people say,

  On St Bartholomew’s Eve

  The great Earl Richard

  And fifteen hundred men

  Landed at Waterford.

  Ragnald and Sidroc

  Were the city’s leaders.

  On St Bartholomew’s Day,

  Earl Richard, the prudent,

  Assaulted and won

  The city of Waterford.

  Many were the citizens

  Who died in the fighting

  Before in the end

  Waterford was won.

  When the earl by force

  Had taken the city,

  He straightaway sent

  A message to Dermot

  Saying he was now

  In charge of the place,

  And asking the king

  To come with his English.

  King Dermot speedily

  Set out with a will

  And in the company

  Of many of his barons,

  Brought his daughter

  To give to the earl.

  The earl with honour

  Wedded her in public.

  King Dermot then gave

  To the famous earl

  The kingdom of Leinster

  With his dear daughter,

  Though he asked to retain

  Lordship while he lived.

  Then the noble earl granted

  The king his desire.

  PC, after the version by Goddard Henry Orpen (Norman French)

  MUIREADHACH ALBANACH Ó DÁLAIGH

  (fl. early 13th century)

  A Poem Addressed to the Blessed Virgin

  Listen to me, O great Mary

  grant me the pleasure of praying to you;

  do not shun your kinsman,

  O Mother of the strong King of the elements.

  Let me recall the story of your mother,

  let me recount and bring to mind

  a graceful girl with dark brows

  and wavy hair.

  That was Anna, God’s grandmother,

  from whose fair brother a king was born;

  she married in turn three husbands,

  no woman neared her in dignity.

  To each goodman she bore a daughter

  this fair bright woman:

  three girls, her beautiful children:

  with smooth bodies and wavy hair.

  An honour to attend them,

  the three women, all called Mary.

  Each one blue-eyed, a pleasure to behold;

  everyone sought their company.

  These three Maries from heaven of the saints

  took a husband each,

  that the three ladies, heavy-haired,

  grew gravid and slow of foot.

  The three women bore three sons

  – magnificent increase.

  (What gentle six were greater?)

  The youngest of these was God.

  The mother of James was one of these women,

  shielded from every ordeal,

  one was Mary, mother of John,

  no one has sung this in poetry.

  You are Mary, Mother of God,

  none has approached your fame;

  the King of true heaven, a royal branch

  three-fold, grew in your womb.

  Into your good house and your stronghold both,

  direct and command me;

  O great Mary, O dear one

  O yellow gold, O flourishing apple tree.

  Food, raiment in your gift,

  tressed locks like the field.

  Mother, Kinswoman, Love,

  direct me well, your poor kinsman.

  Your great Son is a kinsman of mine,

  O gentle scion, noble Mother,

  it is right you should shield a good kinsman,

  daughter of your gentle mother.

  Until I accepted your Husband’s shepherding,

  O fair Mary of the thick tressed hair,

  my heart was a place of black coals –

  today, it is fitting to wash them.

  O Mother of God,

  hair bright-coloured and deep,

  set aside your anger, let us make peace,

  O great Mary, red-gold in a vessel of clay.

  Have I not sufficient kinship with your Husband

  O pure fair woman with the curling hair?

  From heaven came his thigh and his fair side,

  noble as the river.

  O Trinity, O gentle Mary,

  every glory passes but yours.

  Hear my poem, O Four Persons,

  please offer no gold as reward.

  Virgin Mary, black brow,

  bright garden, great tree,

  of women most beloved,

  grant me heaven for my humility.

  You are descended from David,

  great gentle one, no tree compares to you;

  from Abraham the fragrant branches

  braided on your head.

  A Sign of your Husband’s wisdom

  that You carried him, bright his arm

  bright his hand. Your Husband and Father

  cradled at your side.

  A lovely pair you were, seeking refuge glen to glen:

  a dark-browed, white-handed baby,

  a woman, heavy-limbed,

  slow-moving and comely.

  Riding on the ass, you cradled him,

  your pure hand caressing

/>   his crown of yellow hair,

  his fingers tugging at your locks.

