35/3 
 ©■43735' 
 
 HE VOICE 
 
 OF 
 
 IRELAND 
 
 PETER GOLDEN 
 
PS 
 
 CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 GIFT OF 
 
 Miss Ida Langdon 
 
Cornell University Library 
 PS 3513.043735V8 1916 
 
 The voice of Ireland. 
 
 3 1924 022 450 823 
 
The original of tliis book is in 
 tlie Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924022450823 
 
THE VOICE OF IRELAND 
 
 i 
 
 BY 
 
 PETER GOLDEN 
 
 COVER DES GN BY aEORGE ILLIAN 
 
 PRESS OP M. a. O'CONNOR 
 NEW YORK CITY 
 CMS 
 
Copyright Appmed For 
 
voice 
 
 Of- 
 
 1 Re I And 
 
 pe5eH.GOiden 
 
TO 
 ISOLDE 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Preface ^ 1 1 
 
 England, We Pray for Your Death IS 
 
 Inisfail 16 
 
 Send Us, O God ! the Revolution 18 
 
 A Prayer 20 
 
 Unconquered 21 
 
 To England 22 
 
 A Song of Defiance 23 
 
 Resurgam 26 
 
 For England 27 
 
 To Arms 28 
 
 O Heart of Mine, You Are Not Dead 33 
 
 The Call 34 
 
 The End Is Now 37 
 
 Caitlin 40 
 
 The Soul of Ireland 41 
 
 Prepare for Action 42 
 
 Nemesis 44 
 
 A Request 45 
 
 Not Even Then 46 
 
 What Are You Going To Do About It? 47 
 
 The Voice of the Dead 48 
 
 What Pledge? 50 
 
 A Hyphenate's Defiance ., 5 1 
 
 Fear Not for Me 53 
 
 The Dead _..... 55 
 
 Macroom Castle 56 
 
 Eines to the SuUane 59 
 
 Mother o' Mine _ _ 60 
 
 Not Yet ,. 62 
 
 An Irish Reverie 64 
 
 My Love Who Died for Ireland 67 
 
 The Barricades 68 
 
 The Separatist 69 
 
 The News From Fontenoy. 71 
 
PAGE 
 
 To John E. Redmond, Arch Traitor and Slave 73 
 
 The Cause 74 
 
 The Rebel 76 
 
 England's Friendship 76 
 
 Have You Heard About Cork? 77 
 
 The Hills of Holy Ireland 79 
 
 March 4th 80 
 
 Rise, Indians, Rise ! _ 84 
 
 Commotion in Hades 86 
 
 Rats! 86 
 
 Ireland's Answer 86 
 
 John Boyle O'Reilly, 1915 87 
 
 To Seaghan Buidhe 88 
 
 On the War 88 
 
 A Dream of Country Eife 89 
 
 We'll Cling to Holy Ireland Yet 91 
 
 A Cushla Gal Machree 93 
 
 To Ireland 93 
 
 The Spirit of Erin 94 
 
 A Hope 95 
 
 From the Boghera Hills 96 
 
 A Prose Poem _ 97 
 
 Songs for Isolde 98 
 
 A Poet's Midnight Reverie 101 
 
 Eines 105 
 
 A Request 106 
 
 Afraid 106 
 
 To Peggy 107 
 
 As Against Redmond's Prayer for England 108 
 
 To One Who Passed 110 
 
 To Jim the Post 1 1 1 
 
PREFACE 
 
 I NLESS we wish the Irish cause to die, unless we wish 
 the last injunction of Emmet to be merely a memory in- 
 stead of a beacon light and an inspiration, then must we 
 each become a veritable crusader and propound the doc- 
 trine of Irish Nationhood in the face of all opposition and of all 
 defeat. We must become inoculated with the germ of unrest and 
 disquietude and dissatisfaction until the question is finally and 
 forever settled- We must lift up our hearts and our hopes and 
 face the world proudly and unafraid, not skulking with an 
 apology in the corner and professing our willingness to accept 
 even a dole, but rather proclaim forever and without cessation 
 that there is here a living, burning, vital question that with us 
 at least is paramount to all questions and that will not, can not, 
 and shall not down. We must get to have a heart-beat on higher 
 and holier and deeper things than the petty squabbles that but 
 waste our energy and scatter our force nor ever bring us a due 
 meed of reward. We must fan our dormant enthusiasm into a 
 flame, must light and kindle anew the souls and minds and spirit 
 of our people until we create a feeling that it will be impossible 
 to overcome. We must keep constantly before our minds the 
 memory of those who suffered for Ireland, of those who died 
 for Ireland, and swear unswerving, unyielding, undying devotion 
 to the cause for which they labored and at last laid down their 
 lives. If not, what a farce is our patriotism, and a fallacy our 
 profession of loyalty and faith. God will not have His work 
 made manifest by cowards, and our independence will never be 
 won by "weaklings, subtle and suave and mild, but by men with 
 the hearts -of Vikings and the simple faith of a child." And 
 we must above all block England's policy, thwart her plans, and 
 strike at her wherever, whenever and however we can. You 
 say this is the doctrine of hate. Aye, faith, and so is it meant 
 to be. That doctrine we must foster, that doctrine we must 
 propagate, that doctrine we must make grow, because as Emer- 
 
 11 
 
son finely says: "The doctrine of hatred must be preached as 
 the counteraction of the doctrine of love when that pules and 
 whines." 
 
 Ah, no, we want no part in the malodorous and bloodstained 
 British Empire. We glory not in her pageantry, we participate 
 not in her power, the glory and the splendor of her martial array 
 can not and will not and shall not blind us to the blood and the 
 tears and the sufferings she inflicted upon us and to the Gethse- 
 mane of sorrow she compelled us to undergo. We want to finish 
 the fight, the glorious and holy fight carried on by our race for 
 seven centuries and to drive her and every accursed and tainted 
 thing she stands for out of the four shores of Ireland, and though 
 it may still take years of blood and tears and suffering and 
 sorrow to accomplish it, we shall not rest and we shall not falter 
 until it is finally and forever done. Her flag flies in every port, 
 her ships sail upon every sea, the roll of her drumbeat has been 
 heard even by the most savage and remote of tribes, but she 
 has never overcome the undying, unconquerable spirit of Ireland 
 and by God she never, never, never shall. 
 
 We take our place with the dead. Their cause do we 
 espouse, their principles do we promulgate. The flag that has 
 fallen from their dear, dead hands shall not trail, and shall not 
 droop, but shall be carried on in triumph without apology and 
 without fear. And O if they who were ever faithful and went 
 down to nameless and unnumbered graves for Caitlin Ni Houli- 
 han and her holy and sacred cause, could but speak from their 
 graves to-day when a baneful and pernicious and a soul-destroy- 
 ing policy of compromise and conciliation has led the people of 
 the world to believe that the idea of an independent Irish Nation 
 exists only in the minds of dreamers and of visionaries, they 
 would tell you O men and women of Ireland to go out into the 
 highways and the byways, and preach if needs be from the very 
 housetops that the hope of building up again on the western 
 shores of Europe an independent Irish Nation in everything that 
 the words independent and Irish mean, namely, a nation speaking 
 its own language, thinking its own thoughts, creating its own 
 literature and being moulded intellectually by it, having its own 
 
 12 
 
customs, its own manners, its own ways, its own ideas and its 
 own ideals, a nation absolutely self-centered, self-sufficient and 
 self-sustained, that the hope of building up such a nation as 
 this is not merely a dream, is not merely a vision, but is a live, 
 mighty, vital throbbing issue, for the accomplishment of which 
 there are in and out of Ireland hundreds of thousands of men, 
 aye, and women, who will face the cell, and the ship, and the 
 scaffold itself as willingly as did those who fought at Aughrim 
 and the Boyne and went down to death upon the unbroken ram- 
 parts of L,imerick. They would tell you to proclaim in very 
 trumpet tones that by the living God this land of ours, sanctified 
 and made more than dear by all the blood poured out for its 
 redemption shall not die, shall not perish, and shall not now at 
 the eleventh hour barter her birthright for a mess of pottage 
 and become a contented. Crown Colony of England, but that 
 she shall still live, still strive, still suffer, aye, and if needs be, 
 again go down into the Valley of the Shadow of Death rather 
 than relinquish her inherent and her God-given right to be free. 
 That right she never has relinquished and that right she never 
 shall. 
 
 The fight is still on and let no man forget it; the old fight 
 between the Sassenach and the Celt for the soul and for the soil 
 and for the heart and for the mind of Ireland; that fight has 
 been carried on for the last seven hundred and fifty years; it 
 has never even once been abandoned and it never will be aban- 
 doned until the last Irishman in existence drops dead in his 
 tracks. 
 
 Ah, no; we are not reconciled; by the memory of all our 
 dead we are not reconciled. By the memory of Tone and Emmet 
 and Sheares and Orr, and Mitchel and Meagher and Davis and 
 Doheny and Allen, Larkin and O'Brien and Peter O'Neill Crow- 
 ley, we are not reconciled, we are not appeased, we are not con- 
 quered, we have not crossed over the glutted and the unavenged 
 graves of our dead to fall lovingly upon the neck of our op- 
 pressor, and like the great, the brave, the lion-hearted John 
 Mitchel, if we, too, "could catch the flames of hell in our hands 
 we would fling them in the face of the British Empire." 
 
 13 
 
ENGLAND, WE PRAY FOR YOUR DEATH 
 
 FOOT with the Fate that has come to you — 
 The fate that we've waited for — 
 Alert and intent, we watch to-day 
 The outcome of the war. 
 From the uttermost sough of the Southern Sea 
 
 To the Northland's ice-bound breath. 
 Wherever we Irish are to-day, 
 
 England, we pray for your death. 
 
 Aye, England, we pray with the holiest prayer 
 
 That ever to Heaven went 
 To smite you and strike you and drag you down 
 
 Till your Empire apart is rent; 
 Till the people of all the earth rejoice 
 
 That your plundering power is gone 
 And the fetters are broken from Freedom's feet, 
 
 That you foully forged thereon. 
 
 By the centuried wrongs and the countless crimes. 
 
 By our babes' and our women's blood, 
 By all the m)rriads whom you slew. 
 
 Because they for Ireland stood. 
 By the bones of all our brave who fell, 
 
 Your assassin heel beneath, 
 Wherever we Irish are to-day, 
 
 England, we pray for your death. 
 
 IS 
 
INISFAIL 
 
 HE tell-tale finger tips of Time 
 
 Have failed, O Love, to leave a trace 
 On the calm beauty of thy face, 
 That still is stainless and sublime! 
 
 Blessed by thy knightly accolade 
 Thy sons, their bodies ever set 
 Against the bristling bayonet 
 Thy fair renown immortal made. 
 
 Witli Freedom's lightning luminous. 
 With purple pageantry aflame. 
 Chanting unto the night your name. 
 They thronged for things victorious. 
 
 Nor all the splendor that they spent. 
 Nor all their valor could avail 
 To crush thy foes. Loved Inisfail. 
 Yet art thou still a testament, 
 
 Of the high hope that led us on, 
 
 Down through the age-long, blood-red night. 
 
 When all our legions of the light 
 
 By savage foes were set upon. 
 
 With splendid loyalty impearled, 
 Thy sons again will soon essay 
 To hold thy embattled foes at bay 
 Across the highways of the world. 
 
 Aye forth from every hut and hall. 
 Full in the foeman's face to fling, 
 
 16 
 
The gauntlet of their challenging 
 Leaping they'll come unto your call. 
 
 The Nations to their doom have gone, 
 And all their glory, all their sway, 
 Are as a thing of yesterday, 
 Thou still undaunted livest on. 
 
 The tell-tale finger tips of Time 
 Have failed, O Love, to leave a trace 
 On the calm beauty of thy face. 
 That still is stainless and sublime! 
 
 X/ 
 
SEND US, O, GOD! THE REVOLUTION 
 
 "When Ireland gets Home Rule she will be the most loyal 
 part of the British Empire." — The Parliamentary Party. 
 
 jERISH the thought, and perish those 
 
 Who such a feeling now would foster. 
 Our country will not sink so low 
 
 Whatever treasure it may cost her. 
 We did not unto England yield 
 
 When on her noon the sun was shining. 
 And oh! we shall not do so now 
 When all her glory is declining. 
 
 What to that Empire do we owe 
 
 That we to save it now should gather? 
 Go ask of all our countless dead 
 
 Why we should not destroy it rather. 
 God shield us from contributing 
 
 To the foul thing's continuation. 
 But may He send us soon instead 
 
 The crash of its annihilation. 
 
 "No compromise" must be our cry, 
 
 No sign of wavering must we show them. 
 Until we have paid back the debt, 
 
 The awful, awful debt we owe them. 
 The conflict must be carried on 
 
 Though into dust each sword were shivered, 
 Until our Race stands forth alone, 
 
 Redeemed, enfranchised and delivered. 
 
 Small difference it makes to us 
 
 Which British Party robs our nation. 
 We're fighting for a holier cause 
 
 We're fighting for our liberation. 
 
 18 
 
There's just one way and only one 
 
 To free us from the whole pollution 
 
 And to regain our Nationhood 
 
 And that one way is Revolution. 
 
 You may decry it all you will 
 
 And any way you wish taboo it. 
 But if you'd with the strife be done 
 
 There is no other way to do it. 
 Humanity since Time began 
 
 Has had its every right resented, 
 Till its demands were made by men 
 
 And on a rifle's point presented. 
 
