The Piper

George Borrow in his Lavengro

Tells us of a Welshman, who

By some excess of mother-wit

Framed a harp and played on it,

Built a ship and sailed to sea,

And steered it home to melody

Of his own making. I, indeed,

Might write for Everyman to read

A thaumalogue of wonderment

More wonderful, but rest content

With celebrating one I knew

Who built his pipes, and played them, too:

No more.

Ah, played! Therein is all:

The hounded thing, the hunter's call;

The shudder, when the quarry's breath

Is drowned in blood and stilled in death;

The marriage dance, the pulsing vein,

The kiss that must be given again;

The hope that Ireland, like a rose,

Sees shining thro' her tale of woes;

The battle lost, the long lament

For blood and spirit vainly spent;

And so on, thro' the varying scale

Of passion that the western Gael

Knows, and by miracle of art

Draws to the chanter from the heart

Like water from a hidden spring,

To leap or murmur, weep or sing.

I see him now, a little man

In proper black, whey-bearded, wan,

With eyes that scan the eastern hills

Thro' thick, gold-rimmèd spectacles.

His hand is on the chanter. Lo,

The hidden spring begins to flow

In waves of magic. (He is dead

These seven years, but bend your head

And listen.) Rising from the clay

The Master plays The Ring of Day.

It mounts and falls and floats away

Over the sky-line . . . then is gone

Into the silence of the dawn!