The Mountainy Singer - Campbell Joseph

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the pipers of the Gael.

      Samhain gleans the golden harvests

      Duly in their tide and time,

      But my body’s fruit is blasted

      Barely past the Bealtein prime.

      Cethlenn claims the fairest fighters

      Fitly for her own, her own,

      But my seven sons are stricken

      Where no battle-pipe is blown.

      Flowers of the forest fallen

      On the sliding summer stream —

      Light and life and love are with me,

      Then are vanished into dream.

      Berried branches of the rowan

      Rifled in the wizard wind —

      Clan and generation leave me,

      Lonely on the heath behind.

      Who will soothe a father’s sorrow

      When his seven sons are gone?

      Who will watch him in his sleeping?

      Who will wake him at the dawn?

      Seven sons are taken from me

      In the compass of a year;

      Every bone is bose within me,

      All my blood is white with fear.

      Seven youths of brawn and beauty

      Moulder in their mountain bed,

      Up in storied Inis-Scathach

      Where their fathers reaped their bread.

      Nevermore upon the mountain,

      Nevermore in fair or field,

      Shall ye see the seven champions

      Of the silver-mantled shield.

      I will play the “Cumhadh na Cloinne”

      Wildest of the rowth of tunes

      Gathered by the love of mortal

      From the olden druid runes.

      Wail ye! Night is on the water;

      Wind and wave are roaring loud —

      Caoine for the fallen children

      Of the piper of MacLeod.

      TO A TOWN GIRL

      Violet mystery,

      Ringleted gold,

      Whiteness of whiteness,

      Wherefore so cold?

      Silent you sit there —

      Spirit and mould —

      Darkening the dream

      That must never be told!

      A MARCH MOON

      A March moon

      Over the mountain crest,

      Ceanabhan blowing:

      Her neck and breast.

      Arbutus berries

      On the tree head:

      Her mouth of passion,

      Dewy and red.

      Cold as cold

      And hot as hot,

      She loves me..

      And she loves me not!

      A THOUSAND FEET UP

      A thousand feet up: twilight.

      Westwards, a clump of firtrees silhouetted against a bank of blue cumulus cloud;

      The June afterglow like a sea behind.

      The mountain trail, white and clear where human feet have worn it, zigzagging higher and higher till it loses itself in the southern skyline.

      A patch of young corn to my right hand, swaying and swaying continuously, tho’ hardly an air stirs.

      A falcon wheeling overhead.

      The moon rising.

      The damp smell of the night in my nostrils.

      O hills, O hills,

      To you I lift mine eyes!

      I kneel down and kiss the grass under my feet.

      The sense of the mystery and infinity of things overwhelms me, annihilates me almost.

      I kneel down, and silently worship.

      THE DARK

      This is the dark.

      This is the dream that came of the dark.

      This is the dreamer who dreamed the dream that came of the dark.

      This is the look the dreamer looked who dreamed the dream that came of the dark.

      This is the love that followed the look the dreamer looked who dreamed the dream that came of the dark.

      This is the breast that fired the love that followed the look the dreamer looked who dreamed the dream that came of the dark.

      This is the song was made to the breast that fired the love that followed the look the dreamer looked who dreamed the dream that came of the dark.

      This is the sword that tracked the song was made to the breast that fired the love that followed the look the dreamer looked who dreamed the dream that came of the dark.

      This is the rope that swung the sword that tracked the song was made to the breast that fired the love that followed the look the dreamer looked who dreamed the dream that came of the dark.

      This is the dark that buried the rope that swung the sword that tracked the song was made to the breast that fired the love that followed the look the dreamer looked who dreamed the dream that came of the dark.

      This is the dark, indeed!

      REYNARDINE

      If by chance you look for me

      Perhaps you’ll not me find,

      For I’ll be in my castle —

      Enquire for Reynardine!

      Sun and dark he courted me —

      His eyes were red as wine:

      He took me for his leman,

      Did my sweet Reynardine.

      Sun and dark the gay horn blows,

      The beagles run like wind:

      They know not where he harbours,

      The fairy Reynardine.

      If by chance you look for me

      Perhaps you’ll not me find,

      For I’ll be in my castle —

      Enquire for Reynardine!

      SNOW

      Hills that were dark

      At sparing-time last night

      Now in the dawn-ring

      Glimmer cold and white.

      I AM THE GILLY OF CHRIST

      I am the gilly of Christ,

      The mate of Mary’s Son;

      I run the roads at seeding time,

      And

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