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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/1383-0.txt b/1383-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..cc8c445 --- /dev/null +++ b/1383-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9041 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Poems, Volume 3 [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 3 [of 3] + + +Author: George Meredith + + + +Release Date: January 10, 2015 [eBook #1383] +[This file was first posted on May 12, 1998] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POEMS, VOLUME 3 [OF 3]*** + + +Transcribed from the 1912 Times Book Club “Surrey” edition by David +Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org + + [Picture: Book cover] + + [Picture: The South Wester] + + + + + + POEMS + VOL. III + + + BY + GEORGE MEREDITH + + * * * * * + + SURREY EDITION + + * * * * * + + LONDON + THE TIMES BOOK CLUB + 376–384 OXFORD STREET, W. + 1912 + + * * * * * + + Edinburgh: T. and A. Constable, Printers to his Majesty + + + + +CONTENTS + + PAGE +A STAVE OF ROVING TIM, 1 + + The wind is East, the wind is West, +JUMP-TO-GLORY JANE, 5 + + A revelation came on Jane, +THE RIDDLE FOR MEN, 14 + + This Riddle rede or die, +THE SAGE ENAMOURED AND THE HONEST LADY, 15 + + One fairest of the ripe unwedded left +‘LOVE IS WINGED FOR TWO,’ 30 +‘ASK, IS LOVE DIVINE,’ 30 +‘JOY IS FLEET,’ 31 +THE LESSON OF GRIEF, 31 + + Not ere the bitter herb we taste, +WIND ON THE LYRE, 32 + + That was the chirp of Ariel +THE YOUTHFUL QUEST, 33 + + His Lady queen of woods to meet, +THE EMPTY PURSE, 34 + + Thou, run to the dry on this wayside bank, +TO THE COMIC SPIRIT, 56 + + Sword of Common Sense!— +YOUTH IN MEMORY, 68 + + Days, when the ball of our vision +PENETRATION AND TRUST, 75 + + Sleek as a lizard at round of a stone, +NIGHT OF FROST IN MAY, 76 + + With splendour of a silver day, +THE TEACHING OF THE NUDE, 79 + + A Satyr spied a Goddess in her bath, +BREATH OF THE BRIAR, 81 + + O briar-scents, on yon wet wing +EMPEDOCLES, 82 + + He leaped. With none to hinder, +ENGLAND BEFORE THE STORM, 83 + + The day that is the night of days, +TARDY SPRING, 85 + + Now the North wind ceases, +THE LABOURER, 87 + + For a Heracles in his fighting ire there is never the + glory that follows +FORESIGHT AND PATIENCE, 89 + + Sprung of the father blood, the mother brain, +THE WARNING, 99 + + We have seen mighty men ballooning high, +OUTSIDE THE CROWD, 99 + + To sit on History in an easy chair, +TRAFALGAR DAY, 100 + + He leads: we hear our Seaman’s call + Odes in Contribution to the Song of French History +THE REVOLUTION, 105 + + Not yet had History’s Aetna smoked the skies, +NAPOLÉON, 116 + + Cannon his name, +FRANCE, 140 + + We look for her that sunlike stood +ALSACE-LORRAINE, 150 + + The sister Hours in circles linked, +THE CAGEING OF ARES, 170 + + How big of breast our Mother Gaea laughed +THE NIGHT-WALK, 175 + + Awakes for me and leaps from shroud +AT THE CLOSE, 178 + + To Thee, dear God of Mercy, both appeal, +A GARDEN IDYL, 179 + + With sagest craft Arachne worked + A Reading of Life +THE VITAL CHOICE, 185 + + Or shall we run with Artemis +WITH THE HUNTRESS, 186 + + Through the water-eye of night, +WITH THE PERSUADER, 189 + + Who murmurs, hither, hither: who +THE TEST OF MANHOOD, 200 + + Like a flood river whirled at rocky banks, +THE HUELESS LOVE, 208 + + Unto that love must we through fire attain, +UNION IN DISSEVERANCE, 209 + + Sunset worn to its last vermilion he; +SONG IN THE SONGLESS, 210 + + They have no song, the sedges dry, +THE BURDEN OF STRENGTH, 210 + + If that thou hast the gift of strength, then know +THE MAIN REGRET, 211 + + Seen, too clear and historic within us, our sins of + omission +ALTERNATION, 211 + + Between the fountain and the rill +FOREST HISTORY, 212 + + Beneath the vans of doom did men pass in. + Fragments of the Iliad in English Hexameter Verse +THE INVECTIVE OF ACHILLES, 221 + + ‘Heigh me! brazen of front, thou glutton for plunder, how + can one, + + ‘Bibber besotted, with scowl of a cur, having heart of a + deer, thou! +MARSHALLING OF THE ACHAIANS, 225 + + Like as a terrible fire feeds fast on a forest enormous, +AGAMEMNON IN THE FIGHT, 227 + + These, then, he left, and away where ranks were now + clashing the thickest, +PARIS AND DIOMEDES, 228 + + So he, with a clear shout of laughter, +HYPNOS ON IDA, 230 + + They then to fountain-abundant Ida, mother of wild + beasts, +CLASH IN ARMS OF THE ACHAIANS AND TROJANS, 231 + + Not the sea-wave so bellows abroad when it bursts upon + shingle, +THE HORSES OF ACHILLES, 232 + + So now the horses of Aiakides, off wide of the + war-ground, +THE MARES OF THE CAMARGUE, 234 + + A hundred mares, all white! their manes +‘ATKINS’, 236 + + Yonder’s the man with his life in his hand, +THE VOYAGE OF THE ‘OPHIR’, 237 + + Men of our race, we send you one +THE CRISIS, 239 + + Spirit of Russia, now has come +OCTOBER 21, 1905, 241 + + The hundred years have passed, and he +THE CENTENARY OF GARIBALDI, 243 + + We who have seen Italia in the throes, +THE WILD ROSE, 245 + + High climbs June’s wild rose, +THE CALL, 247 + + Under what spell are we debased +ON COMO, 250 + + A rainless darkness drew o’er the lake +MILTON, 251 + + What splendour of imperial station man, +IRELAND, 253 + + Fire in her ashes Ireland feels +THE YEARS HAD WORN THEIR SEASONS’ BELT, 255 + + The years had worn their seasons’ belt, +FRAGMENTS, 257 + + Open horizons round, + + A wilding little stubble flower + + From labours through the night, outworn, + + This love of nature, that allures to take +IL Y A CENT ANS, 259 + + That march of the funereal Past behold; +YOUTH IN AGE, 261 + + Once I was part of the music I heard + Epitaphs +TO A FRIEND LOST, 265 + + When I remember, friend, whom lost I call, +M. M., 265 + + Who call her Mother and who calls her Wife +THE LADY C. M., 266 + + To them that knew her, there is vital flame +ON THE TOMBSTONE OF JAMES CHRISTOPHER WILSON, 266 + + Thou our beloved and light of Earth hast crossed +GORDON OF KHARTOUM, 266 + + Of men he would have raised to light he fell: +J. C. M., 267 + + A fountain of our sweetest, quick to spring +THE EMPEROR FREDERICK OF OUR TIME, 267 + + With Alfred and St. Louis he doth win +ISLET THE DACHS, 267 + + Our Islet out of Helgoland, dismissed +ON HEARING THE NEWS FROM VENICE, 268 + + Now dumb is he who waked the world to speak, +HAWARDEN, 269 + + When comes the lighted day for men to read +AT THE FUNERAL, 270 + + Her sacred body bear: the tenement +ANGELA BURDETT-COUTTS, 270 + + Long with us, now she leaves us; she has rest +THE YEAR’S SHEDDINGS, 270 + + The varied colours are a fitful heap: + + + + +A STAVE OF ROVING TIM +(ADDRESSED TO CERTAIN FRIENDLY TRAMPS.) + + +I + + + THE wind is East, the wind is West, + Blows in and out of haven; + The wind that blows is the wind that’s best, + And croak, my jolly raven! + If here awhile we jigged and laughed, + The like we will do yonder; + For he’s the man who masters a craft, + And light as a lord can wander. + So, foot the measure, Roving Tim, + And croak, my jolly raven! + The wind according to its whim + Is in and out of haven. + + + +II + + + You live in rows of snug abodes, + With gold, maybe, for counting; + And mine’s the beck of the rainy roads + Against the sun a-mounting. + I take the day as it behaves, + Nor shiver when ’tis airy; + But comes a breeze, all you are on waves, + Sick chickens o’ Mother Carey! + So, now for next, cries Roving Tim, + And croak, my jolly raven! + The wind according to its whim + Is in and out of haven. + + + +III + + + Sweet lass, you screw a lovely leer, + To make a man consider. + If you were up with the auctioneer, + I’d be a handsome bidder. + But wedlock clips the rover’s wing; + She tricks him fly to spider; + And when we get to fights in the Ring, + It’s trumps when you play outsider. + So, wrench and split, cries Roving Tim, + And croak, my jolly raven! + The wind according to its whim + Is in and out of haven. + + + +IV + + + Along my winding way I know + A shady dell that’s winking; + The very corner for Self and Co + To do a world of thinking. + And shall I this? and shall I that? + Till Nature answers, ne’ther! + Strike match and light your pipe in your hat, + Rejoicing in sound shoe-leather! + So lead along, cries Roving Tim, + And croak, my jolly raven! + The wind according to its whim + Is in and out of haven. + + + +V + + + A cunning hand ’ll hand you bread, + With freedom for your capers. + I’m not so sure of a cunning head; + It steers to pits or vapours. + But as for Life, we’ll bear in sight + The lesson Nature teaches; + Regard it in a sailoring light, + And treat it like thirsty leeches. + So, fly your jib, cries Roving Tim, + And top your boom, old raven! + The wind according to its whim + Is in and out of haven. + + + +VI + + + She’ll take, to please her dame and dad, + The shopman nicely shaven. + She’ll learn to think o’ the marching lad + When perchers show they’re craven. + You say the shopman piles a heap, + While I perhaps am fasting; + And bless your wits, it haunts him in sleep, + His tin-kettle chance of lasting! + So hail the road, cries Roving Tim, + And hail the rain, old raven! + The wind according to its whim + Is in and out of haven. + + + +VII + + + He’s half a wife, yon pecker bill; + A book and likewise preacher. + With any soul, in a game of skill, + He’ll prove your over-reacher. + The reason is, his brains are bent + On doing things right single. + You’d wish for them when pitching your tent + At night in a whirly dingle! + So, off we go, cries Roving Tim, + And on we go, old raven! + The wind according to its whim + Is in and out of haven. + + + +VIII + + + Lord, no, man’s lot is not for bliss; + To call it woe is blindness: + It’ll here a kick, and it’s there a kiss, + And here and there a kindness. + He starts a hare and calls her joy; + He runs her down to sorrow: + The dogs within him bother the boy, + But ’tis a new day to-morrow. + So, I at helm, cries Roving Tim, + And you at bow, old raven! + The wind according to its whim + Is in and out of haven. + + + + +JUMP-TO-GLORY JANE + + +I + + + A REVELATION came on Jane, + The widow of a labouring swain: + And first her body trembled sharp, + Then all the woman was a harp + With winds along the strings; she heard, + Though there was neither tone nor word. + + + +II + + + For past our hearing was the air, + Beyond our speaking what it bare, + And she within herself had sight + Of heaven at work to cleanse outright, + To make of her a mansion fit + For angel hosts inside to sit. + + + +III + + + They entered, and forthwith entranced, + Her body braced, her members danced; + Surprisingly the woman leapt; + And countenance composed she kept: + As gossip neighbours in the lane + Declared, who saw and pitied Jane. + + + +IV + + + These knew she had been reading books, + The which was witnessed by her looks + Of late: she had a mania + For mad folk in America, + And said for sure they led the way, + But meat and beer were meant to stay. + + + +V + + + That she had visited a fair, + Had seen a gauzy lady there, + Alive with tricks on legs alone, + As good as wings, was also known: + And longwhiles in a sullen mood, + Before her jumping, Jane would brood. + + + +VI + + + A good knee’s height, they say, she sprang; + Her arms and feet like those who hang: + As if afire the body sped, + And neither pair contributed. + She jumped in silence: she was thought + A corpse to resurrection caught. + + + +VII + + + The villagers were mostly dazed; + They jeered, they wondered, and they praised. + ’Twas guessed by some she was inspired, + And some would have it she had hired + An engine in her petticoats, + To turn their wits and win their votes. + + + +VIII + + + Her first was Winny Earnes, a kind + Of woman not to dance inclined; + But she went up, entirely won, + Ere Jump-to-glory Jane had done; + And once a vixen wild for speech, + She found the better way to preach. + + + +IX + + + No long time after, Jane was seen + Directing jumps at Daddy Green; + And that old man, to watch her fly, + Had eyebrows made of arches high; + Till homeward he likewise did hop, + Oft calling on himself to stop! + + + +X + + + It was a scene when man and maid, + Abandoning all other trade, + And careless of the call to meals, + Went jumping at the woman’s heels. + By dozens they were counted soon, + Without a sound to tell their tune. + + + +XI + + + Along the roads they came, and crossed + The fields, and o’er the hills were lost, + And in the evening reappeared; + Then short like hobbled horses reared, + And down upon the grass they plumped: + Alone their Jane to glory jumped. + + + +XII + + + At morn they rose, to see her spring + All going as an engine thing; + And lighter than the gossamer + She led the bobbers following her, + Past old acquaintances, and where + They made the stranger stupid stare. + + + +XIII + + + When turnips were a filling crop, + In scorn they jumped a butcher’s shop: + Or, spite of threats to flog and souse, + They jumped for shame a public-house: + And much their legs were seized with rage + If passing by the vicarage. + + + +XIV + + + The tightness of a hempen rope + Their bodies got; but laundry soap + Not handsomer can rub the skin + For token of the washed within. + Occasionally coughers cast + A leg aloft and coughed their last. + + + +XV + + + The weaker maids and some old men, + Requiring rafters for the pen + On rainy nights, were those who fell. + The rest were quite a miracle, + Refreshed as you may search all round + On Club-feast days and cry, Not found! + + + +XVI + + + For these poor innocents, that slept + Against the sky, soft women wept: + For never did they any theft; + ’Twas known when they their camping left, + And jumped the cold out of their rags; + In spirit rich as money-bags. + + + +XVII + + + They jumped the question, jumped reply; + And whether to insist, deny, + Reprove, persuade, they jumped in ranks + Or singly, straight the arms to flanks, + And straight the legs, with just a knee + For bending in a mild degree. + + + +XVIII + + + The villagers might call them mad; + An endless holiday they had, + Of pleasure in a serious work: + They taught by leaps where perils lurk, + And with the lambkins practised sports + For ’scaping Satan’s pounds and quarts. + + + +XIX + + + It really seemed on certain days, + When they bobbed up their Lord to praise, + And bobbing up they caught the glance + Of light, our secret is to dance, + And hold the tongue from hindering peace; + To dance out preacher and police. + + + +XX + + + Those flies of boys disturbed them sore + On Sundays and when daylight wore: + With withies cut from hedge or copse, + They treated them as whipping-tops, + And flung big stones with cruel aim; + Yet all the flock jumped on the same. + + + +XXI + + + For what could persecution do + To worry such a blessed crew, + On whom it was as wind to fire, + Which set them always jumping higher? + The parson and the lawyer tried, + By meek persistency defied. + + + +XXII + + + But if they bore, they could pursue + As well, and this the Bishop too; + When inner warnings proved him plain + The chase for Jump-to-glory Jane. + She knew it by his being sent + To bless the feasting in the tent. + + + +XXIII + + + Not less than fifty years on end, + The Squire had been the Bishop’s friend: + And his poor tenants, harmless ones, + With souls to save! fed not on buns, + But angry meats: she took her place + Outside to show the way to grace. + + + +XXIV + + + In apron suit the Bishop stood; + The crowding people kindly viewed. + A gaunt grey woman he saw rise + On air, with most beseeching eyes: + And evident as light in dark + It was, she set to him for mark. + + + +XXV + + + Her highest leap had come: with ease + She jumped to reach the Bishop’s knees: + Compressing tight her arms and lips, + She sought to jump the Bishop’s hips: + Her aim flew at his apron-band, + That he might see and understand. + + + +XXVI + + + The mild inquiry of his gaze + Was altered to a peaked amaze, + At sight of thirty in ascent, + To gain his notice clearly bent: + And greatly Jane at heart was vexed + By his ploughed look of mind perplexed. + + + +XXVII + + + In jumps that said, Beware the pit! + More eloquent than speaking it— + That said, Avoid the boiled, the roast; + The heated nose on face of ghost, + Which comes of drinking: up and o’er + The flesh with me! did Jane implore. + + + +XXVIII + + + She jumped him high as huntsmen go + Across the gate; she jumped him low, + To coax him to begin and feel + His infant steps returning, peel + His mortal pride, exposing fruit, + And off with hat and apron suit. + + + +XXIX + + + We need much patience, well she knew, + And out and out, and through and through, + When we would gentlefolk address, + However we may seek to bless: + At times they hide them like the beasts + From sacred beams; and mostly priests. + + + +XXX + + + He gave no sign of making bare, + Nor she of faintness or despair. + Inflamed with hope that she might win, + If she but coaxed him to begin, + She used all arts for making fain; + The mother with her babe was Jane. + + + +XXXI + + + Now stamped the Squire, and knowing not + Her business, waved her from the spot. + Encircled by the men of might, + The head of Jane, like flickering light, + As in a charger, they beheld + Ere she was from the park expelled. + + + +XXXII + + + Her grief, in jumps of earthly weight, + Did Jane around communicate: + For that the moment when began + The holy but mistaken man, + In view of light, to take his lift, + They cut him from her charm adrift! + + + +XXXIII + + + And he was lost: a banished face + For ever from the ways of grace, + Unless pinched hard by dreams in fright. + They saw the Bishop’s wavering sprite + Within her look, at come and go, + Long after he had caused her woe. + + + +XXXIV + + + Her greying eyes (until she sank + At Fredsham on the wayside bank, + Like cinder heaps that whitened lie + From coals that shot the flame to sky) + Had glassy vacancies, which yearned + For one in memory discerned. + + + +XXXV + + + May those who ply the tongue that cheats, + And those who rush to beer and meats, + And those whose mean ambition aims + At palaces and titled names, + Depart in such a cheerful strain + As did our Jump-to-glory Jane! + + + +XXXVI + + + Her end was beautiful: one sigh. + She jumped a foot when it was nigh. + A lily in a linen clout + She looked when they had laid her out. + It is a lily-light she bears + For England up the ladder-stairs. + + + + +THE RIDDLE FOR MEN + + +I + + + THIS Riddle rede or die, + Says History since our Flood, + To warn her sons of power:— + It can be truth, it can be lie; + Be parasite to twist awry; + The drouthy vampire for your blood; + The fountain of the silver flower; + A brand, a lure, a web, a crest; + Supple of wax or tempered steel; + The spur to honour, snake in nest: + ’Tis as you will with it to deal; + To wear upon the breast, + Or trample under heel. + + + +II + + + And rede you not aright, + Says Nature, still in red + Shall History’s tale be writ! + For solely thus you lead to light + The trailing chapters she must write, + And pass my fiery test of dead + Or living through the furnace-pit: + Dislinked from who the softer hold + In grip of brute, and brute remain: + Of whom the woeful tale is told, + How for one short Sultanic reign, + Their bodies lapse to mould, + Their souls behowl the plain. + + + + +THE SAGE ENAMOURED AND THE HONEST LADY + + +I + + + ONE fairest of the ripe unwedded left + Her shadow on the Sage’s path; he found, + By common signs, that she had done a theft. + He could have made the sovereign heights resound + With questions of the wherefore of her state: + He on far other but an hour before + Intent. And was it man, or was it mate, + That she disdained? or was there haply more? + + About her mouth a placid humour slipped + The dimple, as you see smooth lakes at eve + Spread melting rings where late a swallow dipped. + The surface was attentive to receive, + The secret underneath enfolded fast. + She had the step of the unconquered, brave, + Not arrogant; and if the vessel’s mast + Waved liberty, no challenge did it wave. + Her eyes were the sweet world desired of souls, + With something of a wavering line unspelt. + They hold the look whose tenderness condoles + For what the sister in the look has dealt + Of fatal beyond healing; and her tones + A woman’s honeyed amorous outvied, + As when in a dropped viol the wood-throb moans + Among the sobbing strings, that plain and chide + Like infants for themselves, less deep to thrill + Than those rich mother-notes for them breathed round. + Those voices are not magic of the will + To strike love’s wound, but of love’s wound give sound, + Conveying it; the yearnings, pains and dreams. + They waft to the moist tropics after storm, + When out of passion spent thick incense steams, + And jewel-belted clouds the wreck transform. + + Was never hand on brush or lyre to paint + Her gracious manners, where the nuptial ring + Of melody clasped motion in restraint: + The reed-blade with the breeze thereof may sing. + With such endowments armed was she and decked + To make her spoken thoughts eclipse her kind; + Surpassing many a giant intellect, + The marvel of that cradled infant mind. + It clenched the tiny fist, it curled the toe; + Cherubic laughed, enticed, dispensed, absorbed; + And promised in fair feminine to grow + A Sage’s match and mate, more heavenly orbed. + + + +II + + + Across his path the spouseless Lady cast + Her shadow, and the man that thing became. + His youth uprising called his age the Past. + This was the strong grey head of laurelled name, + And in his bosom an inverted Sage + Mistook for light of morn the light which sank. + But who while veins run blood shall know the page + Succeeding ere we turn upon our blank? + Comes Beauty with her tale of moon and cloud, + Her silvered rims of mystery pointing in + To hollows of the half-veiled unavowed, + Where beats her secret life, grey heads will spin + Quick as the young, and spell those hieroglyphs + Of phosphorescent dusk, devoutly bent; + They drink a cup to whirl on dizzier cliffs + For their shamed fall, which asks, why was she sent! + Why, and of whom, and whence; and tell they truth, + The legends of her mission to beguile? + + Hard likeness to the toilful apes of youth + He bore at times, and tempted the sly smile; + And not on her soft lips was it descried. + She stepped her way benevolently grave: + Nor sign that Beauty fed her worm of pride, + By tossing victim to the courtier knave, + Let peep, nor of the naughty pride gave sign. + Rather ’twas humbleness in being pursued, + As pilgrim to the temple of a shrine. + Had he not wits to pierce the mask he wooed? + All wisdom’s armoury this man could wield; + And if the cynic in the Sage it pleased + Traverse her woman’s curtain and poor shield, + For new example of a world diseased; + Showing her shrineless, not a temple, bare; + A curtain ripped to tatters by the blast; + Yet she most surely to this man stood fair: + He worshipped like the young enthusiast, + Named simpleton or poet. Did he read + Right through, and with the voice she held reserved + Amid her vacant ruins jointly plead? + + Compassion for the man thus noble nerved + The pity for herself she felt in him, + To wreak a deed of sacrifice, and save; + At least, be worthy. That our soul may swim, + We sink our heart down bubbling under wave. + It bubbles till it drops among the wrecks. + But, ah! confession of a woman’s breast: + She eminent, she honoured of her sex! + Truth speaks, and takes the spots of the confessed, + To veil them. None of women, save their vile, + Plays traitor to an army in the field. + The cries most vindicating most defile. + How shall a cause to Nature be appealed, + When, under pressure of their common foe, + Her sisters shun the Mother and disown, + On pain of his intolerable crow + Above the fiction, built for him, o’erthrown? + Irrational he is, irrational + Must they be, though not Reason’s light shall wane + In them with ever Nature at close call, + Behind the fiction torturing to sustain; + Who hear her in the milk, and sometimes make + A tongueless answer, shivered on a sigh: + Whereat men dread their lofty structure’s quake + Once more, and in their hosts for tocsin ply + The crazy roar of peril, leonine + For injured majesty. That sigh of dames + Is rare and soon suppressed. Not they combine + To shake the structure sheltering them, which tames + Their lustier if not wilder: fixed are they, + In elegancy scarce denoting ease; + And do they breathe, it is not to betray + The martyr in the caryatides. + Yet here and there along the graceful row + Is one who fetches breath from deeps, who deems, + Moved by a desperate craving, their old foe + May yield a trustier friend than woman seems, + And aid to bear the sculptured floral weight + Massed upon heads not utterly of stone: + May stamp endurance by expounding fate. + She turned to him, and, This you seek is gone; + Look in, she said, as pants the furnace, brief, + Frost-white. She gave his hearing sight to view + The silent chamber of a brown curled leaf: + Thing that had throbbed ere shot black lightning through. + No further sign of heart could he discern: + The picture of her speech was winter sky; + A headless figure folding a cleft urn, + Where tears once at the overflow were dry. + + + +III + + + So spake she her first utterance on the rack. + It softened torment, in the funeral hues + Round wan Romance at ebb, but drove her back + To listen to herself, herself accuse + Harshly as Love’s imperial cause allowed. + She meant to grovel, and her lover praised + So high o’er the condemnatory crowd, + That she perforce a fellow phoenix blazed. + + The picture was of hand fast joined to hand, + Both pushed from angry skies, their grasp more pledged + Under the threatened flash of a bright brand + At arm’s length up, for severing action edged. + Why, then Love’s Court of Honour contemplate; + And two drowned shorecasts, who, for the life esteemed + Above their lost, invoke an advocate + In Passion’s purity, thereby redeemed. + + Redeemed, uplifted, glimmering on a throne, + The woman stricken by an arrow falls. + His advocate she can be, not her own, + If, Traitress to thy sex! one sister calls. + Have we such scenes of drapery’s mournfulness + On Beauty’s revelations, witched we plant, + Over the fair shape humbled to confess, + An angel’s buckler, with loud choiric chant. + + + +IV + + + No knightly sword to serve, nor harp of bard, + The lady’s hand in her physician’s knew. + She had not hoped for them as her award, + When zig-zag on the tongue electric flew + Her charge of counter-motives, none impure: + But muteness whipped her skin. She could have said, + Her free confession was to work his cure, + Show proofs for why she could not love or wed. + Were they not shown? His muteness shook in thrall + Her body on the verge of that black pit + Sheer from the treacherous confessional, + Demanding further, while perusing it. + + Slave is the open mouth beneath the closed. + She sank; she snatched at colours; they were peel + Of fruit past savour, in derision rosed. + For the dark downward then her soul did reel. + A press of hideous impulse urged to speak: + A novel dread of man enchained her dumb. + She felt the silence thicken, heard it shriek, + Heard Life subsiding on the eternal hum: + Welcome to women, when, between man’s laws + And Nature’s thirsts, they, soul from body torn, + Give suck at breast to a celestial cause, + Named by the mouth infernal, and forsworn. + Nathless her forehead twitched a sad content, + To think the cure so manifest, so frail + Her charm remaining. Was the curtain’s rent + Too wide? he but a man of that herd male? + She saw him as that herd of the forked head + Butting the woman harrowed on her knees, + Clothed only in life’s last devouring red. + Confession at her fearful instant sees + Judicial Silence write the devil fact + In letters of the skeleton: at once, + Swayed on the supplication of her act, + The rabble reading, roaring to denounce, + She joins. No longer colouring, with skips + At tangles, picture that for eyes in tears + Might swim the sequence, she addressed her lips + To do the scaffold’s office at his ears. + + Into the bitter judgement of that herd + On women, she, deeming it present, fell. + Her frenzy of abasement hugged the word + They stone with, and so pile their citadel + To launch at outcasts the foul levin bolt. + As had he flung it, in her breast it burned. + Face and reflect it did her hot revolt + From hardness, to the writhing rebel turned; + Because the golden buckler was withheld, + She to herself applies the powder-spark, + For joy of one wild demon burst ere quelled, + Perishing to astound the tyrant Dark. + + She had the Scriptural word so scored on brain, + It rang through air to sky, and rocked a world + That danced down shades the scarlet dance profane; + Most women! see! by the man’s view dustward hurled, + Impenitent, submissive, torn in two. + They sink upon their nature, the unnamed, + And sops of nourishment may get some few, + In place of understanding, scourged and shamed. + + Barely have seasoned women understood + The great Irrational, who thunders power, + Drives Nature to her primitive wild wood, + And courts her in the covert’s dewy hour; + Returning to his fortress nigh night’s end, + With execration of her daughters’ lures. + They help him the proud fortress to defend, + Nor see what front it wears, what life immures, + The murder it commits; nor that its base + Is shifty as a huckster’s opening deal + For bargain under smoothest market face, + While Gentleness bids frigid Justice feel, + Justice protests that Reason is her seat; + Elect Convenience, as Reason masked, + Hears calmly cramped Humanity entreat; + Until a sentient world is overtasked, + And rouses Reason’s fountain-self: she calls + On Nature; Nature answers: Share your guilt + In common when contention cracks the walls + Of the big house which not on me is built. + + The Lady said as much as breath will bear; + To happier sisters inconceivable: + Contemptible to veterans of the fair, + Who show for a convolving pearly shell, + A treasure of the shore, their written book. + As much as woman’s breath will bear and live + Shaped she to words beneath a knotted look, + That held as if for grain the summing sieve. + Her judge now brightened without pause, as wakes + Our homely daylight after dread of spells. + Lips sugared to let loose the little snakes + Of slimy lustres ringing elfin bells + About a story of the naked flesh, + Intending but to put some garment on, + Should learn, that in the subject they enmesh, + A traitor lurks and will be known anon. + Delusion heating pricks the torpid doubt, + Stationed for index down an ancient track: + And ware of it was he while she poured out + A broken moon on forest-waters black. + + Though past the stage where midway men are skilled + To scan their senses wriggling under plough, + When yet to the charmed seed of speech distilled, + Their hearts are fallow, he, and witless how, + Loathing, had yielded, like bruised limb to leech, + Not handsomely; but now beholding bleed + Soul of the woman in her prostrate speech, + The valour of that rawness he could read. + Thence flashed it, as the crimson currents ran + From senses up to thoughts, how she had read + Maternally the warm remainder man + Beneath his crust, and Nature’s pity shed, + In shedding dearer than heart’s blood to light + His vision of the path mild Wisdom walks. + Therewith he could espy Confession’s fright; + Her need of him: these flowers grow on stalks; + They suck from soil, and have their urgencies + Beside and with the lovely face mid leaves. + Veins of divergencies, convergencies, + Our botanist in womankind perceives; + And if he hugs no wound, the man can prize + That splendid consummation and sure proof + Of more than heart in her, who might despise, + Who drowns herself, for pity up aloof + To soar and be like Nature’s pity: she + Instinctive of what virtue in young days + Had served him for his pilot-star on sea, + To trouble him in haven. Thus his gaze + Came out of rust, and more than the schooled tongue + Was gifted to encourage and assure. + He gave her of the deep well she had sprung; + And name it gratitude, the word is poor. + But name it gratitude, is aught as rare + From sex to sex? And let it have survived + Their conflict, comes the peace between the pair, + Unknown to thousands husbanded and wived: + Unknown to Passion, generous for prey: + Unknown to Love, too blissful in a truce. + Their tenderest of self did each one slay; + His cloak of dignity, her fleur de luce; + Her lily flower, and his abolla cloak, + Things living, slew they, and no artery bled. + A moment of some sacrificial smoke + They passed, and were the dearer for their dead. + + He learnt how much we gain who make no claims. + A nightcap on his flicker of grey fire + Was thought of her sharp shudder in the flames, + Confessing; and its conjured image dire, + Of love, the torrent on the valley dashed; + The whirlwind swathing tremulous peaks; young force, + Visioned to hold corrected and abashed + Our senile emulous; which rolls its course + Proud to the shattering end; with these few last + Hot quintessential drops of bryony juice, + Squeezed out in anguish: all of that once vast! + And still, though having skin for man’s abuse, + Though no more glorying in the beauteous wreath + Shot skyward from a blood at passionate jet, + Repenting but in words, that stand as teeth + Between the vivid lips; a vassal set; + And numb, of formal value. Are we true + In nature, never natural thing repents; + Albeit receiving punishment for due, + Among the group of this world’s penitents; + Albeit remorsefully regretting, oft + Cravenly, while the scourge no shudder spares. + + Our world believes it stabler if the soft + Are whipped to show the face repentance wears. + Then hear it, in a moan of atheist gloom, + Deplore the weedy growth of hypocrites; + Count Nature devilish, and accept for doom + The chasm between our passions and our wits! + + Affecting lunar whiteness, patent snows, + It trembles at betrayal of a sore. + Hers is the glacier-conscience, to expose + Impurities for clearness at the core. + + She to her hungered thundering in breast, + _Ye shall not starve_, not feebly designates + The world repressing as a life repressed, + Judged by the wasted martyrs it creates. + How Sin, amid the shades Cimmerian, + Repents, she points for sight: and she avers, + The hoofed half-angel in the Puritan + Nigh reads her when no brutish wrath deters. + + Sin against immaturity, the sin + Of ravenous excess, what deed divides + Man from vitality; these bleed within; + Bleed in the crippled relic that abides. + Perpetually they bleed; a limb is lost, + A piece of life, the very spirit maimed. + But culprit who the law of man has crossed + With Nature’s dubiously within is blamed; + Despite our cry at cutting of the whip, + Our shiver in the night when numbers frown, + We but bewail a broken fellowship, + A sting, an isolation, a fall’n crown. + + Abject of sinners is that sensitive, + The flesh, amenable to stripes, miscalled + Incorrigible: such title do we give + To the poor shrinking stuff wherewith we are walled; + And, taking it for Nature, place in ban + Our Mother, as a Power wanton-willed, + The shame and baffler of the soul of man, + The recreant, reptilious. Do thou build + Thy mind on her foundations in earth’s bed; + Behold man’s mind the child of her keen rod, + For teaching how the wits and passions wed + To rear that temple of the credible God; + Sacred the letters of her laws, and plain, + Will shine, to guide thy feet and hold thee firm: + Then, as a pathway through a field of grain, + Man’s laws appear the blind progressive worm, + That moves by touch, and thrust of linking rings + The which to endow with vision, lift from mud + To level of their nature’s aims and springs, + Must those, the twain beside our vital flood, + Now on opposing banks, the twain at strife + (Whom the so rosy ferryman invites + To junction, and mid-channel over Life, + Unmasked to the ghostly, much asunder smites) + Instruct in deeper than Convenience, + In higher than the harvest of a year. + Only the rooted knowledge to high sense + Of heavenly can mount, and feel the spur + For fruitfullest advancement, eye a mark + Beyond the path with grain on either hand, + Help to the steering of our social Ark + Over the barbarous waters unto land. + + For us the double conscience and its war, + The serving of two masters, false to both, + Until those twain, who spring the root and are + The knowledge in division, plight a troth + Of equal hands: nor longer circulate + A pious token for their current coin, + To growl at the exchange; they, mate and mate, + Fair feminine and masculine shall join + Upon an upper plane, still common mould, + Where stamped religion and reflective pace + A statelier measure, and the hoop of gold + Rounds to horizon for their soul’s embrace. + Then shall those noblest of the earth and sun + Inmix unlike to waves on savage sea. + But not till Nature’s laws and man’s are one, + Can marriage of the man and woman be. + + + +V + + + He passed her through the sermon’s dull defile. + Down under billowy vapour-gorges heaved + The city and the vale and mountain-pile. + She felt strange push of shuttle-threads that weaved. + + A new land in an old beneath her lay; + And forth to meet it did her spirit rush, + As bride who without shame has come to say, + Husband, in his dear face that caused her blush. + + A natural woman’s heart, not more than clad + By station and bright raiment, gathers heat + From nakedness in trusted hands: she had + The joy of those who feel the world’s heart beat, + After long doubt of it as fire or ice; + Because one man had helped her to breathe free; + Surprised to faith in something of a price + Past the old charity in chivalry:— + Our first wild step to right the loaded scales + Displaying women shamefully outweighed. + The wisdom of humaneness best avails + For serving justice till that fraud is brayed. + Her buried body fed the life she drank. + And not another stripping of her wound! + The startled thought on black delirium sank, + While with her gentle surgeon she communed, + And woman’s prospect of the yoke repelled. + Her buried body gave her flowers and food; + The peace, the homely skies, the springs that welled; + Love, the large love that folds the multitude. + Soul’s chastity in honesty, and this + With beauty, made the dower to men refused. + And little do they know the prize they miss; + Which is their happy fortune! Thus he mused + + For him, the cynic in the Sage had play + A hazy moment, by a breath dispersed; + To think, of all alive most wedded they, + Whom time disjoined! He needed her quick thirst + For renovated earth: on earth she gazed, + With humble aim to foot beside the wise. + Lo, where the eyelashes of night are raised + Yet lowly over morning’s pure grey eyes. + + + + +‘LOVE IS WINGED FOR TWO’ + + + LOVE is winged for two, + In the worst he weathers, + When their hearts are tied; + But if they divide, + O too true! + Cracks a globe, and feathers, feathers, + Feathers all the ground bestrew. + + I was breast of morning sea, + Rosy plume on forest dun, + I the laugh in rainy fleeces, + While with me + She made one. + Now must we pick up our pieces, + For that then so winged were we. + + + + +‘ASK, IS LOVE DIVINE’ + + + ASK, is Love divine, + Voices all are, ay. + Question for the sign, + There’s a common sigh. + Would we, through our years, + Love forego, + Quit of scars and tears? + Ah, but no, no, no! + + + + +‘JOY IS FLEET’ + + + JOY is fleet, + Sorrow slow. + Love, so sweet, + Sorrow will sow. + Love, that has flown + Ere day’s decline, + Love to have known, + Sorrow, be mine! + + + + +THE LESSON OF GRIEF + + + Not ere the bitter herb we taste, + Which ages thought of happy times, + To plant us in a weeping waste, + Rings with our fellows this one heart + Accordant chimes. + + When I had shed my glad year’s leaf, + I did believe I stood alone, + Till that great company of Grief + Taught me to know this craving heart + For not my own. + + + + +WIND ON THE LYRE + + + THAT was the chirp of Ariel + You heard, as overhead it flew, + The farther going more to dwell, + And wing our green to wed our blue; + But whether note of joy or knell, + Not his own Father-singer knew; + Nor yet can any mortal tell, + Save only how it shivers through; + The breast of us a sounded shell, + The blood of us a lighted dew. + + + + +THE YOUTHFUL QUEST + + + HIS Lady queen of woods to meet, + He wanders day and night: + The leaves have whisperings discreet, + The mossy ways invite. + + Across a lustrous ring of space, + By covert hoods and caves, + Is promise of her secret face + In film that onward waves. + + For darkness is the light astrain, + Astrain for light the dark. + A grey moth down a larches’ lane + Unwinds a ghostly spark. + + Her lamp he sees, and young desire + Is fed while cloaked she flies. + She quivers shot of violet fire + To ash at look of eyes. + + + + +THE EMPTY PURSE +A SERMON TO OUR LATER PRODIGAL SON + + + THOU, run to the dry on this wayside bank, + Too plainly of all the propellers bereft! + Quenched youth, and is that thy purse? + Even such limp slough as the snake has left + Slack to the gale upon spikes of whin, + For cast-off coat of a life gone blank, + In its frame of a grin at the seeker, is thine; + And thine to crave and to curse + The sweet thing once within. + Accuse him: some devil committed the theft, + Which leaves of the portly a skin, + No more; of the weighty a whine. + + Pursue him: and first, to be sure of his track, + Over devious ways that have led to this, + In the stream’s consecutive line, + Let memory lead thee back + To where waves Morning her fleur-de-lys, + Unflushed at the front of the roseate door + Unopened yet: never shadow there + Of a Tartarus lighted by Dis + For souls whose cry is, alack! + An ivory cradle rocks, apeep + Through his eyelashes’ laugh, a breathing pearl. + There the young chief of the animals wore + A likeness to heavenly hosts, unaware + Of his love of himself; with the hours at leap. + In a dingle away from a rutted highroad, + Around him the earliest throstle and merle, + Our human smile between milk and sleep, + Effervescent of Nature he crowed. + Fair was that season; furl over furl + The banners of blossom; a dancing floor + This earth; very angels the clouds; and fair + Thou on the tablets of forehead and breast: + Careless, a centre of vigilant care. + Thy mother kisses an infant curl. + The room of the toys was a boundless nest, + A kingdom the field of the games, + Till entered the craving for more, + And the worshipped small body had aims. + A good little idol, as records attest, + When they tell of him lightly appeased in a scream + By sweets and caresses: he gave but sign + That the heir of a purse-plumped dominant race, + Accustomed to plenty, not dumb would pine. + Almost magician, his earliest dream + Was lord of the unpossessed + For a look; himself and his chase, + As on puffs of a wind at whirl, + Made one in the wink of a gleam. + She kisses a locket curl, + She conjures to vision a cherub face, + When her butterfly counted his day + All meadow and flowers, mishap + Derided, and taken for play + The fling of an urchin’s cap. + When her butterfly showed him an eaglet born, + For preying too heedlessly bred, + What a heart clapped in thee then! + With what fuller colours of morn! + And high to the uttermost heavens it flew, + Swift as on poet’s pen. + It flew to be wedded, to wed + The mystery scented around: + Issue of flower and dew, + Issue of light and sound: + Thinner than either; a thread + Spun of the dream they threw + To kindle, allure, evade. + It ran the sea-wave, the garden’s dance, + To the forest’s dark heart down a dappled glade; + Led on by a perishing glance, + By a twinkle’s eternal waylaid. + Woman, the name was, when she took form; + Sheaf of the wonders of life. She fled, + Close imaged; she neared, far seen. How she made + Palpitate earth of the living and dead! + Did she not show thee the world designed + Solely for loveliness? Nested warm, + The day was the morrow in flight. And for thee, + She muted the discords, tuned, refined; + Drowned sharp edges beneath her cloak. + Eye of the waters, and throb of the tree, + Sliding on radiance, winging from shade, + With her witch-whisper o’er ruins, in reeds, + She sang low the song of her promise delayed; + Beckoned and died, as a finger of smoke + Astream over woodland. And was not she + History’s heroines white on storm? + Remember her summons to valorous deeds. + Shone she a lure of the honey-bag swarm, + Most was her beam on the knightly: she led + For the honours of manhood more than the prize; + Waved her magnetical yoke + Whither the warrior bled, + Ere to the bower of sighs. + And shy of her secrets she was; under deeps + Plunged at the breath of a thirst that woke + The dream in the cave where the Dreaded sleeps. + + Away over heaven the young heart flew, + And caught many lustres, till some one said + (Or was it the thought into hearing grew?), + _Not thou as commoner men_! + Thy stature puffed and it swayed, + It stiffened to royal-erect; + A brassy trumpet brayed; + A whirling seized thy head; + The vision of beauty was flecked. + Note well the how and the when, + The thing that prompted and sped. + Thereanon the keen passions clapped wing, + Fixed eye, and the world was prey. + No simple world of thy greenblade Spring, + Nor world of thy flowerful prime + On the topmost Orient peak + Above a yet vaporous day. + Flesh was it, breast to beak: + A four-walled windowless world without ray, + Only darkening jets on a river of slime, + Where harsh over music as woodland jay, + A voice chants, Woe to the weak! + And along an insatiate feast, + Women and men are one + In the cup transforming to beast. + Magian worship they paid to their sun, + Lord of the Purse! Behold him climb. + Stalked ever such figure of fun + For monarch in great-grin pantomime? + See now the heart dwindle, the frame distend; + The soul to its anchorite cavern retreat, + From a life that reeks of the rotted end; + While he—is he pictureable? replete, + Gourd-like swells of the rank of the soil, + Hollow, more hollow at core. + And for him did the hundreds toil + Despised; in the cold and heat, + This image ridiculous bore + On their shoulders for morsels of meat! + + Gross, with the fumes of incense full, + With parasites tickled, with slaves begirt, + He strutted, a cock, he bellowed, a bull, + He rolled him, a dog, in dirt. + And dog, bull, cook, was he, fanged, horned, plumed; + Original man, as philosophers vouch; + Carnivorous, cannibal; length-long exhumed, + Frightfully living and armed to devour; + The primitive weapons of prey in his pouch; + The bait, the line and the hook: + To feed on his fellows intent. + God of the Danaé shower, + He had but to follow his bent. + He battened on fowl not safely hutched, + On sheep astray from the crook; + A lure for the foolish in fold: + To carrion turning what flesh he touched. + And O the grace of his air, + As he at the goblet sips, + A centre of girdles loosed, + With their grisly label, Sold! + Credulous hears the fidelity swear, + Which has roving eyes over yielded lips: + To-morrow will fancy himself the seduced, + The stuck in a treacherous slough, + Because of his faith in a purchased pair, + False to a vinous vow. + + In his glory of banquet strip him bare, + And what is the creature we view? + Our pursy Apollo Apollyon’s tool; + A small one, still of the crew + By serpent Apollyon blest: + His plea in apology, blindfold Fool. + A fool surcharged, propelled, unwarned; + Not viler, you hear him protest: + Of a popular countenance not incorrect. + But deeds are the picture in essence, deeds + Paint him the hooved and homed, + Despite the poor pother he pleads, + And his look of a nation’s elect. + We have him, our quarry confessed! + And scan him: the features inspect + Of that bestial multiform: cry, + Corroborate I, O Samian Sage! + The book of thy wisdom, proved + On me, its last hieroglyph page, + Alive in the horned and hooved? + Thou! will he make reply. + + Thus has the plenary purse + Done often: to do will engage + Anew upon all of thy like, or worse. + And now is thy deepest regret + To be man, clean rescued from beast: + From the grip of the Sorcerer, Gold, + Celestially released. + + But now from his cavernous hold, + Free may thy soul be set, + As a child of the Death and the Life, to learn, + Refreshed by some bodily sweat, + The meaning of either in turn, + What issue may come of the two:— + A morn beyond mornings, beyond all reach + Of emotional arms at the stretch to enfold: + A firmament passing our visible blue. + To those having nought to reflect it, ’tis nought; + To those who are misty, ’tis mist on the beach + From the billow withdrawing; to those who see + Earth, our mother, in thought, + Her spirit it is, our key. + + Ay, the Life and the Death are her words to us here, + Of one significance, pricking the blind. + This is thy gain now the surface is clear: + To read with a soul in the mirror of mind + Is man’s chief lesson.—Thou smilest! I preach! + Acid smiling, my friend, reveals + Abysses within; frigid preaching a street + Paved unconcernedly smooth + For the lecturer straight on his heels, + Up and down a policeman’s beat; + Bearing tonics not labelled to soothe. + Thou hast a disgust of the sermon in rhyme. + It is not attractive in being too chaste. + The popular tale of adventure and crime + Would equally sicken an overdone taste. + So, then, onward. Philosophy, thoughtless to soothe, + Lifts, if thou wilt, or there leaves thee supine. + + Thy condition, good sooth, has no seeming of sweet; + It walks our first crags, it is flint for the tooth, + For the thirsts of our nature brine. + But manful has met it, manful will meet. + And think of thy privilege: supple with youth, + To have sight of the headlong swine, + Once fouling thee, jumping the dips! + As the coin of thy purse poured out: + An animal’s holiday past: + And free of them thou, to begin a new bout; + To start a fresh hunt on a resolute blast: + No more an imp-ridden to bournes of eclipse: + Having knowledge to spur thee, a gift to compare; + Rubbing shoulder to shoulder, as only the book + Of the world can be read, by necessity urged. + For witness, what blinkers are they who look + From the state of the prince or the millionnaire! + They see but the fish they attract, + The hungers on them converged; + And never the thought in the shell of the act, + Nor ever life’s fangless mirth. + But first, that the poisonous of thee be purged, + Go into thyself, strike Earth. + She is there, she is felt in a blow struck hard. + Thou findest a pugilist countering quick, + Cunning at drives where thy shutters are barred; + Not, after the studied professional trick, + Blue-sealing; she brightens the sight. Strike Earth, + Antaeus, young giant, whom fortune trips! + And thou com’st on a saving fact, + To nourish thy planted worth. + + Be it clay, flint, mud, or the rubble of chips, + Thy roots have grasp in the stern-exact: + The redemption of sinners deluded! the last + Dry handful, that bruises and saves. + To the common big heart are we bound right fast, + When our Mother admonishing nips + At the nakedness bare of a clout, + And we crave what the commonest craves. + + This wealth was a fortress-wall, + Under which grew our grim little beast-god stout; + Self-worshipped, the foe, in division from all; + With crowds of illogical Christians, no doubt; + Till the rescuing earthquake cracked. + Thus are we man made firm; + Made warm by the numbers compact. + We follow no longer a trumpet-snout, + At a trot where the hog is tracked, + Nor wriggle the way of the worm. + + Thou wilt spare us the cynical pout + At humanity: sign of a nature bechurled. + No stenchy anathemas cast + Upon Providence, women, the world. + Distinguish thy tempers and trim thy wits. + The purchased are things of the mart, not classed + Among resonant types that have freely grown. + + Thy knowledge of women might be surpassed: + As any sad dog’s of sweet flesh when he quits + The wayside wandering bone! + No revilings of comrades as ingrates: thee + The tempter, misleader, and criminal (screened + By laws yet barbarous) own. + + If some one performed Fiend’s deputy, + He was for awhile the Fiend. + Still, nursing a passion to speak, + As the punch-bowl does, in the moral vein, + When the ladle has finished its leak, + And the vessel is loquent of nature’s inane, + Hie where the demagogues roar + Like a Phalaris bull, with the victim’s force: + Hurrah to their jolly attack + On a City that smokes of the Plain; + A city of sin’s death-dyes, + Holding revel of worms in a corse; + A city of malady sore, + Over-ripe for the big doom’s crack: + A city of hymnical snore; + Connubial truths and lies + Demanding an instant divorce, + Clean as the bright from the black. + It were well for thy system to sermonize. + There are giants to slay, and they call for their Jack. + + Then up stand thou in the midst: + Thy good grain out of thee thresh, + Hand upon heart: relate + What things thou legally didst + For the Archseducer of flesh. + Omitting the murmurs of women and fate, + Confess thee an instrument armed + To be snare of our wanton, our weak, + Of all by the sensual charmed. + For once shall repentance be done by the tongue: + Speak, though execrate, speak + A word on grandmotherly Laws + Giving rivers of gold to our young, + In the days of their hungers impure; + To furnish them beak and claws, + And make them a banquet’s lure. + + Thou the example, saved + Miraculously by this poor skin! + Thereat let the Purse be waved: + The snake-slough sick of the snaky sin: + A devil, if devil as devil behaved + Ever, thou knowest, look thou but in, + Where he shivers, a culprit fettered and shaved; + O a bird stripped of feather, a fish clipped of fin! + + And commend for a washing the torrents of wrath, + Which hurl at the foe of the dearest men prize + Rough-rolling boulders and froth. + Gigantical enginery they can command, + For the crushing of enemies not of great size: + But hold to thy desperate stand. + Men’s right of bequeathing their all to their own + (With little regard for the creatures they squeezed); + Their mill and mill-water and nether mill-stone + Tied fast to their infant; lo, this is the last + Of their hungers, by prudent devices appeased. + The law they decree is their ultimate slave; + Wherein we perceive old Voracity glassed. + It works from their dust, and it reeks of their grave. + Point them to greener, though Journals be guns; + To brotherly fields under fatherly skies; + Where the savage still primitive learns of a debt + He has owed since he drummed on his belly for war; + And how for his giving, the more will he get; + For trusting his fellows, leave friends round his sons: + Till they see, with the gape of a startled surprise, + Their adored tyrant-monster a brute to abhor, + The sun of their system a father of flies! + + So, for such good hope, take their scourge unashamed; + ’Tis the portion of them who civilize, + Who speak the word novel and true: + How the brutish antique of our springs may be tamed, + Without loss of the strength that should push us to flower; + How the God of old time will act Satan of new, + If we keep him not straight at the higher God aimed; + For whose habitation within us we scour + This house of our life; where our bitterest pains + Are those to eject the Infernal, who heaps + Mire on the soul. Take stripes or chains; + Grip at thy standard reviled. + And what if our body be dashed from the steeps? + Our spoken in protest remains. + A young generation reaps. + + The young generation! ah, there is the child + Of our souls down the Ages! to bleed for it, proof + That souls we have, with our senses filed, + Our shuttles at thread of the woof. + May it be braver than ours, + To encounter the rattle of hostile bolts, + To look on the rising of Stranger Powers. + May it know how the mind in expansion revolts + From a nursery Past with dead letters aloof, + And the piping to stupor of Precedents shun, + In a field where the forefather print of the hoof + Is not yet overgrassed by the watering hours, + And should prompt us to Change, as to promise of sun, + Till brain-rule splendidly towers. + For that large light we have laboured and tramped + Thorough forests and bogland, still to perceive + Our animate morning stamped + With the lines of a sombre eve. + + A timorous thing ran the innocent hind, + When the wolf was the hypocrite fang under hood, + The snake a lithe lurker up sleeve, + And the lion effulgently ramped. + Then our forefather hoof did its work in the wood, + By right of the better in kind. + But now will it breed yon bestial brood + Three-fold thrice over, if bent to bind, + As the healthy in chains with the sick, + Unto despot usage our issuing mind. + It signifies battle or death’s dull knell. + Precedents icily written on high + Challenge the Tentatives hot to rebel. + Our Mother, who speeds her bloomful quick + For the march, reads which the impediment well. + She smiles when of sapience is their boast. + O loose of the tug between blood run dry + And blood running flame may our offspring run! + May brain democratic be king of the host! + Less then shall the volumes of History tell + Of the stop in progression, the slip in relapse, + That counts us a sand-slack inch hard won + Beneath an oppressive incumbent perhaps. + + Let the senile lords in a parchment sky, + And the generous turbulents drunken of morn, + Their battle of instincts put by, + A moment examine this field: + On a Roman street cast thoughtful eye, + Along to the mounts from the bog-forest weald. + It merits a glance at our history’s maps, + To see across Britain’s old shaggy unshorn, + Through the Parties in strife internecine, foot + The ruler’s close-reckoned direct to the mark. + From the head ran the vanquisher’s orderly route, + In the stride of his forts through the tangle and dark. + From the head runs the paved firm way for advance, + And we shoulder, we wrangle! The light on us shed + Shows dense beetle blackness in swarm, lurid Chance, + The Goddess of gamblers, above. From the head, + Then when it worked for the birth of a star + Fraternal with heaven’s in beauty and ray, + Sprang the Acropolis. Ask what crown + Comes of our tides of the blood at war, + For men to bequeath generations down! + And ask what thou wast when the Purse was brimmed: + What high-bounding ball for the Gods at play: + A Conservative youth! who the cream-bowl skimmed, + Desiring affairs to be left as they are. + + So, thou takest Youth’s natural place in the fray, + As a Tentative, combating Peace, + Our lullaby word for decay.— + There will come an immediate decree + In thy mind for the opposite party’s decease, + If he bends not an instant knee. + Expunge it: extinguishing counts poor gain. + And accept a mild word of police:— + Be mannerly, measured; refrain + From the puffings of him of the bagpipe cheeks. + Our political, even as the merchant main, + A temperate gale requires + For the ship that haven seeks; + Neither God of the winds nor his bellowsy squires. + + Then observe the antagonist, con + His reasons for rocking the lullaby word. + You stand on a different stage of the stairs. + He fought certain battles, yon senile lord. + In the strength of thee, feel his bequest to his heirs. + We are now on his inches of ground hard won, + For a perch to a flight o’er his resting fence. + + Does it knock too hard at thy head if I say, + That Time is both father and son? + Tough lesson, when senses are floods over sense!— + Discern the paternal of Now + As the Then of thy present tense. + You may pull as you will either way, + You can never be other than one. + So, be filial. Giants to slay + Demand knowing eyes in their Jack. + + There are those whom we push from the path with respect. + Bow to that elder, though seeing him bow + To the backward as well, for a thunderous back + Upon thee. In his day he was not all wrong. + Unto some foundered zenith he strove, and was wrecked. + He scrambled to shore with a worship of shore. + The Future he sees as the slippery murk; + The Past as his doctrinal library lore. + He stands now the rock to the wave’s wild wash. + Yet thy lumpish antagonist once did work + Heroical, one of our strong. + His gold to retain and his dross reject, + Engage him, but humour, not aiming to quash. + Detest the dead squat of the Turk, + And suffice it to move him along. + Drink of faith in the brains a full draught + Before the oration: beware + Lest rhetoric moonily waft + Whither horrid activities snare. + Rhetoric, juice for the mob + Despising more luminous grape, + Oft at its fount has it laughed + In the cataracts rolling for rape + Of a Reason left single to sob! + + ’Tis known how the permanent never is writ + In blood of the passions: mercurial they, + Shifty their issue: stir not that pit + To the game our brutes best play. + + But with rhetoric loose, can we check man’s brute? + Assemblies of men on their legs invoke + Excitement for wholesome diversion: there shoot + Electrical sparks between their dry thatch + And thy waved torch, more to kindle than light. + ’Tis instant between you: the trick of a catch + (To match a Batrachian croak) + Will thump them a frenzy or fun in their veins. + Then may it be rather the well-worn joke + Thou repeatest, to stop conflagration, and write + Penance for rhetoric. Strange will it seem, + When thou readest that form of thy homage to brains! + + For the secret why demagogues fail, + Though they carry hot mobs to the red extreme, + And knock out or knock in the nail + (We will rank them as flatly sincere, + Devoutly detesting a wrong, + Engines o’ercharged with our human steam), + Question thee, seething amid the throng. + And ask, whether Wisdom is born of blood-heat; + Or of other than Wisdom comes victory here;— + Aught more than the banquet and roundelay, + That is closed with a terrible terminal wail, + A retributive black ding-dong? + And ask of thyself: This furious Yea + Of a speech I thump to repeat, + In the cause I would have prevail, + For seed of a nourishing wheat, + _Is it accepted of Song_? + Does it sound to the mind through the ear, + Right sober, pure sane? has it disciplined feet? + Thou wilt find it a test severe; + Unerring whatever the theme. + Rings it for Reason a melody clear, + We have bidden old Chaos retreat; + We have called on Creation to hear; + All forces that make us are one full stream. + Simple islander! thus may the spirit in verse, + Showing its practical value and weight, + Pipe to thee clear from the Empty Purse, + Lead thee aloft to that high estate.— + The test is conclusive, I deem: + It embraces or mortally bites. + We have then the key-note for debate: + A Senate that sits on the heights + Over discords, to shape and amend. + + And no singer is needed to serve + The musical God, my friend. + Needs only his law on a sensible nerve: + A law that to Measure invites, + Forbidding the passions contend. + Is it accepted of Song? + And if then the blunt answer be Nay, + Dislink thee sharp from the ramping horde, + Slaves of the Goddess of hoar-old sway, + The Queen of delirious rites, + Queen of those issueless mobs, that rend + For frenzy the strings of a fruitful accord, + Pursuing insensate, seething in throng, + Their wild idea to its ashen end. + Off to their Phrygia, shriek and gong, + Shorn from their fellows, behold them wend! + + But thou, should the answer ring Ay, + Hast warrant of seed for thy word: + The musical God is nigh + To inspirit and temper, tune it, and steer + Through the shoals: is it worthy of Song, + There are souls all woman to hear, + Woman to bear and renew. + For he is the Master of Measure, and weighs, + Broad as the arms of his blue, + Fine as the web of his rays, + Justice, whose voice is a melody clear, + The one sure life for the numbered long, + From him are the brutal and vain, + The vile, the excessive, out-thrust: + He points to the God on the upmost throne: + He is the saver of grain, + The sifter of spirit from dust. + He, Harmony, tells how to Measure pertain + The virilities: Measure alone + Has votaries rich in the male: + Fathers embracing no cloud, + Sowing no harvestless main: + Alike by the flesh and the spirit endowed + To create, to perpetuate; woo, win, wed; + Send progeny streaming, have earth for their own, + Over-run the insensates, disperse with a puff + Simulacra, though solid they sail, + And seem such imperial stuff: + Yes, the living divide off the dead. + + Then thou with thy furies outgrown, + Not as Cybele’s beast will thy head lash tail + So præter-determinedly thermonous, + Nor thy cause be an Attis far fled. + Thou under stress of the strife + Shalt hear for sustainment supreme + The cry of the conscience of Life: + _Keep the young generations in hail_, + _And bequeath them no tumbled house_! + + There hast thou the sacred theme, + Therein the inveterate spur, + Of the Innermost. See her one blink + In vision past eyeballs. Not thee + She cares for, but us. Follow her. + Follow her, and thou wilt not sink. + With thy soul the Life espouse: + This Life of the visible, audible, ring + With thy love tight about; and no death will be; + The name be an empty thing, + And woe a forgotten old trick: + And battle will come as a challenge to drink; + As a warrior’s wound each transient sting. + She leads to the Uppermost link by link; + Exacts but vision, desires not vows. + Above us the singular number to see; + The plural warm round us; ourself in the thick, + A dot or a stop: that is our task; + Her lesson in figured arithmetic, + For the letters of Life behind its mask; + Her flower-like look under fearful brows. + + As for thy special case, O my friend, one must think + Massilia’s victim, who held the carouse + For the length of a carnival year, + Knew worse: but the wretch had his opening choice. + For thee, by our law, no alternatives were: + Thy fall was assured ere thou camest to a voice. + He cancelled the ravaging Plague, + With the roll of his fat off the cliff. + Do thou with thy lean as the weapon of ink, + Though they call thee an angler who fishes the vague + And catches the not too pink, + Attack one as murderous, knowing thy cause + Is the cause of community. Iterate, + Iterate, iterate, harp on the trite: + Our preacher to win is the supple in stiff: + Yet always in measure, with bearing polite: + The manner of one that would expiate + His share in grandmotherly Laws, + Which do the dark thing to destroy, + Under aspect of water so guilelessly white + For the general use, by the devils befouled. + + Enough, poor prodigal boy! + Thou hast listened with patience; another had howled. + Repentance is proved, forgiveness is earned. + And ’tis bony: denied thee thy succulent half + Of the parable’s blessing, to swineherd returned: + A Sermon thy slice of the Scriptural calf! + By my faith, there is feasting to come, + Not the less, when our Earth we have seen + Beneath and on surface, her deeds and designs: + Who gives us the man-loving Nazarene, + The martyrs, the poets, the corn and the vines. + By my faith in the head, she has wonders in loom; + Revelations, delights. I can hear a faint crow + Of the cock of fresh mornings, far, far, yet distinct; + As down the new shafting of mines, + A cry of the metally gnome. + When our Earth we have seen, and have linked + With the home of the Spirit to whom we unfold, + Imprisoned humanity open will throw + Its fortress gates, and the rivers of gold + For the congregate friendliness flow. + Then the meaning of Earth in her children behold: + Glad eyes, frank hands, and a fellowship real: + And laughter on lips, as the birds’ outburst + At the flooding of light. No robbery then + The feast, nor a robber’s abode the home, + For a furnished model of our first den! + Nor Life as a stationed wheel; + Nor History written in blood or in foam, + For vendetta of Parties in cursing accursed. + The God in the conscience of multitudes feel, + And we feel deep to Earth at her heart, + We have her communion with men, + New ground, new skies for appeal. + Yield into harness thy best and thy worst; + Away on the trot of thy servitude start, + Through the rigours and joys and sustainments of air. + If courage should falter, ’tis wholesome to kneel. + Remember that well, for the secret with some, + Who pray for no gift, but have cleansing in prayer, + And free from impurities tower-like stand. + I promise not more, save that feasting will come + To a mind and a body no longer inversed: + The sense of large charity over the land, + Earth’s wheaten of wisdom dispensed in the rough, + And a bell ringing thanks for a sustenance meal + Through the active machine: lean fare, + But it carries a sparkle! And now enough, + And part we as comrades part, + To meet again never or some day or soon. + + Our season of drought is reminder rude:— + No later than yesternoon, + I looked on the horse of a cart, + By the wayside water-trough. + How at every draught of his bride of thirst + His nostrils widened! The sight was good: + Food for us, food, such as first + Drew our thoughts to earth’s lowly for food. + + + + +TO THE COMIC SPIRIT + + + SWORD of Common Sense!— + Our surest gift: the sacred chain + Of man to man: firm earth for trust + In structures vowed to permanence:— + Thou guardian issue of the harvest brain! + Implacable perforce of just; + With that good treasure in defence, + Which is our gold crushed out of joy and pain + Since first men planted foot and hand was king: + Bright, nimble of the marrow-nerve + To wield thy double edge, retort + Or hold the deadlier reserve, + And through thy victim’s weapon sting: + Thine is the service, thine the sport + This shifty heart of ours to hunt + Across its webs and round the many a ring + Where fox it is, or snake, or mingled seeds + Occasion heats to shape, or the poor smoke + Struck from a puff-ball, or the troughster’s grunt;— + Once lion of our desert’s trodden weeds; + And but for thy straight finger at the yoke, + Again to be the lordly paw, + Naming his appetites his needs, + Behind a decorative cloak: + Thou, of the highest, the unwritten Law + We read upon that building’s architrave + In the mind’s firmament, by men upraised + With sweat of blood when they had quitted cave + For fellowship, and rearward looked amazed, + Where the prime motive gapes a lurid jaw, + Thou, soul of wakened heads, art armed to warn, + Restrain, lest we backslide on whence we sprang, + Scarce better than our dwarf beginning shoot, + Of every gathered pearl and blossom shorn; + Through thee, in novel wiles to win disguise, + Seen are the pits of the disruptor, seen + His rebel agitation at our root: + Thou hast him out of hawking eyes; + Nor ever morning of the clang + Young Echo sped on hill from horn + In forest blown when scent was keen + Off earthy dews besprinkling blades + Of covert grass more merrily rang + The yelp of chase down alleys green, + Forth of the headlong-pouring glades, + Over the dappled fallows wild away, + Than thy fine unaccented scorn + At sight of man’s old secret brute, + Devout for pasture on his prey, + Advancing, yawning to devour; + With step of deer, with voice of flute, + Haply with visage of the lily flower. + + Let the cock crow and ruddy morn + His handmaiden appear! Youth claims his hour. + The generously ludicrous + Espouses it. But see we sons of day, + Off whom Life leans for guidance in our fight, + Accept the throb for lord of us; + For lord, for the main central light + That gives direction, not the eclipse; + Or dost thou look where niggard Age, + Demanding reverence for wrinkles, whips + A tumbled top to grind a wolf’s worn tooth;— + Hoar despot on our final stage, + In dotage of a stunted Youth;— + Or it may be some venerable sage, + Not having thee awake in him, compact + Of wisdom else, the breast’s old tempter trips; + Or see we ceremonial state, + Robing the gilded beast, exact + Abjection, while the crackskull name of Fate + Is used to stamp and hallow printed fact; + A cruel corner lengthens up thy lips; + These are thy game wherever men engage: + These and, majestic in a borrowed shape, + The major and the minor potentate, + Creative of their various ape;— + The tiptoe mortals triumphing to write + Upon a perishable page + An inch above their fellows’ height;— + The criers of foregone wisdom, who impose + Its slough on live conditions, much for the greed + Of our first hungry figure wide agape;— + Call up thy hounds of laughter to their run. + These, that would have men still of men be foes, + Eternal fox to prowl and pike to feed; + Would keep our life the whirly pool + Of turbid stuff dishonouring History; + The herd the drover’s herd, the fool the fool, + Ourself our slavish self’s infernal sun: + These are the children of the heart untaught + By thy quick founts to beat abroad, by thee + Untamed to tone its passions under thought, + The rich humaneness reading in thy fun. + Of them a world of coltish heels for school + We have; a world with driving wrecks bestrewn. + + ’Tis written of the Gods of human mould, + Those Nectar Gods, of glorious stature hewn + To quicken hymns, that they did hear, incensed, + Satiric comments overbold, + From one whose part was by decree + The jester’s; but they boiled to feel him bite. + Better for them had they with Reason fenced + Or smiled corrected! They in the great Gods’ might + Their prober crushed, as fingers flea. + Crumbled Olympus when the sovereign sire + His fatal kick to Momus gave, albeit + Men could behold the sacred Mount aspire, + The Satirist pass by on limping feet. + Those Gods who saw the ejected laugh alight + Below had then their last of airy glee; + They in the cup sought Laughter’s drownèd sprite, + Fed to dire fatness off uncurbed conceit. + Eyes under saw them waddle on their Mount, + And drew them down; to flattest earth they rolled. + This know we veritable. O Sage of Mirth! + Can it be true, the story men recount + Of the fall’n plight of the great Gods on earth? + How they being deathless, though of human mould, + With human cravings, undecaying frames, + Must labour for subsistence; are a band + Whom a loose-cheeked, wide-lipped gay cripple leads + At haunts of holiday on summer sand: + And lightly he will hint to one that heeds + Names in pained designation of them, names + Ensphered on blue skies and on black, which twirl + Our hearing madly from our seeing dazed, + Add Bacchus unto both; and he entreats + (His baby dimples in maternal chaps + Running wild labyrinths of line and curl) + Compassion for his masterful Trombone, + Whose thunder is the brass of how he blazed + Of old: for him of the mountain-muscle feats, + Who guts a drum to fetch a snappish groan: + For his fierce bugler horning onset, whom + A truncheon-battered helmet caps . . . + The creature is of earnest mien + To plead a sorrow darker than the tomb. + His Harp and Triangle, in tone subdued, + He names; they are a rayless red and white; + The dawn-hued libertine, the gibbous prude. + And, if we recognize his Tambourine, + He asks; exhausted names her: she has become + A globe in cupolas; the blowziest queen + Of overflowing dome on dome; + Redundancy contending with the tight, + Leaping the dam! He fondly calls, his girl, + The buxom tripper with the goblet-smile, + Refreshful. O but now his brows are dun, + Bunched are his lips, as when distilling guile, + To drop his venomous: the Dame of dames, + Flower of the world, that honey one, + She of the earthly rose in the sea-pearl, + To whom the world ran ocean for her kiss; + He names her, as a worshipper he names, + And indicates with a contemptuous thumb. + The lady meanwhile lures the mob, alike + Ogles the bursters of the horn and drum. + Curtain her close! her open arms + Have suckers for beholders: she to this? + For that she could not, save in fury, hear + A sharp corrective utterance flick + Her idle manners, for the laugh to strike + Beauty so breeding beauty, without peer + Above the snows, among the flowers? She reaps + This mouldy garner of the fatal kick? + Gross with the sacrifice of Circe-swarms, + Astarte of vile sweets that slay, malign, + From Greek resplendent to Phoenician foul, + The trader in attractions sinks, all brine + To thoughts of taste; is ’t love?—bark, dog! hoot, owl! + And she is blushless: ancient worship weeps. + Suicide Graces dangle down the charms + Sprawling like gourds on outer garden-heaps. + She stands in her unholy oily leer + A statue losing feature, weather-sick + Mid draggled creepers of twined ivy sere. + The curtain cried for magnifies to see!— + We cannot quench our one corrupting glance: + The vision of the rumour will not flee. + Doth the Boy own such Mother?—shoot his dart + To bring her, countless as the crested deeps, + Her subjects of the uncorrected heart? + False is that vision, shrieks the devotee; + Incredible, we echo; and anew + Like a far growling lightning-cloud it leaps. + Low humourist this leader seems; perchance + Pitched from his University career, + Adept at classic fooling. Yet of mould + Human those Gods were: deathless too: + On high they not as meditatives paced: + Prodigiously they did the deeds of flesh: + Descending, they would touch the lowest here: + And she, that lighted form of blue and gold, + Whom the seas gave, all earth, all earth embraced; + Exulting in the great hauls of her mesh; + Desired and hated, desperately dear; + Most human of them was. No more pursue! + Enough that the black story can be told. + It preaches to the eminently placed: + For whom disastrous wreckage is nigh due, + Paints omen. Truly they our throbber had; + The passions plumping, passions playing leech, + Cunning to trick us for the day’s good cheer. + Our uncorrected human heart will swell + To notions monstrous, doings mad + As billows on a foam-lashed beach; + Borne on the tides of alternating heats, + Will drug the brain, will doom the soul as well; + Call the closed mouth of that harsh final Power + To speak in judgement: Nemesis, the fell: + Of those bright Gods assembled, offspring sour; + The last surviving on the upper seats; + As with men Reason when their hearts rebel. + + Ah, what a fruitless breeder is this heart, + Full of the mingled seeds, each eating each. + Not wiser of our mark than at the start, + It surges like the wrath-faced father Sea + To countering winds; a force blind-eyed, + On endless rounds of aimless reach; + Emotion for the source of pride, + The grounds of faith in fixity + Above our flesh; its cravings urging speech, + Inspiring prayer; by turns a lump + Swung on a time-piece, and by turns + A quivering energy to jump + For seats angelical: it shrinks, it yearns, + Loves, loathes; is flame or cinders; lastly cloud + Capping a sullen crater: and mankind + We see cloud-capped, an army of the dark, + Because of thy straight leadership declined; + At heels of this or that delusive spark: + Now when the multitudinous races press + Elbow to elbow hourly more, + A thickened host; when now we hear aloud + Life for the very life implore + A signal of a visioned mark; + Light of the mind, the mind’s discourse, + The rational in graciousness, + Thee by acknowledgement enthroned, + To tame and lead that blind-eyed force + In harmony of harness with the crowd, + For payment of their dues; as yet disowned, + Save where some dutiful lone creature, vowed + To holy work, deems it the heart’s intent; + Or where a silken circle views it cowled, + The seeming figure of concordance, bent + On satiating tyrant lust + Or barren fits of sentiment. + + Thou wilt not have our paths befouled + By simulation; are we vile to view, + The heavens shall see us clean of our own dust, + Beneath thy breezy flitting wing: + They make their mirror upon faces true; + And where they win reflection, lucid heave + The under tides of this hot heart seen through. + Beneficently wilt thou clip + All oversteppings of the plumed, + The puffed, and bid the masker strip, + And into the crowned windbag thrust, + Tearing the mortal from the vital thing, + A lightning o’er the half-illumed, + Who to base brute-dominion cleave, + Yet mark effects, and shun the flash, + Till their drowsed wits a beam conceive, + To spy a wound without a gash, + The magic in a turn of wrist, + And how are wedded heart and head regaled + When Wit o’er Folly blows the mort, + And their high note of union spreads + Wide from the timely word with conquest charged; + Victorious laughter, of no loud report, + If heard; derision as divinely veiled + As terrible Immortals in rose-mist, + Given to the vision of arrested men: + Whereat they feel within them weave + Community its closer threads, + And are to our fraternal state enlarged; + Like warm fresh blood is their enlivened ken: + They learn that thou art not of alien sort, + Speaking the tongue by vipers hissed, + Or of the frosty heights unsealed, + Or of the vain who simple speech distort, + Or of the vapours pointing on to nought + Along cold skies; though sharp and high thy pitch; + As when sole homeward the belated treads, + And hears aloft a clamour wailed, + That once had seemed the broomstick witch + Horridly violating cloud for drought: + He, from the rub of minds dispersing fears, + Hears migrants marshalling their midnight train; + Homeliest order in black sky appears, + Not less than in the lighted village steads. + So do those half-illumed wax clear to share + A cry that is our common voice; the note + Of fellowship upon a loftier plane, + Above embattled castle-wall and moat; + And toning drops as from pure heaven it sheds. + So thou for washing a phantasmal air, + For thy sweet singing keynote of the wise, + Laughter—the joy of Reason seeing fade + Obstruction into Earth’s renewing beds, + Beneath the stroke of her good servant’s blade— + Thenceforth art as their earth-star hailed; + Gain of the years, conjunction’s prize. + The greater heart in thy appeal to heads + They see, thou Captain of our civil Fort! + By more elusive savages assailed + On each ascending stage; untired + Both inner foe and outer to cut short, + And blow to chaff pretenders void of grist: + Showing old tiger’s claws, old crocodile’s + Yard-grin of eager grinders, slim to sight, + Like forms in running water, oft when smiles, + When pearly tears, when fluent lips delight: + But never with the slayer’s malice fired: + As little as informs an infant’s fist + Clenched at the sneeze! Thou wouldst but have us be + Good sons of mother soil, whereby to grow + Branching on fairer skies, one stately tree; + Broad of the tilth for flowering at the Court: + Which is the tree bound fast to wave its tress; + Of strength controlled sheer beauty to bestow. + Ambrosial heights of possible acquist, + Where souls of men with soul of man consort, + And all look higher to new loveliness + Begotten of the look: thy mark is there; + While on our temporal ground alive, + Rightly though fearfully thou wieldest sword + Of finer temper now a numbered learn + That they resisting thee themselves resist; + And not thy bigger joy to smite and drive, + Prompt the dense herd to butt, and set the snare + Witching them into pitfalls for hoarse shouts. + More now, and hourly more, and of the Lord + Thou lead’st to, doth this rebel heart discern, + When pinched ascetic and red sensualist + Alternately recurrent freeze or burn, + And of its old religions it has doubts. + It fears thee less when thou hast shown it bare; + Less hates, part understands, nor much resents, + When the prized objects it has raised for prayer, + For fitful prayer;—repentance dreading fire, + Impelled by aches; the blindness which repents + Like the poor trampled worm that writhes in mire;— + Are sounded by thee, and thou darest probe + Old institutions and establishments, + Once fortresses against the floods of sin, + For what their worth; and questioningly prod + For why they stand upon a racing globe, + Impeding blocks, less useful than the clod; + Their angel out of them, a demon in. + + This half-enlightened heart, still doomed to fret, + To hurl at vanities, to drift in shame + Of gain or loss, bewailing the sure rod, + Shall of predestination wed thee yet. + Something it gathers of what things should drop + At entrance on new times; of how thrice broad + The world of minds communicative; how + A straggling Nature classed in school, and scored + With stripes admonishing, may yield to plough + Fruitfullest furrows, nor for waxing tame + Be feeble on an Earth whose gentler crop + Is its most living, in the mind that steers, + By Reason led, her way of tree and flame, + Beyond the genuflexions and the tears; + Upon an Earth that cannot stop, + Where upward is the visible aim, + And ever we espy the greater God, + For simple pointing at a good adored: + Proof of the closer neighbourhood. Head on, + Sword of the many, light of the few! untwist + Or cut our tangles till fair space is won + Beyond a briared wood of austere brow, + Believed of discord by thy timely word + At intervals refreshing life: for thou + Art verify Keeper of the Muse’s Key; + Thyself no vacant melodist; + On lower land elective even as she; + Holding, as she, all dissonance abhorred; + Advising to her measured steps in flow; + And teaching how for being subjected free + Past thought of freedom we may come to know + The music of the meaning of Accord. + + + + +YOUTH IN MEMORY + + + DAYS, when the ball of our vision + Had eagles that flew unabashed to sun; + When the grasp on the bow was decision, + And arrow and hand and eye were one; + When the Pleasures, like waves to a swimmer, + Came heaving for rapture ahead!— + Invoke them, they dwindle, they glimmer + As lights over mounds of the dead. + + Behold the winged Olympus, off the mead, + With thunder of wide pinions, lightning speed, + Wafting the shepherd-boy through ether clear, + To bear the golden nectar-cup. + So flies desire at view of its delight, + When the young heart is tiptoe perched on sight. + We meanwhile who in hues of the sick year + The Spring-time paint to prick us for our lost, + Mount but the fatal half way up— + Whereon shut eyes! This is decreed, + For Age that would to youthful heavens ascend, + By passion for the arms’ possession tossed, + It falls the way of sighs and hath their end; + A spark gone out to more sepulchral night. + Good if the arrowy eagle of the height + Be then the little bird that hops to feed. + + Lame falls the cry to kindle days + Of radiant orb and daring gaze. + It does but clank our mortal chain. + For Earth reads through her felon old + The many-numbered of her fold, + Who forward tottering backward strain, + And would be thieves of treasure spent, + With their grey season soured. + She could write out their history in their thirst + To have again the much devoured, + And be the bud at burst; + In honey fancy join the flow, + Where Youth swims on as once they went, + All choiric for spontaneous glee + Of active eager lungs and thews; + They now bared roots beside the river bent; + Whose privilege themselves to see; + Their place in yonder tideway know; + The current glass peruse; + The depths intently sound; + And sapped by each returning flood + Accept for monitory nourishment + Those worn roped features under crust of mud, + Reflected in the silvery smooth around: + Not less the branching and high singing tree, + A home of nests, a landmark and a tent, + Until their hour for losing hold on ground. + Even such good harvest of the things that flee + Earth offers her subjected, and they choose + Rather of Bacchic Youth one beam to drink, + And warm slow marrow with the sensual wink. + So block they at her source the Mother of the Muse. + + Who cheerfully the little bird becomes, + Without a fall, and pipes for peck at crumbs, + May have her dolings to the lightest touch; + As where some cripple muses by his crutch, + Unwitting that the spirit in him sings: + ‘When I had legs, then had I wings, + As good as any born of eggs, + To feed on all aërial things, + When I had legs!’ + And if not to embrace he sighs, + She gives him breath of Youth awhile, + Perspective of a breezy mile, + Companionable hedgeways, lifting skies; + Scenes where his nested dreams upon their hoard + Brooded, or up to empyrean soared: + Enough to link him with a dotted line. + But cravings for an eagle’s flight, + To top white peaks and serve wild wine + Among the rosy undecayed, + Bring only flash of shade + From her full throbbing breast of day in night. + By what they crave are they betrayed: + And cavernous is that young dragon’s jaw, + Crimson for all the fiery reptile saw + In time now coveted, for teeth to flay, + Once more consume, were Life recurrent May. + They to their moment of drawn breath, + Which is the life that makes the death, + The death that makes ethereal life would bind: + The death that breeds the spectre do they find. + Darkness is wedded and the waste regrets + Beating as dead leaves on a fitful gust, + By souls no longer dowered to climb + Beneath their pack of dust, + Whom envy of a lustrous prime, + Eclipsed while yet invoked, besets, + And dooms to sink and water sable flowers, + That never gladdened eye or loaded bee. + Strain we the arms for Memory’s hours, + We are the seized Persephone. + Responsive never to the soft desire + For one prized tune is this our chord of life. + ’Tis clipped to deadness with a wanton knife, + In wishes that for ecstasies aspire. + Yet have we glad companionship of Youth, + Elysian meadows for the mind, + Dare we to face deeds done, and in our tomb + Filled with the parti-coloured bloom + Of loved and hated, grasp all human truth + Sowed by us down the mazy paths behind. + To feel that heaven must we that hell sound through: + Whence comes a line of continuity, + That brings our middle station into view, + Between those poles; a novel Earth we see, + In likeness of us, made of banned and blest; + The sower’s bed, but not the reaper’s rest: + An Earth alive with meanings, wherein meet + Buried, and breathing, and to be. + Then of the junction of the three, + Even as a heart in brain, full sweet + May sense of soul, the sum of music, beat. + + Only the soul can walk the dusty track + Where hangs our flowering under vapours black, + And bear to see how these pervade, obscure, + Quench recollection of a spacious pure. + They take phantasmal forms, divide, convolve, + Hard at each other point and gape, + Horrible ghosts! in agony dissolve, + To reappear with one they drape + For criminal, and, Father! shrieking name, + Who such distorted issue did beget. + Accept them, them and him, though hiss thy sweat + Off brow on breast, whose furnace flame + Has eaten, and old Self consumes. + Out of the purification will they leap, + Thee renovating while new light illumes + The dusky web of evil, known as pain, + That heavily up healthward mounts the steep; + Our fleshly road to beacon-fire of brain: + Midway the tameless oceanic brute + Below, whose heave is topped with foam for fruit, + And the fair heaven reflecting inner peace + On righteous warfare, that asks not to cease. + + Forth of such passage through black fire we win + Clear hearing of the simple lute, + Whereon, and not on other, Memory plays + For them who can in quietness receive + Her restorative airs: a ditty thin + As note of hedgerow bird in ear of eve, + Or wave at ebb, the shallow catching rays + On a transparent sheet, where curves a glass + To truer heavens than when the breaker neighs + Loud at the plunge for bubbly wreck in roar. + Solidity and bulk and martial brass, + Once tyrants of the senses, faintly score + A mark on pebbled sand or fluid slime, + While present in the spirit, vital there, + Are things that seemed the phantoms of their time; + Eternal as the recurrent cloud, as air + Imperative, refreshful as dawn-dew. + Some evanescent hand on vapour scrawled + Historic of the soul, and heats anew + Its coloured lines where deeds of flesh stand bald. + True of the man, and of mankind ’tis true, + Did we stout battle with the Shade, Despair, + Our cowardice, it blooms; or haply warred + Against the primal beast in us, and flung; + Or cleaving mists of Sorrow, left it starred + Above self-pity slain: or it was Prayer + First taken for Life’s cleanser; or the tongue + Spake for the world against this heart; or rings + Old laughter, from the founts of wisdom sprung; + Or clap of wing of joy, that was a throb + From breast of Earth, and did no creature rob: + These quickening live. But deepest at her springs, + Most filial, is an eye to love her young. + And had we it, to see with it, alive + Is our lost garden, flower, bird and hive. + Blood of her blood, aim of her aim, are then + The green-robed and grey-crested sons of men: + She tributary to her aged restores + The living in the dead; she will inspire + Faith homelier than on the Yonder shores, + Abhorring these as mire, + Uncertain steps, in dimness gropes, + With mortal tremours pricking hopes, + And, by the final Bacchic of the lusts + Propelled, the Bacchic of the spirit trusts: + A fervour drunk from mystic hierophants; + Not utterly misled, though blindly led, + Led round fermenting eddies. Faith she plants + In her own firmness as our midway road: + Which rightly Youth has read, though blindly read; + Her essence reading in her toothsome goad; + Spur of bright dreams experience disenchants. + But love we well the young, her road midway + The darknesses runs consecrated clay. + Despite our feeble hold on this green home, + And the vast outer strangeness void of dome, + Shall we be with them, of them, taught to feel, + Up to the moment of our prostrate fall, + The life they deem voluptuously real + Is more than empty echo of a call, + Or shadow of a shade, or swing of tides; + As brooding upon age, when veins congeal, + Grey palsy nods to think. With us for guides, + Another step above the animal, + To views in Alpine thought are they helped on. + Good if so far we live in them when gone! + + And there the arrowy eagle of the height + Becomes the little bird that hops to feed, + Glad of a crumb, for tempered appetite + To make it wholesome blood and fruitful seed. + Then Memory strikes on no slack string, + Nor sectional will varied Life appear: + Perforce of soul discerned in mind, we hear + Earth with her Onward chime, with Winter Spring. + And ours the mellow note, while sharing joys + No more subjecting mortals who have learnt + To build for happiness on equipoise, + The Pleasures read in sparks of substance burnt; + Know in our seasons an integral wheel, + That rolls us to a mark may yet be willed. + This, the truistic rubbish under heel + Of all the world, we peck at and are filled. + + + + +PENETRATION AND TRUST + + +I + + + SLEEK as a lizard at round of a stone, + The look of her heart slipped out and in. + Sweet on her lord her soft eyes shone, + As innocents clear of a shade of sin. + + + +II + + + He laid a finger under her chin, + His arm for her girdle at waist was thrown: + Now, what will happen and who will win, + With me in the fight and my lady lone? + + + +III + + + He clasped her, clasping a shape of stone; + Was fire on her eyes till they let him in. + Her breast to a God of the daybeams shone, + And never a corner for serpent sin. + + + +IV + + + Tranced she stood, with a chattering chin; + Her shrunken form at his feet was thrown: + At home to the death my lord shall win, + When it is no tyrant who leaves me lone! + + + + +NIGHT OF FROST IN MAY + + + WITH splendour of a silver day, + A frosted night had opened May: + And on that plumed and armoured night, + As one close temple hove our wood, + Its border leafage virgin white. + Remote down air an owl hallooed. + The black twig dropped without a twirl; + The bud in jewelled grasp was nipped; + The brown leaf cracked a scorching curl; + A crystal off the green leaf slipped. + Across the tracks of rimy tan, + Some busy thread at whiles would shoot; + A limping minnow-rillet ran, + To hang upon an icy foot. + + In this shrill hush of quietude, + The ear conceived a severing cry. + Almost it let the sound elude, + When chuckles three, a warble shy, + From hazels of the garden came, + Near by the crimson-windowed farm. + They laid the trance on breath and frame, + A prelude of the passion-charm. + + Then soon was heard, not sooner heard + Than answered, doubled, trebled, more, + Voice of an Eden in the bird + Renewing with his pipe of four + The sob: a troubled Eden, rich + In throb of heart: unnumbered throats + Flung upward at a fountain’s pitch, + The fervour of the four long notes, + That on the fountain’s pool subside, + Exult and ruffle and upspring: + Endless the crossing multiplied + Of silver and of golden string. + There chimed a bubbled underbrew + With witch-wild spray of vocal dew. + + It seemed a single harper swept + Our wild wood’s inner chords and waked + A spirit that for yearning ached + Ere men desired and joyed or wept. + Or now a legion ravishing + Musician rivals did unite + In love of sweetness high to sing + The subtle song that rivals light; + From breast of earth to breast of sky: + And they were secret, they were nigh: + A hand the magic might disperse; + The magic swung my universe. + + Yet sharpened breath forbade to dream, + Where all was visionary gleam; + Where Seasons, as with cymbals, clashed; + And feelings, passing joy and woe, + Churned, gurgled, spouted, interflashed, + Nor either was the one we know: + Nor pregnant of the heart contained + In us were they, that griefless plained, + That plaining soared; and through the heart + Struck to one note the wide apart:— + A passion surgent from despair; + A paining bliss in fervid cold; + Off the last vital edge of air, + Leap heavenward of the lofty-souled, + For rapture of a wine of tears; + As had a star among the spheres + Caught up our earth to some mid-height + Of double life to ear and sight, + She giving voice to thought that shines + Keen-brilliant of her deepest mines; + While steely drips the rillet clinked, + And hoar with crust the cowslip swelled. + + Then was the lyre of earth beheld, + Then heard by me: it holds me linked; + Across the years to dead-ebb shores + I stand on, my blood-thrill restores. + But would I conjure into me + Those issue notes, I must review + What serious breath the woodland drew; + The low throb of expectancy; + How the white mother-muteness pressed + On leaf and meadow-herb; how shook, + Nigh speech of mouth, the sparkle-crest + Seen spinning on the bracken-crook. + + + + +THE TEACHING OF THE NUDE + + +I + + + A SATYR spied a Goddess in her bath, + Unseen of her attendant nymphs; none knew. + Forthwith the creature to his fellows drew, + And looking backward on the curtained path, + He strove to tell; he could but heave a breast + Too full, and point to mouth, with failing leers: + Vainly he danced for speech, he giggled tears, + Made as if torn in two, as if tight pressed, + As if cast prone; then fetching whimpered tunes + For words, flung heel and set his hairy flight + Through forest-hollows, over rocky height. + The green leaves buried him three rounds of moons. + A senatorial Satyr named what herb + Had hurried him outrunning reason’s curb. + + + +II + + + ’Tis told how when that hieaway unchecked + To dell returned, he seemed of tempered mood: + Even as the valley of the torrent rude, + The torrent now a brook, the valley wrecked. + In him, to hale him high or hurl aheap, + Goddess and Goatfoot hourly wrestled sore; + Hourly the immortal prevailing more: + Till one hot noon saw Meliboeus peep + From thicket-sprays to where his full-blown dame, + In circle by the lusty friskers gripped, + Laughed the showered rose-leaves while her limbs were stripped. + She beckoned to our Satyr, and he came. + Then twirled she mounds of ripeness, wreath of arms. + His hoof kicked up the clothing for such charms. + + + + +BREATH OF THE BRIAR + + +I + + + O BRIAR-SCENTS, on yon wet wing + Of warm South-west wind brushing by, + You mind me of the sweetest thing + That ever mingled frank and shy: + When she and I, by love enticed, + Beneath the orchard-apples met, + In equal halves a ripe one sliced, + And smelt the juices ere we ate. + + + +II + + + That apple of the briar-scent, + Among our lost in Britain now, + Was green of rind, and redolent + Of sweetness as a milking cow. + The briar gives it back, well nigh + The damsel with her teeth on it; + Her twinkle between frank and shy, + My thirst to bite where she had bit. + + + + +EMPEDOCLES + + +I + + + HE leaped. With none to hinder, + Of Aetna’s fiery scoriae + In the next vomit-shower, made he + A more peculiar cinder. + And this great Doctor, can it be, + He left no saner recipe + For men at issue with despair? + Admiring, even his poet owns, + While noting his fine lyric tones, + The last of him was heels in air! + + + +II + + + Comes Reverence, her features + Amazed to see high Wisdom hear, + With glimmer of a faunish leer, + One mock her pride of creatures. + Shall such sad incident degrade + A stature casting sunniest shade? + O Reverence! let Reason swim; + Each life its critic deed reveals; + And him reads Reason at his heels, + If heels in air the last of him! + + + + +ENGLAND BEFORE THE STORM + + +I + + + THE day that is the night of days, + With cannon-fire for sun ablaze + We spy from any billow’s lift; + And England still this tidal drift! + Would she to sainted forethought vow + A space before the thunders flood, + That martyr of its hour might now + Spare her the tears of blood. + + + +II + + + Asleep upon her ancient deeds, + She hugs the vision plethora breeds, + And counts her manifold increase + Of treasure in the fruits of peace. + What curse on earth’s improvident, + When the dread trumpet shatters rest, + Is wreaked, she knows, yet smiles content + As cradle rocked from breast. + + + +III + + + She, impious to the Lord of Hosts, + The valour of her offspring boasts, + Mindless that now on land and main + His heeded prayer is active brain. + No more great heart may guard the home, + Save eyed and armed and skilled to cleave + Yon swallower wave with shroud of foam, + We see not distant heave. + + + +IV + + + They stand to be her sacrifice, + The sons this mother flings like dice, + To face the odds and brave the Fates; + As in those days of starry dates, + When cannon cannon’s counterblast + Awakened, muzzle muzzle bowled, + And high in swathe of smoke the mast + Its fighting rag outrolled. + +1891. + + + + +TARDY SPRING + + + NOW the North wind ceases, + The warm South-west awakes; + Swift fly the fleeces, + Thick the blossom-flakes. + + Now hill to hill has made the stride, + And distance waves the without end: + Now in the breast a door flings wide; + Our farthest smiles, our next is friend. + And song of England’s rush of flowers + Is this full breeze with mellow stops, + That spins the lark for shine, for showers; + He drinks his hurried flight, and drops. + The stir in memory seem these things, + Which out of moistened turf and clay + Astrain for light push patient rings, + Or leap to find the waterway. + ’Tis equal to a wonder done, + Whatever simple lives renew + Their tricks beneath the father sun, + As though they caught a broken clue; + So hard was earth an eyewink back: + But now the common life has come, + The blotting cloud a dappled pack, + The grasses one vast underhum. + A City clothed in snow and soot, + With lamps for day in ghostly rows, + Breaks to the scene of hosts afoot, + The river that reflective flows: + And there did fog down crypts of street + Play spectre upon eye and mouth:— + Their faces are a glass to greet + This magic of the whirl for South. + A burly joy each creature swells + With sound of its own hungry quest; + Earth has to fill her empty wells, + And speed the service of the nest; + The phantom of the snow-wreath melt, + That haunts the farmer’s look abroad, + Who sees what tomb a white night built, + Where flocks now bleat and sprouts the clod. + For iron Winter held her firm; + Across her sky he laid his hand; + And bird he starved, he stiffened worm; + A sightless heaven, a shaven land. + Her shivering Spring feigned fast asleep, + The bitten buds dared not unfold: + We raced on roads and ice to keep + Thought of the girl we love from cold. + + But now the North wind ceases, + The warm South-west awakes, + The heavens are out in fleeces, + And earth’s green banner shakes. + + + + +THE LABOURER + + + FOR a Heracles in his fighting ire there is never the glory that + follows + When ashen he lies and the poets arise to sing of the work he has + done. + But to vision alive under shallows of sight, lo, the Labourer’s crown + is Apollo’s, + While stands he yet in his grime and sweat—to wrestle for fruits of + the Sun. + + Can an enemy wither his cheer? Not you, ye fair yellow-flowering + ladies, + Who join with your lords to jar the chords of a bosom heroic, and + clog. + ’Tis the faltering friend, an inanimate land, may drag a great soul to + their Hades, + And plunge him far from a beam of star till he hears the deep bay + of the Dog. + + Apparition is then of a monster-task, in a policy carving new + fashions: + The winninger course than the rule of force, and the springs lured + to run in a stream: + He would bend tough oak, he would stiffen the reed, point Reason to + swallow the passions, + Bid Britons awake two steps to take where one is a trouble extreme! + + Not the less is he nerved with the Labourer’s resolute hope: that by + him shall be written, + To honour his race, this deed of grace, for the weak from the + strong made just: + That her sons over seas in a rally of praise may behold a thrice + vitalised Britain, + Ashine with the light of the doing of right: at the gates of the + Future in trust. + + + + +FORESIGHT AND PATIENCE + + + SPRUNG of the father blood, the mother brain, + Are they who point our pathway and sustain. + They rarely meet; one soars, one walks retired. + When they do meet, it is our earth inspired. + + To see Life’s formless offspring and subdue + Desire of times unripe, we have these two, + Whose union is right reason: join they hands, + The world shall know itself and where it stands; + What cowering angel and what upright beast + Make man, behold, nor count the low the least, + Nor less the stars have round it than its flowers. + When these two meet, a point of time is ours. + + As in a land of waterfalls, that flow + Smooth for the leap on their great voice below, + Some eddies near the brink borne swift along + Will capture hearing with the liquid song, + So, while the headlong world’s imperious force + Resounded under, heard I these discourse. + + First words, where down my woodland walk she led, + To her blind sister Patience, Foresight said: + + —Your faith in me appals, to shake my own, + When still I find you in this mire alone. + + —The few steps taken at a funeral pace + By men had slain me but for those you trace. + + —Look I once back, a broken pinion I: + Black as the rebel angels rained from sky! + + —Needs must you drink of me while here you live, + And make me rich in feeling I can give. + + —A brave To-be is dawn upon my brow: + Yet must I read my sister for the How. + My daisy better knows her God of beams + Than doth an eagle that to mount him seems. + She hath the secret never fieriest reach + Of wing shall master till men hear her teach. + + —Liker the clod flaked by the driving plough, + My semblance when I have you not as now. + The quiet creatures who escape mishap + Bear likeness to pure growths of the green sap: + A picture of the settled peace desired + By cowards shunning strife or strivers tired. + I listen at their breasts: is there no jar + Of wrestlings and of stranglings, dead they are, + And such a picture as the piercing mind + Ranks beneath vegetation. Not resigned + Are my true pupils while the world is brute. + What edict of the stronger keeps me mute, + Stronger impels the motion of my heart. + I am not Resignation’s counterpart. + If that I teach, ’tis little the dry word, + Content, but how to savour hope deferred. + We come of earth, and rich of earth may be; + Soon carrion if very earth are we! + + The coursing veins, the constant breath, the use + Of sleep, declare that strife allows short truce; + Unless we clasp decay, accept defeat, + And pass despised; ‘a-cold for lack of heat,’ + Like other corpses, but without death’s plea. + + —My sister calls for battle; is it she? + + —Rather a world of pressing men in arms, + Than stagnant, where the sensual piper charms + Each drowsy malady and coiling vice + With dreams of ease whereof the soul pays price! + No home is here for peace while evil breeds, + While error governs, none; and must the seeds + You sow, you that for long have reaped disdain, + Lie barren at the doorway of the brain, + Let stout contention drive deep furrows, blood + Moisten, and make new channels of its flood! + + —My sober little maid, when we meet first, + Drinks of me ever with an eager thirst. + So can I not of her till circumstance + Drugs cravings. Here we see how men advance + A doubtful foot, but circle if much stirred, + Like dead weeds on whipped waters. Shout the word + Prompting their hungers, and they grandly march, + As to band-music under Victory’s arch. + Thus was it, and thus is it; save that then + The beauty of frank animals had men. + + —Observe them, and down rearward for a term, + Gaze to the primal twistings of the worm. + Thence look this way, across the fields that show + Men’s early form of speech for Yes and No. + + My sister a bruised infant’s utterance had; + And issuing stronger, to mankind ’twas mad. + I knew my home where I had choice to feel + The toad beneath a harrow or a heel. + + —Speak of this Age. + + —When you it shall discern + Bright as you are, to me the Age will turn. + + —For neither of us has it any care; + Its learning is through Science to despair. + + —Despair lies down and grovels, grapples not + With evil, casts the burden of its lot. + This Age climbs earth. + + —To challenge heaven. + + —Not less + The lower deeps. It laughs at Happiness! + That know I, though the echoes of it wail, + For one step upward on the crags you scale. + Brave is the Age wherein the word will rust, + Which means our soul asleep or body’s lust, + Until from warmth of many breasts, that beat + A temperate common music, sunlike heat + The happiness not predatory sheds! + + —But your fierce Yes and No of butting heads + Now rages to outdo a horny Past. + Shades of a wild Destroyer on the vast + Are thrown by every novel light upraised. + The world’s whole round smokes ominously, amazed + And trembling as its pregnant Aetna swells. + Combustibles on hot combustibles + Run piling, for one spark to roll in fire + The mountain-torrent of infernal ire + And leave the track of devils where men built. + Perceptive of a doom, the sinner’s guilt + Confesses in a cry for help shrill loud, + If drops the chillness of a passing cloud, + To conscience, reason, human love; in vain: + None save they but the souls which them contain. + No extramural God, the God within + Alone gives aid to city charged with sin. + A world that for the spur of fool and knave + Sweats in its laboratory what shall save? + But men who ply their wits in such a school + Must pray the mercy of the knave and fool. + + —Much have I studied hard Necessity! + To know her Wisdom’s mother, and that we + May deem the harshness of her later cries + In labour a sure goad to prick the wise, + If men among the warnings which convulse + Can gravely dread without the craven’s pulse. + Long ere the rising of this age of ours, + The knave and fool were stamped as monstrous Powers. + Of human lusts and lassitudes they spring, + And are as lasting as the parent thing. + Yet numbering locust hosts, bent they to drill, + They might o’ermatch and have mankind at will. + Behold such army gathering; ours the spur, + No scattered foe to face, but Lucifer. + Not fool or knave is now the enemy + O’ershadowing men, ’tis Folly, Knavery! + A sea; nor stays that sea the bastioned beach. + Now must the brother soul alive in each + His traitorous individual devildom + Hold subject lest the grand destruction come. + Dimly men see it menacing apace + To overthrow, perchance uproot, the race. + Within, without, they are a field of tares: + Fruitfuller for them when the contest squares, + And wherefore warrior service they must yield, + Shines visible as life on either field. + That is my comfort, following shock on shock, + Which sets faith quaking on their firmest rock. + Since with his weapons, all the arms of Night, + Frail men have challenged Lucifer to fight, + Have matched in hostile ranks, enrolled, erect, + The human and Satanic intellect, + Determined for their uses to control + What forces on the earth and under roll, + Their granite rock runs igneous; now they stand + Pledged to the heavens for safety of their land. + They cannot learn save grossly, gross that are: + Through fear they learn whose aid is good in war. + + —My sister, as I read them in my glass, + Their field of tares they take for pasture grass. + How waken them that have not any bent + Save browsing—the concrete indifferent! + Friend Lucifer supplies them solid stuff: + They fear not for the race when full the trough. + They have much fear of giving up the ghost; + And these are of mankind the unnumbered host. + + —If I could see with you, and did not faint + In beating wing, the future I would paint. + Those massed indifferents will learn to quake: + Now meanwhile is another mass awake, + Once denser than the grunters of the sty. + If I could see with you! Could I but fly! + + —The length of days that you with them have housed, + An outcast else, approves their cause espoused. + + —O true, they have a cause, and woe for us, + While still they have a cause too piteous! + Yet, happy for us when, their cause defined, + They walk no longer with a stumbler blind, + And quicken in the virtue of their cause, + To think me a poor mouther of old saws! + I wait the issue of a battling Age; + The toilers with your ‘troughsters’ now engage; + Instructing them, through their acutest sense, + How close the dangers of indifference! + Already have my people shown their worth, + More love they light, which folds the love of Earth. + That love to love of labour leads: thence love + Of humankind—earth’s incense flung above. + + —Admit some other features: Faithless, mean; + Encased in matter; vowed to Gods obscene; + Contemptuous of the impalpable, it swells + On Doubt; for pastime swallows miracles; + And if I bid it face what _I_ observe, + Declares me hoodwinked by my optic nerve! + + —Oft has your prophet, for reward of toil, + Seen nests of seeming cockatrices coil: + Disowned them as the unholiest of Time, + Which were his offspring, born of flame on slime. + Nor him, their sire, have known the filial fry: + As little as Time’s earliest knew the sky. + Perchance among them shoots a lustrous flame + At intervals, in proof of whom they came. + To strengthen our foundations is the task + Of this tough Age; not in your beams to bask, + Though, lighted by your beams, down mining caves + The rock it blasts, the hoarded foulness braves. + My sister sees no round beyond her mood; + To hawk this Age has dressed her head in hood. + Out of the course of ancient ruts and grooves, + It moves: O much for me to say it moves! + About his Æthiop Highlands Nile is Nile, + Though not the stream of the paternal smile: + And where his tide of nourishment he drives, + An Abyssinian wantonness revives. + Calm as his lotus-leaf to-day he swims; + He is the yellow crops, the rounded limbs, + The Past yet flowing, the fair time that fills; + Breath of all mouths and grist of many mills. + To-morrow, warning none with tempest-showers, + He is the vast Insensate who devours + His golden promise over leagues of seed, + Then sits in a smooth lake upon the deed. + The races which on barbarous force begin + Inherit onward of their origin, + And cancelled blessings will the current length + Reveal till they know need of shaping strength. + ’Tis not in men to recognize the need + Before they clash in hosts, in hosts they bleed. + Then may sharp suffering their nature grind; + Of rabble passions grow the chieftain Mind. + Yet mark where still broad Nile boasts thousands fed, + For tens up the safe mountains at his head. + Few would be fed, not far his course prolong, + Save for the troublous blood which makes him strong. + —That rings of truth! More do your people thrive; + Your Many are more merrily alive + Than erewhile when I gloried in the page + Of radiant singer and anointed sage. + Greece was my lamp: burnt out for lack of oil; + Rome, Python Rome, prey of its robber spoil! + All structures built upon a narrow space + Must fall, from having not your hosts for base. + O thrice must one be you, to see them shift + Along their desert flats, here dash, there drift; + With faith, that of privations and spilt blood, + Comes Reason armed to clear or bank the flood! + And thrice must one be you, to wait release + From duress in the swamp of their increase. + At which oppressive scene, beyond arrest, + A darkness not with stars of heaven dressed + Philosophers behold; desponding view + Your Many nourished, starved my brilliant few; + Then flinging heels, as charioteers the reins, + Dive down the fumy Ætna of their brains. + Belated vessels on a rising sea, + They seem: they pass! + + —But not Philosophy! + + —Ay, be we faithful to ourselves: despise + Nought but the coward in us! That way lies + The wisdom making passage through our slough. + Am I not heard, my head to Earth shall bow; + Like her, shall wait to see, and seeing wait. + Philosophy is Life’s one match for Fate. + That photosphere of our high fountain One, + Our spirit’s Lord and Reason’s fostering sun, + Philosophy, shall light us in the shade, + Warm in the frost, make Good our aim and aid. + Companioned by the sweetest, ay renewed, + Unconquerable, whose aim for aid is Good! + Advantage to the Many: that we name + God’s voice; have there the surety in our aim. + This thought unto my sister do I owe, + And irony and satire off me throw. + They crack a childish whip, drive puny herds, + Where numbers crave their sustenance in words. + Now let the perils thicken: clearer seen, + Your Chieftain Mind mounts over them serene. + Who never yet of scattered lamps was born + To speed a world, a marching world to warn, + But sunward from the vivid Many springs, + Counts conquest but a step, and through disaster sings. + + + + +THE WARNING + + + WE have seen mighty men ballooning high, + And in another moment bump the ground. + He falls; and in his measurement is found + To count some inches o’er the common fry. + ’Twas not enough to send him climbing sky, + Yet ’twas enough above his fellows crowned, + Had he less panted. Let his faithful hound + Bark at detractors. He may walk or lie. + Concerns it most ourselves, who with our gas— + This little Isle’s insatiable greed + For Continents—filled to inflation burst. + So do ripe nations into squalor pass, + When, driven as herds by their old private thirst, + They scorn the brain’s wild search for virtuous light. + + + + +OUTSIDE THE CROWD + + + TO sit on History in an easy chair, + Still rivalling the wild hordes by whom ’twas writ! + Sure, this beseems a race of laggard wit, + Unwarned by those plain letters scrawled on air. + If more than hands’ and armsful be our share, + Snatch we for substance we see vapours flit. + Have we not heard derision infinite + When old men play the youth to chase the snare? + Let us be belted athletes, matched for foes, + Or stand aloof, the great Benevolent, + The Lord of Lands no Robber-birds annex, + Where Justice holds the scales with pure intent; + Armed to support her sword;—lest we compose + That Chapter for the historic word on Wrecks. + + + + +TRAFALGAR DAY + + + HE leads: we hear our Seaman’s call + In the roll of battles won; + For he is Britain’s Admiral + Till setting of her sun. + + When Britain’s life was in her ships, + He kept the sea as his own right; + And saved us from more fell eclipse + Than drops on day from blackest night. + Again his battle spat the flame! + Again his victory flag men saw! + At sound of Nelson’s chieftain name, + A deeper breath did Freedom draw. + + Each trusty captain knew his part: + They served as men, not marshalled kine: + The pulses they of his great heart, + With heads to work his main design. + Their Nelson’s word, to beat the foe, + And spare the fall’n, before them shone. + Good was the hour of blow for blow, + And clear their course while they fought on. + + Behold the Envied vanward sweep!