Chapter I: Am the Mountainy Singer

I am the mountainy singer--
The voice of the peasant's dream,
The cry of the wind on the wooded hill,
The leap of the fish in the stream.

Quiet and love I sing--
The carn on the mountain crest,
The cailin in her lover's arms,
The child at its mother's breast.

Beauty and peace I sing--
The fire on the open hearth,
The cailleach spinning at her wheel,
The plough in the broken earth.

Travail and pain I sing--
The bride on the childing bed,
The dark man labouring at his rhymes,
The ewe in the lambing shed.

Sorrow and death I sing--
The canker come on the corn,
The fisher lost in the mountain loch,
The cry at the mouth of morn.

No other life I sing,
For I am sprung of the stock
That broke the hilly land for bread,
And built the nest in the rock!

WHEN ROOKS FLY HOMEWARD

When rooks fly homeward
And shadows fall,
When roses fold
On the hay-yard wall,
When blind moths flutter
By door and tree,
Then comes the quiet
Of Christ to me.

When stars look out
On the Children's Path
And grey mists gather
On carn and rath,
When night is one
With the brooding sea,
Then comes the quiet
Of Christ to me.