St. Francis Poems

The second poem in the book was written about a little boy who used to drive cows for some farmer past the poet's door very early every morning, whistling as he went, and who died just before the war. I think that its beautiful and spontaneous simplicity would cost some of our writers gallons of midnight oil. Of the next, "To a Distant One," who will not hope that when "Fame and other little things are won" its clear and confident prophecy will be happily fulfilled?

Quite perfect, if my judgment is of any value, is the little poem on page , "In the Mediterranean—Going to the War.

One feels that the Greeks are of some use, after all, to have inspired—with the help of their sheep—so lovely a poem. Written in Serbia and Egypt, it shows the poet still looking steadfastly at those fields, though so far distant then, of which he was surely born to be the singer. And this devotion to the fields of Meath that, in nearly all his songs, from such far places brings his spirit home, like the instinct that has been given to the swallows, seems to be the key-note of the book.

For this reason I have named it Songs of Peace , in spite of the circumstances under which they were written. There follow poems at which some may wonder: Once the swallow instinct appears again—in the poem called "The Lure"—and a longing for the South, and again in the poem called "Song": Surely for this if there be, as many believed, gods lesser than Those whose business is with destiny, thunder and war, small gods that haunt the groves, seen only at times by few, and then indistinctly at evening, surely from gratitude they will give him peace. W RITING amidst rather too much noise and squalor to do justice at all to the delicate rustic muse of Francis Ledwidge, I do not like to delay his book any longer, nor to fail in a promise long ago made to him to write this introduction.

He has gone down in that vast maelstrom into which poets do well to adventure and from which their country might perhaps be wise to withhold them, but that is our Country's affair. He has left behind him verses of great beauty, simple rural lyrics that may be something of an anodyne for this stricken age. If ever an age needed beautiful little songs our age needs them; and I know few songs more peaceful and happy, or better suited to soothe the scars on the mind of those who have looked on certain places, of which the prophecy in the gospels seems no more than an ominous hint when it speaks of the abomination of desolation.

He told me once that it was on one particular occasion, when walking at evening through the village of Slane in summer, that he heard a blackbird sing. The notes, he said, were very beautiful, and it is this blackbird that he tells of in three wonderful lines in his early poem called "Behind the Closed Eye," and it is this song perhaps more than anything else that has been the inspiration of his brief life.

Dynasties shook and the earth shook; and the war, not yet described by any man, revelled and wallowed in destruction around him; and Francis Ledwidge stayed true to his inspiration, as his homeward songs will show. I had hoped he would have seen the fame he has well deserved; but it is hard for a poet to live to see fame even in times of peace.

In these days it is harder than ever. Public domain Public domain false false. To My Best Friend. Behind the Closed Eye. Bound to the Mast. To a Linnet in a Cage. A Twilight in Middle March. A Rainy Day in April. A Song of April. Thoughts at the Trysting Stile. An Attempt at a City Sunset. The Wife of Llew. The Death of Ailill. The Visitation of Peace. The Vision on the Brink. On an Oaten Straw.

Before the War of Cooley. The Sorrow of Findebar. The Death of Sualtem. The Maid in Low-Moon Land. The Death of Leag, Cuchulain's Charioteer. The Passing of Caoilte. After My Last Song. A Dream of Artemis. A Little Boy in the Morning. To a Distant One.

To Eilish of the Fair Hair. In the Mediterranean—Going to the War. Autumn Evening in Serbia.

The Departure of Proserpine. The Home-Coming of the Sheep. When Love and Beauty Wander Away.

Sacred Poetry from Around the World

Francis received the counsel of St. Yet while the book is quite well informed, it is the wisdom and music of the poems that most directly speak to the soul. Francis, may we have the humility to do just this. View the discussion thread. Sign up for our weekly newsletter. Skip to main content. See more posts by Marjorie Maddox.

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Read this poem in other languages. This poem has not been translated into any other language yet. What do you think this poem is about?

Alexander Pope's Other Poems. Still I Rise Maya Angelou. Delivering Poems Around The World.