— + A day in mourning weeds adored! + Then Victory was wrought to weep; + Then sorrow crowned with laurel soared. + + A breezeless flag above a shroud + All Britain was when wind and wave, + To make her, passing human, proud, + Brought his last gift from o’er the grave! + + Uprose the soul of him a star + On that brave day of Ocean days: + It rolled the smoke from Trafalgár + To darken Austerlitz ablaze. + Are we the men of old, its light + Will point us under every sky + The path he took; and must we fight, + Our Nelson be our battle-cry! + + He leads: we hear our Seaman’s call + In the roll of battles won; + For he is Britain’s Admiral + Till setting of her sun. + + + + +ODES IN CONTRIBUTION TO THE SONG OF FRENCH HISTORY + + +THE REVOLUTION + + +I + + + NOT yet had History’s Aetna smoked the skies, + And low the Gallic Giantess lay enchained, + While overhead in ordered set and rise + Her kingly crowns immutably defiled; + Effulgent on funereal piled + Across the vacant heavens, and distrained + Her body, mutely, even as earth, to bear; + Despoiled the tomb of hope, her mouth of air. + + +II + + + Through marching scores of winters racked she lay, + Beneath a hoar-frost’s brilliant crust, + Whereon the jewelled flies that drained + Her breasts disported in a glistering spray; + She, the land’s fount of fruits, enclosed with dust; + By good and evil angels fed, sustained + In part to curse, in part to pray, + Sucking the dubious rumours, till men saw + The throbs of her charged heart before the Just, + So worn the harrowed surface had become: + And still they deemed the dance above was Law, + Amort all passion in a rebel dumb. + + +III + + + Then, on the unanticipated day, + Earth heaved, and rose a veinous mound + To roar of the underfloods; and off it sprang, + Ravishing as red wine in woman’s form, + A splendid Maenad, she of the delirious laugh, + Her body twisted flames with the smoke-cap crowned; + She of the Bacchic foot; the challenger to the fray, + Bewitchment for the embrace; who sang, who sang + Intoxication to her swarm, + Revolved them, hair, voice, feet, in her carmagnole, + As with a stroke she snapped the Royal staff, + Dealt the awaited blow on gilt decay + (O ripeness of the time! O Retribution sure, + If but our vital lamp illume us to endure!) + And, like a glad releasing of her soul, + Sent the word Liberty up to meet the midway blue, + Her bridegroom in descent to her; and they joined, + In the face of men they joined: attest it true, + The million witnesses, that she, + For ages lying beside the mole, + Was on the unanticipated miracle day + Upraised to midway heaven and, as to her goal, + Enfolded, ere the Immaculate knew + What Lucifer of the Mint had coined + His bride’s adulterate currency + Of burning love corrupt of an infuriate hate; + She worthy, she unworthy; that one day his mate: + His mate for that one day of the unwritten deed. + Read backward on the hoar-frost’s brilliant crust; + Beneath it read. + Athirst to kiss, athirst to slay, she stood, + A radiance fringed with grim affright; + For them that hungered, she was nourishing food, + For those who sparkled, Night. + Read in her heart, and how before the Just + Her doings, her misdoings, plead. + + +IV + + + Down on her leap for him the young Angelical broke + To husband a resurgent France: + From whom, with her dethroning stroke, + Dishonour passed; the dalliance, + That is occasion’s yea or nay, + In issues for the soul to pay, + Discarded; and the cleft ’twixt deed and word, + The sinuous lie which warbles the sweet bird, + Wherein we see old Darkness peer, + Cold Dissolution beck, she had flung hence; + And hence the talons and the beak of prey; + Hence all the lures to silken swine + Thronging the troughs of indolence; + With every sleek convolvement serpentine; + The pride in elfin arts to veil an evil leer, + And bid a goatfoot trip it like a fay. + He clasped in this revived, uprisen France, + A valorous dame, of countenance + The lightning’s upon cloud: unlit as yet + On brows and lips the lurid shine + Of seas in the night-wind’s whirl; unstirred + Her pouch of the centuries’ injuries compressed; + The shriek that tore the world as yet unheard: + Earth’s animate full flower she looked, intense + For worship, wholly given him, fair + Adoring or desiring; in her bright jet, + Earth’s crystal spring to sky: Earth’s warrior Best + To win Heaven’s Pure up that midway + We vision for new ground, where sense + And spirit are one for the further flight; breast-bare, + Bare-limbed; nor graceless gleamed her disarray + In scorn of the seductive insincere, + But martially nude for hot Bellona’s play, + And amorous of the loftiest in her view. + + +V + + + She sprang from dust to drink of earth’s cool dew, + The breath of swaying grasses share, + Mankind embrace, their weaklings rear, + At wrestle with the tyrannic strong; + Her forehead clear to her mate, virgin anew, + As immortals may be in the mortal sphere. + Read through her launching heart, who had lain long + With Earth and heard till it became her own + Our good Great Mother’s eve and matin song: + The humming burden of Earth’s toil to feed + Her creatures all, her task to speed their growth, + Her aim to lead them up her pathways, shown + Between the Pains and Pleasures; warned of both, + Of either aided on their hard ascent. + Now when she looked, with love’s benign delight + After great ecstasy, along the plains, + What foulest impregnation of her sight + Transformed the scene to multitudinous troops + Of human sketches, quaver-figures, bent, + As were they winter sedges, broken hoops, + Dry udder, vineless poles, worm-eaten posts, + With features like the flowers defaced by deluge rains? + Recked she that some perverting devil had limned + Earth’s proudest to spout scorn of the Maker’s hand, + Who could a day behold these deathly hosts, + And see, decked, graced, and delicately trimmed, + A ribanded and gemmed elected few, + Sanctioned, of milk and honey starve the land:— + Like melody in flesh, its pleasant game + Olympianwise perform, cloak but the shame: + Beautiful statures; hideous, + By Christian contrast; pranked with golden chains, + And flexile where is manhood straight; + Mortuaries where warm should beat + The brotherhood that keeps blood sweet: + Who dared in cantique impious + Proclaim the Just, to whom was due + Cathedral gratitude in the pomp of state, + For that on those lean outcasts hung the sucker Pains, + On these elect the swelling Pleasures grew. + Surely a devil’s land when that meant death for each! + Fresh from the breast of Earth, not thus, + With all the body’s life to plump the leech, + Is Nature’s way, she knew. The abominable scene + Spat at the skies; and through her veins, + To cloud celestially sown, + Ran venom of what nourishment + Her dark sustainer subterrene + Supplied her, stretched supine on the rack, + Alive in the shrewd nerves, the seething brains, + Under derisive revels, prone + As one clamped fast, with the interminable senseless blent. + + +VI + + + Now was her face white waves in the tempest’s sharp flame-blink; + Her skies shot black. + Now was it visioned infamy to drink + Of earth’s cool dew, and through the vines + Frolic in pearly laughter with her young, + Watching the healthful, natural, happy signs + Where hands of lads and maids like tendrils clung, + After their sly shy ventures from the leaf, + And promised bunches. Now it seemed + The world was one malarious mire, + Crying for purification: chief + This land of France. It seemed + A duteous desire + To drink of life’s hot flood, and the crimson streamed. + + +VII + + + She drank what makes man demon at the draught. + Her skies lowered black, + Her lover flew, + There swept a shudder over men. + Her heavenly lover fled her, and she laughed, + For laughter was her spirit’s weapon then. + The Infernal rose uncalled, he with his crew. + + +VIII + + + As mighty thews burst manacles, she went mad: + Her heart a flaring torch usurped her wits. + Such enemies of her next-drawn breath she had! + To tread her down in her live grave beneath + Their dancing floor sunned blind by the Royal wreath, + They ringed her steps with crafty prison pits. + Without they girdled her, made nest within. + There ramped the lion, here entrailed the snake. + They forced the cup to her lips when she drank blood; + Believing it, in the mother’s mind at strain, + In the mother’s fears, and in young Liberty’s wail + Alarmed, for her encompassed children’s sake, + The sole sure way to save her priceless bud. + Wherewith, when power had gifted her to prevail, + Vengeance appeared as logically akin. + Insanely rational they; she rationally insane; + And in compute of sin, was hers the appealing sin. + + +IX + + + Amid the plash of scarlet mud + Stained at the mouth, drunk with our common air, + Not lack of love was her defect; + The Fury mourned and raged and bled for France + Breathing from exultation to despair + At every wild-winged hope struck by mischance + Soaring at each faint gleam o’er her abyss. + Heard still, to be heard while France shall stand erect, + The frontier march she piped her sons, for where + Her crouching outer enemy camped, + Attendant on the deadlier inner’s hiss. + She piped her sons the frontier march, the wine + Of martial music, History’s cherished tune; + And they, the saintliest labourers that aye + Dropped sweat on soil for bread, took arms and tramped; + High-breasted to match men or elements, + Or Fortune, harsh schoolmistress with the undrilled: + War’s ragged pupils; many a wavering line, + Torn from the dear fat soil of champaigns hopefully tilled, + Torn from the motherly bowl, the homely spoon, + To jest at famine, ply + The novel scythe, and stand to it on the field; + Lie in the furrows, rain-clouds for their tents; + Fronting the red artillery straighten spine; + Buckle the shiver at sight of comrades strewn; + Over an empty platter affect the merrily filled; + Die, if the multiple hazards around said die; + Downward measure a foeman mightily sized; + Laugh at the legs that would run for a life despised; + Lyrical on into death’s red roaring jaw-gape, steeled + Gaily to take of the foe his lesson, and give reply. + Cheerful apprentices, they shall be masters soon! + + +X + + + Lo, where hurricane flocks of the North-wind rattle their thunder + Loud through a night, and at dawn comes change to the great + South-west, + Hounds are the hounded in clouds, waves, forests, inverted the race: + Lo, in the day’s young beams the colossal invading pursuers + Burst upon rocks and were foam; + Ridged up a torrent crest; + Crumbled to ruin, still gazing a glacial wonder; + Turned shamed feet toe to heel on their track at a panic pace. + Yesterday’s clarion cock scudded hen of the invalid comb; + They, the triumphant tonant towering upper, were under; + They, violators of home, dared hope an inviolate home; + They that had stood for the stroke were the vigorous hewers; + Quick as the trick of the wrist with the rapier, they the pursuers. + Heavens and men amazed heard the arrogant crying for grace; + Saw the once hearth-reek rabble the scourge of an army dispieced; + Saw such a shift of the hunt as when Titan Olympus clomb. + Fly! was the sportsman’s word; and the note of the quarry rang, Chase! + + +XI + + + Banners from South, from East, + Sheaves of pale banners drooping hole and shred; + The captive brides of valour, Sabine Wives + Plucked from the foeman’s blushful bed, + For glorious muted battle-tongues + Of deeds along the horizon’s red, + At cost of unreluctant lives; + Her toilful heroes homeward poured, + To give their fevered mother air of the lungs. + She breathed, and in the breathing craved. + Environed as she was, at bay, + Safety she kissed on her drawn sword, + And waved for victory, for fresh victory waved: + She craved for victory as her daily bread; + For victory as her daily banquet raved. + + +XII + + + Now had her glut of vengeance left her grey + Of blood, who in her entrails fiercely tore + To clutch and squeeze her snakes; herself the more + Devitalizing: red washer Auroral ray; + Desired if but to paint her pallid hue. + The passion for that young horizon red, + Which dowered her with the flags, the blazing fame, + Like dotage of the past-meridian dame + For some bright Sungod adolescent, swelled + Insatiate, to the voracious grew, + The glutton’s inward raveners bred; + Till she, mankind’s most dreaded, most abhorred, + Witless in her demands on Fortune, asked, + As by the weaving Fates impelled, + To have the thing most loathed, the iron lord, + Controller and chastiser, under Victory masked. + + +XIII + + + Banners from East, from South, + She hugged him in them, feared the scourge they meant, + Yet blindly hugged, and hungering built his throne. + So may you see the village innocent, + With curtsey of shut lids and open mouth, + In act to beg for sweets expect a loathly stone: + See furthermore the Just in his measures weigh + Her sufferings and her sins, dispense her meed. + False to her bridegroom lord of the miracle day, + She fell: from his ethereal home observed + Through love, grown alien love, not moved to plead + Against the season’s fruit for deadly Seed, + But marking how she had aimed, and where she swerved, + Why suffered, with a sad consenting thought. + Nor would he shun her sullen look, nor monstrous hold + The doer of the monstrous; she aroused, + She, the long tortured, suddenly freed, distraught, + More strongly the divine in him than when + Joy of her as she sprang from mould + Drew him the midway heavens adown + To clasp her in his arms espoused + Before the sight of wondering men, + And put upon the day a deathless crown. + The veins and arteries of her, fold in fold, + His alien love laid open, to divide + The martyred creature from her crimes; he knew + What cowardice in her valour could reside; + What strength her weakness covered; what abased + Sublimity so illumining, and what raised + This wallower in old slime to noblest heights, + Up to the union on the midway blue:— + Day that the celestial grave Recorder hangs + Among dark History’s nocturnal lights, + With vivid beams indicative to the quick + Of all who have felt the vaulted body’s pangs + Beneath a mind in hopeless soaring sick. + She had forgot how, long enslaved, she yearned + To the one helping hand above; + Forgot her faith in the Great Undiscerned, + Whereof she sprang aloft to her Angelical love + That day: and he, the bright day’s husband, still with love, + Though alien, though to an upper seat retired, + Behold a wrangling heart, as ’twere her soul + On eddies of wild waters cast; + In wilderness division; fired + For domination, freedom, lust, + The Pleasures; lo, a witch’s snaky bowl + Set at her lips; the blood-drinker’s madness fast + Upon her; and therewith mistrust, + Most of herself: a mouth of guile. + Compassionately could he smile, + To hear the mouth disclaiming God, + And clamouring for the Just! + Her thousand impulses, like torches, coursed + City and field; and pushed abroad + O’er hungry waves to thirsty sands, + Flaring at further; she had grown to be + The headless with the fearful hands; + To slaughter, else to suicide, enforced. + But he, remembering how his love began, + And of what creature, pitied when was plain + Another measure of captivity: + The need for strap and rod; + The penitential prayers again; + Again the bitter bowing down to dust; + The burden on the flesh for who disclaims the God, + The answer when is call upon the Just. + Whence her lost virtue had found refuge strode + Her master, saying, ‘I only; I who can!’ + And echoed round her army, now her chain. + So learns the nation, closing Anarch’s reign, + That she had been in travail of a Man. + + + +NAPOLÉON + + +I + + + CANNON his name, + Cannon his voice, he came. + Who heard of him heard shaken hills, + An earth at quake, to quiet stamped; + Who looked on him beheld the will of wills, + The driver of wild flocks where lions ramped: + Beheld War’s liveries flee him, like lumped grass + Nid-nod to ground beneath the cuffing storm; + While laurelled over his Imperial form, + Forth from her bearded tube of lacquey brass, + Reverberant notes and long blew volant Fame. + Incarnate Victory, Power manifest, + Infernal or God-given to mankind, + On the quenched volcano’s cusp did he take stand, + A conquering army’s height above the land, + Which calls that army offspring of its breast, + And sees it mid the starry camps enshrined; + His eye the cannon’s flame, + The cannon’s cave his mind. + + +II + + + To weld the nation in a name of dread, + And scatter carrion flies off wounds unhealed, + The Necessitated came, as comes from out + Electric ebon lightning’s javelin-head, + Threatening agitation in the revealed + Founts of our being; terrible with doubt, + With radiance restorative. At one stride + Athwart the Law he stood for sovereign sway. + That Soliform made featureless beside + His brilliancy who neighboured: vapour they; + Vapour what postured statues barred his tread. + On high in amphitheatre field on field, + Italian, Egyptian, Austrian, + Far heard and of the carnage discord clear, + Bells of his escalading triumphs pealed + In crashes on a choral chant severe, + Heraldic of the authentic Charlemagne, + Globe, sceptre, sword, to enfold, to rule, to smite, + Make unity of the mass, + Coherent or refractory, by his might. + + Forth from her bearded tube of lacquey brass, + Fame blew, and tuned the jangles, bent the knees + Rebellious or submissive; his decrees + Were thunder in those heavens and compelled: + Such as disordered earth, eclipsed of stars, + Endures for sign of Order’s calm return, + Whereunto she is vowed; and his wreckage-spars, + His harried ships, old riotous Ocean lifts alight, + Subdued to splendour in his delirant churn. + Glory suffused the accordant, quelled, + By magic of high sovereignty, revolt: + And he, the reader of men, himself unread; + The name of hope, the name of dread; + Bloom of the coming years or blight; + An arm to hurl the bolt + With aim Olympian; bore + Likeness to Godhead. Whither his flashes hied + Hosts fell; what he constructed held rock-fast. + So did earth’s abjects deem of him that built and clove. + Torch on imagination, beams he cast, + Whereat they hailed him deified: + If less than an eagle-speeding Jove, than Vulcan more. + Or it might be a Vulcan-Jove, + Europe for smithy, Europe’s floor + Lurid with sparks in evanescent showers, + Loud echo-clap of hammers at all hours, + Our skies the reflex of its furnace blast. + + +III + + + On him the long enchained, released + For bride of the miracle day up the midway blue; + She from her heavenly lover fallen to serve for feast + Of rancours and raw hungers; she, the untrue, + Yet pitiable, not despicable, gazed. + Fawning, her body bent, she gazed + With eyes the moonstone portals to her heart: + Eyes magnifying through hysteric tears + This apparition, ghostly for belief; + Demoniac or divine, but sole + Over earth’s mightiest written Chief; + Earth’s chosen, crowned, unchallengeable upstart: + The trumpet word to awake, transform, renew; + The arbiter of circumstance; + High above limitations, as the spheres. + Nor ever had heroical Romance, + Never ensanguined History’s lengthened scroll, + Shown fulminant to shoot the levin dart + Terrific as this man, by whom upraised, + Aggrandized and begemmed, she outstripped her peers; + Like midnight’s levying brazier-beacon blazed + Defiant to the world, a rally for her sons, + Day of the darkness; this man’s mate; by him, + Cannon his name, + Rescued from vivisectionist and knave, + Her body’s dominators and her shame; + By him with the rivers of ranked battalions, brave + Past mortal, girt: a march of swords and guns + Incessant; his proved warriors; loaded dice + He flung on the crested board, where chilly Fears + Behold the Reaper’s ground, Death sitting grim, + Awatch for his predestined ones, + Mid shrieks and torrent-hooves; but these, + Inebriate of his inevitable device, + Hail it their hero’s wood of lustrous laurel-trees, + Blossom and fruit of fresh Hesperides, + The boiling life-blood in their cheers. + Unequalled since the world was man they pour + A spiky girdle round her; these, her sons, + His cataracts at smooth holiday, soon to roar + Obstruction shattered at his will or whim: + Kind to her ear as quiring Cherubim, + And trampling earth like scornful mastodons. + + +IV + + + The flood that swept her to be slave + Adoring, under thought of being his mate, + These were, and unto the visibly unexcelled, + As much of heart as abjects can she gave, + Or what of heart the body bears for freight + When Majesty apparent overawes; + By the flash of his ascending deeds upheld, + Which let not feminine pride in him have pause + To question where the nobler pride rebelled. + She read the hieroglyphic on his brow, + Felt his firm hand to wield the giant’s mace; + Herself whirled upward in an eagle’s claws, + Past recollection of her earthly place; + And if cold Reason pressed her, called him Fate; + Offering abashed the servile woman’s vow. + Delirium was her virtue when the look + At fettered wrists and violated laws + Faith in a rectitude Supernal shook, + Till worship of him shone as her last rational state, + The slave’s apology for gemmed disgrace. + Far in her mind that leap from earth to the ghost + Midway on high; or felt as a troubled pool; + Or as a broken sleep that hunts a dream half lost, + Arrested and rebuked by the common school + Of daily things for truancy. She could rejoice + To know with wakeful eyeballs Violence + Her crowned possessor, and, on every sense + Incumbent, Fact, Imperial Fact, her choice, + In scorn of barren visions, aims at a glassy void. + Who sprang for Liberty once, found slavery sweet; + And Tyranny, on alert subservience buoyed, + Spurred a blood-mare immeasureably fleet + To shoot the transient leagues in a passing wink, + Prompt for the glorious bound at the fanged abyss’s brink. + Scarce felt she that she bled when battle scored + On riddled flags the further conjured line; + From off the meteor gleam of his waved sword + Reflected bright in permanence: she bled + As the Bacchante spills her challengeing wine + With whirl o’ the cup before the kiss to lip; + And bade drudge History in his footprints tread, + For pride of sword-strokes o’er slow penmanship: + Each step of his a volume: his sharp word + The shower of steel and lead + Or pastoral sunshine. + + +V + + + Persistent through the brazen chorus round + His thunderous footsteps on the foeman’s ground, + A broken carol of wild notes was heard, + As when an ailing infant wails a dream. + Strange in familiarity it rang: + And now along the dark blue vault might seem + Winged migratories having but heaven for home, + Now the lone sea-bird’s cry down shocks of foam, + Beneath a ruthless paw the captive’s pang. + + It sang the gift that comes from God + To mind of man as air to lung. + So through her days of under sod + Her faith unto her heart had sung, + Like bedded seed by frozen clod, + With view of wide-armed heaven and buds at burst, + And midway up, Earth’s fluttering little lyre. + Even for a glimpse, for even a hope in chained desire + The vision of it watered thirst. + + +VI + + + But whom those errant moans accused + As Liberty’s murderous mother, cried accursed, + France blew to deafness: for a space she mused; + She smoothed a startled look, and sought, + From treasuries of the adoring slave, + Her surest way to strangle thought; + Picturing her dread lord decree advance + Into the enemy’s land; artillery, bayonet, lance; + His ordering fingers point the dial’s to time their ranks: + Himself the black storm-cloud, the tempest’s bayonet-glaive. + Like foam-heads of a loosened freshet bursting banks, + By mount and fort they thread to swamp the sluggard plains. + Shines his gold-laurel sun, or cloak connivent rains. + They press to where the hosts in line and square throng mute; + He watchful of their form, the Audacious, the Astute; + Eagle to grip the field; to work his craftiest, fox. + From his brief signal, straight the stroke of the leveller falls; + From him those opal puffs, those arcs with the clouded balls: + He waves and the voluble scene is a quagmire shifting blocks; + They clash, they are knotted, and now ’tis the deed of the axe on the + log; + Here away moves a spiky woodland, and yon away sweep + Rivers of horse torrent-mad to the shock, and the heap over heap + Right through the troughed black lines turned to bunches or shreds, or + a fog + Rolling off sunlight’s arrows. Not mightier Phoebus in ire, + Nor deadlier Jove’s avengeing right hand, than he of the brain + Keen at an enemy’s mind to encircle and pierce and constrain, + Muffling his own for a fate-charged blow very Gods may admire. + Sure to behold are his eagles on high where the conflict raged. + Rightly, then, should France worship, and deafen the disaccord + Of those who dare withstand an irresistible sword + To thwart his predestined subjection of Europe. Let them submit! + She said it aloud, and heard in her breast, as a singer caged, + With the beat of wings at bars, Earth’s fluttering little lyre. + No more at midway heaven, but liker midway to the pit: + Not singing the spirally upward of rapture, the downward of pain + Rather, the drop sheer downward from pressure of merciless weight. + + Her strangled thought got breath, with her worship held debate; + To yield and sink, yet eye askant the mark she had missed. + Over the black-blue rollers of that broad Westerly main, + Steady to sky, the light of Liberty glowed + In a flaming pillar, that cast on the troubled waters a road + For Europe to cross, and see the thing lost subsist. + For there ’twas a shepherd led his people, no butcher of sheep; + Firmly there the banner he first upreared + Stands to rally; and nourishing grain do his children reap + From a father beloved in life, in his death revered. + Contemplating him and his work, shall a skyward glance + Clearer sight of our dreamed and abandoned obtain; + Nay, but as if seen in station above the Republic, France + Had view of her one-day’s heavenly lover again; + Saw him amid the bright host looking down on her; knew she had erred, + Knew him her judge, knew yonder the spirit preferred; + Yonder the base of the summit she strove that day to ascend, + Ere cannon mastered her soul, and all dreams had end. + + +VII + + + Soon felt she in her shivered frame + A bodeful drain of blood illume + Her wits with frosty fire to read + The dazzling wizard who would have her bleed + On fruitless marsh and snows of spectral gloom + For victory that was victory scarce in name. + Husky his clarions laboured, and her sighs + O’er slaughtered sons were heavier than the prize; + Recalling how he stood by Frederic’s tomb, + With Frederic’s country underfoot and spurned: + There meditated; till her hope might guess, + Albeit his constant star prescribe success, + The savage strife would sink, the civil aim + To head a mannered world breathe zephyrous + Of morning after storm; whereunto she yearned; + And Labour’s lovely peace, and Beauty’s courtly bloom, + The mind in strenuous tasks hilarious. + At such great height, where hero hero topped, + Right sanely should the Grand Ascendant think + No further leaps at the fanged abyss’s brink + True Genius takes: be battle’s dice-box dropped! + + She watched his desert features, hung to hear + The honey words desired, and veiled her face; + Hearing the Seaman’s name recur + Wrathfully, thick with a meaning worse + Than call to the march: for that inveterate Purse + Could kindle the extinct, inform a vacant place, + Conjure a heart into the trebly felled. + It squeezed the globe, insufferably swelled + To feed insurgent Europe: rear and van + Were haunted by the amphibious curse; + Here flesh, there phantom, livelier after rout: + The Seaman piping aye to the rightabout, + Distracted Europe’s Master, puffed remote + Those Indies of the swift Macedonian, + Whereon would Europe’s Master somewhiles doat, + In dreamings on a docile universe + Beneath an immarcessible Charlemagne. + + Nor marvel France should veil a seer’s face, + And call on darkness as a blest retreat. + Magnanimously could her iron Emperor + Confront submission: hostile stirred to heat + All his vast enginery, allowed no halt + Up withered avenues of waste-blood war, + To the pitiless red mounts of fire afume, + As ’twere the world’s arteries opened! Woe the race! + Ask wherefore Fortune’s vile caprice should balk + His panther spring across the foaming salt, + From martial sands to the cliffs of pallid chalk! + There is no answer: seed of black defeat + She then did sow, and France nigh unto death foredoom. + See since that Seaman’s epicycle sprite + Engirdle, lure and goad him to the chase + Along drear leagues of crimson spotting white + With mother’s tears of France, that he may meet + Behind suborned battalions, ranked as wheat + Where peeps the weedy poppy, him of the sea; + Earth’s power to baffle Ocean’s power resume; + Victorious army crown o’er Victory’s fleet; + And bearing low that Seaman upon knee, + Stay the vexed question of supremacy, + Obnoxious in the vault by Frederic’s tomb. + + +VIII + + + Poured streams of Europe’s veins the flood + Full Rhine or Danube rolls off morning-tide + Through shadowed reaches into crimson-dyed: + And Rhine and Danube knew her gush of blood + Down the plucked roots the deepest in her breast. + He tossed her cordials, from his laurels pressed. + She drank for dryness thirstily, praised his gifts. + The blooded frame a powerful draught uplifts + Writhed the devotedness her voice rang wide + In cries ecstatic, as of the martyr-Blest, + Their spirits issuing forth of bodies racked, + And crazy chuckles, with life’s tears at feud; + While near her heart the sunken sentinel + Called Critic marked, and dumb in awe reviewed + This torture, this anointed, this untracked + To mortal source, this alien of his kind; + Creator, slayer, conjuror, Solon-Mars, + The cataract of the abyss, the star of stars; + Whose arts to lay the senses under spell + Aroused an insurrectionary mind. + + +IX + + + He, did he love her? France was his weapon, shrewd + At edge, a wind in onset: he loved well + His tempered weapon, with the which he hewed + Clean to the ground impediments, or hacked, + Sure of the blade that served the great man-miracle. + He raised her, robed her, gemmed her for his bride, + Did but her blood in blindness given exact. + Her blood she gave, was blind to him as guide: + She quivered at his word, and at his touch + Was hound or steed for any mark he espied. + He loved her more than little, less than much. + The fair subservient of Imperial Fact + Next to his consanguineous was placed + In ranked esteem; above the diurnal meal, + Vexatious carnal appetites above, + Above his hoards, while she Imperial Fact embraced, + And rose but at command from under heel. + The love devolvent, the ascension love, + Receptive or profuse, were fires he lacked, + Whose marrow had expelled their wasteful sparks; + Whose mind, the vast machine of endless haste, + Took up but solids for its glowing seal. + The hungry love, that fish-like creatures feel, + Impelled for prize of hooks, for prey of sharks, + His night’s first quarter sicklied to distaste, + In warm enjoyment barely might distract. + A head that held an Europe half devoured + Taste in the blood’s conceit of pleasure soured. + Nought save his rounding aim, the means he plied, + Death for his cause, to him could point appeal. + His mistress was the thing of uses tried. + Frigid the netting smile on whom he wooed, + But on his Policy his eye was lewd. + That sharp long zig-zag into distance brooked + No foot across; a shade his ire provoked. + The blunder or the cruelty of a deed + His Policy imperative could plead. + He deemed nought other precious, nor knew he + Legitimate outside his Policy. + Men’s lives and works were due, from their birth’s date, + To the State’s shield and sword, himself the State. + He thought for them in mass, as Titan may; + For their pronounced well-being bade obey; + O’er each obstructive thicket thunderclapped, + And straight their easy road to market mapped. + Watched Argus to survey the huge preserves + He held or coveted; Mars was armed alert + At sign of motion; yet his brows were murk, + His gorge would surge, to see the butcher’s work, + The Reaper’s field; a sensitive in nerves. + He rode not over men to do them hurt. + As one who claimed to have for paramour + Earth’s fairest form, he dealt the cancelling blow; + Impassioned, still impersonal; to ensure + Possession; free of rivals, not their foe. + + The common Tyrant’s frenzies, rancour, spites, + He knew as little as men’s claim on rights. + A kindness for old servants, early friends, + Was constant in him while they served his ends; + And if irascible, ’twas the moment’s reek + From fires diverted by some gusty freak. + His Policy the act which breeds the act + Prevised, in issues accurately summed + From reckonings of men’s tempers, terrors, needs:— + That universal army, which he leads + Who builds Imperial on Imperious Fact. + Within his hot brain’s hammering workshop hummed + A thousand furious wheels at whirr, untired + As Nature in her reproductive throes; + And did they grate, he spake, and cannon fired: + The cause being aye the incendiary foes + Proved by prostration culpable. His dispense + Of Justice made his active conscience; + His passive was of ceaseless labour formed. + So found this Tyrant sanction and repose; + Humanly just, inhumanly unwarmed. + Preventive fencings with the foul intent + Occult, by him observed and foiled betimes, + Let fool historians chronicle as crimes. + His blows were dealt to clear the way he went: + Too busy sword and mind for needless blows. + The mighty bird of sky minutest grains + On ground perceived; in heaven but rays or rains; + In humankind diversities of masks, + For rule of men the choice of bait or goads. + The statesman steered the despot to large tasks; + The despot drove the statesman on short roads. + For Order’s cause he laboured, as inclined + A soldier’s training and his Euclid mind. + His army unto men he could present + As model of the perfect instrument. + That creature, woman, was the sofa soft, + When warriors their dusty armour doffed, + And read their manuals for the making truce + With rosy frailties framed to reproduce. + He farmed his land, distillingly alive + For the utmost extract he might have and hive, + Wherewith to marshal force; and in like scheme, + Benign shone Hymen’s torch on young love’s dream. + Thus to be strong was he beneficent; + A fount of earth, likewise a firmament. + + The disputant in words his eye dismayed: + Opinions blocked his passage. Rent + Were Councils with a gesture; brayed + By hoarse camp-phrase what argument + Dared interpose to waken spleen + In him whose vision grasped the unseen, + Whose counsellor was the ready blade, + Whose argument the cannonade. + He loathed his land’s divergent parties, loth + To grant them speech, they were such idle troops; + The friable and the grumous, dizzards both. + Men were good sticks his mastery wrought from hoops; + Some serviceable, none credible on oath. + The silly preference they nursed to die + In beds he scorned, and led where they should lie. + If magic made them pliable for his use, + Magician he could be by planned surprise. + For do they see the deuce in human guise, + As men’s acknowledged head appears the deuce, + And they will toil with devilish craft and zeal. + Among them certain vagrant wits that had + Ideas buzzed; they were the feebly mad; + Pursuers of a film they hailed ideal; + But could be dangerous fire-flies for a brain + Subdued by fact, still amorous of the inane. + With a breath he blew them out, to beat their wings + The way of such transfeminated things, + And France had sense of vacancy in Light. + + That is the soul’s dead darkness, making clutch + Wild hands for aid at muscles within touch; + Adding to slavery’s chain the stringent twist; + Even when it brings close surety that aright + She reads her Tyrant through his golden mist; + Perceives him fast to a harsher Tyrant bound; + Self-ridden, self-hunted, captive of his aim; + Material grandeur’s ape, the Infernal’s hound; + Enormous, with no infinite around; + No starred deep sky, no Muse, or lame + The dusty pattering pinions, + The voice as through the brazen tube of Fame. + + +X + + + Hugest of engines, a much limited man, + She saw the Lustrous, her great lord, appear + Through that smoked glass her last privation brought + To point her critic eye and spur her thought: + A heart but to propel Leviathan; + A spirit that breathed but in earth’s atmosphere. + Amid the plumed and sceptred ones + Irradiatingly Jovian, + The mountain tower capped by the floating cloud; + A nursery screamer where dialectics ruled: + Mannerless, graceless, laughterless, unlike + Herself in all, yet with such power to strike, + That she the various features she could scan + Dared not to sum, though seeing: and befooled + By power which beamed omnipotent, she bowed, + Subservient as roused echo round his guns. + Invulnerable Prince of Myrmidons, + He sparkled, by no sage Athene schooled. + Partly she read her riddle, stricken and pained; + But irony, her spirit’s tongue, restrained. + The Critic, last of vital in the proud + Enslaved, when most detectively endowed, + Admired how irony’s venom off him ran, + Like rain-drops down a statue cast in bronze: + Whereby of her keen rapier disarmed, + Again her chant of eulogy began, + Protesting, but with slavish senses charmed. + + Her warrior, chief among the valorous great + In arms he was, dispelling shades of blame, + With radiance palpable in fruit and weight. + Heard she reproach, his victories blared response; + His victories bent the Critic to acclaim, + As with fresh blows upon a ringing sconce. + Or heard she from scarred ranks of jolly growls + His veterans dwarf their reverence and, like owls, + Laugh in the pitch of discord, to exalt + Their idol for some genial trick or fault, + She, too, became his marching veteran. + Again she took her breath from them who bore + His eagles through the tawny roar, + And murmured at a peaceful state, + That bred the title charlatan, + As missile from the mouth of hate, + For one the daemon fierily filled and hurled, + Cannon his name, + Shattering against a barrier world; + Her supreme player of man’s primaeval game. + + The daemon filled him, and he filled her sons; + Strung them to stature over human height, + As march the standards down the smoky fight; + Her cherubim, her towering mastodons! + Directed vault or breach, break through + Earth’s toughest, seasons, elements, tame; + Dash at the bulk the sharpened few; + Count death the smallest of their debts: + Show that the will to do + Is masculine and begets! + + These princes unto him the mother owed; + These jewels of manhood that rich hand bestowed. + What wonder, though with wits awake + To read her riddle, for these her offspring’s sake;— + And she, before high heaven adulteress, + The lost to honour, in his glory clothed, + Else naked, shamed in sight of men, self-loathed;— + That she should quench her thought, nor worship less + Than ere she bled on sands or snows and knew + The slave’s alternative, to worship or to rue! + + +XI + + + Bright from the shell of that much limited man, + Her hero, like the falchion out of sheath, + Like soul that quits the tumbled body, soared: + And France, impulsive, nuptial with his plan, + Albeit the Critic fretting her, adored + Once more. Exultingly her heart went forth, + Submissive to his mind and mood, + The way of those pent-eyebrows North; + For now was he to win the wreath + Surpassing sunniest in camp or Court; + Next, as the blessed harvest after years of blight, + Sit, the Great Emperor, to be known the Good! + + Now had the Seaman’s volvent sprite, + Lean from the chase that barked his contraband, + A beggared applicant at every port, + To strew the profitless deeps and rot beneath, + Slung northward, for a hunted beast’s retort + On sovereign power; there his final stand, + Among the perjured Scythian’s shaggy horde, + The hydrocephalic aërolite + Had taken; flashing thence repellent teeth, + Though Europe’s Master Europe’s Rebel banned + To be earth’s outcast, ocean’s lord and sport. + + Unmoved might seem the Master’s taunted sword. + Northward his dusky legions nightly slipped, + As on the map of that all-provident head; + He luting Peace the while, like morning’s cock + The quiet day to round the hours for bed; + No pastoral shepherd sweeter to his flock. + Then Europe first beheld her Titan stripped. + To what vast length of limb and mounds of thews, + How trained to scale the eminences, pluck + The hazards for new footing, how compel + Those timely incidents by men named luck, + Through forethought that defied the Fates to choose, + Her grovelling admiration had not yet + Imagined of the great man-miracle; + And France recounted with her comic smile + Duplicities of Court and Cabinet, + The silky female of his male in guile, + Wherewith her two-faced Master could amuse + A dupe he charmed in sunny beams to bask, + Before his feint for camisado struck + The lightning moment of the cast-off mask. + + Splendours of earth repeating heaven’s at set + Of sun down mountain cloud in masses arched; + Since Asia upon Europe marched, + Unmatched the copious multitudes; unknown + To Gallia’s over-runner, Rome’s inveterate foe, + Such hosts; all one machine for overthrow, + Coruscant from the Master’s hand, compact + As reasoned thoughts in the Master’s head; were shown + Yon lightning moment when his acme might + Blazed o’er the stream that cuts the sandy tract + Borussian from Sarmatia’s famished flat; + The century’s flower; and off its pinnacled throne, + Rayed servitude on Europe’s ball of sight. + + +XII + + + Behind the Northern curtain-folds he passed. + There heard hushed France her muffled heart beat fast + Against the hollow ear-drum, where she sat + In expectation’s darkness, until cracked + The straining curtain-seams: a scaly light + Was ghost above an army under shroud. + Imperious on Imperial Fact + Incestuously the incredible begat. + His veterans and auxiliaries, + The trained, the trustful, sanguine, proud, + Princely, scarce numerable to recite,— + Titanic of all Titan tragedies!— + That Northern curtain took them, as the seas + Gulp the great ships to give back shipmen white. + + Alive in marble, she conceived in soul, + With barren eyes and mouth, the mother’s loss; + The bolt from her abandoned heaven sped; + The snowy army rolling knoll on knoll + Beyond horizon, under no blest Cross: + By the vulture dotted and engarlanded. + + Was it a necromancer lured + To weave his tense betraying spell? + A Titan whom our God endured + Till he of his foul hungers fell, + By all his craft and labour scourged? + A deluge Europe’s liberated wave, + Pæan to sky, leapt over that vast grave. + Its shadow-points against her sacred land converged. + And him, her yoke-fellow, her black lord, her fate, + In doubt, in fevered hope, in chills of hate, + That tore her old credulity to strips, + Then pressed the auspicious relics on her lips, + His withered slave for foregone miracles urged. + And he, whom now his ominous halo’s round, + A three parts blank decrescent sickle, crowned, + Prodigious in catastrophe, could wear + The realm of Darkness with its Prince’s air; + Assume in mien the resolute pretence + To satiate an hungered confidence, + Proved criminal by the sceptic seen to cower + Beside the generous face of that frail flower. + + +XIII + + + Desire and terror then had each of each: + His crown and sword were staked on the magic stroke; + Her blood she gave as one who loved her leech; + And both did barter under union’s cloak. + An union in hot fever and fierce need + Of either’s aid, distrust in trust did breed. + Their traffic instincts hooded their live wits + To issues. Never human fortune throve + On such alliance. Viewed by fits, + From Vulcan’s forge a hovering Jove + Evolved. The slave he dragged the Tyrant drove. + Her awe of him his dread of her invoked: + His nature with her shivering faith ran yoked. + What wisdom counselled, Policy declined; + All perils dared he save the step behind. + Ahead his grand initiative becked: + One spark of radiance blurred, his orb was wrecked. + Stripped to the despot upstart, for success + He raged to clothe a perilous nakedness. + He would not fall, while falling; would not be taught, + While learning; would not relax his grasp on aught + He held in hand, while losing it; pressed advance, + Pricked for her lees the veins of wasted France; + Who, had he stayed to husband her, had spun + The strength he taxed unripened for his throw, + In vengeful casts calamitous, + On fields where palsying Pyrrhic laurels grow, + The luminous the ruinous. + An incalescent scorpion, + And fierier for the mounded cirque + That narrowed at him thick and murk, + This gambler with his genius + Flung lives in angry volleys, bloody lightnings, flung + His fortunes to the hosts he stung, + With victories clipped his eagle’s wings. + By the hands that built him up was he undone: + By the star aloft, which was his ram’s-head will + Within; by the toppling throne the soldier won; + By the yeasty ferment of what once had been, + To cloud a rational mind for present things; + By his own force, the suicide in his mill. + Needs never God of Vengeance intervene + When giants their last lesson have to learn. + Fighting against an end he could discern, + The chivalry whereof he had none + He called from his worn slave’s abundant springs: + Not deigning spousally entreat + That ever blinded by his martial skill, + But harsh to have her worship counted out + In human coin, her vital rivers drained, + Her infant forests felled, commanded die + The decade thousand deaths for his Imperial seat, + Where throning he her faith in him maintained; + Bound Reason to believe delayed defeat + Was triumph; and what strength in her remained + To head against the ultimate foreseen rout, + Insensate taxed; of his impenitent will, + Servant and sycophant: without ally, + In Python’s coils, the Master Craftsman still; + The smiter, panther springer, trapper sly, + The deadly wrestler at the crucial bout, + The penetrant, the tonant, tower of towers, + Striking from black disaster starry showers. + Her supreme player of man’s primaeval game, + He won his harnessed victim’s rapturous shout, + When every move was mortal to her frame, + Her prayer to life that stricken he might lie, + She to exchange his laurels for earth’s flowers. + + The innumerable whelmed him, and he fell: + A vessel in mid-ocean under storm. + Ere ceased the lullaby of his passing bell, + He sprang to sight, in human form + Revealed, from no celestial aids: + The shades enclosed him, and he fired the shades. + + Cannon his name, + Cannon his voice, he came. + The fount of miracles from drought-dust arose, + Amazing even on his Imperial stage, + Where marvels lightened through the alternate hours + And winged o’er human earth’s heroical shone. + Into the press of cumulative foes, + Across the friendly fields of smoke and rage, + A broken structure bore his furious powers; + The man no more, the Warrior Chief the same; + Match for all rivals; in himself but flame + Of an outworn lamp, to illumine nought anon. + Yet loud as when he first showed War’s effete + Their Schoolman off his eagre mounted high, + And summoned to subject who dared compete, + The cannon in the name Napoleon + Discoursed of sulphur earth to curtained sky. + So through a tropic day a regnant sun, + Where armies of assailant vapours thronged, + His glory’s trappings laid on them: comes night, + Enwraps him in a bosom quick of heat + From his anterior splendours, and shall seem + Day instant, Day’s own lord in the furnace gleam, + The virulent quiver on ravished eyes prolonged, + When severed darkness, all flaminical bright, + Slips vivid eagles linked in rapid flight; + Which bring at whiles the lionly far roar, + As wrestled he with manacles and gags, + To speed across a cowering world once more, + Superb in ordered floods, his lordly flags. + His name on silence thundered, on the obscure + Lightened; it haunted morn and even-song: + Earth of her prodigy’s extinction long, + With shudderings and with thrillings, hung unsure. + + Snapped was the chord that made the resonant bow, + In France, abased and like a shrunken corse; + Amid the weakest weak, the lowest low, + From the highest fallen, stagnant off her source; + Condemned to hear the nations’ hostile mirth; + See curtained heavens, and smell a sulphurous earth; + Which told how evermore shall tyrant Force + Beget the greater for its overthrow. + The song of Liberty in her hearing spoke + A foreign tongue; Earth’s fluttering little lyre + Unlike, but like the raven’s ravening croak. + Not till her breath of being could aspire + Anew, this loved and scourged of Angels found + Our common brotherhood in sight and sound: + When mellow rang the name Napoleon, + And dim aloft her young Angelical waved. + Between ethereal and gross to choose, + She swung; her soul desired, her senses craved. + They pricked her dreams, while oft her skies were dun + Behind o’ershadowing foemen: on a tide + They drew the nature having need of pride + Among her fellows for its vital dues: + He seen like some rare treasure-galleon, + Hull down, with masts against the Western hues. + + + +FRANCE +DECEMBER 1870 {140} + + +I + + + WE look for her that sunlike stood + Upon the forehead of our day, + An orb of nations, radiating food + For body and for mind alway. + Where is the Shape of glad array; + The nervous hands, the front of steel, + The clarion tongue? Where is the bold proud face? + We see a vacant place; + We hear an iron heel. + + +II + + + O she that made the brave appeal + For manhood when our time was dark, + And from our fetters drove the spark + Which was as lightning to reveal + New seasons, with the swifter play + Of pulses, and benigner day; + She that divinely shook the dead + From living man; that stretched ahead + Her resolute forefinger straight, + And marched toward the gloomy gate + Of earth’s Untried, gave note, and in + The good name of Humanity + Called forth the daring vision! she, + She likewise half corrupt of sin, + Angel and Wanton! can it be? + Her star has foundered in eclipse, + The shriek of madness on her lips; + Shreds of her, and no more, we see. + There is horrible convulsion, smothered din, + As of one that in a grave-cloth struggles to be free. + + +III + + + Look not for spreading boughs + On the riven forest tree. + Look down where deep in blood and mire + Black thunder plants his feet and ploughs + The soil for ruin: that is France: + Still thrilling like a lyre, + Amazed to shivering discord from a fall + Sudden as that the lurid hosts recall + Who met in heaven the irreparable mischance. + O that is France! + The brilliant eyes to kindle bliss, + The shrewd quick lips to laugh and kiss, + Breasts that a sighing world inspire, + And laughter-dimpled countenance + Where soul and senses caught desire! + + +IV + + + Ever invoking fire from heaven, the fire + Has grasped her, unconsumable, but framed + For all the ecstasies of suffering dire. + Mother of Pride, her sanctuary shamed: + Mother of Delicacy, and made a mark + For outrage: Mother of Luxury, stripped stark: + Mother of Heroes, bondsmen: thro’ the rains, + Across her boundaries, lo the league-long chains! + Fond Mother of her martial youth; they pass, + Are spectres in her sight, are mown as grass! + Mother of Honour, and dishonoured: Mother + Of Glory, she condemned to crown with bays + Her victor, and be fountain of his praise. + Is there another curse? There is another: + Compassionate her madness: is she not + Mother of Reason? she that sees them mown + Like grass, her young ones! Yea, in the low groan + And under the fixed thunder of this hour + Which holds the animate world in one foul blot + Tranced circumambient while relentless Power + Beaks at her heart and claws her limbs down-thrown, + She, with the plungeing lightnings overshot, + With madness for an armour against pain, + With milkless breasts for little ones athirst, + And round her all her noblest dying in vain, + Mother of Reason is she, trebly cursed, + To feel, to see, to justify the blow; + Chamber to chamber of her sequent brain + Gives answer of the cause of her great woe, + Inexorably echoing thro’ the vaults, + ‘’Tis thus they reap in blood, in blood who sow: + ‘This is the sum of self-absolvëd faults.’ + Doubt not that thro’ her grief, with sight supreme, + Thro’ her delirium and despair’s last dream, + Thro’ pride, thro’ bright illusion and the brood + Bewildering of her various Motherhood, + The high strong light within her, tho’ she bleeds, + Traces the letters of returned misdeeds. + She sees what seed long sown, ripened of late, + Bears this fierce crop; and she discerns her fate + From origin to agony, and on + As far as the wave washes long and wan + Off one disastrous impulse: for of waves + Our life is, and our deeds are pregnant graves + Blown rolling to the sunset from the dawn. + + +V + + + Ah, what a dawn of splendour, when her sowers + Went forth and bent the necks of populations + And of their terrors and humiliations + Wove her the starry wreath that earthward lowers + Now in the figure of a burning yoke! + Her legions traversed North and South and East, + Of triumph they enjoyed the glutton’s feast: + They grafted the green sprig, they lopped the oak. + They caught by the beard the tempests, by the scalp + The icy precipices, and clove sheer through + The heart of horror of the pinnacled Alp, + Emerging not as men whom mortals knew. + They were the earthquake and the hurricane, + The lightnings and the locusts, plagues of blight, + Plagues of the revel: they were Deluge rain, + And dreaded Conflagration; lawless Might. + Death writes a reeling line along the snows, + Where under frozen mists they may be tracked, + Who men and elements provoked to foes, + And Gods: they were of god and beast compact: + Abhorred of all. Yet, how they sucked the teats + Of Carnage, thirsty issue of their dam, + Whose eagles, angrier than their oriflamme, + Flushed the vext earth with blood, green earth forgets. + The gay young generations mask her grief; + Where bled her children hangs the loaded sheaf. + Forgetful is green earth; the Gods alone + Remember everlastingly: they strike + Remorselessly, and ever like for like. + By their great memories the Gods are known. + + +VI + + + They are with her now, and in her ears, and known. + ’Tis they that cast her to the dust for Strength, + Their slave, to feed on her fair body’s length, + That once the sweetest and the proudest shone; + Scoring for hideous dismemberment + Her limbs, as were the anguish-taking breath + Gone out of her in the insufferable descent + From her high chieftainship; as were she death, + Who hears a voice of justice, feels the knife + Of torture, drinks all ignominy of life. + They are with her, and the painful Gods might weep, + If ever rain of tears came out of heaven + To flatter Weakness and bid conscience sleep, + Viewing the woe of this Immortal, driven + For the soul’s life to drain the maddening cup + Of her own children’s blood implacably: + Unsparing even as they to furrow up + The yellow land to likeness of a sea: + The bountiful fair land of vine and grain, + Of wit and grace and ardour, and strong roots, + Fruits perishable, imperishable fruits; + Furrowed to likeness of the dim grey main + Behind the black obliterating cyclone. + + +VII + + + Behold, the Gods are with her, and are known. + Whom they abandon misery persecutes + No more: them half-eyed apathy may loan + The happiness of pitiable brutes. + Whom the just Gods abandon have no light, + No ruthless light of introspective eyes + That in the midst of misery scrutinize + The heart and its iniquities outright. + They rest, they smile and rest; have earned perchance + Of ancient service quiet for a term; + Quiet of old men dropping to the worm; + And so goes out the soul. But not of France. + She cries for grief, and to the Gods she cries, + For fearfully their loosened hands chastize, + And icily they watch the rod’s caress + Ravage her flesh from scourges merciless, + But she, inveterate of brain, discerns + That Pity has as little place as Joy + Among their roll of gifts; for Strength she yearns. + For Strength, her idol once, too long her toy. + Lo, Strength is of the plain root-Virtues born: + Strength shall ye gain by service, prove in scorn, + Train by endurance, by devotion shape. + Strength is not won by miracle or rape. + It is the offspring of the modest years, + The gift of sire to son, thro’ those firm laws + Which we name Gods; which are the righteous cause, + The cause of man, and manhood’s ministers. + Could France accept the fables of her priests, + Who blest her banners in this game of beasts, + And now bid hope that heaven will intercede + To violate its laws in her sore need, + She would find comfort in their opiates: + Mother of Reason! can she cheat the Fates? + Would she, the champion of the open mind, + The Omnipotent’s prime gift—the gift of growth— + Consent even for a night-time to be blind, + And sink her soul on the delusive sloth, + For fruits ethereal and material, both, + In peril of her place among mankind? + The Mother of the many Laughters might + Call one poor shade of laughter in the light + Of her unwavering lamp to mark what things + The world puts faith in, careless of the truth: + What silly puppet-bodies danced on strings, + Attached by credence, we appear in sooth, + Demanding intercession, direct aid, + When the whole tragic tale hangs on a broken blade! + + She swung the sword for centuries; in a day + It slipped her, like a stream cut off from source. + She struck a feeble hand, and tried to pray, + Clamoured of treachery, and had recourse + To drunken outcries in her dream that Force + Needed but hear her shouting to obey. + Was she not formed to conquer? The bright plumes + Of crested vanity shed graceful nods: + Transcendent in her foundries, Arts and looms, + Had France to fear the vengeance of the Gods? + Her faith was on her battle-roll of names + Sheathed in the records of old war; with dance + And song she thrilled her warriors and her dames, + Embracing her Dishonour: gave him France + From head to foot, France present and to come, + So she might hear the trumpet and the drum— + Bellona and Bacchante! rushing forth + On yon stout marching Schoolmen of the North. + + Inveterate of brain, well knows she why + Strength failed her, faithful to himself the first: + Her dream is done, and she can read the sky, + And she can take into her heart the worst + Calamity to drug the shameful thought + Of days that made her as the man she served + A name of terror, but a thing unnerved: + Buying the trickster, by the trickster bought, + She for dominion, he to patch a throne. + + +VIII + + + Henceforth of her the Gods are known, + Open to them her breast is laid. + Inveterate of brain, heart-valiant, + Never did fairer creature pant + Before the altar and the blade! + + +IX + + + Swift fall the blows, and men upbraid, + And friends give echo blunt and cold, + The echo of the forest to the axe. + Within her are the fires that wax + For resurrection from the mould. + + +X + + + She snatched at heaven’s flame of old, + And kindled nations: she was weak: + Frail sister of her heroic prototype, + The Man; for sacrifice unripe, + She too must fill a Vulture’s beak. + Deride the vanquished, and acclaim + The conqueror, who stains her fame, + Still the Gods love her, for that of high aim + Is this good France, the bleeding thing they stripe. + + +XI + + + She shall rise worthier of her prototype + Thro’ her abasement deep; the pain that runs + From nerve to nerve some victory achieves. + They lie like circle-strewn soaked Autumn-leaves + Which stain the forest scarlet, her fair sons! + And of their death her life is: of their blood + From many streams now urging to a flood, + No more divided, France shall rise afresh. + Of them she learns the lesson of the flesh:— + The lesson writ in red since first Time ran, + A hunter hunting down the beast in man: + That till the chasing out of its last vice, + The flesh was fashioned but for sacrifice. + + Immortal Mother of a mortal host! + Thou suffering of the wounds that will not slay, + Wounds that bring death but take not life away!— + Stand fast and hearken while thy victors boast: + Hearken, and loathe that music evermore. + Slip loose thy garments woven of pride and shame: + The torture lurks in them, with them the blame + Shall pass to leave thee purer than before. + Undo thy jewels, thinking whence they came, + For what, and of the abominable name + Of her who in imperial beauty wore. + + O Mother of a fated fleeting host + Conceived in the past days of sin, and born + Heirs of disease and arrogance and scorn, + Surrender, yield the weight of thy great ghost, + Like wings on air, to what the heavens proclaim + With trumpets from the multitudinous mounds + Where peace has filled the hearing of thy sons: + Albeit a pang of dissolution rounds + Each new discernment of the undying ones, + Do thou stoop to these graves here scattered wide + Along thy fields, as sunless billows roll; + These ashes have the lesson for the soul. + ‘Die to thy Vanity, and strain thy Pride, + Strip off thy Luxury: that thou may’st live, + Die to thyself,’ they say, ‘as we have died + From dear existence and the foe forgive, + Nor pray for aught save in our little space + To warn good seed to greet the fair earth’s face.’ + O Mother! take their counsel, and so shall + The broader world breathe in on this thy home, + Light clear for thee the counter-changing dome, + Strength give thee, like an ocean’s vast expanse + Off mountain cliffs, the generations all, + Not whirling in their narrow rings of foam, + But as a river forward. Soaring France! + Now is Humanity on trial in thee: + Now may’st thou gather humankind in fee: + Now prove that Reason is a quenchless scroll; + Make of calamity thine aureole, + And bleeding head us thro’ the troubles of the sea. + + + +ALSACE-LORRAINE + + +I + + + THE sister Hours in circles linked, + Daughters of men, of men the mates, + Are gone on flow with the day that winked, + With the night that spanned at golden gates. + Mothers, they leave us, quickening seed; + They bear us grain or flower or weed, + As we have sown; is nought extinct + For them we fill to be our Fates. + Life of the breath is but the loan; + Passing death what we have sown. + + Pearly are they till the pale inherited stain + Deepens in us, and the mirrors they form on their flow + Darken to feature and nature: a volumed chain, + Sequent of issue, in various eddies they show. + Theirs is the Book of the River of Life, to read + Leaf by leaf by reapers of long-sown seed: + There doth our shoot up to light from a spiriting sane + Stand as a tree whereon numberless clusters grow: + Legible there how the heart, with its one false move + Cast Eurydice pallor on all we love. + + Our fervid heart has filled that Book in chief; + Our fitful heart a wild reflection views; + Our craving heart of passion suckling grief + Disowns the author’s work it must peruse; + Inconscient in its leap to wreak the deed, + A round of harvests red from crimson seed, + It marks the current Hours show leaf by leaf, + And rails at Destiny; nor traces clues; + Though sometimes it may think what novel light + Will strike their faces when the mind shall write. + + +II + + + Succourful daughters of men are the rosed and starred + Revolving Twelves in their fluent germinal rings, + Despite the burden to chasten, abase, depose. + Fallen on France, as the sweep of scythe over sward, + They breathed in her ear their voice of the crystal springs, + That run from a twilight rise, from a twilight close, + Through alternate beams and glooms, rejoicingly young. + Only to Earth’s best loved, at the breathless turns + Where Life in fold of the Shadow reclines unstrung, + And a ghostly lamp of their moment’s union burns, + Will such pure notes from the fountain-head be sung. + + Voice of Earth’s very soul to the soul she would see renewed: + A song that sought no tears, that laid not a touch on the breast + Sobbing aswoon and, like last foxgloves’ bells upon ferns + In sandy alleys of woodland silence, shedding to bare. + Daughters of Earth and men, they piped of her natural brood; + Her patient helpful four-feet; wings on the flit or in nest; + Paws at our old-world task to scoop a defensive lair; + Snouts at hunt through the scented grasses; enhavened scuts + Flashing escape under show of a laugh nigh the mossed burrow-mouth. + Sack-like droop bronze pears on the nailed branch-frontage of huts, + To greet those wedded toilers from acres where sweat is a shower. + Snake, cicada, lizard, on lavender slopes up South, + Pant for joy of a sunlight driving the fielders to bower. + Sharpened in silver by one chance breeze is the olive’s grey; + A royal-mantle floats, a red fritillary hies; + The bee, for whom no flower of garden or wild has nay, + Noises, heard if but named, so hot is the trade he plies. + Processions beneath green arches of herbage, the long colonnades; + Laboured mounds that a foot or a wanton stick may subvert; + Homely are they for a lowly look on bedewed grass-blades, + On citied fir-droppings, on twisted wreaths of the worm in dirt. + Does nought so loosen our sight from the despot heart, to receive + Balm of a sound Earth’s primary heart at its active beat: + The motive, yet servant, of energy; simple as morn and eve; + Treasureless, fetterless; free of the bonds of a great conceit: + Unwounded even by cruel blows on a body that writhes; + Nor whimpering under misfortune; elusive of obstacles; prompt + To quit any threatened familiar domain seen doomed by the scythes; + Its day’s hard business done, the score to the good accompt. + Creatures of forest and mead, Earth’s essays in being, all kinds + Bound by the navel-knot to the Mother, never astray, + They in the ear upon ground will pour their intuitive minds, + Cut man’s tangles for Earth’s first broad rectilinear way: + Admonishing loftier reaches, the rich adventurous shoots, + Pushes of tentative curves, embryonic upwreathings in air; + Not always the sprouts of Earth’s root-Laws preserving her brutes; + Oft but our primitive hungers licentious in fine and fair. + + Yet the like aërial growths may chance be the delicate sprays, + Infant of Earth’s most urgent in sap, her fierier zeal + For entry on Life’s upper fields: and soul thus flourishing pays + The martyr’s penance, mark for brutish in man to heel. + + Her, from a nerveless well among stagnant pools of the dry, + Through her good aim at divine, shall commune with Earth remake; + Fraternal unto sororial, her, where abashed she may lie, + Divinest of man shall clasp; a world out of darkness awake, + As it were with the Resurrection’s eyelids uplifted, to see + Honour in shame, in substance the spirit, in that dry fount + Jets of the songful ascending silvery-bright water-tree + Spout, with our Earth’s unbaffled resurgent desire for the mount, + Though broken at intervals, clipped, and barren in seeming it be. + For this at our nature arises rejuvenescent from Earth, + However respersive the blow and nigh on infernal the fall, + The chastisement drawn down on us merited: are we of worth + Amid our satanic excrescences, this, for the less than a call, + Will Earth reprime, man cherish; the God who is in us and round, + Consenting, the God there seen. Impiety speaks despair; + Religion the virtue of serving as things of the furrowy ground, + Debtors for breath while breath with our fellows in service we share. + Not such of the crowned discrowned + Can Earth or humanity spare; + Such not the God let die. + + +III + + + Eastward of Paris morn is high; + And darkness on that Eastward side + The heart of France beholds: a thorn + Is in her frame where shines the morn: + A rigid wave usurps her sky, + With eagle crest and eagle-eyed + To scan what wormy wrinkles hint + Her forces gathering: she the thrown + From station, lopped of an arm, astounded, lone, + Reading late History as a foul misprint: + Imperial, Angelical, + At strife commingled in her frame convulsed; + Shame of her broken sword, a ravening gall; + Pain of the limb where once her warm blood pulsed; + These tortures to distract her underneath + Her whelmed Aurora’s shade. But in that space + When lay she dumb beside her trampled wreath, + Like an unburied body mid the tombs, + Feeling against her heart life’s bitter probe + For life, she saw how children of her race, + The many sober sons and daughters, plied, + By cottage lamplight through the water-globe, + By simmering stew-pots, by the serious looms, + Afield, in factories, with the birds astir, + Their nimble feet and fingers; not denied + Refreshful chatter, laughter, galliard songs. + So like Earth’s indestructible they were, + That wrestling with its anguish rose her pride, + To feel where in each breast the thought of her, + On whom the circle Hours laid leaded thongs, + Was constant; spoken sometimes in low tone + At lip or in a fluttered look, + A shortened breath: and they were her loved own; + Nor ever did they waste their strength with tears, + For pity of the weeper, nor rebuke, + Though mainly they were charged to pay her debt, + The Mother having conscience in arrears; + Ready to gush the flood of vain regret, + Else hearken to her weaponed children’s moan + Of stifled rage invoking vengeance: hell’s, + If heaven should fail the counter-wave that swells + In blood and brain for retribution swift. + Those helped not: wings to her soul were these who yet + Could welcome day for labour, night for rest, + Enrich her treasury, built of cheerful thrift, + Of honest heart, beyond all miracles; + And likened to Earth’s humblest were Earth’s best. + + +IV + + + Brooding on her deep fall, the many strings + Which formed her nature set a thought on Kings, + As aids that might the low-laid cripple lift; + And one among them hummed devoutly leal, + While passed the sighing breeze along her breast. + Of Kings by the festive vanquishers rammed down + Her gorge since fell the Chief, she knew their crown; + Upon her through long seasons was its grasp, + For neither soul’s nor body’s weal; + As much bestows the robber wasp, + That in the hanging apple makes a meal, + And carves a face of abscess where was fruit + Ripe ruddy. They would blot + Her radiant leap above the slopes acute, + Of summit to celestial; impute + The wanton’s aim to her divinest shot; + Bid her walk History backward over gaps; + Abhor the day of Phrygian caps; + Abjure her guerdon, execrate herself; + The Hapsburg, Hohenzollern, Guelph, + Admire repentant; reverently prostrate + Her person unto the belly-god; of whom + Is inward plenty and external bloom; + Enough of pomp and state + And carnival to quench + The breast’s desires of an intemperate wench, + The head’s ideas beyond legitimate. + + She flung them: she was France: nor with far frown + Her lover from the embrace of her refrained: + But in her voice an interwoven wire, + The exultation of her gross renown, + Struck deafness at her heavens, and they waned + Over a look ill-gifted to aspire. + Wherefore, as an abandonment, irate, + The intemperate summoned up her trumpet days, + Her treasure-galleon’s wondrous freight. + The cannon-name she sang and shrieked; transferred + Her soul’s allegiance; o’er the Tyrant slurred, + Tranced with the zeal of her first fawning gaze, + To clasp his trophy flags and hail him Saint. + + +V + + + She hailed him Saint: + And her Jeanne unsainted, foully sung! + The virgin who conceived a France when funeral glooms + Across a land aquake with sharp disseverance hung: + Conceived, and under stress of battle brought her forth; + Crowned her in purification of feud and foeman’s taint; + Taught her to feel her blood her being, know her worth, + Have joy of unity: the Jeanne bescreeched, bescoffed, + Who flamed to ashes, flew up wreaths of faggot fumes; + Through centuries a star in vapour-folds aloft. + + For her people to hail her Saint, + Were no lifting of her, Earth’s gem, + Earth’s chosen, Earth’s throb on divine: + In the ranks of the starred she is one, + While man has thought on our line: + No lifting of her, but for them, + Breath of the mountain, beam of the sun + Through mist, out of swamp-fires’ lures release, + Youth on the forehead, the rough right way + Seen to be footed: for them the heart’s peace, + By the mind’s war won for a permanent miracle day. + + Her arms below her sword-hilt crossed, + The heart of that high-hallowed Jeanne + Into the furnace-pit she tossed + Before her body knew the flame, + And sucked its essence: warmth for righteous work, + An undivided power to speed her aim. + She had no self but France: the sainted man + No France but self. Him warrior and clerk, + Free of his iron clutch; and him her young, + In whirled imagination mastodonized; + And him her penmen, him her poets; all + For the visioned treasure-galleon astrain; + Sent zenithward on bass and treble tongue, + Till solely through his glory France was prized. + She who had her Jeanne; + The child of her industrious; + Earth’s truest, earth’s pure fount from the main; + And she who had her one day’s mate, + In the soul’s view illustrious + Past blazonry, her Immaculate, + Those hours of slavish Empire would recall; + Thrill to the rattling anchor-chain + She heard upon a day in ‘I who can’; + Start to the softened, tremulous bugle-blare + Of that Caesarean Italian + Across the storied fields of trampled grain, + As to a Vercingetorix of old Gaul + Blowing the rally against a Caesar’s reign. + Her soul’s protesting sobs she drowned to swear + Fidelity unto the sainted man, + Whose nimbus was her crown; and be again + The foreigner in Europe, known of none, + None knowing; sight to dazzle, voice to stun. + Rearward she stepped, with thirst for Europe’s van; + The dream she nursed a snare, + The flag she bore a pall. + + +VI + + + In Nature is no rearward step allowed. + Hard on the rock Reality do we dash + To be shattered, if the material dream propels. + The worship to departed splendour vowed + Conjured a simulacrum, wove her lash, + For the slow measure timed her peal of bells. + + Thereof was the cannon-name a mockery round her hills; + For the will of wills, + Its flaccid ape, + Weak as the final echo off a giant’s bawl: + Napoleon for disdain, + His banner steeped in crape. + Thereof the barrier of Alsace-Lorraine; + The frozen billow crested to its fall; + Dismemberment; disfigurement; + Her history blotted; her proud mantle rent; + And ever that one word to reperuse, + With eyes behind a veil of fiery dews; + Knelling the spot where Gallic soil defiled + Showed her sons’ valour as a frenzied child + In arms of the mailed man. + Word that her mind must bear, her heart put under ban, + Lest burst it: unto her eyes a ghost, + Incredible though manifest: a scene + Stamped with her new Saint’s name: and all his host + A wattled flock the foeman’s dogs between! + + +VII + + + Mark where a credible ghost pulls bridle to view that bare + Corpse of a field still reddening cloud, and alive in its throes + Beneath her Purgatorial Saint’s evocative stare: + Brand on his name, the gulf of his glory, his Legend’s close. + A lustreless Phosphor heading for daybeam Night’s dead-born, + His underworld eyeballs grip the cast of the land for a fray + Expugnant; swift up the heights, with the Victor’s instinctive scorn + Of the trapped below, he rides; he beholds, and a two-fold grey, + Even as the misty sun growing moon that a frost enrings, + Is shroud on the shrouded; he knows him there in the helmeted ranks. + The golden eagles flap lame wings, + The black double-headed are round their flanks. + He is there in midst of the pupils he harried to brains awake, trod + into union; lo, + These are his Epic’s tutored Dardans, yon that Rhapsode’s Achaeans to + know. + Nor is aught of an equipollent conflict seen, nor the weaker’s flashed + device; + Headless is offered a breast to beaks deliberate, formal, assured, + precise. + Ruled by the mathematician’s hand, they solve their problem, as on a + slate. + This is the ground foremarked, and the day; their leader modestly + hazarded date. + His helmeted ranks might be draggers of pools or reapers of plains for + the warrior’s guile + Displayed; they haul, they rend, as in some orderly office mercantile. + And a timed artillery speaks full-mouthed on a stuttering feeble + reduced to nought. + Can it be France, an army of France, tricked, netted, convulsive, all + writhen caught? + Arterial blood of an army’s heart outpoured the Grey Observer sees: + A forest of France in thunder comes, like a landslide hurled off her + Pyrenees. + Torrent and forest ramp, roll, sling on for a charge against iron, + reason, Fate; + It is gapped through the mass midway, bare ribs and dust ere the + helmeted feel its weight. + So the blue billow white-plumed is plunged upon shingle to screaming + withdrawal, but snatched, + Waved is the laurel eternal yielded by Death o’er the waste of brave + men outmatched. + The France of the fury was there, the thing he had wielded, whose + honour was dearer than life; + The Prussia despised, the harried, the trodden, was here; his pupil, + the scholar in strife. + + He hated to heel, in a spasm of will, + From sleep or debate, a mannikin squire + With head of a merlin hawk and quill + Acrow on an ear. At him rained fire + From a blast of eyeballs hotter than speech, + To say what a deadly poison stuffed + The France here laid in her bloody ditch, + Through the Legend passing human puffed. + + Credible ghost of the field which from him descends, + Each dark anniversary day will its father return, + Haling his shadow to spy where the Legend ends, + That penman trumpeter’s part in the wreck discern. + + There, with the cup it presents at her lips, she stands, + France, with her future staked on the word it may pledge. + The vengeance urged of desire a reserve countermands; + The patience clasped totters hard on the precipice edge. + Lopped of an arm, mother love for her own springs quick, + To curdle the milk in her breasts for the young they feed, + At thought of her single hand, and the lost so nigh. + Mother love for her own, who raised her when she lay sick + Nigh death, and would in like fountains fruitlessly bleed, + Withholds the fling of her heart on the further die. + + Of love is wisdom. Is it great love, then wise + Will our wild heart be, though whipped unto madness more + By its mentor’s counselling voice than thoughtfully reined. + Desire of the wave for the shore, + Passion for one last agony under skies, + To make her heavens remorseful, she restrained + + +VIII + + + On her lost arm love bade her look; + On her one hand to meditate; + The tumult of her blood abate; + Disaster face, derision brook: + Forbade the page of her Historic Muse, + Until her demon his last hold forsook, + And smoothly, with no countenance of hate, + Her conqueror she could scan to measure. Thence + The strange new Winter stream of ruling sense, + Cold, comfortless, but braced to disabuse, + Ran through the mind of this most lowly laid; + From the top billow of victorious War, + Down in the flagless troughs at ebb and flow; + A wreck; her past, her future, both in shade. + She read the things that are; + Reality unaccepted read + For sign of the distraught, and took her blow + To brain; herself read through; + Wherefore her predatory Glory paid + Napoleon ransom knew. + Her nature’s many strings hot gusts did jar + Against the note of reason uttered low, + Ere passionate with duty she might wed, + Compel the bride’s embrace of her stern groom, + Joined at an altar liker to the tomb, + Nest of the Furies their first nuptial bed, + They not the less were mated and proclaimed + The rational their issue. Then she rose. + + See how the rush of southern Springtide glows + Oceanic in the chariot-wheel’s ascent, + Illuminated with one breath. The maimed, + Tom, tortured, winter-visaged, suddenly + Had stature; to the world’s wonderment, + Fair features, grace of mien, nor least + The comic dimples round her April mouth, + Sprung of her intimate humanity. + She stood before mankind the very South + Rapt out of frost to flowery drapery; + Unshadowed save when somewhiles she looked East. + + +IX + + + Let but the rational prevail, + Our footing is on ground though all else fail: + Our kiss of Earth is then a plight + To walk within her Laws and have her light. + Choice of the life or death lies in ourselves; + There is no fate but when unreason lours. + This Land the cheerful toiler delves, + The thinker brightens with fine wit, + The lovelier grace as lyric flowers, + Those rosed and starred revolving Twelves + Shall nurse for effort infinite + While leashed to brain the heart of France the Fair + Beats tempered music and its lead subserves. + Washed from her eyes the Napoleonic glare, + Divinely raised by that in her divine, + Not the clear sight of Earth’s blunt actual swerves + When her lost look, as on a wave of wine, + Rolls Eastward, and the mother-flag descries + Caress with folds and curves + The fortress over Rhine, + Beneath the one tall spire. + Despite her brooding thought, her nightlong sighs, + Her anguish in desire, + She sees, above the brutish paw + Alert on her still quivering limb— + As little in past time she saw, + Nor when dispieced as prey, + As victrix when abhorred— + A Grand Germania, stout on soil; + Audacious up the ethereal dim; + The forest’s Infant; the strong hand for toil; + The patient brain in twilights when astray; + Shrewdest of heads to foil and counterfoil; + The sceptic and devout; the potent sword; + With will and armed to help in hewing way + For Europe’s march; and of the most golden chord + Of the Heliconian lyre + Excellent mistress. Yea, she sees, and can admire; + Still seeing in what walks the Gallia leads; + And with what shield upon Alsace-Lorraine + Her wary sister’s doubtful look misreads + A mother’s throbs for her lost: so loved: so near: + Magnetic. Hard the course for her to steer, + The leap against the sharpened spikes restrain. + For the belted Overshadower hard the course, + On whom devolves the spirit’s touchstone, Force: + Which is the strenuous arm, to strike inclined, + That too much adamantine makes the mind; + Forgets it coin of Nature’s rich Exchange; + Contracts horizons within present sight: + Amalekite to-day, across its range + Indisputable; to-morrow Simeonite. + + +X + + + The mother who gave birth to Jeanne; + Who to her young Angelical sprang; + Who lay with Earth and heard the notes she sang, + And heard her truest sing them; she may reach + Heights yet unknown of nations; haply teach + A thirsting world to learn ’tis ‘she who can.’ + + She that in History’s Heliaea pleads + The nation flowering conscience o’er the beast; + With heart expurged of rancour, tame of greeds; + With the winged mind from fang and claw released;— + Will such a land be seen? It will be seen;— + Shall stand adjudged our foremost and Earth’s Queen. + Acknowledgement that she of God proceeds + The invisible makes visible, as his priest, + To her is yielded by a world reclaimed. + And stands she mutilated, fancy-shamed, + Yet strong in arms, yet strong in self-control, + Known valiant, her maternal throbs repressed, + Discarding vengeance, Giant with a soul;— + My faith in her when she lay low + Was fountain; now as wave at flow + Beneath the lights, my faith in God is best;— + On France has come the test + Of what she holds within + Responsive to Life’s deeper springs. + She above the nations blest + In fruitful and in liveliest, + In all that servant earth to heavenly bidding brings, + The devotee of Glory, she may win + Glory despoiling none, enrich her kind, + Illume her land, and take the royal seat + Unto the strong self-conqueror assigned. + But ah, when speaks a loaded breath the double name, + Humanity’s old Foeman winks agrin. + Her constant Angel eyes her heart’s quick beat, + The thrill of shadow coursing through her frame. + Like wind among the ranks of amber wheat. + Our Europe, vowed to unity or torn, + Observes her face, as shepherds note the morn, + And in a ruddy beacon mark an end + That for the flock in their grave hearing rings. + Specked overhead the imminent vulture wings + At poise, one fatal movement indiscreet, + Sprung from the Aetna passions’ mad revolts, + Draws down; the midnight hovers to descend; + And dire as Indian noons of ulcer heat + Anticipating tempest and the bolts, + Hangs curtained terrors round her next day’s door, + Death’s emblems for the breast of Europe flings; + The breast that waits a spark to fire her store. + Shall, then, the great vitality, France, + Signal the backward step once more; + Again a Goddess Fortune trace + Amid the Deities, and pledge to chance + One whom we never could replace? + Now may she tune her nature’s many strings + To noble harmony, be seen, be known. + + It was the foreign France, the unruly, feared; + Little for all her witcheries endeared; + Theatrical of arrogance, a sprite + With gaseous vapours overblown, + In her conceit of power ensphered, + Foredoomed to violate and atone; + Her the grim conqueror’s iron might + Avengeing clutched, distrusting rent; + Not that sharp intellect with fire endowed + To cleave our webs, run lightnings through our cloud; + Not virtual France, the France benevolent, + The chivalrous, the many-stringed, sublime + At intervals, and oft in sweetest chime; + Though perilously instrument, + A breast for any having godlike gleam. + This France could no antagonist disesteem, + To spurn at heel and confiscate her brood. + Albeit a waverer between heart and mind, + And laurels won from sky or plucked from blood, + Which wither all the wreath when intertwined, + This cherishable France she may redeem. + Beloved of Earth, her heart should feel at length + How much unto Earth’s offspring it doth owe. + Obstructions are for levelling, have we strength; + ’Tis poverty of soul conceived a foe. + Rejected be the wrath that keeps unhealed + Her panting wound; to higher Courts appealed + The wrongs discerned of higher: Europe waits: + She chooses God or gambles with the Fates. + Shines the new Helen in Alsace-Lorraine, + A darker river severs Rhine and Rhone, + Is heard a deadlier Epic of the twain; + We see a Paris burn + Or France Napoleon. + + For yet he breathes whom less her heart forswears + While trembles its desire to thwart her mind: + The Tyrant lives in Victory’s return. + What figure with recurrent footstep fares + Around those memoried tracks of scarlet mud, + To sow her future from an ashen urn + By lantern-light, as dragons’ teeth are sown? + Of bleeding pride the piercing seër is blind. + But, cleared her eyes of that ensanguined scud + Distorting her true features, to be shown + Benignly luminous, one who bears + Humanity at breast, and she might learn + How surely the excelling generous find + Renouncement is possession. Sure + As light enkindles light when heavenly earthly mates, + The flame of pure immits the flame of pure, + Magnanimous magnanimous creates. + So to majestic beauty stricken rears + Hard-visaged rock against the risen glow; + And men are in the secret with the spheres, + Whose glory is celestially to bestow. + + Now nation looks to nation, that may live + Their common nurseling, like the torrent’s flower, + Shaken by foul Destruction’s fast-piled heap. + On France is laid the proud initiative + Of sacrifice in one self-mastering hour, + Whereby more than her lost one will she reap; + Perchance the very lost regain, + To count it less than her superb reward. + Our Europe, where is debtor each to each, + Pass measure of excess, and war is Cain, + Fraternal from the Seaman’s beach, + From answering Rhine in grand accord, + From Neva beneath Northern cloud, + And from our Transatlantic Europe loud, + Will hail the rare example for their theme; + Give response, as rich foliage to the breeze; + In their entrusted nurseling know them one: + Like a brave vessel under press of steam, + Abreast the winds and tides, on angry seas, + Plucked by the heavens forlorn of present sun, + Will drive through darkness, and, with faith supreme, + Have sight of haven and the crowded quays. + + + + +THE CAGEING OF ARES +ILIAD, v. 385 + + + [DEDICATED TO THE COUNCIL AT THE HAGUE, 1899] + + HOW big of breast our Mother Gaea laughed + At sight of her boy Giants on the leap + Each over other as they neighboured home, + Fronting the day’s descent across green slopes, + And up fired mountain crags their shadows danced. + Close with them in their fun, she scarce could guess, + Though these two billowy urchins reeked of craft, + It signalled some adventurous master-trick + To set Olympians buzzing in debate, + Lest it might be their godhead undermined, + The Tyranny menaced. Ephialtes high + On shoulders of his brother Otos waved + For the bull-bellowings given to grand good news, + Compact, complexioned in his gleeful roar + While Otos aped the prisoner’s wrists and knees, + With doleful sniffs between recurrent howls; + Till Gaea’s lap receiving them, they stretched, + And both upon her bosom shaken to speech, + Burst the hot story out of throats of both, + Like rocky head-founts, baffling in their glut + The hurried spout. And as when drifting storm + Disburdened loses clasp of here and yon + A peak, a forest mound, a valley’s gleam + Of grass and the river’s crooks and snaky coils, + Signification marvellous she caught, + Through gurglings of triumphant jollity, + Which now engulphed and now gave eye; at last + Subsided, and the serious naked deed, + With mountain-cloud of laughter banked around, + Stood in her sight confirmed: she could believe + That these, her sprouts of promise, her most prized, + These two made up of lion, bear and fox, + Her sportive, suckling mammoths, her young joy, + Still by the reckoning infants among men, + Had done the deed to strike the Titan host + In envy dumb, in envious heart elate: + These two combining strength and craft had snared, + Enmeshed, bound fast with thongs, discreetly caged + The blood-shedder, the terrible Lord of War; + Destroyer, ravager, superb in plumes; + The barren furrower of anointed fields; + The scarlet heel in towns, foul smoke to sky, + Her hated enemy, too long her scourge: + Great Ares. And they gagged his trumpet mouth + When they had seized on his implacable spear, + Hugged him to reedy helplessness despite + His godlike fury startled from amaze. + For he had eyed them nearing him in play, + The giant cubs, who gambolled and who snarled, + Unheeding his fell presence, by the mount + Ossa, beside a brushwood cavern; there + On Earth’s original fisticuffs they called + For ease of sharp dispute: whereat the God, + Approving, deemed that sometime trained to arms, + Good servitors of Ares they would be, + And ply the pointed spear to dominate + Their rebel restless fellows, villain brood + Vowed to defy Immortals. So it chanced + Amusedly he watched them, and as one + The lusty twain were on him and they had him. + Breath to us, Powers of air, for laughter loud! + Cock of Olympus he, superb in plumes! + Bound like a wheaten sheaf by those two babes! + Because they knew our Mother Gaea loathed him, + Knew him the famine, pestilence and waste; + A desolating fire to blind the sight + With splendour built of fruitful things in ashes; + The gory chariot-wheel on cries for justice; + Her deepest planted and her liveliest voice, + Heard from the babe as from the broken crone. + Behold him in his vessel of bronze encased, + And tumbled down the cave. But rather look— + Ah, that the woman tattler had not sought, + Of all the Gods to let her secret fly, + Hermes, after the thirteen songful months! + Prompting the Dexterous to work his arts, + And shatter earth’s delirious holiday, + Then first, as where the fountain runs a stream, + Resolving to composure on its throbs. + But see her in the Seasons through that year; + That one glad year and the fair opening month. + Had never our Great Mother such sweet face! + War with her, gentle war with her, each day + Her sons and daughters urged; at eve were flung, + On the morrow stood to challenge; in their strength + Renewed, indomitable; whereof they won, + From hourly wrestlings up to shut of lids, + Her ready secret: the abounding life + Returned for valiant labour: she and they + Defeated and victorious turn by turn; + By loss enriched, by overthrow restored. + Exchange of powers of this conflict came; + Defacement none, nor ever squandered force. + Is battle nature’s mandate, here it reigned, + As music unto the hand that smote the strings; + And she the rosier from their showery brows, + They fruitful from her ploughed and harrowed breast. + Back to the primal rational of those + Who suck the teats of milky earth, and clasp + Stability in hatred of the insane, + Man stepped; with wits less fearful to pronounce + The mortal mind’s concept of earth’s divorced + Above; those beautiful, those masterful, + Those lawless. High they sit, and if descend, + Descend to reap, not sowing. Is it just? + Earth in her happy children asked that word, + Whereto within their breast was her reply. + Those beautiful, those masterful, those lawless, + Enjoy the life prolonged, outleap the years; + Yet they (’twas the Great Mother’s voice inspired + The audacious thought), they, glorious over dust, + Outleap not her; disrooted from her soar, + To meet the certain fate of earth’s divorced, + And clap lame wings across a wintry haze, + Up to the farthest bourne: immortal still, + Thenceforth innocuous; lovelier than when ruled + The Tyranny. This her voice within them told, + When softly the Great Mother chid her sons + Not of the giant brood, who did create + Those lawless Gods, first offspring of our brain + Set moving by an abject blood, that waked + To wanton under elements more benign, + And planted aliens on Olympian heights;— + Imagination’s cradle poesy + Become a monstrous pressure upon men;— + Foes of good Gaea; until dispossessed + By light from her, born of the love of her, + Their lordship the illumined brain rejects + For earth’s beneficent, the sons of Law, + Her other name. So spake she in their heart, + Among the wheat-blades proud of stalk; beneath + Young vine-leaves pushing timid fingers forth, + Confidently to cling. And when brown corn + Swayed armied ranks with softened cricket song, + With gold necks bent for any zephyr’s kiss; + When vine-roots daily down a rubble soil + Drank fire of heaven athirst to swell the grape; + When swelled the grape, and in it held a ray, + Rich issue of the embrace of heaven and earth; + The very eye of passion drowsed by excess, + And yet a burning lion for the spring; + Then in that time of general cherishment, + Sweet breathing balm and flutes by cool wood-side, + He the harsh rouser of ire being absent, caged, + Then did good Gaea’s children gratefully + Lift hymns to Gods they judged, but praised for peace, + Delightful Peace, that answers Reason’s call + Harmoniously and images her Law; + Reflects, and though short-lived as then, revives, + In memories made present on the brain + By natural yearnings, all the happy scenes; + The picture of an earth allied to heaven; + Between them the known smile behind black masks; + Rightly their various moods interpreted; + And frolic because toilful children borne + With larger comprehension of Earth’s aim + At loftier, clearer, sweeter, by their aid. + + + + +THE NIGHT-WALK + + + AWAKES for me and leaps from shroud + All radiantly the moon’s own night + Of folded showers in streamer cloud; + Our shadows down the highway white + Or deep in woodland woven-boughed, + With yon and yon a stem alight. + + I see marauder runagates + Across us shoot their dusky wink; + I hear the parliament of chats + In haws beside the river’s brink; + And drops the vole off alder-banks, + To push his arrow through the stream. + These busy people had our thanks + For tickling sight and sound, but theme + They were not more than breath we drew + Delighted with our world’s embrace: + The moss-root smell where beeches grew, + And watered grass in breezy space; + The silken heights, of ghostly bloom + Among their folds, by distance draped. + ’Twas Youth, rapacious to consume, + That cried to have its chaos shaped: + Absorbing, little noting, still + Enriched, and thinking it bestowed; + With wistful looks on each far hill + For something hidden, something owed. + Unto his mantled sister, Day + Had given the secret things we sought + And she was grave and saintly gay; + At times she fluttered, spoke her thought; + She flew on it, then folded wings, + In meditation passing lone, + To breathe around the secret things, + Which have no word, and yet are known; + Of thirst for them are known, as air + Is health in blood: we gained enough + By this to feel it honest fare; + Impalpable, not barren, stuff. + + A pride of legs in motion kept + Our spirits to their task meanwhile, + And what was deepest dreaming slept: + The posts that named the swallowed mile; + Beside the straight canal the hut + Abandoned; near the river’s source + Its infant chirp; the shortest cut; + The roadway missed; were our discourse; + At times dear poets, whom some view + Transcendent or subdued evoked + To speak the memorable, the true, + The luminous as a moon uncloaked; + For proof that there, among earth’s dumb, + A soul had passed and said our best. + Or it might be we chimed on some + Historic favourite’s astral crest, + With part to reverence in its gleam, + And part to rivalry the shout: + So royal, unuttered, is youth’s dream + Of power within to strike without. + But most the silences were sweet, + Like mothers’ breasts, to bid it feel + It lived in such divine conceit + As envies aught we stamp for real. + + To either then an untold tale + Was Life, and author, hero, we. + The chapters holding peaks to scale, + Or depths to fathom, made our glee; + For we were armed of inner fires, + Unbled in us the ripe desires; + And passion rolled a quiet sea, + Whereon was Love the phantom sail. + + + + +AT THE CLOSE + + + TO Thee, dear God of Mercy, both appeal, + Who straightway sound the call to arms. Thou know’st; + And that black spot in each embattled host, + Spring of the blood-stream, later wilt reveal. + Now is it red artillery and white steel; + Till on a day will ring the victor’s boast, + That ’tis Thy chosen towers uppermost, + Where Thy rejected grovels under heel. + So in all times of man’s descent insane + To brute, did strength and craft combining strike, + Even as a God of Armies, his fell blow. + But at the close he entered Thy domain, + Dear God of Mercy, and if lion-like + He tore the fall’n, the Eternal was his Foe. + + + + +A GARDEN IDYL + + + WITH sagest craft Arachne worked + Her web, and at a corner lurked, + Awaiting what should plump her soon, + To case it in the death-cocoon. + Sagaciously her home she chose + For visits that would never close; + Inside my chalet-porch her feast + Plucked all the winds but chill North-east. + + The finished structure, bar on bar, + Had snatched from light to form a star, + And struck on sight, when quick with dews, + Like music of the very Muse. + Great artists pass our single sense; + We hear in seeing, strung to tense; + Then haply marvel, groan mayhap, + To think such beauty means a trap. + But Nature’s genius, even man’s + At best, is practical in plans; + Subservient to the needy thought, + However rare the weapon wrought. + As long as Nature holds it good + To urge her creatures’ quest for food + Will beauty stamp the just intent + Of weapons upon service bent. + For beauty is a flower of roots + Embedded lower than our boots; + Out of the primal strata springs, + And shows for crown of useful things. + + Arachne’s dream of prey to size + Aspired; so she could nigh despise + The puny specks the breezes round + Supplied, and let them shake unwound; + Assured of her fat fly to come; + Perhaps a blue, the spider’s plum; + Who takes the fatal odds in fight, + And gives repast an appetite, + By plunging, whizzing, till his wings + Are webbed, and in the lists he swings, + A shrouded lump, for her to see + Her banquet in her victory. + + This matron of the unnumbered threads, + One day of dandelions’ heads + Distributing their gray perruques + Up every gust, I watched with looks + Discreet beside the chalet-door; + And gracefully a light wind bore, + Direct upon my webster’s wall, + A monster in the form of ball; + The mildest captive ever snared, + That neither struggled nor despaired, + On half the net invading hung, + And plain as in her mother tongue, + While low the weaver cursed her lures, + Remarked, “You have me; I am yours.” + + Thrice magnified, in phantom shape, + Her dream of size she saw, agape. + Midway the vast round-raying beard + A desiccated midge appeared; + Whose body pricked the name of meal, + Whose hair had growth in earth’s unreal; + Provocative of dread and wrath, + Contempt and horror, in one froth, + Inextricable, insensible, + His poison presence there would dwell, + Declaring him her dream fulfilled, + A catch to compliment the skilled; + And she reduced to beaky skin, + Disgraceful among kith and kin + + Against her corner, humped and aged, + Arachne wrinkled, past enraged, + Beyond disgust or hope in guile. + Ridiculously volatile + He seemed to her last spark of mind; + And that in pallid ash declined + Beneath the blow by knowledge dealt, + Wherein throughout her frame she felt + That he, the light wind’s libertine, + Without a scoff, without a grin, + And mannered like the courtly few, + Who merely danced when light winds blew, + Impervious to beak and claws, + Tradition’s ruinous Whitebeard was; + Of whom, as actors in old scenes, + Had grannam weavers warned their weans, + With word, that less than feather-weight, + He smote the web like bolt of Fate. + + This muted drama, hour by hour, + I watched amid a world in flower, + Ere yet Autumnal threads had laid + Their gray-blue o’er the grass’s blade, + And still along the garden-run + The blindworm stretched him, drunk of sun. + Arachne crouched unmoved; perchance + Her visitor performed a dance; + She puckered thinner; he the same + As when on that light wind he came. + + Next day was told what deeds of night + Were done; the web had vanished quite; + With it the strange opposing pair; + And listless waved on vacant air, + For her adieu to heart’s content, + A solitary filament. + + + + +A READING OF LIFE + + +THE VITAL CHOICE + + +I + + + OR shall we run with Artemis + Or yield the breast to Aphrodite? + Both are mighty; + Both give bliss; + Each can torture if divided; + Each claims worship undivided, + In her wake would have us wallow. + + +II + + + Youth must offer on bent knees + Homage unto one or other; + Earth, the mother, + This decrees; + And unto the pallid Scyther + Either points us shun we either + Shun or too devoutly follow. + + + +WITH THE HUNTRESS + + + THROUGH the water-eye of night, + Midway between eve and dawn, + See the chase, the rout, the flight + In deep forest; oread, faun, + Goat-foot, antlers laid on neck; + Ravenous all the line for speed. + See yon wavy sparkle beck + Sign of the Virgin Lady’s lead. + Down her course a serpent star + Coils and shatters at her heels; + Peals the horn exulting, peals + Plaintive, is it near or far. + Huntress, arrowy to pursue, + In and out of woody glen, + Under cliffs that tear the blue, + Over torrent, over fen, + She and forest, where she skims + Feathery, darken and relume: + Those are her white-lightning limbs + Cleaving loads of leafy gloom. + Mountains hear her and call back, + Shrewd with night: a frosty wail + Distant: her the emerald vale + Folds, and wonders in her track. + Now her retinue is lean, + Many rearward; streams the chase + Eager forth of covert; seen + One hot tide the rapturous race. + Quiver-charged and crescent-crowned, + Up on a flash the lighted mound + Leaps she, bow to shoulder, shaft + Strung to barb with archer’s craft, + Legs like plaited lyre-chords, feet + Songs to see, past pitch of sweet. + Fearful swiftness they outrun, + Shaggy wildness, grey or dun, + Challenge, charge of tusks elude: + Theirs the dance to tame the rude; + Beast, and beast in manhood tame, + Follow we their silver flame. + Pride of flesh from bondage free, + Reaping vigour of its waste, + Marks her servitors, and she + Sanctifies the unembraced. + Nought of perilous she reeks; + Valour clothes her open breast; + Sweet beyond the thrill of sex; + Hallowed by the sex confessed. + Huntress arrowy to pursue, + Colder she than sunless dew, + She, that breath of upper air; + Ay, but never lyrist sang, + Draught of Bacchus never sprang + Blood the bliss of Gods to share, + High o’er sweep of eagle wings, + Like the run with her, when rings + Clear her rally, and her dart, + In the forest’s cavern heart, + Tells of her victorious aim. + Then is pause and chatter, cheer, + Laughter at some satyr lame, + Looks upon the fallen deer, + Measuring his noble crest; + Here a favourite in her train, + Foremost mid her nymphs, caressed; + All applauded. Shall she reign + Worshipped? O to be with her there! + She, that breath of nimble air, + Lifts the breast to giant power. + Maid and man, and man and maid, + Who each other would devour + Elsewhere, by the chase betrayed, + There are comrades, led by her, + Maid-preserver, man-maker. + + + +WITH THE PERSUADER + + + WHO murmurs, hither, hither: who + Where nought is audible so fills the ear? + Where nought is visible can make appear + A veil with eyes that waver through, + Like twilight’s pledge of blessed night to come, + Or day most golden? All unseen and dumb, + She breathes, she moves, inviting flees, + Is lost, and leaves the thrilled desire + To clasp and strike a slackened lyre, + Till over smiles of hyacinth seas, + Flame in a crystal vessel sails + Beneath a dome of jewelled spray, + For land that drops the rosy day + On nights of throbbing nightingales. + + Landward did the wonder flit, + Or heart’s desire of her, all earth in it. + We saw the heavens fling down their rose; + On rapturous waves we saw her glide; + The pearly sea-shell half enclose; + The shoal of sea-nymphs flush the tide; + And we, afire to kiss her feet, no more + Behold than tracks along a startled shore, + With brightened edges of dark leaves that feign + An ambush hoped, as heartless night remain. + + More closely, warmly: hither, hither! she, + The very she called forth by ripened blood + For its next breath of being, murmurs; she, + Allurement; she, fulfilment; she, + The stream within us urged to flood; + Man’s cry, earth’s answer, heaven’s consent; O she, + Maid, woman and divinity; + Our over-earthly, inner-earthly mate + Unmated; she, our hunger and our fruit + Untasted; she our written fate + Unread; Life’s flowering, Life’s root: + Unread, divined; unseen, beheld; + The evanescent, ever-present she, + Great Nature’s stern necessity + In radiance clothed, to softness quelled; + With a sword’s edge of sweetness keen to take + Our breath for bliss, our hearts for fulness break. + + The murmur hushes down, the veil is rent. + Man’s cry, earth’s answer, heaven’s consent, + Her form is given to pardoned sight, + And lets our mortal eyes receive + The sovereign loveliness of celestial white; + Adored by them who solitarily pace, + In dusk of the underworld’s perpetual eve, + The paths among the meadow asphodel, + Remembering. Never there her face + Is planetary; reddens to shore sea-shell + Around such whiteness the enamoured air + Of noon that clothes her, never there. + Daughter of light, the joyful light, + She stands unveiled to nuptial sight, + Sweet in her disregard of aid + Divine to conquer or persuade. + A fountain jets from moss; a flower + Bends gently where her sunset tresses shower. + By guerdon of her brilliance may be seen + With eyelids unabashed the passion’s Queen. + + Shorn of attendant Graces she can use + Her natural snares to make her will supreme. + A simple nymph it is, inclined to muse + Before the leader foot shall dip in stream: + One arm at curve along a rounded thigh; + Her firm new breasts each pointing its own way + A knee half bent to shade its fellow shy, + Where innocence, not nature, signals nay. + The bud of fresh virginity awaits + The wooer, and all roseate will she burst: + She touches on the hour of happy mates; + Still is she unaware she wakens thirst. + + And while commanding blissful sight believe + It holds her as a body strained to breast, + Down on the underworld’s perpetual eve + She plunges the possessor dispossessed; + And bids believe that image, heaving warm, + Is lost to float like torch-smoke after flame; + The phantom any breeze blows out of form; + A thirst’s delusion, a defeated aim. + + The rapture shed the torture weaves; + The direst blow on human heart she deals: + The pain to know the seen deceives; + Nought true but what insufferably feels. + And stabs of her delicious note, + That is as heavenly light to hearing, heard + Through shelter leaves, the laughter from her throat, + We answer as the midnight’s morning’s bird. + + She laughs, she wakens gleeful cries; + In her delicious laughter part revealed; + Yet mother is she more of moans and sighs, + For longings unappeased and wounds unhealed. + Yet would she bless, it is her task to bless: + Yon folded couples, passing under shade, + Are her rich harvest; bidden caress, caress, + Consume the fruit in bloom; not disobeyed. + We dolorous complainers had a dream, + Wrought on the vacant air from inner fire, + We saw stand bare of her celestial beam + The glorious Goddess, and we dared desire. + + Thereat are shown reproachful eyes, and lips + Of upward curl to meanings half obscure; + And glancing where a wood-nymph lightly skips + She nods: at once that creature wears her lure. + Blush of our being between birth and death: + Sob of our ripened blood for its next breath: + Her wily semblance nought of her denies; + Seems it the Goddess runs, the Goddess hies, + The generous Goddess yields. And she can arm + Her dwarfed and twisted with her secret charm; + Benevolent as Earth to feed her own. + Fully shall they be fed, if they beseech. + But scorn she has for them that walk alone; + Blanched men, starved women, whom no arts can pleach. + The men as chief of criminals she disdains, + And holds the reason in perceptive thought. + More pitiable, like rivers lacking rains, + Kissing cold stones, the women shrink for drought. + Those faceless discords, out of nature strayed, + Rank of the putrefaction ere decayed, + In impious singles bear the thorny wreaths: + Their lives are where harmonious Pleasure breathes + For couples crowned with flowers that burn in dew. + Comes there a tremor of night’s forest horn + Across her garden from the insaner crew, + She darkens to malignity of scorn. + A shiver courses through her garden-grounds: + Grunt of the tusky boar, the baying hounds, + The hunter’s shouts, are heard afar, and bring + Dead on her heart her crimsoned flower of Spring. + These, the irreverent of Life’s design, + Division between natural and divine + Would cast; these vaunting barrenness for best, + In veins of gathered strength Life’s tide arrest; + And these because the roses flood their cheeks, + Vow them in nature wise as when Love speaks. + With them is war; and well the Goddess knows + What undermines the race who mount the rose; + How the ripe moment, lodged in slumberous hours, + Enkindled by persuasion overpowers: + Why weak as are her frailer trailing weeds, + The strong when Beauty gleams o’er Nature’s needs, + And timely guile unguarded finds them lie. + They who her sway withstand a sea defy, + At every point of juncture must be proof; + Nor look for mercy from the incessant surge + Her forces mixed of craft and passion urge + For the one whelming wave to spring aloof. + She, tenderness, is pitiless to them + Resisting in her godhead nature’s truth. + No flower their face shall be, but writhen stem; + Their youth a frost, their age the dirge for youth. + These miserably disinclined, + The lamentably unembraced, + Insult the Pleasures Earth designed + To people and beflower the waste. + Wherefore the Pleasures pass them by: + For death they live, in life they die. + + Her head the Goddess from them turns, + As from grey mounds of ashes in bronze urns. + She views her quivering couples unconsoled, + And of her beauty mirror they become, + Like orchard blossoms, apple, pear and plum, + Free of the cloud, beneath the flood of gold. + Crowned with wreaths that burn in dew, + Her couples whirl, sun-satiated, + Athirst for shade, they sigh, they wed, + They play the music made of two: + Oldest of earth, earth’s youngest till earth’s end: + Cunninger than the numbered strings, + For melodies, for harmonies, + For mastered discords, and the things + Not vocable, whose mysteries + Are inmost Love’s, Life’s reach of Life extend. + + Is it an anguish overflowing shame + And the tongue’s pudency confides to her, + With eyes of embers, breath of incense myrrh, + The woman’s marrow in some dear youth’s name, + Then is the Goddess tenderness + Maternal, and she has a sister’s tones + Benign to soothe intemperate distress, + Divide despair from hope, and sighs from moans. + Her gentleness imparts exhaling ease + To those of her milk-bearer votaries + As warm of bosom-earth as she; of the source + Direct; erratic but in heart’s excess; + Being mortal and ill-matched for Love’s great force; + Like green leaves caught with flames by his impress. + And pray they under skies less overcast, + That swiftly may her star of eve descend, + Her lustrous morning star fly not too fast, + To lengthen blissful night will she befriend. + + Unfailing her reply to woman’s voice + In supplication instant. Is it man’s, + She hears, approves his words, her garden scans, + And him: the flowers are various, he has choice. + Perchance his wound is deep; she listens long; + Enjoys what music fills the plaintive song; + And marks how he, who would be hawk at poise + Above the bird, his plaintive song enjoys. + + She reads him when his humbled manhood weeps + To her invoked: distraction is implored. + A smile, and he is up on godlike leaps + Above, with his bright Goddess owned the adored. + His tales of her declare she condescends; + Can share his fires, not always goads and rends: + Moreover, quits a throne, and must enclose + A queenlier gem than woman’s wayside rose. + She bends, he quickens; she breathes low, he springs + Enraptured; low she laughs, his woes disperse; + Aloud she laughs and sweeps his varied strings. + ’Tis taught him how for touch of mournful verse + Rarely the music made of two ascends, + And Beauty’s Queen some other way is won. + Or it may solve the riddle, that she lends + Herself to all, and yields herself to none, + Save heavenliest: though claims by men are raised + In hot assurance under shade of doubt: + And numerous are the images bepraised + As Beauty’s Queen, should passion head the rout. + + Be sure the ruddy hue is Love’s: to woo + Love’s Fountain we must mount the ruddy hue. + That is her garden’s precept, seen where shines + Her blood-flower, and its unsought neighbour pines. + Daughter of light, the joyful light, + She bids her couples face full East, + Reflecting radiance, even when from her feast + Their outstretched arms brown deserts disunite, + The lion-haunted thickets hold apart. + In love the ruddy hue declares great heart; + High confidence in her whose aid is lent + To lovers lifting the tuned instrument, + Not one of rippled strings and funeral tone. + And doth the man pursue a tightened zone, + Then be it as the Laurel God he runs, + Confirmed to win, with countenance the Sun’s. + + Should pity bless the tremulous voice of woe + He lifts for pity, limp his offspring show. + For him requiring woman’s arts to please + Infantile tastes with babe reluctances, + No race of giants! In the woman’s veins + Persuasion ripely runs, through hers the pains. + Her choice of him, should kind occasion nod, + Aspiring blends the Titan with the God; + Yet unto dwarf and mortal, she, submiss + In her high Lady’s mandate, yields the kiss; + And is it needed that Love’s daintier brute + Be snared as hunter, she will tempt pursuit. + She is great Nature’s ever intimate + In breast, and doth as ready handmaid wait, + Until perverted by her senseless male, + She plays the winding snake, the shrinking snail, + The flying deer, all tricks of evil fame, + Elusive to allure, since he grew tame. + + Hence has the Goddess, Nature’s earliest Power, + And greatest and most present, with her dower + Of the transcendent beauty, gained repute + For meditated guile. She laughs to hear + A charge her garden’s labyrinths scarce confute, + Her garden’s histories tell of to all near. + Let it be said, But less upon her guile + Doth she rely for her immortal smile. + Still let the rumour spread, and terror screens + To push her conquests by the simplest means. + While man abjures not lustihead, nor swerves + From earth’s good labours, Beauty’s Queen he serves. + + Her spacious garden and her garden’s grant + She offers in reward for handsome cheer: + Choice of the nymphs whose looks will slant + The secret down a dewy leer + Of corner eyelids into haze: + Many a fair Aphrosyne + Like flower-bell to honey-bee: + And here they flicker round the maze + Bewildering him in heart and head: + And here they wear the close demure, + With subtle peeps to reassure: + Others parade where love has bled, + And of its crimson weave their mesh: + Others to snap of fingers leap, + As bearing breast with love asleep. + These are her laughters in the flesh. + Or would she fit a warrior mood, + She lights her seeming unsubdued, + And indicates the fortress-key. + Or is it heart for heart that craves, + She flecks along a run of waves + The one to promise deeper sea. + + Bands of her limpid primitives, + Or patterned in the curious braid, + Are the blest man’s; and whatsoever he gives, + For what he gives is he repaid. + Good is it if by him ’tis held + He wins the fairest ever welled + From Nature’s founts: she whispers it: Even I + Not fairer! and forbids him to deny, + Else little is he lover. Those he clasps, + Intent as tempest, worshipful as prayer,— + And be they doves or be they asps,— + Must seem to him the sovereignty fair; + Else counts he soon among life’s wholly tamed. + Him whom from utter savage she reclaimed, + Half savage must he stay, would he be crowned + The lover. Else, past ripeness, deathward bound, + He reasons; and the totterer Earth detests, + Love shuns, grim logic screws in grasp, is he. + Doth man divide divine Necessity + From Joy, between the Queen of Beauty’s breasts + A sword is driven; for those most glorious twain + Present her; armed to bless and to constrain. + Of this he perishes; not she, the throned + On rocks that spout their springs to the sacred mounts. + A loftier Reason out of deeper founts + Earth’s chosen Goddess bears: by none disowned + While red blood runs to swell the pulse, she boasts, + And Beauty, like her star, descends the sky; + Earth’s answer, heaven’s consent unto man’s cry, + Uplifted by the innumerable hosts. + + Quickened of Nature’s eye and ear, + When the wild sap at high tide smites + Within us; or benignly clear + To vision; or as the iris lights + On fluctuant waters; she is ours + Till set of man: the dreamed, the seen; + Flushing the world with odorous flowers: + A soft compulsion on terrene + By heavenly: and the world is hers + While hunger after Beauty spurs. + + So is it sung in any space + She fills, with laugh at shallow laws + Forbidding love’s devised embrace, + The music Beauty from it draws. + + + +THE TEST OF MANHOOD + + + LIKE a flood river whirled at rocky banks, + An army issues out of wilderness, + With battle plucking round its ragged flanks; + Obstruction in the van; insane excess + Oft at the heart; yet hard the onward stress + Unto more spacious, where move ordered ranks, + And rise hushed temples built of shapely stone, + The work of hands not pledged to grind or slay. + They gave our earth a dress of flesh on bone; + A tongue to speak with answering heaven gave they. + Then was the gracious birth of man’s new day; + Divided from the haunted night it shone. + + That quiet dawn was Reverence; whereof sprang + Ethereal Beauty in full morningtide. + Another sun had risen to clasp his bride: + It was another earth unto him sang. + + Came Reverence from the Huntress on her heights? + From the Persuader came it, in those vales + Whereunto she melodiously invites, + Her troops of eager servitors regales? + Not far those two great Powers of Nature speed + Disciple steps on earth when sole they lead; + Nor either points for us the way of flame. + From him predestined mightier it came; + His task to hold them both in breast, and yield + Their dues to each, and of their war be field. + + The foes that in repulsion never ceased, + Must he, who once has been the goodly beast + Of one or other, at whose beck he ran, + Constrain to make him serviceable man; + Offending neither, nor the natural claim + Each pressed, denying, for his true man’s name. + + Ah, what a sweat of anguish in that strife + To hold them fast conjoined within him still; + Submissive to his will + Along the road of life! + And marvel not he wavered if at whiles + The forward step met frowns, the backward smiles. + For Pleasure witched him her sweet cup to drain; + Repentance offered ecstasy in pain. + Delicious licence called it Nature’s cry; + Ascetic rigours crushed the fleshly sigh; + A tread on shingle timed his lame advance + Flung as the die of Bacchanalian Chance, + He of the troubled marching army leaned + On godhead visible, on godhead screened; + The radiant roseate, the curtained white; + Yet sharp his battle strained through day, through night. + + He drank of fictions, till celestial aid + Might seem accorded when he fawned and prayed; + Sagely the generous Giver circumspect, + To choose for grants the egregious, his elect; + And ever that imagined succour slew + The soul of brotherhood whence Reverence drew. + + In fellowship religion has its founts: + The solitary his own God reveres: + Ascend no sacred Mounts + Our hungers or our fears. + As only for the numbers Nature’s care + Is shown, and she the personal nothing heeds, + So to Divinity the spring of prayer + From brotherhood the one way upward leads. + Like the sustaining air + Are both for flowers and weeds. + But he who claims in spirit to be flower, + Will find them both an air that doth devour. + + Whereby he smelt his treason, who implored + External gifts bestowed but on the sword; + Beheld himself, with less and less disguise, + Through those blood-cataracts which dimmed his eyes, + His army’s foe, condemned to strive and fail; + See a black adversary’s ghost prevail; + Never, though triumphs hailed him, hope to win + While still the conflict tore his breast within. + + Out of that agony, misread for those + Imprisoned Powers warring unappeased, + The ghost of his black adversary rose, + To smother light, shut heaven, show earth diseased. + And long with him was wrestling ere emerged + A mind to read in him the reflex shade + Of its fierce torment; this way, that way urged; + By craven compromises hourly swayed. + + Crouched as a nestling, still its wings untried, + The man’s mind opened under weight of cloud. + To penetrate the dark was it endowed; + Stood day before a vision shooting wide. + Whereat the spectral enemy lost form; + The traversed wilderness exposed its track. + He felt the far advance in looking back; + Thence trust in his foot forward through the storm. + + Under the low-browed tempest’s eye of ire, + That ere it lightened smote a coward heart, + Earth nerved her chastened son to hail athwart + All ventures perilous his shrouded Sire; + A stranger still, religiously divined; + Not yet with understanding read aright. + But when the mind, the cherishable mind, + The multitude’s grave shepherd, took full flight, + Himself as mirror raised among his kind, + He saw, and first of brotherhood had sight: + Knew that his force to fly, his will to see, + His heart enlarged beyond its ribbed domain, + Had come of many a grip in mastery, + Which held conjoined the hostile rival twain, + And of his bosom made him lord, to keep + The starry roof of his unruffled frame + Awake to earth, to heaven, and plumb the deep + Below, above, aye with a wistful aim. + + The mastering mind in him, by tempests blown, + By traitor inmates baited, upward burned; + Perforce of growth, the Master mind discerned, + The Great Unseen, nowise the Dark Unknown. + To whom unwittingly did he aspire + In wilderness, where bitter was his need: + To whom in blindness, as an earthy seed + For light and air, he struck through crimson mire. + But not ere he upheld a forehead lamp, + And viewed an army, once the seeming doomed, + All choral in its fruitful garden camp, + The spiritual the palpable illumed. + + This gift of penetration and embrace, + His prize from tidal battles lost or won, + Reveals the scheme to animate his race: + How that it is a warfare but begun; + Unending; with no Power to interpose; + No prayer, save for strength to keep his ground, + Heard of the Highest; never battle’s close, + The victory complete and victor crowned: + Nor solace in defeat, save from that sense + Of strength well spent, which is the strength renewed. + In manhood must he find his competence; + In his clear mind the spiritual food: + God being there while he his fight maintains; + Throughout his mind the Master Mind being there, + While he rejects the suicide despair; + Accepts the spur of explicable pains; + Obedient to Nature, not her slave: + Her lord, if to her rigid laws he bows; + Her dust, if with his conscience he plays knave, + And bids the Passions on the Pleasures browse:— + Whence Evil in a world unread before; + That mystery to simple springs resolved. + His God the Known, diviner to adore, + Shows Nature’s savage riddles kindly solved. + Inconscient, insensitive, she reigns + In iron laws, though rapturous fair her face. + Back to the primal brute shall he retrace + His path, doth he permit to force her chains + A soft Persuader coursing through his veins, + An icy Huntress stringing to the chase: + What one the flash disdains; + What one so gives it grace. + + But is he rightly manful in her eyes, + A splendid bloodless knight to gain the skies, + A blood-hot son of Earth by all her signs, + Desireing and desireable he shines; + As peaches, that have caught the sun’s uprise + And kissed warm gold till noonday, even as vines. + Earth fills him with her juices, without fear + That she will cast him drunken down the steeps. + All woman is she to this man most dear; + He sows for bread, and she in spirit reaps: + She conscient, she sensitive, in him; + With him enwound, his brave ambition hers: + By him humaner made; by his keen spurs + Pricked to race past the pride in giant limb, + Her crazy adoration of big thews, + Proud in her primal sons, when crags they hurled, + Were thunder spitting lightnings on the world + In daily deeds, and she their evening Muse. + + This man, this hero, works not to destroy; + This godlike—as the rock in ocean stands;— + He of the myriad eyes, the myriad hands + Creative; in his edifice has joy. + How strength may serve for purity is shown + When he himself can scourge to make it clean. + Withal his pitch of pride would not disown + A sober world that walks the balanced mean + Between its tempters, rarely overthrown: + And such at times his army’s march has been. + + Near is he to great Nature in the thought + Each changing Season intimately saith, + That nought save apparition knows the death; + To the God-lighted mind of man ’tis nought. + She counts not loss a word of any weight; + It may befal his passions and his greeds + To lose their treasures, like the vein that bleeds, + But life gone breathless will she reinstate. + + Close on the heart of Earth his bosom beats, + When he the mandate lodged in it obeys, + Alive to breast a future wrapped in haze, + Strike camp, and onward, like the wind’s cloud-fleets. + Unresting she, unresting he, from change + To change, as rain of cloud, as fruit of rain; + She feels her blood-tree throbbing in her grain, + Yet skyward branched, with loftier mark and range. + + No miracle the sprout of wheat from clod, + She knows, nor growth of man in grisly brute; + But he, the flower at head and soil at root, + Is miracle, guides he the brute to God. + And that way seems he bound; that way the road, + With his dark-lantern mind, unled, alone, + Wearifully through forest-tracts unsown, + He travels, urged by some internal goad. + + Dares he behold the thing he is, what thing + He would become is in his mind its child; + Astir, demanding birth to light and wing; + For battle prompt, by pleasure unbeguiled. + So moves he forth in faith, if he has made + His mind God’s temple, dedicate to truth. + Earth’s nourishing delights, no more gainsaid, + He tastes, as doth the bridegroom rich in youth. + Then knows he Love, that beckons and controls; + The star of sky upon his footway cast; + Then match in him who holds his tempters fast, + The body’s love and mind’s, whereof the soul’s. + Then Earth her man for woman finds at last, + To speed the pair unto her goal of goals. + + Or is’t the widowed’s dream of her new mate? + Seen has she virulent days of heat in flood; + The sly Persuader snaky in his blood; + With her the barren Huntress alternate; + His rough refractory off on kicking heels + To rear; the man dragged rearward, shamed, amazed; + And as a torrent stream where cattle grazed, + His tumbled world. What, then, the faith she feels? + May not his aspect, like her own so fair + Reflexively, the central force belie, + And he, the once wild ocean storming sky, + Be rebel at the core? What hope is there? + + ’Tis that in each recovery he preserves, + Between his upper and his nether wit, + Sense of his march ahead, more brightly lit; + He less the shaken thing of lusts and nerves; + With such a grasp upon his brute as tells + Of wisdom from that vile relapsing spun. + A Sun goes down in wasted fire, a Sun + Resplendent springs, to faith refreshed compels. + + + +THE HUELESS LOVE + + + UNTO that love must we through fire attain, + Which those two held as breath of common air; + The hands of whom were given in bond elsewhere; + Whom Honour was untroubled to restrain. + + Midway the road of our life’s term they met, + And one another knew without surprise; + Nor cared that beauty stood in mutual eyes; + Nor at their tardy meeting nursed regret. + + To them it was revealed how they had found + The kindred nature and the needed mind; + The mate by long conspiracy designed; + The flower to plant in sanctuary ground. + + Avowed in vigilant solicitude + For either, what most lived within each breast + They let be seen: yet every human test + Demanding righteousness approved them good. + + She leaned on a strong arm, and little feared + Abandonment to help if heaved or sank + Her heart at intervals while Love looked blank, + Life rosier were she but less revered. + + An arm that never shook did not obscure + Her woman’s intuition of the bliss— + Their tempter’s moment o’er the black abyss, + Across the narrow plank—he could abjure. + + Then came a day that clipped for him the thread, + And their first touch of lips, as he lay cold, + Was all of earthly in their love untold, + Beyond all earthly known to them who wed. + + So has there come the gust at South-west flung + By sudden volt on eves of freezing mist, + When sister snowflake sister snowdrop kissed, + And one passed out, and one the bell-head hung. + + + +UNION IN DISSEVERANCE + + + SUNSET worn to its last vermilion he; + She that star overhead in slow descent: + That white star with the front of angel she; + He undone in his rays of glory spent + + Halo, fair as the bow-shot at his rise, + He casts round her, and knows his hour of rest + Incomplete, were the light for which he dies, + Less like joy of the dove that wings to nest. + + Lustrous momently, near on earth she sinks; + Life’s full throb over breathless and abased: + Yet stand they, though impalpable the links, + One, more one than the bridally embraced. + + + +SONG IN THE SONGLESS + + + THEY have no song, the sedges dry, + And still they sing. + It is within my breast they sing, + As I pass by. + Within my breast they touch a string, + They wake a sigh. + There is but sound of sedges dry; + In me they sing. + + + +THE BURDEN OF STRENGTH + + + IF that thou hast the gift of strength, then know + Thy part is to uplift the trodden low; + Else in a giant’s grasp until the end + A hopeless wrestler shall thy soul contend. + + + +THE MAIN REGRET +WRITTEN FOR THE CHARING CROSS ALBUM + + +I + + + SEEN, too clear and historic within us, our sins of omission + Frown when the Autumn days strike us all ruthlessly bare. + They of our mortal diseases find never healing physician; + Errors they of the soul, past the one hope to repair. + + +II + + + Sunshine might we have been unto seed under soil, or have scattered + Seed to ascendant suns brighter than any that shone. + Even the limp-legged beggar a sick desperado has flattered + Back to a half-sloughed life cheered by the mere human tone. + + + +ALTERNATION + + + BETWEEN the fountain and the rill + I passed, and saw the mighty will + To leap at sky; the careless run, + As earth would lead her little son. + + Beneath them throbs an urgent well, + That here is play, and there is war. + I know not which had most to tell + Of whence we spring and what we are. + + + +FOREST HISTORY + + +I + + + BENEATH the vans of doom did men pass in. + Heroic who came out; for round them hung + A wavering phantom’s red volcano tongue, + With league-long lizard tail and fishy fin: + + +II + + + Old Earth’s original Dragon; there retired + To his last fastness; overthrown by few. + Him a laborious thrust of roadway slew. + Then man to play devorant straight was fired. + + +III + + + More intimate became the forest fear + While pillared darkness hatched malicious life + At either elbow, wolf or gnome or knife + And wary slid the glance from ear to ear. + + +IV + + + In chillness, like a clouded lantern-ray, + The forest’s heart of fog on mossed morass, + On purple pool and silky cotton-grass, + Revealed where lured the swallower byway. + + +V + + + Dead outlook, flattened back with hard rebound + Off walls of distance, left each mounted height. + It seemed a giant hag-fiend, churning spite + Of humble human being, held the ground. + + +VI + + + Through friendless wastes, through treacherous woodland, slow + The feet sustained by track of feet pursued + Pained steps, and found the common brotherhood + By sign of Heaven indifferent, Nature foe. + + +VII + + + Anon a mason’s work amazed the sight, + And long-frocked men, called Brothers, there abode. + They pointed up, bowed head, and dug and sowed; + Whereof was shelter, loaf, and warm firelight. + + +VIII + + + What words they taught were nails to scratch the head. + Benignant works explained the chanting brood. + Their monastery lit black solitude, + As one might think a star that heavenward led. + + +IX + + + Uprose a fairer nest for weary feet, + Like some gold flower nightly inward curled, + Where gentle maidens fled a roaring world, + Or played with it, and had their white retreat. + + +X + + + Into big books of metal clasps they pored. + They governed, even as men; they welcomed lays. + The treasures women are whose aim is praise, + Was shown in them: the Garden half restored. + + +XI + + + A deluge billow scoured the land off seas, + With widened jaws, and slaughter was its foam. + For food, for clothing, ambush, refuge, home, + The lesser savage offered bogs and trees. + + +XII + + + Whence reverence round grey-haired story grew: + And inmost spots of ancient horror shone + As temples under beams of trials bygone; + For in them sang brave times with God in view. + + +XIII + + + Till now trim homesteads bordered spaces green, + Like night’s first little stars through clearing showers. + Was rumoured how a castle’s falcon towers + The wilderness commanded with fierce mien. + + +XIV + + + Therein a serious Baron stuck his lance; + For minstrel songs a beauteous Dame would pout. + Gay knights and sombre, felon or devout, + Pricked onward, bound for their unsung romance. + + +XV + + + It might be that two errant lords across + The block of each came edged, and at sharp cry + They charged forthwith, the better man to try. + One rode his way, one couched on quiet moss. + + +XVI + + + Perchance a lady sweet, whose lord lay slain, + The robbers into gruesome durance drew. + Swift should her hero come, like lightning’s blue! + She prayed for him, as crackling drought for rain. + + +XVII + + + As we, that ere the worst her hero haps, + Of Angels guided, nigh that loathly den: + A toady cave beside an ague fen, + Where long forlorn the lone dog whines and yaps. + + +XVIII + + + By daylight now the forest fear could read + Itself, and at new wonders chuckling went. + Straight for the roebuck’s neck the bowman spent + A dart that laughed at distance and at speed. + + +XIX + + + Right loud the bugle’s hallali elate + Rang forth of merry dingles round the tors; + And deftest hand was he from foreign wars, + But soon he hailed the home-bred yeoman mate. + + +XX + + + Before the blackbird pecked the turf they woke; + At dawn the deer’s wet nostrils blew their last. + To forest, haunt of runs and prime repast, + With paying blows, the yokel strained his yoke. + + +XXI + + + The city urchin mooned on forest air, + On grassy sweeps and flying arrows, thick + As swallows o’er smooth streams, and sighed him sick + For thinking that his dearer home was there. + + +XXII + + + Familiar, still unseized, the forest sprang + An old-world echo, like no mortal thing. + The hunter’s horn might wind a jocund ring, + But held in ear it had a chilly clang. + + +XXIII + + + Some shadow lurked aloof of ancient time; + Some warning haunted any sound prolonged, + As though the leagues of woodland held them wronged + To hear an axe and see a township climb. + + +XXIV + + + The forest’s erewhile emperor at eve + Had voice when lowered heavens drummed for gales. + At midnight a small people danced the dales, + So thin that they might dwindle through a sieve + + +XXV + + + Ringed mushrooms told of them, and in their throats, + Old wives that gathered herbs and knew too much. + The pensioned forester beside his crutch, + Struck showers from embers at those bodeful notes. + + +XXVI + + + Came then the one, all ear, all eye, all heart; + Devourer, and insensibly devoured; + In whom the city over forest flowered, + The forest wreathed the city’s drama-mart. + + +XXVII + + + There found he in new form that Dragon old, + From tangled solitudes expelled; and taught + How blindly each its antidote besought; + For either’s breath the needs of either told. + + +XXVIII + + + Now deep in woods, with song no sermon’s drone, + He showed what charm the human concourse works: + Amid the press of men, what virtue lurks + Where bubble sacred wells of wildness lone. + + +XXIX + + + Our conquest these: if haply we retain + The reverence that ne’er will overrun + Due boundaries of realms from Nature won, + Nor let the poet’s awe in rapture wane. + + + + +FRAGMENTS OF THE ILIAD IN ENGLISH HEXAMETER VERSE + + +ILIAD, i. 149 +THE INVECTIVE OF ACHILLES + + + “HEIGH me! brazen of front, thou glutton for plunder, how can one, + Servant here to thy mandates, heed thee among our Achaians, + Either the mission hie on or stoutly do fight with the foemen? + I, not hither I fared on account of the spear-armèd Trojans, + Pledged to the combat; they unto me have in nowise a harm done; + Never have they, of a truth, come lifting my horses or oxen; + Never in deep-soiled Phthia, the nurser of heroes, my harvests + Ravaged, they; for between us is numbered full many a darksome + Mountain, ay, therewith too the stretch of the windy sea-waters. + O hugely shameless! thee did we follow to hearten thee, justice + Pluck from the Dardans for him, Menelaos, thee too, thou dog-eyed! + Whereof little thy thought is, nought whatever thou reckest. + Worse, it is thou whose threat ’tis to ravish my prize from me, + portion + Won with much labour, the which my gift from the sons of Achaia. + Never, in sooth, have I known my prize equal thine when Achaians + Gave some flourishing populous Trojan town up to pillage. + Nay, sure, mine were the hands did most in the storm of the combat, + Yet when came peradventure share of the booty amongst us, + Bigger to thee went the prize, while I some small blessèd thing bore + Off to the ships, my share of reward for my toil in the bloodshed! + So now go I to Phthia, for better by much it beseems me + Homeward go with my beaked ships now, and I hold not in prospect, + I being outraged, thou mayst gather here plunder and wealth-store.” + + +Iliad, i. 225 + + + “BIBBER besotted, with scowl of a cur, having heart of a deer, thou! + Never to join to thy warriors armed for the press of the conflict, + Never for ambush forth with the princeliest sons of Achaia + Dared thy soul, for to thee that thing would have looked as a + death-stroke. + Sooth, more easy it seems, down the lengthened array of Achaians, + Snatch at the prize of the one whose voice has been lifted against + thee. + Ravening king of the folk, for that thou hast thy rule over abjects; + Else, son of Atreus, now were this outrage on me thy last one. + Nay, but I tell thee, and I do swear a big oath on it likewise: + Yea, by the sceptre here, and it surely bears branches and leaf-buds + Never again, since first it was lopped from its trunk on the + mountains, + No more sprouting; for round it all clean has the sharp metal clipped + off + Leaves and the bark; ay, verify now do the sons of Achaia, + Guardian hands of the counsels of Zeus, pronouncing the judgement, + Hold it aloft; so now unto thee shall the oath have its portent; + Loud will the cry for Achilles burst from the sons of Achaia + Throughout the army, and thou chafe powerless, though in an anguish, + How to give succour when vast crops down under man-slaying Hector + Tumble expiring; and thou deep in thee shalt tear at thy + heart-strings, + Rage-wrung, thou, that in nought thou didst honour the flower of + Achaians.” + + + +ILIAD, ii 455 +MARSHALLING OF THE ACHAIANS + + + LIKE as a terrible fire feeds fast on a forest enormous, + Up on a mountain height, and the blaze of it radiates round far, + So on the bright blest arms of the host in their march did the + splendour + Gleam wide round through the circle of air right up to the sky-vault. + They, now, as when swarm thick in the air multitudinous winged flocks, + Be it of geese or of cranes or the long-necked troops of the + wild-swans, + Off that Asian mead, by the flow of the waters of Kaïstros; + Hither and yon fly they, and rejoicing in pride of their pinions, + Clamour, shaped to their ranks, and the mead all about them + resoundeth; + So those numerous tribes from their ships and their shelterings poured + forth + On that plain of Scamander, and horrible rumbled beneath them + Earth to the quick-paced feet of the men and the tramp of the + horse-hooves. + Stopped they then on the fair-flower’d field of Scamander, their + thousands + Many as leaves and the blossoms born of the flowerful season. + Even as countless hot-pressed flies in their multitudes traverse, + Clouds of them, under some herdsman’s wonning, where then are the + milk-pails + Also, full of their milk, in the bountiful season of spring-time; + Even so thickly the long-haired sons of Achaia the plain held, + Prompt for the dash at the Trojan host, with the passion to crush + them. + Those, likewise, as the goatherds, eyeing their vast flocks of goats, + know + Easily one from the other when all get mixed o’er the pasture, + So did the chieftains rank them here there in their places for + onslaught, + Hard on the push of the fray; and among them King Agamemnon, + He, for his eyes and his head, as when Zeus glows glad in his thunder, + He with the girdle of Ares, he with the breast of Poseidon. + + + +ILIAD, xi, 148 +AGAMEMNON IN THE FIGHT + + + THESE, then, he left, and away where ranks were now clashing the + thickest, + Onward rushed, and with him rushed all of the bright-greaved Achaians. + Foot then footmen slew, that were flying from direful compulsion, + Horse at the horsemen (up from off under them mounted the dust-cloud, + Up off the plain, raised up cloud-thick by the thundering + horse-hooves) + Hewed with the sword’s sharp edge; and so meanwhile Lord Agamemnon + Followed, chasing and slaughtering aye, on-urgeing the Argives. + + Now, as when fire voracious catches the unclippèd wood-land, + This way bears it and that the great whirl of the wind, and the + scrubwood + Stretches uptorn, flung forward alength by the fire’s fury rageing, + So beneath Atreides Agamemnon heads of the scattered + Trojans fell; and in numbers amany the horses, neck-stiffened, + Rattled their vacant cars down the roadway gaps of the war-field, + Missing the blameless charioteers, but, for these, they were + outstretched + Flat upon earth, far dearer to vultures than to their home-mates. + + + +ILIAD, xi, 378 +PARIS AND DIOMEDES + + + SO he, with a clear shout of laughter, + Forth of his ambush leapt, and he vaunted him, uttering thiswise: + “Hit thou art! not in vain flew the shaft; how by rights it had + pierced thee + Into the undermost gut, therewith to have rived thee of life-breath! + Following that had the Trojans plucked a new breath from their direst, + They all frighted of thee, as the goats bleat in flight from a lion.” + Then unto him untroubled made answer stout Diomedes: + “Bow-puller, jiber, thy bow for thy glorying, spyer at virgins! + If that thou dared’st face me here out in the open with weapons, + Nothing then would avail thee thy bow and thy thick shot of arrows. + Now thou plumest thee vainly because of a graze of my footsole; + Reck I as were that stroke from a woman or some pettish infant. + Aye flies blunted the dart of the man that’s emasculate, noughtworth! + Otherwise hits, forth flying from me, and but strikes it the + slightest, + My keen shaft, and it numbers a man of the dead fallen straightway. + Torn, troth, then are the cheeks of the wife of that man fallen + slaughtered, + Orphans his babes, full surely he reddens the earth with his + blood-drops, + Rotting, round him the birds, more numerous they than the women.” + + + +ILIAD, xiv, 283 +HYPNOS ON IDA + + + THEY then to fountain-abundant Ida, mother of wild beasts, + Came, and they first left ocean to fare over mainland at Lektos, + Where underneath of their feet waved loftiest growths of the woodland. + There hung Hypnos fast, ere the vision of Zeus was observant, + Mounted upon a tall pine-tree, tallest of pines that on Ida + Lustily spring off soil for the shoot up aloft into aether. + There did he sit well-cloaked by the wide-branched pine for + concealment, + That loud bird, in his form like, that perched high up in the + mountains, + Chalkis is named by the Gods, but of mortals known as Kymindis. + + + +ILIAD, xvii, 426 +CLASH IN ARMS OF THE ACHAIANS AND TROJANS + + + NOT the sea-wave so bellows abroad when it bursts upon shingle, + Whipped from the sea’s deeps up by the terrible blast of the + Northwind; + Nay, nor is ever the roar of the fierce fire’s rush so arousing, + Down along mountain-glades, when it surges to kindle a woodland; + Nay, nor so tonant thunders the stress of the gale in the oak-trees’ + Foliage-tresses high, when it rages to raveing its utmost; + As rose then stupendous the Trojan’s cry and Achaians’, + Dread upshouting as one when together they clashed in the conflict. + + + +ILIAD, xvii, 426 +THE HORSES OF ACHILLES + + + SO now the horses of Aiakides, off wide of the war-ground, + Wept, since first they were ware of their charioteer overthrown there, + Cast down low in the whirl of the dust under man-slaying Hector. + Sooth, meanwhile, then did Automedon, brave son of Diores, + Oft, on the one hand, urge them with flicks of the swift whip, and + oft, too, + Coax entreatingly, hurriedly; whiles did he angrily threaten. + Vainly, for these would not to the ships, to the Hellespont spacious, + Backward turn, nor be whipped to the battle among the Achaians. + Nay, as a pillar remains immovable, fixed on the tombstone, + Haply, of some dead man or it may be a woman there-under; + Even like hard stood they there attached to the glorious war-car, + Earthward bowed with their heads; and of them so lamenting incessant + Ran the hot teardrops downward on to the earth from their eyelids, + Mourning their charioteer; all their lustrous manes dusty-clotted, + Right side and left of the yoke-ring tossed, to the breadth of the + yoke-bow. + Now when the issue of Kronos beheld that sorrow, his head shook + Pitying them for their grief, these words then he spake in his bosom; + “Why, ye hapless, gave we to Peleus you, to a mortal + Master; ye that are ageless both, ye both of you deathless! + Was it that ye among men most wretched should come to have + heart-grief? + ’Tis most true, than the race of these men is there wretcheder nowhere + Aught over earth’s range found that is gifted with breath and has + movement.” + + + + +THE MARES OF THE CAMARGUE +FROM THE ‘MIRÈIO’ OF MISTRAL + + + A HUNDRED mares, all white! their manes + Like mace-reed of the marshy plains + Thick-tufted, wavy, free o’ the shears: + And when the fiery squadron rears + Bursting at speed, each mane appears + Even as the white scarf of a fay + Floating upon their necks along the heavens away. + + O race of humankind, take shame! + For never yet a hand could tame, + Nor bitter spur that rips the flanks subdue + The mares of the Camargue. I have known, + By treason snared, some captives shown; + Expatriate from their native Rhone, + Led off, their saline pastures far from view: + + And on a day, with prompt rebound, + They have flung their riders to the ground, + And at a single gallop, scouring free, + Wide-nostril’d to the wind, twice ten + Of long marsh-leagues devour’d, and then, + Back to the Vacarés again, + After ten years of slavery just to breathe salt sea + + For of this savage race unbent, + The ocean is the element. + Of old escaped from Neptune’s car, full sure, + Still with the white foam fleck’d are they, + And when the sea puffs black from grey, + And ships part cables, loudly neigh + The stallions of Camargue, all joyful in the roar; + + And keen as a whip they lash and crack + Their tails that drag the dust, and back + Scratch up the earth, and feel, entering their flesh, where he, + The God, drives deep his trident teeth, + Who in one horror, above, beneath, + Bids storm and watery deluge seethe, + And shatters to their depths the abysses of the sea. + + _Cant._ iv. + + + + +‘ATKINS’ + + + YONDER’S the man with his life in his hand, + Legs on the march for whatever the land, + Or to the slaughter, or to the maiming, + Getting the dole of a dog for pay. + Laurels he clasps in the words ‘duty done,’ + England his heart under every sun:— + Exquisite humour! that gives him a naming + Base to the ear as an ass’s bray. + + + + +THE VOYAGE OF THE ‘OPHIR’ + + + MEN of our race, we send you one + Round whom Victoria’s holy name + Is halo from the sunken sun + Of her grand Summer’s day aflame. + The heart of your loved Motherland, + To them she loves as her own blood, + This Flower of Ocean bears in hand, + Assured of gift as good. + + Forth for our Southern shores the fleet + Which crowns a nation’s wisdom steams, + That there may Briton Briton greet, + And stamp as fact Imperial dreams. + Across the globe, from sea to sea, + The long smoke-pennon trails above, + Writes over sky how wise will be + The Power that trusts to love. + + A love that springs from heart and brain + In union gives for ripest fruit + The concord Kings and States in vain + Have sought, who played the lofty brute, + And fondly deeming they possessed, + On force relied, and found it break: + That truth once scored on Britain’s breast + Now keeps her mind awake. + + Australian, Canadian, + To tone old veins with streams of youth, + Our trust be on the best in man + Henceforth, and we shall prove that truth. + Prove to a world of brows down-bent + That in the Britain thus endowed, + Imperial means beneficent, + And strength to service vowed. + + + + +THE CRISIS + + + SPIRIT of Russia, now has come + The day when thou canst not be dumb. + Around thee foams the torrent tide, + Above thee its fell fountain, Pride. + The senseless rock awaits thy word + To crumble; shall it be unheard? + Already, like a tempest-sun, + That shoots the flare and shuts to dun, + Thy land ’twixt flame and darkness heaves, + Showing the blade wherewith Fate cleaves, + If mortals in high courage fail + At the one breath before the gale. + Those rulers in all forms of lust, + Who trod thy children down to dust + On the red Sunday, know right well + What word for them thy voice would spell, + What quick perdition for them weave, + Did they in such a voice believe. + Not thine to raise the avenger’s shriek, + Nor turn to them a Tolstoi cheek; + Nor menace him, the waverer still, + Man of much heart and little will, + The criminal of his high seat, + Whose plea of Guiltless judges it. + For him thy voice shall bring to hand + Salvation, and to thy torn land, + Seen on the breakers. Now has come + The day when thou canst not be dumb, + Spirit of Russia:—those who bind + Thy limbs and iron-cap thy mind, + Take thee for quaking flesh, misdoubt + That thou art of the rabble rout + Which cries and flees, with whimpering lip, + From reckless gun and brutal whip; + But he who has at heart the deeds + Of thy heroic offspring reads + In them a soul; not given to shrink + From peril on the abyss’s brink; + With never dread of murderous power; + With view beyond the crimson hour; + Neither an instinct-driven might, + Nor visionary erudite; + A soul; that art thou. It remains + For thee to stay thy children’s veins, + The countertides of hate arrest, + Give to thy sons a breathing breast, + And Him resembling, in His sight, + Say to thy land, Let there be Light. + + + + +OCTOBER 21, 1905 + + + THE hundred years have passed, and he + Whose name appeased a nation’s fears, + As with a hand laid over sea; + To thunder through the foeman’s ears + Defeat before his blast of fire; + Lives in the immortality + That poets dream and noblest souls desire. + + Never did nation’s need evoke + Hero like him for aid, the while + A Continent was cannon-smoke + Or peace in slavery: this one Isle + Reflecting Nature: this one man + Her sea-hound and her mortal stroke, + With war-worn body aye in battle’s van. + + And do we love him well, as well + As he his country, we may greet, + With hand on steel, our passing bell + Nigh on the swing, for prelude sweet + To the music heard when his last breath + Hung on its ebb beside the knell, + And VICTORY in his ear sang gracious Death. + + Ah, day of glory! day of tears! + Day of a people bowed as one! + Behold across those hundred years + The lion flash of gun at gun: + Our bitter pride; our love bereaved; + What pall of cloud o’ercame our sun + That day, to bear his wreath, the end achieved. + + Joy that no more with murder’s frown + The ancient rivals bark apart. + Now Nelson to brave France is shown + A hero after her own heart: + And he now scanning that quick race, + To whom through life his glove was thrown, + Would know a sister spirit to embrace. + + + + +THE CENTENARY OF GARIBALDI + + + WE who have seen Italia in the throes, + Half risen but to be hurled to ground, and now + Like a ripe field of wheat where once drove plough + All bounteous as she is fair, we think of those + Who blew the breath of life into her frame: + Cavour, Mazzini, Garibaldi: Three: + Her Brain, her Soul, her Sword; and set her free + From ruinous discords, with one lustrous aim. + + That aim, albeit they were of minds diverse, + Conjoined them, not to strive without surcease; + For them could be no babblement of peace + While lay their country under Slavery’s curse. + + The set of torn Italia’s glorious day + Was ever sunrise in each filial breast. + Of eagle beaks by righteousness unblest + They felt her pulsing body made the prey. + + Wherefore they struck, and had to count their dead. + With bitter smile of resolution nerved + To try new issues, holding faith unswerved, + Promise they gathered from the rich blood shed. + + In them Italia, visible to us then + As living, rose; for proof that huge brute Force + Has never being from celestial source, + And is the lord of cravens, not of men. + + Now breaking up the crust of temporal strife, + Who reads their acts enshrined in History, sees + That Tyrants were the Revolutionaries, + The Rebels men heart-vowed to hallowed life. + + Pure as the Archangel’s cleaving Darkness thro’, + The Sword he sees, the keen unwearied Sword, + A single blade against a circling horde, + And aye for Freedom and the trampled few. + + The cry of Liberty from dungeon cell, + From exile, was his God’s command to smite, + As for a swim in sea he joined the fight, + With radiant face, full sure that he did well. + + Behold a warrior dealing mortal strokes, + Whose nature was a child’s: amid his foes + A wary trickster: at the battle’s close, + No gentler friend this leopard dashed with fox. + + Down the long roll of History will run + The story of these deeds, and speed his race + Beneath defeat more hotly to embrace + The noble cause and trust to another sun. + + And lo, that sun is in Italia’s skies + This day, by grace of his good sword in part. + It beckons her to keep a warrior heart + For guard of beauty, all too sweet a prize. + + Earth gave him: blessèd be the Earth that gave. + Earth’s Master crowned his honest work on earth: + Proudly Italia names his place of birth: + The bosom of Humanity his grave. + + + + +THE WILD ROSE + + + HIGH climbs June’s wild rose, + Her bush all blooms in a swarm; + And swift from the bud she blows, + In a day when the wooer is warm; + Frank to receive and give, + Her bosom is open to bee and sun: + Pride she has none, + Nor shame she knows; + Happy to live. + + Unlike those of the garden nigh, + Her queenly sisters enthroned by art; + Loosening petals one by one + To the fiery Passion’s dart + Superbly shy. + For them in some glory of hair, + Or nest of the heaving mounds to lie, + Or path of the bride bestrew. + Ever are they the theme for song. + But nought of that is her share. + Hardly from wayfarers tramping along, + A glance they care not to renew. + + And she at a word of the claims of kin + Shrinks to the level of roads and meads: + She is only a plain princess of the weeds, + As an outcast witless of sin: + Much disregarded, save by the few + Who love her, that has not a spot of deceit, + No promise of sweet beyond sweet, + Often descending to sour. + On any fair breast she would die in an hour. + Praises she scarce could bear, + Were any wild poet to praise. + Her aim is to rise into light and air. + One of the darlings of Earth, no more, + And little it seems in the dusty ways, + Unless to the grasses nodding beneath; + The bird clapping wings to soar, + The clouds of an evetide’s wreath. + + + + +THE CALL + + + UNDER what spell are we debased + By fears for our inviolate Isle, + Whose record is of dangers faced + And flung to heel with even smile? + Is it a vaster force, a subtler guile? + + They say Exercitus designs + To match the famed Salsipotent + Where on her sceptre she reclines; + Awake: but were a slumber sent + By guilty gods, more fell his foul intent. + + The subtler web, the vaster foe, + Well may we meet when drilled for deeds: + But in these days of wealth at flow, + A word of breezy warning breeds + The pained responses seen in lakeside reeds. + + We fain would stand contemplative, + All innocent as meadow grass; + In human goodness fain believe, + Believe a cloud is formed to pass; + Its shadows chase with draughts of hippocras. + + Others have gone; the way they went + Sweet sunny now, and safe our nest. + Humanity, enlightenment, + Against the warning hum protest: + Let the world hear that we know what is best. + + So do the beatific speak; + Yet have they ears, and eyes as well; + And if not with a paler cheek, + They feel the shivers in them dwell, + That something of a dubious future tell. + + For huge possessions render slack + The power we need to hold them fast; + Save when a quickened heart shall make + Our people one, to meet what blast + May blow from temporal heavens overcast. + + Our people one! Nor they with strength + Dependent on a single arm: + Alert, and braced the whole land’s length, + Rejoicing in their manhood’s charm + For friend or foe; to succour, not to harm. + + Has ever weakness won esteem? + Or counts it as a prized ally? + They who have read in History deem + It ranks among the slavish fry, + Whose claim to live justiciary Fates deny. + + It can not be declared we are + A nation till from end to end + The land can show such front to war + As bids a crouching foe expend + His ire in air, and preferably be friend. + + We dreading him, we do him wrong; + For fears discolour, fears invite. + Like him, our task is to be strong; + Unlike him, claiming not by might + To snatch an envied treasure as a right. + + So may a stouter brotherhood + At home be signalled over sea + For righteous, and be understood, + Nay, welcomed, when ’tis shown that we + All duties have embraced in being free. + + This Britain slumbering, she is rich; + Lies placid as a cradled child; + At times with an uneasy twitch, + That tells of dreams unduly wild. + Shall she be with a foreign drug defiled? + + The grandeur of her deeds recall; + Look on her face so kindly fair: + This Britain! and were she to fall, + Mankind would breathe a harsher air, + The nations miss a light of leading rare. + + + + +ON COMO + + + A RAINLESS darkness drew o’er the lake + As we lay in our boat with oars unshipped. + It seemed neither cloud nor water awake, + And forth of the low black curtain slipped + Thunderless lightning. Scoff no more + At angels imagined in downward flight + For the daughters of earth as fabled of yore: + Here was beauty might well invite + Dark heavens to gleam with the fire of a sun + Resurgent; here the exchanged embrace + Worthy of heaven and earth made one. + + And witness it, ye of the privileged space, + Said the flash; and the mountains, as from an abyss + For quivering seconds leaped up to attest + That given, received, renewed was the kiss; + The lips to lips and the breast to breast; + All in a glory of ecstasy, swift + As an eagle at prey, and pure as the prayer + Of an infant bidden joined hands uplift + To be guarded through darkness by spirits of air, + Ere setting the sails of sleep till day. + Slowly the low cloud swung, and far + It panted along its mirrored way; + Above loose threads one sanctioning star, + The wonder of what had been witnessed, sealed, + And with me still as in crystal glassed + Are the depths alight, the heavens revealed, + Where on to the Alps the muteness passed. + + + + +MILTON +DECEMBER 9, 1608: DECEMBER 9, 1908 + + + WHAT splendour of imperial station man, + The Tree of Life, may reach when, rooted fast, + His branching stem points way to upper air + And skyward still aspires, we see in him + Who sang for us the Archangelical host, + Made Morning, by old Darkness urged to the abyss; + A voice that down three centuries onward rolls; + Onward will roll while lives our English tongue, + In the devout of music unsurpassed + Since Piety won Heaven’s ear on Israel’s harp. + + The face of Earth, the soul of Earth, her charm, + Her dread austerity; the quavering fate + Of mortals with blind hope by passion swayed, + His mind embraced, the while on trodden soil, + Defender of the Commonwealth, he joined + Our temporal fray, whereof is vital fruit, + And, choosing armoury of the Scholar, stood + Beside his peers to raise the voice for Freedom: + Nor has fair Liberty a champion armed + To meet on heights or plains the Sophister + Throughout the ages, equal to this man, + Whose spirit breathed high Heaven, and drew thence + The ethereal sword to smite. + + Were England sunk + Beneath the shifting tides, her heart, her brain, + The smile she wears, the faith she holds, her best, + Would live full-toned in the grand delivery + Of his cathedral speech: an utterance + Almost divine, and such as Hellespont, + Crashing its breakers under Ida’s frown, + Inspired: yet worthier he, whose instrument + Was by comparison the coarse reed-pipe; + Whereof have come the marvellous harmonies, + Which, with his lofty theme, of infinite range, + Abash, entrance, exalt. + + We need him now, + This latest Age in repetition cries: + For Belial, the adroit, is in our midst; + Mammon, more swoln to squeeze the slavish sweat + From hopeless toil: and overshadowingly + (Aggrandized, monstrous in his grinning mask + Of hypocritical Peace,) inveterate Moloch + Remains the great example. + + Homage to him + His debtor band, innumerable as waves + Running all golden from an eastern sun, + Joyfully render, in deep reverence + Subscribe, and as they speak their Milton’s name, + Rays of his glory on their foreheads bear. + + + + +IRELAND + + + FIRE in her ashes Ireland feels + And in her veins a glow of heat. + To her the lost old time, appeals + For resurrection, good to greet: + Not as a shape with spectral eyes, + But humanly maternal, young + In all that quickens pride, and wise + To speak the best her bards have sung. + + You read her as a land distraught, + Where bitterest rebel passions seethe. + Look with a core of heart in thought, + For so is known the truth beneath. + She came to you a loathing bride, + And it has been no happy bed. + Believe in her as friend, allied + By bonds as close as those who wed. + + Her speech is held for hatred’s cry; + Her silence tells of treason hid: + Were it her aim to burst the tie, + She sees what iron laws forbid. + Excess of heart obscures from view + A head as keen as yours to count. + Trust her, that she may prove her true + In links whereof is love the fount. + + May she not call herself her own? + That is her cry, and thence her spits + Of fury, thence her graceless tone + At justice given in bits and bits. + The limbs once raw with gnawing chains + Will fret at silken when God’s beams + Of Freedom beckon o’er the plains + From mounts that show it more than dreams. + + She, generous, craves your generous dole; + That will not rouse the crack of doom. + It ends the blundering past control + Simply to give her elbow-room. + Her offspring feels they are a race, + To be a nation is their claim; + Yet stronger bound in your embrace + Than when the tie was but a name. + + A nation she, and formed to charm, + With heart for heart and hands all round. + No longer England’s broken arm, + Would England know where strength is found. + And strength to-day is England’s need; + To-morrow it may be for both + Salvation: heed the portents, heed + The warnings; free the mind from sloth. + + Too long the pair have danced in mud, + With no advance from sun to sun. + Ah, what a bounding course of blood + Has England with an Ireland one! + Behold yon shadow cross the downs, + And off away to yeasty seas. + Lightly will fly old rancour’s frowns + When solid with high heart stand these. + + + + +THE YEARS HAD WORN THEIR SEASONS’ BELT + + + THE years had worn their seasons’ belt, + From bud to rosy prime, + Since Nellie by the larch-pole knelt + And helped the hop to climb. + + Most diligent of teachers then, + But now with all to learn, + She breathed beyond a thought of men, + Though formed to make men burn. + + She dwelt where ’twixt low-beaten thorns + Two mill-blades, like a snail, + Enormous, with inquiring horns, + Looked down on half the vale. + + You know the grey of dew on grass + Ere with the young sun fired, + And you know well the thirst one has + For the coming and desired. + + Quick in our ring she leapt, and gave + Her hand to left, to right. + No claim on her had any, save + To feed the joy of sight. + + For man and maid a laughing word + She tossed, in notes as clear + As when the February bird + Sings out that Spring is near. + + Of what befell behind that scone, + Let none who knows reveal. + In ballad days she might have been + A heroine rousing steel. + + On us did she bestow the hour, + And fixed it firm in thought; + Her spirit like a meadow flower + That gives, and asks for nought. + + She seemed to make the sunlight stay + And show her in its pride. + O she was fair as a beech in May + With the sun on the yonder side. + + There was more life than breath can give, + In the looks in her fair form; + For little can we say we live + Until the heart is warm. + + + + +FRAGMENTS + + + OPEN horizons round, + O mounting mind, to scenes unsung, + Wherein shall walk a lusty Time: + Our Earth is young; + Of measure without bound; + Infinite are the heights to climb, + The depths to sound. + + * * * * * + + A WILDING little stubble flower + The sickle scorned which cut for wheat, + Such was our hope in that dark hour + When nought save uses held the street, + And daily pleasures, daily needs, + With barren vision, looked ahead. + And still the same result of seeds + Gave likeness ’twixt the live and dead. + + * * * * * + + FROM labours through the night, outworn, + Above the hills the front of morn + We see, whose eyes to heights are raised, + And the world’s wise may deem us crazed. + While yet her lord lies under seas, + She takes us as the wind the trees’ + Delighted leafage; all in song + We mount to her, to her belong. + + * * * * * + + THIS love of nature, that allures to take + Irregularity for harmony + Of larger scope than our hard measures make, + Cherish it as thy school for when on thee + The ills of life descend. + + + + +IL Y A CENT ANS + + + THAT march of the funereal Past behold; + How Glory sat on Bondage for its throne; + How men, like dazzled insects, through the mould + Still worked their way, and bled to keep their own. + + We know them, as they strove and wrought and yearned; + Their hopes, their fears; what page of Life they wist: + At whiles their vision upon us was turned, + Baffled by shapes limmed loosely on thick mist. + + Beneath the fortress bulk of Power they bent + Blunt heads, adoring or in shackled hate, + All save the rebel hymned him; and it meant + A world submitting to incarnate Fate. + + From this he drew fresh appetite for sway, + And of it fell: whereat was chorus raised, + How surely shall a mad ambition pay + Dues to Humanity, erewhile amazed. + + ’Twas dreamed by some the deluge would ensue, + So trembling was the tension long constrained; + A spirit of faith was in the chosen few, + That steps to the millennium had been gained. + + But mainly the rich business of the hour, + Their sight, made blind by urgency of blood, + Embraced; and facts, the passing sweet or sour, + To them were solid things that nought withstood. + + Their facts are going headlong on the tides, + Like commas on a line of History’s page; + Nor that which once they took for Truth abides, + Save in the form of youth enlarged from age. + + Meantime give ear to woodland notes around, + Look on our Earth full-breasted to our sun: + So was it when their poets heard the sound, + Beheld the scene: in them our days are one. + + What figures will be shown the century hence? + What lands intact? We do but know that Power + From piety divorced, though seen immense, + Shall sink on envy of the humblest flower. + + Our cry for cradled Peace, while men are still + The three-parts brute which smothers the divine, + Heaven answers: Guard it with forethoughtful will, + Or buy it; all your gains from War resign. + + A land, not indefensibly alarmed, + May see, unwarned by hint of friendly gods, + Between a hermit crab at all points armed, + And one without a shell, decisive odds. + + + + +YOUTH IN AGE + + + ONCE I was part of the music I heard + On the boughs or sweet between earth and sky, + For joy of the beating of wings on high + My heart shot into the breast of the bird. + + I hear it now and I see it fly, + And a life in wrinkles again is stirred, + My heart shoots into the breast of the bird, + As it will for sheer love till the last long sigh. + + + + +EPITAPHS + + +TO A FRIEND LOST +(TOM TAYLOR) + + + WHEN I remember, friend, whom lost I call, + Because a man beloved is taken hence, + The tender humour and the fire of sense + In your good eyes; how full of heart for all, + And chiefly for the weaker by the wall, + You bore that lamp of sane benevolence; + Then see I round you Death his shadows dense + Divide, and at your feet his emblems fall. + For surely are you one with the white host, + Spirits, whose memory is our vital air, + Through the great love of Earth they had: lo, these, + Like beams that throw the path on tossing seas, + Can bid us feel we keep them in the ghost, + Partakers of a strife they joyed to share. + + + +M. M. + + + WHO call her Mother and who calls her Wife + Look on her grave and see not Death but Life. + + + +THE LADY C. M. + + + TO them that knew her, there is vital flame + In these the simple letters of her name. + To them that knew her not, be it but said, + So strong a spirit is not of the dead. + + + +ON THE TOMBSTONE OF +JAMES CHRISTOPHER WILSON +(d. APRIL 11, 1884) +IN HEADLEY CHURCHYARD, SURREY + + + THOU our beloved and light of Earth hast crossed + The sea of darkness to the yonder shore. + There dost thou shine a light transferred, not lost, + Through love to kindle in our souls the more. + + + +GORDON OF KHARTOUM + + + OF men he would have raised to light he fell: + In soul he conquered with those nerveless hands. + His country’s pride and her abasement knell + The Man of England circled by the sands. + + + +J. C. M. + + + A FOUNTAIN of our sweetest, quick to spring + In fellowship abounding, here subsides: + And never passage of a cloud on wing + To gladden blue forgets him; near he hides. + + + +THE EMPEROR FREDERICK OF OUR TIME + + + WITH Alfred and St. Louis he doth win + Grander than crowned head’s mortuary dome: + His gentle heroic manhood enters in + The ever-flowering common heart for home. + + + +ISLET THE DACHS + + + OUR Islet out of Helgoland, dismissed + From his quaint tenement, quits hates and loves. + There lived with us a wagging humourist + In that hound’s arch dwarf-legged on boxing-gloves. + + + +ON HEARING THE NEWS FROM VENICE +(THE DEATH OF ROBERT BROWNING) + + + NOW dumb is he who waked the world to speak, + And voiceless hangs the world beside his bier. + Our words are sobs, our cry of praise a tear: + We are the smitten mortal, we the weak. + We see a spirit on Earth’s loftiest peak + Shine, and wing hence the way he makes more clear: + See a great Tree of Life that never sere + Dropped leaf for aught that age or storms might wreak. + Such ending is not Death: such living shows + What wide illumination brightness sheds + From one big heart, to conquer man’s old foes: + The coward, and the tyrant, and the force + Of all those weedy monsters raising heads + When Song is murk from springs of turbid source. + +_December_ 13, 1889. + + + +HAWARDEN + + + WHEN comes the lighted day for men to read + Life’s meaning, with the work before their hands + Till this good gift of breath from debt is freed, + Earth will not hear her children’s wailful bands + Deplore the chieftain fall’n in sob and dirge; + Nor they look where is darkness, but on high. + The sun that dropped down our horizon’s verge + Illumes his labours through the travelled sky, + Now seen in sum, most glorious; and ’tis known + By what our warrior wrought we hold him fast. + A splendid image built of man has flown; + His deeds inspired of God outstep a Past. + Ours the great privilege to have had one + Among us who celestial tasks has done. + + + +AT THE FUNERAL +FEBRUARY 2, 1901 + + + HER sacred body bear: the tenement + Of that strong soul now ranked with God’s Elect + Her heart upon her people’s heart she spent; + Hence is she Royalty’s lodestar to direct. + + The peace is hers, of whom all lands have praised + Majestic virtues ere her day unseen. + Aloft the name of Womanhood she raised, + And gave new readings to the Title, Queen. + + + +ANGELA BURDETT-COUTTS + + + LONG with us, now she leaves us; she has rest + Beneath our sacred sod: + A woman vowed to Good, whom all attest, + The daylight gift of God. + + + +THE YEAR’S SHEDDINGS + + + THE varied colours are a fitful heap: + They pass in constant service though they sleep; + The self gone out of them, therewith the pain: + Read that, who still to spell our earth remain. + + + + +FOOTNOTES + + +{140} Written in December 1870, printed in the ‘Fortnightly Review,’ and +published in the volume ‘Ballads and Poems.’ + + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POEMS, VOLUME 3 [OF 3]*** + + +******* This file should be named 1383-0.txt or 1383-0.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/3/8/1383 + + +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. 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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 3 [of 3] + + +Author: George Meredith + + + +Release Date: January 10, 2015 [eBook #1383] +[This file was first posted on May 12, 1998] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POEMS, VOLUME 3 [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 South Wester" +title= +"The South Wester" + src="images/fps.jpg" /> +</a></p> +<h1>POEMS<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">VOL. III</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><p> </p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span +class="GutSmall">PAGE</span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>A STAVE OF ROVING TIM,</p> +<p class="gutindent">The wind is East, the wind is West,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page1">1</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>JUMP-TO-GLORY JANE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">A revelation came on Jane,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page5">5</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE RIDDLE FOR MEN,</p> +<p class="gutindent">This Riddle rede or die,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page14">14</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE SAGE ENAMOURED AND THE HONEST LADY,</p> +<p class="gutindent">One fairest of the ripe unwedded left</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page15">15</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>‘LOVE IS WINGED FOR TWO,’</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page30">30</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>‘ASK, IS LOVE DIVINE,’</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page30">30</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>‘JOY IS FLEET,’</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page31">31</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE LESSON OF GRIEF,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Not ere the bitter herb we taste,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page31">31</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>WIND ON THE LYRE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">That was the chirp of Ariel</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page32">32</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE YOUTHFUL QUEST,</p> +<p class="gutindent">His Lady queen of woods to meet,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page33">33</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE EMPTY PURSE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Thou, run to the dry on this wayside +bank,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page34">34</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>TO THE COMIC SPIRIT,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Sword of Common Sense!—</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page56">56</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>YOUTH IN MEMORY,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Days, when the ball of our vision</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page68">68</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>PENETRATION AND TRUST,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Sleek as a lizard at round of a stone,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page75">75</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><a name="pagevi"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +vi</span>NIGHT OF FROST IN MAY,</p> +<p class="gutindent">With splendour of a silver day,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page76">76</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE TEACHING OF THE NUDE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">A Satyr spied a Goddess in her bath,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page79">79</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>BREATH OF THE BRIAR,</p> +<p class="gutindent">O briar-scents, on yon wet wing</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page81">81</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>EMPEDOCLES,</p> +<p class="gutindent">He leaped. With none to hinder,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page82">82</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>ENGLAND BEFORE THE STORM,</p> +<p class="gutindent">The day that is the night of days,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page83">83</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>TARDY SPRING,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Now the North wind ceases,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page85">85</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE LABOURER,</p> +<p class="gutindent">For a Heracles in his fighting ire there is +never the glory that follows</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page87">87</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>FORESIGHT AND PATIENCE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Sprung of the father blood, the mother +brain,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page89">89</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE WARNING,</p> +<p class="gutindent">We have seen mighty men ballooning high,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page99">99</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>OUTSIDE THE CROWD,</p> +<p class="gutindent">To sit on History in an easy chair,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page99">99</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>TRAFALGAR DAY,</p> +<p class="gutindent">He leads: we hear our Seaman’s +call</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page100">100</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p style="text-align: center"><b>Odes in +Contribution to the Song of French History</b></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE REVOLUTION,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Not yet had History’s Aetna smoked the +skies,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page105">105</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>NAPOLÉON,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Cannon his name,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page116">116</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><a name="pagevii"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +vii</span>FRANCE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">We look for her that sunlike stood</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page140">140</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>ALSACE-LORRAINE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">The sister Hours in circles linked,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page150">150</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE CAGEING OF ARES,</p> +<p class="gutindent">How big of breast our Mother Gaea +laughed</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page170">170</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE NIGHT-WALK,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Awakes for me and leaps from shroud</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page175">175</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>AT THE CLOSE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">To Thee, dear God of Mercy, both appeal,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page178">178</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>A GARDEN IDYL,</p> +<p class="gutindent">With sagest craft Arachne worked</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page179">179</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p style="text-align: center"><b>A Reading of +Life</b></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE VITAL CHOICE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Or shall we run with Artemis</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page185">185</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>WITH THE HUNTRESS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Through the water-eye of night,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page186">186</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>WITH THE PERSUADER,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Who murmurs, hither, hither: who</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page189">189</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE TEST OF MANHOOD,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Like a flood river whirled at rocky +banks,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page200">200</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE HUELESS LOVE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Unto that love must we through fire +attain,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page208">208</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>UNION IN DISSEVERANCE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Sunset worn to its last vermilion he;</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page209">209</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>SONG IN THE SONGLESS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">They have no song, the sedges dry,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page210">210</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><a name="pageviii"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +viii</span>THE BURDEN OF STRENGTH,</p> +<p class="gutindent">If that thou hast the gift of strength, then +know</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page210">210</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE MAIN REGRET,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Seen, too clear and historic within us, our +sins of omission</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page211">211</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>ALTERNATION,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Between the fountain and the rill</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page211">211</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>FOREST HISTORY,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Beneath the vans of doom did men pass +in.</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page212">212</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td colspan="2"><p style="text-align: center"><b>Fragments of the +Iliad in English Hexameter Verse</b></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE INVECTIVE OF ACHILLES,</p> +<p class="gutindent">‘Heigh me! brazen of front, thou +glutton for plunder, how can one,</p> +<p class="gutindent">‘Bibber besotted, with scowl of a cur, +having heart of a deer, thou!</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page221">221</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>MARSHALLING OF THE ACHAIANS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Like as a terrible fire feeds fast on a +forest enormous,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page225">225</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>AGAMEMNON IN THE FIGHT,</p> +<p class="gutindent">These, then, he left, and away where ranks +were now clashing the thickest,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page227">227</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>PARIS AND DIOMEDES,</p> +<p class="gutindent">So he, with a clear shout of laughter,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page228">228</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>HYPNOS ON IDA,</p> +<p class="gutindent">They then to fountain-abundant Ida, mother +of wild beasts,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page230">230</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>CLASH IN ARMS OF THE ACHAIANS AND TROJANS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Not the sea-wave so bellows abroad when it +bursts upon shingle,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page231">231</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE HORSES OF ACHILLES,</p> +<p class="gutindent">So now the horses of Aiakides, off wide of +the war-ground,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page232">232</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><a name="pageix"></a><span class="pagenum">p. ix</span>THE +MARES OF THE CAMARGUE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">A hundred mares, all white! their manes</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page234">234</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>‘ATKINS’,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Yonder’s the man with his life in his +hand,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page236">236</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE VOYAGE OF THE ‘OPHIR’,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Men of our race, we send you one</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page237">237</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE CRISIS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Spirit of Russia, now has come</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page239">239</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>OCTOBER 21, 1905,</p> +<p class="gutindent">The hundred years have passed, and he</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page241">241</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE CENTENARY OF GARIBALDI,</p> +<p class="gutindent">We who have seen Italia in the throes,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page243">243</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE WILD ROSE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">High climbs June’s wild rose,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page245">245</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE CALL,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Under what spell are we debased</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page247">247</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>ON COMO,</p> +<p class="gutindent">A rainless darkness drew o’er the +lake</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page250">250</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>MILTON,</p> +<p class="gutindent">What splendour of imperial station man,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page251">251</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>IRELAND,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Fire in her ashes Ireland feels</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page253">253</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE YEARS HAD WORN THEIR SEASONS’ BELT,</p> +<p class="gutindent">The years had worn their seasons’ +belt,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page255">255</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>FRAGMENTS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Open horizons round,</p> +<p class="gutindent">A wilding little stubble flower</p> +<p class="gutindent">From labours through the night, outworn,</p> +<p class="gutindent">This love of nature, that allures to +take</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page257">257</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>IL Y A CENT ANS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">That march of the funereal Past behold;</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page259">259</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p><a name="pagex"></a><span class="pagenum">p. x</span>YOUTH +IN AGE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Once I was part of the music I heard</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 style="text-align: center"><b>Epitaphs</b></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>TO A FRIEND LOST,</p> +<p class="gutindent">When I remember, friend, whom lost I +call,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page265">265</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>M. M.,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Who call her Mother and who calls her +Wife</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page265">265</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE LADY C. M.,</p> +<p class="gutindent">To them that knew her, there is vital +flame</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page266">266</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>ON THE TOMBSTONE OF JAMES CHRISTOPHER WILSON,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Thou our beloved and light of Earth hast +crossed</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page266">266</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>GORDON OF KHARTOUM,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Of men he would have raised to light he +fell:</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page266">266</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>J. C. M.,</p> +<p class="gutindent">A fountain of our sweetest, quick to +spring</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page267">267</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE EMPEROR FREDERICK OF OUR TIME,</p> +<p class="gutindent">With Alfred and St. Louis he doth win</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page267">267</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>ISLET THE DACHS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Our Islet out of Helgoland, dismissed</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page267">267</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>ON HEARING THE NEWS FROM VENICE,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Now dumb is he who waked the world to +speak,</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page268">268</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>HAWARDEN,</p> +<p class="gutindent">When comes the lighted day for men to +read</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page269">269</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>AT THE FUNERAL,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Her sacred body bear: the tenement</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page270">270</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>ANGELA BURDETT-COUTTS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">Long with us, now she leaves us; she has +rest</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page270">270</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><p>THE YEAR’S SHEDDINGS,</p> +<p class="gutindent">The varied colours are a fitful heap:</p> +</td> +<td><p style="text-align: right"><span class="indexpageno"><a +href="#page270">270</a></span></p> +</td> +</tr> +</table> +<h2><a name="page1"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 1</span>A STAVE +OF ROVING TIM<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">(ADDRESSED TO CERTAIN FRIENDLY +TRAMPS.)</span></h2> +<h3>I</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">The</span> wind is East, +the wind is West,<br /> + Blows in and out of haven;<br /> +The wind that blows is the wind that’s best,<br /> + And croak, my jolly raven!<br /> +If here awhile we jigged and laughed,<br /> + The like we will do yonder;<br /> +For he’s the man who masters a craft,<br /> + And light as a lord can wander.<br /> + <a name="page2"></a><span +class="pagenum">p. 2</span>So, foot the measure, Roving Tim,<br +/> + And croak, my +jolly raven!<br /> + The wind according to its whim<br +/> + Is in and out of +haven.</p> +<h3>II</h3> +<p class="poetry">You live in rows of snug abodes,<br /> + With gold, maybe, for counting;<br /> +And mine’s the beck of the rainy roads<br /> + Against the sun a-mounting.<br /> +I take the day as it behaves,<br /> + Nor shiver when ’tis airy;<br /> +But comes a breeze, all you are on waves,<br /> + Sick chickens o’ Mother Carey!<br /> + So, now for next, cries Roving +Tim,<br /> + And croak, my +jolly raven!<br /> + The wind according to its whim<br +/> + Is in and out of +haven.</p> +<h3>III</h3> +<p class="poetry">Sweet lass, you screw a lovely leer,<br /> + To make a man consider.<br /> +If you were up with the auctioneer,<br /> + I’d be a handsome bidder.<br /> +But wedlock clips the rover’s wing;<br /> + She tricks him fly to spider;<br /> +And when we get to fights in the Ring,<br /> + It’s trumps when you play outsider.<br /> + So, wrench and split, cries Roving +Tim,<br /> + And croak, my +jolly raven!<br /> + The wind according to its whim<br +/> + Is in and out of +haven.</p> +<h3>IV</h3> +<p class="poetry">Along my winding way I know<br /> + A shady dell that’s winking;<br /> +The very corner for Self and Co<br /> + To do a world of thinking.<br /> +And shall I this? and shall I that?<br /> + Till Nature answers, ne’ther!<br /> +Strike match and light your pipe in your hat,<br /> + Rejoicing in sound shoe-leather!<br /> + So lead along, cries Roving +Tim,<br /> + And croak, my +jolly raven!<br /> + The wind according to its whim<br +/> + Is in and out of +haven.</p> +<h3><a name="page3"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 3</span>V</h3> +<p class="poetry">A cunning hand ’ll hand you bread,<br /> + With freedom for your capers.<br /> +I’m not so sure of a cunning head;<br /> + It steers to pits or vapours.<br /> +But as for Life, we’ll bear in sight<br /> + The lesson Nature teaches;<br /> +Regard it in a sailoring light,<br /> + And treat it like thirsty leeches.<br /> + So, fly your jib, cries Roving +Tim,<br /> + And top your +boom, old raven!<br /> + The wind according to its whim<br +/> + Is in and out of +haven.</p> +<h3>VI</h3> +<p class="poetry">She’ll take, to please her dame and +dad,<br /> + The shopman nicely shaven.<br /> +She’ll learn to think o’ the marching lad<br /> + When perchers show they’re craven.<br /> +You say the shopman piles a heap,<br /> + While I perhaps am fasting;<br /> +And bless your wits, it haunts him in sleep,<br /> + His tin-kettle chance of lasting!<br /> + So hail the road, cries Roving +Tim,<br /> + And hail the +rain, old raven!<br /> + The wind according to its whim<br +/> + Is in and out of +haven.</p> +<h3>VII</h3> +<p class="poetry">He’s half a wife, yon pecker bill;<br /> + A book and likewise preacher.<br /> +With any soul, in a game of skill,<br /> + He’ll prove your over-reacher.<br /> +<a name="page4"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 4</span>The reason +is, his brains are bent<br /> + On doing things right single.<br /> +You’d wish for them when pitching your tent<br /> + At night in a whirly dingle!<br /> + So, off we go, cries Roving +Tim,<br /> + And on we go, +old raven!<br /> + The wind according to its whim<br +/> + Is in and out of +haven.</p> +<h3>VIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">Lord, no, man’s lot is not for bliss;<br +/> + To call it woe is blindness:<br /> +It’ll here a kick, and it’s there a kiss,<br /> + And here and there a kindness.<br /> +He starts a hare and calls her joy;<br /> + He runs her down to sorrow:<br /> +The dogs within him bother the boy,<br /> + But ’tis a new day to-morrow.<br /> + So, I at helm, cries Roving +Tim,<br /> + And you at bow, +old raven!<br /> + The wind according to its whim<br +/> + Is in and out of +haven.</p> +<h2><a name="page5"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +5</span>JUMP-TO-GLORY JANE</h2> +<h3>I</h3> +<p class="poetry">A <span class="smcap">revelation</span> came on +Jane,<br /> +The widow of a labouring swain:<br /> +And first her body trembled sharp,<br /> +Then all the woman was a harp<br /> +With winds along the strings; she heard,<br /> +Though there was neither tone nor word.</p> +<h3>II</h3> +<p class="poetry">For past our hearing was the air,<br /> +Beyond our speaking what it bare,<br /> +And she within herself had sight<br /> +Of heaven at work to cleanse outright,<br /> +To make of her a mansion fit<br /> +For angel hosts inside to sit.</p> +<h3>III</h3> +<p class="poetry">They entered, and forthwith entranced,<br /> +Her body braced, her members danced;<br /> +Surprisingly the woman leapt;<br /> +And countenance composed she kept:<br /> +As gossip neighbours in the lane<br /> +Declared, who saw and pitied Jane.</p> +<h3>IV</h3> +<p class="poetry">These knew she had been reading books,<br /> +The which was witnessed by her looks<br /> +Of late: she had a mania<br /> +For mad folk in America,<br /> +And said for sure they led the way,<br /> +But meat and beer were meant to stay.</p> +<h3><a name="page6"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 6</span>V</h3> +<p class="poetry">That she had visited a fair,<br /> +Had seen a gauzy lady there,<br /> +Alive with tricks on legs alone,<br /> +As good as wings, was also known:<br /> +And longwhiles in a sullen mood,<br /> +Before her jumping, Jane would brood.</p> +<h3>VI</h3> +<p class="poetry">A good knee’s height, they say, she +sprang;<br /> +Her arms and feet like those who hang:<br /> +As if afire the body sped,<br /> +And neither pair contributed.<br /> +She jumped in silence: she was thought<br /> +A corpse to resurrection caught.</p> +<h3>VII</h3> +<p class="poetry">The villagers were mostly dazed;<br /> +They jeered, they wondered, and they praised.<br /> +’Twas guessed by some she was inspired,<br /> +And some would have it she had hired<br /> +An engine in her petticoats,<br /> +To turn their wits and win their votes.</p> +<h3>VIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">Her first was Winny Earnes, a kind<br /> +Of woman not to dance inclined;<br /> +But she went up, entirely won,<br /> +Ere Jump-to-glory Jane had done;<br /> +And once a vixen wild for speech,<br /> +She found the better way to preach.</p> +<h3><a name="page7"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 7</span>IX</h3> +<p class="poetry">No long time after, Jane was seen<br /> +Directing jumps at Daddy Green;<br /> +And that old man, to watch her fly,<br /> +Had eyebrows made of arches high;<br /> +Till homeward he likewise did hop,<br /> +Oft calling on himself to stop!</p> +<h3>X</h3> +<p class="poetry">It was a scene when man and maid,<br /> +Abandoning all other trade,<br /> +And careless of the call to meals,<br /> +Went jumping at the woman’s heels.<br /> +By dozens they were counted soon,<br /> +Without a sound to tell their tune.</p> +<h3>XI</h3> +<p class="poetry">Along the roads they came, and crossed<br /> +The fields, and o’er the hills were lost,<br /> +And in the evening reappeared;<br /> +Then short like hobbled horses reared,<br /> +And down upon the grass they plumped:<br /> +Alone their Jane to glory jumped.</p> +<h3>XII</h3> +<p class="poetry">At morn they rose, to see her spring<br /> +All going as an engine thing;<br /> +And lighter than the gossamer<br /> +She led the bobbers following her,<br /> +Past old acquaintances, and where<br /> +They made the stranger stupid stare.