 "Divide and conquer" was the cry. 
 
 Since first their hordes appeared upon us, 
 "Divide and conquer" is the cry 
 
 That has to-day almost undone us. 
 And now again by fraud and guile 
 
 Our lines they're seeking to dissever. 
 Oh! men, they must be stricken down 
 
 Nor let them rule our land for ever. 
 
 Brothers, the spirits of the brave 
 
 Intent to-day are bending o'er us. 
 And, oh! our Motherland to save 
 
 With what appealing they implore us. 
 Let not our ranks, united now. 
 
 By Party voicings be invaded. 
 And if we fighting have to fall 
 
 Let us fall gloriously as they did. 
 
 They who so long by Aileach's halls 
 In readiness have been remaining. 
 
 19 
 
Have sensed the struggle from afar. 
 
 And at their leash their steeds are straining, 
 
 Give us, O, Grod ! in this our day 
 
 Of all our centuried strife the fruition, 
 
 The march, the muster, the array. 
 Send us, O, God! the Revolution. 
 
 A PRAYER 
 
 I^ORD God of Battles! Hear us, 
 V ^ Hearken, O God, we pray! 
 
 ^'1 Strike England, the foe of Freedom- 
 Strike England down to-day, 
 Till the last of her ships is shattered. 
 Till the last of her guns is gone. 
 And there's left no sign of her robber rule 
 In the trail of the setting sun! 
 
 20 
 
UNCONQUERED 
 
 OU have planted your flag upon every crag 
 Where the winds of the world blow; 
 Your ships they sail before every gale 
 Where the world's waters go; 
 You have conquered the races near and far. 
 
 From the sun's rise to its set. 
 But, oh, we fling it in your face — 
 We are not conquered yet! 
 
 By the higher things you could never feel. 
 
 By the dreams you could never know. 
 We will fight to the end of the glorious fight, 
 
 O, hated and ancient foe! 
 And we pledge you our hate, our deathless hate. 
 
 Till the stars from their Course are driven. 
 And the very ends of the earth itself 
 
 Asunder are rent and riven. 
 
 21 
 
TO ENGIvAND 
 
 OU may say to the world that you've won us 
 To your side in the conflict at last; 
 You may go and proclaim we've forgotten 
 And forgiven the crimes of the past; 
 
 You may boast that the battle is over, 
 
 That we're vanquished, defeated, undone. 
 
 But soon from your dream you'll recover, 
 O Fool, We've Not Even Begun. 
 
 22 
 
A SONG OF DEFIANCE 
 
 I YE terrorize, intimidate, 
 
 Fill every jail to overflowing. 
 Renew your massacres and make 
 
 A gallows of each tree that's growing; 
 Call every murderous myrmidon 
 
 At your command to crush and quell us, 
 The splendid spirit of our race 
 
 Will to the last remain rebellious. 
 
 You conquer usf Oh, harridan! 
 
 As well lift up your hands to Heaven 
 Then tell the universe that God 
 
 His Kingdom unto you has given. 
 Ah, no; and though from many a field 
 
 We for the time perforce retreated 
 You had to face our ranks again. 
 
 And found us ever undefeated. 
 
 Aye, down through all the centuries. 
 
 Surcharged and sentient with sorrow. 
 Though we were beaten back to-day 
 
 Once more we met you every morrow. 
 From every sanguinary field 
 
 Howe'er the crimson war tide drifted 
 We came unconquered, and on high 
 
 Our flag aloft again was lifted. 
 
 The Fates have spoken, and at last 
 
 You've fallen from your bloodstained station; 
 You're down, in the ashes of defeat 
 
 And we are wild with exultation. 
 Terror has clutched you in her clasp 
 
 And Fear and Panic stalk beside you; 
 
 23 
 
Ah, harpy, you're revealed at last 
 
 Nor all your hoards again can hide you. 
 
 Let parasites proclaim your praise 
 
 We know how we by you were treated, 
 And never once our race shall rest 
 
 Till you are in the dust, defeated. 
 We'll fight unflinchingly until 
 
 The last enslaving link we sever. 
 And send you and your cursed brood 
 
 From out our country's shores for ever. 
 
 Think you, O fool! that we're afraid — 
 
 What is it we should fear in dying? 
 Or could we die a nobler death 
 
 Than your detested power defying? 
 Bring then each bribed assassin forth, 
 
 O! Sassenach, you'll sorely need 'em, 
 To crush the minds of men whose souls 
 
 Are fortressed at the font of Freedom. 
 
 How does our country stand? Sublime, 
 
 With heart and soul and face defiant. 
 Feeling her Liberty at hand 
 
 And gloriously self-reliant — 
 Thrilled with the thought of things to be. 
 
 Fibred in every nerve for Freedom, 
 Again surrounded by her sons 
 
 And pledged to victory to lead 'em. 
 
 Then terrorize, intimidate. 
 
 Fill every jail to overflowing, 
 
 Renew your massacres and make 
 
 A gallows of each tree that's growing; 
 
 24 
 
Call every murderous myrmidon 
 
 At your command to crush and quell us, 
 The splendid spirit of our race 
 
 Will to the last remain rebellious. 
 
 lb 
 
RESURGAM 
 
 J^ranAGNlFICENT and splendid host 
 ^^^1 Whose love for her was uppermost, 
 r^|?H Fear not that Ireland's cause is lost. 
 
 For by our very lives we vow 
 
 The radiant beauty of her brow 
 
 Shall not be drenched in darkness now. 
 
 The flaming flambeaus of the day 
 Shall soon across her portals play. 
 And all the powers of darkness slay. 
 
 And many a far flung banneret 
 Shall blazon in its beauty yet 
 Before her Freedom's sun is set. 
 
 Aye, many a ringing battle cry 
 Shall soon in triumph testify 
 The glory of her victory. 
 
 26 
 
FOR ENGLAND 
 
 Shrieks with such terror and affright? 
 AY, who is this that through the night 
 'Tis England from the Fates in flight. 
 
 England the harpy, she whose name 
 Spread desolation where it came. 
 And misery and want and shame. 
 
 From every land through which she passed 
 Hope, Mercy, Pity fled aghast, 
 Ah; she is in the toils at last. 
 
 She's in the toils, and to the skies. 
 My soul in exultation cries, 
 "Lord, God, increase her agonies." 
 
 Smite her, O God, from head to foot. 
 Strike, strike her to the very root. 
 The perjured, pandering prostitute. 
 
 Winnow the world that it may be 
 From all the fetid foulness free 
 Of the old lecherous debauchee. 
 
 27 
 
TO ARMS 
 
 OWED, bartered, bleeding and betrayed. 
 Of alien parasites the prey. 
 With no one on her side arrayed 
 To point her the heroic way. 
 With only those who to her foe 
 
 Forever bend and fawn and bow. 
 Nor know the nobler way to go 
 
 How is it with our country now ? 
 
 About her dear devoted head 
 
 The crown of sorrow still is pressed, 
 And with her sacred life blood red 
 
 The tyrant's sword is at her breast. 
 And while from every pore she bleeds. 
 
 And slowly ebbs her life away, 
 Who is it seriously heeds 
 
 Our claim to Nationhood to-day? 
 
 How paltry and how mean the plea 
 
 That times have changed, and that at last, 
 Our foe would benefactor be 
 
 If we would but forget the past. 
 And that she uses — what a boon? — 
 
 Her olden methods now no more, 
 Give her but cause and see how soon 
 
 The rack and thumbscrew she'll restore. 
 
 Aye, give her cause, and to her aid 
 Will come at but a word from her. 
 
 In all their perfidy arrayed 
 
 The cutthroat and the perjurer; 
 
 For never will she be our friend. 
 However politicians prate. 
 
 28 
 
But will unto the bitter end, 
 
 Despise us with the deadliest hate. 
 
 O for an hour of those who fought 
 
 In groups of two or three or ten, 
 To think as unafraid they thought. 
 
 To do as they did bravely then ; 
 They unto Britain did not bend. 
 
 Nor ever to her prowess bow. 
 But still resisted to tlie end, 
 
 And would were they but living now. 
 
 What; do you blush for those who dared 
 
 To fight the foe as best they could? 
 Or mock them because unprepared 
 
 They faced him even where he stood? 
 Ah, in the days when they were here. 
 
 No Sassenach, however great. 
 Would ask our country with a sneer 
 
 If she her wants would formulate. 
 
 We never yet a fetter broke 
 
 By speech however eloquent, 
 'Twas only when the rifle spoke 
 
 That unto us an ear was lent; 
 Tipperary's hills can tell a tale 
 
 The Saxon will not soon forget, 
 Tipperary, never known to fail, 
 
 God, is Tipperary living yet? 
 
 What once occurred at Carrickshock 
 
 Made more impress on England's mind 
 
 Than all our talk. Manchester's Lock 
 Made history, too, and of a kind 
 
 29 
 
That for full many an after year 
 She struggled to forget in vain; 
 
 God, is there left no spirit here 
 
 That will inspire our souls again? 
 
 When soon the Indians shall rise 
 
 To send the Saxon to the sea, 
 And revolution lights the skies. 
 
 In what position will we be? 
 Found as we often were before. 
 
 Unorganized and unprepared. 
 And yet our Freedom ten times o'er 
 
 We might have won, had we but dared. 
 
 Where are the arms? where the men? 
 
 The commissariat and all 
 We should have by us to begin 
 
 Unless again like flies we'd fall? 
 The sleekest slave who ever bent 
 
 Obedient to a tyrant's knees, 
 Could from his shrunken soul give vent 
 
 To nobler sentiments than these. 
 
 Who, when the war cry ever came, 
 
 Still by the side of England stood, 
 But we — ^to our eternal shame 
 
 And built her Empire with our blood. 
 Without a solitary thought. 
 
 We gave her of the best we bred. 
 Unmindful of the wrong we wrought. 
 
 And piled her passes with our dead. 
 
 Aye, ever forth for her we go. 
 
 To fight on many a foreign field. 
 
 30 
 
Where if we do not to the foe, 
 
 We to some dread disease must yield; 
 But yet for this in bitter tone, 
 
 No politician will upbraid, 
 'Tis when we struggle for our own 
 
 That we a mockery are made. 
 
 What of the Sea-Divided-Gael? 
 
 Or are they too an empty boast. 
 Or when from out her shores they sail 
 
 Are they to Ireland ever lost? 
 Wherever o'er the earth they've gone, 
 
 For every other land they've fought, 
 Who says they will not for their own 
 
 If they're but once together brought? 
 
 Where sweep the Barrow and the Bann, 
 
 Are there not men to Ireland true? 
 Are there not those who for her can 
 
 And will some deed of daring do? 
 Or have her noblest, greatest, gone 
 
 To nameless and unnumbered graves, 
 Only that we might linger on 
 
 A race of callous, soulless slaves? 
 
 Down the long stretches of the years, 
 
 The best and bravest of our race. 
 Have faithful been through blood and tears. 
 
 Rejecting pomp and power and place; 
 For us they touched each chord of pain. 
 
 Of sorrow sounded the abyss, 
 Christ, did they do it all in vain? 
 
 God, have they only died for this? 
 
 From field and forum mine and mart. 
 Arise and arm, plot, plan, prepare. 
 
 31 
 
To play again of men the part, 
 
 Then let them mock us — if they dare. 
 And though to crush again that Cause 
 
 By all our dead so sacred made. 
 They should invoke the deadliest laws. 
 
 Who says that we shall be afraid? 
 
 32 
 
O HEART OF MINE, YOU ARE NOT DEAD 
 
 HEART of mine, you are not dead. 
 Resplendent soon your Sun will shine, 
 And we shall once again entwine 
 A wreatli of glory round your head. 
 
 Whene'er you called your children came 
 From all the ramparts of the world. 
 To see your flag again unfurled. 
 With hearts and souls and eyes aflame. 
 
 Though fearful and though ill they fared, 
 Yet never were there wanting those 
 Who evermore against your foes 
 The Banner of Revolt upreared. 
 
 And every bloodstained way they went, 
 To bring you back your former fame 
 In one crescendo of acclaim 
 Still of their deeds is eloquent. 
 
 And you have hearts beside you yet 
 Who, till your hillsides once again 
 Shall tremble with the tread of men, 
 Have sworn they will not forget. 
 
 O Heart of mine you are not dead : 
 Resplendent soon your Sun will shine. 
 And we shall once again entwine 
 A wreath of glory round your head. 
 
 33 
 
THE CALL 
 
 IHE crisis has arrived at last, 
 
 'Tis now no time for idle dreaming, 
 Now when a nobler era dawns 
 
 A soldier's life is more beseeming. 
 With policies that but betray 
 
 Let politicians trim and trifle. 
 Be yours the braver, manlier way 
 Of learning how to use a rifle. 
 
 Hark! Hear you not your country's call? 
 
 Oh, rally once again to shield her. 
 Make of your breasts a barrier 
 
 And gloriously your life blood yield her; 
 Stand to defend your heritage. 
 
 One crowded hour in freedom's battle 
 Is worth a senile century 
 
 Wasted in vain and slavish prattle. 
 
 If you'd be free you've got to fight, 
 
 With guns and not with idle chatter, 
 O rest assured your liberty 
 
 Will not be brought you on a platter; 
 'Twas ne'er achieved save by the sword 
 
 And no land Freedom has within it 
 Whose sons and sires did not go forth 
 
 And with their good right arms win it. 
 
