Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). The New Poetry: An Anthology. 1917.
Swift’s PastoralPadraic Colum
Characters: Jonathan Swift and Esther Vanhomrigh
Esther.I know the answer: ’tis ingenious.
I’m tired of your riddles, Doctor Swift.
For you to show your pupil on this highway?
Out of this sunken country.
A Harper and a country lout, his fellow
Upon the highway.
He’ll stay splenetic.
On many a road. I know his name too—
I know a story that they tell about him.
If Cadenus to Vanessa tell the tale?
Turlough O’Carolan; and there is a woman
To make this story almost pastoral.
Was Bridget Cruise. She would not wed him,
And he wed one who had another name,
And made himself a Minstrel, but a Minstrel
Of consequence. His playing on the harp
Was the one glory that in Ireland stayed
After lost battles and old pride cast down.
Where he went men would say:
“Horses we may not own, nor swords may carry;
But Turlough O’Carolan plays upon the harp,
And Turlough O’Carolan’s ten fingers bring us
Horses and swords, gold, wine, and victory.”
He played, and drank full cups; made proper songs
In praise of banquets, wine-cups, and young maids—
Things easily praised. And then when he was old—
Into the Valley of the Shadow of Death!—
Not into the Valley, Vanessa, mark, of Death,
But into the Shadow! Two score of years and ten—
Have we not three score and some more to live?
So has that tree that’s withered at the top—
Dead in the head! Aye, we, Vanessa, grow
Into the Shadow, and in the Shadow stay
So long!
Then saying?
And blind—did I say he was blind?
He cannot see
The wen that makes two heads upon the fellow
That goes beside him, hunched up with the harp;
He cannot see
The Justice to the assizes riding
With soldiers all in red to give him state.
He cannot see
The beggar’s lice and sores.
When this O’Carolan was old and blind,
As I have said, he made the pilgrimage:
’Twas to … No, no, ’twas not the place
That I’m proscribed to, but yet one that is called
Saint Patrick’s Purgatory.
Island or islet. The water round
Is dun, unsunned; there are no meadows near,
No willows grow, no lark nor linnet sings.
A fissure in the island leads down to
The Purgatory of Souls, their fable says.
And now the Harper is but one of those,
The countless wretches, who have brought their sores
To that low island, and brought darkened spirits—
Such stream has flowed there for a thousand years.
I do not know
What length of time the Harper stays, while crowds
Are shambling all around him, weeping, praying,
Famishing themselves; or drinking the dun water
Of the lake for wine; or kneeling, with their knees
On sharpened stones; or crowded
In narrow, stony cells.
Papistical.
Most universal. Do we not walk
Upon a ground that’s drenched with tears, and breathe
An air that’s thickened with men’s darkened spirits?
Aye, and on an islet,
Suffering pain and hearing cries of wretches;
Cut-off, remote, banished, alone, tormented!
Name the place as you will, or let it be
Saint Patrick’s Purgatory.
From that low island. He touches shore, and cries,
“Hands for a blind man’s help!” and hands were held—
He touched a hand.
Here then’s the pastoral:
The hand, the fingers of the hand, the clasp,
The spirit flowing through—he knew them all.
He knew all well, and in an instant knew them;
And he cried out, “The hand of Bridget Cruise!”
To touch a hand, and know the truth within it—
The truth that’s clasped, that holds, the truth that’s all
For us—for every day we live, the truth!
To touch that hand, and then once more to turn
To turn around upon the world’s highway,
And go alone—poor hand, poor hand!
This Bridget Cruise, was leaving that dull shore
For that low island, and had cares beyond
The memory of O’Carolan. Well, they passed,
He going and she coming; well, and then
He took his harp, and the country lout, his fellow,
Went with him, as we see them going now.
And will you take my hand? You used to call me
A white witch, but there is no witchery
In this plain hand of mine!