O stony grey soil of MonaghanThe laugh from my love you thieved;You took the gay child of my passionAnd gave me your clod-conceived. You clogged the feet of my boyhoodAnd I believed that my stumbleHad the poise and stride of ApolloAnd his voice my thick tongued mumble. You told me the plough was immortal!O green-life conquering plough!The mandril stained, your coulter bluntedIn the smooth lea-field of my brow. You sang on steaming dunghillsA song of cowards' brood,You perfumed my clothes with weasel itch,You fed me on swinish food You flung a ditch on my visionOf beauty, love and truth.O stony grey soil of MonaghanYou burgled my bank of youth! Lost the long hours of pleasureAll the women that love young men.O can I stilll stroke the monster's backOr write with unpoisoned pen. His name in these lonely versesOr mention the dark fields whereThe first gay flight of my lyricGot caught in a peasant's prayer. Mullahinsa, Drummeril, Black Shanco-Wherever I turn I seeIn the stony grey soil of MonaghanDead loves that were born for me.
Stony Grey Soil
About the poet
Patrick Kavanagh
1904 - 1967/IrishKavanagh was born on the 21st of October 1904, in the village of Inniskeen, Co. Monaghan. His father was a shoemaker and had a small farm of land. Kavanagh received only primary school education and at the age of thirteen, he became an appren…
View profile & all 9 Poems / StoriesMore from Patrick Kavanagh
Raglan Road
On Raglan Road on an autumn day I met her first and knewThat her dark hair would weave a snare that I might one day rue;
Come Dancing with Kitty Stobling
No, no, no, I know I was not important as I movedThrough the colourful country, I was but a singleItem in the picture, the name, not the beloved.O tedious man with whom no gods commingle.Beauty, who has described beauty? Once upon a timeI had a myth that was a lie but it served:Trees walking across the crest of hills and my rhymeCavorting on mile-high stilts and the unnervedCrowds looking up with terror in their rational faces.O dance with Kitty Stobling I outrageouslyCried out-of-sense to them, while their timorous pacesStumbled behind Jove's page boy paging me.I had a very pleasant journey, thank you sincerelyFor giving me my madness back, or nearly.-Patrick KavanaghCopyright © Estate of Katherine Kavanagh
Innocence
They laughed at one I loved-The triangular hill that hungUnder the Big Forth. They saidThat I was bounded by the whitethorn hedgesOf the little farm and did not know the world.But I knew that love's doorway to lifeIs the same doorway everywhere.Ashamed of what I lovedI flung her from me and called her a ditchAlthough she was smiling at me with violets. But now I am back in her briary armsThe dew of an Indian Summer liesOn bleached potato-stalksWhat age am I? I do not know what age I am,I am no mortal age;I know nothing of women, Nothing of cities,I cannot die Unless I walk outside these whitethorn hedges.
Shancoduff
Shancoduff My black hills have never seen the sun rising,Eternally they look North towards Armagh.Lot's wife would not be salt if she had beenIncurious as my black hills that are happyWhen dawn whitens Glassdrummond chapel. My hills hoard the bright shillings of MarchWhile the sun searches in every pocket.They are my Alps and I have climbed the MatterhornWith a sheaf of hay for three perishing calvesIn the field under the Big Forth of Rocksavage. The sleety winds ****** the the rushy beards of ShancoduffWhile the cattle - drovers sheltering in the Featherna BushLook up and say: "Who owns them hungry hillsThat the water - hen and snip must have forsaken?A poet? Then by heavens he must be poor."I hear and is my heart not badly shaken?
On An Apple-Ripe September Morning
On an apple-ripe September morningThrough the mist-chill fields I went
