Tonight’s poem is spoken by a bird. A blackbird is singing in a tree in Ireland, long ago, and it calls to Saint Patrick, who is ringing the bell for morning prayers. Stop, says the bird, stop and listen: my song is brighter than your bell.
Learn from Songs · Poetry · B2–C1
The Blackbird of Derrycairn
Austin Clarke’s free version of an old Irish poem in which a blackbird tells Saint Patrick to stop and listen to its song: imperatives (Stop, listen, forget…), comparatives (brighter than), more than all, the music of internal rhyme, and the old debate between nature and the church, with Philo, Sophia, Marcos and Demetria.
SOPHIA
PHILO
A bird arguing with a saint? That’s bold.
SOPHIA
It comes from very old Irish stories about Fionn mac Cumhaill and his warriors, who loved hunting and the songs of birds, and about how they met Saint Patrick. The modern poet Austin Clarke made his own version, and he gave it a sharp twist.
MARCOS
I’m on the bird’s side already.
Before you listen: the song
Ireland: an old Gaelic song, retold by Austin Clarke
Austin Clarke (1896–1974) was a Dublin poet who, like Yeats, loved the old Irish legends and wrote many poems based on them. He was also a critic of the power of the Church in the Ireland of his time, and set up his own small press when publishers were cautious.
His poem is a free version of an old Gaelic song, Lon Doire an Chairn, “the blackbird of Derrycairn”. In the old tales, the hero Fionn mac Cumhaill and his band of warriors, the Fianna, loved the blackbird’s song above all music. In later stories, Fionn’s son Oisín lives long enough to meet Saint Patrick and tells him that the old songs and hunts were sweeter than the church bells.
In Clarke’s poem, the blackbird tells Patrick to stop and listen. Prayers can wait until evening; the sun is bright now. Fionn loved the hunt, the shouts of the hunters and the swans on Loch Erne, but more than all of them he loved the blackbird’s song. In the last lines the bird says that knowledge is found among the branches, not only in books.
Wonder can be found in a book and in a bird.
About the text
Austin Clarke’s poem is still in copyright, so it is not printed on this page. Use the “Read the poem” link above, where it is reprinted with the publisher’s permission, or find it in Clarke’s Collected Poems (Carcanet).
Read and listen
PHILO
The poem is still in copyright, so read it at the link and listen to a reading. Who is speaking? Who is listening? What does the bird want Patrick to do?
SOPHIA
Then answer Section A.
🐦⬛ Listen to the song: “The Blackbird of Derrycairn” (Austin Clarke, after an old Irish poem).Find a reading →
📜 Read the poem (reprinted with permission of Carcanet Press) on the Brinkerhoff Poetry site.Read the lyrics →
Imperatives
MARCOS
Stop, stop and listen! Forget the hour-bell! Listen!
SOPHIA
The bird gives orders with imperatives, repeated for energy: Stop, stop and listen. Imperatives at the start of a poem grab the reader, like a hand on the shoulder.
Comparatives and more than all
DEMETRIA
The sun is brighter than God’s own shadow in the cup. Fionn loved the breeze, the hunters’ shouts, the swans, but more than all those voices, the blackbird’s song.
SOPHIA
comparative + than compares two things. more than all (of) + noun = above everything else: I love many books, but more than all of them, this one.
The music of internal rhyme
PHILO
In the poem, words rhyme inside the lines, not only at the end, and vowel sounds repeat.
SOPHIA
Clarke loved the old Irish technique of internal rhyme and assonance (repeated vowel sounds). Read the poem aloud and listen for words that echo each other inside a line. It sounds like birdsong.
Two views: nature and the church
MARCOS
Some readers say the poem celebrates the free, joyful pagan world against a gloomy church.
SOPHIA
Others point out that Christians have always praised God through nature too: Saint Patrick’s own prayer, the Breastplate, calls on the sun, the fire, the wind and the sea; and Irish monks wrote some of the most beautiful nature poems in the world, about blackbirds singing over their books. Is the bird against the church, or calling it back to joy? Decide for yourself.
Sophia’s comparison: Psalm 104 and Pan’s pipes
PHILO
Psalm 104 says: by the streams the birds of the heavens have their home; they sing among the branches. The psalmist hears the birds singing praise. For us, nature and worship are not enemies.
SOPHIA
And we Greeks say that Pan, the god of the wild, played his pipes in the woods so sweetly that even Apollo was challenged. Every people has argued about which music is holier: the temple’s or the forest’s.
Sophia’s summary
| Words and forms | Use | Example |
|---|---|---|
| imperatives, repeated | orders, energy | Stop, stop and listen! |
| comparative + than | comparing two things | brighter than God’s own shadow |
| more than all (of) + noun | above everything | more than all those voices |
| internal rhyme / assonance | sound inside the lines | echoing words within a line |
| some say… / others point out… | two views | Others point out that… |
Practice
Listen to the song for Section A, then do the rest. Press “Check my answers” at the end. You can try again as many times as you like.
A · Listen: the song
Listen to the song and choose the best answer.
1. Who is speaking in the poem?
2. Who is the bird speaking to?
3. What does the bird want him to do?
4. What did Fionn love more than all other voices?
5. Where does the bird say knowledge is found?
6. What is the poem based on?
B · Grammar and vocabulary
Write the missing word or words.
7. , stop and listen! (imperative)
8. the hour-bell! (imperative: don’t remember)
9. The sun is than God’s shadow. (bright)
10. More than those voices, he loved my song.
11. Repeated vowel sounds are called .
12. Others point that monks loved nature too.
C · Right or wrong?
Is the sentence correct English?
13. “The sun is more bright than the bell.”
14. “Stop, stop and listen!”
15. “More than all of them, I love this song.”
16. “He loved the song more than all the others voices.”
Talk and write
Discussion and writing
Bird versus bell. Hold a friendly debate: one team speaks for the blackbird, one for Patrick’s bell. Each team uses imperatives and comparatives. Then find a way they can agree.
Discuss. 1. Is the poem against the church, or against forgetting joy? 2. Where do you find “knowledge among the branches”? 3. Why did Irish monks write poems about birds in the margins of holy books?
Write (100–120 words). Write a short poem or speech in which an animal or a place speaks to a busy person and tells them to stop and notice it. Use imperatives, a comparative, and more than all.
Now play the gamebook: a scholar who never leaves the Library, and a blackbird in spring.Play the gamebook →