</p> +<h3><a name="page8"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +8</span>XIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">When turnips were a filling crop,<br /> +In scorn they jumped a butcher’s shop:<br /> +Or, spite of threats to flog and souse,<br /> +They jumped for shame a public-house:<br /> +And much their legs were seized with rage<br /> +If passing by the vicarage.</p> +<h3>XIV</h3> +<p class="poetry">The tightness of a hempen rope<br /> +Their bodies got; but laundry soap<br /> +Not handsomer can rub the skin<br /> +For token of the washed within.<br /> +Occasionally coughers cast<br /> +A leg aloft and coughed their last.</p> +<h3>XV</h3> +<p class="poetry">The weaker maids and some old men,<br /> +Requiring rafters for the pen<br /> +On rainy nights, were those who fell.<br /> +The rest were quite a miracle,<br /> +Refreshed as you may search all round<br /> +On Club-feast days and cry, Not found!</p> +<h3>XVI</h3> +<p class="poetry">For these poor innocents, that slept<br /> +Against the sky, soft women wept:<br /> +For never did they any theft;<br /> +’Twas known when they their camping left,<br /> +And jumped the cold out of their rags;<br /> +In spirit rich as money-bags.</p> +<h3><a name="page9"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +9</span>XVII</h3> +<p class="poetry">They jumped the question, jumped reply;<br /> +And whether to insist, deny,<br /> +Reprove, persuade, they jumped in ranks<br /> +Or singly, straight the arms to flanks,<br /> +And straight the legs, with just a knee<br /> +For bending in a mild degree.</p> +<h3>XVIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">The villagers might call them mad;<br /> +An endless holiday they had,<br /> +Of pleasure in a serious work:<br /> +They taught by leaps where perils lurk,<br /> +And with the lambkins practised sports<br /> +For ’scaping Satan’s pounds and quarts.</p> +<h3>XIX</h3> +<p class="poetry">It really seemed on certain days,<br /> +When they bobbed up their Lord to praise,<br /> +And bobbing up they caught the glance<br /> +Of light, our secret is to dance,<br /> +And hold the tongue from hindering peace;<br /> +To dance out preacher and police.</p> +<h3>XX</h3> +<p class="poetry">Those flies of boys disturbed them sore<br /> +On Sundays and when daylight wore:<br /> +With withies cut from hedge or copse,<br /> +They treated them as whipping-tops,<br /> +And flung big stones with cruel aim;<br /> +Yet all the flock jumped on the same.</p> +<h3><a name="page10"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +10</span>XXI</h3> +<p class="poetry">For what could persecution do<br /> +To worry such a blessed crew,<br /> +On whom it was as wind to fire,<br /> +Which set them always jumping higher?<br /> +The parson and the lawyer tried,<br /> +By meek persistency defied.</p> +<h3>XXII</h3> +<p class="poetry">But if they bore, they could pursue<br /> +As well, and this the Bishop too;<br /> +When inner warnings proved him plain<br /> +The chase for Jump-to-glory Jane.<br /> +She knew it by his being sent<br /> +To bless the feasting in the tent.</p> +<h3>XXIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">Not less than fifty years on end,<br /> +The Squire had been the Bishop’s friend:<br /> +And his poor tenants, harmless ones,<br /> +With souls to save! fed not on buns,<br /> +But angry meats: she took her place<br /> +Outside to show the way to grace.</p> +<h3>XXIV</h3> +<p class="poetry">In apron suit the Bishop stood;<br /> +The crowding people kindly viewed.<br /> +A gaunt grey woman he saw rise<br /> +On air, with most beseeching eyes:<br /> +And evident as light in dark<br /> +It was, she set to him for mark.</p> +<h3><a name="page11"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +11</span>XXV</h3> +<p class="poetry">Her highest leap had come: with ease<br /> +She jumped to reach the Bishop’s knees:<br /> +Compressing tight her arms and lips,<br /> +She sought to jump the Bishop’s hips:<br /> +Her aim flew at his apron-band,<br /> +That he might see and understand.</p> +<h3>XXVI</h3> +<p class="poetry">The mild inquiry of his gaze<br /> +Was altered to a peaked amaze,<br /> +At sight of thirty in ascent,<br /> +To gain his notice clearly bent:<br /> +And greatly Jane at heart was vexed<br /> +By his ploughed look of mind perplexed.</p> +<h3>XXVII</h3> +<p class="poetry">In jumps that said, Beware the pit!<br /> +More eloquent than speaking it—<br /> +That said, Avoid the boiled, the roast;<br /> +The heated nose on face of ghost,<br /> +Which comes of drinking: up and o’er<br /> +The flesh with me! did Jane implore.</p> +<h3>XXVIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">She jumped him high as huntsmen go<br /> +Across the gate; she jumped him low,<br /> +To coax him to begin and feel<br /> +His infant steps returning, peel<br /> +His mortal pride, exposing fruit,<br /> +And off with hat and apron suit.</p> +<h3><a name="page12"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +12</span>XXIX</h3> +<p class="poetry">We need much patience, well she knew,<br /> +And out and out, and through and through,<br /> +When we would gentlefolk address,<br /> +However we may seek to bless:<br /> +At times they hide them like the beasts<br /> +From sacred beams; and mostly priests.</p> +<h3>XXX</h3> +<p class="poetry">He gave no sign of making bare,<br /> +Nor she of faintness or despair.<br /> +Inflamed with hope that she might win,<br /> +If she but coaxed him to begin,<br /> +She used all arts for making fain;<br /> +The mother with her babe was Jane.</p> +<h3>XXXI</h3> +<p class="poetry">Now stamped the Squire, and knowing not<br /> +Her business, waved her from the spot.<br /> +Encircled by the men of might,<br /> +The head of Jane, like flickering light,<br /> +As in a charger, they beheld<br /> +Ere she was from the park expelled.</p> +<h3>XXXII</h3> +<p class="poetry">Her grief, in jumps of earthly weight,<br /> +Did Jane around communicate:<br /> +For that the moment when began<br /> +The holy but mistaken man,<br /> +In view of light, to take his lift,<br /> +They cut him from her charm adrift!</p> +<h3><a name="page13"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +13</span>XXXIII</h3> +<p class="poetry">And he was lost: a banished face<br /> +For ever from the ways of grace,<br /> +Unless pinched hard by dreams in fright.<br /> +They saw the Bishop’s wavering sprite<br /> +Within her look, at come and go,<br /> +Long after he had caused her woe.</p> +<h3>XXXIV</h3> +<p class="poetry">Her greying eyes (until she sank<br /> +At Fredsham on the wayside bank,<br /> +Like cinder heaps that whitened lie<br /> +From coals that shot the flame to sky)<br /> +Had glassy vacancies, which yearned<br /> +For one in memory discerned.</p> +<h3>XXXV</h3> +<p class="poetry">May those who ply the tongue that cheats,<br /> +And those who rush to beer and meats,<br /> +And those whose mean ambition aims<br /> +At palaces and titled names,<br /> +Depart in such a cheerful strain<br /> +As did our Jump-to-glory Jane!</p> +<h3>XXXVI</h3> +<p class="poetry">Her end was beautiful: one sigh.<br /> +She jumped a foot when it was nigh.<br /> +A lily in a linen clout<br /> +She looked when they had laid her out.<br /> +It is a lily-light she bears<br /> +For England up the ladder-stairs.</p> +<h2><a name="page14"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 14</span>THE +RIDDLE FOR MEN</h2> +<h3>I</h3> +<p class="poetry"> <span +class="smcap">This</span> Riddle rede or die,<br /> + Says History since our Flood,<br /> + To warn her sons of power:—<br /> +It can be truth, it can be lie;<br /> +Be parasite to twist awry;<br /> +The drouthy vampire for your blood;<br /> +The fountain of the silver flower;<br /> +A brand, a lure, a web, a crest;<br /> +Supple of wax or tempered steel;<br /> +The spur to honour, snake in nest:<br /> +’Tis as you will with it to deal;<br /> + To wear upon the breast,<br /> + Or trample under heel.</p> +<h3>II</h3> +<p class="poetry"> And rede you not aright,<br +/> + Says Nature, still in red<br /> + Shall History’s tale be writ!<br /> +For solely thus you lead to light<br /> +The trailing chapters she must write,<br /> +And pass my fiery test of dead<br /> +Or living through the furnace-pit:<br /> +Dislinked from who the softer hold<br /> +In grip of brute, and brute remain:<br /> +Of whom the woeful tale is told,<br /> +How for one short Sultanic reign,<br /> + Their bodies lapse to mould,<br /> + Their souls behowl the plain.</p> +<h2><a name="page15"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 15</span>THE +SAGE ENAMOURED AND THE HONEST LADY</h2> +<h3>I</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">One</span> fairest of the +ripe unwedded left<br /> +Her shadow on the Sage’s path; he found,<br /> +By common signs, that she had done a theft.<br /> +He could have made the sovereign heights resound<br /> +With questions of the wherefore of her state:<br /> +He on far other but an hour before<br /> +Intent. And was it man, or was it mate,<br /> +That she disdained? or was there haply more?</p> +<p class="poetry">About her mouth a placid humour slipped<br /> +The dimple, as you see smooth lakes at eve<br /> +Spread melting rings where late a swallow dipped.<br /> +The surface was attentive to receive,<br /> +The secret underneath enfolded fast.<br /> +She had the step of the unconquered, brave,<br /> +Not arrogant; and if the vessel’s mast<br /> +Waved liberty, no challenge did it wave.<br /> +Her eyes were the sweet world desired of souls,<br /> +With something of a wavering line unspelt.<br /> +They hold the look whose tenderness condoles<br /> +For what the sister in the look has dealt<br /> +Of fatal beyond healing; and her tones<br /> +A woman’s honeyed amorous outvied,<br /> +As when in a dropped viol the wood-throb moans<br /> +Among the sobbing strings, that plain and chide<br /> +<a name="page16"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 16</span>Like +infants for themselves, less deep to thrill<br /> +Than those rich mother-notes for them breathed round.<br /> +Those voices are not magic of the will<br /> +To strike love’s wound, but of love’s wound give +sound,<br /> +Conveying it; the yearnings, pains and dreams.<br /> +They waft to the moist tropics after storm,<br /> +When out of passion spent thick incense steams,<br /> +And jewel-belted clouds the wreck transform.</p> +<p class="poetry">Was never hand on brush or lyre to paint<br /> +Her gracious manners, where the nuptial ring<br /> +Of melody clasped motion in restraint:<br /> +The reed-blade with the breeze thereof may sing.<br /> +With such endowments armed was she and decked<br /> +To make her spoken thoughts eclipse her kind;<br /> +Surpassing many a giant intellect,<br /> +The marvel of that cradled infant mind.<br /> +It clenched the tiny fist, it curled the toe;<br /> +Cherubic laughed, enticed, dispensed, absorbed;<br /> +And promised in fair feminine to grow<br /> +A Sage’s match and mate, more heavenly orbed.</p> +<h3>II</h3> +<p class="poetry">Across his path the spouseless Lady cast<br /> +Her shadow, and the man that thing became.<br /> +His youth uprising called his age the Past.<br /> +This was the strong grey head of laurelled name,<br /> +And in his bosom an inverted Sage<br /> +Mistook for light of morn the light which sank.<br /> +But who while veins run blood shall know the page<br /> +Succeeding ere we turn upon our blank?<br /> +Comes Beauty with her tale of moon and cloud,<br /> +Her silvered rims of mystery pointing in<br /> +To hollows of the half-veiled unavowed,<br /> +Where beats her secret life, grey heads will spin<br /> +<a name="page17"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 17</span>Quick as +the young, and spell those hieroglyphs<br /> +Of phosphorescent dusk, devoutly bent;<br /> +They drink a cup to whirl on dizzier cliffs<br /> +For their shamed fall, which asks, why was she sent!<br /> +Why, and of whom, and whence; and tell they truth,<br /> +The legends of her mission to beguile?</p> +<p class="poetry">Hard likeness to the toilful apes of youth<br +/> +He bore at times, and tempted the sly smile;<br /> +And not on her soft lips was it descried.<br /> +She stepped her way benevolently grave:<br /> +Nor sign that Beauty fed her worm of pride,<br /> +By tossing victim to the courtier knave,<br /> +Let peep, nor of the naughty pride gave sign.<br /> +Rather ’twas humbleness in being pursued,<br /> +As pilgrim to the temple of a shrine.<br /> +Had he not wits to pierce the mask he wooed?<br /> +All wisdom’s armoury this man could wield;<br /> +And if the cynic in the Sage it pleased<br /> +Traverse her woman’s curtain and poor shield,<br /> +For new example of a world diseased;<br /> +Showing her shrineless, not a temple, bare;<br /> +A curtain ripped to tatters by the blast;<br /> +Yet she most surely to this man stood fair:<br /> +He worshipped like the young enthusiast,<br /> +Named simpleton or poet. Did he read<br /> +Right through, and with the voice she held reserved<br /> +Amid her vacant ruins jointly plead?</p> +<p class="poetry">Compassion for the man thus noble nerved<br /> +The pity for herself she felt in him,<br /> +To wreak a deed of sacrifice, and save;<br /> +At least, be worthy. That our soul may swim,<br /> +We sink our heart down bubbling under wave.<br /> +<a name="page18"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 18</span>It bubbles +till it drops among the wrecks.<br /> +But, ah! confession of a woman’s breast:<br /> +She eminent, she honoured of her sex!<br /> +Truth speaks, and takes the spots of the confessed,<br /> +To veil them. None of women, save their vile,<br /> +Plays traitor to an army in the field.<br /> +The cries most vindicating most defile.<br /> +How shall a cause to Nature be appealed,<br /> +When, under pressure of their common foe,<br /> +Her sisters shun the Mother and disown,<br /> +On pain of his intolerable crow<br /> +Above the fiction, built for him, o’erthrown?<br /> +Irrational he is, irrational<br /> +Must they be, though not Reason’s light shall wane<br /> +In them with ever Nature at close call,<br /> +Behind the fiction torturing to sustain;<br /> +Who hear her in the milk, and sometimes make<br /> +A tongueless answer, shivered on a sigh:<br /> +Whereat men dread their lofty structure’s quake<br /> +Once more, and in their hosts for tocsin ply<br /> +The crazy roar of peril, leonine<br /> +For injured majesty. That sigh of dames<br /> +Is rare and soon suppressed. Not they combine<br /> +To shake the structure sheltering them, which tames<br /> +Their lustier if not wilder: fixed are they,<br /> +In elegancy scarce denoting ease;<br /> +And do they breathe, it is not to betray<br /> +The martyr in the caryatides.<br /> +Yet here and there along the graceful row<br /> +Is one who fetches breath from deeps, who deems,<br /> +Moved by a desperate craving, their old foe<br /> +May yield a trustier friend than woman seems,<br /> +And aid to bear the sculptured floral weight<br /> +Massed upon heads not utterly of stone:<br /> +May stamp endurance by expounding fate.<br /> +<a name="page19"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 19</span>She turned +to him, and, This you seek is gone;<br /> +Look in, she said, as pants the furnace, brief,<br /> +Frost-white. She gave his hearing sight to view<br /> +The silent chamber of a brown curled leaf:<br /> +Thing that had throbbed ere shot black lightning through.<br /> +No further sign of heart could he discern:<br /> +The picture of her speech was winter sky;<br /> +A headless figure folding a cleft urn,<br /> +Where tears once at the overflow were dry.</p> +<h3>III</h3> +<p class="poetry">So spake she her first utterance on the +rack.<br /> +It softened torment, in the funeral hues<br /> +Round wan Romance at ebb, but drove her back<br /> +To listen to herself, herself accuse<br /> +Harshly as Love’s imperial cause allowed.<br /> +She meant to grovel, and her lover praised<br /> +So high o’er the condemnatory crowd,<br /> +That she perforce a fellow phoenix blazed.</p> +<p class="poetry">The picture was of hand fast joined to hand,<br +/> +Both pushed from angry skies, their grasp more pledged<br /> +Under the threatened flash of a bright brand<br /> +At arm’s length up, for severing action edged.<br /> +Why, then Love’s Court of Honour contemplate;<br /> +And two drowned shorecasts, who, for the life esteemed<br /> +Above their lost, invoke an advocate<br /> +In Passion’s purity, thereby redeemed.</p> +<p class="poetry">Redeemed, uplifted, glimmering on a throne,<br +/> +The woman stricken by an arrow falls.<br /> +His advocate she can be, not her own,<br /> +If, Traitress to thy sex! one sister calls.<br /> +<a name="page20"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 20</span>Have we +such scenes of drapery’s mournfulness<br /> +On Beauty’s revelations, witched we plant,<br /> +Over the fair shape humbled to confess,<br /> +An angel’s buckler, with loud choiric chant.</p> +<h3>IV</h3> +<p class="poetry">No knightly sword to serve, nor harp of +bard,<br /> +The lady’s hand in her physician’s knew.<br /> +She had not hoped for them as her award,<br /> +When zig-zag on the tongue electric flew<br /> +Her charge of counter-motives, none impure:<br /> +But muteness whipped her skin. She could have said,<br /> +Her free confession was to work his cure,<br /> +Show proofs for why she could not love or wed.<br /> +Were they not shown? His muteness shook in thrall<br /> +Her body on the verge of that black pit<br /> +Sheer from the treacherous confessional,<br /> +Demanding further, while perusing it.</p> +<p class="poetry">Slave is the open mouth beneath the closed.<br +/> +She sank; she snatched at colours; they were peel<br /> +Of fruit past savour, in derision rosed.<br /> +For the dark downward then her soul did reel.<br /> +A press of hideous impulse urged to speak:<br /> +A novel dread of man enchained her dumb.<br /> +She felt the silence thicken, heard it shriek,<br /> +Heard Life subsiding on the eternal hum:<br /> +Welcome to women, when, between man’s laws<br /> +And Nature’s thirsts, they, soul from body torn,<br /> +Give suck at breast to a celestial cause,<br /> +Named by the mouth infernal, and forsworn.<br /> +<a name="page21"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 21</span>Nathless +her forehead twitched a sad content,<br /> +To think the cure so manifest, so frail<br /> +Her charm remaining. Was the curtain’s rent<br /> +Too wide? he but a man of that herd male?<br /> +She saw him as that herd of the forked head<br /> +Butting the woman harrowed on her knees,<br /> +Clothed only in life’s last devouring red.<br /> +Confession at her fearful instant sees<br /> +Judicial Silence write the devil fact<br /> +In letters of the skeleton: at once,<br /> +Swayed on the supplication of her act,<br /> +The rabble reading, roaring to denounce,<br /> +She joins. No longer colouring, with skips<br /> +At tangles, picture that for eyes in tears<br /> +Might swim the sequence, she addressed her lips<br /> +To do the scaffold’s office at his ears.</p> +<p class="poetry">Into the bitter judgement of that herd<br /> +On women, she, deeming it present, fell.<br /> +Her frenzy of abasement hugged the word<br /> +They stone with, and so pile their citadel<br /> +To launch at outcasts the foul levin bolt.<br /> +As had he flung it, in her breast it burned.<br /> +Face and reflect it did her hot revolt<br /> +From hardness, to the writhing rebel turned;<br /> +Because the golden buckler was withheld,<br /> +She to herself applies the powder-spark,<br /> +For joy of one wild demon burst ere quelled,<br /> +Perishing to astound the tyrant Dark.</p> +<p class="poetry">She had the Scriptural word so scored on +brain,<br /> +It rang through air to sky, and rocked a world<br /> +That danced down shades the scarlet dance profane;<br /> +Most women! see! by the man’s view dustward hurled,<br /> +<a name="page22"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +22</span>Impenitent, submissive, torn in two.<br /> +They sink upon their nature, the unnamed,<br /> +And sops of nourishment may get some few,<br /> +In place of understanding, scourged and shamed.</p> +<p class="poetry">Barely have seasoned women understood<br /> +The great Irrational, who thunders power,<br /> +Drives Nature to her primitive wild wood,<br /> +And courts her in the covert’s dewy hour;<br /> +Returning to his fortress nigh night’s end,<br /> +With execration of her daughters’ lures.<br /> +They help him the proud fortress to defend,<br /> +Nor see what front it wears, what life immures,<br /> +The murder it commits; nor that its base<br /> +Is shifty as a huckster’s opening deal<br /> +For bargain under smoothest market face,<br /> +While Gentleness bids frigid Justice feel,<br /> +Justice protests that Reason is her seat;<br /> +Elect Convenience, as Reason masked,<br /> +Hears calmly cramped Humanity entreat;<br /> +Until a sentient world is overtasked,<br /> +And rouses Reason’s fountain-self: she calls<br /> +On Nature; Nature answers: Share your guilt<br /> +In common when contention cracks the walls<br /> +Of the big house which not on me is built.</p> +<p class="poetry">The Lady said as much as breath will bear;<br +/> +To happier sisters inconceivable:<br /> +Contemptible to veterans of the fair,<br /> +Who show for a convolving pearly shell,<br /> +A treasure of the shore, their written book.<br /> +As much as woman’s breath will bear and live<br /> +Shaped she to words beneath a knotted look,<br /> +That held as if for grain the summing sieve.<br /> +<a name="page23"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 23</span>Her judge +now brightened without pause, as wakes<br /> +Our homely daylight after dread of spells.<br /> +Lips sugared to let loose the little snakes<br /> +Of slimy lustres ringing elfin bells<br /> +About a story of the naked flesh,<br /> +Intending but to put some garment on,<br /> +Should learn, that in the subject they enmesh,<br /> +A traitor lurks and will be known anon.<br /> +Delusion heating pricks the torpid doubt,<br /> +Stationed for index down an ancient track:<br /> +And ware of it was he while she poured out<br /> +A broken moon on forest-waters black.</p> +<p class="poetry">Though past the stage where midway men are +skilled<br /> +To scan their senses wriggling under plough,<br /> +When yet to the charmed seed of speech distilled,<br /> +Their hearts are fallow, he, and witless how,<br /> +Loathing, had yielded, like bruised limb to leech,<br /> +Not handsomely; but now beholding bleed<br /> +Soul of the woman in her prostrate speech,<br /> +The valour of that rawness he could read.<br /> +Thence flashed it, as the crimson currents ran<br /> +From senses up to thoughts, how she had read<br /> +Maternally the warm remainder man<br /> +Beneath his crust, and Nature’s pity shed,<br /> +In shedding dearer than heart’s blood to light<br /> +His vision of the path mild Wisdom walks.<br /> +Therewith he could espy Confession’s fright;<br /> +Her need of him: these flowers grow on stalks;<br /> +They suck from soil, and have their urgencies<br /> +Beside and with the lovely face mid leaves.<br /> +Veins of divergencies, convergencies,<br /> +Our botanist in womankind perceives;<br /> +<a name="page24"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 24</span>And if he +hugs no wound, the man can prize<br /> +That splendid consummation and sure proof<br /> +Of more than heart in her, who might despise,<br /> +Who drowns herself, for pity up aloof<br /> +To soar and be like Nature’s pity: she<br /> +Instinctive of what virtue in young days<br /> +Had served him for his pilot-star on sea,<br /> +To trouble him in haven. Thus his gaze<br /> +Came out of rust, and more than the schooled tongue<br /> +Was gifted to encourage and assure.<br /> +He gave her of the deep well she had sprung;<br /> +And name it gratitude, the word is poor.<br /> +But name it gratitude, is aught as rare<br /> +From sex to sex? And let it have survived<br /> +Their conflict, comes the peace between the pair,<br /> +Unknown to thousands husbanded and wived:<br /> +Unknown to Passion, generous for prey:<br /> +Unknown to Love, too blissful in a truce.<br /> +Their tenderest of self did each one slay;<br /> +His cloak of dignity, her fleur de luce;<br /> +Her lily flower, and his abolla cloak,<br /> +Things living, slew they, and no artery bled.<br /> +A moment of some sacrificial smoke<br /> +They passed, and were the dearer for their dead.</p> +<p class="poetry">He learnt how much we gain who make no +claims.<br /> +A nightcap on his flicker of grey fire<br /> +Was thought of her sharp shudder in the flames,<br /> +Confessing; and its conjured image dire,<br /> +Of love, the torrent on the valley dashed;<br /> +The whirlwind swathing tremulous peaks; young force,<br /> +Visioned to hold corrected and abashed<br /> +Our senile emulous; which rolls its course<br /> +<a name="page25"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 25</span>Proud to +the shattering end; with these few last<br /> +Hot quintessential drops of bryony juice,<br /> +Squeezed out in anguish: all of that once vast!<br /> +And still, though having skin for man’s abuse,<br /> +Though no more glorying in the beauteous wreath<br /> +Shot skyward from a blood at passionate jet,<br /> +Repenting but in words, that stand as teeth<br /> +Between the vivid lips; a vassal set;<br /> +And numb, of formal value. Are we true<br /> +In nature, never natural thing repents;<br /> +Albeit receiving punishment for due,<br /> +Among the group of this world’s penitents;<br /> +Albeit remorsefully regretting, oft<br /> +Cravenly, while the scourge no shudder spares.</p> +<p class="poetry">Our world believes it stabler if the soft<br /> +Are whipped to show the face repentance wears.<br /> +Then hear it, in a moan of atheist gloom,<br /> +Deplore the weedy growth of hypocrites;<br /> +Count Nature devilish, and accept for doom<br /> +The chasm between our passions and our wits!</p> +<p class="poetry">Affecting lunar whiteness, patent snows,<br /> +It trembles at betrayal of a sore.<br /> +Hers is the glacier-conscience, to expose<br /> +Impurities for clearness at the core.</p> +<p class="poetry">She to her hungered thundering in breast,<br /> +<i>Ye shall not starve</i>, not feebly designates<br /> +The world repressing as a life repressed,<br /> +Judged by the wasted martyrs it creates.<br /> +<a name="page26"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 26</span>How Sin, +amid the shades Cimmerian,<br /> +Repents, she points for sight: and she avers,<br /> +The hoofed half-angel in the Puritan<br /> +Nigh reads her when no brutish wrath deters.</p> +<p class="poetry">Sin against immaturity, the sin<br /> +Of ravenous excess, what deed divides<br /> +Man from vitality; these bleed within;<br /> +Bleed in the crippled relic that abides.<br /> +Perpetually they bleed; a limb is lost,<br /> +A piece of life, the very spirit maimed.<br /> +But culprit who the law of man has crossed<br /> +With Nature’s dubiously within is blamed;<br /> +Despite our cry at cutting of the whip,<br /> +Our shiver in the night when numbers frown,<br /> +We but bewail a broken fellowship,<br /> +A sting, an isolation, a fall’n crown.</p> +<p class="poetry">Abject of sinners is that sensitive,<br /> +The flesh, amenable to stripes, miscalled<br /> +Incorrigible: such title do we give<br /> +To the poor shrinking stuff wherewith we are walled;<br /> +And, taking it for Nature, place in ban<br /> +Our Mother, as a Power wanton-willed,<br /> +The shame and baffler of the soul of man,<br /> +The recreant, reptilious. Do thou build<br /> +Thy mind on her foundations in earth’s bed;<br /> +Behold man’s mind the child of her keen rod,<br /> +For teaching how the wits and passions wed<br /> +To rear that temple of the credible God;<br /> +Sacred the letters of her laws, and plain,<br /> +Will shine, to guide thy feet and hold thee firm:<br /> +Then, as a pathway through a field of grain,<br /> +Man’s laws appear the blind progressive worm,<br /> +<a name="page27"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 27</span>That moves +by touch, and thrust of linking rings<br /> +The which to endow with vision, lift from mud<br /> +To level of their nature’s aims and springs,<br /> +Must those, the twain beside our vital flood,<br /> +Now on opposing banks, the twain at strife<br /> +(Whom the so rosy ferryman invites<br /> +To junction, and mid-channel over Life,<br /> +Unmasked to the ghostly, much asunder smites)<br /> +Instruct in deeper than Convenience,<br /> +In higher than the harvest of a year.<br /> +Only the rooted knowledge to high sense<br /> +Of heavenly can mount, and feel the spur<br /> +For fruitfullest advancement, eye a mark<br /> +Beyond the path with grain on either hand,<br /> +Help to the steering of our social Ark<br /> +Over the barbarous waters unto land.</p> +<p class="poetry">For us the double conscience and its war,<br /> +The serving of two masters, false to both,<br /> +Until those twain, who spring the root and are<br /> +The knowledge in division, plight a troth<br /> +Of equal hands: nor longer circulate<br /> +A pious token for their current coin,<br /> +To growl at the exchange; they, mate and mate,<br /> +Fair feminine and masculine shall join<br /> +Upon an upper plane, still common mould,<br /> +Where stamped religion and reflective pace<br /> +A statelier measure, and the hoop of gold<br /> +Rounds to horizon for their soul’s embrace.<br /> +Then shall those noblest of the earth and sun<br /> +Inmix unlike to waves on savage sea.<br /> +But not till Nature’s laws and man’s are one,<br /> +Can marriage of the man and woman be.</p> +<h3><a name="page28"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 28</span>V</h3> +<p class="poetry">He passed her through the sermon’s dull +defile.<br /> +Down under billowy vapour-gorges heaved<br /> +The city and the vale and mountain-pile.<br /> +She felt strange push of shuttle-threads that weaved.</p> +<p class="poetry">A new land in an old beneath her lay;<br /> +And forth to meet it did her spirit rush,<br /> +As bride who without shame has come to say,<br /> +Husband, in his dear face that caused her blush.</p> +<p class="poetry">A natural woman’s heart, not more than +clad<br /> +By station and bright raiment, gathers heat<br /> +From nakedness in trusted hands: she had<br /> +The joy of those who feel the world’s heart beat,<br /> +After long doubt of it as fire or ice;<br /> +Because one man had helped her to breathe free;<br /> +Surprised to faith in something of a price<br /> +Past the old charity in chivalry:—<br /> +Our first wild step to right the loaded scales<br /> +Displaying women shamefully outweighed.<br /> +The wisdom of humaneness best avails<br /> +For serving justice till that fraud is brayed.<br /> +Her buried body fed the life she drank.<br /> +And not another stripping of her wound!<br /> +The startled thought on black delirium sank,<br /> +While with her gentle surgeon she communed,<br /> +And woman’s prospect of the yoke repelled.<br /> +Her buried body gave her flowers and food;<br /> +The peace, the homely skies, the springs that welled;<br /> +Love, the large love that folds the multitude.<br /> +<a name="page29"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +29</span>Soul’s chastity in honesty, and this<br /> +With beauty, made the dower to men refused.<br /> +And little do they know the prize they miss;<br /> +Which is their happy fortune! Thus he mused</p> +<p class="poetry">For him, the cynic in the Sage had play<br /> +A hazy moment, by a breath dispersed;<br /> +To think, of all alive most wedded they,<br /> +Whom time disjoined! He needed her quick thirst<br /> +For renovated earth: on earth she gazed,<br /> +With humble aim to foot beside the wise.<br /> +Lo, where the eyelashes of night are raised<br /> +Yet lowly over morning’s pure grey eyes.</p> +<h2><a name="page30"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +30</span>‘LOVE IS WINGED FOR TWO’</h2> +<p class="poetry"> <span +class="smcap">Love</span> is winged for two,<br /> + In the worst he weathers,<br /> + When their hearts are tied;<br /> + But if they divide,<br /> + O too true!<br /> +Cracks a globe, and feathers, feathers,<br /> +Feathers all the ground bestrew.</p> +<p class="poetry">I was breast of morning sea,<br /> +Rosy plume on forest dun,<br /> +I the laugh in rainy fleeces,<br /> + While with me<br /> + She made one.<br /> +Now must we pick up our pieces,<br /> +For that then so winged were we.</p> +<h2>‘ASK, IS LOVE DIVINE’</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Ask</span>, is Love +divine,<br /> +Voices all are, ay.<br /> +Question for the sign,<br /> +There’s a common sigh.<br /> +Would we, through our years,<br /> +Love forego,<br /> +Quit of scars and tears?<br /> +Ah, but no, no, no!</p> +<h2><a name="page31"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +31</span>‘JOY IS FLEET’</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Joy</span> is fleet,<br /> +Sorrow slow.<br /> +Love, so sweet,<br /> +Sorrow will sow.<br /> +Love, that has flown<br /> +Ere day’s decline,<br /> +Love to have known,<br /> +Sorrow, be mine!</p> +<h2>THE LESSON OF GRIEF</h2> +<p class="poetry">Not ere the bitter herb we taste,<br /> +Which ages thought of happy times,<br /> +To plant us in a weeping waste,<br /> +Rings with our fellows this one heart<br /> + + +Accordant chimes.</p> +<p class="poetry">When I had shed my glad year’s leaf,<br +/> +I did believe I stood alone,<br /> +Till that great company of Grief<br /> +Taught me to know this craving heart<br /> + For not my own.</p> +<h2><a name="page32"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 32</span>WIND +ON THE LYRE</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">That</span> was the chirp +of Ariel<br /> +You heard, as overhead it flew,<br /> +The farther going more to dwell,<br /> +And wing our green to wed our blue;<br /> +But whether note of joy or knell,<br /> +Not his own Father-singer knew;<br /> +Nor yet can any mortal tell,<br /> +Save only how it shivers through;<br /> +The breast of us a sounded shell,<br /> +The blood of us a lighted dew.</p> +<h2><a name="page33"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 33</span>THE +YOUTHFUL QUEST</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">His</span> Lady queen of +woods to meet,<br /> + He wanders day and night:<br /> +The leaves have whisperings discreet,<br /> + The mossy ways invite.</p> +<p class="poetry">Across a lustrous ring of space,<br /> + By covert hoods and caves,<br /> +Is promise of her secret face<br /> + In film that onward waves.</p> +<p class="poetry">For darkness is the light astrain,<br /> + Astrain for light the dark.<br /> +A grey moth down a larches’ lane<br /> + Unwinds a ghostly spark.</p> +<p class="poetry">Her lamp he sees, and young desire<br /> + Is fed while cloaked she flies.<br /> +She quivers shot of violet fire<br /> + To ash at look of eyes.</p> +<h2><a name="page34"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 34</span>THE +EMPTY PURSE<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">A SERMON TO OUR LATER PRODIGAL +SON</span></h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Thou</span>, run to the dry +on this wayside bank,<br /> +Too plainly of all the propellers bereft!<br /> + Quenched youth, and is that thy purse?<br /> +Even such limp slough as the snake has left<br /> +Slack to the gale upon spikes of whin,<br /> +For cast-off coat of a life gone blank,<br /> +In its frame of a grin at the seeker, is thine;<br /> + And thine to crave and to curse<br /> + The sweet thing once within.<br /> +Accuse him: some devil committed the theft,<br /> + Which leaves of the portly a skin,<br /> + No more; of the weighty a whine.</p> +<p class="poetry">Pursue him: and first, to be sure of his +track,<br /> +Over devious ways that have led to this,<br /> + In the stream’s consecutive line,<br /> + Let memory lead thee back<br /> +To where waves Morning her fleur-de-lys,<br /> +Unflushed at the front of the roseate door<br /> +Unopened yet: never shadow there<br /> + Of a Tartarus lighted by Dis<br /> + For souls whose cry is, alack!<br /> +An ivory cradle rocks, apeep<br /> +Through his eyelashes’ laugh, a breathing pearl.<br /> +<a name="page35"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 35</span>There the +young chief of the animals wore<br /> +A likeness to heavenly hosts, unaware<br /> +Of his love of himself; with the hours at leap.<br /> +In a dingle away from a rutted highroad,<br /> +Around him the earliest throstle and merle,<br /> +Our human smile between milk and sleep,<br /> + Effervescent of Nature he crowed.<br /> +Fair was that season; furl over furl<br /> +The banners of blossom; a dancing floor<br /> +This earth; very angels the clouds; and fair<br /> +Thou on the tablets of forehead and breast:<br /> +Careless, a centre of vigilant care.<br /> +Thy mother kisses an infant curl.<br /> +The room of the toys was a boundless nest,<br /> + A kingdom the field of the games,<br /> + Till entered the craving for more,<br /> + And the worshipped small body had aims.<br /> +A good little idol, as records attest,<br /> +When they tell of him lightly appeased in a scream<br /> +By sweets and caresses: he gave but sign<br /> +That the heir of a purse-plumped dominant race,<br /> +Accustomed to plenty, not dumb would pine.<br /> +Almost magician, his earliest dream<br /> + Was lord of the unpossessed<br /> + For a look; himself and his chase,<br /> + As on puffs of a wind at whirl,<br /> + Made one in the wink of a gleam.<br /> + She kisses a locket curl,<br /> +She conjures to vision a cherub face,<br /> + When her butterfly counted his day<br /> + All meadow and flowers, mishap<br /> + Derided, and taken for play<br /> + The fling of an urchin’s cap.<br /> +<a name="page36"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 36</span>When her +butterfly showed him an eaglet born,<br /> + For preying too heedlessly bred,<br /> + What a heart clapped in thee then!<br /> + With what fuller colours of morn!<br /> +And high to the uttermost heavens it flew,<br /> + Swift as on poet’s pen.<br /> + It flew to be wedded, to wed<br /> + The mystery scented around:<br /> + Issue of flower and dew,<br /> + Issue of light and sound:<br /> + Thinner than either; a thread<br /> + Spun of the dream they threw<br /> + To kindle, allure, evade.<br /> +It ran the sea-wave, the garden’s dance,<br /> +To the forest’s dark heart down a dappled glade;<br /> + Led on by a perishing glance,<br /> + By a twinkle’s eternal waylaid.<br /> +Woman, the name was, when she took form;<br /> +Sheaf of the wonders of life. She fled,<br /> +Close imaged; she neared, far seen. How she made<br /> +Palpitate earth of the living and dead!<br /> +Did she not show thee the world designed<br /> +Solely for loveliness? Nested warm,<br /> +The day was the morrow in flight. And for thee,<br /> +She muted the discords, tuned, refined;<br /> +Drowned sharp edges beneath her cloak.<br /> +Eye of the waters, and throb of the tree,<br /> +Sliding on radiance, winging from shade,<br /> +With her witch-whisper o’er ruins, in reeds,<br /> +She sang low the song of her promise delayed;<br /> +Beckoned and died, as a finger of smoke<br /> +Astream over woodland. And was not she<br /> +History’s heroines white on storm?<br /> +Remember her summons to valorous deeds.<br /> +Shone she a lure of the honey-bag swarm,<br /> +<a name="page37"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 37</span>Most was +her beam on the knightly: she led<br /> +For the honours of manhood more than the prize;<br /> + Waved her magnetical yoke<br /> + Whither the warrior bled,<br /> + Ere to the bower of sighs.<br /> +And shy of her secrets she was; under deeps<br /> +Plunged at the breath of a thirst that woke<br /> +The dream in the cave where the Dreaded sleeps.</p> +<p class="poetry">Away over heaven the young heart flew,<br /> +And caught many lustres, till some one said<br /> +(Or was it the thought into hearing grew?),<br /> + <i>Not thou as commoner men</i>!<br /> + Thy stature puffed and it swayed,<br /> + It stiffened to royal-erect;<br /> + A brassy trumpet brayed;<br /> + A whirling seized thy head;<br /> + The vision of beauty was flecked.<br /> + Note well the how and the when,<br /> + The thing that prompted and sped.<br /> + Thereanon the keen passions clapped wing,<br /> + Fixed eye, and the world was prey.<br /> +No simple world of thy greenblade Spring,<br /> + Nor world of thy flowerful prime<br /> + On the topmost Orient peak<br /> + Above a yet vaporous day.<br /> + Flesh was it, breast to beak:<br /> +A four-walled windowless world without ray,<br /> +Only darkening jets on a river of slime,<br /> +Where harsh over music as woodland jay,<br /> + A voice chants, Woe to the weak!<br /> + And along an insatiate feast,<br /> + Women and men are one<br /> + In the cup transforming to beast.<br /> +<a name="page38"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 38</span>Magian +worship they paid to their sun,<br /> +Lord of the Purse! Behold him climb.<br /> + Stalked ever such figure of fun<br /> +For monarch in great-grin pantomime?<br /> +See now the heart dwindle, the frame distend;<br /> +The soul to its anchorite cavern retreat,<br /> +From a life that reeks of the rotted end;<br /> +While he—is he pictureable? replete,<br /> +Gourd-like swells of the rank of the soil,<br /> + Hollow, more hollow at core.<br /> + And for him did the hundreds toil<br /> + Despised; in the cold and heat,<br /> + This image ridiculous bore<br /> + On their shoulders for morsels of meat!</p> +<p class="poetry">Gross, with the fumes of incense full,<br /> +With parasites tickled, with slaves begirt,<br /> +He strutted, a cock, he bellowed, a bull,<br /> + He rolled him, a dog, in dirt.<br /> +And dog, bull, cook, was he, fanged, horned, plumed;<br /> +Original man, as philosophers vouch;<br /> +Carnivorous, cannibal; length-long exhumed,<br /> +Frightfully living and armed to devour;<br /> +The primitive weapons of prey in his pouch;<br /> + The bait, the line and the hook:<br /> + To feed on his fellows intent.<br /> + God of the Danaé shower,<br /> + He had but to follow his bent.<br /> +He battened on fowl not safely hutched,<br /> + On sheep astray from the crook;<br /> + A lure for the foolish in fold:<br /> +To carrion turning what flesh he touched.<br /> + And O the grace of his air,<br /> + As he at the goblet sips,<br /> + <a name="page39"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +39</span>A centre of girdles loosed,<br /> + With their grisly label, Sold!<br /> +Credulous hears the fidelity swear,<br /> +Which has roving eyes over yielded lips:<br /> +To-morrow will fancy himself the seduced,<br /> + The stuck in a treacherous slough,<br /> +Because of his faith in a purchased pair,<br /> + False to a vinous vow.</p> +<p class="poetry">In his glory of banquet strip him bare,<br /> + And what is the creature we view?<br /> +Our pursy Apollo Apollyon’s tool;<br /> + A small one, still of the crew<br /> + By serpent Apollyon blest:<br /> +His plea in apology, blindfold Fool.<br /> +A fool surcharged, propelled, unwarned;<br /> + Not viler, you hear him protest:<br /> +Of a popular countenance not incorrect.<br /> +But deeds are the picture in essence, deeds<br /> + Paint him the hooved and homed,<br /> + Despite the poor pother he pleads,<br /> + And his look of a nation’s elect.<br /> + We have him, our quarry confessed!<br /> + And scan him: the features inspect<br /> + Of that bestial multiform: cry,<br /> +Corroborate I, O Samian Sage!<br /> + The book of thy wisdom, proved<br /> + On me, its last hieroglyph page,<br /> + Alive in the horned and hooved?<br /> + Thou! will he make reply.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Thus has the plenary purse<br +/> + Done often: to do will engage<br /> +Anew upon all of thy like, or worse.<br /> + <a name="page40"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +40</span>And now is thy deepest regret<br /> + To be man, clean rescued from beast:<br /> + From the grip of the Sorcerer, Gold,<br /> + Celestially released.</p> +<p class="poetry"> But now from his cavernous +hold,<br /> + Free may thy soul be set,<br /> +As a child of the Death and the Life, to learn,<br /> + Refreshed by some bodily sweat,<br /> + The meaning of either in turn,<br /> + What issue may come of the two:—<br /> +A morn beyond mornings, beyond all reach<br /> +Of emotional arms at the stretch to enfold:<br /> +A firmament passing our visible blue.<br /> +To those having nought to reflect it, ’tis nought;<br /> +To those who are misty, ’tis mist on the beach<br /> +From the billow withdrawing; to those who see<br /> + Earth, our mother, in thought,<br /> + Her spirit it is, our key.</p> +<p class="poetry">Ay, the Life and the Death are her words to us +here,<br /> +Of one significance, pricking the blind.<br /> +This is thy gain now the surface is clear:<br /> +To read with a soul in the mirror of mind<br /> +Is man’s chief lesson.—Thou smilest! I +preach!<br /> + Acid smiling, my friend, reveals<br /> +Abysses within; frigid preaching a street<br /> + Paved unconcernedly smooth<br /> + For the lecturer straight on his heels,<br /> + Up and down a policeman’s beat;<br /> + Bearing tonics not labelled to soothe.<br /> +Thou hast a disgust of the sermon in rhyme.<br /> +It is not attractive in being too chaste.<br /> +The popular tale of adventure and crime<br /> +<a name="page41"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 41</span>Would +equally sicken an overdone taste.<br /> +So, then, onward. Philosophy, thoughtless to soothe,<br /> +Lifts, if thou wilt, or there leaves thee supine.</p> +<p class="poetry">Thy condition, good sooth, has no seeming of +sweet;<br /> +It walks our first crags, it is flint for the tooth,<br /> + For the thirsts of our nature brine.<br /> +But manful has met it, manful will meet.<br /> +And think of thy privilege: supple with youth,<br /> + To have sight of the headlong swine,<br /> + Once fouling thee, jumping the dips!<br /> + As the coin of thy purse poured out:<br /> + An animal’s holiday past:<br /> +And free of them thou, to begin a new bout;<br /> +To start a fresh hunt on a resolute blast:<br /> +No more an imp-ridden to bournes of eclipse:<br /> +Having knowledge to spur thee, a gift to compare;<br /> +Rubbing shoulder to shoulder, as only the book<br /> +Of the world can be read, by necessity urged.<br /> +For witness, what blinkers are they who look<br /> +From the state of the prince or the millionnaire!<br /> + They see but the fish they attract,<br /> + The hungers on them converged;<br /> +And never the thought in the shell of the act,<br /> + Nor ever life’s fangless mirth.<br /> +But first, that the poisonous of thee be purged,<br /> + Go into thyself, strike Earth.<br /> +She is there, she is felt in a blow struck hard.<br /> +Thou findest a pugilist countering quick,<br /> +Cunning at drives where thy shutters are barred;<br /> +Not, after the studied professional trick,<br /> +Blue-sealing; she brightens the sight. Strike Earth,<br /> +Antaeus, young giant, whom fortune trips!<br /> + And thou com’st on a saving fact,<br /> + To nourish thy planted worth.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page42"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +42</span>Be it clay, flint, mud, or the rubble of chips,<br /> +Thy roots have grasp in the stern-exact:<br /> +The redemption of sinners deluded! the last<br /> + Dry handful, that bruises and saves.<br /> +To the common big heart are we bound right fast,<br /> + When our Mother admonishing nips<br /> + At the nakedness bare of a clout,<br /> + And we crave what the commonest craves.</p> +<p class="poetry"> This wealth was a +fortress-wall,<br /> +Under which grew our grim little beast-god stout;<br /> +Self-worshipped, the foe, in division from all;<br /> +With crowds of illogical Christians, no doubt;<br /> + Till the rescuing earthquake cracked.<br /> + Thus are we man made firm;<br /> + Made warm by the numbers compact.<br /> +We follow no longer a trumpet-snout,<br /> + At a trot where the hog is tracked,<br /> + Nor wriggle the way of the worm.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Thou wilt spare us the +cynical pout<br /> +At humanity: sign of a nature bechurled.<br /> + No stenchy anathemas cast<br /> + Upon Providence, women, the world.<br /> +Distinguish thy tempers and trim thy wits.<br /> +The purchased are things of the mart, not classed<br /> +Among resonant types that have freely grown.</p> +<p class="poetry">Thy knowledge of women might be surpassed:<br +/> +As any sad dog’s of sweet flesh when he quits<br /> + The wayside wandering bone!<br /> +No revilings of comrades as ingrates: thee<br /> +The tempter, misleader, and criminal (screened<br /> + By laws yet barbarous) own.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page43"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +43</span>If some one performed Fiend’s deputy,<br /> + He was for awhile the Fiend.<br /> + Still, nursing a passion to speak,<br /> +As the punch-bowl does, in the moral vein,<br /> + When the ladle has finished its leak,<br /> +And the vessel is loquent of nature’s inane,<br /> + Hie where the demagogues roar<br /> +Like a Phalaris bull, with the victim’s force:<br /> + Hurrah to their jolly attack<br /> + On a City that smokes of the Plain;<br /> + A city of sin’s death-dyes,<br /> + Holding revel of worms in a corse;<br /> + A city of malady sore,<br /> + Over-ripe for the big doom’s crack:<br /> + A city of hymnical snore;<br /> + Connubial truths and lies<br /> + Demanding an instant divorce,<br /> + Clean as the bright from the black.<br /> +It were well for thy system to sermonize.<br /> +There are giants to slay, and they call for their Jack.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Then up stand thou in the +midst:<br /> + Thy good grain out of thee thresh,<br /> + Hand upon heart: relate<br /> + What things thou legally didst<br /> + For the Archseducer of flesh.<br /> +Omitting the murmurs of women and fate,<br /> + Confess thee an instrument armed<br /> + To be snare of our wanton, our weak,<br /> + Of all by the sensual charmed.<br /> +For once shall repentance be done by the tongue:<br /> + Speak, though execrate, speak<br /> + A word on grandmotherly Laws<br /> + Giving rivers of gold to our young,<br /> +<a name="page44"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 44</span>In the +days of their hungers impure;<br /> +To furnish them beak and claws,<br /> +And make them a banquet’s lure.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Thou the example, saved<br /> +Miraculously by this poor skin!<br /> + Thereat let the Purse be waved:<br /> +The snake-slough sick of the snaky sin:<br /> +A devil, if devil as devil behaved<br /> +Ever, thou knowest, look thou but in,<br /> +Where he shivers, a culprit fettered and shaved;<br /> +O a bird stripped of feather, a fish clipped of fin!</p> +<p class="poetry">And commend for a washing the torrents of +wrath,<br /> + Which hurl at the foe of the dearest men prize<br /> +Rough-rolling boulders and froth.<br /> +Gigantical enginery they can command,<br /> +For the crushing of enemies not of great size:<br /> + But hold to thy desperate stand.<br /> +Men’s right of bequeathing their all to their own<br /> +(With little regard for the creatures they squeezed);<br /> +Their mill and mill-water and nether mill-stone<br /> +Tied fast to their infant; lo, this is the last<br /> +Of their hungers, by prudent devices appeased.<br /> +The law they decree is their ultimate slave;<br /> +Wherein we perceive old Voracity glassed.<br /> +It works from their dust, and it reeks of their grave.<br /> +Point them to greener, though Journals be guns;<br /> +To brotherly fields under fatherly skies;<br /> +Where the savage still primitive learns of a debt<br /> +He has owed since he drummed on his belly for war;<br /> +And how for his giving, the more will he get;<br /> +For trusting his fellows, leave friends round his sons:<br /> +<a name="page45"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 45</span>Till they +see, with the gape of a startled surprise,<br /> +Their adored tyrant-monster a brute to abhor,<br /> +The sun of their system a father of flies!</p> +<p class="poetry">So, for such good hope, take their scourge +unashamed;<br /> +’Tis the portion of them who civilize,<br /> + Who speak the word novel and true:<br /> +How the brutish antique of our springs may be tamed,<br /> +Without loss of the strength that should push us to flower;<br /> +How the God of old time will act Satan of new,<br /> +If we keep him not straight at the higher God aimed;<br /> +For whose habitation within us we scour<br /> +This house of our life; where our bitterest pains<br /> +Are those to eject the Infernal, who heaps<br /> +Mire on the soul. Take stripes or chains;<br /> + Grip at thy standard reviled.<br /> +And what if our body be dashed from the steeps?<br /> + Our spoken in protest remains.<br /> + A young generation reaps.</p> +<p class="poetry">The young generation! ah, there is the child<br +/> +Of our souls down the Ages! to bleed for it, proof<br /> +That souls we have, with our senses filed,<br /> + Our shuttles at thread of the woof.<br /> + May it be braver than ours,<br /> +To encounter the rattle of hostile bolts,<br /> +To look on the rising of Stranger Powers.<br /> +May it know how the mind in expansion revolts<br /> +From a nursery Past with dead letters aloof,<br /> +And the piping to stupor of Precedents shun,<br /> +In a field where the forefather print of the hoof<br /> +Is not yet overgrassed by the watering hours,<br /> +And should prompt us to Change, as to promise of sun,<br /> + Till brain-rule splendidly towers.<br /> +<a name="page46"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 46</span>For that +large light we have laboured and tramped<br /> +Thorough forests and bogland, still to perceive<br /> + Our animate morning stamped<br /> + With the lines of a sombre eve.</p> +<p class="poetry">A timorous thing ran the innocent hind,<br /> +When the wolf was the hypocrite fang under hood,<br /> + The snake a lithe lurker up sleeve,<br /> + And the lion effulgently ramped.<br /> +Then our forefather hoof did its work in the wood,<br /> + By right of the better in kind.<br /> +But now will it breed yon bestial brood<br /> +Three-fold thrice over, if bent to bind,<br /> + As the healthy in chains with the sick,<br /> +Unto despot usage our issuing mind.<br /> +It signifies battle or death’s dull knell.<br /> +Precedents icily written on high<br /> +Challenge the Tentatives hot to rebel.<br /> +Our Mother, who speeds her bloomful quick<br /> +For the march, reads which the impediment well.<br /> +She smiles when of sapience is their boast.<br /> +O loose of the tug between blood run dry<br /> +And blood running flame may our offspring run!<br /> +May brain democratic be king of the host!<br /> +Less then shall the volumes of History tell<br /> +Of the stop in progression, the slip in relapse,<br /> +That counts us a sand-slack inch hard won<br /> +Beneath an oppressive incumbent perhaps.</p> +<p class="poetry">Let the senile lords in a parchment sky,<br /> +And the generous turbulents drunken of morn,<br /> + Their battle of instincts put by,<br /> + A moment examine this field:<br /> +On a Roman street cast thoughtful eye,<br /> +Along to the mounts from the bog-forest weald.<br /> +<a name="page47"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 47</span>It merits +a glance at our history’s maps,<br /> +To see across Britain’s old shaggy unshorn,<br /> +Through the Parties in strife internecine, foot<br /> +The ruler’s close-reckoned direct to the mark.<br /> +From the head ran the vanquisher’s orderly route,<br /> +In the stride of his forts through the tangle and dark.<br /> +From the head runs the paved firm way for advance,<br /> +And we shoulder, we wrangle! The light on us shed<br /> +Shows dense beetle blackness in swarm, lurid Chance,<br /> +The Goddess of gamblers, above. From the head,<br /> +Then when it worked for the birth of a star<br /> +Fraternal with heaven’s in beauty and ray,<br /> +Sprang the Acropolis. Ask what crown<br /> +Comes of our tides of the blood at war,<br /> +For men to bequeath generations down!<br /> +And ask what thou wast when the Purse was brimmed:<br /> +What high-bounding ball for the Gods at play:<br /> +A Conservative youth! who the cream-bowl skimmed,<br /> +Desiring affairs to be left as they are.</p> +<p class="poetry">So, thou takest Youth’s natural place in +the fray,<br /> + As a Tentative, combating Peace,<br /> + Our lullaby word for decay.—<br /> + There will come an immediate decree<br /> +In thy mind for the opposite party’s decease,<br /> + If he bends not an instant knee.<br /> +Expunge it: extinguishing counts poor gain.<br /> + And accept a mild word of police:—<br /> + Be mannerly, measured; refrain<br /> +From the puffings of him of the bagpipe cheeks.<br /> +Our political, even as the merchant main,<br /> + A temperate gale requires<br /> + For the ship that haven seeks;<br /> +Neither God of the winds nor his bellowsy squires.</p> +<p class="poetry"> <a name="page48"></a><span +class="pagenum">p. 48</span>Then observe the antagonist, con<br +/> +His reasons for rocking the lullaby word.<br /> +You stand on a different stage of the stairs.<br /> +He fought certain battles, yon senile lord.<br /> +In the strength of thee, feel his bequest to his heirs.<br /> +We are now on his inches of ground hard won,<br /> +For a perch to a flight o’er his resting fence.</p> +<p class="poetry">Does it knock too hard at thy head if I say,<br +/> + That Time is both father and son?<br /> +Tough lesson, when senses are floods over sense!—<br /> + Discern the paternal of Now<br /> + As the Then of thy present tense.<br /> + You may pull as you will either way,<br /> + You can never be other than one.<br /> + So, be filial. Giants to slay<br /> + Demand knowing eyes in their Jack.</p> +<p class="poetry">There are those whom we push from the path with +respect.<br /> +Bow to that elder, though seeing him bow<br /> +To the backward as well, for a thunderous back<br /> +Upon thee. In his day he was not all wrong.<br /> +Unto some foundered zenith he strove, and was wrecked.<br /> +He scrambled to shore with a worship of shore.<br /> +The Future he sees as the slippery murk;<br /> +The Past as his doctrinal library lore.<br /> +He stands now the rock to the wave’s wild wash.<br /> +Yet thy lumpish antagonist once did work<br /> + Heroical, one of our strong.<br /> +His gold to retain and his dross reject,<br /> +Engage him, but humour, not aiming to quash.<br /> + Detest the dead squat of the Turk,<br /> + And suffice it to move him along.<br /> + <a name="page49"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +49</span>Drink of faith in the brains a full draught<br /> + Before the oration: beware<br /> + Lest rhetoric moonily waft<br /> + Whither horrid activities snare.<br /> + Rhetoric, juice for the mob<br /> + Despising more luminous grape,<br /> + Oft at its fount has it laughed<br /> + In the cataracts rolling for rape<br /> + Of a Reason left single to sob!</p> +<p class="poetry">’Tis known how the permanent never is +writ<br /> +In blood of the passions: mercurial they,<br /> +Shifty their issue: stir not that pit<br /> + To the game our brutes best play.</p> +<p class="poetry">But with rhetoric loose, can we check +man’s brute?<br /> +Assemblies of men on their legs invoke<br /> +Excitement for wholesome diversion: there shoot<br /> +Electrical sparks between their dry thatch<br /> +And thy waved torch, more to kindle than light.<br /> +’Tis instant between you: the trick of a catch<br /> + (To match a Batrachian croak)<br /> +Will thump them a frenzy or fun in their veins.<br /> +Then may it be rather the well-worn joke<br /> +Thou repeatest, to stop conflagration, and write<br /> +Penance for rhetoric. Strange will it seem,<br /> +When thou readest that form of thy homage to brains!</p> +<p class="poetry"> For the secret why demagogues +fail,<br /> +Though they carry hot mobs to the red extreme,<br /> + And knock out or knock in the nail<br /> + (We will rank them as flatly sincere,<br /> + Devoutly detesting a wrong,<br /> +Engines o’ercharged with our human steam),<br /> +<a name="page50"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 50</span>Question +thee, seething amid the throng.<br /> +And ask, whether Wisdom is born of blood-heat;<br /> +Or of other than Wisdom comes victory here;—<br /> +Aught more than the banquet and roundelay,<br /> +That is closed with a terrible terminal wail,<br /> + A retributive black ding-dong?<br /> +And ask of thyself: This furious Yea<br /> + Of a speech I thump to repeat,<br /> + In the cause I would have prevail,<br /> + For seed of a nourishing wheat,<br /> + <i>Is it accepted of Song</i>?<br /> + Does it sound to the mind through the ear,<br /> +Right sober, pure sane? has it disciplined feet?<br /> + Thou wilt find it a test severe;<br /> + Unerring whatever the theme.<br /> +Rings it for Reason a melody clear,<br /> + We have bidden old Chaos retreat;<br /> + We have called on Creation to hear;<br /> +All forces that make us are one full stream.<br /> +Simple islander! thus may the spirit in verse,<br /> +Showing its practical value and weight,<br /> +Pipe to thee clear from the Empty Purse,<br /> +Lead thee aloft to that high estate.—<br /> + The test is conclusive, I deem:<br /> + It embraces or mortally bites.<br /> + We have then the key-note for debate:<br /> + A Senate that sits on the heights<br /> + Over discords, to shape and amend.</p> +<p class="poetry"> And no singer is needed to +serve<br /> + The musical God, my friend.<br /> +Needs only his law on a sensible nerve:<br /> + A law that to Measure invites,<br /> + Forbidding the passions contend.<br /> + <a name="page51"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +51</span>Is it accepted of Song?<br /> + And if then the blunt answer be Nay,<br /> +Dislink thee sharp from the ramping horde,<br /> +Slaves of the Goddess of hoar-old sway,<br /> + The Queen of delirious rites,<br /> +Queen of those issueless mobs, that rend<br /> +For frenzy the strings of a fruitful accord,<br /> +Pursuing insensate, seething in throng,<br /> +Their wild idea to its ashen end.<br /> +Off to their Phrygia, shriek and gong,<br /> +Shorn from their fellows, behold them wend!</p> +<p class="poetry"> But thou, should the answer +ring Ay,<br /> + Hast warrant of seed for thy word:<br /> + The musical God is nigh<br /> +To inspirit and temper, tune it, and steer<br /> + Through the shoals: is it worthy of Song,<br /> + There are souls all woman to hear,<br /> + Woman to bear and renew.<br /> +For he is the Master of Measure, and weighs,<br /> + Broad as the arms of his blue,<br /> + Fine as the web of his rays,<br /> +Justice, whose voice is a melody clear,<br /> +The one sure life for the numbered long,<br /> + From him are the brutal and vain,<br /> + The vile, the excessive, out-thrust:<br /> +He points to the God on the upmost throne:<br /> + He is the saver of grain,<br /> + The sifter of spirit from dust.<br /> +He, Harmony, tells how to Measure pertain<br /> + The virilities: Measure alone<br /> + Has votaries rich in the male:<br /> + Fathers embracing no cloud,<br /> + Sowing no harvestless main:<br /> +Alike by the flesh and the spirit endowed<br /> +<a name="page52"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 52</span>To create, +to perpetuate; woo, win, wed;<br /> +Send progeny streaming, have earth for their own,<br /> +Over-run the insensates, disperse with a puff<br /> + Simulacra, though solid they sail,<br /> + And seem such imperial stuff:<br /> + Yes, the living divide off the dead.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Then thou with thy furies +outgrown,<br /> +Not as Cybele’s beast will thy head lash tail<br /> +So præter-determinedly thermonous,<br /> + Nor thy cause be an Attis far fled.<br /> + Thou under stress of the strife<br /> + Shalt hear for sustainment supreme<br /> + The cry of the conscience of Life:<br /> + <i>Keep the young generations in hail</i>,<br /> + <i>And bequeath them no tumbled house</i>!</p> +<p class="poetry"> There hast thou the sacred +theme,<br /> + Therein the inveterate spur,<br /> + Of the Innermost. See her one blink<br /> + In vision past eyeballs. Not thee<br /> + She cares for, but us. Follow her.<br /> + Follow her, and thou wilt not sink.<br /> + With thy soul the Life espouse:<br /> +This Life of the visible, audible, ring<br /> +With thy love tight about; and no death will be;<br /> + The name be an empty thing,<br /> + And woe a forgotten old trick:<br /> +And battle will come as a challenge to drink;<br /> +As a warrior’s wound each transient sting.<br /> +She leads to the Uppermost link by link;<br /> +Exacts but vision, desires not vows.<br /> +Above us the singular number to see;<br /> +The plural warm round us; ourself in the thick,<br /> +A dot or a stop: that is our task;<br /> +<a name="page53"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 53</span>Her lesson +in figured arithmetic,<br /> +For the letters of Life behind its mask;<br /> +Her flower-like look under fearful brows.</p> +<p class="poetry">As for thy special case, O my friend, one must +think<br /> +Massilia’s victim, who held the carouse<br /> + For the length of a carnival year,<br /> +Knew worse: but the wretch had his opening choice.<br /> +For thee, by our law, no alternatives were:<br /> +Thy fall was assured ere thou camest to a voice.<br /> + He cancelled the ravaging Plague,<br /> + With the roll of his fat off the cliff.<br /> +Do thou with thy lean as the weapon of ink,<br /> +Though they call thee an angler who fishes the vague<br /> + And catches the not too pink,<br /> +Attack one as murderous, knowing thy cause<br /> +Is the cause of community. Iterate,<br /> +Iterate, iterate, harp on the trite:<br /> +Our preacher to win is the supple in stiff:<br /> +Yet always in measure, with bearing polite:<br /> +The manner of one that would expiate<br /> + His share in grandmotherly Laws,<br /> + Which do the dark thing to destroy,<br /> +Under aspect of water so guilelessly white<br /> +For the general use, by the devils befouled.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Enough, poor prodigal boy!<br +/> +Thou hast listened with patience; another had howled.<br /> +Repentance is proved, forgiveness is earned.<br /> +And ’tis bony: denied thee thy succulent half<br /> +Of the parable’s blessing, to swineherd returned:<br /> +A Sermon thy slice of the Scriptural calf!<br /> + By my faith, there is feasting to come,<br /> + Not the less, when our Earth we have seen<br /> +Beneath and on surface, her deeds and designs:<br /> +<a name="page54"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 54</span>Who gives +us the man-loving Nazarene,<br /> +The martyrs, the poets, the corn and the vines.<br /> +By my faith in the head, she has wonders in loom;<br /> +Revelations, delights. I can hear a faint crow<br /> +Of the cock of fresh mornings, far, far, yet distinct;<br /> + As down the new shafting of mines,<br /> + A cry of the metally gnome.<br /> + When our Earth we have seen, and have linked<br /> +With the home of the Spirit to whom we unfold,<br /> +Imprisoned humanity open will throw<br /> +Its fortress gates, and the rivers of gold<br /> + For the congregate friendliness flow.<br /> +Then the meaning of Earth in her children behold:<br /> +Glad eyes, frank hands, and a fellowship real:<br /> +And laughter on lips, as the birds’ outburst<br /> +At the flooding of light. No robbery then<br /> +The feast, nor a robber’s abode the home,<br /> +For a furnished model of our first den!<br /> + Nor Life as a stationed wheel;<br /> +Nor History written in blood or in foam,<br /> +For vendetta of Parties in cursing accursed.<br /> +The God in the conscience of multitudes feel,<br /> + And we feel deep to Earth at her heart,<br /> + We have her communion with men,<br /> + New ground, new skies for appeal.<br /> +Yield into harness thy best and thy worst;<br /> +Away on the trot of thy servitude start,<br /> +Through the rigours and joys and sustainments of air.<br /> +If courage should falter, ’tis wholesome to kneel.<br /> +Remember that well, for the secret with some,<br /> +Who pray for no gift, but have cleansing in prayer,<br /> +And free from impurities tower-like stand.<br /> +I promise not more, save that feasting will come<br /> +To a mind and a body no longer inversed:<br /> +The sense of large charity over the land,<br /> +<a name="page55"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +55</span>Earth’s wheaten of wisdom dispensed in the +rough,<br /> +And a bell ringing thanks for a sustenance meal<br /> + Through the active machine: lean fare,<br /> +But it carries a sparkle! And now enough,<br /> + And part we as comrades part,<br /> +To meet again never or some day or soon.</p> +<p class="poetry">Our season of drought is reminder +rude:—<br /> + No later than yesternoon,<br /> + I looked on the horse of a cart,<br /> + By the wayside water-trough.<br /> +How at every draught of his bride of thirst<br /> +His nostrils widened! The sight was good:<br /> + Food for us, food, such as first<br /> + Drew our thoughts to earth’s lowly for +food.</p> +<h2><a name="page56"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 56</span>TO THE +COMIC SPIRIT</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Sword</span> of Common +Sense!—<br /> +Our surest gift: the sacred chain<br /> +Of man to man: firm earth for trust<br /> +In structures vowed to permanence:—<br /> +Thou guardian issue of the harvest brain!<br /> +Implacable perforce of just;<br /> +With that good treasure in defence,<br /> +Which is our gold crushed out of joy and pain<br /> +Since first men planted foot and hand was king:<br /> +Bright, nimble of the marrow-nerve<br /> +To wield thy double edge, retort<br /> +Or hold the deadlier reserve,<br /> +And through thy victim’s weapon sting:<br /> +Thine is the service, thine the sport<br /> +This shifty heart of ours to hunt<br /> +Across its webs and round the many a ring<br /> +Where fox it is, or snake, or mingled seeds<br /> +Occasion heats to shape, or the poor smoke<br /> +Struck from a puff-ball, or the troughster’s +grunt;—<br /> +Once lion of our desert’s trodden weeds;<br /> +And but for thy straight finger at the yoke,<br /> +Again to be the lordly paw,<br /> +Naming his appetites his needs,<br /> +Behind a decorative cloak:<br /> +Thou, of the highest, the unwritten Law<br /> +We read upon that building’s architrave<br /> +In the mind’s firmament, by men upraised<br /> +With sweat of blood when they had quitted cave<br /> +For fellowship, and rearward looked amazed,<br /> +Where the prime motive gapes a lurid jaw,<br /> +<a name="page57"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 57</span>Thou, soul +of wakened heads, art armed to warn,<br /> +Restrain, lest we backslide on whence we sprang,<br /> +Scarce better than our dwarf beginning shoot,<br /> +Of every gathered pearl and blossom shorn;<br /> +Through thee, in novel wiles to win disguise,<br /> +Seen are the pits of the disruptor, seen<br /> +His rebel agitation at our root:<br /> +Thou hast him out of hawking eyes;<br /> +Nor ever morning of the clang<br /> +Young Echo sped on hill from horn<br /> +In forest blown when scent was keen<br /> +Off earthy dews besprinkling blades<br /> +Of covert grass more merrily rang<br /> +The yelp of chase down alleys green,<br /> +Forth of the headlong-pouring glades,<br /> +Over the dappled fallows wild away,<br /> +Than thy fine unaccented scorn<br /> +At sight of man’s old secret brute,<br /> +Devout for pasture on his prey,<br /> +Advancing, yawning to devour;<br /> +With step of deer, with voice of flute,<br /> +Haply with visage of the lily flower.</p> +<p class="poetry">Let the cock crow and ruddy morn<br /> +His handmaiden appear! Youth claims his hour.<br /> +The generously ludicrous<br /> +Espouses it. But see we sons of day,<br /> +Off whom Life leans for guidance in our fight,<br /> +Accept the throb for lord of us;<br /> +For lord, for the main central light<br /> +That gives direction, not the eclipse;<br /> +Or dost thou look where niggard Age,<br /> +Demanding reverence for wrinkles, whips<br /> +A tumbled top to grind a wolf’s worn tooth;—<br /> +Hoar despot on our final stage,<br /> +<a name="page58"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 58</span>In dotage +of a stunted Youth;—<br /> +Or it may be some venerable sage,<br /> +Not having thee awake in him, compact<br /> +Of wisdom else, the breast’s old tempter trips;<br /> +Or see we ceremonial state,<br /> +Robing the gilded beast, exact<br /> +Abjection, while the crackskull name of Fate<br /> +Is used to stamp and hallow printed fact;<br /> +A cruel corner lengthens up thy lips;<br /> +These are thy game wherever men engage:<br /> +These and, majestic in a borrowed shape,<br /> +The major and the minor potentate,<br /> +Creative of their various ape;—<br /> +The tiptoe mortals triumphing to write<br /> +Upon a perishable page<br /> +An inch above their fellows’ height;—<br /> +The criers of foregone wisdom, who impose<br /> +Its slough on live conditions, much for the greed<br /> +Of our first hungry figure wide agape;—<br /> +Call up thy hounds of laughter to their run.<br /> +These, that would have men still of men be foes,<br /> +Eternal fox to prowl and pike to feed;<br /> +Would keep our life the whirly pool<br /> +Of turbid stuff dishonouring History;<br /> +The herd the drover’s herd, the fool the fool,<br /> +Ourself our slavish self’s infernal sun:<br /> +These are the children of the heart untaught<br /> +By thy quick founts to beat abroad, by thee<br /> +Untamed to tone its passions under thought,<br /> +The rich humaneness reading in thy fun.<br /> +Of them a world of coltish heels for school<br /> +We have; a world with driving wrecks bestrewn.</p> +<p class="poetry">’Tis written of the Gods of human +mould,<br /> +Those Nectar Gods, of glorious stature hewn<br /> +<a name="page59"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 59</span>To quicken +hymns, that they did hear, incensed,<br /> +Satiric comments overbold,<br /> +From one whose part was by decree<br /> +The jester’s; but they boiled to feel him bite.<br /> +Better for them had they with Reason fenced<br /> +Or smiled corrected! They in the great Gods’ might<br +/> +Their prober crushed, as fingers flea.<br /> +Crumbled Olympus when the sovereign sire<br /> +His fatal kick to Momus gave, albeit<br /> +Men could behold the sacred Mount aspire,<br /> +The Satirist pass by on limping feet.<br /> +Those Gods who saw the ejected laugh alight<br /> +Below had then their last of airy glee;<br /> +They in the cup sought Laughter’s drownèd sprite,<br +/> +Fed to dire fatness off uncurbed conceit.<br /> +Eyes under saw them waddle on their Mount,<br /> +And drew them down; to flattest earth they rolled.<br /> +This know we veritable. O Sage of Mirth!<br /> +Can it be true, the story men recount<br /> +Of the fall’n plight of the great Gods on earth?<br /> +How they being deathless, though of human mould,<br /> +With human cravings, undecaying frames,<br /> +Must labour for subsistence; are a band<br /> +Whom a loose-cheeked, wide-lipped gay cripple leads<br /> +At haunts of holiday on summer sand:<br /> +And lightly he will hint to one that heeds<br /> +Names in pained designation of them, names<br /> +Ensphered on blue skies and on black, which twirl<br /> +Our hearing madly from our seeing dazed,<br /> +Add Bacchus unto both; and he entreats<br /> +(His baby dimples in maternal chaps<br /> +Running wild labyrinths of line and curl)<br /> +Compassion for his masterful Trombone,<br /> +Whose thunder is the brass of how he blazed<br /> +Of old: for him of the mountain-muscle feats,<br /> +<a name="page60"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 60</span>Who guts a +drum to fetch a snappish groan:<br /> +For his fierce bugler horning onset, whom<br /> +A truncheon-battered helmet caps . . .<br /> +The creature is of earnest mien<br /> +To plead a sorrow darker than the tomb.<br /> +His Harp and Triangle, in tone subdued,<br /> +He names; they are a rayless red and white;<br /> +The dawn-hued libertine, the gibbous prude.<br /> +And, if we recognize his Tambourine,<br /> +He asks; exhausted names her: she has become<br /> +A globe in cupolas; the blowziest queen<br /> +Of overflowing dome on dome;<br /> +Redundancy contending with the tight,<br /> +Leaping the dam! He fondly calls, his girl,<br /> +The buxom tripper with the goblet-smile,<br /> +Refreshful. O but now his brows are dun,<br /> +Bunched are his lips, as when distilling guile,<br /> +To drop his venomous: the Dame of dames,<br /> +Flower of the world, that honey one,<br /> +She of the earthly rose in the sea-pearl,<br /> +To whom the world ran ocean for her kiss;<br /> +He names her, as a worshipper he names,<br /> +And indicates with a contemptuous thumb.<br /> +The lady meanwhile lures the mob, alike<br /> +Ogles the bursters of the horn and drum.<br /> +Curtain her close! her open arms<br /> +Have suckers for beholders: she to this?<br /> +For that she could not, save in fury, hear<br /> +A sharp corrective utterance flick<br /> +Her idle manners, for the laugh to strike<br /> +Beauty so breeding beauty, without peer<br /> +Above the snows, among the flowers? She reaps<br /> +This mouldy garner of the fatal kick?<br /> +Gross with the sacrifice of Circe-swarms,<br /> +Astarte of vile sweets that slay, malign,<br /> +<a name="page61"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 61</span>From Greek +resplendent to Phoenician foul,<br /> +The trader in attractions sinks, all brine<br /> +To thoughts of taste; is ’t love?—bark, dog! hoot, +owl!<br /> +And she is blushless: ancient worship weeps.<br /> +Suicide Graces dangle down the charms<br /> +Sprawling like gourds on outer garden-heaps.<br /> +She stands in her unholy oily leer<br /> +A statue losing feature, weather-sick<br /> +Mid draggled creepers of twined ivy sere.<br /> +The curtain cried for magnifies to see!—<br /> +We cannot quench our one corrupting glance:<br /> +The vision of the rumour will not flee.<br /> +Doth the Boy own such Mother?—shoot his dart<br /> +To bring her, countless as the crested deeps,<br /> +Her subjects of the uncorrected heart?<br /> +False is that vision, shrieks the devotee;<br /> +Incredible, we echo; and anew<br /> +Like a far growling lightning-cloud it leaps.<br /> +Low humourist this leader seems; perchance<br /> +Pitched from his University career,<br /> +Adept at classic fooling. Yet of mould<br /> +Human those Gods were: deathless too:<br /> +On high they not as meditatives paced:<br /> +Prodigiously they did the deeds of flesh:<br /> +Descending, they would touch the lowest here:<br /> +And she, that lighted form of blue and gold,<br /> +Whom the seas gave, all earth, all earth embraced;<br /> +Exulting in the great hauls of her mesh;<br /> +Desired and hated, desperately dear;<br /> +Most human of them was. No more pursue!<br /> +Enough that the black story can be told.<br /> +It preaches to the eminently placed:<br /> +For whom disastrous wreckage is nigh due,<br /> +Paints omen. Truly they our throbber had;<br /> +The passions plumping, passions playing leech,<br /> +<a name="page62"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 62</span>Cunning to +trick us for the day’s good cheer.<br /> +Our uncorrected human heart will swell<br /> +To notions monstrous, doings mad<br /> +As billows on a foam-lashed beach;<br /> +Borne on the tides of alternating heats,<br /> +Will drug the brain, will doom the soul as well;<br /> +Call the closed mouth of that harsh final Power<br /> +To speak in judgement: Nemesis, the fell:<br /> +Of those bright Gods assembled, offspring sour;<br /> +The last surviving on the upper seats;<br /> +As with men Reason when their hearts rebel.</p> +<p class="poetry">Ah, what a fruitless breeder is this heart,<br +/> +Full of the mingled seeds, each eating each.<br /> +Not wiser of our mark than at the start,<br /> +It surges like the wrath-faced father Sea<br /> +To countering winds; a force blind-eyed,<br /> +On endless rounds of aimless reach;<br /> +Emotion for the source of pride,<br /> +The grounds of faith in fixity<br /> +Above our flesh; its cravings urging speech,<br /> +Inspiring prayer; by turns a lump<br /> +Swung on a time-piece, and by turns<br /> +A quivering energy to jump<br /> +For seats angelical: it shrinks, it yearns,<br /> +Loves, loathes; is flame or cinders; lastly cloud<br /> +Capping a sullen crater: and mankind<br /> +We see cloud-capped, an army of the dark,<br /> +Because of thy straight leadership declined;<br /> +At heels of this or that delusive spark:<br /> +Now when the multitudinous races press<br /> +Elbow to elbow hourly more,<br /> +A thickened host; when now we hear aloud<br /> +Life for the very life implore<br /> +A signal of a visioned mark;<br /> +<a name="page63"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 63</span>Light of +the mind, the mind’s discourse,<br /> +The rational in graciousness,<br /> +Thee by acknowledgement enthroned,<br /> +To tame and lead that blind-eyed force<br /> +In harmony of harness with the crowd,<br /> +For payment of their dues; as yet disowned,<br /> +Save where some dutiful lone creature, vowed<br /> +To holy work, deems it the heart’s intent;<br /> +Or where a silken circle views it cowled,<br /> +The seeming figure of concordance, bent<br /> +On satiating tyrant lust<br /> +Or barren fits of sentiment.</p> +<p class="poetry">Thou wilt not have our paths befouled<br /> +By simulation; are we vile to view,<br /> +The heavens shall see us clean of our own dust,<br /> +Beneath thy breezy flitting wing:<br /> +They make their mirror upon faces true;<br /> +And where they win reflection, lucid heave<br /> +The under tides of this hot heart seen through.<br /> +Beneficently wilt thou clip<br /> +All oversteppings of the plumed,<br /> +The puffed, and bid the masker strip,<br /> +And into the crowned windbag thrust,<br /> +Tearing the mortal from the vital thing,<br /> +A lightning o’er the half-illumed,<br /> +Who to base brute-dominion cleave,<br /> +Yet mark effects, and shun the flash,<br /> +Till their drowsed wits a beam conceive,<br /> +To spy a wound without a gash,<br /> +The magic in a turn of wrist,<br /> +And how are wedded heart and head regaled<br /> +When Wit o’er Folly blows the mort,<br /> +And their high note of union spreads<br /> +Wide from the timely word with conquest charged;<br /> +<a name="page64"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 64</span>Victorious +laughter, of no loud report,<br /> +If heard; derision as divinely veiled<br /> +As terrible Immortals in rose-mist,<br /> +Given to the vision of arrested men:<br /> +Whereat they feel within them weave<br /> +Community its closer threads,<br /> +And are to our fraternal state enlarged;<br /> +Like warm fresh blood is their enlivened ken:<br /> +They learn that thou art not of alien sort,<br /> +Speaking the tongue by vipers hissed,<br /> +Or of the frosty heights unsealed,<br /> +Or of the vain who simple speech distort,<br /> +Or of the vapours pointing on to nought<br /> +Along cold skies; though sharp and high thy pitch;<br /> +As when sole homeward the belated treads,<br /> +And hears aloft a clamour wailed,<br /> +That once had seemed the broomstick witch<br /> +Horridly violating cloud for drought:<br /> +He, from the rub of minds dispersing fears,<br /> +Hears migrants marshalling their midnight train;<br /> +Homeliest order in black sky appears,<br /> +Not less than in the lighted village steads.<br /> +So do those half-illumed wax clear to share<br /> +A cry that is our common voice; the note<br /> +Of fellowship upon a loftier plane,<br /> +Above embattled castle-wall and moat;<br /> +And toning drops as from pure heaven it sheds.<br /> +So thou for washing a phantasmal air,<br /> +For thy sweet singing keynote of the wise,<br /> +Laughter—the joy of Reason seeing fade<br /> +Obstruction into Earth’s renewing beds,<br /> +Beneath the stroke of her good servant’s blade—<br /> +Thenceforth art as their earth-star hailed;<br /> +Gain of the years, conjunction’s prize.<br /> +The greater heart in thy appeal to heads<br /> +<a name="page65"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 65</span>They see, +thou Captain of our civil Fort!<br /> +By more elusive savages assailed<br /> +On each ascending stage; untired<br /> +Both inner foe and outer to cut short,<br /> +And blow to chaff pretenders void of grist:<br /> +Showing old tiger’s claws, old crocodile’s<br /> +Yard-grin of eager grinders, slim to sight,<br /> +Like forms in running water, oft when smiles,<br /> +When pearly tears, when fluent lips delight:<br /> +But never with the slayer’s malice fired:<br /> +As little as informs an infant’s fist<br /> +Clenched at the sneeze! Thou wouldst but have us be<br /> +Good sons of mother soil, whereby to grow<br /> +Branching on fairer skies, one stately tree;<br /> +Broad of the tilth for flowering at the Court:<br /> +Which is the tree bound fast to wave its tress;<br /> +Of strength controlled sheer beauty to bestow.<br /> +Ambrosial heights of possible acquist,<br /> +Where souls of men with soul of man consort,<br /> +And all look higher to new loveliness<br /> +Begotten of the look: thy mark is there;<br /> +While on our temporal ground alive,<br /> +Rightly though fearfully thou wieldest sword<br /> +Of finer temper now a numbered learn<br /> +That they resisting thee themselves resist;<br /> +And not thy bigger joy to smite and drive,<br /> +Prompt the dense herd to butt, and set the snare<br /> +Witching them into pitfalls for hoarse shouts.<br /> +More now, and hourly more, and of the Lord<br /> +Thou lead’st to, doth this rebel heart discern,<br /> +When pinched ascetic and red sensualist<br /> +Alternately recurrent freeze or burn,<br /> +And of its old religions it has doubts.<br /> +It fears thee less when thou hast shown it bare;<br /> +Less hates, part understands, nor much resents,<br /> +<a name="page66"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 66</span>When the +prized objects it has raised for prayer,<br /> +For fitful prayer;—repentance dreading fire,<br /> +Impelled by aches; the blindness which repents<br /> +Like the poor trampled worm that writhes in mire;—<br /> +Are sounded by thee, and thou darest probe<br /> +Old institutions and establishments,<br /> +Once fortresses against the floods of sin,<br /> +For what their worth; and questioningly prod<br /> +For why they stand upon a racing globe,<br /> +Impeding blocks, less useful than the clod;<br /> +Their angel out of them, a demon in.</p> +<p class="poetry">This half-enlightened heart, still doomed to +fret,<br /> +To hurl at vanities, to drift in shame<br /> +Of gain or loss, bewailing the sure rod,<br /> +Shall of predestination wed thee yet.<br /> +Something it gathers of what things should drop<br /> +At entrance on new times; of how thrice broad<br /> +The world of minds communicative; how<br /> +A straggling Nature classed in school, and scored<br /> +With stripes admonishing, may yield to plough<br /> +Fruitfullest furrows, nor for waxing tame<br /> +Be feeble on an Earth whose gentler crop<br /> +Is its most living, in the mind that steers,<br /> +By Reason led, her way of tree and flame,<br /> +Beyond the genuflexions and the tears;<br /> +Upon an Earth that cannot stop,<br /> +Where upward is the visible aim,<br /> +And ever we espy the greater God,<br /> +For simple pointing at a good adored:<br /> +Proof of the closer neighbourhood. Head on,<br /> +Sword of the many, light of the few! untwist<br /> +Or cut our tangles till fair space is won<br /> +Beyond a briared wood of austere brow,<br /> +Believed of discord by thy timely word<br /> +<a name="page67"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 67</span>At +intervals refreshing life: for thou<br /> +Art verify Keeper of the Muse’s Key;<br /> +Thyself no vacant melodist;<br /> +On lower land elective even as she;<br /> +Holding, as she, all dissonance abhorred;<br /> +Advising to her measured steps in flow;<br /> +And teaching how for being subjected free<br /> +Past thought of freedom we may come to know<br /> +The music of the meaning of Accord.</p> +<h2><a name="page68"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 68</span>YOUTH +IN MEMORY</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Days</span>, when the ball +of our vision<br /> +Had eagles that flew unabashed to sun;<br /> +When the grasp on the bow was decision,<br /> +And arrow and hand and eye were one;<br /> +When the Pleasures, like waves to a swimmer,<br /> +Came heaving for rapture ahead!—<br /> +Invoke them, they dwindle, they glimmer<br /> +As lights over mounds of the dead.</p> +<p class="poetry">Behold the winged Olympus, off the mead,<br /> +With thunder of wide pinions, lightning speed,<br /> +Wafting the shepherd-boy through ether clear,<br /> +To bear the golden nectar-cup.<br /> +So flies desire at view of its delight,<br /> +When the young heart is tiptoe perched on sight.<br /> +We meanwhile who in hues of the sick year<br /> +The Spring-time paint to prick us for our lost,<br /> +Mount but the fatal half way up—<br /> +Whereon shut eyes! This is decreed,<br /> +For Age that would to youthful heavens ascend,<br /> +By passion for the arms’ possession tossed,<br /> +It falls the way of sighs and hath their end;<br /> +A spark gone out to more sepulchral night.<br /> +Good if the arrowy eagle of the height<br /> +Be then the little bird that hops to feed.</p> +<p class="poetry">Lame falls the cry to kindle days<br /> +Of radiant orb and daring gaze.<br /> +It does but clank our mortal chain.<br /> +For Earth reads through her felon old<br /> +<a name="page69"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 69</span>The +many-numbered of her fold,<br /> +Who forward tottering backward strain,<br /> +And would be thieves of treasure spent,<br /> +With their grey season soured.<br /> +She could write out their history in their thirst<br /> +To have again the much devoured,<br /> +And be the bud at burst;<br /> +In honey fancy join the flow,<br /> +Where Youth swims on as once they went,<br /> +All choiric for spontaneous glee<br /> +Of active eager lungs and thews;<br /> +They now bared roots beside the river bent;<br /> +Whose privilege themselves to see;<br /> +Their place in yonder tideway know;<br /> +The current glass peruse;<br /> +The depths intently sound;<br /> +And sapped by each returning flood<br /> +Accept for monitory nourishment<br /> +Those worn roped features under crust of mud,<br /> +Reflected in the silvery smooth around:<br /> +Not less the branching and high singing tree,<br /> +A home of nests, a landmark and a tent,<br /> +Until their hour for losing hold on ground.<br /> +Even such good harvest of the things that flee<br /> +Earth offers her subjected, and they choose<br /> +Rather of Bacchic Youth one beam to drink,<br /> +And warm slow marrow with the sensual wink.<br /> +So block they at her source the Mother of the Muse.</p> +<p class="poetry">Who cheerfully the little bird becomes,<br /> +Without a fall, and pipes for peck at crumbs,<br /> +May have her dolings to the lightest touch;<br /> +As where some cripple muses by his crutch,<br /> +Unwitting that the spirit in him sings:<br /> +‘When I had legs, then had I wings,<br /> +<a name="page70"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 70</span>As good as +any born of eggs,<br /> +To feed on all aërial things,<br /> +When I had legs!’<br /> +And if not to embrace he sighs,<br /> +She gives him breath of Youth awhile,<br /> +Perspective of a breezy mile,<br /> +Companionable hedgeways, lifting skies;<br /> +Scenes where his nested dreams upon their hoard<br /> +Brooded, or up to empyrean soared:<br /> +Enough to link him with a dotted line.<br /> +But cravings for an eagle’s flight,<br /> +To top white peaks and serve wild wine<br /> +Among the rosy undecayed,<br /> +Bring only flash of shade<br /> +From her full throbbing breast of day in night.<br /> +By what they crave are they betrayed:<br /> +And cavernous is that young dragon’s jaw,<br /> +Crimson for all the fiery reptile saw<br /> +In time now coveted, for teeth to flay,<br /> +Once more consume, were Life recurrent May.<br /> +They to their moment of drawn breath,<br /> +Which is the life that makes the death,<br /> +The death that makes ethereal life would bind:<br /> +The death that breeds the spectre do they find.<br /> +Darkness is wedded and the waste regrets<br /> +Beating as dead leaves on a fitful gust,<br /> +By souls no longer dowered to climb<br /> +Beneath their pack of dust,<br /> +Whom envy of a lustrous prime,<br /> +Eclipsed while yet invoked, besets,<br /> +And dooms to sink and water sable flowers,<br /> +That never gladdened eye or loaded bee.<br /> +Strain we the arms for Memory’s hours,<br /> +We are the seized Persephone.<br /> +<a name="page71"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 71</span>Responsive +never to the soft desire<br /> +For one prized tune is this our chord of life.<br /> +’Tis clipped to deadness with a wanton knife,<br /> +In wishes that for ecstasies aspire.<br /> +Yet have we glad companionship of Youth,<br /> +Elysian meadows for the mind,<br /> +Dare we to face deeds done, and in our tomb<br /> +Filled with the parti-coloured bloom<br /> +Of loved and hated, grasp all human truth<br /> +Sowed by us down the mazy paths behind.<br /> +To feel that heaven must we that hell sound through:<br /> +Whence comes a line of continuity,<br /> +That brings our middle station into view,<br /> +Between those poles; a novel Earth we see,<br /> +In likeness of us, made of banned and blest;<br /> +The sower’s bed, but not the reaper’s rest:<br /> +An Earth alive with meanings, wherein meet<br /> +Buried, and breathing, and to be.<br /> +Then of the junction of the three,<br /> +Even as a heart in brain, full sweet<br /> +May sense of soul, the sum of music, beat.</p> +<p class="poetry">Only the soul can walk the dusty track<br /> +Where hangs our flowering under vapours black,<br /> +And bear to see how these pervade, obscure,<br /> +Quench recollection of a spacious pure.<br /> +They take phantasmal forms, divide, convolve,<br /> +Hard at each other point and gape,<br /> +Horrible ghosts! in agony dissolve,<br /> +To reappear with one they drape<br /> +For criminal, and, Father! shrieking name,<br /> +Who such distorted issue did beget.<br /> +Accept them, them and him, though hiss thy sweat<br /> +Off brow on breast, whose furnace flame<br /> +Has eaten, and old Self consumes.<br /> +<a name="page72"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 72</span>Out of the +purification will they leap,<br /> +Thee renovating while new light illumes<br /> +The dusky web of evil, known as pain,<br /> +That heavily up healthward mounts the steep;<br /> +Our fleshly road to beacon-fire of brain:<br /> +Midway the tameless oceanic brute<br /> +Below, whose heave is topped with foam for fruit,<br /> +And the fair heaven reflecting inner peace<br /> +On righteous warfare, that asks not to cease.</p> +<p class="poetry">Forth of such passage through black fire we +win<br /> +Clear hearing of the simple lute,<br /> +Whereon, and not on other, Memory plays<br /> +For them who can in quietness receive<br /> +Her restorative airs: a ditty thin<br /> +As note of hedgerow bird in ear of eve,<br /> +Or wave at ebb, the shallow catching rays<br /> +On a transparent sheet, where curves a glass<br /> +To truer heavens than when the breaker neighs<br /> +Loud at the plunge for bubbly wreck in roar.<br /> +Solidity and bulk and martial brass,<br /> +Once tyrants of the senses, faintly score<br /> +A mark on pebbled sand or fluid slime,<br /> +While present in the spirit, vital there,<br /> +Are things that seemed the phantoms of their time;<br /> +Eternal as the recurrent cloud, as air<br /> +Imperative, refreshful as dawn-dew.<br /> +Some evanescent hand on vapour scrawled<br /> +Historic of the soul, and heats anew<br /> +Its coloured lines where deeds of flesh stand bald.<br /> +True of the man, and of mankind ’tis true,<br /> +Did we stout battle with the Shade, Despair,<br /> +Our cowardice, it blooms; or haply warred<br /> +Against the primal beast in us, and flung;<br /> +Or cleaving mists of Sorrow, left it starred<br /> +<a name="page73"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 73</span>Above +self-pity slain: or it was Prayer<br /> +First taken for Life’s cleanser; or the tongue<br /> +Spake for the world against this heart; or rings<br /> +Old laughter, from the founts of wisdom sprung;<br /> +Or clap of wing of joy, that was a throb<br /> +From breast of Earth, and did no creature rob:<br /> +These quickening live. But deepest at her springs,<br /> +Most filial, is an eye to love her young.<br /> +And had we it, to see with it, alive<br /> +Is our lost garden, flower, bird and hive.<br /> +Blood of her blood, aim of her aim, are then<br /> +The green-robed and grey-crested sons of men:<br /> +She tributary to her aged restores<br /> +The living in the dead; she will inspire<br /> +Faith homelier than on the Yonder shores,<br /> +Abhorring these as mire,<br /> +Uncertain steps, in dimness gropes,<br /> +With mortal tremours pricking hopes,<br /> +And, by the final Bacchic of the lusts<br /> +Propelled, the Bacchic of the spirit trusts:<br /> +A fervour drunk from mystic hierophants;<br /> +Not utterly misled, though blindly led,<br /> +Led round fermenting eddies. Faith she plants<br /> +In her own firmness as our midway road:<br /> +Which rightly Youth has read, though blindly read;<br /> +Her essence reading in her toothsome goad;<br /> +Spur of bright dreams experience disenchants.<br /> +But love we well the young, her road midway<br /> +The darknesses runs consecrated clay.<br /> +Despite our feeble hold on this green home,<br /> +And the vast outer strangeness void of dome,<br /> +Shall we be with them, of them, taught to feel,<br /> +Up to the moment of our prostrate fall,<br /> +The life they deem voluptuously real<br /> +Is more than empty echo of a call,<br /> +<a name="page74"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 74</span>Or shadow +of a shade, or swing of tides;<br /> +As brooding upon age, when veins congeal,<br /> +Grey palsy nods to think. With us for guides,<br /> +Another step above the animal,<br /> +To views in Alpine thought are they helped on.<br /> +Good if so far we live in them when gone!</p> +<p class="poetry">And there the arrowy eagle of the height<br /> +Becomes the little bird that hops to feed,<br /> +Glad of a crumb, for tempered appetite<br /> +To make it wholesome blood and fruitful seed.<br /> +Then Memory strikes on no slack string,<br /> +Nor sectional will varied Life appear:<br /> +Perforce of soul discerned in mind, we hear<br /> +Earth with her Onward chime, with Winter Spring.<br /> +And ours the mellow note, while sharing joys<br /> +No more subjecting mortals who have learnt<br /> +To build for happiness on equipoise,<br /> +The Pleasures read in sparks of substance burnt;<br /> +Know in our seasons an integral wheel,<br /> +That rolls us to a mark may yet be willed.<br /> +This, the truistic rubbish under heel<br /> +Of all the world, we peck at and are filled.</p> +<h2><a name="page75"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +75</span>PENETRATION AND TRUST</h2> +<h3>I</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Sleek</span> as a lizard at +round of a stone,<br /> +The look of her heart slipped out and in.<br /> +Sweet on her lord her soft eyes shone,<br /> +As innocents clear of a shade of sin.</p> +<h3>II</h3> +<p class="poetry">He laid a finger under her chin,<br /> +His arm for her girdle at waist was thrown:<br /> +Now, what will happen and who will win,<br /> +With me in the fight and my lady lone?</p> +<h3>III</h3> +<p class="poetry">He clasped her, clasping a shape of stone;<br +/> +Was fire on her eyes till they let him in.<br /> +Her breast to a God of the daybeams shone,<br /> +And never a corner for serpent sin.</p> +<h3>IV</h3> +<p class="poetry">Tranced she stood, with a chattering chin;<br +/> +Her shrunken form at his feet was thrown:<br /> +At home to the death my lord shall win,<br /> +When it is no tyrant who leaves me lone!</p> +<h2><a name="page76"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 76</span>NIGHT +OF FROST IN MAY</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">With</span> splendour of a +silver day,<br /> +A frosted night had opened May:<br /> +And on that plumed and armoured night,<br /> +As one close temple hove our wood,<br /> +Its border leafage virgin white.<br /> +Remote down air an owl hallooed.<br /> +The black twig dropped without a twirl;<br /> +The bud in jewelled grasp was nipped;<br /> +The brown leaf cracked a scorching curl;<br /> +A crystal off the green leaf slipped.<br /> +Across the tracks of rimy tan,<br /> +Some busy thread at whiles would shoot;<br /> +A limping minnow-rillet ran,<br /> +To hang upon an icy foot.</p> +<p class="poetry">In this shrill hush of quietude,<br /> +The ear conceived a severing cry.<br /> +Almost it let the sound elude,<br /> +When chuckles three, a warble shy,<br /> +From hazels of the garden came,<br /> +Near by the crimson-windowed farm.<br /> +They laid the trance on breath and frame,<br /> +A prelude of the passion-charm.</p> +<p class="poetry">Then soon was heard, not sooner heard<br /> +Than answered, doubled, trebled, more,<br /> +Voice of an Eden in the bird<br /> +Renewing with his pipe of four<br /> +<a name="page77"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 77</span>The sob: a +troubled Eden, rich<br /> +In throb of heart: unnumbered throats<br /> +Flung upward at a fountain’s pitch,<br /> +The fervour of the four long notes,<br /> +That on the fountain’s pool subside,<br /> +Exult and ruffle and upspring:<br /> +Endless the crossing multiplied<br /> +Of silver and of golden string.<br /> +There chimed a bubbled underbrew<br /> +With witch-wild spray of vocal dew.</p> +<p class="poetry">It seemed a single harper swept<br /> +Our wild wood’s inner chords and waked<br /> +A spirit that for yearning ached<br /> +Ere men desired and joyed or wept.<br /> +Or now a legion ravishing<br /> +Musician rivals did unite<br /> +In love of sweetness high to sing<br /> +The subtle song that rivals light;<br /> +From breast of earth to breast of sky:<br /> +And they were secret, they were nigh:<br /> +A hand the magic might disperse;<br /> +The magic swung my universe.</p> +<p class="poetry">Yet sharpened breath forbade to dream,<br /> +Where all was visionary gleam;<br /> +Where Seasons, as with cymbals, clashed;<br /> +And feelings, passing joy and woe,<br /> +Churned, gurgled, spouted, interflashed,<br /> +Nor either was the one we know:<br /> +Nor pregnant of the heart contained<br /> +In us were they, that griefless plained,<br /> +That plaining soared; and through the heart<br /> +Struck to one note the wide apart:—<br /> +<a name="page78"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 78</span>A passion +surgent from despair;<br /> +A paining bliss in fervid cold;<br /> +Off the last vital edge of air,<br /> +Leap heavenward of the lofty-souled,<br /> +For rapture of a wine of tears;<br /> +As had a star among the spheres<br /> +Caught up our earth to some mid-height<br /> +Of double life to ear and sight,<br /> +She giving voice to thought that shines<br /> +Keen-brilliant of her deepest mines;<br /> +While steely drips the rillet clinked,<br /> +And hoar with crust the cowslip swelled.</p> +<p class="poetry">Then was the lyre of earth beheld,<br /> +Then heard by me: it holds me linked;<br /> +Across the years to dead-ebb shores<br /> +I stand on, my blood-thrill restores.<br /> +But would I conjure into me<br /> +Those issue notes, I must review<br /> +What serious breath the woodland drew;<br /> +The low throb of expectancy;<br /> +How the white mother-muteness pressed<br /> +On leaf and meadow-herb; how shook,<br /> +Nigh speech of mouth, the sparkle-crest<br /> +Seen spinning on the bracken-crook.</p> +<h2><a name="page79"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 79</span>THE +TEACHING OF THE NUDE</h2> +<h3>I</h3> +<p class="poetry">A <span class="smcap">Satyr</span> spied a +Goddess in her bath,<br /> +Unseen of her attendant nymphs; none knew.<br /> +Forthwith the creature to his fellows drew,<br /> +And looking backward on the curtained path,<br /> +He strove to tell; he could but heave a breast<br /> +Too full, and point to mouth, with failing leers:<br /> +Vainly he danced for speech, he giggled tears,<br /> +Made as if torn in two, as if tight pressed,<br /> +As if cast prone; then fetching whimpered tunes<br /> +For words, flung heel and set his hairy flight<br /> +Through forest-hollows, over rocky height.<br /> +The green leaves buried him three rounds of moons.<br /> +A senatorial Satyr named what herb<br /> +Had hurried him outrunning reason’s curb.</p> +<h3>II</h3> +<p class="poetry">’Tis told how when that hieaway +unchecked<br /> +To dell returned, he seemed of tempered mood:<br /> +Even as the valley of the torrent rude,<br /> +The torrent now a brook, the valley wrecked.<br /> +In him, to hale him high or hurl aheap,<br /> +Goddess and Goatfoot hourly wrestled sore;<br /> +Hourly the immortal prevailing more:<br /> +Till one hot noon saw Meliboeus peep<br /> +From thicket-sprays to where his full-blown dame,<br /> +<a name="page80"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 80</span>In circle +by the lusty friskers gripped,<br /> +Laughed the showered rose-leaves while her limbs were +stripped.<br /> +She beckoned to our Satyr, and he came.<br /> +Then twirled she mounds of ripeness, wreath of arms.<br /> +His hoof kicked up the clothing for such charms.</p> +<h2><a name="page81"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 81</span>BREATH +OF THE BRIAR</h2> +<h3>I</h3> +<p class="poetry">O <span class="smcap">briar-scents</span>, on +yon wet wing<br /> +Of warm South-west wind brushing by,<br /> +You mind me of the sweetest thing<br /> +That ever mingled frank and shy:<br /> +When she and I, by love enticed,<br /> +Beneath the orchard-apples met,<br /> +In equal halves a ripe one sliced,<br /> +And smelt the juices ere we ate.</p> +<h3>II</h3> +<p class="poetry">That apple of the briar-scent,<br /> +Among our lost in Britain now,<br /> +Was green of rind, and redolent<br /> +Of sweetness as a milking cow.<br /> +The briar gives it back, well nigh<br /> +The damsel with her teeth on it;<br /> +Her twinkle between frank and shy,<br /> +My thirst to bite where she had bit.</p> +<h2><a name="page82"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +82</span>EMPEDOCLES</h2> +<h3>I</h3> +<p class="poetry"> <span class="smcap">He</span> +leaped. With none to hinder,<br /> +Of Aetna’s fiery scoriae<br /> +In the next vomit-shower, made he<br /> + A more peculiar cinder.<br /> +And this great Doctor, can it be,<br /> +He left no saner recipe<br /> +For men at issue with despair?<br /> +Admiring, even his poet owns,<br /> +While noting his fine lyric tones,<br /> +The last of him was heels in air!</p> +<h3>II</h3> +<p class="poetry"> Comes Reverence, her +features<br /> +Amazed to see high Wisdom hear,<br /> +With glimmer of a faunish leer,<br /> + One mock her pride of creatures.<br /> +Shall such sad incident degrade<br /> +A stature casting sunniest shade?<br /> +O Reverence! let Reason swim;<br /> +Each life its critic deed reveals;<br /> +And him reads Reason at his heels,<br /> +If heels in air the last of him!