A Book of Irish Verse Part 15

His hair is a shower of soft gold, His eye is as clear as the day, His conscience and vote were unsold When others were carried away; His word is as good as an oath, And freely 'twas given to me; O! sure 'twill be happy for both The day of our marriage to see.

Then, O! the marriage, etc.

His kinsmen are honest and kind, The neighbours think much of his skill, And Eoghan's the lad to my mind, Though he owns neither castle nor mill.

But he has a tilloch of land, A horse, and a stocking of coin, A foot for a dance, and a hand In the cause of his country to join.

Then, O! the marriage, etc.

We meet in the market and fair-- We meet in the morning and night-- He sits on the half of my chair, And my people are wild with delight.

Yet I long through the winter to skim, Though Eoghan longs more, I can see, When I will be married to him, And he will be married to me.

Then, O! the marriage, the marriage, With love and _mo bhuachaill_ for me, The ladies that ride in a carriage Might envy my marriage to me.

_Thomas Davis_

A PLEA FOR LOVE

The summer brook flows in the bed, The winter torrent tore asunder; The skylark's gentle wings are spread Where walk the lightning and the thunder; And thus you'll find the sternest soul The gayest tenderness concealing, And minds that seem to mock control, Are ordered by some fairy feeling.

Then, maiden! start not from the hand That's hardened by the swaying sabre-- The pulse beneath may be as bland As evening after day of labour: And, maiden! start not from the brow That thought has knit, and pa.s.sion darkened-- In twilight hours, 'neath forest bough, The tenderest tales are often hearkened.

_Thomas Davis_

REMEMBRANCE

Cold in the earth--and the deep snow piled above thee, Far, far removed, cold in the dreary grave!

Have I forgot, my only Love, to love thee, Severed at last by Time's all-severing wave?

Now, when alone, do my thoughts no longer hover Over the mountains, on that northern sh.o.r.e, Resting their wings where heath and fern-leaves cover Thy n.o.ble heart for ever, ever more?

Cold in the earth--and fifteen wild Decembers, From these brown hills, have melted into spring!

Faithful, indeed, is the spirit that remembers After such years of change and suffering!

Sweet Love of youth, forgive, if I forget thee, While the world's tide is bearing me along; Other desires and other hopes beset me, Hopes which obscure, but cannot do thee wrong;

No later light has lighted up my heaven, No second morn has ever shone for me; All my life's bliss from thy dear life was given, All my life's bliss is in the grave with thee.

But, when the days of golden dreams had perished, And even Despair was powerless to destroy; Then did I learn how existence could be cherished, Strengthened and fed without the aid of joy.

Then did I check the tears of useless pa.s.sion-- Weaned my young soul from yearning after thine; Sternly denied its burning wish to hasten, Down to that tomb already more than mine.

And, even yet, I dare not let it languish, Dare not indulge in memory's rapturous pain; Once drinking deep of that divinest anguish How could I seek the empty world again?

_Emily Bronte_

A FRAGMENT FROM 'THE PRISONER: A FRAGMENT'

Still, let my tyrants know, I am not doomed to wear Year after year in gloom, and desolate despair; A messenger of Hope comes every night to me, And offers for short life, eternal liberty.

He comes with Western winds, with evening's wandering airs, With that clear dusk of heaven that brings the thickest stars.

Winds take a pensive tone, and stars a tender fire, And visions rise, and change, that kill me with desire.

Desire for nothing known in my maturer years, When Joy grew mad with awe, at counting future tears.

When, if my spirit's sky was full of flashes warm, I knew not whence they came, from sun or thunderstorm.

But first, a hush of peace--a soundless calm descends; The struggle of distress, and fierce impatience ends.

Mute music soothes my breast--unuttered harmony That I could never dream, till Earth was lost to me.

Then dawns the Invisible; the Unseen its truth reveals; My outward sense is gone, my inward essence feels: Its wings are almost free--its home, its harbour found, Measuring the gulf, it stoops, and dares the final bound.

O, dreadful is the check--intense the agony-- When the ear begins to hear, and the eye begins to see; When the pulse begins to throb,--the brain to think again, The soul to feel the flesh, and the flesh to feel the chain.

Yet I would lose no sting, would wish no torture less, The more that anguish racks, the earlier it will bless; And robed in fires of h.e.l.l, or bright with heavenly s.h.i.+ne, If it but herald death, the vision is divine.

_Emily Bronte_

LAST LINES

No coward soul is mine, No trembler in the world's storm-troubled sphere: I see Heaven's glories s.h.i.+ne, And faith s.h.i.+nes equal, arming me from fear.

O G.o.d, within my breast, Almighty, ever-present Deity!

Life--that in me has rest, As I--undying Life--have power in Thee.

Vain are the thousand creeds That move men's hearts: unutterably vain; Worthless as withered weeds, Or idlest froth amid the boundless main,

To waken doubt in one Holding so fast to Thine infinity; So surely anch.o.r.ed on The steadfast rock of immortality,

With wide-embracing love Thy spirit animates eternal years, Pervades and broods above, Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates, and rears.

Though earth and man were gone, And suns and universes ceased to be, And Thou were left alone, Every existence would exist in Thee.

There is not room for Death, Nor atom that his might could render void: Thou--Thou art Being and Breath, And what Thou art may never be destroyed.

_Emily Bronte_