So here we're on the summit. I can see The Aran Islands, Connemara Hills, And Galway in the breaking light; there too The enemy has toppled wall and roof And torn from ancient walls to boil his pot The oaken panelling that had been dear To generations of children and old men. But for that pair for whom you would have my pardon It might be now like Bayeux or like Caen Or little Italian town amid its walls For though we have neither coal nor iron ore To make us rich and cover heaven with smoke Our country, if that crime were uncommitted Had been most beautiful. Why do you dance? Why do you gaze and with so passionate eyes One on the other and then turn away Covering your eyes and weave it in a dance, Who are you? what are you? you are not natural. THE GIRL Seven hundred years our lips have never met. YOUNG MAN Why do you look so strangely at one another, So strangely and so sweetly? THE GIRL Seven hundred years. YOUNG MAN So strangely and so sweetly. All the ruin, All, all their handiwork is blown away As though the mountain air had blown it away Because their eyes have met. They cannot hear, Being folded up and hidden in their dance. The dance is changing now. They have dropped their eyes, They have covered up their eyes as though their hearts Had suddenly been broken--never, never Shall Dermot and Dervorgilla be forgiven. They have drifted in the dance from rock to rock. They have raised their hands as though to snatch the sleep That lingers always in the abyss of the sky Though they can never reach it. A cloud floats up And covers all the mountain head in a moment. And now it lifts and they are swept away. I had almost yielded and forgiven it all-- This is indeed a place of terrible temptation. (The Musicians begin unfolding and folding a black cloth. The First Musician comes forward to the front of the stage, at the centre. He holds the cloth before him. The other two come one on either side and unfold it. They afterwards fold it up in the same way. While it is unfolded, the Young Man leaves the stage.) THE MUSICIANS I (singing) At the grey round of the hill Music of a lost kingdom Runs, runs and is suddenly still. The winds out of Clare-Galway Carry it: suddenly it is still. I have heard in the night air A wandering airy music; And moidered in that snare A man is lost of a sudden, In that sweet wandering snare. What finger first began Music of a lost kingdom. They dreamed that laughed in the sun. Dry bones that dream are bitter, They dream and darken our sun. Those crazy fingers play A wandering airy music; Our luck is withered away, And wheat in the wheat-ear withered, And the wind blows it away. II