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diff --git a/1382-h/1382-h.htm b/1382-h/1382-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b957832 --- /dev/null +++ b/1382-h/1382-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,9326 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII" /> +<title>Poems, Volume 2 [of 3], by George Meredith</title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + P { margin-top: .75em; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + P.gutsumm { margin-left: 5%;} + P.poetry {margin-left: 3%; } + .GutSmall { font-size: 0.7em; } + H1, H2 { + text-align: center; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + } + H3, H4, H5 { + text-align: center; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; + } + BODY{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + table { border-collapse: collapse; } +table {margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto;} + td { vertical-align: top; border: 1px solid black;} + td p { margin: 0.2em; } + .blkquot {margin-left: 4em; margin-right: 4em;} /* block indent */ + + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + + .pagenum {position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: small; + text-align: right; + font-weight: normal; + color: gray; + } + img { border: none; } + img.dc { float: left; width: 50px; height: 50px; } + p.gutindent { margin-left: 2em; } + div.gapspace { height: 0.8em; } + div.gapline { height: 0.8em; width: 100%; border-top: 1px solid;} + div.gapmediumline { height: 0.3em; width: 40%; margin-left:30%; + border-top: 1px solid; } + div.gapmediumdoubleline { height: 0.3em; width: 40%; margin-left:30%; + border-top: 1px solid; border-bottom: 1px solid;} + div.gapshortdoubleline { height: 0.3em; width: 20%; + margin-left: 40%; border-top: 1px solid; + border-bottom: 1px solid; } + div.gapdoubleline { height: 0.3em; width: 50%; + margin-left: 25%; border-top: 1px solid; + border-bottom: 1px solid;} + div.gapshortline { height: 0.3em; width: 20%; margin-left:40%; + border-top: 1px solid; } + .citation {vertical-align: super; + font-size: .8em; + text-decoration: none;} + img.floatleft { float: left; + margin-right: 1em; + margin-top: 0.5em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; } + img.floatright { float: right; + margin-left: 1em; margin-top: 0.5em; + margin-bottom: 0.5em; } + img.clearcenter {display: block; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0.5em; + margin-bottom: 0.5em} + --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> +</head> +<body> +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Poems, Volume 2 [of 3], by George Meredith + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most +other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of +the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have +to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. + + + + +Title: Poems, Volume 2 [of 3] + + +Author: George Meredith + + + +Release Date: January 2, 2015 [eBook #1382] +[This file was first posted on May 7, 1998] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POEMS, VOLUME 2 [OF 3]*** +</pre> +<p>Transcribed from the 1912 Times Book Club “Surrey” +edition by David Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org</p> +<p style="text-align: center"> +<a href="images/coverb.jpg"> +<img alt= +"Book cover" +title= +"Book cover" + src="images/covers.jpg" /> +</a></p> +<p style="text-align: center"> +<a href="images/fpb.jpg"> +<img alt= +"The Châlet, Box Hill" +title= +"The Châlet, Box Hill" + src="images/fps.jpg" /> +</a></p> +<h1>POEMS<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">VOL. II</span></h1> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">BY</span><br +/> +GEORGE MEREDITH</p> + +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p style="text-align: center">SURREY EDITION</p> + +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p style="text-align: center">LONDON<br /> +THE TIMES BOOK CLUB<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">376–384 OXFORD STREET, W.</span><br +/> +1912</p> + +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p style="text-align: center"><a name="pageiv"></a><span +class="pagenum">p. iv</span>Edinburgh: T. and A. Constable, +Printers to his Majesty</p> +<h2><a name="pagev"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +v</span>CONTENTS</h2> +<table> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p> </p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span +class="GutSmall">PAGE</span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>TO J. M.,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Let Fate or Insufficiency provide</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page1">1</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>LINES TO A FRIEND VISITING AMERICA,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Now farewell to you! you are</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page2">2</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>TIME AND SENTIMENT,</p> +<p class="gutindent">I see a fair young couple in a wood,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page11">11</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>LUCIFER IN STARLIGHT,</p> +<p class="gutindent">On a starred night Prince Lucifer uprose</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page12">12</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE STAR SIRIUS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Bright Sirius! that when Orion pales</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page12">12</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>SENSE AND SPIRIT,</p> +<p class="gutindent">The senses loving Earth or well or ill</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page13">13</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>EARTH’S SECRET,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Not solitarily in fields we find</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page13">13</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>INTERNAL HARMONY,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Assured of worthiness we do not dread</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page14">14</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>GRACE AND LOVE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Two flower-enfolding crystal vases she</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page14">14</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>APPRECIATION,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Earth was not Earth before her sons +appeared,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page15">15</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE DISCIPLINE OF WISDOM,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Rich labour is the struggle to be wise</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page15">15</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE STATE OF AGE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Rub thou thy battered lamp: nor claim nor +beg</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page16">16</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p><a name="pagevi"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +vi</span>PROGRESS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">In Progress you have little faith, say +you:</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page16">16</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE WORLD’S ADVANCE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Judge mildly the tasked world; and +disincline</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page17">17</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>A CERTAIN PEOPLE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">As Puritans they prominently wax,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page17">17</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE GARDEN OF EPICURUS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">That Garden of sedate Philosophy</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page18">18</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>A LATER ALEXANDRIAN,</p> +<p class="gutindent">An inspiration caught from dubious hues</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page18">18</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>AN ORSON OF THE MUSE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Her son, albeit the Muse’s livery</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page19">19</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE POINT OF TASTE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Unhappy poets of a sunken prime!</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page19">19</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>CAMELUS SALTAT,</p> +<p class="gutindent">What say you, critic, now you have +become</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page20">20</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>CONTINUED,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Oracle of the market! thence you drew</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page20">20</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>MY THEME,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Of me and of my theme think what thou +wilt:</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page21">21</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>CONTINUED,</p> +<p class="gutindent">’Tis true the wisdom that my mind +exacts</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page21">21</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>ON THE DANGER OF WAR,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Avert, High Wisdom, never vainly wooed,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page22">22</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>TO CARDINAL MANNING,</p> +<p class="gutindent">I, wakeful for the skylark voice in men,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page23">23</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>TO COLONEL CHARLES,</p> +<p class="gutindent">An English heart, my commandant,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page24">24</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>TO CHILDREN: FOR TYRANTS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Strike not thy dog with a stick!</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page27">27</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="3"><p style="text-align: center"><a +name="pagevii"></a><span class="pagenum">p. vii</span><b>Poems +and Lyrics of the Joy of Earth</b></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE WOODS OF WESTERMAIN,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Enter these enchanted woods,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page33">33</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>A BALLAD OF PAST MERIDIAN,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Last night returning from my twilight +walk</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page48">48</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE DAY OF THE DAUGHTER OF HADES,</p> +<p class="gutindent">He who has looked upon Earth</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page49">49</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE LARK ASCENDING,</p> +<p class="gutindent">He rises and begins to round,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page67">67</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>PHOEBUS WITH ADMETUS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">When by Zeus relenting the mandate was +revoked,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page71">71</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>MELAMPUS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">With love exceeding a simple love of the +things</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page75">75</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>LOVE IN THE VALLEY,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Under yonder beech-tree single on the +greensward,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page80">80</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE THREE SINGERS TO YOUNG BLOOD,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Carols nature, counsel men,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page88">88</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE ORCHARD AND THE HEATH,</p> +<p class="gutindent">I chanced upon an early walk to spy</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page90">90</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>EARTH AND MAN,</p> +<p class="gutindent">On her great venture, Man,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page92">92</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>A BALLAD OF FAIR LADIES IN REVOLT,</p> +<p class="gutindent">See the sweet women, friend, that lean +beneath</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page100">100</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="3"><p style="text-align: center"><b>Ballads and +poems of Tragic Life</b></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE TWO MASKS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Melpomene among her livid people,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page115">115</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>ARCHDUCHESS ANNE,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page116">116</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span +class="GutSmall">I.</span></p> +</td> +<td><p>In middle age an evil thing</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"> </p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span +class="GutSmall">II.</span></p> +</td> +<td><p>Archduchess Anne sat carved in frost</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"> </p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span +class="GutSmall">III.</span></p> +</td> +<td><p>Old Kraken read a missive penned</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"> </p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p><a name="pageviii"></a><span +class="pagenum">p. viii</span>THE SONG OF THEODOLINDA,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Queen Theodolind has built</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page133">133</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>A PREACHING FROM A SPANISH BALLAD,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Ladies who in chains of wedlock</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page139">139</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE YOUNG PRINCESS,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page144">144</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span +class="GutSmall">I.</span></p> +</td> +<td><p>When the South sang like a nightingale</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"> </p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span +class="GutSmall">II.</span></p> +</td> +<td><p>The lords of the Court they sighed heart-sick,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"> </p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span +class="GutSmall">III.</span></p> +</td> +<td><p>Lord Dusiote sprang from priest and squire;</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"> </p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span +class="GutSmall">IV.</span></p> +</td> +<td><p>The soft night-wind went laden to death</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"> </p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>KING HARALD’S TRANCE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Sword in length a reaping-hook amain</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page154">154</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>WHIMPER OF SYMPATHY,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Hawk or shrike has done this deed</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page158">158</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>YOUNG REYNARD,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Gracefullest leaper, the dappled fox-cub</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page159">159</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>MANFRED,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Projected from the bilious Childe,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page160">160</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>HERNANI,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Cistercians might crack their sides</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page161">161</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE NUPTIALS OF ATTILA,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Flat as to an eagle’s eye,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page162">162</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>ANEURIN’S HARP,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Prince of Bards was old Aneurin;</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page180">180</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>MEN AND MAN,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Men the Angels eyed;</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page186">186</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE LAST CONTENTION,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Young captain of a crazy bark!</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page187">187</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>PERIANDER,</p> +<p class="gutindent">How died Melissa none dares shape in +words.</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page190">190</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p><a name="pageix"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +ix</span>SOLON,</p> +<p class="gutindent">The Tyrant passed, and friendlier was his +eye</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page195">195</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>BELLEROPHON,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Maimed, beggared, grey; seeking an alms; +with nod</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page197">197</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>PHAÉTHÔN,</p> +<p class="gutindent">At the coming up of Phoebus the all-luminous +charioteer,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page200">200</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="3"><p style="text-align: center"><b>A Reading of +Earth</b></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>SEED-TIME,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Flowers of the willow-herb are wool;</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page209">209</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>HARD WEATHER,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Bursts from a rending East in flaws</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page211">211</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE SOUTH-WESTER,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Day of the cloud in fleets! O day</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page215">215</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE THRUSH IN FEBRUARY,</p> +<p class="gutindent">I know him, February’s thrush,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page220">220</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE APPEASEMENT OF DEMETER,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Demeter devastated our good land,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page226">226</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>EARTH AND A WEDDED WOMAN,</p> +<p class="gutindent">The shepherd, with his eye on hazy +South,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page231">231</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>MOTHER TO BABE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Fleck of sky you are,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page234">234</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>WOODLAND PEACE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Sweet as Eden is the air,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page235">235</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE QUESTION WHITHER,</p> +<p class="gutindent">When we have thrown off this old suit,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page236">236</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>OUTER AND INNER,</p> +<p class="gutindent">From twig to twig the spider weaves</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page237">237</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p><a name="pagex"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +x</span>NATURE AND LIFE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Leave the uproar: at a leap</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page239">239</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>DIRGE IN WOODS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">A wind sways the pines,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page240">240</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>A FAITH ON TRIAL,</p> +<p class="gutindent">On the morning of May,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page241">241</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>CHANGE IN RECURRENCE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">I stood at the gate of the cot</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page260">260</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>HYMN TO COLOUR,</p> +<p class="gutindent">With Life and Death I walked when Love +appeared,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page261">261</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>MEDITATION UNDER STARS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">What links are ours with orbs that are</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page265">265</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>WOODMAN AND ECHO,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Close Echo hears the woodman’s +axe,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page268">268</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>THE WISDOM OF ELD,</p> +<p class="gutindent">We spend our lives in learning pilotage,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page270">270</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>EARTH’S PREFERENCE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Earth loves her young: a preference +manifest:</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page270">270</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>SOCIETY,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Historic be the survey of our kind,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page271">271</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>WINTER HEAVENS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Sharp is the night, but stars with frost +alive</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page271">271</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p>NOTES</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page272">272</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +</table> +<h2><a name="page1"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 1</span>TO J. +M.</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Let</span> Fate or +Insufficiency provide<br /> +Mean ends for men who what they are would be:<br /> +Penned in their narrow day no change they see<br /> +Save one which strikes the blow to brutes and pride.<br /> +Our faith is ours and comes not on a tide:<br /> +And whether Earth’s great offspring, by decree,<br /> +Must rot if they abjure rapacity,<br /> +Not argument but effort shall decide.<br /> +They number many heads in that hard flock:<br /> +Trim swordsmen they push forth: yet try thy steel.<br /> +Thou, fighting for poor humankind, wilt feel<br /> +The strength of Roland in thy wrist to hew<br /> +A chasm sheer into the barrier rock,<br /> +And bring the army of the faithful through.</p> +<h2><a name="page2"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 2</span>LINES TO +A FRIEND VISITING AMERICA</h2> +<h3>I</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Now</span> farewell to you! +you are<br /> +One of my dearest, whom I trust:<br /> +Now follow you the Western star,<br /> +And cast the old world off as dust.</p> +<h3>II</h3> +<p class="poetry">From many friends adieu! adieu!<br /> +The quick heart of the word therein.<br /> +Much that we hope for hangs with you:<br /> +We lose you, but we lose to win.</p> +<h3>III</h3> +<p class="poetry">The beggar-king, November, frets:<br /> +His tatters rich with Indian dyes<br /> +Goes hugging: we our season’s debts<br /> +Pay calmly, of the Spring forewise.</p> +<h3>IV</h3> +<p class="poetry">We send our worthiest; can no less,<br /> +If we would now be read aright,—<br /> +To that great people who may bless<br /> +Or curse mankind: they have the might.</p> +<h3><a name="page3"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 3</span>V</h3> +<p class="poetry">The proudest seasons find their graves,<br /> +And we, who would not be wooed, must court.<br /> +We have let the blunderers and the waves<br /> +Divide us, and the devil had sport.</p> +<h3>VI</h3> +<p class="poetry">The blunderers and the waves no more<br /> +Shall sever kindred sending forth<br /> +Their worthiest from shore to shore<br /> +For welcome, bent to prove their worth.</p> +<h3>VII</h3> +<p class="poetry">Go you and such as you afloat,<br /> +Our lost kinsfellowship to revive.<br /> +The battle of the antidote<br /> +Is tough, though silent: may you thrive!</p> +<h3>VIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">I, when in this North wind I see<br /> +The straining red woods blown awry,<br /> +Feel shuddering like the winter tree,<br /> +All vein and artery on cold sky.</p> +<h3>IX</h3> +<p class="poetry">The leaf that clothed me is torn away;<br /> +My friend is as a flying seed.<br /> +Ay, true; to bring replenished day<br /> +Light ebbs, but I am bare, and bleed.</p> +<h3><a name="page4"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 4</span>X</h3> +<p class="poetry">What husky habitations seem<br /> +These comfortable sayings! they fell,<br /> +In some rich year become a dream:—<br /> +So cries my heart, the infidel! . . .</p> +<h3>XI</h3> +<p class="poetry">Oh! for the strenuous mind in quest,<br /> +Arabian visions could not vie<br /> +With those broad wonders of the West,<br /> +And would I bid you stay? Not I!</p> +<h3>XII</h3> +<p class="poetry">The strange experimental land<br /> +Where men continually dare take<br /> +Niagara leaps;—unshattered stand<br /> +’Twixt fall and fall;—for conscience’ sake,</p> +<h3>XIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">Drive onward like a flood’s +increase;—<br /> +Fresh rapids and abysms engage;—<br /> +(We live—we die) scorn fireside peace,<br /> +And, as a garment, put on rage,</p> +<h3>XIV</h3> +<p class="poetry">Rather than bear God’s reprimand,<br /> +By rearing on a full fat soil<br /> +Concrete of sin and sloth;—this land,<br /> +You will observe it coil in coil.</p> +<h3><a name="page5"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 5</span>XV</h3> +<p class="poetry">The land has been discover’d long,<br /> +The people we have yet to know;<br /> +Themselves they know not, save that strong<br /> +For good and evil still they grow.</p> +<h3>XVI</h3> +<p class="poetry">Nor know they us. Yea, well enough<br /> +In that inveterate machine<br /> +Through which we speak the printed stuff<br /> +Daily, with voice most hugeous, mien</p> +<h3>XVII</h3> +<p class="poetry">Tremendous:—as a lion’s show<br /> +The grand menagerie paintings hide:<br /> +Hear the drum beat, the trombones blow!<br /> +The poor old Lion lies inside! . . .</p> +<h3>XVIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">It is not England that they hear,<br /> +But mighty Mammon’s pipers, trained<br /> +To trumpet out his moods, and stir<br /> +His sluggish soul: <i>her</i> voice is chained:</p> +<h3>XIX</h3> +<p class="poetry">Almost her spirit seems moribund!<br /> +O teach them, ’tis not she displays<br /> +The panic of a purse rotund,<br /> +Eternal dread of evil days,—</p> +<h3><a name="page6"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 6</span>XX</h3> +<p class="poetry">That haunting spectre of success<br /> +Which shows a heart sunk low in the girths:<br /> +Not England answers nobleness,—<br /> +‘Live for thyself: thou art not earth’s.’</p> +<h3>XXI</h3> +<p class="poetry">Not she, when struggling manhood tries<br /> +For freedom, air, a hopefuller fate,<br /> +Points out the planet, Compromise,<br /> +And shakes a mild reproving pate:</p> +<h3>XXII</h3> +<p class="poetry">Says never: ‘I am well at ease,<br /> +My sneers upon the weak I shed:<br /> +The strong have my cajoleries:<br /> +And those beneath my feet I tread.’</p> +<h3>XXIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">Nay, but ’tis said for her, great +Lord!<br /> +The misery’s there! The shameless one<br /> +Adjures mankind to sheathe the sword,<br /> +Herself not yielding what it won:—</p> +<h3>XXIV</h3> +<p class="poetry">Her sermon at cock-crow doth preach,<br /> +On sweet Prosperity—or greed.<br /> +‘Lo! as the beasts feed, each for each,<br /> +God’s blessings let us take, and feed!’</p> +<h3><a name="page7"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 7</span>XXV</h3> +<p class="poetry">Ungrateful creatures crave a part—<br /> +She tells them firmly she is full;<br /> +Lost sheared sheep hurt her tender heart<br /> +With bleating, stops her ears with wool:—</p> +<h3>XXVI</h3> +<p class="poetry">Seized sometimes by prodigious qualms<br /> +(Nightmares of bankruptcy and death),—<br /> +Showers down in lumps a load of alms,<br /> +Then pants as one who has lost a breath;</p> +<h3>XXVII</h3> +<p class="poetry">Believes high heaven, whence favours flow,<br +/> +Too kind to ask a sacrifice<br /> +For what it specially doth bestow;—<br /> +Gives <i>she</i>, ’tis generous, cheese to mice.</p> +<h3>XXVIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">She saw the young Dominion strip<br /> +For battle with a grievous wrong,<br /> +And curled a noble Norman lip,<br /> +And looked with half an eye sidelong;</p> +<h3>XXIX</h3> +<p class="poetry">And in stout Saxon wrote her sneers,<br /> +Denounced the waste of blood and coin,<br /> +Implored the combatants, with tears,<br /> +Never to think they could rejoin.</p> +<h3><a name="page8"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 8</span>XXX</h3> +<p class="poetry">Oh! was it England that, alas!<br /> +Turned sharp the victor to cajole?<br /> +Behold her features in the glass:<br /> +A monstrous semblance mocks her soul!</p> +<h3>XXXI</h3> +<p class="poetry">A false majority, by stealth,<br /> +Have got her fast, and sway the rod:<br /> +A headless tyrant built of wealth,<br /> +The hypocrite, the belly-God.</p> +<h3>XXXII</h3> +<p class="poetry">To him the daily hymns they raise:<br /> +His tastes are sought: his will is done:<br /> +He sniffs the putrid steam of praise,<br /> +Place for true England here is none!</p> +<h3>XXXIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">But can a distant race discern<br /> +The difference ’twixt her and him?<br /> +My friend, that will you bid them learn.<br /> +He shames and binds her, head and limb.</p> +<h3>XXXIV</h3> +<p class="poetry">Old wood has blossoms of this sort.<br /> +Though sound at core, she is old wood.<br /> +If freemen hate her, one retort<br /> +She has; but one!—‘You are my blood.’</p> +<h3><a name="page9"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +9</span>XXXV</h3> +<p class="poetry">A poet, half a prophet, rose<br /> +In recent days, and called for power.<br /> +I love him; but his mountain prose—<br /> +His Alp and valley and wild flower—</p> +<h3>XXXVI</h3> +<p class="poetry">Proclaimed our weakness, not its source.<br /> +What medicine for disease had he?<br /> +Whom summoned for a show of force?<br /> +Our titular aristocracy!</p> +<h3>XXXVII</h3> +<p class="poetry">Why, these are great at City feasts;<br /> +From City riches mainly rise:<br /> +’Tis well to hear them, when the beasts<br /> +That die for us they eulogize!</p> +<h3>XXXVIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">But these, of all the liveried crew<br /> +Obeisant in Mammon’s walk,<br /> +Most deferent ply the facial screw,<br /> +The spinal bend, submissive talk.</p> +<h3>XXXIX</h3> +<p class="poetry">Small fear that they will run to books<br /> +(At least the better form of seed)!<br /> +I, too, have hoped from their good looks,<br /> +And fables of their Northman breed;—</p> +<h3><a name="page10"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +10</span>XL</h3> +<p class="poetry">Have hoped that they the land would head<br /> +In acts magnanimous; but, lo,<br /> +When fainting heroes beg for bread<br /> +They frown: where they are driven they go.</p> +<h3>XLI</h3> +<p class="poetry">Good health, my friend! and may your lot<br /> +Be cheerful o’er the Western rounds.<br /> +This butter-woman’s market-trot<br /> +Of verse is passing market-bounds.</p> +<h3>XLII</h3> +<p class="poetry">Adieu! the sun sets; he is gone.<br /> +On banks of fog faint lines extend:<br /> +Adieu! bring back a braver dawn<br /> +To England, and to me my friend.</p> +<p><i>November</i> 15<i>th</i>, 1867.</p> +<h2><a name="page11"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 11</span>TIME +AND SENTIMENT</h2> +<p class="poetry">I <span class="smcap">see</span> a fair young +couple in a wood,<br /> +And as they go, one bends to take a flower,<br /> +That so may be embalmed their happy hour,<br /> +And in another day, a kindred mood,<br /> +Haply together, or in solitude,<br /> +Recovered what the teeth of Time devour,<br /> +The joy, the bloom, and the illusive power,<br /> +Wherewith by their young blood they are endued<br /> +To move all enviable, framed in May,<br /> +And of an aspect sisterly with Truth:<br /> +Yet seek they with Time’s laughing things to wed:<br /> +Who will be prompted on some pallid day<br /> +To lift the hueless flower and show that dead,<br /> +Even such, and by this token, is their youth.</p> +<h2><a name="page12"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +12</span>LUCIFER IN STARLIGHT</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">On</span> a starred night +Prince Lucifer uprose.<br /> +Tired of his dark dominion swung the fiend<br /> +Above the rolling ball in cloud part screened,<br /> +Where sinners hugged their spectre of repose.<br /> +Poor prey to his hot fit of pride were those.<br /> +And now upon his western wing he leaned,<br /> +Now his huge bulk o’er Afric’s sands careened,<br /> +Now the black planet shadowed Arctic snows.<br /> +Soaring through wider zones that pricked his scars<br /> +With memory of the old revolt from Awe,<br /> +He reached a middle height, and at the stars,<br /> +Which are the brain of heaven, he looked, and sank.<br /> +Around the ancient track marched, rank on rank,<br /> +The army of unalterable law.</p> +<h2>THE STAR SIRIUS</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Bright</span> Sirius! that +when Orion pales<br /> +To dotlings under moonlight still art keen<br /> +With cheerful fervour of a warrior’s mien<br /> +Who holds in his great heart the battle-scales:<br /> +Unquenched of flame though swift the flood assails,<br /> +Reducing many lustrous to the lean:<br /> +Be thou my star, and thou in me be seen<br /> +To show what source divine is, and prevails.<br /> +Long watches through, at one with godly night,<br /> +I mark thee planting joy in constant fire;<br /> +And thy quick beams, whose jets of life inspire<br /> +Life to the spirit, passion for the light,<br /> +Dark Earth since first she lost her lord from sight<br /> +Has viewed and felt them sweep her as a lyre.</p> +<h2><a name="page13"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 13</span>SENSE +AND SPIRIT</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">The</span> senses loving +Earth or well or ill<br /> +Ravel yet more the riddle of our lot.<br /> +The mind is in their trammels, and lights not<br /> +By trimming fear-bred tales; nor does the will<br /> +To find in nature things which less may chill<br /> +An ardour that desires, unknowing what.<br /> +Till we conceive her living we go distraught,<br /> +At best but circle-windsails of a mill.<br /> +Seeing she lives, and of her joy of life<br /> +Creatively has given us blood and breath<br /> +For endless war and never wound unhealed,<br /> +The gloomy Wherefore of our battle-field<br /> +Solves in the Spirit, wrought of her through strife<br /> +To read her own and trust her down to death.</p> +<h2>EARTH’S SECRET</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Not</span> solitarily in +fields we find<br /> +Earth’s secret open, though one page is there;<br /> +Her plainest, such as children spell, and share<br /> +With bird and beast; raised letters for the blind.<br /> +Not where the troubled passions toss the mind,<br /> +In turbid cities, can the key be bare.<br /> +It hangs for those who hither thither fare,<br /> +Close interthreading nature with our kind.<br /> +They, hearing History speak, of what men were,<br /> +And have become, are wise. The gain is great<br /> +In vision and solidity; it lives.<br /> +Yet at a thought of life apart from her,<br /> +Solidity and vision lose their state,<br /> +For Earth, that gives the milk, the spirit gives.</p> +<h2><a name="page14"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +14</span>INTERNAL HARMONY</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Assured</span> of +worthiness we do not dread<br /> +Competitors; we rather give them hail<br /> +And greeting in the lists where we may fail:<br /> +Must, if we bear an aim beyond the head!<br /> +My betters are my masters: purely fed<br /> +By their sustainment I likewise shall scale<br /> +Some rocky steps between the mount and vale;<br /> +Meanwhile the mark I have and I will wed.<br /> +So that I draw the breath of finer air,<br /> +Station is nought, nor footways laurel-strewn,<br /> +Nor rivals tightly belted for the race.<br /> +Good speed to them! My place is here or there;<br /> +My pride is that among them I have place:<br /> +And thus I keep this instrument in tune.</p> +<h2>GRACE AND LOVE</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Two</span> flower-enfolding +crystal vases she<br /> +I love fills daily, mindful but of one:<br /> +And close behind pale morn she, like the sun<br /> +Priming our world with light, pours, sweet to see,<br /> +Clear water in the cup, and into me<br /> +The image of herself: and that being done,<br /> +Choice of what blooms round her fair garden run<br /> +In climbers or in creepers or the tree<br /> +She ranges with unerring fingers fine,<br /> +To harmony so vivid that through sight<br /> +I hear, I have her heavenliness to fold<br /> +Beyond the senses, where such love as mine,<br /> +Such grace as hers, should the strange Fates withhold<br /> +Their starry more from her and me, unite.</p> +<h2><a name="page15"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +15</span>APPRECIATION</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Earth</span> was not Earth +before her sons appeared,<br /> +Nor Beauty Beauty ere young Love was born:<br /> +And thou when I lay hidden wast as morn<br /> +At city-windows, touching eyelids bleared;<br /> +To none by her fresh wingedness endeared;<br /> +Unwelcome unto revellers outworn.<br /> +I the last echoes of Diana’s horn<br /> +In woodland heard, and saw thee come, and cheered.<br /> +No longer wast thou then mere light, fair soul!<br /> +And more than simple duty moved thy feet.<br /> +New colours rose in thee, from fear, from shame,<br /> +From hope, effused: though not less pure a scroll<br /> +May men read on the heart I taught to beat:<br /> +That change in thee, if not thyself, I claim.</p> +<h2>THE DISCIPLINE OF WISDOM</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Rich</span> labour is the +struggle to be wise,<br /> +While we make sure the struggle cannot cease.<br /> +Else better were it in some bower of peace<br /> +Slothful to swing, contending with the flies.<br /> +You point at Wisdom fixed on lofty skies,<br /> +As mid barbarian hordes a sculptured Greece:<br /> +She falls. To live and shine, she grows her fleece,<br /> +Is shorn, and rubs with follies and with lies.<br /> +So following her, your hewing may attain<br /> +The right to speak unto the mute, and shun<br /> +That sly temptation of the illumined brain,<br /> +Deliveries oracular, self-spun.<br /> +Who sweats not with the flock will seek in vain<br /> +To shed the words which are ripe fruit of sun.</p> +<h2><a name="page16"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 16</span>THE +STATE OF AGE</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Rub</span> thou thy +battered lamp: nor claim nor beg<br /> +Honours from aught about thee. Light the young.<br /> +Thy frame is as a dusty mantle hung,<br /> +O grey one! pendant on a loosened peg.<br /> +Thou art for this our life an ancient egg,<br /> +Or a tough bird: thou hast a rudderless tongue,<br /> +Turning dead trifles, like the cock of dung,<br /> +Which runs, Time’s contrast to thy halting leg.<br /> +Nature, it is most sure, not thee admires.<br /> +But hast thou in thy season set her fires<br /> +To burn from Self to Spirit through the lash,<br /> +Honoured the sons of Earth shall hold thee high:<br /> +Yea, to spread light when thy proud letter I<br /> +Drops prone and void as any thoughtless dash.</p> +<h2>PROGRESS</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">In</span> Progress you have +little faith, say you:<br /> +Men will maintain dear interests, wreak base hates,<br /> +By force, and gentle women choose their mates<br /> +Most amorously from the gilded fighting crew:<br /> +The human heart Bellona’s mad halloo<br /> +Will ever fire to dicing with the Fates.<br /> +‘Now at this time,’ says History, ‘those two +States<br /> +Stood ready their past wrestling to renew.<br /> +They sharpened arms and showed them, like the brutes<br /> +Whose haunches quiver. But a yellow blight<br /> +Fell on their waxing harvests. They deferred<br /> +The bloody settlement of their disputes<br /> +Till God should bless them better.’ They did +right.<br /> +And naming Progress, both shall have the word.</p> +<h2><a name="page17"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 17</span>THE +WORLD’S ADVANCE</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Judge</span> mildly the +tasked world; and disincline<br /> +To brand it, for it bears a heavy pack.<br /> +You have perchance observed the inebriate’s track<br /> +At night when he has quitted the inn-sign:<br /> +He plays diversions on the homeward line,<br /> +Still that way bent albeit his legs are slack:<br /> +A hedge may take him, but he turns not back,<br /> +Nor turns this burdened world, of curving spine.<br /> +‘Spiral,’ the memorable Lady terms<br /> +Our mind’s ascent: our world’s advance presents<br /> +That figure on a flat; the way of worms.<br /> +Cherish the promise of its good intents,<br /> +And warn it, not one instinct to efface<br /> +Ere Reason ripens for the vacant place.</p> +<h2>A CERTAIN PEOPLE</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">As</span> Puritans they +prominently wax,<br /> +And none more kindly gives and takes hard knocks.<br /> +Strong psalmic chanting, like to nasal cocks,<br /> +They join to thunderings of their hearty thwacks.<br /> +But naughtiness, with hoggery, not lacks<br /> +When Peace another door in them unlocks,<br /> +Where conscience shows the eyeing of an ox<br /> +Grown dully apprehensive of an Axe.<br /> +Graceless they are when gone to frivolousness,<br /> +Fearing the God they flout, the God they glut.<br /> +They need their pious exercises less<br /> +Than schooling in the Pleasures: fair belief<br /> +That these are devilish only to their thief,<br /> +Charged with an Axe nigh on the occiput.</p> +<h2><a name="page18"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 18</span>THE +GARDEN OF EPICURUS</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">That</span> Garden of +sedate Philosophy<br /> +Once flourished, fenced from passion and mishap,<br /> +A shining spot upon a shaggy map;<br /> +Where mind and body, in fair junction free,<br /> +Luted their joyful concord; like the tree<br /> +From root to flowering twigs a flowing sap.<br /> +Clear Wisdom found in tended Nature’s lap<br /> +Of gentlemen the happy nursery.<br /> +That Garden would on light supremest verge,<br /> +Were the long drawing of an equal breath<br /> +Healthful for Wisdom’s head, her heart, her aims.<br /> +Our world which for its Babels wants a scourge,<br /> +And for its wilds a husbandman, acclaims<br /> +The crucifix that came of Nazareth.</p> +<h2>A LATER ALEXANDRIAN</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">An</span> inspiration +caught from dubious hues<br /> +Filled him, and mystic wrynesses he chased;<br /> +For they lead farther than the single-faced,<br /> +Wave subtler promise when desire pursues.