And when my back began to smart,
'Twas like a pen-knife in my heart;
And when my heart began to bleed,
Then I was dead—and dead indeed.
[319]. "It Had Become a Glimmering Girl."
"The Tuatha De Danaan—the divine Children of Danu which forgotten centuries ago invaded Ireland—can take all shapes, and those that are in the waters take often the shape of fish. A woman of Burren, in Galway, says, 'There are more of them in the sea than on the land ...,' and another Galway woman says, 'Surely those things are in the sea as well as on land. My father was out fishing one night off Tyrone. And something came beside the boat that had eyes shining like candles. And then a wave came in, and a storm rose all in a minute, and whatever was in the wave, the weight of it had like to sink the boat. And then they saw that it was a woman in the sea that had the shining eyes. So my father went to the priest, and he bid him always to take a drop of holy water and a pinch of salt out in the boat with him, and nothing could harm him.'"
W. B. Yeats
[321]. "One Without."
Was it the sound of a footfall I heard
On the cold flag stone?