The Penguin Book of Irish Poetry
Page 52
Certain I am that it was they,
Though someone may know them here and say
What different men they are,
I know their pictures – and there they sat,
And passing the Catholic church at Rathgar
Calvin took off his hat
And blessed himself, and Chaucer at that
Chuckled and looked away.
The Night Hunt
In the morning, in the dark,
When the stars begin to blunt,
By the wall of Barna Park
Dogs I heard and saw them hunt.
All the parish dogs were there,
All the dogs for miles around,
Teeming up behind a hare,
In the dark, without a sound.
How I heard I scarce can tell –
’Twas a patter in the grass –
And I did not see them well
Come across the dark and pass;
Yet I saw them and I knew
Spearman’s dog and Spellman’s dog
And, beside my own dog too,
Leamy’s from the Island Bog.
In the morning when the sun
Burnished all the green to gorse,
I went out to take a run
Round the bog upon my horse;
And my dog that had been sleeping
In the heat beside the door
Left his yawning and went leaping
On a hundred yards before.
Through the village street we passed –
Not a dog there raised a snout –
Through the street and out at last
On the white bog road and out
Over Barna Park full pace,
Over to the Silver Stream,
Horse and dog in happy race,
Rider between thought and dream.
By the stream, at Leamy’s house,
Lay a dog – my pace I curbed –
But our coming did not rouse
Him from drowsing undisturbed;
And my dog, as unaware
Of the other, dropped beside
And went running by me there
With my horse’s slackened stride.
Yet by something, by a twitch
Of the sleeper’s eye, a look
From the runner, something which
Little chords of feeling shook,
I was conscious that a thought
Shuddered through the silent deep
Of a secret – I had caught
Something I had known in sleep.
The Man Upright
I once spent an evening in a village
Where the people are all taken up with tillage,
Or do some business in a small way
Among themselves, and all the day
Go crooked, doubled to half their size,
Both working and loafing, with their eyes
Stuck in the ground or in a board, –
For some of them tailor, and some of them hoard
Pence in a till in their little shops,
And some of them shoe-soles – they get the tops
Ready-made from England, and they die cobblers –
All bent up double, a village of hobblers
And slouchers and squatters, whether they straggle
Up and down, or bend to haggle
Over a counter, or bend at a plough,
Or to dig with a spade, or to milk a cow,
Or to shove the goose-iron stiffly along
The stuff on the sleeve-board, or lace the fong
In the boot on the last, or to draw the wax-end
Tight cross-ways – and so to make or to mend
What will soon be worn out by the crooked people.
The only thing straight in the place was the steeple,
I thought at first. I was wrong in that;
For there past the window at which I sat
Watching the crooked little men
Go slouching, and with the gait of a hen
An odd little woman go pattering past,
And the cobbler crouching over his last
In the window opposite, and next door
The tailor squatting inside on the floor –
While I watched them, as I have said before,
And thought that only the steeple was straight,
There came a man of a different gait –
A man who neither slouched nor pattered,
But planted his steps as if each step mattered;
Yet walked down the middle of the street
Not like a policeman on his beat,
But like a man with nothing to do
Except walk straight upright like me and you.
JOSEPH CAMPBELL
(1879–1944)
The Newspaper-Seller
(Times Square, New York, about two o’clock on a winter’s morning)
And how is Cabey’s Lane?
I’m forty years left Ennis, sir,
And never like to see the place again.
’Twas out of there I married her –
The first one – Mattha Twomey’s daughter.
The ‘bit o’ paint’, they called her.
She was young, tall as a birch-tree, pale,
With blushes in her cheeks,
And eyes as brown as Burren water.
Faith, and there was lavish drinking
At her wedding. Now, as I’m thinking –
Four half-barrels of ale,
Old whisky, cordial and wine;
And eating fine.
I’d ten by her;
Ten topping childer, sir,
Like apples, red and sweet.
In fair-meadow or street
You wouldn’t see the likes of ’em …
And then she died.
You can’t live by the dead,
Leastways, when you have hungry mouths to fill
That’s what my people said.
And so inside a year I wed again –
This time, to Mary Quill,
A Limerick girl was lodging in the lane
West of Cabey’s. The first was quiet and wise,
The second had laughing eyes:
I put a charm on them, and married her.
Says she on the wedding night,
‘You’re in a sorry plight
With me and the little ones. Let’s go away.’
