A Statue Of Life 

2 

Before I die, God grant me
    To put a statue up 
In that old Danish seaport
    Among my mother's folk. 

That every man and woman
    With blood that still runs wild
May see at night and morning
    A mother and her child. 

No tamed and virgin beauty,
    A face to shock and fright,
And shame the pallid houses
    And plan with noon and night—

To swell the tides of passion,
    And straighten every back,
And fill the town with music,
    Give life to Joan and Jack. 

From every twilit archway
    The shawly girls would slip,
And link their boys beneath it.
    And flutes would lead a step.

And men that fought for England,
    And boys that fled to sea
And saw that face in dying,
    Even in their graves would see

The market with its tumult
    Become her fold and camp,
And hear on distant highways
    Her singing legions stamp.



Source: O'Connor, Frank; Three Old Brothers and Other Poems; 1936;
London; Thomas Nelson & Sons Ltd.; p.30