IV.
OISEEN'S QUESTION.
O Patrick, taught by Him, the Unknown,
These questions answer ere I die:
Why, when the trees at evening moan,
Why must an old man sigh?
No kinsmen of my stock are they
Though reared was I in sylvan cell:
Love-whispers once they breathed: this day
They mutter but ‘Farewell!’
What mean the floods? Of old they said,
‘Thus, thus, ye chiefs, ye clans, sweep on:’
They whiten still their rocky bed:
Those chiefs and clans are gone!
What Power is that which daily heaves
O'er earth's dark verge the rising sun,
As large the Druid Alph believes,
As Tork or Mangerton?
A woman once in youthful flower
Her infant laid upon my knee:
What was it shook my heart that hour?
I live—O, where is he?
What thing is Youth, which speeds so fast?
What thing is Life, which lags so long?
Trapped, trapped we are by age at last
In a net of fraud and wrong!
I cheated am by eld—or cheat—
Heart-young as leaves in sun that bask:
Is that fresh heart a counterfeit,
Or this grey shape a mask?
Some say 'tis folly to be moved:
‘The dog, he dieth—why not thou?’
They lie! We loved!—ill deeds reproved,—
Is Oscar nothing now?
O Patrick of the crosier-staff,
The wondrous Book, and anthems slow,
If thou the riddle know'st but half,
Help those who nothing know!
Who made the worlds? the soul? Man's race?
The man that knoweth, he is man!
I, once a prince, will serve in place
Clansman of that man's clan!
