Modern British Poetry Part 15

The wit or the point o' what I spakes Ye've got to find if ye can; A wunnerful difference spellin' makes In the 'ands of a competent man!

I mayn't knaw mooch o' corliflower plants, I mayn't knaw 'oes from trowels, But I does ma wark, if ma consonants Be properly mixed with ma vowels!

_J. M. Synge_

The most brilliant star of the Celtic revival was born at Rathfarnham, near Dublin, in 1871. As a child in Wicklow, he was already fascinated by the strange idioms and the rhythmic speech he heard there, a native utterance which was his greatest delight and which was to be rich material for his greatest work. He did not use this folk-language merely as he heard it. He was an artist first and last, and as an artist he bent and shaped the rough material, selecting with great fastidiousness, so that in his plays every speech is, as he himself declared all good speech should be, "as fully flavored as a nut or apple." Even in _The Tinker's Wedding_ (1907), possibly the least important of his plays, one is arrested by s.n.a.t.c.hes like:

"That's a sweet tongue you have, Sarah Casey; but if sleep's a grand thing, it's a grand thing to be waking up a day the like of this, when there's a warm sun in it, and a kind air, and you'll hear the cuckoos singing and crying out on the top of the hill."

For some time, Synge's career was uncertain. He went to Germany half intending to become a professional musician. There he studied the theory of music, perfecting himself meanwhile in Gaelic and Hebrew, winning prizes in both of these languages. Yeats found him in France in 1898 and advised him to go to the Aran Islands, to live there as if he were one of the people. "Express a life," said Yeats, "that has never found expression." Synge went. He became part of the life of Aran, living upon salt fish and eggs, talking Irish for the most part but listening also to that beautiful English which, to quote Yeats again, "has grown up in Irish-speaking districts and takes its vocabulary from the time of Malory and of the translators of the Bible, but its idiom and vivid metaphor from Irish." The result of this close contact was five of the greatest poetic prose dramas not only of his own generation, but of several generations preceding it.

(See Preface.)

In _Riders to the Sea_ (1903), _The Well of the Saints_ (1905), and _The Playboy of the Western World_ (1907) we have a richness of imagery, a new language startling in its vigor, a wildness and pa.s.sion that contrast strangely with the suave mysticism and delicate spirituality of his a.s.sociates in the Irish Theatre.

Synge's _Poems and Translations_ (1910), a volume which was not issued until after his death, contains not only his few hard and earthy verses, but also Synge's theory of poetry. The translations, which have been rendered in a highly intensified prose, are as racy as anything in his plays; his versions of Villon and Petrarch are remarkable for their adherence to the original and still radiate the poet's own personality.

Synge died, just as he was beginning to attain fame, at a private hospital in Dublin March 24, 1909.

BEG-INNISH

Bring Kateen-beug and Maurya Jude To dance in Beg-Innish,[13]

And when the lads (they're in Dunquin) Have sold their crabs and fish, Wave fawny shawls and call them in, And call the little girls who spin, And seven weavers from Dunquin, To dance in Beg-Innish.

I'll play you jigs, and Maurice Kean, Where nets are laid to dry, I've silken strings would draw a dance From girls are lame or shy; Four strings I've brought from Spain and France To make your long men skip and prance, Till stars look out to see the dance Where nets are laid to dry.

We'll have no priest or peeler in To dance in Beg-Innish; But we'll have drink from M'riarty Jim Rowed round while gannets fish, A keg with porter to the brim, That every lad may have his whim, Till we up sails with M'riarty Jim And sail from Beg-Innish.

A TRANSLATION FROM PETRARCH

(_He is Jealous of the Heavens and the Earth_)

What a grudge I am bearing the earth that has its arms about her, and is holding that face away from me, where I was finding peace from great sadness.

What a grudge I am bearing the Heavens that are after taking her, and shutting her in with greediness, the Heavens that do push their bolt against so many.

What a grudge I am bearing the blessed saints that have got her sweet company, that I am always seeking; and what a grudge I am bearing against Death, that is standing in her two eyes, and will not call me with a word.

TO THE OAKS OF GLENCREE

My arms are round you, and I lean Against you, while the lark Sings over us, and golden lights, and green Shadows are on your bark.

There'll come a season when you'll stretch Black boards to cover me; Then in Mount Jerome I will lie, poor wretch, With worms eternally.

FOOTNOTES:

[13] (The accent is on the last syllable.)

_Nora Hopper Chesson_

Nora Hopper was born in Exeter on January 2, 1871, and married W. H.

Chesson, a well-known writer, in 1901. Although the Irish element in her work is acquired and incidental, there is a distinct if somewhat fitful race consciousness in _Ballads in Prose_ (1894) and _Under Quickened Boughs_ (1896). She died suddenly April 14, 1906.

A CONNAUGHT LAMENT

I will arise and go hence to the west, And dig me a grave where the hill-winds call; But O were I dead, were I dust, the fall Of my own love's footstep would break my rest!

My heart in my bosom is black as a sloe!

I heed not cuckoo, nor wren, nor swallow: Like a flying leaf in the sky's blue hollow The heart in my breast is, that beats so low.

Because of the words your lips have spoken, (O dear black head that I must not follow) My heart is a grave that is stripped and hollow, As ice on the water my heart is broken.

O lips forgetful and kindness fickle, The swallow goes south with you: I go west Where fields are empty and scythes at rest.

I am the poppy and you the sickle; My heart is broken within my breast.

_Eva Gore-Booth_

Eva Gore-Booth, the second daughter of Sir Henry Gore-Booth and the sister of Countess Marcievicz, was born in Sligo, Ireland, in 1872.

She first appeared in "A. E."'s anthology, _New Songs_, in which so many of the modern Irish poets first came forward.

Her initial volume, _Poems_ (1898), showed practically no distinction--not even the customary "promise." But _The One and the Many_ (1904) and _The Sorrowful Princess_ (1907) revealed the gift of the Celtic singer who is half mystic, half minstrel. Primarily philosophic, her verse often turns to lyrics as haunting as the two examples here reprinted.

THE WAVES OF BREFFNY

The grand road from the mountain goes shining to the sea, And there is traffic on it and many a horse and cart, But the little roads of Cloonagh are dearer far to me And the little roads of Cloonagh go rambling through my heart.

A great storm from the ocean goes shouting o'er the hill, And there is glory in it; and terror on the wind: But the haunted air of twilight is very strange and still, And the little winds of twilight are dearer to my mind.

The great waves of the Atlantic sweep storming on their way, Shining green and silver with the hidden herring shoal; But the little waves of Breffny have drenched my heart in spray, And the little waves of Breffny go stumbling through my soul.

WALLS

Free to all souls the hidden beauty calls, The sea thrift dwelling on her spray-swept height, The lofty rose, the low-grown aconite, The gliding river and the stream that brawls Down the sharp cliffs with constant breaks and falls-- All these are equal in the equal light-- All waters mirror the one Infinite.