 Appeal no further to the foe. 
 
 Great God by now should you not know him, 
 He will not yield to you until 
 
 The burnish of a blade you show him. 
 Have you forgotten how he quailed 
 
 What time he saw the shining cannon 
 
 34 
 
That spoke more mightily than words 
 
 From out the streets of old Dungannon? 
 
 Where have we in our history 
 
 By words alone won satisfaction 
 Save when our words were backed by those 
 
 Whose every attitude meant action? 
 No, tyranny has never ceased 
 
 The seeds of Liberty to stifle, 
 Until came crashing round its ears 
 
 The royal music of a rifle. 
 
 Oh, be not once again deceived 
 
 By those who cry "conciliation," 
 That loathsome and that coward creed 
 
 That brought disaster to our nation. 
 Conciliate; unite with those 
 
 Who fain would forge anew our fetters? 
 Ah, no; by the Almighty God 
 
 We never will unite with traitors. 
 
 Nature and Nature's God from first 
 
 Intended us to be a Nation, 
 The peer of any upon earth 
 
 Without one bond or limitation ; 
 And, oh, on that disastrous day — 
 
 — If it should come — that will permit us 
 To give that Nationhood away 
 
 May Christ, the Son of God, forget us. 
 
 Oh, if atlast we fall so low. 
 
 For all the sorrows we have suffered. 
 As to relinquish every right 
 
 For this base compromise that's offered, 
 
 35 
 
Then speak of liberty no more 
 
 I^est all our dead unknown and nameless 
 Should rise from out their every grave 
 
 To curse a race tliat sank so shameless. 
 
 Away, away; leave loyalty 
 
 To rot within its fetid furrow, 
 Gird up your loins for nobler things. 
 
 And watch you for the warlike morrow. 
 Grasp in your hands the bayonet's hilt, 
 
 Liberty's only true defender. 
 And swear the very sun shall wilt 
 
 Before 'twill witness your surrender. 
 
 Rise, daughters of our race and be 
 
 As were those splendid Spartan mothers, 
 Who bravely to the battle sent 
 
 Their sweethearts, husbands, sires and brothers. 
 Bid yours prepare with might and main 
 
 To face again the conflict glorious. 
 And tell them as the Spartans told 
 
 "Come on your shields if not victorious." 
 
 For all the glory of the past. 
 
 For all the future holds before us, 
 Let not the hour go by again. 
 
 That even now is looming o'er us. 
 Bury all discord and all strife, 
 
 Each spirit of disunion stifle. 
 Come forward at your country's call 
 
 And learn how to use a rifle. 
 
 .% 
 
THE END IS NOW 
 
 GAIN they go, my children go. 
 
 Who should remain beside me now. 
 They go to fight for her who burned 
 
 This cross upon their mother's brow 
 
 There's scarce a war way of the world. 
 Whereon their bravery's not writ. 
 
 Writ for the foe who flung them forth. 
 The shame of it, the shame of it! 
 
 By Alpine hill and Russian steppe, 
 
 And far off by the Indian sea. 
 Their bones are bleaching in the sun — 
 
 If only they had died for me! 
 
 Through many a wild and rough defile. 
 Up many a bleak and lonely height, 
 
 Where sign of man was never seen. 
 
 They've borne the flag that's been their blight. 
 
 And even at that world's end. 
 
 Where Thibet's monks are called to prayer. 
 Leading the first of England's hosts. 
 
 My sons have left their bodies there. 
 
 Oh, I had ratlier see them dead 
 
 And sleeping calmly by my side. 
 Than know they were the pawns of her 
 
 By whom I have been crucified! 
 
 She takes their youth and strength, and when 
 
 They can no more a bulwark be, 
 She lets them in the ditches die. 
 
 Or sends them paupers back to me — 
 
 37 
 
To me deserted and despoiled. 
 
 The plaything of her tyranny, 
 Stripped of my heritage and left 
 
 Alone in my Gethsemane. 
 
 Oh, had they but by me remained. 
 If only they for me had died, 
 
 What rank would not be mine to-day. 
 
 What joy, what prowess and what pride! 
 
 Pride, but not with pride like hers. 
 
 Not proud for all the spoils of war. 
 
 Not proud for things material. 
 
 But proud for what is nobler far. 
 
 Proud for the inner gift to see 
 
 And give instruction by that sight. 
 
 As when, before, shone from my shores. 
 To all the world a flood of light. 
 
 Then darkness was upon the land. 
 
 And Europe in its hand was held, 
 
 Until I sent my children forth 
 
 And lo, that darkness was dispelled! 
 
 Aye, before every breeze that blew 
 
 My barks were sailing all the seas. 
 
 Favored by all the winds of God, 
 Bearing abroad my mission'ries. 
 
 They went not with Invasion's blight. 
 
 They went not with Oppression's pall, 
 
 Nor treasures seeking, but to bear 
 
 Learning and love and light to all. 
 
 And so again in pride of place, 
 I would to man a mentor be. 
 
 38 
 
To lead him to the heights and show 
 
 There was a something more to see — 
 
 A something higher was to see, 
 
 A something nobler was to know. 
 
 Other than the transition things 
 
 That vanish as the winter's snow. 
 
 But ah, they go; my children go, 
 
 Her impious Empire to extend. 
 
 And leave me in my loneliness! 
 
 When is the end, when is the end? 
 * * * * 
 
 The end is near, the end is now, 
 O, Motherland, look up and see 
 
 The wanton of the world at last 
 Is stricken in her infamy! 
 
 Not theirs the blame, O, Mother mine. 
 
 But hers who sent them forth to slay. 
 
 But by our suffering and their shame. 
 And by our God we will repay! 
 
 Aye, by our God we will repay 
 
 A thousand fold the centuried debt, 
 
 We will again to England show 
 
 That we have not been conquered yet. 
 
 And, Mother, we will stand for you 
 As fearless as our fathers stood. 
 
 And we will wipe your sorrows out 
 
 Drowned in the best of England's blood. 
 
 Time has brought many things to pass. 
 Time has not and will never see 
 
 The day when England "finis" writes 
 Unto your struggle to be free. 
 
 39 
 
CAITLIN 
 
 NSHROUDED in my suffering 
 Along my lonely way I go, 
 But hopeful for the few who cling 
 
 And cleave to me through every woe. 
 
 Through every woe and every war, 
 Unending fight for me they made, 
 
 My faithful undefeated sons 
 
 Whose fealty was unafraid. 
 
 And all that Life's young morning meant. 
 All the red wine of L,ife they gave. 
 
 And to their death, they deathless went. 
 My splendid heritage to save. 
 
 They went, they fell, and to their place 
 To safeguard my unconquered cause. 
 
 Sprang all the splendor of the race 
 
 With all that great and wondrous was. 
 
 And many a crashing cavalcade. 
 
 Up through each blinding battle smoke. 
 Bearing my banner to the sun 
 
 With cries unconquerable broke. 
 
 They gave me all the gifts they had. 
 
 Their blood has dyed my every plain, 
 
 My Brave, my Brave who loved me well. 
 What dastard says they died in vain? 
 
 40 
 
THE SOUL OF IRELAND 
 
 I AM a stranger indeed to many, but, ah, I am well known 
 and well beloved by a glorious few! Sorrow is upon 
 me and a great grief. Banishment has been my por- 
 tion and an unbroken canticle of suffering has been 
 my lot. I have lived in caves and mountain places and have 
 gone down to the Valley of Desolation, but / have never sold 
 my soul. Bruised and bleeding are my feet, and bleeding, aye 
 bleeding for ages has been my heart. I was there with Brian 
 when he smote with the Sword of Righteousness and banished 
 for ever from my shores tliose who would desecrate my soil. 
 I was in every effort made by all my faithful until in one wild 
 caoine of lamentation the world heard how my heart was being 
 broken at the Boyne; and after that, down all the night, the 
 fearful, fearful night, when, with never a ray of consolation, 
 my bravest went forth with the great faith of children to 
 restore me my heritage and bring me back my own. Prince 
 and Priest, scholar and soldier, the titled lady and the little 
 maid, all, all left their every avocation and burned the incense 
 of their splendid adoration in worship before my shrine. I was 
 at Fontenoy and Eanden when my sons gave their lives for an- 
 other but sighed out their last breath in sorrow and longing for 
 me. I was in Thomas Street when the Strangers shed the 
 bravest blood poured out for my redemption, and in '48 and '67 
 I saw my sons go down to failure but never to defeat. To- 
 morrow I shall call for sacrifice again. On whom can I rely? 
 On whom can I rely? 
 
 Even now the mists are rising from the valleys and I hear 
 voices vibrant with triumphant music halloing along the hills. 
 I am calling on you again, O children of the Gael ! I am calling 
 on you again. On whom can I rely? On whom can I rely? 
 
 41 
 
PREPARE FOR ACTION 
 
 ND this then is the thing you send. 
 
 To bridge the centuries of sorrow. 
 This is the thing for which you say 
 
 Your Empire we'll uphold to-morrow? 
 Ah, no, our hands are free from crime 
 
 They have no shameful stains upon them, 
 And if we have concessions won 
 
 We do not thank you that we won them. 
 
 We bow no head, we bend no knee, 
 
 No acquiescence do we yield you. 
 Nor do we promise of our hearts 
 
 One moiety to guard or shield you. 
 Though every slave within the land 
 
 Should spend his life blood in rejoicing, 
 We, who have other work to do. 
 
 To other matters must give voicing. 
 
 Our rebel flag still woos the breeze. 
 
 Where is the dastard who would flout it 
 While there remain a rebel few 
 
 Who'll range their bodies all about it? 
 Though trampled upon many a field 
 
 It yielded to the f oeman never. 
 And lo ! it takes its place again 
 
 And floats more proudly now than ever. 
 
 Let there be peace? Aye, honest peace. 
 
 The peace that will our rights restore us, 
 But never peace while there remains 
 
 Great Britain's blood-stained banner o'er us. 
 Though loyalty is cried aloud 
 
 All have not yet the cause forsaken, 
 All are not won, nor will they be 
 
 Though to its centre earth were shaken. 
 
 42 
 
O ! noble and devoted dead. 
 
 Fear not your sacrifice was wasted; 
 They lie who tell us 'twas in vain 
 
 The bitterest things of life you tasted. 
 They're slaves who say our native land 
 
 Will never more become a nation. 
 The cause you fought for must go on 
 
 Till we achieve its consummation. 
 
 Even the faithfullest had feared 
 
 That Fate eternally would flout us. 
 When, lo ! that hour for which we prayed, 
 
 Loomed as by miracle about us. 
 No man can shirk his duty now. 
 
 Now, now the hour is that will try us. 
 And, oh! how great will be our shame 
 
 If we again let it go by us. 
 
 What mockery was all we said. 
 
 How more than vain was all our vaunting. 
 If when the crisis comes again. 
 
 That crisis comes and finds us wanting. 
 Forbid it God that this should be 
 
 Forbid that we should show a token 
 Of yielding until every tie 
 
 And every binding link is broken. 
 
 And so, in God's name, let's prepare. 
 
 Be ready when arrives the summons. 
 Our country's honor to uphold 
 
 Regardless of their Lords or Commons. 
 Let's seek no more by vain appeal 
 
 To gain for Ireland satisfaction; 
 The time for talking has gone by 
 
 Have done with words, prepare for action. 
 
 43 
 
NEMESIS 
 
 ITH infamy inebriate 
 Upon her blood-stained throne she sate, 
 And thought herself secure. At last 
 Nemesis through the portals passed. 
 
 And she whose hydra-headed hate 
 Made half the world desolate. 
 Looked forth in horror to behold 
 The scrolls of Fate at last unfold. 
 
 And hear the millions forced to flee 
 The trammels of her tyranny, 
 With hearts and souls aflame, to-day 
 For her annihilation pray. 
 
 44 
 
A REQUEST 
 
 OR all the sorrows we withstood 
 Against the Saxon blackguard brood, 
 I raise my voice, O, God on high 
 And crave of you to hear my cry! 
 
 When Britain is securely bound 
 And 'round her fast Fate's web is wound, 
 Lord, God in Heaven, I ask one prayer — 
 Grant me the glory to be there! 
 
 Give me the great boon to be nigh 
 When 'round her neck the noose they tie. 
 And send her shrieking in the air 
 Grant, grant, O God, that I be there ! 
 
 45 
 
NOT EVEN THEN 
 
 INCE you polluted first our shores 
 
 Seven hundred sad years have departed. 
 Yet England we are here to-day 
 
 As unsubdued as when we started; 
 You may have gold and ships and men. 
 
 And faith by all the gods you'll need 'em 
 To make our rebel Irish race 
 
 Forego its glorious fight for freedom. 
 
 You drove us from each fertile plain. 
 
 You scourged us from each blood-drenched valley; 
 You thought us crushed when from each hill 
 
 There rose again our rebel rally. 
 Aye, at the very time when most 
 
 You of our death were calmly dreaming, 
 You saw again against the sky 
 
 Our glorious banner grandly gleaming. 
 
 That flag will float, that spirit live, 
 
 Eong after all your power is humbled. 
 And the soul of Ireland will survive 
 
 When into dust your race has crumbled; 
 But should you live a million years. 
 
