A Place in They Memory, Irish poem

This is a poem from the novel ‘The Collegians‘ by Gerald Griffin.

The story is a melodrama of love between gentry and commoner set in rural Ireland in the early 19th century –an intricate story of love, secrecy, and betrayal, based on a real case of 1829.

It was one of the most successful thrillers at the time.

A Place in Thy Memory

A place in thy memory, Dearest!
Is all that I claim:
To pause and look back when thou hearest
The sound of my name.
Another may woo thee, nearer
Another may win and wear;
I care not though he be dearer,
If I am remember’d there.

Remember me, not as a lover
Whose hope was cross’d,
Whose bosom can never recover
The light it hath lost!
As the young bride remembers the mother
She loves, though she never may see,
As a sister remembers a brother,
O Dearest, remember me!

Could I be thy true lover, Dearest!
Couldst thou smile on me,
I would be the fondest and dearest
That ever lov’d thee: 20
But a cloud on my pathway is glooming
That never must burst upon thine;
And heaven, that made thee all blooming,
Ne’er made thee to wither on mine.

Remember me then! O remember
My calm light love,
Though bleak as the blasts of November
My life may prove!
That life will, though lonely, be sweet
If its brightest enjoyment should be 30
A smile and kind word when we meet
And a place in thy memory.

A silent movie was made from the novel called The Colleen Bawn in 1911. Every scene was shot in Ireland.

The story is still creating interest, written by Brian Warfield of the Wolftones has written a song Collen Bawn. Here are the Wolftones performing Colleen Bawn.

History of tragic story

Gerald Griffin – A Place in Thy Memory

A Place in Thy Memory

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