<br /> +The moon of cloud discoloured was his Muse,<br /> +His pipe the reed of the old moaning waste.<br /> +Love was to him with anguish fast enlaced,<br /> +And Beauty where she walked blood-shot the dews.<br /> +Men railed at such a singer; women thrilled<br /> +Responsively: he sang not Nature’s own<br /> +Divinest, but his lyric had a tone,<br /> +As ’twere a forest-echo of her voice:<br /> +What barrenly they yearn for seemed distilled<br /> +From what they dread, who do through tears rejoice.</p> +<h2><a name="page19"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 19</span>AN +ORSON OF THE MUSE</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Her</span> son, albeit the +Muse’s livery<br /> +And measured courtly paces rouse his taunts,<br /> +Naked and hairy in his savage haunts,<br /> +To Nature only will he bend the knee;<br /> +Spouting the founts of her distillery<br /> +Like rough rock-sources; and his woes and wants<br /> +Being Nature’s, civil limitation daunts<br /> +His utterance never; the nymphs blush, not he.<br /> +Him, when he blows of Earth, and Man, and Fate,<br /> +The Muse will hearken to with graver ear<br /> +Than many of her train can waken: him<br /> +Would fain have taught what fruitful things and dear<br /> +Must sink beneath the tidewaves, of their weight,<br /> +If in no vessel built for sea they swim.</p> +<h2>THE POINT OF TASTE</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Unhappy</span> poets of a +sunken prime!<br /> +You to reviewers are as ball to bat.<br /> +They shadow you with Homer, knock you flat<br /> +With Shakespeare: bludgeons brainingly sublime<br /> +On you the excommunicates of Rhyme,<br /> +Because you sing not in the living Fat.<br /> +The wiry whizz of an intrusive gnat<br /> +Is verse that shuns their self-producing time.<br /> +Sound them their clocks, with loud alarum trump,<br /> +Or watches ticking temporal at their fobs,<br /> +You win their pleased attention. But, bright God<br /> +O’ the lyre, what bully-drawlers they applaud!<br /> +Rather for us a tavern-catch, and bump<br /> +Chorus where Lumpkin with his Giles hobnobs.</p> +<h2><a name="page20"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +20</span>CAMELUS SALTAT</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">What</span> say you, +critic, now you have become<br /> +An author and maternal?—in this trap<br /> +(To quote you) of poor hollow folk who rap<br /> +On instruments as like as drum to drum.<br /> +You snarled tut-tut for welcome to tum-tum,<br /> +So like the nose fly-teased in its noon’s nap.<br /> +You scratched an insect-slaughtering thunder-clap<br /> +With that between the fingers and the thumb.<br /> +It seemeth mad to quit the Olympian couch,<br /> +Which bade our public gobble or reject.<br /> +O spectacle of Peter, shrewdly pecked,<br /> +Piper, by his own pepper from his pouch!<br /> +What of the sneer, the jeer, the voice austere,<br /> +You dealt?—the voice austere, the jeer, the sneer.</p> +<h2>CONTINUED</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Oracle</span> of the +market! thence you drew<br /> +The taste which stamped you guide of the inept.—<br /> +A North-sea pilot, Hildebrand yclept,<br /> +A sturdy and a briny, once men knew.<br /> +He loved small beer, and for that copious brew,<br /> +To roll ingurgitation till he slept,<br /> +Rations exchanged with flavour for the adept:<br /> +And merrily plied him captain, mate and crew.<br /> +At last this dancer to the Polar star<br /> +Sank, washed out within, and overboard was pitched,<br /> +To drink the sea and pilot him to land.<br /> +O captain-critic! printed, neatly stitched,<br /> +Know while the pillory-eggs fly fast, they are<br /> +Not eggs, but the drowned soul of Hildebrand.</p> +<h2><a name="page21"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 21</span>MY +THEME</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Of</span> me and of my +theme think what thou wilt:<br /> +The song of gladness one straight bolt can check.<br /> +But I have never stood at Fortune’s beck:<br /> +Were she and her light crew to run atilt<br /> +At my poor holding little would be spilt;<br /> +Small were the praise for singing o’er that wreck.<br /> +Who courts her dooms to strife his bended neck;<br /> +He grasps a blade, not always by the hilt.<br /> +Nathless she strikes at random, can be fell<br /> +With other than those votaries she deals<br /> +The black or brilliant from her thunder-rift.<br /> +I say but that this love of Earth reveals<br /> +A soul beside our own to quicken, quell,<br /> +Irradiate, and through ruinous floods uplift.</p> +<h2>CONTINUED</h2> +<p class="poetry">’<span class="smcap">Tis</span> true the +wisdom that my mind exacts<br /> +Through contemplation from a heart unbent<br /> +By many tempests may be stained and rent:<br /> +The summer flies it mightily attracts.<br /> +Yet they seem choicer than your sons of facts,<br /> +Which scarce give breathing of the sty’s content<br /> +For their diurnal carnal nourishment:<br /> +Which treat with Nature in official pacts.<br /> +The deader body Nature could proclaim.<br /> +Much life have neither. Let the heavens of wrath<br /> +Rattle, then both scud scattering to froth.<br /> +But during calms the flies of idle aim<br /> +Less put the spirit out, less baffle thirst<br /> +For light than swinish grunters, blest or curst.</p> +<h2><a name="page22"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 22</span>ON THE +DANGER OF WAR</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Avert</span>, High Wisdom, +never vainly wooed,<br /> +This threat of War, that shows a land brain-sick.<br /> +When nations gain the pitch where rhetoric<br /> +Seems reason they are ripe for cannon’s food.<br /> +Dark looms the issue though the cause be good,<br /> +But with the doubt ’tis our old devil’s trick.<br /> +O now the down-slope of the lunatic<br /> +Illumine lest we redden of that brood.<br /> +For not since man in his first view of thee<br /> +Ascended to the heavens giving sign<br /> +Within him of deep sky and sounded sea,<br /> +Did he unforfeiting thy laws transgress;<br /> +In peril of his blood his ears incline<br /> +To drums whose loudness is their emptiness.</p> +<h2><a name="page23"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 23</span>TO +CARDINAL MANNING</h2> +<p class="poetry">I, <span class="smcap">wakeful</span> for the +skylark voice in men,<br /> +Or straining for the angel of the light,<br /> +Rebuked am I by hungry ear and sight,<br /> +When I behold one lamp that through our fen<br /> +Goes hourly where most noisome; hear again<br /> +A tongue that loathsomeness will not affright<br /> +From speaking to the soul of us forthright<br /> +What things our craven senses keep from ken.<br /> +This is the doing of the Christ; the way<br /> +He went on earth; the service above guile<br /> +To prop a tyrant creed: it sings, it shines;<br /> +Cries to the Mammonites: Allay, allay<br /> +Such misery as by these present signs<br /> +Brings vengeance down; nor them who rouse revile.</p> +<h2><a name="page24"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 24</span>TO +COLONEL CHARLES<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">(DYING GENERAL C.B.B.)</span></h2> +<h3>I</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">An</span> English heart, my +commandant,<br /> +A soldier’s eye you have, awake<br /> +To right and left; with looks askant<br /> +On bulwarks not of adamant,<br /> +Where white our Channel waters break.</p> +<h3>II</h3> +<p class="poetry">Where Grisnez winks at Dungeness<br /> +Across the ruffled strip of salt,<br /> +You look, and like the prospect less.<br /> +On men and guns would you lay stress,<br /> +To bid the Island’s foemen halt.</p> +<h3>III</h3> +<p class="poetry">While loud the Year is raising cry<br /> +At birth to know if it must bear<br /> +In history the bloody dye,<br /> +An English heart, a soldier’s eye,<br /> +For the old country first will care.</p> +<h3>IV</h3> +<p class="poetry">And how stands she, artillerist,<br /> +Among the vapours waxing dense,<br /> +With cannon charged? ’Tis hist! and hist!<br /> +And now she screws a gouty fist,<br /> +And now she counts to clutch her pence.</p> +<h3><a name="page25"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 25</span>V</h3> +<p class="poetry">With shudders chill as aconite,<br /> +The couchant chewer of the cud<br /> +Will start at times in pussy fright<br /> +Before the dogs, when reads her sprite<br /> +The streaks predicting streams of blood.</p> +<h3>VI</h3> +<p class="poetry">She thinks they may mean something; thinks<br +/> +They may mean nothing: haply both.<br /> +Where darkness all her daylight drinks,<br /> +She fain would find a leader lynx,<br /> +Not too much taxing mental sloth.</p> +<h3>VII</h3> +<p class="poetry">Cleft like the fated house in twain,<br /> +One half is, Arm! and one, Retrench!<br /> +Gambetta’s word on dull MacMahon:<br /> +‘The cow that sees a passing train’:<br /> +So spies she Russian, German, French.</p> +<h3>VIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">She? no, her weakness: she unbraced<br /> +Among those athletes fronting storms!<br /> +The muscles less of steel than paste,<br /> +Why, they of nature feel distaste<br /> +For flash, much more for push, of arms.</p> +<h3>IX</h3> +<p class="poetry">The poet sings, and well know we,<br /> +That ‘iron draws men after it.’<br /> +But towering wealth may seem the tree<br /> +Which bears the fruit <i>Indemnity</i>,<br /> +And draw as fast as battle’s fit,</p> +<h3><a name="page26"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 26</span>X</h3> +<p class="poetry">If feeble be the hand on guard,<br /> +Alas, alas! And nations are<br /> +Still the mad forces, though the scarred.<br /> +Should they once deem our emblem Pard<br /> +Wagger of tail for all save war;—</p> +<h3>XI</h3> +<p class="poetry">Mechanically screwed to flail<br /> +His flanks by Presses conjuring fear;—<br /> +A money-bag with head and tail;—<br /> +Too late may valour then avail!<br /> +As you beheld, my cannonier,</p> +<h3>XII</h3> +<p class="poetry">When with the staff of Benedek,<br /> +On the plateau of Königgrätz,<br /> +You saw below that wedgeing speck;<br /> +Foresaw proud Austria rammed to wreck,<br /> +Where Chlum drove deep in smoky jets.</p> +<p><i>February</i> 1887.</p> +<h2><a name="page27"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 27</span>TO +CHILDREN: FOR TYRANTS</h2> +<h3>I</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Strike</span> not thy dog +with a stick!<br /> + I did it yesterday:<br /> +Not to undo though I gained<br /> +The Paradise: heavy it rained<br /> + On Kobold’s flanks, and he lay.</p> +<h3>II</h3> +<p class="poetry">Little Bruno, our long-ear pup,<br /> + From his hunt had come back to my heel.<br /> +I heard a sharp worrying sound,<br /> +And Bruno foamed on the ground,<br /> + With Koby as making a meal.</p> +<h3>III</h3> +<p class="poetry">I did what I could not undo<br /> + Were the gates of the Paradise shut<br /> +Behind me: I deemed it was just.<br /> +I left Koby crouched in the dust,<br /> + Some yards from the woodman’s hut.</p> +<h3>IV</h3> +<p class="poetry">He bewhimpered his welting, and I<br /> + Scarce thought it enough for him: so,<br /> +By degrees, through the upper box-grove,<br /> +Within me an old story hove,<br /> + Of a man and a dog: you shall know.</p> +<h3><a name="page28"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 28</span>V</h3> +<p class="poetry">The dog was of novel breed,<br /> + The Shannon retriever, untried:<br /> +His master, an old Irish lord,<br /> +In an oaken armchair snored<br /> + At midnight, whisky beside.</p> +<h3>VI</h3> +<p class="poetry">Perched up a desolate tower,<br /> + Where the black storm-wind was a whip<br /> +To set it nigh spinning, these two<br /> +Were alone, like the last of a crew,<br /> + Outworn in a wave-beaten ship.</p> +<h3>VII</h3> +<p class="poetry">The dog lifted muzzle, and sniffed;<br /> + He quitted his couch on the rug,<br /> +Nose to floor, nose aloft; whined, barked;<br /> +And, finding the signals unmarked,<br /> + Caught a hand in a death-grapple tug.</p> +<h3>VIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">He pulled till his master jumped<br /> + For fury of wrath, and laid on<br /> +With the length of a tough knotted staff,<br /> +Fit to drive the life flying like chaff,<br /> + And leave a sheer carcase anon.</p> +<h3>IX</h3> +<p class="poetry">That done, he sat, panted, and cursed<br /> + The vile cross of this brute: nevermore<br /> +Would he house it to rear such a cur!<br /> +The dog dragged his legs, pained to stir,<br /> + Eyed his master, dropped, barked at the door.</p> +<h3><a name="page29"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 29</span>X</h3> +<p class="poetry">Then his master raised head too, and +sniffed:<br /> + It struck him the dog had a sense<br /> +That honoured both dam and sire.<br /> +You have guessed how the tower was afire.<br /> + The Shannon retriever dates thence.</p> +<h3>XI</h3> +<p class="poetry">I mused: saw the pup ease his heart<br /> + Of his instinct for chasing, and sink<br /> +Overwrought by excitement so new:<br /> +A scene that for Koby to view<br /> + Was the seizure of nerves in a link.</p> +<h3>XII</h3> +<p class="poetry">And part sympathetic, and part<br /> + Imitatively, raged my poor brute;<br /> +And I, not thinking of ill,<br /> +Doing eviller: nerves are still<br /> + Our savage too quick at the root.</p> +<h3>XIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">They spring us: I proved it, albeit<br /> + I played executioner then<br /> +For discipline, justice, the like.<br /> +Yon stick I had handy to strike<br /> + Should have warned of the tyrant in men.</p> +<h3>XIV</h3> +<p class="poetry">You read in your History books,<br /> + How the Prince in his youth had a mind<br /> +For governing gently his land.<br /> +Ah, the use of that weapon at hand,<br /> + When the temper is other than kind!</p> +<h3><a name="page30"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +30</span>XV</h3> +<p class="poetry">At home all was well; Koby’s ribs<br /> + Not so sore as my thoughts: if, beguiled,<br /> +He forgives me, his criminal air<br /> +Throws a shade of Llewellyn’s despair<br /> + For the hound slain for saving his child.</p> +<h2><a name="page31"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 31</span>POEMS +AND LYRICS OF THE JOY OF EARTH</h2> +<h3><a name="page33"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 33</span>THE +WOODS OF WESTERMAIN</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Enter</span> these +enchanted woods,<br /> + You who dare.<br /> +Nothing harms beneath the leaves<br /> +More than waves a swimmer cleaves.<br /> +Toss your heart up with the lark,<br /> +Foot at peace with mouse and worm,<br /> + Fair you fare.<br /> +Only at a dread of dark<br /> +Quaver, and they quit their form:<br /> +Thousand eyeballs under hoods<br /> + Have you by the hair.<br /> +Enter these enchanted woods,<br /> + You who dare.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Here the snake across your path<br /> +Stretches in his golden bath:<br /> +Mossy-footed squirrels leap<br /> +Soft as winnowing plumes of Sleep:<br /> +Yaffles on a chuckle skim<br /> +Low to laugh from branches dim:<br /> +Up the pine, where sits the star,<br /> +Rattles deep the moth-winged jar.<br /> +Each has business of his own;<br /> +But should you distrust a tone,<br /> + Then beware.<br /> +<a name="page34"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 34</span>Shudder +all the haunted roods,<br /> +All the eyeballs under hoods<br /> + Shroud you in their glare.<br /> +Enter these enchanted woods,<br /> + You who dare.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Open hither, open hence,<br /> +Scarce a bramble weaves a fence,<br /> +Where the strawberry runs red,<br /> +With white star-flower overhead;<br /> +Cumbered by dry twig and cone,<br /> +Shredded husks of seedlings flown,<br /> +Mine of mole and spotted flint:<br /> +Of dire wizardry no hint,<br /> +Save mayhap the print that shows<br /> +Hasty outward-tripping toes,<br /> +Heels to terror on the mould.<br /> +These, the woods of Westermain,<br /> +Are as others to behold,<br /> +Rich of wreathing sun and rain;<br /> +Foliage lustreful around<br /> +Shadowed leagues of slumbering sound.<br /> +Wavy tree-tops, yellow whins,<br /> +Shelter eager minikins,<br /> +Myriads, free to peck and pipe:<br /> +Would you better? would you worse?<br /> +You with them may gather ripe<br /> +Pleasures flowing not from purse.<br /> +Quick and far as Colour flies<br /> +Taking the delighted eyes,<br /> +You of any well that springs<br /> +May unfold the heaven of things;<br /> +Have it homely and within,<br /> +And thereof its likeness win,<br /> +<a name="page35"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 35</span>Will you +so in soul’s desire:<br /> +This do sages grant t’ the lyre.<br /> +This is being bird and more,<br /> +More than glad musician this;<br /> +Granaries you will have a store<br /> +Past the world of woe and bliss;<br /> +Sharing still its bliss and woe;<br /> +Harnessed to its hungers, no.<br /> +On the throne Success usurps,<br /> +You shall seat the joy you feel<br /> +Where a race of water chirps,<br /> +Twisting hues of flourished steel:<br /> +Or where light is caught in hoop<br /> +Up a clearing’s leafy rise,<br /> +Where the crossing deerherds troop<br /> +Classic splendours, knightly dyes.<br /> +Or, where old-eyed oxen chew<br /> +Speculation with the cud,<br /> +Read their pool of vision through,<br /> +Back to hours when mind was mud;<br /> +Nigh the knot, which did untwine<br /> +Timelessly to drowsy suns;<br /> +Seeing Earth a slimy spine,<br /> +Heaven a space for winging tons.<br /> +Farther, deeper, may you read,<br /> +Have you sight for things afield,<br /> +Where peeps she, the Nurse of seed,<br /> +Cloaked, but in the peep revealed;<br /> +Showing a kind face and sweet:<br /> +Look you with the soul you see’t.<br /> +Glory narrowing to grace,<br /> +Grace to glory magnified,<br /> +Following that will you embrace<br /> +Close in arms or aëry wide.<br /> +Banished is the white Foam-born<br /> +<a name="page36"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 36</span>Not from +here, nor under ban<br /> +Phoebus lyrist, Phoebe’s horn,<br /> +Pipings of the reedy Pan.<br /> +Loved of Earth of old they were,<br /> +Loving did interpret her;<br /> +And the sterner worship bars<br /> +None whom Song has made her stars.<br /> +You have seen the huntress moon<br /> +Radiantly facing dawn,<br /> +Dusky meads between them strewn<br /> +Glimmering like downy awn:<br /> +Argent Westward glows the hunt,<br /> +East the blush about to climb;<br /> +One another fair they front,<br /> +Transient, yet outshine the time;<br /> +Even as dewlight off the rose<br /> +In the mind a jewel sows.<br /> +Thus opposing grandeurs live<br /> +Here if Beauty be their dower:<br /> +Doth she of her spirit give,<br /> +Fleetingness will spare her flower.<br /> +This is in the tune we play,<br /> +Which no spring of strength would quell;<br /> +In subduing does not slay;<br /> +Guides the channel, guards the well:<br /> +Tempered holds the young blood-heat,<br /> +Yet through measured grave accord,<br /> +Hears the heart of wildness beat<br /> +Like a centaur’s hoof on sward.<br /> +Drink the sense the notes infuse,<br /> +You a larger self will find:<br /> +Sweetest fellowship ensues<br /> +With the creatures of your kind.<br /> +Ay, and Love, if Love it be<br /> +Flaming over <i>I</i> and <i>ME</i>,<br /> +<a name="page37"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 37</span>Love meet +they who do not shove<br /> +Cravings in the van of Love.<br /> +Courtly dames are here to woo,<br /> +Knowing love if it be true.<br /> +Reverence the blossom-shoot<br /> +Fervently, they are the fruit.<br /> +Mark them stepping, hear them talk,<br /> +Goddess, is no myth inane,<br /> +You will say of those who walk<br /> +In the woods of Westermain.<br /> +Waters that from throat and thigh<br /> +Dart the sun his arrows back;<br /> +Leaves that on a woodland sigh<br /> +Chat of secret things no lack;<br /> +Shadowy branch-leaves, waters clear,<br /> +Bare or veiled they move sincere;<br /> +Not by slavish terrors tripped<br /> +Being anew in nature dipped,<br /> +Growths of what they step on, these;<br /> +With the roots the grace of trees.<br /> +Casket-breasts they give, nor hide,<br /> +For a tyrant’s flattered pride,<br /> +Mind, which nourished not by light,<br /> +Lurks the shuffling trickster sprite:<br /> +Whereof are strange tales to tell;<br /> +Some in blood writ, tombed in bell.<br /> +Here the ancient battle ends,<br /> +Joining two astonished friends,<br /> +Who the kiss can give and take<br /> +With more warmth than in that world<br /> +Where the tiger claws the snake,<br /> +Snake her tiger clasps infurled,<br /> +And the issue of their fight<br /> +People lands in snarling plight.<br /> +Here her splendid beast she leads<br /> +<a name="page38"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +38</span>Silken-leashed and decked with weeds<br /> +Wild as he, but breathing faint<br /> +Sweetness of unfelt constraint.<br /> +Love, the great volcano, flings<br /> +Fires of lower Earth to sky;<br /> +Love, the sole permitted, sings<br /> +Sovereignly of <i>ME</i> and <i>I</i>.<br /> +Bowers he has of sacred shade,<br /> +Spaces of superb parade,<br /> +Voiceful . . . But bring you a note<br /> +Wrangling, howsoe’er remote,<br /> +Discords out of discord spin<br /> +Round and round derisive din:<br /> +Sudden will a pallor pant<br /> +Chill at screeches miscreant;<br /> +Owls or spectres, thick they flee;<br /> +Nightmare upon horror broods;<br /> +Hooded laughter, monkish glee,<br /> + Gaps the vital air.<br /> +Enter these enchanted woods<br /> + You who dare.</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">You must love the light so well<br /> +That no darkness will seem fell.<br /> +Love it so you could accost<br /> +Fellowly a livid ghost.<br /> +Whish! the phantom wisps away,<br /> +Owns him smoke to cocks of day.<br /> +In your breast the light must burn<br /> +Fed of you, like corn in quern<br /> +Ever plumping while the wheel<br /> +Speeds the mill and drains the meal.<br /> +<a name="page39"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 39</span>Light to +light sees little strange,<br /> +Only features heavenly new;<br /> +Then you touch the nerve of Change,<br /> +Then of Earth you have the clue;<br /> +Then her two-sexed meanings melt<br /> +Through you, wed the thought and felt.<br /> +Sameness locks no scurfy pond<br /> +Here for Custom, crazy-fond:<br /> +Change is on the wing to bud<br /> +Rose in brain from rose in blood.<br /> +Wisdom throbbing shall you see<br /> +Central in complexity;<br /> +From her pasture ’mid the beasts<br /> +Rise to her ethereal feasts,<br /> +Not, though lightnings track your wit<br /> +Starward, scorning them you quit:<br /> +For be sure the bravest wing<br /> +Preens it in our common spring,<br /> +Thence along the vault to soar,<br /> +You with others, gathering more,<br /> +Glad of more, till you reject<br /> +Your proud title of elect,<br /> +Perilous even here while few<br /> +Roam the arched greenwood with you.<br /> + Heed that snare.<br /> +Muffled by his cavern-cowl<br /> +Squats the scaly Dragon-fowl,<br /> +Who was lord ere light you drank,<br /> +And lest blood of knightly rank<br /> +Stream, let not your fair princess<br /> +Stray: he holds the leagues in stress,<br /> + Watches keenly there.<br /> +Oft has he been riven; slain<br /> +Is no force in Westermain.<br /> +Wait, and we shall forge him curbs,<br /> +<a name="page40"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 40</span>Put his +fangs to uses, tame,<br /> +Teach him, quick as cunning herbs,<br /> +How to cure him sick and lame.<br /> +Much restricted, much enringed,<br /> +Much he frets, the hooked and winged,<br /> + Never known to spare.<br /> +’Tis enough: the name of Sage<br /> +Hits no thing in nature, nought;<br /> +Man the least, save when grave Age<br /> +From yon Dragon guards his thought.<br /> +Eye him when you hearken dumb<br /> +To what words from Wisdom come.<br /> +When she says how few are by<br /> +Listening to her, eye his eye.<br /> + Self, his name declare.<br /> +Him shall Change, transforming late,<br /> +Wonderously renovate.<br /> +Hug himself the creature may:<br /> +What he hugs is loathed decay.<br /> +Crying, slip thy scales, and slough!<br /> +Change will strip his armour off;<br /> +Make of him who was all maw,<br /> +Inly only thrilling-shrewd,<br /> +Such a servant as none saw<br /> +Through his days of dragonhood.<br /> +Days when growling o’er his bone,<br /> +Sharpened he for mine and thine;<br /> +Sensitive within alone;<br /> +Scaly as the bark of pine.<br /> +Change, the strongest son of Life,<br /> +Has the Spirit here to wife.<br /> +Lo, their young of vivid breed,<br /> +Bear the lights that onward speed,<br /> +Threading thickets, mounting glades,<br /> +Up the verdurous colonnades,<br /> +<a name="page41"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 41</span>Round the +fluttered curves, and down,<br /> +Out of sight of Earth’s blue crown,<br /> +Whither, in her central space,<br /> +Spouts the Fount and Lure o’ the chase.<br /> +Fount unresting, Lure divine!<br /> +There meet all: too late look most.<br /> +Fire in water hued as wine,<br /> +Springs amid a shadowy host,<br /> +Circled: one close-headed mob,<br /> +Breathless, scanning divers heaps,<br /> +Where a Heart begins to throb,<br /> +Where it ceases, slow, with leaps.<br /> +And ’tis very strange, ’tis said,<br /> +How you spy in each of them<br /> +Semblance of that Dragon red,<br /> +As the oak in bracken-stem.<br /> +And, ’tis said, how each and each:<br /> +Which commences, which subsides:<br /> +First my Dragon! doth beseech<br /> +Her who food for all provides.<br /> +And she answers with no sign;<br /> +Utters neither yea nor nay;<br /> +Fires the water hued as wine;<br /> +Kneads another spark in clay.<br /> +Terror is about her hid;<br /> +Silence of the thunders locked;<br /> +Lightnings lining the shut lid;<br /> +Fixity on quaking rocked.<br /> +Lo, you look at Flow and Drought<br /> +Interflashed and interwrought:<br /> +Ended is begun, begun<br /> +Ended, quick as torrents run.<br /> +Young Impulsion spouts to sink;<br /> +Luridness and lustre link;<br /> +’Tis your come and go of breath;<br /> +<a name="page42"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 42</span>Mirrored +pants the Life, the Death;<br /> +Each of either reaped and sown:<br /> +Rosiest rosy wanes to crone.<br /> +See you so? your senses drift;<br /> +’Tis a shuttle weaving swift.<br /> +Look with spirit past the sense,<br /> +Spirit shines in permanence.<br /> +That is She, the view of whom<br /> +Is the dust within the tomb,<br /> +Is the inner blush above,<br /> +Look to loathe, or look to love;<br /> +Think her Lump, or know her Flame;<br /> +Dread her scourge, or read her aim;<br /> +Shoot your hungers from their nerve;<br /> +Or, in her example, serve.<br /> +Some have found her sitting grave;<br /> +Laughing, some; or, browed with sweat,<br /> +Hurling dust of fool and knave<br /> +In a hissing smithy’s jet.<br /> +More it were not well to speak;<br /> +Burn to see, you need but seek.<br /> +Once beheld she gives the key<br /> +Airing every doorway, she.<br /> +Little can you stop or steer<br /> +Ere of her you are the seër.<br /> +On the surface she will witch,<br /> +Rendering Beauty yours, but gaze<br /> +Under, and the soul is rich<br /> +Past computing, past amaze.<br /> +Then is courage that endures<br /> +Even her awful tremble yours.<br /> +Then, the reflex of that Fount<br /> +Spied below, will Reason mount<br /> +Lordly and a quenchless force,<br /> +Lighting Pain to its mad source,<br /> +<a name="page43"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 43</span>Scaring +Fear till Fear escapes,<br /> +Shot through all its phantom shapes.<br /> +Then your spirit will perceive<br /> +Fleshly seed of fleshly sins;<br /> +Where the passions interweave,<br /> +How the serpent tangle spins<br /> +Of the sense of Earth misprised,<br /> +Brainlessly unrecognized;<br /> +She being Spirit in her clods,<br /> +Footway to the God of Gods.<br /> +Then for you are pleasures pure,<br /> +Sureties as the stars are sure:<br /> +Not the wanton beckoning flags<br /> +Which, of flattery and delight,<br /> +Wax to the grim Habit-Hags<br /> +Riding souls of men to night:<br /> +Pleasures that through blood run sane,<br /> +Quickening spirit from the brain.<br /> +Each of each in sequent birth,<br /> +Blood and brain and spirit, three,<br /> +(Say the deepest gnomes of Earth),<br /> +Join for true felicity.<br /> +Are they parted, then expect<br /> +Some one sailing will be wrecked:<br /> +Separate hunting are they sped,<br /> +Scan the morsel coveted.<br /> +Earth that Triad is: she hides<br /> +Joy from him who that divides;<br /> +Showers it when the three are one<br /> +Glassing her in union.<br /> +Earth your haven, Earth your helm,<br /> +You command a double realm;<br /> +Labouring here to pay your debt,<br /> +Till your little sun shall set;<br /> +Leaving her the future task:<br /> +<a name="page44"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 44</span>Loving her +too well to ask.<br /> +Eglantine that climbs the yew,<br /> +She her darkest wreathes for those<br /> +Knowing her the Ever-new,<br /> +And themselves the kin o’ the rose.<br /> +Life, the chisel, axe and sword,<br /> +Wield who have her depths explored:<br /> +Life, the dream, shall be their robe<br /> +Large as air about the globe;<br /> +Life, the question, hear its cry<br /> +Echoed with concordant Why;<br /> +Life, the small self-dragon ramped,<br /> +Thrill for service to be stamped.<br /> +Ay, and over every height<br /> +Life for them shall wave a wand:<br /> +That, the last, where sits affright,<br /> +Homely shows the stream beyond.<br /> +Love the light and be its lynx,<br /> +You will track her and attain;<br /> +Read her as no cruel Sphinx<br /> +In the woods of Westermain,<br /> +Daily fresh the woods are ranged;<br /> +Glooms which otherwhere appal,<br /> +Sounded: here, their worths exchanged<br /> +Urban joins with pastoral:<br /> +Little lost, save what may drop<br /> +Husk-like, and the mind preserves.<br /> +Natural overgrowths they lop,<br /> +Yet from nature neither swerves,<br /> +Trained or savage: for this cause:<br /> +Of our Earth they ply the laws,<br /> +Have in Earth their feeding root,<br /> +Mind of man and bent of brute.<br /> +Hear that song; both wild and ruled.<br /> +Hear it: is it wail or mirth?<br /> +<a name="page45"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 45</span>Ordered, +bubbled, quite unschooled?<br /> +None, and all: it springs of Earth.<br /> +O but hear it! ’tis the mind;<br /> +Mind that with deep Earth unites,<br /> +Round the solid trunk to wind<br /> +Rings of clasping parasites.<br /> +Music have you there to feed<br /> +Simplest and most soaring need.<br /> +Free to wind, and in desire<br /> +Winding, they to her attached<br /> +Feel the trunk a spring of fire,<br /> +And ascend to heights unmatched,<br /> +Whence the tidal world is viewed<br /> +As a sea of windy wheat,<br /> +Momently black, barren, rude;<br /> +Golden-brown, for harvest meet,<br /> +Dragon-reaped from folly-sown;<br /> +Bride-like to the sickle-blade:<br /> +Quick it varies, while the moan,<br /> +Moan of a sad creature strayed,<br /> +Chiefly is its voice. So flesh<br /> +Conjures tempest-flails to thresh<br /> +Good from worthless. Some clear lamps<br /> +Light it; more of dead marsh-damps.<br /> +Monster is it still, and blind,<br /> +Fit but to be led by Pain.<br /> +Glance we at the paths behind,<br /> +Fruitful sight has Westermain.<br /> +There we laboured, and in turn<br /> +Forward our blown lamps discern,<br /> +As you see on the dark deep<br /> +Far the loftier billows leap,<br /> + Foam for beacon bear.<br /> +Hither, hither, if you will,<br /> +Drink instruction, or instil,<br /> +<a name="page46"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 46</span>Run the +woods like vernal sap,<br /> +Crying, hail to luminousness!<br /> + But have care.<br /> +In yourself may lurk the trap:<br /> +On conditions they caress.<br /> +Here you meet the light invoked<br /> +Here is never secret cloaked.<br /> +Doubt you with the monster’s fry<br /> +All his orbit may exclude;<br /> +Are you of the stiff, the dry,<br /> +Cursing the not understood;<br /> +Grasp you with the monster’s claws;<br /> +Govern with his truncheon-saws;<br /> +Hate, the shadow of a grain;<br /> +You are lost in Westermain:<br /> +Earthward swoops a vulture sun,<br /> +Nighted upon carrion:<br /> +Straightway venom wine-cups shout<br /> +Toasts to One whose eyes are out:<br /> +Flowers along the reeling floor<br /> +Drip henbane and hellebore:<br /> +Beauty, of her tresses shorn,<br /> +Shrieks as nature’s maniac:<br /> +Hideousness on hoof and horn<br /> +Tumbles, yapping in her track:<br /> +Haggard Wisdom, stately once,<br /> +Leers fantastical and trips:<br /> +Allegory drums the sconce,<br /> +Impiousness nibblenips.<br /> +Imp that dances, imp that flits,<br /> +Imp o’ the demon-growing girl,<br /> +Maddest! whirl with imp o’ the pits<br /> +Round you, and with them you whirl<br /> +Fast where pours the fountain-rout<br /> +Out of Him whose eyes are out:<br /> +<a name="page47"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 47</span>Multitudes +on multitudes,<br /> +Drenched in wallowing devilry:<br /> +And you ask where you may be,<br /> + In what reek of a lair<br /> +Given to bones and ogre-broods:<br /> + And they yell you Where.<br /> +Enter these enchanted woods,<br /> + You who dare.</p> +<h3><a name="page48"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 48</span>A +BALLAD OF PAST MERIDIAN</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Last</span> night returning +from my twilight walk<br /> +I met the grey mist Death, whose eyeless brow<br /> +Was bent on me, and from his hand of chalk<br /> +He reached me flowers as from a withered bough:<br /> +O Death, what bitter nosegays givest thou!</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Death said, I gather, and pursued his way.<br +/> +Another stood by me, a shape in stone,<br /> +Sword-hacked and iron-stained, with breasts of clay,<br /> +And metal veins that sometimes fiery shone:<br /> +O Life, how naked and how hard when known!</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Life said, As thou hast carved me, such am +I.<br /> +Then memory, like the nightjar on the pine,<br /> +And sightless hope, a woodlark in night sky,<br /> +Joined notes of Death and Life till night’s decline<br /> +Of Death, of Life, those inwound notes are mine.</p> +<h3><a name="page49"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 49</span>THE +DAY OF THE DAUGHTER OF HADES</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">He</span> who has looked +upon Earth<br /> +Deeper than flower and fruit,<br /> +Losing some hue of his mirth,<br /> +As the tree striking rock at the root,<br /> +Unto him shall the marvellous tale<br /> +Of Callistes more humanly come<br /> +With the touch on his breast than a hail<br /> +From the markets that hum.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Now the youth footed swift to the dawn.<br /> +’Twas the season when wintertide,<br /> +In the higher rock-hollows updrawn,<br /> +Leaves meadows to bud, and he spied,<br /> +By light throwing shallow shade,<br /> +Between the beam and the gloom,<br /> +Sicilian Enna, whose Maid<br /> +Such aspect wears in her bloom<br /> +Underneath since the Charioteer<br /> +Of Darkness whirled her away,<br /> +On a reaped afternoon of the year,<br /> +Nigh the poppy-droop of Day.<br /> +O and naked of her, all dust,<br /> +The majestic Mother and Nurse,<br /> +Ringing cries to the God, the Just,<br /> +Curled the land with the blight of her curse:<br /> +Recollected of this glad isle<br /> +<a name="page50"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 50</span>Still +quaking. But now more fair,<br /> +And momently fraying the while<br /> +The veil of the shadows there,<br /> +Soft Enna that prostrate grief<br /> +Sang through, and revealed round the vines,<br /> +Bronze-orange, the crisp young leaf,<br /> +The wheat-blades tripping in lines,<br /> +A hue unillumined by sun<br /> +Of the flowers flooding grass as from founts:<br /> +All the penetrable dun<br /> + Of the morn ere she mounts.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Nor had saffron and sapphire and red<br /> +Waved aloft to their sisters below,<br /> +When gaped by the rock-channel head<br /> +Of the lake, black, a cave at one blow,<br /> +Reverberant over the plain:<br /> +A sound oft fearfully swung<br /> +For the coming of wrathful rain:<br /> +And forth, like the dragon-tongue<br /> +Of a fire beaten flat by the gale,<br /> +But more as the smoke to behold,<br /> +A chariot burst. Then a wail<br /> +Quivered high of the love that would fold<br /> +Bliss immeasurable, bigger than heart,<br /> +Though a God’s: and the wheels were stayed,<br /> +And the team of the chariot swart<br /> +Reared in marble, the six, dismayed,<br /> +Like hoofs that by night plashing sea<br /> +Curve and ramp from the vast swan-wave:<br /> +For, lo, the Great Mother, She!<br /> +And Callistes gazed, he gave<br /> +His eyeballs up to the sight:<br /> +The embrace of the Twain, of whom<br /> +<a name="page51"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 51</span>To men are +their day, their night,<br /> +Mellow fruits and the shearing tomb:<br /> +Our Lady of the Sheaves<br /> +And the Lily of Hades, the Sweet<br /> +Of Enna: he saw through leaves<br /> +The Mother and Daughter meet.<br /> +They stood by the chariot-wheel,<br /> +Embraced, very tall, most like<br /> +Fellow poplars, wind-taken, that reel<br /> +Down their shivering columns and strike<br /> +Head to head, crossing throats: and apart,<br /> +For the feast of the look, they drew,<br /> +Which Darkness no longer could thwart;<br /> +And they broke together anew,<br /> +Exulting to tears, flower and bud.<br /> +But the mate of the Rayless was grave:<br /> +She smiled like Sleep on its flood,<br /> +That washes of all we crave:<br /> +Like the trance of eyes awake<br /> +And the spirit enshrouded, she cast<br /> +The wan underworld on the lake.<br /> + They were so, and they passed.</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">He tells it, who knew the law<br /> +Upon mortals: he stood alive<br /> +Declaring that this he saw:<br /> + He could see, and survive.</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Now the youth was not ware of the beams<br /> +With the grasses intertwined,<br /> +For each thing seen, as in dreams,<br /> +Came stepping to rear through his mind,<br /> +Till it struck his remembered prayer<br /> +<a name="page52"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 52</span>To be +witness of this which had flown<br /> +Like a smoke melted thinner than air,<br /> +That the vacancy doth disown.<br /> +And viewing a maiden, he thought<br /> +It might now be morn, and afar<br /> +Within him the memory wrought<br /> +Of a something that slipped from the car<br /> +When those, the august, moved by:<br /> +Perchance a scarf, and perchance<br /> +This maiden. She did not fly,<br /> +Nor started at his advance:<br /> +She looked, as when infinite thirst<br /> +Pants pausing to bless the springs,<br /> +Refreshed, unsated. Then first<br /> +He trembled with awe of the things<br /> +He had seen; and he did transfer,<br /> +Divining and doubting in turn,<br /> +His reverence unto her;<br /> +Nor asked what he crouched to learn:<br /> +The whence of her, whither, and why<br /> +Her presence there, and her name,<br /> +Her parentage: under which sky<br /> +Her birth, and how hither she came,<br /> +So young, a virgin, alone,<br /> +Unfriended, having no fear,<br /> +As Oreads have; no moan,<br /> +Like the lost upon earth; no tear;<br /> +Not a sign of the torch in the blood,<br /> +Though her stature had reached the height<br /> +When mantles a tender rud<br /> +In maids that of youths have sight,<br /> +If maids of our seed they be:<br /> +For he said: A glad vision art thou!<br /> +And she answered him: Thou to me!<br /> + As men utter a vow.</p> +<h4><a name="page53"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +53</span>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Then said she, quick as the cries<br /> +Of the rainy cranes: Light! light!<br /> +And Helios rose in her eyes,<br /> +That were full as the dew-balls bright,<br /> +Relucent to him as dews<br /> +Unshaded. Breathing, she sent<br /> +Her voice to the God of the Muse,<br /> +And along the vale it went,<br /> +Strange to hear: not thin, not shrill:<br /> +Sweet, but no young maid’s throat:<br /> +The echo beyond the hill<br /> +Ran falling on half the note:<br /> +And under the shaken ground<br /> +Where the Hundred-headed groans<br /> +By the roots of great Aetna bound,<br /> +As of him were hollow tones<br /> +Of wondering roared: a tale<br /> +Repeated to sunless halls.<br /> +But now off the face of the vale<br /> +Shadows fled in a breath, and the walls<br /> +Of the lake’s rock-head were gold,<br /> +And the breast of the lake, that swell<br /> +Of the crestless long wave rolled<br /> +To shore-bubble, pebble and shell.<br /> +A morning of radiant lids<br /> +O’er the dance of the earth opened wide:<br /> +The bees chose their flowers, the snub kids<br /> +Upon hindlegs went sportive, or plied,<br /> +Nosing, hard at the dugs to be filled:<br /> +There was milk, honey, music to make:<br /> +Up their branches the little birds billed:<br /> +Chirrup, drone, bleat and buzz ringed the lake.<br /> +O shining in sunlight, chief<br /> +After water and water’s caress,<br /> +<a name="page54"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 54</span>Was the +young bronze-orange leaf,<br /> +That clung to the tree as a tress,<br /> +Shooting lucid tendrils to wed<br /> +With the vine-hook tree or pole,<br /> +Like Arachne launched out on her thread.<br /> +Then the maiden her dusky stole<br /> +In the span of the black-starred zone,<br /> +Gathered up for her footing fleet.<br /> +As one that had toil of her own<br /> +She followed the lines of wheat<br /> +Tripping straight through the fields, green blades,<br /> +To the groves of olive grey,<br /> +Downy-grey, golden-tinged: and to glades<br /> +Where the pear-blossom thickens the spray<br /> +In a night, like the snow-packed storm:<br /> +Pear, apple, almond, plum:<br /> +Not wintry now: pushing, warm!<br /> +And she touched them with finger and thumb,<br /> +As the vine-hook closes: she smiled,<br /> +Recounting again and again,<br /> +Corn, wine, fruit, oil! like a child,<br /> +With the meaning known to men.<br /> +For hours in the track of the plough<br /> +And the pruning-knife she stepped,<br /> +And of how the seed works, and of how<br /> +Yields the soil, she seemed adept.<br /> +Then she murmured that name of the dearth,<br /> +The Beneficent, Hers, who bade<br /> +Our husbandmen sow for the birth<br /> +Of the grain making earth full glad.<br /> +She murmured that Other’s: the dirge<br /> +Of life-light: for whose dark lap<br /> +Our locks are clipped on the verge<br /> +Of the realm where runs no sap.<br /> +She said: We have looked on both!<br /> +<a name="page55"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 55</span>And her +eyes had a wavering beam<br /> +Of various lights, like the froth<br /> +Of the storm-swollen ravine stream<br /> +In flame of the bolt. What links<br /> +Were these which had made him her friend?<br /> +He eyed her, as one who drinks,<br /> + And would drink to the end.</p> +<h4>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Now the meadows with crocus besprent,<br /> +And the asphodel woodsides she left,<br /> +And the lake-slopes, the ravishing scent<br /> +Of narcissus, dark-sweet, for the cleft<br /> +That tutors the torrent-brook,<br /> +Delaying its forceful spleen<br /> +With many a wind and crook<br /> +Through rock to the broad ravine.<br /> +By the hyacinth-bells in the brakes,<br /> +And the shade-loved white windflower, half hid,<br /> +And the sun-loving lizards and snakes<br /> +On the cleft’s barren ledges, that slid<br /> +Out of sight, smooth as waterdrops, all,<br /> +At a snap of twig or bark<br /> +In the track of the foreign foot-fall,<br /> +She climbed to the pineforest dark,<br /> +Overbrowing an emerald chine<br /> +Of the grass-billows. Thence, as a wreath,<br /> +Running poplar and cypress to pine,<br /> +The lake-banks are seen, and beneath,<br /> +Vineyard, village, groves, rivers, towers, farms,<br /> +The citadel watching the bay,<br /> +The bay with the town in its arms,<br /> +The town shining white as the spray<br /> +Of the sapphire sea-wave on the rock,<br /> +Where the rock stars the girdle of sea,<br /> +<a name="page56"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +56</span>White-ringed, as the midday flock,<br /> +Clipped by heat, rings the round of the tree.