</p> +<h2><a name="page83"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +83</span>ENGLAND BEFORE THE STORM</h2> +<h3>I</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">The</span> day that is the +night of days,<br /> +With cannon-fire for sun ablaze<br /> +We spy from any billow’s lift;<br /> +And England still this tidal drift!<br /> +Would she to sainted forethought vow<br /> +A space before the thunders flood,<br /> +That martyr of its hour might now<br /> + Spare her the tears of blood.</p> +<h3>II</h3> +<p class="poetry">Asleep upon her ancient deeds,<br /> +She hugs the vision plethora breeds,<br /> +And counts her manifold increase<br /> +Of treasure in the fruits of peace.<br /> +What curse on earth’s improvident,<br /> +When the dread trumpet shatters rest,<br /> +Is wreaked, she knows, yet smiles content<br /> + As cradle rocked from breast.</p> +<h3>III</h3> +<p class="poetry">She, impious to the Lord of Hosts,<br /> +The valour of her offspring boasts,<br /> +Mindless that now on land and main<br /> +His heeded prayer is active brain.<br /> +No more great heart may guard the home,<br /> +Save eyed and armed and skilled to cleave<br /> +Yon swallower wave with shroud of foam,<br /> + We see not distant heave.</p> +<h3><a name="page84"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +84</span>IV</h3> +<p class="poetry">They stand to be her sacrifice,<br /> +The sons this mother flings like dice,<br /> +To face the odds and brave the Fates;<br /> +As in those days of starry dates,<br /> +When cannon cannon’s counterblast<br /> +Awakened, muzzle muzzle bowled,<br /> +And high in swathe of smoke the mast<br /> + Its fighting rag outrolled.</p> +<p>1891.</p> +<h2><a name="page85"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 85</span>TARDY +SPRING</h2> +<p class="poetry"> <span +class="smcap">Now</span> the North wind ceases,<br /> + The warm South-west awakes;<br /> + Swift fly the fleeces,<br /> + Thick the blossom-flakes.</p> +<p class="poetry">Now hill to hill has made the stride,<br /> +And distance waves the without end:<br /> +Now in the breast a door flings wide;<br /> +Our farthest smiles, our next is friend.<br /> +And song of England’s rush of flowers<br /> +Is this full breeze with mellow stops,<br /> +That spins the lark for shine, for showers;<br /> +He drinks his hurried flight, and drops.<br /> +The stir in memory seem these things,<br /> +Which out of moistened turf and clay<br /> +Astrain for light push patient rings,<br /> +Or leap to find the waterway.<br /> +’Tis equal to a wonder done,<br /> +Whatever simple lives renew<br /> +Their tricks beneath the father sun,<br /> +As though they caught a broken clue;<br /> +So hard was earth an eyewink back:<br /> +But now the common life has come,<br /> +The blotting cloud a dappled pack,<br /> +The grasses one vast underhum.<br /> +A City clothed in snow and soot,<br /> +With lamps for day in ghostly rows,<br /> +Breaks to the scene of hosts afoot,<br /> +The river that reflective flows:<br /> +<a name="page86"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 86</span>And there +did fog down crypts of street<br /> +Play spectre upon eye and mouth:—<br /> +Their faces are a glass to greet<br /> +This magic of the whirl for South.<br /> +A burly joy each creature swells<br /> +With sound of its own hungry quest;<br /> +Earth has to fill her empty wells,<br /> +And speed the service of the nest;<br /> +The phantom of the snow-wreath melt,<br /> +That haunts the farmer’s look abroad,<br /> +Who sees what tomb a white night built,<br /> +Where flocks now bleat and sprouts the clod.<br /> +For iron Winter held her firm;<br /> +Across her sky he laid his hand;<br /> +And bird he starved, he stiffened worm;<br /> +A sightless heaven, a shaven land.<br /> +Her shivering Spring feigned fast asleep,<br /> +The bitten buds dared not unfold:<br /> +We raced on roads and ice to keep<br /> +Thought of the girl we love from cold.</p> +<p class="poetry"> But now the North wind +ceases,<br /> + The warm South-west awakes,<br /> + The heavens are out in fleeces,<br /> + And earth’s green banner shakes.</p> +<h2><a name="page87"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 87</span>THE +LABOURER</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">For</span> a Heracles in +his fighting ire there is never the glory that follows<br /> + When ashen he lies and the poets arise to sing of +the work he has done.<br /> +But to vision alive under shallows of sight, lo, the +Labourer’s crown is Apollo’s,<br /> + While stands he yet in his grime and sweat—to +wrestle for fruits of the Sun.</p> +<p class="poetry">Can an enemy wither his cheer? Not you, +ye fair yellow-flowering ladies,<br /> + Who join with your lords to jar the chords of a +bosom heroic, and clog.<br /> +’Tis the faltering friend, an inanimate land, may drag a +great soul to their Hades,<br /> + And plunge him far from a beam of star till he hears +the deep bay of the Dog.</p> +<p class="poetry">Apparition is then of a monster-task, in a +policy carving new fashions:<br /> + The winninger course than the rule of force, and the +springs lured to run in a stream:<br /> +He would bend tough oak, he would stiffen the reed, point Reason +to swallow the passions,<br /> + Bid Britons awake two steps to take where one is a +trouble extreme!</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page88"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +88</span>Not the less is he nerved with the Labourer’s +resolute hope: that by him shall be written,<br /> + To honour his race, this deed of grace, for the weak +from the strong made just:<br /> +That her sons over seas in a rally of praise may behold a thrice +vitalised Britain,<br /> + Ashine with the light of the doing of right: at the +gates of the Future in trust.</p> +<h2><a name="page89"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +89</span>FORESIGHT AND PATIENCE</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Sprung</span> of the father +blood, the mother brain,<br /> +Are they who point our pathway and sustain.<br /> +They rarely meet; one soars, one walks retired.<br /> +When they do meet, it is our earth inspired.</p> +<p class="poetry">To see Life’s formless offspring and +subdue<br /> +Desire of times unripe, we have these two,<br /> +Whose union is right reason: join they hands,<br /> +The world shall know itself and where it stands;<br /> +What cowering angel and what upright beast<br /> +Make man, behold, nor count the low the least,<br /> +Nor less the stars have round it than its flowers.<br /> +When these two meet, a point of time is ours.</p> +<p class="poetry">As in a land of waterfalls, that flow<br /> +Smooth for the leap on their great voice below,<br /> +Some eddies near the brink borne swift along<br /> +Will capture hearing with the liquid song,<br /> +So, while the headlong world’s imperious force<br /> +Resounded under, heard I these discourse.</p> +<p class="poetry">First words, where down my woodland walk she +led,<br /> +To her blind sister Patience, Foresight said:</p> +<p class="poetry">—Your faith in me appals, to shake my +own,<br /> +When still I find you in this mire alone.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page90"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +90</span>—The few steps taken at a funeral pace<br /> +By men had slain me but for those you trace.</p> +<p class="poetry">—Look I once back, a broken pinion I:<br +/> +Black as the rebel angels rained from sky!</p> +<p class="poetry">—Needs must you drink of me while here +you live,<br /> +And make me rich in feeling I can give.</p> +<p class="poetry">—A brave To-be is dawn upon my brow:<br +/> +Yet must I read my sister for the How.<br /> +My daisy better knows her God of beams<br /> +Than doth an eagle that to mount him seems.<br /> +She hath the secret never fieriest reach<br /> +Of wing shall master till men hear her teach.</p> +<p class="poetry">—Liker the clod flaked by the driving +plough,<br /> +My semblance when I have you not as now.<br /> +The quiet creatures who escape mishap<br /> +Bear likeness to pure growths of the green sap:<br /> +A picture of the settled peace desired<br /> +By cowards shunning strife or strivers tired.<br /> +I listen at their breasts: is there no jar<br /> +Of wrestlings and of stranglings, dead they are,<br /> +And such a picture as the piercing mind<br /> +Ranks beneath vegetation. Not resigned<br /> +Are my true pupils while the world is brute.<br /> +What edict of the stronger keeps me mute,<br /> +Stronger impels the motion of my heart.<br /> +I am not Resignation’s counterpart.<br /> +If that I teach, ’tis little the dry word,<br /> +Content, but how to savour hope deferred.<br /> +We come of earth, and rich of earth may be;<br /> +Soon carrion if very earth are we!</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page91"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +91</span>The coursing veins, the constant breath, the use<br /> +Of sleep, declare that strife allows short truce;<br /> +Unless we clasp decay, accept defeat,<br /> +And pass despised; ‘a-cold for lack of heat,’<br /> +Like other corpses, but without death’s plea.</p> +<p class="poetry">—My sister calls for battle; is it +she?</p> +<p class="poetry">—Rather a world of pressing men in +arms,<br /> +Than stagnant, where the sensual piper charms<br /> +Each drowsy malady and coiling vice<br /> +With dreams of ease whereof the soul pays price!<br /> +No home is here for peace while evil breeds,<br /> +While error governs, none; and must the seeds<br /> +You sow, you that for long have reaped disdain,<br /> +Lie barren at the doorway of the brain,<br /> +Let stout contention drive deep furrows, blood<br /> +Moisten, and make new channels of its flood!</p> +<p class="poetry">—My sober little maid, when we meet +first,<br /> +Drinks of me ever with an eager thirst.<br /> +So can I not of her till circumstance<br /> +Drugs cravings. Here we see how men advance<br /> +A doubtful foot, but circle if much stirred,<br /> +Like dead weeds on whipped waters. Shout the word<br /> +Prompting their hungers, and they grandly march,<br /> +As to band-music under Victory’s arch.<br /> +Thus was it, and thus is it; save that then<br /> +The beauty of frank animals had men.</p> +<p class="poetry">—Observe them, and down rearward for a +term,<br /> +Gaze to the primal twistings of the worm.<br /> +Thence look this way, across the fields that show<br /> +Men’s early form of speech for Yes and No.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page92"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +92</span>My sister a bruised infant’s utterance had;<br /> +And issuing stronger, to mankind ’twas mad.<br /> +I knew my home where I had choice to feel<br /> +The toad beneath a harrow or a heel.</p> +<p class="poetry">—Speak of this Age.</p> +<p class="poetry">—When you it shall discern<br /> +Bright as you are, to me the Age will turn.</p> +<p class="poetry">—For neither of us has it any care;<br /> +Its learning is through Science to despair.</p> +<p class="poetry">—Despair lies down and grovels, grapples +not<br /> +With evil, casts the burden of its lot.<br /> +This Age climbs earth.</p> +<p class="poetry">—To challenge heaven.</p> +<p class="poetry">—Not less<br /> +The lower deeps. It laughs at Happiness!<br /> +That know I, though the echoes of it wail,<br /> +For one step upward on the crags you scale.<br /> +Brave is the Age wherein the word will rust,<br /> +Which means our soul asleep or body’s lust,<br /> +Until from warmth of many breasts, that beat<br /> +A temperate common music, sunlike heat<br /> +The happiness not predatory sheds!</p> +<p class="poetry">—But your fierce Yes and No of butting +heads<br /> +Now rages to outdo a horny Past.<br /> +Shades of a wild Destroyer on the vast<br /> +Are thrown by every novel light upraised.<br /> +The world’s whole round smokes ominously, amazed<br /> +<a name="page93"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 93</span>And +trembling as its pregnant Aetna swells.<br /> +Combustibles on hot combustibles<br /> +Run piling, for one spark to roll in fire<br /> +The mountain-torrent of infernal ire<br /> +And leave the track of devils where men built.<br /> +Perceptive of a doom, the sinner’s guilt<br /> +Confesses in a cry for help shrill loud,<br /> +If drops the chillness of a passing cloud,<br /> +To conscience, reason, human love; in vain:<br /> +None save they but the souls which them contain.<br /> +No extramural God, the God within<br /> +Alone gives aid to city charged with sin.<br /> +A world that for the spur of fool and knave<br /> +Sweats in its laboratory what shall save?<br /> +But men who ply their wits in such a school<br /> +Must pray the mercy of the knave and fool.</p> +<p class="poetry">—Much have I studied hard Necessity!<br +/> +To know her Wisdom’s mother, and that we<br /> +May deem the harshness of her later cries<br /> +In labour a sure goad to prick the wise,<br /> +If men among the warnings which convulse<br /> +Can gravely dread without the craven’s pulse.<br /> +Long ere the rising of this age of ours,<br /> +The knave and fool were stamped as monstrous Powers.<br /> +Of human lusts and lassitudes they spring,<br /> +And are as lasting as the parent thing.<br /> +Yet numbering locust hosts, bent they to drill,<br /> +They might o’ermatch and have mankind at will.<br /> +Behold such army gathering; ours the spur,<br /> +No scattered foe to face, but Lucifer.<br /> +Not fool or knave is now the enemy<br /> +O’ershadowing men, ’tis Folly, Knavery!<br /> +A sea; nor stays that sea the bastioned beach.<br /> +Now must the brother soul alive in each<br /> +<a name="page94"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 94</span>His +traitorous individual devildom<br /> +Hold subject lest the grand destruction come.<br /> +Dimly men see it menacing apace<br /> +To overthrow, perchance uproot, the race.<br /> +Within, without, they are a field of tares:<br /> +Fruitfuller for them when the contest squares,<br /> +And wherefore warrior service they must yield,<br /> +Shines visible as life on either field.<br /> +That is my comfort, following shock on shock,<br /> +Which sets faith quaking on their firmest rock.<br /> +Since with his weapons, all the arms of Night,<br /> +Frail men have challenged Lucifer to fight,<br /> +Have matched in hostile ranks, enrolled, erect,<br /> +The human and Satanic intellect,<br /> +Determined for their uses to control<br /> +What forces on the earth and under roll,<br /> +Their granite rock runs igneous; now they stand<br /> +Pledged to the heavens for safety of their land.<br /> +They cannot learn save grossly, gross that are:<br /> +Through fear they learn whose aid is good in war.</p> +<p class="poetry">—My sister, as I read them in my +glass,<br /> +Their field of tares they take for pasture grass.<br /> +How waken them that have not any bent<br /> +Save browsing—the concrete indifferent!<br /> +Friend Lucifer supplies them solid stuff:<br /> +They fear not for the race when full the trough.<br /> +They have much fear of giving up the ghost;<br /> +And these are of mankind the unnumbered host.</p> +<p class="poetry">—If I could see with you, and did not +faint<br /> +In beating wing, the future I would paint.<br /> +Those massed indifferents will learn to quake:<br /> +Now meanwhile is another mass awake,<br /> +<a name="page95"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 95</span>Once +denser than the grunters of the sty.<br /> +If I could see with you! Could I but fly!</p> +<p class="poetry">—The length of days that you with them +have housed,<br /> +An outcast else, approves their cause espoused.</p> +<p class="poetry">—O true, they have a cause, and woe for +us,<br /> +While still they have a cause too piteous!<br /> +Yet, happy for us when, their cause defined,<br /> +They walk no longer with a stumbler blind,<br /> +And quicken in the virtue of their cause,<br /> +To think me a poor mouther of old saws!<br /> +I wait the issue of a battling Age;<br /> +The toilers with your ‘troughsters’ now engage;<br /> +Instructing them, through their acutest sense,<br /> +How close the dangers of indifference!<br /> +Already have my people shown their worth,<br /> +More love they light, which folds the love of Earth.<br /> +That love to love of labour leads: thence love<br /> +Of humankind—earth’s incense flung above.</p> +<p class="poetry">—Admit some other features: Faithless, +mean;<br /> +Encased in matter; vowed to Gods obscene;<br /> +Contemptuous of the impalpable, it swells<br /> +On Doubt; for pastime swallows miracles;<br /> +And if I bid it face what <i>I</i> observe,<br /> +Declares me hoodwinked by my optic nerve!</p> +<p class="poetry">—Oft has your prophet, for reward of +toil,<br /> +Seen nests of seeming cockatrices coil:<br /> +Disowned them as the unholiest of Time,<br /> +Which were his offspring, born of flame on slime.<br /> +Nor him, their sire, have known the filial fry:<br /> +As little as Time’s earliest knew the sky.<br /> +<a name="page96"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 96</span>Perchance +among them shoots a lustrous flame<br /> +At intervals, in proof of whom they came.<br /> +To strengthen our foundations is the task<br /> +Of this tough Age; not in your beams to bask,<br /> +Though, lighted by your beams, down mining caves<br /> +The rock it blasts, the hoarded foulness braves.<br /> +My sister sees no round beyond her mood;<br /> +To hawk this Age has dressed her head in hood.<br /> +Out of the course of ancient ruts and grooves,<br /> +It moves: O much for me to say it moves!<br /> +About his Æthiop Highlands Nile is Nile,<br /> +Though not the stream of the paternal smile:<br /> +And where his tide of nourishment he drives,<br /> +An Abyssinian wantonness revives.<br /> +Calm as his lotus-leaf to-day he swims;<br /> +He is the yellow crops, the rounded limbs,<br /> +The Past yet flowing, the fair time that fills;<br /> +Breath of all mouths and grist of many mills.<br /> +To-morrow, warning none with tempest-showers,<br /> +He is the vast Insensate who devours<br /> +His golden promise over leagues of seed,<br /> +Then sits in a smooth lake upon the deed.<br /> +The races which on barbarous force begin<br /> +Inherit onward of their origin,<br /> +And cancelled blessings will the current length<br /> +Reveal till they know need of shaping strength.<br /> +’Tis not in men to recognize the need<br /> +Before they clash in hosts, in hosts they bleed.<br /> +Then may sharp suffering their nature grind;<br /> +Of rabble passions grow the chieftain Mind.<br /> +Yet mark where still broad Nile boasts thousands fed,<br /> +For tens up the safe mountains at his head.<br /> +Few would be fed, not far his course prolong,<br /> +Save for the troublous blood which makes him strong.<br /> +<a name="page97"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +97</span>—That rings of truth! More do your people +thrive;<br /> +Your Many are more merrily alive<br /> +Than erewhile when I gloried in the page<br /> +Of radiant singer and anointed sage.<br /> +Greece was my lamp: burnt out for lack of oil;<br /> +Rome, Python Rome, prey of its robber spoil!<br /> +All structures built upon a narrow space<br /> +Must fall, from having not your hosts for base.<br /> +O thrice must one be you, to see them shift<br /> +Along their desert flats, here dash, there drift;<br /> +With faith, that of privations and spilt blood,<br /> +Comes Reason armed to clear or bank the flood!<br /> +And thrice must one be you, to wait release<br /> +From duress in the swamp of their increase.<br /> +At which oppressive scene, beyond arrest,<br /> +A darkness not with stars of heaven dressed<br /> +Philosophers behold; desponding view<br /> +Your Many nourished, starved my brilliant few;<br /> +Then flinging heels, as charioteers the reins,<br /> +Dive down the fumy Ætna of their brains.<br /> +Belated vessels on a rising sea,<br /> +They seem: they pass!</p> +<p +class="poetry"> —But +not Philosophy!</p> +<p class="poetry">—Ay, be we faithful to ourselves: +despise<br /> +Nought but the coward in us! That way lies<br /> +The wisdom making passage through our slough.<br /> +Am I not heard, my head to Earth shall bow;<br /> +Like her, shall wait to see, and seeing wait.<br /> +Philosophy is Life’s one match for Fate.<br /> +That photosphere of our high fountain One,<br /> +Our spirit’s Lord and Reason’s fostering sun,<br /> +Philosophy, shall light us in the shade,<br /> +Warm in the frost, make Good our aim and aid.<br /> +<a name="page98"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +98</span>Companioned by the sweetest, ay renewed,<br /> +Unconquerable, whose aim for aid is Good!<br /> +Advantage to the Many: that we name<br /> +God’s voice; have there the surety in our aim.<br /> +This thought unto my sister do I owe,<br /> +And irony and satire off me throw.<br /> +They crack a childish whip, drive puny herds,<br /> +Where numbers crave their sustenance in words.<br /> +Now let the perils thicken: clearer seen,<br /> +Your Chieftain Mind mounts over them serene.<br /> +Who never yet of scattered lamps was born<br /> +To speed a world, a marching world to warn,<br /> +But sunward from the vivid Many springs,<br /> +Counts conquest but a step, and through disaster sings.</p> +<h2><a name="page99"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 99</span>THE +WARNING</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">We</span> have seen mighty +men ballooning high,<br /> +And in another moment bump the ground.<br /> +He falls; and in his measurement is found<br /> +To count some inches o’er the common fry.<br /> +’Twas not enough to send him climbing sky,<br /> +Yet ’twas enough above his fellows crowned,<br /> +Had he less panted. Let his faithful hound<br /> +Bark at detractors. He may walk or lie.<br /> +Concerns it most ourselves, who with our gas—<br /> +This little Isle’s insatiable greed<br /> +For Continents—filled to inflation burst.<br /> +So do ripe nations into squalor pass,<br /> +When, driven as herds by their old private thirst,<br /> +They scorn the brain’s wild search for virtuous light.</p> +<h2>OUTSIDE THE CROWD</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">To</span> sit on History in +an easy chair,<br /> +Still rivalling the wild hordes by whom ’twas writ!<br /> +Sure, this beseems a race of laggard wit,<br /> +Unwarned by those plain letters scrawled on air.<br /> +If more than hands’ and armsful be our share,<br /> +Snatch we for substance we see vapours flit.<br /> +Have we not heard derision infinite<br /> +When old men play the youth to chase the snare?<br /> +Let us be belted athletes, matched for foes,<br /> +Or stand aloof, the great Benevolent,<br /> +The Lord of Lands no Robber-birds annex,<br /> +Where Justice holds the scales with pure intent;<br /> +Armed to support her sword;—lest we compose<br /> +That Chapter for the historic word on Wrecks.</p> +<h2><a name="page100"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +100</span>TRAFALGAR DAY</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">He</span> leads: we hear +our Seaman’s call<br /> + In the roll of battles won;<br /> +For he is Britain’s Admiral<br /> + Till setting of her sun.</p> +<p class="poetry">When Britain’s life was in her ships,<br +/> + He kept the sea as his own right;<br /> +And saved us from more fell eclipse<br /> + Than drops on day from blackest night.<br /> +Again his battle spat the flame!<br /> + Again his victory flag men saw!<br /> +At sound of Nelson’s chieftain name,<br /> + A deeper breath did Freedom draw.</p> +<p class="poetry">Each trusty captain knew his part:<br /> + They served as men, not marshalled kine:<br /> +The pulses they of his great heart,<br /> + With heads to work his main design.<br /> +Their Nelson’s word, to beat the foe,<br /> + And spare the fall’n, before them shone.<br /> +Good was the hour of blow for blow,<br /> + And clear their course while they fought on.</p> +<p class="poetry">Behold the Envied vanward sweep!—<br /> + A day in mourning weeds adored!<br /> +Then Victory was wrought to weep;<br /> + Then sorrow crowned with laurel soared.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page101"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +101</span>A breezeless flag above a shroud<br /> + All Britain was when wind and wave,<br /> +To make her, passing human, proud,<br /> + Brought his last gift from o’er the grave!</p> +<p class="poetry">Uprose the soul of him a star<br /> + On that brave day of Ocean days:<br /> +It rolled the smoke from Trafalgár<br /> + To darken Austerlitz ablaze.<br /> +Are we the men of old, its light<br /> + Will point us under every sky<br /> +The path he took; and must we fight,<br /> + Our Nelson be our battle-cry!</p> +<p class="poetry">He leads: we hear our Seaman’s call<br /> + In the roll of battles won;<br /> +For he is Britain’s Admiral<br /> + Till setting of her sun.</p> +<h2><a name="page103"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 103</span>ODES +IN CONTRIBUTION TO THE SONG OF FRENCH HISTORY</h2> +<h3><a name="page105"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 105</span>THE +REVOLUTION</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Not</span> yet had +History’s Aetna smoked the skies,<br /> +And low the Gallic Giantess lay enchained,<br /> +While overhead in ordered set and rise<br /> +Her kingly crowns immutably defiled;<br /> +Effulgent on funereal piled<br /> +Across the vacant heavens, and distrained<br /> +Her body, mutely, even as earth, to bear;<br /> +Despoiled the tomb of hope, her mouth of air.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Through marching scores of winters racked she +lay,<br /> +Beneath a hoar-frost’s brilliant crust,<br /> +Whereon the jewelled flies that drained<br /> +Her breasts disported in a glistering spray;<br /> +She, the land’s fount of fruits, enclosed with dust;<br /> +By good and evil angels fed, sustained<br /> +In part to curse, in part to pray,<br /> +Sucking the dubious rumours, till men saw<br /> +The throbs of her charged heart before the Just,<br /> +So worn the harrowed surface had become:<br /> +And still they deemed the dance above was Law,<br /> +Amort all passion in a rebel dumb.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Then, on the unanticipated day,<br /> +Earth heaved, and rose a veinous mound<br /> +<a name="page106"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 106</span>To roar +of the underfloods; and off it sprang,<br /> +Ravishing as red wine in woman’s form,<br /> +A splendid Maenad, she of the delirious laugh,<br /> +Her body twisted flames with the smoke-cap crowned;<br /> +She of the Bacchic foot; the challenger to the fray,<br /> +Bewitchment for the embrace; who sang, who sang<br /> +Intoxication to her swarm,<br /> +Revolved them, hair, voice, feet, in her carmagnole,<br /> +As with a stroke she snapped the Royal staff,<br /> +Dealt the awaited blow on gilt decay<br /> +(O ripeness of the time! O Retribution sure,<br /> +If but our vital lamp illume us to endure!)<br /> +And, like a glad releasing of her soul,<br /> +Sent the word Liberty up to meet the midway blue,<br /> +Her bridegroom in descent to her; and they joined,<br /> +In the face of men they joined: attest it true,<br /> +The million witnesses, that she,<br /> +For ages lying beside the mole,<br /> +Was on the unanticipated miracle day<br /> +Upraised to midway heaven and, as to her goal,<br /> +Enfolded, ere the Immaculate knew<br /> +What Lucifer of the Mint had coined<br /> +His bride’s adulterate currency<br /> +Of burning love corrupt of an infuriate hate;<br /> +She worthy, she unworthy; that one day his mate:<br /> +His mate for that one day of the unwritten deed.<br /> +Read backward on the hoar-frost’s brilliant crust;<br /> +Beneath it read.<br /> +Athirst to kiss, athirst to slay, she stood,<br /> +A radiance fringed with grim affright;<br /> +For them that hungered, she was nourishing food,<br /> +For those who sparkled, Night.<br /> +Read in her heart, and how before the Just<br /> +Her doings, her misdoings, plead.</p> +<h4><a name="page107"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +107</span>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Down on her leap for him the young Angelical +broke<br /> +To husband a resurgent France:<br /> +From whom, with her dethroning stroke,<br /> +Dishonour passed; the dalliance,<br /> +That is occasion’s yea or nay,<br /> +In issues for the soul to pay,<br /> +Discarded; and the cleft ’twixt deed and word,<br /> +The sinuous lie which warbles the sweet bird,<br /> +Wherein we see old Darkness peer,<br /> +Cold Dissolution beck, she had flung hence;<br /> +And hence the talons and the beak of prey;<br /> +Hence all the lures to silken swine<br /> +Thronging the troughs of indolence;<br /> +With every sleek convolvement serpentine;<br /> +The pride in elfin arts to veil an evil leer,<br /> +And bid a goatfoot trip it like a fay.<br /> +He clasped in this revived, uprisen France,<br /> +A valorous dame, of countenance<br /> +The lightning’s upon cloud: unlit as yet<br /> +On brows and lips the lurid shine<br /> +Of seas in the night-wind’s whirl; unstirred<br /> +Her pouch of the centuries’ injuries compressed;<br /> +The shriek that tore the world as yet unheard:<br /> +Earth’s animate full flower she looked, intense<br /> +For worship, wholly given him, fair<br /> +Adoring or desiring; in her bright jet,<br /> +Earth’s crystal spring to sky: Earth’s warrior +Best<br /> +To win Heaven’s Pure up that midway<br /> +We vision for new ground, where sense<br /> +And spirit are one for the further flight; breast-bare,<br /> +Bare-limbed; nor graceless gleamed her disarray<br /> +In scorn of the seductive insincere,<br /> +But martially nude for hot Bellona’s play,<br /> +And amorous of the loftiest in her view.</p> +<h4><a name="page108"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +108</span>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">She sprang from dust to drink of earth’s +cool dew,<br /> +The breath of swaying grasses share,<br /> +Mankind embrace, their weaklings rear,<br /> +At wrestle with the tyrannic strong;<br /> +Her forehead clear to her mate, virgin anew,<br /> +As immortals may be in the mortal sphere.<br /> +Read through her launching heart, who had lain long<br /> +With Earth and heard till it became her own<br /> +Our good Great Mother’s eve and matin song:<br /> +The humming burden of Earth’s toil to feed<br /> +Her creatures all, her task to speed their growth,<br /> +Her aim to lead them up her pathways, shown<br /> +Between the Pains and Pleasures; warned of both,<br /> +Of either aided on their hard ascent.<br /> +Now when she looked, with love’s benign delight<br /> +After great ecstasy, along the plains,<br /> +What foulest impregnation of her sight<br /> +Transformed the scene to multitudinous troops<br /> +Of human sketches, quaver-figures, bent,<br /> +As were they winter sedges, broken hoops,<br /> +Dry udder, vineless poles, worm-eaten posts,<br /> +With features like the flowers defaced by deluge rains?<br /> +Recked she that some perverting devil had limned<br /> +Earth’s proudest to spout scorn of the Maker’s +hand,<br /> +Who could a day behold these deathly hosts,<br /> +And see, decked, graced, and delicately trimmed,<br /> +A ribanded and gemmed elected few,<br /> +Sanctioned, of milk and honey starve the land:—<br /> +Like melody in flesh, its pleasant game<br /> +Olympianwise perform, cloak but the shame:<br /> +Beautiful statures; hideous,<br /> +By Christian contrast; pranked with golden chains,<br /> +And flexile where is manhood straight;<br /> +Mortuaries where warm should beat<br /> +<a name="page109"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 109</span>The +brotherhood that keeps blood sweet:<br /> +Who dared in cantique impious<br /> +Proclaim the Just, to whom was due<br /> +Cathedral gratitude in the pomp of state,<br /> +For that on those lean outcasts hung the sucker Pains,<br /> +On these elect the swelling Pleasures grew.<br /> +Surely a devil’s land when that meant death for each!<br /> +Fresh from the breast of Earth, not thus,<br /> +With all the body’s life to plump the leech,<br /> +Is Nature’s way, she knew. The abominable scene<br /> +Spat at the skies; and through her veins,<br /> +To cloud celestially sown,<br /> +Ran venom of what nourishment<br /> +Her dark sustainer subterrene<br /> +Supplied her, stretched supine on the rack,<br /> +Alive in the shrewd nerves, the seething brains,<br /> +Under derisive revels, prone<br /> +As one clamped fast, with the interminable senseless blent.</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Now was her face white waves in the +tempest’s sharp flame-blink;<br /> +Her skies shot black.<br /> +Now was it visioned infamy to drink<br /> +Of earth’s cool dew, and through the vines<br /> +Frolic in pearly laughter with her young,<br /> +Watching the healthful, natural, happy signs<br /> +Where hands of lads and maids like tendrils clung,<br /> +After their sly shy ventures from the leaf,<br /> +And promised bunches. Now it seemed<br /> +The world was one malarious mire,<br /> +Crying for purification: chief<br /> +This land of France. It seemed<br /> +A duteous desire<br /> +To drink of life’s hot flood, and the crimson streamed.</p> +<h4><a name="page110"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +110</span>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">She drank what makes man demon at the +draught.<br /> +Her skies lowered black,<br /> +Her lover flew,<br /> +There swept a shudder over men.<br /> +Her heavenly lover fled her, and she laughed,<br /> +For laughter was her spirit’s weapon then.<br /> +The Infernal rose uncalled, he with his crew.</p> +<h4>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">As mighty thews burst manacles, she went +mad:<br /> +Her heart a flaring torch usurped her wits.<br /> +Such enemies of her next-drawn breath she had!<br /> +To tread her down in her live grave beneath<br /> +Their dancing floor sunned blind by the Royal wreath,<br /> +They ringed her steps with crafty prison pits.<br /> +Without they girdled her, made nest within.<br /> +There ramped the lion, here entrailed the snake.<br /> +They forced the cup to her lips when she drank blood;<br /> +Believing it, in the mother’s mind at strain,<br /> +In the mother’s fears, and in young Liberty’s wail<br +/> +Alarmed, for her encompassed children’s sake,<br /> +The sole sure way to save her priceless bud.<br /> +Wherewith, when power had gifted her to prevail,<br /> +Vengeance appeared as logically akin.<br /> +Insanely rational they; she rationally insane;<br /> +And in compute of sin, was hers the appealing sin.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Amid the plash of scarlet mud<br /> +Stained at the mouth, drunk with our common air,<br /> +Not lack of love was her defect;<br /> +The Fury mourned and raged and bled for France<br /> +Breathing from exultation to despair<br /> +At every wild-winged hope struck by mischance<br /> +<a name="page111"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 111</span>Soaring +at each faint gleam o’er her abyss.<br /> +Heard still, to be heard while France shall stand erect,<br /> +The frontier march she piped her sons, for where<br /> +Her crouching outer enemy camped,<br /> +Attendant on the deadlier inner’s hiss.<br /> +She piped her sons the frontier march, the wine<br /> +Of martial music, History’s cherished tune;<br /> +And they, the saintliest labourers that aye<br /> +Dropped sweat on soil for bread, took arms and tramped;<br /> +High-breasted to match men or elements,<br /> +Or Fortune, harsh schoolmistress with the undrilled:<br /> +War’s ragged pupils; many a wavering line,<br /> +Torn from the dear fat soil of champaigns hopefully tilled,<br /> +Torn from the motherly bowl, the homely spoon,<br /> +To jest at famine, ply<br /> +The novel scythe, and stand to it on the field;<br /> +Lie in the furrows, rain-clouds for their tents;<br /> +Fronting the red artillery straighten spine;<br /> +Buckle the shiver at sight of comrades strewn;<br /> +Over an empty platter affect the merrily filled;<br /> +Die, if the multiple hazards around said die;<br /> +Downward measure a foeman mightily sized;<br /> +Laugh at the legs that would run for a life despised;<br /> +Lyrical on into death’s red roaring jaw-gape, steeled<br /> +Gaily to take of the foe his lesson, and give reply.<br /> +Cheerful apprentices, they shall be masters soon!</p> +<h4>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">Lo, where hurricane flocks of the North-wind +rattle their thunder<br /> +Loud through a night, and at dawn comes change to the great +South-west,<br /> +Hounds are the hounded in clouds, waves, forests, inverted the +race:<br /> +<a name="page112"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 112</span>Lo, in +the day’s young beams the colossal invading pursuers<br /> +Burst upon rocks and were foam;<br /> +Ridged up a torrent crest;<br /> +Crumbled to ruin, still gazing a glacial wonder;<br /> +Turned shamed feet toe to heel on their track at a panic pace.<br +/> +Yesterday’s clarion cock scudded hen of the invalid +comb;<br /> +They, the triumphant tonant towering upper, were under;<br /> +They, violators of home, dared hope an inviolate home;<br /> +They that had stood for the stroke were the vigorous hewers;<br +/> +Quick as the trick of the wrist with the rapier, they the +pursuers.<br /> +Heavens and men amazed heard the arrogant crying for grace;<br /> +Saw the once hearth-reek rabble the scourge of an army +dispieced;<br /> +Saw such a shift of the hunt as when Titan Olympus clomb.<br /> +Fly! was the sportsman’s word; and the note of the quarry +rang, Chase!</p> +<h4>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Banners from South, from East,<br /> +Sheaves of pale banners drooping hole and shred;<br /> +The captive brides of valour, Sabine Wives<br /> +Plucked from the foeman’s blushful bed,<br /> +For glorious muted battle-tongues<br /> +Of deeds along the horizon’s red,<br /> +At cost of unreluctant lives;<br /> +Her toilful heroes homeward poured,<br /> +To give their fevered mother air of the lungs.<br /> +<a name="page113"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 113</span>She +breathed, and in the breathing craved.<br /> +Environed as she was, at bay,<br /> +Safety she kissed on her drawn sword,<br /> +And waved for victory, for fresh victory waved:<br /> +She craved for victory as her daily bread;<br /> +For victory as her daily banquet raved.</p> +<h4>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Now had her glut of vengeance left her grey<br +/> +Of blood, who in her entrails fiercely tore<br /> +To clutch and squeeze her snakes; herself the more<br /> +Devitalizing: red washer Auroral ray;<br /> +Desired if but to paint her pallid hue.<br /> +The passion for that young horizon red,<br /> +Which dowered her with the flags, the blazing fame,<br /> +Like dotage of the past-meridian dame<br /> +For some bright Sungod adolescent, swelled<br /> +Insatiate, to the voracious grew,<br /> +The glutton’s inward raveners bred;<br /> +Till she, mankind’s most dreaded, most abhorred,<br /> +Witless in her demands on Fortune, asked,<br /> +As by the weaving Fates impelled,<br /> +To have the thing most loathed, the iron lord,<br /> +Controller and chastiser, under Victory masked.</p> +<h4>XIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Banners from East, from South,<br /> +She hugged him in them, feared the scourge they meant,<br /> +Yet blindly hugged, and hungering built his throne.<br /> +So may you see the village innocent,<br /> +With curtsey of shut lids and open mouth,<br /> +In act to beg for sweets expect a loathly stone:<br /> +See furthermore the Just in his measures weigh<br /> +Her sufferings and her sins, dispense her meed.<br /> +False to her bridegroom lord of the miracle day,<br /> +<a name="page114"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 114</span>She +fell: from his ethereal home observed<br /> +Through love, grown alien love, not moved to plead<br /> +Against the season’s fruit for deadly Seed,<br /> +But marking how she had aimed, and where she swerved,<br /> +Why suffered, with a sad consenting thought.<br /> +Nor would he shun her sullen look, nor monstrous hold<br /> +The doer of the monstrous; she aroused,<br /> +She, the long tortured, suddenly freed, distraught,<br /> +More strongly the divine in him than when<br /> +Joy of her as she sprang from mould<br /> +Drew him the midway heavens adown<br /> +To clasp her in his arms espoused<br /> +Before the sight of wondering men,<br /> +And put upon the day a deathless crown.<br /> +The veins and arteries of her, fold in fold,<br /> +His alien love laid open, to divide<br /> +The martyred creature from her crimes; he knew<br /> +What cowardice in her valour could reside;<br /> +What strength her weakness covered; what abased<br /> +Sublimity so illumining, and what raised<br /> +This wallower in old slime to noblest heights,<br /> +Up to the union on the midway blue:—<br /> +Day that the celestial grave Recorder hangs<br /> +Among dark History’s nocturnal lights,<br /> +With vivid beams indicative to the quick<br /> +Of all who have felt the vaulted body’s pangs<br /> +Beneath a mind in hopeless soaring sick.<br /> +She had forgot how, long enslaved, she yearned<br /> +To the one helping hand above;<br /> +Forgot her faith in the Great Undiscerned,<br /> +Whereof she sprang aloft to her Angelical love<br /> +That day: and he, the bright day’s husband, still with +love,<br /> +Though alien, though to an upper seat retired,<br /> +Behold a wrangling heart, as ’twere her soul<br /> +<a name="page115"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 115</span>On +eddies of wild waters cast;<br /> +In wilderness division; fired<br /> +For domination, freedom, lust,<br /> +The Pleasures; lo, a witch’s snaky bowl<br /> +Set at her lips; the blood-drinker’s madness fast<br /> +Upon her; and therewith mistrust,<br /> +Most of herself: a mouth of guile.<br /> +Compassionately could he smile,<br /> +To hear the mouth disclaiming God,<br /> +And clamouring for the Just!<br /> +Her thousand impulses, like torches, coursed<br /> +City and field; and pushed abroad<br /> +O’er hungry waves to thirsty sands,<br /> +Flaring at further; she had grown to be<br /> +The headless with the fearful hands;<br /> +To slaughter, else to suicide, enforced.<br /> +But he, remembering how his love began,<br /> +And of what creature, pitied when was plain<br /> +Another measure of captivity:<br /> +The need for strap and rod;<br /> +The penitential prayers again;<br /> +Again the bitter bowing down to dust;<br /> +The burden on the flesh for who disclaims the God,<br /> +The answer when is call upon the Just.<br /> +Whence her lost virtue had found refuge strode<br /> +Her master, saying, ‘I only; I who can!’<br /> +And echoed round her army, now her chain.<br /> +So learns the nation, closing Anarch’s reign,<br /> +That she had been in travail of a Man.</p> +<h3><a name="page116"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +116</span>NAPOLÉON</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Cannon</span> his name,<br +/> +Cannon his voice, he came.<br /> +Who heard of him heard shaken hills,<br /> +An earth at quake, to quiet stamped;<br /> +Who looked on him beheld the will of wills,<br /> +The driver of wild flocks where lions ramped:<br /> +Beheld War’s liveries flee him, like lumped grass<br /> +Nid-nod to ground beneath the cuffing storm;<br /> +While laurelled over his Imperial form,<br /> +Forth from her bearded tube of lacquey brass,<br /> +Reverberant notes and long blew volant Fame.<br /> +Incarnate Victory, Power manifest,<br /> +Infernal or God-given to mankind,<br /> +On the quenched volcano’s cusp did he take stand,<br /> +A conquering army’s height above the land,<br /> +Which calls that army offspring of its breast,<br /> +And sees it mid the starry camps enshrined;<br /> +His eye the cannon’s flame,<br /> +The cannon’s cave his mind.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">To weld the nation in a name of dread,<br /> +And scatter carrion flies off wounds unhealed,<br /> +The Necessitated came, as comes from out<br /> +Electric ebon lightning’s javelin-head,<br /> +Threatening agitation in the revealed<br /> +Founts of our being; terrible with doubt,<br /> +<a name="page117"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 117</span>With +radiance restorative. At one stride<br /> +Athwart the Law he stood for sovereign sway.<br /> +That Soliform made featureless beside<br /> +His brilliancy who neighboured: vapour they;<br /> +Vapour what postured statues barred his tread.<br /> +On high in amphitheatre field on field,<br /> +Italian, Egyptian, Austrian,<br /> +Far heard and of the carnage discord clear,<br /> +Bells of his escalading triumphs pealed<br /> +In crashes on a choral chant severe,<br /> +Heraldic of the authentic Charlemagne,<br /> +Globe, sceptre, sword, to enfold, to rule, to smite,<br /> +Make unity of the mass,<br /> +Coherent or refractory, by his might.</p> +<p class="poetry">Forth from her bearded tube of lacquey +brass,<br /> +Fame blew, and tuned the jangles, bent the knees<br /> +Rebellious or submissive; his decrees<br /> +Were thunder in those heavens and compelled:<br /> +Such as disordered earth, eclipsed of stars,<br /> +Endures for sign of Order’s calm return,<br /> +Whereunto she is vowed; and his wreckage-spars,<br /> +His harried ships, old riotous Ocean lifts alight,<br /> +Subdued to splendour in his delirant churn.<br /> +Glory suffused the accordant, quelled,<br /> +By magic of high sovereignty, revolt:<br /> +And he, the reader of men, himself unread;<br /> +The name of hope, the name of dread;<br /> +Bloom of the coming years or blight;<br /> +An arm to hurl the bolt<br /> +With aim Olympian; bore<br /> +Likeness to Godhead. Whither his flashes hied<br /> +Hosts fell; what he constructed held rock-fast.<br /> +So did earth’s abjects deem of him that built and clove.<br +/> +<a name="page118"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 118</span>Torch on +imagination, beams he cast,<br /> +Whereat they hailed him deified:<br /> +If less than an eagle-speeding Jove, than Vulcan more.<br /> +Or it might be a Vulcan-Jove,<br /> +Europe for smithy, Europe’s floor<br /> +Lurid with sparks in evanescent showers,<br /> +Loud echo-clap of hammers at all hours,<br /> +Our skies the reflex of its furnace blast.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">On him the long enchained, released<br /> +For bride of the miracle day up the midway blue;<br /> +She from her heavenly lover fallen to serve for feast<br /> +Of rancours and raw hungers; she, the untrue,<br /> +Yet pitiable, not despicable, gazed.<br /> +Fawning, her body bent, she gazed<br /> +With eyes the moonstone portals to her heart:<br /> +Eyes magnifying through hysteric tears<br /> +This apparition, ghostly for belief;<br /> +Demoniac or divine, but sole<br /> +Over earth’s mightiest written Chief;<br /> +Earth’s chosen, crowned, unchallengeable upstart:<br /> +The trumpet word to awake, transform, renew;<br /> +The arbiter of circumstance;<br /> +High above limitations, as the spheres.<br /> +Nor ever had heroical Romance,<br /> +Never ensanguined History’s lengthened scroll,<br /> +Shown fulminant to shoot the levin dart<br /> +Terrific as this man, by whom upraised,<br /> +Aggrandized and begemmed, she outstripped her peers;<br /> +Like midnight’s levying brazier-beacon blazed<br /> +Defiant to the world, a rally for her sons,<br /> +<a name="page119"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 119</span>Day of +the darkness; this man’s mate; by him,<br /> +Cannon his name,<br /> +Rescued from vivisectionist and knave,<br /> +Her body’s dominators and her shame;<br /> +By him with the rivers of ranked battalions, brave<br /> +Past mortal, girt: a march of swords and guns<br /> +Incessant; his proved warriors; loaded dice<br /> +He flung on the crested board, where chilly Fears<br /> +Behold the Reaper’s ground, Death sitting grim,<br /> +Awatch for his predestined ones,<br /> +Mid shrieks and torrent-hooves; but these,<br /> +Inebriate of his inevitable device,<br /> +Hail it their hero’s wood of lustrous laurel-trees,<br /> +Blossom and fruit of fresh Hesperides,<br /> +The boiling life-blood in their cheers.<br /> +Unequalled since the world was man they pour<br /> +A spiky girdle round her; these, her sons,<br /> +His cataracts at smooth holiday, soon to roar<br /> +Obstruction shattered at his will or whim:<br /> +Kind to her ear as quiring Cherubim,<br /> +And trampling earth like scornful mastodons.</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">The flood that swept her to be slave<br /> +Adoring, under thought of being his mate,<br /> +These were, and unto the visibly unexcelled,<br /> +As much of heart as abjects can she gave,<br /> +Or what of heart the body bears for freight<br /> +When Majesty apparent overawes;<br /> +By the flash of his ascending deeds upheld,<br /> +Which let not feminine pride in him have pause<br /> +To question where the nobler pride rebelled.<br /> +She read the hieroglyphic on his brow,<br /> +Felt his firm hand to wield the giant’s mace;<br /> +<a name="page120"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 120</span>Herself +whirled upward in an eagle’s claws,<br /> +Past recollection of her earthly place;<br /> +And if cold Reason pressed her, called him Fate;<br /> +Offering abashed the servile woman’s vow.<br /> +Delirium was her virtue when the look<br /> +At fettered wrists and violated laws<br /> +Faith in a rectitude Supernal shook,<br /> +Till worship of him shone as her last rational state,<br /> +The slave’s apology for gemmed disgrace.<br /> +Far in her mind that leap from earth to the ghost<br /> +Midway on high; or felt as a troubled pool;<br /> +Or as a broken sleep that hunts a dream half lost,<br /> +Arrested and rebuked by the common school<br /> +Of daily things for truancy. She could rejoice<br /> +To know with wakeful eyeballs Violence<br /> +Her crowned possessor, and, on every sense<br /> +Incumbent, Fact, Imperial Fact, her choice,<br /> +In scorn of barren visions, aims at a glassy void.<br /> +Who sprang for Liberty once, found slavery sweet;<br /> +And Tyranny, on alert subservience buoyed,<br /> +Spurred a blood-mare immeasureably fleet<br /> +To shoot the transient leagues in a passing wink,<br /> +Prompt for the glorious bound at the fanged abyss’s +brink.<br /> +Scarce felt she that she bled when battle scored<br /> +On riddled flags the further conjured line;<br /> +From off the meteor gleam of his waved sword<br /> +Reflected bright in permanence: she bled<br /> +As the Bacchante spills her challengeing wine<br /> +With whirl o’ the cup before the kiss to lip;<br /> +And bade drudge History in his footprints tread,<br /> +For pride of sword-strokes o’er slow penmanship:<br /> +Each step of his a volume: his sharp word<br /> +The shower of steel and lead<br /> +Or pastoral sunshine.</p> +<h4><a name="page121"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +121</span>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Persistent through the brazen chorus round<br +/> +His thunderous footsteps on the foeman’s ground,<br /> +A broken carol of wild notes was heard,<br /> +As when an ailing infant wails a dream.<br /> +Strange in familiarity it rang:<br /> +And now along the dark blue vault might seem<br /> +Winged migratories having but heaven for home,<br /> +Now the lone sea-bird’s cry down shocks of foam,<br /> +Beneath a ruthless paw the captive’s pang.</p> +<p class="poetry">It sang the gift that comes from God<br /> +To mind of man as air to lung.<br /> +So through her days of under sod<br /> +Her faith unto her heart had sung,<br /> +Like bedded seed by frozen clod,<br /> +With view of wide-armed heaven and buds at burst,<br /> +And midway up, Earth’s fluttering little lyre.<br /> +Even for a glimpse, for even a hope in chained desire<br /> +The vision of it watered thirst.</p> +<h4>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">But whom those errant moans accused<br /> +As Liberty’s murderous mother, cried accursed,<br /> +France blew to deafness: for a space she mused;<br /> +She smoothed a startled look, and sought,<br /> +From treasuries of the adoring slave,<br /> +Her surest way to strangle thought;<br /> +Picturing her dread lord decree advance<br /> +Into the enemy’s land; artillery, bayonet, lance;<br /> +His ordering fingers point the dial’s to time their +ranks:<br /> +Himself the black storm-cloud, the tempest’s +bayonet-glaive.<br /> +Like foam-heads of a loosened freshet bursting banks,<br /> +<a name="page122"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 122</span>By mount +and fort they thread to swamp the sluggard plains.<br /> +Shines his gold-laurel sun, or cloak connivent rains.<br /> +They press to where the hosts in line and square throng mute;<br +/> +He watchful of their form, the Audacious, the Astute;<br /> +Eagle to grip the field; to work his craftiest, fox.<br /> +From his brief signal, straight the stroke of the leveller +falls;<br /> +From him those opal puffs, those arcs with the clouded balls:<br +/> +He waves and the voluble scene is a quagmire shifting blocks;<br +/> +They clash, they are knotted, and now ’tis the deed of the +axe on the log;<br /> +Here away moves a spiky woodland, and yon away sweep<br /> +Rivers of horse torrent-mad to the shock, and the heap over +heap<br /> +Right through the troughed black lines turned to bunches or +shreds, or a fog<br /> +Rolling off sunlight’s arrows. Not mightier Phoebus +in ire,<br /> +Nor deadlier Jove’s avengeing right hand, than he of the +brain<br /> +Keen at an enemy’s mind to encircle and pierce and +constrain,<br /> +Muffling his own for a fate-charged blow very Gods may admire.<br +/> +Sure to behold are his eagles on high where the conflict +raged.<br /> +Rightly, then, should France worship, and deafen the disaccord<br +/> +Of those who dare withstand an irresistible sword<br /> +To thwart his predestined subjection of Europe. Let them +submit!<br /> +<a name="page123"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 123</span>She said +it aloud, and heard in her breast, as a singer caged,<br /> +With the beat of wings at bars, Earth’s fluttering little +lyre.<br /> +No more at midway heaven, but liker midway to the pit:<br /> +Not singing the spirally upward of rapture, the downward of +pain<br /> +Rather, the drop sheer downward from pressure of merciless +weight.</p> +<p class="poetry">Her strangled thought got breath, with her +worship held debate;<br /> +To yield and sink, yet eye askant the mark she had missed.<br /> +Over the black-blue rollers of that broad Westerly main,<br /> +Steady to sky, the light of Liberty glowed<br /> +In a flaming pillar, that cast on the troubled waters a road<br +/> +For Europe to cross, and see the thing lost subsist.<br /> +For there ’twas a shepherd led his people, no butcher of +sheep;<br /> +Firmly there the banner he first upreared<br /> +Stands to rally; and nourishing grain do his children reap<br /> +From a father beloved in life, in his death revered.<br /> +Contemplating him and his work, shall a skyward glance<br /> +Clearer sight of our dreamed and abandoned obtain;<br /> +Nay, but as if seen in station above the Republic, France<br /> +Had view of her one-day’s heavenly lover again;<br /> +Saw him amid the bright host looking down on her; knew she had +erred,<br /> +Knew him her judge, knew yonder the spirit preferred;<br /> +Yonder the base of the summit she strove that day to ascend,<br +/> +Ere cannon mastered her soul, and all dreams had end.</p> +<h4><a name="page124"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +124</span>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Soon felt she in her shivered frame<br /> +A bodeful drain of blood illume<br /> +Her wits with frosty fire to read<br /> +The dazzling wizard who would have her bleed<br /> +On fruitless marsh and snows of spectral gloom<br /> +For victory that was victory scarce in name.<br /> +Husky his clarions laboured, and her sighs<br /> +O’er slaughtered sons were heavier than the prize;<br /> +Recalling how he stood by Frederic’s tomb,<br /> +With Frederic’s country underfoot and spurned:<br /> +There meditated; till her hope might guess,<br /> +Albeit his constant star prescribe success,<br /> +The savage strife would sink, the civil aim<br /> +To head a mannered world breathe zephyrous<br /> +Of morning after storm; whereunto she yearned;<br /> +And Labour’s lovely peace, and Beauty’s courtly +bloom,<br /> +The mind in strenuous tasks hilarious.<br /> +At such great height, where hero hero topped,<br /> +Right sanely should the Grand Ascendant think<br /> +No further leaps at the fanged abyss’s brink<br /> +True Genius takes: be battle’s dice-box dropped!</p> +<p class="poetry">She watched his desert features, hung to +hear<br /> +The honey words desired, and veiled her face;<br /> +Hearing the Seaman’s name recur<br /> +Wrathfully, thick with a meaning worse<br /> +Than call to the march: for that inveterate Purse<br /> +Could kindle the extinct, inform a vacant place,<br /> +Conjure a heart into the trebly felled.<br /> +It squeezed the globe, insufferably swelled<br /> +To feed insurgent Europe: rear and van<br /> +Were haunted by the amphibious curse;<br /> +<a name="page125"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 125</span>Here +flesh, there phantom, livelier after rout:<br /> +The Seaman piping aye to the rightabout,<br /> +Distracted Europe’s Master, puffed remote<br /> +Those Indies of the swift Macedonian,<br /> +Whereon would Europe’s Master somewhiles doat,<br /> +In dreamings on a docile universe<br /> +Beneath an immarcessible Charlemagne.</p> +<p class="poetry">Nor marvel France should veil a seer’s +face,<br /> +And call on darkness as a blest retreat.<br /> +Magnanimously could her iron Emperor<br /> +Confront submission: hostile stirred to heat<br /> +All his vast enginery, allowed no halt<br /> +Up withered avenues of waste-blood war,<br /> +To the pitiless red mounts of fire afume,<br /> +As ’twere the world’s arteries opened! Woe the +race!<br /> +Ask wherefore Fortune’s vile caprice should balk<br /> +His panther spring across the foaming salt,<br /> +From martial sands to the cliffs of pallid chalk!<br /> +There is no answer: seed of black defeat<br /> +She then did sow, and France nigh unto death foredoom.<br /> +See since that Seaman’s epicycle sprite<br /> +Engirdle, lure and goad him to the chase<br /> +Along drear leagues of crimson spotting white<br /> +With mother’s tears of France, that he may meet<br /> +Behind suborned battalions, ranked as wheat<br /> +Where peeps the weedy poppy, him of the sea;<br /> +Earth’s power to baffle Ocean’s power resume;<br /> +Victorious army crown o’er Victory’s fleet;<br /> +And bearing low that Seaman upon knee,<br /> +Stay the vexed question of supremacy,<br /> +Obnoxious in the vault by Frederic’s tomb.</p> +<h4><a name="page126"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +126</span>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Poured streams of Europe’s veins the +flood<br /> +Full Rhine or Danube rolls off morning-tide<br /> +Through shadowed reaches into crimson-dyed:<br /> +And Rhine and Danube knew her gush of blood<br /> +Down the plucked roots the deepest in her breast.<br /> +He tossed her cordials, from his laurels pressed.<br /> +She drank for dryness thirstily, praised his gifts.<br /> +The blooded frame a powerful draught uplifts<br /> +Writhed the devotedness her voice rang wide<br /> +In cries ecstatic, as of the martyr-Blest,<br /> +Their spirits issuing forth of bodies racked,<br /> +And crazy chuckles, with life’s tears at feud;<br /> +While near her heart the sunken sentinel<br /> +Called Critic marked, and dumb in awe reviewed<br /> +This torture, this anointed, this untracked<br /> +To mortal source, this alien of his kind;<br /> +Creator, slayer, conjuror, Solon-Mars,<br /> +The cataract of the abyss, the star of stars;<br /> +Whose arts to lay the senses under spell<br /> +Aroused an insurrectionary mind.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">He, did he love her? France was his +weapon, shrewd<br /> +At edge, a wind in onset: he loved well<br /> +His tempered weapon, with the which he hewed<br /> +Clean to the ground impediments, or hacked,<br /> +Sure of the blade that served the great man-miracle.<br /> +He raised her, robed her, gemmed her for his bride,<br /> +Did but her blood in blindness given exact.<br /> +Her blood she gave, was blind to him as guide:<br /> +She quivered at his word, and at his touch<br /> +Was hound or steed for any mark he espied.<br /> +He loved her more than little, less than much.<br /> +<a name="page127"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 127</span>The fair +subservient of Imperial Fact<br /> +Next to his consanguineous was placed<br /> +In ranked esteem; above the diurnal meal,<br /> +Vexatious carnal appetites above,<br /> +Above his hoards, while she Imperial Fact embraced,<br /> +And rose but at command from under heel.<br /> +The love devolvent, the ascension love,<br /> +Receptive or profuse, were fires he lacked,<br /> +Whose marrow had expelled their wasteful sparks;<br /> +Whose mind, the vast machine of endless haste,<br /> +Took up but solids for its glowing seal.<br /> +The hungry love, that fish-like creatures feel,<br /> +Impelled for prize of hooks, for prey of sharks,<br /> +His night’s first quarter sicklied to distaste,<br /> +In warm enjoyment barely might distract.<br /> +A head that held an Europe half devoured<br /> +Taste in the blood’s conceit of pleasure soured.<br /> +Nought save his rounding aim, the means he plied,<br /> +Death for his cause, to him could point appeal.<br /> +His mistress was the thing of uses tried.<br /> +Frigid the netting smile on whom he wooed,<br /> +But on his Policy his eye was lewd.<br /> +That sharp long zig-zag into distance brooked<br /> +No foot across; a shade his ire provoked.<br /> +The blunder or the cruelty of a deed<br /> +His Policy imperative could plead.<br /> +He deemed nought other precious, nor knew he<br /> +Legitimate outside his Policy.<br /> +Men’s lives and works were due, from their birth’s +date,<br /> +To the State’s shield and sword, himself the State.<br /> +He thought for them in mass, as Titan may;<br /> +For their pronounced well-being bade obey;<br /> +O’er each obstructive thicket thunderclapped,<br /> +And straight their easy road to market mapped.<br /> +<a name="page128"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 128</span>Watched +Argus to survey the huge preserves<br /> +He held or coveted; Mars was armed alert<br /> +At sign of motion; yet his brows were murk,<br /> +His gorge would surge, to see the butcher’s work,<br /> +The Reaper’s field; a sensitive in nerves.<br /> +He rode not over men to do them hurt.<br /> +As one who claimed to have for paramour<br /> +Earth’s fairest form, he dealt the cancelling blow;<br /> +Impassioned, still impersonal; to ensure<br /> +Possession; free of rivals, not their foe.</p> +<p class="poetry">The common Tyrant’s frenzies, rancour, +spites,<br /> +He knew as little as men’s claim on rights.<br /> +A kindness for old servants, early friends,<br /> +Was constant in him while they served his ends;<br /> +And if irascible, ’twas the moment’s reek<br /> +From fires diverted by some gusty freak.<br /> +His Policy the act which breeds the act<br /> +Prevised, in issues accurately summed<br /> +From reckonings of men’s tempers, terrors, needs:—<br +/> +That universal army, which he leads<br /> +Who builds Imperial on Imperious Fact.<br /> +Within his hot brain’s hammering workshop hummed<br /> +A thousand furious wheels at whirr, untired<br /> +As Nature in her reproductive throes;<br /> +And did they grate, he spake, and cannon fired:<br /> +The cause being aye the incendiary foes<br /> +Proved by prostration culpable. His dispense<br /> +Of Justice made his active conscience;<br /> +His passive was of ceaseless labour formed.<br /> +So found this Tyrant sanction and repose;<br /> +Humanly just, inhumanly unwarmed.<br /> +<a name="page129"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +129</span>Preventive fencings with the foul intent<br /> +Occult, by him observed and foiled betimes,<br /> +Let fool historians chronicle as crimes.<br /> +His blows were dealt to clear the way he went:<br /> +Too busy sword and mind for needless blows.<br /> +The mighty bird of sky minutest grains<br /> +On ground perceived; in heaven but rays or rains;<br /> +In humankind diversities of masks,<br /> +For rule of men the choice of bait or goads.<br /> +The statesman steered the despot to large tasks;<br /> +The despot drove the statesman on short roads.<br /> +For Order’s cause he laboured, as inclined<br /> +A soldier’s training and his Euclid mind.<br /> +His army unto men he could present<br /> +As model of the perfect instrument.<br /> +That creature, woman, was the sofa soft,<br /> +When warriors their dusty armour doffed,<br /> +And read their manuals for the making truce<br /> +With rosy frailties framed to reproduce.<br /> +He farmed his land, distillingly alive<br /> +For the utmost extract he might have and hive,<br /> +Wherewith to marshal force; and in like scheme,<br /> +Benign shone Hymen’s torch on young love’s dream.<br +/> +Thus to be strong was he beneficent;<br /> +A fount of earth, likewise a firmament.</p> +<p class="poetry">The disputant in words his eye dismayed:<br /> +Opinions blocked his passage. Rent<br /> +Were Councils with a gesture; brayed<br /> +By hoarse camp-phrase what argument<br /> +Dared interpose to waken spleen<br /> +In him whose vision grasped the unseen,<br /> +Whose counsellor was the ready blade,<br /> +Whose argument the cannonade.<br /> +<a name="page130"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 130</span>He +loathed his land’s divergent parties, loth<br /> +To grant them speech, they were such idle troops;<br /> +The friable and the grumous, dizzards both.<br /> +Men were good sticks his mastery wrought from hoops;<br /> +Some serviceable, none credible on oath.<br /> +The silly preference they nursed to die<br /> +In beds he scorned, and led where they should lie.<br /> +If magic made them pliable for his use,<br /> +Magician he could be by planned surprise.<br /> +For do they see the deuce in human guise,<br /> +As men’s acknowledged head appears the deuce,<br /> +And they will toil with devilish craft and zeal.<br /> +Among them certain vagrant wits that had<br /> +Ideas buzzed; they were the feebly mad;<br /> +Pursuers of a film they hailed ideal;<br /> +But could be dangerous fire-flies for a brain<br /> +Subdued by fact, still amorous of the inane.<br /> +With a breath he blew them out, to beat their wings<br /> +The way of such transfeminated things,<br /> +And France had sense of vacancy in Light.</p> +<p class="poetry">That is the soul’s dead darkness, making +clutch<br /> +Wild hands for aid at muscles within touch;<br /> +Adding to slavery’s chain the stringent twist;<br /> +Even when it brings close surety that aright<br /> +She reads her Tyrant through his golden mist;<br /> +Perceives him fast to a harsher Tyrant bound;<br /> +Self-ridden, self-hunted, captive of his aim;<br /> +Material grandeur’s ape, the Infernal’s hound;<br /> +Enormous, with no infinite around;<br /> +No starred deep sky, no Muse, or lame<br /> +The dusty pattering pinions,<br /> +The voice as through the brazen tube of Fame.</p> +<h4><a name="page131"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +131</span>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">Hugest of engines, a much limited man,<br /> +She saw the Lustrous, her great lord, appear<br /> +Through that smoked glass her last privation brought<br /> +To point her critic eye and spur her thought:<br /> +A heart but to propel Leviathan;<br /> +A spirit that breathed but in earth’s atmosphere.<br /> +Amid the plumed and sceptred ones<br /> +Irradiatingly Jovian,<br /> +The mountain tower capped by the floating cloud;<br /> +A nursery screamer where dialectics ruled:<br /> +Mannerless, graceless, laughterless, unlike<br /> +Herself in all, yet with such power to strike,<br /> +That she the various features she could scan<br /> +Dared not to sum, though seeing: and befooled<br /> +By power which beamed omnipotent, she bowed,<br /> +Subservient as roused echo round his guns.<br /> +Invulnerable Prince of Myrmidons,<br /> +He sparkled, by no sage Athene schooled.<br /> +Partly she read her riddle, stricken and pained;<br /> +But irony, her spirit’s tongue, restrained.<br /> +The Critic, last of vital in the proud<br /> +Enslaved, when most detectively endowed,<br /> +Admired how irony’s venom off him ran,<br /> +Like rain-drops down a statue cast in bronze:<br /> +Whereby of her keen rapier disarmed,<br /> +Again her chant of eulogy began,<br /> +Protesting, but with slavish senses charmed.</p> +<p class="poetry">Her warrior, chief among the valorous great<br +/> +In arms he was, dispelling shades of blame,<br /> +With radiance palpable in fruit and weight.<br /> +Heard she reproach, his victories blared response;<br /> +His victories bent the Critic to acclaim,<br /> +As with fresh blows upon a ringing sconce.<br /> +<a name="page132"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 132</span>Or heard +she from scarred ranks of jolly growls<br /> +His veterans dwarf their reverence and, like owls,<br /> +Laugh in the pitch of discord, to exalt<br /> +Their idol for some genial trick or fault,<br /> +She, too, became his marching veteran.<br /> +Again she took her breath from them who bore<br /> +His eagles through the tawny roar,<br /> +And murmured at a peaceful state,<br /> +That bred the title charlatan,<br /> +As missile from the mouth of hate,<br /> +For one the daemon fierily filled and hurled,<br /> +Cannon his name,<br /> +Shattering against a barrier world;<br /> +Her supreme player of man’s primaeval game.</p> +<p class="poetry">The daemon filled him, and he filled her +sons;<br /> +Strung them to stature over human height,<br /> +As march the standards down the smoky fight;<br /> +Her cherubim, her towering mastodons!<br /> +Directed vault or breach, break through<br /> +Earth’s toughest, seasons, elements, tame;<br /> +Dash at the bulk the sharpened few;<br /> +Count death the smallest of their debts:<br /> +Show that the will to do<br /> +Is masculine and begets!</p> +<p class="poetry">These princes unto him the mother owed;<br /> +These jewels of manhood that rich hand bestowed.<br /> +What wonder, though with wits awake<br /> +To read her riddle, for these her offspring’s +sake;—<br /> +And she, before high heaven adulteress,<br /> +The lost to honour, in his glory clothed,<br /> +Else naked, shamed in sight of men, self-loathed;—<br /> +That she should quench her thought, nor worship less<br /> +Than ere she bled on sands or snows and knew<br /> +The slave’s alternative, to worship or to rue!</p> +<h4><a name="page133"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +133</span>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Bright from the shell of that much limited +man,<br /> +Her hero, like the falchion out of sheath,<br /> +Like soul that quits the tumbled body, soared:<br /> +And France, impulsive, nuptial with his plan,<br /> +Albeit the Critic fretting her, adored<br /> +Once more. Exultingly her heart went forth,<br /> +Submissive to his mind and mood,<br /> +The way of those pent-eyebrows North;<br /> +For now was he to win the wreath<br /> +Surpassing sunniest in camp or Court;<br /> +Next, as the blessed harvest after years of blight,<br /> +Sit, the Great Emperor, to be known the Good!</p> +<p class="poetry">Now had the Seaman’s volvent sprite,<br +/> +Lean from the chase that barked his contraband,<br /> +A beggared applicant at every port,<br /> +To strew the profitless deeps and rot beneath,<br /> +Slung northward, for a hunted beast’s retort<br /> +On sovereign power; there his final stand,<br /> +Among the perjured Scythian’s shaggy horde,<br /> +The hydrocephalic aërolite<br /> +Had taken; flashing thence repellent teeth,<br /> +Though Europe’s Master Europe’s Rebel banned<br /> +To be earth’s outcast, ocean’s lord and sport.</p> +<p class="poetry">Unmoved might seem the Master’s taunted +sword.<br /> +Northward his dusky legions nightly slipped,<br /> +As on the map of that all-provident head;<br /> +He luting Peace the while, like morning’s cock<br /> +The quiet day to round the hours for bed;<br /> +No pastoral shepherd sweeter to his flock.<br /> +Then Europe first beheld her Titan stripped.<br /> +To what vast length of limb and mounds of thews,<br /> +<a name="page134"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 134</span>How +trained to scale the eminences, pluck<br /> +The hazards for new footing, how compel<br /> +Those timely incidents by men named luck,<br /> +Through forethought that defied the Fates to choose,<br /> +Her grovelling admiration had not yet<br /> +Imagined of the great man-miracle;<br /> +And France recounted with her comic smile<br /> +Duplicities of Court and Cabinet,<br /> +The silky female of his male in guile,<br /> +Wherewith her two-faced Master could amuse<br /> +A dupe he charmed in sunny beams to bask,<br /> +Before his feint for camisado struck<br /> +The lightning moment of the cast-off mask.</p> +<p class="poetry">Splendours of earth repeating heaven’s at +set<br /> +Of sun down mountain cloud in masses arched;<br /> +Since Asia upon Europe marched,<br /> +Unmatched the copious multitudes; unknown<br /> +To Gallia’s over-runner, Rome’s inveterate foe,<br /> +Such hosts; all one machine for overthrow,<br /> +Coruscant from the Master’s hand, compact<br /> +As reasoned thoughts in the Master’s head; were shown<br /> +Yon lightning moment when his acme might<br /> +Blazed o’er the stream that cuts the sandy tract<br /> +Borussian from Sarmatia’s famished flat;<br /> +The century’s flower; and off its pinnacled throne,<br /> +Rayed servitude on Europe’s ball of sight.</p> +<h4>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Behind the Northern curtain-folds he passed.<br +/> +There heard hushed France her muffled heart beat fast<br /> +Against the hollow ear-drum, where she sat<br /> +In expectation’s darkness, until cracked<br /> +<a name="page135"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 135</span>The +straining curtain-seams: a scaly light<br /> +Was ghost above an army under shroud.<br /> +Imperious on Imperial Fact<br /> +Incestuously the incredible begat.<br /> +His veterans and auxiliaries,<br /> +The trained, the trustful, sanguine, proud,<br /> +Princely, scarce numerable to recite,—<br /> +Titanic of all Titan tragedies!—<br /> +That Northern curtain took them, as the seas<br /> +Gulp the great ships to give back shipmen white.</p> +<p class="poetry">Alive in marble, she conceived in soul,<br /> +With barren eyes and mouth, the mother’s loss;<br /> +The bolt from her abandoned heaven sped;<br /> +The snowy army rolling knoll on knoll<br /> +Beyond horizon, under no blest Cross:<br /> +By the vulture dotted and engarlanded.</p> +<p class="poetry">Was it a necromancer lured<br /> +To weave his tense betraying spell?<br /> +A Titan whom our God endured<br /> +Till he of his foul hungers fell,<br /> +By all his craft and labour scourged?<br /> +A deluge Europe’s liberated wave,<br /> +Pæan to sky, leapt over that vast grave.<br /> +Its shadow-points against her sacred land converged.<br /> +And him, her yoke-fellow, her black lord, her fate,<br /> +In doubt, in fevered hope, in chills of hate,<br /> +That tore her old credulity to strips,<br /> +Then pressed the auspicious relics on her lips,<br /> +His withered slave for foregone miracles urged.<br /> +And he, whom now his ominous halo’s round,<br /> +A three parts blank decrescent sickle, crowned,<br /> +Prodigious in catastrophe, could wear<br /> +The realm of Darkness with its Prince’s air;<br /> +<a name="page136"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 136</span>Assume +in mien the resolute pretence<br /> +To satiate an hungered confidence,<br /> +Proved criminal by the sceptic seen to cower<br /> +Beside the generous face of that frail flower.</p> +<h4>XIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Desire and terror then had each of each:<br /> +His crown and sword were staked on the magic stroke;<br /> +Her blood she gave as one who loved her leech;<br /> +And both did barter under union’s cloak.<br /> +An union in hot fever and fierce need<br /> +Of either’s aid, distrust in trust did breed.<br /> +Their traffic instincts hooded their live wits<br /> +To issues. Never human fortune throve<br /> +On such alliance. Viewed by fits,<br /> +From Vulcan’s forge a hovering Jove<br /> +Evolved. The slave he dragged the Tyrant drove.<br /> +Her awe of him his dread of her invoked:<br /> +His nature with her shivering faith ran yoked.<br /> +What wisdom counselled, Policy declined;<br /> +All perils dared he save the step behind.<br /> +Ahead his grand initiative becked:<br /> +One spark of radiance blurred, his orb was wrecked.<br /> +Stripped to the despot upstart, for success<br /> +He raged to clothe a perilous nakedness.<br /> +He would not fall, while falling; would not be taught,<br /> +While learning; would not relax his grasp on aught<br /> +He held in hand, while losing it; pressed advance,<br /> +Pricked for her lees the veins of wasted France;<br /> +Who, had he stayed to husband her, had spun<br /> +The strength he taxed unripened for his throw,<br /> +In vengeful casts calamitous,<br /> +On fields where palsying Pyrrhic laurels grow,<br /> +The luminous the ruinous.<br /> +An incalescent scorpion,<br /> +<a name="page137"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 137</span>And +fierier for the mounded cirque<br /> +That narrowed at him thick and murk,<br /> +This gambler with his genius<br /> +Flung lives in angry volleys, bloody lightnings, flung<br /> +His fortunes to the hosts he stung,<br /> +With victories clipped his eagle’s wings.<br /> +By the hands that built him up was he undone:<br /> +By the star aloft, which was his ram’s-head will<br /> +Within; by the toppling throne the soldier won;<br /> +By the yeasty ferment of what once had been,<br /> +To cloud a rational mind for present things;<br /> +By his own force, the suicide in his mill.<br /> +Needs never God of Vengeance intervene<br /> +When giants their last lesson have to learn.<br /> +Fighting against an end he could discern,<br /> +The chivalry whereof he had none<br /> +He called from his worn slave’s abundant springs:<br /> +Not deigning spousally entreat<br /> +That ever blinded by his martial skill,<br /> +But harsh to have her worship counted out<br /> +In human coin, her vital rivers drained,<br /> +Her infant forests felled, commanded die<br /> +The decade thousand deaths for his Imperial seat,<br /> +Where throning he her faith in him maintained;<br /> +Bound Reason to believe delayed defeat<br /> +Was triumph; and what strength in her remained<br /> +To head against the ultimate foreseen rout,<br /> +Insensate taxed; of his impenitent will,<br /> +Servant and sycophant: without ally,<br /> +In Python’s coils, the Master Craftsman still;<br /> +The smiter, panther springer, trapper sly,<br /> +The deadly wrestler at the crucial bout,<br /> +The penetrant, the tonant, tower of towers,<br /> +Striking from black disaster starry showers.<br /> +Her supreme player of man’s primaeval game,<br /> +<a name="page138"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 138</span>He won +his harnessed victim’s rapturous shout,<br /> +When every move was mortal to her frame,<br /> +Her prayer to life that stricken he might lie,<br /> +She to exchange his laurels for earth’s flowers.</p> +<p class="poetry">The innumerable whelmed him, and he fell:<br /> +A vessel in mid-ocean under storm.<br /> +Ere ceased the lullaby of his passing bell,<br /> +He sprang to sight, in human form<br /> +Revealed, from no celestial aids:<br /> +The shades enclosed him, and he fired the shades.</p> +<p class="poetry">Cannon his name,<br /> +Cannon his voice, he came.<br /> +The fount of miracles from drought-dust arose,<br /> +Amazing even on his Imperial stage,<br /> +Where marvels lightened through the alternate hours<br /> +And winged o’er human earth’s heroical shone.<br /> +Into the press of cumulative foes,<br /> +Across the friendly fields of smoke and rage,<br /> +A broken structure bore his furious powers;<br /> +The man no more, the Warrior Chief the same;<br /> +Match for all rivals; in himself but flame<br /> +Of an outworn lamp, to illumine nought anon.<br /> +Yet loud as when he first showed War’s effete<br /> +Their Schoolman off his eagre mounted high,<br /> +And summoned to subject who dared compete,<br /> +The cannon in the name Napoleon<br /> +Discoursed of sulphur earth to curtained sky.<br /> +So through a tropic day a regnant sun,<br /> +Where armies of assailant vapours thronged,<br /> +His glory’s trappings laid on them: comes night,<br /> +Enwraps him in a bosom quick of heat<br /> +From his anterior splendours, and shall seem<br /> +Day instant, Day’s own lord in the furnace gleam,<br /> +The virulent quiver on ravished eyes prolonged,<br /> +<a name="page139"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 139</span>When +severed darkness, all flaminical bright,<br /> +Slips vivid eagles linked in rapid flight;<br /> +Which bring at whiles the lionly far roar,<br /> +As wrestled he with manacles and gags,<br /> +To speed across a cowering world once more,<br /> +Superb in ordered floods, his lordly flags.<br /> +His name on silence thundered, on the obscure<br /> +Lightened; it haunted morn and even-song:<br /> +Earth of her prodigy’s extinction long,<br /> +With shudderings and with thrillings, hung unsure.</p> +<p class="poetry">Snapped was the chord that made the resonant +bow,<br /> +In France, abased and like a shrunken corse;<br /> +Amid the weakest weak, the lowest low,<br /> +From the highest fallen, stagnant off her source;<br /> +Condemned to hear the nations’ hostile mirth;<br /> +See curtained heavens, and smell a sulphurous earth;<br /> +Which told how evermore shall tyrant Force<br /> +Beget the greater for its overthrow.<br /> +The song of Liberty in her hearing spoke<br /> +A foreign tongue; Earth’s fluttering little lyre<br /> +Unlike, but like the raven’s ravening croak.<br /> +Not till her breath of being could aspire<br /> +Anew, this loved and scourged of Angels found<br /> +Our common brotherhood in sight and sound:<br /> +When mellow rang the name Napoleon,<br /> +And dim aloft her young Angelical waved.<br /> +Between ethereal and gross to choose,<br /> +She swung; her soul desired, her senses craved.<br /> +They pricked her dreams, while oft her skies were dun<br /> +Behind o’ershadowing foemen: on a tide<br /> +They drew the nature having need of pride<br /> +Among her fellows for its vital dues:<br /> +He seen like some rare treasure-galleon,<br /> +Hull down, with masts against the Western hues.</p> +<h3><a name="page140"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +140</span>FRANCE<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">DECEMBER 1870</span> <a +name="citation140"></a><a href="#footnote140" +class="citation">[140]</a></h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">We</span> look for her that +sunlike stood<br /> +Upon the forehead of our day,<br /> +An orb of nations, radiating food<br /> +For body and for mind alway.<br /> +Where is the Shape of glad array;<br /> +The nervous hands, the front of steel,<br /> +The clarion tongue? Where is the bold proud face?<br /> +We see a vacant place;<br /> +We hear an iron heel.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">O she that made the brave appeal<br /> +For manhood when our time was dark,<br /> +And from our fetters drove the spark<br /> +Which was as lightning to reveal<br /> +New seasons, with the swifter play<br /> +Of pulses, and benigner day;<br /> +She that divinely shook the dead<br /> +From living man; that stretched ahead<br /> +Her resolute forefinger straight,<br /> +And marched toward the gloomy gate<br /> +Of earth’s Untried, gave note, and in<br /> +The good name of Humanity<br /> +Called forth the daring vision! she,<br /> +She likewise half corrupt of sin,<br /> +Angel and Wanton! can it be?<br /> +<a name="page141"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 141</span>Her star +has foundered in eclipse,<br /> +The shriek of madness on her lips;<br /> +Shreds of her, and no more, we see.<br /> +There is horrible convulsion, smothered din,<br /> +As of one that in a grave-cloth struggles to be free.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Look not for spreading boughs<br /> +On the riven forest tree.<br /> +Look down where deep in blood and mire<br /> +Black thunder plants his feet and ploughs<br /> +The soil for ruin: that is France:<br /> +Still thrilling like a lyre,<br /> +Amazed to shivering discord from a fall<br /> +Sudden as that the lurid hosts recall<br /> +Who met in heaven the irreparable mischance.<br /> +O that is France!<br /> +The brilliant eyes to kindle bliss,<br /> +The shrewd quick lips to laugh and kiss,<br /> +Breasts that a sighing world inspire,<br /> +And laughter-dimpled countenance<br /> +Where soul and senses caught desire!</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Ever invoking fire from heaven, the fire<br /> +Has grasped her, unconsumable, but framed<br /> +For all the ecstasies of suffering dire.<br /> +Mother of Pride, her sanctuary shamed:<br /> +Mother of Delicacy, and made a mark<br /> +For outrage: Mother of Luxury, stripped stark:<br /> +Mother of Heroes, bondsmen: thro’ the rains,<br /> +Across her boundaries, lo the league-long chains!<br /> +Fond Mother of her martial youth; they pass,<br /> +Are spectres in her sight, are mown as grass!<br /> +<a name="page142"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 142</span>Mother +of Honour, and dishonoured: Mother<br /> +Of Glory, she condemned to crown with bays<br /> +Her victor, and be fountain of his praise.<br /> +Is there another curse? There is another:<br /> +Compassionate her madness: is she not<br /> +Mother of Reason? she that sees them mown<br /> +Like grass, her young ones! Yea, in the low groan<br /> +And under the fixed thunder of this hour<br /> +Which holds the animate world in one foul blot<br /> +Tranced circumambient while relentless Power<br /> +Beaks at her heart and claws her limbs down-thrown,<br /> +She, with the plungeing lightnings overshot,<br /> +With madness for an armour against pain,<br /> +With milkless breasts for little ones athirst,<br /> +And round her all her noblest dying in vain,<br /> +Mother of Reason is she, trebly cursed,<br /> +To feel, to see, to justify the blow;<br /> +Chamber to chamber of her sequent brain<br /> +Gives answer of the cause of her great woe,<br /> +Inexorably echoing thro’ the vaults,<br /> +‘’Tis thus they reap in blood, in blood who sow:<br +/> +‘This is the sum of self-absolvëd faults.’<br /> +Doubt not that thro’ her grief, with sight supreme,<br /> +Thro’ her delirium and despair’s last dream,<br /> +Thro’ pride, thro’ bright illusion and the brood<br +/> +Bewildering of her various Motherhood,<br /> +The high strong light within her, tho’ she bleeds,<br /> +Traces the letters of returned misdeeds.<br /> +She sees what seed long sown, ripened of late,<br /> +Bears this fierce crop; and she discerns her fate<br /> +From origin to agony, and on<br /> +As far as the wave washes long and wan<br /> +Off one disastrous impulse: for of waves<br /> +Our life is, and our deeds are pregnant graves<br /> +Blown rolling to the sunset from the dawn.</p> +<h4><a name="page143"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +143</span>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Ah, what a dawn of splendour, when her +sowers<br /> +Went forth and bent the necks of populations<br /> +And of their terrors and humiliations<br /> +Wove her the starry wreath that earthward lowers<br /> +Now in the figure of a burning yoke!<br /> +Her legions traversed North and South and East,<br /> +Of triumph they enjoyed the glutton’s feast:<br /> +They grafted the green sprig, they lopped the oak.<br /> +They caught by the beard the tempests, by the scalp<br /> +The icy precipices, and clove sheer through<br /> +The heart of horror of the pinnacled Alp,<br /> +Emerging not as men whom mortals knew.<br /> +They were the earthquake and the hurricane,<br /> +The lightnings and the locusts, plagues of blight,<br /> +Plagues of the revel: they were Deluge rain,<br /> +And dreaded Conflagration; lawless Might.<br /> +Death writes a reeling line along the snows,<br /> +Where under frozen mists they may be tracked,<br /> +Who men and elements provoked to foes,<br /> +And Gods: they were of god and beast compact:<br /> +Abhorred of all. Yet, how they sucked the teats<br /> +Of Carnage, thirsty issue of their dam,<br /> +Whose eagles, angrier than their oriflamme,<br /> +Flushed the vext earth with blood, green earth forgets.<br /> +The gay young generations mask her grief;<br /> +Where bled her children hangs the loaded sheaf.<br /> +Forgetful is green earth; the Gods alone<br /> +Remember everlastingly: they strike<br /> +Remorselessly, and ever like for like.<br /> +By their great memories the Gods are known.</p> +<h4><a name="page144"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +144</span>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">They are with her now, and in her ears, and +known.<br /> +’Tis they that cast her to the dust for Strength,<br /> +Their slave, to feed on her fair body’s length,<br /> +That once the sweetest and the proudest shone;<br /> +Scoring for hideous dismemberment<br /> +Her limbs, as were the anguish-taking breath<br /> +Gone out of her in the insufferable descent<br /> +From her high chieftainship; as were she death,<br /> +Who hears a voice of justice, feels the knife<br /> +Of torture, drinks all ignominy of life.<br /> +They are with her, and the painful Gods might weep,<br /> +If ever rain of tears came out of heaven<br /> +To flatter Weakness and bid conscience sleep,<br /> +Viewing the woe of this Immortal, driven<br /> +For the soul’s life to drain the maddening cup<br /> +Of her own children’s blood implacably:<br /> +Unsparing even as they to furrow up<br /> +The yellow land to likeness of a sea:<br /> +The bountiful fair land of vine and grain,<br /> +Of wit and grace and ardour, and strong roots,<br /> +Fruits perishable, imperishable fruits;<br /> +Furrowed to likeness of the dim grey main<br /> +Behind the black obliterating cyclone.</p> +<h4>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Behold, the Gods are with her, and are +known.<br /> +Whom they abandon misery persecutes<br /> +No more: them half-eyed apathy may loan<br /> +The happiness of pitiable brutes.<br /> +Whom the just Gods abandon have no light,<br /> +No ruthless light of introspective eyes<br /> +That in the midst of misery scrutinize<br /> +The heart and its iniquities outright.<br /> +<a name="page145"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 145</span>They +rest, they smile and rest; have earned perchance<br /> +Of ancient service quiet for a term;<br /> +Quiet of old men dropping to the worm;<br /> +And so goes out the soul. But not of France.<br /> +She cries for grief, and to the Gods she cries,<br /> +For fearfully their loosened hands chastize,<br /> +And icily they watch the rod’s caress<br /> +Ravage her flesh from scourges merciless,<br /> +But she, inveterate of brain, discerns<br /> +That Pity has as little place as Joy<br /> +Among their roll of gifts; for Strength she yearns.<br /> +For Strength, her idol once, too long her toy.<br /> +Lo, Strength is of the plain root-Virtues born:<br /> +Strength shall ye gain by service, prove in scorn,<br /> +Train by endurance, by devotion shape.<br /> +Strength is not won by miracle or rape.<br /> +It is the offspring of the modest years,<br /> +The gift of sire to son, thro’ those firm laws<br /> +Which we name Gods; which are the righteous cause,<br /> +The cause of man, and manhood’s ministers.<br /> +Could France accept the fables of her priests,<br /> +Who blest her banners in this game of beasts,<br /> +And now bid hope that heaven will intercede<br /> +To violate its laws in her sore need,<br /> +She would find comfort in their opiates:<br /> +Mother of Reason! can she cheat the Fates?<br /> +Would she, the champion of the open mind,<br /> +The Omnipotent’s prime gift—the gift of +growth—<br /> +Consent even for a night-time to be blind,<br /> +And sink her soul on the delusive sloth,<br /> +For fruits ethereal and material, both,<br /> +In peril of her place among mankind?<br /> +The Mother of the many Laughters might<br /> +Call one poor shade of laughter in the light<br /> +<a name="page146"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 146</span>Of her +unwavering lamp to mark what things<br /> +The world puts faith in, careless of the truth:<br /> +What silly puppet-bodies danced on strings,<br /> +Attached by credence, we appear in sooth,<br /> +Demanding intercession, direct aid,<br /> +When the whole tragic tale hangs on a broken blade!</p> +<p class="poetry">She swung the sword for centuries; in a day<br +/> +It slipped her, like a stream cut off from source.<br /> +She struck a feeble hand, and tried to pray,<br /> +Clamoured of treachery, and had recourse<br /> +To drunken outcries in her dream that Force<br /> +Needed but hear her shouting to obey.<br /> +Was she not formed to conquer? The bright plumes<br /> +Of crested vanity shed graceful nods:<br /> +Transcendent in her foundries, Arts and looms,<br /> +Had France to fear the vengeance of the Gods?<br /> +Her faith was on her battle-roll of names<br /> +Sheathed in the records of old war; with dance<br /> +And song she thrilled her warriors and her dames,<br /> +Embracing her Dishonour: gave him France<br /> +From head to foot, France present and to come,<br /> +So she might hear the trumpet and the drum—<br /> +Bellona and Bacchante! rushing forth<br /> +On yon stout marching Schoolmen of the North.</p> +<p class="poetry">Inveterate of brain, well knows she why<br /> +Strength failed her, faithful to himself the first:<br /> +Her dream is done, and she can read the sky,<br /> +And she can take into her heart the worst<br /> +Calamity to drug the shameful thought<br /> +Of days that made her as the man she served<br /> +A name of terror, but a thing unnerved:<br /> +Buying the trickster, by the trickster bought,<br /> +She for dominion, he to patch a throne.</p> +<h4><a name="page147"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +147</span>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Henceforth of her the Gods are known,<br /> +Open to them her breast is laid.<br /> +Inveterate of brain, heart-valiant,<br /> +Never did fairer creature pant<br /> +Before the altar and the blade!</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Swift fall the blows, and men upbraid,<br /> +And friends give echo blunt and cold,<br /> +The echo of the forest to the axe.<br /> +Within her are the fires that wax<br /> +For resurrection from the mould.</p> +<h4>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">She snatched at heaven’s flame of old,<br +/> +And kindled nations: she was weak:<br /> +Frail sister of her heroic prototype,<br /> +The Man; for sacrifice unripe,<br /> +She too must fill a Vulture’s beak.<br /> +Deride the vanquished, and acclaim<br /> +The conqueror, who stains her fame,<br /> +Still the Gods love her, for that of high aim<br /> +Is this good France, the bleeding thing they stripe.</p> +<h4>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">She shall rise worthier of her prototype<br /> +Thro’ her abasement deep; the pain that runs<br /> +From nerve to nerve some victory achieves.<br /> +They lie like circle-strewn soaked Autumn-leaves<br /> +Which stain the forest scarlet, her fair sons!<br /> +And of their death her life is: of their blood<br /> +From many streams now urging to a flood,<br /> +<a name="page148"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 148</span>No more +divided, France shall rise afresh.<br /> +Of them she learns the lesson of the flesh:—<br /> +The lesson writ in red since first Time ran,<br /> +A hunter hunting down the beast in man:<br /> +That till the chasing out of its last vice,<br /> +The flesh was fashioned but for sacrifice.</p> +<p class="poetry">Immortal Mother of a mortal host!<br /> +Thou suffering of the wounds that will not slay,<br /> +Wounds that bring death but take not life away!—<br /> +Stand fast and hearken while thy victors boast:<br /> +Hearken, and loathe that music evermore.<br /> +Slip loose thy garments woven of pride and shame:<br /> +The torture lurks in them, with them the blame<br /> +Shall pass to leave thee purer than before.<br /> +Undo thy jewels, thinking whence they came,<br /> +For what, and of the abominable name<br /> +Of her who in imperial beauty wore.</p> +<p class="poetry">O Mother of a fated fleeting host<br /> +Conceived in the past days of sin, and born<br /> +Heirs of disease and arrogance and scorn,<br /> +Surrender, yield the weight of thy great ghost,<br /> +Like wings on air, to what the heavens proclaim<br /> +With trumpets from the multitudinous mounds<br /> +Where peace has filled the hearing of thy sons:<br /> +Albeit a pang of dissolution rounds<br /> +Each new discernment of the undying ones,<br /> +Do thou stoop to these graves here scattered wide<br /> +Along thy fields, as sunless billows roll;<br /> +These ashes have the lesson for the soul.<br /> +‘Die to thy Vanity, and strain thy Pride,<br /> +Strip off thy Luxury: that thou may’st live,<br /> +Die to thyself,’ they say, ‘as we have died<br /> +From dear existence and the foe forgive,<br /> +<a name="page149"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 149</span>Nor pray +for aught save in our little space<br /> +To warn good seed to greet the fair earth’s face.’<br +/> +O Mother! take their counsel, and so shall<br /> +The broader world breathe in on this thy home,<br /> +Light clear for thee the counter-changing dome,<br /> +Strength give thee, like an ocean’s vast expanse<br /> +Off mountain cliffs, the generations all,<br /> +Not whirling in their narrow rings of foam,<br /> +But as a river forward. Soaring France!<br /> +Now is Humanity on trial in thee:<br /> +Now may’st thou gather humankind in fee:<br /> +Now prove that Reason is a quenchless scroll;<br /> +Make of calamity thine aureole,<br /> +And bleeding head us thro’ the troubles of the sea.</p> +<h3><a name="page150"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +150</span>ALSACE-LORRAINE</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">The</span> sister Hours in +circles linked,<br /> +Daughters of men, of men the mates,<br /> +Are gone on flow with the day that winked,<br /> +With the night that spanned at golden gates.<br /> +Mothers, they leave us, quickening seed;<br /> +They bear us grain or flower or weed,<br /> +As we have sown; is nought extinct<br /> +For them we fill to be our Fates.<br /> +Life of the breath is but the loan;<br /> +Passing death what we have sown.</p> +<p class="poetry">Pearly are they till the pale inherited +stain<br /> +Deepens in us, and the mirrors they form on their flow<br /> +Darken to feature and nature: a volumed chain,<br /> +Sequent of issue, in various eddies they show.<br /> +Theirs is the Book of the River of Life, to read<br /> +Leaf by leaf by reapers of long-sown seed:<br /> +There doth our shoot up to light from a spiriting sane<br /> +Stand as a tree whereon numberless clusters grow:<br /> +Legible there how the heart, with its one false move<br /> +Cast Eurydice pallor on all we love.</p> +<p class="poetry">Our fervid heart has filled that Book in +chief;<br /> +Our fitful heart a wild reflection views;<br /> +Our craving heart of passion suckling grief<br /> +Disowns the author’s work it must peruse;<br /> +Inconscient in its leap to wreak the deed,<br /> +A round of harvests red from crimson seed,<br /> +<a name="page151"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 151</span>It marks +the current Hours show leaf by leaf,<br /> +And rails at Destiny; nor traces clues;<br /> +Though sometimes it may think what novel light<br /> +Will strike their faces when the mind shall write.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Succourful daughters of men are the rosed and +starred<br /> +Revolving Twelves in their fluent germinal rings,<br /> +Despite the burden to chasten, abase, depose.<br /> +Fallen on France, as the sweep of scythe over sward,<br /> +They breathed in her ear their voice of the crystal springs,<br +/> +That run from a twilight rise, from a twilight close,<br /> +Through alternate beams and glooms, rejoicingly young.<br /> +Only to Earth’s best loved, at the breathless turns<br /> +Where Life in fold of the Shadow reclines unstrung,<br /> +And a ghostly lamp of their moment’s union burns,<br /> +Will such pure notes from the fountain-head be sung.</p> +<p class="poetry">Voice of Earth’s very soul to the soul +she would see renewed:<br /> +A song that sought no tears, that laid not a touch on the +breast<br /> +Sobbing aswoon and, like last foxgloves’ bells upon +ferns<br /> +In sandy alleys of woodland silence, shedding to bare.<br /> +Daughters of Earth and men, they piped of her natural brood;<br +/> +Her patient helpful four-feet; wings on the flit or in nest;<br +/> +Paws at our old-world task to scoop a defensive lair;<br /> +Snouts at hunt through the scented grasses; enhavened scuts<br /> +Flashing escape under show of a laugh nigh the mossed +burrow-mouth.<br /> +Sack-like droop bronze pears on the nailed branch-frontage of +huts,<br /> +<a name="page152"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 152</span>To greet +those wedded toilers from acres where sweat is a shower.<br /> +Snake, cicada, lizard, on lavender slopes up South,<br /> +Pant for joy of a sunlight driving the fielders to bower.<br /> +Sharpened in silver by one chance breeze is the olive’s +grey;<br /> +A royal-mantle floats, a red fritillary hies;<br /> +The bee, for whom no flower of garden or wild has nay,<br /> +Noises, heard if but named, so hot is the trade he plies.<br /> +Processions beneath green arches of herbage, the long +colonnades;<br /> +Laboured mounds that a foot or a wanton stick may subvert;<br /> +Homely are they for a lowly look on bedewed grass-blades,<br /> +On citied fir-droppings, on twisted wreaths of the worm in +dirt.<br /> +Does nought so loosen our sight from the despot heart, to +receive<br /> +Balm of a sound Earth’s primary heart at its active +beat:<br /> +The motive, yet servant, of energy; simple as morn and eve;<br /> +Treasureless, fetterless; free of the bonds of a great +conceit:<br /> +Unwounded even by cruel blows on a body that writhes;<br /> +Nor whimpering under misfortune; elusive of obstacles; prompt<br +/> +To quit any threatened familiar domain seen doomed by the +scythes;<br /> +Its day’s hard business done, the score to the good +accompt.<br /> +<a name="page153"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +153</span>Creatures of forest and mead, Earth’s essays in +being, all kinds<br /> +Bound by the navel-knot to the Mother, never astray,<br /> +They in the ear upon ground will pour their intuitive minds,<br +/> +Cut man’s tangles for Earth’s first broad rectilinear +way:<br /> +Admonishing loftier reaches, the rich adventurous shoots,<br /> +Pushes of tentative curves, embryonic upwreathings in air;<br /> +Not always the sprouts of Earth’s root-Laws preserving her +brutes;<br /> +Oft but our primitive hungers licentious in fine and fair.</p> +<p class="poetry">Yet the like aërial growths may chance be +the delicate sprays,<br /> +Infant of Earth’s most urgent in sap, her fierier zeal<br +/> +For entry on Life’s upper fields: and soul thus flourishing +pays<br /> +The martyr’s penance, mark for brutish in man to heel.</p> +<p class="poetry">Her, from a nerveless well among stagnant pools +of the dry,<br /> +Through her good aim at divine, shall commune with Earth +remake;<br /> +Fraternal unto sororial, her, where abashed she may lie,<br /> +Divinest of man shall clasp; a world out of darkness awake,<br /> +As it were with the Resurrection’s eyelids uplifted, to +see<br /> +Honour in shame, in substance the spirit, in that dry fount<br /> +Jets of the songful ascending silvery-bright water-tree<br /> +Spout, with our Earth’s unbaffled resurgent desire for the +mount,<br /> +Though broken at intervals, clipped, and barren in seeming it +be.<br /> +<a name="page154"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 154</span>For this +at our nature arises rejuvenescent from Earth,<br /> +However respersive the blow and nigh on infernal the fall,<br /> +The chastisement drawn down on us merited: are we of worth<br /> +Amid our satanic excrescences, this, for the less than a call,<br +/> +Will Earth reprime, man cherish; the God who is in us and +round,<br /> +Consenting, the God there seen. Impiety speaks despair;<br +/> +Religion the virtue of serving as things of the furrowy +ground,<br /> +Debtors for breath while breath with our fellows in service we +share.<br /> +Not such of the crowned discrowned<br /> +Can Earth or humanity spare;<br /> +Such not the God let die.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">Eastward of Paris morn is high;<br /> +And darkness on that Eastward side<br /> +The heart of France beholds: a thorn<br /> +Is in her frame where shines the morn:<br /> +A rigid wave usurps her sky,<br /> +With eagle crest and eagle-eyed<br /> +To scan what wormy wrinkles hint<br /> +Her forces gathering: she the thrown<br /> +From station, lopped of an arm, astounded, lone,<br /> +Reading late History as a foul misprint:<br /> +Imperial, Angelical,<br /> +At strife commingled in her frame convulsed;<br /> +Shame of her broken sword, a ravening gall;<br /> +Pain of the limb where once her warm blood pulsed;<br /> +<a name="page155"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 155</span>These +tortures to distract her underneath<br /> +Her whelmed Aurora’s shade. But in that space<br /> +When lay she dumb beside her trampled wreath,<br /> +Like an unburied body mid the tombs,<br /> +Feeling against her heart life’s bitter probe<br /> +For life, she saw how children of her race,<br /> +The many sober sons and daughters, plied,<br /> +By cottage lamplight through the water-globe,<br /> +By simmering stew-pots, by the serious looms,<br /> +Afield, in factories, with the birds astir,<br /> +Their nimble feet and fingers; not denied<br /> +Refreshful chatter, laughter, galliard songs.<br /> +So like Earth’s indestructible they were,<br /> +That wrestling with its anguish rose her pride,<br /> +To feel where in each breast the thought of her,<br /> +On whom the circle Hours laid leaded thongs,<br /> +Was constant; spoken sometimes in low tone<br /> +At lip or in a fluttered look,<br /> +A shortened breath: and they were her loved own;<br /> +Nor ever did they waste their strength with tears,<br /> +For pity of the weeper, nor rebuke,<br /> +Though mainly they were charged to pay her debt,<br /> +The Mother having conscience in arrears;<br /> +Ready to gush the flood of vain regret,<br /> +Else hearken to her weaponed children’s moan<br /> +Of stifled rage invoking vengeance: hell’s,<br /> +If heaven should fail the counter-wave that swells<br /> +In blood and brain for retribution swift.<br /> +Those helped not: wings to her soul were these who yet<br /> +Could welcome day for labour, night for rest,<br /> +Enrich her treasury, built of cheerful thrift,<br /> +Of honest heart, beyond all miracles;<br /> +And likened to Earth’s humblest were Earth’s +best.