 You'll find that still we in your way are. 
 You'll find us Irish still at bay 
 
 As rebel then as we to-day are. 
 
 46 
 
WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO ABOUT IT? 
 
 ^ES, we're "conspiring" as you claim, 
 
 To save our kin across the water. 
 From being led forth in England's van. 
 And sent into the shambles' slaughter; 
 We're putting rifles in their hands 
 
 To use whatever time they'll need 'em — 
 Since when has it become a crime, 
 America, to arm for Freedom? 
 
 Time was within your own domain 
 
 When in the balance Freedom trembled, 
 The exiled children of the Gael 
 
 Around you to a man assembled. 
 Nor was there found in that long roll 
 
 One who disloyal was or traitor. 
 Nor have I heard that they were then 
 
 Assigned the name of "agitator." 
 
 Our people's safety is at stake. 
 
 The British desperately need 'em. 
 Out on the battlefields of France, 
 
 There to the cannon's mouth to feed 'em. 
 By every means within their power 
 
 The men of Ireland will oppose it. 
 And we'll uphold them to the end. 
 
 Nor do we give a damn who knows it. 
 
 And may success be on their side. 
 
 And may the God of battles speed 'em. 
 Who'll arm when, where, and how, they can, 
 
 To fight again for Ireland's Freedom. 
 So let us send the fiat forth, 
 
 Let no man for a moment doubt it. 
 We're with our people to the end. 
 
 What are you going to do about it? 
 
 47 
 
THE VOICE OF THE DEAD 
 
 ETCH me my claymore," cried O'Neill, 
 
 I,oud from his grave O'Donnell spoke 
 "Who are these dastards who proclaim 
 Allegiance to the English yoke?" 
 
 And every stalwart gallowglass 
 
 Who fell beneath the English heel 
 
 Rose upward from his gory shroud 
 
 And reached instinctive for his steel. 
 
 And all our dead, o'er all the earth. 
 
 Who through the years have slept in peace 
 At tidings of the treachery 
 
 Clamored incessant for release — 
 
 All who upon the scaffold died, 
 
 And all who brave in battle fell. 
 
 And all whose splendid lives were spent 
 In many a loathsome prison cell, 
 
 And all the millions of our race 
 
 Who filled the frightful famine graves, 
 
 And all of those whose bones to-day 
 
 Are buried 'neath th' Atlantic waves, 
 
 And all the dauntless unsubdued 
 
 Who fought through penury and pain 
 
 To keep their motherland alive. 
 
 Some glory for that land to gain. 
 
 Not for a better thing to eat, 
 
 Not for a better place to bide. 
 But for her liberty complete 
 
 Have these, the flower of Ireland died — 
 
 48 
 
Ireland, whose every vale and hill 
 
 And mountain way with blood is wet, 
 
 The blood of all her precious ones — 
 
 God, can their children now forget — 
 
 The victims of seven hundred years 
 Of massacre and blood and flame 
 
 Sundered the shroud in which they slept, 
 And to tlieir country's summons came. 
 
 A million wraith-like hands were raised, 
 A million wraith-like voices spoke: 
 
 "Accurst forever be the slaves 
 
 Who bow beneath the Saxon yoke!" 
 
 Back to your graves, devoted dead. 
 
 Nor fear for Ireland's freedom now. 
 
 Nor heed the traitors who would burn 
 The brand of slavery on her brow. 
 
 Leave them who would their land betray 
 And on her bondage now seem bent 
 
 To that which surely will repay — 
 To Time's terrific chastisement. 
 
 But Ireland will not be subdued 
 Nor will her honor bartered be 
 
 Though all the world against her stood 
 While runs one river to the sea. 
 
 49 
 
WHAT PLEDGE? 
 
 On the theory, no doubt, that "fools rush in where angels 
 fear to tread," several New York scribes have lately been clamor- 
 ing for a renewal of fealty to the United States by those dreadful 
 people, the "hyphenated-Americans." It might be interesting 
 to ascertain how many of said scribes are really American 
 citizens. 
 
 ^gcn PLEDGE! Of what? Of our loyalty? 
 
 We've ^ven that with our bravest blood. 
 Wherever our flag was by foes assailed, 
 
 'Twas we who foremost against them stood. 
 
 You give a pledge of whom there's doubt ; 
 
 We need no oath or pledge to bind us. 
 Whenever our country on us calls, 
 
 Fronting the foe — 'tis there you'll find us. 
 
 50 
 
A HYPHENATE'S DEFIANCE 
 
 A certain distinguished citizen has seen fit to lecture the 
 only people who always stood by this country when it was in 
 danger upon their supposed want of loyalty to "the flag." He 
 has threatened us with all manner of punishment, even that of 
 having us shot in the back, typical perhaps of the mode of war- 
 fare that type of warrior pursues. It might not be amiss for 
 some of this gentleman's friends to supply him with a sedative. 
 
 RATE not about the "flag" to us. 
 
 We've never been to it a stranger, 
 'Twas we who rallied round its folds 
 
 And saved it when it was in danger; 
 Each battlefield's dyed with the blood 
 
 Of those who fell that flag defending, 
 And Glory's splendid coronal 
 
 Above their graves to-day is bending. 
 
 We glory in our hyphened names. 
 
 We love the Motherland that bore us. 
 Nor shall we once forego that love 
 
 Whatever flag is floating o'er us. 
 He who is recreant to the land 
 
 That all his people lived and died in 
 Will never honor by his life 
 
 The land he happens to reside in. 
 
 We never failed the country yet. 
 
 And when the foe would fain invade it 
 The hyphens leaped to its defence 
 
 And none defended it as they did. 
 And if a crisis comes again, 
 
 We'll be found foremost in the vanguard. 
 And with our bodies and our lives 
 
 We'll make a shield for Freedom's standard. 
 
 51 
 
We did not have to come and learn 
 
 What patriotism is from you, sir. 
 Nor shall we suffer you to say 
 
 What policy we must pursue, sir, 
 And when again in threatening tones 
 
 You shriek, be careful whom you bray at, 
 For if you're spoiling for a fight. 
 
 Well, that's a game that two can play at. 
 
 52 
 
FEAR NOT FOR ME 
 
 HEN all around me lay the deep 
 Calm unanimity of sleep, 
 A voice said proudly, "Do not weep ; 
 
 "Nor fear that I will faithless be 
 To all the dead who died for me 
 Beneath the Saxon perfidy. 
 
 "Though only slaves my soil should tread. 
 Yet will I bear unbowed my head 
 While rest with me my gallant dead. 
 
 "Through Death and Death's delirium. 
 Though 'twere to meet their martyrdom. 
 They to my call have ever come. 
 
 "Each splendid gift for me they gave, 
 Nor sought they once their lives to save. 
 Though loomed the gallows and the grave. 
 
 "When all the country pulsed with pain. 
 And blood and tears were shed like rain. 
 The Stranger sought, but sought in vain, 
 
 "To crush me, aye, for even still 
 That spirit that he could not kill 
 Is calling loud from every hill. 
 
 "And when my bravest lay beneath 
 The dismal draperies of Death 
 Because of their unconquered faith 
 
 S3 
 
"Stayed by me still the heroic few. 
 Whom even Death could not undo. 
 Whose faith no foeman could subdue. 
 
 "The Stranger boasts the pomp of war; 
 I boast what is more potent far — 
 A mind his might can never mar. 
 
 "Fear not for me, nor be afraid, 
 I'll not be crushed howe'er betrayed 
 Till all the land in death is laid." 
 
 54 
 
THE DEAD 
 
 HEY went to death, and you could not save them, 
 O ! tender Mother and Mother true. 
 And though 'twas but sorrow and grief you gave them. 
 They still were faithful, asthore, to you. 
 
 Not once, O Heart, did they ever fail you. 
 
 Nor question once what the end might prove. 
 
 But they went to death with a joy and laughter. 
 For their hearts were aflame with a holy love. 
 
 They have not failed; from their graves has risen 
 
 A spirit that ever shall guide us on. 
 Till we reach the heights to which they led us. 
 
 And bathe our foreheads in Freedom's dawn. 
 
 55 
 
MACROOM CASTI.E 
 
 There, too, was the dear old town among the hills, with the 
 beautiful river flowing between, o'er whose banks still frowned 
 that grand old castle that may have had bravely withstood the 
 march of the invaders, or witnessed the last glorious struggle 
 of the thousands of souls who died immortally and grand for 
 Mother Ireland. There it stood, clothed with ivy, looking dark 
 and frowning as if mourning over days that were gone, but still 
 erect and grand as if to inspire one with the hope that though 
 we were deprived of our own and sent broadcast over the earth, 
 by God there should yet come the day for revenge. 
 
 HE wintry days are gone at last, 
 The winds are o'er, the storms are passed : 
 The woods that long had lost their sheen 
 Are clad again in brilliant green; 
 
 Once more from out each shady grove 
 
 The birds renew their lays of love. 
 
 Pure is the air, each wind that blows 
 
 Kisses the petals of a rose. 
 
 From every bank the daisies peep. 
 
 And cowslips from each crevice creep, ^ 
 
 And flowers in wild profusion bloom 
 
 Around the Castle of Macroom. 
 
 Old stronghold of Mac Caura Clan — 
 
 Mac Caura chivalrous and brave. 
 Before whom oft the Saxon ran, 
 
 Or stayed to fill a foeman's grave. 
 How oft around thy festive board 
 Thronged many a rebel Irish lord. 
 Who yet again full deeply swore 
 To drive the Saxon from the shore. 
 How quick and festive flew the hours 
 Within thy strong and stately towers, 
 
 56 
 
As 'round the wine cup circled free 
 
 And rose and swelled the minstrelsy. 
 
 What pleasure beamed on every face. 
 
 As the aged minstrel took his place 
 
 To sing to many a Gaelic air 
 
 Of noble knight and lady fair, 
 
 Of love and war, and dwell upon 
 
 The days that now alas were gone. 
 
 Before the bastard Saxon came 
 
 To blight our land with sword and flame. 
 
 And plant within our souls a hate, 
 
 That nothing can obliterate. 
 
 And well that aged minstrel might 
 
 Sing of their prowess in a fight. 
 
 For since from o'er the seas there came 
 
 The founder of the honored name, 
 
 Never upon a battlefield 
 
 Was a Mac Caura known to yield. 
 
 And many a time the foeman felt 
 
 The blow by their strong arm dealt. 
 
 Well might the foeman blanche with fear. 
 
 Whene'er their war cry sounded near. 
 
 The battle axe was swift and sure. 
 
 When wielded by Mac Caura Mor: 
 
 And often did their cannon boom 
 
 To hold the town of old Macroom. 
 
 Peace be unto your every grave. 
 Rebellious forefathers and brave, 
 Who willingly your lifeblood gave, 
 Your land from tyranny to save; 
 Each storied page doth amply tell 
 How valiantly you fought and well. 
 Fought for the land whose every vale, 
 And lake and rock and crag and dale. 
 
 57 
 
Is hallowed with a heroic tale — 
 
 Our own dear Island of the Sea 
 
 That could not, would not conquered be. 
 
 For every vale and every hill. 
 
 Would be a rebel stronghold still. 
 
 If we but only had our will. 
 
 Aye, think you, Sassenach, that we 
 
 Who've fought so long for I^iberty, 
 
 Think you that we whose bitter tears 
 
 Have fallen for seven hundred years. 
 
 Will basely now relinquish all 
 
 For some concession mean and small? 
 
 Oh, no, because from every vale. 
 
 Wherever fell a rebel Gael, 
 
 From every glen and every hill 
 
 Where the old spirit's throbbing still. 
 
 From gibbet, hulk and prison cell. 
 
 Where we have learned to know you well — 
 
 From Liffey's banks and Shannon's side 
 
 And the old Lee's rebellious tide — 
 
 From Mullaghmast and old Dunbuidhe, 
 
 And Limerick of the Treaty, 
 
 From thine own Castle, old Macroom, 
 
 And Emmet's unrecorded tomb. 
 
 Oh, from where'er the Gael has fled. 
 
 The voices of the martyred dead. 
 
 Ring out defiantly and free 
 
 It shall not be, it shall not be. 
 
 58 
 
I.INES TO THE SULLANE 
 
 HEN my soul shall escape from its prison of clay, 
 And wing its aerial flight 'mid the blue, 
 Methinks I shall hover awhile on my way, 
 To bid to Macroom a last, lingering adieu. 
 When the birds are all sleeping, the stars shining bright. 
 
 And the moonbeams at play upon every lawn, 
 I'll poise for the last taste of earthly delight, 
 
 O'er the banks of my own, my beloved Sullane. 
 
 Dear spot, where in childhood I ofentimes played 
 
 With the friends and companions now scattered afar. 
 And dreamt the vain dreams that so soon were to fade 
 
 'Mid the din of the world's rude clamor and war. 
 Ah, fondly I cherish each memory dear. 
 
 That embellished the hues of Life's roseate dawn. 
 If e'er there was heaven on earth sure 'twas here 
 
 By the banks of my own, my beloved Sullane. 
 
 Historic old town — for historic thou art. 
 
 And hast writ in thy country's story a leaf. 
 When the time came to strike, didst not thou take a part? 
 
 And the struggle was grand and heroic, though brief. 
 Sullane : did thy waters then "Caoine" for the brave. 
 
 Who before the Invader were destined to fall, 
 When valor and daring availed not to save. 
 
