Both Musicman & Zander below correctly give the old Gaelic tune Finne Gael An La' (speling)as the tune) it was put to that tune in 1964 by Luke Kelly of The Dubliners. After a brief meeting with Kvanagh in Dublin's Bailey pub. In the only conversation Kelly remembers, Kavanagh approached him with the poem and said " hey you Kelly, you should make a song out of this" The rest is history and one of my favourite songs. The poem was titled The Dawning Of The Day. Kelly found there were at least 4 other works of the same name so changed the title to Raglan Road.

Kavanagh never explained the heavy, mysterious symbolism of the words. But having studied it for over 6 years, I believe it's both an unrequieted love song, partly for Hilda Moriarty (there never was a real affair) and his love/hate relationship with the Irish State's relationship with the Catholic Faith, he was most critical of both. His fall ot with Brendan Behan is also in there I'm sure. 'The Queen of hearts still Making tartsm while I not making hay' almost certainly refers to Behan