Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE IMMORTAL HOUR; A DRAMA, by WILLIAM SHARP


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE IMMORTAL HOUR; A DRAMA, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: By dim moon-glimmering coasts and dim grey wastes
Last Line: . . . . . . The dream of death.
Alternate Author Name(s): Macleod, Fiona
Subject(s): Legends, Celtic


DRAMATIS PERSONÆ

EOCHAIDH. High King of Ireland.
ETAIN. A Lost Princess, afterwards
Eochaidh's Queen.
MIDIR. A Prince of the Hidden People.
DALUA. The Amadan-Dhu.
Two Peasants, Manus and Maive, and Harpers, Warriors, etc.

ACT I
A forest glade at the rising of the moon. In the background is the hazel-
shadowed pool of a wide waste of water. As the moonshine falls upon an ancient
oak to the right, the tall figure of DALUA is seen leaning against the
bole.
He is clad in black, with a small black cap from which hangs a black hawk's
feather.

DALUA
[Slowly coming out of the shadow
By dim moon-glimmering coasts and dim grey wastes
Of thistle-gathered shingle, and sea-murmuring woods
Trod once but now untrod . . . under grey skies
That had the grey wave sighing in their sails,
And in their drooping sails the grey sea-ebb,
And with the grey wind wailing evermore
Blowing the dun leaf from the blackening trees,
I have travelled from one darkness to another.

VOICES IN THE WOOD
Though you have travelled from one darkness to another
Following the dun leaf from the blackening trees
That the grey wind harries, and have trodden the woods
Where the grey-hooded crows that once were men
Gather in multitude from the long grey wastes
Of thistled shingle by sea-murmurous coasts,
Yet you have come no further than a rood,
A little rood of ground in a circle woven.

DALUA
My lips have lost the salt of the driven foam,
Howbeit I hear no more the long dull roar,
Of the long grey beaches of the Hebrides.

VOICES
Behind the little windless leaves of the wood
The sea-wastes of the wind-worn Hebrides,
With thunderous crashes falling wave on wave,
Are but the troubled sighs of a great silence.

DALUA
To the world's end I have come, to the world's end.

VOICES
You have come but a little way who think so far
The long uncounted leagues to the world's end:
And now you are mazed because you stand at the edge
Where the last tangled slope leans over the abyss.

DALUA
You know not who I am, sombre and ancient voices.
[Silence
And if I tread the long, continuous way
Within a narrow round, not thinking it long,
And fare a single hour thinking it many days,
I am not first or last of the Immortal Clan,
For whom the long ways of the world are brief
And the short ways heavy with unimagined time.

VOICES IN THE WOOD
There is no first or last, or any end.

DALUA

I have come hither, led by dreams and visions,
And know not why I come, and to what end,
And wherefore, mid the noise of chariot wheels
Where the swung world roars down the starry ways,
The Voice I know and dread was one with me
As the uplifted grain and wind are one.

VOICES
Above you is the light of a wandering star . . .
O Son of the Wandering Star, we know you now!

DALUA
Like great black birds the demons haunt the woods . . .
Hail, ye unknown who know me! . . .

A VOICE
Hail, Son of Shadow!

VOICES

Hail, Brother of the strong, immortal gods,
And of the gods who have passed into a sleep
In sandless hollows of forgotten hills,
And of the homeless, sad, bewildered gods
Who as grey wandering mists lickt up of the wind
Pass slowly in the dull unfriendly light
Of the cold, curious eyes of envious men. . . .

OTHER VOICES
. . . . . . Ai! Ai!
Who yet have that which gives their mortal clay
A light and a power and a wonder that none has
Of all the Clans of the Shee, save only those who are not sprung of Orchil and
of Kaìl,
The mother and father of the earth-wrought folk
Greater than men, but less than Orchil and Kaìl,
As they in turn are less than sky-set Lu,
Or Oengus who is keeper of the four great keys . . .

OTHER VOICES
Than sky-set Lu who leads the hosts of the stars . . .

OTHER VOICES
Than Dagda, Lord of Thunder and of Silence,
And Ana, the ancient Mother of the gods. . . .

OTHER VOICES
Than Mánan of the innumerable waters. . . .

OTHER VOICES
Than moon-crown'd Brigid of the undying flame. . . .

OTHER VOICES
Than Midir of the Dew and the Evening Star. . . .

OTHER VOICES
Than Oengus, keeper of the East: of Birth, of Song;
The keeper of the South: of Passion, and of War;
The keeper of the West: of Sorrow, of Dreams;
The keeper of the North: of Death, of Life.

DALUA
Yet one more ancient even than the god of the sun,
Than flame-haired Oengus, lord of Love and Death,
Holds the last dreadful key . . . Oblivion.

VOICES
Dim ages that are dust are but the loosened laughters
Spilt in the youth of Oengus the Ever-Young!

DALUA
I am old, more old, more ancient than the gods,
For I am son of Shadow, eldest god
Who dreamed the passionate and terrible dreams
We have called Fire and Light, Water and Wind,
Air, Darkness, Death, Change, and Decay, and Birth
And all the infinite bitter range that is.

A VOICE
Brother and kin to all the twilit gods,
Living, forgot, long dead: sad Shadow of pale hopes,
Forgotten dreams, and madness of men's minds:
Outcast among the gods, and called the Fool,
Yet dreaded even by those immortal eyes
Because thy fateful touch can wreck the mind,
Or lay a frost of silence on the heart:
Dalua, hail! . . .

