The Penguin Book of Irish Poetry

by Patrick Crotty (ed)

  Who is happy in hedgerow

  Or meadow as he is?

  Paying no dues to the parish,

  He argues in logic

  And has no care of cattle

  But a satchel and stick.

  The showery airs grow softer,

  He profits from his ploughland

  For the share of the schoolmen

  Is a pen in hand.

  When midday hides the reaping,

  He sleeps by a river

  Or comes to the stone plain

  Where the saints live.

  But in winter by the big fires,

  The ignorant hear his fiddle,

  And he battles on the chessboard,

  As the land lords bid him.

  Austin Clarke

  The Curse

  You brindled beast through whom I’ve lost her!

  Out of my sight! the devil take you!

  And, ’pon my soul! this is no jest,

  This year I’ll rest not till I break you.

  Satanic Ananias blast you!

  Is that the way you learned to carry?

  Your master in the mud to hurl

  Before the girl he meant to marry.

  The everlasting night fiend ride you!

  My curse cling closer than your saddle!

  Hell’s ravens pick your eyes like eggs!

  You scarecrow with your legs astraddle!

  And it was only yesterday too

  I gave the stable-boy a shilling

  To stuff your belly full of hay

  For fear you’d play this trick, you villain!

  I gave you oats, you thankless devil!

  And saved your life, you graceless fiend, you!

  From ragged mane to scrubby tail

  I combed and brushed and scraped and cleaned you.

  You brute! the devil scorch and burn you!

  You had a decent mare for mother,

  And many a pound I’ve spent on hay

  To feed you one day and another.

  The best of reins, the finest saddle,

  Good crupper and good pad together,

  Stout hempen girth – for these I’ve paid,

  And breastplate made of Spanish leather.

  What’s the excuse? What blindness caused it?

  That bias in your indirections

  That made a windmill of your legs

  And lost for good my Meg’s affections.

  With my left spur I’ll slash and stab you

  And run it through the heart within you

  And with the right I’ll take great lumps

  Out of your rumps until I skin you.

  If ever again I go a-courting

  Across your back – may Hellfire melt you! –

  Then may I split my fork in twain

  And lose the girl again as well too!

  Robin Flower

  III

  * * *

  CIVILIZATIONS: 1601–1800

  Ionmholta malairt bhisigh (‘A turn for the better’)

  Eochaidh Ó hEodhasa, ‘The New Poetry’

  EOCHAIDH Ó HEODHASA

  (c.1565–1612)

  O’Hussey’s Ode to the Maguire

  Where is my Chief, my Master, this bleak night, mavrone!

  O, cold, cold, miserably cold is this bleak night for Hugh,

  It’s showery, arrowy, speary sleet pierceth one through and through,

  Pierceth one to the very bone!

  Rolls real thunder? Or was that red, livid light

  Only a meteor? I scarce know; but through the midnight dim

  The pitiless ice-wind streams. Except the hate that persecutes him

  Nothing hath crueller venomy might.

  An awful, a tremendous night is this, meseems!

  The flood-gates of the rivers of heaven, I think, have been burst wide –

  Down from the overcharged clouds, like unto headlong ocean’s tide,

  Descends grey rain in roaring streams.

  Though he were even a wolf ranging the round green woods,

  Though he were even a pleasant salmon in the unchainable sea,

  Though he were a wild mountain eagle, he could scarce bear, he,

  This sharp, sore sleet, these howling floods.

  O, mournful is my soul this night for Hugh Maguire!

  Darkly, as in a dream, he strays! Before him and behind

  Triumphs the tyrannous anger of the wounding wind,

  The wounding wind, that burns as fire!

  It is my bitter grief – it cuts me to the heart –

  That in the country of Clan Darry this should be his fate!

  O, woe is me, where is he? Wandering, houseless, desolate,

  Alone, without or guide or chart!

  Medreams I see just now his face, the strawberry bright,

  Uplifted to the blackened heavens, while the tempestuous winds

  Blow fiercely over and round him, and the smiting sleet-shower blinds

  The hero of Galang tonight!

  Large, large affliction unto me and mine it is,

  That one of his majestic bearing, his fair, stately form,

  Should thus be tortured and o’erborne – that this unsparing storm

  Should wreak its wrath on head like his!

  That his great hand, so oft the avenger of the oppressed,

  Should this chill, churlish night, perchance, be paralysed by frost –

  While through some icicle-hung thicket – as one lorn and lost –

  He walks and wanders without rest.

  The tempest-driven torrent deluges the mead,

  It overflows the low banks of the rivulets and ponds –

  The lawns and pasture-grounds lie locked in icy bonds

  So that the cattle cannot feed.

  The pale bright margins of the streams are seen by none.

