Corpus of Electronic Texts Edition
The Dream of John Mac Donnell (Author: James Clarence Mangan)
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- I lay in unrestold thoughts of pain,
That I struggled in vain to smother,
Like midnight spectres haunted my brain
Dark fantasies chased each other;
When, lo! a Figurewho might it be
A tall fair figure stood near me!
Who might it be? An unreal Banshee?
Or an angel sent to cheer me?
- Though years have rolled since then, yet now
My memory thrillingly lingers
On her awful charms, her waxen brow,
Her pale, translucent fingers,
Her eyes that mirrored a wonder world,
Her mien of unearthly mildness,
And her waving raven tresses that curled
To the ground in beautiful wildness.
- 'Whence comest thou, Spirit?' I asked, methought;
'Thou art not one of the Banished!'
Alas, for me! she answered nought,
But rose aloft and evanished;
And a radiance, like to a glory, beamed
In the light she left behind her.
Long time I wept, and at last medreamed
I left my shieling to find her.
- And first I turned to the thunderous North,
To Gruagach's mansion kingly;
Untouching the earth I then sped forth
To Inver-lough, and the shingly
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And shining strand of the fishful Erne,
And thence to Cruachan the golden,
Of whose resplendent palace ye learn
So many a marvel olden
- I saw the Mourna's billows flow
I passed the walls of Shenady,
And stood in the hero-thronged Ardroe,
Embosked amid greenwoods shady;
And visited that proud pile that stands
Above the Boyne's broad waters,
Where Aengus dwells, with his warrior-bands
And the fairest of Ulster's daughters.
- To the halls of Mac Lir, to Creevroe's height,
To Tara, the glory of Erin,
To the fairy palace that glances bright
On the peak of the blue Cnocfeerin,
I vainly hied. I went west and east
I travelled seaward and shoreward
But thus was I greeted at field and at feast
'Thy way lies onward and forward!'
- At last I reached, I wist not how,
The royal towers of Ival,
Which under the cliff's gigantic brow,
Still rise without a rival;
And here were Thomond's chieftains all,
With amour, and swords, and lances,
And here sweet music filled the hall
And damsels charmed with dances.
- And here, at length, on a silvery throne,
Half seated, half reclining,
With forehead white as the marble stone,
And garments so starrily shining
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And features beyond the poet's pen
The sweetest, saddest features
Appeared before me once again,
The fairest of Living Creatures!
- 'Draw near, O mortal!' she said, with a sigh.
'And hear my mournful story!
The Guardian-Spirit of Erin am I,
But dimmed is mine ancient glory;
My priests are banished, my warriors wear
No longer victory's garland;
And my Child2, my Son, my beloved Heir,
Is an exile in a far land!'
- I heard no moreI saw no more
The bands of slumber were broken;
And palace and hero, and river and shore,
Had vanished, and left no token.
Dissolved was the spell that had bound my will
And my fancy thus for a season;
But a sorrow therefore hangs over me still,
Despite of the teachings of Reason!