A Seer

'BELOW there are white-faced throngs,
Their march is a tide coming Higher;
Below there are white-faced throngs,
Their faith is a banner flung higher;
Below there are white-faced throngs,
White swords they have yet, but red songs;
Place and lot they have lost hear you not?
For a dream you once dreamed and forgot!'

'But a dream has a life of its own
The wizard seas it can cross
A dream has a life of its own
It comes like the albatross.
A dream has a life of its own,
From my feet to your feet it has flown
And you, you victorious
That wild, white thing will lose!'

poem by Padraic Colum
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Gilderoy

THE smith who made the manacles,
With bar and bolt, and link and ring,
Sang out above his hearty blows
'I can't have grief for everything.'

As Roger by the rope-walk went
The bramble-bird cheeped up to sing;
He cut the wanted coil, and said
'I can't have grief for everything.'

The lad who came to Ladder Lane,
And saw his hemp-cravat a-string,
'Jack's doom 's Jill's dule,' he said, 'but then,
I can't have grief for everything.'
And I who carried bag and wig,
Looked up and saw him turn and swing;
The dog he gave fixed eyes on me
Can I have grief for everything?

poem by Padraic Colum
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Legend

THERE is an hour, they say,
On which your dream has power:
Then all you wish for comes,
As comes the lost field-bird
Down to the island-lights;
There is an hour, they say,
That's woven with your wish:
In dawn, or dayli’ gone,
In mirk-dark, or at noon,
In hush or hum of day,
May be that secret hour.

A herd-boy in the rain
Who looked o'er stony fields;
A young man in a street,
When fife and drum went by,
Making the sunlight shrill;
A girl in a lane,
When the long June twilight
Made friendly far-off things,

[...] Read more

poem by Padraic Colum
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Snake

BUT, Snake, you must not come where we abide,
For you would tempt us; we should hear you say:

'Oh, somewhere was a world was cold and spare,
And voiceless; somewhere was a Being was not

Engrossed with substance, with no fervencies
Of love and hatred, and he made me, Snake!

The wise Elohim, they who made the rest
Of Creatures, made them ail-too manifold

Mortised and rampired, jointed, vascular;
And I was put an alien in their world,

All head, all spine, all limb, all loin,
Swift as a bird and single as a fish.'

Above you fruits unglanced at bend and glow,
And, bare and voiceless, you do tempt us, Snake!

poem by Padraic Colum
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She Moved Through the Faire

My young love said to me: My mother won't mind,
And my father won't slight you for your lack of kind.
She put her arms 'round me; these words she did say:
It will not be long, love, 'til our wedding day!
Then she stepped away from me, and she moved thru the Faire,
And so fondly I watched her move here and move there;
At last she turned homeward, with one star awake,
As the Swan in the evening moves over the lake.
Last night she came to me, my dead love came in,
And so soft did she move that her feet made no din;
She put her arms 'round me; these words she did say:
It will not be long, love, 'til our wedding day!

poem by Padraic Colum
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Otters

I'LL be an otter, and I'll let you swim
A mate beside me; we will venture down
A deep, full river when the sky above
Is shut of the sun; spoilers are we;
Thick-coated; no dog's tooth can bite at our veins
With ears and eyes of poachers; deep-earthed ones
Turned hunters: let him slip past,
The little vole, my teeth are on an edge
For the King-fish of the River!

I hold him up
The glittering salmon that smells of the sea:
I hold him up and whistle!

Now we go
Back to our earth; we will tear and eat
Sea-smelling salmon: you will tell the cubs
I am the Booty-brmger: I am the Lord
Of the River the deep, dark, full, and flowing River!

poem by Padraic Colum
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At Cashel

ABOVE me stand, worn from their ancient use,
The King's, the Bishop's, and the Warrior's house,
Quiet as folds upon a grassy knoll:
Stark-grey they stand, wall joined to ancient wall,
Chapel, and Castle, and Cathedral.

It is not they are old, but stone by stone
Into another lifetime they have grown,
The life of memories an old man has:
They dream upon what things have come to pass,
And know that stones grow friendly with the grass.

The name has crumbled CASHEL that has come
From conqueror-challenging CASTELLUM
Walls m a name! No citadel is here,
Now as a fane the empty walls uprear
Where green and greener grass spreads far and near!

poem by Padraic Colum
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Before The Fair

'Lost,' 'lost,' the beeves and the bullocks,
The cattle men sell and buy,
Crowded upon the fair green,
Low to the lightless sky.

'Live,' 'live,' and 'Here,' 'here,' the blackbird
From the top of the bare ash-tree,
Over the acres whistles
With beak of yellow blee.

And climbing, turning, and climbing
His little stair of sound,
'Content,' 'content,' from the low hedge
The redbreast sings in a round.

And I who hear that hedge-song
Will fare with all the rest,
With thoughts of lust and labour,
And bargain in my breast.

[...] Read more

poem by Padraic Colum
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River-Mates

I’LL be an otter, and I’ll let you swim
A mate beside me; we will venture down
A deep, dark river, when the sky above
Is shut of the sun; spoilers are we,
Thick-coated; no dog’s tooth can bite at our veins
With eyes and ears of poachers; deep-earthed ones
Turned hunters; let him slip past
The little vole; my teeth are on an edge
For the King-fish of the River!
I hold him up
The glittering salmon that smells of the sea;
I hold him high and whistle!
Now we go
Back to our earths; we will tear and eat
Sea-smelling salmon; you will tell the cubs
I am the Booty-bringer, I am the Lord
Of the River; the deep, dark, full and flowing River.

poem by Padraic Colum
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David Ap Gwillam At The Mass Of The Birds

THE Thrush, the Lark, and, chief, the Nightingale,
With one small bird whose name I do not ken,
Offered a Mass; the little bird was clerk,
At intervals he struck his silver bell.
The stars above that were but whitened then
The candles were; the altar was a stone;
Myself was there, with meet observances
Hearing the Mass the birds said in the dell.

It was the Lark who sang in dark's decrease
Kyrie Eleison; then the Nightingale
The Consecration chanted solemnly.
(The silver bell was rung for him in chief.)
And then the Thrush, the dweller in the vale,
Orate Fratres sang how near, how clear!
The Thrush it was who, as the sun appeared,
Held up the Monstrance, a dew-circled leaf!

poem by Padraic Colum
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