 And the tyrant strode conqueror, lord over all? 
 
 Oh, delighted I'd gaze upon every spot 
 
 That I knew in the sweet hours of childhood so well. 
 And though from them I roamed sure they were not forgot. 
 
 Fain, fain would I linger to bid them farewell: 
 On the old Bridge's battlement long would I stay, 
 
 Till the skylark betokened the coming of dawn. 
 And ascending on high, I'd look down on my way. 
 
 For a last, long farewell to my lovely Sullane. 
 
 59 
 
MOTHER O' MINE 
 
 I H, there's no one at all in the world like you, dear. 
 No one at all who so holds to my heart, 
 No one so tender and no one so true, dear. 
 
 No one for whom I from you would depart; 
 Though exiled afar to the land of the stranger, 
 I shall not forget you in shadow or shine. 
 In sickness, or sorrow, in dread or in danger. 
 To you I'll be faithful, oh. Mother o' Mine. 
 
 Through the night of my exile your hands have upheld me. 
 
 Your memory has cheered me, and lighted my way. 
 And the hope, oh, my Mother, has evermore thrilled me. 
 
 That soon I shall witness the dawn of the day — 
 The day that will see from each mountain and valley. 
 
 The sheen of our sabres resplendently shine. 
 When your children again all around you shall rally. 
 
 To bring back your glory, oh,. Mother o' Mine. 
 
 Oh, Mother o' Mine, can you hear how I cry to you. 
 
 Call to you all through the night time and day. 
 Yearn for you, long for you, wish I might fly to you. 
 
 But awaken to find myself far, far away? 
 Sure the heart in my bosom is broken with longing. 
 
 And my soul for your face never ceases to pine 
 And through all of my life there is no thought comes thronging 
 
 That is not of you, dear, oh, Mother o' Mine. 
 
 They have bowed down in sorrow your head that was peerless, 
 
 With the blood of your bravest they've drenched every plain. 
 With fire and with sword, all your homes they made cheerless, 
 
 And proclaimed you were conquered again and again. 
 In their wake they left nothing but rapine and slaughter. 
 
 They have ruined each hearthstone, and rifled each shrine. 
 But the best of their blood shall yet flow like the water. 
 
 When we come to avenge you, oh. Mother o' Mine. 
 
 60 
 
The call to the hillsides again will be sounding, 
 
 And tense with devotion we wait for the cry, 
 When your children again o'er the seas will go bounding, 
 
 Once more for your sake, dear, to do and to die. 
 The whine of the coward we pass by with scorning. 
 
 The fight for your freedom we shall not resign 
 Until we have crowned you sublime as the morning. 
 
 And throned you in beauty, oh, Mother o' Mine. 
 
 61 
 
NOT YET 
 
 Mr. Redmond has declared' that he was denied his birth- 
 right in being born outside the pale of the British Empire, but 
 that with the enactment of Home Rule his birthright will be re- 
 stored, and that Ireland will then send the brawn and brain of 
 the country to build up the Empire and make it strong. 
 
 f^l 
 
 ND shall we basely then forget 
 The countless hosts who for us set 
 Their breasts against the bayonet? 
 
 Ah ! no ; by all our martyred dead 
 We must fight on with heart and head 
 And fearlessly the winepress tread. 
 
 And though our victory may be late 
 Thou knowest, God, our cause is great. 
 And we can still afford to wait. 
 
 We did not unto Britain bow 
 When triumph circled all her brow. 
 Who dares say we shall do so now ? 
 
 We envy not her loathsome name. 
 Upon her crimes we lay no claim 
 Nor shall we shoulder now her shame. 
 
 We speak the spirit of our race 
 That no power ever can efface 
 And back our steps we shall not trace. 
 
 The winds o'er a dead world shall wail 
 Hell against heaven shall prevail 
 Before we in our trust shall fail. 
 
 62 
 
You pledge our country's brain and brawn 
 To safeguard for the devil's spawn — 
 Now that her glory's well nigh gone — 
 
 The accursed bloated Empire, built 
 By daggers poisoned to the hilt 
 And blood and treachery and guilt ? 
 
 Ah ! no, she'll suffer on as she 
 Has suffered in the past ere we 
 Consent to such an infamy. 
 
 Rather the ravages of war 
 And all the miseries that are 
 Before we say we've fallen so far. 
 
 O ! rivers that ran red with blood ; 
 O ! fields whereon our fathers stood ; 
 O ! all you mighty multitude 
 
 Who for the cause of Ireland fell 
 
 On gibbet and in prison cell, 
 
 lyike you the tale these traitors tell? 
 
 The very hills a protest shout. 
 Great God! the very stones cry out 
 What is this thing that you're about? 
 
 O ! spurn that monumental shame. 
 Press on in Ireland's holy name 
 And fight for Freedom's oriflame. 
 
 63 
 
AN IRISH REVERIE 
 
 |IGHT'S lengthening shadows traiUng down 
 Are fast enveloping the town, 
 The sea birds moaning from the west. 
 Send of the storm a due behest, 
 
 Even now upon the window pane 
 
 A tattoo's beaten by the rain. 
 
 That call boy of the hurricane. 
 
 And while across the o'ertopping hill 
 
 The bleak New England wind is blowing, 
 
 My heart that never can be still 
 
 Forever, ever back is going 
 
 To where from many a mountain stream 
 
 The Launa to the Lee is flowing. 
 
 Back, back my thoughts take flight to when 
 I roamed a boy in Harding's Glen, 
 Finding in crannies and in nooks 
 A knowledge never given in books. 
 And in my day dreams saw reveal'd 
 The glory of each flood and field. 
 Heard Nature's myriad harmonies 
 Chant many an anthem through the trees, 
 Saw every scene before me spread 
 By many a wild flower garlanded 
 Nor ever for a moment thought 
 That sorrow could to me be brought. 
 Even then I pondered o'er again 
 The record of each robber reign, 
 Saw how the land had been betrayed 
 By every law the tyrant made, — 
 That land that had so long been great 
 Now with but woe articulate, — 
 Beheld the appalling mental blight 
 
 64 
 
That crushed her through the age-long night, 
 
 Saw Famine's gaunt and hellish hand 
 
 Spread death and doom throughout the land, 
 
 Until her sons, with sorrow bent. 
 
 Far to the west unwilling went. 
 
 To where even wilds a shelter lent. 
 
 Till all that beauteous used to be 
 
 Was melted to a memory, 
 
 And low in tears I bowed my head 
 
 O'er the Golgotha of her dead. 
 
 And it seemed vain^ aye, worse than vain. 
 
 To hope that L,and would live again. 
 
 And yet that hope was never slain; 
 
 For hoarded in my heart away. 
 
 As manna for a mournful way, 
 
 I also saw before her play 
 
 The breaking of a better day. 
 
 I saw the glory and the grace 
 
 That soon shall flood and fill her face. 
 
 When she again shall take her place — 
 
 The Mother of a free-born race — 
 
 When in the end supreme, sublime. 
 
 She'll triumph even over Time. 
 
 Even now, in Memory's mazes lost, 
 
 I view the Autumnal holocaust 
 
 Ablaze from mountain crest to coast; 
 
 Deep in the city hear the call 
 
 Of many a winding waterfall. 
 
 And though I see it near no more. 
 
 Thrill to the torrent's rush and roar 
 
 As when I 'mong the meadows played. 
 
 By moonlight o'er the mountains strayed 
 
 And heard from out each glen and glade 
 
 The music that the fairies made. 
 
 And, envious of every star 
 
 65 
 
That shines above you where you are, 
 
 Motherland, whom none can mar, 
 
 1 wait your war cry from afar. 
 
 And through the night, the whole day through, 
 
 O, Heart, I can but cry to you ! 
 
 I can but cry and crave to be 
 
 Deep in the fight to make you free. 
 
 That so before I too have gone 
 
 Where sun nor moon has never shone 
 
 I'll something give of heart or brain 
 
 To bring your glory back again; 
 
 For when the knell for me is rung 
 
 I fain would find myself among 
 
 The splendid brave whose eyes with pride 
 
 Were lifted when for you they died, 
 
 O, Mother grand and glorified. 
 
 f)6 
 
MY LOVE WHO DIED FOR IRELAND 
 
 [HE flowers again are budding, 'tis the springtide of the 
 year, 
 And all around the woodlands the birds are singing 
 clear. 
 While in loneliness and sorrow I kneel beside you here — 
 My Love who died in battle brave for Ireland. 
 
 Heart: the tears I shed for you — the tears that still I shed — 
 When first they told me that my Love was out there with the dead. 
 And yet, mo croidhe, I could not wish for you a holier bed. 
 
 Than where you fell in battle brave for Ireland. 
 
 Mo croidhe, mo croidhe, I made no moan when forth from me 
 
 you went. 
 Though many a day and many an hour in sorrow since I spent. 
 But Mary's Son was kind to me and courage to me lent. 
 
 The day that you went forth to fight for Ireland. 
 
 1 have waited in the boreen, dear, full many a time since then, 
 And have crooned my song of sorrow to the hawthorn and the 
 
 whin. 
 The boreen where I met you — ah — we shall not meet again — 
 The day that you went forth to fight for Ireland. 
 
 They have laid you in the valley where so nobly, dear, you died. 
 And ever since you left me my tears have not been dried. 
 But I know that up in heaven, dear, your soul is glorified. 
 Because you fell in battle brave for Ireland. 
 
 67 
 
THE BARRICADES 
 
 I HEY told us of it gloatingly, they told us you were 
 dead, 
 And that among the nations no more should rise your 
 head. 
 They said the strife was over, that our struggle was in vain, 
 But yet we'll man the barricades for Motherland again. 
 
 The tramp of armed men once more is heard on every hand 
 And the old undying spirit is spreading through the land. 
 Rejoice, O men of Ireland, and shout the glad refrain : 
 We're going to man the barricades for Motherland again. 
 
 By the great God of Glory, 'tis good again to know 
 That serried ranks are forming once more to face the foe. 
 O Noble Dead ! O Splendid Dead ! You have not died in vain 
 And we're going to man the barricades for Motherland again. 
 
 68 
 
THE SEPARATIST 
 
 I E is where free men never fail 
 To voice the cause of Innisfail, 
 Where free men still a warfare wage. 
 For Ireland's holy heritage, 
 
 Wherever men together meet 
 
 The ways of tyrants to defeat, 
 
 Wherever Freedom's trumpets blare 
 
 You'll find the Separatist there. 
 
 Through persecutions' age-long night 
 
 He ever stood for Ireland's right. 
 
 For her the outlawed life he led, 
 
 A price for ever on his head, 
 
 The bracken bleak and bare his bed; 
 
 And many a lawless Saxon band 
 
 Who fain would desecrate the land 
 
 Met its undoing at his hand. 
 
 That Saxon saw him gaunt and grim 
 
 Defend the passes of Aughrim; 
 
 Cromwell's invaders at Clonmel 
 
 Beheld his bravery excel 
 
 The fury of the infidel; 
 
 While with O'Donnell and O'Neill 
 
 To fight for Ireland at Kinsale 
 
 The Separatist did not fail. 
 
 And after all the bitter years 
 
 Of blood and treachery and tears 
 
 The voice that spoke from Oulart Hill 
 
 Attested he was living still; 
 
 And lo ! how splendidly he stood 
 
 Unterrified and unsubdued 
 
 Again within Kilclooney wood. 
 
 69 
 
He is not in the Saxon halls. 
 Where every cringing coward crawls. 
 He is not with the reptile band 
 Who fain would barter Motherland, 
 But where men gather bold and brave 
 Who seek again their land to save 
 And for her sake will all things dare 
 O, Slave! the Separatist's there. 
 
 70 
 
THE NEWS FROM FONTENOY 
 
 "In Ireland, as the news came in, first of the British defeat, 
 and then gradually of the glorious achievements of the Brigade 
 and the honors paid to Irish soldiers, a sudden but silent flush 
 of triumph and of hope broke upon the oppressed race; and 
 many a gloomy countenance brightened, with a gleam of stern 
 joy, in the thought that the long mourned 'Wild Geese' would 
 one day return with Freedom and Vengeance in the flash of the 
 bayonets of Fontenoy." — Mitchel's History of Ireland. 
 
 O : Dermot, lift thy heart once more, nor shed that burn- 
 ing tear. 
 But rouse thee up and list unto the tidings that are 
 here. 
 Go bid each soul-crushed man rejoice, spread wide the tale of 
 
 joy. 
 Our "Wild Geese" beat the Sassenach to-day at Fontenoy. 
 
 Nay tarry not nor stand amazed but get thee quickly forth. 
 Proclaim the glorious, joyful news all through the south and 
 
 north. 
 And oh : how glad will beat each heart to hear thee tell my boy. 
 Of how the foe was beaten back to-day at Fontenoy. 
 
 Oh: many a sunken downcast eye will flash forth fire again. 
 And hope shall beat in many a breast where sorrow long has lain. 
 And many a fervent prayer of thanks shall there ascend on high. 
 Because our "Wild Geese" beat the foe to-day at Fontenoy. 
 
 Aye, eyes shall flash and hearts shall hope and bosoms beat once 
 
 more. 
 And eyes shall fondly look for aid to France's friendly shore. 
 The aid that will enable us for ever to destroy 
 The robber horde who met defeat to-day at Fontenoy. 
 