  His hand at your white breast:

  no need of his was unmet,

  you washed the fair branch, kissed

  the slender hand and foot.

  A yellow-gold splendour on your gentle head

  my kind-eyed kinswoman;

  Mary of the smooth white heavy breast,

  suckling the noble infant.

  Woe to him who slanders you –

  unslanderable, sinless. Lady,

  if your womb is not chaste,

  no branch bears a nut in the greenwood.

  Vain to mention the clan of thieves,

  woman of the fair tresses.

  Foolish to doubt you,

  soft-haired lady.

  The Lord begot Mary’s son

  with no unholy union,

  replete, like the fish’s belly

  was your full womb.

  Because of you, great Mary

  it’s plain to a man enslaved:

  to shun low women is to find peace,

  lady of the curled hair.

  He resembles you, in his curled hair,

  your only son, the slender one –

  the same round eyes of the noble scion,

  his hands are yours, and the pure red nail.

  Your hand is long and bright.

  – beneath your sheltering brow,

  your face shines, blue-eyed,

  – I say the truth, in poetry.

  Pure and yellow the curls

  wreathed around your head,

  pure your slender-fingered hand,

  your strong perfect foot.

  Your equal has never died,

  never will she be born. In truth:

  none like you has ever tasted life,

  bright womb, God-cradling.

  Give me board and ale,

  O high head, earth-unsullied,

  spare me the endless feast of falsity,

  O strong one of the white teeth.

  May your dark brow plead

  for the love of your soul, O pure love;

  your Husband will not be jealous

  that I pray to you, bright, white-toothed one.

  O Mary of the fine brows,

  of the wavy yellow hair,

  bear me in your heart,

  and forsake me not.

  Let us honour together with feasting

  your handsome form, O swift one

  I offer up my poems, my well-wrought verse,

  O noble, O shapely one.

  No woman but you in my house,

  you its Mistress. Let what is mine

  not be led by false women,

  nor lured by wealth.

  May the drinking-horns of others

  be as nought to me, nor their women,

  their fine horses and their dogs;

  wealth, dogs, horses may I disdain, fair swan.

  Lift the dark brow, let me behold

  the countenance like calf’s blood,

  lift and let me witness

  the beautiful dark hair.

  Lift to me the foot and hand,

  the resplendent curls. Raise to me

  the clear, blue youthful eye,

  that I may revel in your soft locks.

  Kathleen Jamie

  Praise of a Dagger

  (Before going on Crusade)

  The dagger that goes wherever I go –

  She is the woman I love!

  Until her master returns home safe

  My rapt devotion she’ll have.

  No thick-ankled peasant girl is she

  But a lady – graceful, refined;

  The man who gave her as a gift

  Is expert in horses and wine.

  That deep-browed lord has granted

  Ornament for her lip,

  All the gold that she can carry

  And a blue luxurious slip;

  Her point is beautifully keen,

  And slender and sleek her side:

  A prince has given me royal steel

  To wear on my belt with pride.

  A fine new plaited scabbard

  Holds her in close embrace:

  Its gold ridge runs the length of her back

  Its carved bough covers her face.

  A distinguished southern lady

  In otherworld ivory swanked!

  A woman of Munster to hang from my waist

  With her shapely, clean-edged flank!

  Donnchadh Cairbreach of the sleek hounds

  From his poet holds nothing back;

  I cherish the blade of that golden-haired man

  In its covert under my cloak.

  And bless Maol Ruanaidh, the craftsman –

  May his prestige never fade

  Who took no rest but kept working

  Until the dagger was made.

  PC

  On Cutting His Hair before Going on Crusade

  This hair is for you, Father God.

  A light gift, but a hard one.

  Great till tonight my share of sins:

  this hair I give you in their place.

  Good its combing and its keeping

  within Ireland’s soft-grassed land;

  I’m sad for the poor ugly thing.

  This fair hair, Maker, is yours.

  I promised to you, Father God,

  My hair shorn from its curling head;

  it’s right, Father God, to accept it –

  it would have gone on its own.