<br /> +That hour of the piercing shaft<br /> +Transfixes bough-shadows, confused<br /> +In veins of fire, and she laughed,<br /> +With her quiet mouth amused<br /> +To see the whole flock, adroop,<br /> +Asleep, hug the tree-stem as one,<br /> +Imperceptibly filling the loop<br /> +Of its shade at a slant of sun.<br /> +The pipes under pent of the crag,<br /> +Where the goatherds in piping recline,<br /> +Have whimsical stops, burst and flag<br /> +Uncorrected as outstretched swine:<br /> +For the fingers are slack and unsure,<br /> +And the wind issues querulous:—thorns<br /> +And snakes!—but she listened demure,<br /> +Comparing day’s music with morn’s.<br /> +Of the gentle spirit that slips<br /> +From the bark of the tree she discoursed,<br /> +And of her of the wells, whose lips<br /> +Are coolness enchanting, rock-sourced.<br /> +And much of the sacred loon,<br /> +The frolic, the Goatfoot God,<br /> +For stories of indolent noon<br /> +In the pineforest’s odorous nod,<br /> +She questioned, not knowing: he can<br /> +Be waspish, irascible, rude,<br /> +He is oftener friendly to man,<br /> +And ever to beasts and their brood.<br /> +For the which did she love him well,<br /> +She said, and his pipes of the reed,<br /> +His twitched lips puffing to tell<br /> +In music his tears and his need,<br /> +Against the sharp catch of his hurt.<br /> +<a name="page57"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 57</span>Not as +shepherds of Pan did she speak,<br /> +Nor spake as the schools, to divert,<br /> +But fondly, perceiving him weak<br /> +Before Gods, and to shepherds a fear,<br /> +A holiness, horn and heel.<br /> +All this she had learnt in her ear<br /> +From Callistes, and taught him to feel.<br /> +Yea, the solemn divinity flushed<br /> +Through the shaggy brown skin of the beast,<br /> +And the steeps where the cataract rushed,<br /> +And the wilds where the forest is priest,<br /> +Were his temple to clothe him in awe,<br /> +While she spake: ’twas a wonder: she read<br /> +The haunts of the beak and the claw<br /> +As plain as the land of bread,<br /> +But Cities and martial States,<br /> +Whither soon the youth veered his theme,<br /> +Were impervious barrier-gates<br /> +To her: and that ship, a trireme,<br /> +Nearing harbour, scarce wakened her glance,<br /> +Though he dwelt on the message it bore<br /> +Of sceptre and sword and lance<br /> +To the bee-swarms black on the shore,<br /> +Which were audible almost,<br /> +So black they were. It befel<br /> +That he called up the warrior host<br /> +Of the Song pouring hydromel<br /> +In thunder, the wide-winged Song.<br /> +And he named with his boyish pride<br /> +The heroes, the noble throng<br /> +Past Acheron now, foul tide!<br /> +With his joy of the godlike band<br /> +And the verse divine, he named<br /> +The chiefs pressing hot on the strand,<br /> +Seen of Gods, of Gods aided, and maimed.<br /> +<a name="page58"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 58</span>The +fleetfoot and ireful; the King;<br /> +Him, the prompter in stratagem,<br /> +Many-shifted and masterful: Sing,<br /> +O Muse! But she cried: Not of them<br /> +She breathed as if breath had failed,<br /> +And her eyes, while she bade him desist,<br /> +Held the lost-to-light ghosts grey-mailed,<br /> +As you see the grey river-mist<br /> +Hold shapes on the yonder bank.<br /> +A moment her body waned,<br /> +The light of her sprang and sank:<br /> +Then she looked at the sun, she regained<br /> +Clear feature, and she breathed deep.<br /> +She wore the wan smile he had seen,<br /> +As the flow of the river of Sleep,<br /> +On the mouth of the Shadow-Queen.<br /> +In sunlight she craved to bask,<br /> +Saying: Life! And who was she? who?<br /> +Of what issue? He dared not ask,<br /> + For that partly he knew.</p> +<h4>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">A noise of the hollow ground<br /> +Turned the eye to the ear in debate:<br /> +Not the soft overflowing of sound<br /> +Of the pines, ranked, lofty, straight,<br /> +Barely swayed to some whispers remote,<br /> +Some swarming whispers above:<br /> +Not the pines with the faint airs afloat,<br /> +Hush-hushing the nested dove:<br /> +It was not the pines, or the rout<br /> +Oft heard from mid-forest in chase,<br /> +But the long muffled roar of a shout<br /> +Subterranean. Sharp grew her face.<br /> +She rose, yet not moved by affright;<br /> +<a name="page59"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +59</span>’Twas rather good haste to use<br /> +Her holiday of delight<br /> +In the beams of the God of the Muse.<br /> +And the steeps of the forest she crossed,<br /> +On its dry red sheddings and cones<br /> +Up the paths by roots green-mossed,<br /> +Spotted amber, and old mossed stones.<br /> +Then out where the brook-torrent starts<br /> +To her leap, and from bend to curve<br /> +A hurrying elbow darts<br /> +For the instant-glancing swerve,<br /> +Decisive, with violent will<br /> +In the action formed, like hers,<br /> +The maiden’s, ascending; and still<br /> +Ascending, the bud of the furze,<br /> +The broom, and all blue-berried shoots<br /> +Of stubborn and prickly kind,<br /> +The juniper flat on its roots,<br /> +The dwarf rhododaphne, behind<br /> +She left, and the mountain sheep<br /> +Far behind, goat, herbage and flower.<br /> +The island was hers, and the deep,<br /> +All heaven, a golden hour.<br /> +Then with wonderful voice, that rang<br /> +Through air as the swan’s nigh death,<br /> +Of the glory of Light she sang,<br /> +She sang of the rapture of Breath.<br /> +Nor ever, says he who heard,<br /> +Heard Earth in her boundaries broad,<br /> +From bosom of singer or bird<br /> +A sweetness thus rich of the God<br /> +Whose harmonies always are sane.<br /> +She sang of furrow and seed,<br /> +The burial, birth of the grain,<br /> +The growth, and the showers that feed,<br /> +<a name="page60"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 60</span>And the +green blades waxing mature<br /> +For the husbandman’s armful brown.<br /> +O, the song in its burden ran pure,<br /> +And burden to song was a crown.<br /> +Callistes, a singer, skilled<br /> +In the gift he could measure and praise,<br /> +By a rival’s art was thrilled,<br /> +Though she sang but a Song of Days,<br /> +Where the husbandman’s toil and strife<br /> +Little varies to strife and toil:<br /> +But the milky kernel of life,<br /> +With her numbered: corn, wine, fruit, oil<br /> +The song did give him to eat:<br /> +Gave the first rapt vision of Good,<br /> +And the fresh young sense of Sweet<br /> +The grace of the battle for food,<br /> +With the issue Earth cannot refuse<br /> +When men to their labour are sworn.<br /> +’Twas a song of the God of the Muse<br /> + To the forehead of Morn.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Him loved she. Lo, now was he veiled:<br +/> +Over sea stood a swelled cloud-rack:<br /> +The fishing-boat heavenward sailed,<br /> +Bent abeam, with a whitened track,<br /> +Surprised, fast hauling the net,<br /> +As it flew: sea dashed, earth shook.<br /> +She said: Is it night? O not yet!<br /> +With a travail of thoughts in her look.<br /> +The mountain heaved up to its peak:<br /> +Sea darkened: earth gathered her fowl;<br /> +Of bird or of branch rose the shriek.<br /> +Night? but never so fell a scowl<br /> +Wore night, nor the sky since then<br /> +<a name="page61"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 61</span>When ocean +ran swallowing shore,<br /> +And the Gods looked down for men.<br /> +Broke tempest with that stern roar<br /> +Never yet, save when black on the whirl<br /> +Rode wrath of a sovereign Power.<br /> +Then the youth and the shuddering girl,<br /> +Dim as shades in the angry shower,<br /> +Joined hands and descended a maze<br /> +Of the paths that were racing alive<br /> +Round boulder and bush, cleaving ways,<br /> +Incessant, with sound of a hive.<br /> +The height was a fountain-urn<br /> +Pouring streams, and the whole solid height<br /> +Leaped, chasing at every turn<br /> +The pair in one spirit of flight<br /> +To the folding pineforest. Yet here,<br /> +Like the pause to things hunted, in doubt,<br /> +The stillness bred spectral fear<br /> +Of the awfulness ranging without,<br /> +And imminent. Downward they fled,<br /> +From under the haunted roof,<br /> +To the valley aquake with the tread<br /> +Of an iron-resounding hoof,<br /> +As of legions of thunderful horse<br /> +Broken loose and in line tramping hard.<br /> +For the rage of a hungry force<br /> +Roamed blind of its mark over sward:<br /> +They saw it rush dense in the cloak<br /> +Of its travelling swathe of steam;<br /> +All the vale through a thin thread-smoke<br /> +Was thrown back to distance extreme:<br /> +And dull the full breast of it blinked,<br /> +Like a buckler of steel breathed o’er,<br /> +Diminished, in strangeness distinct,<br /> +Glowing cold, unearthly, hoar:<br /> +<a name="page62"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 62</span>An Enna of +fields beyond sun,<br /> +Out of light, in a lurid web;<br /> +And the traversing fury spun<br /> +Up and down with a wave’s flow and ebb;<br /> +As the wave breaks to grasp and to spurn,<br /> +Retire, and in ravenous greed,<br /> +Inveterate, swell its return.<br /> +Up and down, as if wringing from speed<br /> +Sights that made the unsighted appear,<br /> +Delude and dissolve, on it scoured.<br /> +Lo, a sea upon land held career<br /> +Through the plain of the vale half-devoured.<br /> +Callistes of home and escape<br /> +Muttered swiftly, unwitting of speech.<br /> +She gazed at the Void of shape,<br /> +She put her white hand to his reach,<br /> +Saying: Now have we looked on the Three.<br /> +And divided from day, from night,<br /> +From air that is breath, stood she,<br /> + Like the vale, out of light.</p> +<h4>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">Then again in disorderly words<br /> +He muttered of home, and was mute,<br /> +With the heart of the cowering birds<br /> +Ere they burst off the fowler’s foot.<br /> +He gave her some redness that streamed<br /> +Through her limbs in a flitting glow.<br /> +The sigh of our life she seemed,<br /> +The bliss of it clothing in woe.<br /> +Frailer than flower when the round<br /> +Of the sickle encircles it: strong<br /> +To tell of the things profound,<br /> +Our inmost uttering song,<br /> +Unspoken. So stood she awhile<br /> +<a name="page63"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 63</span>In the +gloom of the terror afield,<br /> +And the silence about her smile<br /> +Said more than of tongue is revealed.<br /> +I have breathed: I have gazed: I have been:<br /> +It said: and not joylessly shone<br /> +The remembrance of light through the screen<br /> +Of a face that seemed shadow and stone.<br /> +She led the youth trembling, appalled,<br /> +To the lake-banks he saw sink and rise<br /> +Like a panic-struck breast. Then she called,<br /> +And the hurricane blackness had eyes.<br /> +It launched like the Thunderer’s bolt.<br /> +Pale she drooped, and the youth by her side<br /> +Would have clasped her and dared a revolt<br /> +Sacrilegious as ever defied<br /> +High Olympus, but vainly for strength<br /> +His compassionate heart shook a frame<br /> +Stricken rigid to ice all its length.<br /> +On amain the black traveller came.<br /> +Lo, a chariot, cleaving the storm,<br /> +Clove the fountaining lake with a plough,<br /> +And the lord of the steeds was in form<br /> +He, the God of implacable brow,<br /> +Darkness: he: he in person: he raged<br /> +Through the wave like a boar of the wilds<br /> +From the hunters and hounds disengaged,<br /> +And a name shouted hoarsely: his child’s.<br /> +Horror melted in anguish to hear.<br /> +Lo, the wave hissed apart for the path<br /> +Of the terrible Charioteer,<br /> +With the foam and torn features of wrath,<br /> +Hurled aloft on each arm in a sheet;<br /> +And the steeds clove it, rushing at land<br /> +Like the teeth of the famished at meat.<br /> + Then he swept out his hand.</p> +<h4><a name="page64"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +64</span>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">This, no more, doth Callistes recall:<br /> +He saw, ere he dropped in swoon,<br /> +On the maiden the chariot fall,<br /> +As a thundercloud swings on the moon.<br /> +Forth, free of the deluge, one cry<br /> +From the vanishing gallop rose clear:<br /> +And: Skiágeneia! the sky<br /> +Rang; Skiágeneia! the sphere.<br /> +And she left him therewith, to rejoice,<br /> +Repine, yearn, and know not his aim,<br /> +The life of their day in her voice,<br /> + Left her life in her name.</p> +<h4>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Now the valley in ruin of fields<br /> +And fair meadowland, showing at eve<br /> +Like the spear-pitted warrior’s shields<br /> +After battle, bade men believe<br /> +That no other than wrathfullest God<br /> +Had been loose on her beautiful breast,<br /> +Where the flowery grass was clod,<br /> +Wheat and vine as a trailing nest.<br /> +The valley, discreet in grief,<br /> +Disclosed but the open truth,<br /> +And Enna had hope of the sheaf:<br /> +There was none for the desolate youth<br /> +Devoted to mourn and to crave.<br /> +Of the secret he had divined<br /> +Of his friend of a day would he rave:<br /> +How for light of our earth she pined:<br /> +For the olive, the vine and the wheat,<br /> +Burning through with inherited fire:<br /> +And when Mother went Mother to meet,<br /> +She was prompted by simple desire<br /> +<a name="page65"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 65</span>In the +day-destined car to have place<br /> +At the skirts of the Goddess, unseen,<br /> +And be drawn to the dear earth’s face.<br /> +She was fire for the blue and the green<br /> +Of our earth, dark fire; athirst<br /> +As a seed of her bosom for dawn,<br /> +White air that had robed and nursed<br /> +Her mother. Now was she gone<br /> +With the Silent, the God without tear,<br /> +Like a bud peeping out of its sheath<br /> +To be sundered and stamped with the sere.<br /> +And Callistes to her beneath,<br /> +As she to our beams, extinct,<br /> +Strained arms: he was shade of her shade.<br /> +In division so were they linked.<br /> +But the song which had betrayed<br /> +Her flight to the cavernous ear<br /> +For its own keenly wakeful: that song<br /> +Of the sowing and reaping, and cheer<br /> +Of the husbandman’s heart made strong<br /> +Through droughts and deluging rains<br /> +With his faith in the Great Mother’s love:<br /> +O the joy of the breath she sustains,<br /> +And the lyre of the light above,<br /> +And the first rapt vision of Good,<br /> +And the fresh young sense of Sweet:<br /> +That song the youth ever pursued<br /> +In the track of her footing fleet.<br /> +For men to be profited much<br /> +By her day upon earth did he sing:<br /> +Of her voice, and her steps, and her touch<br /> +On the blossoms of tender Spring,<br /> +Immortal: and how in her soul<br /> +She is with them, and tearless abides,<br /> +Folding grain of a love for one goal<br /> +<a name="page66"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 66</span>In +patience, past flowing of tides.<br /> +And if unto him she was tears,<br /> +He wept not: he wasted within:<br /> +Seeming sane in the song, to his peers,<br /> +Only crazed where the cravings begin.<br /> +Our Lady of Gifts prized he less<br /> +Than her issue in darkness: the dim<br /> +Lost Skiágencia’s caress<br /> +Of our earth made it richest for him.<br /> +And for that was a curse on him raised,<br /> +And he withered rathe, dry to his prime,<br /> +Though the bounteous Giver be praised<br /> +Through the island with rites of old time<br /> +Exceedingly fervent, and reaped<br /> +Veneration for teachings devout,<br /> +Pious hymns when the corn-sheaves are heaped<br /> +And the wine-presses ruddily spout,<br /> +And the olive and apple are juice<br /> +At a touch light as hers lost below.<br /> +Whatsoever to men is of use<br /> +Sprang his worship of them who bestow,<br /> +In a measure of songs unexcelled:<br /> +But that soul loving earth and the sun<br /> +From her home of the shadows he held<br /> +For his beacon where beam there is none:<br /> +And to join her, or have her brought back,<br /> +In his frenzy the singer would call,<br /> +Till he followed where never was track,<br /> +On the path trod of all.</p> +<h3><a name="page67"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 67</span>THE +LARK ASCENDING</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">He</span> rises and begins +to round,<br /> +He drops the silver chain of sound,<br /> +Of many links without a break,<br /> +In chirrup, whistle, slur and shake,<br /> +All intervolved and spreading wide,<br /> +Like water-dimples down a tide<br /> +Where ripple ripple overcurls<br /> +And eddy into eddy whirls;<br /> +A press of hurried notes that run<br /> +So fleet they scarce are more than one,<br /> +Yet changeingly the trills repeat<br /> +And linger ringing while they fleet,<br /> +Sweet to the quick o’ the ear, and dear<br /> +To her beyond the handmaid ear,<br /> +Who sits beside our inner springs,<br /> +Too often dry for this he brings,<br /> +Which seems the very jet of earth<br /> +At sight of sun, her music’s mirth,<br /> +As up he wings the spiral stair,<br /> +A song of light, and pierces air<br /> +With fountain ardour, fountain play,<br /> +To reach the shining tops of day,<br /> +And drink in everything discerned<br /> +An ecstasy to music turned,<br /> +Impelled by what his happy bill<br /> +Disperses; drinking, showering still,<br /> +Unthinking save that he may give<br /> +His voice the outlet, there to live<br /> +Renewed in endless notes of glee,<br /> +<a name="page68"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 68</span>So thirsty +of his voice is he,<br /> +For all to hear and all to know<br /> +That he is joy, awake, aglow;<br /> +The tumult of the heart to hear<br /> +Through pureness filtered crystal-clear,<br /> +And know the pleasure sprinkled bright<br /> +By simple singing of delight;<br /> +Shrill, irreflective, unrestrained,<br /> +Rapt, ringing, on the jet sustained<br /> +Without a break, without a fall,<br /> +Sweet-silvery, sheer lyrical,<br /> +Perennial, quavering up the chord<br /> +Like myriad dews of sunny sward<br /> +That trembling into fulness shine,<br /> +And sparkle dropping argentine;<br /> +Such wooing as the ear receives<br /> +From zephyr caught in choric leaves<br /> +Of aspens when their chattering net<br /> +Is flushed to white with shivers wet;<br /> +And such the water-spirit’s chime<br /> +On mountain heights in morning’s prime,<br /> +Too freshly sweet to seem excess,<br /> +Too animate to need a stress;<br /> +But wider over many heads<br /> +The starry voice ascending spreads,<br /> +Awakening, as it waxes thin,<br /> +The best in us to him akin;<br /> +And every face to watch him raised,<br /> +Puts on the light of children praised;<br /> +So rich our human pleasure ripes<br /> +When sweetness on sincereness pipes,<br /> +Though nought be promised from the seas,<br /> +But only a soft-ruffling breeze<br /> +Sweep glittering on a still content,<br /> +Serenity in ravishment<br /> +<a name="page69"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 69</span>For +singing till his heaven fills,<br /> +’Tis love of earth that he instils,<br /> +And ever winging up and up,<br /> +Our valley is his golden cup,<br /> +And he the wine which overflows<br /> +To lift us with him as he goes:<br /> +The woods and brooks, the sheep and kine,<br /> +He is, the hills, the human line,<br /> +The meadows green, the fallows brown,<br /> +The dreams of labour in the town;<br /> +He sings the sap, the quickened veins;<br /> +The wedding song of sun and rains<br /> +He is, the dance of children, thanks<br /> +Of sowers, shout of primrose-banks,<br /> +And eye of violets while they breathe;<br /> +All these the circling song will wreathe,<br /> +And you shall hear the herb and tree,<br /> +The better heart of men shall see,<br /> +Shall feel celestially, as long<br /> +As you crave nothing save the song.</p> +<p class="poetry">Was never voice of ours could say<br /> +Our inmost in the sweetest way,<br /> +Like yonder voice aloft, and link<br /> +All hearers in the song they drink.<br /> +Our wisdom speaks from failing blood,<br /> +Our passion is too full in flood,<br /> +We want the key of his wild note<br /> +Of truthful in a tuneful throat;<br /> +The song seraphically free<br /> +Of taint of personality,<br /> +So pure that it salutes the suns<br /> +The voice of one for millions,<br /> +In whom the millions rejoice<br /> +For giving their one spirit voice.<br /> +<a name="page70"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 70</span>Yet men +have we, whom we revere,<br /> +Now names, and men still housing here,<br /> +Whose lives, by many a battle-dint<br /> +Defaced, and grinding wheels on flint,<br /> +Yield substance, though they sing not, sweet<br /> +For song our highest heaven to greet:<br /> +Whom heavenly singing gives us new,<br /> +Enspheres them brilliant in our blue,<br /> +From firmest base to farthest leap,<br /> +Because their love of Earth is deep,<br /> +And they are warriors in accord<br /> +With life to serve, and, pass reward,<br /> +So touching purest and so heard<br /> +In the brain’s reflex of yon bird:<br /> +Wherefore their soul in me, or mine,<br /> +Through self-forgetfulness divine,<br /> +In them, that song aloft maintains,<br /> +To fill the sky and thrill the plains<br /> +With showerings drawn from human stores,<br /> +As he to silence nearer soars,<br /> +Extends the world at wings and dome,<br /> +More spacious making more our home,<br /> +Till lost on his aërial rings<br /> +In light, and then the fancy sings.</p> +<h3><a name="page71"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +71</span>PHOEBUS WITH ADMETUS</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">When</span> by Zeus +relenting the mandate was revoked,<br /> + Sentencing to exile the bright Sun-God,<br /> +Mindful were the ploughmen of who the steer had yoked,<br /> + Who: and what a track showed the upturned sod!<br /> +Mindful were the shepherds, as now the noon severe<br /> + Bent a burning eyebrow to brown evetide,<br /> +How the rustic flute drew the silver to the sphere,<br /> + Sister of his own, till her rays fell wide.<br /> + God! of whom +music<br /> + And song and +blood are pure,<br /> + The day is never +darkened<br /> + That had thee +here obscure.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Chirping none, the scarlet cicadas crouched in +ranks:<br /> + Slack the thistle-head piled its down-silk grey:<br +/> +Scarce the stony lizard sucked hollows in his flanks:<br /> + Thick on spots of umbrage our drowsed flocks lay.<br +/> +Sudden bowed the chestnuts beneath a wind unheard,<br /> + Lengthened ran the grasses, the sky grew slate:<br +/> +Then amid a swift flight of winged seed white as curd,<br /> + Clear of limb a Youth smote the master’s +gate.<br /> + God! of whom +music<br /> + And song and +blood are pure,<br /> + The day is never +darkened<br /> + That had thee +here obscure.</p> +<h4><a name="page72"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +72</span>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Water, first of singers, o’er rocky mount +and mead,<br /> + First of earthly singers, the sun-loved rill,<br /> +Sang of him, and flooded the ripples on the reed,<br /> + Seeking whom to waken and what ear fill.<br /> +Water, sweetest soother to kiss a wound and cool,<br /> + Sweetest and divinest, the sky-born brook,<br /> +Chuckled, with a whimper, and made a mirror-pool<br /> + Round the guest we welcomed, the strange hand +shook.<br /> + God! of whom +music<br /> + And song and +blood are pure,<br /> + The day is never +darkened<br /> + That had thee +here obscure.</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Many swarms of wild bees descended on our +fields:<br /> + Stately stood the wheatstalk with head bent high:<br +/> +Big of heart we laboured at storing mighty yields,<br /> + Wool and corn, and clusters to make men cry!<br /> +Hand-like rushed the vintage; we strung the bellied skins<br /> + Plump, and at the sealing the Youth’s voice +rose:<br /> +Maidens clung in circle, on little fists their chins;<br /> + Gentle beasties through pushed a cold long nose.<br +/> + God! of whom +music<br /> + And song and +blood are pure,<br /> + The day is never +darkened<br /> + That had thee +here obscure.</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Foot to fire in snowtime we trimmed the slender +shaft:<br /> + Often down the pit spied the lean wolf’s +teeth<br /> +Grin against his will, trapped by masterstrokes of craft;<br /> + Helpless in his froth-wrath as green logs seethe!<br +/> +<a name="page73"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 73</span>Safe the +tender lambs tugged the teats, and winter sped<br /> + Whirled before the crocus, the year’s new +gold.<br /> +Hung the hooky beak up aloft, the arrowhead<br /> + Reddened through his feathers for our dear fold.<br +/> + God! of whom +music<br /> + And song and +blood are pure,<br /> + The day is never +darkened<br /> + That had thee +here obscure.</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Tales we drank of giants at war with Gods +above:<br /> + Rocks were they to look on, and earth climbed +air!<br /> +Tales of search for simples, and those who sought of love<br /> + Ease because the creature was all too fair.<br /> +Pleasant ran our thinking that while our work was good,<br /> + Sure as fruits for sweat would the praise come +fast.<br /> +He that wrestled stoutest and tamed the billow-brood<br /> + Danced in rings with girls, like a sail-flapped +mast.<br /> + God! of whom +music<br /> + And song and +blood are pure,<br /> + The day is never +darkened<br /> + That had thee +here obscure.</p> +<h4>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Lo, the herb of healing, when once the herb is +known,<br /> + Shines in shady woods bright as new-sprung flame.<br +/> +Ere the string was tightened we heard the mellow tone,<br /> + After he had taught how the sweet sounds came<br /> +<a name="page74"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 74</span>Stretched +about his feet, labour done, ’twas as you see<br /> + Red pomegranates tumble and burst hard rind.<br /> +So began contention to give delight and be<br /> + Excellent in things aimed to make life kind.<br /> + God! of whom +music<br /> + And song and +blood are pure,<br /> + The day is never +darkened<br /> + That had thee +here obscure.</p> +<h4>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">You with shelly horns, rams! and, promontory +goats,<br /> + You whose browsing beards dip in coldest dew!<br /> +Bulls, that walk the pastures in kingly-flashing coats!<br /> + Laurel, ivy, vine, wreathed for feasts not few!<br +/> +You that build the shade-roof, and you that court the rays,<br /> + You that leap besprinkling the rock stream-rent:<br +/> +He has been our fellow, the morning of our days!<br /> + Us he chose for housemates, and this way went.<br /> + God! of whom +music<br /> + And song and +blood are pure,<br /> + The day is never +darkened<br /> + That had thee +here obscure.</p> +<h3><a name="page75"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +75</span>MELAMPUS</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">With</span> love exceeding +a simple love of the things<br /> + That glide in grasses and rubble of woody wreck;<br +/> +Or change their perch on a beat of quivering wings<br /> + From branch to branch, only restful to pipe and +peck;<br /> +Or, bristled, curl at a touch their snouts in a ball;<br /> + Or cast their web between bramble and thorny +hook;<br /> +The good physician Melampus, loving them all,<br /> + Among them walked, as a scholar who reads a +book.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">For him the woods were a home and gave him the +key<br /> + Of knowledge, thirst for their treasures in herbs +and flowers.<br /> +The secrets held by the creatures nearer than we<br /> + To earth he sought, and the link of their life with +ours:<br /> +And where alike we are, unlike where, and the veined<br /> + Division, veined parallel, of a blood that flows<br +/> +In them, in us, from the source by man unattained<br /> + Save marks he well what the mystical woods +disclose.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">And this he deemed might be boon of love to a +breast<br /> + Embracing tenderly each little motive shape,<br /> +The prone, the flitting, who seek their food whither best<br /> + Their wits direct, whither best from their foes +escape.<br /> +For closer drawn to our mother’s natural milk,<br /> + As babes they learn where her motherly help is +great:<br /> +They know the juice for the honey, juice for the silk,<br /> + And need they medical antidotes, find them +straight.</p> +<h4><a name="page76"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +76</span>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Of earth and sun they are wise, they nourish +their broods,<br /> + Weave, build, hive, burrow and battle, take joy and +pain<br /> +Like swimmers varying billows: never in woods<br /> + Runs white insanity fleeing itself: all sane<br /> +The woods revolve: as the tree its shadowing limns<br /> + To some resemblance in motion, the rooted life<br /> +Restrains disorder: you hear the primitive hymns<br /> + Of earth in woods issue wild of the web of +strife.</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Now sleeping once on a day of marvellous +fire,<br /> + A brood of snakes he had cherished in grave +regret<br /> +That death his people had dealt their dam and their sire,<br /> + Through savage dread of them, crept to his neck, and +set<br /> +Their tongues to lick him: the swift affectionate tongue<br /> + Of each ran licking the slumberer: then his ears<br +/> +A forked red tongue tickled shrewdly: sudden upsprung,<br /> + He heard a voice piping: Ay, for he has no +fears!</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">A bird said that, in the notes of birds, and +the speech<br /> + Of men, it seemed: and another renewed: He moves<br +/> +To learn and not to pursue, he gathers to teach;<br /> + He feeds his young as do we, and as we love +loves.<br /> +No fears have I of a man who goes with his head<br /> + To earth, chance looking aloft at us, kind of +hand:<br /> +I feel to him as to earth of whom we are fed;<br /> + I pipe him much for his good could he +understand.</p> +<h4><a name="page77"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +77</span>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Melampus touched at his ears, laid finger on +wrist<br /> + He was not dreaming, he sensibly felt and heard.<br +/> +Above, through leaves, where the tree-twigs inter-twist,<br /> + He spied the birds and the bill of the speaking +bird.<br /> +His cushion mosses in shades of various green,<br /> + The lumped, the antlered, he pressed, while the +sunny snake<br /> +Slipped under: draughts he had drunk of clear Hippocrene,<br /> + It seemed, and sat with a gift of the Gods +awake.</p> +<h4>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Divinely thrilled was the man, exultingly +full,<br /> + As quick well-waters that come of the heart of +earth,<br /> +Ere yet they dart in a brook are one bubble-pool<br /> + To light and sound, wedding both at the leap of +birth.<br /> +The soul of light vivid shone, a stream within stream;<br /> + The soul of sound from a musical shell outflew;<br +/> +Where others hear but a hum and see but a beam,<br /> + The tongue and eye of the fountain of life he +knew.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">He knew the Hours: they were round him, laden +with seed<br /> + Of hours bestrewn upon vapour, and one by one<br /> +They winged as ripened in fruit the burden decreed<br /> + For each to scatter; they flushed like the buds in +sun,<br /> +Bequeathing seed to successive similar rings,<br /> + Their sisters, bearers to men of what men have +earned:<br /> +He knew them, talked with the yet unreddened; the stings,<br /> + The sweets, they warmed at their bosoms divined, +discerned.</p> +<h4><a name="page78"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 78</span>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">Not unsolicited, sought by diligent feet,<br /> + By riddling fingers expanded, oft watched in +growth<br /> +With brooding deep as the noon-ray’s quickening wheat,<br +/> + Ere touch’d, the pendulous flower of the +plants of sloth,<br /> +The plants of rigidness, answered question and squeeze,<br /> + Revealing wherefore it bloomed, uninviting, bent,<br +/> +Yet making harmony breathe of life and disease,<br /> + The deeper chord of a wonderful instrument.</p> +<h4>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">So passed he luminous-eyed for earth and the +fates<br /> + We arm to bruise or caress us: his ears were +charged<br /> +With tones of love in a whirl of voluble hates,<br /> + With music wrought of distraction his heart +enlarged.<br /> +Celestial-shining, though mortal, singer, though mute,<br /> + He drew the Master of harmonies, voiced or +stilled,<br /> +To seek him; heard at the silent medicine-root<br /> + A song, beheld in fulfilment the unfulfilled.</p> +<h4>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Him Phoebus, lending to darkness colour and +form<br /> + Of light’s excess, many lessons and counsels +gave,<br /> +Showed Wisdom lord of the human intricate swarm,<br /> + And whence prophetic it looks on the hives that +rave,<br /> +And how acquired, of the zeal of love to acquire,<br /> + And where it stands, in the centre of life a +sphere;<br /> +And Measure, mood of the lyre, the rapturous lyre,<br /> + He said was Wisdom, and struck him the notes to +hear.</p> +<h4><a name="page79"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +79</span>XIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Sweet, sweet: ’twas glory of vision, +honey, the breeze<br /> + In heat, the run of the river on root and stone,<br +/> +All senses joined, as the sister Pierides<br /> + Are one, uplifting their chorus, the Nine, his +own.<br /> +In stately order, evolved of sound into sight,<br /> + From sight to sound intershifting, the man +descried<br /> +The growths of earth, his adored, like day out of night,<br /> + Ascend in song, seeing nature and song allied.</p> +<h4>XIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">And there vitality, there, there solely in +song,<br /> + Resides, where earth and her uses to men, their +needs,<br /> +Their forceful cravings, the theme are: there is it strong,<br /> + The Master said: and the studious eye that reads,<br +/> +(Yea, even as earth to the crown of Gods on the mount),<br /> + In links divine with the lyrical tongue is bound.<br +/> +Pursue thy craft: it is music drawn of a fount<br /> + To spring perennial; well-spring is common +ground.</p> +<h4>XV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Melampus dwelt among men: physician and +sage,<br /> + He served them, loving them, healing them; sick or +maimed,<br /> +Or them that frenzied in some delirious rage<br /> + Outran the measure, his juice of the woods +reclaimed.<br /> +He played on men, as his master, Phoebus, on strings<br /> + Melodious: as the God did he drive and check,<br /> +Through love exceeding a simple love of the things<br /> + That glide in grasses and rubble of woody wreck.</p> +<h3><a name="page80"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 80</span>LOVE +IN THE VALLEY</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Under</span> yonder +beech-tree single on the greensward,<br /> + Couched with her arms behind her golden head,<br /> +Knees and tresses folded to slip and ripple idly,<br /> + Lies my young love sleeping in the shade.<br /> +Had I the heart to slide an arm beneath her,<br /> + Press her parting lips as her waist I gather +slow,<br /> +Waking in amazement she could not but embrace me:<br /> + Then would she hold me and never let me go?</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Shy as the squirrel and wayward as the +swallow,<br /> + Swift as the swallow along the river’s +light<br /> +Circleting the surface to meet his mirrored winglets,<br /> + Fleeter she seems in her stay than in her flight.<br +/> +Shy as the squirrel that leaps among the pine-tops,<br /> + Wayward as the swallow overhead at set of sun,<br /> +She whom I love is hard to catch and conquer,<br /> + Hard, but O the glory of the winning were she +won!</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">When her mother tends her before the laughing +mirror,<br /> + Tying up her laces, looping up her hair,<br /> +Often she thinks, were this wild thing wedded,<br /> + More love should I have, and much less care.<br /> +When her mother tends her before the lighted mirror,<br /> + Loosening her laces, combing down her curls,<br /> +Often she thinks, were this wild thing wedded,<br /> + I should miss but one for the many boys and +girls.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page81"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +81</span>Heartless she is as the shadow in the meadows<br /> + Flying to the hills on a blue and breezy noon.<br /> +No, she is athirst and drinking up her wonder:<br /> + Earth to her is young as the slip of the new +moon.<br /> +Deals she an unkindness, ’tis but her rapid measure,<br /> + Even as in a dance; and her smile can heal no +less:<br /> +Like the swinging May-cloud that pelts the flowers with +hailstones<br /> + Off a sunny border, she was made to bruise and +bless.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Lovely are the curves of the white owl +sweeping<br /> + Wavy in the dusk lit by one large star.<br /> +Lone on the fir-branch, his rattle-note unvaried,<br /> + Brooding o’er the gloom, spins the brown +eve-jar.<br /> +Darker grows the valley, more and more forgetting:<br /> + So were it with me if forgetting could be willed.<br +/> +Tell the grassy hollow that holds the bubbling well-spring,<br /> + Tell it to forget the source that keeps it +filled.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Stepping down the hill with her fair +companions,<br /> + Arm in arm, all against the raying West,<br /> +Boldly she sings, to the merry tune she marches,<br /> + Brave in her shape, and sweeter unpossessed.<br /> +Sweeter, for she is what my heart first awaking<br /> + Whispered the world was; morning light is she.<br /> +Love that so desires would fain keep her changeless;<br /> + Fain would fling the net, and fain have her +free.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Happy happy time, when the white star hovers<br +/> + Low over dim fields fresh with bloomy dew,<br /> +Near the face of dawn, that draws athwart the darkness,<br /> + Threading it with colour, like yewberries the +yew.<br /> +<a name="page82"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 82</span>Thicker +crowd the shades as the grave East deepens<br /> + Glowing, and with crimson a long cloud swells.<br /> +Maiden still the morn is; and strange she is, and secret;<br /> + Strange her eyes; her cheeks are cold as cold +sea-shells.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Sunrays, leaning on our southern hills and +lighting<br /> + Wild cloud-mountains that drag the hills along,<br +/> +Oft ends the day of your shifting brilliant laughter<br /> + Chill as a dull face frowning on a song.<br /> +Ay, but shows the South-west a ripple-feathered bosom<br /> + Blown to silver while the clouds are shaken and +ascend<br /> +Scaling the mid-heavens as they stream, there comes a sunset<br +/> + Rich, deep like love in beauty without end.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">When at dawn she sighs, and like an infant to +the window<br /> + Turns grave eyes craving light, released from +dreams,<br /> +Beautiful she looks, like a white water-lily<br /> + Bursting out of bud in havens of the streams.<br /> +When from bed she rises clothed from neck to ankle<br /> + In her long nightgown sweet as boughs of May,<br /> +Beautiful she looks, like a tall garden lily<br /> + Pure from the night, and splendid for the day.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Mother of the dews, dark eye-lashed +twilight,<br /> + Low-lidded twilight, o’er the valley’s +brim,<br /> +Rounding on thy breast sings the dew-delighted skylark,<br /> + Clear as though the dewdrops had their voice in +him.<br /> +Hidden where the rose-flush drinks the rayless planet,<br /> + Fountain-full he pours the spraying +fountain-showers.<br /> +Let me hear her laughter, I would have her ever<br /> + Cool as dew in twilight, the lark above the +flowers.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page83"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +83</span>All the girls are out with their baskets for the +primrose;<br /> + Up lanes, woods through, they troop in joyful +bands.<br /> +My sweet leads: she knows not why, but now she loiters,<br /> + Eyes bent anemones, and hangs her hands.<br /> +Such a look will tell that the violets are peeping,<br /> + Coming the rose: and unaware a cry<br /> +Springs in her bosom for odours and for colour,<br /> + Covert and the nightingale; she knows not why.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Kerchiefed head and chin, she darts between her +tulips,<br /> + Streaming like a willow grey in arrowy rain:<br /> +Some bend beaten cheek to gravel, and their angel<br /> + She will be; she lifts them, and on she speeds +again.<br /> +Black the driving raincloud breasts the iron gate-way:<br /> + She is forth to cheer a neighbour lacking mirth.<br +/> +So when sky and grass met rolling dumb for thunder,<br /> + Saw I once a white dove, sole light of earth.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Prim little scholars are the flowers of her +garden,<br /> + Trained to stand in rows, and asking if they +please.<br /> +I might love them well but for loving more the wild ones.<br /> + O my wild ones! they tell me more than these.<br /> +You, my wild one, you tell of honied field-rose,<br /> + Violet, blushing eglantine in life; and even as +they,<br /> +They by the wayside are earnest of your goodness,<br /> + You are of life’s, on the banks that line the +way.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Peering at her chamber the white crowns the red +rose,<br /> + Jasmine winds the porch with stars two and three.<br +/> +Parted is the window; she sleeps; the starry jasmine<br /> + Breathes a falling breath that carries thoughts of +me.<br /> +<a name="page84"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 84</span>Sweeter +unpossessed, have I said of her my sweetest<br /> + Not while she sleeps: while she sleeps the jasmine +breathes,<br /> +Luring her to love; she sleeps; the starry jasmine<br /> + Bears me to her pillow under white rose-wreaths.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Yellow with birdfoot-trefoil are the +grass-glades;<br /> + Yellow with cinquefoil of the dew-grey leaf:<br /> +Yellow with stonecrop; the moss-mounds are yellow;<br /> + Blue-necked the wheat sways, yellowing to the +sheaf.<br /> +Green-yellow, bursts from the copse the laughing yaffle;<br /> + Sharp as a sickle is the edge of shade and shine:<br +/> +Earth in her heart laughs looking at the heavens,<br /> + Thinking of the harvest: I look and think of +mine.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">This I may know: her dressing and undressing<br +/> + Such a change of light shows as when the skies in +sport<br /> +Shift from cloud to moonlight; or edging over thunder<br /> + Slips a ray of sun; or sweeping into port<br /> +White sails furl; or on the ocean borders<br /> + White sails lean along the waves leaping green.<br +/> +Visions of her shower before me, but from eyesight<br /> + Guarded she would be like the sun were she seen.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Front door and back of the mossed old +farmhouse<br /> + Open with the morn, and in a breezy link<br /> +Freshly sparkles garden to stripe-shadowed orchard,<br /> + Green across a rill where on sand the minnows +wink.<br /> +Busy in the grass the early sun of summer<br /> + Swarms, and the blackbird’s mellow fluting +notes<br /> +Call my darling up with round and roguish challenge:<br /> + Quaintest, richest carol of all the singing +throats!</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page85"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +85</span>Cool was the woodside; cool as her white dairy<br /> + Keeping sweet the cream-pan; and there the boys from +school,<br /> +Cricketing below, rushed brown and red with sunshine;<br /> + O the dark translucence of the deep-eyed cool!<br /> +Spying from the farm, herself she fetched a pitcher<br /> + Full of milk, and tilted for each in turn the +beak.<br /> +Then a little fellow, mouth up and on tiptoe,<br /> + Said, ‘I will kiss you’: she laughed and +leaned her cheek.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Doves of the fir-wood walling high our red +roof<br /> + Through the long noon coo, crooning through the +coo.