‘Where to?’ says I. ‘To America,’
Says she. ‘This country is too poor and small
For us, and over there there’s work and bread for all.’
She was an eager kind, you see –
Far different to Sibby.
Well, by dint of slaving night and day
We made the passage out, and Boston Quay
Saw me and her in Eighteen Seventy-Three,
The Blizzard Year. That’s four decades ago;
But even now I feel the bitter snow –
I feel it in my marrow, sir – the snow
And the high, driving wind.
We left our clan behind
In Cabey’s Lane with neighbours
Till such times as I could find
The cash to fetch ’em after us.
And God was kind –
Kinder than I thought He’d be
In a strange land.
For work came rolling to my hand, sir,
And I wrought for constant pay
In a bakehouse. He was German, sir,
The boss; and Germans, mostly, mixed the dough,
And watched the fires. That’s how I came to know
The Deutsch. I speak it better than I used to do
The Gaelic at home.
I’d twelve by Mary, sir –
Ten living and two dead.
I’d ten by Sibby. Twenty childer, sir –
Twelve daughters and eight sons …
And better for myself I ne’er had one!
My curse on Matt and Ned
That let old age come down on my grey head,
&n
bsp; And left me selling Worlds!
My curse on Shaun!
My curse on Meehaul Ban,
The fair-haired boy, the gentleman,
That wouldn’t look the road I doddered on!
My seven curses on him,
And the flaming curse of God!
My curse on Peter!
My blessing on poor Joe, who’s now in quod
For housebreaking – the white lamb of the flock
He helped me when my right hand was a crock
With blood-poison, and paid the rent for me.
My curse on all my daughters!
On Sibby Ann, who’s married west,
And has her auto, while I creep on limbs
All crookened with the pains!
My curse on Peg and Fan!
My curse on Angeline!
My curse on Ceely, and the rest!
I don’t know half their names:
The devil’s brood, but no brood of mine.
And Cabey’s Lane, sir? I was happy there,
In Ennis town in Clare,
When I was young. Ah, young, not old …
God help us, isn’t it bitter cold!
Raven’s Rock
The line of the hills is a song.
Abhna, Aa-na-craebhi,
Places of trees and rivers,
Praise God with their sweetness.
The lake shines, darker than a hound’s eye.
On the stones
The shadows of fern-stalks
Write secretly in ogham.
The rainbows build their towers,
And pull them down again.
A cloud comes,
And out of it a sun-stained man.
Who is it that is coming?
Cumhall’s son, of the sídh of Almhain.
The Red Spears are no more:
They have gone from the bright world.
Who is the grey head that follows?
I came over sea;
I freed Fál from her bondage;
I blessed the fountain;
I walk now bodiless.
Who passes, crowned with a crown?
A knitter of warring rules,
A maker of circuits,
A giver of gold;
Slain at last on the still edge of battle.
Who is the boy on horseback?
No stranger to this glen.
Through snowdrifts they hunted me,
As the lame wolf is hunted.
Who is he, pale and bloody from a wound?
When the wild geese cry, the west listens.
I died not for my own,
But my own love me.
Who is the young man with sad dreams?
The weavers of green cloth,
The beaters of pikes may tell you.
You will not see my name cut on a grave.
Who is the proud, bearded man?
Shorn by a woman of kingship,
Thus far have I led you,
But set no mark to your journey.
Who are the marching fianna?
Ask the spring,
The summer torrent that wept us.
If we are dead, it is for the great love
We bore the Gael.
Who is the tall prisoner?
I go to the rope and the quicklime.
They have no hands that would deliver me –
O Christ of Nazareth! no hands.
The cloud lightens:
The vision is gone.
Dúas, like a woman’s nipple,
Bares itself in beauty.
The lake shines, whiter than honey-comb.
On the stones
The ferns, with moveless strokes,
Write the saga of time.
The rainbow-branches bud,
And flower, and wither again.
Silent, the earth waits the hour of her travail.
JAMES STEPHENS
(1880?–1950)
The Red-haired Man’s Wife
I have taken that vow!
And you were my friend
But yesterday – Now
All that’s at an end;
And you are my husband, and claim me, and
I must depend!
Yesterday I was free!
Now you, as I stand,
Walk over to me
And take hold of my hand;
You look at my lips! Your eyes are too
bold, your smile is too bland!
