Death & Dying

Monaltri

by Anonymous (Scottish Gaelic) traditional; collected in the Highlands and Islands 1855–1899

Translated by Thomas Pattison (1866) · From Lyra Celtica (1924)

Death & Dying

There’s a sound on the hill,
Not of joy but of ailing;
Dark-hair’d women mourn--
Beat their hands, with loud wailing.

They cry out, Ochon!
For the young Monaltri,
Who went to the hill;
But home came not he.

Without snood, without plaid
Katrina’s gone roaming.
O Katrina, my dear!
Homeward be coming.

Och! hear, on the castle
Yon pretty bird singing,
“Snoodless and plaidless,
Her hands she is ringing.”

MLA

Anonymous (Scottish Gaelic). “Monaltri.” Translated by Thomas Pattison. Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/anonymous-scottish-gaelic/127/.

Chicago

Anonymous (Scottish Gaelic). “Monaltri.” Translated by Thomas Pattison. Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/anonymous-scottish-gaelic/127/.

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