The Penguin Book of Irish Poetry

by Patrick Crotty (ed)

  But fit among like-natured gods to live,

  Amongst whom, entering too soon, he perishes,

  Unable to endure their fervid gaze.

  Though now thy young, heroic soul

  Be mate for her immortal might,

  Yet think: thy being is still but as a lake

  That, by the help of friendly streams unfed,

  Full soon the sun drinks up.

  Wait till thou hast sea-depths –

  Till all the tides of life and deed,

  Of action and of meditation,

  Of service unto others and their love,

  Shall pour into the caverns of thy being

  The might of their unconquerable floods.

  Then canst thou bear the glow of eyes divine,

  And like the sea beneath the sun at noon

  Shalt shine in splendour inexhaustible.

  Therefore be no more tempted by her lures –

  Not that way lies thine immortality:

  But thou shalt find it in the ways of men,

  Where many a task remains for thee to do,

  And shall remain for many after thee,

  Till all the storm-winds of the world be bound.

  THOMAS GIVEN

  (1850–1917)

  A Song for February

  Day in an’ day oot on his auld farrantfn1 loom,

  Time lengthens the wab o’ the past;

  Dame Nature steps in like a lamp tae the room,

  Hir e’efn2 tae the simmer o’ life geein’ bloom.

  So winter slips by, wi’ its mirth an’ its gloom,

  As spring is appearin’ at last.

  The robin gets up an’ he lauchs in his glee,

  In view o’ the prospect so braw;

  Sets his heid tae the side, wi’ its feathers agee,fn3

  As he spies a bit snaw drop at fitfn4 o’ the tree,

  An’ says tae himsel’ a’ll hae dentiesfn5 tae preefn6

  By an’ by when the splash is awa.

  The blackbird keeksfn7 oot frae the fogfn8 at the broo,fn9

  Gees his nebfn10 a bit dichtfn11 on a stane;

  His eye caught the primrose appearin’ in view,

  An’ the tiny wee violet o’ Nature’s ain blue;

  He sung them a sang o’ the auld an’ the new –

  A sang we may a’ let alane.

  The thrush cuff’tfn12 the leaves ’neath the skepfn13 o’ the bee,

  An’ he tirrl’tfn14 them aside wae a zest;

  I maun hurry awa tae rehearsal, quo he,

  This work fits the sparrow far better than me;

  His sang pleased the ear frae the tap o’ the tree

  As he fell intae tune wae the rest.

  Thus Nature provides for hir hoose an’ hir wanes,fn15

  An’ we may rejoice in the plan;

  The wren tae the bluebonnet sings his refrain

  On causeyfn16 o’ cottier or lordly domain;

  The wagtail looks on withoot shade o’ disdain,

  May we aye say the same o’ the man.

  OSCAR WILDE

  (1854–1900)

  from Poems in Prose

  The Artist

  One evening there came into his soul the desire to fashion an image of The Pleasure that abideth for a Moment. And he went forth into the world to look for bronze. For he could only think in bronze.

  But all the bronze of the whole world had disappeared, nor anywhere in the whole world was there any bronze to be found, save only the bronze of the image of The Sorrow that endureth for Ever.

  Now this image he had himself, and with his own hands, fashioned, and had set it on the tomb of the one thing he had loved in life. On the tomb of the dead thing he had most loved had he set this image of his own fashioning, that it might serve as a sign of the love of man that dieth not, and a symbol of the sorrow of man that endureth for ever. And in the whole world there was no other bronze save the bronze of this image.

  And he took the image he had fashioned, and set it in a great furnace, and gave it to the fire.

  And out of the bronze of the image of The Sorrow that endureth for Ever he fashioned an image of The Pleasure that abideth for a Moment.

  The Disciple

  When Narcissus died the pool of his pleasure changed from a cup of sweet waters into a cup of salt tears, and the Oreads came weeping through the woodland that they might sing to the pool and give it comfort.

  And when they saw that the pool had changed from a cup of sweet waters into a cup of salt tears, they loosened the green tresses of their hair and cried to the pool and said, ‘We do not wonder that you should mourn in this manner for Narcissus, so beautiful was he.’

  ‘But was Narcissus beautiful?’ said the pool.

  ‘Who should know that better than you?’ answered the Oreads. ‘Us did he ever pass by, but you he sought for, and would lie on your banks and look down at you, and in the mirror of your waters he would mirror his own beauty.’

  And the pool answered, ‘But I loved Narcissus because, as he lay on my banks and looked down at me, in the mirror of his eyes I saw ever my own beauty mirrored.’

  T. W. ROLLESTON

  (1857–1920)

  The Dead at Clonmacnois

  In a quiet water’d land, a land of roses,

  Stands Saint Kieran’s city fair:

  And the warriors of Erin in their famous generations

  Slumber there.

  There beneath the dewy hillside sleep the noblest

  Of the clan of Conn,

  Each below his stone with name in branching Ogham

  And the sacred knot thereon.

