Best Irish Poetry

LegacyUser

What is your favourite poem written by an Irish ?

No second Troy

WHY should I blame her that she filled my days
With misery, or that she would of late
Have taught to ignorant men most violent ways,
Or hurled the little streets upon the great.
Had they but courage equal to desire?
What could have made her peaceful with a mind
That nobleness made simple as a fire,
With beauty like a tightened bow, a kind
That is not natural in an age like this,
Being high and solitary and most stern?
Why, what could she have done, being what she is?
Was there another Troy for her to burn?

W.B. Yeats

John

I've always like most of Michael Longley's and Seamus Heaney's work. In fact Seamus Heaney has a cd out where he recites his poems and Liam O'Flynn provides backing music (mostly uileann pipes but other musicians play on some of the tracks). It's really wonderful.

simu

I really like Yeats too! Here are two of his poems - they're very interesting because they show how his conception of the origin of art changed.

Sailing to Byzantium

That is no country for old men. The young
In one another's arms, birds in the trees -
Those dying generations - at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.

An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.

O sages standing in God's holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.

Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come.

-- William Butler Yeats

***********************
The Circus Animals' Desertion
I

I sought a theme and sought for it in vain,
I sought it daily for six weeks or so.
Maybe at last, being but a broken man,
I must be satisfied with my heart, although
Winter and summer till old age began
My circus animals were all on show,
Those stilted boys, that burnished chariot,
Lion and woman and the Lord knows what.

II

What can I but enumerate old themes,
First that sea-rider Oisin led by the nose
Through three enchanted islands, allegorical dreams,
Vain gaiety, vain battle, vain repose,
Themes of the embittered heart, or so it seems,
That might adorn old songs or courtly shows;
But what cared I that set him on to ride,
I, starved for the bosom of his faery bride.

And then a counter-truth filled out its play,
'The Countess Cathleen' was the name I gave it;
She, pity-crazed, had given her soul away,
But masterful Heaven had intervened to save it.
I thought my dear must her own soul destroy
So did fanaticism and hate enslave it,
And this brought forth a dream and soon enough
This dream itself had all my thought and love.

And when the Fool and Blind Man stole the bread
Cuchulain fought the ungovernable sea;
Heart-mysteries there, and yet when all is said
It was the dream itself enchanted me:
Character isolated by a deed
To engross the present and dominate memory.
Players and painted stage took all my love,
And not those things that they were emblems of.

III

Those masterful images because complete
Grew in pure mind, but out of what began?
A mound of refuse or the sweepings of a street,
Old kettles, old bottles, and a broken can,
Old iron, old bones, old rags, that raving slut
Who keeps the till. Now that my ladder's gone,
I must lie down where all the ladders start
In the foul rag and bone shop of the heart.

LegacyUser

John2 wrote:

I've always like most of Michael Longley's and Seamus Heaney's work. In fact Seamus Heaney has a cd out where he recites his poems and Liam O'Flynn provides backing music (mostly uileann pipes but other musicians play on some of the tracks). It's really wonderful.

Alright, good to hear about the CD. About Heaney: Once I recited 'Bogland', I know 'Lovers on Aran', and my teachers told me to read 'Twice Shy' out loud

LegacyUser

Simu: Yeats is divine! There are loads of splendid poems like Leda and the Swan, the Mask, To The Rose Upon The Rood Of Time. I like No Second Troy, because it shows Yeats' hidden feelings for the revolutionary Maude


He Wishes For The Cloths Of Heaven

HAD I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams


What do you think about the poem 'September 1913' ?

simu

Isabelle wrote:

What do you think about the poem 'September 1913' ?

We did that one at school too and I have to say, I really like it as well. It reminds me of an Irish proverb - "faightear gach laoch in aisce" (heros come cheap). The poem manages to show respect for these guys who died for Ireland but acknowledges how extreme their situations were and how heroic deeds are soon forgotten. It's cool that the poem manages not to fall into sentimental patriotism or complete cynicism.

*Angel*

I enjoy the poetry of Yeats and Patrick Kavanagh

Lines Written on a Seat on the Grand Canal, Dublin

O commemorate me where there is water
Canal water preferably, so stilly
Greeny at the heart of summer. Brother
Commemorate me thus beautifully
Where by a lock niagorously roars
The falls for those who sit in the tremendous silence
Of mid-July. No one will speak in prose
Who finds his way to these Parnassian islands.
A swan goes by head low with many apologies,
Fantastic light looks through the eyes of bridges -
And look! a barge comes bringing from Athy
and other far-flung towns mythologies.
O commemorate me with no hero-courageous
Tomb - just a canal-bank seat for the passer-by.

