Do you remember that thrush in Glenasmole
In the high lane on the West side where I made the engine stop,
When he perched across the roadway like a fellow taking toll:
So well within his rights was he, he would not even hop?

That thrush is the owner of all Glenasmole,
From the mild bends of the river to the purple-stemmed rose bushes;
For the men who had the giving of such things when Life was whole
Called Glenasmole, as it is still, The Valley of the Thrushes.

There is not one of all the throng of giant men surviving,
The men who dwelt with magic, apple-cheeked and steady eyed;
But the thrush whose happy armour was their love of Song is living
And he sings the song unaltered that he sang before they died.

Strong is the delicate line of generations:
Two thousand songs unbroken of the thrushes in the Glen.
Two thousand years cannot restore the mighty exultations
Of men whose manhood now would be incredible to men.

Song under leaf by the water in the valley!
Bird's throat distended! For the men of old who died
Left a fame beyond all language in the music of their ally,
In the throbbing song outshaken of the bird with bosom pied.

There beyond the river and the ridge is Bohernabreena,
The Road House by the road that runs beside a vanished inn;
I can see it like a window opened clearly in the saga
Of an ancient battle ambush that no chivalry could win.

When the Lochlann galleys raided and consumed the kingly hostel
Where the chieftains sat in silence with their spears in water cooled,
What happened? O what happened? Can the soft notes of the throstle
Tell how the golden heroes in their chivalry were fooled?

Far though they are, forget not that the bushes,
The wild rose with its dull white thorns, the hedges and the stream
Are nearer to our longing in the Valley of the Thrushes
Than any glen in any hills that neighbour near to dream:

Wings that fly low for a moment in the twilight;
Kings undisturbed by the blaze and battle roll;
Bloom in the seed; the song in egg; the grey light
That holds so deep a glory in the Vale of Glenasmole!