 71 
 
Then Dermot let thy heart no more be filled with dread or fear. 
 But rouse thee up — who would not at the great news that is here 
 Bid every rebel soul rejoice, spread wide the tale of joy, 
 Our "Wild Geese" beat the Sassenach to-day at Fontenoy. 
 
 72 
 
TO JOHN E. REDMOND, ARCH TRAITOR AND 
 
 SLAVE 
 
 ^piESIDE your heaped up monumental shame 
 ^pj Iscariot's will be an honored name; 
 P^ Dermot MacMurrough, Corydon or Keogh 
 For all their treason never sank so low. 
 O Arch Assassin of your land and race 
 Long may you live to dodder in disgrace, 
 And when they lay your carcass in the clay 
 The very worms, ashamed, will crawl away. 
 
 73 
 
THE CAUSE 
 
 O, Ireland's Cause shall never die 
 However crushed by cruelty — 
 That cause for which with glorious pride 
 Our bravest and our best have died, 
 
 Nor ever valued aught beside. 
 
 Betrayed, deserted, fugitive. 
 
 Forbidden in the land to live. 
 
 Banished, in terror to abide 
 
 On many a lonely mountain side. 
 
 Where every rustle seemed to be 
 
 The footfall of the enemy, 
 
 Yet evermore before they died 
 
 They made one last defiant stand 
 
 For Freedom and for Motherland, 
 
 And dying, swore their sons to see 
 
 The Cause would not abandoned be; , 
 
 And left behind a heritage 
 
 That even Time can never age. 
 
 And though 'tis more the fashion now 
 
 Before the enemy to bow 
 
 And favors from her hand to take. 
 
 Who tried our mother's heart to break. 
 
 Counselling gravely that 'twere best 
 
 At last to leave the land to rest; 
 
 And of the brave who suffered say — 
 
 "Too bad they threw their lives away" — 
 
 'Tis men like these who stood alone 
 
 When even hope itself seemed gone. 
 
 Whose every even vain defence, 
 
 Was moulded in magnificence. 
 
 Who through the gloom could ever see 
 
 The aureole of Liberty, 
 
 And labored, suffered, struggled on 
 
 74 
 
Through every darkness to the dawn. 
 'Tis men like these who will achieve 
 That end for which alone we live — 
 Our country's freedom to restore 
 And all its glory to her give. 
 And though in bitterness we own 
 That many now have recreant grown. 
 That many joy to kiss the hand 
 That made a shambles of their land, 
 Fear not, we lived through that before. 
 When ruin reigned at every door 
 And happiness was known no more. 
 When shattered, trampled in the dust, 
 Lay all on which our hopes were founded, 
 A rebel few of dauntless mind 
 Swept like a Msenad down the wind. 
 From every ensanguined grave ' 
 Leaped forth the spirits of the brave, 
 Again was raised Rebellion's brand 
 Illuminating all the land 
 And out from every hill a grand 
 Reveille of revolt resounded. 
 A rebel few will raise again — 
 And this time, surely, not in vain, — 
 The standard that so long withstood 
 The onslaught of each English brood. 
 And from our shores will banish her. 
 The monstrous, murderous minister 
 Of every evil thing astir. 
 
 75 
 
THE REBEL 
 
 E died upon the hillside all alone. 
 Determined, grim. 
 God, I'd have given much 
 To have died with him. 
 
 He never questioned once 
 How many were or few, 
 
 The only thing he knew 
 Was — what to do. 
 
 He died upon the hillside all alone. 
 
 Determined, grim. 
 God, I'd have given much 
 
 To have died with him. 
 
 ENGLAND'S FRIENDSHIP 
 
 HE preferred us her hand before. 
 
 And promised to atone her guilt. 
 We took it, foolishly, to find — 
 A dagger poisoned to the hilt. 
 
 We've known her for seven hundred years, 
 That brought but treachery in their train. 
 
 Woe unto you who heed her now 
 
 Or trust her plighted word again. 
 
 76 
 
HAVE YOU HEARD ABOUT CORK? 
 
 A friend of mine told me that during the Fenian dajys the 
 Cork men, running short of ammunition for the intended insur- 
 rection, went to some of the old burial grounds and dug up the 
 lead coffins to mould them into bullets, and that James Stephens, 
 on hearing it, said : "I wouldn't doubt the Cork men." I can't 
 vouch for the veracity of my friend's statement, but if the Cork 
 men did do this I certainly should not consider it a sacrilege 
 nor could the Cork men of to-day to better than to emulate their 
 example. 
 
 I AVE you heard about Cork, the unfailing and fearless. 
 All you who in terror would flinch from the fray? 
 Have you heard about Cork that was never found 
 wanting 
 
 When brave men were needed to blazon the way? 
 Fling it out so the winds of the world may hear it. 
 Fling it so the tyrant may tremble to know 
 That the true men of Cork have gone down to the graves 
 To get lead to make bullets to fire at the foe. 
 
 Magnificent Cork, you were ever rebellious, 
 
 Since first the invader polluted your sod. 
 Your sword ever leaped to the forefront in danger 
 
 And sent many a Sassenach soul to its God, 
 All through the long night of dark desolation 
 
 In the cause of our freedom not once did you fciil. 
 But you stood unafraid with your face to the foeman 
 
 To safeguard the glory and rights of the Gael. 
 
 And Saxon, to-day, when the wiles that you're weaving, 
 
 lyike a blighting miasma o'ershadow the land. 
 When even the bravest and best have grown doubtful. 
 Say still where does Cork the magnificent stand? 
 
 11 
 
Why she stands here unchanged, as rebellious as ever. 
 Still splendidly faithful and splendidly true. 
 
 And the roar of the rifle, the crash of the cannon, 
 
 Are the tokens of friendship Cork proffers to you. 
 
 78 
 
THE HILLS OF HOLY IRELAND 
 
 I HERE'S a glitter and a glamor all along the Great White 
 Way, 
 And every blessed wan I meet is rigged in fine 
 array, 
 But the heart, and faith the soul of me are far from here to-day. 
 Back home among the hills of Holy Ireland. 
 
 For all the glare and glitter, 'tis meself that's feelin' queer. 
 Sure every day in this place is as long as half a year, 
 And there's nothing that I hope for and there's nothing that I 
 hear. 
 But the callin' o' the hills of Holy Ireland. 
 
 Sure I'm never free from worry, and I'm never free from care. 
 And hearts like those in Ireland I can't find anywhere. 
 And I'd give all I ever saw for just one breath of air 
 That blows across the hills of Holy Ireland. 
 
 79 
 
MARCH 4th 
 
 Tyrants may deride and provincialists may endeavor to take 
 from them the merit that is undoubtedly theirs, but the memory 
 of those "who rose in dark and evil days to right their native 
 land" will remain imperishably pure in the hearts of their 
 countrymen as long as the grass grows green upon the hillsides 
 of Eire. They died not for honor or esteem, they died not for 
 glory or renown, but they died tliat we their children might 
 breathe pure and untainted the holy atmosphere of freedom. 
 Surrounded by foes and beset by traitors, immortally they stood 
 at bay and magnificently flung back against the face of tyranny 
 the wrongs of a people oppressed. These are the men in whose 
 footsteps we must follow, these the men whose principles we 
 must preach. 
 
 jHE summer's day was nearly done, 
 And low had gone the setting sun, 
 In peace the valley lay below. 
 The heathery hills were all aglow. 
 
 The mountain brooklet babbling by 
 
 Crooned many a mournful melody, 
 
 The swan was resting on the lake. 
 
 The birds had gathered in the brake. 
 
 And all was silent as I stood 
 
 Alone amid the solitude. 
 
 The ruined castle standing nigh 
 
 Refreshed again my memory. 
 
 Till all my country's past appeared 
 
 With blood and tears and treachery seared, 
 
 I saw how we had been betrayed, 
 
 I saw the havoc that was made. 
 
 Our every roof tree burned and bare 
 
 Until at last in our despair 
 
 We turned our eyes to paradise 
 
 80 
 
And asked was God no longer there. 
 
 How oft I thought from yonder wall 
 
 Responsive to the warder's call 
 
 At morn came forth a merry throng. 
 
 With jovial laugh and joyous song, 
 
 To follow fleetly as the wind. 
 
 Far to the north the hart and hind 
 
 Through many a fertile vale and glen 
 
 That were not all deserted then. 
 
 While many a shrill and wild haloo 
 
 Full many a valley echoed through 
 
 And waked the dead who therein lie 
 
 Entombed for many a century. 
 
 Ah, came they now, they scarce would know 
 
 Nor flower doth bloom nor tree doth blow 
 
 For all is barren, bleak and bare 
 
 That once bloomed beautiful and fair 
 
 O'er many a rolling fertile plain 
 
 You seek a human home in vain 
 For where our fathers' homesteads rose 
 Now roam the cattle of our foes. 
 While cast on many a foreign land 
 Labors the manhood of our land 
 Who but for alien laws would be 
 A proud and prosperous peasantry. 
 Behold the fields bereft and bare 
 Where once our people's dwellings were. 
 Huts, if you will, unkempt, unclean. 
 
 Where squalor stalked with wretchedness. 
 But huts that held their walls within 
 
 The nationhood's manhood nonetheless. 
 Where are they now? Gone to enrich 
 
 With all that Ireland to them gave 
 Full many a foreign land, the while 
 
 She goes unguarded to her grave. 
 
 81 
 
The alien flag from many a hill 
 
 Still flaunting floats, and Emmet still 
 
 Sleeps in an unrecorded grave. 
 
 While we to whom the trust he gave 
 
 Are cravens all and suppliants now. 
 
 Ready to beg and fawn and bow. 
 
 Nor any other method know 
 
 To wrench our Freedom from the foe. 
 
 And who his principles profess 
 
 Are craven cowards none the less, 
 
 For when the long awaited day. 
 
 For which we earnestly did pray 
 
 At length arrived, where then were they? 
 
 O, had he lived, whose name of late 
 
 We mention but to desecrate, 
 
 When that long looked for day came on, 
 
 Would he not to the fray have gone. 
 
 And even though alone, have stood 
 
 L,ike Crowley at Kilclooney Wood, 
 
 And fallen on the battlefield 
 
 Without one stain upon his shield? 
 
 But demagogues have long betrayed 
 
 The Cause that he so sacred made. 
 
 Till nowadays, alas, at best 
 
 Our country's freedom's but a jest. 
 
 But though we long have been misled. 
 
 By men who meant not what they said, 
 
 Saxon I see a race arise 
 
 Full of new life and energies. 
 
 Who when they'll hear the stories told. 
 
 Of wrongs that now are centuries old. 
 
 Who when they'll list with wondering ears 
 
 Unto the tales of blood and tears, 
 
 Will with a just and holy cause 
 
 Hate both thy language and thy laws. 
 
 82 
 
And to the last refuse the hand 
 That laid in waste their Motherland. 
 For on and on the Cause must go, 
 
 However soon the time or late. 
 Till blood for blood and blow for blow, 
 
 Shall fully, freely compensate; 
 Aye, though each blade of grass that grows 
 
 Were drooped beneath a diadem. 
 Though every flower that blooming blows 
 
 Were weighed with rubies to its stem. 
 Still should we fight, still, still protest, 
 
 Nor pause until upon our plains, 
 No trace North, South, or East or West, 
 
 Of your accursed rule remains. 
 
 S3 
 
RISE, INDIANS. RISE! 
 
 |ISE, Indians, rise, from Motherland 
 Drive out the foul invader, 
 Strike to their death the dastard crew 
 Who've plundered and betrayed her ; 
 Let not this long awaited hour 
 Go by without your giving 
 Unstinted all you have in life, 
 To keep your India living. 
 
 Look to the *Feringhis themselves 
 
 Do you the same as they did 
 When with your best and bravest blood 
 
 Your beauteous land they bathed, 
 Oh, strike with everything you can 
 
 To smite and slay the foeman, 
 And from this day bid India swear 
 
 She'll bow her head to no man ! 
 
 Oh, better far one glorious hour 
 
 In great and splendid daring, 
 Than many an empty year eked out 
 
 For no grand purpose caring, 
 Better the shout, the headlong charge, 
 
 The sudden, noble ending. 
 Than have one's soul without a strife 
 
 Up to its God ascending! 
 
 Hark from the heights of Hindustan 
 
 Your martyred dead are crying. 
 They call from every hill whereon 
 
 They left their bleached bones lying: 
 
 Note (*) Feringhis — the English. 
 84 
 
"For Mother India face all 
 
 Dare every death-like danger, 
 
 Oh, fail not to avenge us now 
 
 Drive out, drive out the Stranger!" 
 
 Rise, Indians, rise, from Motlierland 
 
 Drive out the foul invader. 
 Strike to their death the dastard crew 
 
 Who've plundered and betrayed her, 
 I,et not this long awaited hour 
 
 Go by without your giving 
 Unstinted all you have in life 
 
 To keep your India living. 
 
 8S 
 
COMMOTION IN HADES 
 
 UDAS, Arnold, and Castlereagh 
 
 Spoke loudly through the gloom: 
 "Redmond, our master, comes to-day, 
 Make room there, boys, make room.' 
 
 RATS! 
 
 HE fetid corpse of cut-throat Castlereagh 
 With rats was pelted on its burial day. 
 But now so many Castlereaghs abound 
 Where will the rats to pelt them with be found? 
 
