Poem by Gerald Griffin

Adare

Oh, sweet Adare! oh, lovely vale!
Oh, soft retreat of sylvan splendour!
Nor summer sun nor morning gale
E'er hail'd a scene more softly tender.
How shall I tell the thousand charms
Within thy verdant bosom dwelling,
Where, lull'd in Nature's fost'ring arms,
Soft peace abides and joy excelling.

Ye morning airs, how sweet at dawn
The slumbering boughs your song awaken,
Or linger o'er the silent lawn,
With odour of the harebell taken.
Thou rising sun, how richly gleams
Thy smile from far Knockfierna's mountain,
O'er waving woods and bounding streams,
And many a grove and glancing fountain.

In sweet Adare, the jocund spring
His notes of odorous joy is breathing;
The wild birds in the woodland sing,
The wild flowers in the vale are wreathing.
There wings the Mague, as silver clear,
Among the elms so sweetly flowing;
There, fragrant in the early year,
Wild roses on the banks are blowing.

The wild-duck seeks the sedgy bank,
Or dives beneath the glistening billow,
Where graceful droop and clustering dank
The osier bright and rustling willow.
The hawthorn scents the leafy dale,
In thicket lone the stag is belling,
And sweet along the echoing vale
The sound of vernal joy is swelling.

1. To a Sea-Gull
2. Mitchelstown Caverns
3. A Place in Thy Memory
4. Come to Glengariff! Come!
5. Taunton Dene

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