A FAREWELL TO FAL Sad to fare from the hills of Fal, Sad to leave the land of Ireland! The sweet land of the bee-haunted bens, Isle of the hoof-prints of young horses! Ableit my faring is over the eastward ocean, And my back is turned to the land of Fionntain, All heart for the road hath left me: No sod shall I love but the sod of Ireland. Sod that is heaviest with fruit of trees, Sod that is greenest with grassy meadows, Old plain of Ir, dewy, crop-abounding, The branchy, wheat bearing-country! If God were to grant me back again To come to my native world, >From the Galls I would not take it to go Among the crafty clans of England. Were there even no peril of the sea In leaving the lios of Laoghaire, I shall not deny that my courage would droop -- To fare from Delvin is hard! Good-bye to the band I leave behind, The lads of Dundargveis, The songs and minstrelsy of the plain of Meath, Plain of the noblest companies! -- Gerald Nugent (c. 1573) - translated by Padraic Pearse