Lucina Schynning in Silence of the Nicht (Leaving Cert English): Revision Notes
Lucina Schynning in Silence of the Nicht
Overview and context
This distinctive poem by Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin recounts a night spent sleeping in a ruined old chapel, stripped of the comforts of modern civilisation. The poet encounters nature 'up close' and, through that encounter, confronts Ireland's violent historical past — particularly the Cromwellian devastation of the 17th century — before arriving at a tone of renewal and peace.
The poem's unusual title is taken from the opening line of "The Birth of Antichrist" by William Dunbar, a 15th-century Scottish poet. In archaic Scots it translates roughly as "Moonlight shining in silence of the night." Lucina derives from the Latin lux (light), and echoes luna (moon); in Roman mythology Lucina is actually an epithet of Juno / Diana as goddess of childbirth — of "bringing into the light." In this poem the name primarily functions as moonlight / illumination, not as a named moon goddess.
The poem closes with the poet watching a hare sitting still — an image that echoes the opening of "On Lacking the Killer Instinct", and links the two poems thematically through their shared imagery of hares, bog water and the Irish landscape.
Stanza-by-stanza analysis
Stanza 1: Reading by candlelight in a ruin
The opening stanza establishes the poet in a medieval-feeling setting: alone in a ruin, reading by candlelight, "without roast meat or music / Strong drink or a shield from the air". The language conjures the austerity of a feasting hall stripped of its feast — the civilisation the ruin once belonged to is gone, and she is exposed to the elements.
After three days of rain, moonlight shines through the "crazed window". This physical clarity after storm sets up the spiritual and historical clarity the rest of the poem will pursue.
Stanza 2: Safety in the natural world
The second stanza introduces powerful water imagery. The poet washes in cold bog water, "orange, channelled down bogs / Dipped between cresses" — an image that roots her firmly in the Irish landscape. Though bats fly through her sleeping space, she "slept safely", and wakes to find "Sheep stared at me when I woke".
The natural world, far from threatening, offers safety and acceptance. Animals co-exist with her without hostility. This peaceful tone is crucial, because the next stanza will tip sharply into darkness — and the contrast matters.
Stanza 3: The waves of darkness — Cromwellian Ireland
The mood shifts dramatically. The triple repetition of "plague" is the stanza's defining device:
Textual analysis: The waves of darkness
"Behind me the waves of darkness lay, the plague Of mice, plague of beetles Crawling out of the spines of books, Plague shadowing pale faces with clay The disease of the moon gone astray."
The "waves of darkness" behind her refer to terrible events from the past, not to her present state. The plague imagery evokes mass death and historical destruction — specifically the Cromwellian violence and dispossession that left ruined chapels like the one she is sleeping in. Pale faces shadowed with clay suggests mass burial of plague victims, and "the disease of the moon gone astray" plays on "lunacy" (from Latin luna) — madness as another symptom of a world thrown out of joint.
The beetles crawling out of the spines of books link the violence of the past to the decay of culture itself — even the learning stored in the ruined building is being devoured.
Stanza 4: "When Cromwell had departed" — the turning point
The fourth stanza is the hinge of the poem, and it names its subject explicitly:
Textual analysis: The Cromwell simile
"In the desert I relaxed, amazed As the mosaic beasts on the chapel floor When Cromwell had departed, and they saw The sky growing through a hole in the roof."
An extended simile compares the poet's awe to the wonder of the mosaic animals on the chapel floor seeing daylight for the first time after Cromwell's forces departed. The chapel was desecrated, the roof broken open — but the destruction let the sky in. The "desert" is not despair but release: the poet, like the mosaic beasts, experiences ruin as a strange kind of liberation.
This is the explicit historical reference that anchors the "plague" imagery of the previous stanza. The devastation is Cromwellian; the departure is the turning point; nature and light move back in.
Stanza 5: Renewal and the returning creatures
The final stanza brings a clear sense of growth and life returning after destruction:
Textual analysis: The return of life
"Sheepdogs embraced me; the grasshopper Returned with lark and bee."
The sheepdogs "embracing" the poet continues the theme of animal acceptance. The verb "Returned" is key: the grasshopper, lark and bee are coming back — life reoccupying ground that violence emptied. This is where the poem's earlier darkness is answered.
The poet then sees a hare "absorbed, sitting still / In the middle of the track" — the stillness of a creature completely at home in its world. The poem closes with the line "I heard / Again the chirp in the stream running", suggesting that life is in continuous motion and renews itself regardless of human destruction.
Major themes
Ireland's violent history and renewal is the poem's central concern. The plague imagery, the ruined chapel and the explicit naming of Cromwell all place the poem within Ireland's memory of the 17th-century devastation. But the poem's arc is toward recovery — nature reclaims what violence emptied.
