 | Fand and Other Poems |  |
“Ha! goddess though she be,
Now shall she learn that Ulster women are strong,
Her beauty shall our husbands tempt no more.”
She moved not: if they had laid hands on her,
Too dreadful were the deed that had been done.
But, from the woods, or from the cleavèd earth,—
I knew not whence, suddenly stood between them,
A shape majestic, radiant, beautiful,—
A man, yet more than man, with shining eyes:
He was superb as is a summer surge,
Rolling to shorewards on such reefs as lie
Beneath the cliffs of Irros or Malinmore:
Dazzling it rolleth from the sapphire deeps,
Curling to emerald and snow: he towered o'er us:
The women were wash'd back, and from the lips
Of Fand came faintly the revealing name,
“Mananaun!” It was the sea-god and her spouse.
“Alas!” she cried, “how poor a sight for thee!
How pitiable the state of me, thy wife,
Rejected by a mortal!”
Now shall she learn that Ulster women are strong,
Her beauty shall our husbands tempt no more.”
She moved not: if they had laid hands on her,
Too dreadful were the deed that had been done.
But, from the woods, or from the cleavèd earth,—
I knew not whence, suddenly stood between them,
A shape majestic, radiant, beautiful,—
A man, yet more than man, with shining eyes:
He was superb as is a summer surge,
Rolling to shorewards on such reefs as lie
Beneath the cliffs of Irros or Malinmore:
Dazzling it rolleth from the sapphire deeps,
Curling to emerald and snow: he towered o'er us:
The women were wash'd back, and from the lips
Of Fand came faintly the revealing name,
“Mananaun!” It was the sea-god and her spouse.
“Alas!” she cried, “how poor a sight for thee!
25
Rejected by a mortal!”
| Fand and Other Poems | |