There is a field o’ergrown
With grass and greening rushes,
Afar in fair Tyrone,
Tyrone among the bushes.

A fairy field it is;
I know it is enchanted;
The proof of that is this –
By it I’m ever haunted.

A fence of thorn and whin
Provided a border stately
That lets no rude winds in;
Winds enter there sedately.

The sun, approving, peers
Over the hedge-top early;
And on a million spears
Night’s million tears grow pearly.

The bees from far away,
When they that field discover,
Speed there, nor brook delay –
As to his tryst the lover.

Beloved by feathered bards,
From near and far they hurry
To sing their kind regards;
Long, loath to leave, they tarry.

The dullest soul ‘twould rouse
To hear that Eden ringing,
When on a hundred boughs
A hundred bards are singing.

Few, few indeed could see
That field and fail to love it;
Oh! Hard the heart must be
If these charms could not move it.

–

MICHAEL MULLIN

‘THE BARD OF FOREMASS’
FOREMASS LOWER, SIXMILECROSS, CO. TYRONE