<br /> +Loose droop the leaves, and down the sleepy road-way<br /> + Sometimes pipes a chaffinch; loose droops the +blue.<br /> +Cows flap a slow tail knee-deep in the river,<br /> + Breathless, given up to sun and gnat and fly.<br /> +Nowhere is she seen; and if I see her nowhere,<br /> + Lightning may come, straight rains and tiger +sky.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">O the golden sheaf, the rustling +treasure-armful!<br /> + O the nutbrown tresses nodding interlaced!<br /> +O the treasure-tresses one another over<br /> + Nodding! O the girdle slack about the +waist!<br /> +Slain are the poppies that shot their random scarlet<br /> + Quick amid the wheatears: wound about the waist,<br +/> +Gathered, see these brides of earth one blush of ripeness!<br /> + O the nutbrown tresses nodding interlaced!</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Large and smoky red the sun’s cold disk +drops,<br /> + Clipped by naked hills, on violet shaded snow:<br /> +Eastward large and still lights up a bower of moon-rise,<br /> + Whence at her leisure steps the moon aglow.<br /> +<a name="page86"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 86</span>Nightlong +on black print-branches our beech-tree<br /> + Gazes in this whiteness: nightlong could I.<br /> +Here may life on death or death on life be painted.<br /> + Let me clasp her soul to know she cannot die!</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Gossips count her faults; they scour a narrow +chamber<br /> + Where there is no window, read not heaven or her.<br +/> +‘When she was a tiny,’ one aged woman quavers,<br /> + Plucks at my heart and leads me by the ear.<br /> +Faults she had once as she learnt to run and tumbled:<br /> + Faults of feature some see, beauty not complete.<br +/> +Yet, good gossips, beauty that makes holy<br /> + Earth and air, may have faults from head to +feet.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Hither she comes; she comes to me; she +lingers,<br /> + Deepens her brown eyebrows, while in new surprise<br +/> +High rise the lashes in wonder of a stranger;<br /> + Yet am I the light and living of her eyes.<br /> +Something friends have told her fills her heart to brimming,<br +/> + Nets her in her blushes, and wounds her, and +tames.—<br /> +Sure of her haven, O like a dove alighting,<br /> + Arms up, she dropped: our souls were in our +names.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Soon will she lie like a white-frost +sunrise.<br /> + Yellow oats and brown wheat, barley pale as rye,<br +/> +Long since your sheaves have yielded to the thresher,<br /> + Felt the girdle loosened, seen the tresses fly.<br +/> +Soon will she lie like a blood-red sunset.<br /> + Swift with the to-morrow, green-winged Spring!<br /> +Sing from the South-west, bring her back the truants,<br /> + Nightingale and swallow, song and dipping wing.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page87"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +87</span>Soft new beech-leaves, up to beamy April<br /> + Spreading bough on bough a primrose mountain, you<br +/> +Lucid in the moon, raise lilies to the skyfields,<br /> + Youngest green transfused in silver shining +through:<br /> +Fairer than the lily, than the wild white cherry:<br /> + Fair as in image my seraph love appears<br /> +Borne to me by dreams when dawn is at my eye-lids:<br /> + Fair as in the flesh she swims to me on tears.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Could I find a place to be alone with +heaven,<br /> + I would speak my heart out: heaven is my need.<br /> +Every woodland tree is flushing like the dogwood,<br /> + Flashing like the whitebeam, swaying like the +reed.<br /> +Flushing like the dogwood crimson in October;<br /> + Streaming like the flag-reed South-west blown;<br /> +Flashing as in gusts the sudden-lighted whitebeam:<br /> + All seem to know what is for heaven alone.</p> +<h3><a name="page88"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 88</span>THE +THREE SINGERS TO YOUNG BLOOD</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Carols</span> nature, +counsel men.<br /> +Different notes as rook from wren<br /> +Hear we when our steps begin,<br /> +And the choice is cast within,<br /> +Where a robber raven’s tale<br /> +Urges passion’s nightingale.</p> +<p class="poetry">Hark to the three. Chimed they in one,<br +/> +Life were music of the sun.<br /> +Liquid first, and then the caw,<br /> +Then the cry that knows not law.</p> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry">As the birds do, so do we,<br /> +Bill our mate, and choose our tree.<br /> +Swift to building work addressed,<br /> +Any straw will help a nest.<br /> +Mates are warm, and this is truth,<br /> +Glad the young that come of youth.<br /> +They have bloom i’ the blood and sap<br /> +Chilling at no thunder-clap.<br /> +Man and woman on the thorn<br /> +Trust not Earth, and have her scorn.<br /> +They who in her lead confide,<br /> +Wither me if they spread not wide!<br /> +Look for aid to little things,<br /> +You will get them quick as wings,<br /> +Thick as feathers; would you feed,<br /> +Take the leap that springs the need.</p> +<h4><a name="page89"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +89</span>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Contemplate the rutted road:<br /> +Life is both a lure and goad.<br /> +Each to hold in measure just,<br /> +Trample appetite to dust.<br /> +Mark the fool and wanton spin:<br /> +Keep to harness as a skin.<br /> +Ere you follow nature’s lead,<br /> +Of her powers in you have heed;<br /> +Else a shiverer you will find<br /> +You have challenged humankind.<br /> +Mates are chosen marketwise:<br /> +Coolest bargainer best buys.<br /> +Leap not, nor let leap the heart:<br /> +Trot your track, and drag your cart.<br /> +So your end may be in wool,<br /> +Honoured, and with manger full.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">O the rosy light! it fleets,<br /> +Dearer dying than all sweets.<br /> +That is life: it waves and goes;<br /> +Solely in that cherished Rose<br /> +Palpitates, or else ’tis death.<br /> +Call it love with all thy breath.<br /> +Love! it lingers: Love! it nears:<br /> +Love! O Love! the Rose appears,<br /> +Blushful, magic, reddening air.<br /> +Now the choice is on thee: dare!<br /> +Mortal seems the touch, but makes<br /> +Immortal the hand that takes.<br /> +Feel what sea within thee shames<br /> +Of its force all other claims,<br /> +Drowns them. Clasp! the world will be<br /> +Heavenly Rose to swelling sea.</p> +<h3><a name="page90"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 90</span>THE +ORCHARD AND THE HEATH</h3> +<p class="poetry">I <span class="smcap">chanced</span> upon an +early walk to spy<br /> +A troop of children through an orchard gate:<br /> + The boughs hung low, the grass was high;<br /> + They had but to lift hands or wait<br /> +For fruits to fill them; fruits were all their sky.</p> +<p class="poetry">They shouted, running on from tree to tree,<br +/> +And played the game the wind plays, on and round.<br /> + ’Twas visible invisible glee<br /> + Pursuing; and a fountain’s sound<br /> +Of laughter spouted, pattering fresh on me.</p> +<p class="poetry">I could have watched them till the daylight +fled,<br /> +Their pretty bower made such a light of day.<br /> + A small one tumbling sang, ‘Oh! +head!’<br /> + The rest to comfort her straightway<br /> +Seized on a branch and thumped down apples red.</p> +<p class="poetry">The tiny creature flashing through green +grass,<br /> +And laughing with her feet and eyes among<br /> + Fresh apples, while a little lass<br /> + Over as o’er breeze-ripples hung:<br /> +That sight I saw, and passed as aliens pass.</p> +<p class="poetry">My footpath left the pleasant farms and +lanes,<br /> +Soft cottage-smoke, straight cocks a-crow, gay flowers;<br /> + Beyond the wheel-ruts of the wains,<br /> + Across a heath I walked for hours,<br /> +And met its rival tenants, rays and rains.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page91"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +91</span>Still in my view mile-distant firs appeared,<br /> +When, under a patched channel-bank enriched<br /> + With foxglove whose late bells drooped seared,<br /> + Behold, a family had pitched<br /> +Their camp, and labouring the low tent upreared.</p> +<p class="poetry">Here, too, were many children, quick to scan<br +/> +A new thing coming; swarthy cheeks, white teeth:<br /> + In many-coloured rags they ran,<br /> + Like iron runlets of the heath.<br /> +Dispersed lay broth-pot, sticks, and drinking-can.</p> +<p class="poetry">Three girls, with shoulders like a boat at +sea<br /> +Tipped sideways by the wave (their clothing slid<br /> + From either ridge unequally),<br /> + Lean, swift and voluble, bestrid<br /> +A starting-point, unfrocked to the bent knee.</p> +<p class="poetry">They raced; their brothers yelled them on, and +broke<br /> +In act to follow, but as one they snuffed<br /> + Wood-fumes, and by the fire that spoke<br /> + Of provender, its pale flame puffed,<br /> +And rolled athwart dwarf furzes grey-blue smoke.</p> +<p class="poetry">Soon on the dark edge of a ruddier gleam,<br /> +The mother-pot perusing, all, stretched flat,<br /> + Paused for its bubbling-up supreme:<br /> + A dog upright in circle sat,<br /> +And oft his nose went with the flying steam.</p> +<p class="poetry">I turned and looked on heaven awhile, where +now<br /> +The moor-faced sunset broadened with red light;<br /> + Threw high aloft a golden bough,<br /> + And seemed the desert of the night<br /> +Far down with mellow orchards to endow.</p> +<h3><a name="page92"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 92</span>EARTH +AND MAN</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">On</span> her great +venture, Man,<br /> +Earth gazes while her fingers dint the breast<br /> +Which is his well of strength, his home of rest,<br /> +And fair to scan.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">More aid than that embrace,<br /> +That nourishment, she cannot give: his heart<br /> +Involves his fate; and she who urged the start<br /> +Abides the race.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">For he is in the lists<br /> +Contentious with the elements, whose dower<br /> +First sprang him; for swift vultures to devour<br /> +If he desists.</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">His breath of instant thirst<br /> +Is warning of a creature matched with strife,<br /> +To meet it as a bride, or let fall life<br /> +On life’s accursed.</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">No longer forth he bounds<br /> +The lusty animal, afield to roam,<br /> +But peering in Earth’s entrails, where the gnome<br /> +Strange themes propounds.</p> +<h4><a name="page93"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +93</span>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">By hunger sharply sped<br /> +To grasp at weapons ere he learns their use,<br /> +In each new ring he bears a giant’s thews,<br /> +An infant’s head.</p> +<h4>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">And ever that old task<br /> +Of reading what he is and whence he came,<br /> +Whither to go, finds wilder letters flame<br /> +Across her mask.</p> +<h4>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">She hears his wailful prayer,<br /> +When now to the Invisible he raves<br /> +To rend him from her, now of his mother craves<br /> +Her calm, her care.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">The thing that shudders most<br /> +Within him is the burden of his cry.<br /> +Seen of his dread, she is to his blank eye<br /> +The eyeless Ghost.</p> +<h4>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">Or sometimes she will seem<br /> +Heavenly, but her blush, soon wearing white,<br /> +Veils like a gorsebush in a web of blight,<br /> +With gold-buds dim.</p> +<h4>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Once worshipped Prime of Powers,<br /> +She still was the Implacable: as a beast,<br /> +She struck him down and dragged him from the feast<br /> +She crowned with flowers.</p> +<h4><a name="page94"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +94</span>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Her pomp of glorious hues,<br /> +Her revelries of ripeness, her kind smile,<br /> +Her songs, her peeping faces, lure awhile<br /> +With symbol-clues.</p> +<h4>XIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">The mystery she holds<br /> +For him, inveterately he strains to see,<br /> +And sight of his obtuseness is the key<br /> +Among those folds.</p> +<h4>XIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">He may entreat, aspire,<br /> +He may despair, and she has never heed.<br /> +She drinking his warm sweat will soothe his need,<br /> +Not his desire.</p> +<h4>XV</h4> +<p class="poetry">She prompts him to rejoice,<br /> +Yet scares him on the threshold with the shroud.<br /> +He deems her cherishing of her best-endowed<br /> +A wanton’s choice.</p> +<h4>XVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Albeit thereof he has found<br /> +Firm roadway between lustfulness and pain;<br /> +Has half transferred the battle to his brain,<br /> +From bloody ground;</p> +<h4>XVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">He will not read her good,<br /> +Or wise, but with the passion Self obscures;<br /> +Through that old devil of the thousand lures,<br /> +Through that dense hood:</p> +<h4><a name="page95"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +95</span>XVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Through terror, through distrust;<br /> +The greed to touch, to view, to have, to live:<br /> +Through all that makes of him a sensitive<br /> +Abhorring dust.</p> +<h4>XIX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Behold his wormy home!<br /> +And he the wind-whipped, anywhither wave<br /> +Crazily tumbled on a shingle-grave<br /> +To waste in foam.</p> +<h4>XX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Therefore the wretch inclined<br /> +Afresh to the Invisible, who, he saith,<br /> +Can raise him high: with vows of living faith<br /> +For little signs.</p> +<h4>XXI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Some signs he must demand,<br /> +Some proofs of slaughtered nature; some prized few,<br /> +To satisfy the senses it is true,<br /> +And in his hand,</p> +<h4>XXII</h4> +<p class="poetry">This miracle which saves<br /> +Himself, himself doth from extinction clutch,<br /> +By virtue of his worth, contrasting much<br /> +With brutes and knaves.</p> +<h4>XXIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">From dust, of him abhorred,<br /> +He would be snatched by Grace discovering worth.<br /> +‘Sever me from the hollowness of Earth!<br /> +Me take, dear Lord!’</p> +<h4><a name="page96"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +96</span>XXIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">She hears him. Him she owes<br /> +For half her loveliness a love well won<br /> +By work that lights the shapeless and the dun,<br /> +Their common foes.</p> +<h4>XXV</h4> +<p class="poetry">He builds the soaring spires,<br /> +That sing his soul in stone: of her he draws,<br /> +Though blind to her, by spelling at her laws,<br /> +Her purest fires.</p> +<h4>XXVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Through him hath she exchanged,<br /> +For the gold harvest-robes, the mural crown,<br /> +Her haggard quarry-features and thick frown<br /> +Where monsters ranged.</p> +<h4>XXVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">And order, high discourse,<br /> +And decency, than which is life less dear,<br /> +She has of him: the lyre of language clear,<br /> +Love’s tongue and source.</p> +<h4>XXVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">She hears him, and can hear<br /> +With glory in his gains by work achieved:<br /> +With grief for grief that is the unperceived<br /> +In her so near.</p> +<h4>XXIX</h4> +<p class="poetry">If he aloft for aid<br /> +Imploring storms, her essence is the spur.<br /> +His cry to heaven is a cry to her<br /> +He would evade.</p> +<h4><a name="page97"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +97</span>XXX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Not elsewhere can he tend.<br /> +Those are her rules which bid him wash foul sins;<br /> +Those her revulsions from the skull that grins<br /> +To ape his end.</p> +<h4>XXXI</h4> +<p class="poetry">And her desires are those<br /> +For happiness, for lastingness, for light.<br /> +’Tis she who kindles in his haunting night<br /> +The hoped dawn-rose.</p> +<h4>XXXII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Fair fountains of the dark<br /> +Daily she waves him, that his inner dream<br /> +May clasp amid the glooms a springing beam,<br /> +A quivering lark:</p> +<h4>XXIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">This life and her to know<br /> +For Spirit: with awakenedness of glee<br /> +To feel stern joy her origin: not he<br /> +The child of woe.</p> +<h4>XXXIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">But that the senses still<br /> +Usurp the station of their issue mind,<br /> +He would have burst the chrysalis of the blind:<br /> +As yet he will;</p> +<h4>XXXV</h4> +<p class="poetry">As yet he will, she prays,<br /> +Yet will when his distempered devil of Self;—<br /> +The glutton for her fruits, the wily elf<br /> +In shifting rays;—</p> +<h4><a name="page98"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +98</span>XXXVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">That captain of the scorned;<br /> +The coveter of life in soul and shell,<br /> +The fratricide, the thief, the infidel,<br /> +The hoofed and horned;—</p> +<h4>XXXVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">He singularly doomed<br /> +To what he execrates and writhes to shun;—<br /> +When fire has passed him vapour to the sun,<br /> +And sun relumed,</p> +<h4>XXXVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Then shall the horrid pall<br /> +Be lifted, and a spirit nigh divine,<br /> +‘Live in thy offspring as I live in mine,’<br /> +Will hear her call.</p> +<h4>XXXIX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Whence looks he on a land<br /> +Whereon his labour is a carven page;<br /> +And forth from heritage to heritage<br /> +Nought writ on sand.</p> +<h4>XL</h4> +<p class="poetry">His fables of the Above,<br /> +And his gapped readings of the crown and sword,<br /> +The hell detested and the heaven adored,<br /> +The hate, the love,</p> +<h4>XLI</h4> +<p class="poetry">The bright wing, the black hoof,<br /> +He shall peruse, from Reason not disjoined,<br /> +And never unfaith clamouring to be coined<br /> +To faith by proof.</p> +<h4><a name="page99"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +99</span>XLII</h4> +<p class="poetry">She her just Lord may view,<br /> +Not he, her creature, till his soul has yearned<br /> +With all her gifts to reach the light discerned<br /> +Her spirit through.</p> +<h4>XLIIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Then in him time shall run<br /> +As in the hour that to young sunlight crows;<br /> +And—‘If thou hast good faith it can repose,’<br +/> +She tells her son.</p> +<h4>XLIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Meanwhile on him, her chief<br /> +Expression, her great word of life, looks she;<br /> +Twi-minded of him, as the waxing tree,<br /> +Or dated leaf.</p> +<h3><a name="page100"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 100</span>A +BALLAD OF FAIR LADIES IN REVOLT</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">See</span> the sweet women, +friend, that lean beneath<br /> +The ever-falling fountain of green leaves<br /> +Round the white bending stem, and like a wreath<br /> +Of our most blushful flower shine trembling through,<br /> +To teach philosophers the thirst of thieves:<br /> + Is one for me? is one for you?</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Fair sirs, we give you welcome, yield +you place,<br /> +And you shall choose among us which you will,<br /> +Without the idle pastime of the chase,<br /> +If to this treaty you can well agree:<br /> +To wed our cause, and its high task fulfil.<br /> + He who’s for us, for him are we!</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Most gracious ladies, nigh when light +has birth,<br /> +A troop of maids, brown as burnt heather-bells,<br /> +And rich with life as moss-roots breathe of earth<br /> +In the first plucking of them, past us flew<br /> +To labour, singing rustic ritornells:<br /> + Had they a cause? are they of you?</p> +<h4><a name="page101"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +101</span>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Sirs, they are as unthinking armies +are<br /> +To thoughtful leaders, and our cause is theirs.<br /> +When they know men they know the state of war:<br /> +But now they dream like sunlight on a sea,<br /> +And deem you hold the half of happy pairs.<br /> + He who’s for us, for him are we!</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Ladies, I listened to a ring of +dames;<br /> +Judicial in the robe and wig; secure<br /> +As venerated portraits in their frames;<br /> +And they denounced some insurrection new<br /> +Against sound laws which keep you good and pure.<br /> + Are you of them? are they of you?</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Sirs, they are of us, as their dress +denotes,<br /> +And by as much: let them together chime:<br /> +It is an ancient bell within their throats,<br /> +Pulled by an aged ringer; with what glee<br /> +Befits the yellow yesterdays of time.<br /> + He who’s for us, for him are we!</p> +<h4>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Sweet ladies, you with beauty, you with +wit;<br /> +Dowered of all favours and all blessed things<br /> +Whereat the ruddy torch of Love is lit;<br /> +Wherefore this vain and outworn strife renew,<br /> +Which stays the tide no more than eddy-rings?<br /> + Who is for love must be for you.</p> +<h4><a name="page102"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +102</span>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—The manners of the market, honest +sirs,<br /> +’Tis hard to quit when you behold the wares.<br /> +You flatter us, or perchance our milliners<br /> +You flatter; so this vain and outworn She<br /> +May still be the charmed snake to your soft airs!<br /> + A higher lord than Love claim we.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">—One day, dear lady, missing the broad +track,<br /> +I came on a wood’s border, by a mead,<br /> +Where golden May ran up to moted black:<br /> +And there I saw Queen Beauty hold review,<br /> +With Love before her throne in act to plead.<br /> + Take him for me, take her for you.</p> +<h4>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Ingenious gentleman, the tale is +known.<br /> +Love pleaded sweetly: Beauty would not melt:<br /> +She would not melt: he turned in wrath: her throne<br /> +The shadow of his back froze witheringly,<br /> +And sobbing at his feet Queen Beauty knelt.<br /> + O not such slaves of Love are we!</p> +<h4>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Love, lady, like the star above that +lance<br /> +Of radiance flung by sunset on ridged cloud,<br /> +Sad as the last line of a brave romance!—<br /> +Young Love hung dim, yet quivering round him threw<br /> +Beams of fresh fire, while Beauty waned and bowed.<br /> + Scorn Love, and dread the doom for you.</p> +<h4><a name="page103"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +103</span>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Called she not for her mirror, +sir? Forth ran<br /> +Her women: I am lost, she cried, when lo,<br /> +Love in the form of an admiring man<br /> +Once more in adoration bent the knee,<br /> +And brought the faded Pagan to full blow:<br /> + For which her throne she gave: not we!</p> +<h4>XIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—My version, madam, runs not to that +end.<br /> +A certain madness of an hour half past,<br /> +Caught her like fever; her just lord no friend<br /> +She fancied; aimed beyond beauty, and thence grew<br /> +The prim acerbity, sweet Love’s outcast.<br /> + Great heaven ward off that stroke from you!</p> +<h4>XIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Your prayer to heaven, good sir, is +generous:<br /> +How generous likewise that you do not name<br /> +Offended nature! She from all of us<br /> +Couched idle underneath our showering tree,<br /> +May quite withhold her most destructive flame;<br /> + And then what woeful women we!</p> +<h4>XV</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Quite, could not be, fair lady; yet your +youth<br /> +May run to drought in visionary schemes:<br /> +And a late waking to perceive the truth,<br /> +When day falls shrouding her supreme adieu,<br /> +Shows darker wastes than unaccomplished dreams:<br /> + And that may be in store for you.</p> +<h4><a name="page104"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +104</span>XVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">—O sir, the truth, the truth! is’t +in the skies,<br /> +Or in the grass, or in this heart of ours?<br /> +But O the truth, the truth! the many eyes<br /> +That look on it! the diverse things they see,<br /> +According to their thirst for fruit or flowers!<br /> + Pass on: it is the truth seek we.</p> +<h4>XVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Lady, there is a truth of settled +laws<br /> +That down the past burns like a great watch-fire.<br /> +Let youth hail changeful mornings; but your cause,<br /> +Whetting its edge to cut the race in two,<br /> +Is felony: you forfeit the bright lyre,<br /> + Much honour and much glory you!</p> +<h4>XVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Sir, was it glory, was it honour, +pride,<br /> +And not as cat and serpent and poor slave,<br /> +Wherewith we walked in union by your side?<br /> +Spare to false womanliness her delicacy,<br /> +Or bid true manliness give ear, we crave:<br /> + In our defence thus chained are we.</p> +<h4>XIX</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Yours, madam, were the privileges of +life<br /> +Proper to man’s ideal; you were the mark<br /> +Of action, and the banner in the strife:<br /> +Yea, of your very weakness once you drew<br /> +The strength that sounds the wells, outflies the lark:<br /> + Wrapped in a robe of flame were you!</p> +<h4><a name="page105"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +105</span>XX</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Your friend looks thoughtful. Sir, +when we were chill,<br /> +You clothed us warmly; all in honour! when<br /> +We starved you fed us; all in honour still:<br /> +Oh, all in honour, ultra-honourably!<br /> +Deep is the gratitude we owe to men,<br /> + For privileged indeed were we!</p> +<h4>XXI</h4> +<p class="poetry">—You cite exceptions, madam, that are +sad,<br /> +But come in the red struggle of our growth.<br /> +Alas, that I should have to say it! bad<br /> +Is two-sexed upon earth: this which you do,<br /> +Shows animal impatience, mental sloth:<br /> + Man monstrous! pining seraphs you!</p> +<h4>XXII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—I fain would ask your friend . . . but I +will ask<br /> +You, sir, how if in place of numbers vague,<br /> +Your sad exceptions were to break that mask<br /> +They wear for your cool mind historically,<br /> +And blaze like black lists of a <i>present</i> plague?<br /> + But in that light behold them we.</p> +<h4>XXIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Your spirit breathes a mist upon our +world,<br /> +Lady, and like a rain to pierce the roof<br /> +And drench the bed where toil-tossed man lies curled<br /> +In his hard-earned oblivion! You are few,<br /> +Scattered, ill-counselled, blinded: for a proof,<br /> + I have lived, and have known none like you.</p> +<h4><a name="page106"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +106</span>XXIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">—We may be blind to men, sir: we +embrace<br /> +A future now beyond the fowler’s nets.<br /> +Though few, we hold a promise for the race<br /> +That was not at our rising: you are free<br /> +To win brave mates; you lose but marionnettes.<br /> + He who’s for us, for him are we.</p> +<h4>XXV</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Ah! madam, were they puppets who +withstood<br /> +Youth’s cravings for adventure to preserve<br /> +The dedicated ways of womanhood?<br /> +The light which leads us from the paths of rue,<br /> +That light above us, never seen to swerve,<br /> + Should be the home-lamp trimmed by you.</p> +<h4>XXVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Ah! sir, our worshipped posture we +perchance<br /> +Shall not abandon, though we see not how,<br /> +Being to that lamp-post fixed, we may advance<br /> +Beside our lords in any real degree,<br /> +Unless we move: and to advance is now<br /> + A sovereign need, think more than we.</p> +<h4>XXVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—So push you out of harbour in small +craft,<br /> +With little seamanship; and comes a gale,<br /> +The world will laugh, the world has often laughed,<br /> +Lady, to see how bold when skies are blue,<br /> +When black winds churn the deeps how panic-pale,<br /> + How swift to the old nest fly you!</p> +<h4><a name="page107"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +107</span>XXVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—What thinks your friend, kind sir? +We have escaped<br /> +But partly that old half-tamed wild beast’s paw<br /> +Whereunder woman, the weak thing, was shaped:<br /> +Men, too, have known the cramping enemy<br /> +In grim brute force, whom force of brain shall awe:<br /> + Him our deliverer, await we!</p> +<h4>XXIX</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Delusions are with eloquence endowed,<br +/> +And yours might pluck an angel from the spheres<br /> +To play in this revolt whereto you are vowed,<br /> +Deliverer, lady! but like summer dew<br /> +O’er fields that crack for rain your friends drop tears,<br +/> + Who see the awakening for you.</p> +<h4>XXX</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Is he our friend, there silent? he weeps +not.<br /> +O sir, delusion mounting like a sun<br /> +On a mind blank as the white wife of Lot,<br /> +Giving it warmth and movement! if this be<br /> +Delusion, think of what thereby was won<br /> + For men, and dream of what win we.</p> +<h4>XXXI</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Lady, the destiny of minor powers,<br /> +Who would recast us, is but to convulse:<br /> +You enter on a strife that frets and sours;<br /> +You can but win sick disappointment’s hue;<br /> +And simply an accelerated pulse,<br /> + Some tonic you have drunk moves you.</p> +<h4><a name="page108"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +108</span>XXXII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Thinks your friend so? Good sir, +your wit is bright;<br /> +But wit that strives to speak the popular voice,<br /> +Puts on its nightcap and puts out its light.<br /> +Curfew, would seem your conqueror’s decree<br /> +To women likewise: and we have no choice<br /> + Save darkness or rebellion, we!</p> +<h4>XXXIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—A plain safe intermediate way is +cleft<br /> +By reason foiling passion: you that rave<br /> +Of mad alternatives to right and left<br /> +Echo the tempter, madam: and ’tis due<br /> +Unto your sex to shun it as the grave,<br /> + This later apple offered you.</p> +<h4>XXXIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">—This apple is not ripe, it is not +sweet;<br /> +Nor rosy, sir, nor golden: eye and mouth<br /> +Are little wooed by it; yet we would eat.<br /> +We are somewhat tired of Eden, is our plea.<br /> +We have thirsted long; this apple suits our drouth:<br /> + ’Tis good for men to halve, think we.</p> +<h4>XXXV</h4> +<p class="poetry">—But say, what seek you, madam? +’Tis enough<br /> +That you should have dominion o’er the springs<br /> +Domestic and man’s heart: those ways, how rough,<br /> +How vile, outside the stately avenue<br /> +Where you walk sheltered by your angel’s wings,<br /> + Are happily unknown to you.</p> +<h4><a name="page109"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +109</span>XXXVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">—We hear women’s shrieks on +them. We like your phrase,<br /> +Dominion domestic! And that roar,<br /> +‘What seek you?’ is of tyrants in all days.<br /> +Sir, get you something of our purity<br /> +And we will of your strength: we ask no more.<br /> + That is the sum of what seek we.</p> +<h4>XXXVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—O for an image, madam, in one word,<br +/> +To show you as the lightning night reveals,<br /> +Your error and your perils: you have erred<br /> +In mind only, and the perils that ensue<br /> +Swift heels may soften; wherefore to swift heels<br /> + Address your hopes of safety you!</p> +<h4>XXXVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—To err in mind, sir . . . your friend +smiles: he may!<br /> +To err in mind, if err in mind we can,<br /> +Is grievous error you do well to stay.<br /> +But O how different from reality<br /> +Men’s fiction is! how like you in the plan,<br /> + Is woman, knew you her as we!</p> +<h4>XXXIX</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Look, lady, where yon river winds its +line<br /> +Toward sunset, and receives on breast and face<br /> +The splendour of fair life: to be divine,<br /> +’Tis nature bids you be to nature true,<br /> +Flowing with beauty, lending earth your grace,<br /> + Reflecting heaven in clearness you.</p> +<h4><a name="page110"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +110</span>XL</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Sir, you speak well: your friend no word +vouchsafes.<br /> +To flow with beauty, breeding fools and worse,<br /> +Cowards and worse: at such fair life she chafes,<br /> +Who is not wholly of the nursery,<br /> +Nor of your schools: we share the primal curse;<br /> + Together shake it off, say we!</p> +<h4>XLI</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Hear, then, my friend, madam! +Tongue-restrained he stands<br /> +Till words are thoughts, and thoughts, like swords enriched<br /> +With traceries of the artificer’s hands,<br /> +Are fire-proved steel to cut, fair flowers to view.—<br /> +Do I hear him? Oh, he is bewitched, bewitched!<br /> + Heed him not! Traitress beauties you!</p> +<h4>XLII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—We have won a champion, sisters, and a +sage!<br /> +—Ladies, you win a guest to a good feast!<br /> +—Sir spokesman, sneers are weakness veiling rage.<br /> +—Of weakness, and wise men, you have the key.<br /> +—Then are there fresher mornings mounting East<br /> + Than ever yet have dawned, sing we!</p> +<h4>XLIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">—False ends as false began, madam, be +sure!<br /> +—What lure there is the pure cause purifies!<br /> +—Who purifies the victim of the lure?<br /> +—That soul which bids us our high light pursue.<br /> +—Some heights are measured down: the wary wise<br /> + Shun Reason in the masque with you!</p> +<h4><a name="page111"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +111</span>XLIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Sir, for the friend you bring us, take +our thanks.<br /> +Yes, Beauty was of old this barren goal;<br /> +A thing with claws; and brute-like in her pranks!<br /> +But could she give more loyal guarantee<br /> +Than wooing Wisdom, that in her a soul<br /> + Has risen? Adieu: content are we!</p> +<h4>XLV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Those ladies led their captive to the +flood’s<br /> +Green edge. He floating with them seemed the most<br /> +Fool-flushed old noddy ever crowned with buds.<br /> +Happier than I! Then, why not wiser too?<br /> +For he that lives with Beauty, he may boast<br /> + His comrade over me and you.</p> +<h4>XLVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Have women nursed some dream since Helen +sailed<br /> +Over the sea of blood the blushing star,<br /> +That beauty, whom frail man as Goddess hailed,<br /> +When not possessing her (for such is he!),<br /> +Might in a wondering season seen afar,<br /> + Be tamed to say not ‘I,’ but +‘we’?</p> +<h4>XLVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">And shall they make of Beauty their estate,<br +/> +The fortress and the weapon of their sex?<br /> +Shall she in her frost-brilliancy dictate,<br /> +More queenly than of old, how we must woo,<br /> +Ere she will melt? The halter’s on our necks,<br /> + Kick as it likes us, I and you.</p> +<h4><a name="page112"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +112</span>XLVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Certain it is, if Beauty has disdained<br /> +Her ancient conquests, with an aim thus high:<br /> +If this, if that, if more, the fight is gained.<br /> +But can she keep her followers without fee?<br /> +Yet ah! to hear anew those ladies cry,<br /> + He who’s for us, for him are we!</p> +<h2><a name="page113"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +113</span>BALLADS AND POEMS OF TRAGIC LIFE</h2> +<h3><a name="page115"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 115</span>THE +TWO MASKS</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Melpomene</span> among her +livid people,<br /> +Ere stroke of lyre, upon Thaleia looks,<br /> +Warned by old contests that one museful ripple<br /> +Along those lips of rose with tendril hooks<br /> +Forebodes disturbance in the springs of pathos,<br /> +Perchance may change of masks midway demand,<br /> +Albeit the man rise mountainous as Athos,<br /> +The woman wild as Cape Leucadia stand.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">For this the Comic Muse exacts of creatures<br +/> +Appealing to the fount of tears: that they<br /> +Strive never to outleap our human features,<br /> +And do Right Reason’s ordinance obey,<br /> +In peril of the hum to laughter nighest.<br /> +But prove they under stress of action’s fire<br /> +Nobleness, to that test of Reason highest,<br /> +She bows: she waves them for the loftier lyre.</p> +<h3><a name="page116"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +116</span>ARCHDUCHESS ANNE</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<h5>I</h5> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">In</span> middle age an +evil thing<br /> + Befell Archduchess Anne:<br /> +She looked outside her wedding-ring<br /> + Upon a princely man.</p> +<h5>II</h5> +<p class="poetry">Count Louis was for horse and arms;<br /> + And if its beacon waved,<br /> +For love; but ladies had not charms<br /> + To match a danger braved.</p> +<h5>III</h5> +<p class="poetry">On battlefields he was the bow<br /> + Bestrung to fly the shaft:<br /> +In idle hours his heart would flow<br /> + As winds on currents waft.</p> +<h5>IV</h5> +<p class="poetry">His blood was of those warrior tribes<br /> + That streamed from morning’s fire,<br /> +Whom now with traps and now with bribes<br /> + The wily Council wire.</p> +<h5>V</h5> +<p class="poetry">Archduchess Anne the Council ruled,<br /> + Count Louis his great dame;<br /> +And woe to both when one had cooled!<br /> + Little was she to blame.</p> +<h5><a name="page117"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +117</span>VI</h5> +<p class="poetry">Among her chiefs who spun their plots,<br /> + Old Kraken stood the sword:<br /> +As sharp his wits for cutting knots<br /> + Of babble he abhorred.</p> +<h5>VII</h5> +<p class="poetry">He reverenced her name and line,<br /> + Nor other merit had<br /> +Save soldierwise to wait her sign,<br /> + And do the deed she bade.</p> +<h5>VIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">He saw her hand jump at her side<br /> + Ere royally she smiled<br /> +On Louis and his fair young bride<br /> + Where courtly ranks defiled.</p> +<h5>IX</h5> +<p class="poetry">That was a moment when a shock<br /> + Through the procession ran,<br /> +And thrilled the plumes, and stayed the clock,<br /> + Yet smiled Archduchess Anne.</p> +<h5>X</h5> +<p class="poetry">No touch gave she to hound in leash,<br /> + No wink to sword in sheath:<br /> +She seemed a woman scarce of flesh;<br /> + Above it, or beneath.</p> +<h5><a name="page118"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +118</span>XI</h5> +<p class="poetry">Old Kraken spied with kennelled snarl,<br /> + His Lady deemed disgraced.<br /> +He footed as on burning marl,<br /> + When out of Hall he paced.</p> +<h5>XII</h5> +<p class="poetry">’Twas seen he hammered striding legs,<br +/> + And stopped, and strode again.<br /> +Now Vengeance has a brood of eggs,<br /> + But Patience must be hen.</p> +<h5>XIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">Too slow are they for wrath to hatch,<br /> + Too hot for time to rear.<br /> +Old Kraken kept unwinding watch;<br /> + He marked his day appear.</p> +<h5>XIV</h5> +<p class="poetry">He neighed a laugh, though moods were rough<br +/> + With standards in revolt:<br /> +His nostrils took the news for snuff,<br /> + His smacking lips for salt.</p> +<h5>XV</h5> +<p class="poetry">Count Louis’ wavy cock’s plumes +led<br /> + His troops of black-haired manes,<br /> +A rebel; and old Kraken sped<br /> + To front him on the plains.</p> +<h5><a name="page119"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +119</span>XVI</h5> +<p class="poetry">Then camp opposed to camp did they<br /> + Fret earth with panther claws<br /> +For signal of a bloody day,<br /> + Each reading from the Laws.</p> +<h5>XVII</h5> +<p class="poetry">‘Forefend it, heaven!’ Count Louis +cried,<br /> + ‘And let the righteous plead:<br /> +My country is a willing bride,<br /> + Was never slave decreed.</p> +<h5>XVIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">‘Not we for thirst of blood appeal<br /> + To sword and slaughter curst;<br /> +We have God’s blessing on our steel,<br /> + Do we our pleading first.’</p> +<h5>XIX</h5> +<p class="poetry">Count Louis, soul of chivalry,<br /> + Put trust in plighted word;<br /> +By starlight on the broad brown lea,<br /> + To bar the strife he spurred.</p> +<h5>XX</h5> +<p class="poetry">Across his breast a crimson spot,<br /> + That in a quiver glowed,<br /> +The ruddy crested camp-fires shot,<br /> + As he to darkness rode.</p> +<h5><a name="page120"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +120</span>XXI</h5> +<p class="poetry">He rode while omens called, beware<br /> + Old Kraken’s pledge of faith!<br /> +A smile and waving hand in air,<br /> + And outward flew the wraith.</p> +<h5>XXII</h5> +<p class="poetry">Before pale morn had mixed with gold,<br /> + His army roared, and chilled,<br /> +As men who have a woe foretold,<br /> + And see it red fulfilled.</p> +<h5>XXIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">Away and to his young wife speed,<br /> + And say that Honour’s dead!<br /> +Another word she will not need<br /> + To bow a widow’s head.</p> +<h5>XXIV</h5> +<p class="poetry">Old Kraken roped his white moustache<br /> + Right, left, for savage glee:<br /> +—To swing him in his soldier’s sash<br /> + Were kind for such as he!</p> +<h5>XXV</h5> +<p class="poetry">Old Kraken’s look hard Winter wears<br /> + When sweeps the wild snow-blast:<br /> +He had the hug of Arctic bears<br /> + For captives he held fast.</p> +<h4><a name="page121"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +121</span>II</h4> +<h5>I</h5> +<p class="poetry">Archduchess Anne sat carved in frost,<br /> + Shut off from priest and spouse.<br /> +Her lips were locked, her arms were crossed,<br /> + Her eyes were in her brows.</p> +<h5>II</h5> +<p class="poetry">One hand enclosed a paper scroll,<br /> + Held as a strangled asp.<br /> +So may we see the woman’s soul<br /> + In her dire tempter’s grasp.</p> +<h5>III</h5> +<p class="poetry">Along that scroll Count Louis’ doom<br /> + Throbbed till the letters flamed.<br /> +She saw him in his scornful bloom,<br /> + She saw him chained and shamed.</p> +<h5>IV</h5> +<p class="poetry">Around that scroll Count Louis’ fate<br +/> + Was acted to her stare,<br /> +And hate in love and love in hate<br /> + Fought fell to smite or spare.</p> +<h5><a name="page122"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +122</span>V</h5> +<p class="poetry">Between the day that struck her old,<br /> + And this black star of days,<br /> +Her heart swung like a storm-bell tolled<br /> + Above a town ablaze.</p> +<h5>VI</h5> +<p class="poetry">His beauty pressed to intercede,<br /> + His beauty served him ill.<br /> +—Not Vengeance, ’tis his rebel’s deed,<br /> + ’Tis Justice, not our will!</p> +<h5>VII</h5> +<p class="poetry">Yet who had sprung to life’s full +force<br /> + A breast that loveless dried?<br /> +But who had sapped it at the source,<br /> + With scarlet to her pride!</p> +<h5>VIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">He brought her waning heart as ’twere<br +/> + New message from the skies.