  Rushes and sweeps along the untameable flood on every side –

  It penetrates and fills the cottagers’ dwellings far and wide –

  Water and land are blent in one.

  Through some dark woods, ’mid bones of monsters, Hugh now strays,

  As he confronts the storm with anguished heart, but manly brow –

  O! what a sword-wound to that tender heart of his were now

  A backward glance at peaceful days.

  But other thoughts are his – thoughts that can still inspire

  With joy and an onward-bounding hope the bosom of MacNee –

  Thoughts of his warriors charging like bright billows of the sea,

  Borne on the wind’s wings, flashing fire!

  And though frost glaze tonight the clear dew of his eyes,

  And white ice-gauntlets glove his noble fine fair fingers o’er,

  A warm dress is to him that lightning-garb he ever wore,

  The lightning of the soul, not skies.

  Hugh marched forth to the fight – I grieved to see him so depart;

  And lo! tonight he wanders frozen, rain-drenched, sad, betrayed –

  But the memory of the lime-white mansions his right hand hath laid

  In ashes warms the hero’s heart!

  James Clarence Mangan

  Poem in the Guise of Cú Chonnacht Óg Mág Uidhir to Brighid Chill Dara

  Is it because I’m a stranger, friends,

  you all step back in alarm?

  An incubus? Or a clay-cold spirit

  incapable of harm?

  Does it seem when you look closer

  I have a body at all?

  Or am I just a wraith,

  deceiving, ethereal?

  I see now there’s nothing

  I owe to anyone;

  true friends, if such you were,

  might have grieved to hear I was gone.

  And oh what a pity, people,

  you lost all you had to give –

  what animates my name now

  doesn’t breathe or truly live.

  I am not what you think I am,

  see me but do not believe,<
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  a paltry poor ghost best not

  crossed – if you want to survive.

  Of all the folk who’ve lived on earth

  how few of them have had

  two chances at it like I’ve enjoyed,

  your two-timing ghostly lad!

  No upright man could claim

  I haven’t passed away;

  it’s less a time for telling lies

  than a time to kneel and pray

  for my soul; the precise instant

  it left I remember well

  despite the prattle of doubters

  who argue I’m alive still.

  No wound or sad mishap

  undid me, but a rush of joy;

  no fit of gloom – is anything worse? –

  no plague, no disease laid me low.

  If by an angelic creature

  in a celestial dream

  the soul was snatched from my body

  how strange my mourning must seem!

  After I’d glimpsed her, Lord,

  how could I still desire life?

  From one who goes round killing men

  only the dead are safe.

  No tidal wave of sadness

  nor hatred for anyone here

  nor no love of earthly thing

  killed me, in fact, but terror.

  On coming to my senses,

  though still consumed by dread,

  I soon got wind of the rumour

  that said I wasn’t dead.

  Though I do not know her features

  (on them no eye can gaze)

  across the front of my mind

  her radiant image strays.

  I’m enchanted still, a changeling,

  at home in perplexity;

  let the eye of no ill-willed person

  see the human frame you see.

  And may God protect me from her

  if she try to restore my breath:

  what I’ve endured so far is nothing

  to thoughts of a second death.

  My name and its meaning were both

  well known before I died:

  ask for a hound, cunning and swift,

  with nowhere left to hide.

  PC

  The New Poetry

  Praise be! A turn for the better,

  A sudden shift in the weather.

  If I don’t tap into this new racket

  I could end up out of pocket.

  Good riddance, then, to the old measures,

  To those fussy rules and strictures.

  This method’s cushier, more enlightened,

  And might usher me into the limelight.

  Those erstwhile ornamented poems

  Fell on deaf ears only – lofty odes

  Sailing over the heads of the people,

  Like caviar thrown at the general.

  If verse of mine from now to the last trump

  Perplex the brain of one Ulster dunce

  I’ll give back – it’s a hefty wager –

  Every last farthing of my retainer.

  Free verse and the open road!

  It’s what pops the money ball.

  I’ll soon be paying off my loans

  Courtesy of Earl Tyrconnell.

  No one’s going to best yours truly

  When it comes to pap and vacuity.

  I’ll be out there on the fairground

  In all weathers pulling in the crowds.

  I’ve scuppered – what a relief! –

  That top-heavy worm-eaten ball-breaking craft.

  Though if the Earl gets wind of my drift

  He’s bound to piss himself laughing.

  Let me not ruin a hard-won reputation

  For mastery of bardic scholarship and skill.

  I’ll make sure the Earl (or former Chieftain)

  Isn’t in town when I give a recital.

  The thing is I’m quite a draw,

  Flavour of the month in certain quarters.

  I’d be gone down that path like a rat from hell,

  But I’m wary of the Earl –

  Not to mention it was the same Aodh’s son

  Who once dubbed my strict verse ‘easy’.