DALUA
I am but what I am.
I am no thirsty evil lapping life.
[Loud laughters from the wood
Laugh not, ye outcasts of the invisible world,
For Lu and Oengus laugh not, nor the gods
Safe set above the perishable stars.
[Silence
They laugh not, nor any in the high celestial house.
Their proud immortal eyes grow dim and clouded
When as a morning shadow I am gathered
Into their holy light, for well they know
The dreadful finger of the Nameless One,

That moves as a shadow falls. For I Dalua
Am yet the blown leaf of the unknown powers.

VOICES
[Tumultuously
We too are the blown leaves of the unseen powers.

DALUA
Demons and Dreams and Shadows, and all ye
Invisible folk who haunt the darkling ways,
I am grown weary, who have stooped and lain
Over the green edge o' the shaken world
And seen beneath the whirling maze of stars
Infinite gulfs of silence, and the obscure
Abysmal wastes where Time hath never trod.

VOICES
We too are weary: we are Weariness.

DALUA
[Listening intently
Voices of shadowy things, be still! I hear
The feet of one who wanders through the wood.

VOICES
We who are the children of the broken way,
The wandered wind, the idle wave, blown leaves,
The wild distempered hour and swirling dust,
Hail thee, Dalua, Herdsman of fallen stars,
Shepherd of Shadows! Lord of the Hidden Way!

DALUA
[Going back to the oak
Voices be still! The woods are suddenly troubled.
I hear the footfall of predestined things.
[Enter ETAIN, in a coiled robe of pale green, with mistletoe
intertwined in her long, dark, unloosened hair. She comes slowly forward, and
stands silent, looking at the moonshine on the water.

ETAIN
[Singing to a slow monotonous air
Fair is the moonlight
And fair the wood,
But not so fair
As the place I come from.

Why did I leave it,
The beautiful country,
Where Death is only
A drifting Shadow?

O face of Love,
Of Dream and Longing,
There is sorrow upon me
That I am here.

I will go back
To the Country of the Young,
And see again
The lances of the Shee

As they keep hosting
With laughing cries
In pale places
Under the moon.
[ETAIN turns, and walks slowly forward. She starts as she hears a
peculiar cry from the wood

ETAIN
None made that cry who has not known the Shee.

DALUA
[Coming forward and bowing low with fantastic grace
Hail, daughter of kings, and star among the dreams
Which are the lives and souls of whom have won
The Country of the Young!

ETAIN
I know you not:
But though I have not seen your face before,
I think you are of those who have not kept
The bitter honey of mortality,
But are among the deathless folk who dwell
In hollow hills, or isles far off, or where
Flatheanas lies, or cold Ifurin is.

DALUA
I have come far, led here by dreams and visions.

ETAIN
By dreams and visions led I too have come
But know not whence or by what devious way,
Nor to what end I am come through these dim woods
To this grey lonely loch.

DALUA
[Touching her lightly with the shadow of his hand
Have you forgot
The delicate smiling land beneath the arcs
Which day and night and momently are wove
Between its peaceful shores and the vast gulf
Of dreadful silence and the unpathwayed dark?

ETAIN
If somewhat I remember, more is lost.
Have I come here to meet with you, fair sir,
Whose name I do not know, whose face is strange?

DALUA
Can you remember. . . .

ETAIN
I have forgotten all . . .
I can remember nothing: no, not this
The little song I sang ev'n now, or what sweet thought,
What ache of longing lay behind the song.
All is forgot. And this has come to me
The wind-way of the leaf. But now my thoughts

Ran leaping through the green ways of my mind
Like fawns at play: but now I know no more
That this: that I am Etain White o' the Wave,
Etain come hither from the lovely land
Where the immortal Shee fill up their lives
As flowers with honey brewed of summer airs,
Flame of the sun, dawn-rains, and evening dews.

DALUA
[Sombrely
How knew you not that once, where the unsetting moon
The grassy elf mounds fills with drowsy gold,
I kissed your shadowy lips beneath the thorn
Heavy with old foam of changeless blossom?

ETAIN
[Leaning forward and looking into his face
You loved me once? I have no memory
Of this: if once you loved me, have you lost
The subtle breath of love, the sudden fire?
For you are cold as are your shadowy eyes.

DALUA
[Unstirring
When, at the last, amid the o'erwearied
Shee—
Weary of long delight and deathless joys—
One you shall love may fade before your eyes,
Before your eyes may fade, and be as mist
Caught in the sunny hollow of Lu's hand,
Lord of the Day. . . .

ETAIN
[Eagerly, with her left hand pressed against her heart
What then?

DALUA
It may be then, white dove,
Your eyes may dwell on one on whom falls not
The first chill breath blown from the Unknown Land,
Of which the tender poets of the Shee
Sing in the dewy eves when the wild deer
Are milked, and 'neath the evening-star moths rise
Grey-gold against a wave-uplifted moon.

ETAIN
Well?

DALUA
Then I, Dalua, in that fateful hour,
Shall know the star-song of supreme desire,
And placing hand upon the perfect fruit
Shall taste and die. . . .
[A pause
. . . or, if I do not die,
Shall know the sweet fruit mine, then see it slip
Down through dim branches into the abyss
Where all sweet fruit that is, the souls of men,
The joyous Shee, old gods, all beautiful words,
Song, music, dreams, desires, shall in the end
Sway like blown moths against the rosewhite flame
That is the fiery plume upon the brows
Of Him called Silence.

ETAIN
I do not understand:
Your love shall fall about me like sweet rain
In drouth of death: so much I hear and know:
But how can death o'ertake the immortal folk
With whom I dwell? And if you love me thus,

Why is there neither word nor smile nor glance
Of love, nor any little sign that love
Shakes like a windy reed within your heart?

DALUA
[Sombrely
I am Dalua.

ETAIN
I have heard lips whisper
Of one Dalua, but with sucked-in breath,
As though the lips were fearful of the word.
No more than this I know, no more recall.

