Works

"Abide with us!" Where could we go?
Thou art our strength, thou art our tower,
Our refuge from the ills below,
In darkness light, in weakness power.

"Abide with us!" We would prevail,...

At the grey dawn, amongst the felling leaves,
A little bird outside my window swung,
High on a topmost branch he trilled his song,
And 'Ireland! Ireland! Ireland!' ever sung.
...

A summer's morning that has but one voice;
Five hundred stocks, like golden lovers, lean
Their heads together, in their quiet way,
And but one bird sings, of a number seen.
...

'Croak, croak, croak,'
Thus the Raven spoke,
Perched on his crooked tree
As hoarse as hoarse could be.
Shun him and fear him,
Lest the Bridegroom hear him;
Scout him and rout him...

An old man who had charge of field,
With pride he saw two birds did build,
A broad capacious warm nest,
So full of young with speckled breast,

And when the old man there did pass,...

It's a year almost that I have not seen her:
Oh, last summer green things were greener,
Brambles fewer, the blue sky bluer.

It's surely summer, for there's a swallow:...

My heart is like a singing bird
Whose nest is in a watered shoot;
My heart is like an apple-tree
Whose boughs are bent with thickset fruit;
My heart is like a rainbow shell...

No gift I bring but worship, and the love
Which all must bear to lovely souls and pure,
Those lights, that, when all else is dark, endure;
Stars in the night, to lift our eyes above;
...

For ever wave, for ever float and shine
Before my yearning eyes, oh! dream of mine
Wherein I dreamed that time was like a vine,

A creeping rose, that clomb a height of dread...

Who is the shepherd sent to lead,
Through pastures green, the Master's sheep?
What guileless "Israelite indeed"
The folded flock may watch and keep?

He who with manliest spirit joins...

Here in this gold-green evening end,
While air is soft and sky is clear,
What tender message shall I send
To her I hold so dear?
What rose of song with breath like myrrh,...

(WRITTEN FOR A FRIEND'S BIRTHDAY.)

"The days of our life are threescore years and ten."


A birthday: - and a day that rose
With much of hope, with meaning rife -...

Who know thee, love: thy life be such
That, ere the year be o'er,
Each one who loves thee now so much,
Even God, may love thee more!

One tree, storm-twisted, like an evil hag,
The sea-wind in its hair, beside a path
Waves frantic arms, as if in wild-witch wrath
At all the world. Gigantic, grey as slag,...

[PARIS, 1896]


Oh, damsel fair at the Porte Maillot,
With the soft blue eyes that haunt me so,
Pray what should I do
When a girl like you
Bestows her smile, her glance, and her sigh...

As I near my lonely cottage,
At the close of weary day,
There's a little bit of gladness
Comes to meet me on the way:
Dimpled, tanned, and petticoated,
Innocent as angels are,...

We met her on the hillside green
Below old Castle Blarney;
Her name, she whispered, was Eileen,
Her home it was Killarney.

I see her yet, her Irish eyes
Blue gray as seas in summer,...

"No doubt the pleasure is as great,
Of being cheated as to cheat." - HUDIBRAS.


The history of human-kind to trace,
Since Eve - the first of dupes - our doom unriddled,...

Be you near, or be you far,
Let my blessing, like a star,
Shine upon you everywhere!
And in each lone evening hour,
When the twilight folds the flower,
I will fold thy name in prayer.
...

O Patrick Sarsfield, health be to you, since you went to France and your camps were loosened; making your sighs along with the king, and you left poor Ireland and the Gael defeated--Och ochone! O Patrick Sarsfield, it is a man ...