She said, with laughter tender and sweet:"I have not yet, war-weary king,"Been spoken of with any one;"Yet now I choose, for these four feet"Ran through the foam and ran to this"That I might have your son to kiss."
"Were there no better than my son"That you through all that foam should run?"
"I loved no man, though kings besought"Love, till the Danaan poets brought"Rhyme, that rhymed to Usheen's name,"And now I am dizzy with the thought"Of all that wisdom and the fame"Of battles broken by his hands,"Of stories builded by his words"That are like coloured Asian birds"At evening in their rainless lands."
O Patric, by your brazen bell,There was no limb of mine but fellInto a desperate gulph of love!"You only will I wed," I cried,"And I will make a thousand songs,"And set your name all names above."And captives bound with leathern thongs"Shall kneel and praise you, one by one,"At evening in my western dun."
"O Usheen, mount by me and ride"To shores by the wash of the tremulous tide,"Where men have heaped no burial mounds,"And the days pass by like a wayward tune,"Where broken faith has never been known,"And the blushes of first love never have flown;"And there I will give you a hundred hounds;"No mightier creatures bay at the moon;"And a hundred robes of murmuring silk,"And a hundred calves and a hundred sheep"Whose long wool whiter than sea froth flows,"And a hundred spears and a hundred bows,"And oil and wine and honey and milk,"And always never-anxious sleep;"While a hundred youths, mighty of limb,"But knowing nor tumult nor hate nor strife,"And a hundred maidens, merry as birds,"Who when they dance to a fitful measure"Have a speed like the speed of the salmon herds,"Shall follow your horn and obey your whim,"And you shall know the Danaan leisure:"And Niam be with you for a wife."Then she sighed gently, "It grows late,"Music and love and sleep await,"Where I would be when the white moon climbs"The red sun falls, and the world grows dim."
And then I mounted and she bound meWith her triumphing arms around me,And whispering to herself enwound me;But when the horse had felt my weight,He shook himself and neighed three times:Caolte, Conan, and Finn came near,And wept, and raised their lamenting hands,And bid me stay, with many a tear;But we rode out from the human lands.
In what far kingdom do you go,Ah, Fenians, with the shield and bow?Or are you phantoms white as snow,Whose lips had life's most prosperous glow?O you, with whom in sloping valleys,Or down the dewy forest alleys,I chased at morn the flying deer,With whom I hurled the hurrying spear,And heard the foemen's bucklers rattle,And broke the heaving ranks of battle!And Bran, Sgeolan, and Lomair,Where are you with your long rough hair?You go not where the red deer feeds,Nor tear the foemen from their steeds.
S. PATRIC
Boast not, nor mourn with drooping headCompanions long accurst and dead,And hounds for centuries dust and air.
USHEEN
We galloped over the glossy sea:I know not if days passed or hours,And Niam sang continuallyDanaan songs, and their dewy showersOf pensive laughter, unhuman sound,Lulled weariness, and softly roundMy human sorrow her white arms wound.
We galloped; now a hornless deerPassed by us, chased by a phantom houndAll pearly white, save one red ear;And now a maiden rode like the windWith an apple of gold in her tossing hand;And a beautiful young man followed behindWith quenchless gaze and fluttering hair.
"Were these two born in the Danaan land,"Or have they breathed the mortal air?"
"Vex them no longer," Niam said,And sighing bowed her gentle head,And sighing laid the pearly tipOf one long finger on my lip.
But now the moon like a white rose shoneIn the pale west, and the sun's rim sank,And clouds arrayed their rank on rankAbout his fading crimson balclass="underline" The floor of Emen's hosting hallWas not more level than the sea,As full of loving phantasy,And with low murmurs we rode on,Where many a trumpet-twisted shellThat in immortal silence sleepsDreaming of her own melting hues,Her golds, her ambers, and her blues,Pierced with soft light the shallowing deeps.
But now a wandering land breeze cameAnd a far sound of feathery quires;It seemed to blow from the dying flame,They seemed to sing in the smouldering fires.The horse towards the music raced,Neighing along the lifeless waste;Like sooty fingers, many a treeRose ever out of the warm sea;And they were trembling ceaselessly,As though they all were beating time,Upon the centre of the sun,To that low laughing woodland rhyme.And, now our wandering hours were done,We cantered to the shore, and knewThe reason of the trembling trees:Round every branch the song-birds flew,Or clung thereon like swarming bees;While round the shore a million stoodLike drops of frozen rainbow light,And pondered in a soft vain moodUpon their shadows in the tide,And told the purple deeps their pride,And murmured snatches of delight;And on the shores were many boatsWith bending sterns and bending bows.
And carven figures on their prowsOf bitterns, and fish-eating stoats,And swans with their exultant throats:And where the wood and waters meetWe tied the horse in a leafy clump,And Niam blew three merry notesOut of a little silver trump;And then an answering whispering flewOver the bare and woody land,A whisper of impetuous feet,And ever nearer, nearer grew;And from the woods rushed out a bandOf men and maidens, hand in hand,And singing, singing altogether;Their brows were white as fragrant milk,Their cloaks made out of yellow silk,And trimmed with many a crimson feather:And when they saw the cloak I woreWas dim with mire of a mortal shore,They fingered it and gazed on meAnd laughed like murmurs of the sea;But Niam with a swift distressBid them away and hold their peace;And when they heard her voice they ranAnd knelt them, every maid and manAnd kissed, as they would never cease,Her pearl-pale hand and the hem of her dress.She bade them bring us to the hallWhere Aengus dreams, from sun to sun,A Druid dream of the end of daysWhen the stars are to wane and the world be done.
They led us by long and shadowy waysWhere drops of dew in myriads fall,And tangled creepers every hourBlossom in some new crimson flower,And once a sudden laughter sprangFrom all their lips, and once they sangTogether, while the dark woods rang,And made in all their distant parts,With boom of bees in honey marts,A rumour of delighted hearts.And once a maiden by my sideGave me a harp, and bid me sing,And touch the laughing silver string;But when I sang of human joyA sorrow wrapped each merry face,And, Patric! by your beard, they wept,Until one came, a tearful boy;"A sadder creature never stept"Than this strange human bard," he cried;And caught the silver harp away,And, weeping over the white strings, hurledIt down in a leaf-hid, hollow placeThat kept dim waters from the sky;And each one said, with a long, long sigh,"O saddest harp in all the world,"Sleep there till the moon and the stars die!"