Telling the Bees
This is the son of the white morning singing,
Combing her silken hair’s simmer of gold,
All of her slenderness wrapped in a gossamer
Green of the dawning sky, dear to behold.
‘When the lime is in blossom the bees are busy,
Summer has come with her honey-sweet mouth;
The lime is in bloom and the hive it is silent,
Come little bees from the North and the South!
’Gather your store when the red sun is shining,
Gather the harvest so that you may feast,
The hive is nigh empty, the Queen she is weeping,
Come little bees from the West and the East.’
I saw one go in the pale of the dawning,
In a fair May-time a-telling the bees,
Tapping the hive there she told of men dying,
Many a dear name she called to the breeze.
They are coming, the bees, for the time is in blossom;
They are coming, the bees, from the West, South, and East;
They hum ‘donas Sasan,’ they hum ‘Sonas Eireann,
We gather the honey, prepare for the feast.’