DALUA
I cannot give you word of love, or kiss,
Sweet love, for in my fatal breath there lies
The subtle air of madness: from my hand
Death shoots an arrowy tongue, if I but touch
The unsuspecting clay with bitter heed,
With hate darkling as the swift winter hail,
Or sudden malice such as lifts and falls
A dreadful shadow of ill within my mind.
Nor could I if I would. We are sheep led
By an unknown Shepherd, we who are the Shee,
For all we dream we are as gods, and far
Upgathered from the little woes of men.

ETAIN
Then why this meeting, here in this old wood,
By moonlight, by this melancholy water?

DALUA
I knew not: now I know. A king of men
Has wooed the Immortal Hour. He seeks to know
The joy that is more great than joy
The beauty of the old green earth can give.
He has known dreams, and because bitter dreams
Have sweeter been than honey, he has sought
The open road that lies mid shadowy things.
He hath sought and found and called upon the Shee
To lead his love to one more beautiful
Than any mortal maid, so fair that he
Shall know a joy beyond all mortal joy,
And stand silent and rapt beside the gate,
The rainbow gate of her whom none may find,
The Beauty of all Beauty.

ETAIN
Can this be?

DALUA
Nay, but he doth not know the end. There is
But one way to that Gate: it is not Love
A flame with all desire, but Love at peace.

ETAIN
Who is this poet, this king?

DALUA
Led here by dreams,
By dreams and visions led as you and I,
His feet are nearing us. When you are won
By love and adoration, Star of dreams,
And take sweet mortal clay, and have forgot
The love-sweet whisper of the King of The Shee,
And, even as now, hear Midir's name unmov'd;
When you are won thus, Etain, and none know,
Not any of your kindred, whence unknown
As all unknowing you have come, for you
The wayward thistledown of fate shall blow
On the same idle wind—the doom of him
Who blindfold seeks you.

ETAIN
But he may not love?

DALUA
Yes, he shall love. Upon him I shall lay
My touch, the touch of him men dread and call
The Amadan-Dhu, the Dark One, Fairy Fool.
He shall have madness even as he wills,
And think it wisdom. I shall be his thought—
A dream within a dream, the flame wherein
The white moths of his thought shall rise and die.
[A blast of a horn is heard

DALUA
[Abruptly
FAREWELL.
[Touches her lightly with the shadow of his hand, and whispers in her
ear
Now go. The huntsman's lodge is near.
I have told all that need be told, and given
Bewilderment and dreams, but dreams that are
The fruit of that sweet clay of which I spoke.
[ETAIN slowly goes, putting her hand to her head bewilderedly. Before
she
passes into and out of sight in the wood, she sings plaintively

I would go back
To the Country of the Young,
And see again
The lances of the Shee,

As they keep their hosting
With laughing cries
In pale places
Under the moon.

SCENE II.—The same.
[DALUA stands, waiting the coming of EOCHAIDH the king. The king is
clad in a leathern hunting dress, with a cleft helmet surmounted by a dragon
in
pale findruiney

EOCHAIDH
[Stopping abruptly
Sir, I am glad. I had not thought to see
One here.

DALUA
[Taking off his cap, and sweeping it low
The king is welcome here.

EOCHAIDH
The king?
How know you that the king is here? Far off
The war-horns bray about my threatened Dûn.
None knows that I am here.

DALUA
'And why, O king?

EOCHAIDH
For I am weary of wars and idle strife,
Who have no joy in all these little things
Men break their lives upon. But in my dreams,
In dreams I have seen that which climbs the stars
And sings upon me through my lonely hours
And will not let me be.

DALUA
What song is that?

EOCHAIDH
The song . . . but who is he who knows the king
Here in this dim, remote, forgotten wood,
Where led by dreams and visions I have come?


DALUA
Those led by dreams shall be misled, O king!

EOCHAIDH
You are no druid: no knight in arms: none
Whom I have seen.

DALUA
I have known camps of men,
The minds and souls of men, and I have heard
Eochaidh the king sighing out his soul in sighs.

EOCHAIDH
Tell me your name.

DALUA
I am called Dalua.

EOCHAIDH
[Ponderingly
I have not heard that name, and yet in dreams
I have known one who waved a shadowy plume
And smiling said, "I am Dalua." Speak:
Are you this same Dalua?

DALUA
I have come
To this lone wood and to this lonely mere
To drink from out the Fountain of all dreams,
The Shadowy Fount of Beauty.

EOCHAIDH
[Eagerly
At last!
The Fount of Beauty, Fountain of all dreams!
Now am I come upon my long desire!
The days have trampled me like armed men
Thrusting their spears as ever on they go,
And I am weary of all things save the stars,
The wind, shadows and moonrise, and strange dreams.
If you can show me this immortal Fount
Whatso you will is yours.

DALUA
[Touching him lightly
You are the king,
And know, now, whence you came, and to what end?

EOCHAIDH
[Confusedly
The king? The king? What king?

DALUA
You are the king?

EOCHAIDH
A king of shadows, I! I am no king.

DALUA
And whither now, and whence?

EOCHAIDH
I am not come
From any place I know of, and I go
Where dreams and visions lead me.
[Suddenly a fountain rises in the mere, the spray rising high in the
moonshine

DALUA
Look, O king!

EOCHAIDH
[Staring eagerly, with hand above his eyes
I cannot see what you would have me see.

DALUA
[Plucking a branch from a mountainash, and waving it before the king's
face
Look!

EOCHAIDH
I see a Fountain and within its shadow
A great fish swims, and on the moveless wave
The scarlet berries float: dim mid the depths
The face of One I see, most calm and great,
August, with mournful eyes.

DALUA
Ask what you will.