- Kavanagh

LegacyUser

simu wrote:

We did that one at school too and I have to say, I really like it as well. It reminds me of an Irish proverb - "faightear gach laoch in aisce" (heros come cheap). The poem manages to show respect for these guys who died for Ireland but acknowledges how extreme their situations were and how heroic deeds are soon forgotten. It's cool that the poem manages not to fall into sentimental patriotism or complete cynicism.

Aye, and it is also about the time when the Irish middle class became a bit richer and when it seems that they forgot about the Irish heroes that helped Eire to free herself by blood & sweat! Never forget about your roots & never forget about the roots of freedom!

LegacyUser

Angel: Yeah, Kavanagh is good too. I like 'Raglan Road' which is nowadays more famous as a traditional air.

On Raglan Road of an Autumn day
I saw her first and knew,
That her dark hair would weave a snare
That I might someday rue.
I saw the danger and I passed
Along the enchanted way.
And I said,"Let grief be a fallen leaf
At the dawning of the day."

On Grafton Street in November, we
Tripped lightly along the ledge
Of a deep ravine where can be seen
The worth of passion play.
The Queen of Hearts still making tarts
And I not making hay;
Oh, I loved too much and by such and such
Is happiness thrown away.

I gave her gifts of the mind,
I gave her the secret signs,
That's known to the artists who have known
The true gods of sound and stone.
And her words and tint without stint
I gave her poems to say
With her own name there and her own dark hair
Like clouds over fields of May.

On a quiet street where old ghosts meet
I see her walking now,
And away from me so hurriedly
My reason must allow.
That I had loved, not as I should
A creature made of clay,
When the angel woos the clay, he'll lose
His wings at the dawn of day.

theCzar

I havn't looked at poetry since the leaving cert, reading the above, i realise i've missed it!

To the Library!

LegacyUser

theCzar wrote:

I havn't looked at poetry since the leaving cert, reading the above, i realise i've missed it!

To the Library!

Good to hear Czar, now jump run immediately

scotsmurf

Funny enough, it was through poetry that I found this site, had this line going round and round in my head and although I could remember the poem , I couldn't think of the next line.

"the bicycles go by in twos and threes"

Inniskeen Road, Patrick Kavanagh.

And Lines written on a seat by him as well, manys the time I sat there and ate my lunch.

But by far and away, my favourite is Mid Term Break by Heaney.
we did it in primary school , along time ago, and it still gets me every time i read it.

Cathy

Austin Clarke - The Planters Daughter

When night stirred at sea,
An the fire brought a crowd in
They say that her beauty
Was music in mouth
And few in the candlelight
Thought her too proud,
For the house of the planter
Is known by the trees.

Men that had seen her
Drank deep and were silent,
The women were speaking
Wherever she went --
As a bell that is rung
Or a wonder told shyly
And O she was the Sunday
In every week.




and


W.B. Yeats - The Stolen Child

Where dips the rocky highland
Of Sleuth Wood in the lake,
There lies a leafy island
Where flapping herons wake
The drowsy water-rats;
There we've hid our faery vats,
Full of berries
And of reddest stolen cherries.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you
can understand.
Where the wave of moonlight glosses
The dim grey sands with light,
Far off by furthest Rosses
We foot it all the night,
Weaving olden dances,
Mingling hands and mingling glances
Till the moon has taken flight;
To and fro we leap
And chase the frothy bubbles,
While the world is full of troubles
And is anxious in its sleep.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you
can understand.
Where the wandering water gushes
From the hills above Glencar,.
In pools among the rushes
That scarce could bathe a star,
We seek for slumbering trout
And whispering in their ears
Give them unquiet dreams;
Leaning softly out
From ferns that drop their tears
Over the young streams.
Come away, O human child!
To to waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For to world's more full of weeping than you
can understand.
Away with us he's going,
The solemn-eyed:
He'll hear no more the lowing
Of the calves on the warm hillside
Or the kettle on the hob
Sing peace into his breast,
Or see the brown mice bob
Round and round the oatmeal-chest.
For be comes, the human child,
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
from a world more full of weeping than you
can understand.

LegacyUser

Nice poems Cathy !

Especially the stolen child part of:

Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand
For the world's morefull of weeping than you
can understand.

Have been 'hammering' in my mind

http://www.online-literature.com/yeats/

a good site to read Yeats on line

rain on

I'm a big fan of Eavan Boland - I'm writing a 4,000-word essay on her and Eilean Ni Chuilleanain at the moment, which is a nice excuse to sit around reading her. Some Seamus Heaney is good, some Derek Mahon, some Macdara Woods.. but overall I'm not hugely into Irish poetry.

