81. Muckish Mountain (The Pig’s Back)

LIKE a sleeping swine upon the skyline,

Muckish, thou art shadowed out,

Grubbing up the rubble of the ages

With your broken, granite snout.

Muckish, greatest pig in Ulster’s oakwoods,

Littered out of rock and fire,

Deep you thrust your mottled flanks for cooling

Underneath the peaty mire.

Long before the Gael was young in Ireland,

You were ribbed and old and grey,

Muckish, you have long outstayed his staying,

You have seen him swept away.

Muckish, you will not forget the people

Of the laughing speech and eye,

They who gave you name of Pig-back-mountain

And the Heavens for a sty!