</p> +<h4><a name="page156"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +156</span>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Brooding on her deep fall, the many strings<br +/> +Which formed her nature set a thought on Kings,<br /> +As aids that might the low-laid cripple lift;<br /> +And one among them hummed devoutly leal,<br /> +While passed the sighing breeze along her breast.<br /> +Of Kings by the festive vanquishers rammed down<br /> +Her gorge since fell the Chief, she knew their crown;<br /> +Upon her through long seasons was its grasp,<br /> +For neither soul’s nor body’s weal;<br /> +As much bestows the robber wasp,<br /> +That in the hanging apple makes a meal,<br /> +And carves a face of abscess where was fruit<br /> +Ripe ruddy. They would blot<br /> +Her radiant leap above the slopes acute,<br /> +Of summit to celestial; impute<br /> +The wanton’s aim to her divinest shot;<br /> +Bid her walk History backward over gaps;<br /> +Abhor the day of Phrygian caps;<br /> +Abjure her guerdon, execrate herself;<br /> +The Hapsburg, Hohenzollern, Guelph,<br /> +Admire repentant; reverently prostrate<br /> +Her person unto the belly-god; of whom<br /> +Is inward plenty and external bloom;<br /> +Enough of pomp and state<br /> +And carnival to quench<br /> +The breast’s desires of an intemperate wench,<br /> +The head’s ideas beyond legitimate.</p> +<p class="poetry">She flung them: she was France: nor with far +frown<br /> +Her lover from the embrace of her refrained:<br /> +But in her voice an interwoven wire,<br /> +The exultation of her gross renown,<br /> +Struck deafness at her heavens, and they waned<br /> +Over a look ill-gifted to aspire.<br /> +<a name="page157"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +157</span>Wherefore, as an abandonment, irate,<br /> +The intemperate summoned up her trumpet days,<br /> +Her treasure-galleon’s wondrous freight.<br /> +The cannon-name she sang and shrieked; transferred<br /> +Her soul’s allegiance; o’er the Tyrant slurred,<br /> +Tranced with the zeal of her first fawning gaze,<br /> +To clasp his trophy flags and hail him Saint.</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">She hailed him Saint:<br /> +And her Jeanne unsainted, foully sung!<br /> +The virgin who conceived a France when funeral glooms<br /> +Across a land aquake with sharp disseverance hung:<br /> +Conceived, and under stress of battle brought her forth;<br /> +Crowned her in purification of feud and foeman’s taint;<br +/> +Taught her to feel her blood her being, know her worth,<br /> +Have joy of unity: the Jeanne bescreeched, bescoffed,<br /> +Who flamed to ashes, flew up wreaths of faggot fumes;<br /> +Through centuries a star in vapour-folds aloft.</p> +<p class="poetry">For her people to hail her Saint,<br /> +Were no lifting of her, Earth’s gem,<br /> +Earth’s chosen, Earth’s throb on divine:<br /> +In the ranks of the starred she is one,<br /> +While man has thought on our line:<br /> +No lifting of her, but for them,<br /> +Breath of the mountain, beam of the sun<br /> +Through mist, out of swamp-fires’ lures release,<br /> +Youth on the forehead, the rough right way<br /> +Seen to be footed: for them the heart’s peace,<br /> +By the mind’s war won for a permanent miracle day.</p> +<p class="poetry">Her arms below her sword-hilt crossed,<br /> +The heart of that high-hallowed Jeanne<br /> +Into the furnace-pit she tossed<br /> +<a name="page158"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 158</span>Before +her body knew the flame,<br /> +And sucked its essence: warmth for righteous work,<br /> +An undivided power to speed her aim.<br /> +She had no self but France: the sainted man<br /> +No France but self. Him warrior and clerk,<br /> +Free of his iron clutch; and him her young,<br /> +In whirled imagination mastodonized;<br /> +And him her penmen, him her poets; all<br /> +For the visioned treasure-galleon astrain;<br /> +Sent zenithward on bass and treble tongue,<br /> +Till solely through his glory France was prized.<br /> +She who had her Jeanne;<br /> +The child of her industrious;<br /> +Earth’s truest, earth’s pure fount from the main;<br +/> +And she who had her one day’s mate,<br /> +In the soul’s view illustrious<br /> +Past blazonry, her Immaculate,<br /> +Those hours of slavish Empire would recall;<br /> +Thrill to the rattling anchor-chain<br /> +She heard upon a day in ‘I who can’;<br /> +Start to the softened, tremulous bugle-blare<br /> +Of that Caesarean Italian<br /> +Across the storied fields of trampled grain,<br /> +As to a Vercingetorix of old Gaul<br /> +Blowing the rally against a Caesar’s reign.<br /> +Her soul’s protesting sobs she drowned to swear<br /> +Fidelity unto the sainted man,<br /> +Whose nimbus was her crown; and be again<br /> +The foreigner in Europe, known of none,<br /> +None knowing; sight to dazzle, voice to stun.<br /> +Rearward she stepped, with thirst for Europe’s van;<br /> +The dream she nursed a snare,<br /> +The flag she bore a pall.</p> +<h4><a name="page159"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +159</span>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">In Nature is no rearward step allowed.<br /> +Hard on the rock Reality do we dash<br /> +To be shattered, if the material dream propels.<br /> +The worship to departed splendour vowed<br /> +Conjured a simulacrum, wove her lash,<br /> +For the slow measure timed her peal of bells.</p> +<p class="poetry">Thereof was the cannon-name a mockery round her +hills;<br /> +For the will of wills,<br /> +Its flaccid ape,<br /> +Weak as the final echo off a giant’s bawl:<br /> +Napoleon for disdain,<br /> +His banner steeped in crape.<br /> +Thereof the barrier of Alsace-Lorraine;<br /> +The frozen billow crested to its fall;<br /> +Dismemberment; disfigurement;<br /> +Her history blotted; her proud mantle rent;<br /> +And ever that one word to reperuse,<br /> +With eyes behind a veil of fiery dews;<br /> +Knelling the spot where Gallic soil defiled<br /> +Showed her sons’ valour as a frenzied child<br /> +In arms of the mailed man.<br /> +Word that her mind must bear, her heart put under ban,<br /> +Lest burst it: unto her eyes a ghost,<br /> +Incredible though manifest: a scene<br /> +Stamped with her new Saint’s name: and all his host<br /> +A wattled flock the foeman’s dogs between!</p> +<h4>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Mark where a credible ghost pulls bridle to +view that bare<br /> +Corpse of a field still reddening cloud, and alive in its +throes<br /> +Beneath her Purgatorial Saint’s evocative stare:<br /> +<a name="page160"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 160</span>Brand on +his name, the gulf of his glory, his Legend’s close.<br /> +A lustreless Phosphor heading for daybeam Night’s +dead-born,<br /> +His underworld eyeballs grip the cast of the land for a fray<br +/> +Expugnant; swift up the heights, with the Victor’s +instinctive scorn<br /> +Of the trapped below, he rides; he beholds, and a two-fold +grey,<br /> +Even as the misty sun growing moon that a frost enrings,<br /> +Is shroud on the shrouded; he knows him there in the helmeted +ranks.<br /> +The golden eagles flap lame wings,<br /> +The black double-headed are round their flanks.<br /> +He is there in midst of the pupils he harried to brains awake, +trod into union; lo,<br /> +These are his Epic’s tutored Dardans, yon that +Rhapsode’s Achaeans to know.<br /> +Nor is aught of an equipollent conflict seen, nor the +weaker’s flashed device;<br /> +Headless is offered a breast to beaks deliberate, formal, +assured, precise.<br /> +Ruled by the mathematician’s hand, they solve their +problem, as on a slate.<br /> +This is the ground foremarked, and the day; their leader modestly +hazarded date.<br /> +His helmeted ranks might be draggers of pools or reapers of +plains for the warrior’s guile<br /> +Displayed; they haul, they rend, as in some orderly office +mercantile.<br /> +And a timed artillery speaks full-mouthed on a stuttering feeble +reduced to nought.<br /> +Can it be France, an army of France, tricked, netted, convulsive, +all writhen caught?<br /> +<a name="page161"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 161</span>Arterial +blood of an army’s heart outpoured the Grey Observer +sees:<br /> +A forest of France in thunder comes, like a landslide hurled off +her Pyrenees.<br /> +Torrent and forest ramp, roll, sling on for a charge against +iron, reason, Fate;<br /> +It is gapped through the mass midway, bare ribs and dust ere the +helmeted feel its weight.<br /> +So the blue billow white-plumed is plunged upon shingle to +screaming withdrawal, but snatched,<br /> +Waved is the laurel eternal yielded by Death o’er the waste +of brave men outmatched.<br /> +The France of the fury was there, the thing he had wielded, whose +honour was dearer than life;<br /> +The Prussia despised, the harried, the trodden, was here; his +pupil, the scholar in strife.</p> +<p class="poetry">He hated to heel, in a spasm of will,<br /> +From sleep or debate, a mannikin squire<br /> +With head of a merlin hawk and quill<br /> +Acrow on an ear. At him rained fire<br /> +From a blast of eyeballs hotter than speech,<br /> +To say what a deadly poison stuffed<br /> +The France here laid in her bloody ditch,<br /> +Through the Legend passing human puffed.</p> +<p class="poetry">Credible ghost of the field which from him +descends,<br /> +Each dark anniversary day will its father return,<br /> +Haling his shadow to spy where the Legend ends,<br /> +That penman trumpeter’s part in the wreck discern.</p> +<p class="poetry">There, with the cup it presents at her lips, +she stands,<br /> +France, with her future staked on the word it may pledge.<br /> +The vengeance urged of desire a reserve countermands;<br /> +The patience clasped totters hard on the precipice edge.<br /> +<a name="page162"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 162</span>Lopped +of an arm, mother love for her own springs quick,<br /> +To curdle the milk in her breasts for the young they feed,<br /> +At thought of her single hand, and the lost so nigh.<br /> +Mother love for her own, who raised her when she lay sick<br /> +Nigh death, and would in like fountains fruitlessly bleed,<br /> +Withholds the fling of her heart on the further die.</p> +<p class="poetry">Of love is wisdom. Is it great love, then +wise<br /> +Will our wild heart be, though whipped unto madness more<br /> +By its mentor’s counselling voice than thoughtfully +reined.<br /> +Desire of the wave for the shore,<br /> +Passion for one last agony under skies,<br /> +To make her heavens remorseful, she restrained</p> +<h4>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">On her lost arm love bade her look;<br /> +On her one hand to meditate;<br /> +The tumult of her blood abate;<br /> +Disaster face, derision brook:<br /> +Forbade the page of her Historic Muse,<br /> +Until her demon his last hold forsook,<br /> +And smoothly, with no countenance of hate,<br /> +Her conqueror she could scan to measure. Thence<br /> +The strange new Winter stream of ruling sense,<br /> +Cold, comfortless, but braced to disabuse,<br /> +Ran through the mind of this most lowly laid;<br /> +From the top billow of victorious War,<br /> +Down in the flagless troughs at ebb and flow;<br /> +A wreck; her past, her future, both in shade.<br /> +<a name="page163"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 163</span>She read +the things that are;<br /> +Reality unaccepted read<br /> +For sign of the distraught, and took her blow<br /> +To brain; herself read through;<br /> +Wherefore her predatory Glory paid<br /> +Napoleon ransom knew.<br /> +Her nature’s many strings hot gusts did jar<br /> +Against the note of reason uttered low,<br /> +Ere passionate with duty she might wed,<br /> +Compel the bride’s embrace of her stern groom,<br /> +Joined at an altar liker to the tomb,<br /> +Nest of the Furies their first nuptial bed,<br /> +They not the less were mated and proclaimed<br /> +The rational their issue. Then she rose.</p> +<p class="poetry">See how the rush of southern Springtide +glows<br /> +Oceanic in the chariot-wheel’s ascent,<br /> +Illuminated with one breath. The maimed,<br /> +Tom, tortured, winter-visaged, suddenly<br /> +Had stature; to the world’s wonderment,<br /> +Fair features, grace of mien, nor least<br /> +The comic dimples round her April mouth,<br /> +Sprung of her intimate humanity.<br /> +She stood before mankind the very South<br /> +Rapt out of frost to flowery drapery;<br /> +Unshadowed save when somewhiles she looked East.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Let but the rational prevail,<br /> +Our footing is on ground though all else fail:<br /> +Our kiss of Earth is then a plight<br /> +To walk within her Laws and have her light.<br /> +Choice of the life or death lies in ourselves;<br /> +There is no fate but when unreason lours.<br /> +<a name="page164"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 164</span>This +Land the cheerful toiler delves,<br /> +The thinker brightens with fine wit,<br /> +The lovelier grace as lyric flowers,<br /> +Those rosed and starred revolving Twelves<br /> +Shall nurse for effort infinite<br /> +While leashed to brain the heart of France the Fair<br /> +Beats tempered music and its lead subserves.<br /> +Washed from her eyes the Napoleonic glare,<br /> +Divinely raised by that in her divine,<br /> +Not the clear sight of Earth’s blunt actual swerves<br /> +When her lost look, as on a wave of wine,<br /> +Rolls Eastward, and the mother-flag descries<br /> +Caress with folds and curves<br /> +The fortress over Rhine,<br /> +Beneath the one tall spire.<br /> +Despite her brooding thought, her nightlong sighs,<br /> +Her anguish in desire,<br /> +She sees, above the brutish paw<br /> +Alert on her still quivering limb—<br /> +As little in past time she saw,<br /> +Nor when dispieced as prey,<br /> +As victrix when abhorred—<br /> +A Grand Germania, stout on soil;<br /> +Audacious up the ethereal dim;<br /> +The forest’s Infant; the strong hand for toil;<br /> +The patient brain in twilights when astray;<br /> +Shrewdest of heads to foil and counterfoil;<br /> +The sceptic and devout; the potent sword;<br /> +With will and armed to help in hewing way<br /> +For Europe’s march; and of the most golden chord<br /> +Of the Heliconian lyre<br /> +Excellent mistress. Yea, she sees, and can admire;<br /> +Still seeing in what walks the Gallia leads;<br /> +And with what shield upon Alsace-Lorraine<br /> +Her wary sister’s doubtful look misreads<br /> +<a name="page165"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 165</span>A +mother’s throbs for her lost: so loved: so near:<br /> +Magnetic. Hard the course for her to steer,<br /> +The leap against the sharpened spikes restrain.<br /> +For the belted Overshadower hard the course,<br /> +On whom devolves the spirit’s touchstone, Force:<br /> +Which is the strenuous arm, to strike inclined,<br /> +That too much adamantine makes the mind;<br /> +Forgets it coin of Nature’s rich Exchange;<br /> +Contracts horizons within present sight:<br /> +Amalekite to-day, across its range<br /> +Indisputable; to-morrow Simeonite.</p> +<h4>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">The mother who gave birth to Jeanne;<br /> +Who to her young Angelical sprang;<br /> +Who lay with Earth and heard the notes she sang,<br /> +And heard her truest sing them; she may reach<br /> +Heights yet unknown of nations; haply teach<br /> +A thirsting world to learn ’tis ‘she who +can.’</p> +<p class="poetry">She that in History’s Heliaea pleads<br +/> +The nation flowering conscience o’er the beast;<br /> +With heart expurged of rancour, tame of greeds;<br /> +With the winged mind from fang and claw released;—<br /> +Will such a land be seen? It will be seen;—<br /> +Shall stand adjudged our foremost and Earth’s Queen.<br /> +Acknowledgement that she of God proceeds<br /> +The invisible makes visible, as his priest,<br /> +To her is yielded by a world reclaimed.<br /> +And stands she mutilated, fancy-shamed,<br /> +Yet strong in arms, yet strong in self-control,<br /> +Known valiant, her maternal throbs repressed,<br /> +Discarding vengeance, Giant with a soul;—<br /> +<a name="page166"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 166</span>My faith +in her when she lay low<br /> +Was fountain; now as wave at flow<br /> +Beneath the lights, my faith in God is best;—<br /> +On France has come the test<br /> +Of what she holds within<br /> +Responsive to Life’s deeper springs.<br /> +She above the nations blest<br /> +In fruitful and in liveliest,<br /> +In all that servant earth to heavenly bidding brings,<br /> +The devotee of Glory, she may win<br /> +Glory despoiling none, enrich her kind,<br /> +Illume her land, and take the royal seat<br /> +Unto the strong self-conqueror assigned.<br /> +But ah, when speaks a loaded breath the double name,<br /> +Humanity’s old Foeman winks agrin.<br /> +Her constant Angel eyes her heart’s quick beat,<br /> +The thrill of shadow coursing through her frame.<br /> +Like wind among the ranks of amber wheat.<br /> +Our Europe, vowed to unity or torn,<br /> +Observes her face, as shepherds note the morn,<br /> +And in a ruddy beacon mark an end<br /> +That for the flock in their grave hearing rings.<br /> +Specked overhead the imminent vulture wings<br /> +At poise, one fatal movement indiscreet,<br /> +Sprung from the Aetna passions’ mad revolts,<br /> +Draws down; the midnight hovers to descend;<br /> +And dire as Indian noons of ulcer heat<br /> +Anticipating tempest and the bolts,<br /> +Hangs curtained terrors round her next day’s door,<br /> +Death’s emblems for the breast of Europe flings;<br /> +The breast that waits a spark to fire her store.<br /> +Shall, then, the great vitality, France,<br /> +Signal the backward step once more;<br /> +<a name="page167"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 167</span>Again a +Goddess Fortune trace<br /> +Amid the Deities, and pledge to chance<br /> +One whom we never could replace?<br /> +Now may she tune her nature’s many strings<br /> +To noble harmony, be seen, be known.</p> +<p class="poetry">It was the foreign France, the unruly, +feared;<br /> +Little for all her witcheries endeared;<br /> +Theatrical of arrogance, a sprite<br /> +With gaseous vapours overblown,<br /> +In her conceit of power ensphered,<br /> +Foredoomed to violate and atone;<br /> +Her the grim conqueror’s iron might<br /> +Avengeing clutched, distrusting rent;<br /> +Not that sharp intellect with fire endowed<br /> +To cleave our webs, run lightnings through our cloud;<br /> +Not virtual France, the France benevolent,<br /> +The chivalrous, the many-stringed, sublime<br /> +At intervals, and oft in sweetest chime;<br /> +Though perilously instrument,<br /> +A breast for any having godlike gleam.<br /> +This France could no antagonist disesteem,<br /> +To spurn at heel and confiscate her brood.<br /> +Albeit a waverer between heart and mind,<br /> +And laurels won from sky or plucked from blood,<br /> +Which wither all the wreath when intertwined,<br /> +This cherishable France she may redeem.<br /> +Beloved of Earth, her heart should feel at length<br /> +How much unto Earth’s offspring it doth owe.<br /> +Obstructions are for levelling, have we strength;<br /> +’Tis poverty of soul conceived a foe.<br /> +Rejected be the wrath that keeps unhealed<br /> +Her panting wound; to higher Courts appealed<br /> +The wrongs discerned of higher: Europe waits:<br /> +She chooses God or gambles with the Fates.<br /> +<a name="page168"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 168</span>Shines +the new Helen in Alsace-Lorraine,<br /> +A darker river severs Rhine and Rhone,<br /> +Is heard a deadlier Epic of the twain;<br /> +We see a Paris burn<br /> +Or France Napoleon.</p> +<p class="poetry">For yet he breathes whom less her heart +forswears<br /> +While trembles its desire to thwart her mind:<br /> +The Tyrant lives in Victory’s return.<br /> +What figure with recurrent footstep fares<br /> +Around those memoried tracks of scarlet mud,<br /> +To sow her future from an ashen urn<br /> +By lantern-light, as dragons’ teeth are sown?<br /> +Of bleeding pride the piercing seër is blind.<br /> +But, cleared her eyes of that ensanguined scud<br /> +Distorting her true features, to be shown<br /> +Benignly luminous, one who bears<br /> +Humanity at breast, and she might learn<br /> +How surely the excelling generous find<br /> +Renouncement is possession. Sure<br /> +As light enkindles light when heavenly earthly mates,<br /> +The flame of pure immits the flame of pure,<br /> +Magnanimous magnanimous creates.<br /> +So to majestic beauty stricken rears<br /> +Hard-visaged rock against the risen glow;<br /> +And men are in the secret with the spheres,<br /> +Whose glory is celestially to bestow.</p> +<p class="poetry">Now nation looks to nation, that may live<br /> +Their common nurseling, like the torrent’s flower,<br /> +Shaken by foul Destruction’s fast-piled heap.<br /> +On France is laid the proud initiative<br /> +Of sacrifice in one self-mastering hour,<br /> +Whereby more than her lost one will she reap;<br /> +<a name="page169"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +169</span>Perchance the very lost regain,<br /> +To count it less than her superb reward.<br /> +Our Europe, where is debtor each to each,<br /> +Pass measure of excess, and war is Cain,<br /> +Fraternal from the Seaman’s beach,<br /> +From answering Rhine in grand accord,<br /> +From Neva beneath Northern cloud,<br /> +And from our Transatlantic Europe loud,<br /> +Will hail the rare example for their theme;<br /> +Give response, as rich foliage to the breeze;<br /> +In their entrusted nurseling know them one:<br /> +Like a brave vessel under press of steam,<br /> +Abreast the winds and tides, on angry seas,<br /> +Plucked by the heavens forlorn of present sun,<br /> +Will drive through darkness, and, with faith supreme,<br /> +Have sight of haven and the crowded quays.</p> +<h2><a name="page170"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 170</span>THE +CAGEING OF ARES<br /> +<span class="smcap">Iliad</span>, v. 385</h2> +<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">[DEDICATED +TO THE COUNCIL AT THE HAGUE, 1899]</span></p> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">How</span> big of breast +our Mother Gaea laughed<br /> +At sight of her boy Giants on the leap<br /> +Each over other as they neighboured home,<br /> +Fronting the day’s descent across green slopes,<br /> +And up fired mountain crags their shadows danced.<br /> +Close with them in their fun, she scarce could guess,<br /> +Though these two billowy urchins reeked of craft,<br /> +It signalled some adventurous master-trick<br /> +To set Olympians buzzing in debate,<br /> +Lest it might be their godhead undermined,<br /> +The Tyranny menaced. Ephialtes high<br /> +On shoulders of his brother Otos waved<br /> +For the bull-bellowings given to grand good news,<br /> +Compact, complexioned in his gleeful roar<br /> +While Otos aped the prisoner’s wrists and knees,<br /> +With doleful sniffs between recurrent howls;<br /> +Till Gaea’s lap receiving them, they stretched,<br /> +And both upon her bosom shaken to speech,<br /> +Burst the hot story out of throats of both,<br /> +Like rocky head-founts, baffling in their glut<br /> +The hurried spout. And as when drifting storm<br /> +Disburdened loses clasp of here and yon<br /> +A peak, a forest mound, a valley’s gleam<br /> +Of grass and the river’s crooks and snaky coils,<br /> +Signification marvellous she caught,<br /> +Through gurglings of triumphant jollity,<br /> +Which now engulphed and now gave eye; at last<br /> +<a name="page171"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +171</span>Subsided, and the serious naked deed,<br /> +With mountain-cloud of laughter banked around,<br /> +Stood in her sight confirmed: she could believe<br /> +That these, her sprouts of promise, her most prized,<br /> +These two made up of lion, bear and fox,<br /> +Her sportive, suckling mammoths, her young joy,<br /> +Still by the reckoning infants among men,<br /> +Had done the deed to strike the Titan host<br /> +In envy dumb, in envious heart elate:<br /> +These two combining strength and craft had snared,<br /> +Enmeshed, bound fast with thongs, discreetly caged<br /> +The blood-shedder, the terrible Lord of War;<br /> +Destroyer, ravager, superb in plumes;<br /> +The barren furrower of anointed fields;<br /> +The scarlet heel in towns, foul smoke to sky,<br /> +Her hated enemy, too long her scourge:<br /> +Great Ares. And they gagged his trumpet mouth<br /> +When they had seized on his implacable spear,<br /> +Hugged him to reedy helplessness despite<br /> +His godlike fury startled from amaze.<br /> +For he had eyed them nearing him in play,<br /> +The giant cubs, who gambolled and who snarled,<br /> +Unheeding his fell presence, by the mount<br /> +Ossa, beside a brushwood cavern; there<br /> +On Earth’s original fisticuffs they called<br /> +For ease of sharp dispute: whereat the God,<br /> +Approving, deemed that sometime trained to arms,<br /> +Good servitors of Ares they would be,<br /> +And ply the pointed spear to dominate<br /> +Their rebel restless fellows, villain brood<br /> +Vowed to defy Immortals. So it chanced<br /> +Amusedly he watched them, and as one<br /> +The lusty twain were on him and they had him.<br /> +Breath to us, Powers of air, for laughter loud!<br /> +Cock of Olympus he, superb in plumes!<br /> +<a name="page172"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 172</span>Bound +like a wheaten sheaf by those two babes!<br /> +Because they knew our Mother Gaea loathed him,<br /> +Knew him the famine, pestilence and waste;<br /> +A desolating fire to blind the sight<br /> +With splendour built of fruitful things in ashes;<br /> +The gory chariot-wheel on cries for justice;<br /> +Her deepest planted and her liveliest voice,<br /> +Heard from the babe as from the broken crone.<br /> +Behold him in his vessel of bronze encased,<br /> +And tumbled down the cave. But rather look—<br /> +Ah, that the woman tattler had not sought,<br /> +Of all the Gods to let her secret fly,<br /> +Hermes, after the thirteen songful months!<br /> +Prompting the Dexterous to work his arts,<br /> +And shatter earth’s delirious holiday,<br /> +Then first, as where the fountain runs a stream,<br /> +Resolving to composure on its throbs.<br /> +But see her in the Seasons through that year;<br /> +That one glad year and the fair opening month.<br /> +Had never our Great Mother such sweet face!<br /> +War with her, gentle war with her, each day<br /> +Her sons and daughters urged; at eve were flung,<br /> +On the morrow stood to challenge; in their strength<br /> +Renewed, indomitable; whereof they won,<br /> +From hourly wrestlings up to shut of lids,<br /> +Her ready secret: the abounding life<br /> +Returned for valiant labour: she and they<br /> +Defeated and victorious turn by turn;<br /> +By loss enriched, by overthrow restored.<br /> +Exchange of powers of this conflict came;<br /> +Defacement none, nor ever squandered force.<br /> +Is battle nature’s mandate, here it reigned,<br /> +As music unto the hand that smote the strings;<br /> +And she the rosier from their showery brows,<br /> +They fruitful from her ploughed and harrowed breast.<br /> +<a name="page173"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 173</span>Back to +the primal rational of those<br /> +Who suck the teats of milky earth, and clasp<br /> +Stability in hatred of the insane,<br /> +Man stepped; with wits less fearful to pronounce<br /> +The mortal mind’s concept of earth’s divorced<br /> +Above; those beautiful, those masterful,<br /> +Those lawless. High they sit, and if descend,<br /> +Descend to reap, not sowing. Is it just?<br /> +Earth in her happy children asked that word,<br /> +Whereto within their breast was her reply.<br /> +Those beautiful, those masterful, those lawless,<br /> +Enjoy the life prolonged, outleap the years;<br /> +Yet they (’twas the Great Mother’s voice inspired<br +/> +The audacious thought), they, glorious over dust,<br /> +Outleap not her; disrooted from her soar,<br /> +To meet the certain fate of earth’s divorced,<br /> +And clap lame wings across a wintry haze,<br /> +Up to the farthest bourne: immortal still,<br /> +Thenceforth innocuous; lovelier than when ruled<br /> +The Tyranny. This her voice within them told,<br /> +When softly the Great Mother chid her sons<br /> +Not of the giant brood, who did create<br /> +Those lawless Gods, first offspring of our brain<br /> +Set moving by an abject blood, that waked<br /> +To wanton under elements more benign,<br /> +And planted aliens on Olympian heights;—<br /> +Imagination’s cradle poesy<br /> +Become a monstrous pressure upon men;—<br /> +Foes of good Gaea; until dispossessed<br /> +By light from her, born of the love of her,<br /> +Their lordship the illumined brain rejects<br /> +For earth’s beneficent, the sons of Law,<br /> +Her other name. So spake she in their heart,<br /> +Among the wheat-blades proud of stalk; beneath<br /> +Young vine-leaves pushing timid fingers forth,<br /> +<a name="page174"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +174</span>Confidently to cling. And when brown corn<br /> +Swayed armied ranks with softened cricket song,<br /> +With gold necks bent for any zephyr’s kiss;<br /> +When vine-roots daily down a rubble soil<br /> +Drank fire of heaven athirst to swell the grape;<br /> +When swelled the grape, and in it held a ray,<br /> +Rich issue of the embrace of heaven and earth;<br /> +The very eye of passion drowsed by excess,<br /> +And yet a burning lion for the spring;<br /> +Then in that time of general cherishment,<br /> +Sweet breathing balm and flutes by cool wood-side,<br /> +He the harsh rouser of ire being absent, caged,<br /> +Then did good Gaea’s children gratefully<br /> +Lift hymns to Gods they judged, but praised for peace,<br /> +Delightful Peace, that answers Reason’s call<br /> +Harmoniously and images her Law;<br /> +Reflects, and though short-lived as then, revives,<br /> +In memories made present on the brain<br /> +By natural yearnings, all the happy scenes;<br /> +The picture of an earth allied to heaven;<br /> +Between them the known smile behind black masks;<br /> +Rightly their various moods interpreted;<br /> +And frolic because toilful children borne<br /> +With larger comprehension of Earth’s aim<br /> +At loftier, clearer, sweeter, by their aid.</p> +<h2><a name="page175"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 175</span>THE +NIGHT-WALK</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Awakes</span> for me and +leaps from shroud<br /> +All radiantly the moon’s own night<br /> +Of folded showers in streamer cloud;<br /> +Our shadows down the highway white<br /> +Or deep in woodland woven-boughed,<br /> +With yon and yon a stem alight.</p> +<p class="poetry">I see marauder runagates<br /> +Across us shoot their dusky wink;<br /> +I hear the parliament of chats<br /> +In haws beside the river’s brink;<br /> +And drops the vole off alder-banks,<br /> +To push his arrow through the stream.<br /> +These busy people had our thanks<br /> +For tickling sight and sound, but theme<br /> +They were not more than breath we drew<br /> +Delighted with our world’s embrace:<br /> +The moss-root smell where beeches grew,<br /> +And watered grass in breezy space;<br /> +The silken heights, of ghostly bloom<br /> +Among their folds, by distance draped.<br /> +’Twas Youth, rapacious to consume,<br /> +That cried to have its chaos shaped:<br /> +Absorbing, little noting, still<br /> +Enriched, and thinking it bestowed;<br /> +With wistful looks on each far hill<br /> +For something hidden, something owed.<br /> +Unto his mantled sister, Day<br /> +Had given the secret things we sought<br /> +<a name="page176"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 176</span>And she +was grave and saintly gay;<br /> +At times she fluttered, spoke her thought;<br /> +She flew on it, then folded wings,<br /> +In meditation passing lone,<br /> +To breathe around the secret things,<br /> +Which have no word, and yet are known;<br /> +Of thirst for them are known, as air<br /> +Is health in blood: we gained enough<br /> +By this to feel it honest fare;<br /> +Impalpable, not barren, stuff.</p> +<p class="poetry">A pride of legs in motion kept<br /> +Our spirits to their task meanwhile,<br /> +And what was deepest dreaming slept:<br /> +The posts that named the swallowed mile;<br /> +Beside the straight canal the hut<br /> +Abandoned; near the river’s source<br /> +Its infant chirp; the shortest cut;<br /> +The roadway missed; were our discourse;<br /> +At times dear poets, whom some view<br /> +Transcendent or subdued evoked<br /> +To speak the memorable, the true,<br /> +The luminous as a moon uncloaked;<br /> +For proof that there, among earth’s dumb,<br /> +A soul had passed and said our best.<br /> +Or it might be we chimed on some<br /> +Historic favourite’s astral crest,<br /> +With part to reverence in its gleam,<br /> +And part to rivalry the shout:<br /> +So royal, unuttered, is youth’s dream<br /> +Of power within to strike without.<br /> +But most the silences were sweet,<br /> +Like mothers’ breasts, to bid it feel<br /> +It lived in such divine conceit<br /> +As envies aught we stamp for real.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page177"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +177</span>To either then an untold tale<br /> +Was Life, and author, hero, we.<br /> +The chapters holding peaks to scale,<br /> +Or depths to fathom, made our glee;<br /> +For we were armed of inner fires,<br /> +Unbled in us the ripe desires;<br /> +And passion rolled a quiet sea,<br /> +Whereon was Love the phantom sail.</p> +<h2><a name="page178"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 178</span>AT +THE CLOSE</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">To</span> Thee, dear God of +Mercy, both appeal,<br /> +Who straightway sound the call to arms. Thou +know’st;<br /> +And that black spot in each embattled host,<br /> +Spring of the blood-stream, later wilt reveal.<br /> +Now is it red artillery and white steel;<br /> +Till on a day will ring the victor’s boast,<br /> +That ’tis Thy chosen towers uppermost,<br /> +Where Thy rejected grovels under heel.<br /> +So in all times of man’s descent insane<br /> +To brute, did strength and craft combining strike,<br /> +Even as a God of Armies, his fell blow.<br /> +But at the close he entered Thy domain,<br /> +Dear God of Mercy, and if lion-like<br /> +He tore the fall’n, the Eternal was his Foe.</p> +<h2><a name="page179"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 179</span>A +GARDEN IDYL</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">With</span> sagest craft +Arachne worked<br /> +Her web, and at a corner lurked,<br /> +Awaiting what should plump her soon,<br /> +To case it in the death-cocoon.<br /> +Sagaciously her home she chose<br /> +For visits that would never close;<br /> +Inside my chalet-porch her feast<br /> +Plucked all the winds but chill North-east.</p> +<p class="poetry">The finished structure, bar on bar,<br /> +Had snatched from light to form a star,<br /> +And struck on sight, when quick with dews,<br /> +Like music of the very Muse.<br /> +Great artists pass our single sense;<br /> +We hear in seeing, strung to tense;<br /> +Then haply marvel, groan mayhap,<br /> +To think such beauty means a trap.<br /> +But Nature’s genius, even man’s<br /> +At best, is practical in plans;<br /> +Subservient to the needy thought,<br /> +However rare the weapon wrought.<br /> +As long as Nature holds it good<br /> +To urge her creatures’ quest for food<br /> +Will beauty stamp the just intent<br /> +Of weapons upon service bent.<br /> +For beauty is a flower of roots<br /> +Embedded lower than our boots;<br /> +Out of the primal strata springs,<br /> +And shows for crown of useful things.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page180"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +180</span>Arachne’s dream of prey to size<br /> +Aspired; so she could nigh despise<br /> +The puny specks the breezes round<br /> +Supplied, and let them shake unwound;<br /> +Assured of her fat fly to come;<br /> +Perhaps a blue, the spider’s plum;<br /> +Who takes the fatal odds in fight,<br /> +And gives repast an appetite,<br /> +By plunging, whizzing, till his wings<br /> +Are webbed, and in the lists he swings,<br /> +A shrouded lump, for her to see<br /> +Her banquet in her victory.</p> +<p class="poetry">This matron of the unnumbered threads,<br /> +One day of dandelions’ heads<br /> +Distributing their gray perruques<br /> +Up every gust, I watched with looks<br /> +Discreet beside the chalet-door;<br /> +And gracefully a light wind bore,<br /> +Direct upon my webster’s wall,<br /> +A monster in the form of ball;<br /> +The mildest captive ever snared,<br /> +That neither struggled nor despaired,<br /> +On half the net invading hung,<br /> +And plain as in her mother tongue,<br /> +While low the weaver cursed her lures,<br /> +Remarked, “You have me; I am yours.”</p> +<p class="poetry">Thrice magnified, in phantom shape,<br /> +Her dream of size she saw, agape.<br /> +Midway the vast round-raying beard<br /> +A desiccated midge appeared;<br /> +Whose body pricked the name of meal,<br /> +Whose hair had growth in earth’s unreal;<br /> +Provocative of dread and wrath,<br /> +Contempt and horror, in one froth,<br /> +<a name="page181"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +181</span>Inextricable, insensible,<br /> +His poison presence there would dwell,<br /> +Declaring him her dream fulfilled,<br /> +A catch to compliment the skilled;<br /> +And she reduced to beaky skin,<br /> +Disgraceful among kith and kin</p> +<p class="poetry">Against her corner, humped and aged,<br /> +Arachne wrinkled, past enraged,<br /> +Beyond disgust or hope in guile.<br /> +Ridiculously volatile<br /> +He seemed to her last spark of mind;<br /> +And that in pallid ash declined<br /> +Beneath the blow by knowledge dealt,<br /> +Wherein throughout her frame she felt<br /> +That he, the light wind’s libertine,<br /> +Without a scoff, without a grin,<br /> +And mannered like the courtly few,<br /> +Who merely danced when light winds blew,<br /> +Impervious to beak and claws,<br /> +Tradition’s ruinous Whitebeard was;<br /> +Of whom, as actors in old scenes,<br /> +Had grannam weavers warned their weans,<br /> +With word, that less than feather-weight,<br /> +He smote the web like bolt of Fate.</p> +<p class="poetry">This muted drama, hour by hour,<br /> +I watched amid a world in flower,<br /> +Ere yet Autumnal threads had laid<br /> +Their gray-blue o’er the grass’s blade,<br /> +And still along the garden-run<br /> +The blindworm stretched him, drunk of sun.<br /> +Arachne crouched unmoved; perchance<br /> +Her visitor performed a dance;<br /> +<a name="page182"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 182</span>She +puckered thinner; he the same<br /> +As when on that light wind he came.</p> +<p class="poetry">Next day was told what deeds of night<br /> +Were done; the web had vanished quite;<br /> +With it the strange opposing pair;<br /> +And listless waved on vacant air,<br /> +For her adieu to heart’s content,<br /> +A solitary filament.</p> +<h2><a name="page183"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 183</span>A +READING OF LIFE</h2> +<h3><a name="page185"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 185</span>THE +VITAL CHOICE</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Or</span> shall we run with +Artemis<br /> +Or yield the breast to Aphrodite?<br /> +Both are mighty;<br /> +Both give bliss;<br /> +Each can torture if divided;<br /> +Each claims worship undivided,<br /> +In her wake would have us wallow.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Youth must offer on bent knees<br /> +Homage unto one or other;<br /> +Earth, the mother,<br /> +This decrees;<br /> +And unto the pallid Scyther<br /> +Either points us shun we either<br /> +Shun or too devoutly follow.</p> +<h3><a name="page186"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 186</span>WITH +THE HUNTRESS</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Through</span> the +water-eye of night,<br /> +Midway between eve and dawn,<br /> +See the chase, the rout, the flight<br /> +In deep forest; oread, faun,<br /> +Goat-foot, antlers laid on neck;<br /> +Ravenous all the line for speed.<br /> +See yon wavy sparkle beck<br /> +Sign of the Virgin Lady’s lead.<br /> +Down her course a serpent star<br /> +Coils and shatters at her heels;<br /> +Peals the horn exulting, peals<br /> +Plaintive, is it near or far.<br /> +Huntress, arrowy to pursue,<br /> +In and out of woody glen,<br /> +Under cliffs that tear the blue,<br /> +Over torrent, over fen,<br /> +She and forest, where she skims<br /> +Feathery, darken and relume:<br /> +Those are her white-lightning limbs<br /> +Cleaving loads of leafy gloom.<br /> +Mountains hear her and call back,<br /> +Shrewd with night: a frosty wail<br /> +Distant: her the emerald vale<br /> +Folds, and wonders in her track.<br /> +Now her retinue is lean,<br /> +Many rearward; streams the chase<br /> +Eager forth of covert; seen<br /> +One hot tide the rapturous race.<br /> +Quiver-charged and crescent-crowned,<br /> +Up on a flash the lighted mound<br /> +<a name="page187"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 187</span>Leaps +she, bow to shoulder, shaft<br /> +Strung to barb with archer’s craft,<br /> +Legs like plaited lyre-chords, feet<br /> +Songs to see, past pitch of sweet.<br /> +Fearful swiftness they outrun,<br /> +Shaggy wildness, grey or dun,<br /> +Challenge, charge of tusks elude:<br /> +Theirs the dance to tame the rude;<br /> +Beast, and beast in manhood tame,<br /> +Follow we their silver flame.<br /> +Pride of flesh from bondage free,<br /> +Reaping vigour of its waste,<br /> +Marks her servitors, and she<br /> +Sanctifies the unembraced.<br /> +Nought of perilous she reeks;<br /> +Valour clothes her open breast;<br /> +Sweet beyond the thrill of sex;<br /> +Hallowed by the sex confessed.<br /> +Huntress arrowy to pursue,<br /> +Colder she than sunless dew,<br /> +She, that breath of upper air;<br /> +Ay, but never lyrist sang,<br /> +Draught of Bacchus never sprang<br /> +Blood the bliss of Gods to share,<br /> +High o’er sweep of eagle wings,<br /> +Like the run with her, when rings<br /> +Clear her rally, and her dart,<br /> +In the forest’s cavern heart,<br /> +Tells of her victorious aim.<br /> +Then is pause and chatter, cheer,<br /> +Laughter at some satyr lame,<br /> +Looks upon the fallen deer,<br /> +Measuring his noble crest;<br /> +Here a favourite in her train,<br /> +Foremost mid her nymphs, caressed;<br /> +<a name="page188"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 188</span>All +applauded. Shall she reign<br /> +Worshipped? O to be with her there!<br /> +She, that breath of nimble air,<br /> +Lifts the breast to giant power.<br /> +Maid and man, and man and maid,<br /> +Who each other would devour<br /> +Elsewhere, by the chase betrayed,<br /> +There are comrades, led by her,<br /> +Maid-preserver, man-maker.</p> +<h3><a name="page189"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 189</span>WITH +THE PERSUADER</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Who</span> murmurs, hither, +hither: who<br /> +Where nought is audible so fills the ear?<br /> +Where nought is visible can make appear<br /> +A veil with eyes that waver through,<br /> +Like twilight’s pledge of blessed night to come,<br /> +Or day most golden? All unseen and dumb,<br /> +She breathes, she moves, inviting flees,<br /> +Is lost, and leaves the thrilled desire<br /> +To clasp and strike a slackened lyre,<br /> +Till over smiles of hyacinth seas,<br /> +Flame in a crystal vessel sails<br /> +Beneath a dome of jewelled spray,<br /> +For land that drops the rosy day<br /> +On nights of throbbing nightingales.</p> +<p class="poetry">Landward did the wonder flit,<br /> +Or heart’s desire of her, all earth in it.<br /> +We saw the heavens fling down their rose;<br /> +On rapturous waves we saw her glide;<br /> +The pearly sea-shell half enclose;<br /> +The shoal of sea-nymphs flush the tide;<br /> +And we, afire to kiss her feet, no more<br /> +Behold than tracks along a startled shore,<br /> +With brightened edges of dark leaves that feign<br /> +An ambush hoped, as heartless night remain.</p> +<p class="poetry">More closely, warmly: hither, hither! she,<br +/> +The very she called forth by ripened blood<br /> +<a name="page190"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 190</span>For its +next breath of being, murmurs; she,<br /> +Allurement; she, fulfilment; she,<br /> +The stream within us urged to flood;<br /> +Man’s cry, earth’s answer, heaven’s consent; O +she,<br /> +Maid, woman and divinity;<br /> +Our over-earthly, inner-earthly mate<br /> +Unmated; she, our hunger and our fruit<br /> +Untasted; she our written fate<br /> +Unread; Life’s flowering, Life’s root:<br /> +Unread, divined; unseen, beheld;<br /> +The evanescent, ever-present she,<br /> +Great Nature’s stern necessity<br /> +In radiance clothed, to softness quelled;<br /> +With a sword’s edge of sweetness keen to take<br /> +Our breath for bliss, our hearts for fulness break.</p> +<p class="poetry">The murmur hushes down, the veil is rent.<br /> +Man’s cry, earth’s answer, heaven’s consent,<br +/> +Her form is given to pardoned sight,<br /> +And lets our mortal eyes receive<br /> +The sovereign loveliness of celestial white;<br /> +Adored by them who solitarily pace,<br /> +In dusk of the underworld’s perpetual eve,<br /> +The paths among the meadow asphodel,<br /> +Remembering. Never there her face<br /> +Is planetary; reddens to shore sea-shell<br /> +Around such whiteness the enamoured air<br /> +Of noon that clothes her, never there.<br /> +Daughter of light, the joyful light,<br /> +She stands unveiled to nuptial sight,<br /> +Sweet in her disregard of aid<br /> +Divine to conquer or persuade.<br /> +A fountain jets from moss; a flower<br /> +Bends gently where her sunset tresses shower.<br /> +By guerdon of her brilliance may be seen<br /> +With eyelids unabashed the passion’s Queen.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page191"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +191</span>Shorn of attendant Graces she can use<br /> +Her natural snares to make her will supreme.<br /> +A simple nymph it is, inclined to muse<br /> +Before the leader foot shall dip in stream:<br /> +One arm at curve along a rounded thigh;<br /> +Her firm new breasts each pointing its own way<br /> +A knee half bent to shade its fellow shy,<br /> +Where innocence, not nature, signals nay.<br /> +The bud of fresh virginity awaits<br /> +The wooer, and all roseate will she burst:<br /> +She touches on the hour of happy mates;<br /> +Still is she unaware she wakens thirst.</p> +<p class="poetry">And while commanding blissful sight believe<br +/> +It holds her as a body strained to breast,<br /> +Down on the underworld’s perpetual eve<br /> +She plunges the possessor dispossessed;<br /> +And bids believe that image, heaving warm,<br /> +Is lost to float like torch-smoke after flame;<br /> +The phantom any breeze blows out of form;<br /> +A thirst’s delusion, a defeated aim.</p> +<p class="poetry">The rapture shed the torture weaves;<br /> +The direst blow on human heart she deals:<br /> +The pain to know the seen deceives;<br /> +Nought true but what insufferably feels.<br /> +And stabs of her delicious note,<br /> +That is as heavenly light to hearing, heard<br /> +Through shelter leaves, the laughter from her throat,<br /> +We answer as the midnight’s morning’s bird.</p> +<p class="poetry">She laughs, she wakens gleeful cries;<br /> +In her delicious laughter part revealed;<br /> +Yet mother is she more of moans and sighs,<br /> +For longings unappeased and wounds unhealed.<br /> +<a name="page192"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 192</span>Yet +would she bless, it is her task to bless:<br /> +Yon folded couples, passing under shade,<br /> +Are her rich harvest; bidden caress, caress,<br /> +Consume the fruit in bloom; not disobeyed.<br /> +We dolorous complainers had a dream,<br /> +Wrought on the vacant air from inner fire,<br /> +We saw stand bare of her celestial beam<br /> +The glorious Goddess, and we dared desire.</p> +<p class="poetry">Thereat are shown reproachful eyes, and lips<br +/> +Of upward curl to meanings half obscure;<br /> +And glancing where a wood-nymph lightly skips<br /> +She nods: at once that creature wears her lure.<br /> +Blush of our being between birth and death:<br /> +Sob of our ripened blood for its next breath:<br /> +Her wily semblance nought of her denies;<br /> +Seems it the Goddess runs, the Goddess hies,<br /> +The generous Goddess yields. And she can arm<br /> +Her dwarfed and twisted with her secret charm;<br /> +Benevolent as Earth to feed her own.<br /> +Fully shall they be fed, if they beseech.<br /> +But scorn she has for them that walk alone;<br /> +Blanched men, starved women, whom no arts can pleach.<br /> +The men as chief of criminals she disdains,<br /> +And holds the reason in perceptive thought.<br /> +More pitiable, like rivers lacking rains,<br /> +Kissing cold stones, the women shrink for drought.<br /> +Those faceless discords, out of nature strayed,<br /> +Rank of the putrefaction ere decayed,<br /> +In impious singles bear the thorny wreaths:<br /> +Their lives are where harmonious Pleasure breathes<br /> +For couples crowned with flowers that burn in dew.<br /> +Comes there a tremor of night’s forest horn<br /> +Across her garden from the insaner crew,<br /> +She darkens to malignity of scorn.<br /> +<a name="page193"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 193</span>A shiver +courses through her garden-grounds:<br /> +Grunt of the tusky boar, the baying hounds,<br /> +The hunter’s shouts, are heard afar, and bring<br /> +Dead on her heart her crimsoned flower of Spring.<br /> +These, the irreverent of Life’s design,<br /> +Division between natural and divine<br /> +Would cast; these vaunting barrenness for best,<br /> +In veins of gathered strength Life’s tide arrest;<br /> +And these because the roses flood their cheeks,<br /> +Vow them in nature wise as when Love speaks.<br /> +With them is war; and well the Goddess knows<br /> +What undermines the race who mount the rose;<br /> +How the ripe moment, lodged in slumberous hours,<br /> +Enkindled by persuasion overpowers:<br /> +Why weak as are her frailer trailing weeds,<br /> +The strong when Beauty gleams o’er Nature’s needs,<br +/> +And timely guile unguarded finds them lie.<br /> +They who her sway withstand a sea defy,<br /> +At every point of juncture must be proof;<br /> +Nor look for mercy from the incessant surge<br /> +Her forces mixed of craft and passion urge<br /> +For the one whelming wave to spring aloof.<br /> +She, tenderness, is pitiless to them<br /> +Resisting in her godhead nature’s truth.<br /> +No flower their face shall be, but writhen stem;<br /> +Their youth a frost, their age the dirge for youth.<br /> +These miserably disinclined,<br /> +The lamentably unembraced,<br /> +Insult the Pleasures Earth designed<br /> +To people and beflower the waste.<br /> +Wherefore the Pleasures pass them by:<br /> +For death they live, in life they die.</p> +<p class="poetry">Her head the Goddess from them turns,<br /> +As from grey mounds of ashes in bronze urns.<br /> +<a name="page194"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 194</span>She +views her quivering couples unconsoled,<br /> +And of her beauty mirror they become,<br /> +Like orchard blossoms, apple, pear and plum,<br /> +Free of the cloud, beneath the flood of gold.<br /> +Crowned with wreaths that burn in dew,<br /> +Her couples whirl, sun-satiated,<br /> +Athirst for shade, they sigh, they wed,<br /> +They play the music made of two:<br /> +Oldest of earth, earth’s youngest till earth’s +end:<br /> +Cunninger than the numbered strings,<br /> +For melodies, for harmonies,<br /> +For mastered discords, and the things<br /> +Not vocable, whose mysteries<br /> +Are inmost Love’s, Life’s reach of Life extend.</p> +<p class="poetry">Is it an anguish overflowing shame<br /> +And the tongue’s pudency confides to her,<br /> +With eyes of embers, breath of incense myrrh,<br /> +The woman’s marrow in some dear youth’s name,<br /> +Then is the Goddess tenderness<br /> +Maternal, and she has a sister’s tones<br /> +Benign to soothe intemperate distress,<br /> +Divide despair from hope, and sighs from moans.<br /> +Her gentleness imparts exhaling ease<br /> +To those of her milk-bearer votaries<br /> +As warm of bosom-earth as she; of the source<br /> +Direct; erratic but in heart’s excess;<br /> +Being mortal and ill-matched for Love’s great force;<br /> +Like green leaves caught with flames by his impress.<br /> +And pray they under skies less overcast,<br /> +That swiftly may her star of eve descend,<br /> +Her lustrous morning star fly not too fast,<br /> +To lengthen blissful night will she befriend.</p> +<p class="poetry">Unfailing her reply to woman’s voice<br +/> +In supplication instant. Is it man’s,<br /> +<a name="page195"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 195</span>She +hears, approves his words, her garden scans,<br /> +And him: the flowers are various, he has choice.<br /> +Perchance his wound is deep; she listens long;<br /> +Enjoys what music fills the plaintive song;<br /> +And marks how he, who would be hawk at poise<br /> +Above the bird, his plaintive song enjoys.</p> +<p class="poetry">She reads him when his humbled manhood weeps<br +/> +To her invoked: distraction is implored.<br /> +A smile, and he is up on godlike leaps<br /> +Above, with his bright Goddess owned the adored.<br /> +His tales of her declare she condescends;<br /> +Can share his fires, not always goads and rends:<br /> +Moreover, quits a throne, and must enclose<br /> +A queenlier gem than woman’s wayside rose.<br /> +She bends, he quickens; she breathes low, he springs<br /> +Enraptured; low she laughs, his woes disperse;<br /> +Aloud she laughs and sweeps his varied strings.<br /> +’Tis taught him how for touch of mournful verse<br /> +Rarely the music made of two ascends,<br /> +And Beauty’s Queen some other way is won.<br /> +Or it may solve the riddle, that she lends<br /> +Herself to all, and yields herself to none,<br /> +Save heavenliest: though claims by men are raised<br /> +In hot assurance under shade of doubt:<br /> +And numerous are the images bepraised<br /> +As Beauty’s Queen, should passion head the rout.</p> +<p class="poetry">Be sure the ruddy hue is Love’s: to +woo<br /> +Love’s Fountain we must mount the ruddy hue.<br /> +That is her garden’s precept, seen where shines<br /> +Her blood-flower, and its unsought neighbour pines.<br /> +Daughter of light, the joyful light,<br /> +She bids her couples face full East,<br /> +Reflecting radiance, even when from her feast<br /> +<a name="page196"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 196</span>Their +outstretched arms brown deserts disunite,<br /> +The lion-haunted thickets hold apart.<br /> +In love the ruddy hue declares great heart;<br /> +High confidence in her whose aid is lent<br /> +To lovers lifting the tuned instrument,<br /> +Not one of rippled strings and funeral tone.<br /> +And doth the man pursue a tightened zone,<br /> +Then be it as the Laurel God he runs,<br /> +Confirmed to win, with countenance the Sun’s.</p> +<p class="poetry">Should pity bless the tremulous voice of woe<br +/> +He lifts for pity, limp his offspring show.<br /> +For him requiring woman’s arts to please<br /> +Infantile tastes with babe reluctances,<br /> +No race of giants! In the woman’s veins<br /> +Persuasion ripely runs, through hers the pains.<br /> +Her choice of him, should kind occasion nod,<br /> +Aspiring blends the Titan with the God;<br /> +Yet unto dwarf and mortal, she, submiss<br /> +In her high Lady’s mandate, yields the kiss;<br /> +And is it needed that Love’s daintier brute<br /> +Be snared as hunter, she will tempt pursuit.<br /> +She is great Nature’s ever intimate<br /> +In breast, and doth as ready handmaid wait,<br /> +Until perverted by her senseless male,<br /> +She plays the winding snake, the shrinking snail,<br /> +The flying deer, all tricks of evil fame,<br /> +Elusive to allure, since he grew tame.</p> +<p class="poetry">Hence has the Goddess, Nature’s earliest +Power,<br /> +And greatest and most present, with her dower<br /> +Of the transcendent beauty, gained repute<br /> +For meditated guile. She laughs to hear<br /> +A charge her garden’s labyrinths scarce confute,<br /> +Her garden’s histories tell of to all near.<br /> +<a name="page197"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 197</span>Let it +be said, But less upon her guile<br /> +Doth she rely for her immortal smile.<br /> +Still let the rumour spread, and terror screens<br /> +To push her conquests by the simplest means.<br /> +While man abjures not lustihead, nor swerves<br /> +From earth’s good labours, Beauty’s Queen he +serves.</p> +<p class="poetry">Her spacious garden and her garden’s +grant<br /> +She offers in reward for handsome cheer:<br /> +Choice of the nymphs whose looks will slant<br /> +The secret down a dewy leer<br /> +Of corner eyelids into haze:<br /> +Many a fair Aphrosyne<br /> +Like flower-bell to honey-bee:<br /> +And here they flicker round the maze<br /> +Bewildering him in heart and head:<br /> +And here they wear the close demure,<br /> +With subtle peeps to reassure:<br /> +Others parade where love has bled,<br /> +And of its crimson weave their mesh:<br /> +Others to snap of fingers leap,<br /> +As bearing breast with love asleep.<br /> +These are her laughters in the flesh.<br /> +Or would she fit a warrior mood,<br /> +She lights her seeming unsubdued,<br /> +And indicates the fortress-key.<br /> +Or is it heart for heart that craves,<br /> +She flecks along a run of waves<br /> +The one to promise deeper sea.</p> +<p class="poetry">Bands of her limpid primitives,<br /> +Or patterned in the curious braid,<br /> +Are the blest man’s; and whatsoever he gives,<br /> +For what he gives is he repaid.<br /> +<a name="page198"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 198</span>Good is +it if by him ’tis held<br /> +He wins the fairest ever welled<br /> +From Nature’s founts: she whispers it: Even I<br /> +Not fairer! and forbids him to deny,<br /> +Else little is he lover. Those he clasps,<br /> +Intent as tempest, worshipful as prayer,—<br /> +And be they doves or be they asps,—<br /> +Must seem to him the sovereignty fair;<br /> +Else counts he soon among life’s wholly tamed.<br /> +Him whom from utter savage she reclaimed,<br /> +Half savage must he stay, would he be crowned<br /> +The lover. Else, past ripeness, deathward bound,<br /> +He reasons; and the totterer Earth detests,<br /> +Love shuns, grim logic screws in grasp, is he.<br /> +Doth man divide divine Necessity<br /> +From Joy, between the Queen of Beauty’s breasts<br /> +A sword is driven; for those most glorious twain<br /> +Present her; armed to bless and to constrain.<br /> +Of this he perishes; not she, the throned<br /> +On rocks that spout their springs to the sacred mounts.<br /> +A loftier Reason out of deeper founts<br /> +Earth’s chosen Goddess bears: by none disowned<br /> +While red blood runs to swell the pulse, she boasts,<br /> +And Beauty, like her star, descends the sky;<br /> +Earth’s answer, heaven’s consent unto man’s +cry,<br /> +Uplifted by the innumerable hosts.</p> +<p class="poetry">Quickened of Nature’s eye and ear,<br /> +When the wild sap at high tide smites<br /> +Within us; or benignly clear<br /> +To vision; or as the iris lights<br /> +On fluctuant waters; she is ours<br /> +Till set of man: the dreamed, the seen;<br /> +Flushing the world with odorous flowers:<br /> +<a name="page199"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 199</span>A soft +compulsion on terrene<br /> +By heavenly: and the world is hers<br /> +While hunger after Beauty spurs.</p> +<p class="poetry">So is it sung in any space<br /> +She fills, with laugh at shallow laws<br /> +Forbidding love’s devised embrace,<br /> +The music Beauty from it draws.</p> +<h3><a name="page200"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 200</span>THE +TEST OF MANHOOD</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Like</span> a flood river +whirled at rocky banks,<br /> +An army issues out of wilderness,<br /> +With battle plucking round its ragged flanks;<br /> +Obstruction in the van; insane excess<br /> +Oft at the heart; yet hard the onward stress<br /> +Unto more spacious, where move ordered ranks,<br /> +And rise hushed temples built of shapely stone,<br /> +The work of hands not pledged to grind or slay.<br /> +They gave our earth a dress of flesh on bone;<br /> +A tongue to speak with answering heaven gave they.<br /> +Then was the gracious birth of man’s new day;<br /> +Divided from the haunted night it shone.</p> +<p class="poetry">That quiet dawn was Reverence; whereof +sprang<br /> +Ethereal Beauty in full morningtide.<br /> +Another sun had risen to clasp his bride:<br /> +It was another earth unto him sang.</p> +<p class="poetry">Came Reverence from the Huntress on her +heights?<br /> +From the Persuader came it, in those vales<br /> +Whereunto she melodiously invites,<br /> +Her troops of eager servitors regales?<br /> +Not far those two great Powers of Nature speed<br /> +Disciple steps on earth when sole they lead;<br /> +Nor either points for us the way of flame.<br /> +From him predestined mightier it came;<br /> +His task to hold them both in breast, and yield<br /> +Their dues to each, and of their war be field.</p> +<p class="poetry">The foes that in repulsion never ceased,<br /> +Must he, who once has been the goodly beast<br /> +<a name="page201"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 201</span>Of one +or other, at whose beck he ran,<br /> +Constrain to make him serviceable man;<br /> +Offending neither, nor the natural claim<br /> +Each pressed, denying, for his true man’s name.</p> +<p class="poetry">Ah, what a sweat of anguish in that strife<br +/> +To hold them fast conjoined within him still;<br /> +Submissive to his will<br /> +Along the road of life!<br /> +And marvel not he wavered if at whiles<br /> +The forward step met frowns, the backward smiles.<br /> +For Pleasure witched him her sweet cup to drain;<br /> +Repentance offered ecstasy in pain.<br /> +Delicious licence called it Nature’s cry;<br /> +Ascetic rigours crushed the fleshly sigh;<br /> +A tread on shingle timed his lame advance<br /> +Flung as the die of Bacchanalian Chance,<br /> +He of the troubled marching army leaned<br /> +On godhead visible, on godhead screened;<br /> +The radiant roseate, the curtained white;<br /> +Yet sharp his battle strained through day, through night.</p> +<p class="poetry">He drank of fictions, till celestial aid<br /> +Might seem accorded when he fawned and prayed;<br /> +Sagely the generous Giver circumspect,<br /> +To choose for grants the egregious, his elect;<br /> +And ever that imagined succour slew<br /> +The soul of brotherhood whence Reverence drew.</p> +<p class="poetry">In fellowship religion has its founts:<br /> +The solitary his own God reveres:<br /> +Ascend no sacred Mounts<br /> +Our hungers or our fears.<br /> +<a name="page202"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 202</span>As only +for the numbers Nature’s care<br /> +Is shown, and she the personal nothing heeds,<br /> +So to Divinity the spring of prayer<br /> +From brotherhood the one way upward leads.<br /> +Like the sustaining air<br /> +Are both for flowers and weeds.<br /> +But he who claims in spirit to be flower,<br /> +Will find them both an air that doth devour.</p> +<p class="poetry">Whereby he smelt his treason, who implored<br +/> +External gifts bestowed but on the sword;<br /> +Beheld himself, with less and less disguise,<br /> +Through those blood-cataracts which dimmed his eyes,<br /> +His army’s foe, condemned to strive and fail;<br /> +See a black adversary’s ghost prevail;<br /> +Never, though triumphs hailed him, hope to win<br /> +While still the conflict tore his breast within.</p> +<p class="poetry">Out of that agony, misread for those<br /> +Imprisoned Powers warring unappeased,<br /> +The ghost of his black adversary rose,<br /> +To smother light, shut heaven, show earth diseased.<br /> +And long with him was wrestling ere emerged<br /> +A mind to read in him the reflex shade<br /> +Of its fierce torment; this way, that way urged;<br /> +By craven compromises hourly swayed.</p> +<p class="poetry">Crouched as a nestling, still its wings +untried,<br /> +The man’s mind opened under weight of cloud.<br /> +To penetrate the dark was it endowed;<br /> +Stood day before a vision shooting wide.<br /> +Whereat the spectral enemy lost form;<br /> +The traversed wilderness exposed its track.<br /> +He felt the far advance in looking back;<br /> +Thence trust in his foot forward through the storm.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page203"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +203</span>Under the low-browed tempest’s eye of ire,<br /> +That ere it lightened smote a coward heart,<br /> +Earth nerved her chastened son to hail athwart<br /> +All ventures perilous his shrouded Sire;<br /> +A stranger still, religiously divined;<br /> +Not yet with understanding read aright.<br /> +But when the mind, the cherishable mind,<br /> +The multitude’s grave shepherd, took full flight,<br /> +Himself as mirror raised among his kind,<br /> +He saw, and first of brotherhood had sight:<br /> +Knew that his force to fly, his will to see,<br /> +His heart enlarged beyond its ribbed domain,<br /> +Had come of many a grip in mastery,<br /> +Which held conjoined the hostile rival twain,<br /> +And of his bosom made him lord, to keep<br /> +The starry roof of his unruffled frame<br /> +Awake to earth, to heaven, and plumb the deep<br /> +Below, above, aye with a wistful aim.</p> +<p class="poetry">The mastering mind in him, by tempests +blown,<br /> +By traitor inmates baited, upward burned;<br /> +Perforce of growth, the Master mind discerned,<br /> +The Great Unseen, nowise the Dark Unknown.<br /> +To whom unwittingly did he aspire<br /> +In wilderness, where bitter was his need:<br /> +To whom in blindness, as an earthy seed<br /> +For light and air, he struck through crimson mire.<br /> +But not ere he upheld a forehead lamp,<br /> +And viewed an army, once the seeming doomed,<br /> +All choral in its fruitful garden camp,<br /> +The spiritual the palpable illumed.</p> +<p class="poetry">This gift of penetration and embrace,<br /> +His prize from tidal battles lost or won,<br /> +Reveals the scheme to animate his race:<br /> +<a name="page204"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 204</span>How that +it is a warfare but begun;<br /> +Unending; with no Power to interpose;<br /> +No prayer, save for strength to keep his ground,<br /> +Heard of the Highest; never battle’s close,<br /> +The victory complete and victor crowned:<br /> +Nor solace in defeat, save from that sense<br /> +Of strength well spent, which is the strength renewed.<br /> +In manhood must he find his competence;<br /> +In his clear mind the spiritual food:<br /> +God being there while he his fight maintains;<br /> +Throughout his mind the Master Mind being there,<br /> +While he rejects the suicide despair;<br /> +Accepts the spur of explicable pains;<br /> +Obedient to Nature, not her slave:<br /> +Her lord, if to her rigid laws he bows;<br /> +Her dust, if with his conscience he plays knave,<br /> +And bids the Passions on the Pleasures browse:—<br /> +Whence Evil in a world unread before;<br /> +That mystery to simple springs resolved.<br /> +His God the Known, diviner to adore,<br /> +Shows Nature’s savage riddles kindly solved.<br /> +Inconscient, insensitive, she reigns<br /> +In iron laws, though rapturous fair her face.<br /> +Back to the primal brute shall he retrace<br /> +His path, doth he permit to force her chains<br /> +A soft Persuader coursing through his veins,<br /> +An icy Huntress stringing to the chase:<br /> +What one the flash disdains;<br /> +What one so gives it grace.</p> +<p class="poetry">But is he rightly manful in her eyes,<br /> +A splendid bloodless knight to gain the skies,<br /> +A blood-hot son of Earth by all her signs,<br /> +Desireing and desireable he shines;<br /> +As peaches, that have caught the sun’s uprise<br /> +And kissed warm gold till noonday, even as vines.<br /> +<a name="page205"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 205</span>Earth +fills him with her juices, without fear<br /> +That she will cast him drunken down the steeps.<br /> +All woman is she to this man most dear;<br /> +He sows for bread, and she in spirit reaps:<br /> +She conscient, she sensitive, in him;<br /> +With him enwound, his brave ambition hers:<br /> +By him humaner made; by his keen spurs<br /> +Pricked to race past the pride in giant limb,<br /> +Her crazy adoration of big thews,<br /> +Proud in her primal sons, when crags they hurled,<br /> +Were thunder spitting lightnings on the world<br /> +In daily deeds, and she their evening Muse.</p> +<p class="poetry">This man, this hero, works not to destroy;<br +/> +This godlike—as the rock in ocean stands;—<br /> +He of the myriad eyes, the myriad hands<br /> +Creative; in his edifice has joy.<br /> +How strength may serve for purity is shown<br /> +When he himself can scourge to make it clean.<br /> +Withal his pitch of pride would not disown<br /> +A sober world that walks the balanced mean<br /> +Between its tempters, rarely overthrown:<br /> +And such at times his army’s march has been.</p> +<p class="poetry">Near is he to great Nature in the thought<br /> +Each changing Season intimately saith,<br /> +That nought save apparition knows the death;<br /> +To the God-lighted mind of man ’tis nought.<br /> +She counts not loss a word of any weight;<br /> +It may befal his passions and his greeds<br /> +To lose their treasures, like the vein that bleeds,<br /> +But life gone breathless will she reinstate.</p> +<p class="poetry">Close on the heart of Earth his bosom beats,<br +/> +When he the mandate lodged in it obeys,<br /> +<a name="page206"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 206</span>Alive to +breast a future wrapped in haze,<br /> +Strike camp, and onward, like the wind’s cloud-fleets.<br +/> +Unresting she, unresting he, from change<br /> +To change, as rain of cloud, as fruit of rain;<br /> +She feels her blood-tree throbbing in her grain,<br /> +Yet skyward branched, with loftier mark and range.</p> +<p class="poetry">No miracle the sprout of wheat from clod,<br /> +She knows, nor growth of man in grisly brute;<br /> +But he, the flower at head and soil at root,<br /> +Is miracle, guides he the brute to God.<br /> +And that way seems he bound; that way the road,<br /> +With his dark-lantern mind, unled, alone,<br /> +Wearifully through forest-tracts unsown,<br /> +He travels, urged by some internal goad.</p> +<p class="poetry">Dares he behold the thing he is, what thing<br +/> +He would become is in his mind its child;<br /> +Astir, demanding birth to light and wing;<br /> +For battle prompt, by pleasure unbeguiled.<br /> +So moves he forth in faith, if he has made<br /> +His mind God’s temple, dedicate to truth.<br /> +Earth’s nourishing delights, no more gainsaid,<br /> +He tastes, as doth the bridegroom rich in youth.<br /> +Then knows he Love, that beckons and controls;<br /> +The star of sky upon his footway cast;<br /> +Then match in him who holds his tempters fast,<br /> +The body’s love and mind’s, whereof the +soul’s.<br /> +Then Earth her man for woman finds at last,<br /> +To speed the pair unto her goal of goals.</p> +<p class="poetry">Or is’t the widowed’s dream of her +new mate?<br /> +Seen has she virulent days of heat in flood;<br /> +The sly Persuader snaky in his blood;<br /> +With her the barren Huntress alternate;<br /> +<a name="page207"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 207</span>His +rough refractory off on kicking heels<br /> +To rear; the man dragged rearward, shamed, amazed;<br /> +And as a torrent stream where cattle grazed,<br /> +His tumbled world. What, then, the faith she feels?<br /> +May not his aspect, like her own so fair<br /> +Reflexively, the central force belie,<br /> +And he, the once wild ocean storming sky,<br /> +Be rebel at the core? What hope is there?</p> +<p class="poetry">’Tis that in each recovery he +preserves,<br /> +Between his upper and his nether wit,<br /> +Sense of his march ahead, more brightly lit;<br /> +He less the shaken thing of lusts and nerves;<br /> +With such a grasp upon his brute as tells<br /> +Of wisdom from that vile relapsing spun.<br /> +A Sun goes down in wasted fire, a Sun<br /> +Resplendent springs, to faith refreshed compels.</p> +<h3><a name="page208"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 208</span>THE +HUELESS LOVE</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Unto</span> that love must +we through fire attain,<br /> + Which those two held as breath of common air;<br /> + The hands of whom were given in bond elsewhere;<br +/> +Whom Honour was untroubled to restrain.</p> +<p class="poetry">Midway the road of our life’s term they +met,<br /> + And one another knew without surprise;<br /> + Nor cared that beauty stood in mutual eyes;<br /> +Nor at their tardy meeting nursed regret.</p> +<p class="poetry">To them it was revealed how they had found<br +/> + The kindred nature and the needed mind;<br /> + The mate by long conspiracy designed;<br /> +The flower to plant in sanctuary ground.</p> +<p class="poetry">Avowed in vigilant solicitude<br /> + For either, what most lived within each breast<br /> + They let be seen: yet every human test<br /> +Demanding righteousness approved them good.</p> +<p class="poetry">She leaned on a strong arm, and little +feared<br /> + Abandonment to help if heaved or sank<br /> + Her heart at intervals while Love looked blank,<br +/> +Life rosier were she but less revered.</p> +<p class="poetry">An arm that never shook did not obscure<br /> + Her woman’s intuition of the bliss—<br +/> + Their tempter’s moment o’er the black +abyss,<br /> +Across the narrow plank—he could abjure.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page209"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +209</span>Then came a day that clipped for him the thread,<br /> + And their first touch of lips, as he lay cold,<br /> + Was all of earthly in their love untold,<br /> +Beyond all earthly known to them who wed.</p> +<p class="poetry">So has there come the gust at South-west +flung<br /> + By sudden volt on eves of freezing mist,<br /> + When sister snowflake sister snowdrop kissed,<br /> +And one passed out, and one the bell-head hung.</p> +<h3>UNION IN DISSEVERANCE</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Sunset</span> worn to its +last vermilion he;<br /> +She that star overhead in slow descent:<br /> +That white star with the front of angel she;<br /> +He undone in his rays of glory spent</p> +<p class="poetry">Halo, fair as the bow-shot at his rise,<br /> +He casts round her, and knows his hour of rest<br /> +Incomplete, were the light for which he dies,<br /> +Less like joy of the dove that wings to nest.</p> +<p class="poetry">Lustrous momently, near on earth she sinks;<br +/> +Life’s full throb over breathless and abased:<br /> +Yet stand they, though impalpable the links,<br /> +One, more one than the bridally embraced.</p> +<h3><a name="page210"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 210</span>SONG +IN THE SONGLESS</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">They</span> have no song, +the sedges dry,<br /> + And still they sing.<br /> +It is within my breast they sing,<br /> + As I pass by.<br /> +Within my breast they touch a string,<br /> + They wake a sigh.<br /> +There is but sound of sedges dry;<br /> + In me they sing.</p> +<h3>THE BURDEN OF STRENGTH</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">If</span> that thou hast +the gift of strength, then know<br /> +Thy part is to uplift the trodden low;<br /> +Else in a giant’s grasp until the end<br /> +A hopeless wrestler shall thy soul contend.</p> +<h3><a name="page211"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 211</span>THE +MAIN REGRET<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">WRITTEN FOR THE CHARING CROSS +ALBUM</span></h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Seen</span>, too clear and +historic within us, our sins of omission<br /> + Frown when the Autumn days strike us all ruthlessly +bare.<br /> +They of our mortal diseases find never healing physician;<br /> + Errors they of the soul, past the one hope to +repair.</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Sunshine might we have been unto seed under +soil, or have scattered<br /> + Seed to ascendant suns brighter than any that +shone.<br /> +Even the limp-legged beggar a sick desperado has flattered<br /> + Back to a half-sloughed life cheered by the mere +human tone.</p> +<h3>ALTERNATION</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Between</span> the fountain +and the rill<br /> +I passed, and saw the mighty will<br /> +To leap at sky; the careless run,<br /> +As earth would lead her little son.</p> +<p class="poetry">Beneath them throbs an urgent well,<br /> +That here is play, and there is war.<br /> +I know not which had most to tell<br /> +Of whence we spring and what we are.</p> +<h3><a name="page212"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +212</span>FOREST HISTORY</h3> +<h4>I</h4> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Beneath</span> the vans of +doom did men pass in.<br /> + Heroic who came out; for round them hung<br /> + A wavering phantom’s red volcano tongue,<br /> +With league-long lizard tail and fishy fin:</p> +<h4>II</h4> +<p class="poetry">Old Earth’s original Dragon; there +retired<br /> + To his last fastness; overthrown by few.<br /> + Him a laborious thrust of roadway slew.<br /> +Then man to play devorant straight was fired.</p> +<h4>III</h4> +<p class="poetry">More intimate became the forest fear<br /> + While pillared darkness hatched malicious life<br /> + At either elbow, wolf or gnome or knife<br /> +And wary slid the glance from ear to ear.</p> +<h4>IV</h4> +<p class="poetry">In chillness, like a clouded lantern-ray,<br /> + The forest’s heart of fog on mossed morass,<br +/> + On purple pool and silky cotton-grass,<br /> +Revealed where lured the swallower byway.</p> +<h4>V</h4> +<p class="poetry">Dead outlook, flattened back with hard +rebound<br /> + Off walls of distance, left each mounted height.<br +/> + It seemed a giant hag-fiend, churning spite<br /> +Of humble human being, held the ground.</p> +<h4><a name="page213"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +213</span>VI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Through friendless wastes, through treacherous +woodland, slow<br /> + The feet sustained by track of feet pursued<br /> + Pained steps, and found the common brotherhood<br /> +By sign of Heaven indifferent, Nature foe.</p> +<h4>VII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Anon a mason’s work amazed the sight,<br +/> + And long-frocked men, called Brothers, there +abode.<br /> + They pointed up, bowed head, and dug and sowed;<br +/> +Whereof was shelter, loaf, and warm firelight.</p> +<h4>VIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">What words they taught were nails to scratch +the head.<br /> + Benignant works explained the chanting brood.<br /> + Their monastery lit black solitude,<br /> +As one might think a star that heavenward led.</p> +<h4>IX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Uprose a fairer nest for weary feet,<br /> + Like some gold flower nightly inward curled,<br /> + Where gentle maidens fled a roaring world,<br /> +Or played with it, and had their white retreat.</p> +<h4>X</h4> +<p class="poetry">Into big books of metal clasps they pored.<br +/> + They governed, even as men; they welcomed lays.<br +/> + The treasures women are whose aim is praise,<br /> +Was shown in them: the Garden half restored.</p> +<h4><a name="page214"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +214</span>XI</h4> +<p class="poetry">A deluge billow scoured the land off seas,<br +/> + With widened jaws, and slaughter was its foam.<br /> + For food, for clothing, ambush, refuge, home,<br /> +The lesser savage offered bogs and trees.</p> +<h4>XII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Whence reverence round grey-haired story +grew:<br /> + And inmost spots of ancient horror shone<br /> + As temples under beams of trials bygone;<br /> +For in them sang brave times with God in view.</p> +<h4>XIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Till now trim homesteads bordered spaces +green,<br /> + Like night’s first little stars through +clearing showers.<br /> + Was rumoured how a castle’s falcon towers<br +/> +The wilderness commanded with fierce mien.</p> +<h4>XIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Therein a serious Baron stuck his lance;<br /> + For minstrel songs a beauteous Dame would pout.<br +/> + Gay knights and sombre, felon or devout,<br /> +Pricked onward, bound for their unsung romance.</p> +<h4>XV</h4> +<p class="poetry">It might be that two errant lords across<br /> + The block of each came edged, and at sharp cry<br /> + They charged forthwith, the better man to try.<br /> +One rode his way, one couched on quiet moss.</p> +<h4><a name="page215"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +215</span>XVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Perchance a lady sweet, whose lord lay +slain,<br /> + The robbers into gruesome durance drew.<br /> + Swift should her hero come, like lightning’s +blue!<br /> +She prayed for him, as crackling drought for rain.</p> +<h4>XVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">As we, that ere the worst her hero haps,<br /> + Of Angels guided, nigh that loathly den:<br /> + A toady cave beside an ague fen,<br /> +Where long forlorn the lone dog whines and yaps.</p> +<h4>XVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">By daylight now the forest fear could read<br +/> + Itself, and at new wonders chuckling went.<br /> + Straight for the roebuck’s neck the bowman +spent<br /> +A dart that laughed at distance and at speed.</p> +<h4>XIX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Right loud the bugle’s hallali elate<br +/> + Rang forth of merry dingles round the tors;<br /> + And deftest hand was he from foreign wars,<br /> +But soon he hailed the home-bred yeoman mate.</p> +<h4>XX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Before the blackbird pecked the turf they +woke;<br /> + At dawn the deer’s wet nostrils blew their +last.<br /> + To forest, haunt of runs and prime repast,<br /> +With paying blows, the yokel strained his yoke.</p> +<h4><a name="page216"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +216</span>XXI</h4> +<p class="poetry">The city urchin mooned on forest air,<br /> + On grassy sweeps and flying arrows, thick<br /> + As swallows o’er smooth streams, and sighed +him sick<br /> +For thinking that his dearer home was there.</p> +<h4>XXII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Familiar, still unseized, the forest sprang<br +/> + An old-world echo, like no mortal thing.<br /> + The hunter’s horn might wind a jocund ring,<br +/> +But held in ear it had a chilly clang.</p> +<h4>XXIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Some shadow lurked aloof of ancient time;<br /> + Some warning haunted any sound prolonged,<br /> + As though the leagues of woodland held them +wronged<br /> +To hear an axe and see a township climb.</p> +<h4>XXIV</h4> +<p class="poetry">The forest’s erewhile emperor at eve<br +/> + Had voice when lowered heavens drummed for gales.<br +/> + At midnight a small people danced the dales,<br /> +So thin that they might dwindle through a sieve</p> +<h4>XXV</h4> +<p class="poetry">Ringed mushrooms told of them, and in their +throats,<br /> + Old wives that gathered herbs and knew too much.<br +/> + The pensioned forester beside his crutch,<br /> +Struck showers from embers at those bodeful notes.</p> +<h4><a name="page217"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +217</span>XXVI</h4> +<p class="poetry">Came then the one, all ear, all eye, all +heart;<br /> + Devourer, and insensibly devoured;<br /> + In whom the city over forest flowered,<br /> +The forest wreathed the city’s drama-mart.</p> +<h4>XXVII</h4> +<p class="poetry">There found he in new form that Dragon old,<br +/> + From tangled solitudes expelled; and taught<br /> + How blindly each its antidote besought;<br /> +For either’s breath the needs of either told.</p> +<h4>XXVIII</h4> +<p class="poetry">Now deep in woods, with song no sermon’s +drone,<br /> + He showed what charm the human concourse works:<br +/> + Amid the press of men, what virtue lurks<br /> +Where bubble sacred wells of wildness lone.</p> +<h4>XXIX</h4> +<p class="poetry">Our conquest these: if haply we retain<br /> + The reverence that ne’er will overrun<br /> + Due boundaries of realms from Nature won,<br /> +Nor let the poet’s awe in rapture wane.</p> +<h2><a name="page219"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +219</span>FRAGMENTS OF THE ILIAD IN ENGLISH HEXAMETER VERSE</h2> +<h3><a name="page221"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +221</span><span class="smcap">Iliad</span>, i. 149<br /> +THE INVECTIVE OF ACHILLES</h3> +<p class="poetry">“<span class="smcap">Heigh</span> me! +brazen of front, thou glutton for plunder, how can one,<br /> +Servant here to thy mandates, heed thee among our Achaians,<br /> +Either the mission hie on or stoutly do fight with the foemen?<br +/> +I, not hither I fared on account of the spear-armèd +Trojans,<br /> +Pledged to the combat; they unto me have in nowise a harm +done;<br /> +Never have they, of a truth, come lifting my horses or oxen;<br +/> +Never in deep-soiled Phthia, the nurser of heroes, my harvests<br +/> +Ravaged, they; for between us is numbered full many a darksome<br +/> +Mountain, ay, therewith too the stretch of the windy +sea-waters.<br /> +O hugely shameless! thee did we follow to hearten thee, +justice<br /> +Pluck from the Dardans for him, Menelaos, thee too, thou +dog-eyed!<br /> +Whereof little thy thought is, nought whatever thou reckest.<br +/> +<a name="page222"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 222</span>Worse, +it is thou whose threat ’tis to ravish my prize from me, +portion<br /> +Won with much labour, the which my gift from the sons of +Achaia.<br /> +Never, in sooth, have I known my prize equal thine when +Achaians<br /> +Gave some flourishing populous Trojan town up to pillage.<br /> +Nay, sure, mine were the hands did most in the storm of the +combat,<br /> +Yet when came peradventure share of the booty amongst us,<br /> +Bigger to thee went the prize, while I some small blessèd +thing bore<br /> +Off to the ships, my share of reward for my toil in the +bloodshed!<br /> +So now go I to Phthia, for better by much it beseems me<br /> +Homeward go with my beaked ships now, and I hold not in +prospect,<br /> +I being outraged, thou mayst gather here plunder and +wealth-store.”</p> +<h4><a name="page223"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +223</span>Iliad, i. 225</h4> +<p class="poetry">“<span class="smcap">Bibber</span> +besotted, with scowl of a cur, having heart of a deer, thou!<br +/> +Never to join to thy warriors armed for the press of the +conflict,<br /> +Never for ambush forth with the princeliest sons of Achaia<br /> +Dared thy soul, for to thee that thing would have looked as a +death-stroke.<br /> +Sooth, more easy it seems, down the lengthened array of +Achaians,<br /> +Snatch at the prize of the one whose voice has been lifted +against thee.<br /> +Ravening king of the folk, for that thou hast thy rule over +abjects;<br /> +Else, son of Atreus, now were this outrage on me thy last one.<br +/> +Nay, but I tell thee, and I do swear a big oath on it +likewise:<br /> +Yea, by the sceptre here, and it surely bears branches and +leaf-buds<br /> +Never again, since first it was lopped from its trunk on the +mountains,<br /> +No more sprouting; for round it all clean has the sharp metal +clipped off<br /> +Leaves and the bark; ay, verify now do the sons of Achaia,<br /> +Guardian hands of the counsels of Zeus, pronouncing the +judgement,<br /> +Hold it aloft; so now unto thee shall the oath have its +portent;<br /> +Loud will the cry for Achilles burst from the sons of Achaia<br +/> +<a name="page224"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +224</span>Throughout the army, and thou chafe powerless, though +in an anguish,<br /> +How to give succour when vast crops down under man-slaying +Hector<br /> +Tumble expiring; and thou deep in thee shalt tear at thy +heart-strings,<br /> +Rage-wrung, thou, that in nought thou didst honour the flower of +Achaians.”</p> +<h3><a name="page225"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +225</span><span class="smcap">Iliad</span>, ii 455<br /> +MARSHALLING OF THE ACHAIANS</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Like</span> as a terrible +fire feeds fast on a forest enormous,<br /> +Up on a mountain height, and the blaze of it radiates round +far,<br /> +So on the bright blest arms of the host in their march did the +splendour<br /> +Gleam wide round through the circle of air right up to the +sky-vault.<br /> +They, now, as when swarm thick in the air multitudinous winged +flocks,<br /> +Be it of geese or of cranes or the long-necked troops of the +wild-swans,<br /> +Off that Asian mead, by the flow of the waters of +Kaïstros;<br /> +Hither and yon fly they, and rejoicing in pride of their +pinions,<br /> +Clamour, shaped to their ranks, and the mead all about them +resoundeth;<br /> +So those numerous tribes from their ships and their shelterings +poured forth<br /> +On that plain of Scamander, and horrible rumbled beneath them<br +/> +Earth to the quick-paced feet of the men and the tramp of the +horse-hooves.<br /> +Stopped they then on the fair-flower’d field of Scamander, +their thousands<br /> +Many as leaves and the blossoms born of the flowerful season.<br +/> +Even as countless hot-pressed flies in their multitudes +traverse,<br /> +<a name="page226"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 226</span>Clouds +of them, under some herdsman’s wonning, where then are the +milk-pails<br /> +Also, full of their milk, in the bountiful season of +spring-time;<br /> +Even so thickly the long-haired sons of Achaia the plain held,<br +/> +Prompt for the dash at the Trojan host, with the passion to crush +them.<br /> +Those, likewise, as the goatherds, eyeing their vast flocks of +goats, know<br /> +Easily one from the other when all get mixed o’er the +pasture,<br /> +So did the chieftains rank them here there in their places for +onslaught,<br /> +Hard on the push of the fray; and among them King Agamemnon,<br +/> +He, for his eyes and his head, as when Zeus glows glad in his +thunder,<br /> +He with the girdle of Ares, he with the breast of Poseidon.</p> +<h3><a name="page227"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +227</span><span class="smcap">Iliad</span>, xi, 148<br /> +AGAMEMNON IN THE FIGHT</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">These</span>, then, he +left, and away where ranks were now clashing the thickest,<br /> +Onward rushed, and with him rushed all of the bright-greaved +Achaians.<br /> +Foot then footmen slew, that were flying from direful +compulsion,<br /> +Horse at the horsemen (up from off under them mounted the +dust-cloud,<br /> +Up off the plain, raised up cloud-thick by the thundering +horse-hooves)<br /> +Hewed with the sword’s sharp edge; and so meanwhile Lord +Agamemnon<br /> +Followed, chasing and slaughtering aye, on-urgeing the +Argives.</p> +<p class="poetry">Now, as when fire voracious catches the +unclippèd wood-land,<br /> +This way bears it and that the great whirl of the wind, and the +scrubwood<br /> +Stretches uptorn, flung forward alength by the fire’s fury +rageing,<br /> +So beneath Atreides Agamemnon heads of the scattered<br /> +Trojans fell; and in numbers amany the horses, neck-stiffened,<br +/> +Rattled their vacant cars down the roadway gaps of the +war-field,<br /> +Missing the blameless charioteers, but, for these, they were +outstretched<br /> +Flat upon earth, far dearer to vultures than to their +home-mates.</p> +<h3><a name="page228"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +228</span><span class="smcap">Iliad</span>, xi, 378<br /> +PARIS AND DIOMEDES</h3> +<p +class="poetry"> <span +class="smcap">So</span> he, with a clear shout of laughter,<br /> +Forth of his ambush leapt, and he vaunted him, uttering +thiswise:<br /> +“Hit thou art! not in vain flew the shaft; how by rights it +had pierced thee<br /> +Into the undermost gut, therewith to have rived thee of +life-breath!<br /> +Following that had the Trojans plucked a new breath from their +direst,<br /> +They all frighted of thee, as the goats bleat in flight from a +lion.”<br /> +Then unto him untroubled made answer stout Diomedes:<br /> +“Bow-puller, jiber, thy bow for thy glorying, spyer at +virgins!<br /> +If that thou dared’st face me here out in the open with +weapons,<br /> +Nothing then would avail thee thy bow and thy thick shot of +arrows.<br /> +Now thou plumest thee vainly because of a graze of my +footsole;<br /> +Reck I as were that stroke from a woman or some pettish +infant.<br /> +Aye flies blunted the dart of the man that’s emasculate, +noughtworth!<br /> +Otherwise hits, forth flying from me, and but strikes it the +slightest,<br /> +My keen shaft, and it numbers a man of the dead fallen +straightway.<br /> +<a name="page229"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 229</span>Torn, +troth, then are the cheeks of the wife of that man fallen +slaughtered,<br /> +Orphans his babes, full surely he reddens the earth with his +blood-drops,<br /> +Rotting, round him the birds, more numerous they than the +women.”</p> +<h3><a name="page230"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +230</span><span class="smcap">Iliad</span>, xiv, 283<br /> +HYPNOS ON IDA</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">They</span> then to +fountain-abundant Ida, mother of wild beasts,<br /> +Came, and they first left ocean to fare over mainland at +Lektos,<br /> +Where underneath of their feet waved loftiest growths of the +woodland.<br /> +There hung Hypnos fast, ere the vision of Zeus was observant,<br +/> +Mounted upon a tall pine-tree, tallest of pines that on Ida<br /> +Lustily spring off soil for the shoot up aloft into aether.<br /> +There did he sit well-cloaked by the wide-branched pine for +concealment,<br /> +That loud bird, in his form like, that perched high up in the +mountains,<br /> +Chalkis is named by the Gods, but of mortals known as +Kymindis.</p> +<h3><a name="page231"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +231</span><span class="smcap">Iliad</span>, xvii, 426<br /> +CLASH IN ARMS OF THE ACHAIANS AND TROJANS</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Not</span> the sea-wave so +bellows abroad when it bursts upon shingle,<br /> +Whipped from the sea’s deeps up by the terrible blast of +the Northwind;<br /> +Nay, nor is ever the roar of the fierce fire’s rush so +arousing,<br /> +Down along mountain-glades, when it surges to kindle a +woodland;<br /> +Nay, nor so tonant thunders the stress of the gale in the +oak-trees’<br /> +Foliage-tresses high, when it rages to raveing its utmost;<br /> +As rose then stupendous the Trojan’s cry and +Achaians’,<br /> +Dread upshouting as one when together they clashed in the +conflict.</p> +<h3><a name="page232"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +232</span><span class="smcap">Iliad</span>, xvii, 426<br /> +THE HORSES OF ACHILLES</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">So</span> now the horses of +Aiakides, off wide of the war-ground,<br /> +Wept, since first they were ware of their charioteer overthrown +there,<br /> +Cast down low in the whirl of the dust under man-slaying +Hector.<br /> +Sooth, meanwhile, then did Automedon, brave son of Diores,<br /> +Oft, on the one hand, urge them with flicks of the swift whip, +and oft, too,<br /> +Coax entreatingly, hurriedly; whiles did he angrily threaten.<br +/> +Vainly, for these would not to the ships, to the Hellespont +spacious,<br /> +Backward turn, nor be whipped to the battle among the +Achaians.<br /> +Nay, as a pillar remains immovable, fixed on the tombstone,<br /> +Haply, of some dead man or it may be a woman there-under;<br /> +Even like hard stood they there attached to the glorious +war-car,<br /> +Earthward bowed with their heads; and of them so lamenting +incessant<br /> +Ran the hot teardrops downward on to the earth from their +eyelids,<br /> +Mourning their charioteer; all their lustrous manes +dusty-clotted,<br /> +Right side and left of the yoke-ring tossed, to the breadth of +the yoke-bow.<br /> + <a name="page233"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +233</span>Now when the issue of Kronos beheld that sorrow, his +head shook<br /> +Pitying them for their grief, these words then he spake in his +bosom;<br /> +“Why, ye hapless, gave we to Peleus you, to a mortal<br /> +Master; ye that are ageless both, ye both of you deathless!<br /> +Was it that ye among men most wretched should come to have +heart-grief?<br /> +’Tis most true, than the race of these men is there +wretcheder nowhere<br /> +Aught over earth’s range found that is gifted with breath +and has movement.”</p> +<h2><a name="page234"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 234</span>THE +MARES OF THE CAMARGUE<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">FROM THE ‘MIRÈIO’ OF +MISTRAL</span></h2> +<p class="poetry"> A <span +class="smcap">hundred</span> mares, all white! their manes<br /> + Like mace-reed of the marshy plains<br /> + Thick-tufted, wavy, free o’ the shears:<br /> + And when the fiery squadron rears<br /> + Bursting at speed, each mane appears<br /> + Even as the white scarf of a fay<br /> +Floating upon their necks along the heavens away.</p> +<p class="poetry"> O race of humankind, take +shame!<br /> + For never yet a hand could tame,<br /> + Nor bitter spur that rips the flanks subdue<br /> + The mares of the Camargue. I have known,<br /> + By treason snared, some captives shown;<br /> + Expatriate from their native Rhone,<br /> +Led off, their saline pastures far from view:</p> +<p class="poetry"> And on a day, with prompt +rebound,<br /> + They have flung their riders to the ground,<br /> + And at a single gallop, scouring free,<br /> + Wide-nostril’d to the wind, twice ten<br /> + Of long marsh-leagues devour’d, and then,<br +/> + Back to the Vacarés again,<br /> +After ten years of slavery just to breathe salt sea</p> +<p class="poetry"> For of this savage race +unbent,<br /> + The ocean is the element.<br /> + Of old escaped from Neptune’s car, full +sure,<br /> + <a name="page235"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +235</span>Still with the white foam fleck’d are they,<br /> + And when the sea puffs black from grey,<br /> + And ships part cables, loudly neigh<br /> +The stallions of Camargue, all joyful in the roar;</p> +<p class="poetry"> And keen as a whip they lash +and crack<br /> + Their tails that drag the dust, and back<br /> + Scratch up the earth, and feel, entering their +flesh, where he,<br /> + The God, drives deep his trident teeth,<br /> + Who in one horror, above, beneath,<br /> + Bids storm and watery deluge seethe,<br /> +And shatters to their depths the abysses of the sea.</p> +<p style="text-align: right"><i>Cant.</i> iv.</p> +<h2><a name="page236"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +236</span>‘ATKINS’</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Yonder’s</span> the +man with his life in his hand,<br /> +Legs on the march for whatever the land,<br /> + Or to the slaughter, or to the maiming,<br /> + Getting the dole of a dog for +pay.<br /> +Laurels he clasps in the words ‘duty done,’<br /> +England his heart under every sun:—<br /> + Exquisite humour! that gives him a naming<br /> + Base to the ear as an ass’s +bray.</p> +<h2><a name="page237"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 237</span>THE +VOYAGE OF THE ‘OPHIR’</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Men</span> of our race, we +send you one<br /> +Round whom Victoria’s holy name<br /> +Is halo from the sunken sun<br /> +Of her grand Summer’s day aflame.<br /> +The heart of your loved Motherland,<br /> +To them she loves as her own blood,<br /> +This Flower of Ocean bears in hand,<br /> + Assured of gift as good.</p> +<p class="poetry">Forth for our Southern shores the fleet<br /> +Which crowns a nation’s wisdom steams,<br /> +That there may Briton Briton greet,<br /> +And stamp as fact Imperial dreams.<br /> +Across the globe, from sea to sea,<br /> +The long smoke-pennon trails above,<br /> +Writes over sky how wise will be<br /> + The Power that trusts to love.</p> +<p class="poetry">A love that springs from heart and brain<br /> +In union gives for ripest fruit<br /> +The concord Kings and States in vain<br /> +Have sought, who played the lofty brute,<br /> +And fondly deeming they possessed,<br /> +On force relied, and found it break:<br /> +That truth once scored on Britain’s breast<br /> + Now keeps her mind awake.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page238"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +238</span>Australian, Canadian,<br /> +To tone old veins with streams of youth,<br /> +Our trust be on the best in man<br /> +Henceforth, and we shall prove that truth.<br /> +Prove to a world of brows down-bent<br /> +That in the Britain thus endowed,<br /> +Imperial means beneficent,<br /> + And strength to service vowed.</p> +<h2><a name="page239"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 239</span>THE +CRISIS</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Spirit</span> of Russia, +now has come<br /> +The day when thou canst not be dumb.<br /> +Around thee foams the torrent tide,<br /> +Above thee its fell fountain, Pride.<br /> +The senseless rock awaits thy word<br /> +To crumble; shall it be unheard?<br /> +Already, like a tempest-sun,<br /> +That shoots the flare and shuts to dun,<br /> +Thy land ’twixt flame and darkness heaves,<br /> +Showing the blade wherewith Fate cleaves,<br /> +If mortals in high courage fail<br /> +At the one breath before the gale.<br /> +Those rulers in all forms of lust,<br /> +Who trod thy children down to dust<br /> +On the red Sunday, know right well<br /> +What word for them thy voice would spell,<br /> +What quick perdition for them weave,<br /> +Did they in such a voice believe.<br /> +Not thine to raise the avenger’s shriek,<br /> +Nor turn to them a Tolstoi cheek;<br /> +Nor menace him, the waverer still,<br /> +Man of much heart and little will,<br /> +The criminal of his high seat,<br /> +Whose plea of Guiltless judges it.<br /> +For him thy voice shall bring to hand<br /> +Salvation, and to thy torn land,<br /> +Seen on the breakers. Now has come<br /> +The day when thou canst not be dumb,<br /> +<a name="page240"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 240</span>Spirit +of Russia:—those who bind<br /> +Thy limbs and iron-cap thy mind,<br /> +Take thee for quaking flesh, misdoubt<br /> +That thou art of the rabble rout<br /> +Which cries and flees, with whimpering lip,<br /> +From reckless gun and brutal whip;<br /> +But he who has at heart the deeds<br /> +Of thy heroic offspring reads<br /> +In them a soul; not given to shrink<br /> +From peril on the abyss’s brink;<br /> +With never dread of murderous power;<br /> +With view beyond the crimson hour;<br /> +Neither an instinct-driven might,<br /> +Nor visionary erudite;<br /> +A soul; that art thou. It remains<br /> +For thee to stay thy children’s veins,<br /> +The countertides of hate arrest,<br /> +Give to thy sons a breathing breast,<br /> +And Him resembling, in His sight,<br /> +Say to thy land, Let there be Light.</p> +<h2><a name="page241"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +241</span>OCTOBER 21, 1905</h2> +<p class="poetry"> <span +class="smcap">The</span> hundred years have passed, and he<br /> + Whose name appeased a nation’s fears,<br /> + As with a hand laid over sea;<br /> + To thunder through the foeman’s ears<br /> + Defeat before his blast of fire;<br /> + Lives in the immortality<br /> +That poets dream and noblest souls desire.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Never did nation’s need +evoke<br /> + Hero like him for aid, the while<br /> + A Continent was cannon-smoke<br /> + Or peace in slavery: this one Isle<br /> + Reflecting Nature: this one man<br /> + Her sea-hound and her mortal stroke,<br /> +With war-worn body aye in battle’s van.</p> +<p class="poetry"> And do we love him well, as +well<br /> + As he his country, we may greet,<br /> + With hand on steel, our passing bell<br /> + Nigh on the swing, for prelude sweet<br /> + To the music heard when his last breath<br /> + Hung on its ebb beside the knell,<br /> +And <span class="smcap">Victory</span> in his ear sang gracious +Death.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Ah, day of glory! day of +tears!<br /> + Day of a people bowed as one!<br /> + Behold across those hundred years<br /> + <a name="page242"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +242</span>The lion flash of gun at gun:<br /> + Our bitter pride; our love bereaved;<br /> + What pall of cloud o’ercame our sun<br /> +That day, to bear his wreath, the end achieved.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Joy that no more with +murder’s frown<br /> + The ancient rivals bark apart.<br /> + Now Nelson to brave France is shown<br /> + A hero after her own heart:<br /> + And he now scanning that quick race,<br /> + To whom through life his glove was thrown,<br /> +Would know a sister spirit to embrace.</p> +<h2><a name="page243"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 243</span>THE +CENTENARY OF GARIBALDI</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">We</span> who have seen +Italia in the throes,<br /> +Half risen but to be hurled to ground, and now<br /> +Like a ripe field of wheat where once drove plough<br /> +All bounteous as she is fair, we think of those<br /> +Who blew the breath of life into her frame:<br /> +Cavour, Mazzini, Garibaldi: Three:<br /> +Her Brain, her Soul, her Sword; and set her free<br /> +From ruinous discords, with one lustrous aim.</p> +<p class="poetry">That aim, albeit they were of minds diverse,<br +/> +Conjoined them, not to strive without surcease;<br /> +For them could be no babblement of peace<br /> +While lay their country under Slavery’s curse.</p> +<p class="poetry">The set of torn Italia’s glorious day<br +/> +Was ever sunrise in each filial breast.<br /> +Of eagle beaks by righteousness unblest<br /> +They felt her pulsing body made the prey.</p> +<p class="poetry">Wherefore they struck, and had to count their +dead.<br /> +With bitter smile of resolution nerved<br /> +To try new issues, holding faith unswerved,<br /> +Promise they gathered from the rich blood shed.</p> +<p class="poetry">In them Italia, visible to us then<br /> +As living, rose; for proof that huge brute Force<br /> +Has never being from celestial source,<br /> +And is the lord of cravens, not of men.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page244"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +244</span>Now breaking up the crust of temporal strife,<br /> +Who reads their acts enshrined in History, sees<br /> +That Tyrants were the Revolutionaries,<br /> +The Rebels men heart-vowed to hallowed life.