My old name is lost;
My distinction of race!
Now, the line has been crossed,
Must I step to your pace?
Must I walk as you list, and obey,
and smile up in your face?
All the white and the red
Of my cheeks you have won!
All the hair of my head!
And my feet, tho’ they run,
Are yours, and you own me and end me,
just as I begun!
Must I bow when you speak!
Be silent and hear;
Inclining my cheek
And incredulous ear
To your voice, and command, and behest;
hold your lightest wish dear!
I am woman! But still
Am alive, and can feel
Every intimate thrill
That is woe or is weal:
I, aloof, and divided, apart, standing far,
can I kneel?
Oh, if kneeling were right,
I should kneel nor be sad!
And abase in your sight
All the pride that I had!
I should come to you, hold to you, cling to
you, call to you, glad!
If not, I shall know,
I shall surely find out!
And your world will throw
In disaster and rout!
I am woman, and glory, and beauty; I,
mystery, terror and doubt!
I am separate still!
I am I and not you!
And my mind and my will,
As in secret they grew,
Still are secret; unreached, and untouched,
and not subject to you.
The Street Behind Yours
The night droops down upon the street,
Shade after shade! A solemn frown
Is pressing to
A deeper hue
The houses drab and brown;
Till all in blackness touch and meet,
Are mixed and melted down.
All is so silent! Not a sound
Comes through the dark! The gas-lamps throw,
From here and there,
A feeble glare
On the pavement cracked below;
On the greasy, muddy ground;
On the houses in a row.
Those rigid houses, black and sour!
Each dark thin building stretching high;
Rank upon rank
Of windows blank
Stare from a sullen eye;
With doleful aspect scowl and glower
At the timid passer-by.
And down between those spectre files
The narrow roadway, thick with mud,
Doth crouch and hide!
While close beside
The gutter churns a flood
Of noisome water through the piles
Of garbage, thick as blood!
And tho’ ’tis silent! Tho’ no sound
Crawls from the blackness thickly spread!
Yet darkness brings
Grim, noiseless things
That walk as they were dead!
They glide, and peer, and steal around,
With stealthy, silent tread!
You dare not walk! That awful crew
Might speak or laugh as you pass by!
Might touch and paw
With a formless claw,
Or leer from a sodden eye!
Might whisper awful things they knew!
– Or wring their hands and cry!
/> There is the doorway mean and low!
And there are the houses drab and brown!
And the night’s black pall!
And the hours that crawl!
And the forms that peer and frown!
And the lamps’ dim flare on the slush below!
And the gutter grumbling down!
O Bruadair
I will sing no more songs! The pride of my country I sang
Through forty long years of good rhyme, without any avail;
And no one cared even the half of the half of a hang
For the song or the singer – so, here is an end to the tale!
If you say, if you think, I complain, and have not got a cause,
Let you come to me here, let you look at the state of my hand!
Let you say if a goose-quill has calloused these horny old paws,
Or the spade that I grip on, and dig with, out there in the land?
When our nobles were safe and renowned and were rooted and tough,
Though my thought went to them and had joy in the fortune of those,
And pride that was proud of their pride – they gave little enough!
Not as much as two boots for my feet, or an old suit of clothes!
I ask of the Craftsman that fashioned the fly and the bird;
Of the Champion whose passion will lift me from death in a time;
Of the Spirit that melts icy hearts with the wind of a word,
That my people be worthy, and get, better singing than mine.
I had hoped to live decent, when Ireland was quit of her care,
As a poet or steward, perhaps, in a house of degree,
But my end of the tale is – old brogues and old breeches to wear!
So I’ll sing no more songs for the men that care nothing for me.
PADRAIC COLUM
(1881–1972)
A Drover
To Meath of the pastures,
From wet hills by the sea,
Through Leitrim and Longford,
Go my cattle and me.
I hear in the darkness
Their slipping and breathing –
I name them the by-ways
They’re to pass without heeding;
Then the wet, winding roads,
Brown bogs with black water,
And my thoughts on white ships
And the King o’ Spain’s daughter.
O farmer, strong farmer!
You can spend at the fair,
But your face you must turn
To your crops and your care;
And soldiers, red soldiers!
You’ve seen many lands,
But you walk two by two,
And by captain’s commands!
O the smell of the beasts,
The wet wind in the morn,
And the proud and hard earth
Never broken for corn!