POETRY.
THE MIST THAT'S OVER IRELAND. THERE'S a mist that's over Ireland where the black bird calls, And when you come it's risin' and when you go it falls. It's made of green and silver and the rain and dew, And the finest sun is over it you ever knew.
Och, sure it isn't mist at all, except a mist o tears, A haze of love and longin' for the happy years,
When myself that's old and fretted now and colder than the
stone
Was young in golden Ireland with the friends that's gone.
The mist is like a curtain that the wind'll blow And lift a little wisp of it till you see below The shiningest country ever was of hills and streams With the faces do be haunting you in lonesome dreams.
There's people do be in the mist : their like's hard to find, Their faces full of welcome, and their smile so soft and kind. It was little I was thinkin' in the days that ran away How I'd sit and break my heart for them one weary day.
It isn't fields and mountains and it isn't streams and trees, Though all o' them is in the mist, nor bummin' of the bees, Nor yet the thrush and blackbird, could vex me as I stand And look the way of Ireland with my head in my band.
'Tis little that we value them, when we are young and gay, We think we'll have them with us for ever and a day. We never know the good we have till lovin' friends depart And leave us just with half a life and half a heart.
There's a gold mist over Ireland that will never rise, And some is walkin' in it was the light of my eyes. They're never old and troubled now, and never sick and sad, The days we had together were the best I ever had.
Please God, some day that's comin', when the dread of death is past, And I take the lonesome valley we all must take at last, I'll sight the hills of Heaven and the people all in white, And you, and you, among them was my heart's delight.
The mist that's over Ireland will be blowin' in my face, I'll reach the other side of it to the happy place. And I'll not be lookin' backward like a lonesome ghost From the mist that's over Ireland and the friends I lost.
KATHARINE TYNAN.
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