  There they laid to rest the seven Kings of Tara,

  There the sons of Cairbré sleep –

  Battle-banners of the Gael, that in Kieran’s plain of crosses

  Now their final hosting keep.

  And in Clonmacnois they laid the men of Teffia,

  And right many a lord of Breagh;

  Deep the sod above Clan Creidé and Clan Conaill,

  Kind in hall and fierce in fray.

  Many and many a son of Conn, the Hundred-Fighter,

  In the red earth lies at rest;

  Many a blue eye of Clan Colman the turf covers,

  Many a swan-white breast.

  KATHARINE TYNAN

  (1861–1931)

  Sheep and Lambs

  All in the April evening,

  April airs were abroad;

  The sheep with their little lambs

  Passed me by on the road.

  The sheep with their little lambs

  Passed me by on the road;

  All in an April evening,

  I thought on the Lamb of God.

  The lambs were weary, and crying

  With a weak, human cry.

  I thought on the Lamb of God

  Going meekly to die.

  Up in the blue, blue mountains

  Dewy pastures are sweet;

  Rest for the little bodies,

  Rest for the little feet.

  But for the Lamb of God

  Up on the hill-top green,

  Only a Cross of shame,

  Two stark crosses between.

  All in the April evening,

  April airs were abroad;

  I saw the sheep with their lambs,

  And thought of the Lamb of God.

  Waiting

  In a grey cave, where comes no glimpse of sky,

  Set in the blue hill’s heart full many a mile,

  Having the dripping stone for canopy,

  Missing the wind’s laugh and the good sun’s smile,

  I, Fionn, with all my sleeping warriors lie.

  In the great outer cave our horses are,

  Carved of grey stone, with heads erect, amazed,

  Purple their trappings, gold each bolt and bar,

  One fore-foot poised, the quivering thin ears raised:

  Methinks they scent the battle from afar.

  A frozen hound lies by eac
h warrior’s feet –

  Ah, Bran, my jewel! Bran, my king of hounds!

  Deep-throated art thou, mighty-flanked, and fleet;

  Dost thou remember how with giant bounds

  Didst chase the red deer in the noontide heat?

  I was a king in ages long ago,

  A mighty warrior, and a seer likewise,

  Still mine eyes look with solemn gaze of woe

  From stony lids adown the centuries,

  And in my frozen heart I know, I know.

  A giant I, of a primeval race,

  These, great-limbed, bearing helm and shield and sword,

  My good knights are, and each still, awful face

  Will one day wake to knowledge at a word –

  O’erhead the groaning years turn round apace.

  Here with the peaceful dead we keep our state;

  Some day a cry shall ring adown the lands:

  ‘The hour is come, the hour grown large with fate.’

  He knows who hath the centuries in His hands

  When that shall be – till then we watch and wait.

  The queens that loved us, whither be they gone,

  The sweet, large women with the hair as gold,

  As though one drew long threads from out the sun?

  Ages ago, grown tired, and very cold,

  They fell asleep beneath the daisies wan.

  The waving woods are gone that once we knew,

  And towns grown grey with years are in their place:

  A little lake, as innocent and blue

  As my queen’s eyes were, lifts a baby face

  Where once my palace towers were fair to view.

  The fierce old gods we hailed with worshipping,

  The blind old gods, waxed mad with sin and blood,

  Laid down their godhead as an idle thing

  At a God’s feet, whose throne was but a Rood;

  His crown, wrought thorns; His joy, long travailing.

  Here in the gloom I see it all again,

  As ages since in visions mystical

  I saw the swaying crowds of fierce-eyed men,

  And heard the murmurs in the judgment hall.

  Oh, for one charge of my dark warriors then!

  Nay, if He willed, His Father presently

  Twelve star-girt legions unto Him had given.

  I traced the blood-stained path to Calvary,

  And heard far off the angels weep in heaven;

  Then the Rood’s arms against an awful sky.

  I saw Him when they pierced Him, hands and feet,

  And one came by and smote Him, this new King,

  So pale and harmless, on the tired face sweet;

  He was so lovely and so pitying,

  The icy heart in me began to beat.

  Then a strong cry – the mountain heaved and swayed

  That held us in its heart, the groaning world

  Was reft with lightning and in ruins laid,

  His Father’s awful hand the red bolts hurled,

  And He was dead – I trembled, sore afraid.

  Then I upraised myself with mighty strain

  In the gloom, I heard the tumult rage without,

  I saw those large dead faces glimmer plain,

  The life just stirred within them and went out,

  And I fell back, and grew to stone again.

  So the years went – on earth how fleet they be!

  Here in this cave their feet are slow of pace,

  And I grow old, and tired exceedingly,

  I would the sweet earth were my dwelling-place –

  Shamrocks and little daisies wrapping me!

  There I should lie, and feel the silence sweet

  As a meadow at noon, where birds sing in the trees;

  To mine ears should come the patter of little feet,

  And baby cries, and croon of summer seas,

  And the wind’s laughter in the upland wheat.

  Meantime o’erhead the years were full and bright,

  With a kind sun, and gold wide fields of corn;

  The happy children sang from morn to night,

  The blessed church bells rang, new arts were born,

  Strong towns rose up and glimmered fair and white.