EOCHAIDH
The word of wisdom, O thou hidden God:
Show me my star of dreams, show me the way!

A VOICE
[Solemnly
[Return, O Eochaidh Airemh, wandering king

EOCHAIDH
That shall not be. No backward way is mine.
If I indeed be king, then kingly I
Shall cleave my way through shadows, as through men.

A VOICE
Return!

EOCHAIDH
Nay, by the Sun and Moon, I swear
I will not turn my feet.

A VOICE
Return! Return!

EOCHAIDH
[Hesitating, turns to look at DALUA, who has swiftly and silently
with-drawn into the wood
[Silence
There is no backward way for such as I!
Howbeit—for I am shaken with old dreams,
And as an idle wave tossed to and fro—
I will go hence: I will go back to where
The quiet moonlight spills from the black brow
Of the great hill that towers above the lands
Wherein men hail me king.
[DALUA'S laughter comes from the wood

DALUA
Follow, O follow, king of dreams and shadows!

EOCHAIDH
I follow. . . .
[Exit
SCENE III.—The rude interior of the cabin of the huntsman,
MÁNUS.
He is sitting, clad in deerskin, with strapped sandals, before a
fire of pine-
logs. Long, unkempt, black hair falls about his face. His wife, MAIVE, a
worn woman with a scared look, stands at the back, plucking
feathers from a dead
cockerel. At the other side of the hearth, ETAIN sits.

MÁNUS
I've seen that man before who came to-night.
[He has addressed no one, and no one answers
I say I have seen that man before.

MAIVE
Hush Mánus
Beware of what you say. How can we tell
Who comes, who goes? And, too, good man, you've had
Three golden pieces.

MÁNUS
Aye, they are put by,
That comforts me: for gold is ever gold.

MAIVE
One was for her who stays with us to-night
And shares our scanty fare.
[Making a curtsey
Right welcome, too:
The other was for any who might come,
Asking for bite or sup, for fireside warmth.
The third. . . .

MÁNUS
Yes, woman, yes, I know: for silence. Hush!
[A moan of wind is heard
There comes the rain.

ETAIN
[Rising and going to the left doorway, pulls back
the hide. Shuddering,
she thrusts it crosswise again, and returns
It was so beautiful,
So still, with not a breath of wind, and now
The hill-wind moans, the night is filled with tears
Of bitter rain. Good people, have you seen
Such quiet eves fall into stormy nights
Before?

MÁNUS
Who knows the wild way of the wind:
The wild way of the rain? They come, and go:
We stay. We wait. We listen. Not for us
To ask, to wonder.

MAIVE
They're more great than we.
They are so old, the wind and rain, so old,
They know all things, Grey Feathers and Blind
Eyes!

ETAIN
Who? . . . Who? . . .

MÁNUS
. . . the woman speaks of Wind and Rain:
Blind Eyes, the dreadful one whom none has seen,
Whose voice we hear: Grey Feathers, his pale love,
Who flies before or follows, grey in rains,
Fierce blue in hail, death-white in whirling snows.

ETAIN
Does any ever come to you by night?
. . . lost woodlander, stray wayfarer from the hills,
Merchant or warrior from the far-off plains?

MÁNUS
None.

MAIVE
We are so far away: so far, I think
Sometimes, we must be close upon the edge
Of the green earth, there where the old tales say
The bramble-bushes and the heather make
A hollow tangle over the abyss.

ETAIN
But sometimes . . . sometimes. . . . Tell me: have you heard,
By dusk or moonset have you never heard
Sweet voices, delicate music? . . . never seen
The passage of the lordly beautiful ones
Men call the Shee?

MÁNUS
[Rising abruptly
We do not speak of them.

MAIVE
Hark!
[A stronger blast strikes the house. MÁNUS throws more logs on
the fire

MAIVE
Hark! a second time I've heard a cry!
[All listen. Suddenly a loud knock is heard. MAIVE covers her head,
and cowers beside the fire, behind ETAIN, who rises. MÁNUS seizes
a
spear, and stands waiting. The heavy knock is repeated

A VOICE
Open, good folk!
MÁNUS
There is no door to ope:
Thrust back the skins from off the post.
[The ox-fell is thrust aside, and EOCHAIDH enters. He stops at the
threshold, staring at ETAIN

EOCHAIDH
Good folk,
I give you greeting. [A pause
Lady, I bow my knee.
[ETAIN bows slowly in return. EOCHAIDH comes a few steps forward,
stops, and looks fixedly at ETAIN. He says slowly—
You have great beauty.
[A pause

I have never seen
Beauty so great, so wonderful. In dreams,
In dreams alone such beauty have I seen,
A star above my dusk.

ETAIN
Sir, I pray you
Draw near the fire. This bitter wind and rain
Must sure have chilled you.
[She points to her vacant three-legged stool. As EOCHAIDH slowly
passes her, MÁNUS slides his hand over his shoulder and back

MÁNUS
[With a strange look at MAIVE
He is not wet. The driving rains have left
No single drop!

MAIVE
[Piteously
Good sir! brave lord! good sir!
Have pity on us: sir, have pity!
We are poor, and all alone, and have no wile
To save ourselves from great ones, or from those
Who dwell in secret places on the hills
Or wander where they will in shadow clothed.

MÁNUS
Hush, woman! Name no names: and speak no word
Of them who come unbidden and unknown.
Good, sir, you are most welcome. I am Mánus,
And this poor woman is Maive, my childless wife,
And this is a great lady of the land
Who shelters here to-night. Her name is Etain.

EOCHAIDH
Tell me, good Mánus: who else is here, or whom
You may expect?

MÁNUS
No one, fair lord. The wild
Gray stormy seas are doors that shut the world
From us poor island-folk. . . .

