The Ballad of Father Gilligan by W.B. Yeats
The old priest Peter Gilligan
Was weary night and day;
For half his flock were in their beds,
Or under green sods lay.
Once, while he nodded on a chair,
At the moth-hour of eve,
Another poor man sent for him,
And he began to grieve.
'I have no rest, nor joy, nor peace,
For people die and die';
And after cried he, 'God forgive!
My body spake, not I!'
He knelt, and leaning on the chair
He prayed and fell asleep;
And the moth-hour went from the fields,
And stars began to peep.
They slowly into millions grew,
And leaves shook in the wind;
And God covered the world with shade,
And whispered to mankind.
Upon the time of sparrow-chirp
When the moths came once more.
The old priest Peter Gilligan
Stood upright on the floor.
'Mavrone, mavrone! the man has died
While I slept on the chair';
He roused his horse out of its sleep,
And rode with little care.
He rode now as he never rode,
By rocky lane and fen;
The sick man's wife opened the door:
'Father! you come again!'
'And is the poor man dead?' he cried.
'He died an hour ago.'
The old priest Peter Gilligan
In grief swayed to and fro.
'When you were gone, he turned and died
As merry as a bird.'
The old priest Peter Gilligan
He knelt him at that word.
'He Who hath made the night of stars
For souls who tire and bleed,
Sent one of His great angels down
To help me in my need.
'He Who is wrapped in purple robes,
With planets in His care,
Had pity on the least of things
Asleep upon a chair.
Background
Yeats notes for this poem: “This Ballad is upon the Kerry version of an old folk tale. A tradition among the people of Castleisland, Kerry.”
“Moth Hour” is a phrase coined by Yeats, referring to Dawn and Dusk. Moths appear in large numbers at the beginning of night, and just before Sunrise.
The priest’s exclamation “Mavrone” is an Anglicised word for the Gaeilge “Mo Bhrón”, meaning “My Grief/Sorrow”. This word is commonly used in Anglo-Irish poetry, used by poets such as “A.P. Graves, William Allingham, R.D. Joyce, and in the poem “O’Hussey’s Ode to the Maguire” by J.C. Mangan, which was included in Yeats’ book “A Book on Irish Verse” (1895).
The poem is supposed to have been written in 1890, during a time when much of Yeats’ poetry was focused on Gaelic myths & folklore. This poem celebrating the duty of a Catholic Priest for his flock, and the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick. It is notable as Yeats, who was not a Catholic and was born a Protestant, in this period was known for not believing in the Christian religion at all, and being mor interested in the Occult and Paganism.
Yeats is even supposed to have said cited the Natural Sciences as the reason for losing his faith in Christianity, a trope that would become common and even cliché in our time, just over a century after this poem was written. Despite this, the poem gives a very sympathetic portrayal of the life of a Catholic Priest, one of tireless duty and responsibility.
Synopsis
An old priest named Father Gilligan, asleep at a chair, is called to by “another” poor man to attend to a man who is dying. The priest laments his lack of rest, “for people die and die”. He kneels for a moment to pray, but falls asleep once more.
He wakes at dawn, in horror at the thought of the man dying while he slept. He rides on horse as fast he can to the house of the dying man, only to be told he has already been to the house that night, the man having died “merry as a bird”.
The priest kneels in prayer again, thanking God for coming to his aid with a miracle, grateful that God “with planets in his care, had pity on the least of things, asleep upon a chair”.