John

rain on wrote:

I'm a big fan of Eavan Boland - I'm writing a 4,000-word essay on her

That is my idea of a nightmare. I never liked her at all. I see her from time to time locally and I keep meaning to tell her the anguish she caused during my leaving cert.

lolli

Dark Rosaleen
by James Clarence Mangan

O my Dark Rosaleen,
Do not sigh, do not weep!
The priests are on the ocean green,
They march along the deep.
There 's wine from the royal Pope,
Upon the ocean green;
And Spanish ale shall give you hope,
My Dark Rosaleen!
My own Rosaleen!
Shall glad your heart, shall give you hope,
Shall give you health, and help, and hope,
My Dark Rosaleen!

Over hills, and thro' dales,
Have I roam'd for your sake;
All yesterday I sail'd with sails
On river and on lake.
The Erne, at its highest flood,
I dash'd across unseen,
For there was lightning in my blood,
My Dark Rosaleen!
My own Rosaleen!
O, there was lightning in my blood,
Red lightning lighten'd thro' my blood.
My Dark Rosaleen!

All day long, in unrest,
To and fro, do I move.
The very soul within my breast
Is wasted for you, love!
The heart in my bosom faints
To think of you, my Queen,
My life of life, my saint of saints,
My Dark Rosaleen!
My own Rosaleen!
To hear your sweet and sad complaints,
My life, my love, my saint of saints,
My Dark Rosaleen!

Woe and pain, pain and woe,
Are my lot, night and noon,
To see your bright face clouded so,
Like to the mournful moon.
But yet will I rear your throne
Again in golden sheen;
'Tis you shall reign, shall reign alone,
My Dark Rosaleen!
My own Rosaleen!
'Tis you shall have the golden throne,
'Tis you shall reign, and reign alone,
My Dark Rosaleen!

Over dews, over sands,
Will I fly, for your weal:
Your holy delicate white hands
Shall girdle me with steel.
At home, in your emerald bowers,
From morning's dawn till e'en,
You'll pray for me, my flower of flowers,
My Dark Rosaleen!
My fond Rosaleen!
You'll think of me through daylight hours,
My virgin flower, my flower of flowers,
My Dark Rosaleen!

I could scale the blue air,
I could plough the high hills,
O, I could kneel all night in prayer,
To heal your many ills!
And one beamy smile from you
Would float like light between
My toils and me, my own, my true,
My Dark Rosaleen!
My fond Rosaleen!
Would give me life and soul anew,
A second life, a soul anew,
My Dark Rosaleen!

O, the Erne shall run red,
With redundance of blood,
The earth shall rock beneath our tread,
And flames wrap hill and wood,
And gun-peal and slogan-cry
Wake many a glen serene,
Ere you shall fade, ere you shall die,
My Dark Rosaleen!
My own Rosaleen!
The Judgement Hour must first be nigh,
Ere you can fade, ere you can die,
My Dark Rosaleen!

simu

That's not an entirely original composition but a version of an Irish song! It's really amazing alright, though!

Róisín Dubh

A Róisín, ná bíodh brón ort fé 'r éirigh dhuit,
Tá na bráithre ag teacht thar sáile is iad ag triall ar muir,
Tiocfaidh do phardún ón bPápa is ón Róimh anoir,
Is ní spárálfar fíon Spáinneach ar mo Róisín Dubh.

Is fada an réim do lig mé ó inné go dtí inniu,
Trasna sléibhte go ndeachas léi fe sheolta ar muir,
Is an Éirne do chaith mé de léim í cé mór é an sruth
Is bhí ceol téad ar gach taobh díom is mo Róisín Dubh.

Mhearaigh tú mé, a bhrídeog, is nárabh fhearrde duit
Is go bhfuil m'anam istigh i ngean ort, is ní inné ná inniu
D'fhág tú lag anbhann mé i ngné is i gcruth;
Ná feall orm is mé i ngean ort, a Róisín Dubh.

Shiúlfainn féin an drúcht leat is fásaigh ghoirt
Mar shúil go bhfaighinn rún uait nó páirt de m' thoil.
A chraibhín chumhra, gheallaig domsa go raibh grá agat dom
Is gurb í fíorscoth na Mumhan í mo Róisín Dubh.

Beidh an Éirne ina tuilte tréana is réabfar cnoic
Beidh an fharraige ina tonnta dearga is doirtfear fuil,
Beidh gach gleann sléibhe ar fud Éireann is móinte ar crith
Lá éigin sula n-éaga mo Róisín Dubh.

LegacyUser

Simu: Róisín Dubh
Now I know where the music venue in Galway got its name from

Oh yes, Yeats is divine and we mention Henay and Kavanagh of course!

What about a Moore poem ?

