Padraic Colum

8 December 1881 – 11 January 1972 / County Longford

In The Carolina Woods

HERE you should lie, ye Kings of eld,
Barbarossa, Boabdil,
And Czar Lazar and Charlemagne,
Arthur, Gaelic Finn-
Here where the
muffling Spanish mosses
Forests with forests fill!

Not in a cavern where the winds
Trample with battle-call,
But in these woods where branch and branch
From tree and tree let fall
Not moss, but grey and cobweb beards,
Kings' cabalistic beards!

Here should you sleep your cycles out,
Ye Kings with hoary beards!
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