<br /> +And he betrayed, and left on her<br /> + The burden of their sighs.</p> +<h5>IX</h5> +<p class="poetry">In floods her tender memories poured;<br /> + They foamed with waves of spite:<br /> +She crushed them, high her heart outsoared,<br /> + To keep her mind alight.</p> +<h5><a name="page123"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +123</span>X</h5> +<p class="poetry">—The crawling creature, called in +scorn<br /> + A woman!—with this pen<br /> +We sign a paper that may warn<br /> + His crowing fellowmen.</p> +<h5>XI</h5> +<p class="poetry">—We read them lesson of a power<br /> + They slight who do us wrong.<br /> +That bitter hour this bitter hour<br /> + Provokes; by turns the strong!</p> +<h5>XII</h5> +<p class="poetry">—That we were woman once is known:<br /> + That we are Justice now,<br /> +Above our sex, above the throne,<br /> + Men quaking shall avow.</p> +<h5>XIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">Archduchess Anne ascending flew,<br /> + Her heart outsoared, but felt<br /> +The demon of her sex pursue,<br /> + Incensing or to melt.</p> +<h5>XIV</h5> +<p class="poetry">Those counterfloods below at leap<br /> + Still in her breast blew storm,<br /> +And farther up the heavenly steep<br /> + Wrestled in angels’ form.</p> +<h5><a name="page124"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +124</span>XV</h5> +<p class="poetry">To disentangle one clear wish<br /> + Not of her sex, she sought;<br /> +And womanish to womanish<br /> + Discerned in lighted thought.</p> +<h5>XVI</h5> +<p class="poetry">With Louis’ chance it went not well<br /> + When at herself she raged;<br /> +A woman, of whom men might tell<br /> + She doted, crazed and aged.</p> +<h5>XVII</h5> +<p class="poetry">Or else enamoured of a sweet<br /> + Withdrawn, a vengeful crone!<br /> +And say, what figure at her feet<br /> + Is this that utters moan?</p> +<h5>XVIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">The Countess Louis from her head<br /> + Drew veil: ‘Great Lady, hear!<br /> +My husband deems you Justice dread,<br /> + I know you Mercy dear.</p> +<h5>XIX</h5> +<p class="poetry">‘His error upon him may fall;<br /> + He will not breathe a nay.<br /> +I am his helpless mate in all,<br /> + Except for grace to pray.</p> +<h5><a name="page125"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +125</span>XX</h5> +<p class="poetry">‘Perchance on me his choice inclined,<br +/> + To give his House an heir:<br /> +I had not marriage with his mind,<br /> + His counsel could not share.</p> +<h5>XXI</h5> +<p class="poetry">‘I brought no portion for his weal<br /> + But this one instinct true,<br /> +Which bids me in my weakness kneel,<br /> + Archduchess Anne, to you.’</p> +<h5>XXII</h5> +<p class="poetry">The frowning Lady uttered, +‘Forth!’<br /> + Her look forbade delay:<br /> +‘It is not mine to weigh your worth;<br /> + Your husband’s others weigh.</p> +<h5>XXIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">‘Hence with the woman in your +speech,’<br /> + For nothing it avails<br /> +In woman’s fashion to beseech<br /> + Where Justice holds the scales.’</p> +<h5>XXIV</h5> +<p class="poetry">Then bent and went the lady wan,<br /> + Whose girlishness made grey<br /> +The thoughts that through Archduchess Anne<br /> + Shattered like stormy spray.</p> +<h5><a name="page126"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +126</span>XXV</h5> +<p class="poetry">Long sat she there, as flame that strives<br /> + To hold on beating wind:<br /> +—His wife must be the fool of wives,<br /> + Or cunningly designed!</p> +<h5>XXVI</h5> +<p class="poetry">She sat until the tempest-pitch<br /> + In her torn bosom fell;<br /> +—His wife must be a subtle witch<br /> + Or else God loves her well!</p> +<h4><a name="page127"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +127</span>III</h4> +<h5>I</h5> +<p class="poetry">Old Kraken read a missive penned<br /> + By his great Lady’s hand.<br /> +Her condescension called him friend,<br /> + To raise the crest she fanned.</p> +<h5>II</h5> +<p class="poetry">Swiftly to where he lay encamped<br /> + It flew, yet breathed aloof<br /> +From woman’s feeling, and he stamped<br /> + A heel more like a hoof.</p> +<h5>III</h5> +<p class="poetry">She wrote of Mercy: ‘She was loth<br /> + Too hard to goad a foe.’<br /> +He stamped, as when men drive an oath<br /> + Devils transcribe below.</p> +<h5>IV</h5> +<p class="poetry">She wrote: ‘We have him half by +theft.’<br /> + His wrinkles glistened keen:<br /> +And see the Winter storm-cloud cleft<br /> + To lurid skies between!</p> +<h5><a name="page128"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +128</span>V</h5> +<p class="poetry">When read old Kraken: ‘Christ our +Guide,’<br /> + His eyes were spikes of spar:<br /> +And see the white snow-storm divide<br /> + About an icy star!</p> +<h5>VI</h5> +<p class="poetry">‘She trusted him to understand,’<br +/> + She wrote, and further prayed<br /> +That policy might rule the land.<br /> + Old Kraken’s laughter neighed.</p> +<h5>VII</h5> +<p class="poetry">Her words he took; her nods and winks<br /> + Treated as woman’s fog.<br /> +The man-dog for his mistress thinks,<br /> + Not less her faithful dog.</p> +<h5>VIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">She hugged a cloak old Kraken ripped;<br /> + Disguise to him he loathed.<br /> +—Your mercy, madam, shows you stripped,<br /> + While mine will keep you clothed.</p> +<h5>IX</h5> +<p class="poetry">A rough ill-soldered scar in haste<br /> + He rubbed on his cheek-bone.<br /> +—Our policy the man shall taste;<br /> + Our mercy shall be shown.</p> +<h5><a name="page129"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +129</span>X</h5> +<p class="poetry">‘Count Louis, honour to your race<br /> + Decrees the Council-hall:<br /> +You ’scape the rope by special grace,<br /> + And like a soldier fall.’</p> +<h5>XI</h5> +<p class="poetry">—I am a man of many sins,<br /> + Who for one virtue die,<br /> +Count Louis said.—They play at shins,<br /> + Who kick, was the reply.</p> +<h5>XII</h5> +<p class="poetry">Uprose the day of crimson sight,<br /> + The day without a God.<br /> +At morn the hero said Good-night:<br /> + See there that stain on sod!</p> +<h5>XIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">At morn the Countess Louis heard<br /> + Young light sing in the lark.<br /> +Ere eve it was that other bird,<br /> + Which brings the starless dark.</p> +<h5>XIV</h5> +<p class="poetry">To heaven she vowed herself, and yearned<br /> + Beside her lord to lie.<br /> +Archduchess Anne on Kraken turned,<br /> + All white as a dead eye.</p> +<h5><a name="page130"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +130</span>XV</h5> +<p class="poetry">If I could kill thee! shrieked her look:<br /> + If lightning sprang from Will!<br /> +An oaken head old Kraken shook,<br /> + And she might thank or kill.</p> +<h5>XVI</h5> +<p class="poetry">The pride that fenced her heart in mail<br /> + By mortal pain was torn.<br /> +Forth from her bosom leaped a wail,<br /> + As of a babe new-born.</p> +<h5>XVII</h5> +<p class="poetry">She clad herself in courtly use,<br /> + And one who heard them prate<br /> +Had said they differed upon views<br /> + Where statecraft raised debate.</p> +<h5>XVIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">The wretch detested must she trust,<br /> + The servant master own:<br /> +Confide to godless cause so just,<br /> + And for God’s blessing moan.</p> +<h5>XIX</h5> +<p class="poetry">Austerely she her heart kept down,<br /> + Her woman’s tongue was mute<br /> +When voice of People, voice of Crown,<br /> + In cannon held dispute.</p> +<h5><a name="page131"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +131</span>XX</h5> +<p class="poetry">The Crown on seas of blood, like swine,<br /> + Swam forefoot at the throat:<br /> +It drank of its dear veins for wine,<br /> + Enough if it might float!</p> +<h5>XXI</h5> +<p class="poetry">It sank with piteous yelp, resurged<br /> + Electrical with fear.<br /> +O had she on old Kraken urged<br /> + Her word of mercy clear!</p> +<h5>XXII</h5> +<p class="poetry">O had they with Count Louis been<br /> + Accordant in his plea!<br /> +Cursed are the women vowed to screen<br /> + A heart that all can see!</p> +<h5>XXIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">The godless drove unto a goal<br /> + Was worse than vile defeat.<br /> +Did vengeance prick Count Louis’ soul<br /> + They dressed him luscious meat.</p> +<h5>XXIV</h5> +<p class="poetry">Worms will the faithless find their lies<br /> + In the close treasure-chest.<br /> +Without a God no day can rise,<br /> + Though it should slay our best.</p> +<h5><a name="page132"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +132</span>XXV</h5> +<p class="poetry">The Crown it furled a draggled flag,<br /> + It sheathed a broken blade.<br /> +Behold its triumph in the hag<br /> + That lives with looks decayed!</p> +<h5>XXVI</h5> +<p class="poetry">And lo, the man of oaken head,<br /> + Of soldier’s honour bare,<br /> +He fled his land, but most he fled<br /> + His Lady’s frigid stare.</p> +<h5>XXVII</h5> +<p class="poetry">Judged by the issue we discern<br /> + God’s blessing, and the bane.<br /> +Count Louis’ dust would fill an urn,<br /> + His deeds are waving grain.</p> +<h5>XXVIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">And she that helped to slay, yet bade<br /> + To spare the fated man,<br /> +Great were her errors, but she had<br /> + Great heart, Archduchess Anne.</p> +<h3><a name="page133"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 133</span>THE +SONG OF THEODOLINDA</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Queen</span> Theodolind has +built<br /> +In the earth a furnace-bed:<br /> +There the Traitor Nail that spilt<br /> +Blood of the anointed Head,<br /> +Red of heat, resolves in shame:<br /> +White of heat, awakes to flame.<br /> + Beat, beat! white of heat,<br /> + Red of heat, beat, beat!</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Mark the skeleton of fire<br /> +Lightening from its thunder-roof:<br /> +So comes this that saw expire<br /> +Him we love, for our behoof!<br /> +Red of heat, O white of heat,<br /> +This from off the Cross we greet.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Brown-cowled hammermen around<br /> +Nerve their naked arms to strike<br /> +Death with Resurrection crowned,<br /> +Each upon that cruel spike.<br /> +Red of heat the furnace leaps,<br /> +White of heat transfigured sleeps.</p> +<h4><a name="page134"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +134</span>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Hard against the furnace core<br /> +Holds the Queen her streaming eyes:<br /> +Lo! that thing of piteous gore<br /> +In the lap of radiance lies,<br /> +Red of heat, as when He takes,<br /> +White of heat, whom earth forsakes.</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Forth with it, and crushing ring<br /> +Iron hymns, for men to hear<br /> +Echoes of the deeds that sting<br /> +Earth into its graves, and fear!<br /> +Red of heat, He maketh thus,<br /> +White of heat, a crown of us.</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">This that killed Thee, kissed Thee, Lord!<br /> +Touched Thee, and we touch it: dear,<br /> +Dark it is; adored, abhorred:<br /> +Vilest, yet most sainted here.<br /> +Red of heat, O white of heat,<br /> +In it hell and heaven meet.</p> +<h4>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">I behold our morning day<br /> +When they chased Him out with rods<br /> +Up to where this traitor lay<br /> +Thirsting; and the blood was God’s!<br /> +Red of heat, it shall be pressed,<br /> +White of heat, once on my breast!</p> +<h4><a name="page135"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +135</span>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Quick! the reptile in me shrieks,<br /> +Not the soul. Again; the Cross<br /> +Burn there. Oh! this pain it wreaks<br /> +Rapture is: pain is not loss.<br /> +Red of heat, the tooth of Death,<br /> +White of heat, has caught my breath.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Brand me, bite me, bitter thing!<br /> +Thus He felt, and thus I am<br /> +One with Him in suffering,<br /> +One with Him in bliss, the Lamb.<br /> +Red of heat, O white of heat,<br /> +Thus is bitterness made sweet.</p> +<h4>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">Now am I, who bear that stamp<br /> +Scorched in me, the living sign<br /> +Sole on earth—the lighted lamp<br /> +Of the dreadful Day divine.<br /> +White of heat, beat on it fast!<br /> +Red of heat, its shape has passed.</p> +<h4>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Out in angry sparks they fly,<br /> +They that sentenced Him to bleed:<br /> +Pontius and his troop: they die,<br /> +Damned for ever for the deed!<br /> +White of heat in vain they soar:<br /> +Red of heat they strew the floor.</p> +<h4><a name="page136"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +136</span>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Fury on it! have its debt!<br /> +Thunder on the Hill accurst,<br /> +Golgotha, be ye! and sweat<br /> +Blood, and thirst the Passion’s thirst.<br /> +Red of heat and white of heat,<br /> +Champ it like fierce teeth that eat.</p> +<h4>XIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Strike it as the ages crush<br /> +Towers! for while a shape is seen<br /> +I am rivalled. Quench its blush,<br /> +Devil! But it crowns me Queen,<br /> +Red of heat, as none before,<br /> +White of heat, the circlet wore.</p> +<h4>XIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Lowly I will be, and quail,<br /> +Crawling, with a beggar’s hand:<br /> +On my breast the branded Nail,<br /> +On my head the iron band.<br /> +Red of heat, are none so base!<br /> +White of heat, none know such grace!</p> +<h4>XV</h4> +<p class="poetry">In their heaven the sainted hosts,<br /> +Robed in violet unflecked,<br /> +Gaze on humankind as ghosts:<br /> +I draw down a ray direct.<br /> +Red of heat, across my brow,<br /> +White of heat, I touch Him now.</p> +<h4><a name="page137"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +137</span>XVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Robed in violet, robed in gold,<br /> +Robed in pearl, they make our dawn.<br /> +What am I to them? Behold<br /> +What ye are to me, and fawn.<br /> +Red of heat, be humble, ye!<br /> +White of heat, O teach it me!</p> +<h4>XVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Martyrs! hungry peaks in air,<br /> +Rent with lightnings, clad with snow,<br /> +Crowned with stars! you strip me bare,<br /> +Pierce me, shame me, stretch me low,<br /> +Red of heat, but it may be,<br /> +White of heat, some envy me!</p> +<h4>XVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">O poor enviers! God’s own gifts<br +/> +Have a devil for the weak.<br /> +Yea, the very force that lifts<br /> +Finds the vessel’s secret leak.<br /> +Red of heat, I rise o’er all:<br /> +White of heat, I faint, I fall.</p> +<h4>XIX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Those old Martyrs sloughed their pride,<br /> +Taking humbleness like mirth.<br /> +I am to His Glory tied,<br /> +I that witness Him on earth!<br /> +Red of heat, my pride of dust,<br /> +White of heat, feeds fire in trust.</p> +<h4><a name="page138"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +138</span>XX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Kindle me to constant fire,<br /> +Lest the nail be but a nail!<br /> +Give me wings of great desire,<br /> +Lest I look within, and fail!<br /> +Red of heat, the furnace light,<br /> +White of heat, fix on my sight.</p> +<h4>XXI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Never for the Chosen peace!<br /> +Know, by me tormented know,<br /> +Never shall the wrestling cease<br /> +Till with our outlasting Foe,<br /> +Red of heat to white of heat,<br /> +Roll we to the Godhead’s feet!<br /> + Beat, beat! white of heat,<br /> + Red of heat, beat, beat!</p> +<h3><a name="page139"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 139</span>A +PREACHING FROM A SPANISH BALLAD</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Ladies</span> who in chains +of wedlock<br /> +Chafe at an unequal yoke,<br /> +Not to nightingales give hearing;<br /> +Better this, the raven’s croak.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Down the Prado strolled my seigneur,<br /> +Arm at lordly bow on hip,<br /> +Fingers trimming his moustachios,<br /> +Eyes for pirate fellowship.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Home sat she that owned him master;<br /> +Like the flower bent to ground<br /> +Rain-surcharged and sun-forsaken;<br /> +Heedless of her hair unbound.</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Sudden at her feet a lover<br /> +Palpitating knelt and wooed;<br /> +Seemed a very gift from heaven<br /> +To the starved of common food.</p> +<h4><a name="page140"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +140</span>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Love me? she his vows repeated:<br /> +Fiery vows oft sung and thrummed:<br /> +Wondered, as on earth a stranger;<br /> +Thirsted, trusted, and succumbed.</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">O beloved youth! my lover!<br /> +Mine! my lover! take my life<br /> +Wholly: thine in soul and body,<br /> +By this oath of more than wife!</p> +<h4>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Know me for no helpless woman;<br /> +Nay, nor coward, though I sink<br /> +Awed beside thee, like an infant<br /> +Learning shame ere it can think.</p> +<h4>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Swing me hence to do thee service,<br /> +Be thy succour, prove thy shield;<br /> +Heaven will hear!—in house thy handmaid,<br /> +Squire upon the battlefield.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">At my breasts I cool thy footsoles;<br /> +Wine I pour, I dress thy meats;<br /> +Humbly, when my lord it pleaseth,<br /> +Lie with him on perfumed sheets:</p> +<h4><a name="page141"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +141</span>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">Pray for him, my blood’s dear +fountain,<br /> +While he sleeps, and watch his yawn<br /> +In that wakening babelike moment,<br /> +Sweeter to my thought than dawn!—</p> +<h4>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Thundered then her lord of thunders;<br /> +Burst the door, and, flashing sword,<br /> +Loud disgorged the woman’s title:<br /> +Condemnation in one word.</p> +<h4>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Grand by righteous wrath transfigured,<br /> +Towers the husband who provides<br /> +In his person judge and witness,<br /> +Death’s black doorkeeper besides!</p> +<h4>XIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Round his head the ancient terrors,<br /> +Conjured of the stronger’s law,<br /> +Circle, to abash the creature<br /> +Daring twist beneath his paw.</p> +<h4>XIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">How though he hath squandered Honour<br /> +High of Honour let him scold:<br /> +Gilding of the man’s possession,<br /> +’Tis the woman’s coin of gold.</p> +<h4><a name="page142"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +142</span>XV</h4> +<p class="poetry">She inheriting from many<br /> +Bleeding mothers bleeding sense<br /> +Feels ’twixt her and sharp-fanged nature<br /> +Honour first did plant the fence.</p> +<h4>XVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Nature, that so shrieks for justice;<br /> +Honour’s thirst, that blood will slake;<br /> +These are women’s riddles, roughly<br /> +Mixed to write them saint or snake.</p> +<h4>XVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Never nature cherished woman:<br /> +She throughout the sexes’ war<br /> +Serves as temptress and betrayer,<br /> +Favouring man, the muscular.</p> +<h4>XVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Lureful is she, bent for folly;<br /> +Doating on the child which crows:<br /> +Yours to teach him grace in fealty,<br /> +What the bloom is, what the rose.</p> +<h4>XIX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Hard the task: your prison-chamber<br /> +Widens not for lifted latch<br /> +Till the giant thews and sinews<br /> +Meet their Godlike overmatch.</p> +<h4><a name="page143"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +143</span>XX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Read that riddle, scorning pity’s<br /> +Tears, of cockatrices shed:<br /> +When the heart is vowed for freedom,<br /> +Captaincy it yields to head.</p> +<h4>XXI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Meanwhile you, freaked nature’s +martyrs,<br /> +Honour’s army, flower and weed,<br /> +Gentle ladies, wedded ladies,<br /> +See for you this fair one bleed.</p> +<h4>XXII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Sole stood her offence, she faltered;<br /> +Prayed her lord the youth to spare;<br /> +Prayed that in the orange garden<br /> +She might lie, and ceased her prayer.</p> +<h4>XXIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Then commanding to all women<br /> +Chastity, her breasts she laid<br /> +Bare unto the self-avenger.<br /> +Man in metal was the blade.</p> +<h3><a name="page144"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 144</span>THE +YOUNG PRINCESS<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">A BALLAD OF OLD LAWS OF LOVE</span></h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<h5>I</h5> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">When</span> the South sang +like a nightingale<br /> + Above a bower in May,<br /> +The training of Love’s vine of flame<br /> +Was writ in laws, for lord and dame<br /> + To say their yea and nay.</p> +<h5>II</h5> +<p class="poetry">When the South sang like a nightingale<br /> + Across the flowering night,<br /> +And lord and dame held gentle sport,<br /> +There came a young princess to Court,<br /> + A frost of beauty white.</p> +<h5>III</h5> +<p class="poetry">The South sang like a nightingale<br /> + To thaw her glittering dream:<br /> +No vine of Love her bosom gave,<br /> +She drank no wine of Love, but grave<br /> + She held them to Love’s theme.</p> +<h5>IV</h5> +<p class="poetry">The South grew all a nightingale<br /> + Beneath a moon unmoved:<br /> +Like the banner of war she led them on;<br /> +She left them to lie, like the light that has gone<br /> + From wine-cups overproved.</p> +<h5><a name="page145"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +145</span>V</h5> +<p class="poetry">When the South was a fervid nightingale,<br /> + And she a chilling moon,<br /> +’Twas pity to see on the garden swards,<br /> +Against Love’s laws, those rival lords<br /> + As willow-wands lie strewn.</p> +<h5>VI</h5> +<p class="poetry">The South had throat of a nightingale<br /> + For her, the young princess:<br /> +She gave no vine of Love to rear,<br /> +Love’s wine drank not, yet bent her ear<br /> + To themes of Love no less.</p> +<h4><a name="page146"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +146</span>II</h4> +<h5>I</h5> +<p class="poetry">The lords of the Court they sighed +heart-sick,<br /> + Heart-free Lord Dusiote laughed:<br /> +I prize her no more than a fling o’ the dice,<br /> +But, or shame to my manhood, a lady of ice,<br /> + We master her by craft!</p> +<h5>II</h5> +<p class="poetry">Heart-sick the lords of joyance yawned,<br /> + Lord Dusiote laughed heart-free:<br /> +I count her as much as a crack o’ my thumb,<br /> +But, or shame of my manhood, to me she shall come<br /> + Like the bird to roost in the tree!</p> +<h5>III</h5> +<p class="poetry">At dead of night when the palace-guard<br /> + Had passed the measured rounds,<br /> +The young princess awoke to feel<br /> +A shudder of blood at the crackle of steel<br /> + Within the garden-bounds.</p> +<h5>IV</h5> +<p class="poetry">It ceased, and she thought of whom was need,<br +/> + The friar or the leech;<br /> +When lo, stood her tirewoman breathless by:<br /> +Lord Dusiote, madam, to death is nigh,<br /> + Of you he would have speech.</p> +<h5><a name="page147"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +147</span>V</h5> +<p class="poetry">He prays you of your gentleness,<br /> + To light him to his dark end.<br /> +The princess rose, and forth she went,<br /> +For charity was her intent,<br /> + Devoutly to befriend.</p> +<h5>VI</h5> +<p class="poetry">Lord Dusiote hung on his good squire’s +arm,<br /> + The priest beside him knelt:<br /> +A weeping handkerchief was pressed<br /> +To stay the red flood at his breast,<br /> + And bid cold ladies melt.</p> +<h5>VII</h5> +<p class="poetry">O lady, though you are ice to men,<br /> + All pure to heaven as light<br /> +Within the dew within the flower,<br /> +Of you ’tis whispered that love has power<br /> + When secret is the night.</p> +<h5>VIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">I have silenced the slanderers, peace to their +souls!<br /> + Save one was too cunning for me.<br /> +I die, whose love is late avowed,<br /> +He lives, who boasts the lily has bowed<br /> + To the oath of a bended knee.</p> +<h5>IX</h5> +<p class="poetry">Lord Dusiote drew breath with pain,<br /> + And she with pain drew breath:<br /> +On him she looked, on his like above;<br /> +She flew in the folds of a marvel of love<br /> + Revealed to pass to death.</p> +<h5><a name="page148"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +148</span>X</h5> +<p class="poetry">You are dying, O great-hearted lord,<br /> + You are dying for me, she cried;<br /> +O take my hand, O take my kiss,<br /> +And take of your right for love like this,<br /> + The vow that plights me bride.</p> +<h5>XI</h5> +<p class="poetry">She bade the priest recite his words<br /> + While hand in hand were they,<br /> +Lord Dusiote’s soul to waft to bliss;<br /> +He had her hand, her vow, her kiss,<br /> + And his body was borne away.</p> +<h4><a name="page149"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +149</span>III</h4> +<h5>I</h5> +<p class="poetry">Lord Dusiote sprang from priest and squire;<br +/> + He gazed at her lighted room:<br /> +The laughter in his heart grew slack;<br /> +He knew not the force that pushed him back<br /> + From her and the morn in bloom.</p> +<h5>II</h5> +<p class="poetry">Like a drowned man’s length on the strong +flood-tide,<br /> + Like the shade of a bird in the sun,<br /> +He fled from his lady whom he might claim<br /> +As ghost, and who made the daybeams flame<br /> + To scare what he had done.</p> +<h5>III</h5> +<p class="poetry">There was grief at Court for one so gay,<br /> + Though he was a lord less keen<br /> +For training the vine than at vintage-press;<br /> +But in her soul the young princess<br /> + Believed that love had been.</p> +<h5>IV</h5> +<p class="poetry">Lord Dusiote fled the Court and land,<br /> + He crossed the woeful seas,<br /> +Till his traitorous doing seemed clearer to burn,<br /> +And the lady beloved drew his heart for return,<br /> + Like the banner of war in the breeze.</p> +<h5><a name="page150"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +150</span>V</h5> +<p class="poetry">He neared the palace, he spied the Court,<br /> + And music he heard, and they told<br /> +Of foreign lords arrived to bring<br /> +The nuptial gifts of a bridegroom king<br /> + To the princess grave and cold.</p> +<h5>VI</h5> +<p class="poetry">The masque and the dance were cloud on wave,<br +/> + And down the masque and the dance<br /> +Lord Dusiote stepped from dame to dame,<br /> +And to the young princess he came,<br /> + With a bow and a burning glance.</p> +<h5>VII</h5> +<p class="poetry">Do you take a new husband to-morrow, lady?<br +/> + She shrank as at prick of steel.<br /> +Must the first yield place to the second, he sighed.<br /> +Her eyes were like the grave that is wide<br /> + For the corpse from head to heel.</p> +<h5>VIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">My lady, my love, that little hand<br /> + Has mine ringed fast in plight:<br /> +I bear for your lips a lawful thirst,<br /> +And as justly the second should follow the first,<br /> + I come to your door this night.</p> +<h5>IX</h5> +<p class="poetry">If a ghost should come a ghost will go:<br /> + No more the lady said,<br /> +Save that ever when he in wrath began<br /> +To swear by the faith of a living man,<br /> + She answered him, You are dead.</p> +<h4><a name="page151"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +151</span>IV</h4> +<h5>I</h5> +<p class="poetry">The soft night-wind went laden to death<br /> + With smell of the orange in flower;<br /> +The light leaves prattled to neighbour ears;<br /> +The bird of the passion sang over his tears;<br /> + The night named hour by hour.</p> +<h5>II</h5> +<p class="poetry">Sang loud, sang low the rapturous bird<br /> + Till the yellow hour was nigh,<br /> +Behind the folds of a darker cloud:<br /> +He chuckled, he sobbed, alow, aloud;<br /> + The voice between earth and sky.</p> +<h5>III</h5> +<p class="poetry">O will you, will you, women are weak;<br /> + The proudest are yielding mates<br /> +For a forward foot and a tongue of fire:<br /> +So thought Lord Dusiote’s trusty squire,<br /> + At watch by the palace-gates.</p> +<h5>IV</h5> +<p class="poetry">The song of the bird was wine in his blood,<br +/> + And woman the odorous bloom:<br /> +His master’s great adventure stirred<br /> +Within him to mingle the bloom and bird,<br /> + And morn ere its coming illume.</p> +<h5><a name="page152"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +152</span>V</h5> +<p class="poetry">Beside him strangely a piece of the dark<br /> + Had moved, and the undertones<br /> +Of a priest in prayer, like a cavernous wave,<br /> +He heard, as were there a soul to save<br /> + For urgency now in the groans.</p> +<h5>VI</h5> +<p class="poetry">No priest was hired for the play this night:<br +/> + And the squire tossed head like a deer<br /> +At sniff of the tainted wind; he gazed<br /> +Where cresset-lamps in a door were raised,<br /> + Belike on a passing bier.</p> +<h5>VII</h5> +<p class="poetry">All cloaked and masked, with naked blades,<br +/> + That flashed of a judgement done,<br /> +The lords of the Court, from the palace-door,<br /> +Came issuing silently, bearers four,<br /> + And flat on their shoulders one.</p> +<h5>VIII</h5> +<p class="poetry">They marched the body to squire and priest,<br +/> + They lowered it sad to earth:<br /> +The priest they gave the burial dole,<br /> +Bade wrestle hourly for his soul,<br /> + Who was a lord of worth.</p> +<h5>IX</h5> +<p class="poetry">One said, farewell to a gallant knight!<br /> + And one, but a restless ghost!<br /> +’Tis a year and a day since in this place<br /> +He died, sped high by a lady of grace<br /> + To join the blissful host.</p> +<h5><a name="page153"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +153</span>X</h5> +<p class="poetry">Not vainly on us she charged her cause,<br /> + The lady whom we revere<br /> +For faith in the mask of a love untrue<br /> +To the Love we honour, the Love her due,<br /> + The Love we have vowed to rear.</p> +<h5>XI</h5> +<p class="poetry">A trap for the sweet tooth, lures for the +light,<br /> + For the fortress defiant a mine:<br /> +Right well! But not in the South, princess,<br /> +Shall the lady snared of her nobleness<br /> + Ever shamed or a captive pine.</p> +<h5>XII</h5> +<p class="poetry">When the South had voice of a nightingale<br /> + Above a Maying bower,<br /> +On the heights of Love walked radiant peers;<br /> +The bird of the passion sang over his tears<br /> + To the breeze and the orange-flower.</p> +<h3><a name="page154"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 154</span>KING +HARALD’S TRANCE</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Sword</span> in length a +reaping-hook amain<br /> +Harald sheared his field, blood up to shank:<br /> + ’Mid the swathes of +slain,<br /> + First at moonrise drank.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Thereof hunger, as for meats the knife,<br /> +Pricked his ribs, in one sharp spur to reach<br /> + Home and his young wife,<br /> + Nigh the sea-ford beach.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">After battle keen to feed was he:<br /> +Smoking flesh the thresher washed down fast,<br /> + Like an angry sea<br /> + Ships from keel to mast.</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Name us glory, singer, name us pride<br /> +Matching Harald’s in his deeds of strength;<br /> + Chiefs, wife, sword by side,<br /> + Foemen stretched their length!</p> +<h4><a name="page155"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +155</span>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Half a winter night the toasts hurrahed,<br /> +Crowned him, clothed him, trumpeted him high,<br /> + Till awink he bade<br /> + Wife to chamber fly.</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Twice the sun had mounted, twice had sunk,<br +/> +Ere his ears took sound; he lay for dead;<br /> + Mountain on his trunk,<br /> + Ocean on his head.</p> +<h4>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Clamped to couch, his fiery hearing sucked<br +/> +Whispers that at heart made iron-clang:<br /> + Here fool-women clucked,<br /> + There men held harangue.</p> +<h4>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Burial to fit their lord of war<br /> +They decreed him: hailed the kingling: ha!<br /> + Hateful! but this Thor<br /> + Failed a weak lamb’s +baa.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">King they hailed a branchlet, shaped to +fare,<br /> +Weighted so, like quaking shingle spume,<br /> + When his blood’s own heir<br +/> + Ripened in the womb!</p> +<h4><a name="page156"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +156</span>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">Still he heard, and doglike, hoglike, ran<br /> +Nose of hearing till his blind sight saw:<br /> + Woman stood with man<br /> + Mouthing low, at paw.</p> +<h4>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Woman, man, they mouthed; they spake a thing<br +/> +Armed to split a mountain, sunder seas:<br /> + Still the frozen king<br /> + Lay and felt him freeze.</p> +<h4>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Doglike, hoglike, horselike now he raced,<br /> +Riderless, in ghost across a ground<br /> + Flint of breast, blank-faced,<br +/> + Past the fleshly bound.</p> +<h4>XIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Smell of brine his nostrils filled with +might:<br /> +Nostrils quickened eyelids, eyelids hand:<br /> + Hand for sword at right<br /> + Groped, the great haft +spanned.</p> +<h4>XIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Wonder struck to ice his people’s +eyes:<br /> +Him they saw, the prone upon the bier,<br /> + Sheer from backbone rise,<br /> + Sword uplifting peer.</p> +<h4><a name="page157"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +157</span>XV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Sitting did he breathe against the blade,<br /> +Standing kiss it for that proof of life:<br /> + Strode, as netters wade,<br /> + Straightway to his wife.</p> +<h4>XVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Her he eyed: his judgement was one word,<br /> +Foulbed! and she fell: the blow clove two.<br /> + Fearful for the third,<br /> + All their breath indrew.</p> +<h4>XVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Morning danced along the waves to beach;<br /> +Dumb his chiefs fetched breath for what might hap:<br /> + Glassily on each<br /> + Stared the iron cap.</p> +<h4>XVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Sudden, as it were a monster oak<br /> +Split to yield a limb by stress of heat,<br /> + Strained he, staggered, broke<br +/> + Doubled at their feet.</p> +<h3><a name="page158"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +158</span>WHIMPER OF SYMPATHY</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Hawk</span> or shrike has +done this deed<br /> +Of downy feathers: rueful sight!<br /> +Sweet sentimentalist, invite<br /> +Your bosom’s Power to intercede.</p> +<p class="poetry">So hard it seems that one must bleed<br /> +Because another needs will bite!<br /> +All round we find cold Nature slight<br /> +The feelings of the totter-knee’d.</p> +<p class="poetry">O it were pleasant with you<br /> +To fly from this tussle of foes,<br /> +The shambles, the charnel, the wrinkle!<br /> +To dwell in yon dribble of dew<br /> +On the cheek of your sovereign rose,<br /> +And live the young life of a twinkle.</p> +<h3><a name="page159"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +159</span>YOUNG REYNARD</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Gracefullest</span> leaper, +the dappled fox-cub<br /> +Curves over brambles with berries and buds,<br /> +Light as a bubble that flies from the tub,<br /> +Whisked by the laundry-wife out of her suds.<br /> +Wavy he comes, woolly, all at his ease,<br /> +Elegant, fashioned to foot with the deuce;<br /> +Nature’s own prince of the dance: then he sees<br /> +Me, and retires as if making excuse.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Never closed minuet courtlier! Soon<br /> +Cub-hunting troops were abroad, and a yelp<br /> +Told of sure scent: ere the stroke upon noon<br /> +Reynard the younger lay far beyond help.<br /> +Wild, my poor friend, has the fate to be chased;<br /> +Civil will conquer: were ’t other ’twere worse;<br /> +Fair, by the flushed early morning embraced,<br /> +Haply you live a day longer in verse.</p> +<h3><a name="page160"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +160</span>MANFRED</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Projected</span> from the +bilious Childe,<br /> +This clatterjaw his foot could set<br /> +On Alps, without a breast beguiled<br /> +To glow in shedding rascal sweat.<br /> +Somewhere about his grinder teeth,<br /> +He mouthed of thoughts that grilled beneath,<br /> +And summoned Nature to her feud<br /> +With bile and buskin Attitude.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Considerably was the world<br /> +Of spinsterdom and clergy racked<br /> +While he his hinted horrors hurled,<br /> +And she pictorially attacked.<br /> +A duel hugeous. Tragic? Ho!<br /> +The cities, not the mountains, blow<br /> +Such bladders; in their shapes confessed<br /> +An after-dinner’s indigest.</p> +<h3><a name="page161"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +161</span>HERNANI</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Cistercians</span> might +crack their sides<br /> +With laughter, and exemption get,<br /> +At sight of heroes clasping brides,<br /> +And hearing—O the horn! the horn!<br /> +The horn of their obstructive debt!</p> +<p class="poetry">But quit the stage, that note applies<br /> +For sermons cosmopolitan,<br /> +Hernani. Have we filched our prize,<br /> +Forgetting . . .? O the horn! the horn!<br /> +The horn of the Old Gentleman!</p> +<h3><a name="page162"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 162</span>THE +NUPTIALS OF ATTILA</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Flat</span> as to an +eagle’s eye,<br /> + Earth hung under Attila.<br /> +Sign for carnage gave he none.<br /> +In the peace of his disdain,<br /> +Sun and rain, and rain and sun,<br /> +Cherished men to wax again,<br /> +Crawl, and in their manner die.<br /> +On his people stood a frost.<br /> +Like the charger cut in stone,<br /> +Rearing stiff, the warrior host,<br /> +Which had life from him alone,<br /> +Craved the trumpet’s eager note,<br /> +As the bridled earth the Spring.<br /> +Rusty was the trumpet’s throat.<br /> +He let chief and prophet rave;<br /> +Venturous earth around him string<br /> +Threads of grass and slender rye,<br /> +Wave them, and untrampled wave.<br /> +O for the time when God did cry,<br /> + Eye and have, my Attila!</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Scorn of conquest filled like sleep<br /> +Him that drank of havoc deep<br /> +When the Green Cat pawed the globe:<br /> +When the horsemen from his bow<br /> +<a name="page163"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 163</span>Shot in +sheaves and made the foe<br /> +Crimson fringes of a robe,<br /> +Trailed o’er towns and fields in woe;<br /> +When they streaked the rivers red,<br /> +When the saddle was the bed.<br /> + Attila, my Attila!</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">He breathed peace and pulled a flower.<br /> + Eye and have, my Attila!<br /> +This was the damsel Ildico,<br /> +Rich in bloom until that hour:<br /> +Shyer than the forest doe<br /> +Twinkling slim through branches green.<br /> +Yet the shyest shall be seen.<br /> + Make the bed for Attila!</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Seen of Attila, desired,<br /> +She was led to him straightway:<br /> +Radiantly was she attired;<br /> +Rifled lands were her array,<br /> +Jewels bled from weeping crowns,<br /> +Gold of woeful fields and towns.<br /> +She stood pallid in the light.<br /> +How she walked, how withered white,<br /> +From the blessing to the board,<br /> +She who would have proudly blushed,<br /> +Women whispered, asking why,<br /> +Hinting of a youth, and hushed.<br /> +Was it terror of her lord?<br /> +Was she childish? was she sly?<br /> +<a name="page164"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 164</span>Was it +the bright mantle’s dye<br /> +Drained her blood to hues of grief<br /> +Like the ash that shoots the spark?<br /> +See the green tree all in leaf:<br /> +See the green tree stripped of bark!—<br /> + Make the bed for Attila!</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Round the banquet-table’s load<br /> +Scores of iron horsemen rode;<br /> +Chosen warriors, keen and hard;<br /> +Grain of threshing battle-dints;<br /> +Attila’s fierce body-guard,<br /> +Smelling war like fire in flints.<br /> +Grant them peace be fugitive!<br /> +Iron-capped and iron-heeled,<br /> +Each against his fellow’s shield<br /> +Smote the spear-head, shouting, Live,<br /> + Attila! my Attila!<br /> +Eagle, eagle of our breed,<br /> +Eagle, beak the lamb, and feed!<br /> +Have her, and unleash us! live,<br /> + Attila! my Attila!</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">He was of the blood to shine<br /> +Bronze in joy, like skies that scorch.<br /> +Beaming with the goblet wine<br /> +In the wavering of the torch,<br /> +Looked he backward on his bride.<br /> + Eye and have, my Attila!<br /> +Fair in her wide robe was she:<br /> +Where the robe and vest divide,<br /> +<a name="page165"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 165</span>Fair she +seemed surpassingly:<br /> +Soft, yet vivid as the stream<br /> +Danube rolls in the moonbeam<br /> +Through rock-barriers: but she smiled<br /> +Never, she sat cold as salt:<br /> +Open-mouthed as a young child<br /> +Wondering with a mind at fault.<br /> + Make the bed for Attila!</p> +<h4>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Under the thin hoop of gold<br /> +Whence in waves her hair outrolled,<br /> +’Twixt her brows the women saw<br /> +Shadows of a vulture’s claw<br /> +Gript in flight: strange knots that sped<br /> +Closing and dissolving aye:<br /> +Such as wicked dreams betray<br /> +When pale dawn creeps o’er the bed.<br /> +They might show the common pang<br /> +Known to virgins, in whom dread<br /> +Hunts their bliss like famished hounds;<br /> +While the chiefs with roaring rounds<br /> +Tossed her to her lord, and sang<br /> +Praise of him whose hand was large,<br /> +Cheers for beauty brought to yield,<br /> +Chirrups of the trot afield,<br /> +Hurrahs of the battle-charge.</p> +<h4>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Those rock-faces hung with weed<br /> +Reddened: their great days of speed,<br /> +Slaughter, triumph, flood and flame,<br /> +Like a jealous frenzy wrought,<br /> +<a name="page166"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 166</span>Scoffed +at them and did them shame,<br /> +Quaffing idle, conquering nought.<br /> +O for the time when God decreed<br /> + Earth the prey of Attila!<br /> +God called on thee in his wrath,<br /> +Trample it to mire! ’Twas done.<br /> +Swift as Danube clove our path<br /> +Down from East to Western sun.<br /> +Huns! behold your pasture, gaze,<br /> +Take, our king said: heel to flank<br /> +(Whisper it, the war-horse neighs!)<br /> +Forth we drove, and blood we drank<br /> +Fresh as dawn-dew: earth was ours:<br /> +Men were flocks we lashed and spurned:<br /> +Fast as windy flame devours,<br /> +Flame along the wind, we burned.<br /> +Arrow javelin, spear, and sword!<br /> +Here the snows and there the plains;<br /> +On! our signal: onward poured<br /> +Torrents of the tightened reins,<br /> +Foaming over vine and corn<br /> +Hot against the city-wall.<br /> +Whisper it, you sound a horn<br /> +To the grey beast in the stall!<br /> +Yea, he whinnies at a nod.<br /> +O for sound of the trumpet-notes!<br /> +O for the time when thunder-shod,<br /> +He that scarce can munch his oats,<br /> +Hung on the peaks, brooded aloof,<br /> +Champed the grain of the wrath of God,<br /> +Pressed a cloud on the cowering roof,<br /> +Snorted out of the blackness fire!