The Meeting of the Waters

There is not in the wide world a valley so sweet
As that vale in whose bosom the bright waters meet
Oh the last rays of feeling and life must depart
Ere the bloom of that valley shall fade from my heart
Ere the bloom of that valley shall fade from my heart

Yet it was not that nature had shed o'er the scene
Her purest of crystal and brightest of green
'Twas not her soft magic of streamlet or hill
Oh No 'twas something more exquisite still
Oh No 'twas something more exquisite still

'Twas that friends, the belov'd of my bosom were near
Who made every scene of enchantment more dear
And who felt how the best charms of nature improve
When we see them reflected from looks that we love
When we see them reflected from looks that we love

Sweet vale of Avoca! How calm could I rest
In thy bosom of shade, with the friends I love best
Where the storms that we feel in this cold world should cease
And our hearts, like thy waters, be mingled in peace
And our hearts, like thy waters, be mingled in peace

Shabadu

Here's some Pat Ingoldsdy for the mix.

Conversation With A Garda In
Grafton Street
by Pat Ingoldsby

A couple of years back I paused in Grafton Street
and leaned against a litter bin to listen to a busker.

A large garda appeared beside me.

“Are you selling anything that you shouldn’t be selling?”
he said.

“I’m just enjoying the sunshine and the music”

“Yeah but are you selling anything that you shouldn’t
be selling”

“I’m simply enjoying the music.”

PAUSE

“You’re wearing an awful lot of jewellery all the same.”

“That is none of your business” I said.

“I was just making conversation” he said.

Lovely.


Up and Down the Strip
by Pat Ingoldsby

It's the tingle between your legs that takes you down to Leeson Street, down to the The Strip down to meet tight jeans tight thighs denim bottoms hopes high standing and sitting sipping the wine buy you a bottle make you mine and the Stones can't get no satisfaction.

Business men working late grey haired overweight white shirts club ties credit cards white lies cigar smoke bald spots big stomachs big shots wrinkles over rugby scars randy thoughts company cars and the Stones can't get no satisfaction.

Eyes meet look away how do you start? what do you say? look unmarried like you couldn't care less look unfrustrated they'll never guess pray to God that your daughter's not here hold in your stomach swallow your fear grab two glasses bottle of wine take a sip make you mine and the Stones can't get no satisfaction.

Jump suits open zipped legs crossed leather hipped tight jeans young blood long skirts looking good some do some don't how can you tell which one won't more important which one will onto the dance floor get in for the kill dance fast dance slow move in closer now you know dance fast dance slow nuzzle the neck here we go

.......

Up the steps tired and slow she drank your wine she's still below up the steps tired and slow the taxis are waiting all in a row and the Stones can't get no satisfaction.


A Good Trick If You Can Do It
by Pat Ingoldsby

I don’t know how he did it.
The bus driver said- “Watch this!”
And he stopped the bus.
The trees and fields
on both sides of the road
kept on moving past us.

“Now they think the bus
is moving,” he said

Tobias Greeshman

simu wrote:

I must lie down where all the ladders start
In the foul rag and bone shop of the heart.

I really love these final lines from The Circus Animals Desertion, about learning how to be creative again.

Yeats has to be the best Irish Poet, I used to hate him for quite a while (the Maud Gonne infatuation pi**ed me off a little) and favour Patrick Kavanagh, but yeats was cool, wrote some very moving and beautiful pieces of poetry.

Does anyone remember the poem the The Fisherman, it was on the leaving cert syllabus a while back, here it is:

Although I can see him still.
The freckled man who goes
To a grey place on a hill
In grey Connemara clothes
At dawn to cast his flies,
It's long since I began
To call up to the eyes
This wise and simple man.
All day I'd looked in the face
What I had hoped 'twould be
To write for my own race
And the reality;
The living men that I hate,
The dead man that I loved,
The craven man in his seat,
The insolent unreproved,
And no knave brought to book
Who has won a drunken cheer,
The witty man and his joke
Aimed at the commonest ear,
The clever man who cries
The catch-cries of the clown,
The beating down of the wise
And great Art beaten down.

Maybe a twelvemonth since
Suddenly I began,
In scorn of this audience,
Imagining a man,
And his sun-freckled face,
And grey Connemara cloth,
Climbing up to a place
Where stone is dark under froth,
And the down-turn of his wrist
When the flies drop in the stream;
A man who does not exist,
A man who is but a dream;
And cried, 'Before I am old
I shall have written him one
poem maybe as cold
And passionate as the dawn.'

Earthhorse

People often overlook the fact that Oscar Wilde wrote more than plays. This is perhaps his most famous poem, The Ballad of Reading Gaol: http://www.theotherpages.org/poems/wilde04.html.

Ditto Beckett and Swift. Yeats is more than likely the greatest though, in terms of depth, breadth and mastery of the form.