To-day when the wind wafts the wavelets
To the gray altar steps of yon shore,
Each wearing an alb foam-embroidered,
And kneeling, like priests, to adore
The God of the land — I will mingle
My prayers, aged priest! with the sea,
While God, for thy fifty years' priesthood,
Will hear thy prayers whispered for me.
Song of the Deathless Voice
'Twas the dusky Hallowe'en —
Hour of fairy and of wraith,
When in many a dim-lit green,
'Neath the stars' prophetic sheen,
As the olden legend saith,
All the future may be seen,
And when — an older story hath —
Whate'er in life hath ever been
Loveful, hopeful, or of wrath,
Cometh back upon our path.
I was dreaming in my room,
'Mid the shadows, still as they;
Night, in veil of woven gloom,
Wept and trailed her tresses gray
O'er her fair, dead sister — Day.
To me from some far-away
Crept a voice — or seemed to creep —
As a wave-child of the deep,
Frightened by the wild storm's roar
Creeps low-sighing to the shore
Very low and very lone
Came the voice with song of moan,
This, weak-sung in weaker word,
Is the song that night I heard:
How long! Alas, how long!
How long shall the Celt chant the sad song of hope,
That a sunrise may break on the long starless night of our past?
How long shall we wander and wait on the desolate slope
Of Thabors that promise our Transfiguration at last?
How long, O Lord! How long!
How long, O Fate! How long!
How long shall our sunburst reflect but the sunset of Right,
When gloaming still lights the dim immemorial years?
How long shall our harp's strings, like winds that are wearied of night,
Sound sadder than moanings in tones all a-trembling with tears?
How long, O Lord! How long!
How long, O Right! How long!
How long shall our banner, the brightest that ever did flame
In battle with wrong, droop furled like a flag o'er a grave?
How long shall we be but a nation with only a name,
Whose history clanks with the sounds of the chains that enslave?
How long, O Lord! How long!
How long! Alas, how long!
How long shall our isle be a Golgotha, out in the sea,
With a cross in the dark? Oh, when shall our Good Friday close?
How long shall thy sea that beats round thee bring only to thee
The wailings, O Erin! that float down the waves of thy woes?
How long, O Lord! How long!
How long! Alas, how long!
How long shall the cry of the wronged, O Freedom! for thee
Ascend all in vain from the valleys of sorrow below?
How long ere the dawn of the day in the ages to be,
When the Celt will forgive, or else tread on the heart of his foe?
How long, O Lord! How long!
Whence came the voice? Around me gray silence fall;
And without in the gloom not a sound is astir 'neath the sky;
And who is the singer? Or hear I a singer at all?
Or, hush! Is't my heart athrill with some deathless old cry?
Ah! blood forgets not in its flowing its forefathers' wrongs —
They are the heart's trust, from which we may ne'er be released;
Blood keeps in its throbs the echoes of all the old songs
And sings them the best when it flows thro' the heart of a priest.