MAIVE
We are alone,
We're all alone, fair sir: there is none here
But whom you see. Gray Feathers and Blind Eyes
Are all we know without.

EOCHAIDH
Who are these others?

MÁNUS
The woman speaks, sir, of the Wind and Rain.
These unknown gods are as all gods that are,
And do not love to have their sacred names
Used lightly: so we speak of him who lifts
A ceaseless wing across all lands and seas,
Moaning or glad, and flieth all unseeing
From darkness into darkness, as Blind Eyes:
And her, his lovely bride, for he is deaf and so
Veers this way and that for ever, seeing not
His love who breaks in tears beneath his wings
Or falls in snows before his frosty breath—
Her we name thus, Grey Feathers.

MAIVE
As for us,
We are poor lonely folk, and mean no wrong.
Sir, sir, if you are of the nameless ones,
The noble nameless ones, do us no ill!

EOCHAIDH
Good folk, I mean no ill. Nor am I made
Of other clay than yours. I am a man.
Let me have shelter here to-night: to-morrow
I will go hence.

MÁNUS
You are most welcome, sir.

EOCHAIDH
And you, fair Etain, is it with your will
That I be sheltered from the wind and rain?

ETAIN
How could I grudge you that ungrudged to me?
[MÁNUS and MAIVE withdraw into the background. . The light
wanes, as the logs give less flame. EOCHAIDH speaks in a low, strained
voice
Etain, fair beautiful love, at last I know
Why dreams have led me hither. All these years
These eyes like stars have led me: all these years
This love that dwells like moonlight in your face
Has been the wind that moved my idle wave.
Forgive presumptuous words. I mean no ill.
I am a king, and kingly. Ard-Righ, I am,
Ard-Righ of Eiré.

ETAIN
And your name, fair lord?

EOCHAIDH
Eochaidh Airemh.

ETAIN
And I am Etain called,
Daughter of lordly ones, of princely line.
But more I cannot say, for on my mind
A strange forgetful cloud bewilders me,
And I have memory only of those things
Of which I cannot speak, being under bond
To keep the silence of my lordly folk.
How I came here, or to what end, or why
I am left here, I know not.

EOCHAIDH
Truly, I
[Taking her hand in his
Now know full well.
Etain, dear love, my dreams
Come true. I have seen this dim pale face in dreams
For days and months and years; till at the last
Too great a spell of beauty held my hours.

My kingdom was no more to me than sand,
Or a green palace built of August leaves
Already yellowing, waiting for the wind
To scatter them to north and south and east.
I have forgotten all that men hold dear,
And given my kinghood to the wheeling crows,
The trampling desert hinds, the snarling fox.
I have no thought, no dream, no hope, but this—
[Kissing her upon the brow
To call you love, to take you hence, my Queen—
Queen of my Heart, my Queen, my Dream, my Queen!

ETAIN
[Looking into his face, with thrownback head
I too, I too, am lifted with the breath
Of a tumultous wind. My lord and king,
I too am lit with fire, which fills my heart,
And lifts it like a flame to burn with thine,
To pass and be at one and flame in thine,
My, lord, my king! My lord, my lord, my king!

EOCHAIDH
The years, the bitter years of all the world
Are now no more. We have gained that which stands
Above the trampling feet of hurrying years.
[A brief burst of mocking laughter is heard

EOCHAIDH
[Turning angrily, and looking into the shadowy background where are

MÁNUS and MAIVE
Who laughed? What means that laughter?

MÁNUS
[Sullenly
No one laughed.

EOCHAIDH
Who laughed? Who laughed?

MAIVE
Grey Feathers and Blind Eyes.

ETAIN
[Wearily
None laughed. It was the hooting of an owl.
Dear lord, sit here. I am weary.
[MÁNUS and MAIVE withdraw, and lie down. EOCHAIDH and
ETAIN sit before the smouldering fire. The room darkens. Suddenly EOCHAIDH
leans forward, and whispers

EOCHAIDH
Etain!
Etain, dear love!

ETAIN
[Not looking at him, and slowly swaying as she sings
How beautiful they are,
The lordly ones
Who dwell in the hills,
In the hollow hills.

They have faces like flowers
And their breath is wind
That blows over grass
Filled with dewy clover.

Their limbs are more white
Than shafts of moonshine:
They are more fleet
Than the March wind.

They laugh and are glad
And are terrible:
When their lances shake
Every green reed quivers.

How beautiful they are
How beautiful
The lordly ones
In the hollow hills.

[Darkness, save for the red flame in the heart of the fire.

ACT II

SCENE I.—A year later. In the hall of the Royal Dûn at Tara. The
walls covered with skins, stag's heads and boar's heads, weapons: at intervals
great torches. At lower end, a company of warriors, for the most part in
bratta
of red and green, or red and green and blue, like tartan but in long, broad
lines or curves, and not in squares, deerskin gaiters and sandals. Also
harpers
and others, and white-clad druids and bards. On a dais sits EOCHAIDH the
High King. Beside him sits ETAIN, his queen. Behind her is a group of
whiterobed girls.
HARPERS (strike a loud clanging music from their harps).

CHORUS OF BARDS
Glory of years, O king, glory of years!
Hail, Eochaidh the High King of Eiré, hail!
Etain the Beautiful, hail!

OTHER BARDS, HARPERS, AND MINSTRELS
Hail!

DRUIDS
Hail!

WARRIORS
Hail!

EOCHAIDH
Drink from the great shells and horns! . . . for I am glad
That on this night which rounds my year of joy,
In amity and all glad fellowship
We feast together.
[Turning to ETAIN
Etain, speak, my Queen.

