by W. B. Yeats
What is that ugly thing on the black cross?
FATHER HART
You cannot know how naughty your words are!
That is our Blessed Lord.
THE CHILD
Hide it away!
BRIDGET
I have begun to be afraid again.
THE CHILD
Hide it away!
MAURTEEN
That would be wickedness!
BRIDGET
That would be sacrilege!
THE CHILD
The tortured thing!
Hide it away!
MAURTEEN
Her parents are to blame.
FATHER HART
That is the image of the Son of God.
THE CHILD (caressing him)
Hide it away, hide it away!
MAURTEEN
No, no.
FATHER HART
Because you are so young and like a bird,
That must take fright at every stir of the leaves,
I will go take it down.
THE CHILD
Hide it away!
And cover it out of sight and out of mind!
(FATHER HART takes crucifix from wall and carries it towards inner room.)
FATHER HART
Since you have come into this barony,
I will instruct you in our blessed faith;
And being so keen witted you’ll soon learn.
(To the others.)
We must be tender to all budding things,
Our Maker let no thought of Calvary
Trouble the morning stars in their first song.
(Puts crucifix in inner room.)
THE CHILD
Here is level ground for dancing; I will dance.
(Sings.)
“The wind blows out of the gates of the day,
The wind blows over the lonely of heart,
And the lonely of heart is withered away.”
(She dances.)
MARY (to SHAWN)
Just now when she came near I thought I heard
Other small steps beating upon the floor,
And a faint music blowing in the wind,
Invisible pipes giving her feet the tune.
SHAWN
I heard no steps but hers.
MARY
I hear them now,
The unholy powers are dancing in the house.
MAURTEEN
Come over here, and if you promise me
Not to talk wickedly of holy things
I will give you something.
THE CHILD
Bring it me, old father.
MAURTEEN
Here are some ribbons that I bought in the town
For my son’s wife — but she will let me give them
To tie up that wild hair the winds have tumbled.
THE CHILD
Come, tell me, do you love me?
MAURTEEN
Yes, I love you.
THE CHILD
Ah, but you love this fireside. Do you love me?
FATHER HART
When the Almighty puts so great a share
Of His own ageless youth into a creature,
To look is but to love.
THE CHILD
But you love Him?
BRIDGET
She is blaspheming.
THE CHILD
And do you love me too?
MARY
I do not know.
THE CHILD
You love that young man there,
Yet I could make you ride upon the winds,
Run on the top of the dishevelled tide,
And dance upon the mountains like a flame.
MARY
Queen of Angels and kind saints defend us!
Some dreadful thing will happen. A while ago
She took away the blessed quicken wood.
FATHER HART
You fear because of her unmeasured prattle;
She knows no better. Child, how old are you?
THE CHILD
When winter sleep is abroad my hair grows thin,
My feet unsteady. When the leaves awaken
My mother carries me in her golden arms;
I’ll soon put on my womanhood and marry
The spirits of wood and water, but who can tell
When I was born for the first time? I think
I am much older than the eagle cock
That blinks and blinks on Ballygawley Hill,
And he is the oldest thing under the moon.
FATHER HART
O she is of the faery people.
THE CHILD
One called,
I sent my messengers for milk and fire,
She called again and after that I came.
(All except SHAWN and MARY BRUIN gather behind the priest for protection.)
SHAWN (rising)
Though you have made all these obedient,
You have not charmed my sight and won from me
A wish or gift to make you powerful;
I’ll turn you from the house.
FATHER HART
No, I will face her.
THE CHILD
Because you took away the crucifix
I am so mighty that there’s none can pass,
Unless I will it, where my feet have danced
Or where I’ve whirled my finger-tops.
(SHAWN tries to approach her and cannot.)
MAURTEEN
Look, look!
There something stops him — look how he moves his hands
As though he rubbed them on a wall of glass!