 IREIvAND'S ANSWER 
 
 LING Ireland's rebel answer 
 
 To all the winds that blow — 
 "No treaty with traitors. 
 
 No friendship with the foe." 
 
JOHN BOYLE O'REIIvLY, 1915 
 
 At the commemoration exercises held recently in Boston to 
 the memory of John Boyle O'Reilly a poem was read which is 
 in line with the efforts made over the death of that other in- 
 domitable Gaelj O'Dpnovan Rossa, to the effect that these men, 
 who spent their lives in an eternal and unceasing conflict against 
 England, would to-day be on her side. Surely the dead might 
 be saved from such desecration. 
 
 [HERE would he stand were he now in the midst of us. 
 He who stood ever for Ireland alone; 
 Where would he be in this great hour of conflict. 
 
 When the foes of his country are being overthrown ? 
 How his heart would rejoice at the fall of the foeman. 
 
 How his voice would be heard now to rally the Gael ! 
 Ah! 'tis he who'd stand forth as the voice of the Nation 
 To call us to freedom and tell us not fail. 
 
 What treason is this and what blasphemous story 
 
 That says that O'Reilly with England would stand? 
 Dear God ! Are we dead to the voice of the Nation ; 
 
 Are we dead to the brave ones who died for our land? 
 Ah ! no ; if O'Reilly were here and among us. 
 
 No man would to-day be more faithful than he 
 To rally the hosts of the Gaolta together 
 
 And lead them in front from the foe to be free. 
 
 87 
 
TO SEAGHAN BUIDHE 
 
 I E'ER may thy perjured head, 
 Ivie on a peaceful bed. 
 And when thy days are sped 
 And tliy. life's over. 
 May there be none to weep. 
 No one a watch to keep. 
 But o'er thy putrid heap 
 May harpies hover. 
 
 ON THE WAR 
 
 The gods at last seem to have frowned upon 
 That vile, diseased old harlot Albion. 
 
 88 
 
A DREAM OF COUNTRY LIFE 
 
 I DREAMT a dream, I would were not a dream, 
 Other than dreamer I have never been, 
 And yet so real everything did seem. 
 The hills, the woodlands and the meadows green. 
 The lovely valleys where so oft I've been. 
 The sloping glades and the enchanting grove. 
 The lofty crags, the rivulets between. 
 There calmly did mine eye enraptured rove. 
 And view again the scenes my childhood used to love. 
 
 There shone the sun o'er the delightful land. 
 
 There lowed the peaceful herd across the lea. 
 
 There labored in the field the farm hand, 
 
 And ran the river onward merrily, 
 
 There waved the corn, and I too could see 
 
 From many a chimney towering high the smoke. 
 
 On came the wagons laden heavily. 
 
 The farmer sauntered up and kindly spoke 
 
 To bid me welcome home, at which alas I woke. 
 
 Theirs was the peaceful life that knew no care, 
 
 "Vaulting ambition" never came their way. 
 
 But they lived on in rest and quiet there. 
 
 And generations came and passed away. 
 
 Still were they found 'round the old home to stay 
 
 To keep which often they were sorely tried. 
 
 And had to struggle ever night and day, 
 
 But they were happy where their fathers died. 
 
 An honest lineage their glory and their pride. 
 
 Early I'm up, 'tis yet scarce dawning day, 
 God, what a heavenly delightful scene, 
 As down along the lawn I make my way, 
 
 89 
 
And on through dewy laden meadows green, 
 From yonder houses no one yet is seen, 
 But on before me nimbly leaps the hare. 
 Startled, the rabbit runs the rocks between. 
 Amid the thicket Reynard seeks his lair. 
 And high the skylark flies into the morning air. 
 
 The rippling of the little rill I hear. 
 
 Startled from out yon brake the blackbird flies. 
 
 The glorious sun himself doth now appear, 
 
 Ploughing his way amid the eastern skies. 
 
 The owl into the wood's deep darkness hies. 
 
 The frog leaps on before me as I go. 
 
 And from his bed the farmer doth arise. 
 
 The cock doth shrilly in the barnyard crow 
 
 To which is answered back the herdsman's "ho ho.' 
 
 Towering the smoke from many a roof ascends. 
 Slowly the kindly cattle wander home, 
 Supple the farmer at his labor bends, 
 Lazy the dogs from yonder kennel come. 
 And busy is the housewife with her broom, 
 The cars are rattling along the road. 
 Sedate the ploughman turns the fertile loam. 
 The children go to school hard by the wood. 
 And all the farm hands are laboring abroad. 
 
 Below the horizon now has gone the sun. 
 The lovely moon is climbing up the east. 
 The workman wanders home his labor done. 
 And there is rest for man and bird and beast. 
 And all the toiling of the day has ceased. 
 His children greet him homeward with a kiss. 
 And soon is spread the simple rustic feast. 
 Ah, there was never known such joy as this 
 Divine monotony of rural homely bliss. 
 
 90 
 
WE'LL CLING TO HOLY IRELAND YET 
 (A Song for the Times) 
 
 HE Strangers came into our land. 
 
 Our countrymen to rob and kill. 
 But our swords leaped forth like lightning darts, 
 And their bones are bleaching many a hill. 
 And while one Saxon skull is seen 
 
 Our Irish blades with blood to wet. 
 We'll still be true to Rosaleen, 
 And cling to Holy Ireland yet. 
 
 CHORUS : 
 
 We'll cling to Holy Ireland yet. 
 
 Although her eyes with tears are wet 
 
 Oh! while our hands can hold a blade 
 We'll cling to Holy Ireland yet. 
 
 The promises they send us now 
 
 Beneath the brutal Saxon sway 
 Can't tear us from our native land. 
 
 Nor lure us from our love away. 
 And though besmirched is now her sheen. 
 
 And with scalding tears her eyes are wet. 
 We'll still be true to Rosaleen, 
 
 And cling to Holy Ireland yet. 
 
 CHORUS : 
 
 We'll cling to Holy Ireland yet, 
 
 Although her eyes with tears are wet. 
 
 Oh ! while our hands can hold a blade 
 We'll cling to Holy Ireland yet. 
 
 91 
 
By all the martyrs of our land, 
 
 On gibbet, hulk and battlefield. 
 We in their places take our stand. 
 
 And swear that we will never yield. 
 By all the patriot blood that flowed. 
 
 By all the crimes we can't forget. 
 Through life and death, through weal and woe 
 
 We'll cling to Holy Ireland yet. 
 
 92 
 
A CUSHLA GAL MACHREE- 
 
 I'VE loved you so through all the years. 
 
 In sunshine and in rain, 
 
 My soul cried out to be with you, 
 
 But, oh, it cried in vain! 
 
 And now, when tliey're to strike for you. 
 
 Oh, lyoved One, will it be 
 That I'll be exiled from your side, 
 A Cushla Gal Machree! 
 
 The sun may shine and flowers may bloom 
 
 And every bird may sing, 
 But neither sun nor flowers nor birds 
 
 A joy to me can bring. 
 For I am as a sailor lost 
 
 Upon Life's troubled sea 
 What time I'm exiled from your side, 
 
 A Cushla Gal Machree 1 
 
 TO IRELAND 
 
 ] HE trip is o'er, the storm is past. 
 And we are safe arrived at last. 
 And far from thee, asthore, I stand. 
 Once more upon a foreign land. 
 But though the seas between us roll 
 I love thee still, my Soul, my Soul. 
 
 93 
 
THE SPIRIT OF ERIN 
 
 NQUENCHED by the dangers by which 'twas assailed. 
 Undiminished its glory, unshackled and free, 
 The spirit of Erin ne'er wavered nor quailed. 
 Nor bent unto tyrants a suppliant knee: 
 For though faint, still it shone when all else seemed to set, 
 
 Aye, it beamed forth untainted, unsullied, unchained. 
 Spite of tyrants and traitors and treachery, yet • 
 
 That spirit invincible ever remained. 
 
 When the savage marauder amongst us appeared. 
 
 And ruined and slaughtered our bravest hearts lay. 
 To the weakly who wavered, or the doubtful who feared, 
 
 That spirit shone on to illumine the way — 
 It has lived through the terror of slavery's night. 
 
 It has shone through the darkness, survived through the 
 gloom. 
 And though clouded its pathway it soon will shine bright, 
 
 And shall phoenix-like rise o'er its enemies' tomb. 
 
 94 
 
A HOPE 
 
 I INCE first I came to Reason's years. 
 
 One hope has lived within my breast. 
 One hope that still through smiles and tears. 
 Shone brighter far than all the rest, 
 That hope has lit my lonely way 
 
 Through hours that else would darksome be — 
 That on my native hills one day, 
 
 I'd stand to set my country free. 
 
 Nor all the vagaries that came. 
 
 Nor promises that but decoy. 
 Have for one moment quenched the flame 
 
 That lit my bosom when a boy. 
 For on with undiminished ray. 
 
 The hope doth still burn glowingly — 
 That on my native hills one day, 
 
 I'll stand to set my country free. 
 
 95 
 
FROM THE BOGHERA HILES 
 
 I AM sitting watching the coal fire burning, 
 
 But my heart and thoughts are far from here, 
 For on Fancy's pinions are they turning, 
 
 To where Cork's dear old peaks appear: 
 There is something here on the shelf before me. 
 And oh, with what rapture my heart it fills. 
 What a flood of memories it brings o'er me, 
 'Tis a sod of turf. from the Boghera Hills. 
 
 One sod of turf that with devotion, 
 
 I brought away as a souvenir. 
 Oh little I thought that beyond the ocean, 
 
 'Twould one day cause me to shed a tear. 
 Yet I would not stop that tear from flowing 
 
 At the thought of Ireland's valleys and rills. 
 Nor would I stop my mind from going 
 
 In fancy back to the dear old Boghera Hills. 
 
 Old Hills: in your bleak majestic splendor. 
 
 Oh you are far more dear to me. 
 And your memory wakens thoughts more tender, 
 
 Than all the beauties that here I see. 
 The city's sights may be grand and glowing, 
 
 But oh my bosom with sadness fills, 
 And I ever long for the breezes blowing. 
 
 For ever o'er the dear old Boghera Hills. 
 
 96 
 
A PROSE POEM 
 
 I EANWHILE I was seeing, meanwhile I was learning. I 
 saw men who boasted that they were free, bound down 
 by the iron heel of Superstition and chained to the 
 shackles of Custom. I saw the religion of God distorted 
 until the Lonely Man of Nazareth must again have wept. I saw 
 that the idea of a God as taught me in mine infancy was alto- 
 gether wrong, so that instead of a God of whom I was in con- 
 stant terror I came to reverence a Deity who realized our frail- 
 ties and forgave our faults, and I had but scant respect for the 
 man who gave to his fellowman, not because by doing so he 
 ameliorated that f ellowman's condition or alleviated his pain, but 
 because he had a self-satisfactory confidence that he was pur- 
 chasing a dwelling place 'till Time should be no more. I could 
 not see that I was doomed to eternal punishment because I did 
 not believe something which did not commend itself to my under- 
 standing as being reasonable and Just, and I thought my Creator 
 paid more heed to one prayer thought of in the chambers of the 
 heart, and uttered not because too deep for words, than to an 
 entire Litany said because the omission of it meant a sin. I saw 
 the sisters of shame — those who loved not wisely but too well — 
 passed on tlie streets by the minions of Respectability whose lives 
 were they but known were perhaps a thousand fold more open 
 to blame. I saw that men worshipped not God but Mammon, 
 and I saw them bow down as abjectly to cant, and greed, and 
 hypocrisy, and fashion, as ever their fathers did to a golden 
 calf, and though my being independent should cost me my all, 
 I vowed that come what might, I would not "flatter their rank 
 breath nor bow to their idolatry a patient knee," nor would I 
 stoop to any man whether he wore a caubeen or a coronet. O 
 I would live a beggar all my life, and lie contented in the Potter's 
 Field 'ere I'd grow great by such foul means as these. 
 
 97 
 
SONGS FOR ISOLDE 
 
 I 
 
 I HEN on my heart the hush of twilight falls, 
 
 And all the beauties of the past shall be. 
 But as a dear and long remembered dream 
 Within the hallowed Halls of Memory; 
 From out the dust of dead things I will take 
 A living joy for your remembered sake. 
 
 The splendor of the dear Autumnal days, 
 
 When all the woods with color were athrill. 
 
 And Nature, riot of her gifts, displayed 
 October's banner upon every hill, — 
 
 The talismanic wand of Memory 
 
 Will bring it back in all its joys to me. 
 
 And I shall feel again the heaven I felt 
 
 What time we wandered on the woodlands through. 
 And all the desert places of my heart 
 
 With joy were jubilant because of you. 
 Heaven will come again when I recall 
 The holiness and beauty of it all. 
 
 II 
 
 I AY all the woodlands ring for you 
 And all the birdies sing for you. 
 And all the breezes bring for you 
 The fragrances of May. 
 May roses strew the way for you 
 Nor ever clouds be grey for you 
 And may the angels pray for you 
 For ever and a day. 
 
 98 
 
Ill 
 
 GAINST the prison bars of Circumstance 
 
 To reach the stars I struggled many a year. 
 At last God led me to your lovely side, — 
 
 The bars are broken, and the stars are here. 
 
 IV 
 
 AY all things sacred that the world knows 
 Remain with you unclouded to the close. 
 And when the Veil is drawn, may this life be 
 But as the prelude to a symphony. 
 