<br /> +Scarlet broke the sky, and down,<br /> +Hammering West with print of his hoof,<br /> +He burst out of the bosom of ire<br /> +<a name="page167"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 167</span>Sharp as +eyelight under thy frown,<br /> + Attila, my Attila!</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Ravaged cities rolling smoke<br /> +Thick on cornfields dry and black,<br /> +Wave his banners, bear his yoke.<br /> +Track the lightning, and you track<br /> +Attila. They moan: ’tis he!<br /> +Bleed: ’tis he! Beneath his foot<br /> +Leagues are deserts charred and mute;<br /> +Where he passed, there passed a sea.<br /> + Attila, my Attila!</p> +<h4>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Who breathed on the king cold breath?<br +/> +Said a voice amid the host,<br /> +He is Death that weds a ghost,<br /> +Else a ghost that weds with Death?<br /> +Ildico’s chill little hand<br /> +Shuddering he beheld: austere<br /> +Stared, as one who would command<br /> +Sight of what has filled his ear:<br /> +Plucked his thin beard, laughed disdain.<br /> +Feast, ye Huns! His arm be raised,<br /> +Like the warrior, battle-dazed,<br /> +Joining to the fight amain.<br /> + Make the bed for Attila!</p> +<h4>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Silent Ildico stood up.<br /> +King and chief to pledge her well,<br /> +Shocked sword sword and cup on cup,<br /> +Clamouring like a brazen bell.<br /> +<a name="page168"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 168</span>Silent +stepped the queenly slave.<br /> +Fair, by heaven! she was to meet<br /> +On a midnight, near a grave,<br /> +Flapping wide the winding-sheet.</p> +<h4>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Death and she walked through the crowd,<br /> +Out beyond the flush of light.<br /> +Ceremonious women bowed<br /> +Following her: ’twas middle night.<br /> +Then the warriors each on each<br /> +Spied, nor overloudly laughed;<br /> +Like the victims of the leech,<br /> +Who have drunk of a strange draught.</p> +<h4>XIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Attila remained. Even so<br /> +Frowned he when he struck the blow,<br /> +Brained his horse, that stumbled twice,<br /> +On a bloody day in Gaul,<br /> +Bellowing, Perish omens! All<br /> +Marvelled at the sacrifice,<br /> +But the battle, swinging dim,<br /> +Rang off that axe-blow for him.<br /> + Attila, my Attila!</p> +<h4>XIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Brightening over Danube wheeled<br /> +Star by star; and she, most fair,<br /> +Sweet as victory half-revealed,<br /> +Seized to make him glad and young;<br /> +She, O sweet as the dark sign<br /> +<a name="page169"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 169</span>Given +him oft in battles gone,<br /> +When the voice within said, Dare!<br /> +And the trumpet-notes were sprung<br /> +Rapturous for the charge in line:<br /> +She lay waiting: fair as dawn<br /> +Wrapped in folds of night she lay;<br /> +Secret, lustrous; flaglike there,<br /> +Waiting him to stream and ray,<br /> +With one loosening blush outflung,<br /> +Colours of his hordes of horse<br /> +Ranked for combat; still he hung<br /> +Like the fever dreading air,<br /> +Cursed of heat; and as a corse<br /> +Gathers vultures, in his brain<br /> +Images of her eyes and kiss<br /> +Plucked at the limbs that could remain<br /> +Loitering nigh the doors of bliss.<br /> + Make the bed for Attila!</p> +<h4>XV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Passion on one hand, on one,<br /> +Destiny led forth the Hun.<br /> +Heard ye outcries of affright,<br /> +Voices that through many a fray,<br /> +In the press of flag and spear,<br /> +Warned the king of peril near?<br /> +Men were dumb, they gave him way,<br /> +Eager heads to left and right,<br /> +Like the bearded standard, thrust,<br /> +As in battle, for a nod<br /> +From their lord of battle-dust.<br /> + Attila, my Attila!<br /> +Slow between the lines he trod.<br /> +Saw ye not the sun drop slow<br /> +<a name="page170"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 170</span>On this +nuptial day, ere eve<br /> +Pierced him on the couch aglow?<br /> + Attila, my Attila!<br /> +Here and there his heart would cleave<br /> +Clotted memory for a space:<br /> +Some stout chief’s familiar face,<br /> +Choicest of his fighting brood,<br /> +Touched him, as ’twere one to know<br /> +Ere he met his bride’s embrace.<br /> + Attila, my Attila!<br /> +Twisting fingers in a beard<br /> +Scant as winter underwood,<br /> +With a narrowed eye he peered;<br /> +Like the sunset’s graver red<br /> +Up old pine-stems. Grave he stood<br /> +Eyeing them on whom was shed<br /> +Burning light from him alone.<br /> + Attila, my Attila!<br /> +Red were they whose mouths recalled<br /> +Where the slaughter mounted high,<br /> +High on it, o’er earth appalled,<br /> +He; heaven’s finger in their sight<br /> +Raising him on waves of dead,<br /> +Up to heaven his trumpets blown.<br /> +O for the time when God’s delight<br /> + Crowned the head of Attila!<br /> +Hungry river of the crag<br /> +Stretching hands for earth he came:<br /> +Force and Speed astride his name<br /> +Pointed back to spear and flag.<br /> +He came out of miracle cloud,<br /> +Lightning-swift and spectre-lean.<br /> +Now those days are in a shroud:<br /> +Have him to his ghostly queen.<br /> + Make the bed for Attila!</p> +<h4><a name="page171"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +171</span>XVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">One, with winecups overstrung,<br /> +Cried him farewell in Rome’s tongue.<br /> +Who? for the great king turned as though<br /> +Wrath to the shaft’s head strained the bow.<br /> +Nay, not wrath the king possessed,<br /> +But a radiance of the breast.<br /> +In that sound he had the key<br /> +Of his cunning malady.<br /> +Lo, where gleamed the sapphire lake,<br /> +Leo, with his Rome at stake,<br /> +Drew blank air to hues and forms;<br /> +Whereof Two that shone distinct,<br /> +Linked as orbed stars are linked,<br /> +Clear among the myriad swarms,<br /> +In a constellation, dashed<br /> +Full on horse and rider’s eyes<br /> +Sunless light, but light it was—<br /> +Light that blinded and abashed,<br /> +Froze his members, bade him pause,<br /> +Caught him mid-gallop, blazed him home.<br /> + Attila, my Attila!<br /> +What are streams that cease to flow?<br /> +What was Attila, rolled thence,<br /> +Cheated by a juggler’s show?<br /> +Like that lake of blue intense,<br /> +Under tempest lashed to foam,<br /> +Lurid radiance, as he passed,<br /> +Filled him, and around was glassed,<br /> +When deep-voiced he uttered, Rome!</p> +<h4>XVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Rome! the word was: and like meat<br /> +Flung to dogs the word was torn.<br /> +<a name="page172"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 172</span>Soon +Rome’s magic priests shall bleat<br /> +Round their magic Pope forlorn!<br /> +Loud they swore the king had sworn<br /> +Vengeance on the Roman cheat,<br /> +Ere he passed, as, grave and still,<br /> +Danube through the shouting hill:<br /> +Sworn it by his naked life!<br /> +Eagle, snakes these women are:<br /> +Take them on the wing! but war,<br /> +Smoking war’s the warrior’s wife!<br /> +Then for plunder! then for brides<br /> +Won without a winking priest!—<br /> +Danube whirled his train of tides<br /> +Black toward the yellow East.<br /> + Make the bed for Attila!</p> +<h4>XVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Chirrups of the trot afield,<br /> +Hurrahs of the battle-charge,<br /> +How they answered, how they pealed,<br /> +When the morning rose and drew<br /> +Bow and javelin, lance and targe,<br /> +In the nuptial casement’s view!<br /> + Attila, my Attila!<br /> +Down the hillspurs, out of tents<br /> +Glimmering in mid-forest, through<br /> +Mists of the cool morning scents,<br /> +Forth from city-alley, court,<br /> +Arch, the bounding horsemen flew,<br /> +Joined along the plains of dew,<br /> +Raced and gave the rein to sport,<br /> +Closed and streamed like curtain-rents<br /> +Fluttered by a wind, and flowed<br /> +Into squadrons: trumpets blew,<br /> +<a name="page173"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 173</span>Chargers +neighed, and trappings glowed<br /> +Brave as the bright Orient’s.<br /> +Look on the seas that run to greet<br /> +Sunrise: look on the leagues of wheat:<br /> +Look on the lines and squares that fret<br /> +Leaping to level the lance blood-wet.<br /> +Tens of thousands, man and steed,<br /> +Tossing like field-flowers in Spring;<br /> +Ready to be hurled at need<br /> +Whither their great lord may sling.<br /> +Finger Romeward, Romeward, King!<br /> + Attila, my Attila!<br /> +Still the woman holds him fast<br /> +As a night-flag round the mast.</p> +<h4>XIX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Nigh upon the fiery noon,<br /> +Out of ranks a roaring burst.<br /> +’Ware white women like the moon!<br /> +They are poison: they have thirst<br /> +First for love, and next for rule.<br /> +Jealous of the army, she?<br /> +Ho, the little wanton fool!<br /> +We were his before she squealed<br /> +Blind for mother’s milk, and heeled<br /> +Kicking on her mother’s knee.<br /> +His in life and death are we:<br /> +She but one flower of a field.<br /> +We have given him bliss tenfold<br /> +In an hour to match her night:<br /> + Attila, my Attila!<br /> +Still her arms the master hold,<br /> +As on wounds the scarf winds tight.</p> +<h4><a name="page174"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +174</span>XX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Over Danube day no more,<br /> +Like the warrior’s planted spear,<br /> +Stood to hail the King: in fear<br /> +Western day knocked at his door.<br /> + Attila, my Attila!<br /> +Sudden in the army’s eyes<br /> +Rolled a blast of lights and cries:<br /> +Flashing through them: Dead are ye!<br /> +Dead, ye Huns, and torn piecemeal!<br /> +See the ordered army reel<br /> +Stricken through the ribs: and see,<br /> +Wild for speed to cheat despair,<br /> +Horsemen, clutching knee to chin,<br /> +Crouch and dart they know not where.<br /> + Attila, my Attila!<br /> +Faces covered, faces bare,<br /> +Light the palace-front like jets<br /> +Of a dreadful fire within.<br /> +Beating hands and driving hair<br /> +Start on roof and parapets.<br /> +Dust rolls up; the slaughter din.<br /> +—Death to them who call him dead!<br /> +Death to them who doubt the tale!<br /> +Choking in his dusty veil,<br /> +Sank the sun on his death-bed.<br /> + Make the bed for Attila!</p> +<h4>XXI</h4> +<p class="poetry">’Tis the room where thunder sleeps.<br /> +Frenzy, as a wave to shore<br /> +Surging, burst the silent door,<br /> +And drew back to awful deeps<br /> +<a name="page175"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 175</span>Breath +beaten out, foam-white. Anew<br /> +Howled and pressed the ghastly crew,<br /> +Like storm-waters over rocks.<br /> + Attila, my Attila!<br /> +One long shaft of sunset red<br /> +Laid a finger on the bed.<br /> +Horror, with the snaky locks,<br /> +Shocked the surge to stiffened heaps,<br /> +Hoary as the glacier’s head<br /> +Faced to the moon. Insane they look.<br /> +God it is in heaven who weeps<br /> +Fallen from his hand the Scourge he shook.<br /> + Make the bed for Attila!</p> +<h4>XXII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Square along the couch, and stark,<br /> +Like the sea-rejected thing<br /> +Sea-sucked white, behold their King.<br /> + Attila, my Attila!<br /> +Beams that panted black and bright,<br /> +Scornful lightnings danced their sight:<br /> +Him they see an oak in bud,<br /> +Him an oaklog stripped of bark:<br /> +Him, their lord of day and night,<br /> +White, and lifting up his blood<br /> +Dumb for vengeance. Name us that,<br /> +Huddled in the corner dark<br /> +Humped and grinning like a cat,<br /> +Teeth for lips!—’tis she! she stares,<br /> +Glittering through her bristled hairs.<br /> +Rend her! Pierce her to the hilt!<br /> +She is Murder: have her out!<br /> +What! this little fist, as big<br /> +As the southern summer fig!<br /> +<a name="page176"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 176</span>She is +Madness, none may doubt.<br /> +Death, who dares deny her guilt!<br /> +Death, who says his blood she spilt!<br /> + Make the bed for Attila!</p> +<h4>XXIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Torch and lamp and sunset-red<br /> +Fell three-fingered on the bed.<br /> +In the torch the beard-hair scant<br /> +With the great breast seemed to pant:<br /> +In the yellow lamp the limbs<br /> +Wavered, as the lake-flower swims:<br /> +In the sunset red the dead<br /> +Dead avowed him, dry blood-red.</p> +<h4>XXIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Hatred of that abject slave,<br /> +Earth, was in each chieftain’s heart.<br /> +Earth has got him, whom God gave,<br /> +Earth may sing, and earth shall smart!<br /> + Attila, my Attila!</p> +<h4>XXV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Thus their prayer was raved and ceased.<br /> +Then had Vengeance of her feast<br /> +Scent in their quick pang to smite<br /> +Which they knew not, but huge pain<br /> +Urged them for some victim slain<br /> +Swift, and blotted from the sight.<br /> +Each at each, a crouching beast,<br /> +Glared, and quivered for the word.<br /> +Each at each, and all on that,<br /> +Humped and grinning like a cat,<br /> +<a name="page177"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +177</span>Head-bound with its bridal-wreath.<br /> +Then the bitter chamber heard<br /> +Vengeance in a cauldron seethe.<br /> +Hurried counsel rage and craft<br /> +Yelped to hungry men, whose teeth<br /> +Hard the grey lip-ringlet gnawed,<br /> +Gleaming till their fury laughed.<br /> +With the steel-hilt in the clutch,<br /> +Eyes were shot on her that froze<br /> +In their blood-thirst overawed;<br /> +Burned to rend, yet feared to touch.<br /> +She that was his nuptial rose,<br /> +She was of his heart’s blood clad:<br /> +Oh! the last of him she had!—<br /> +Could a little fist as big<br /> +As the southern summer fig,<br /> +Push a dagger’s point to pierce<br /> +Ribs like those? Who else! They glared<br /> +Each at each. Suspicion fierce<br /> +Many a black remembrance bared.<br /> + Attila, my Attila!<br /> +Death, who dares deny her guilt!<br /> +Death, who says his blood she spilt!<br /> +Traitor he, who stands between!<br /> +Swift to hell, who harms the Queen!<br /> +She, the wild contention’s cause,<br /> +Combed her hair with quiet paws.<br /> + Make the bed for Attila!</p> +<h4>XXVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Night was on the host in arms.<br /> +Night, as never night before,<br /> +Hearkened to an army’s roar<br /> +Breaking up in snaky swarms:<br /> +<a name="page178"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 178</span>Torch +and steel and snorting steed,<br /> +Hunted by the cry of blood,<br /> +Cursed with blindness, mad for day.<br /> +Where the torches ran a flood,<br /> +Tales of him and of the deed<br /> +Showered like a torrent spray.<br /> +Fear of silence made them strive<br /> +Loud in warrior-hymns that grew<br /> +Hoarse for slaughter yet unwreaked.<br /> +Ghostly Night across the hive,<br /> +With a crimson finger drew<br /> +Letters on her breast and shrieked.<br /> +Night was on them like the mould<br /> +On the buried half alive.<br /> +Night, their bloody Queen, her fold<br /> +Wound on them and struck them through.<br /> + Make the bed for Attila!</p> +<h4>XXVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Earth has got him whom God gave,<br /> +Earth may sing, and earth shall smart!<br /> +None of earth shall know his grave.<br /> +They that dig with Death depart.<br /> + Attila, my Attila!</p> +<h4>XXVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Thus their prayer was raved and passed:<br /> +Passed in peace their red sunset:<br /> +Hewn and earthed those men of sweat<br /> +Who had housed him in the vast,<br /> +Where no mortal might declare,<br /> +There lies he—his end was there!<br /> + Attila, my Attila!</p> +<h4><a name="page179"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +179</span>XXIX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Kingless was the army left:<br /> +Of its head the race bereft.<br /> +Every fury of the pit<br /> +Tortured and dismembered it.<br /> +Lo, upon a silent hour,<br /> +When the pitch of frost subsides,<br /> +Danube with a shout of power<br /> +Loosens his imprisoned tides:<br /> +Wide around the frighted plains<br /> +Shake to hear his riven chains,<br /> +Dreadfuller than heaven in wrath,<br /> +As he makes himself a path:<br /> +High leap the ice-cracks, towering pile<br /> +Floes to bergs, and giant peers<br /> +Wrestle on a drifted isle;<br /> +Island on ice-island rears;<br /> +Dissolution battles fast:<br /> +Big the senseless Titans loom,<br /> +Through a mist of common doom<br /> +Striving which shall die the last:<br /> +Till a gentle-breathing morn<br /> +Frees the stream from bank to bank.<br /> +So the Empire built of scorn<br /> +Agonized, dissolved and sank.<br /> +Of the Queen no more was told<br /> +Than of leaf on Danube rolled.<br /> + Make the bed for Attila!</p> +<h3><a name="page180"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +180</span>ANEURIN’S HARP</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Prince</span> of Bards was +old Aneurin;<br /> +He the grand Gododin sang;<br /> +All his numbers threw such fire in,<br /> +Struck his harp so wild a twang;—<br /> +Still the wakeful Briton borrows<br /> +Wisdom from its ancient heat:<br /> +Still it haunts our source of sorrows,<br /> +Deep excess of liquor sweet!</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Here the Briton, there the Saxon,<br /> +Face to face, three fields apart,<br /> +Thirst for light to lay their thwacks on<br /> +Each the other with good heart.<br /> +Dry the Saxon sits, ’mid dinful<br /> +Noise of iron knits his steel:<br /> +Fresh and roaring with a skinful,<br /> +Britons round the hirlas reel.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Yellow flamed the meady sunset;<br /> +Red runs up the flag of morn.<br /> +Signal for the British onset<br /> +Hiccups through the British horn.<br /> +<a name="page181"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 181</span>Down +these hillmen pour like cattle<br /> +Sniffing pasture: grim below,<br /> +Showing eager teeth of battle,<br /> +In his spear-heads lies the foe.</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">—Monster of the sea! we drive him<br /> +Back into his hungry brine.<br /> +—You shall lodge him, feed him, wive him,<br /> +Look on us; we stand in line.<br /> +—Pale sea-monster! foul the waters<br /> +Cast him; foul he leaves our land.<br /> +—You shall yield us land and daughters:<br /> +Stay the tongue, and try the hand.</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Swift as torrent-streams our warriors,<br /> +Tossing torrent lights, find way;<br /> +Burst the ridges, crowd the barriers,<br /> +Pierce them where the spear-heads play;<br /> +Turn them as the clods in furrow,<br /> +Top them like the leaping foam;<br /> +Sorrow to the mother, sorrow,<br /> +Sorrow to the wife at home!</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Stags, they butted; bulls, they bellowed;<br /> +Hounds, we baited them; oh, brave!<br /> +Every second man, unfellowed,<br /> +Took the strokes of two, and gave.<br /> +Bare as hop-stakes in November’s<br /> +Mists they met our battle-flood:<br /> +Hoary-red as Winter’s embers<br /> +Lay their dead lines done in blood.</p> +<h4><a name="page182"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +182</span>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Thou, my Bard, didst hang thy lyre in<br /> +Oak-leaves, and with crimson brand<br /> +Rhythmic fury spent, Aneurin;<br /> +Songs the churls could understand:<br /> +Thrumming on their Saxon sconces<br /> +Straight, the invariable blow,<br /> +Till they snorted true responses.<br /> +Ever thus the Bard they know!</p> +<h4>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">But ere nightfall, harper lusty!<br /> +When the sun was like a ball<br /> +Dropping on the battle dusty,<br /> +What was yon discordant call?<br /> +Cambria’s old metheglin demon<br /> +Breathed against our rushing tide;<br /> +Clove us midst the threshing seamen:—<br /> +Gashed, we saw our ranks divide!</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Britain then with valedictory<br /> +Shriek veiled off her face and knelt.<br /> +Full of liquor, full of victory,<br /> +Chief on chief old vengeance dealt.<br /> +Backward swung their hurly-burly;<br /> +None but dead men kept the fight.<br /> +They that drink their cup too early,<br /> +Darkness they shall see ere night.</p> +<h4>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">Loud we heard the yellow rover<br /> +Laugh to sleep, while we raged thick,<br /> +Thick as ants the ant-hill over,<br /> +Asking who has thrust the stick.<br /> +<a name="page183"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 183</span>Lo, as +frogs that Winter cumbers<br /> +Meet the Spring with stiffen’d yawn,<br /> +We from our hard night of slumbers<br /> +Marched into the bloody dawn.</p> +<h4>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Day on day we fought, though shattered:<br /> +Pushed and met repulses sharp,<br /> +Till our Raven’s plumes were scattered:<br /> +All, save old Aneurin’s harp.<br /> +Hear it wailing like a mother<br /> +O’er the strings of children slain!<br /> +He in one tongue, in another,<br /> +Alien, I; one blood, yet twain.</p> +<h4>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Old Aneurin! droop no longer.<br /> +That squat ocean-scum, we own,<br /> +Had fine stoutness, made us stronger,<br /> +Brought us much-required backbone:<br /> +Claimed of Power their dues, and granted<br /> +Dues to Power in turn, when rose<br /> +Mightier rovers; they that planted<br /> +Sovereign here the Norman nose.</p> +<h4>XIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Glorious men, with heads of eagles,<br /> +Chopping arms, and cupboard lips;<br /> +Warriors, hunters, keen as beagles,<br /> +Mounted aye on horse or ships.<br /> +Active, being hungry creatures;<br /> +Silent, having nought to say:<br /> +High they raised the lord of features,<br /> +Saxon-worshipped to this day.</p> +<h4><a name="page184"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +184</span>XIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Hear its deeds, the great recital!<br /> +Stout as bergs of Arctic ice<br /> +Once it led, and lived; a title<br /> +Now it is, and names its price.<br /> +This our Saxon brothers cherish:<br /> +This, when by the worth of wits<br /> +Lands are reared aloft, or perish,<br /> +Sole illumes their lucre-pits.</p> +<h4>XV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Know we not our wrongs, unwritten<br /> +Though they be, Aneurin? Sword,<br /> +Song, and subtle mind, the Briton<br /> +Brings to market, all ignored.<br /> +’Gainst the Saxon’s bone impinging,<br /> +Still is our Gododin played;<br /> +Shamed we see him humbly cringing<br /> +In a shadowy nose’s shade.</p> +<h4>XVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Bitter is the weight that crushes<br /> +Low, my Bard, thy race of fire.<br /> +Here no fair young future blushes<br /> +Bridal to a man’s desire.<br /> +Neither chief, nor aim, nor splendour<br /> +Dressing distance, we perceive.<br /> +Neither honour, nor the tender<br /> +Bloom of promise, morn or eve.</p> +<h4>XVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Joined we are; a tide of races<br /> +Rolled to meet a common fate;<br /> +England clasps in her embraces<br /> +Many: what is England’s state?<br /> +<a name="page185"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 185</span>England +her distended middle<br /> +Thumps with pride as Mammon’s wife;<br /> +Says that thus she reads thy riddle,<br /> +Heaven! ’tis heaven to plump her life.</p> +<h4>XVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">O my Bard! a yellow liquor,<br /> +Like to that we drank of old—<br /> +Gold is her metheglin beaker,<br /> +She destruction drinks in gold.<br /> +Warn her, Bard, that Power is pressing<br /> +Hotly for his dues this hour;<br /> +Tell her that no drunken blessing<br /> +Stops the onward march of Power.</p> +<h4>XIX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Has she ears to take forewarnings<br /> +She will cleanse her of her stains,<br /> +Feed and speed for braver mornings<br /> +Valorously the growth of brains.<br /> +Power, the hard man knit for action,<br /> +Reads each nation on the brow.<br /> +Cripple, fool, and petrifaction<br /> +Fall to him—are falling now!</p> +<h3><a name="page186"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 186</span>MEN +AND MAN</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Men</span> the Angels +eyed;<br /> +And here they were wild waves,<br /> +And there as marsh descried;<br /> +Men the Angels eyed,<br /> +And liked the picture best<br /> +Where they were greenly dressed<br /> +In brotherhood of graves.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Man the Angels marked:<br /> +He led a host through murk,<br /> +On fearful seas embarked;<br /> +Man the Angels marked;<br /> +To think without a nay,<br /> +That he was good as they,<br /> +And help him at his work.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Man and Angels, ye<br /> +A sluggish fen shall drain,<br /> +Shall quell a warring sea.<br /> +Man and Angels, ye,<br /> +Whom stain of strife befouls,<br /> +A light to kindle souls<br /> +Bear radiant in the stain.</p> +<h3><a name="page187"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 187</span>THE +LAST CONTENTION</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Young</span> captain of a +crazy bark!<br /> +O tameless heart in battered frame!<br /> +Thy sailing orders have a mark,<br /> + And hers is not the name.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">For action all thine iron clanks<br /> +In cravings for a splendid prize;<br /> +Again to race or bump thy planks<br /> + With any flag that flies.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Consult them; they are eloquent<br /> +For senses not inebriate.<br /> +They trust thee on the star intent,<br /> + That leads to land their freight.</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">And they have known thee high peruse<br /> +The heavens, and deep the earth, till thou<br /> +Didst into the flushed circle cruise<br /> + Where reason quits the brow.</p> +<h4><a name="page188"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +188</span>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Thou animatest ancient tales,<br /> +To prove our world of linear seed:<br /> +Thy very virtue now assails,<br /> + A tempter to mislead.</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">But thou hast answer I am I;<br /> +My passion hallows, bids command:<br /> +And she is gracious, she is nigh:<br /> + One motion of the hand!</p> +<h4>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">It will suffice; a whirly tune<br /> +These winds will pipe, and thou perform<br /> +The nodded part of pantaloon<br /> + In thy created storm.</p> +<h4>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Admires thee Nature with much pride;<br /> +She clasps thee for a gift of morn,<br /> +Till thou art set against the tide,<br /> + And then beware her scorn.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Sad issue, should that strife befall<br /> +Between thy mortal ship and thee!<br /> +It writes the melancholy scrawl<br /> + Of wreckage over sea.</p> +<h4><a name="page189"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +189</span>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">This lady of the luting tongue,<br /> +The flash in darkness, billow’s grace,<br /> +For thee the worship; for the young<br /> + In muscle the embrace.</p> +<h4>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Soar on thy manhood clear from those<br /> +Whose toothless Winter claws at May,<br /> +And take her as the vein of rose<br /> + Athwart an evening grey.</p> +<h3><a name="page190"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +190</span>PERIANDER</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">How</span> died Melissa +none dares shape in words.<br /> +A woman who is wife despotic lords<br /> +Count faggot at the question, Shall she live!<br /> +Her son, because his brows were black of her,<br /> +Runs barking for his bread, a fugitive,<br /> +And Corinth frowns on them that feed the cur.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">There is no Corinth save the whip and curb<br +/> +Of Corinth, high Periander; the superb<br /> +In magnanimity, in rule severe.<br /> +Up on his marble fortress-tower he sits,<br /> +The city under him: a white yoked steer,<br /> +That bears his heart for pulse, his head for wits.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Bloom of the generous fires of his fair +Spring<br /> +Still coloured him when men forbore to sting;<br /> +Admiring meekly where the ordered seeds<br /> +Of his good sovereignty showed gardens trim;<br /> +And owning that the hoe he struck at weeds<br /> +Was author of the flowers raised face to him.</p> +<h4><a name="page191"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +191</span>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">His Corinth, to each mood subservient<br /> +In homage, made he as an instrument<br /> +To yield him music with scarce touch of stops.<br /> +He breathed, it piped; he moved, it rose to fly:<br /> +At whiles a bloodhorse racing till it drops;<br /> +At whiles a crouching dog, on him all eye.</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">His wisdom men acknowledged; only one,<br /> +The creature, issue of him, Lycophron,<br /> +That rebel with his mother in his brows,<br /> +Contested: such an infamous would foul<br /> +Pirene! Little heed where he might house<br /> +The prince gave, hearing: so the fox, the owl!</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">To prove the Gods benignant to his rule,<br /> +The years, which fasten rigid whom they cool,<br /> +Reviewing, saw him hold the seat of power.<br /> +A grey one asked: Who next? nor answer had:<br /> +One greyer pointed on the pallid hour<br /> +To come: a river dried of waters glad.</p> +<h4>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">For which of his male issue promised grip<br /> +To stride yon people, with the curb and whip?<br /> +This Lycophron! he sole, the father like,<br /> +Fired prospect of a line in one strong tide,<br /> +By right of mastery; stern will to strike;<br /> +Pride to support the stroke: yea, Godlike pride!</p> +<h4><a name="page192"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +192</span>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Himself the prince beheld a failing fount.<br +/> +His line stretched back unto its holy mount:<br /> +The thirsty onward waved for him no sign.<br /> +Then stood before his vision that hard son.<br /> +The seizure of a passion for his line<br /> +Impelled him to the path of Lycophron.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">The youth was tossing pebbles in the sea;<br /> +A figure shunned along the busy quay,<br /> +Perforce of the harsh edict for who dared<br /> +Address him outcast. Naming it, he crossed<br /> +His father’s look with look that proved them paired<br /> +For stiffness, and another pebble tossed.</p> +<h4>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">An exile to the Island ere nightfall<br /> +He passed from sight, from the hushed mouths of all.<br /> +It had resemblance to a death: and on,<br /> +Against a coast where sapphire shattered white,<br /> +The seasons rolled like troops of billows blown<br /> +To spraymist. The prince gazed on capping night.</p> +<h4>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Deaf Age spake in his ear with shouts: Thy +son!<br /> +Deep from his heart Life raved of work not done.<br /> +He heard historic echoes moan his name,<br /> +As of the prince in whom the race had pause;<br /> +Till Tyranny paternity became,<br /> +And him he hated loved he for the cause.</p> +<h4><a name="page193"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +193</span>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Not Lycophron the exile now appeared,<br /> +But young Periander, from the shadow cleared,<br /> +That haunted his rebellious brows. The prince<br /> +Grew bright for him; saw youth, if seeming loth,<br /> +Return: and of pure pardon to convince,<br /> +Despatched the messenger most dear with both.</p> +<h4>XIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">His daughter, from the exile’s Island +home,<br /> +Wrote, as a flight of halcyons o’er the foam,<br /> +Sweet words: her brother to his father bowed;<br /> +Accepted his peace-offering, and rejoiced.<br /> +To bring him back a prince the father vowed,<br /> +Commanded man the oars, the white sails hoist.</p> +<h4>XIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">He waved the fleet to strain its westward +way<br /> +On to the sea-hued hills that crown the bay:<br /> +Soil of those hospitable islanders<br /> +Whom now his heart, for honour to his blood,<br /> +Thanked. They should learn what boons a prince confers<br +/> +When happiness enjoins him gratitude!</p> +<h4>XV</h4> +<p class="poetry">In watch upon the offing, worn with haste<br /> +To see his youth revived, and, close embraced,<br /> +Pardon who had subdued him, who had gained<br /> +Surely the stoutest battle between two<br /> +Since Titan pierced by young Apollo stained<br /> +Earth’s breast, the prince looked forth, himself looked +through.</p> +<h4><a name="page194"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +194</span>XVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Errors aforetime unperceived were bared,<br /> +To be by his young masterful repaired:<br /> +Renewed his great ideas gone to smoke;<br /> +His policy confirmed amid the surge<br /> +Of States and people fretting at his yoke.<br /> +And lo, the fleet brown-flocked on the sea-verge!</p> +<h4>XVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Oars pulled: they streamed in harbour; without +cheer<br /> +For welcome shadowed round the heaving bier.<br /> +They, whose approach in such rare pomp and stress<br /> +Of numbers the free islanders dismayed<br /> +At Tyranny come masking to oppress,<br /> +Found Lycophron this breathless, this lone-laid.</p> +<h4>XVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Who smote the man thrown open to young joy?<br +/> +The image of the mother of his boy<br /> +Came forth from his unwary breast in wreaths,<br /> +With eyes. And shall a woman, that extinct,<br /> +Smite out of dust the Powerful who breathes?<br /> +Her loved the son; her served; they lay close-linked!</p> +<h4>XIX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Dead was he, and demanding earth. +Demand<br /> +Sharper for vengeance of an instant hand,<br /> +The Tyrant in the father heard him cry,<br /> +And raged a plague; to prove on free Hellenes<br /> +How prompt the Tyrant for the Persian dye;<br /> +How black his Gods behind their marble screens.</p> +<h3><a name="page195"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +195</span>SOLON</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">The</span> Tyrant passed, +and friendlier was his eye<br /> +On the great man of Athens, whom for foe<br /> +He knew, than on the sycophantic fry<br /> +That broke as waters round a galley’s flow,<br /> +Bubbles at prow and foam along the wake.<br /> +Solidity the Thunderer could not shake,<br /> +Beneath an adverse wind still stripping bare,<br /> +His kinsman, of the light-in-cavern look,<br /> +From thought drew, and a countenance could wear<br /> +Not less at peace than fields in Attic air<br /> +Shorn, and shown fruitful by the reaper’s hook.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Most enviable so; yet much insane<br /> +To deem of minds of men they grow! these sheep,<br /> +By fits wild horses, need the crook and rein;<br /> +Hot bulls by fits, pure wisdom hold they cheap,<br /> +My Lawgiver, when fiery is the mood.<br /> +For ones and twos and threes thy words are good;<br /> +For thine own government are pillars: mine<br /> +Stand acts to fit the herd; which has quick thirst,<br /> +Rejecting elegiacs, though they shine<br /> +On polished brass, and, worthy of the Nine,<br /> +In showering columns from their fountain burst.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Thus museful rode the Tyrant, princely +plumed,<br /> +To his high seat upon the sacred rock:<br /> +<a name="page196"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 196</span>And +Solon, blank beside his rule, resumed<br /> +The meditation which that passing mock<br /> +Had buffeted awhile to sallowness.<br /> +He little loved the man, his office less,<br /> +Yet owned him for a flower of his kind.<br /> +Therefore the heavier curse on Athens he!<br /> +The people grew not in themselves, but, blind,<br /> +Accepted sight from him, to him resigned<br /> +Their hopes of stature, rootless as at sea.</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">As under sea lay Solon’s work, or +seemed<br /> +By turbid shore-waves beaten day by day;<br /> +Defaced, half formless, like an image dreamed,<br /> +Or child that fashioned in another clay<br /> +Appears, by strangers’ hands to home returned.<br /> +But shall the Present tyrannize us? earned<br /> +It was in some way, justly says the sage.<br /> +One sees not how, while husbanding regrets;<br /> +While tossing scorn abroad from righteous rage,<br /> +High vision is obscured; for this is age<br /> +When robbed—more infant than the babe it frets!</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Yet see Athenians treading the black path<br /> +Laid by a prince’s shadow! well content<br /> +To wait his pleasure, shivering at his wrath:<br /> +They bow to their accepted Orient<br /> +With offer of the all that renders bright:<br /> +Forgetful of the growth of men to light,<br /> +As creatures reared on Persian milk they bow.<br /> +Unripe! unripe! The times are overcast.<br /> +But still may they who sowed behind the plough<br /> +True seed fix in the mind an unborn NOW<br /> +To make the plagues afflicting us things past.</p> +<h3><a name="page197"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +197</span>BELLEROPHON</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Maimed</span>, beggared, +grey; seeking an alms; with nod<br /> +Of palsy doing task of thanks for bread;<br /> + Upon the stature of a God,<br /> +He whom the Gods have struck bends low his head.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Weak words he has, that slip the nerveless +tongue<br /> +Deformed, like his great frame: a broken arc:<br /> + Once radiant as the javelin flung<br /> +Right at the centre breastplate of his mark.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Oft pausing on his white-eyed inward look,<br +/> +Some undermountain narrative he tells,<br /> + As gapped by Lykian heat the brook<br /> +Cut from the source that in the upland swells.</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">The cottagers who dole him fruit and crust<br +/> +With patient inattention hear him prate:<br /> + And comes the snow, and comes the dust,<br /> +Comes the old wanderer, more bent of late.</p> +<h4><a name="page198"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +198</span>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">A crazy beggar grateful for a meal<br /> +Has ever of himself a world to say.<br /> + For them he is an ancient wheel<br /> +Spinning a knotted thread the livelong day.</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">He cannot, nor do they, the tale connect;<br /> +For never singer in the land had been<br /> + Who him for theme did not reject:<br /> +Spurned of the hoof that sprang the Hippocrene.</p> +<h4>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Albeit a theme of flame to bring them +straight<br /> +The snorting white-winged brother of the wave,<br /> + They hear him as a thing by fate<br /> +Cursed in unholy babble to his grave.</p> +<h4>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">As men that spied the wings, that heard the +snort,<br /> +Their sires have told; and of a martial prince<br /> + Bestriding him; and old report<br /> +Speaks of a monster slain by one long since.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">There is that story of the golden bit<br /> +By Goddess given to tame the lightning steed:<br /> + A mortal who could mount, and sit<br /> +Flying, and up Olympus midway speed.</p> +<h4><a name="page199"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +199</span>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">He rose like the loosed fountain’s utmost +leap;<br /> +He played the star at span of heaven right o’er<br /> + Men’s heads: they saw the snowy steep,<br /> +Saw the winged shoulders: him they saw not more.</p> +<h4>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">He fell: and says the shattered man, I fell:<br +/> +And sweeps an arm the height an eagle wins;<br /> + And in his breast a mouthless well<br /> +Heaves the worn patches of his coat of skins.</p> +<h4>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Lo, this is he in whom the surgent springs<br +/> +Of recollections richer than our skies<br /> + To feed the flow of tuneful strings,<br /> +Show but a pool of scum for shooting flies.</p> +<h4><a name="page200"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +200</span>PHAÉTHÔN<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">ATTEMPTED IN THE GALLIAMBIC +MEASURE</span></h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">At</span> the coming up of +Phoebus the all-luminous charioteer,<br /> +Double-visaged stand the mountains in imperial multitudes,<br /> +And with shadows dappled men sing to him, Hail, O Beneficent!<br +/> +For they shudder chill, the earth-vales, at his clouding, shudder +to black;<br /> +In the light of him there is music thro’ the poplar and +river-sedge,<br /> +Renovation, chirp of brooks, hum of the forest—an +ocean-song.<br /> +Never pearl from ocean-hollows by the diver exultingly,<br /> +In his breathlessness, above thrust, is as earth to Helios.<br /> +Who usurps his place there, rashest? Aphrodite’s +loved one it is!<br /> +To his son the flaming Sun-God, to the tender youth, Phaethon,<br +/> +Rule of day this day surrenders as a thing hereditary,<br /> +Having sworn by Styx tremendous, for the proof of his +parentage,<br /> +He would grant his son’s petition, whatsoever the sign +thereof.<br /> +Then, rejoiced, the stripling answered: ‘Rule of day give +me; give it me,<br /> +Give me place that men may see me how I blaze, and +transcendingly<br /> +I, divine, proclaim my birthright.’ Darkened Helios, +and his utterance<br /> +<a name="page201"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 201</span>Choked +prophetic: ‘O half mortal!’ he exclaimed in an +agony,<br /> +‘O lost son of mine! lost son! No! put a prayer for +another thing:<br /> +Not for this: insane to wish it, and to crave the gift +impious!<br /> +Cannot other gifts my godhead shed upon thee? miraculous<br /> +Mighty gifts to prove a blessing, that to earth thou shalt be a +joy?<br /> +Gifts of healing, wherewith men walk as the Gods beneficently;<br +/> +As a God to sway to concord hearts of men, reconciling them;<br +/> +Gifts of verse, the lyre, the laurel, therewithal that thine +origin<br /> +Shall be known even as when <i>I</i> strike on the string’d +shell with melody,<br /> +And the golden notes, like medicine, darting straight to the +cavities,<br /> +Fill them up, till hearts of men bound as the billows, the ships +thereon.’<br /> +Thus intently urged the Sun-God; but the force of his +eloquence<br /> +Was the pressing on of sea-waves scattered broad from the rocks +away.<br /> +What shall move a soul from madness? Lost, lost in +delirium,<br /> +Rock-fast, the adolescent to his father, irreverent,<br /> +‘By the oath! the oath! thine oath!’ cried. The +effulgent foreseër then,<br /> +Quivering in his loins parental, on the boy’s beaming +countenance<br /> +Looked and moaned, and urged him for love’s sake, for sweet +life’s sake, to yield the claim,<br /> +<a name="page202"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 202</span>To +abandon his mad hunger, and avert the calamity.<br /> +But he, vehement, passionate, called out: ‘Let me show I am +what I say,<br /> +That the taunts I hear be silenced: I am stung with their +whispering.<br /> +Only, Thou, my Father, Thou tell how aloft the revolving +wheels,<br /> +How aloft the cleaving horse-crests I may guide peremptorily,<br +/> +Till I drink the shadows, fire-hot, like a flower celestial,<br +/> +And my fellows see me curbing the fierce steeds, the dear +dew-drinkers:<br /> +Yea, for this I gaze on life’s light; throw for this any +sacrifice.’