FATHER HART
I will confront this mighty spirit alone;
Be not afraid, the Father is with us,
The Holy Martyrs and the Innocents,
The adoring Magi in their coats of mail,
And He who died and rose on the third day,
And all the nine angelic hierarchies.
(The CHILD kneels upon the settle beside Mary and puts her arms about her.)
Cry, daughter, to the Angels and the Saints.
THE CHILD
You shall go with me, newly-married bride,
And gaze upon a merrier multitude.
White-armed Nuala, Aengus of the Birds,
Feacra of the hurtling foam, and him
Who is the ruler of the Western Host,
Finvarra, and their Land of Heart’s Desire,
Where beauty has no ebb, decay no flood,
But joy is wisdom, Time an endless song.
I kiss you and the world begins to fade.
SHAWN
Awake out of that trance — and cover up
Your eyes and ears.
FATHER HART
She must both look and listen,
For only the soul’s choice can save her now.
Come over to me, daughter; stand beside me;
Think of this house and of your duties in it.
THE CHILD
Stay and come with me, newly-married bride,
For if you hear him you grow like the rest;
Bear children, cook, and bend above the churn,
And wrangle over butter, fowl, and eggs,
Until at last, grown old and bitter of tongue,
You’re crouching there and shivering at the grave.
FATHER HART
Daughter, I point you out the way to Heaven.
THE CHILD
But I can lead you, newly-married bride,
Where nobody gets old and crafty and wise,
Where nobody gets old and godly and grave,
Where nobody gets old and bitter of tongue,
And where kind tongues bring no captivity;
For we are but obedient to the thoughts
That drift into the mind at a wink of the eye.
FATHER HART
By the dear Name of the One crucified,
I bid you, Mary Bruin, come to me.
THE CHILD
I keep you in the name of your own heart.<
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FATHER HART
It is because I put away the crucifix
That I am nothing, and my power is nothing.
I’ll bring it here again.
MAURTEEN (clinging to him)
No.
BRIDGET
Do not leave us.
FATHER HART
O, let me go before it is too late;
It is my sin alone that brought it all.
(Singing outside.)
THE CHILD
I hear them sing, “Come, newly-married bride,
Come, to the woods and waters and pale lights.”
MARY
I will go with you.
FATHER HART
She is lost, alas!
THE CHILD (standing by the door)
But clinging mortal hope must fall from you,
For we who ride the winds, run on the waves,
And dance upon the mountains are more light
Than dewdrops on the banner of the dawn.
MARY
O, take me with you.
SHAWN
Beloved, I will keep you.
I’ve more than words, I have these arms to hold you,
Nor all the faery host, do what they please,
Shall ever make me loosen you from these arms.
MARY
Dear face! Dear voice!
THE CHILD
Come, newly-married bride.
MARY
I always loved her world — and yet — and yet — —
THE CHILD
White bird, white bird, come with me, little bird.
MARY
She calls me!
THE CHILD
Come with me, little bird.
(Distant dancing figures appear in the wood.)
MARY
I can hear songs and dancing.
SHAWN
Stay with me.
MARY
I think that I would stay — and yet — and yet — —
THE CHILD
Come, little bird, with crest of gold.
MARY (very softly)
And yet — —
THE CHILD
Come, little bird with silver feet!
(MARY BRUIN dies, and the CHILD goes.)
SHAWN
She is dead!
BRIDGET
Come from that image; body and soul are gone.
You have thrown your arms about a drift of leaves,
Or bole of an ash-tree changed into her image.
FATHER HART
Thus do the spirits of evil snatch their prey,
Almost out of the very hand of God;
And day by day their power is more and more,
And men and women leave old paths, for pride
Comes knocking with thin knuckles on the heart.
