Cold, cold this thousand years--yet still On many a time-stained page Your pride, your truth, your dauntless will, Burn on from age to age.
And still around the fires of peat Live on the ancient days; There still do living lips repeat The old and deathless lays.
And when the wavering wreaths ascend, Blue in the evening air, The soul of Ireland seems to bend Above her children there.
Singer of Jason’s quest and Sigurd’s doom! Teller of vision-haunted wanderings! Who touched a strange new music from the strings Of old Romance--a space amidst the gloom Of cloudy centuries thou didst illume; And there thy word a dreamlike splendour flings On crown and helm--and even the tears of things Brighten thy morning world’s immortal bloom.
Yet some, great Craftsman, reverence thee more That Beauty, coldly throned among the stars, Came at thy lure to tread the homely earth: And, sweet and kindly as in days of yore, Played with our children, graced our household cares, And knelt content by many a quiet hearth.
_Dedication of a Book of Irish Verses by various hands_[2]
Because you suffered for the Cause; Because you strove with voice and pen To serve a Law above all laws That purifies the hearts of men;
Because you failed, and grew not slack, Not sullen, not disconsolate, Nor stooped to seek a lower track, But showed your soul a match for Fate;
Because you hated all things base, And held your country’s honour high; Because you wrought in Time and Space Not heedless of Eternity;
Because you loved the nobler part Of Erinn,--so we bring you here Words such as once the Irish heart On Irish lips rejoiced to hear:
Strains that have little chance to live With those that Davis’ clarion blew, But all the best we have to give To Mother Erinn and to you.
[2] “Poems and Ballads of Young Ireland, 1888.”
Clear as air, the western waters evermore their sweet unchanging song Murmur in their stony channels round O’Conor’s sepulchre in Cong.
Crownless, hopeless, here he lingered; felt the years go by him like a dream, Heard the far-off roar of conquest murmur faintly like the singing stream.
Here he died, and here they tomb’d him, men of Fechin, chanting round his grave. Did they know, ah, did they know it, what they buried by the babbling wave?