ETAIN
[Rising
Warriors and druids, bards, harpers, friends
Of high and low degree, I who am queen
Do also thank you. But I am weary now,
And weary too with strange perplexing dreams
Thrice dreamed: and so I bid you all farewell.
[Bows low. Turning to the king adds
To you, dear love, my lord and king, I too
Will bid farewell to-night.

EOCHAIDH
[Lovingly
Say not farewell:
Say not farewell, dear love, for we shall meet
When the last starry dews are gathered up
And loud in the green woods the throstles call.

ETAIN
Dear, I am tired. . . . Farewell!

EOCHAIDH
No, no, my fawn—
My fawn of love: this night, this night I pray
Leave me not here alone: for under all
This outer tide of joy I am sore wrought
By dreams and premonitions. For three nights
I have heard sudden laughters in the dark,
Where nothing was; and in the first false dawn
Have seen phantasmal shapes, and on the grass
A host of shadows marching, bent one way
As when green leagues of reed become one reed
Blown slantwise by the wind.

ETAIN
I, too, have heard
Strange delicate music, subtle murmurings,
A little lovely noise of myriad leaves,
As though the greenness on the wind o' the south
Came traveling to bare woods on one still night:
[A pause
I, too, have heard sweet laughter at the dawn,
Amid the twilight fern: but when I leaned
To see the unknown friends, no more than this
I saw—grey delicate shadows on the grass,
Grey shadows on the fern, the flowers, the leaves,
Swift flitting, like foam-shadows o'er a wave,
Before the grey wave of the coming day.
[A pause: then suddenly
But I am weary. Eochaidh, love and king,
Sweet sleep and sweeter dreams!
[ETAIN leans and kisses the king. He stoops, and takes her right hand,
and lifts it to his lips. Warriors raise their swords and spears, as ETAIN
leaves, followed by her women.

WARRIORS AND OTHERS
The Queen! The Queen!
HARPERS (strike a loud clanging music from their harps).

CHORUS OF BARDS
Glory of years, O king, glory of years!
Hail, Eochaidh Ard-Righ of Eiré, hail! hail!
Etain the Beautiful, hail!

OTHER BARDS, HARPERS, AND MINSTRELS
Hail!

DRUIDS
Hail!

WARRIORS
Hail!

EOCHAIDH
[Raising a white hazel-wand, till absolute silence falls
Now go in peace. To one and all, good-night.
[The warriors, bards, minstrels troop out, leaving only the harpers and
a
few druids, who do not follow, but stand uncertain as a stranger passes
through
their midst and confronts the king. He is young, princely, fair to see; clad al
l
in green, with a gold belt, a gold torque round his neck, gold armlets on his
bare arms, and two gold torques round his bare ankles. On his long curling
dark
hair, falling over his shoulder, is a small green cap from which trails a
peacockfeather. To his left side is slung a small clarsach, or harp.

MIDIR
Hail, Eochaidh, King of Eiré.

EOCHAIDH
[Standing motionless and looking fixedly at the stranger
Hail, fair sir!

MIDIR
[With light grace
Sorrow upon me that I am so late
For this great feasting; but I come from far,
And winds and rains delayed me. Yet full glad
I am to stand before the king to-night
And claim a boon!

EOCHAIDH
No stranger claims in vain
Here in my Dûn, a boon if that boon be
Such I may grant without a loss of fame,
Honour, or common weal. But first, fair sir,
I ask the name and rank of him who craves,
To all unknown?

MIDIR
I am a king's first son:
My kingdom lies beyond your lordly realms,
O king, and yet upon our mist-white shores
The Three Great Waves of Eiré rise in foam.
But I am under geasa, sacred bonds,
To tell to no one, even to the king,
My name and lineage. King, I wish you well:
Lordship and peace and all your heart's desire.

EOCHAIDH
Fair lord, my thanks I give. Lordship I have,
And peace a little while, though one brief year
Has seen its birth and life: my heart's desire—
Ah, unknown lord, give me my heart's desire—
And I will give you lordship of these lands,
Kingship of Eiré, riches, greatness, power,
All, all, for but the little infinite thing
That is my heart's desire!

MIDIR
And that, O king?

EOCHAIDH
It is to know there is no twilight hour
Upon my day of joy: no starless night
Wherein my swimming love may reach in vain
For any shore, wherein great love shall drown
And be a lifeless weed, which the pale shapes
Of ghastly things shall look at and pass by
With idle fin.

MIDIR
Have not the poets sung
Great love survives the night, and climbs the stars,
And lives th' immortal hour along the brows
Of that infinitude called Youth, whom men
Name Oengus, Sunrise?

EOCHAIDH
Sir, I too have been
A poet.

MIDIR
Within the Country of the Young,
Whence I have come, our life is full of joy,
For there the poet's dreams alone are true.

EOCHAIDH
Dreams . . . dreams. . . .
[A pause: then abruptly
But tell me now, fair lord, the boon
You crave.

MIDIR
I have heard rumour say that there is none
Can win the crown at chess from this crowned king
Called Eochaidh.

EOCHAIDH
Well?

MIDIR
And I would win that crown:
For none in all the lands that I have been
Has led me to the maze wherein the pawns
Are lost or go away.

EOCHAIDH
Sir, it is late,
But if I play with you, and I should win,
What is the guerdon?

MIDIR
That—your heart's desire.
[A pause

MIDIR
And what, O king, my guerdon if I win?

EOCHAIDH
What you shall ask.

MIDIR
Then be it so, O, king.

EOCHAIDH
Yet why not on the morrow, my fair lord?
To-night the hour is late; the queen is gone:
The chessboard lies upon a fawnskin couch
Beside the queen. She is weary, asleep.
To-morrow then . . .

