Editing Columba (section)

=== Poetry ===
Columba currently has two poems attributed to him: "Adiutor Laborantium" and "[[Altus Prosator]]".<ref name="ailb_Help">{{Cite web | title = Helper of Workers | last = Moore | first = T.M. | work = The Fellowship of Ailbe | date = 23 August 2014 | access-date = 10 June 2018 | url = https://www.ailbe.org/columns/item/5470-helper-of-workers | archive-date = 12 June 2018 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20180612140902/https://www.ailbe.org/columns/item/5470-helper-of-workers | url-status = live }}</ref> Both poems are examples of [[Abecedarian hymn]]s in Latin written while Columba was at the [[Iona Abbey]].

The shorter of the two poems, "Adiutor Laborantium" consists of twenty-seven lines of eight syllables each, with each line following the format of an [[Abecedarian hymn]] using the [[Classical Latin alphabet]] save for lines 10–11 and 25–27. The content of the poem addresses God as a helper, ruler, guard, defender and lifter for those who are good and an enemy of sinners whom he will punish.{{sfn|Clancy|Gilbert|1995|p=73}}

"[[Altus Prosator]]" consists of twenty-three stanzas sixteen syllables long, with the first containing seven lines and six lines in each subsequent stanza. It uses the same format and alphabet as "Adiutor Laborantium" except with each stanza starting with a different letter rather than each line. The poem tells a story over three parts split into the beginning of time, the history of Creation, and the Apocalypse or end of time.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Wesseling|first=Margaret|year=1988|title=Structure and Image in the "Altus Prosator": Columba's Symmetrical Universe|jstor=20557197|journal=Proceedings of the Harvard Celtic Colloquium|volume=8|pages=46–57}}</ref>