</p> +<p class="poetry">Pure as the Archangel’s cleaving Darkness +thro’,<br /> +The Sword he sees, the keen unwearied Sword,<br /> +A single blade against a circling horde,<br /> +And aye for Freedom and the trampled few.</p> +<p class="poetry">The cry of Liberty from dungeon cell,<br /> +From exile, was his God’s command to smite,<br /> +As for a swim in sea he joined the fight,<br /> +With radiant face, full sure that he did well.</p> +<p class="poetry">Behold a warrior dealing mortal strokes,<br /> +Whose nature was a child’s: amid his foes<br /> +A wary trickster: at the battle’s close,<br /> +No gentler friend this leopard dashed with fox.</p> +<p class="poetry">Down the long roll of History will run<br /> +The story of these deeds, and speed his race<br /> +Beneath defeat more hotly to embrace<br /> +The noble cause and trust to another sun.</p> +<p class="poetry">And lo, that sun is in Italia’s skies<br +/> +This day, by grace of his good sword in part.<br /> +It beckons her to keep a warrior heart<br /> +For guard of beauty, all too sweet a prize.</p> +<p class="poetry">Earth gave him: blessèd be the Earth +that gave.<br /> +Earth’s Master crowned his honest work on earth:<br /> +Proudly Italia names his place of birth:<br /> +The bosom of Humanity his grave.</p> +<h2><a name="page245"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 245</span>THE +WILD ROSE</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">High</span> climbs +June’s wild rose,<br /> +Her bush all blooms in a swarm;<br /> +And swift from the bud she blows,<br /> +In a day when the wooer is warm;<br /> +Frank to receive and give,<br /> +Her bosom is open to bee and sun:<br /> +Pride she has none,<br /> +Nor shame she knows;<br /> +Happy to live.</p> +<p class="poetry">Unlike those of the garden nigh,<br /> +Her queenly sisters enthroned by art;<br /> +Loosening petals one by one<br /> +To the fiery Passion’s dart<br /> +Superbly shy.<br /> +For them in some glory of hair,<br /> +Or nest of the heaving mounds to lie,<br /> +Or path of the bride bestrew.<br /> +Ever are they the theme for song.<br /> +But nought of that is her share.<br /> +Hardly from wayfarers tramping along,<br /> +A glance they care not to renew.</p> +<p class="poetry">And she at a word of the claims of kin<br /> +Shrinks to the level of roads and meads:<br /> +She is only a plain princess of the weeds,<br /> +As an outcast witless of sin:<br /> +Much disregarded, save by the few<br /> +<a name="page246"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 246</span>Who love +her, that has not a spot of deceit,<br /> +No promise of sweet beyond sweet,<br /> +Often descending to sour.<br /> +On any fair breast she would die in an hour.<br /> +Praises she scarce could bear,<br /> +Were any wild poet to praise.<br /> +Her aim is to rise into light and air.<br /> +One of the darlings of Earth, no more,<br /> +And little it seems in the dusty ways,<br /> +Unless to the grasses nodding beneath;<br /> +The bird clapping wings to soar,<br /> +The clouds of an evetide’s wreath.</p> +<h2><a name="page247"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 247</span>THE +CALL</h2> +<p class="poetry"> <span +class="smcap">Under</span> what spell are we debased<br /> + By fears for our inviolate +Isle,<br /> + Whose record is of dangers faced<br /> + And flung to heel with even +smile?<br /> +Is it a vaster force, a subtler guile?</p> +<p class="poetry"> They say Exercitus designs<br +/> + To match the famed Salsipotent<br +/> + Where on her sceptre she reclines;<br /> + Awake: but were a slumber sent<br +/> +By guilty gods, more fell his foul intent.</p> +<p class="poetry"> The subtler web, the vaster +foe,<br /> + Well may we meet when drilled for +deeds:<br /> + But in these days of wealth at flow,<br /> + A word of breezy warning breeds<br +/> +The pained responses seen in lakeside reeds.</p> +<p class="poetry"> We fain would stand +contemplative,<br /> + All innocent as meadow grass;<br +/> + In human goodness fain believe,<br /> + Believe a cloud is formed to +pass;<br /> +Its shadows chase with draughts of hippocras.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Others have gone; the way +they went<br /> + Sweet sunny now, and safe our +nest.<br /> + Humanity, enlightenment,<br /> + Against the warning hum +protest:<br /> +Let the world hear that we know what is best.</p> +<p class="poetry"> <a name="page248"></a><span +class="pagenum">p. 248</span>So do the beatific speak;<br /> + Yet have they ears, and eyes as +well;<br /> + And if not with a paler cheek,<br /> + They feel the shivers in them +dwell,<br /> +That something of a dubious future tell.</p> +<p class="poetry"> For huge possessions render +slack<br /> + The power we need to hold them +fast;<br /> + Save when a quickened heart shall make<br /> + Our people one, to meet what +blast<br /> +May blow from temporal heavens overcast.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Our people one! Nor +they with strength<br /> + Dependent on a single arm:<br /> + Alert, and braced the whole land’s length,<br +/> + Rejoicing in their manhood’s +charm<br /> +For friend or foe; to succour, not to harm.</p> +<p class="poetry"> Has ever weakness won +esteem?<br /> + Or counts it as a prized ally?<br +/> + They who have read in History deem<br /> + It ranks among the slavish fry,<br +/> +Whose claim to live justiciary Fates deny.</p> +<p class="poetry"> It can not be declared we +are<br /> + A nation till from end to end<br +/> + The land can show such front to war<br /> + As bids a crouching foe expend <br +/> +His ire in air, and preferably be friend.</p> +<p class="poetry"> We dreading him, we do him +wrong;<br /> + For fears discolour, fears +invite.<br /> + Like him, our task is to be strong;<br /> + Unlike him, claiming not by +might<br /> +To snatch an envied treasure as a right.</p> +<p class="poetry"> <a name="page249"></a><span +class="pagenum">p. 249</span>So may a stouter brotherhood<br /> + At home be signalled over sea<br +/> + For righteous, and be understood,<br /> + Nay, welcomed, when ’tis +shown that we<br /> +All duties have embraced in being free.</p> +<p class="poetry"> This Britain slumbering, she +is rich;<br /> + Lies placid as a cradled child;<br +/> + At times with an uneasy twitch,<br /> + That tells of dreams unduly +wild.<br /> +Shall she be with a foreign drug defiled?</p> +<p class="poetry"> The grandeur of her deeds +recall;<br /> + Look on her face so kindly +fair:<br /> + This Britain! and were she to fall,<br /> + Mankind would breathe a harsher +air,<br /> +The nations miss a light of leading rare.</p> +<h2><a name="page250"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 250</span>ON +COMO</h2> +<p class="poetry">A <span class="smcap">rainless</span> darkness +drew o’er the lake<br /> +As we lay in our boat with oars unshipped.<br /> +It seemed neither cloud nor water awake,<br /> +And forth of the low black curtain slipped<br /> +Thunderless lightning. Scoff no more<br /> +At angels imagined in downward flight<br /> +For the daughters of earth as fabled of yore:<br /> +Here was beauty might well invite<br /> +Dark heavens to gleam with the fire of a sun<br /> +Resurgent; here the exchanged embrace<br /> +Worthy of heaven and earth made one.</p> +<p class="poetry">And witness it, ye of the privileged space,<br +/> +Said the flash; and the mountains, as from an abyss<br /> +For quivering seconds leaped up to attest<br /> +That given, received, renewed was the kiss;<br /> +The lips to lips and the breast to breast;<br /> +All in a glory of ecstasy, swift<br /> +As an eagle at prey, and pure as the prayer<br /> +Of an infant bidden joined hands uplift<br /> +To be guarded through darkness by spirits of air,<br /> +Ere setting the sails of sleep till day.<br /> +Slowly the low cloud swung, and far<br /> +It panted along its mirrored way;<br /> +Above loose threads one sanctioning star,<br /> +The wonder of what had been witnessed, sealed,<br /> +And with me still as in crystal glassed<br /> +Are the depths alight, the heavens revealed,<br /> +Where on to the Alps the muteness passed.</p> +<h2><a name="page251"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +251</span>MILTON<br /> +DECEMBER 9, 1608: DECEMBER 9, 1908</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">What</span> splendour of +imperial station man,<br /> +The Tree of Life, may reach when, rooted fast,<br /> +His branching stem points way to upper air<br /> +And skyward still aspires, we see in him<br /> +Who sang for us the Archangelical host,<br /> +Made Morning, by old Darkness urged to the abyss;<br /> +A voice that down three centuries onward rolls;<br /> +Onward will roll while lives our English tongue,<br /> +In the devout of music unsurpassed<br /> +Since Piety won Heaven’s ear on Israel’s harp.</p> +<p class="poetry">The face of Earth, the soul of Earth, her +charm,<br /> +Her dread austerity; the quavering fate<br /> +Of mortals with blind hope by passion swayed,<br /> +His mind embraced, the while on trodden soil,<br /> +Defender of the Commonwealth, he joined<br /> +Our temporal fray, whereof is vital fruit,<br /> +And, choosing armoury of the Scholar, stood<br /> +Beside his peers to raise the voice for Freedom:<br /> +Nor has fair Liberty a champion armed<br /> +To meet on heights or plains the Sophister<br /> +Throughout the ages, equal to this man,<br /> +Whose spirit breathed high Heaven, and drew thence<br /> +The ethereal sword to smite.</p> +<p +class="poetry"> Were +England sunk<br /> +Beneath the shifting tides, her heart, her brain,<br /> +The smile she wears, the faith she holds, her best,<br /> +<a name="page252"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 252</span>Would +live full-toned in the grand delivery<br /> +Of his cathedral speech: an utterance<br /> +Almost divine, and such as Hellespont,<br /> +Crashing its breakers under Ida’s frown,<br /> +Inspired: yet worthier he, whose instrument<br /> +Was by comparison the coarse reed-pipe;<br /> +Whereof have come the marvellous harmonies,<br /> +Which, with his lofty theme, of infinite range,<br /> +Abash, entrance, exalt.</p> +<p +class="poetry"> We +need him now,<br /> +This latest Age in repetition cries:<br /> +For Belial, the adroit, is in our midst;<br /> +Mammon, more swoln to squeeze the slavish sweat<br /> +From hopeless toil: and overshadowingly<br /> +(Aggrandized, monstrous in his grinning mask<br /> +Of hypocritical Peace,) inveterate Moloch<br /> +Remains the great example.</p> +<p +class="poetry"> Homage +to him<br /> +His debtor band, innumerable as waves<br /> +Running all golden from an eastern sun,<br /> +Joyfully render, in deep reverence<br /> +Subscribe, and as they speak their Milton’s name,<br /> +Rays of his glory on their foreheads bear.</p> +<h2><a name="page253"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +253</span>IRELAND</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Fire</span> in her ashes +Ireland feels<br /> + And in her veins a glow of heat.<br /> +To her the lost old time, appeals<br /> + For resurrection, good to greet:<br /> +Not as a shape with spectral eyes,<br /> + But humanly maternal, young<br /> +In all that quickens pride, and wise<br /> + To speak the best her bards have sung.</p> +<p class="poetry">You read her as a land distraught,<br /> + Where bitterest rebel passions seethe.<br /> +Look with a core of heart in thought,<br /> + For so is known the truth beneath.<br /> +She came to you a loathing bride,<br /> + And it has been no happy bed.<br /> +Believe in her as friend, allied<br /> + By bonds as close as those who wed.</p> +<p class="poetry">Her speech is held for hatred’s cry;<br +/> + Her silence tells of treason hid:<br /> +Were it her aim to burst the tie,<br /> + She sees what iron laws forbid.<br /> +Excess of heart obscures from view<br /> + A head as keen as yours to count.<br /> +Trust her, that she may prove her true<br /> + In links whereof is love the fount.</p> +<p class="poetry">May she not call herself her own?<br /> + That is her cry, and thence her spits<br /> +Of fury, thence her graceless tone<br /> + At justice given in bits and bits.<br /> +<a name="page254"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 254</span>The +limbs once raw with gnawing chains<br /> + Will fret at silken when God’s beams<br /> +Of Freedom beckon o’er the plains<br /> + From mounts that show it more than dreams.</p> +<p class="poetry">She, generous, craves your generous dole;<br /> + That will not rouse the crack of doom.<br /> +It ends the blundering past control<br /> + Simply to give her elbow-room.<br /> +Her offspring feels they are a race,<br /> + To be a nation is their claim;<br /> +Yet stronger bound in your embrace<br /> + Than when the tie was but a name.</p> +<p class="poetry">A nation she, and formed to charm,<br /> + With heart for heart and hands all round.<br /> +No longer England’s broken arm,<br /> + Would England know where strength is found.<br /> +And strength to-day is England’s need;<br /> + To-morrow it may be for both<br /> +Salvation: heed the portents, heed<br /> + The warnings; free the mind from sloth.</p> +<p class="poetry">Too long the pair have danced in mud,<br /> + With no advance from sun to sun.<br /> +Ah, what a bounding course of blood<br /> + Has England with an Ireland one!<br /> +Behold yon shadow cross the downs,<br /> + And off away to yeasty seas.<br /> +Lightly will fly old rancour’s frowns<br /> + When solid with high heart stand these.</p> +<h2><a name="page255"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 255</span>THE +YEARS HAD WORN THEIR SEASONS’ BELT</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">The</span> years had worn +their seasons’ belt,<br /> + From bud to rosy prime,<br /> +Since Nellie by the larch-pole knelt<br /> + And helped the hop to climb.</p> +<p class="poetry">Most diligent of teachers then,<br /> + But now with all to learn,<br /> +She breathed beyond a thought of men,<br /> + Though formed to make men burn.</p> +<p class="poetry">She dwelt where ’twixt low-beaten +thorns<br /> + Two mill-blades, like a snail,<br /> +Enormous, with inquiring horns,<br /> + Looked down on half the vale.</p> +<p class="poetry">You know the grey of dew on grass<br /> + Ere with the young sun fired,<br /> +And you know well the thirst one has<br /> + For the coming and desired.</p> +<p class="poetry">Quick in our ring she leapt, and gave<br /> + Her hand to left, to right.<br /> +No claim on her had any, save<br /> + To feed the joy of sight.</p> +<p class="poetry">For man and maid a laughing word<br /> + She tossed, in notes as clear<br /> +As when the February bird<br /> + Sings out that Spring is near.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page256"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +256</span>Of what befell behind that scone,<br /> + Let none who knows reveal.<br /> +In ballad days she might have been<br /> + A heroine rousing steel.</p> +<p class="poetry">On us did she bestow the hour,<br /> + And fixed it firm in thought;<br /> +Her spirit like a meadow flower<br /> + That gives, and asks for nought.</p> +<p class="poetry">She seemed to make the sunlight stay<br /> + And show her in its pride.<br /> +O she was fair as a beech in May<br /> + With the sun on the yonder side.</p> +<p class="poetry">There was more life than breath can give,<br /> + In the looks in her fair form;<br /> +For little can we say we live<br /> + Until the heart is warm.</p> +<h2><a name="page257"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +257</span>FRAGMENTS</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Open</span> horizons +round,<br /> +O mounting mind, to scenes unsung,<br /> +Wherein shall walk a lusty Time:<br /> +Our Earth is young;<br /> +Of measure without bound;<br /> +Infinite are the heights to climb,<br /> +The depths to sound.</p> + +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p class="poetry">A <span class="smcap">wilding</span> little +stubble flower<br /> +The sickle scorned which cut for wheat,<br /> +Such was our hope in that dark hour<br /> +When nought save uses held the street,<br /> +And daily pleasures, daily needs,<br /> +With barren vision, looked ahead.<br /> +And still the same result of seeds<br /> +Gave likeness ’twixt the live and dead.</p> + +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page258"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +258</span><span class="smcap">From</span> labours through the +night, outworn,<br /> +Above the hills the front of morn<br /> +We see, whose eyes to heights are raised,<br /> +And the world’s wise may deem us crazed.<br /> +While yet her lord lies under seas,<br /> +She takes us as the wind the trees’<br /> +Delighted leafage; all in song<br /> +We mount to her, to her belong.</p> + +<div class="gapspace"> </div> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">This</span> love of nature, +that allures to take<br /> +Irregularity for harmony<br /> +Of larger scope than our hard measures make,<br /> +Cherish it as thy school for when on thee<br /> +The ills of life descend.</p> +<h2><a name="page259"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 259</span>IL Y +A CENT ANS</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">That</span> march of the +funereal Past behold;<br /> + How Glory sat on Bondage for its throne;<br /> +How men, like dazzled insects, through the mould<br /> + Still worked their way, and bled to keep their +own.</p> +<p class="poetry">We know them, as they strove and wrought and +yearned;<br /> + Their hopes, their fears; what page of Life they +wist:<br /> +At whiles their vision upon us was turned,<br /> + Baffled by shapes limmed loosely on thick mist.</p> +<p class="poetry">Beneath the fortress bulk of Power they bent<br +/> + Blunt heads, adoring or in shackled hate,<br /> +All save the rebel hymned him; and it meant<br /> + A world submitting to incarnate Fate.</p> +<p class="poetry">From this he drew fresh appetite for sway,<br +/> + And of it fell: whereat was chorus raised,<br /> +How surely shall a mad ambition pay<br /> + Dues to Humanity, erewhile amazed.</p> +<p class="poetry">’Twas dreamed by some the deluge would +ensue,<br /> + So trembling was the tension long constrained;<br /> +A spirit of faith was in the chosen few,<br /> + That steps to the millennium had been gained.</p> +<p class="poetry">But mainly the rich business of the hour,<br /> + Their sight, made blind by urgency of blood,<br /> +Embraced; and facts, the passing sweet or sour,<br /> + To them were solid things that nought withstood.</p> +<p class="poetry"><a name="page260"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +260</span>Their facts are going headlong on the tides,<br /> + Like commas on a line of History’s page;<br /> +Nor that which once they took for Truth abides,<br /> + Save in the form of youth enlarged from age.</p> +<p class="poetry">Meantime give ear to woodland notes around,<br +/> + Look on our Earth full-breasted to our sun:<br /> +So was it when their poets heard the sound,<br /> + Beheld the scene: in them our days are one.</p> +<p class="poetry">What figures will be shown the century +hence?<br /> + What lands intact? We do but know that +Power<br /> +From piety divorced, though seen immense,<br /> + Shall sink on envy of the humblest flower.</p> +<p class="poetry">Our cry for cradled Peace, while men are +still<br /> + The three-parts brute which smothers the divine,<br +/> +Heaven answers: Guard it with forethoughtful will,<br /> + Or buy it; all your gains from War resign.</p> +<p class="poetry">A land, not indefensibly alarmed,<br /> + May see, unwarned by hint of friendly gods,<br /> +Between a hermit crab at all points armed,<br /> + And one without a shell, decisive odds.</p> +<h2><a name="page261"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +261</span>YOUTH IN AGE</h2> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Once</span> I was part of +the music I heard<br /> + On the boughs or sweet between earth and sky,<br /> +For joy of the beating of wings on high<br /> + My heart shot into the breast of the bird.</p> +<p class="poetry">I hear it now and I see it fly,<br /> + And a life in wrinkles again is stirred,<br /> +My heart shoots into the breast of the bird,<br /> + As it will for sheer love till the last long +sigh.</p> +<h2><a name="page263"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +263</span>EPITAPHS</h2> +<h3><a name="page265"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 265</span>TO A +FRIEND LOST<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">(TOM TAYLOR)</span></h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">When</span> I remember, +friend, whom lost I call,<br /> +Because a man beloved is taken hence,<br /> +The tender humour and the fire of sense<br /> +In your good eyes; how full of heart for all,<br /> +And chiefly for the weaker by the wall,<br /> +You bore that lamp of sane benevolence;<br /> +Then see I round you Death his shadows dense<br /> +Divide, and at your feet his emblems fall.<br /> +For surely are you one with the white host,<br /> +Spirits, whose memory is our vital air,<br /> +Through the great love of Earth they had: lo, these,<br /> +Like beams that throw the path on tossing seas,<br /> +Can bid us feel we keep them in the ghost,<br /> +Partakers of a strife they joyed to share.</p> +<h3>M. M.</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Who</span> call her Mother +and who calls her Wife<br /> +Look on her grave and see not Death but Life.</p> +<h3><a name="page266"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 266</span>THE +LADY C. M.</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">To</span> them that knew +her, there is vital flame<br /> +In these the simple letters of her name.<br /> +To them that knew her not, be it but said,<br /> +So strong a spirit is not of the dead.</p> +<h3><span class="GutSmall">ON THE TOMBSTONE OF</span><br /> +JAMES CHRISTOPHER WILSON<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">(d. APRIL 11, 1884)</span><br /> +<span class="GutSmall">IN HEADLEY CHURCHYARD, SURREY</span></h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Thou</span> our beloved and +light of Earth hast crossed<br /> +The sea of darkness to the yonder shore.<br /> +There dost thou shine a light transferred, not lost,<br /> +Through love to kindle in our souls the more.</p> +<h3>GORDON OF KHARTOUM</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Of</span> men he would have +raised to light he fell:<br /> +In soul he conquered with those nerveless hands.<br /> +His country’s pride and her abasement knell<br /> +The Man of England circled by the sands.</p> +<h3><a name="page267"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 267</span>J. +C. M.</h3> +<p class="poetry">A <span class="smcap">fountain</span> of our +sweetest, quick to spring<br /> +In fellowship abounding, here subsides:<br /> +And never passage of a cloud on wing<br /> +To gladden blue forgets him; near he hides.</p> +<h3>THE EMPEROR FREDERICK OF OUR TIME</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">With</span> Alfred and St. +Louis he doth win<br /> +Grander than crowned head’s mortuary dome:<br /> +His gentle heroic manhood enters in<br /> +The ever-flowering common heart for home.</p> +<h3>ISLET THE DACHS</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Our</span> Islet out of +Helgoland, dismissed<br /> +From his quaint tenement, quits hates and loves.<br /> +There lived with us a wagging humourist<br /> +In that hound’s arch dwarf-legged on boxing-gloves.</p> +<h3><a name="page268"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 268</span>ON +HEARING THE NEWS FROM VENICE<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">(THE DEATH OF ROBERT BROWNING)</span></h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Now</span> dumb is he who +waked the world to speak,<br /> +And voiceless hangs the world beside his bier.<br /> +Our words are sobs, our cry of praise a tear:<br /> +We are the smitten mortal, we the weak.<br /> +We see a spirit on Earth’s loftiest peak<br /> +Shine, and wing hence the way he makes more clear:<br /> +See a great Tree of Life that never sere<br /> +Dropped leaf for aught that age or storms might wreak.<br /> +Such ending is not Death: such living shows<br /> +What wide illumination brightness sheds<br /> +From one big heart, to conquer man’s old foes:<br /> +The coward, and the tyrant, and the force<br /> +Of all those weedy monsters raising heads<br /> +When Song is murk from springs of turbid source.</p> +<p><i>December</i> 13, 1889.</p> +<h3><a name="page269"></a><span class="pagenum">p. +269</span>HAWARDEN</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">When</span> comes the +lighted day for men to read<br /> +Life’s meaning, with the work before their hands<br /> +Till this good gift of breath from debt is freed,<br /> +Earth will not hear her children’s wailful bands<br /> +Deplore the chieftain fall’n in sob and dirge;<br /> +Nor they look where is darkness, but on high.<br /> +The sun that dropped down our horizon’s verge<br /> +Illumes his labours through the travelled sky,<br /> +Now seen in sum, most glorious; and ’tis known<br /> +By what our warrior wrought we hold him fast.<br /> +A splendid image built of man has flown;<br /> +His deeds inspired of God outstep a Past.<br /> +Ours the great privilege to have had one<br /> +Among us who celestial tasks has done.</p> +<h3><a name="page270"></a><span class="pagenum">p. 270</span>AT +THE FUNERAL<br /> +<span class="GutSmall">FEBRUARY 2, 1901</span></h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Her</span> sacred body +bear: the tenement<br /> + Of that strong soul now ranked with God’s +Elect<br /> +Her heart upon her people’s heart she spent;<br /> + Hence is she Royalty’s lodestar to direct.</p> +<p class="poetry">The peace is hers, of whom all lands have +praised<br /> + Majestic virtues ere her day unseen.<br /> +Aloft the name of Womanhood she raised,<br /> + And gave new readings to the Title, Queen.</p> +<h3>ANGELA BURDETT-COUTTS</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">Long</span> with us, now +she leaves us; she has rest<br /> + Beneath our sacred sod:<br /> +A woman vowed to Good, whom all attest,<br /> + The daylight gift of God.</p> +<h3>THE YEAR’S SHEDDINGS</h3> +<p class="poetry"><span class="smcap">The</span> varied colours +are a fitful heap:<br /> +They pass in constant service though they sleep;<br /> +The self gone out of them, therewith the pain:<br /> +Read that, who still to spell our earth remain.</p> +<h2>FOOTNOTES</h2> +<p><a name="footnote140"></a><a href="#citation140" +class="footnote">[140]</a> Written in December 1870, +printed in the ‘Fortnightly Review,’ and published in +the volume ‘Ballads and Poems.’</p> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POEMS, VOLUME 3 [OF 3]***</p> +<pre> + + +***** This file should be named 1383-h.htm or 1383-h.zip****** + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/3/8/1383 + + +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. 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FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* + + + + + +Poems by George Meredith--Volume 3 + + + + +A STAVE OF ROVING TIM +(ADDRESSED TO CERTAIN FRIENDLY TRAMPS.) + + + +I + +The wind is East, the wind is West, +Blows in and out of haven; +The wind that blows is the wind that's best, +And croak, my jolly raven! +If here awhile we jigged and laughed, +The like we will do yonder; +For he's the man who masters a craft, +And light as a lord can wander. +So, foot the measure, Roving Tim, +And croak, my jolly raven! +The wind according to its whim +Is in and out of haven. + +II + +You live in rows of snug abodes, +With gold, maybe, for counting; +And mine's the beck of the rainy roads +Against the sun a-mounting. +I take the day as it behaves, +Nor shiver when 'tis airy; +But comes a breeze, all you are on waves, +Sick chickens o' Mother Carey! +So, now for next, cries Roving Tim, +And croak, my jolly raven! +The wind according to its whim +Is in and out of haven. + +III + +Sweet lass, you screw a lovely leer, +To make a man consider. +If you were up with the auctioneer, +I'd be a handsome bidder. +But wedlock clips the rover's wing; +She tricks him fly to spider; +And when we get to fights in the Ring, +It's trumps when you play outsider. +So, wrench and split, cries Roving Tim, +And croak, my jolly raven! +The wind according to its whim +Is in and out of haven. + +IV + +Along my winding way I know +A shady dell that's winking; +The very corner for Self and Co +To do a world of thinking. +And shall I this? and shall I that? +Till Nature answers, ne'ther! +Strike match and light your pipe in your hat, +Rejoicing in sound shoe-leather! +So lead along, cries Roving Tim, +And croak, my jolly raven! +The wind according to its whim +Is in and out of haven. + +V + +A cunning hand 'll hand you bread, +With freedom for your capers. +I'm not so sure of a cunning head; +It steers to pits or vapours. +But as for Life, we'll bear in sight +The lesson Nature teaches; +Regard it in a sailoring light, +And treat it like thirsty leeches. +So, fly your jib, cries Roving Tim, +And top your boom, old raven! +The wind according to its whim +Is in and out of haven. + +VI + +She'll take, to please her dame and dad, +The shopman nicely shaven. +She'll learn to think o' the marching lad +When perchers show they're craven. +You say the shopman piles a heap, +While I perhaps am fasting; +And bless your wits, it haunts him in sleep, +His tin-kettle chance of lasting! +So hail the road, cries Roving Tim, +And hail the rain, old raven! +The wind according to its whim +Is in and out of haven. + +VII + +He's half a wife, yon pecker bill; +A book and likewise preacher. +With any soul, in a game of skill, +He'll prove your over-reacher. +The reason is, his brains are bent +On doing things right single. +You'd wish for them when pitching your tent +At night in a whirly dingle! +So, off we go, cries Roving Tim, +And on we go, old raven! +The wind according to its whim +Is in and out of haven. + +VIII + +Lord, no, man's lot is not for bliss; +To call it woe is blindness: +It'll here a kick, and it's there a kiss, +And here and there a kindness. +He starts a hare and calls her joy; +He runs her down to sorrow: +The dogs within him bother the boy, +But 'tis a new day to-morrow. +So, I at helm, cries Roving Tim, +And you at bow, old raven! +The wind according to its whim +Is in and out of haven. + + + +JUMP-TO-GLORY JANE + + + +I + +A revelation came on Jane, +The widow of a labouring swain: +And first her body trembled sharp, +Then all the woman was a harp +With winds along the strings; she heard, +Though there was neither tone nor word. + +II + +For past our hearing was the air, +Beyond our speaking what it bare, +And she within herself had sight +Of heaven at work to cleanse outright, +To make of her a mansion fit +For angel hosts inside to sit. + +III + +They entered, and forthwith entranced, +Her body braced, her members danced; +Surprisingly the woman leapt; +And countenance composed she kept: +As gossip neighbours in the lane +Declared, who saw and pitied Jane. + +IV + +These knew she had been reading books, +The which was witnessed by her looks +Of late: she had a mania +For mad folk in America, +And said for sure they led the way, +But meat and beer were meant to stay. + +V + +That she had visited a fair, +Had seen a gauzy lady there, +Alive with tricks on legs alone, +As good as wings, was also known: +And longwhiles in a sullen mood, +Before her jumping, Jane would brood. + +VI + +A good knee's height, they say, she sprang; +Her arms and feet like those who hang: +As if afire the body sped, +And neither pair contributed. +She jumped in silence: she was thought +A corpse to resurrection caught. + +VII + +The villagers were mostly dazed; +They jeered, they wondered, and they praised. +'Twas guessed by some she was inspired, +And some would have it she had hired +An engine in her petticoats, +To turn their wits and win their votes. + +VIII + +Her first was Winny Earnes, a kind +Of woman not to dance inclined; +But she went up, entirely won, +Ere Jump-to-glory Jane had done; +And once a vixen wild for speech, +She found the better way to preach. + +IX + +No long time after, Jane was seen +Directing jumps at Daddy Green; +And that old man, to watch her fly, +Had eyebrows made of arches high; +Till homeward he likewise did hop, +Oft calling on himself to stop! + +X + +It was a scene when man and maid, +Abandoning all other trade, +And careless of the call to meals, +Went jumping at the woman's heels. +By dozens they were counted soon, +Without a sound to tell their tune. + +XI + +Along the roads they came, and crossed +The fields, and o'er the hills were lost, +And in the evening reappeared; +Then short like hobbled horses reared, +And down upon the grass they plumped: +Alone their Jane to glory jumped. + +XII + +At morn they rose, to see her spring +All going as an engine thing; +And lighter than the gossamer +She led the bobbers following her, +Past old acquaintances, and where +They made the stranger stupid stare. + +XIII + +When turnips were a filling crop, +In scorn they jumped a butcher's shop: +Or, spite of threats to flog and souse, +They jumped for shame a public-house: +And much their legs were seized with rage +If passing by the vicarage. + +XIV + +The tightness of a hempen rope +Their bodies got; but laundry soap +Not handsomer can rub the skin +For token of the washed within. +Occasionally coughers cast +A leg aloft and coughed their last. + +XV + +The weaker maids and some old men, +Requiring rafters for the pen +On rainy nights, were those who fell. +The rest were quite a miracle, +Refreshed as you may search all round +On Club-feast days and cry, Not found! + +XVI + +For these poor innocents, that slept +Against the sky, soft women wept: +For never did they any theft; +'Twas known when they their camping left, +And jumped the cold out of their rags; +In spirit rich as money-bags. + +XVII + +They jumped the question, jumped reply; +And whether to insist, deny, +Reprove, persuade, they jumped in ranks +Or singly, straight the arms to flanks, +And straight the legs, with just a knee +For bending in a mild degree. + +XVIII + +The villagers might call them mad; +An endless holiday they had, +Of pleasure in a serious work: +They taught by leaps where perils lurk, +And with the lambkins practised sports +For 'scaping Satan's pounds and quarts. + +XIX + +It really seemed on certain days, +When they bobbed up their Lord to praise, +And bobbing up they caught the glance +Of light, our secret is to dance, +And hold the tongue from hindering peace; +To dance out preacher and police. + +XX + +Those flies of boys disturbed them sore +On Sundays and when daylight wore: +With withies cut from hedge or copse, +They treated them as whipping-tops, +And flung big stones with cruel aim; +Yet all the flock jumped on the same. + +XXI + +For what could persecution do +To worry such a blessed crew, +On whom it was as wind to fire, +Which set them always jumping higher? +The parson and the lawyer tried, +By meek persistency defied. + +XXII + +But if they bore, they could pursue +As well, and this the Bishop too; +When inner warnings proved him plain +The chase for Jump-to-glory Jane. +She knew it by his being sent +To bless the feasting in the tent. + +XXIII + +Not less than fifty years on end, +The Squire had been the Bishop's friend: +And his poor tenants, harmless ones, +With souls to save! fed not on buns, +But angry meats: she took her place +Outside to show the way to grace. + +XXIV + +In apron suit the Bishop stood; +The crowding people kindly viewed. +A gaunt grey woman he saw rise +On air, with most beseeching eyes: +And evident as light in dark +It was, she set to him for mark. + +XXV + +Her highest leap had come: with ease +She jumped to reach the Bishop's knees: +Compressing tight her arms and lips, +She sought to jump the Bishop's hips: +Her aim flew at his apron-band, +That he might see and understand. + +XXVI + +The mild inquiry of his gaze +Was altered to a peaked amaze, +At sight of thirty in ascent, +To gain his notice clearly bent: +And greatly Jane at heart was vexed +By his ploughed look of mind perplexed. + +XXVII + +In jumps that said, Beware the pit! +More eloquent than speaking it - +That said, Avoid the boiled, the roast; +The heated nose on face of ghost, +Which comes of drinking: up and o'er +The flesh with me! did Jane implore. + +XXVIII + +She jumped him high as huntsmen go +Across the gate; she jumped him low, +To coax him to begin and feel +His infant steps returning, peel +His mortal pride, exposing fruit, +And off with hat and apron suit. + +XXIX + +We need much patience, well she knew, +And out and out, and through and through, +When we would gentlefolk address, +However we may seek to bless: +At times they hide them like the beasts +From sacred beams; and mostly priests. + +XXX + +He gave no sign of making bare, +Nor she of faintness or despair. +Inflamed with hope that she might win, +If she but coaxed him to begin, +She used all arts for making fain; +The mother with her babe was Jane. + +XXXI + +Now stamped the Squire, and knowing not +Her business, waved her from the spot. +Encircled by the men of might, +The head of Jane, like flickering light, +As in a charger, they beheld +Ere she was from the park expelled. + +XXXII + +Her grief, in jumps of earthly weight, +Did Jane around communicate: +For that the moment when began +The holy but mistaken man, +In view of light, to take his lift, +They cut him from her charm adrift! + +XXXIII + +And he was lost: a banished face +For ever from the ways of grace, +Unless pinched hard by dreams in fright. +They saw the Bishop's wavering sprite +Within her look, at come and go, +Long after he had caused her woe. + +XXXIV + +Her greying eyes (until she sank +At Fredsham on the wayside bank, +Like cinder heaps that whitened lie +From coals that shot the flame to sky) +Had glassy vacancies, which yearned +For one in memory discerned. + +XXXV + +May those who ply the tongue that cheats, +And those who rush to beer and meats, +And those whose mean ambition aims +At palaces and titled names, +Depart in such a cheerful strain +As did our Jump-to-glory Jane! + +XXXVI + +Her end was beautiful: one sigh. +She jumped a foot when it was nigh. +A lily in a linen clout +She looked when they had laid her out. +It is a lily-light she bears +For England up the ladder-stairs. + + + +THE RIDDLE FOR MEN + + + +I + +This Riddle rede or die, +Says History since our Flood, +To warn her sons of power:- +It can be truth, it can be lie; +Be parasite to twist awry; +The drouthy vampire for your blood; +The fountain of the silver flower; +A brand, a lure, a web, a crest; +Supple of wax or tempered steel; +The spur to honour, snake in nest: +'Tis as you will with it to deal; +To wear upon the breast, +Or trample under heel. + +II + +And rede you not aright, +Says Nature, still in red +Shall History's tale be writ! +For solely thus you lead to light +The trailing chapters she must write, +And pass my fiery test of dead +Or living through the furnace-pit: +Dislinked from who the softer hold +In grip of brute, and brute remain: +Of whom the woeful tale is told, +How for one short Sultanic reign, +Their bodies lapse to mould, +Their souls behowl the plain. + + + +THE SAGE ENAMOURED AND THE HONEST LADY + + + +I + +One fairest of the ripe unwedded left +Her shadow on the Sage's path; he found, +By common signs, that she had done a theft. +He could have made the sovereign heights resound +With questions of the wherefore of her state: +He on far other but an hour before +Intent. And was it man, or was it mate, +That she disdained? or was there haply more? + +About her mouth a placid humour slipped +The dimple, as you see smooth lakes at eve +Spread melting rings where late a swallow dipped. +The surface was attentive to receive, +The secret underneath enfolded fast. +She had the step of the unconquered, brave, +Not arrogant; and if the vessel's mast +Waved liberty, no challenge did it wave. +Her eyes were the sweet world desired of souls, +With something of a wavering line unspelt. +They hold the look whose tenderness condoles +For what the sister in the look has dealt +Of fatal beyond healing; and her tones +A woman's honeyed amorous outvied, +As when in a dropped viol the wood-throb moans +Among the sobbing strings, that plain and chide +Like infants for themselves, less deep to thrill +Than those rich mother-notes for them breathed round. +Those voices are not magic of the will +To strike love's wound, but of love's wound give sound, +Conveying it; the yearnings, pains and dreams. +They waft to the moist tropics after storm, +When out of passion spent thick incense steams, +And jewel-belted clouds the wreck transform. + +Was never hand on brush or lyre to paint +Her gracious manners, where the nuptial ring +Of melody clasped motion in restraint: +The reed-blade with the breeze thereof may sing. +With such endowments armed was she and decked +To make her spoken thoughts eclipse her kind; +Surpassing many a giant intellect, +The marvel of that cradled infant mind. +It clenched the tiny fist, it curled the toe; +Cherubic laughed, enticed, dispensed, absorbed; +And promised in fair feminine to grow +A Sage's match and mate, more heavenly orbed. + +II + +Across his path the spouseless Lady cast +Her shadow, and the man that thing became. +His youth uprising called his age the Past. +This was the strong grey head of laurelled name, +And in his bosom an inverted Sage +Mistook for light of morn the light which sank. +But who while veins run blood shall know the page +Succeeding ere we turn upon our blank? +Comes Beauty with her tale of moon and cloud, +Her silvered rims of mystery pointing in +To hollows of the half-veiled unavowed, +Where beats her secret life, grey heads will spin +Quick as the young, and spell those hieroglyphs +Of phosphorescent dusk, devoutly bent; +They drink a cup to whirl on dizzier cliffs +For their shamed fall, which asks, why was she sent! +Why, and of whom, and whence; and tell they truth, +The legends of her mission to beguile? + +Hard likeness to the toilful apes of youth +He bore at times, and tempted the sly smile; +And not on her soft lips was it descried. +She stepped her way benevolently grave: +Nor sign that Beauty fed her worm of pride, +By tossing victim to the courtier knave, +Let peep, nor of the naughty pride gave sign. +Rather 'twas humbleness in being pursued, +As pilgrim to the temple of a shrine. +Had he not wits to pierce the mask he wooed? +All wisdom's armoury this man could wield; +And if the cynic in the Sage it pleased +Traverse her woman's curtain and poor shield, +For new example of a world diseased; +Showing her shrineless, not a temple, bare; +A curtain ripped to tatters by the blast; +Yet she most surely to this man stood fair: +He worshipped like the young enthusiast, +Named simpleton or poet. Did he read +Right through, and with the voice she held reserved +Amid her vacant ruins jointly plead? + +Compassion for the man thus noble nerved +The pity for herself she felt in him, +To wreak a deed of sacrifice, and save; +At least, be worthy. That our soul may swim, +We sink our heart down bubbling under wave. +It bubbles till it drops among the wrecks. +But, ah! confession of a woman's breast: +She eminent, she honoured of her sex! +Truth speaks, and takes the spots of the confessed, +To veil them. None of women, save their vile, +Plays traitor to an army in the field. +The cries most vindicating most defile. +How shall a cause to Nature be appealed, +When, under pressure of their common foe, +Her sisters shun the Mother and disown, +On pain of his intolerable crow +Above the fiction, built for him, o'erthrown? +Irrational he is, irrational +Must they be, though not Reason's light shall wane +In them with ever Nature at close call, +Behind the fiction torturing to sustain; +Who hear her in the milk, and sometimes make +A tongueless answer, shivered on a sigh: +Whereat men dread their lofty structure's quake +Once more, and in their hosts for tocsin ply +The crazy roar of peril, leonine +For injured majesty. That sigh of dames +Is rare and soon suppressed. Not they combine +To shake the structure sheltering them, which tames +Their lustier if not wilder: fixed are they, +In elegancy scarce denoting ease; +And do they breathe, it is not to betray +The martyr in the caryatides. +Yet here and there along the graceful row +Is one who fetches breath from deeps, who deems, +Moved by a desperate craving, their old foe +May yield a trustier friend than woman seems, +And aid to bear the sculptured floral weight +Massed upon heads not utterly of stone: +May stamp endurance by expounding fate. +She turned to him, and, This you seek is gone; +Look in, she said, as pants the furnace, brief, +Frost-white. She gave his hearing sight to view +The silent chamber of a brown curled leaf: +Thing that had throbbed ere shot black lightning through. +No further sign of heart could he discern: +The picture of her speech was winter sky; +A headless figure folding a cleft urn, +Where tears once at the overflow were dry. + +III + +So spake she her first utterance on the rack. +It softened torment, in the funeral hues +Round wan Romance at ebb, but drove her back +To listen to herself, herself accuse +Harshly as Love's imperial cause allowed. +She meant to grovel, and her lover praised +So high o'er the condemnatory crowd, +That she perforce a fellow phoenix blazed. + +The picture was of hand fast joined to hand, +Both pushed from angry skies, their grasp more pledged +Under the threatened flash of a bright brand +At arm's length up, for severing action edged. +Why, then Love's Court of Honour contemplate; +And two drowned shorecasts, who, for the life esteemed +Above their lost, invoke an advocate +In Passion's purity, thereby redeemed. + +Redeemed, uplifted, glimmering on a throne, +The woman stricken by an arrow falls. +His advocate she can be, not her own, +If, Traitress to thy sex! one sister calls. +Have we such scenes of drapery's mournfulness +On Beauty's revelations, witched we plant, +Over the fair shape humbled to confess, +An angel's buckler, with loud choiric chant. + +IV + +No knightly sword to serve, nor harp of bard, +The lady's hand in her physician's knew. +She had not hoped for them as her award, +When zig-zag on the tongue electric flew +Her charge of counter-motives, none impure: +But muteness whipped her skin. She could have said, +Her free confession was to work his cure, +Show proofs for why she could not love or wed. +Were they not shown? His muteness shook in thrall +Her body on the verge of that black pit +Sheer from the treacherous confessional, +Demanding further, while perusing it. + +Slave is the open mouth beneath the closed. +She sank; she snatched at colours; they were peel +Of fruit past savour, in derision rosed. +For the dark downward then her soul did reel. +A press of hideous impulse urged to speak: +A novel dread of man enchained her dumb. +She felt the silence thicken, heard it shriek, +Heard Life subsiding on the eternal hum: +Welcome to women, when, between man's laws +And Nature's thirsts, they, soul from body torn, +Give suck at breast to a celestial cause, +Named by the mouth infernal, and forsworn. +Nathless her forehead twitched a sad content, +To think the cure so manifest, so frail +Her charm remaining. Was the curtain's rent +Too wide? he but a man of that herd male? +She saw him as that herd of the forked head +Butting the woman harrowed on her knees, +Clothed only in life's last devouring red. +Confession at her fearful instant sees +Judicial Silence write the devil fact +In letters of the skeleton: at once, +Swayed on the supplication of her act, +The rabble reading, roaring to denounce, +She joins. No longer colouring, with skips +At tangles, picture that for eyes in tears +Might swim the sequence, she addressed her lips +To do the scaffold's office at his ears. + +Into the bitter judgement of that herd +On women, she, deeming it present, fell. +Her frenzy of abasement hugged the word +They stone with, and so pile their citadel +To launch at outcasts the foul levin bolt. +As had he flung it, in her breast it burned. +Face and reflect it did her hot revolt +From hardness, to the writhing rebel turned; +Because the golden buckler was withheld, +She to herself applies the powder-spark, +For joy of one wild demon burst ere quelled, +Perishing to astound the tyrant Dark. + +She had the Scriptural word so scored on brain, +It rang through air to sky, and rocked a world +That danced down shades the scarlet dance profane; +Most women! see! by the man's view dustward hurled, +Impenitent, submissive, torn in two. +They sink upon their nature, the unnamed, +And sops of nourishment may get some few, +In place of understanding, scourged and shamed. + +Barely have seasoned women understood +The great Irrational, who thunders power, +Drives Nature to her primitive wild wood, +And courts her in the covert's dewy hour; +Returning to his fortress nigh night's end, +With execration of her daughters' lures. +They help him the proud fortress to defend, +Nor see what front it wears, what life immures, +The murder it commits; nor that its base +Is shifty as a huckster's opening deal +For bargain under smoothest market face, +While Gentleness bids frigid Justice feel, +Justice protests that Reason is her seat; +Elect Convenience, as Reason masked, +Hears calmly cramped Humanity entreat; +Until a sentient world is overtasked, +And rouses Reason's fountain-self: she calls +On Nature; Nature answers: Share your guilt +In common when contention cracks the walls +Of the big house which not on me is built. + +The Lady said as much as breath will bear; +To happier sisters inconceivable: +Contemptible to veterans of the fair, +Who show for a convolving pearly shell, +A treasure of the shore, their written book. +As much as woman's breath will bear and live +Shaped she to words beneath a knotted look, +That held as if for grain the summing sieve. +Her judge now brightened without pause, as wakes +Our homely daylight after dread of spells. +Lips sugared to let loose the little snakes +Of slimy lustres ringing elfin bells +About a story of the naked flesh, +Intending but to put some garment on, +Should learn, that in the subject they enmesh, +A traitor lurks and will be known anon. +Delusion heating pricks the torpid doubt, +Stationed for index down an ancient track: +And ware of it was he while she poured out +A broken moon on forest-waters black. + +Though past the stage where midway men are skilled +To scan their senses wriggling under plough, +When yet to the charmed seed of speech distilled, +Their hearts are fallow, he, and witless how, +Loathing, had yielded, like bruised limb to leech, +Not handsomely; but now beholding bleed +Soul of the woman in her prostrate speech, +The valour of that rawness he could read. +Thence flashed it, as the crimson currents ran +From senses up to thoughts, how she had read +Maternally the warm remainder man +Beneath his crust, and Nature's pity shed, +In shedding dearer than heart's blood to light +His vision of the path mild Wisdom walks. +Therewith he could espy Confession's fright; +Her need of him: these flowers grow on stalks; +They suck from soil, and have their urgencies +Beside and with the lovely face mid leaves. +Veins of divergencies, convergencies, +Our botanist in womankind perceives; +And if he hugs no wound, the man can prize +That splendid consummation and sure proof +Of more than heart in her, who might despise, +Who drowns herself, for pity up aloof +To soar and be like Nature's pity: she +Instinctive of what virtue in young days +Had served him for his pilot-star on sea, +To trouble him in haven. Thus his gaze +Came out of rust, and more than the schooled tongue +Was gifted to encourage and assure. +He gave her of the deep well she had sprung; +And name it gratitude, the word is poor. +But name it gratitude, is aught as rare +From sex to sex? And let it have survived +Their conflict, comes the peace between the pair, +Unknown to thousands husbanded and wived: +Unknown to Passion, generous for prey: +Unknown to Love, too blissful in a truce. +Their tenderest of self did each one slay; +His cloak of dignity, her fleur de luce; +Her lily flower, and his abolla cloak, +Things living, slew they, and no artery bled. +A moment of some sacrificial smoke +They passed, and were the dearer for their dead. + +He learnt how much we gain who make no claims. +A nightcap on his flicker of grey fire +Was thought of her sharp shudder in the flames, +Confessing; and its conjured image dire, +Of love, the torrent on the valley dashed; +The whirlwind swathing tremulous peaks; young force, +Visioned to hold corrected and abashed +Our senile emulous; which rolls its course +Proud to the shattering end; with these few last +Hot quintessential drops of bryony juice, +Squeezed out in anguish: all of that once vast! +And still, though having skin for man's abuse, +Though no more glorying in the beauteous wreath +Shot skyward from a blood at passionate jet, +Repenting but in words, that stand as teeth +Between the vivid lips; a vassal set; +And numb, of formal value. Are we true +In nature, never natural thing repents; +Albeit receiving punishment for due, +Among the group of this world's penitents; +Albeit remorsefully regretting, oft +Cravenly, while the scourge no shudder spares. + +Our world believes it stabler if the soft +Are whipped to show the face repentance wears. +Then hear it, in a moan of atheist gloom, +Deplore the weedy growth of hypocrites; +Count Nature devilish, and accept for doom +The chasm between our passions and our wits! + +Affecting lunar whiteness, patent snows, +It trembles at betrayal of a sore. +Hers is the glacier-conscience, to expose +Impurities for clearness at the core. + +She to her hungered thundering in breast, +YE SHALL NOT STARVE, not feebly designates +The world repressing as a life repressed, +Judged by the wasted martyrs it creates. +How Sin, amid the shades Cimmerian, +Repents, she points for sight: and she avers, +The hoofed half-angel in the Puritan +Nigh reads her when no brutish wrath deters. + +Sin against immaturity, the sin +Of ravenous excess, what deed divides +Man from vitality; these bleed within; +Bleed in the crippled relic that abides. +Perpetually they bleed; a limb is lost, +A piece of life, the very spirit maimed. +But culprit who the law of man has crossed +With Nature's dubiously within is blamed; +Despite our cry at cutting of the whip, +Our shiver in the night when numbers frown, +We but bewail a broken fellowship, +A sting, an isolation, a fall'n crown. + +Abject of sinners is that sensitive, +The flesh, amenable to stripes, miscalled +Incorrigible: such title do we give +To the poor shrinking stuff wherewith we are walled; +And, taking it for Nature, place in ban +Our Mother, as a Power wanton-willed, +The shame and baffler of the soul of man, +The recreant, reptilious. Do thou build +Thy mind on her foundations in earth's bed; +Behold man's mind the child of her keen rod, +For teaching how the wits and passions wed +To rear that temple of the credible God; +Sacred the letters of her laws, and plain, +Will shine, to guide thy feet and hold thee firm: +Then, as a pathway through a field of grain, +Man's laws appear the blind progressive worm, +That moves by touch, and thrust of linking rings +The which to endow with vision, lift from mud +To level of their nature's aims and springs, +Must those, the twain beside our vital flood, +Now on opposing banks, the twain at strife +(Whom the so rosy ferryman invites +To junction, and mid-channel over Life, +Unmasked to the ghostly, much asunder smites) +Instruct in deeper than Convenience, +In higher than the harvest of a year. +Only the rooted knowledge to high sense +Of heavenly can mount, and feel the spur +For fruitfullest advancement, eye a mark +Beyond the path with grain on either hand, +Help to the steering of our social Ark +Over the barbarous waters unto land. + +For us the double conscience and its war, +The serving of two masters, false to both, +Until those twain, who spring the root and are +The knowledge in division, plight a troth +Of equal hands: nor longer circulate +A pious token for their current coin, +To growl at the exchange; they, mate and mate, +Fair feminine and masculine shall join +Upon an upper plane, still common mould, +Where stamped religion and reflective pace +A statelier measure, and the hoop of gold +Rounds to horizon for their soul's embrace. +Then shall those noblest of the earth and sun +Inmix unlike to waves on savage sea. +But not till Nature's laws and man's are one, +Can marriage of the man and woman be. + +V + +He passed her through the sermon's dull defile. +Down under billowy vapour-gorges heaved +The city and the vale and mountain-pile. +She felt strange push of shuttle-threads that weaved. + +A new land in an old beneath her lay; +And forth to meet it did her spirit rush, +As bride who without shame has come to say, +Husband, in his dear face that caused her blush. + +A natural woman's heart, not more than clad +By station and bright raiment, gathers heat +From nakedness in trusted hands: she had +The joy of those who feel the world's heart beat, +After long doubt of it as fire or ice; +Because one man had helped her to breathe free; +Surprised to faith in something of a price +Past the old charity in chivalry:- +Our first wild step to right the loaded scales +Displaying women shamefully outweighed. +The wisdom of humaneness best avails +For serving justice till that fraud is brayed. +Her buried body fed the life she drank. +And not another stripping of her wound! +The startled thought on black delirium sank, +While with her gentle surgeon she communed, +And woman's prospect of the yoke repelled. +Her buried body gave her flowers and food; +The peace, the homely skies, the springs that welled; +Love, the large love that folds the multitude. +Soul's chastity in honesty, and this +With beauty, made the dower to men refused. +And little do they know the prize they miss; +Which is their happy fortune! Thus he mused + +For him, the cynic in the Sage had play +A hazy moment, by a breath dispersed; +To think, of all alive most wedded they, +Whom time disjoined! He needed her quick thirst +For renovated earth: on earth she gazed, +With humble aim to foot beside the wise. +Lo, where the eyelashes of night are raised +Yet lowly over morning's pure grey eyes. + + + +'LOVE IS WINGED FOR TWO' + + + +Love is winged for two, +In the worst he weathers, +When their hearts are tied; +But if they divide, +O too true! +Cracks a globe, and feathers, feathers, +Feathers all the ground bestrew. + +I was breast of morning sea, +Rosy plume on forest dun, +I the laugh in rainy fleeces, +While with me +She made one. +Now must we pick up our pieces, +For that then so winged were we. + + + +'ASK, IS LOVE DIVINE' + + + +Ask, is Love divine, +Voices all are, ay. +Question for the sign, +There's a common sigh. +Would we, through our years, +Love forego, +Quit of scars and tears? +Ah, but no, no, no! + + + +'JOY IS FLEET' + + + +Joy is fleet, +Sorrow slow. +Love, so sweet, +Sorrow will sow. +Love, that has flown +Ere day's decline, +Love to have known, +Sorrow, be mine! + + + +THE LESSON OF GRIEF + + + +Not ere the bitter herb we taste, +Which ages thought of happy times, +To plant us in a weeping waste, +Rings with our fellows this one heart +Accordant chimes. + +When I had shed my glad year's leaf, +I did believe I stood alone, +Till that great company of Grief +Taught me to know this craving heart +For not my own. + + + +WIND ON THE LYRE + + + +That was the chirp of Ariel +You heard, as overhead it flew, +The farther going more to dwell, +And wing our green to wed our blue; +But whether note of joy or knell, +Not his own Father-singer knew; +Nor yet can any mortal tell, +Save only how it shivers through; +The breast of us a sounded shell, +The blood of us a lighted dew. + + + +THE YOUTHFUL QUEST + + + +His Lady queen of woods to meet, +He wanders day and night: +The leaves have whisperings discreet, +The mossy ways invite. + +Across a lustrous ring of space, +By covert hoods and caves, +Is promise of her secret face +In film that onward waves. + +For darkness is the light astrain, +Astrain for light the dark. +A grey moth down a larches' lane +Unwinds a ghostly spark. + +Her lamp he sees, and young desire +Is fed while cloaked she flies. +She quivers shot of violet fire +To ash at look of eyes. + + + +THE EMPTY PURSE--A SERMON TO OUR LATER PRODIGAL SON + + + +Thou, run to the dry on this wayside bank, +Too plainly of all the propellers bereft! +Quenched youth, and is that thy purse? +Even such limp slough as the snake has left +Slack to the gale upon spikes of whin, +For cast-off coat of a life gone blank, +In its frame of a grin at the seeker, is thine; +And thine to crave and to curse +The sweet thing once within. +Accuse him: some devil committed the theft, +Which leaves of the portly a skin, +No more; of the weighty a whine. + +Pursue him: and first, to be sure of his track, +Over devious ways that have led to this, +In the stream's consecutive line, +Let memory lead thee back +To where waves Morning her fleur-de-lys, +Unflushed at the front of the roseate door +Unopened yet: never shadow there +Of a Tartarus lighted by Dis +For souls whose cry is, alack! +An ivory cradle rocks, apeep +Through his eyelashes' laugh, a breathing pearl. +There the young chief of the animals wore +A likeness to heavenly hosts, unaware +Of his love of himself; with the hours at leap. +In a dingle away from a rutted highroad, +Around him the earliest throstle and merle, +Our human smile between milk and sleep, +Effervescent of Nature he crowed. +Fair was that season; furl over furl +The banners of blossom; a dancing floor +This earth; very angels the clouds; and fair +Thou on the tablets of forehead and breast: +Careless, a centre of vigilant care. +Thy mother kisses an infant curl. +The room of the toys was a boundless nest, +A kingdom the field of the games, +Till entered the craving for more, +And the worshipped small body had aims. +A good little idol, as records attest, +When they tell of him lightly appeased in a scream +By sweets and caresses: he gave but sign +That the heir of a purse-plumped dominant race, +Accustomed to plenty, not dumb would pine. +Almost magician, his earliest dream +Was lord of the unpossessed +For a look; himself and his chase, +As on puffs of a wind at whirl, +Made one in the wink of a gleam. +She kisses a locket curl, +She conjures to vision a cherub face, +When her butterfly counted his day +All meadow and flowers, mishap +Derided, and taken for play +The fling of an urchin's cap. +When her butterfly showed him an eaglet born, +For preying too heedlessly bred, +What a heart clapped in thee then! +With what fuller colours of morn! +And high to the uttermost heavens it flew, +Swift as on poet's pen. +It flew to be wedded, to wed +The mystery scented around: +Issue of flower and dew, +Issue of light and sound: +Thinner than either; a thread +Spun of the dream they threw +To kindle, allure, evade. +It ran the sea-wave, the garden's dance, +To the forest's dark heart down a dappled glade; +Led on by a perishing glance, +By a twinkle's eternal waylaid. +Woman, the name was, when she took form; +Sheaf of the wonders of life. She fled, +Close imaged; she neared, far seen. How she made +Palpitate earth of the living and dead! +Did she not show thee the world designed +Solely for loveliness? Nested warm, +The day was the morrow in flight. And for thee, +She muted the discords, tuned, refined; +Drowned sharp edges beneath her cloak. +Eye of the waters, and throb of the tree, +Sliding on radiance, winging from shade, +With her witch-whisper o'er ruins, in reeds, +She sang low the song of her promise delayed; +Beckoned and died, as a finger of smoke +Astream over woodland. And was not she +History's heroines white on storm? +Remember her summons to valorous deeds. +Shone she a lure of the honey-bag swarm, +Most was her beam on the knightly: she led +For the honours of manhood more than the prize; +Waved her magnetical yoke +Whither the warrior bled, +Ere to the bower of sighs. +And shy of her secrets she was; under deeps +Plunged at the breath of a thirst that woke +The dream in the cave where the Dreaded sleeps. + +Away over heaven the young heart flew, +And caught many lustres, till some one said +(Or was it the thought into hearing grew?), +NOT THOU AS COMMONER MEN! +Thy stature puffed and it swayed, +It stiffened to royal-erect; +A brassy trumpet brayed; +A whirling seized thy head; +The vision of beauty was flecked. +Note well the how and the when, +The thing that prompted and sped. +Thereanon the keen passions clapped wing, +Fixed eye, and the world was prey. +No simple world of thy greenblade Spring, +Nor world of thy flowerful prime +On the topmost Orient peak +Above a yet vaporous day. +Flesh was it, breast to beak: +A four-walled windowless world without ray, +Only darkening jets on a river of slime, +Where harsh over music as woodland jay, +A voice chants, Woe to the weak! +And along an insatiate feast, +Women and men are one +In the cup transforming to beast. +Magian worship they paid to their sun, +Lord of the Purse! Behold him climb. +Stalked ever such figure of fun +For monarch in great-grin pantomime? +See now the heart dwindle, the frame distend; +The soul to its anchorite cavern retreat, +From a life that reeks of the rotted end; +While he--is he pictureable? replete, +Gourd-like swells of the rank of the soil, +Hollow, more hollow at core. +And for him did the hundreds toil +Despised; in the cold and heat, +This image ridiculous bore +On their shoulders for morsels of meat! + +Gross, with the fumes of incense full, +With parasites tickled, with slaves begirt, +He strutted, a cock, he bellowed, a bull, +He rolled him, a dog, in dirt. +And dog, bull, cook, was he, fanged, horned, plumed; +Original man, as philosophers vouch; +Carnivorous, cannibal; length-long exhumed, +Frightfully living and armed to devour; +The primitive weapons of prey in his pouch; +The bait, the line and the hook: +To feed on his fellows intent. +God of the Danae shower, +He had but to follow his bent. +He battened on fowl not safely hutched, +On sheep astray from the crook; +A lure for the foolish in fold: +To carrion turning what flesh he touched. +And O the grace of his air, +As he at the goblet sips, +A centre of girdles loosed, +With their grisly label, Sold! +Credulous hears the fidelity swear, +Which has roving eyes over yielded lips: +To-morrow will fancy himself the seduced, +The stuck in a treacherous slough, +Because of his faith in a purchased pair, +False to a vinous vow. + +In his glory of banquet strip him bare, +And what is the creature we view? +Our pursy Apollo Apollyon's tool; +A small one, still of the crew +By serpent Apollyon blest: +His plea in apology, blindfold Fool. +A fool surcharged, propelled, unwarned; +Not viler, you hear him protest: +Of a popular countenance not incorrect. +But deeds are the picture in essence, deeds +Paint him the hooved and homed, +Despite the poor pother he pleads, +And his look of a nation's elect. +We have him, our quarry confessed! +And scan him: the features inspect +Of that bestial multiform: cry, +Corroborate I, O Samian Sage! +The book of thy wisdom, proved +On me, its last hieroglyph page, +Alive in the horned and hooved? +Thou! will he make reply. + +Thus has the plenary purse +Done often: to do will engage +Anew upon all of thy like, or worse. +And now is thy deepest regret +To be man, clean rescued from beast: +From the grip of the Sorcerer, Gold, +Celestially released. + +But now from his cavernous hold, +Free may thy soul be set, +As a child of the Death and the Life, to learn, +Refreshed by some bodily sweat, +The meaning of either in turn, +What issue may come of the two:- +A morn beyond mornings, beyond all reach +Of emotional arms at the stretch to enfold: +A firmament passing our visible blue. +To those having nought to reflect it, 'tis nought; +To those who are misty, 'tis mist on the beach +From the billow withdrawing; to those who see +Earth, our mother, in thought, +Her spirit it is, our key. + +Ay, the Life and the Death are her words to us here, +Of one significance, pricking the blind. +This is thy gain now the surface is clear: +To read with a soul in the mirror of mind +Is man's chief lesson.--Thou smilest! I preach! +Acid smiling, my friend, reveals +Abysses within; frigid preaching a street +Paved unconcernedly smooth +For the lecturer straight on his heels, +Up and down a policeman's beat; +Bearing tonics not labelled to soothe. +Thou hast a disgust of the sermon in rhyme. +It is not attractive in being too chaste. +The popular tale of adventure and crime +Would equally sicken an overdone taste. +So, then, onward. Philosophy, thoughtless to soothe, +Lifts, if thou wilt, or there leaves thee supine. + +Thy condition, good sooth, has no seeming of sweet; +It walks our first crags, it is flint for the tooth, +For the thirsts of our nature brine. +But manful has met it, manful will meet. +And think of thy privilege: supple with youth, +To have sight of the headlong swine, +Once fouling thee, jumping the dips! +As the coin of thy purse poured out: +An animal's holiday past: +And free of them thou, to begin a new bout; +To start a fresh hunt on a resolute blast: +No more an imp-ridden to bournes of eclipse: +Having knowledge to spur thee, a gift to compare; +Rubbing shoulder to shoulder, as only the book +Of the world can be read, by necessity urged. +For witness, what blinkers are they who look +From the state of the prince or the millionnaire! +They see but the fish they attract, +The hungers on them converged; +And never the thought in the shell of the act, +Nor ever life's fangless mirth. +But first, that the poisonous of thee be purged, +Go into thyself, strike Earth. +She is there, she is felt in a blow struck hard. +Thou findest a pugilist countering quick, +Cunning at drives where thy shutters are barred; +Not, after the studied professional trick, +Blue-sealing; she brightens the sight. Strike Earth, +Antaeus, young giant, whom fortune trips! +And thou com'st on a saving fact, +To nourish thy planted worth. + +Be it clay, flint, mud, or the rubble of chips, +Thy roots have grasp in the stern-exact: +The redemption of sinners deluded! the last +Dry handful, that bruises and saves. +To the common big heart are we bound right fast, +When our Mother admonishing nips +At the nakedness bare of a clout, +And we crave what the commonest craves. + +This wealth was a fortress-wall, +Under which grew our grim little beast-god stout; +Self-worshipped, the foe, in division from all; +With crowds of illogical Christians, no doubt; +Till the rescuing earthquake cracked. +Thus are we man made firm; +Made warm by the numbers compact. +We follow no longer a trumpet-snout, +At a trot where the hog is tracked, +Nor wriggle the way of the worm. + +Thou wilt spare us the cynical pout +At humanity: sign of a nature bechurled. +No stenchy anathemas cast +Upon Providence, women, the world. +Distinguish thy tempers and trim thy wits. +The purchased are things of the mart, not classed +Among resonant types that have freely grown. + +Thy knowledge of women might be surpassed: +As any sad dog's of sweet flesh when he quits +The wayside wandering bone! +No revilings of comrades as ingrates: thee +The tempter, misleader, and criminal (screened +By laws yet barbarous) own. + +If some one performed Fiend's deputy, +He was for awhile the Fiend. +Still, nursing a passion to speak, +As the punch-bowl does, in the moral vein, +When the ladle has finished its leak, +And the vessel is loquent of nature's inane, +Hie where the demagogues roar +Like a Phalaris bull, with the victim's force: +Hurrah to their jolly attack +On a City that smokes of the Plain; +A city of sin's death-dyes, +Holding revel of worms in a corse; +A city of malady sore, +Over-ripe for the big doom's crack: +A city of hymnical snore; +Connubial truths and lies +Demanding an instant divorce, +Clean as the bright from the black. +It were well for thy system to sermonize. +There are giants to slay, and they call for their Jack. + +Then up stand thou in the midst: +Thy good grain out of thee thresh, +Hand upon heart: relate +What things thou legally didst +For the Archseducer of flesh. +Omitting the murmurs of women and fate, +Confess thee an instrument armed +To be snare of our wanton, our weak, +Of all by the sensual charmed. +For once shall repentance be done by the tongue: +Speak, though execrate, speak +A word on grandmotherly Laws +Giving rivers of gold to our young, +In the days of their hungers impure; +To furnish them beak and claws, +And make them a banquet's lure. + +Thou the example, saved +Miraculously by this poor skin! +Thereat let the Purse be waved: +The snake-slough sick of the snaky sin: +A devil, if devil as devil behaved +Ever, thou knowest, look thou but in, +Where he shivers, a culprit fettered and shaved; +O a bird stripped of feather, a fish clipped of fin! + +And commend for a washing the torrents of wrath, +Which hurl at the foe of the dearest men prize +Rough-rolling boulders and froth. +Gigantical enginery they can command, +For the crushing of enemies not of great size: +But hold to thy desperate stand. +Men's right of bequeathing their all to their own +(With little regard for the creatures they squeezed); +Their mill and mill-water and nether mill-stone +Tied fast to their infant; lo, this is the last +Of their hungers, by prudent devices appeased. +The law they decree is their ultimate slave; +Wherein we perceive old Voracity glassed. +It works from their dust, and it reeks of their grave. +Point them to greener, though Journals be guns; +To brotherly fields under fatherly skies; +Where the savage still primitive learns of a debt +He has owed since he drummed on his belly for war; +And how for his giving, the more will he get; +For trusting his fellows, leave friends round his sons: +Till they see, with the gape of a startled surprise, +Their adored tyrant-monster a brute to abhor, +The sun of their system a father of flies! + +So, for such good hope, take their scourge unashamed; +'Tis the portion of them who civilize, +Who speak the word novel and true: +How the brutish antique of our springs may be tamed, +Without loss of the strength that should push us to flower; +How the God of old time will act Satan of new, +If we keep him not straight at the higher God aimed; +For whose habitation within us we scour +This house of our life; where our bitterest pains +Are those to eject the Infernal, who heaps +Mire on the soul. Take stripes or chains; +Grip at thy standard reviled. +And what if our body be dashed from the steeps? +Our spoken in protest remains. +A young generation reaps. + +The young generation! ah, there is the child +Of our souls down the Ages! to bleed for it, proof +That souls we have, with our senses filed, +Our shuttles at thread of the woof. +May it be braver than ours, +To encounter the rattle of hostile bolts, +To look on the rising of Stranger Powers. +May it know how the mind in expansion revolts +From a nursery Past with dead letters aloof, +And the piping to stupor of Precedents shun, +In a field where the forefather print of the hoof +Is not yet overgrassed by the watering hours, +And should prompt us to Change, as to promise of sun, +Till brain-rule splendidly towers. +For that large light we have laboured and tramped +Thorough forests and bogland, still to perceive +Our animate morning stamped +With the lines of a sombre eve. + +A timorous thing ran the innocent hind, +When the wolf was the hypocrite fang under hood, +The snake a lithe lurker up sleeve, +And the lion effulgently ramped. +Then our forefather hoof did its work in the wood, +By right of the better in kind. +But now will it breed yon bestial brood +Three-fold thrice over, if bent to bind, +As the healthy in chains with the sick, +Unto despot usage our issuing mind. +It signifies battle or death's dull knell. +Precedents icily written on high +Challenge the Tentatives hot to rebel. +Our Mother, who speeds her bloomful quick +For the march, reads which the impediment well. +She smiles when of sapience is their boast. +O loose of the tug between blood run dry +And blood running flame may our offspring run! +May brain democratic be king of the host! +Less then shall the volumes of History tell +Of the stop in progression, the slip in relapse, +That counts us a sand-slack inch hard won +Beneath an oppressive incumbent perhaps. + +Let the senile lords in a parchment sky, +And the generous turbulents drunken of morn, +Their battle of instincts put by, +A moment examine this field: +On a Roman street cast thoughtful eye, +Along to the mounts from the bog-forest weald. +It merits a glance at our history's maps, +To see across Britain's old shaggy unshorn, +Through the Parties in strife internecine, foot +The ruler's close-reckoned direct to the mark. +From the head ran the vanquisher's orderly route, +In the stride of his forts through the tangle and dark. +From the head runs the paved firm way for advance, +And we shoulder, we wrangle! The light on us shed +Shows dense beetle blackness in swarm, lurid Chance, +The Goddess of gamblers, above. From the head, +Then when it worked for the birth of a star +Fraternal with heaven's in beauty and ray, +Sprang the Acropolis. Ask what crown +Comes of our tides of the blood at war, +For men to bequeath generations down! +And ask what thou wast when the Purse was brimmed: +What high-bounding ball for the Gods at play: +A Conservative youth! who the cream-bowl skimmed, +Desiring affairs to be left as they are. + +So, thou takest Youth's natural place in the fray, +As a Tentative, combating Peace, +Our lullaby word for decay. - +There will come an immediate decree +In thy mind for the opposite party's decease, +If he bends not an instant knee. +Expunge it: extinguishing counts poor gain. +And accept a mild word of police:- +Be mannerly, measured; refrain +From the puffings of him of the bagpipe cheeks. +Our political, even as the merchant main, +A temperate gale requires +For the ship that haven seeks; +Neither God of the winds nor his bellowsy squires. + +Then observe the antagonist, con +His reasons for rocking the lullaby word. +You stand on a different stage of the stairs. +He fought certain battles, yon senile lord. +In the strength of thee, feel his bequest to his heirs. +We are now on his inches of ground hard won, +For a perch to a flight o'er his resting fence. + +Does it knock too hard at thy head if I say, +That Time is both father and son? +Tough lesson, when senses are floods over sense! - +Discern the paternal of Now +As the Then of thy present tense. +You may pull as you will either way, +You can never be other than one. +So, be filial. Giants to slay +Demand knowing eyes in their Jack. + +There are those whom we push from the path with respect. +Bow to that elder, though seeing him bow +To the backward as well, for a thunderous back +Upon thee. In his day he was not all wrong. +Unto some foundered zenith he strove, and was wrecked. +He scrambled to shore with a worship of shore. +The Future he sees as the slippery murk; +The Past as his doctrinal library lore. +He stands now the rock to the wave's wild wash. +Yet thy lumpish antagonist once did work +Heroical, one of our strong. +His gold to retain and his dross reject, +Engage him, but humour, not aiming to quash. +Detest the dead squat of the Turk, +And suffice it to move him along. +Drink of faith in the brains a full draught +Before the oration: beware +Lest rhetoric moonily waft +Whither horrid activities snare. +Rhetoric, juice for the mob +Despising more luminous grape, +Oft at its fount has it laughed +In the cataracts rolling for rape +Of a Reason left single to sob! + +'Tis known how the permanent never is writ +In blood of the passions: mercurial they, +Shifty their issue: stir not that pit +To the game our brutes best play. + +But with rhetoric loose, can we check man's brute? +Assemblies of men on their legs invoke +Excitement for wholesome diversion: there shoot +Electrical sparks between their dry thatch +And thy waved torch, more to kindle than light. +'Tis instant between you: the trick of a catch +(To match a Batrachian croak) +Will thump them a frenzy or fun in their veins. +Then may it be rather the well-worn joke +Thou repeatest, to stop conflagration, and write +Penance for rhetoric. Strange will it seem, +When thou readest that form of thy homage to brains! + +For the secret why demagogues fail, +Though they carry hot mobs to the red extreme, +And knock out or knock in the nail +(We will rank them as flatly sincere, +Devoutly detesting a wrong, +Engines o'ercharged with our human steam), +Question thee, seething amid the throng. +And ask, whether Wisdom is born of blood-heat; +Or of other than Wisdom comes victory here; - +Aught more than the banquet and roundelay, +That is closed with a terrible terminal wail, +A retributive black ding-dong? +And ask of thyself: This furious Yea +Of a speech I thump to repeat, +In the cause I would have prevail, +For seed of a nourishing wheat, +IS IT ACCEPTED OF SONG? +Does it sound to the mind through the ear, +Right sober, pure sane? has it disciplined feet? +Thou wilt find it a test severe; +Unerring whatever the theme. +Rings it for Reason a melody clear, +We have bidden old Chaos retreat; +We have called on Creation to hear; +All forces that make us are one full stream. +Simple islander! thus may the spirit in verse, +Showing its practical value and weight, +Pipe to thee clear from the Empty Purse, +Lead thee aloft to that high estate. - +The test is conclusive, I deem: +It embraces or mortally bites. +We have then the key-note for debate: +A Senate that sits on the heights +Over discords, to shape and amend. + +And no singer is needed to serve +The musical God, my friend. +Needs only his law on a sensible nerve: +A law that to Measure invites, +Forbidding the passions contend. +Is it accepted of Song? +And if then the blunt answer be Nay, +Dislink thee sharp from the ramping horde, +Slaves of the Goddess of hoar-old sway, +The Queen of delirious rites, +Queen of those issueless mobs, that rend +For frenzy the strings of a fruitful accord, +Pursuing insensate, seething in throng, +Their wild idea to its ashen end. +Off to their Phrygia, shriek and gong, +Shorn from their fellows, behold them wend! + +But thou, should the answer ring Ay, +Hast warrant of seed for thy word: +The musical God is nigh +To inspirit and temper, tune it, and steer +Through the shoals: is it worthy of Song, +There are souls all woman to hear, +Woman to bear and renew. +For he is the Master of Measure, and weighs, +Broad as the arms of his blue, +Fine as the web of his rays, +Justice, whose voice is a melody clear, +The one sure life for the numbered long, +From him are the brutal and vain, +The vile, the excessive, out-thrust: +He points to the God on the upmost throne: +He is the saver of grain, +The sifter of spirit from dust. +He, Harmony, tells how to Measure pertain +The virilities: Measure alone +Has votaries rich in the male: +Fathers embracing no cloud, +Sowing no harvestless main: +Alike by the flesh and the spirit endowed +To create, to perpetuate; woo, win, wed; +Send progeny streaming, have earth for their own, +Over-run the insensates, disperse with a puff +Simulacra, though solid they sail, +And seem such imperial stuff: +Yes, the living divide off the dead. + +Then thou with thy furies outgrown, +Not as Cybele's beast will thy head lash tail +So praeter-determinedly thermonous, +Nor thy cause be an Attis far fled. +Thou under stress of the strife +Shalt hear for sustainment supreme +The cry of the conscience of Life: +KEEP THE YOUNG GENERATIONS IN HAIL, +AND BEQUEATH THEM NO TUMBLED HOUSE! + +There hast thou the sacred theme, +Therein the inveterate spur, +Of the Innermost. See her one blink +In vision past eyeballs. Not thee +She cares for, but us. Follow her. +Follow her, and thou wilt not sink. +With thy soul the Life espouse: +This Life of the visible, audible, ring +With thy love tight about; and no death will be; +The name be an empty thing, +And woe a forgotten old trick: +And battle will come as a challenge to drink; +As a warrior's wound each transient sting. +She leads to the Uppermost link by link; +Exacts but vision, desires not vows. +Above us the singular number to see; +The plural warm round us; ourself in the thick, +A dot or a stop: that is our task; +Her lesson in figured arithmetic, +For the letters of Life behind its mask; +Her flower-like look under fearful brows. + +As for thy special case, O my friend, one must think +Massilia's victim, who held the carouse +For the length of a carnival year, +Knew worse: but the wretch had his opening choice. +For thee, by our law, no alternatives were: +Thy fall was assured ere thou camest to a voice. +He cancelled the ravaging Plague, +With the roll of his fat off the cliff. +Do thou with thy lean as the weapon of ink, +Though they call thee an angler who fishes the vague +And catches the not too pink, +Attack one as murderous, knowing thy cause +Is the cause of community. Iterate, +Iterate, iterate, harp on the trite: +Our preacher to win is the supple in stiff: +Yet always in measure, with bearing polite: +The manner of one that would expiate +His share in grandmotherly Laws, +Which do the dark thing to destroy, +Under aspect of water so guilelessly white +For the general use, by the devils befouled. + +Enough, poor prodigal boy! +Thou hast listened with patience; another had howled. +Repentance is proved, forgiveness is earned. +And 'tis bony: denied thee thy succulent half +Of the parable's blessing, to swineherd returned: +A Sermon thy slice of the Scriptural calf! +By my faith, there is feasting to come, +Not the less, when our Earth we have seen +Beneath and on surface, her deeds and designs: +Who gives us the man-loving Nazarene, +The martyrs, the poets, the corn and the vines. +By my faith in the head, she has wonders in loom; +Revelations, delights. I can hear a faint crow +Of the cock of fresh mornings, far, far, yet distinct; +As down the new shafting of mines, +A cry of the metally gnome. +When our Earth we have seen, and have linked +With the home of the Spirit to whom we unfold, +Imprisoned humanity open will throw +Its fortress gates, and the rivers of gold +For the congregate friendliness flow. +Then the meaning of Earth in her children behold: +Glad eyes, frank hands, and a fellowship real: +And laughter on lips, as the birds' outburst +At the flooding of light. No robbery then +The feast, nor a robber's abode the home, +For a furnished model of our first den! +Nor Life as a stationed wheel; +Nor History written in blood or in foam, +For vendetta of Parties in cursing accursed. +The God in the conscience of multitudes feel, +And we feel deep to Earth at her heart, +We have her communion with men, +New ground, new skies for appeal. +Yield into harness thy best and thy worst; +Away on the trot of thy servitude start, +Through the rigours and joys and sustainments of air. +If courage should falter, 'tis wholesome to kneel. +Remember that well, for the secret with some, +Who pray for no gift, but have cleansing in prayer, +And free from impurities tower-like stand. +I promise not more, save that feasting will come +To a mind and a body no longer inversed: +The sense of large charity over the land, +Earth's wheaten of wisdom dispensed in the rough, +And a bell ringing thanks for a sustenance meal +Through the active machine: lean fare, +But it carries a sparkle! And now enough, +And part we as comrades part, +To meet again never or some day or soon. + +Our season of drought is reminder rude:- +No later than yesternoon, +I looked on the horse of a cart, +By the wayside water-trough. +How at every draught of his bride of thirst +His nostrils widened! The sight was good: +Food for us, food, such as first +Drew our thoughts to earth's lowly for food. + + + +TO THE COMIC SPIRIT + + + +Sword of Common Sense! - +Our surest gift: the sacred chain +Of man to man: firm earth for trust +In structures vowed to permanence:- +Thou guardian issue of the harvest brain! +Implacable perforce of just; +With that good treasure in defence, +Which is our gold crushed out of joy and pain +Since first men planted foot and hand was king: +Bright, nimble of the marrow-nerve +To wield thy double edge, retort +Or hold the deadlier reserve, +And through thy victim's weapon sting: +Thine is the service, thine the sport +This shifty heart of ours to hunt +Across its webs and round the many a ring +Where fox it is, or snake, or mingled seeds +Occasion heats to shape, or the poor smoke +Struck from a puff-ball, or the troughster's grunt; - +Once lion of our desert's trodden weeds; +And but for thy straight finger at the yoke, +Again to be the lordly paw, +Naming his appetites his needs, +Behind a decorative cloak: +Thou, of the highest, the unwritten Law +We read upon that building's architrave +In the mind's firmament, by men upraised +With sweat of blood when they had quitted cave +For fellowship, and rearward looked amazed, +Where the prime motive gapes a lurid jaw, +Thou, soul of wakened heads, art armed to warn, +Restrain, lest we backslide on whence we sprang, +Scarce better than our dwarf beginning shoot, +Of every gathered pearl and blossom shorn; +Through thee, in novel wiles to win disguise, +Seen are the pits of the disruptor, seen +His rebel agitation at our root: +Thou hast him out of hawking eyes; +Nor ever morning of the clang +Young Echo sped on hill from horn +In forest blown when scent was keen +Off earthy dews besprinkling blades +Of covert grass more merrily rang +The yelp of chase down alleys green, +Forth of the headlong-pouring glades, +Over the dappled fallows wild away, +Than thy fine unaccented scorn +At sight of man's old secret brute, +Devout for pasture on his prey, +Advancing, yawning to devour; +With step of deer, with voice of flute, +Haply with visage of the lily flower. + +Let the cock crow and ruddy morn +His handmaiden appear! Youth claims his hour. +The generously ludicrous +Espouses it. But see we sons of day, +Off whom Life leans for guidance in our fight, +Accept the throb for lord of us; +For lord, for the main central light +That gives direction, not the eclipse; +Or dost thou look where niggard Age, +Demanding reverence for wrinkles, whips +A tumbled top to grind a wolf's worn tooth; - +Hoar despot on our final stage, +In dotage of a stunted Youth; - +Or it may be some venerable sage, +Not having thee awake in him, compact +Of wisdom else, the breast's old tempter trips; +Or see we ceremonial state, +Robing the gilded beast, exact +Abjection, while the crackskull name of Fate +Is used to stamp and hallow printed fact; +A cruel corner lengthens up thy lips; +These are thy game wherever men engage: +These and, majestic in a borrowed shape, +The major and the minor potentate, +Creative of their various ape; - +The tiptoe mortals triumphing to write +Upon a perishable page +An inch above their fellows' height; - +The criers of foregone wisdom, who impose +Its slough on live conditions, much for the greed +Of our first hungry figure wide agape; - +Call up thy hounds of laughter to their run. +These, that would have men still of men be foes, +Eternal fox to prowl and pike to feed; +Would keep our life the whirly pool +Of turbid stuff dishonouring History; +The herd the drover's herd, the fool the fool, +Ourself our slavish self's infernal sun: +These are the children of the heart untaught +By thy quick founts to beat abroad, by thee +Untamed to tone its passions under thought, +The rich humaneness reading in thy fun. +Of them a world of coltish heels for school +We have; a world with driving wrecks bestrewn. + +'Tis written of the Gods of human mould, +Those Nectar Gods, of glorious stature hewn +To quicken hymns, that they did hear, incensed, +Satiric comments overbold, +From one whose part was by decree +The jester's; but they boiled to feel him bite. +Better for them had they with Reason fenced +Or smiled corrected! They in the great Gods' might +Their prober crushed, as fingers flea. +Crumbled Olympus when the sovereign sire +His fatal kick to Momus gave, albeit +Men could behold the sacred Mount aspire, +The Satirist pass by on limping feet. +Those Gods who saw the ejected laugh alight +Below had then their last of airy glee; +They in the cup sought Laughter's drowned sprite, +Fed to dire fatness off uncurbed conceit. +Eyes under saw them waddle on their Mount, +And drew them down; to flattest earth they rolled. +This know we veritable. O Sage of Mirth! +Can it be true, the story men recount +Of the fall'n plight of the great Gods on earth? +How they being deathless, though of human mould, +With human cravings, undecaying frames, +Must labour for subsistence; are a band +Whom a loose-cheeked, wide-lipped gay cripple leads +At haunts of holiday on summer sand: +And lightly he will hint to one that heeds +Names in pained designation of them, names +Ensphered on blue skies and on black, which twirl +Our hearing madly from our seeing dazed, +Add Bacchus unto both; and he entreats +(His baby dimples in maternal chaps +Running wild labyrinths of line and curl) +Compassion for his masterful Trombone, +Whose thunder is the brass of how he blazed +Of old: for him of the mountain-muscle feats, +Who guts a drum to fetch a snappish groan: +For his fierce bugler horning onset, whom +A truncheon-battered helmet caps . . . +The creature is of earnest mien +To plead a sorrow darker than the tomb. +His Harp and Triangle, in tone subdued, +He names; they are a rayless red and white; +The dawn-hued libertine, the gibbous prude. +And, if we recognize his Tambourine, +He asks; exhausted names her: she has become +A globe in cupolas; the blowziest queen +Of overflowing dome on dome; +Redundancy contending with the tight, +Leaping the dam! He fondly calls, his girl, +The buxom tripper with the goblet-smile, +Refreshful. O but now his brows are dun, +Bunched are his lips, as when distilling guile, +To drop his venomous: the Dame of dames, +Flower of the world, that honey one, +She of the earthly rose in the sea-pearl, +To whom the world ran ocean for her kiss; +He names her, as a worshipper he names, +And indicates with a contemptuous thumb. +The lady meanwhile lures the mob, alike +Ogles the bursters of the horn and drum. +Curtain her close! her open arms +Have suckers for beholders: she to this? +For that she could not, save in fury, hear +A sharp corrective utterance flick +Her idle manners, for the laugh to strike +Beauty so breeding beauty, without peer +Above the snows, among the flowers? She reaps +This mouldy garner of the fatal kick? +Gross with the sacrifice of Circe-swarms, +Astarte of vile sweets that slay, malign, +From Greek resplendent to Phoenician foul, +The trader in attractions sinks, all brine +To thoughts of taste; is 't love?--bark, dog! hoot, owl! +And she is blushless: ancient worship weeps. +Suicide Graces dangle down the charms +Sprawling like gourds on outer garden-heaps. +She stands in her unholy oily leer +A statue losing feature, weather-sick +Mid draggled creepers of twined ivy sere. +The curtain cried for magnifies to see! - +We cannot quench our one corrupting glance: +The vision of the rumour will not flee. +Doth the Boy own such Mother?