Analysis of Celts And Saxons.
Thomas Osborne Davis 1814 (Mallow, County Cork) – 1845 (Dublin)
We hate the Saxon and the Dane,
We hate the Norman men--
We cursed their greed for blood and gain,
We curse them now again.
Yet start not, Irish-born man!
If you're to Ireland true,
We heed not blood, nor creed, nor clan--
We have no curse for you.
We have no curse for you or yours,
But Friendship's ready grasp,
And Faith to stand by you and yours
Unto our latest gasp--
To stand by you against all foes,
Howe'er, or whence they come,
With traitor arts, or bribes, or blows,
From England, France, or Rome.
What matter that at different shrines
We pray unto one God?
What matter that at different times
Your fathers won this sod?
In fortune and in name we're bound
By stronger links than steel;
And neither can be safe nor sound
But in the other's weal.
As Nubian rocks, and Ethiop sand
Long drifting down the Nile,
Built up old Egypt's fertile land
For many a hundred mile,
So Pagan clans to Ireland came,
And clans of Christendom,
Yet joined their wisdom and their fame
To build a nation from.
Here came the brown Phoenician,
The man of trade and toil--
Here came the proud Milesian,
A hungering for spoil;
And the Firbolg and the Cymry,
And the hard, enduring Dane,
And the iron Lords of Normandy,
With the Saxons in their train.
And oh! it were a gallant deed
To show before mankind,
How every race and every creed
Might be by love combined--
Might be combined, yet not forget
The fountains whence they rose,
As, filled by many a rivulet,
The stately Shannon flows.
Nor would we wreak our ancient feud
On Belgian or on Dane,
Nor visit in a hostile mood
The hearths of Gaul or Spain;
But long as on our country lies
The Anglo-Norman yoke,
Their tyranny we'll stigmatize,
And God's revenge invoke.
We do not hate, we never cursed,
Nor spoke a foeman's word
Against a man in Ireland nursed,
Howe'er we thought he erred;
So start not, Irish-born man,
If you're to Ireland true,
We heed not race, nor creed, nor clan,
We've hearts and hands for you.
Scheme | ababcDcd efefghgx xixijkjk lmlmnhnh xoaodaxa pqpqxgig rarastst uxuxcDcd |
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Poetic Form | |
Metre | 11010001 110101 11111101 111101 1111011 1111001 11111111 111111 11111111 11101 01111101 1010101 11110111 101111 11011111 110111 110111001 111011 110111001 110111 01000111 110111 01011111 100101 11001011 110101 11110101 1100101 110111001 011100 11110011 110101 1101010 011101 11011 010011 001001 0010101 001011100 1010011 01100101 110111 1100101001 111101 11011101 010111 1111001 010101 111110101 110111 11000101 011111 111110101 010101 1100110 010101 11111101 11011 010101001 101111 1111011 1111001 11111111 110111 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,980 |
Words | 392 |
Sentences | 22 |
Stanzas | 8 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8 |
Lines Amount | 64 |
Letters per line (avg) | 23 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 188 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 45 |
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Submitted on August 03, 2020
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 2:01 min read
- 33 Views
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"Celts And Saxons." Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 19 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/56801/celts-and-saxons.>.
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