in the fog. Shattered glass and toppling masonry. In gay Paree he hides,
Egan of Paris, unsought by any save by me. Making his day's stations, the
dingy printingcase, his three taverns, the Montmartre lair he sleeps short
night in, rue de la Goutte-d'Or, damascened with flyblown faces of the
gone. Loveless, landless, wifeless. She is quite nicey comfy without her
outcast man, madame in rue Git-le-Coeur, canary and two buck lodgers.
Peachy cheeks, a zebra skirt, frisky as a young thing's. Spurned and
undespairing. Tell Pat you saw me, won't you? I wanted to get poor Pat a
job one time. MON FILS, soldier of France. I taught him to sing THE BOYS
OF KILKENNY ARE STOUT ROARING BLADES. Know that old lay? I taught Patrice
that. Old Kilkenny: saint Canice, Strongbow's castle on the Nore. Goes
like this. O, O. He takes me, Napper Tandy, by the hand.


O, O THE BOYS OF
KILKENNY ...


Weak wasting hand on mine. They have forgotten Kevin Egan, not he
them. Remembering thee, O Sion.

He had come nearer the edge of the sea and wet sand slapped his
boots. The new air greeted him, harping in wild nerves, wind of wild air
of seeds of brightness. Here, I am not walking out to the Kish lightship,
am I? He stood suddenly, his feet beginning to sink slowly in the quaking
soil. Turn back.

Turning, he scanned the shore south, his feet sinking again slowly in
new sockets. The cold domed room of the tower waits. Through the
barbacans the shafts of light are moving ever, slowly ever as my feet are