I have every bounty that life could hold,
With Guare, arch-monarch of Aidne cold,
But, fallen away from my haughty folk,
In Irluachair's field my heart lies broke.
There is chanting in glorious Aidne's meadow,
Under St. Colman's Church's shadow;
A hero flame sinks into the tomb—
Dinertach, alas my love and my doom!
Chaste Christ! that now at my life's last breath
I should tryst with Sorrow and mate with Death!
At every hour of the night's black deep,
These are the arrows that murder sleep.
Alfred Perceval Graves.
[THE STUDENT AND HIS CAT]
The Irish of this playful poem was written by a student of the Monastery of Carinthia on a copy of St. Paul's Epistles about the close of the eighth century.
I and Pangur Bán, my cat,
'Tis a like task we are at;
Hunting mice is his delight,
Hunting words I sit all night.
Better far than praise of men
'Tis to sit with book and pen;
Pangur bears me no ill-will,
He, too, plies his simple skill.