Poems appear but rarely in the mythological or heroic cycles, and are loosely scattered among the prose of the bardic tales.
A few are of war, but they are chiefly dirges like the Song of Emer over the dead body of Cuchulain, or that of Deirdre over Naisi--pathetic wailings for lost love.

There is an abrupt and pitiful pain in the brief songs of Fionnuala, but I fancy these were made and inserted in Christian times.

Poetry was more at home among the Fianna.
The conditions of life were easier; there was more leisure and more romance.

And the other arts, which stimulate poetry, were more widely practised than in the earlier ages.

Finn's Song to May, here translated, is of a good type, frank and observant, with a fresh air in it, and a fresh pleasure in its writing.