Cuireadh do Mhuire / An Invitation to Mary

Cuireadh do Mhuire

An eol duit, a Mhuire,
Cá rachair i mbliana
Ag iarraidh foscaidh
Dod leanbh Naofa,
Tráth bhfuil gach doras
Dúnta ina éadan
Ag fuath is uabhar
An chine daonna?

Deonaigh glacadh
Le cuireadh uaimse
Go hoileán mara
San iarthar chianda:
Beidh coinnle geala
I ngach fuinneoig lasta
Is tine mhóna
Ar theallach adhanta.

An Invitation to Mary

Do you know, O Mary,
Where you will go this year
To look for shelter
For your Holy Infant,
At a time when every door
Is shut in his face
By the hate and the pride
Of human kind?

Be pleased to accept
An invitation from me
To an island in the sea
Far away in the west:
There will be bright candles
Lighting in every window
And a turf fire
Blazing in the hearth.

©: Máirtín Ó Direáin (1910 – 1988), the great poet from the Aran Islands, wrote the poem ‘Cuireadh do Mhuire’ at Christmas, 1942. We are grateful to his Dublin publishers, Clóchomhar, for permission to reproduce it.

Translation: © The Wales Famine Forum.

Published in The Green Dragon No 5, Winter 1997.

A childhood memory by this author.

Christmas Box.

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