  Once came a wind of conflict, fierce as hail,

  And beat about my brows: on the eastward shore,

  Where never since the Vikings’ dark ships sail,

  All day the battle raged with mighty roar;

  At night the Victor’s fair dead face was pale.

  Ah! the dark years since then, the anguished cry

  That pierced my deaf ears, made my hard eyes weep,

  From Erin wrestling in her agony,

  While we, her strongest, in a helpless sleep,

  Lay, as the blood-stained years trailed slowly by.

  And often in those years the East was drest

  In phantom fires, that mocked the distant dawn,

  Then blackest night – her bravest and her best

  Were led to die, while I slept dumbly on,

  With the whole mountain’s weight upon my breast.

  Once in my time it chanced a peasant hind

  Strayed to this cave. I heard, and burst my chain,

  And raised my awful face stone-dead and blind,

  Cried, ‘Is it time?’ and so fell back again.

  I heard his wild cry borne adown the wind.

  Some hearts wait with us. Owen Roe O’Neill,

  The kingliest king that ever went uncrowned,

  Sleeps in his panoply of gold and steel

  Ready to wake, and in the kindly ground

  A many another’s death-wounds close and heal.

  Great Hugh O’Neill, far off in purple Rome,

  And Hugh O’Donnell, in their stately tombs

  Lie, with their grand fair faces turned to home.

  Some day a voice will ring adown the glooms:

  ‘Arise, ye Princes, for the hour is come!’

  And these will rise, and we will wait them here,

  In this blue hill-heart in fair Donegal;

  That hour shall sound the clash of sword and spear,

  The steeds shall neigh to hear their masters’ call,

  And the hounds’ cry shall echo shrill and clear.

  WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS

  (1865–1939)

  The Madness of King Goll

  I sat on cushioned otter-skin:

  My word was law from Ith to Emain,

  And shook at Inver Amergin

  The hearts of the world-troubling seamen,

  And drove tumult and war away

  From girl and boy and man and beast;

  The fields grew fatter day by day,

  The wild fowl of the air increased;

  And every ancient Ollave said,

  While he bent down his fading head,

  ‘He drives away the Northern cold.’

  They will not hush, the leaves a-flutter round me, the beech leaves old.

  I sat and mused and drank sweet wine;

  A herdsman came from inland valleys,

  Crying, the pirates drove his swine

  To fill their dark-beaked hollow galleys.

  I called my battle-breaking men

  And my loud brazen battle-cars

  From rolling vale and rivery glen;

  And under the blinking of the stars

  Fell on the pirates by the deep,

  And hurled them in the gulph of sleep:

  These hands won many a torque of gold.

  They will not hush, the leaves a-flutter round me, the beech leaves old.

  But slowly, as I shouting slew

  And trampled in the bubbling mire,

  In my most secret spirit grew

  A whirling and a wandering fire:

  I stood: keen stars above me shone,

  Around me shone keen eyes of men:

  I laughed aloud and hurried on

  By rocky shore and rushy fen;

  I lau
ghed because birds fluttered by,

  And starlight gleamed, and clouds flew high,

  And rushes waved and waters rolled.

  They will not hush, the leaves a-flutter round me, the beech leaves old.

  And now I wander in the woods

  When summer gluts the golden bees,

  Or in autumnal solitudes

  Arise the leopard-coloured trees;

  Or when along the wintry strands

  The cormorants shiver on their rocks;

  I wander on, and wave my hands,

  And sing, and shake my heavy locks.

  The grey wolf knows me; by one ear

  I lead along the woodland deer;

  The hares run by me growing bold.

  They will not hush, the leaves a-flutter round me, the beech leaves old.

  I came upon a little town

  That slumbered in the harvest moon,

  And passed a-tiptoe up and down,

  Murmuring, to a fitful tune,

  How I have followed, night and day,

  A tramping of tremendous feet,

  And saw where this old tympan lay

  Deserted on a doorway seat,

  And bore it to the woods with me;

  Of some inhuman misery

  Our married voices wildly trolled.

  They will not hush, the leaves a-flutter round me, the beech leaves old.

  I sang how, when day’s toil is done,

  Orchil shakes out her long dark hair

  That hides away the dying sun

  And sheds faint odours through the air:

  When my hand passed from wire to wire

  It quenched, with sound like falling dew,

  The whirling and the wandering fire;

  But lift a mournful ulalu,

  For the kind wires are torn and still,

  And I must wander wood and hill

  Through summer’s heat and winter’s cold.

  They will not hush, the leaves a-flutter round me, the beech leaves old.

  Fergus and the Druid

  Fergus. This whole day have I followed in the rocks,

  And you have changed and flowed from shape to shape,

  First as a raven on whose ancient wings

  Scarcely a feather lingered, then you seemed

  A weasel moving on from stone to stone,

  And now at last you wear a human shape,

  A thin grey man half lost in gathering night.

  Druid. What would you, king of the proud Red Branch kings?