The Death of Cuchulain William Butler Yeats

A man came slowly from the setting sun,
To Forgail's daughter‚ Emer‚ in her dun‚
And found her dyeing cloth with subtle care,
And said, casting aside his draggled hair:
" I am Aleel‚ the swineherd, whom you bid
Go dwell upon the sea cliffs, vapour hid;
But now my years of watching are no more."

Then Emer cast her web upon the floor‚
And stretching her arms, red with the dye,
Parted her lips with a loud sudden cry.

Looking on her, Aleel, the swineherd, said:
" Not any god alive, nor mortal dead,
Has slain so mighty armies, so great kings,
Nor won the gold that now Cuchulain brings."

" Why do you tremble thus from feet to crown?"

Aleel, the swineherd, wept and cast him down
Upon the web-heaped floor, and thus his word:
" With him is one sweet-throated like a bird."

" Who bade you tell these things?" and then she cried
To those about, " Beat him with thongs of hide
And drive him from the door."
And thus it was:
And where her son, Finmole, on the smooth grass
Was driving cattle, came she with swift feet,
And called out to him, " Son, it is not meet
That you stay idling here with flocks and herds."
" I long have waited, mother, for those words:
But wherefore now?"
" There is a man to die;
You have the heaviest arm under the sky."