Epic

 by Patrick Kavanagh

Epic 

I have lived in important places, times

When great events were decided, who owned

That half a rood of rock, a no-man's land

Surrounded by our pitchfork-armed claims.

I heard the Duffys shouting "Damn your soul!"

And old McCabe stripped to the waist, seen

Step the plot defying blue cast-steel -

"Here is the march along these iron stones."

That was the year of the Munich bother. Which

Was more important? I inclined

To lose my faith in Ballyrush and Gortin

Till Homer's ghost came whispering to my mind.

He said: I made the Iliad from such

A local row. Gods make their own importance. 

Advent 

We have tested and tasted too much, lover-

Through a chink too wide there comes in no wonder.

But here in the Advent-darkened room

Where the dry black bread and the sugarless tea

Of penance will charm back the luxury

Of a child's soul, we'll return to Doom

The knowledge we stole but could not use.

And the newness that was in every stale thing

When we looked at it as children: the spirit-shocking

Wonder in a black slanting Ulster hill

Or the prophetic astonishment in the tedious talking

Of an old fool will awake for us and bring

You and me to the yard gate to watch the whins

And the bog-holes, cart-tracks, old stables where Time begins.

O after Christmas we'll have no need to go searching

For the difference that sets an old phrase burning-

We'll hear it in the whispered argument of a churning

Or in the streets where the village boys are lurching.

And we'll hear it among decent men too

Who barrow dung in gardens under trees,

Wherever life pours ordinary plenty.

Won't we be rich, my love and I, and

God we shall not ask for reason's payment,

The why of heart-breaking strangeness in dreeping hedges

Nor analyse God's breath in common statement.

We have thrown into the dust-bin the clay-minted wages

Of pleasure, knowledge and the conscious hour-

And Christ comes with a January flower.

Primrose

Upon a bank I sat, a child made seer

Of one small primrose flowering in my mind.

Better than wealth it is, I said, to find

One small page of Truth's manuscript made clear.

I looked at Christ transfigured without fear--

The light was very beautiful and kind,

And where the Holy Ghost in flame had signed

I read it through the lenses of a tear.

And then my sight grew dim, I could not see

The primrose that had lighted me to Heaven,

And there was but the shadow of a tree

Ghostly among the stars. The years that pass

Like tired soldiers nevermore have given

Moments to see wonders in the grass.