(Outside there are dancing figures, and it may be a white bird, and many voices singing:)
“The wind blows out of the gates of the day,
The wind blows over the lonely of heart,
And the lonely of heart is withered away;
While the faeries dance in a place apart,
Shaking their milk-white feet in a ring,
Tossing their milk-white arms in the air;
For they hear the wind laugh and murmur and sing
Of a land where even the old are fair,
And even the wise are merry of tongue;
But I heard a reed of Coolaney say —
‘When the wind has laughed and murmured and sung,
The lonely of heart is withered away.’“
CROSSWAYS
“The stars are threshed, and the souls are threshed from their husks.”
William Blake.
To
A.E.
THE SONG OF THE HAPPY SHEPHERD
The woods of Arcady are dead,
And over is their antique joy;
Of old the world on dreaming fed;
Gray Truth is now her painted toy;
Yet still she turns her restless head:
But O, sick children of the world,
Of all the many changing things
In dreary dancing past us whirled,
To the cracked tune that Chronos sings,
Words alone are certain good.
Where are now the warring kings,
Word be-mockers? — By the Rood
Where are now the warring kings?
An idle word is now their glory,
By the stammering schoolboy said,
Reading some entangled story:
The kings of the old time are fled
The wandering earth herself may be
Only a sudden flaming word,
In clanging space a moment heard,
Troubling the endless reverie.
Then nowise worship dusty deeds,
Nor seek; for this is also sooth;
To hunger fiercely after truth,
Lest all thy toiling only breeds
New dreams, new dreams; there is no truth
Saving in thine own heart. Seek, then,
No learning from the starry men,
Who follow with the optic glass
The whirling ways of stars that pass —
Seek, then, for this is also sooth,
No word of theirs — the cold star-bane
Has cloven and rent their hearts in twain,
And dead is all their human truth.
Go gather by the humming-sea
Some twisted, echo-harbouring shell,
And to its lips thy story tell,
And they thy comforters will be,
Rewarding in melodious guile,
Thy fretful words a little while,
Till they shall singing fade in ruth,
And die a pearly brotherhood;
For words alone are certain good:
Sing, then, for this is also sooth.
I must be gone: there is a grave
Where daffodil and lily wave,
And I would please the hapless faun,
Buried under the sleepy ground,
With mirthful songs before the dawn.
His shouting days with mirth were crowned;
And still I dream he treads the lawn,
Walking ghostly in the dew,
Pierced by my glad singing through,
My songs of old earth’s dreamy youth:
But ah! she dreams not now; dream thou!
For fair are poppies on the brow:
Dream, dream, for this is also sooth.
THE SAD SHEPHERD
There was a man whom Sorrow named his friend,
And he, of his high comrade Sorrow dreaming,
Went walking with slow steps along the gleaming
And humming sands, where windy surges wend:
And he called loudly to the stars to bend
From their pale thrones and comfort him, but they
Among themselves laugh on and sing alway:
And then the man whom Sorrow named his friend
Cried out, Dim sea, hear my most piteous story!
The sea swept on and cried her old cry still,
Rolling along in dreams from hill to hill;
He fled the persecution of her glory
And, in a far-off, gentle valley stopping,
Cried all his story to the dewdrops glistening,
But naught they heard, for they are always listening,
The dewdrops, for the sound of their own dropping.
And then the man whom Sorrow named his friend,
Sought once again the shore, and found a shell,
And thought, I will my heavy story tell
Till my own words, re-echoing, shall send
Their sadness through a hollow, pearly heart;
And my own tale again for me shall sing,
And my own whispering words be comforting,
And lo! my ancient burden may depart.
Then he sang softly nigh the pearly rim;
But the sad dweller by the sea-way
s lone
Changed all he sang to inarticulate moan
Among her wildering whirls, forgetting him.
THE CLOAK, THE BOAT, AND THE SHOES
“What do you make so fair and bright?”
“I make the cloak of Sorrow:
“O, lovely to see in all men’s sight
“Shall be the cloak of Sorrow,
“In all men’s sight.”
“What do you build with sails for flight?”
