The Kiltartan Poetry Book | Page 9

hair with troubled minds
Keening
miserably after the Fenians.
The pipes of our organs are broken
Our harps have lost their strings
that were tuned
That might have made the great lamentations of
Ireland.
Until the strong men come back across the sea
There is no
help for us but bitter crying,
Screams, and beating of hands, and
calling out.
I do not know of anything under the sky
That is friendly or
favourable to the Gael
But only the sea that our need brings us to,
Or the wind that blows to
the harbour
The ship that is bearing us away from Ireland;
And
there is reason that these are reconciled with us,
For we increase the
sea with our tears
And the wandering wind with our sighs.
The Heart of the Wood
My hope and my love, we will go for a while into the wood, scattering
the dew, where we will see the trout, we will see the blackbird on its
nest; the deer and the buck calling, the little bird that is sweetest
singing on the branches; the cuckoo on the top of the fresh green; and
death will never come near us for ever in the sweet wood.
An Craoibhin Complains Because He Is a Poet
It's my grief that I am not a little white duck,
And I'd swim over the
sea to France or to Spain;
I would not stay in Ireland for one week
only,
To be without eating, without drinking, without a full jug.

Without a full jug, without eating, without drinking,
Without a feast
to get, without wine, without meat,
Without high dances, without a
big name, without music;
There is hunger on me, and I astray this
long time.
It's my grief that I am not an old crow,
I would sit for awhile up on
the old branch,
I could satisfy my hunger, and I not as I am
With a
grain of oats or a white potato
It's my grief that I am not a red fox,
Leaping strong and swift on the
mountains,
Eating cocks and hens without pity,
Taking ducks and
geese as a conquerer.
It's my grief that I am not a bright salmon,
Going through the strong
full water,
Catching the mayflies by my craft,
Swimming at my
choice, and swimming with
the stream
It's my grief that I am of the race of the poets;
It would be better for
me to be a high rock,
Or a stone or a tree or an herb or a flower
Or
anything at all but the thing that I am!
He Cries Out Against Love
There are three fine devils eating my heart--
They left me, my grief!
without a thing;
Sickness wrought, and Love wrought,
And an
empty pocket, my ruin and my woe.
Poverty left me without a shirt,

Barefooted, barelegged, without any covering;
Sickness left me
with my head weak
And my body miserable, an ugly thing.
Love
left me like a coal upon the floor,
Like a half-burned sod that is never
put out.
Worse than the cough, worse than the fever itself,
Worse
than any curse at all under the sun,
Worse than the great poverty
Is
the devil that is called "Love" by the people.
And if I were in my
young youth again
I would not take, or give, or ask for a kiss!
He Meditates on the Life of a Rich Man

A golden cradle under you, and you young;
A right mother and a
strong kiss.
A lively horse, and you a boy;
A school and learning and close
companions.
A beautiful wife, and you a man;
A wide house and everything that is
good.
A fine wife, children, substance;
Cattle, means, herds and flocks.
A place to sit, a place to lie down;
Plenty of food and plenty of drink.

After that, an old man among old men;
Respect on you and honour
on you.
Head of the court, of the jury, of the meeting,
And the counsellors not
the worse for having you.
At the end of your days death, and then
Hiding away; the boards and
the church.
What are you better after to-night
Than Ned the beggar or Seaghan
the fool?
Forgaill's Praise of Columcille
This now is the poem of praise and of lamentation that was made for
Columcille, Speckled Salmon of the Boyne, High Saint of the Gael, by
Forgaill that was afterwards called Blind Forgaill, Chief Poet of
Ireland:
It is not a little story this is; it is not a story about a fool it is; it is not
one district that is keening but every district, with a great sound that is
not to be borne, hearing the story of Columcille, without life, without a
church.
It is not the trouble of one house, or the grief of one harp-string; all the

plains are heavy, hearing the word that is a wound.
What way will a simple man tell of him? Even Nera from the Sidhe
could not do it; he is not made much of now; our learned one is not the
light of