IRISH-IN-UK-L Archives

From: "Jean R." <>
Subject: "Land" -- C. DAY-LEWIS - b. Co. Laois (Queen's Co)
Date: Sun, 19 Feb 2006 13:21:30 -0800

LAND

The boundary stone,
The balk, fence or hedge
Says on one side, "I own,"
On the other "I acknowledge."

The small farmer carved
His children rations.
He died. The heart was halved,
Quartered, fragmented, apportioned:

To the sons, a share
Of what he'd clung to
By nature, plod and care --
His land, his antique land-hunger.

Many years he ruled,
Many a year sons
Followed him to oat-field,
Pasture, bog, down shaded boreens.

Turf, milk, harvest -- he
Grew from earth also
His own identity
Firmed by the seasons' come-and-go.

Now at last the sons,
Captive though long-fledged,
Own what they envied once --
Right men, the neighbours acknowledge.

-- C. Day-Lewis, Anglo-Irish Poet Laureate of England

This thread:

• "Land" -- C. DAY-LEWIS - b. Co. Laois (Queen's Co) by "Jean R." <>