Nature as restorative presence runs throughout. The wilderness offers safety, acceptance and continuity where civilisation's institutions (the chapel, the books) have been broken. Animals co-exist with the poet on equal terms; the stream keeps running.
The persistence of the past shapes the poem's middle. The "waves of darkness" lie behind the poet — the past is not gone, but it is behind her. The poem doesn't deny history; it survives it.
Some readers connect the poem loosely to the "dark night of the soul" tradition — the spiritual crisis described by St John of the Cross and other mystics, in which confrontation with darkness precedes renewal. The religious setting (chapel, mosaics) supports this reading, though the poem's darkness is historical and political before it is personal.
Light and sight operate throughout. Moonlight, the sky seen through the broken roof, and the mosaic beasts "seeing" daylight all connect the title's Lucina / lux to the moment of post-Cromwellian clarity.
Key imagery and symbolism
The ruined chapel is both the poem's physical setting and its central historical symbol — a building broken by Cromwellian violence, still standing, now open to the sky. Its ruin is its redemption: the damage lets the light in.
Water imagery — rain, bog water, the running stream — operates as a thread of cleansing and continuity. The orange bog water "channelled down bogs / Dipped between cresses" ties the poet specifically to the Irish landscape. The stream in the final line is the clearest emblem of life's ongoing flow.
Water across the poem
- Three days' rain — the storm that has just passed, clearing the air.
- Orange bog water — the specifically Irish natural world, used for washing.
- The stream running — the final image of continuing life, its "chirp" heard again.
The plague imagery (mice, beetles, clay-shadowed faces) is the poem's figurative vocabulary for Cromwellian devastation, not for generic psychological distress. The repetition of "plague" three times drives the historical weight.
The mosaic beasts on the chapel floor are one of Ní Chuilleanáin's most striking images — ancient, patient figures who, like the poet, see the sky only because the roof is broken. They embody survival through catastrophe.
The hare, grasshopper, lark, bee and sheepdogs at the poem's close all signify life returning — the ordinary fauna of Irish countryside moving back in.
Stylistic techniques
Archaic title — the borrowing from William Dunbar gives the poem a medieval, dreamlike register from the first word. It signals that the poem will move between present experience and historical depth.
Repetition — the threefold repetition of "plague" in stanza 3 drives home the accumulating weight of historical violence. The word "Again" near the end ("I heard / Again the chirp") signals return and renewal.
Extended simile — the comparison of the poet's amazement to that of the mosaic beasts seeing daylight after Cromwell's departure is the poem's structural centrepiece.
Metaphor (not onomatopoeia) — the "chirp in the stream running" is a metaphor / transferred epithet: streams don't literally chirp, birds do. The poet lends the stream a living, bird-like voice to signal the return of life. It's a small detail but worth naming correctly — this is metaphor, not onomatopoeia.
Assonance and alliteration — "Plague shadowing pale faces with clay" uses both the repeated long 'a' sound (assonance) and the 'p'/'pl' alliteration to give the line an incantatory weight.
First-person narration gives the poem an intimate, reflective voice without making it narrowly autobiographical — the "I" is present in the landscape and in history at the same time.
The distinctive voice of this poem comes from the way historical memory, Irish natural landscape and religious architecture are woven together without any one dominating. The ruined chapel is the history, the habitat and the spiritual space all at once.
Tone and mood progression
The poem traces a three-part movement:
- Quiet austerity in stanzas 1–2 — the poet alone, cold, safe among animals.
- Dark historical weight in stanza 3 — plague, destruction, lunacy, books devoured.
- Wonder and return in stanzas 4–5 — the post-Cromwellian "desert," the mosaic beasts seeing sky, the grasshopper and lark returning, the hare at rest, the stream audible again.
The movement is not from grief to acceptance, but from solitary exposure, through historical reckoning, to the observation that life continues regardless.
Remember!
Key Points to Remember:
- The poem is set in a ruined chapel and its central subject is Ireland's violent history — particularly the Cromwellian devastation — followed by nature's return.
- The title comes from William Dunbar's "The Birth of Antichrist" (15th century). Lucina derives from Latin lux (light), linked to luna (moon), and in Roman mythology is the goddess of childbirth / "bringing into the light".
- The threefold "plague" in stanza 3 evokes mass death and historical destruction, not personal grief. "The disease of the moon gone astray" puns on lunacy.
- Stanza 4 names Cromwell explicitly — the mosaic beasts seeing sky through the broken roof is the simile that anchors the whole poem.
- The final stanza's grasshopper, lark, bee, sheepdogs and hare are all images of life returning after violence.
- The "chirp in the stream running" is a metaphor, not onomatopoeia — and the word "Again" signals renewal.
- The hare image links this poem to "On Lacking the Killer Instinct" through shared imagery of hares, bog water and the Irish landscape.