  My hair and my comrade’s curled hair

  for your waving hair and soft glance:

  this fair hair and the yellow hair –

  I think they’ll be too dark for you.

  The shearing – small the sacrifice –

  of these two heads for fear of doom;

  these two tonight, Son of Mary,

  offer you their fine yellow locks.

  Better is your body, wounded

  for our sake – cruel the deed –

  better your hair’s grace, and purer,

  bluer eye and whiter feet.

  Brighter the foot and slender side,

  whiter your breast like trees’ flower,

  whiter the foot, heart’s hazel nut,

  which was pierced, fairer the hand.

  Whiter the teeth, browner the brow,

  finer body, gentler face;

  lovelier the hue of your curled locks,

  smoother the cheek, softer hair.

  Four years has this whole head of hair

  been on me until tonight;

  I will shear from me its curved crop:

  my hair will requite my false poems.

  Thomas Owen Clancy

  On the Death of His Wife

  I parted from my life last night,

  A woman’s body sunk in clay:

  The tender bosom that I loved

  Wrapped in a sheet they took away.

  The heavy blossom that had lit

  The ancient boughs is tossed and blown;

  Hers was the burden of delight

  That long had weighed the old tree down.

  And I am left alone tonight

  And desolate is the world I see,

  For lovely was that woman’s weight

  That even last night had lain on me.

  Weeping I look upon the place

  Where she used to rest her head –

  For yesterday her body’s length

  Reposed upon you too, my bed.

  Yesterday that smiling face

  Upon one side of you was laid

  That could match the hazel bloom

  In its dark delicate sweet shade.

  Maelva of the shadowy brows

  Was the mead-cask at my side;

  Fairest of all flowers that grow

  Was the beauty that has died.

  My body’s self deserts me now,

  The half of me that was her own,

  Since all I knew of brigh
tness died

  Half of me lingers, half is gone.

  The face that was like hawthorn bloom

  Was my right foot and my right side;

  And my right hand and my right eye

  Were no more mine than hers who died.

  Poor is the share of me that’s left

  Since half of me died with my wife;

  I shudder at the words I speak;

  Dear God, that girl was half my life.

  And our first look was her first love;

  No man had fondled ere I came

  The little breasts so small and firm

  And the long body like a flame.

  For twenty years we shared a home,

  Our converse milder with each year;

  Eleven children in its time

  Did that tall stately body bear.

  It was the King of hosts and roads

  Who snatched her from me in her prime:

  Little she wished to leave alone

  The man she loved before her time.

  Now King of churches and of bells,

  Though never raised to pledge a lie

  That woman’s hand – can it be true? –

  No more beneath my head will lie.

  Frank O’Connor

  GIOLLA BRIGHDE MAC CON MIDHE

  (?1210–?72)

  The Harp that Ransomed

  Bring my King’s harp here to me,

  That my grief, forgot, may flee;

  Full soon shall pass man’s sadness

  When wakes that voice of gladness.

  Noble he, and skilled in all,

  Who owned this tree musical;

  Many lofty songs he sang

  Whilst its soft sweet numbers rang.

  Many jewels he bestowed,

  Seated, where this fair gem glowed;

  Oft he guerdoned the beholder,

  Its curved neck on his shoulder.

  Dear the hand that smote the chords

  Of the slight, smooth, polished boards;

  Bright and brave, the tall youth played,

  True his hand, for music made.

  When his hand o’er this would roam –

  Music’s meet and perfect home –

  Then its great soft tender sigh

  Bore away man’s misery.

  When the curled Dalcassians came,

  Guests, within his hall of fame,

  Then its deep voice, woke again,

  Welcomed Cashel’s comely men.

  All men admired the Maiden,

  Banba with praise was laden:

  ‘Doncad’s harp,’ they all exclaim,

  ‘The fair, fragrant tree of fame!’

  ‘O’Brian’s harp! clear its call

  O’er the feast in Gabran’s hall;

  How the heir of Gabran’s Kings

  Shook deep music from its strings!’

  Son of Gael, of weapon sharp,

  Wins not now O’Brian’s harp:

  Son of stranger shall not gain