Littell's Living Age/Volume 169/Issue 2182/Sonnet: a Cry from Ireland

by H. D. R.

I heard, a voice come moaning over sea,
     "England and ye who fain would legislate,
     Heart-cankering woe and immemorial hate
Are not the servants of a law's decree:
Cleave us asunder! we are bond, not free.
     League-makers tyrannize, the priests dictate,
     Give us the land! yet Famine will not bate
Her stern demands of all she holds in fee,
Our bodies' breath and marrow: we are slaves,
     Slaves to tradition's wrong and tribal scorn,
          And though our acres, bog and moor and fen,
          From dragon's teeth may yield its armèd men,
Pale Hunger stands above our shallow graves,
     And wringing empty hands cries out for corn."