</p> +<p class="poetry">All the end foreseeing, Phoebus to his oath +irrevocable<br /> +Bowed obedient, deploring the insanity pitiless.<br /> +Then the flame-outsnorting horses were led forth: it was so +decreed.<br /> +They were yoked before the glad youth by his +sister-ancillaries.<br /> +Swift the ripple ripples follow’d, as of aureate +Helicon,<br /> +Down their flanks, while they impatient pawed desire of the +distances,<br /> +And the bit with fury champed. Oh! unimaginable delight!<br +/> +Unimagined speed and splendour in the circle of upper air!<br /> +Glory grander than the armed host upon earth singing victory!<br +/> +Chafed the youth with their spirit súrcharged, as when +blossom is shaken by winds,<br /> +Marked that labour by his sister Phaethontiades finished, +quick<br /> +On the slope of the car his forefoot set assured: and the morning +rose:<br /> +<a name="page203"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 203</span>Seeing +whom, and what a day dawned, stood the God, as in harvest +fields,<br /> +When the reaper grasps the full sheaf and the sickle that severs +it:<br /> +Hugged the withered head with one hand, with the other, to +indicate<br /> +(If this woe might be averted, this immeasurable evil),<br /> +Laid the kindling course in view, told how the reins to +manipulate:<br /> +Named the horses fondly, fearful, caution’d urgently +betweenwhiles:<br /> +Their diverging tempers dwelt on, and their wantonness, +wickedness,<br /> +That the voice of Gods alone held in restraint; but the voice of +Gods;<br /> +None but Gods can curb. He spake: vain were the words: +scarcely listening,<br /> +Mounted Phaethon, swinging reins loose, and, ‘Behold me, +companions,<br /> +It is I here, I!’ he shouted, glancing down with +supremacy;<br /> +‘Not to any of you was this gift granted ever in annals of +men;<br /> +I alone what only Gods can, I alone am governing day!’<br +/> +Short the triumph, brief his rapture: see a hurricane suddenly<br +/> +Beat the lifting billow crestless, roll it broken this way and +that;—<br /> +At the leap on yielding ether, in despite of his reprimand,<br /> +Swayed tumultuous the fire-steeds, plunging reckless hither and +yon;<br /> +Unto men a great amazement, all agaze at the Troubled +East:—<br /> +Pitifully for mastery striving in ascension, the charioteer,<br +/> +<a name="page204"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +204</span>Reminiscent, drifts of counsel caught confused in his +arid wits;<br /> +The reins stiff ahind his shoulder madly pulled for the +mastery,<br /> +Till a thunder off the tense chords thro’ his ears +dinnèd horrible.<br /> +Panic seized him: fled his vision of inviolability;<br /> +Fled the dream that he of mortals rode mischances predominant;<br +/> +And he cried, ‘Had I petitioned for a cup of chill +aconite,<br /> +My descent to awful Hades had been soft, for now must I go<br /> +With the curse by father Zeus cast on ambition immoderate.<br /> +Oh, my sisters! Thou, my Goddess, in whose love I was +enviable,<br /> +From whose arms I rushed befrenzied, what a wreck will this body +be,<br /> +That admired of thee stood rose-warm in the courts where thy +mysteries<br /> +Celebration had from me, me the most splendidly privileged!<br /> +Never more shall I thy temple fill with incenses bewildering;<br +/> +Not again hear thy half-murmurs—I am lost!—never, +never more.<br /> +I am wrecked on seas of air, hurled to my death in a vessel of +flame!<br /> +Hither, sisters! Father, save me! Hither, succour me, +Cypria!’</p> +<p class="poetry">Now a wail of men to Zeus rang: from Olympus +the Thunderer<br /> +Saw the rage of the havoc wide-mouthed, the bright car +superimpending<br /> +<a name="page205"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 205</span>Over +Asia, Africa, low down; ruin flaming over the vales;<br /> +Light disastrous rising savage out of smoke inveterately;<br /> +Beast-black, conflagration like a menacing shadow move<br /> +With voracious roaring southward, where aslant, insufferable,<br +/> +The bright steeds careered their parched way down an arc of the +firmament.<br /> +For the day grew like to thick night, and the orb was its +beacon-fire,<br /> +And from hill to hill of darkness burst the day’s +apparition forth.<br /> +Lo, a wrestler, not a God, stood in the chariot ever lowering:<br +/> +Lo, the shape of one who raced there to outstrip the legitimate +hours:<br /> +Lo, the ravish’d beams of Phoebus dragged in shame at the +chariot-wheels:<br /> +Light of days of happy pipings by the mead-singing rivulets!<br +/> +Lo, lo, increasing lustre, torrid breath to the nostrils; lo,<br +/> +Torrid brilliancies thro’ the vapours lighten swifter, +penetrate them,<br /> +Fasten merciless, ruminant, hueless, on earth’s frame +crackling busily.<br /> +He aloft, the frenzied driver, in the glow of the universe,<br /> +Like the paling of the dawn-star withers visibly, he aloft:<br /> +Bitter fury in his aspect, bitter death in the heart of him.<br +/> +Crouch the herds, contract the reptiles, crouch the lions under +their paws.<br /> +White as metal in the furnace are the faces of human-kind:<br /> +Inarticulate creatures of earth dumb all await the ultimate +shock.<br /> +<a name="page206"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 206</span>To the +bolt he launched, ‘Strike dead, thou,’ uttered Zeus, +very terrible;<br /> +‘Perish folly, else ’tis man’s fate’; and +the bolt flew unerringly.<br /> +Then the kindler stooped; from the torch-car down the measureless +altitudes<br /> +Leaned his rayless head, relinquished rein and footing, raised +not a cry.<br /> +Like the flower on the river’s surface when expanding it +vanishes,<br /> +Gave his limbs to right and left, quenched: and so fell he +precipitate,<br /> +Seen of men as a glad rain-fall, sending coolness yet ere it +comes:<br /> +So he showered above them, shadowed o’er the blue +archipelagoes,<br /> +O’er the silken-shining pastures of the continents and the +isles;<br /> +So descending brought revival to the greenery of our earth.</p> +<p class="poetry">Lither, noisy in the breezes now his sisters +shivering weep,<br /> +By the river flowing smooth out to the vexed sea of Adria,<br /> +Where he fell, and where they suffered sudden change to the +tremulous<br /> +Ever-wailful trees bemoaning him, a bruised purple cyclamen.</p> +<h2><a name="page207"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 207</span>A +READING OF EARTH</h2> +<h3><a name="page209"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +209</span>SEED-TIME</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Flowers</span> of the +willow-herb are wool;<br /> +Flowers of the briar berries red;<br /> +Speeding their seed as the breeze may rule,<br /> +Flowers of the thistle loosen the thread.<br /> +Flowers of the clematis drip in beard,<br /> +Slack from the fir-tree youngly climbed;<br /> +Chaplets in air, flies foliage seared;<br /> +Heeled upon earth, lie clusters rimed.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Where were skies of the mantle stained<br /> +Orange and scarlet, a coat of frieze<br /> +Travels from North till day has waned,<br /> +Tattered, soaked in the ditch’s dyes;<br /> +Tumbles the rook under grey or slate;<br /> +Else enfolding us, damps to the bone;<br /> +Narrows the world to my neighbour’s gate;<br /> +Paints me Life as a wheezy crone.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Now seems none but the spider lord;<br /> +Star in circle his web waits prey,<br /> +Silvering bush-mounds, blue brushing sward;<br /> +Slow runs the hour, swift flits the ray.<br /> +Now to his thread-shroud is he nigh,<br /> +Nigh to the tangle where wings are sealed,<br /> +He who frolicked the jewelled fly;<br /> +All is adroop on the down and the weald.</p> +<h4><a name="page210"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +210</span>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Mists more lone for the sheep-bell enwrap<br /> +Nights that tardily let slip a morn<br /> +Paler than moons, and on noontide’s lap<br /> +Flame dies cold, like the rose late born.<br /> +Rose born late, born withered in bud!—<br /> +I, even I, for a zenith of sun<br /> +Cry, to fulfil me, nourish my blood:<br /> +O for a day of the long light, one!</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Master the blood, nor read by chills,<br /> +Earth admonishes: Hast thou ploughed,<br /> +Sown, reaped, harvested grain for the mills,<br /> +Thou hast the light over shadow of cloud.<br /> +Steadily eyeing, before that wail<br /> +Animal-infant, thy mind began,<br /> +Momently nearer me: should sight fail,<br /> +Plod in the track of the husbandman.</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Verily now is our season of seed,<br /> +Now in our Autumn; and Earth discerns<br /> +Them that have served her in them that can read,<br /> +Glassing, where under the surface she burns,<br /> +Quick at her wheel, while the fuel, decay,<br /> +Brightens the fire of renewal: and we?<br /> +Death is the word of a bovine day,<br /> +Know you the breast of the springing To-be.</p> +<h3><a name="page211"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 211</span>HARD +WEATHER</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Bursts</span> from a +rending East in flaws<br /> +The young green leaflet’s harrier, sworn<br /> +To strew the garden, strip the shaws,<br /> +And show our Spring with banner torn.<br /> +Was ever such virago morn?<br /> +The wind has teeth, the wind has claws.<br /> +All the wind’s wolves through woods are loose,<br /> +The wild wind’s falconry aloft.<br /> +Shrill underfoot the grassblade shrews,<br /> +At gallop, clumped, and down the croft<br /> +Bestrid by shadows, beaten, tossed;<br /> +It seems a scythe, it seems a rod.<br /> +The howl is up at the howl’s accost;<br /> +The shivers greet and the shivers nod.</p> +<p class="poetry">Is the land ship? we are rolled, we drive<br /> +Tritonly, cleaving hiss and hum;<br /> +Whirl with the dead, or mount or dive,<br /> +Or down in dregs, or on in scum.<br /> +And drums the distant, pipes the near,<br /> +And vale and hill are grey in grey,<br /> +As when the surge is crumbling sheer,<br /> +And sea-mews wing the haze of spray.<br /> +Clouds—are they bony witches?—swarms,<br /> +Darting swift on the robber’s flight,<br /> +Hurry an infant sky in arms:<br /> +It peeps, it becks; ’tis day, ’tis night.<br /> +<a name="page212"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 212</span>Black +while over the loop of blue<br /> +The swathe is closed, like shroud on corse.<br /> +Lo, as if swift the Furies flew,<br /> +The Fates at heel at a cry to horse!</p> +<p class="poetry">Interpret me the savage whirr:<br /> +And is it Nature scourged, or she,<br /> +Her offspring’s executioner,<br /> +Reducing land to barren sea?<br /> +But is there meaning in a day<br /> +When this fierce angel of the air,<br /> +Intent to throw, and haply slay,<br /> +Can for what breath of life we bear,<br /> +Exact the wrestle?—Call to mind<br /> +The many meanings glistening up<br /> +When Nature to her nurslings kind,<br /> +Hands them the fruitage and the cup!<br /> +And seek we rich significance<br /> +Not otherwhere than with those tides<br /> +Of pleasure on the sunned expanse,<br /> +Whose flow deludes, whose ebb derides?</p> +<p class="poetry">Look in the face of men who fare<br /> +Lock-mouthed, a match in lungs and thews<br /> +For this fierce angel of the air,<br /> +To twist with him and take his bruise.<br /> +That is the face beloved of old<br /> +Of Earth, young mother of her brood:<br /> +Nor broken for us shows the mould<br /> +When muscle is in mind renewed:<br /> +Though farther from her nature rude,<br /> +Yet nearer to her spirit’s hold:<br /> +And though of gentler mood serene,<br /> +Still forceful of her fountain-jet.<br /> +So shall her blows be shrewdly met,<br /> +<a name="page213"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 213</span>Be +luminously read the scene<br /> +Where Life is at her grindstone set,<br /> +That she may give us edgeing keen,<br /> +String us for battle, till as play<br /> +The common strokes of fortune shower.<br /> +Such meaning in a dagger-day<br /> +Our wits may clasp to wax in power.<br /> +Yea, feel us warmer at her breast,<br /> +By spin of blood in lusty drill,<br /> +Than when her honeyed hands caressed,<br /> +And Pleasure, sapping, seemed to fill.</p> +<p class="poetry">Behold the life at ease; it drifts.<br /> +The sharpened life commands its course.<br /> +She winnows, winnows roughly; sifts,<br /> +To dip her chosen in her source:<br /> +Contention is the vital force,<br /> +Whence pluck they brain, her prize of gifts,<br /> +Sky of the senses! on which height,<br /> +Not disconnected, yet released,<br /> +They see how spirit comes to light,<br /> +Through conquest of the inner beast,<br /> +Which Measure tames to movement sane,<br /> +In harmony with what is fair.<br /> +Never is Earth misread by brain:<br /> +That is the welling of her, there<br /> +The mirror: with one step beyond,<br /> +For likewise is it voice; and more,<br /> +Benignest kinship bids respond,<br /> +When wail the weak, and them restore<br /> +Whom days as fell as this may rive,<br /> +While Earth sits ebon in her gloom,<br /> +Us atomies of life alive<br /> +Unheeding, bent on life to come.<br /> +Her children of the labouring brain,<br /> +<a name="page214"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 214</span>These +are the champions of the race,<br /> +True parents, and the sole humane,<br /> +With understanding for their base.<br /> +Earth yields the milk, but all her mind<br /> +Is vowed to thresh for stouter stock.<br /> +Her passion for old giantkind,<br /> +That scaled the mount, uphurled the rock,<br /> +Devolves on them who read aright<br /> +Her meaning and devoutly serve;<br /> +Nor in her starlessness of night<br /> +Peruse her with the craven nerve:<br /> +But even as she from grass to corn,<br /> +To eagle high from grubbing mole,<br /> +Prove in strong brain her noblest born,<br /> +The station for the flight of soul.</p> +<h3><a name="page215"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 215</span>THE +SOUTH-WESTER</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Day</span> of the cloud in +fleets! O day<br /> +Of wedded white and blue, that sail<br /> +Immingled, with a footing ray<br /> +In shadow-sandals down our vale!—<br /> +And swift to ravish golden meads,<br /> +Swift up the run of turf it speeds,<br /> +Thy bright of head and dark of heel,<br /> +To where the hilltop flings on sky,<br /> +As hawk from wrist or dust from wheel,<br /> +The tiptoe sealers tossed to fly:—<br /> +Thee the last thunder’s caverned peal<br /> +Delivered from a wailful night:<br /> +All dusky round thy cradled light,<br /> +Those brine-born issues, now in bloom<br /> +Transfigured, wreathed as raven’s plume<br /> +And briony-leaf to watch thee lie:<br /> +Dark eyebrows o’er a dreamful eye<br /> +Nigh opening: till in the braid<br /> +Of purpled vapours thou wert rosed:<br /> +Till that new babe a Goddess maid<br /> +Appeared and vividly disclosed<br /> +Her beat of life: then crimson played<br /> +On edges of the plume and leaf:<br /> +Shape had they and fair feature brief,<br /> +The wings, the smiles: they flew the breast,<br /> +<a name="page216"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +216</span>Earth’s milk. But what imperial march<br /> +Their standards led for earth, none guessed<br /> +Ere upward of a coloured arch,<br /> +An arrow straining eager head<br /> +Lightened, and high for zenith sped.<br /> +Fierier followed; followed Fire.<br /> +Name the young lord of Earth’s desire,<br /> +Whose look her wine is, and whose mouth<br /> +Her music! Beauteous was she seen<br /> +Beneath her midway West of South;<br /> +And sister was her quivered green<br /> +To sapphire of the Nereid eyes<br /> +On sea when sun is breeze; she winked<br /> +As they, and waved, heaved waterwise<br /> +Her flood of leaves and grasses linked:<br /> +A myriad lustrous butterflies<br /> +A moment in the fluttering sheen;<br /> +Becapped with the slate air that throws<br /> +The reindeer’s antlers black between<br /> +Low-frowning and wide-fallen snows,<br /> +A minute after; hooded, stoled<br /> +To suit a graveside Season’s dirge.<br /> +Lo, but the breaking of a surge,<br /> +And she is in her lover’s fold,<br /> +Illumined o’er a boundless range<br /> +Anew: and through quick morning hours<br /> +The Tropic-Arctic countercharge<br /> +Did seem to pant in beams and showers.</p> +<p class="poetry">But noon beheld a larger heaven;<br /> +Beheld on our reflecting field<br /> +The Sower to the Bearer given,<br /> +And both their inner sweetest yield,<br /> +Fresh as when dews were grey or first<br /> +Received the flush of hues athirst.<br /> +<a name="page217"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 217</span>Heard we +the woodland, eyeing sun,<br /> +As harp and harper were they one.<br /> +A murky cloud a fair pursued,<br /> +Assailed, and felt the limbs elude:<br /> +He sat him down to pipe his woe,<br /> +And some strange beast of sky became:<br /> +A giant’s club withheld the blow;<br /> +A milky cloud went all to flame.<br /> +And there were groups where silvery springs<br /> +The ethereal forest showed begirt<br /> +By companies in choric rings,<br /> +Whom but to see made ear alert.<br /> +For music did each movement rouse,<br /> +And motion was a minstrel’s rage<br /> +To have our spirits out of house,<br /> +And bathe them on the open page.<br /> +This was a day that knew not age.<br /> +Since flew the vapoury twos and threes<br /> +From western pile to eastern rack;<br /> +As on from peaks of Pyrenees<br /> +To Graians; youngness ruled the track.<br /> +When songful beams were shut in caves,<br /> +And rainy drapery swept across;<br /> +When the ranked clouds were downy waves,<br /> +Breast of swan, eagle, albatross,<br /> +In ordered lines to screen the blue,<br /> +Youngest of light was nigh, we knew.<br /> +The silver finger of it laughed<br /> +Along the narrow rift: it shot,<br /> +Slew the huge gloom with golden shaft,<br /> +Then haled on high the volumed blot,<br /> +To build the hurling palace, cleave<br /> +The dazzling chasm; the flying nests,<br /> +The many glory-garlands weave,<br /> +<a name="page218"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 218</span>Whose +presence not our sight attests<br /> +Till wonder with the splendour blent,<br /> +And passion for the beauty flown,<br /> +Make evanescence permanent,<br /> +The thing at heart our endless own.</p> +<p class="poetry">Only at gathered eve knew we<br /> +The marvels of the day: for then<br /> +Mount upon mountain out of sea<br /> +Arose, and to our spacious ken<br /> +Trebled sublime Olympus round<br /> +In towering amphitheatre.<br /> +Colossal on enormous mound,<br /> +Majestic gods we saw confer.<br /> +They wafted the Dream-messenger<br /> +From off the loftiest, the crowned:<br /> +That Lady of the hues of foam<br /> +In sun-rays: who, close under dome,<br /> +A figure on the foot’s descent,<br /> +Irradiate to vapour went,<br /> +As one whose mission was resigned,<br /> +Dispieced, undraped, dissolved to threads;<br /> +Melting she passed into the mind,<br /> +Where immortal with mortal weds.</p> +<p class="poetry">Whereby was known that we had viewed<br /> +The union of our earth and skies<br /> +Renewed: nor less alive renewed<br /> +Than when old bards, in nature wise,<br /> +Conceived pure beauty given to eyes,<br /> +And with undyingness imbued.<br /> +Pageant of man’s poetic brain,<br /> +His grand procession of the song,<br /> +It was; the Muses and their train;<br /> +<a name="page219"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 219</span>Their +God to lead the glittering throng:<br /> +At whiles a beat of forest gong;<br /> +At whiles a glimpse of Python slain.<br /> +Mostly divinest harmony,<br /> +The lyre, the dance. We could believe<br /> +A life in orb and brook and tree,<br /> +And cloud; and still holds Memory<br /> +A morning in the eyes of eve.</p> +<h3><a name="page220"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 220</span>THE +THRUSH IN FEBRUARY</h3> +<p class="poetry">I <span class="smcap">know</span> him, +February’s thrush,<br /> +And loud at eve he valentines<br /> +On sprays that paw the naked bush<br /> +Where soon will sprout the thorns and bines.</p> +<p class="poetry">Now ere the foreign singer thrills<br /> +Our vale his plain-song pipe he pours,<br /> +A herald of the million bills;<br /> +And heed him not, the loss is yours.</p> +<p class="poetry">My study, flanked with ivied fir<br /> +And budded beech with dry leaves curled,<br /> +Perched over yew and juniper,<br /> +He neighbours, piping to his world:—</p> +<p class="poetry">The wooded pathways dank on brown,<br /> +The branches on grey cloud a web,<br /> +The long green roller of the down,<br /> +An image of the deluge-ebb:—</p> +<p class="poetry">And farther, they may hear along<br /> +The stream beneath the poplar row.<br /> +By fits, like welling rocks, the song<br /> +Spouts of a blushful Spring in flow.</p> +<p class="poetry">But most he loves to front the vale<br /> +When waves of warm South-western rains<br /> +Have left our heavens clear in pale,<br /> +With faintest beck of moist red veins:</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page221"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +221</span>Vermilion wings, by distance held<br /> +To pause aflight while fleeting swift:<br /> +And high aloft the pearl inshelled<br /> +Her lucid glow in glow will lift;</p> +<p class="poetry">A little south of coloured sky;<br /> +Directing, gravely amorous,<br /> +The human of a tender eye<br /> +Through pure celestial on us:</p> +<p class="poetry">Remote, not alien; still, not cold;<br /> +Unraying yet, more pearl than star;<br /> +She seems a while the vale to hold<br /> +In trance, and homelier makes the far.</p> +<p class="poetry">Then Earth her sweet unscented breathes,<br /> +An orb of lustre quits the height;<br /> +And like blue iris-flags, in wreaths<br /> +The sky takes darkness, long ere quite.</p> +<p class="poetry">His Island voice then shall you hear,<br /> +Nor ever after separate<br /> +From such a twilight of the year<br /> +Advancing to the vernal gate.</p> +<p class="poetry">He sings me, out of Winter’s throat,<br +/> +The young time with the life ahead;<br /> +And my young time his leaping note<br /> +Recalls to spirit-mirth from dead.</p> +<p class="poetry">Imbedded in a land of greed,<br /> +Of mammon-quakings dire as Earth’s,<br /> +My care was but to soothe my need;<br /> +At peace among the littleworths.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page222"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +222</span>To light and song my yearning aimed;<br /> +To that deep breast of song and light<br /> +Which men have barrenest proclaimed;<br /> +As ’tis to senses pricked with fright.</p> +<p class="poetry">So mine are these new fruitings rich<br /> +The simple to the common brings;<br /> +I keep the youth of souls who pitch<br /> +Their joy in this old heart of things:</p> +<p class="poetry">Who feel the Coming young as aye,<br /> +Thrice hopeful on the ground we plough;<br /> +Alive for life, awake to die;<br /> +One voice to cheer the seedling Now.</p> +<p class="poetry">Full lasting is the song, though he,<br /> +The singer, passes: lasting too,<br /> +For souls not lent in usury,<br /> +The rapture of the forward view.</p> +<p class="poetry">With that I bear my senses fraught<br /> +Till what I am fast shoreward drives.<br /> +They are the vessel of the Thought.<br /> +The vessel splits, the Thought survives.</p> +<p class="poetry">Nought else are we when sailing brave,<br /> +Save husks to raise and bid it burn.<br /> +Glimpse of its livingness will wave<br /> +A light the senses can discern</p> +<p class="poetry">Across the river of the death,<br /> +Their close. Meanwhile, O twilight bird<br /> +Of promise! bird of happy breath!<br /> +I hear, I would the City heard.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page223"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +223</span>The City of the smoky fray;<br /> +A prodded ox, it drags and moans:<br /> +Its Morrow no man’s child; its Day<br /> +A vulture’s morsel beaked to bones.</p> +<p class="poetry">It strives without a mark for strife;<br /> +It feasts beside a famished host:<br /> +The loose restraint of wanton life,<br /> +That threatened penance in the ghost!</p> +<p class="poetry">Yet there our battle urges; there<br /> +Spring heroes many: issuing thence,<br /> +Names that should leave no vacant air<br /> +For fresh delight in confidence.</p> +<p class="poetry">Life was to them the bag of grain,<br /> +And Death the weedy harrow’s tooth.<br /> +Those warriors of the sighting brain<br /> +Give worn Humanity new youth.</p> +<p class="poetry">Our song and star are they to lead<br /> +The tidal multitude and blind<br /> +From bestial to the higher breed<br /> +By fighting souls of love divined,</p> +<p class="poetry">They scorned the ventral dream of peace,<br /> +Unknown in nature. This they knew:<br /> +That life begets with fair increase<br /> +Beyond the flesh, if life be true.</p> +<p class="poetry">Just reason based on valiant blood,<br /> +The instinct bred afield would match<br /> +To pipe thereof a swelling flood,<br /> +Were men of Earth made wise in watch.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page224"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +224</span>Though now the numbers count as drops<br /> +An urn might bear, they father Time.<br /> +She shapes anew her dusty crops;<br /> +Her quick in their own likeness climb.</p> +<p class="poetry">Of their own force do they create;<br /> +They climb to light, in her their root.<br /> +Your brutish cry at muffled fate<br /> +She smites with pangs of worse than brute.</p> +<p class="poetry">She, judged of shrinking nerves, appears<br /> +A Mother whom no cry can melt;<br /> +But read her past desires and fears,<br /> +The letters on her breast are spelt.</p> +<p class="poetry">A slayer, yea, as when she pressed<br /> +Her savage to the slaughter-heaps,<br /> +To sacrifice she prompts her best:<br /> +She reaps them as the sower reaps.</p> +<p class="poetry">But read her thought to speed the race,<br /> +And stars rush forth of blackest night:<br /> +You chill not at a cold embrace<br /> +To come, nor dread a dubious might.</p> +<p class="poetry">Her double visage, double voice,<br /> +In oneness rise to quench the doubt.<br /> +This breath, her gift, has only choice<br /> +Of service, breathe we in or out.</p> +<p class="poetry">Since Pain and Pleasure on each hand<br /> +Led our wild steps from slimy rock<br /> +To yonder sweeps of gardenland,<br /> +We breathe but to be sword or block.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page225"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +225</span>The sighting brain her good decree<br /> +Accepts; obeys those guides, in faith,<br /> +By reason hourly fed, that she,<br /> +To some the clod, to some the wraith,</p> +<p class="poetry">Is more, no mask; a flame, a stream.<br /> +Flame, stream, are we, in mid career<br /> +From torrent source, delirious dream,<br /> +To heaven-reflecting currents clear.</p> +<p class="poetry">And why the sons of Strength have been<br /> +Her cherished offspring ever; how<br /> +The Spirit served by her is seen<br /> +Through Law; perusing love will show.</p> +<p class="poetry">Love born of knowledge, love that gains<br /> +Vitality as Earth it mates,<br /> +The meaning of the Pleasures, Pains,<br /> +The Life, the Death, illuminates.</p> +<p class="poetry">For love we Earth, then serve we all;<br /> +Her mystic secret then is ours:<br /> +We fall, or view our treasures fall,<br /> +Unclouded, as beholds her flowers</p> +<p class="poetry">Earth, from a night of frosty wreck,<br /> +Enrobed in morning’s mounted fire,<br /> +When lowly, with a broken neck,<br /> +The crocus lays her cheek to mire.</p> +<h3><a name="page226"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 226</span>THE +APPEASEMENT OF DEMETER</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Demeter</span> devastated +our good land,<br /> +In blackness for her daughter snatched below.<br /> +Smoke-pillar or loose hillock was the sand,<br /> +Where soil had been to clasp warm seed and throw<br /> +The wheat, vine, olive, ripe to Summer’s ray.<br /> +Now whether night advancing, whether day,<br /> + Scarce did the +baldness show:<br /> +The hand of man was a defeated hand.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Necessity, the primal goad to growth,<br /> +Stood shrunken; Youth and Age appeared as one;<br /> +Like Winter Summer; good as labour sloth;<br /> +Nor was there answer wherefore beamed the sun,<br /> +Or why men drew the breath to carry pain.<br /> +High reared the ploughshare, broken lay the wain,<br /> + Idly the +flax-wheel spun<br /> +Unridered: starving lords were wasp and moth.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Lean grassblades losing green on their bent +flags,<br /> +Sang chilly to themselves; lone honey-bees<br /> +Pursued the flowers that were not with dry bags;<br /> +Sole sound aloud the snap of sapless trees,<br /> +<a name="page227"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 227</span>More +sharp than slingstones on hard breastplates hurled.<br /> +Back to first chaos tumbled the stopped world,<br /> + Careless to lure +or please.<br /> +A nature of gaunt ribs, an earth of crags.</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">No smile Demeter cast: the gloom she saw,<br /> +Well draped her direful musing; for in gloom,<br /> +In thicker gloom, deep down the cavern-maw,<br /> +Her sweet had vanished; liker unto whom,<br /> +And whose pale place of habitation mute,<br /> +She and all seemed where Seasons, pledged for fruit<br /> + Anciently, gaped +for bloom:<br /> +Where hand of man was as a plucked fowl’s claw.</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">The wrathful Queen descended on a vale,<br /> +That ere the ravished hour for richness heaved.<br /> +Iambe, maiden of the merry tale,<br /> +Beside her eyed the once red-cheeked, green-leaved.<br /> +It looked as if the Deluge had withdrawn.<br /> +Pity caught at her throat; her jests were gone.<br /> + More than for +her who grieved,<br /> +She could for this waste home have piped the wail.</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Iambe, her dear mountain-rivulet<br /> +To waken laughter from cold stones, beheld<br /> +A riven wheatfield cracking for the wet,<br /> +And seed like infant’s teeth, that never swelled,<br /> +Apeep up flinty ridges, milkless round.<br /> +Teeth of the giants marked she where thin ground<br /> + Rocky in spikes +rebelled<br /> +Against the hand here slack as rotted net.</p> +<h4><a name="page228"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +228</span>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">The valley people up the ashen scoop<br /> +She beckoned, aiming hopelessly to win<br /> +Her Mistress in compassion of yon group<br /> +So pinched and wizened; with their aged grin,<br /> +For lack of warmth to smile on mouths of woe,<br /> +White as in chalk outlining little O,<br /> + Dumb, from a +falling chin;<br /> +Young, old, alike half-bent to make the hoop.</p> +<h4>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Their tongues of birds they wagged, weak-voiced +as when<br /> +Dark underwaters the recesses choke;<br /> +With cluck and upper quiver of a hen<br /> +In grasp, past peeking: cry before the croak.<br /> +Relentlessly their gold-haired Heaven, their fount<br /> +Bountiful of old days, heard them recount<br /> + This and that +cruel stroke:<br /> +Nor eye nor ear had she for piteous men.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">A figure of black rock by sunbeams crowned<br +/> +Through stormclouds, where the volumed shades enfold<br /> +An earth in awe before the claps resound<br /> +And woods and dwellings are as billows rolled,<br /> +The barren Nourisher unmelted shed<br /> +Death from the looks that wandered with the dead<br /> + Out of the +realms of gold,<br /> +In famine for her lost, her lost unfound.</p> +<h4>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">Iambe from her Mistress tripped; she raised<br +/> +The cattle-call above the moan of prayer;<br /> +And slowly out of fields their fancy grazed,<br /> +Among the droves, defiled a horse and mare:<br /> +<a name="page229"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 229</span>The +wrecks of horse and mare: such ribs as view<br /> +Seas that have struck brave ships ashore, while through<br /> + Shoots the swift +foamspit: bare<br /> +They nodded, and Demeter on them gazed.</p> +<h4>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Howbeit the season of the dancing blood,<br /> +Forgot was horse of mare, yea, mare of horse:<br /> +Reversed, each head at either’s flank, they stood.<br /> +Whereat the Goddess, in a dim remorse,<br /> +Laid hand on them, and smacked; and her touch pricked.<br /> +Neighing within, at either’s flank they licked;<br /> + Played on a +moment’s force<br /> +At courtship, withering to the crazy nod.</p> +<h4>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">The nod was that we gather for consent;<br /> +And mournfully amid the group a dame,<br /> +Interpreting the thing in nature meant,<br /> +Her hands held out like bearers of the flame,<br /> +And nodded for the negative sideways.<br /> +Keen at her Mistress glanced Iambe: rays<br /> + From the Great +Mother came:<br /> +Her lips were opened wide; the curse was rent.</p> +<h4>XIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">She laughed: since our first harvesting heard +none<br /> +Like thunder of the song of heart: her face,<br /> +The dreadful darkness, shook to mounted sun,<br /> +And peal on peal across the hills held chase.<br /> +She laughed herself to water; laughed to fire;<br /> +Laughed the torrential laugh of dam and sire<br /> + Full of the +marrowy race.<br /> +Her laughter, Gods! was flesh on skeleton.</p> +<h4><a name="page230"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +230</span>XIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">The valley people huddled, broke, afraid,<br /> +Assured, and taking lightning in the veins,<br /> +They puffed, they leaped, linked hands, together swayed,<br /> +Unwitting happiness till golden rains<br /> +Of tears in laughter, laughter weeping, smote<br /> +Knowledge of milky mercy from that throat<br /> + Pouring to heal +their pains:<br /> +And one bold youth set mouth at a shy maid.</p> +<h4>XV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Iambe clapped to see the kindly lusts<br /> +Inspire the valley people, still on seas,<br /> +Like poplar-tops relieved from stress of gusts,<br /> +With rapture in their wonderment; but these,<br /> +Low homage being rendered, ran to plough,<br /> +Fed by the laugh, as by the mother cow<br /> + Calves at the +teats they tease:<br /> +Soon drove they through the yielding furrow-crusts.</p> +<h4>XVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Uprose the blade in green, the leaf in red,<br +/> +The tree of water and the tree of wood:<br /> +And soon among the branches overhead<br /> +Gave beauty juicy issue sweet for food.<br /> +O Laughter! beauty plumped and love had birth.<br /> +Laughter! O thou reviver of sick Earth!<br /> + Good for the +spirit, good<br /> +For body, thou! to both art wine and bread!</p> +<h3><a name="page231"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +231</span>EARTH AND A WEDDED WOMAN</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">The</span> shepherd, with +his eye on hazy South,<br /> +Has told of rain upon the fall of day.<br /> +But promise is there none for Susan’s drouth,<br /> +That he will come, who keeps in dry delay.<br /> +The freshest of the village three years gone,<br /> +She hangs as the white field-rose hangs short-lived;<br /> + And she and Earth are one<br /> + In withering unrevived.<br /> +Rain! O the glad refresher of the grain!<br /> +And welcome waterspouts, had we sweet rain!</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Ah, what is Marriage, says each pouting +maid,<br /> +When she who wedded with the soldier hides<br /> +At home as good as widowed in the shade,<br /> +A lighthouse to the girls that would be brides:<br /> +Nor dares to give a lad an ogle, nor<br /> +To dream of dancing, but must hang and moan,<br /> + Her husband in the war,<br /> + And she to lie alone.<br /> +Rain! O the glad refresher of the grain!<br /> +And welcome waterspouts, had we sweet rain!</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">They have not known; they are not in the +stream;<br /> +Light as the flying seed-ball is their play,<br /> +<a name="page232"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 232</span>The +silly maids! and happy souls they seem;<br /> +Yet Grief would not change fates with such as they.<br /> +They have not struck the roots which meet the fires<br /> +Beneath, and bind us fast with Earth, to know<br /> + The strength of her desires,<br /> + The sternness of her woe.<br /> +Rain! O the glad refresher of the grain!<br /> +And welcome waterspouts, had we sweet rain!</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Now, shepherd, see thy word, where without +shower<br /> +A borderless low blotting Westward spreads.<br /> +The hall-clock holds the valley on the hour;<br /> +Across an inner chamber thunder treads:<br /> +The dead leaf trips, the tree-top swings, the floor<br /> +Of dust whirls, dropping lumped: near thunder speaks,<br /> + And drives the dames to door,<br +/> + Their kerchiefs flapped at +cheeks.<br /> +Rain! O the glad refresher of the grain!<br /> +And welcome waterspouts of blessed rain!</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Through night, with bedroom window wide for +air,<br /> +Lay Susan tranced to hear all heaven descend:<br /> +And gurgling voices came of Earth, and rare,<br /> +Past flowerful, breathings, deeper than life’s end,<br /> +From her heaved breast of sacred common mould;<br /> +Whereby this lone-laid wife was moved to feel<br /> + Unworded things and old<br /> + To her pained heart appeal.<br /> +Rain! O the glad refresher of the grain!<br /> +And down in deluges of blessed rain!</p> +<h4><a name="page233"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +233</span>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">At morn she stood to live for ear and sight,<br +/> +Love sky or cloud, or rose or grasses drenched.<br /> +A lureful devil, that in glow-worm light<br /> +Set languor writhing all its folds, she quenched.<br /> +But she would muse when neighbours praised her face,<br /> +Her services, and staunchness to her mate:<br /> + Knowing by some dim trace,<br /> + The change might bear a date.<br +/> +Rain! O the glad refresher of the grain!<br /> +Thrice beauteous is our sunshine after rain!</p> +<h3><a name="page234"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +234</span>MOTHER TO BABE</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Fleck</span> of sky you +are,<br /> +Dropped through branches dark,<br /> + O my little one, mine!<br /> +Promise of the star,<br /> +Outpour of the lark;<br /> + Beam and song divine.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">See this precious gift,<br /> +Steeping in new birth<br /> + All my being, for sign<br /> +Earth to heaven can lift,<br /> +Heaven descend on earth,<br /> + Both in one be mine!</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Life in light you glass<br /> +When you peep and coo,<br /> + You, my little one, mine!<br /> +Brooklet chirps to grass,<br /> +Daisy looks in dew<br /> + Up to dear sunshine.</p> +<h3><a name="page235"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +235</span>WOODLAND PEACE</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Sweet</span> as Eden is the +air,<br /> + And Eden-sweet the ray.<br /> +No Paradise is lost for them<br /> +Who foot by branching root and stem,<br /> +And lightly with the woodland share<br /> + The change of night and day.</p> +<p class="poetry">Here all say,<br /> +We serve her, even as I:<br /> +We brood, we strive to sky,<br /> +We gaze upon decay,<br /> +We wot of life through death,<br /> +How each feeds each we spy;<br /> +And is a tangle round,<br /> +Are patient; what is dumb<br /> +We question not, nor ask<br /> +The silent to give sound,<br /> +The hidden to unmask,<br /> +The distant to draw near.</p> +<p class="poetry">And this the woodland saith:<br /> +I know not hope or fear;<br /> +I take whate’er may come;<br /> +I raise my head to aspects fair,<br /> +From foul I turn away.</p> +<p class="poetry">Sweet as Eden is the air,<br /> + And Eden-sweet the ray.</p> +<h3><a name="page236"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 236</span>THE +QUESTION WHITHER</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">When</span> we have thrown +off this old suit,<br /> + So much in need of mending,<br /> +To sink among the naked mute,<br /> + Is that, think you, our ending?<br /> +We follow many, more we lead,<br /> + And you who sadly turf us,<br /> +Believe not that all living seed<br /> + Must flower above the surface.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Sensation is a gracious gift,<br /> + But were it cramped to station,<br /> +The prayer to have it cast adrift<br /> + Would spout from all sensation.<br /> +Enough if we have winked to sun,<br /> + Have sped the plough a season;<br /> +There is a soul for labour done,<br /> + Endureth fixed as reason.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Then let our trust be firm in Good,<br /> + Though we be of the fasting;<br /> +Our questions are a mortal brood,<br /> + Our work is everlasting.<br /> +We children of Beneficence<br /> + Are in its being sharers;<br /> +And Whither vainer sounds than Whence,<br /> + For word with such wayfarers.</p> +<h3><a name="page237"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +237</span>OUTER AND INNER</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">From</span> twig to twig +the spider weaves<br /> + At noon his webbing fine.<br /> +So near to mute the zephyrs flute<br /> + That only leaflets dance.<br /> +The sun draws out of hazel leaves<br /> + A smell of woodland wine.<br /> +I wake a swarm to sudden storm<br /> + At any step’s advance.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Along my path is bugloss blue,<br /> + The star with fruit in moss;<br /> +The foxgloves drop from throat to top<br /> + A daily lesser bell.<br /> +The blackest shadow, nurse of dew,<br /> + Has orange skeins across;<br /> +And keenly red is one thin thread<br /> + That flashing seems to swell.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">My world I note ere fancy comes,<br /> + Minutest hushed observe:<br /> +What busy bits of motioned wits<br /> + Through antlered mosswork strive.<br /> +But now so low the stillness hums,<br /> + My springs of seeing swerve,<br /> +For half a wink to thrill and think<br /> + The woods with nymphs alive.</p> +<h4><a name="page238"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +238</span>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">I neighbour the invisible<br /> + So close that my consent<br /> +Is only asked for spirits masked<br /> + To leap from trees and flowers.<br /> +And this because with them I dwell<br /> + In thought, while calmly bent<br /> +To read the lines dear Earth designs<br /> + Shall speak her life on ours.</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Accept, she says; it is not hard<br /> + In woods; but she in towns<br /> +Repeats, accept; and have we wept,<br /> + And have we quailed with fears,<br /> +Or shrunk with horrors, sure reward<br /> + We have whom knowledge crowns;<br /> +Who see in mould the rose unfold,<br /> + The soul through blood and tears.</p> +<h3><a name="page239"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +239</span>NATURE AND LIFE</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Leave</span> the uproar: at +a leap<br /> +Thou shalt strike a woodland path,<br /> +Enter silence, not of sleep,<br /> +Under shadows, not of wrath;<br /> +Breath which is the spirit’s bath<br /> +In the old Beginnings find,<br /> +And endow them with a mind,<br /> +Seed for seedling, swathe for swathe.<br /> +That gives Nature to us, this<br /> +Give we her, and so we kiss.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Fruitful is it so: but hear<br /> +How within the shell thou art,<br /> +Music sounds; nor other near<br /> +Can to such a tremor start.<br /> +Of the waves our life is part;<br /> +They our running harvests bear:<br /> +Back to them for manful air,<br /> +Laden with the woodland’s heart!<br /> +That gives Battle to us, this<br /> +Give we it, and good the kiss.</p> +<h3><a name="page240"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +240</span>DIRGE IN WOODS</h3> +<p class="poetry">A wind sways the pines,<br /> + And below<br /> +Not a breath of wild air;<br /> +Still as the mosses that glow<br /> +On the flooring and over the lines<br /> +Of the roots here and there.