The Red Man's Wife

    Then she arose
        And walked in the valley
            In her fine clothes.

    After great fire
        Great frost
            Comes following.

    Turgesius was lost
        By the daughter of Maelsheachlin
            The King.

    By Grainne,
        Of high Ben Gulbain in the north,
            Was Diarmuid lost.

    The strong sons of Ushna,
        Who never submitted,
            They fell by Deirdre.

James Stephens

James Stephens was an Irish novelist and poet, whose literary output includes many retellings of Irish myths and fairy tales. He was born on February 9, 1880, and passed away on December 26, 1950. Notable works include 'The Crock of Gold' and 'The Demi-Gods'. Stephens also wrote several well-regarded collections of poetry, including 'The Hill of Vision' and 'Insurrections'. His work is characterized by a blend of myth, fantasy, and modernism, capturing the spirit and culture of Ireland.

James Stephens

The Snare

James Stephens, Simple Poetry

When I Was Young (The Adventures Of Seumas Beg)

James Stephens, Simple Poetry

Eileen, Diarmuid And Teig

James Stephens, Simple Poetry

The Cherry Tree (The Adventures Of Seumas Beg)

James Stephens, Simple Poetry

English

Suggested Poems

Explore a curated selection of verses that share themes, styles, and emotional resonance with the poem you've just read.

Deirdre

Do not let any woman read this verse;
It is for men, and after them their sons
And their sons' sons.

The time comes when our hearts sink utterly;
When we remember Deirdre and her tale,
And that her lips are dust.

Once she did tread the earth: men took her hand;.
They looked into her eyes and said their say,
And she replied to them.

More than a thousand years it is since she
Was beautiful: she trod the waving grass;
She saw the clouds.

A thousand years! The grass is still the same,
The clouds as lovely as they were that time
When Deirdre was alive.

But there has never been a woman born
Who was so beautiful, not one so beautiful
Of all the women born.

Let all men go apart and mourn together;
No man can ever love...

James Stephens

Preface To Diarmid's Story

Best beloved of ancient stories
Are our Diarmid's woes to me.
Like a mist, by breezes broken,
So this tale of olden glories
Floats in fragments, as a token
Of the song of Ireland's sea.

Through long centuries repeated
Lived the legend told in Erse,
But a change comes swift or slowly
Fades the language, and defeated
Flies the faith, once counted holy,
Old-world ways, and oral verse.

Not from men of note or learning
May we gather now these tales,
Heard beneath the cotter's rafter,
Or where smithy sparks are burning,
Or at sea, when hushed the laughter
Of the breeze on hull and sails.

Then with Ossian's rhythmic Measure
Comes upon the fancy's sight,
One with golden locks; resplendent,
Great and strong with eyes of azure,...

John Campbell

Brigid

(AFTER THE IRISH)

Do not marry, Breed, asthore!
That old man whose head is hoar
As the winter, but instead
Mate with some young curly-head;
He will give to you a child,
He will never leave your side,
And at morning when you wake
Kiss for kiss will give and take.

I wish that I had died, I do,
Before I gave my love to you;
Love so lasting that it will
While I live be with you still:
And for it what do I get?
Pain and trouble and regret,
The terrors of the aspen-tree
Which the wind shakes fearfully.

If this country could be seen
As it ought - then you had been
Living in a castle grand
With the ladies of the land:
The friend and foe, the gael and gall,
Would be cheering, one and all,
For yourself, and, this is t...

James Stephens

The Song Of O'Ruark, Prince Of Breffni.[1]

The valley lay smiling before me,
    Where lately I left her behind;
Yet I trembled, and something hung o'er me,
    That saddened the joy of my mind.
I looked for the lamp which, she told me,
    Should shine, when her Pilgrim returned;
But, tho' darkness began to infold me,
    No lamp from the battlements burned!

I flew to her chamber--'twas lonely,
    As if the loved tenant lay dead;--
Ah, would it were death, and death only!
    But no, the young false one had fled.
And there hung the lute that could soften
    My very worst pains into bliss;
While the hand, that had waked it so often,
    Now throbbed to a proud rival's kiss.

There was a time, falsest of women,
    When Breffni's good sword would have sought
That man, thro'...

Thomas Moore

The Parting Of Goll And His Wife

And when Goll knew Finn to be watching for his life he made no attempt to escape but stopped where he was, without food, without drink, and he blinded with the sand that was blowing into his eyes.

And his wife came to a rock where she could speak with him, and she called to him to come to her. "Come over to me," she said; "and it is a pity you to be blinded where you are, on the rocks of the waste sea, with no drink but the salt water, a man that was first in every fight. And come now to be sleeping beside me," she said; "and in place of the hard sea-water I will nourish you from my own breast, and it is I will do your healing," she said; "for it is seven years since you wedded with me, and from that night to this night I never got a hard word from you. And the gold of your hair is my desire for ever," she said, "and do not sto...

Isabella Augusta, Lady Gregory

The Turn Of The Road (The Adventures Of Seumas Beg)

    I was playing with my hoop along the road
        Just where the bushes are, when, suddenly,
    There came a shout., I ran away and stowed
        Myself beneath a bush, and watched to see
    What made the noise, and then, around the bend,
        I saw a woman running.    She was old
    And wrinkle-faced, and had big teeth., The end
        Of her red shawl caught on a bush and rolled
    Right off her, and her hair fell down., Her face
        Was awful white, and both her eyes looked sick,
    And she was talking queer.    "O God of Grace!"
        Said she, "where is the child?" and flew back quick
    The way she came, and screamed, and shook her hands;
        ... Maybe she was a witch from foreign lands.

James Stephens