Chapter III

Across the woods of Meath the bird of day
Fell from the boughs of noon with bleeding wing,
While dark-browed Balor strode the eastern way,
And scattered darkness from his cloudy sling,
Till at his feet the hosts of Erin lay
Smitten with sleep; then round their dreams he cast
The chains wherewith he binds his prisoners fast.

From dawn till dark, in many a hero-game
Glad eyes had flashed, or bent in pride august
To hear the chant of some undying name
Whose deeds were strong as wine. Anon the dust
Of festive feet stormed in a wild acclaim
Around the royal place where, side by side,
Sat Eochaidh and Etain his new-made bride.

Now ancient Sleep, with Silence for his queen,
Reigns o'er those palaces of stately fir
That drowse in curtained moonlight's misty sheen.
Within, the arras hardly seems to stir
Its languorous folds of purple, blue and green,
Whose colours part or mix, as rise and fall
The pine fire's odorous gleams on roof and wall.

No sound, no life, save where with soft salute
The wide-eyed sentinels a moment wait
And listen sidelong to the passing bruit
Of ghostly winds, that murmur at their state
And pass, with peevish cry and soundless foot,
Where the dead fly upon the waveless moat
Makes of the dead dropped leaf a funeral boat.

Yet in the midst of silence so profound,
One stirred his rushy couch as though in pain,
For through his dreams a torrent of swift sound
Stumbled in foam about his echoing brain,
And all his thought in loud confusion drowned
And bore him toward a dim and perilous steep
That flung its shadow on a writhing deep.

Then like the sun obscured by valley smoke,
With some vague trouble glooming in his eye,
Ailill the brother of the king awoke
And scanned the portents of the morning sky,
Till on his mind a mellowing radiance broke,
And in his heart there dawned a wondrous face
That lit his world with Love's exalted grace.

Often in dreams a shadow by his side
Had sung of one who came in some great hour
With Love--and woe. Now came his brother's bride;
And when he bent before her in her bower,
Within his heart the shadow rose and cried,
And passed away, while all his being shook,
Stricken with joy and sorrow in a look.

Among the clamours of the festal time
His love for ease he hid, again pursued,
Finding a solace in the chanted rhyme
Of aged bards, or youths in merry mood
Where angry words were counted as a crime;
And fireside friendship staunched his hungry sighs
When she no more was banquet for his eyes.

But when the marriage festival was past,
And restless day gave place to torturing night,
His captive passion burst its chains, and cast
Its ardours from his brain in living light;
Then like the thin voice of a spell-raised blast,
A dissonant note from hidden harp-strings drawn
Troubled the dreams of Eochaidh and Etain.

By day the dream had faded to a mist
In some far-folded valley of the mind;
But when, heart-charmed in evening's amethyst,
The labouring world grew wonderfully kind,
And upturned lips by brooding love were kissed;
Like silent rain in summer twilight spilled,
A wandering thought King Eochaidh touched and chilled.

Meanwhile with steps that would and would not shun
Bliss craved and spurned; with tongue that might not speak
The pain that some strange sweetness now had won,
Ailill moved to and fro; and soon his cheek
Paled like the austere Servants of the Sun;
And day by day his passion's famished flame
Nourished itself upon his wasting frame.

In vain the king's diviners daily strove
To find the spring of Ailill's gathering ill;
In vain Etain by stream and murmuring grove
Sought for the shadowy hand that held his will;
And when dark Balor cracked his whip, and drove
His winter herd across the bounds of day,
Ailill upon his couch in weakness lay.

So when a year had passed, and through the land
The king went forth on royal pilgrimage,
Unto Etain he gave his last command
That she, his brother's sickness to assuage,
Withhold no gift, but give with regal hand;
And should chill death blow out his flickering blaze,
His funeral-stone with honour she should raise.