Page:The Tricolour, Poems of the Irish Revolution.djvu/69

 She could not tame you with her gentle ways Yet her right anger filled you with amaze. When she would face you, giving jeer for jeer, You struck her down, and laughed to see her tear. With her great heart for pity not too strong, Yet not too weak for anger at the wrong You loved to plague her with, as when a child You gave her grief if e'er you thought she smiled. You snatched her flag, her gun, her little ships— The very bread that touched her parted lips! Her pretty chainey and her shining glass, And all that took your greedy eyes, alas! Then with rough promise sought to still her cry, And named her “Vixen” to the passer-by. Ah, with what care a seething pot you'd brew A bitter draught none mixed so well as you; You'd force her take, so, weakened, you might cry: “She's ne'er contented, yet how good am I.”

The little Church wherein she loved to tell Her pretty beads, I do remember well,