| |
| I WALKED through Ballinderry in the spring-time, | |
| When the bud was on the tree; | |
| And I said, in every fresh-ploughed field beholding | |
| The sowers striding free, | |
| Scattering broadside forth the corn in golden plenty | 5 |
| On the quick seed-clasping soil, | |
| “Even such this day, among the fresh-stirred hearts of Erin. | |
| Thomas Davis, is thy toil.” | |
| |
| I Sat by Ballyshannon in the summer, | |
| And saw the salmon leap; | 10 |
| And I said, as I beheld the gallant creatures | |
| Spring glittering from the deep, | |
| Through the spray, and through the prone heaps striving onward | |
| To the calm, clear streams above, | |
| “So seekest thou thy native founts of freedom, Thomas Davis, | 15 |
| In thy brightness of strength and love.” | |
| |
| I stood in Derrybawn in the autumn, | |
| And I heard the eagle call, | |
| With a clangorous cry of wrath and lamentation | |
| That filled the wide mountain hall, | 20 |
| O’er the bare, deserted place of his plundered eyrie; | |
| And I said, as he screamed and soared, | |
| “So callest thou, thou wrathful, soaring Thomas Davis, | |
| For a nation’s rights restored!” | |
| |
| And, alas! to think but now, and thou art lying, | 25 |
| Dear Davis, dead at thy mother’s knee; | |
| And I, no mother near, on my own sick-bed, | |
| That face on earth shall never see; | |
| I may lie and try to feel that I am dreaming, | |
| I may lie and try to say, “Thy will be done,” | 30 |
| But a hundred such as I will never comfort Erin | |
| For the loss of the noble son! | |
| |
| Young husbandman of Erin’s fruitful seed-time, | |
| In the fresh track of danger’s plough! | |
| Who will walk the heavy, toilsome, perilous furrow, | 35 |
| Girt with freedom’s seed-sheets, now? | |
| Who will banish with the wholesome crop of knowledge | |
| The daunting weed and the bitter thorn, | |
| Now that thou thyself art but a seed for hopeful planting | |
| Against the Resurrection morn? | 40 |
| |
| Young salmon of the flood-tide of freedom | |
| That swells round Erin’s shore! | |
| Thou wilt leap against their loud oppressive torrent | |
| Of bigotry and hate no more; | |
| Drawn downward by their prone material instinct, | 45 |
| Let them thunder on their rocks and foam— | |
| Thou hast leapt, aspiring soul, to founts beyond their raging, | |
| Where troubled waters never come! | |
| |
| But I grieve not, Eagle of the empty eyrie, | |
| That thy wrathful cry is still; | 50 |
| And that the songs alone of peaceful mourners | |
| Are heard to-day on Earth’s hill; | |
| Better far, if brothers’ war be destined for us | |
| (God avert that horrid day I pray), | |
| That ere our hands be stained with slaughter fratricidal, | 55 |
| Thy warm heart should be cold in clay. | |
| |
| But my trust is strong in God, Who made us brothers, | |
| That He will not suffer their right hands, | |
| Which thou hast joined in holier rites than wedlock | |
| To draw opposing brands. | 60 |
| Oh, many a tuneful tongue that thou madest vocal | |
| Would lie cold and silent then; | |
| And songless long once more, should often-widowed Erin | |
| Mourn the loss of her brave young men. | |
| |
| Oh, brave young men, my love, my pride, my promise, | 65 |
| ’Tis on you my hopes are set, | |
| In manliness, in kindliness, in justice, | |
| To make Erin a nation yet; | |
| Self-respecting, self-relying, self-advancing— | |
| In union or in severance, free and strong— | 70 |
| And if God grant this, then, under God, to Thomas Davis | |
| Let the greater praise belong. | |
