Nancy Pelosi, the House speaker and one of the most powerful Democrats in the country, has marked St Patrick’s Day by reading aloud a poem by Bono that encompassed both Irish mythology and the crisis in Ukraine.
Pelosi was attending the annual Friends of Ireland lunch in Washington DC on Thursday, when she said she had been sent some verse.
“I got this message this morning from Bono,” Pelosi said of U2’s lead singer.
She added: “Most of us, always, whether we’re in Ireland, here, wherever it is, Bono has been a very Irish part of our lives.”
Speaker Pelosi reads #StPatricksDay poem by Bono, which reads in part:
— CSPAN (@cspan) March 17, 2022
"Ireland's sorrow and pain
Is now the Ukraine
And Saint Patrick's name now Zelenskyy."
She then introduces Riverdance. pic.twitter.com/NzPY1VP2bN
Pelosi then read out Bono’s poem, which referenced both St Patrick’s banishment of snakes from Ireland and the current situation in Ukraine.
Huffington Post transcribed the full poem:
Oh, St Patrick he drove out the snakes
With his prayers but that’s not all it takes
For the snake symbolises
An evil that rises
And hides in your heart, as it breaksAnd the evil has risen my friends
From the darkness that lives in some men
But in sorrow and fear
That’s when saints can appear
To drive out those old snakes once againAnd they struggle for us to be free
From the psycho in this human family
Ireland’s sorrow and pain
Is now the Ukraine
And St Patrick’s name now Zelenskiy
Pelosi also introduced Joe Biden at the luncheon. In a speech the president told the audience of his Irish heritage.
“Irish Americans think they’re more Irish than the Irish. And – but that’s kind of how I was raised, like so many Americans of Irish heritage – like other people of other heritage as well,” Biden said.
“I was – it was imbued in me to be proud of – proud of my heritage.”
Biden was scheduled to have an in-person meeting with Micheál Martin, Ireland’s taoiseach, on Thursday, but Martin tested positive for Covid-19 on Wednesday.
Biden said he had a 45-minute Zoom call with Martin instead, adding that he is “looking well” and “feels well”.