MIDIR
[Drawing from his green vest a small chess-board of ivory, and then a
handful of gold pawns
Not so, Ard-Righ, for see
I have a chess-board here, fit for a king—
For it is made of yellow ivory
That in dim days of old was white as cream

When Dana, mother of the ancient gods,
Withdrew it from her thigh, with golden shapes
Of unborn gods and kings to be her pawns.

EOCHAIDH
[Leaning forward curiously
Lay it upon the dais. In all my years
I have seen none so fair, so wonderful.
[Both lie upon the dais, and move the pawns upon the ivory board
HARPERS (play a delicate music).

A YOUNG MINSTREL
[Sings slowly
I have seen all things pass and all men go
Under the shadow of the drifting leaf:
Green leaf, red leaf, brown leaf,
Grey leaf blown to and fro:
Blown to and fro.

I have seen happy dreams rise up and pass
Silent and swift as shadows on the grass:
Grey shadows of old dreams,
Grey beauty of old dreams,
Grey shadows in the grass.

SCENE II.—The same.
EOCHAIDH
[Rising abruptly, followed by MIDIR more slowly
So, you have won! For the first time the king
Has known one subtler than himself. Fair sir,
Your boon?

MIDIR
O king, it is a little thing.
All that I ask is this, that I may touch
With my own lips the white hand of the queen:
And that sweet Etain whom you love so well
Should listen to the distant shell-sweet song,
A little echoing song that I have made
Down by the foam on sea-drown'd shores to please
Her lovelier beauty.

EOCHAIDH
Sir, I would that boon
Were other than it is: for the queen sleeps
Grown sad with weariness and many dreams:
But as you have my kingly word, so be it.
[Calls to the young minstrel
Go boy, to where the women sleep, and call
Etain, the Queen.

[The minstrel goes, to left
HARPERS (play a low delicate music).
[Enter ETAIN, in a robe of pale green, with mistletoe intertwined
in
her long loose hair

EOCHAIDH
Welcome, fair lovely queen.
But, Etain, whom I love as the dark wave
Loves the white star within its travelling breast,
Why do you come thus clad in green, with hair
Entangled with the mystic mistletoe, as when
I saw you first, in that dim, lonely wood
Down by forgotten shores, where the last clouds
Slip through grey branches into the grey wave?

ETAIN
I could not sleep. My dreams came close to me
And whispered in my ears. And someone played
A vague perplexing air without my room.
I was as dim and silent as the grass,
Till a faint wind moved over me, and dews
Gathered, and in the myriad little bells
I saw a myriad stars.

EOCHAIDH
This nameless lord
Has won a boon from me. It is to touch
The whiteness of this hand with his hot lips,
For he is fevered with a secret trouble,
From rumour of that beauty which too well
I know a burning flame. And he would sing
A song of echoes caught from out the foam
Of sea-drown'd shores, a song that he has made,
Dreaming a foolish idle dream, an idle dream.

ETAIN
[Looking long and lingeringly at MIDIR, slowly gives him her hand.
When he has raised it to his lips, bowing, and let it go, she starts, puts
it to
her brow bewilderingly, and again looks fixedly at MIDIR
Fair nameless lord, I pray you sing that song.

MIDIR
[Slowly chanting and looking steadfastly at ETAIN How beautiful they
are, The lordly ones Who dwell in the hills, In the hollow hills.

They have faces like flowers,
And their breath is wind
That stirs amid grasses
Filled with white clover.

Their limbs are more white
Than shafts of moonshine:
They are more fleet
Than the March wind.

They laugh and are glad
And are terrible;
When their lances shake
Every green reed quivers.

How beautiful they are,
How beautiful,
The lordly ones
In the hollow hills.
[Silence. ETAIN again puts her hand to her brow bewilderedly

ETAIN
[Dreamily
I have heard. . . . I have dreamed. . . . I, too, have heard,
Have sung . . . that song: O lordly ones that dwell

In secret places in the hollow hills,
Who have put moonlit dreams into my mind
And filled my noons with visions, from afar
I hear sweet dewfall voices, and the clink,
The delicate silvery spring and clink
Of faery lances underneath the moon.

MIDIR
I am a song
In the Land of the Young,
A sweet song:
I am Love.

I am a bird
With white wings
And a breast of flame,
Singing, singing.

The wind sways me
On the quicken-bough:
Hark! Hark!
I hear laughter.

Among the nuts
On the hazel-tree
I sing to the Salmon
In the faery pool.

What is the dream
The Salmon dreams,
In the Pool of Connla
Under the hazels?

It is: There is no death
Midir, with thee,
In the honeysweet land
Of Heart's Desire.

It is a name wonderful,
Midir, Love:
It was born on the lips
Of Oengus Og.

Go, look for it:
Lost name, beautiful:
Strayed from the honeysweet
Land of Youth.

I am Midir, Love:
But where is my secret
Name in the land of
Heart's desire?

I am a bird
With white wings
And a breast of flame
Singing, singing:

The Salmon of knowledge
Hears, whispers:
Look for it, Midir,
In the heart of Etain:

Etain, Etain,
My Heart's Desire:
Love, love, love,
Sorrow, Sorrow!

[ETAIN moves a little nearer, then stops. She puts both hands
before
her eyes, then withdraws them

ETAIN
I am a small green leaf in a great wood
And you, the wind o' the South!
[Silence. EOCHAIDH, as though spellbound, cannot advance, but
stretches his arms towards ETAIN

EOCHAIDH
Etain, speak!
What is this song the harper sings, what tongue
It this he speaks? for in no Gaelic lands
Is speech like this upon the lips of men.
No word of all these honey-dripping words
Is known to me. Beware, beware the words

Brewed in the moonshine under ancient oaks
White with pale banners of the mistletoe
Twined round them in their slow and stately death.
It is the Feast of Sáveen.

