English

It's Micky Eamon Diver and he's only skin and bone,
With acres holm and heather, that, and money of his own—
It's all day long he's sitting with his elbow on the hob,
The crabbit Micky Eamon with his dudheen in his gob;
A near old scranny scrape-the-pot that's askin' dusk and dawn.
“Boy! are ye never gettin' on with diggin' Garrybawn!”

My gallowses are hangin' down and twistin' round my legs;
The girls can see the most of me that's stickin' through my rags;
It's dribs and drabs on back and front and freezin' to the pelt—

On Chagóla the air was full of butterflies,
They fluttered down the valleys of bright blue;
White they were, snow-tinted, soft as the soft sea-foam
That far inland breaks in mysterious bloom:

Invisibly, as Spring lapping dark hills,
It breaks into a billow pale as snow;
From Chagóla there rolls a shadowy tide
Of harebells, drops of brightly quivering blue.

The sky it had not rained its azure down
But hoarded still its deep soft purple air;
A glacier shone, a cold, a cold white bride

The angels bending
To kiss her brow,
Sang unending—
“Come with us now.”

The child replying,
The angels drew
To her cradle lying:—
“I'll go with you.”

The angel faces
'Mid wings of gold,
Took her embraces
Within their hold.

And with the breaking
Of pallid day,
The crib forsaking,
They flew away.

Buried deep in the darkness,
Far from the sun's warm light,
See you not the blind worm
In his night?

He was born in the darkness,
Fated there to creep,
Sleepless, in the kingdom
Of eternal deep.

Like a worm in the darkness,
Dumb and blind and frail,
You pass childhood's wonder-years,
Weak and pale.

Near your cradle your mother
Sings no song
Of a happy, quiet life-time,
Sweet and long.

Nor of fields and gardens
Where a boy
Plays and spends the daylight hours,

I would be ever your desired,
Never the possessed—
Nor in this will of mine is wantonness expressed.
The desired woman is most dear,
The possessed wanton is too near.

I would be far on unattainable height—
Always for knowledge, always for sight:
While from your touch and kisses I am free,
Our love is the high, perfect thing to be.

When I get a child,
I get him with fixed intent;
I don't get him by accident.
I get him because I am content with life,
Satisfied with myself,
And because I love my wife.

When the child is born,
I am full of scorn
At thought of other children.
By instinct I divine
There never was so fine a boy as mine.
I think this, because I am satisfied with life,
Conceited with myself,
And because I love my wife.

And I want to keep my son,
I want to finish what I have begun.

Fools drove him with goads and whips
Down to the sea where there were ships
And he was forced at the risk of his neck
To find a refuge on a stranger's deck.

Then that ship sailed away
Far from the land that day,
He watched the sky, and mourned to be
In such a dread captivity.

But from a rift of flying cloud
Burst a tempest quick and loud;
A burning bolt struck the strange deck
Bringing the ship to sudden wreck.

So the poor slave swam free
Over a quick calmed sea:
On a new coast-line he was thrown,

I Came, with friendship's face, to glad my heart,
But sad, and sorrowful my steps depart!
In my friend's stead—a spot of earth was shown,
And on his grave my woe-struck eyes were thrown!
No more to their distracted sight remain'd,
But the cold clay that all they lov'd contain'd:
And there his last and narrow bed was made,
And the drear tomb-stone for its covering laid!

Alas!—for this my aged heart is wrung!
Grief choaks my voice, and trembles on my tongue.
Lonely and desolate, I mourn the dead,

“What injury can I cause unto thee
O, thou guardian of man? Why hast thou
Set me as an object to strike at so
That I am become a burden to mysself?”—Job.

Infinite might, thou tyrant of worlds!
The earth and the suns, the stars and the planets,
They are all nothing but toys for thee—
A means to kill time and only to shorten
The long and tedious procession of years,
Of which even thou cannot be freed.
And though recklessly strewn o'er vast spaces,
Whose distances none but thou couldst measure,

Ask me not, my little Lucy,
What the gods may give to me,
Nor ought you be glad could you see
What your future's going to be.

Better far to bear the blowy
Breezes, come they slow or fast.
Jove may give us many snowy
Winters; this may be the last.

Wisdom, Lucy. Take the present!
Take the treasure of to-day!
Even as I write these pleasant
Rhymes, this evening slips away.