<br /> +The pine-tree drops its dead;<br /> +They are quiet, as under the sea.<br /> +Overhead, overhead<br /> +Rushes life in a race,<br /> +As the clouds the clouds chase;<br /> + And we go,<br /> +And we drop like the fruits of the tree,<br /> + Even we,<br /> + Even so.</p> +<h3><a name="page241"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 241</span>A +FAITH ON TRIAL</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">On</span> the morning of +May,<br /> +Ere the children had entered my gate<br /> +With their wreaths and mechanical lay,<br /> +A metal ding-dong of the date!<br /> +I mounted our hill, bearing heart<br /> +That had little of life save its weight:<br /> +The crowned Shadow poising dart<br /> +Hung over her: she, my own,<br /> +My good companion, mate,<br /> +Pulse of me: she who had shown<br /> +Fortitude quiet as Earth’s<br /> +At the shedding of leaves. And around<br /> +The sky was in garlands of cloud,<br /> +Winning scents from unnumbered new births,<br /> +Pointed buds, where the woods were browned<br /> +By a mouldered beechen shroud;<br /> +Or over our meads of the vale,<br /> +Such an answer to sun as he,<br /> +Brave in his gold; to a sound,<br /> +None sweeter, of woods flapping sail,<br /> +With the first full flood of our year,<br /> +For their voyage on lustreful sea:<br /> +Unto what curtained haven in chief,<br /> +Will be writ in the book of the sere.<br /> +But surely the crew are we,<br /> +Eager or stamped or bowed;<br /> +Counted thinner at fall of the leaf.<br /> +Grief heard them, and passed like a bier.<br /> +Due Summerward, lo, they were set,<br /> +In volumes of foliage proud,<br /> +<a name="page242"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 242</span>On the +heave of their favouring tides,<br /> +And their song broadened out to the cheer<br /> +When a neck of the ramping surf<br /> +Rattles thunder a boat overrides.<br /> +All smiles ran the highways wet;<br /> +The worm drew its links from the turf;<br /> +The bird of felicity loud<br /> +Spun high, and a South wind blew.<br /> +Weak out of sheath downy leaves<br /> +Of the beech quivered lucid as dew,<br /> +Their radiance asking, who grieves;<br /> +For nought of a sorrow they knew:<br /> +No space to the dread wrestle vowed,<br /> +No chamber in shadow of night.<br /> +At times as the steadier breeze<br /> +Flutter-huddled their twigs to a crowd,<br /> +The beam of them wafted my sight<br /> +To league-long sun upon seas:<br /> +The golden path we had crossed<br /> +Many years, till her birthland swung<br /> +Recovered to vision from lost,<br /> +A light in her filial glance.<br /> +And sweet was her voice with the tongue,<br /> +The speechful tongue of her France,<br /> +Soon at ripple about us, like rills<br /> +Ever busy with little: away<br /> +Through her Normandy, down where the mills<br /> +Dot at lengths a rivercourse, grey<br /> +As its bordering poplars bent<br /> +To gusts off the plains above.<br /> +Old stone château and farms,<br /> +Home of her birth and her love!<br /> +On the thread of the pasture you trace,<br /> +By the river, their milk, for miles,<br /> +Spotted once with the English tent,<br /> +<a name="page243"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 243</span>In days +of the tocsin’s alarms,<br /> +To tower of the tallest of piles,<br /> +The country’s surveyor breast-high.<br /> +Home of her birth and her love!<br /> +Home of a diligent race;<br /> +Thrifty, deft-handed to ply<br /> +Shuttle or needle, and woo<br /> +Sun to the roots of the pear<br /> +Frogging each mud-walled cot.<br /> +The elders had known her in arms.<br /> +There plucked we the bluet, her hue<br /> +Of the deeper forget-me-not;<br /> +Well wedding her ripe-wheat hair.</p> +<p class="poetry">I saw, unsighting: her heart<br /> +I saw, and the home of her love<br /> +There printed, mournfully rent:<br /> +Her ebbing adieu, her adieu,<br /> +And the stride of the Shadow athwart.<br /> +For one of our Autumns there! . . .<br /> +Straight as the flight of a dove<br /> +We went, swift winging we went.<br /> +We trod solid ground, we breathed air,<br /> +The heavens were unbroken. Break they,<br /> +The word of the world is adieu:<br /> +Her word: and the torrents are round,<br /> +The jawed wolf-waters of prey.<br /> +We stand upon isles, who stand:<br /> +A Shadow before us, and back,<br /> +A phantom the habited land.<br /> +We may cry to the Sunderer, spare<br /> +That dearest! he loosens his pack.<br /> +Arrows we breathe, not air.<br /> +The memories tenderly bound<br /> +To us are a drifting crew,<br /> +<a name="page244"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 244</span>Amid +grey-gapped waters for ground.<br /> +Alone do we stand, each one,<br /> +Till rootless as they we strew<br /> +Those deeps of the corse-like stare<br /> +At a foreign and stony sun.</p> +<p class="poetry">Eyes had I but for the scene<br /> +Of my circle, what neighbourly grew.<br /> +If haply no finger lay out<br /> +To the figures of days that had been,<br /> +I gathered my herb, and endured;<br /> +My old cloak wrapped me about.<br /> +Unfooted was ground-ivy blue,<br /> +Whose rustic shrewd odour allured<br /> +In Spring’s fresh of morning: unseen<br /> +Her favourite wood-sorrel bell<br /> +As yet, though the leaves’ green floor<br /> +Awaited their flower, that would tell<br /> +Of a red-veined moist yestreen,<br /> +With its droop and the hues it wore,<br /> +When we two stood overnight<br /> +One, in the dark van-glow<br /> +On our hill-top, seeing beneath<br /> +Our household’s twinkle of light<br /> +Through spruce-boughs, gem of a wreath.</p> +<p class="poetry">Budding, the service-tree, white<br /> +Almost as whitebeam, threw,<br /> +From the under of leaf upright,<br /> +Flecks like a showering snow<br /> +On the flame-shaped junipers green,<br /> +On the sombre mounds of the yew.<br /> +Like silvery tapers bright<br /> +By a solemn cathedral screen,<br /> +They glistened to closer view.<br /> +<a name="page245"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 245</span>Turf for +a rooks’ revel striped<br /> +Pleased those devourers astute.<br /> +Chorister blackbird and thrush<br /> +Together or alternate piped;<br /> +A free-hearted harmony large,<br /> +With meaning for man, for brute,<br /> +When the primitive forces are brimmed.<br /> +Like featherings hither and yon<br /> +Of aëry tree-twigs over marge,<br /> +To the comb of the winds, untrimmed,<br /> +Their measure is found in the vast.<br /> +Grief heard them, and stepped her way on.<br /> +She has but a narrow embrace.<br /> +Distrustful of hearing she passed.<br /> +They piped her young Earth’s Bacchic rout;<br /> +The race, and the prize of the race;<br /> +Earth’s lustihead pressing to sprout.</p> +<p class="poetry">But sight holds a soberer space.<br /> +Colourless dogwood low<br /> +Curled up a twisted root,<br /> +Nigh yellow-green mosses, to flush<br /> +Redder than sun upon rocks,<br /> +When the creeper clematis-shoot<br /> +Shall climb, cap his branches, and show,<br /> +Beside veteran green of the box,<br /> +At close of the year’s maple blush,<br /> +A bleeding greybeard is he,<br /> +Now hale in the leafage lush.<br /> +Our parasites paint us. Hard by,<br /> +A wet yew-trunk flashed the peel<br /> +Of our naked forefathers in fight;<br /> +With stains of the fray sweating free;<br /> +And him came no parasite nigh:<br /> +Firm on the hard knotted knee,<br /> +<a name="page246"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 246</span>He stood +in the crown of his dun;<br /> +Earth’s toughest to stay her wheel:<br /> +Under whom the full day is night;<br /> +Whom the century-tempests call son,<br /> +Having striven to rend him in vain.</p> +<p class="poetry">I walked to observe, not to feel,<br /> +Not to fancy, if simple of eye<br /> +One may be among images reaped<br /> +For a shift of the glance, as grain:<br /> +Profitless froth you espy<br /> +Ashore after billows have leaped.<br /> +I fled nothing, nothing pursued:<br /> +The changeful visible face<br /> +Of our Mother I sought for my food;<br /> +Crumbs by the way to sustain.<br /> +Her sentence I knew past grace.<br /> +Myself I had lost of us twain,<br /> +Once bound in mirroring thought.<br /> +She had flung me to dust in her wake;<br /> +And I, as your convict drags<br /> +His chain, by the scourge untaught,<br /> +Bore life for a goad, without aim.<br /> +I champed the sensations that make<br /> +Of a ruffled philosophy rags.<br /> +For them was no meaning too blunt,<br /> +Nor aspect too cutting of steel.<br /> +This Earth of the beautiful breasts,<br /> +Shining up in all colours aflame,<br /> +To them had visage of hags:<br /> +A Mother of aches and jests:<br /> +Soulless, heading a hunt<br /> +Aimless except for the meal.<br /> +Hope, with the star on her front;<br /> +Fear, with an eye in the heel;<br /> +<a name="page247"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 247</span>Our +links to a Mother of grace;<br /> +They were dead on the nerve, and dead<br /> +For the nature divided in three;<br /> +Gone out of heart, out of brain,<br /> +Out of soul: I had in their place<br /> +The calm of an empty room.<br /> +We were joined but by that thin thread,<br /> +My disciplined habit to see.<br /> +And those conjure images, those,<br /> +The puppets of loss or gain;<br /> +Not he who is bare to his doom;<br /> +For whom never semblance plays<br /> +To bewitch, overcloud, illume.<br /> +The dusty mote-images rose;<br /> +Sheer film of the surface awag:<br /> +They sank as they rose; their pain<br /> +Declaring them mine of old days.</p> +<p class="poetry">Now gazed I where, sole upon gloom,<br /> +As flower-bush in sun-specked crag,<br /> +Up the spine of the double combe<br /> +With yew-boughs heavily cloaked,<br /> +A young apparition shone:<br /> +Known, yet wonderful, white<br /> +Surpassingly; doubtfully known,<br /> +For it struck as the birth of Light:<br /> +Even Day from the dark unyoked.<br /> +It waved like a pilgrim flag<br /> +O’er processional penitents flown<br /> +When of old they broke rounding yon spine:<br /> +O the pure wild-cherry in bloom!</p> +<p class="poetry">For their Eastward march to the shrine<br /> +Of the footsore far-eyed Faith,<br /> +Was banner so brave, so fair,<br /> +So quick with celestial sign<br /> +<a name="page248"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 248</span>Of +victorious rays over death?<br /> +For a conquest of coward despair;—<br /> +Division of soul from wits,<br /> +And these made rulers;—full sure,<br /> +More starlike never did shine<br /> +To illumine the sinister field<br /> +Where our life’s old night-bird flits.<br /> +I knew it: with her, my own,<br /> +Had hailed it pure of the pure;<br /> +Our beacon yearly: but strange<br /> +When it strikes to within is the known;<br /> +Richer than newness revealed.<br /> +There was needed darkness like mine.<br /> +Its beauty to vividness blown<br /> +Drew the life in me forward, chased,<br /> +From aloft on a pinnacle’s range,<br /> +That hindward spidery line,<br /> +The length of the ways I had paced,<br /> +A footfarer out of the dawn,<br /> +To Youth’s wild forest, where sprang,<br /> +For the morning of May long gone,<br /> +The forest’s white virgin; she<br /> +Seen yonder; and sheltered me, sang;<br /> +She in me, I in her; what songs<br /> +The fawn-eared wood-hollows revive<br /> +To pour forth their tune-footed throngs;<br /> +Inspire to the dreaming of good<br /> +Illimitable to come:<br /> +She, the white wild cherry, a tree,<br /> +Earth-rooted, tangibly wood,<br /> +Yet a presence throbbing alive;<br /> +Nor she in our language dumb:<br /> +A spirit born of a tree;<br /> +Because earth-rooted alive:<br /> +Huntress of things worth pursuit<br /> +<a name="page249"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 249</span>Of +souls; in our naming, dreams.<br /> +And each unto other was lute,<br /> +By fits quick as breezy gleams.<br /> +My quiver of aims and desires<br /> +Had colour that she would have owned;<br /> +And if by humaner fires<br /> +Hued later, these held her enthroned:<br /> +My crescent of Earth; my blood<br /> +At the silvery early stir;<br /> +Hour of the thrill of the bud<br /> +About to burst, and by her<br /> +Directed, attuned, englobed:<br /> +My Goddess, the chaste, not chill;<br /> +Choir over choir white-robed;<br /> +White-bosomed fold within fold:<br /> +For so could I dream, breast-bare,<br /> +In my time of blooming; dream still<br /> +Through the maze, the mesh, and the wreck,<br /> +Despite, since manhood was bold,<br /> +The yoke of the flesh on my neck.<br /> +She beckoned, I gazed, unaware<br /> +How a shaft of the blossoming tree<br /> +Was shot from the yew-wood’s core.<br /> +I stood to the touch of a key<br /> +Turned in a fast-shut door.</p> +<p class="poetry">They rounded my garden, content,<br /> +The small fry, clutching their fee,<br /> +Their fruit of the wreath and the pole;<br /> +And, chatter, hop, skip, they were sent,<br /> +In a buzz of young company glee,<br /> +Their natural music, swift shoal<br /> +To the next easy shedders of pence.<br /> +Why not? for they had me in tune<br /> +With the hungers of my kind.<br /> +<a name="page250"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 250</span>Do +readings of earth draw thence,<br /> +Then a concord deeper than cries<br /> +Of the Whither whose echo is Whence,<br /> +To jar unanswered, shall rise<br /> +As a fountain-jet in the mind<br /> +Bowed dark o’er the falling and strewn.</p> +<p style="text-align: center">* * *</p> +<p class="poetry">Unwitting where it might lead,<br /> +How it came, for the anguish to cease,<br /> +And the Questions that sow not nor spin,<br /> +This wisdom, rough-written, and black,<br /> +As of veins that from venom bleed,<br /> +I had with the peace within;<br /> +Or patience, mortal of peace,<br /> +Compressing the surgent strife<br /> +In a heart laid open, not mailed,<br /> +To the last blank hour of the rack,<br /> +When struck the dividing knife:<br /> +When the hand that never had failed<br /> +In its pressure to mine hung slack.</p> +<p class="poetry">But this in myself did I know,<br /> +Not needing a studious brow,<br /> +Or trust in a governing star,<br /> +While my ears held the jangled shout<br /> +The children were lifting afar:<br /> +That natures at interflow<br /> +With all of their past and the now,<br /> +Are chords to the Nature without,<br /> +Orbs to the greater whole:<br /> +First then, nor utterly then<br /> +Till our lord of sensations at war,<br /> +The rebel, the heart, yields place<br /> +To brain, each prompting the soul.<br /> +<a name="page251"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 251</span>Thus our +dear Earth we embrace<br /> +For the milk, her strength to men.</p> +<p class="poetry">And crave we her medical herb,<br /> +We have but to see and hear,<br /> +Though pierced by the cruel acerb,<br /> +The troops of the memories armed<br /> +Hostile to strike at the nest<br /> +That nourished and flew them warmed.<br /> +Not she gives the tear for the tear.<br /> +Weep, bleed, rave, writhe, be distraught,<br /> +She is moveless. Not of her breast<br /> +Are the symbols we conjure when Fear<br /> +Takes leaven of Hope. I caught,<br /> +With Death in me shrinking from Death,<br /> +As cold from cold, for a sign<br /> +Of the life beyond ashes: I cast,<br /> +Believing the vision divine,<br /> +Wings of that dream of my Youth<br /> +To the spirit beloved: ’twas unglassed<br /> +On her breast, in her depths austere:<br /> +A flash through the mist, mere breath,<br /> +Breath on a buckler of steel.<br /> +For the flesh in revolt at her laws,<br /> +Neither song nor smile in ruth,<br /> +Nor promise of things to reveal,<br /> +Has she, nor a word she saith:<br /> +We are asking her wheels to pause.<br /> +Well knows she the cry of unfaith.<br /> +If we strain to the farther shore,<br /> +We are catching at comfort near.<br /> +Assurances, symbols, saws,<br /> +Revelations in legends, light<br /> +To eyes rolling darkness, these<br /> +Desired of the flesh in affright,<br /> +<a name="page252"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 252</span>For the +which it will swear to adore,<br /> +She yields not for prayers at her knees;<br /> +The woolly beast bleating will shear.<br /> +These are our sensual dreams;<br /> +Of the yearning to touch, to feel<br /> +The dark Impalpable sure,<br /> +And have the Unveiled appear;<br /> +Whereon ever black she beams,<br /> +Doth of her terrible deal,<br /> +She who dotes over ripeness at play,<br /> +Rosiness fondles and feeds,<br /> +Guides it with shepherding crook,<br /> +To her sports and her pastures alway.<br /> +Not she gives the tear for the tear:<br /> +Harsh wisdom gives Earth, no more;<br /> +In one the spur and the curb:<br /> +An answer to thoughts or deeds;<br /> +To the Legends an alien look;<br /> +To the Questions a figure of clay.<br /> +Yet we have but to see and hear,<br /> +Crave we her medical herb.<br /> +For the road to her soul is the Real:<br /> +The root of the growth of man:<br /> +And the senses must traverse it fresh<br /> +With a love that no scourge shall abate,<br /> +To reach the lone heights where we scan<br /> +In the mind’s rarer vision this flesh;<br /> +In the charge of the Mother our fate;<br /> +Her law as the one common weal.</p> +<p class="poetry">We, whom the view benumbs,<br /> +We, quivering upward, each hour<br /> +Know battle in air and in ground<br /> +For the breath that goes as it comes,<br /> +For the choice between sweet and sour,<br /> +<a name="page253"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 253</span>For the +smallest grain of our worth:<br /> +And he who the reckoning sums<br /> +Finds nought in his hand save Earth.<br /> +Of Earth are we stripped or crowned.<br /> +The fleeting Present we crave,<br /> +Barter our best to wed,<br /> +In hope of a cushioned bower,<br /> +What is it but Future and Past<br /> +Like wind and tide at a wave!<br /> +Idea of the senses, bred<br /> +For the senses to snap and devour:<br /> +Thin as the shell of a sound<br /> +In delivery, withered in light.<br /> +Cry we for permanence fast,<br /> +Permanence hangs by the grave;<br /> +Sits on the grave green-grassed,<br /> +On the roll of the heaved grave-mound.<br /> +By Death, as by Life, are we fed:<br /> +The two are one spring; our bond<br /> +With the numbers; with whom to unite<br /> +Here feathers wings for beyond:<br /> +Only they can waft us in flight.<br /> +For they are Reality’s flower.<br /> +Of them, and the contact with them,<br /> +Issues Earth’s dearest daughter, the firm<br /> +In footing, the stately of stem;<br /> +Unshaken though elements lour;<br /> +A warrior heart unquelled;<br /> +Mirror of Earth, and guide<br /> +To the Holies from sense withheld:<br /> +Reason, man’s germinant fruit.<br /> +She wrestles with our old worm<br /> +Self in the narrow and wide:<br /> +Relentless quencher of lies,<br /> +With laughter she pierces the brute;<br /> +<a name="page254"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 254</span>And hear +we her laughter peal,<br /> +’Tis Light in us dancing to scour<br /> +The loathed recess of his dens;<br /> +Scatter his monstrous bed,<br /> +And hound him to harrow and plough.<br /> +She is the world’s one prize;<br /> +Our champion, rightfully head;<br /> +The vessel whose piloted prow,<br /> +Though Folly froth round, hiss and hoot,<br /> +Leaves legible print at the keel.<br /> +Nor least is the service she does,<br /> +That service to her may cleanse<br /> +The well of the Sorrows in us;<br /> +For a common delight will drain<br /> +The rank individual fens<br /> +Of a wound refusing to heal<br /> +While the old worm slavers its root.</p> +<p class="poetry">I bowed as a leaf in rain;<br /> +As a tree when the leaf is shed<br /> +To winds in the season at wane:<br /> +And when from my soul I said,<br /> +May the worm be trampled: smite,<br /> +Sacred Reality! power<br /> +Filled me to front it aright.<br /> +I had come of my faith’s ordeal.</p> +<p class="poetry">It is not to stand on a tower<br /> +And see the flat universe reel;<br /> +Our mortal sublimities drop<br /> +Like raiment by glisterlings worn,<br /> +At a sweep of the scythe for the crop.<br /> +Wisdom is won of its fight,<br /> +The combat incessant; and dries<br /> +To mummywrap perching a height.<br /> +<a name="page255"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 255</span>It chews +the contemplative cud<br /> +In peril of isolate scorn,<br /> +Unfed of the onward flood.<br /> +Nor view we a different morn<br /> +If we gaze with the deeper sight,<br /> +With the deeper thought forewise:<br /> +The world is the same, seen through;<br /> +The features of men are the same.<br /> +But let their historian new<br /> +In the language of nakedness write,<br /> +Rejoice we to know not shame,<br /> +Not a dread, not a doubt: to have done<br /> +With the tortures of thought in the throes,<br /> +Our animal tangle, and grasp<br /> +Very sap of the vital in this:<br /> +That from flesh unto spirit man grows<br /> +Even here on the sod under sun:<br /> +That she of the wanton’s kiss,<br /> +Broken through with the bite of an asp,<br /> +Is Mother of simple truth,<br /> +Relentless quencher of lies;<br /> +Eternal in thought; discerned<br /> +In thought mid-ferry between<br /> +The Life and the Death, which are one,<br /> +As our breath in and out, joy or teen.<br /> +She gives the rich vision to youth,<br /> +If we will, of her prompting wise;<br /> +Or men by the lash made lean,<br /> +Who in harness the mind subserve,<br /> +Their title to read her have earned;<br /> +Having mastered sensation—insane<br /> +At a stroke of the terrified nerve;<br /> +And out of the sensual hive<br /> +Grown to the flower of brain;<br /> +To know her a thing alive,<br /> +<a name="page256"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 256</span>Whose +aspects mutably swerve,<br /> +Whose laws immutably reign.<br /> +Our sentencer, clother in mist,<br /> +Her morn bends breast to her noon,<br /> +Noon to the hour dark-dyed,<br /> +If we will, of her promptings wise:<br /> +Her light is our own if we list.<br /> +The legends that sweep her aside,<br /> +Crying loud for an opiate boon,<br /> +To comfort the human want,<br /> +From the bosom of magical skies,<br /> +She smiles on, marking their source:<br /> +They read her with infant eyes.<br /> +Good ships of morality they,<br /> +For our crude developing force;<br /> +Granite the thought to stay,<br /> +That she is a thing alive<br /> +To the living, the falling and strewn.<br /> +But the Questions, the broods that haunt<br /> +Sensation insurgent, may drive,<br /> +The way of the channelling mole,<br /> +Head in a ground-vault gaunt<br /> +As your telescope’s skeleton moon.<br /> +Barren comfort to these will she dole;<br /> +Dead is her face to their cries.<br /> +Intelligence pushing to taste<br /> +A lesson from beasts might heed.<br /> +They scatter a voice in the waste,<br /> +Where any dry swish of a reed<br /> +By grey-glassy water replies.</p> +<p class="poetry">‘They see not above or below;<br /> +Farthest are they from my soul,’<br /> +Earth whispers: ‘they scarce have the thirst,<br /> +Except to unriddle a rune;<br /> +<a name="page257"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 257</span>And I +spin none; only show,<br /> +Would humanity soar from its worst,<br /> +Winged above darkness and dole,<br /> +How flesh unto spirit must grow.<br /> +Spirit raves not for a goal.<br /> +Shapes in man’s likeness hewn<br /> +Desires not; neither desires<br /> +The sleep or the glory: it trusts;<br /> +Uses my gifts, yet aspires;<br /> +Dreams of a higher than it.<br /> +The dream is an atmosphere;<br /> +A scale still ascending to knit<br /> +The clear to the loftier Clear.<br /> +’Tis Reason herself, tiptoe<br /> +At the ultimate bound of her wit,<br /> +On the verges of Night and Day.<br /> +But is it a dream of the lusts,<br /> +To my dustiest ’tis decreed;<br /> +And them that so shuffle astray<br /> +I touch with no key of gold<br /> +For the wealth of the secret nook;<br /> +Though I dote over ripeness at play,<br /> +Rosiness fondle and feed,<br /> +Guide it with shepherding crook<br /> +To my sports and my pastures alway.<br /> +The key will shriek in the lock,<br /> +The door will rustily hinge,<br /> +Will open on features of mould,<br /> +To vanish corrupt at a glimpse,<br /> +And mock as the wild echoes mock,<br /> +Soulless in mimic, doth Greed<br /> +Or the passion for fruitage tinge<br /> +That dream, for your parricide imps<br /> +To wing through the body of Time,<br /> +Yourselves in slaying him slay.<br /> +<a name="page258"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 258</span>Much are +you shots of your prime,<br /> +You men of the act and the dream:<br /> +And please you to fatten a weed<br /> +That perishes, pledged to decay,<br /> +’Tis dearth in your season of need,<br /> +Down the slopes of the shoreward way;—<br /> +Nigh on the misty stream,<br /> +Where Ferryman under his hood,<br /> +With a call to be ready to pay<br /> +The small coin, whitens red blood.<br /> +But the young ethereal seed<br /> +Shall bring you the bread no buyer<br /> +Can have for his craving supreme;<br /> +To my quenchless quick shall speed<br /> +The soul at her wrestle rude<br /> +With devil, with angel more dire;<br /> +With the flesh, with the Fates, enringed.<br /> +The dream of the blossom of Good<br /> +Is your banner of battle unrolled<br /> +In its waver and current and curve<br /> +(Choir over choir white-winged,<br /> +White-bosomed fold within fold):<br /> +Hopeful of victory most<br /> +When hard is the task to sustain<br /> +Assaults of the fearful sense<br /> +At a mind in desolate mood<br /> +With the Whither, whose echo is Whence;<br /> +And humanity’s clamour, lost, lost;<br /> +And its clasp of the staves that snap;<br /> +And evil abroad, as a main<br /> +Uproarious, bursting its dyke.<br /> +For back do you look, and lo,<br /> +Forward the harvest of grain!—<br /> +Numbers in council, awake<br /> +To love more than things of my lap,<br /> +<a name="page259"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 259</span>Love me; +and to let the types break,<br /> +Men be grass, rocks rivers, all flow;<br /> +All save the dream sink alike<br /> +To the source of my vital in sap:<br /> +Their battle, their loss, their ache,<br /> +For my pledge of vitality know.<br /> +The dream is the thought in the ghost;<br /> +The thought sent flying for food;<br /> +Eyeless, but sprung of an aim<br /> +Supernal of Reason, to find<br /> +The great Over-Reason we name<br /> +Beneficence: mind seeking Mind.<br /> +Dream of the blossom of Good,<br /> +In its waver and current and curve,<br /> +With the hopes of my offspring enscrolled!<br /> +Soon to be seen of a host<br /> +The flag of the Master I serve!<br /> +And life in them doubled on Life,<br /> +As flame upon flame, to behold,<br /> +High over Time-tumbled sea,<br /> +The bliss of his headship of strife,<br /> +Him through handmaiden me.’</p> +<h3><a name="page260"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +260</span>CHANGE IN RECURRENCE</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry">I <span class="smcap">stood</span> at the gate +of the cot<br /> +Where my darling, with side-glance demure,<br /> +Would spy, on her trim garden-plot,<br /> +The busy wild things chase and lure.<br /> +For these with their ways were her feast;<br /> +They had surety no enemy lurked.<br /> +Their deftest of tricks to their least<br /> +She gathered in watch as she worked.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">When berries were red on her ash,<br /> +The blackbird would rifle them rough,<br /> +Till the ground underneath looked a gash,<br /> +And her rogue grew the round of a chough.<br /> +The squirrel cocked ear o’er his hoop,<br /> +Up the spruce, quick as eye, trailing brush.<br /> +She knew any tit of the troop<br /> +All as well as the snail-tapping thrush.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">I gazed: ’twas the scene of the frame,<br +/> +With the face, the dear life for me, fled.<br /> +No window a lute to my name,<br /> +No watcher there plying the thread.<br /> +But the blackbird hung peeking at will;<br /> +The squirrel from cone hopped to cone;<br /> +The thrush had a snail in his bill,<br /> +And tap-tapped the shell hard on a stone.</p> +<h3><a name="page261"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 261</span>HYMN +TO COLOUR</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">With</span> Life and Death +I walked when Love appeared,<br /> +And made them on each side a shadow seem.<br /> +Through wooded vales the land of dawn we neared,<br /> +Where down smooth rapids whirls the helmless dream<br /> +To fall on daylight; and night puts away<br /> + Her darker veil +for grey.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">In that grey veil green grassblades brushed we +by;<br /> +We came where woods breathed sharp, and overhead<br /> +Rocks raised clear horns on a transforming sky:<br /> +Around, save for those shapes, with him who led<br /> +And linked them, desert varied by no sign<br /> + Of other life +than mine.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">By this the dark-winged planet, raying wide,<br +/> +From the mild pearl-glow to the rose upborne,<br /> +Drew in his fires, less faint than far descried,<br /> +Pure-fronted on a stronger wave of morn:<br /> +And those two shapes the splendour interweaved,<br /> + Hung web-like, +sank and heaved.</p> +<h4><a name="page262"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +262</span>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Love took my hand when hidden stood the sun<br +/> +To fling his robe on shoulder-heights of snow.<br /> +Then said: There lie they, Life and Death in one.<br /> +Whichever is, the other is: but know,<br /> +It is thy craving self that thou dost see,<br /> + Not in them +seeing me.</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Shall man into the mystery of breath,<br /> +From his quick beating pulse a pathway spy?<br /> +Or learn the secret of the shrouded death,<br /> +By lifting up the lid of a white eye?<br /> +Cleave thou thy way with fathering desire<br /> + Of fire to reach +to fire.</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Look now where Colour, the soul’s +bridegroom, makes<br /> +The house of heaven splendid for the bride.<br /> +To him as leaps a fountain she awakes,<br /> +In knotting arms, yet boundless: him beside,<br /> +She holds the flower to heaven, and by his power<br /> + Brings heaven to +the flower.</p> +<h4>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">He gives her homeliness in desert air,<br /> +And sovereignty in spaciousness; he leads<br /> +Through widening chambers of surprise to where<br /> +Throbs rapture near an end that aye recedes,<br /> +Because his touch is infinite and lends<br /> + A yonder to all +ends.</p> +<h4><a name="page263"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +263</span>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Death begs of Life his blush; Life Death +persuades<br /> +To keep long day with his caresses graced.<br /> +He is the heart of light, the wing of shades,<br /> +The crown of beauty: never soul embraced<br /> +Of him can harbour unfaith; soul of him<br /> + Possessed walks +never dim.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Love eyed his rosy memories: he sang:<br /> +O bloom of dawn, breathed up from the gold sheaf<br /> +Held springing beneath Orient! that dost hang<br /> +The space of dewdrops running over leaf;<br /> +Thy fleetingness is bigger in the ghost<br /> + Than Time with +all his host!</p> +<h4>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">Of thee to say behold, has said adieu:<br /> +But love remembers how the sky was green,<br /> +And how the grasses glimmered lightest blue;<br /> +How saint-like grey took fervour: how the screen<br /> +Of cloud grew violet; how thy moment came<br /> + Between a blush +and flame.</p> +<h4>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Love saw the emissary eglantine<br /> +Break wave round thy white feet above the gloom;<br /> +Lay finger on thy star; thy raiment line<br /> +With cherub wing and limb; wed thy soft bloom,<br /> +Gold-quivering like sunrays in thistle-down,<br /> + Earth under +rolling brown.</p> +<h4><a name="page264"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +264</span>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">They do not look through love to look on +thee,<br /> +Grave heavenliness! nor know they joy of sight,<br /> +Who deem the wave of rapt desire must be<br /> +Its wrecking and last issue of delight.<br /> +Dead seasons quicken in one petal-spot<br /> + Of colour +unforgot.</p> +<h4>XIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">This way have men come out of brutishness<br /> +To spell the letters of the sky and read<br /> +A reflex upon earth else meaningless.<br /> +With thee, O fount of the Untimed! to lead,<br /> +Drink they of thee, thee eyeing, they unaged<br /> + Shall on through +brave wars waged.</p> +<h4>XIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">More gardens will they win than any lost;<br /> +The vile plucked out of them, the unlovely slain.<br /> +Not forfeiting the beast with which they are crossed,<br /> +To stature of the Gods will they attain.<br /> +They shall uplift their Earth to meet her Lord,<br /> + Themselves the +attuning chord!</p> +<h4>XV</h4> +<p class="poetry">The song had ceased; my vision with the +song.<br /> +Then of those Shadows, which one made descent<br /> +Beside me I knew not: but Life ere long<br /> +Came on me in the public ways and bent<br /> +Eyes deeper than of old: Death met I too,<br /> + And saw the dawn +glow through.</p> +<h3><a name="page265"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +265</span>MEDITATION UNDER STARS</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">What</span> links are ours +with orbs that are<br /> + So resolutely far:<br /> +The solitary asks, and they<br /> +Give radiance as from a shield:<br /> + Still at the death of day,<br /> + The seen, the unrevealed.<br /> + Implacable they shine<br /> +To us who would of Life obtain<br /> +An answer for the life we strain<br /> + To nourish with one sign.<br /> +Nor can imagination throw<br /> +The penetrative shaft: we pass<br /> +The breath of thought, who would divine<br /> + If haply they may grow<br /> +As Earth; have our desire to know;<br /> +If life comes there to grain from grass,<br /> +And flowers like ours of toil and pain;<br /> + Has passion to beat bar,<br /> + Win space from cleaving brain;<br /> + The mystic link attain,<br /> + Whereby star holds on star.</p> +<p class="poetry">Those visible immortals beam<br /> + Allurement to the dream:<br /> +Ireful at human hungers brook<br /> + No question in the look.<br /> +For ever virgin to our sense,<br /> +Remote they wane to gaze intense:<br /> +<a name="page266"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 266</span>Prolong +it, and in ruthlessness they smite<br /> +The beating heart behind the ball of sight:<br /> + Till we conceive their heavens hoar,<br /> + Those lights they raise but sparkles frore,<br /> +And Earth, our blood-warm Earth, a shuddering prey<br /> +To that frigidity of brainless ray.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Yet space is given for breath +of thought<br /> + Beyond our bounds when musing: more<br /> + When to that musing love is brought,<br /> + And love is asked of love’s wherefore.<br /> + ’Tis Earth’s, her gift; else have we +nought:<br /> + Her gift, her secret, here our tie.<br /> + And not with her and yonder sky?<br /> + Bethink you: were it Earth alone<br /> + Breeds love, would not her region be<br /> + The sole delight and throne<br /> + Of generous Deity?</p> +<p class="poetry"> To deeper than this ball of +sight<br /> +Appeal the lustrous people of the night.<br /> +Fronting yon shoreless, sown with fiery sails,<br /> + It is our ravenous that quails,<br /> +Flesh by its craven thirsts and fears distraught.<br /> + The spirit leaps +alight,<br /> + Doubts not in +them is he,<br /> +The binder of his sheaves, the sane, the right:<br /> +Of magnitude to magnitude is wrought,<br /> +To feel it large of the great life they hold:<br /> +In them to come, or vaster intervolved,<br /> +The issues known in us, our unsolved solved:<br /> +That there with toil Life climbs the self-same Tree,<br /> +Whose roots enrichment have from ripeness dropped.<br /> +So may we read and little find them cold:<br /> +Let it but be the lord of Mind to guide<br /> +<a name="page267"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 267</span>Our +eyes; no branch of Reason’s growing lopped;<br /> +Nor dreaming on a dream; but fortified<br /> +By day to penetrate black midnight; see,<br /> +Hear, feel, outside the senses; even that we,<br /> +The specks of dust upon a mound of mould,<br /> +We who reflect those rays, though low our place,<br /> + To them are lastingly allied.</p> +<p class="poetry">So may we read, and little find them cold:<br +/> +Not frosty lamps illumining dead space,<br /> +Not distant aliens, not senseless Powers.<br /> +The fire is in them whereof we are born;<br /> +The music of their motion may be ours.<br /> +Spirit shall deem them beckoning Earth and voiced<br /> +Sisterly to her, in her beams rejoiced.<br /> +Of love, the grand impulsion, we behold<br /> + The love that lends her grace<br /> + Among the starry fold.<br /> +Then at new flood of customary morn,<br /> + Look at her through her showers,<br /> + Her mists, her streaming gold,<br /> +A wonder edges the familiar face:<br /> +She wears no more that robe of printed hours;<br /> +Half strange seems Earth, and sweeter than her flowers.</p> +<h3><a name="page268"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +268</span>WOODMAN AND ECHO</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Close</span> Echo hears the +woodman’s axe,<br /> +To double on it, as in glee,<br /> +With clap of hands, and little lacks<br /> +Of meaning in her repartee.<br /> + For all shall fall,<br /> + As one has done,<br /> + The tree of me,<br /> + Of thee the tree;<br /> + And unto all<br /> + The fate we wait<br /> + Reveals the wheels<br /> + Whereon we run:<br /> + We tower to flower,<br /> + We spread the shade,<br /> + We drop for crop,<br /> + At length are laid;<br /> + Are rolled in mould,<br /> + From chop and lop:<br /> +And are we thick in woodland tracks,<br /> +Or tempting of our stature we,<br /> +The end is one, we do but wax<br /> +For service over land and sea.<br /> + So, strike! the like<br /> + Shall thus of us,<br /> +My brawny woodman, claim the tax.<br /> + Nor foe thy blow,<br /> + Though wood be good,<br /> +<a name="page269"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 269</span>And +shriekingly the timber cracks:<br /> + The ground we crowned<br /> + Shall speed the seed<br /> +Of younger into swelling sacks.</p> +<p class="poetry"> For use he hews,<br /> + To make awake<br /> +The spirit of what stuff we be:<br /> + Our earth of mirth<br /> + And tears he clears<br /> +For braver, let our minds agree;<br /> + And then will men<br /> + Within them win<br /> +An Echo clapping harmony.</p> +<h3><a name="page270"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 270</span>THE +WISDOM OF ELD</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">We</span> spend our lives +in learning pilotage,<br /> +And grow good steersmen when the vessel’s crank!<br /> +Gap-toothed he spake, and with a tottering shank<br /> +Sidled to gain the sunny bench of Age.<br /> +It is the sentence which completes that stage;<br /> +A testament of wisdom reading blank.<br /> +The seniors of the race, on their last plank,<br /> +Pass mumbling it as nature’s final page.<br /> +These, bent by such experience, are the band<br /> +Who captain young enthusiasts to maintain<br /> +What things we view, and Earth’s decree withstand,<br /> +Lest dreaded Change, long dammed by dull decay,<br /> +Should bring the world a vessel steered by brain,<br /> +And ancients musical at close of day.</p> +<h3>EARTH’S PREFERENCE</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Earth</span> loves her +young: a preference manifest:<br /> +She prompts them to her fruits and flower-beds;<br /> +Their beauty with her choicest interthreads,<br /> +And makes her revel of their merry zest;<br /> +As in our East much were it in our West,<br /> +If men had risen to do the work of heads.<br /> +Her gabbling grey she eyes askant, nor treads<br /> +The ways they walk; by what they speak oppressed.<br /> +How wrought they in their zenith? ’Tis not writ;<br +/> +Not all; yet she by one sure sign can read:<br /> +Have they but held her laws and nature dear,<br /> +They mouth no sentence of inverted wit.<br /> +More prizes she her beasts than this high breed<br /> +Wry in the shape she wastes her milk to rear.</p> +<h3><a name="page271"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +271</span>SOCIETY</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Historic</span> be the +survey of our kind,<br /> +And how their brave Society took shape.<br /> +Lion, wolf, vulture, fox, jackal and ape,<br /> +The strong of limb, the keen of nose, we find,<br /> +Who, with some jars in harmony, combined,<br /> +Their primal instincts taming, to escape<br /> +The brawl indecent, and hot passions drape.<br /> +Convenience pricked conscience, that the mind.<br /> +Thus entered they the field of milder beasts,<br /> +Which in some sort of civil order graze,<br /> +And do half-homage to the God of Laws.<br /> +But are they still for their old ravenous feasts,<br /> +Earth gives the edifice they build no base:<br /> +They spring another flood of fangs and claws.</p> +<h3>WINTER HEAVENS</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Sharp</span> is the night, +but stars with frost alive<br /> +Leap off the rim of earth across the dome.<br /> +It is a night to make the heavens our home<br /> +More than the nest whereto apace we strive.<br /> +Lengths down our road each fir-tree seems a hive,<br /> +In swarms outrushing from the golden comb.<br /> +They waken waves of thoughts that burst to foam:<br /> +The living throb in me, the dead revive.<br /> +Yon mantle clothes us: there, past mortal breath,<br /> +Life glistens on the river of the death.<br /> +It folds us, flesh and dust; and have we knelt,<br /> +Or never knelt, or eyed as kine the springs<br /> +Of radiance, the radiance enrings:<br /> +And this is the soul’s haven to have felt.</p> +<h2><a name="page272"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +272</span>NOTES</h2> +<h3>PHAETHON<br /> +<i>The Galliambic Measure</i></h3> +<p>Hermann (<i>Elementa Doctrinae Metricae</i>), after citing +lines from the Tragic poet Phrynichus and from the Comic, +observes:</p> +<p>Dixi supra, Phrynichorum versus videri puros Ionicos +esse. Id si verum est, Galliambi non alia re ab his +differunt, quam quod anaclasin, contractionesque et solutiones +recipiunt. Itaque versus Galliambicus ex duobus versibus +Anacreonteis constat, quorum secundus catalecticus est, hac +forma:</p> +<p style="text-align: center"> +<a href="images/p272b.jpg"> +<img alt= +"Graphic depiction of scheme" +title= +"Graphic depiction of scheme" + src="images/p272s.jpg" /> +</a></p> +<p>The wonderful <i>Attis</i> of Catullus is the one classic +example. A few lines have been gathered elsewhere. +Lord Tennyson’s <i>Boadicea</i> rides over many +difficulties and is a noble poem. Catullus makes general +use of the variant second of the above metrical forms:</p> +<blockquote><p><i>Mihi januae frequentes</i>, <i>mihi limina +tepida</i>:</p> +</blockquote> +<p>With stress on the emotion;</p> +<blockquote><p><i>Jam</i>, <i>jam dolet quod egi</i>, <i>jam +jamque poenitet</i>.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>A perfect conquest of the measure is not possible in our +tongue. For the sake of an occasional success in the +velocity, sweep, volume of the line, it seems worth an effort; +and, if to some degree serviceable for narrative verse, it is one +of the exercises of a writer which readers may be invited to +share.</p> +<h3>THEODOLINDA</h3> +<p>The legend of the Iron Crown of Lombardy, formed of a nail of +the true Cross by order of the devout Queen Theodolinda, is well +known. In this dramatic song she is seen passing through +one of the higher temptations of the believing Christian.</p> + +<div class="gapspace"> </div> + +<div class="gapmediumline"> </div> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">Printed by +T. and A. Constable, Printers to His Majesty</span><br /> +<span class="GutSmall">at the Edinburgh University +Press</span></p> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POEMS, VOLUME 2 [OF 3]***</p> +<pre> + + +***** This file should be named 1382-h.htm or 1382-h.zip****** + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/3/8/1382 + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will +be renamed. + +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part +of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm +concept and trademark. 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