ETAIN
All is dark
That has been light.

EOCHAIDH
Come back, come back, O love that slips away!

ETAIN
I cannot hear your voice so far away:
So far away in that dim lonely dark
Whence I have come. The light is gone. Farewell!

EOCHAIDH
Come back, come back! It is a dream that calls,
A wild and empty dream! There is no light
Within that black and terrible abyss
Whereon you stand. Etain, come back, come back,
I give you life and love.

ETAIN
I cannot hear
Your strange forgotten words, already dumb
And empty sounds of dim defeated shows.
I go from dark to light.

MIDIR
[Slowly whispering
From dark to light.

EOCHAIDH
O, do not leave me, Star of my Desire!
My love, my hope, my dream: for now I know
That you are part of me, and I the clay,
The idle mortal clay that longed to gain,
To keep, to hold, the starry Danann fire,
The little spark that lives and does not die.

ETAIN
Old, dim, wind-wandered lichens on a stone
Grown grey with ancient age: as these thy words,
Forgotten symbols. So, Farewell: farewell!

MIDIR
Hasten, lost love, found love! Come, Etain, come!

ETAIN
What are those sounds I hear? The wild deer call
From the hill-hollows: and in the hollows sing,
Mid waving birchen boughs, brown wandering streams:
And through the rainbow'd spray flit azure birds
Whose song is faint, is faint and far with love:
O, home-sweet, hearth-sweet, cradle-sweet it is,
The song I hear!

MIDIR
[Slowly moving backward
Come, Etain, come! Afar
The hillside maids are milking the wild deer;
The elf-horns blow: green harpers on the shores
Play a wild music out across the foam:
Rose-flusht on one long wave's pale golden front,
The moon of faery hangs, low on that wave.
Come! When the vast full yellow flower is swung
High o'er the ancient woods wherein old gods,
Ancient as they, dream their eternal dreams
That in the faery dawns as shadows rise
And float into the lives and minds of men

And are the tragic pulses of the world,
Then shall we two stoop by the Secret Pool
And drink, and salve our sudden eyes with dew
Gathered from foxglove and the moonlit fern,
And see. . . .
[Slowly chanting and looking steadfastly at ETAIN
How beautiful they are,
The lordly ones
Who dwell in the hills,
In the hollow hills.

They have faces like flowers,
And their breath is wind
That stirs amid grasses
Filled with white clover.

Their limbs are more white
Than shafts of moonshine:
They are more fleet
Than the March wind.

They laugh and are glad
And are terrible:
When their lances shake
Every green reed quivers.

How beautiful they are,
How beautiful,
The lordly ones
In the hollow hills.

ETAIN
Hush! Hush!
Who laughed?

MIDIR
None laughed. All here are in a spell
Of frozen silence.

ETAIN
Sure, sure, one laughed.
Tell me, sweet Voice, which one among the Shee
Is he who plays with shadows, and whose laugh
Moves like a bat through silent haunted woods?

MIDIR
He is not here: so fear him not: Dalua.
It is the mortal name of him whose age
Was idle laughing youth when Time was born.
He is not here: but come with me, and where
The falling stars spray down the dark Abyss,
There, on a quicken, growing from mid-earth
And hanging like a spar across the depths,
Dalua sits: and sometimes through the dusk
Of immemorial congregated time,
His laughter rings: and then he listens long,
And when the echo swims up from the deeps
He springs from crag to crag, for he is mad,
And like a lost lamb crieth to his ewe,
That ancient dreadful Mother of the Gods
Whom men call Fear.

When he has wandered thence
Whether among the troubled lives of men or mid
The sacred Danann ways, dim wolflike shapes
Of furtive shadow follow him and leap
The windway of his thought: or sometimes dwarfed, more dread,
The stealthy moonwhite weasels of life and death
Glide hither and thither. Even the high gods
Who laugh and mock the lonely Fairy Fool
When in his mortal guise he haunts the earth,
Shrink from the Amadan Dhu when in their ways
He moves, silent, unsmiling, wearing a dark star
Above his foamwhite brows and midnight eyes.

Come, Etain, come: and have no fear, wild fawn,
For I am Midir, Love, who loved you well
Before this mortal veil withheld you here.
Come!

In the Land of Youth
There are pleasant places:
Green meadows, woods,
Swift grey-blue waters.

There is no age there,
Nor any sorrow:
As the stars in heaven
Are the cattle in the valleys.

Great rivers wander
Through flowery plains,
Streams of milk, of mead,
Streams of strong ale.

There is no hunger
And no thirst
In the Hollow Land,
In the Land of Youth.

How beautiful they are,
The lordly ones
Who dwell in the hills,
In the hollow hills.

They play with lances
And are proud and terrible,
Marching in the moonlight
With fierce blue eyes.

They love and are loved:
There is no sin there:
But slaying without death,
And loving without shame.

Every day a bird sings:
It is the Desire of the Heart.
What the bird sings,
That is it that one has.

Come, longing heart,
Come, Etain, come!
Wild Fawn, I am calling
Across the fern!

[Slowly ETAIN, clasping his hand, moves away with MIDIR.
They
pass the spell-bound guards, and disappear. A sudden darkness falls. Out of the

shadow DALUA moves rapidly to the side of EOCHAIDH, who starts, and
peers into the face of the stranger

EOCHAIDH
It is the same Dalua whom I met
Long since, in that grey shadowy wood
About the verge of the old broken earth
Where, at the last, moss-clad it hangs in cloud.

DALUA
I am come.

EOCHAIDH
My dreams! my dreams! Give me my dream!

DALUA
There is none left but this—
[Touches the king, who stands stiff and erect, sways, and falls to
the
ground

DALUA
. . . . . . the dream of Death.






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