  Thank God he’s sojourning with the Saxon.

  For the time being, I have a breather.

  Those poems I pummelled into shape before

  Damn near broke my heart.

  The new softer more accessible approach

  Will prove a tonic for my health.

  And what if the Earl (the ex-Chieftain)

  Quibbles now and then with a quatrain –

  Aren’t there plenty goons about

  Who’ll shout the pedant down?

  Maurice Riordan

  ANONYMOUS

  On the Death of a Poet (composed during the last illness of Eochaidh Ó hEodhasa)

  Poetry is touched by decline:

  how can we come to her aid?

  She is sure all hope is gone

  in her poorly state.

  Consider poetry’s plight,

  fit only for the sickbed

  as word of Eochaidh’s death is brought

  to her who was his bride.

  It is hard to witness the honour

  once hers turn to scorn:

  woeful indignity drawing near,

  the cloud of abasement come down.

  To Eochaidh above all men she gave

  the flower in its prime

  of her artistry and love;

  and all to nourish him.

  The hidden ore of his poet’s craft

  burned with a gemlike flame

  lighting up the art he left;

  much died with his name.

  Well he knew the schoolmen’s work,

  who sat among the wise;

  poet of the golden cloak,

  a great lament shall be his.

  He stumbled on the hazel of knowledge

  in its secret grove,

  and left its branches hung with flesh,

  stripping the nutshells off.

  Out of words both dark and subtle

  the poet makes his art

  with perfect ease, and in recital

  omits no part.

  It is no small help to his work

  to add the gold relief

  of learning to his every word:

  such is the way of the beehive.

  Bees all over brim their hoard

  with the juice they collect

  from the oozings of a milky gourd

  or a flower unpacked.

  They are examples to the bard

  whose craft none can match;

  no flower or fruit, soft or hard,

  escapes his search.

  It is he resolves the doubts

  of those already skilled;

  he who settles all debates,

  he to whom all yield.

  Who has not been touched by sorrow

  at the master’s loss of life?

  This disease goes to the marrow

  and pierces like a spike.

  Like a cow parted from her calf,

  my wits are overthrown;

  I make melody from my grief,

  I am an orphan;

  and poetry is a widow unless

  Maoilseachlainn’s son returns;

  no one can make good her loss

  but the man she mourns.

  David Wheatley

  GIOLLA BRIGHDE (BONAVENTURA) Ó HEODHASA

  (c.1570–1614)

  In Memoriam Richard Nugent

  It is hard to sleep on a friend’s hurt.

  Any friend untroubled

  by his comrade’s wound

  is nearer to an enemy.

  Who could take his ease

  beside a wounded friend? A heart

  untainted by another’s grief,

  uncut, is hardly pure.

  For true friends grow of one

  unbroken root. Their troubles

  and their pains, their joys
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  and triumphs shared are one.

  So could you doubt

  my suffering, dear sister,

  as your own wound’s venom

  bites my mind afresh?

  Your sighs grow more

  than I can bear to hear;

  each tear, beloved,

  draws my own heart’s blood.

  Could I displace your sorrow

  by my own; with this coin

  of my pain earn you relief –

  I’d put my care to work.

  A horror: to have lost a son.

  Your family’s dear ambition

  and your comfort. Your own

  lustrous boy; and only, Janet.

  Green with Delvin’s hopes,

  bright as the hills that bred him,

  child of warriors, your champion

  and guardian, brave Richard.

  Sheltering bloom of the Island

  of the Fair, Richard Nugent,

  finely formed in heart and deed,

  fierce tender of great Marward’s line.

  So noble was your grown boy,

  no one wonders at the fathom

  of your loss. He blazed through life;

  a fighter, leader, sage.

  Who learned all things in their

  inner selves, the working parts

  of heaven and its deep, moist earth –

  and all he cared for flourished.

  Don’t they tell the stories still

  of how he travelled in the stars’

  wake, pole to pole, and proved

  himself, the world, unshakable?

  And though it stings you hard

  to hear it, don’t resent Him,

  who first yielded to your care

  the fruits you’ve lost.

  Our father God, old master

  who made Richard for himself,

  has just reclaimed that pure, bright

  hand from your safekeeping.

  A man’s death is the door to life.

  We have no business fretting

  over one who dies a blessed death,

  whose grace is clear and sure.

  Open up your shrouded face,

  and dry your gleaming cheek.

  I send my prayer to draw

  the splinter from your heart, there.

  Tiffany Atkinson

  RICHARD NUGENT

  (fl. 1604)

  To His Cousin Master Richard Nugent of Dunower

  Mine owne Dicke Nugent, if thou list to know

  The cause that makes me shun my western home,

  And how my tedious time here I bestow,

  While angry Thetis ’gainst her bounds doth foam,

  Wert that to ease that never-healing wound