Shane O’Neill’s Cairn

Robinson Jeffers 1887 (Allegheny) – 1962 (Carmel-by-the-Sea)



TO U. J.
When you and I on the Palos Verdes cliff
Found life more desperate than dear,
And when we hawked at it on the lake by Seattle,
In the west of the world, where hardly
Anything has died yet: we'd not have been sorry, Una,
But surprised, to foresee this gray
Coast in our days, the gray waters of the Moyle
Below us, and under our feet
The heavy black stones of the cairn of the lord of Ulster.
A man of blood who died bloodily
Four centuries ago: but death's nothing, and life,
From a high death-mark on a headland
Of this dim island of burials, is nothing either.
How beautiful are both these nothings.

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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

36 sec read
90

Quick analysis:

Scheme ABCDEFAGHIDJHIK
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 604
Words 120
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 15

Robinson Jeffers

John Robinson Jeffers was an American poet, known for his work about the central California coast. more…

All Robinson Jeffers poems | Robinson Jeffers Books

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