A legend of Ancient Eire a song of Conor and Mona,
Who lived near the Halls of Fiarna, and loved in the days of old
Long ere a Saxon shallop fretted our tranquil rivers
Mona, the fairest of maidens,
Conor, the young and bold.
Mona, gift of Baalthina, cradled in fairy croonings,
Nursed in the lap of legend, met the advancing years
Haunted by dark forebodings, which, while lauds of her beauty,
Shaded her brightest fancies with indefinable fears.
Rocked by the winds and the billows, lulled by the tempest and thunder,
Schooled on the hills, in the forests, Conor subdues the years,
Till down the blue-veined valleys he followed his father’s banner,
And entered the lists of glory,
At the head of his Galla spears.
When war grew weary of,
And peace had wreathed his lances,
Cooled his hot lips with her kisses, healed his deep wounds with her tears,
To seal the red front of carnage,
Bridge the black chasm with roses,
Mona was plighted in marriage to Conor of the spears.
Out from the feud camp of hatred, in a blest lull of contention,
Voicing love’s olden evangel,
Filled with his courage and faith,
Stept forth young Conor and Mona,
And, so with love’s divination,
Met at the red grave of Discord
And laid the insatiate wraith.
‘Mona, my life, on the morrow
our souls will meet like two rivers,
Thereafter to flow forever as one through the coming years,
You droop like a sunless lily!
Lies love like a cloud on thy spirit?
True love has no room for sorrow,’ said Conor of the spears.
‘My heart knows its only master,
and sends up its eager homage,
To give thee love’s crimson greeting and banish the ghostly fears
That croak in my ears like ravens, spreading their sable pinions,
Clouding life’s sunshine, said Mona to Conor of the spears.
‘I dreamt we were withered and olden! Life going out like the autumn!
Joys blown as leaves through the forest! Love but dust on our biers!
Night looming up like a spectre!
We fading into the shadows
Two shadows drawn into the shadow! Oh, Conor of the Spears!
‘O, Conor, that life were eternal;
that youth were a fadeless glory;
That love could live on forever,
Nor run into earth in tears;
I love thee with love supernal
But Time will lap up the fountain;
Death will seal up the fountain,
Oh! Conor of the Spear!
‘Eva, my nurse, has told me that
Nooma, the daughter of Fiarna,
Wears on her regal finger a ring that defies the years,
And they who with it are wedded
Dower me with youth eternal;
Love that will live forever;
Bring me the ring of Nooma,
Brave Conor of the Spears!’
He that grew bold in battle,
Rode on its red crest of carnage,
Felt his heart quail at this questing, in awe, for he sees and he hears
The angry front of old legends, dark, indefinable phantoms,
Rise up with purport forbiddings
Shouting dissent in his ears!
‘I’ve flouted the fates in the battle, breasted the waves of their anger,
To live in the songs of the minstrels; to shine o’er my youth’s compeers,
But thou art still dearer than glory pluckt from the brow of destruction-
I go to the Halls of Fiarna! Said Conor of the Spears.
He prest his lips on her forehead
In long, still, passionate kisses,
That seemed like farewells forever,
When hearts are prophetic as seers:
‘Mona, should love prove but mortal a dream pursued by a phantom-
I go to make thee immortal!’
Said Conor of the Spears.
There was feasting that night in Fiarna! The chieftains of ancient Eire
Toasted in amber medher, and welcomed, with ringing cheers,
The bridegroom hitherward coming: they rose to their feet as he entered,
And cried, ‘Cead Mile Failte to Conor of the Spears.’
‘O son of Miledh the Mighty,
and shades of the ancient hunters,
I come not to drink brown medher with you in your fairy spheres;
I come for the ring of Nooma, to wed with the weeping Mona,
Who waits in her father’s palace
For Conor of the Spears!’
‘Then drink to the Lady Mona,
for Nooma’s ring, that sparkles
On the fairest of fairy fingers,
Will drip up her falling tears!
I drink to the mighty chieftains
Whose swords, like a shield
Of lightening,
Girdled the hills of Eire!’ cried
Conor of the Spears.
He drinks of the thrilling medher,
And forth steps the queenly Nooma
Doubt slips away at her coming!
Hope, which has fled, reappears
‘Bear this to the weeping Mona!
And she slips the ring on his finger!
‘Ha, ha! You are wed to Nooma
brave Conor of the Spears!’
Then Mona dropt from his being
Never for him had existence;
The praises of the bards and the ministrels,
The glory that crowned his years,
Were less than a heated vision
Unremembered at waking,
For Nooma reigned in the spirit
Of Conor of the Spears.
The cold grey eye of the morning
Saw Mona watching and weeping,
Her gaze ever turned to Fiarna
-alas! Through belated tears
And calling ‘O Nooma! Nooma!
Pity your mortal sister!
Send back, whole-hearted and ringless, my Conor of the Spears!
Oft, like a bride long waiting the hour of the bridegroom’s coming,
When life ran loud and the palace echoed with militant cheers,
She stole from the bridal chamber, when moons were high over Fiarna,
To call on the fairy Nooma for Conor of the Spears.
What time the feast of Baalthina lights up the sombre mountains,
Flashing like skies with their star lights, the fairy host appears;
Mona, withered and olden, watches the happy hunters
Till forth, by the side of Nooma,
Rides Conor of the Spears.
She stretches her shriveled fingers up to his golden bridle,
Calls to her love in anguish, faint, as a sigh, he hears,
Sees her white locks, like moonlight; stabs her with looks of pity-
Unredeemed by remembrance!
Oh, Conor of the Spears!
Her life went out like the gloaming that mourns autumnal sunsets
And dies on the russet meadows,
A farewell sigh on the meres;
Tears on he grave grew and flourisht, birds sang and built in their branches,
Till her love was a fireside story
For Conor of the Spears.
When the lakes are fairy mirrors in the ing Irish moonlight,
That flings its veil of silver o’er the consecrated hills,
And the fertile plain of Limerick,
A picture lies before you,
In its frame of circling mountains, while your soul with rapture fills-
Hark unto the hunters’ chorus
And the horses’ golden clatter,
See who ride adown the valley:
Ladies fair and cavaliers,
From the palace gates of Fiarna
(soul possessors still of Eire!)
And by the side of Nooma rides
Conor of the Spears
In their Tir na nOg they feel not time nor time’s mutations;
There they love and live forever-
Love and live and know no tears;
Harping, singing, feasting, hunting, their enjoyment never palling
So live the fadeless Nooma and Conor of the Spears.
(Michael Scanlan)
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