I bPáras

In Paris

So here is my desert and here am I
In the midst of it alone,
Silent and free, as a hawk in the sky,
Unnoticed and unknown.

I speak to no one from sun to sun,
And do my single will,
Though round me loud voiced millions run
And life is never still.

There goes the bell of the Sorbonne
Just as in Villon's day--
He heard it here go sounding on,
And stopped his work to pray--

Just in this place, in time of snow,
Alone, at a table bent--
Four hundred and fifty years ago
He wrote that Testament.

Thomas MacDonagh

I bPáras

Sé seo m’fhásach-sa, is táim anseo liom féin
Ina lár is níl aithne ag éinne orm.
I mo thost mar a bheadh seabhac i gcéin
Sa spéir ghorm.

Ní labhraím le héinne ó mhaidin go hoíche
Mo ghnó féin á chur i gcrích,
An slua callánach thart orm ina mílte
Gan sos gan scíth.

Buaileann clog mór an tSorbonne
Mar a bhuail anseo fadó
Siar in aimsir Villon
A scoir láithreach dá ghnó.

San áit seo is sneachta ag titim ón spéir
Leis féin ina sheomra cúng –
Ceithre chéad caoga bliain ó shin
Le Grand Testament do chum.