nce round stage)

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;