Padraic Colum Poems

A gaunt built woman and her son-in-law—
A broad-faced fellow, with such flesh as shows
Nothing but easy nature—and his wife,
The woman’s daughter, who spills all her talk
...

ONCE I loved a maiden fair,
Over the hills and jar away,
Lands she had and lovers to spare,
Over the hills and far away.
...

A HUNDRED men think I am theirs when with them I
drink ale,
But their presence fades away from me and their high spirits fail
...

You would not slumber
If laid at my breast:
You would not slumber.
...

MOULD-COLOURED like the leaf long fallen from
The autumn branch, he rises now, the Fish.
The cold eyes of the gannets see their rock:
...

Of the Irish, Paris
THE Lombards having gone back to their land,
We, who might never flock to native land
...

MY Afghan poet-friend
With this made his message end,
'The scroll around my wall shows two the poets have known
...

WE'VE watched the starlings flocking past the statues
That we have often seen in other cities
Hope, Justice, Commerce and have heard them sing
...

IT'S my fear that my wake won't be quiet,
Nor my wake house a silent place :
For who would keep back the hundreds
...

In The Farmer's House
I'M glad to lie on a sack of leaves
By a wasted fire and take my ease.
For the wind would strip me bare as a tree
...