Dreams, Songs, and Sorrow: Three Celtic Poets to Read Now

Ireland is a land shaped by myth, story, and poetry — and her sister countries in the Celtic world, Scotland, Wales, Cornwall, and so forth, all share in their affinity to eloquence and incantatory language. Names like William Butler Yeats, Seamus Heaney, Robert Burns, Dylan Thomas, R.S. Thomas (no relation, I believe) and countless others testify to the enduring place of poetry in the hearts and minds of the Celtic peoples.

In traditional Gaelic culture, the bard played a central role in the sp...