 V 
 
 HE sun is shining. 
 The flowers are springing. 
 The rills are laughing. 
 
 The skies are blue. 
 The birds their way 
 To heaven are winging 
 And madly singing 
 
 Because of you. 
 
 VI 
 
 OU shone like starlight on my soul 
 
 And Sorrow on his bier lies slain, 
 Romance is riot, and the Dawn 
 Is dancing on the hills again. 
 
 99 
 
VII 
 H Lovely Little Lady, by your grace 
 I yet may kneel in an anointed place, 
 And guided by your sacramental hand 
 I too may yet among the stainless stand. 
 
 VIII 
 OWLED as in prayer the frightened clouds go by, 
 For Night is holding revels in her Hall, 
 A star has fallen forward on its face 
 
 Drunk from the blinding beauty of it all, 
 And meted out in measures manifold 
 Are gifts more treasurable far than gold. 
 
 O Little Lady, let me hold your hand 
 Sacredly thus, that I may understand. 
 That I may sunder so tlie prison bars 
 And climb through you the stretches to the stars. 
 
 IX 
 I HEN Time his toll has taken. 
 That he of all must take. 
 And in this world of wonder 
 I will no more awake. 
 Oh, in the Land of Shadows 
 
 I know there will come through 
 For all things intervening 
 The loveliness of you. 
 
 From out the leafy woodlands 
 
 The birds no more may sing, 
 And in the month of roses 
 
 The roses may not spring. 
 The sun may not remember 
 
 To shine the shadows through. 
 But oh, I shall remember 
 
 The loveliness of you. 
 
 100 
 
A POET'S MIDNIGHT REVERIE 
 
 IS midnight's holy hour" although 
 
 There's little either high or holy, 
 For one who for the nonce is low 
 With a most morbid melancholy, 
 I stand beside the window pane. 
 
 And see the streets below deserted. 
 The while my mind goes back again 
 To days that have, alas, departed. 
 
 Dear God: but what a fool I've been, 
 
 I'm sure there lived ray equal never. 
 And, faith, for all that I have seen, 
 
 I'm just as foolish now as ever. 
 How many and many a thing I've tried. 
 
 And 'tis small pleasure now I ween. 
 To see forever at one's side 
 
 The shadows of what might have been. 
 
 Thoughts will come thronging thick and fast. 
 
 And backward still my memory hies. 
 Unto the dear days of the past. 
 
 But hold, for "that way madness lies," 
 I am not now what then I was. 
 
 And oh! not what I hoped to be, 
 Yet shall I not account the cause. 
 
 For little would it comfort me. 
 
 The petty and the plodding part. 
 
 That one to get one's bread must take. 
 Has caused full many a noble heart 
 
 In sorrow silently to break: 
 For sure as two and one are three. 
 
 Lyrics from Keats or even Shelley, 
 However beauteous they may be. 
 
 Will not appease a poor bard's belly. 
 
 101 
 
I, too, have had my dreams and thought 
 
 Even at times to rouse a nation, 
 But all the odds 'gainst which I fought 
 
 Have dulled and drabbed my inspiration. 
 And rhyme as I had hoped I can't, 
 
 Nor forth my thoughts in beauty blazon, 
 Yet one day I again may chant 
 
 Perhaps a beauteous diapason. 
 
 Well, I was warned from the first. 
 
 By those who surely ought to know it, 
 I'd little better be than cursed 
 
 If I aspired to be a poet — 
 As well to reason with the wind. 
 
 For arguments are only wasted. 
 Upon that mad and moonstruck mind 
 
 That with poetic fire is blasted. 
 
 Some publishers to whom I hied. 
 
 Suggested that I write a story, 
 " 'Twould sooner sell," they said ; I cried : 
 
 "Money be damned, I write for glory." 
 For many a man has lost his head, 
 
 And gone the roadway to ruination. 
 What time he let himself be led. 
 
 To seek the "bubble reputation." 
 
 I was no fashion plate that day. 
 
 My clothes were threadbare and looked seedy, 
 And money — money did I say? 
 
 Of that I have been ever needy. 
 But something in my bosom beat. 
 
 That led me where the sun was shining. 
 And still refused to know defeat. 
 
 Nor sought a refuge in repining. 
 
 102 
 
Lilies were tlien for me aglow. 
 
 Through many a field with wild flowers laden. 
 And I beheld knights gaily go. 
 
 To couch a lance for many a maiden. 
 They were a lusty lot I trow, 
 
 And looked on life as but a chance. 
 In the brave days of long ago. 
 
 When reigned the royal Queen Romance. 
 
 Those dreams are gone to come no ^nore. 
 
 And of the past are now a part. 
 While all about I hear the roar 
 
 Of traffic and the money mart — 
 *rhe mountains call me and the sea. 
 
 And many a leafy woodland way 
 Proclaims the joys awaiting me. 
 
 But I am fettered and must stay. 
 
 God: give me back the past again, 
 
 'Tis gone and will no more be given, 
 As utterly as by the rain 
 
 The snows of yesterday are driven. 
 We are but puppets in a play, 
 
 Whose scenes are set without our knowing. 
 And blindly on we wend our way. 
 
 Nor know we whither we are going. 
 
 Dreaming of what could never be. 
 
 The morning of my life I've wasted. 
 
 Still gazing out beyond the sea. 
 
 For things that I have never tasted. 
 
 I seem to have played again a part. 
 Like that of him who said of old. 
 
 103 
 
upon whate'er I set my heart. 
 
 The same shall perish and grow cold. 
 
 My head and faith my heart are tired, 
 
 I'll draw the blind and close the shutter, 
 I should have long ago retired. 
 
 So I'll no more this moonshine mutter. 
 However winding seems the way. 
 
 Things always in the end come right, 
 At least here's hoping that they may. 
 
 And so to everyone good night. 
 
 104 
 
LINES 
 
 I T is not sweet on flying feet 
 
 To see one's life go by, 
 It is not sweet to see one's hopes 
 In ruins round you lie. 
 It is not sweet alone to live 
 Nor yet alone to die. 
 
 For there is many a loneliness. 
 
 That well may be endured, 
 And there is many a loneliness 
 
 To which one gets inured, 
 But oh, the loneliness within. 
 
 That never can be cured. 
 
 Some there are who die by night, 
 
 And some who die by day. 
 Some when their hearts are young and light. 
 
 And some when they are gray. 
 But Christ in heaven pity those 
 
 Who eat their hearts away. 
 
 105 
 
A REQUEST 
 
 HOUGH fallen far from me are all 
 
 The castles that I built in Spain, 
 Grant me O God this boon I crave — 
 That I may build them all again. 
 
 Though all my splendid dreams are dead 
 From conflict with the eternal war, 
 
 Desert me not O God I pray, 
 But let me vision still a star. 
 
 Though Hope has folded all her tents. 
 And all her race Romance has run. 
 
 Still let me sense the ecstacy 
 
 Of sheer ascension to the sun. 
 
 AFRAID 
 
 O lift my face I am afraid 
 Lest all my life be naked laid 
 Of which I've such a nightmare made. 
 
 The years have fallen from my hand. 
 As from the hour glass falls the sand. 
 And barren and bereft I stand. 
 
 To lift my face I am afraid. 
 Afraid, O God, afraid, afraid. 
 
 106 
 
TO PEGGY 
 
 I HEN winds are cold, and skies are drear. 
 
 And clouds hang low o'er moor and meadow. 
 Across thy pathway Peggy dear. 
 
 May there ne'er fall a single shadow, 
 But ever on through life's decline, 
 
 Be thou supplied with every pleasure. 
 May every grace and bliss be thine, 
 
 And brimming o'er be every measure. 
 For ever may each worldly store 
 Be unto thee in plenty given. 
 And when from here we'll travel o'er. 
 
 Pray God that we may meet in heaven. 
 
 107 
 
AS AGAINST REDMOND'S PRAYER FOR ENGLAND 
 
 I HEN John Redmond arose in the English House of 
 Commons and called on God to "save England," there 
 appeared before me as in a panorama the terrible story 
 of Ireland since the English first set foot upon her 
 shores, and I saw, as in a vision, a mighty host, which stretched 
 back in unbroken continuity to a point beyond which there was no 
 further tracing, a host of all the known and all the unknown dead, 
 the dead who died for Ireland. I saw all who were massacred at 
 Drogheda and Wexford and Mullaghmast: I saw all who went 
 down to death under the iron heel of Cromwell and the other 
 marauders who followed in his wake: I saw the little children 
 tossed into the air and caught up as they fell upon the points 
 of England's bayonets to the terrible accompaniment of the 
 fiendish jibe that "nits make lice": I saw the children torn out 
 of their mothers' wombs before the time allotted by tlie L,ord 
 God for their natural deliverance: I saw the women of Ireland 
 banished as slaves to the Barbadoes, while their fathers and 
 brothers, the very flower and chivalry of the land, were exiled 
 all over Europe fighting for Kings whom they did not know and 
 perishing for causes for which they had but little care but cry- 
 ing out with their last breath in sorrow and longing for the land 
 that gave them birth: I saw O'Neill dying broken-hearted in 
 Rome and O'Donnell in Spain and Sarsfield on the plains of 
 L,anden catching his life's blood in his hand and crying out, "O 
 that this were for Ireland": I saw our monasteries turned into 
 barrack-rooms and stables, our schools and churches uprooted 
 and burned to the ground, our people denied an education or the 
 right to enter any profession or learn even the most menial 
 trade: I saw the laws inscribed on their statute books whereby 
 it was no crime to "Kill the mere Irish": I saw twenty dollars 
 put on the head of a wolf, but twenty-five dollars put on the 
 head of an Irish schoolmaster or an Irish priest, and I saw how 
 through it all when rank and wealth and retinue and preferment 
 
 108 
 
were the lot of the pervert our fathers remained faithful to Ire- 
 land with a fidelity with which there is nothing to compare: I 
 saw the horrors of 'Ninety-eight, when the people were goaded 
 into rebellion, the pitchcaps, the hangings, the massacres. Tone 
 and Fitzgerald and Sheares and Orr done mercilessly to death, 
 and the blood of Emmet, of him who is the symbol of all that 
 is highest and noblest in our race, lapped up by the very dogs 
 in Thomas Street: I saw the frightful Famine when in a land 
 flowing with abundance millions of our people starved to death : 
 I saw our Three, our Martyred, Magnificent Three surrounded 
 the morning of their execution by a howling English mob, go 
 splendidly to their doom with the immortal death cry upon their 
 lips of "God Save Ireland" : I saw our country among the richest 
 in Europe, that could support in plenty twenty-five millions of 
 people, not competently maintaining four: I saw how the very 
 sun must have become ashamed to shine for the wrongs that 
 were committed, how the very rain must have wept down in 
 sorrow and commiseration upon our lot, how the very winds 
 must have carried our story to the ends of the earth, and seeing 
 all that and feeling all that aflame within me, I lifted up my 
 hands to God then and I now lift up my hands to God again 
 and against that prayer of Redmond's that God might save Eng- 
 land, I pray God to wither and blight and annihilate and destroy 
 England and strike her down, strike her down, strike her down. 
 
 109 
 
TO ONE WHO PASSED 
 
 I DAWN do not remind her 
 
 What wonders lie your way, 
 Lest that the noontide find her 
 
 From where I'd have her stay, 
 O mountains robed in splendor 
 
 Ascending to the sky. 
 Call to her not so tender 
 
 Lest from me she should fly. 
 
 O dunes where dwell the shadows, 
 
 O haunted cloud-capped hill, 
 O luring moorland meadows 
 
 Be still a while, be still, 
 O thoughts come not thus thronging 
 
 Of sunset and the sea. 
 For fear her heart with longing 
 
 Might break and fly from me. 
 
 II 
 
 |HE melody of olden songs 
 The beauty that to morn belongs. 
 Dear God: the glory of a race 
 Was writ and mirrored in thy face. 
 
 For at thy birth strange spirits came 
 To light thee with a lustral flame. 
 Filched from the wave and wind and wood 
 That no man ever understood. 
 
 110 
 
TO JIM THE POST 
 
 j H none were e'er from care more free, 
 And few were e'er so happy. 
 Or worried less I'm sure than we. 
 When "bousing at the nappy." 
 What cared we how the world went, 
 Or how the skies lowered o'er us. 
 While we sat by the fire content. 
 With a flowing bowl before us. 
 
 How happy passed the hours away 
 
 As each of us by turns. 
 Now from the "Nation" sang a lay. 
 
 And now from Bobbie Burns, 
 And when the loud applause grew still. 
 
 Our program would we vary. 
 You sang "The Moon Behind the Hill," 
 
 And I sang "Bonnie Mary." 
 
 How many a yarn Jim you spun. 
 
 And many a truthful story. 
 Of deeds that were by brave men done. 
 
 In the days of Ireland's glory. 
 How oft did you recite 'mid cheers. 
 
 Some tale of the dear old sireland. 
 From "The Flag in Irish Lore Appears" 
 
 To "The Dawn on the Hills of Ireland." 
 
 But ah : what noise breaks on my ear, 
 'Tis noon's discordant whistle. 
 
 Which makes me stop unwilling here. 
 And finish this epistle, 
 
For many a pleasant afternoon 
 To you I am beholden. 
 
 And Jim, I shan't forget you soon. 
 Your old friend 
 
 Peter Golden. 
 
 112 
 
.in