the mystery

I am the wind which breathes upon the sea,

I am the wave of the ocean,

I am the murmur of the billows,

I am the ox of the seven combats,

I am the vulture upon the rocks,

I am a beam of the sun,

I am the fairest of plants,

I am the wild boar in valour,

I am the salmon in the water,

I am a lake in the plain,

I am a world of knowledge,

I am the point of the lance of battle,

I am the God who created the fire in the head.

Who is it who throws light into the meeting on the mountain? 

Who announces the ages of the moon?

Who teaches the place where couches the sun?

(if not I)

~ Amairgen 

(chief poet of the Milesians,)

from Anam Cara, by John O'Donohue

This poem is ascribed to Amergin,

 a Milesian prince or druid who settled in Ireland

 hundreds of years before Christ 

and is from the Leabhar Gabhala, 

or Book of Invasions.

"The three short pieces of verse ascribed to Amergin are certainly very ancient

 and very strange. But as the whole story of the Milesian Invasion

 is wrapped in mystery and is quite possibly a rationalized account

 of early Irish mythology no faith can be placed in the alleged date

 or genuineness of Amergin's verses. They are of interest, because

 as Irish tradition has them as being the first verses made in Ireland, 

so it may very well be they actually do present the oldest surviving

 lines of any vernacular tongue in Europe except Greece."

 by Douglas Hyde, The Story of Early Gaelic Literature

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