Poetry Revisited: Snow at Morning by Thomas MacDonagh

Snow at Morning

(from An Macaomh Vol. I, No. 2: Christmas 1909)


As with fitful tune,
All a heart-born air,
Note by note doth fall
The far vision fair
From the Source of all
On the dreaming soul,
Fall to vanish soon.

From the darkening dome,
Starlight every one
Brightening down its way,
Each a little swan
From a cygnet grey,
Wave on wave doth sail,
Whitening into foam.

Late unloosed by God
From their cage aloft
Somewhere near the sky
Snow flakes flutter soft,
Flutter, fall, and die
On the pavement mute,
On the fields untrod.

Thomas MacDonagh (1878-1916)
Irish poet, playwright, educationalist,
political activist, and revolutionary leader