--shoot his dart +To bring her, countless as the crested deeps, +Her subjects of the uncorrected heart? +False is that vision, shrieks the devotee; +Incredible, we echo; and anew +Like a far growling lightning-cloud it leaps. +Low humourist this leader seems; perchance +Pitched from his University career, +Adept at classic fooling. Yet of mould +Human those Gods were: deathless too: +On high they not as meditatives paced: +Prodigiously they did the deeds of flesh: +Descending, they would touch the lowest here: +And she, that lighted form of blue and gold, +Whom the seas gave, all earth, all earth embraced; +Exulting in the great hauls of her mesh; +Desired and hated, desperately dear; +Most human of them was. No more pursue! +Enough that the black story can be told. +It preaches to the eminently placed: +For whom disastrous wreckage is nigh due, +Paints omen. Truly they our throbber had; +The passions plumping, passions playing leech, +Cunning to trick us for the day's good cheer. +Our uncorrected human heart will swell +To notions monstrous, doings mad +As billows on a foam-lashed beach; +Borne on the tides of alternating heats, +Will drug the brain, will doom the soul as well; +Call the closed mouth of that harsh final Power +To speak in judgement: Nemesis, the fell: +Of those bright Gods assembled, offspring sour; +The last surviving on the upper seats; +As with men Reason when their hearts rebel. + +Ah, what a fruitless breeder is this heart, +Full of the mingled seeds, each eating each. +Not wiser of our mark than at the start, +It surges like the wrath-faced father Sea +To countering winds; a force blind-eyed, +On endless rounds of aimless reach; +Emotion for the source of pride, +The grounds of faith in fixity +Above our flesh; its cravings urging speech, +Inspiring prayer; by turns a lump +Swung on a time-piece, and by turns +A quivering energy to jump +For seats angelical: it shrinks, it yearns, +Loves, loathes; is flame or cinders; lastly cloud +Capping a sullen crater: and mankind +We see cloud-capped, an army of the dark, +Because of thy straight leadership declined; +At heels of this or that delusive spark: +Now when the multitudinous races press +Elbow to elbow hourly more, +A thickened host; when now we hear aloud +Life for the very life implore +A signal of a visioned mark; +Light of the mind, the mind's discourse, +The rational in graciousness, +Thee by acknowledgement enthroned, +To tame and lead that blind-eyed force +In harmony of harness with the crowd, +For payment of their dues; as yet disowned, +Save where some dutiful lone creature, vowed +To holy work, deems it the heart's intent; +Or where a silken circle views it cowled, +The seeming figure of concordance, bent +On satiating tyrant lust +Or barren fits of sentiment. + +Thou wilt not have our paths befouled +By simulation; are we vile to view, +The heavens shall see us clean of our own dust, +Beneath thy breezy flitting wing: +They make their mirror upon faces true; +And where they win reflection, lucid heave +The under tides of this hot heart seen through. +Beneficently wilt thou clip +All oversteppings of the plumed, +The puffed, and bid the masker strip, +And into the crowned windbag thrust, +Tearing the mortal from the vital thing, +A lightning o'er the half-illumed, +Who to base brute-dominion cleave, +Yet mark effects, and shun the flash, +Till their drowsed wits a beam conceive, +To spy a wound without a gash, +The magic in a turn of wrist, +And how are wedded heart and head regaled +When Wit o'er Folly blows the mort, +And their high note of union spreads +Wide from the timely word with conquest charged; +Victorious laughter, of no loud report, +If heard; derision as divinely veiled +As terrible Immortals in rose-mist, +Given to the vision of arrested men: +Whereat they feel within them weave +Community its closer threads, +And are to our fraternal state enlarged; +Like warm fresh blood is their enlivened ken: +They learn that thou art not of alien sort, +Speaking the tongue by vipers hissed, +Or of the frosty heights unsealed, +Or of the vain who simple speech distort, +Or of the vapours pointing on to nought +Along cold skies; though sharp and high thy pitch; +As when sole homeward the belated treads, +And hears aloft a clamour wailed, +That once had seemed the broomstick witch +Horridly violating cloud for drought: +He, from the rub of minds dispersing fears, +Hears migrants marshalling their midnight train; +Homeliest order in black sky appears, +Not less than in the lighted village steads. +So do those half-illumed wax clear to share +A cry that is our common voice; the note +Of fellowship upon a loftier plane, +Above embattled castle-wall and moat; +And toning drops as from pure heaven it sheds. +So thou for washing a phantasmal air, +For thy sweet singing keynote of the wise, +Laughter--the joy of Reason seeing fade +Obstruction into Earth's renewing beds, +Beneath the stroke of her good servant's blade - +Thenceforth art as their earth-star hailed; +Gain of the years, conjunction's prize. +The greater heart in thy appeal to heads +They see, thou Captain of our civil Fort! +By more elusive savages assailed +On each ascending stage; untired +Both inner foe and outer to cut short, +And blow to chaff pretenders void of grist: +Showing old tiger's claws, old crocodile's +Yard-grin of eager grinders, slim to sight, +Like forms in running water, oft when smiles, +When pearly tears, when fluent lips delight: +But never with the slayer's malice fired: +As little as informs an infant's fist +Clenched at the sneeze! Thou wouldst but have us be +Good sons of mother soil, whereby to grow +Branching on fairer skies, one stately tree; +Broad of the tilth for flowering at the Court: +Which is the tree bound fast to wave its tress; +Of strength controlled sheer beauty to bestow. +Ambrosial heights of possible acquist, +Where souls of men with soul of man consort, +And all look higher to new loveliness +Begotten of the look: thy mark is there; +While on our temporal ground alive, +Rightly though fearfully thou wieldest sword +Of finer temper now a numbered learn +That they resisting thee themselves resist; +And not thy bigger joy to smite and drive, +Prompt the dense herd to butt, and set the snare +Witching them into pitfalls for hoarse shouts. +More now, and hourly more, and of the Lord +Thou lead'st to, doth this rebel heart discern, +When pinched ascetic and red sensualist +Alternately recurrent freeze or burn, +And of its old religions it has doubts. +It fears thee less when thou hast shown it bare; +Less hates, part understands, nor much resents, +When the prized objects it has raised for prayer, +For fitful prayer;--repentance dreading fire, +Impelled by aches; the blindness which repents +Like the poor trampled worm that writhes in mire; - +Are sounded by thee, and thou darest probe +Old institutions and establishments, +Once fortresses against the floods of sin, +For what their worth; and questioningly prod +For why they stand upon a racing globe, +Impeding blocks, less useful than the clod; +Their angel out of them, a demon in. + +This half-enlightened heart, still doomed to fret, +To hurl at vanities, to drift in shame +Of gain or loss, bewailing the sure rod, +Shall of predestination wed thee yet. +Something it gathers of what things should drop +At entrance on new times; of how thrice broad +The world of minds communicative; how +A straggling Nature classed in school, and scored +With stripes admonishing, may yield to plough +Fruitfullest furrows, nor for waxing tame +Be feeble on an Earth whose gentler crop +Is its most living, in the mind that steers, +By Reason led, her way of tree and flame, +Beyond the genuflexions and the tears; +Upon an Earth that cannot stop, +Where upward is the visible aim, +And ever we espy the greater God, +For simple pointing at a good adored: +Proof of the closer neighbourhood. Head on, +Sword of the many, light of the few! untwist +Or cut our tangles till fair space is won +Beyond a briared wood of austere brow, +Believed of discord by thy timely word +At intervals refreshing life: for thou +Art verify Keeper of the Muse's Key; +Thyself no vacant melodist; +On lower land elective even as she; +Holding, as she, all dissonance abhorred; +Advising to her measured steps in flow; +And teaching how for being subjected free +Past thought of freedom we may come to know +The music of the meaning of Accord. + + + +YOUTH IN MEMORY + + + +Days, when the ball of our vision +Had eagles that flew unabashed to sun; +When the grasp on the bow was decision, +And arrow and hand and eye were one; +When the Pleasures, like waves to a swimmer, +Came heaving for rapture ahead! - +Invoke them, they dwindle, they glimmer +As lights over mounds of the dead. + +Behold the winged Olympus, off the mead, +With thunder of wide pinions, lightning speed, +Wafting the shepherd-boy through ether clear, +To bear the golden nectar-cup. +So flies desire at view of its delight, +When the young heart is tiptoe perched on sight. +We meanwhile who in hues of the sick year +The Spring-time paint to prick us for our lost, +Mount but the fatal half way up - +Whereon shut eyes! This is decreed, +For Age that would to youthful heavens ascend, +By passion for the arms' possession tossed, +It falls the way of sighs and hath their end; +A spark gone out to more sepulchral night. +Good if the arrowy eagle of the height +Be then the little bird that hops to feed. + +Lame falls the cry to kindle days +Of radiant orb and daring gaze. +It does but clank our mortal chain. +For Earth reads through her felon old +The many-numbered of her fold, +Who forward tottering backward strain, +And would be thieves of treasure spent, +With their grey season soured. +She could write out their history in their thirst +To have again the much devoured, +And be the bud at burst; +In honey fancy join the flow, +Where Youth swims on as once they went, +All choiric for spontaneous glee +Of active eager lungs and thews; +They now bared roots beside the river bent; +Whose privilege themselves to see; +Their place in yonder tideway know; +The current glass peruse; +The depths intently sound; +And sapped by each returning flood +Accept for monitory nourishment +Those worn roped features under crust of mud, +Reflected in the silvery smooth around: +Not less the branching and high singing tree, +A home of nests, a landmark and a tent, +Until their hour for losing hold on ground. +Even such good harvest of the things that flee +Earth offers her subjected, and they choose +Rather of Bacchic Youth one beam to drink, +And warm slow marrow with the sensual wink. +So block they at her source the Mother of the Muse. + +Who cheerfully the little bird becomes, +Without a fall, and pipes for peck at crumbs, +May have her dolings to the lightest touch; +As where some cripple muses by his crutch, +Unwitting that the spirit in him sings: +'When I had legs, then had I wings, +As good as any born of eggs, +To feed on all aerial things, +When I had legs!' +And if not to embrace he sighs, +She gives him breath of Youth awhile, +Perspective of a breezy mile, +Companionable hedgeways, lifting skies; +Scenes where his nested dreams upon their hoard +Brooded, or up to empyrean soared: +Enough to link him with a dotted line. +But cravings for an eagle's flight, +To top white peaks and serve wild wine +Among the rosy undecayed, +Bring only flash of shade +From her full throbbing breast of day in night. +By what they crave are they betrayed: +And cavernous is that young dragon's jaw, +Crimson for all the fiery reptile saw +In time now coveted, for teeth to flay, +Once more consume, were Life recurrent May. +They to their moment of drawn breath, +Which is the life that makes the death, +The death that makes ethereal life would bind: +The death that breeds the spectre do they find. +Darkness is wedded and the waste regrets +Beating as dead leaves on a fitful gust, +By souls no longer dowered to climb +Beneath their pack of dust, +Whom envy of a lustrous prime, +Eclipsed while yet invoked, besets, +And dooms to sink and water sable flowers, +That never gladdened eye or loaded bee. +Strain we the arms for Memory's hours, +We are the seized Persephone. +Responsive never to the soft desire +For one prized tune is this our chord of life. +'Tis clipped to deadness with a wanton knife, +In wishes that for ecstasies aspire. +Yet have we glad companionship of Youth, +Elysian meadows for the mind, +Dare we to face deeds done, and in our tomb +Filled with the parti-coloured bloom +Of loved and hated, grasp all human truth +Sowed by us down the mazy paths behind. +To feel that heaven must we that hell sound through: +Whence comes a line of continuity, +That brings our middle station into view, +Between those poles; a novel Earth we see, +In likeness of us, made of banned and blest; +The sower's bed, but not the reaper's rest: +An Earth alive with meanings, wherein meet +Buried, and breathing, and to be. +Then of the junction of the three, +Even as a heart in brain, full sweet +May sense of soul, the sum of music, beat. + +Only the soul can walk the dusty track +Where hangs our flowering under vapours black, +And bear to see how these pervade, obscure, +Quench recollection of a spacious pure. +They take phantasmal forms, divide, convolve, +Hard at each other point and gape, +Horrible ghosts! in agony dissolve, +To reappear with one they drape +For criminal, and, Father! shrieking name, +Who such distorted issue did beget. +Accept them, them and him, though hiss thy sweat +Off brow on breast, whose furnace flame +Has eaten, and old Self consumes. +Out of the purification will they leap, +Thee renovating while new light illumes +The dusky web of evil, known as pain, +That heavily up healthward mounts the steep; +Our fleshly road to beacon-fire of brain: +Midway the tameless oceanic brute +Below, whose heave is topped with foam for fruit, +And the fair heaven reflecting inner peace +On righteous warfare, that asks not to cease. + +Forth of such passage through black fire we win +Clear hearing of the simple lute, +Whereon, and not on other, Memory plays +For them who can in quietness receive +Her restorative airs: a ditty thin +As note of hedgerow bird in ear of eve, +Or wave at ebb, the shallow catching rays +On a transparent sheet, where curves a glass +To truer heavens than when the breaker neighs +Loud at the plunge for bubbly wreck in roar. +Solidity and bulk and martial brass, +Once tyrants of the senses, faintly score +A mark on pebbled sand or fluid slime, +While present in the spirit, vital there, +Are things that seemed the phantoms of their time; +Eternal as the recurrent cloud, as air +Imperative, refreshful as dawn-dew. +Some evanescent hand on vapour scrawled +Historic of the soul, and heats anew +Its coloured lines where deeds of flesh stand bald. +True of the man, and of mankind 'tis true, +Did we stout battle with the Shade, Despair, +Our cowardice, it blooms; or haply warred +Against the primal beast in us, and flung; +Or cleaving mists of Sorrow, left it starred +Above self-pity slain: or it was Prayer +First taken for Life's cleanser; or the tongue +Spake for the world against this heart; or rings +Old laughter, from the founts of wisdom sprung; +Or clap of wing of joy, that was a throb +From breast of Earth, and did no creature rob: +These quickening live. But deepest at her springs, +Most filial, is an eye to love her young. +And had we it, to see with it, alive +Is our lost garden, flower, bird and hive. +Blood of her blood, aim of her aim, are then +The green-robed and grey-crested sons of men: +She tributary to her aged restores +The living in the dead; she will inspire +Faith homelier than on the Yonder shores, +Abhorring these as mire, +Uncertain steps, in dimness gropes, +With mortal tremours pricking hopes, +And, by the final Bacchic of the lusts +Propelled, the Bacchic of the spirit trusts: +A fervour drunk from mystic hierophants; +Not utterly misled, though blindly led, +Led round fermenting eddies. Faith she plants +In her own firmness as our midway road: +Which rightly Youth has read, though blindly read; +Her essence reading in her toothsome goad; +Spur of bright dreams experience disenchants. +But love we well the young, her road midway +The darknesses runs consecrated clay. +Despite our feeble hold on this green home, +And the vast outer strangeness void of dome, +Shall we be with them, of them, taught to feel, +Up to the moment of our prostrate fall, +The life they deem voluptuously real +Is more than empty echo of a call, +Or shadow of a shade, or swing of tides; +As brooding upon age, when veins congeal, +Grey palsy nods to think. With us for guides, +Another step above the animal, +To views in Alpine thought are they helped on. +Good if so far we live in them when gone! + +And there the arrowy eagle of the height +Becomes the little bird that hops to feed, +Glad of a crumb, for tempered appetite +To make it wholesome blood and fruitful seed. +Then Memory strikes on no slack string, +Nor sectional will varied Life appear: +Perforce of soul discerned in mind, we hear +Earth with her Onward chime, with Winter Spring. +And ours the mellow note, while sharing joys +No more subjecting mortals who have learnt +To build for happiness on equipoise, +The Pleasures read in sparks of substance burnt; +Know in our seasons an integral wheel, +That rolls us to a mark may yet be willed. +This, the truistic rubbish under heel +Of all the world, we peck at and are filled. + + + +PENETRATION AND TRUST + + + +I + +Sleek as a lizard at round of a stone, +The look of her heart slipped out and in. +Sweet on her lord her soft eyes shone, +As innocents clear of a shade of sin. + +II + +He laid a finger under her chin, +His arm for her girdle at waist was thrown: +Now, what will happen and who will win, +With me in the fight and my lady lone? + +III + +He clasped her, clasping a shape of stone; +Was fire on her eyes till they let him in. +Her breast to a God of the daybeams shone, +And never a corner for serpent sin. + +IV + +Tranced she stood, with a chattering chin; +Her shrunken form at his feet was thrown: +At home to the death my lord shall win, +When it is no tyrant who leaves me lone! + + + +NIGHT OF FROST IN MAY + + + +With splendour of a silver day, +A frosted night had opened May: +And on that plumed and armoured night, +As one close temple hove our wood, +Its border leafage virgin white. +Remote down air an owl hallooed. +The black twig dropped without a twirl; +The bud in jewelled grasp was nipped; +The brown leaf cracked a scorching curl; +A crystal off the green leaf slipped. +Across the tracks of rimy tan, +Some busy thread at whiles would shoot; +A limping minnow-rillet ran, +To hang upon an icy foot. + +In this shrill hush of quietude, +The ear conceived a severing cry. +Almost it let the sound elude, +When chuckles three, a warble shy, +From hazels of the garden came, +Near by the crimson-windowed farm. +They laid the trance on breath and frame, +A prelude of the passion-charm. + +Then soon was heard, not sooner heard +Than answered, doubled, trebled, more, +Voice of an Eden in the bird +Renewing with his pipe of four +The sob: a troubled Eden, rich +In throb of heart: unnumbered throats +Flung upward at a fountain's pitch, +The fervour of the four long notes, +That on the fountain's pool subside, +Exult and ruffle and upspring: +Endless the crossing multiplied +Of silver and of golden string. +There chimed a bubbled underbrew +With witch-wild spray of vocal dew. + +It seemed a single harper swept +Our wild wood's inner chords and waked +A spirit that for yearning ached +Ere men desired and joyed or wept. +Or now a legion ravishing +Musician rivals did unite +In love of sweetness high to sing +The subtle song that rivals light; +From breast of earth to breast of sky: +And they were secret, they were nigh: +A hand the magic might disperse; +The magic swung my universe. + +Yet sharpened breath forbade to dream, +Where all was visionary gleam; +Where Seasons, as with cymbals, clashed; +And feelings, passing joy and woe, +Churned, gurgled, spouted, interflashed, +Nor either was the one we know: +Nor pregnant of the heart contained +In us were they, that griefless plained, +That plaining soared; and through the heart +Struck to one note the wide apart:- +A passion surgent from despair; +A paining bliss in fervid cold; +Off the last vital edge of air, +Leap heavenward of the lofty-souled, +For rapture of a wine of tears; +As had a star among the spheres +Caught up our earth to some mid-height +Of double life to ear and sight, +She giving voice to thought that shines +Keen-brilliant of her deepest mines; +While steely drips the rillet clinked, +And hoar with crust the cowslip swelled. + +Then was the lyre of earth beheld, +Then heard by me: it holds me linked; +Across the years to dead-ebb shores +I stand on, my blood-thrill restores. +But would I conjure into me +Those issue notes, I must review +What serious breath the woodland drew; +The low throb of expectancy; +How the white mother-muteness pressed +On leaf and meadow-herb; how shook, +Nigh speech of mouth, the sparkle-crest +Seen spinning on the bracken-crook. + + + +THE TEACHING OF THE NUDE + + + +I + +A satyr spied a Goddess in her bath, +Unseen of her attendant nymphs; none knew. +Forthwith the creature to his fellows drew, +And looking backward on the curtained path, +He strove to tell; he could but heave a breast +Too full, and point to mouth, with failing leers: +Vainly he danced for speech, he giggled tears, +Made as if torn in two, as if tight pressed, +As if cast prone; then fetching whimpered tunes +For words, flung heel and set his hairy flight +Through forest-hollows, over rocky height. +The green leaves buried him three rounds of moons. +A senatorial Satyr named what herb +Had hurried him outrunning reason's curb. + +II + +'Tis told how when that hieaway unchecked +To dell returned, he seemed of tempered mood: +Even as the valley of the torrent rude, +The torrent now a brook, the valley wrecked. +In him, to hale him high or hurl aheap, +Goddess and Goatfoot hourly wrestled sore; +Hourly the immortal prevailing more: +Till one hot noon saw Meliboeus peep +From thicket-sprays to where his full-blown dame, +In circle by the lusty friskers gripped, +Laughed the showered rose-leaves while her limbs were stripped. +She beckoned to our Satyr, and he came. +Then twirled she mounds of ripeness, wreath of arms. +His hoof kicked up the clothing for such charms. + + + +BREATH OF THE BRIAR + + + +I + +O briar-scents, on yon wet wing +Of warm South-west wind brushing by, +You mind me of the sweetest thing +That ever mingled frank and shy: +When she and I, by love enticed, +Beneath the orchard-apples met, +In equal halves a ripe one sliced, +And smelt the juices ere we ate. + +II + +That apple of the briar-scent, +Among our lost in Britain now, +Was green of rind, and redolent +Of sweetness as a milking cow. +The briar gives it back, well nigh +The damsel with her teeth on it; +Her twinkle between frank and shy, +My thirst to bite where she had bit. + + + +EMPEDOCLES + + + +I + +He leaped. With none to hinder, +Of Aetna's fiery scoriae +In the next vomit-shower, made he +A more peculiar cinder. +And this great Doctor, can it be, +He left no saner recipe +For men at issue with despair? +Admiring, even his poet owns, +While noting his fine lyric tones, +The last of him was heels in air! + +II + +Comes Reverence, her features +Amazed to see high Wisdom hear, +With glimmer of a faunish leer, +One mock her pride of creatures. +Shall such sad incident degrade +A stature casting sunniest shade? +O Reverence! let Reason swim; +Each life its critic deed reveals; +And him reads Reason at his heels, +If heels in air the last of him! + + + +ENGLAND BEFORE THE STORM + + + +I + +The day that is the night of days, +With cannon-fire for sun ablaze +We spy from any billow's lift; +And England still this tidal drift! +Would she to sainted forethought vow +A space before the thunders flood, +That martyr of its hour might now +Spare her the tears of blood. + +II + +Asleep upon her ancient deeds, +She hugs the vision plethora breeds, +And counts her manifold increase +Of treasure in the fruits of peace. +What curse on earth's improvident, +When the dread trumpet shatters rest, +Is wreaked, she knows, yet smiles content +As cradle rocked from breast. + +III + +She, impious to the Lord of Hosts, +The valour of her offspring boasts, +Mindless that now on land and main +His heeded prayer is active brain. +No more great heart may guard the home, +Save eyed and armed and skilled to cleave +Yon swallower wave with shroud of foam, +We see not distant heave. + +IV + +They stand to be her sacrifice, +The sons this mother flings like dice, +To face the odds and brave the Fates; +As in those days of starry dates, +When cannon cannon's counterblast +Awakened, muzzle muzzle bowled, +And high in swathe of smoke the mast +Its fighting rag outrolled. + +1891. + + + +TARDY SPRING + + + +Now the North wind ceases, +The warm South-west awakes; +Swift fly the fleeces, +Thick the blossom-flakes. + +Now hill to hill has made the stride, +And distance waves the without end: +Now in the breast a door flings wide; +Our farthest smiles, our next is friend. +And song of England's rush of flowers +Is this full breeze with mellow stops, +That spins the lark for shine, for showers; +He drinks his hurried flight, and drops. +The stir in memory seem these things, +Which out of moistened turf and clay +Astrain for light push patient rings, +Or leap to find the waterway. +'Tis equal to a wonder done, +Whatever simple lives renew +Their tricks beneath the father sun, +As though they caught a broken clue; +So hard was earth an eyewink back: +But now the common life has come, +The blotting cloud a dappled pack, +The grasses one vast underhum. +A City clothed in snow and soot, +With lamps for day in ghostly rows, +Breaks to the scene of hosts afoot, +The river that reflective flows: +And there did fog down crypts of street +Play spectre upon eye and mouth:- +Their faces are a glass to greet +This magic of the whirl for South. +A burly joy each creature swells +With sound of its own hungry quest; +Earth has to fill her empty wells, +And speed the service of the nest; +The phantom of the snow-wreath melt, +That haunts the farmer's look abroad, +Who sees what tomb a white night built, +Where flocks now bleat and sprouts the clod. +For iron Winter held her firm; +Across her sky he laid his hand; +And bird he starved, he stiffened worm; +A sightless heaven, a shaven land. +Her shivering Spring feigned fast asleep, +The bitten buds dared not unfold: +We raced on roads and ice to keep +Thought of the girl we love from cold. + +But now the North wind ceases, +The warm South-west awakes, +The heavens are out in fleeces, +And earth's green banner shakes. + + + +THE LABOURER + + + +For a Heracles in his fighting ire there is never the glory that +follows +When ashen he lies and the poets arise to sing of the work he has +done. +But to vision alive under shallows of sight, lo, the Labourer's +crown is Apollo's, +While stands he yet in his grime and sweat--to wrestle for fruits of +the Sun. + +Can an enemy wither his cheer? Not you, ye fair yellow-flowering +ladies, +Who join with your lords to jar the chords of a bosom heroic, and +clog. +'Tis the faltering friend, an inanimate land, may drag a great soul +to their Hades, +And plunge him far from a beam of star till he hears the deep bay of +the Dog. + +Apparition is then of a monster-task, in a policy carving new +fashions: +The winninger course than the rule of force, and the springs lured +to run in a stream: +He would bend tough oak, he would stiffen the reed, point Reason to +swallow the passions, +Bid Britons awake two steps to take where one is a trouble extreme! + +Not the less is he nerved with the Labourer's resolute hope: that +by him shall be written, +To honour his race, this deed of grace, for the weak from the strong +made just: +That her sons over seas in a rally of praise may behold a thrice +vitalised Britain, +Ashine with the light of the doing of right: at the gates of the +Future in trust. + + + +FORESIGHT AND PATIENCE + + + +Sprung of the father blood, the mother brain, +Are they who point our pathway and sustain. +They rarely meet; one soars, one walks retired. +When they do meet, it is our earth inspired. + +To see Life's formless offspring and subdue +Desire of times unripe, we have these two, +Whose union is right reason: join they hands, +The world shall know itself and where it stands; +What cowering angel and what upright beast +Make man, behold, nor count the low the least, +Nor less the stars have round it than its flowers. +When these two meet, a point of time is ours. + +As in a land of waterfalls, that flow +Smooth for the leap on their great voice below, +Some eddies near the brink borne swift along +Will capture hearing with the liquid song, +So, while the headlong world's imperious force +Resounded under, heard I these discourse. + +First words, where down my woodland walk she led, +To her blind sister Patience, Foresight said: + +- Your faith in me appals, to shake my own, +When still I find you in this mire alone. + +- The few steps taken at a funeral pace +By men had slain me but for those you trace. + +- Look I once back, a broken pinion I: +Black as the rebel angels rained from sky! + +- Needs must you drink of me while here you live, +And make me rich in feeling I can give. + +- A brave To-be is dawn upon my brow: +Yet must I read my sister for the How. +My daisy better knows her God of beams +Than doth an eagle that to mount him seems. +She hath the secret never fieriest reach +Of wing shall master till men hear her teach. + +- Liker the clod flaked by the driving plough, +My semblance when I have you not as now. +The quiet creatures who escape mishap +Bear likeness to pure growths of the green sap: +A picture of the settled peace desired +By cowards shunning strife or strivers tired. +I listen at their breasts: is there no jar +Of wrestlings and of stranglings, dead they are, +And such a picture as the piercing mind +Ranks beneath vegetation. Not resigned +Are my true pupils while the world is brute. +What edict of the stronger keeps me mute, +Stronger impels the motion of my heart. +I am not Resignation's counterpart. +If that I teach, 'tis little the dry word, +Content, but how to savour hope deferred. +We come of earth, and rich of earth may be; +Soon carrion if very earth are we! + +The coursing veins, the constant breath, the use +Of sleep, declare that strife allows short truce; +Unless we clasp decay, accept defeat, +And pass despised; 'a-cold for lack of heat,' +Like other corpses, but without death's plea. + +- My sister calls for battle; is it she? + +- Rather a world of pressing men in arms, +Than stagnant, where the sensual piper charms +Each drowsy malady and coiling vice +With dreams of ease whereof the soul pays price! +No home is here for peace while evil breeds, +While error governs, none; and must the seeds +You sow, you that for long have reaped disdain, +Lie barren at the doorway of the brain, +Let stout contention drive deep furrows, blood +Moisten, and make new channels of its flood! + +- My sober little maid, when we meet first, +Drinks of me ever with an eager thirst. +So can I not of her till circumstance +Drugs cravings. Here we see how men advance +A doubtful foot, but circle if much stirred, +Like dead weeds on whipped waters. Shout the word +Prompting their hungers, and they grandly march, +As to band-music under Victory's arch. +Thus was it, and thus is it; save that then +The beauty of frank animals had men. + +- Observe them, and down rearward for a term, +Gaze to the primal twistings of the worm. +Thence look this way, across the fields that show +Men's early form of speech for Yes and No. + +My sister a bruised infant's utterance had; +And issuing stronger, to mankind 'twas mad. +I knew my home where I had choice to feel +The toad beneath a harrow or a heel. + +- Speak of this Age. + +- When you it shall discern +Bright as you are, to me the Age will turn. + +- For neither of us has it any care; +Its learning is through Science to despair. + +- Despair lies down and grovels, grapples not +With evil, casts the burden of its lot. +This Age climbs earth. + +-To challenge heaven. + +- Not less +The lower deeps. It laughs at Happiness! +That know I, though the echoes of it wail, +For one step upward on the crags you scale. +Brave is the Age wherein the word will rust, +Which means our soul asleep or body's lust, +Until from warmth of many breasts, that beat +A temperate common music, sunlike heat +The happiness not predatory sheds! + +- But your fierce Yes and No of butting heads +Now rages to outdo a horny Past. +Shades of a wild Destroyer on the vast +Are thrown by every novel light upraised. +The world's whole round smokes ominously, amazed +And trembling as its pregnant Aetna swells. +Combustibles on hot combustibles +Run piling, for one spark to roll in fire +The mountain-torrent of infernal ire +And leave the track of devils where men built. +Perceptive of a doom, the sinner's guilt +Confesses in a cry for help shrill loud, +If drops the chillness of a passing cloud, +To conscience, reason, human love; in vain: +None save they but the souls which them contain. +No extramural God, the God within +Alone gives aid to city charged with sin. +A world that for the spur of fool and knave +Sweats in its laboratory what shall save? +But men who ply their wits in such a school +Must pray the mercy of the knave and fool. + +- Much have I studied hard Necessity! +To know her Wisdom's mother, and that we +May deem the harshness of her later cries +In labour a sure goad to prick the wise, +If men among the warnings which convulse +Can gravely dread without the craven's pulse. +Long ere the rising of this age of ours, +The knave and fool were stamped as monstrous Powers. +Of human lusts and lassitudes they spring, +And are as lasting as the parent thing. +Yet numbering locust hosts, bent they to drill, +They might o'ermatch and have mankind at will. +Behold such army gathering; ours the spur, +No scattered foe to face, but Lucifer. +Not fool or knave is now the enemy +O'ershadowing men, 'tis Folly, Knavery! +A sea; nor stays that sea the bastioned beach. +Now must the brother soul alive in each +His traitorous individual devildom +Hold subject lest the grand destruction come. +Dimly men see it menacing apace +To overthrow, perchance uproot, the race. +Within, without, they are a field of tares: +Fruitfuller for them when the contest squares, +And wherefore warrior service they must yield, +Shines visible as life on either field. +That is my comfort, following shock on shock, +Which sets faith quaking on their firmest rock. +Since with his weapons, all the arms of Night, +Frail men have challenged Lucifer to fight, +Have matched in hostile ranks, enrolled, erect, +The human and Satanic intellect, +Determined for their uses to control +What forces on the earth and under roll, +Their granite rock runs igneous; now they stand +Pledged to the heavens for safety of their land. +They cannot learn save grossly, gross that are: +Through fear they learn whose aid is good in war. + +- My sister, as I read them in my glass, +Their field of tares they take for pasture grass. +How waken them that have not any bent +Save browsing--the concrete indifferent! +Friend Lucifer supplies them solid stuff: +They fear not for the race when full the trough. +They have much fear of giving up the ghost; +And these are of mankind the unnumbered host. + +- If I could see with you, and did not faint +In beating wing, the future I would paint. +Those massed indifferents will learn to quake: +Now meanwhile is another mass awake, +Once denser than the grunters of the sty. +If I could see with you! Could I but fly! + +- The length of days that you with them have housed, +An outcast else, approves their cause espoused. + +- O true, they have a cause, and woe for us, +While still they have a cause too piteous! +Yet, happy for us when, their cause defined, +They walk no longer with a stumbler blind, +And quicken in the virtue of their cause, +To think me a poor mouther of old saws! +I wait the issue of a battling Age; +The toilers with your 'troughsters' now engage; +Instructing them, through their acutest sense, +How close the dangers of indifference! +Already have my people shown their worth, +More love they light, which folds the love of Earth. +That love to love of labour leads: thence love +Of humankind--earth's incense flung above. + +- Admit some other features: Faithless, mean; +Encased in matter; vowed to Gods obscene; +Contemptuous of the impalpable, it swells +On Doubt; for pastime swallows miracles; +And if I bid it face what I observe, +Declares me hoodwinked by my optic nerve! + +- Oft has your prophet, for reward of toil, +Seen nests of seeming cockatrices coil: +Disowned them as the unholiest of Time, +Which were his offspring, born of flame on slime. +Nor him, their sire, have known the filial fry: +As little as Time's earliest knew the sky. +Perchance among them shoots a lustrous flame +At intervals, in proof of whom they came. +To strengthen our foundations is the task +Of this tough Age; not in your beams to bask, +Though, lighted by your beams, down mining caves +The rock it blasts, the hoarded foulness braves. +My sister sees no round beyond her mood; +To hawk this Age has dressed her head in hood. +Out of the course of ancient ruts and grooves, +It moves: O much for me to say it moves! +About his AEthiop Highlands Nile is Nile, +Though not the stream of the paternal smile: +And where his tide of nourishment he drives, +An Abyssinian wantonness revives. +Calm as his lotus-leaf to-day he swims; +He is the yellow crops, the rounded limbs, +The Past yet flowing, the fair time that fills; +Breath of all mouths and grist of many mills. +To-morrow, warning none with tempest-showers, +He is the vast Insensate who devours +His golden promise over leagues of seed, +Then sits in a smooth lake upon the deed. +The races which on barbarous force begin +Inherit onward of their origin, +And cancelled blessings will the current length +Reveal till they know need of shaping strength. +'Tis not in men to recognize the need +Before they clash in hosts, in hosts they bleed. +Then may sharp suffering their nature grind; +Of rabble passions grow the chieftain Mind. +Yet mark where still broad Nile boasts thousands fed, +For tens up the safe mountains at his head. +Few would be fed, not far his course prolong, +Save for the troublous blood which makes him strong. +- That rings of truth! More do your people thrive; +Your Many are more merrily alive +Than erewhile when I gloried in the page +Of radiant singer and anointed sage. +Greece was my lamp: burnt out for lack of oil; +Rome, Python Rome, prey of its robber spoil! +All structures built upon a narrow space +Must fall, from having not your hosts for base. +O thrice must one be you, to see them shift +Along their desert flats, here dash, there drift; +With faith, that of privations and spilt blood, +Comes Reason armed to clear or bank the flood! +And thrice must one be you, to wait release +From duress in the swamp of their increase. +At which oppressive scene, beyond arrest, +A darkness not with stars of heaven dressed +Philosophers behold; desponding view +Your Many nourished, starved my brilliant few; +Then flinging heels, as charioteers the reins, +Dive down the fumy AEtna of their brains. +Belated vessels on a rising sea, +They seem: they pass! + +- But not Philosophy! + +- Ay, be we faithful to ourselves: despise +Nought but the coward in us! That way lies +The wisdom making passage through our slough. +Am I not heard, my head to Earth shall bow; +Like her, shall wait to see, and seeing wait. +Philosophy is Life's one match for Fate. +That photosphere of our high fountain One, +Our spirit's Lord and Reason's fostering sun, +Philosophy, shall light us in the shade, +Warm in the frost, make Good our aim and aid. +Companioned by the sweetest, ay renewed, +Unconquerable, whose aim for aid is Good! +Advantage to the Many: that we name +God's voice; have there the surety in our aim. +This thought unto my sister do I owe, +And irony and satire off me throw. +They crack a childish whip, drive puny herds, +Where numbers crave their sustenance in words. +Now let the perils thicken: clearer seen, +Your Chieftain Mind mounts over them serene. +Who never yet of scattered lamps was born +To speed a world, a marching world to warn, +But sunward from the vivid Many springs, +Counts conquest but a step, and through disaster sings. + + + +THE WARNING + + + +We have seen mighty men ballooning high, +And in another moment bump the ground. +He falls; and in his measurement is found +To count some inches o'er the common fry. +'Twas not enough to send him climbing sky, +Yet 'twas enough above his fellows crowned, +Had he less panted. Let his faithful hound +Bark at detractors. He may walk or lie. +Concerns it most ourselves, who with our gas - +This little Isle's insatiable greed +For Continents--filled to inflation burst. +So do ripe nations into squalor pass, +When, driven as herds by their old private thirst, +They scorn the brain's wild search for virtuous light. + + + +OUTSIDE THE CROWD + + + +To sit on History in an easy chair, +Still rivalling the wild hordes by whom 'twas writ! +Sure, this beseems a race of laggard wit, +Unwarned by those plain letters scrawled on air. +If more than hands' and armsful be our share, +Snatch we for substance we see vapours flit. +Have we not heard derision infinite +When old men play the youth to chase the snare? +Let us be belted athletes, matched for foes, +Or stand aloof, the great Benevolent, +The Lord of Lands no Robber-birds annex, +Where Justice holds the scales with pure intent; +Armed to support her sword;--lest we compose +That Chapter for the historic word on Wrecks. + + + +TRAFALGAR DAY + + + +He leads: we hear our Seaman's call +In the roll of battles won; +For he is Britain's Admiral +Till setting of her sun. + +When Britain's life was in her ships, +He kept the sea as his own right; +And saved us from more fell eclipse +Than drops on day from blackest night. +Again his battle spat the flame! +Again his victory flag men saw! +At sound of Nelson's chieftain name, +A deeper breath did Freedom draw. + +Each trusty captain knew his part: +They served as men, not marshalled kine: +The pulses they of his great heart, +With heads to work his main design. +Their Nelson's word, to beat the foe, +And spare the fall'n, before them shone. +Good was the hour of blow for blow, +And clear their course while they fought on. + +Behold the Envied vanward sweep! - +A day in mourning weeds adored! +Then Victory was wrought to weep; +Then sorrow crowned with laurel soared. + +A breezeless flag above a shroud +All Britain was when wind and wave, +To make her, passing human, proud, +Brought his last gift from o'er the grave! + +Uprose the soul of him a star +On that brave day of Ocean days: +It rolled the smoke from Trafalger +To darken Austerlitz ablaze. +Are we the men of old, its light +Will point us under every sky +The path he took; and must we fight, +Our Nelson be our battle-cry! + +He leads: we hear our Seaman's call +In the roll of battles won; +For he is Britain's Admiral +Till setting of her sun. + + + +THE REVOLUTION + + + +I + +Not yet had History's Aetna smoked the skies, +And low the Gallic Giantess lay enchained, +While overhead in ordered set and rise +Her kingly crowns immutably defiled; +Effulgent on funereal piled +Across the vacant heavens, and distrained +Her body, mutely, even as earth, to bear; +Despoiled the tomb of hope, her mouth of air. + +II + +Through marching scores of winters racked she lay, +Beneath a hoar-frost's brilliant crust, +Whereon the jewelled flies that drained +Her breasts disported in a glistering spray; +She, the land's fount of fruits, enclosed with dust; +By good and evil angels fed, sustained +In part to curse, in part to pray, +Sucking the dubious rumours, till men saw +The throbs of her charged heart before the Just, +So worn the harrowed surface had become: +And still they deemed the dance above was Law, +Amort all passion in a rebel dumb. + +III + +Then, on the unanticipated day, +Earth heaved, and rose a veinous mound +To roar of the underfloods; and off it sprang, +Ravishing as red wine in woman's form, +A splendid Maenad, she of the delirious laugh, +Her body twisted flames with the smoke-cap crowned; +She of the Bacchic foot; the challenger to the fray, +Bewitchment for the embrace; who sang, who sang +Intoxication to her swarm, +Revolved them, hair, voice, feet, in her carmagnole, +As with a stroke she snapped the Royal staff, +Dealt the awaited blow on gilt decay +(O ripeness of the time! O Retribution sure, +If but our vital lamp illume us to endure!) +And, like a glad releasing of her soul, +Sent the word Liberty up to meet the midway blue, +Her bridegroom in descent to her; and they joined, +In the face of men they joined: attest it true, +The million witnesses, that she, +For ages lying beside the mole, +Was on the unanticipated miracle day +Upraised to midway heaven and, as to her goal, +Enfolded, ere the Immaculate knew +What Lucifer of the Mint had coined +His bride's adulterate currency +Of burning love corrupt of an infuriate hate; +She worthy, she unworthy; that one day his mate: +His mate for that one day of the unwritten deed. +Read backward on the hoar-frost's brilliant crust; +Beneath it read. +Athirst to kiss, athirst to slay, she stood, +A radiance fringed with grim affright; +For them that hungered, she was nourishing food, +For those who sparkled, Night. +Read in her heart, and how before the Just +Her doings, her misdoings, plead. + +IV + +Down on her leap for him the young Angelical broke +To husband a resurgent France: +From whom, with her dethroning stroke, +Dishonour passed; the dalliance, +That is occasion's yea or nay, +In issues for the soul to pay, +Discarded; and the cleft 'twixt deed and word, +The sinuous lie which warbles the sweet bird, +Wherein we see old Darkness peer, +Cold Dissolution beck, she had flung hence; +And hence the talons and the beak of prey; +Hence all the lures to silken swine +Thronging the troughs of indolence; +With every sleek convolvement serpentine; +The pride in elfin arts to veil an evil leer, +And bid a goatfoot trip it like a fay. +He clasped in this revived, uprisen France, +A valorous dame, of countenance +The lightning's upon cloud: unlit as yet +On brows and lips the lurid shine +Of seas in the night-wind's whirl; unstirred +Her pouch of the centuries' injuries compressed; +The shriek that tore the world as yet unheard: +Earth's animate full flower she looked, intense +For worship, wholly given him, fair +Adoring or desiring; in her bright jet, +Earth's crystal spring to sky: Earth's warrior Best +To win Heaven's Pure up that midway +We vision for new ground, where sense +And spirit are one for the further flight; breast-bare, +Bare-limbed; nor graceless gleamed her disarray +In scorn of the seductive insincere, +But martially nude for hot Bellona's play, +And amorous of the loftiest in her view. + +V + +She sprang from dust to drink of earth's cool dew, +The breath of swaying grasses share, +Mankind embrace, their weaklings rear, +At wrestle with the tyrannic strong; +Her forehead clear to her mate, virgin anew, +As immortals may be in the mortal sphere. +Read through her launching heart, who had lain long +With Earth and heard till it became her own +Our good Great Mother's eve and matin song: +The humming burden of Earth's toil to feed +Her creatures all, her task to speed their growth, +Her aim to lead them up her pathways, shown +Between the Pains and Pleasures; warned of both, +Of either aided on their hard ascent. +Now when she looked, with love's benign delight +After great ecstasy, along the plains, +What foulest impregnation of her sight +Transformed the scene to multitudinous troops +Of human sketches, quaver-figures, bent, +As were they winter sedges, broken hoops, +Dry udder, vineless poles, worm-eaten posts, +With features like the flowers defaced by deluge rains? +Recked she that some perverting devil had limned +Earth's proudest to spout scorn of the Maker's hand, +Who could a day behold these deathly hosts, +And see, decked, graced, and delicately trimmed, +A ribanded and gemmed elected few, +Sanctioned, of milk and honey starve the land:- +Like melody in flesh, its pleasant game +Olympianwise perform, cloak but the shame: +Beautiful statures; hideous, +By Christian contrast; pranked with golden chains, +And flexile where is manhood straight; +Mortuaries where warm should beat +The brotherhood that keeps blood sweet: +Who dared in cantique impious +Proclaim the Just, to whom was due +Cathedral gratitude in the pomp of state, +For that on those lean outcasts hung the sucker Pains, +On these elect the swelling Pleasures grew. +Surely a devil's land when that meant death for each! +Fresh from the breast of Earth, not thus, +With all the body's life to plump the leech, +Is Nature's way, she knew. The abominable scene +Spat at the skies; and through her veins, +To cloud celestially sown, +Ran venom of what nourishment +Her dark sustainer subterrene +Supplied her, stretched supine on the rack, +Alive in the shrewd nerves, the seething brains, +Under derisive revels, prone +As one clamped fast, with the interminable senseless blent. + +VI + +Now was her face white waves in the tempest's sharp flame-blink; +Her skies shot black. +Now was it visioned infamy to drink +Of earth's cool dew, and through the vines +Frolic in pearly laughter with her young, +Watching the healthful, natural, happy signs +Where hands of lads and maids like tendrils clung, +After their sly shy ventures from the leaf, +And promised bunches. Now it seemed +The world was one malarious mire, +Crying for purification: chief +This land of France. It seemed +A duteous desire +To drink of life's hot flood, and the crimson streamed. + +VII + +She drank what makes man demon at the draught. +Her skies lowered black, +Her lover flew, +There swept a shudder over men. +Her heavenly lover fled her, and she laughed, +For laughter was her spirit's weapon then. +The Infernal rose uncalled, he with his crew. + +VIII + +As mighty thews burst manacles, she went mad: +Her heart a flaring torch usurped her wits. +Such enemies of her next-drawn breath she had! +To tread her down in her live grave beneath +Their dancing floor sunned blind by the Royal wreath, +They ringed her steps with crafty prison pits. +Without they girdled her, made nest within. +There ramped the lion, here entrailed the snake. +They forced the cup to her lips when she drank blood; +Believing it, in the mother's mind at strain, +In the mother's fears, and in young Liberty's wail +Alarmed, for her encompassed children's sake, +The sole sure way to save her priceless bud. +Wherewith, when power had gifted her to prevail, +Vengeance appeared as logically akin. +Insanely rational they; she rationally insane; +And in compute of sin, was hers the appealing sin. + +IX + +Amid the plash of scarlet mud +Stained at the mouth, drunk with our common air, +Not lack of love was her defect; +The Fury mourned and raged and bled for France +Breathing from exultation to despair +At every wild-winged hope struck by mischance +Soaring at each faint gleam o'er her abyss. +Heard still, to be heard while France shall stand erect, +The frontier march she piped her sons, for where +Her crouching outer enemy camped, +Attendant on the deadlier inner's hiss. +She piped her sons the frontier march, the wine +Of martial music, History's cherished tune; +And they, the saintliest labourers that aye +Dropped sweat on soil for bread, took arms and tramped; +High-breasted to match men or elements, +Or Fortune, harsh schoolmistress with the undrilled: +War's ragged pupils; many a wavering line, +Torn from the dear fat soil of champaigns hopefully tilled, +Torn from the motherly bowl, the homely spoon, +To jest at famine, ply +The novel scythe, and stand to it on the field; +Lie in the furrows, rain-clouds for their tents; +Fronting the red artillery straighten spine; +Buckle the shiver at sight of comrades strewn; +Over an empty platter affect the merrily filled; +Die, if the multiple hazards around said die; +Downward measure a foeman mightily sized; +Laugh at the legs that would run for a life despised; +Lyrical on into death's red roaring jaw-gape, steeled +Gaily to take of the foe his lesson, and give reply. +Cheerful apprentices, they shall be masters soon! + +X + +Lo, where hurricane flocks of the North-wind rattle their thunder +Loud through a night, and at dawn comes change to the great South- +west, +Hounds are the hounded in clouds, waves, forests, inverted the race: +Lo, in the day's young beams the colossal invading pursuers +Burst upon rocks and were foam; +Ridged up a torrent crest; +Crumbled to ruin, still gazing a glacial wonder; +Turned shamed feet toe to heel on their track at a panic pace. +Yesterday's clarion cock scudded hen of the invalid comb; +They, the triumphant tonant towering upper, were under; +They, violators of home, dared hope an inviolate home; +They that had stood for the stroke were the vigorous hewers; +Quick as the trick of the wrist with the rapier, they the pursuers. +Heavens and men amazed heard the arrogant crying for grace; +Saw the once hearth-reek rabble the scourge of an army dispieced; +Saw such a shift of the hunt as when Titan Olympus clomb. +Fly! was the sportsman's word; and the note of the quarry rang, +Chase! + +XI + +Banners from South, from East, +Sheaves of pale banners drooping hole and shred; +The captive brides of valour, Sabine Wives +Plucked from the foeman's blushful bed, +For glorious muted battle-tongues +Of deeds along the horizon's red, +At cost of unreluctant lives; +Her toilful heroes homeward poured, +To give their fevered mother air of the lungs. +She breathed, and in the breathing craved. +Environed as she was, at bay, +Safety she kissed on her drawn sword, +And waved for victory, for fresh victory waved: +She craved for victory as her daily bread; +For victory as her daily banquet raved. + +XII + +Now had her glut of vengeance left her grey +Of blood, who in her entrails fiercely tore +To clutch and squeeze her snakes; herself the more +Devitalizing: red washer Auroral ray; +Desired if but to paint her pallid hue. +The passion for that young horizon red, +Which dowered her with the flags, the blazing fame, +Like dotage of the past-meridian dame +For some bright Sungod adolescent, swelled +Insatiate, to the voracious grew, +The glutton's inward raveners bred; +Till she, mankind's most dreaded, most abhorred, +Witless in her demands on Fortune, asked, +As by the weaving Fates impelled, +To have the thing most loathed, the iron lord, +Controller and chastiser, under Victory masked. + +XIII + +Banners from East, from South, +She hugged him in them, feared the scourge they meant, +Yet blindly hugged, and hungering built his throne. +So may you see the village innocent, +With curtsey of shut lids and open mouth, +In act to beg for sweets expect a loathly stone: +See furthermore the Just in his measures weigh +Her sufferings and her sins, dispense her meed. +False to her bridegroom lord of the miracle day, +She fell: from his ethereal home observed +Through love, grown alien love, not moved to plead +Against the season's fruit for deadly Seed, +But marking how she had aimed, and where she swerved, +Why suffered, with a sad consenting thought. +Nor would he shun her sullen look, nor monstrous hold +The doer of the monstrous; she aroused, +She, the long tortured, suddenly freed, distraught, +More strongly the divine in him than when +Joy of her as she sprang from mould +Drew him the midway heavens adown +To clasp her in his arms espoused +Before the sight of wondering men, +And put upon the day a deathless crown. +The veins and arteries of her, fold in fold, +His alien love laid open, to divide +The martyred creature from her crimes; he knew +What cowardice in her valour could reside; +What strength her weakness covered; what abased +Sublimity so illumining, and what raised +This wallower in old slime to noblest heights, +Up to the union on the midway blue:- +Day that the celestial grave Recorder hangs +Among dark History's nocturnal lights, +With vivid beams indicative to the quick +Of all who have felt the vaulted body's pangs +Beneath a mind in hopeless soaring sick. +She had forgot how, long enslaved, she yearned +To the one helping hand above; +Forgot her faith in the Great Undiscerned, +Whereof she sprang aloft to her Angelical love +That day: and he, the bright day's husband, still with love, +Though alien, though to an upper seat retired, +Behold a wrangling heart, as 'twere her soul +On eddies of wild waters cast; +In wilderness division; fired +For domination, freedom, lust, +The Pleasures; lo, a witch's snaky bowl +Set at her lips; the blood-drinker's madness fast +Upon her; and therewith mistrust, +Most of herself: a mouth of guile. +Compassionately could he smile, +To hear the mouth disclaiming God, +And clamouring for the Just! +Her thousand impulses, like torches, coursed +City and field; and pushed abroad +O'er hungry waves to thirsty sands, +Flaring at further; she had grown to be +The headless with the fearful hands; +To slaughter, else to suicide, enforced. +But he, remembering how his love began, +And of what creature, pitied when was plain +Another measure of captivity: +The need for strap and rod; +The penitential prayers again; +Again the bitter bowing down to dust; +The burden on the flesh for who disclaims the God, +The answer when is call upon the Just. +Whence her lost virtue had found refuge strode +Her master, saying, 'I only; I who can!' +And echoed round her army, now her chain. +So learns the nation, closing Anarch's reign, +That she had been in travail of a Man. + + + +NAPOLEON + + + +I + +Cannon his name, +Cannon his voice, he came. +Who heard of him heard shaken hills, +An earth at quake, to quiet stamped; +Who looked on him beheld the will of wills, +The driver of wild flocks where lions ramped: +Beheld War's liveries flee him, like lumped grass +Nid-nod to ground beneath the cuffing storm; +While laurelled over his Imperial form, +Forth from her bearded tube of lacquey brass, +Reverberant notes and long blew volant Fame. +Incarnate Victory, Power manifest, +Infernal or God-given to mankind, +On the quenched volcano's cusp did he take stand, +A conquering army's height above the land, +Which calls that army offspring of its breast, +And sees it mid the starry camps enshrined; +His eye the cannon's flame, +The cannon's cave his mind. + +II + +To weld the nation in a name of dread, +And scatter carrion flies off wounds unhealed, +The Necessitated came, as comes from out +Electric ebon lightning's javelin-head, +Threatening agitation in the revealed +Founts of our being; terrible with doubt, +With radiance restorative. At one stride +Athwart the Law he stood for sovereign sway. +That Soliform made featureless beside +His brilliancy who neighboured: vapour they; +Vapour what postured statues barred his tread. +On high in amphitheatre field on field, +Italian, Egyptian, Austrian, +Far heard and of the carnage discord clear, +Bells of his escalading triumphs pealed +In crashes on a choral chant severe, +Heraldic of the authentic Charlemagne, +Globe, sceptre, sword, to enfold, to rule, to smite, +Make unity of the mass, +Coherent or refractory, by his might. + +Forth from her bearded tube of lacquey brass, +Fame blew, and tuned the jangles, bent the knees +Rebellious or submissive; his decrees +Were thunder in those heavens and compelled: +Such as disordered earth, eclipsed of stars, +Endures for sign of Order's calm return, +Whereunto she is vowed; and his wreckage-spars, +His harried ships, old riotous Ocean lifts alight, +Subdued to splendour in his delirant churn. +Glory suffused the accordant, quelled, +By magic of high sovereignty, revolt: +And he, the reader of men, himself unread; +The name of hope, the name of dread; +Bloom of the coming years or blight; +An arm to hurl the bolt +With aim Olympian; bore +Likeness to Godhead. Whither his flashes hied +Hosts fell; what he constructed held rock-fast. +So did earth's abjects deem of him that built and clove. +Torch on imagination, beams he cast, +Whereat they hailed him deified: +If less than an eagle-speeding Jove, than Vulcan more. +Or it might be a Vulcan-Jove, +Europe for smithy, Europe's floor +Lurid with sparks in evanescent showers, +Loud echo-clap of hammers at all hours, +Our skies the reflex of its furnace blast. + +III + +On him the long enchained, released +For bride of the miracle day up the midway blue; +She from her heavenly lover fallen to serve for feast +Of rancours and raw hungers; she, the untrue, +Yet pitiable, not despicable, gazed. +Fawning, her body bent, she gazed +With eyes the moonstone portals to her heart: +Eyes magnifying through hysteric tears +This apparition, ghostly for belief; +Demoniac or divine, but sole +Over earth's mightiest written Chief; +Earth's chosen, crowned, unchallengeable upstart: +The trumpet word to awake, transform, renew; +The arbiter of circumstance; +High above limitations, as the spheres. +Nor ever had heroical Romance, +Never ensanguined History's lengthened scroll, +Shown fulminant to shoot the levin dart +Terrific as this man, by whom upraised, +Aggrandized and begemmed, she outstripped her peers; +Like midnight's levying brazier-beacon blazed +Defiant to the world, a rally for her sons, +Day of the darkness; this man's mate; by him, +Cannon his name, +Rescued from vivisectionist and knave, +Her body's dominators and her shame; +By him with the rivers of ranked battalions, brave +Past mortal, girt: a march of swords and guns +Incessant; his proved warriors; loaded dice +He flung on the crested board, where chilly Fears +Behold the Reaper's ground, Death sitting grim, +Awatch for his predestined ones, +Mid shrieks and torrent-hooves; but these, +Inebriate of his inevitable device, +Hail it their hero's wood of lustrous laurel-trees, +Blossom and fruit of fresh Hesperides, +The boiling life-blood in their cheers. +Unequalled since the world was man they pour +A spiky girdle round her; these, her sons, +His cataracts at smooth holiday, soon to roar +Obstruction shattered at his will or whim: +Kind to her ear as quiring Cherubim, +And trampling earth like scornful mastodons. + +IV + +The flood that swept her to be slave +Adoring, under thought of being his mate, +These were, and unto the visibly unexcelled, +As much of heart as abjects can she gave, +Or what of heart the body bears for freight +When Majesty apparent overawes; +By the flash of his ascending deeds upheld, +Which let not feminine pride in him have pause +To question where the nobler pride rebelled. +She read the hieroglyphic on his brow, +Felt his firm hand to wield the giant's mace; +Herself whirled upward in an eagle's claws, +Past recollection of her earthly place; +And if cold Reason pressed her, called him Fate; +Offering abashed the servile woman's vow. +Delirium was her virtue when the look +At fettered wrists and violated laws +Faith in a rectitude Supernal shook, +Till worship of him shone as her last rational state, +The slave's apology for gemmed disgrace. +Far in her mind that leap from earth to the ghost +Midway on high; or felt as a troubled pool; +Or as a broken sleep that hunts a dream half lost, +Arrested and rebuked by the common school +Of daily things for truancy. She could rejoice +To know with wakeful eyeballs Violence +Her crowned possessor, and, on every sense +Incumbent, Fact, Imperial Fact, her choice, +In scorn of barren visions, aims at a glassy void. +Who sprang for Liberty once, found slavery sweet; +And Tyranny, on alert subservience buoyed, +Spurred a blood-mare immeasureably fleet +To shoot the transient leagues in a passing wink, +Prompt for the glorious bound at the fanged abyss's brink. +Scarce felt she that she bled when battle scored +On riddled flags the further conjured line; +From off the meteor gleam of his waved sword +Reflected bright in permanence: she bled +As the Bacchante spills her challengeing wine +With whirl o' the cup before the kiss to lip; +And bade drudge History in his footprints tread, +For pride of sword-strokes o'er slow penmanship: +Each step of his a volume: his sharp word +The shower of steel and lead +Or pastoral sunshine. + +V + +Persistent through the brazen chorus round +His thunderous footsteps on the foeman's ground, +A broken carol of wild notes was heard, +As when an ailing infant wails a dream. +Strange in familiarity it rang: +And now along the dark blue vault might seem +Winged migratories having but heaven for home, +Now the lone sea-bird's cry down shocks of foam, +Beneath a ruthless paw the captive's pang. + +It sang the gift that comes from God +To mind of man as air to lung. +So through her days of under sod +Her faith unto her heart had sung, +Like bedded seed by frozen clod, +With view of wide-armed heaven and buds at burst, +And midway up, Earth's fluttering little lyre. +Even for a glimpse, for even a hope in chained desire +The vision of it watered thirst. + +VI + +But whom those errant moans accused +As Liberty's murderous mother, cried accursed, +France blew to deafness: for a space she mused; +She smoothed a startled look, and sought, +From treasuries of the adoring slave, +Her surest way to strangle thought; +Picturing her dread lord decree advance +Into the enemy's land; artillery, bayonet, lance; +His ordering fingers point the dial's to time their ranks: +Himself the black storm-cloud, the tempest's bayonet-glaive. +Like foam-heads of a loosened freshet bursting banks, +By mount and fort they thread to swamp the sluggard plains. +Shines his gold-laurel sun, or cloak connivent rains. +They press to where the hosts in line and square throng mute; +He watchful of their form, the Audacious, the Astute; +Eagle to grip the field; to work his craftiest, fox. +From his brief signal, straight the stroke of the leveller falls; +From him those opal puffs, those arcs with the clouded balls: +He waves and the voluble scene is a quagmire shifting blocks; +They clash, they are knotted, and now 'tis the deed of the axe on +the log; +Here away moves a spiky woodland, and yon away sweep +Rivers of horse torrent-mad to the shock, and the heap over heap +Right through the troughed black lines turned to bunches or shreds, +or a fog +Rolling off sunlight's arrows. Not mightier Phoebus in ire, +Nor deadlier Jove's avengeing right hand, than he of the brain +Keen at an enemy's mind to encircle and pierce and constrain, +Muffling his own for a fate-charged blow very Gods may admire. +Sure to behold are his eagles on high where the conflict raged. +Rightly, then, should France worship, and deafen the disaccord +Of those who dare withstand an irresistible sword +To thwart his predestined subjection of Europe. Let them submit! +She said it aloud, and heard in her breast, as a singer caged, +With the beat of wings at bars, Earth's fluttering little lyre. +No more at midway heaven, but liker midway to the pit: +Not singing the spirally upward of rapture, the downward of pain +Rather, the drop sheer downward from pressure of merciless weight. + +Her strangled thought got breath, with her worship held debate; +To yield and sink, yet eye askant the mark she had missed. +Over the black-blue rollers of that broad Westerly main, +Steady to sky, the light of Liberty glowed +In a flaming pillar, that cast on the troubled waters a road +For Europe to cross, and see the thing lost subsist. +For there 'twas a shepherd led his people, no butcher of sheep; +Firmly there the banner he first upreared +Stands to rally; and nourishing grain do his children reap +From a father beloved in life, in his death revered. +Contemplating him and his work, shall a skyward glance +Clearer sight of our dreamed and abandoned obtain; +Nay, but as if seen in station above the Republic, France +Had view of her one-day's heavenly lover again; +Saw him amid the bright host looking down on her; knew she had +erred, +Knew him her judge, knew yonder the spirit preferred; +Yonder the base of the summit she strove that day to ascend, +Ere cannon mastered her soul, and all dreams had end. + +VII + +Soon felt she in her shivered frame +A bodeful drain of blood illume +Her wits with frosty fire to read +The dazzling wizard who would have her bleed +On fruitless marsh and snows of spectral gloom +For victory that was victory scarce in name. +Husky his clarions laboured, and her sighs +O'er slaughtered sons were heavier than the prize; +Recalling how he stood by Frederic's tomb, +With Frederic's country underfoot and spurned: +There meditated; till her hope might guess, +Albeit his constant star prescribe success, +The savage strife would sink, the civil aim +To head a mannered world breathe zephyrous +Of morning after storm; whereunto she yearned; +And Labour's lovely peace, and Beauty's courtly bloom, +The mind in strenuous tasks hilarious. +At such great height, where hero hero topped, +Right sanely should the Grand Ascendant think +No further leaps at the fanged abyss's brink +True Genius takes: be battle's dice-box dropped! + +She watched his desert features, hung to hear +The honey words desired, and veiled her face; +Hearing the Seaman's name recur +Wrathfully, thick with a meaning worse +Than call to the march: for that inveterate Purse +Could kindle the extinct, inform a vacant place, +Conjure a heart into the trebly felled. +It squeezed the globe, insufferably swelled +To feed insurgent Europe: rear and van +Were haunted by the amphibious curse; +Here flesh, there phantom, livelier after rout: +The Seaman piping aye to the rightabout, +Distracted Europe's Master, puffed remote +Those Indies of the swift Macedonian, +Whereon would Europe's Master somewhiles doat, +In dreamings on a docile universe +Beneath an immarcessible Charlemagne. + +Nor marvel France should veil a seer's face, +And call on darkness as a blest retreat. +Magnanimously could her iron Emperor +Confront submission: hostile stirred to heat +All his vast enginery, allowed no halt +Up withered avenues of waste-blood war, +To the pitiless red mounts of fire afume, +As 'twere the world's arteries opened! Woe the race! +Ask wherefore Fortune's vile caprice should balk +His panther spring across the foaming salt, +From martial sands to the cliffs of pallid chalk! +There is no answer: seed of black defeat +She then did sow, and France nigh unto death foredoom. +See since that Seaman's epicycle sprite +Engirdle, lure and goad him to the chase +Along drear leagues of crimson spotting white +With mother's tears of France, that he may meet +Behind suborned battalions, ranked as wheat +Where peeps the weedy poppy, him of the sea; +Earth's power to baffle Ocean's power resume; +Victorious army crown o'er Victory's fleet; +And bearing low that Seaman upon knee, +Stay the vexed question of supremacy, +Obnoxious in the vault by Frederic's tomb. + +VIII + +Poured streams of Europe's veins the flood +Full Rhine or Danube rolls off morning-tide +Through shadowed reaches into crimson-dyed: +And Rhine and Danube knew her gush of blood +Down the plucked roots the deepest in her breast. +He tossed her cordials, from his laurels pressed. +She drank for dryness thirstily, praised his gifts. +The blooded frame a powerful draught uplifts +Writhed the devotedness her voice rang wide +In cries ecstatic, as of the martyr-Blest, +Their spirits issuing forth of bodies racked, +And crazy chuckles, with life's tears at feud; +While near her heart the sunken sentinel +Called Critic marked, and dumb in awe reviewed +This torture, this anointed, this untracked +To mortal source, this alien of his kind; +Creator, slayer, conjuror, Solon-Mars, +The cataract of the abyss, the star of stars; +Whose arts to lay the senses under spell +Aroused an insurrectionary mind. + +IX + +He, did he love her? France was his weapon, shrewd +At edge, a wind in onset: he loved well +His tempered weapon, with the which he hewed +Clean to the ground impediments, or hacked, +Sure of the blade that served the great man-miracle. +He raised her, robed her, gemmed her for his bride, +Did but her blood in blindness given exact. +Her blood she gave, was blind to him as guide: +She quivered at his word, and at his touch +Was hound or steed for any mark he espied. +He loved her more than little, less than much. +The fair subservient of Imperial Fact +Next to his consanguineous was placed +In ranked esteem; above the diurnal meal, +Vexatious carnal appetites above, +Above his hoards, while she Imperial Fact embraced, +And rose but at command from under heel. +The love devolvent, the ascension love, +Receptive or profuse, were fires he lacked, +Whose marrow had expelled their wasteful sparks; +Whose mind, the vast machine of endless haste, +Took up but solids for its glowing seal. +The hungry love, that fish-like creatures feel, +Impelled for prize of hooks, for prey of sharks, +His night's first quarter sicklied to distaste, +In warm enjoyment barely might distract. +A head that held an Europe half devoured +Taste in the blood's conceit of pleasure soured. +Nought save his rounding aim, the means he plied, +Death for his cause, to him could point appeal. +His mistress was the thing of uses tried. +Frigid the netting smile on whom he wooed, +But on his Policy his eye was lewd. +That sharp long zig-zag into distance brooked +No foot across; a shade his ire provoked. +The blunder or the cruelty of a deed +His Policy imperative could plead. +He deemed nought other precious, nor knew he +Legitimate outside his Policy. +Men's lives and works were due, from their birth's date, +To the State's shield and sword, himself the State. +He thought for them in mass, as Titan may; +For their pronounced well-being bade obey; +O'er each obstructive thicket thunderclapped, +And straight their easy road to market mapped. +Watched Argus to survey the huge preserves +He held or coveted; Mars was armed alert +At sign of motion; yet his brows were murk, +His gorge would surge, to see the butcher's work, +The Reaper's field; a sensitive in nerves. +He rode not over men to do them hurt. +As one who claimed to have for paramour +Earth's fairest form, he dealt the cancelling blow; +Impassioned, still impersonal; to ensure +Possession; free of rivals, not their foe. + +The common Tyrant's frenzies, rancour, spites, +He knew as little as men's claim on rights. +A kindness for old servants, early friends, +Was constant in him while they served his ends; +And if irascible, 'twas the moment's reek +From fires diverted by some gusty freak. +His Policy the act which breeds the act +Prevised, in issues accurately summed +From reckonings of men's tempers, terrors, needs:- +That universal army, which he leads +Who builds Imperial on Imperious Fact. +Within his hot brain's hammering workshop hummed +A thousand furious wheels at whirr, untired +As Nature in her reproductive throes; +And did they grate, he spake, and cannon fired: +The cause being aye the incendiary foes +Proved by prostration culpable. His dispense +Of Justice made his active conscience; +His passive was of ceaseless labour formed. +So found this Tyrant sanction and repose; +Humanly just, inhumanly unwarmed. +Preventive fencings with the foul intent +Occult, by him observed and foiled betimes, +Let fool historians chronicle as crimes. +His blows were dealt to clear the way he went: +Too busy sword and mind for needless blows. +The mighty bird of sky minutest grains +On ground perceived; in heaven but rays or rains; +In humankind diversities of masks, +For rule of men the choice of bait or goads. +The statesman steered the despot to large tasks; +The despot drove the statesman on short roads. +For Order's cause he laboured, as inclined +A soldier's training and his Euclid mind. +His army unto men he could present +As model of the perfect instrument. +That creature, woman, was the sofa soft, +When warriors their dusty armour doffed, +And read their manuals for the making truce +With rosy frailties framed to reproduce. +He farmed his land, distillingly alive +For the utmost extract he might have and hive, +Wherewith to marshal force; and in like scheme, +Benign shone Hymen's torch on young love's dream. +Thus to be strong was he beneficent; +A fount of earth, likewise a firmament. + +The disputant in words his eye dismayed: +Opinions blocked his passage. Rent +Were Councils with a gesture; brayed +By hoarse camp-phrase what argument +Dared interpose to waken spleen +In him whose vision grasped the unseen, +Whose counsellor was the ready blade, +Whose argument the cannonade. +He loathed his land's divergent parties, loth +To grant them speech, they were such idle troops; +The friable and the grumous, dizzards both. +Men were good sticks his mastery wrought from hoops; +Some serviceable, none credible on oath. +The silly preference they nursed to die +In beds he scorned, and led where they should lie. +If magic made them pliable for his use, +Magician he could be by planned surprise. +For do they see the deuce in human guise, +As men's acknowledged head appears the deuce, +And they will toil with devilish craft and zeal. +Among them certain vagrant wits that had +Ideas buzzed; they were the feebly mad; +Pursuers of a film they hailed ideal; +But could be dangerous fire-flies for a brain +Subdued by fact, still amorous of the inane. +With a breath he blew them out, to beat their wings +The way of such transfeminated things, +And France had sense of vacancy in Light. + +That is the soul's dead darkness, making clutch +Wild hands for aid at muscles within touch; +Adding to slavery's chain the stringent twist; +Even when it brings close surety that aright +She reads her Tyrant through his golden mist; +Perceives him fast to a harsher Tyrant bound; +Self-ridden, self-hunted, captive of his aim; +Material grandeur's ape, the Infernal's hound; +Enormous, with no infinite around; +No starred deep sky, no Muse, or lame +The dusty pattering pinions, +The voice as through the brazen tube of Fame. + +X + +Hugest of engines, a much limited man, +She saw the Lustrous, her great lord, appear +Through that smoked glass her last privation brought +To point her critic eye and spur her thought: +A heart but to propel Leviathan; +A spirit that breathed but in earth's atmosphere. +Amid the plumed and sceptred ones +Irradiatingly Jovian, +The mountain tower capped by the floating cloud; +A nursery screamer where dialectics ruled: +Mannerless, graceless, laughterless, unlike +Herself in all, yet with such power to strike, +That she the various features she could scan +Dared not to sum, though seeing: and befooled +By power which beamed omnipotent, she bowed, +Subservient as roused echo round his guns. +Invulnerable Prince of Myrmidons, +He sparkled, by no sage Athene schooled. +Partly she read her riddle, stricken and pained; +But irony, her spirit's tongue, restrained. +The Critic, last of vital in the proud +Enslaved, when most detectively endowed, +Admired how irony's venom off him ran, +Like rain-drops down a statue cast in bronze: +Whereby of her keen rapier disarmed, +Again her chant of eulogy began, +Protesting, but with slavish senses charmed. + +Her warrior, chief among the valorous great +In arms he was, dispelling shades of blame, +With radiance palpable in fruit and weight. +Heard she reproach, his victories blared response; +His victories bent the Critic to acclaim, +As with fresh blows upon a ringing sconce. +Or heard she from scarred ranks of jolly growls +His veterans dwarf their reverence and, like owls, +Laugh in the pitch of discord, to exalt +Their idol for some genial trick or fault, +She, too, became his marching veteran. +Again she took her breath from them who bore +His eagles through the tawny roar, +And murmured at a peaceful state, +That bred the title charlatan, +As missile from the mouth of hate, +For one the daemon fierily filled and hurled, +Cannon his name, +Shattering against a barrier world; +Her supreme player of man's primaeval game. + +The daemon filled him, and he filled her sons; +Strung them to stature over human height, +As march the standards down the smoky fight; +Her cherubim, her towering mastodons! +Directed vault or breach, break through +Earth's toughest, seasons, elements, tame; +Dash at the bulk the sharpened few; +Count death the smallest of their debts: +Show that the will to do +Is masculine and begets! + +These princes unto him the mother owed; +These jewels of manhood that rich hand bestowed. +What wonder, though with wits awake +To read her riddle, for these her offspring's sake; - +And she, before high heaven adulteress, +The lost to honour, in his glory clothed, +Else naked, shamed in sight of men, self-loathed; - +That she should quench her thought, nor worship less +Than ere she bled on sands or snows and knew +The slave's alternative, to worship or to rue! + +XI + +Bright from the shell of that much limited man, +Her hero, like the falchion out of sheath, +Like soul that quits the tumbled body, soared: +And France, impulsive, nuptial with his plan, +Albeit the Critic fretting her, adored +Once more. Exultingly her heart went forth, +Submissive to his mind and mood, +The way of those pent-eyebrows North; +For now was he to win the wreath +Surpassing sunniest in camp or Court; +Next, as the blessed harvest after years of blight, +Sit, the Great Emperor, to be known the Good! + +Now had the Seaman's volvent sprite, +Lean from the chase that barked his contraband, +A beggared applicant at every port, +To strew the profitless deeps and rot beneath, +Slung northward, for a hunted beast's retort +On sovereign power; there his final stand, +Among the perjured Scythian's shaggy horde, +The hydrocephalic aerolite +Had taken; flashing thence repellent teeth, +Though Europe's Master Europe's Rebel banned +To be earth's outcast, ocean's lord and sport. + +Unmoved might seem the Master's taunted sword. +Northward his dusky legions nightly slipped, +As on the map of that all-provident head; +He luting Peace the while, like morning's cock +The quiet day to round the hours for bed; +No pastoral shepherd sweeter to his flock. +Then Europe first beheld her Titan stripped. +To what vast length of limb and mounds of thews, +How trained to scale the eminences, pluck +The hazards for new footing, how compel +Those timely incidents by men named luck, +Through forethought that defied the Fates to choose, +Her grovelling admiration had not yet +Imagined of the great man-miracle; +And France recounted with her comic smile +Duplicities of Court and Cabinet, +The silky female of his male in guile, +Wherewith her two-faced Master could amuse +A dupe he charmed in sunny beams to bask, +Before his feint for camisado struck +The lightning moment of the cast-off mask. + +Splendours of earth repeating heaven's at set +Of sun down mountain cloud in masses arched; +Since Asia upon Europe marched, +Unmatched the copious multitudes; unknown +To Gallia's over-runner, Rome's inveterate foe, +Such hosts; all one machine for overthrow, +Coruscant from the Master's hand, compact +As reasoned thoughts in the Master's head; were shown +Yon lightning moment when his acme might +Blazed o'er the stream that cuts the sandy tract +Borussian from Sarmatia's famished flat; +The century's flower; and off its pinnacled throne, +Rayed servitude on Europe's ball of sight. + +XII + +Behind the Northern curtain-folds he passed. +There heard hushed France her muffled heart beat fast +Against the hollow ear-drum, where she sat +In expectation's darkness, until cracked +The straining curtain-seams: a scaly light +Was ghost above an army under shroud. +Imperious on Imperial Fact +Incestuously the incredible begat. +His veterans and auxiliaries, +The trained, the trustful, sanguine, proud, +Princely, scarce numerable to recite, - +Titanic of all Titan tragedies! - +That Northern curtain took them, as the seas +Gulp the great ships to give back shipmen white. + +Alive in marble, she conceived in soul, +With barren eyes and mouth, the mother's loss; +The bolt from her abandoned heaven sped; +The snowy army rolling knoll on knoll +Beyond horizon, under no blest Cross: +By the vulture dotted and engarlanded. + +Was it a necromancer lured +To weave his tense betraying spell? +A Titan whom our God endured +Till he of his foul hungers fell, +By all his craft and labour scourged? +A deluge Europe's liberated wave, +Paean to sky, leapt over that vast grave. +Its shadow-points against her sacred land converged. +And him, her yoke-fellow, her black lord, her fate, +In doubt, in fevered hope, in chills of hate, +That tore her old credulity to strips, +Then pressed the auspicious relics on her lips, +His withered slave for foregone miracles urged. +And he, whom now his ominous halo's round, +A three parts blank decrescent sickle, crowned, +Prodigious in catastrophe, could wear +The realm of Darkness with its Prince's air; +Assume in mien the resolute pretence +To satiate an hungered confidence, +Proved criminal by the sceptic seen to cower +Beside the generous face of that frail flower. + +XIII + +Desire and terror then had each of each: +His crown and sword were staked on the magic stroke; +Her blood she gave as one who loved her leech; +And both did barter under union's cloak. +An union in hot fever and fierce need +Of either's aid, distrust in trust did breed. +Their traffic instincts hooded their live wits +To issues. Never human fortune throve +On such alliance. Viewed by fits, +From Vulcan's forge a hovering Jove +Evolved. The slave he dragged the Tyrant drove. +Her awe of him his dread of her invoked: +His nature with her shivering faith ran yoked. +What wisdom counselled, Policy declined; +All perils dared he save the step behind. +Ahead his grand initiative becked: +One spark of radiance blurred, his orb was wrecked. +Stripped to the despot upstart, for success +He raged to clothe a perilous nakedness. +He would not fall, while falling; would not be taught, +While learning; would not relax his grasp on aught +He held in hand, while losing it; pressed advance, +Pricked for her lees the veins of wasted France; +Who, had he stayed to husband her, had spun +The strength he taxed unripened for his throw, +In vengeful casts calamitous, +On fields where palsying Pyrrhic laurels grow, +The luminous the ruinous. +An incalescent scorpion, +And fierier for the mounded cirque +That narrowed at him thick and murk, +This gambler with his genius +Flung lives in angry volleys, bloody lightnings, flung +His fortunes to the hosts he stung, +With victories clipped his eagle's wings. +By the hands that built him up was he undone: +By the star aloft, which was his ram's-head will +Within; by the toppling throne the soldier won; +By the yeasty ferment of what once had been, +To cloud a rational mind for present things; +By his own force, the suicide in his mill. +Needs never God of Vengeance intervene +When giants their last lesson have to learn. +Fighting against an end he could discern, +The chivalry whereof he had none +He called from his worn slave's abundant springs: +Not deigning spousally entreat +That ever blinded by his martial skill, +But harsh to have her worship counted out +In human coin, her vital rivers drained, +Her infant forests felled, commanded die +The decade thousand deaths for his Imperial seat, +Where throning he her faith in him maintained; +Bound Reason to believe delayed defeat +Was triumph; and what strength in her remained +To head against the ultimate foreseen rout, +Insensate taxed; of his impenitent will, +Servant and sycophant: without ally, +In Python's coils, the Master Craftsman still; +The smiter, panther springer, trapper sly, +The deadly wrestler at the crucial bout, +The penetrant, the tonant, tower of towers, +Striking from black disaster starry showers. +Her supreme player of man's primaeval game, +He won his harnessed victim's rapturous shout, +When every move was mortal to her frame, +Her prayer to life that stricken he might lie, +She to exchange his laurels for earth's flowers. + +The innumerable whelmed him, and he fell: +A vessel in mid-ocean under storm. +Ere ceased the lullaby of his passing bell, +He sprang to sight, in human form +Revealed, from no celestial aids: +The shades enclosed him, and he fired the shades. + +Cannon his name, +Cannon his voice, he came. +The fount of miracles from drought-dust arose, +Amazing even on his Imperial stage, +Where marvels lightened through the alternate hours +And winged o'er human earth's heroical shone. +Into the press of cumulative foes, +Across the friendly fields of smoke and rage, +A broken structure bore his furious powers; +The man no more, the Warrior Chief the same; +Match for all rivals; in himself but flame +Of an outworn lamp, to illumine nought anon. +Yet loud as when he first showed War's effete +Their Schoolman off his eagre mounted high, +And summoned to subject who dared compete, +The cannon in the name Napoleon +Discoursed of sulphur earth to curtained sky. +So through a tropic day a regnant sun, +Where armies of assailant vapours thronged, +His glory's trappings laid on them: comes night, +Enwraps him in a bosom quick of heat +From his anterior splendours, and shall seem +Day instant, Day's own lord in the furnace gleam, +The virulent quiver on ravished eyes prolonged, +When severed darkness, all flaminical bright, +Slips vivid eagles linked in rapid flight; +Which bring at whiles the lionly far roar, +As wrestled he with manacles and gags, +To speed across a cowering world once more, +Superb in ordered floods, his lordly flags. +His name on silence thundered, on the obscure +Lightened; it haunted morn and even-song: +Earth of her prodigy's extinction long, +With shudderings and with thrillings, hung unsure. + +Snapped was the chord that made the resonant bow, +In France, abased and like a shrunken corse; +Amid the weakest weak, the lowest low, +From the highest fallen, stagnant off her source; +Condemned to hear the nations' hostile mirth; +See curtained heavens, and smell a sulphurous earth; +Which told how evermore shall tyrant Force +Beget the greater for its overthrow. +The song of Liberty in her hearing spoke +A foreign tongue; Earth's fluttering little lyre +Unlike, but like the raven's ravening croak. +Not till her breath of being could aspire +Anew, this loved and scourged of Angels found +Our common brotherhood in sight and sound: +When mellow rang the name Napoleon, +And dim aloft her young Angelical waved. +Between ethereal and gross to choose, +She swung; her soul desired, her senses craved. +They pricked her dreams, while oft her skies were dun +Behind o'ershadowing foemen: on a tide +They drew the nature having need of pride +Among her fellows for its vital dues: +He seen like some rare treasure-galleon, +Hull down, with masts against the Western hues. + + + +FRANCE--DECEMBER 1870 + + + +I + +We look for her that sunlike stood +Upon the forehead of our day, +An orb of nations, radiating food +For body and for mind alway. +Where is the Shape of glad array; +The nervous hands, the front of steel, +The clarion tongue? Where is the bold proud face? +We see a vacant place; +We hear an iron heel. + +II + +O she that made the brave appeal +For manhood when our time was dark, +And from our fetters drove the spark +Which was as lightning to reveal +New seasons, with the swifter play +Of pulses, and benigner day; +She that divinely shook the dead +From living man; that stretched ahead +Her resolute forefinger straight, +And marched toward the gloomy gate +Of earth's Untried, gave note, and in +The good name of Humanity +Called forth the daring vision! she, +She likewise half corrupt of sin, +Angel and Wanton! can it be? +Her star has foundered in eclipse, +The shriek of madness on her lips; +Shreds of her, and no more, we see. +There is horrible convulsion, smothered din, +As of one that in a grave-cloth struggles to be free. + +III + +Look not for spreading boughs +On the riven forest tree. +Look down where deep in blood and mire +Black thunder plants his feet and ploughs +The soil for ruin: that is France: +Still thrilling like a lyre, +Amazed to shivering discord from a fall +Sudden as that the lurid hosts recall +Who met in heaven the irreparable mischance. +O that is France! +The brilliant eyes to kindle bliss, +The shrewd quick lips to laugh and kiss, +Breasts that a sighing world inspire, +And laughter-dimpled countenance +Where soul and senses caught desire! + +IV + +Ever invoking fire from heaven, the fire +Has grasped her, unconsumable, but framed +For all the ecstasies of suffering dire. +Mother of Pride, her sanctuary shamed: +Mother of Delicacy, and made a mark +For outrage: Mother of Luxury, stripped stark: +Mother of Heroes, bondsmen: thro' the rains, +Across her boundaries, lo the league-long chains! +Fond Mother of her martial youth; they pass, +Are spectres in her sight, are mown as grass! +Mother of Honour, and dishonoured: Mother +Of Glory, she condemned to crown with bays +Her victor, and be fountain of his praise. +Is there another curse? There is another: +Compassionate her madness: is she not +Mother of Reason? she that sees them mown +Like grass, her young ones! Yea, in the low groan +And under the fixed thunder of this hour +Which holds the animate world in one foul blot +Tranced circumambient while relentless Power +Beaks at her heart and claws her limbs down-thrown, +She, with the plungeing lightnings overshot, +With madness for an armour against pain, +With milkless breasts for little ones athirst, +And round her all her noblest dying in vain, +Mother of Reason is she, trebly cursed, +To feel, to see, to justify the blow; +Chamber to chamber of her sequent brain +Gives answer of the cause of her great woe, +Inexorably echoing thro' the vaults, +''Tis thus they reap in blood, in blood who sow: +'This is the sum of self-absolved faults.' +Doubt not that thro' her grief, with sight supreme, +Thro' her delirium and despair's last dream, +Thro' pride, thro' bright illusion and the brood +Bewildering of her various Motherhood, +The high strong light within her, tho' she bleeds, +Traces the letters of returned misdeeds. +She sees what seed long sown, ripened of late, +Bears this fierce crop; and she discerns her fate +From origin to agony, and on +As far as the wave washes long and wan +Off one disastrous impulse: for of waves +Our life is, and our deeds are pregnant graves +Blown rolling to the sunset from the dawn. + +V + +Ah, what a dawn of splendour, when her sowers +Went forth and bent the necks of populations +And of their terrors and humiliations +Wove her the starry wreath that earthward lowers +Now in the figure of a burning yoke! +Her legions traversed North and South and East, +Of triumph they enjoyed the glutton's feast: +They grafted the green sprig, they lopped the oak. +They caught by the beard the tempests, by the scalp +The icy precipices, and clove sheer through +The heart of horror of the pinnacled Alp, +Emerging not as men whom mortals knew. +They were the earthquake and the hurricane, +The lightnings and the locusts, plagues of blight, +Plagues of the revel: they were Deluge rain, +And dreaded Conflagration; lawless Might. +Death writes a reeling line along the snows, +Where under frozen mists they may be tracked, +Who men and elements provoked to foes, +And Gods: they were of god and beast compact: +Abhorred of all. Yet, how they sucked the teats +Of Carnage, thirsty issue of their dam, +Whose eagles, angrier than their oriflamme, +Flushed the vext earth with blood, green earth forgets. +The gay young generations mask her grief; +Where bled her children hangs the loaded sheaf. +Forgetful is green earth; the Gods alone +Remember everlastingly: they strike +Remorselessly, and ever like for like. +By their great memories the Gods are known. + +VI + +They are with her now, and in her ears, and known. +'Tis they that cast her to the dust for Strength, +Their slave, to feed on her fair body's length, +That once the sweetest and the proudest shone; +Scoring for hideous dismemberment +Her limbs, as were the anguish-taking breath +Gone out of her in the insufferable descent +From her high chieftainship; as were she death, +Who hears a voice of justice, feels the knife +Of torture, drinks all ignominy of life. +They are with her, and the painful Gods might weep, +If ever rain of tears came out of heaven +To flatter Weakness and bid conscience sleep, +Viewing the woe of this Immortal, driven +For the soul's life to drain the maddening cup +Of her own children's blood implacably: +Unsparing even as they to furrow up +The yellow land to likeness of a sea: +The bountiful fair land of vine and grain, +Of wit and grace and ardour, and strong roots, +Fruits perishable, imperishable fruits; +Furrowed to likeness of the dim grey main +Behind the black obliterating cyclone. + +VII + +Behold, the Gods are with her, and are known. +Whom they abandon misery persecutes +No more: them half-eyed apathy may loan +The happiness of pitiable brutes. +Whom the just Gods abandon have no light, +No ruthless light of introspective eyes +That in the midst of misery scrutinize +The heart and its iniquities outright. +They rest, they smile and rest; have earned perchance +Of ancient service quiet for a term; +Quiet of old men dropping to the worm; +And so goes out the soul. But not of France. +She cries for grief, and to the Gods she cries, +For fearfully their loosened hands chastize, +And icily they watch the rod's caress +Ravage her flesh from scourges merciless, +But she, inveterate of brain, discerns +That Pity has as little place as Joy +Among their roll of gifts; for Strength she yearns. +For Strength, her idol once, too long her toy. +Lo, Strength is of the plain root-Virtues born: +Strength shall ye gain by service, prove in scorn, +Train by endurance, by devotion shape. +Strength is not won by miracle or rape. +It is the offspring of the modest years, +The gift of sire to son, thro' those firm laws +Which we name Gods; which are the righteous cause, +The cause of man, and manhood's ministers. +Could France accept the fables of her priests, +Who blest her banners in this game of beasts, +And now bid hope that heaven will intercede +To violate its laws in her sore need, +She would find comfort in their opiates: +Mother of Reason! can she cheat the Fates? +Would she, the champion of the open mind, +The Omnipotent's prime gift--the gift of growth - +Consent even for a night-time to be blind, +And sink her soul on the delusive sloth, +For fruits ethereal and material, both, +In peril of her place among mankind? +The Mother of the many Laughters might +Call one poor shade of laughter in the light +Of her unwavering lamp to mark what things +The world puts faith in, careless of the truth: +What silly puppet-bodies danced on strings, +Attached by credence, we appear in sooth, +Demanding intercession, direct aid, +When the whole tragic tale hangs on a broken blade! + +She swung the sword for centuries; in a day +It slipped her, like a stream cut off from source. +She struck a feeble hand, and tried to pray, +Clamoured of treachery, and had recourse +To drunken outcries in her dream that Force +Needed but hear her shouting to obey. +Was she not formed to conquer? The bright plumes +Of crested vanity shed graceful nods: +Transcendent in her foundries, Arts and looms, +Had France to fear the vengeance of the Gods? +Her faith was on her battle-roll of names +Sheathed in the records of old war; with dance +And song she thrilled her warriors and her dames, +Embracing her Dishonour: gave him France +From head to foot, France present and to come, +So she might hear the trumpet and the drum - +Bellona and Bacchante! rushing forth +On yon stout marching Schoolmen of the North. + +Inveterate of brain, well knows she why +Strength failed her, faithful to himself the first: +Her dream is done, and she can read the sky, +And she can take into her heart the worst +Calamity to drug the shameful thought +Of days that made her as the man she served +A name of terror, but a thing unnerved: +Buying the trickster, by the trickster bought, +She for dominion, he to patch a throne. + +VIII + +Henceforth of her the Gods are known, +Open to them her breast is laid. +Inveterate of brain, heart-valiant, +Never did fairer creature pant +Before the altar and the blade! + +IX + +Swift fall the blows, and men upbraid, +And friends give echo blunt and cold, +The echo of the forest to the axe. +Within her are the fires that wax +For resurrection from the mould. + +X + +She snatched at heaven's flame of old, +And kindled nations: she was weak: +Frail sister of her heroic prototype, +The Man; for sacrifice unripe, +She too must fill a Vulture's beak. +Deride the vanquished, and acclaim +The conqueror, who stains her fame, +Still the Gods love her, for that of high aim +Is this good France, the bleeding thing they stripe. + +XI + +She shall rise worthier of her prototype +Thro' her abasement deep; the pain that runs +From nerve to nerve some victory achieves. +They lie like circle-strewn soaked Autumn-leaves +Which stain the forest scarlet, her fair sons! +And of their death her life is: of their blood +From many streams now urging to a flood, +No more divided, France shall rise afresh. +Of them she learns the lesson of the flesh:- +The lesson writ in red since first Time ran, +A hunter hunting down the beast in man: +That till the chasing out of its last vice, +The flesh was fashioned but for sacrifice. + +Immortal Mother of a mortal host! +Thou suffering of the wounds that will not slay, +Wounds that bring death but take not life away! - +Stand fast and hearken while thy victors boast: +Hearken, and loathe that music evermore. +Slip loose thy garments woven of pride and shame: +The torture lurks in them, with them the blame +Shall pass to leave thee purer than before. +Undo thy jewels, thinking whence they came, +For what, and of the abominable name +Of her who in imperial beauty wore. + +O Mother of a fated fleeting host +Conceived in the past days of sin, and born +Heirs of disease and arrogance and scorn, +Surrender, yield the weight of thy great ghost, +Like wings on air, to what the heavens proclaim +With trumpets from the multitudinous mounds +Where peace has filled the hearing of thy sons: +Albeit a pang of dissolution rounds +Each new discernment of the undying ones, +Do thou stoop to these graves here scattered wide +Along thy fields, as sunless billows roll; +These ashes have the lesson for the soul. +'Die to thy Vanity, and strain thy Pride, +Strip off thy Luxury: that thou may'st live, +Die to thyself,' they say, 'as we have died +From dear existence and the foe forgive, +Nor pray for aught save in our little space +To warn good seed to greet the fair earth's face.' +O Mother! take their counsel, and so shall +The broader world breathe in on this thy home, +Light clear for thee the counter-changing dome, +Strength give thee, like an ocean's vast expanse +Off mountain cliffs, the generations all, +Not whirling in their narrow rings of foam, +But as a river forward. Soaring France! +Now is Humanity on trial in thee: +Now may'st thou gather humankind in fee: +Now prove that Reason is a quenchless scroll; +Make of calamity thine aureole, +And bleeding head us thro' the troubles of the sea. + + + +ALSACE-LORRAINE + + + +I + +The sister Hours in circles linked, +Daughters of men, of men the mates, +Are gone on flow with the day that winked, +With the night that spanned at golden gates. +Mothers, they leave us, quickening seed; +They bear us grain or flower or weed, +As we have sown; is nought extinct +For them we fill to be our Fates. +Life of the breath is but the loan; +Passing death what we have sown. + +Pearly are they till the pale inherited stain +Deepens in us, and the mirrors they form on their flow +Darken to feature and nature: a volumed chain, +Sequent of issue, in various eddies they show. +Theirs is the Book of the River of Life, to read +Leaf by leaf by reapers of long-sown seed: +There doth our shoot up to light from a spiriting sane +Stand as a tree whereon numberless clusters grow: +Legible there how the heart, with its one false move +Cast Eurydice pallor on all we love. + +Our fervid heart has filled that Book in chief; +Our fitful heart a wild reflection views; +Our craving heart of passion suckling grief +Disowns the author's work it must peruse; +Inconscient in its leap to wreak the deed, +A round of harvests red from crimson seed, +It marks the current Hours show leaf by leaf, +And rails at Destiny; nor traces clues; +Though sometimes it may think what novel light +Will strike their faces when the mind shall write. + +II + +Succourful daughters of men are the rosed and starred +Revolving Twelves in their fluent germinal rings, +Despite the burden to chasten, abase, depose. +Fallen on France, as the sweep of scythe over sward, +They breathed in her ear their voice of the crystal springs, +That run from a twilight rise, from a twilight close, +Through alternate beams and glooms, rejoicingly young. +Only to Earth's best loved, at the breathless turns +Where Life in fold of the Shadow reclines unstrung, +And a ghostly lamp of their moment's union burns, +Will such pure notes from the fountain-head be sung. + +Voice of Earth's very soul to the soul she would see renewed: +A song that sought no tears, that laid not a touch on the breast +Sobbing aswoon and, like last foxgloves' bells upon ferns +In sandy alleys of woodland silence, shedding to bare. +Daughters of Earth and men, they piped of her natural brood; +Her patient helpful four-feet; wings on the flit or in nest; +Paws at our old-world task to scoop a defensive lair; +Snouts at hunt through the scented grasses; enhavened scuts +Flashing escape under show of a laugh nigh the mossed burrow-mouth. +Sack-like droop bronze pears on the nailed branch-frontage of huts, +To greet those wedded toilers from acres where sweat is a shower. +Snake, cicada, lizard, on lavender slopes up South, +Pant for joy of a sunlight driving the fielders to bower. +Sharpened in silver by one chance breeze is the olive's grey; +A royal-mantle floats, a red fritillary hies; +The bee, for whom no flower of garden or wild has nay, +Noises, heard if but named, so hot is the trade he plies. +Processions beneath green arches of herbage, the long colonnades; +Laboured mounds that a foot or a wanton stick may subvert; +Homely are they for a lowly look on bedewed grass-blades, +On citied fir-droppings, on twisted wreaths of the worm in dirt. +Does nought so loosen our sight from the despot heart, to receive +Balm of a sound Earth's primary heart at its active beat: +The motive, yet servant, of energy; simple as morn and eve; +Treasureless, fetterless; free of the bonds of a great conceit: +Unwounded even by cruel blows on a body that writhes; +Nor whimpering under misfortune; elusive of obstacles; prompt +To quit any threatened familiar domain seen doomed by the scythes; +Its day's hard business done, the score to the good accompt. +Creatures of forest and mead, Earth's essays in being, all kinds +Bound by the navel-knot to the Mother, never astray, +They in the ear upon ground will pour their intuitive minds, +Cut man's tangles for Earth's first broad rectilinear way: +Admonishing loftier reaches, the rich adventurous shoots, +Pushes of tentative curves, embryonic upwreathings in air; +Not always the sprouts of Earth's root-Laws preserving her brutes; +Oft but our primitive hungers licentious in fine and fair. + +Yet the like aerial growths may chance be the delicate sprays, +Infant of Earth's most urgent in sap, her fierier zeal +For entry on Life's upper fields: and soul thus flourishing pays +The martyr's penance, mark for brutish in man to heel. + +Her, from a nerveless well among stagnant pools of the dry, +Through her good aim at divine, shall commune with Earth remake; +Fraternal unto sororial, her, where abashed she may lie, +Divinest of man shall clasp; a world out of darkness awake, +As it were with the Resurrection's eyelids uplifted, to see +Honour in shame, in substance the spirit, in that dry fount +Jets of the songful ascending silvery-bright water-tree +Spout, with our Earth's unbaffled resurgent desire for the mount, +Though broken at intervals, clipped, and barren in seeming it be. +For this at our nature arises rejuvenescent from Earth, +However respersive the blow and nigh on infernal the fall, +The chastisement drawn down on us merited: are we of worth +Amid our satanic excrescences, this, for the less than a call, +Will Earth reprime, man cherish; the God who is in us and round, +Consenting, the God there seen. Impiety speaks despair; +Religion the virtue of serving as things of the furrowy ground, +Debtors for breath while breath with our fellows in service we +share. +Not such of the crowned discrowned +Can Earth or humanity spare; +Such not the God let die. + +III + +Eastward of Paris morn is high; +And darkness on that Eastward side +The heart of France beholds: a thorn +Is in her frame where shines the morn: +A rigid wave usurps her sky, +With eagle crest and eagle-eyed +To scan what wormy wrinkles hint +Her forces gathering: she the thrown +From station, lopped of an arm, astounded, lone, +Reading late History as a foul misprint: +Imperial, Angelical, +At strife commingled in her frame convulsed; +Shame of her broken sword, a ravening gall; +Pain of the limb where once her warm blood pulsed; +These tortures to distract her underneath +Her whelmed Aurora's shade. But in that space +When lay she dumb beside her trampled wreath, +Like an unburied body mid the tombs, +Feeling against her heart life's bitter probe +For life, she saw how children of her race, +The many sober sons and daughters, plied, +By cottage lamplight through the water-globe, +By simmering stew-pots, by the serious looms, +Afield, in factories, with the birds astir, +Their nimble feet and fingers; not denied +Refreshful chatter, laughter, galliard songs. +So like Earth's indestructible they were, +That wrestling with its anguish rose her pride, +To feel where in each breast the thought of her, +On whom the circle Hours laid leaded thongs, +Was constant; spoken sometimes in low tone +At lip or in a fluttered look, +A shortened breath: and they were her loved own; +Nor ever did they waste their strength with tears, +For pity of the weeper, nor rebuke, +Though mainly they were charged to pay her debt, +The Mother having conscience in arrears; +Ready to gush the flood of vain regret, +Else hearken to her weaponed children's moan +Of stifled rage invoking vengeance: hell's, +If heaven should fail the counter-wave that swells +In blood and brain for retribution swift. +Those helped not: wings to her soul were these who yet +Could welcome day for labour, night for rest, +Enrich her treasury, built of cheerful thrift, +Of honest heart, beyond all miracles; +And likened to Earth's humblest were Earth's best. + +IV + +Brooding on her deep fall, the many strings +Which formed her nature set a thought on Kings, +As aids that might the low-laid cripple lift; +And one among them hummed devoutly leal, +While passed the sighing breeze along her breast. +Of Kings by the festive vanquishers rammed down +Her gorge since fell the Chief, she knew their crown; +Upon her through long seasons was its grasp, +For neither soul's nor body's weal; +As much bestows the robber wasp, +That in the hanging apple makes a meal, +And carves a face of abscess where was fruit +Ripe ruddy. They would blot +Her radiant leap above the slopes acute, +Of summit to celestial; impute +The wanton's aim to her divinest shot; +Bid her walk History backward over gaps; +Abhor the day of Phrygian caps; +Abjure her guerdon, execrate herself; +The Hapsburg, Hohenzollern, Guelph, +Admire repentant; reverently prostrate +Her person unto the belly-god; of whom +Is inward plenty and external bloom; +Enough of pomp and state +And carnival to quench +The breast's desires of an intemperate wench, +The head's ideas beyond legitimate. + +She flung them: she was France: nor with far frown +Her lover from the embrace of her refrained: +But in her voice an interwoven wire, +The exultation of her gross renown, +Struck deafness at her heavens, and they waned +Over a look ill-gifted to aspire. +Wherefore, as an abandonment, irate, +The intemperate summoned up her trumpet days, +Her treasure-galleon's wondrous freight. +The cannon-name she sang and shrieked; transferred +Her soul's allegiance; o'er the Tyrant slurred, +Tranced with the zeal of her first fawning gaze, +To clasp his trophy flags and hail him Saint. + +V + +She hailed him Saint: +And her Jeanne unsainted, foully sung! +The virgin who conceived a France when funeral glooms +Across a land aquake with sharp disseverance hung: +Conceived, and under stress of battle brought her forth; +Crowned her in purification of feud and foeman's taint; +Taught her to feel her blood her being, know her worth, +Have joy of unity: the Jeanne bescreeched, bescoffed, +Who flamed to ashes, flew up wreaths of faggot fumes; +Through centuries a star in vapour-folds aloft. + +For her people to hail her Saint, +Were no lifting of her, Earth's gem, +Earth's chosen, Earth's throb on divine: +In the ranks of the starred she is one, +While man has thought on our line: +No lifting of her, but for them, +Breath of the mountain, beam of the sun +Through mist, out of swamp-fires' lures release, +Youth on the forehead, the rough right way +Seen to be footed: for them the heart's peace, +By the mind's war won for a permanent miracle day. + +Her arms below her sword-hilt crossed, +The heart of that high-hallowed Jeanne +Into the furnace-pit she tossed +Before her body knew the flame, +And sucked its essence: warmth for righteous work, +An undivided power to speed her aim. +She had no self but France: the sainted man +No France but self. Him warrior and clerk, +Free of his iron clutch; and him her young, +In whirled imagination mastodonized; +And him her penmen, him her poets; all +For the visioned treasure-galleon astrain; +Sent zenithward on bass and treble tongue, +Till solely through his glory France was prized. +She who had her Jeanne; +The child of her industrious; +Earth's truest, earth's pure fount from the main; +And she who had her one day's mate, +In the soul's view illustrious +Past blazonry, her Immaculate, +Those hours of slavish Empire would recall; +Thrill to the rattling anchor-chain +She heard upon a day in 'I who can'; +Start to the softened, tremulous bugle-blare +Of that Caesarean Italian +Across the storied fields of trampled grain, +As to a Vercingetorix of old Gaul +Blowing the rally against a Caesar's reign. +Her soul's protesting sobs she drowned to swear +Fidelity unto the sainted man, +Whose nimbus was her crown; and be again +The foreigner in Europe, known of none, +None knowing; sight to dazzle, voice to stun. +Rearward she stepped, with thirst for Europe's van; +The dream she nursed a snare, +The flag she bore a pall. + +VI + +In Nature is no rearward step allowed. +Hard on the rock Reality do we dash +To be shattered, if the material dream propels. +The worship to departed splendour vowed +Conjured a simulacrum, wove her lash, +For the slow measure timed her peal of bells. + +Thereof was the cannon-name a mockery round her hills; +For the will of wills, +Its flaccid ape, +Weak as the final echo off a giant's bawl: +Napoleon for disdain, +His banner steeped in crape. +Thereof the barrier of Alsace-Lorraine; +The frozen billow crested to its fall; +Dismemberment; disfigurement; +Her history blotted; her proud mantle rent; +And ever that one word to reperuse, +With eyes behind a veil of fiery dews; +Knelling the spot where Gallic soil defiled +Showed her sons' valour as a frenzied child +In arms of the mailed man. +Word that her mind must bear, her heart put under ban, +Lest burst it: unto her eyes a ghost, +Incredible though manifest: a scene +Stamped with her new Saint's name: and all his host +A wattled flock the foeman's dogs between! + +VII + +Mark where a credible ghost pulls bridle to view that bare +Corpse of a field still reddening cloud, and alive in its throes +Beneath her Purgatorial Saint's evocative stare: +Brand on his name, the gulf of his glory, his Legend's close. +A lustreless Phosphor heading for daybeam Night's dead-born, +His underworld eyeballs grip the cast of the land for a fray +Expugnant; swift up the heights, with the Victor's instinctive scorn +Of the trapped below, he rides; he beholds, and a two-fold grey, +Even as the misty sun growing moon that a frost enrings, +Is shroud on the shrouded; he knows him there in the helmeted ranks. +The golden eagles flap lame wings, +The black double-headed are round their flanks. +He is there in midst of the pupils he harried to brains awake, trod +into union; lo, +These are his Epic's tutored Dardans, yon that Rhapsode's Achaeans +to know. +Nor is aught of an equipollent conflict seen, nor the weaker's +flashed device; +Headless is offered a breast to beaks deliberate, formal, assured, +precise. +Ruled by the mathematician's hand, they solve their problem, as on a +slate. +This is the ground foremarked, and the day; their leader modestly +hazarded date. +His helmeted ranks might be draggers of pools or reapers of plains +for the warrior's guile +Displayed; they haul, they rend, as in some orderly office +mercantile. +And a timed artillery speaks full-mouthed on a stuttering feeble +reduced to nought. +Can it be France, an army of France, tricked, netted, convulsive, +all writhen caught? +Arterial blood of an army's heart outpoured the Grey Observer sees: +A forest of France in thunder comes, like a landslide hurled off her +Pyrenees. +Torrent and forest ramp, roll, sling on for a charge against iron, +reason, Fate; +It is gapped through the mass midway, bare ribs and dust ere the +helmeted feel its weight. +So the blue billow white-plumed is plunged upon shingle to screaming +withdrawal, but snatched, +Waved is the laurel eternal yielded by Death o'er the waste of brave +men outmatched. +The France of the fury was there, the thing he had wielded, whose +honour was dearer than life; +The Prussia despised, the harried, the trodden, was here; his pupil, +the scholar in strife. + +He hated to heel, in a spasm of will, +From sleep or debate, a mannikin squire +With head of a merlin hawk and quill +Acrow on an ear. At him rained fire +From a blast of eyeballs hotter than speech, +To say what a deadly poison stuffed +The France here laid in her bloody ditch, +Through the Legend passing human puffed. + +Credible ghost of the field which from him descends, +Each dark anniversary day will its father return, +Haling his shadow to spy where the Legend ends, +That penman trumpeter's part in the wreck discern. + +There, with the cup it presents at her lips, she stands, +France, with her future staked on the word it may pledge. +The vengeance urged of desire a reserve countermands; +The patience clasped totters hard on the precipice edge. +Lopped of an arm, mother love for her own springs quick, +To curdle the milk in her breasts for the young they feed, +At thought of her single hand, and the lost so nigh. +Mother love for her own, who raised her when she lay sick +Nigh death, and would in like fountains fruitlessly bleed, +Withholds the fling of her heart on the further die. + +Of love is wisdom. Is it great love, then wise +Will our wild heart be, though whipped unto madness more +By its mentor's counselling voice than thoughtfully reined. +Desire of the wave for the shore, +Passion for one last agony under skies, +To make her heavens remorseful, she restrained + +VIII + +On her lost arm love bade her look; +On her one hand to meditate; +The tumult of her blood abate; +Disaster face, derision brook: +Forbade the page of her Historic Muse, +Until her demon his last hold forsook, +And smoothly, with no countenance of hate, +Her conqueror she could scan to measure. Thence +The strange new Winter stream of ruling sense, +Cold, comfortless, but braced to disabuse, +Ran through the mind of this most lowly laid; +From the top billow of victorious War, +Down in the flagless troughs at ebb and flow; +A wreck; her past, her future, both in shade. +She read the things that are; +Reality unaccepted read +For sign of the distraught, and took her blow +To brain; herself read through; +Wherefore her predatory Glory paid +Napoleon ransom knew. +Her nature's many strings hot gusts did jar +Against the note of reason uttered low, +Ere passionate with duty she might wed, +Compel the bride's embrace of her stern groom, +Joined at an altar liker to the tomb, +Nest of the Furies their first nuptial bed, +They not the less were mated and proclaimed +The rational their issue. Then she rose. + +See how the rush of southern Springtide glows +Oceanic in the chariot-wheel's ascent, +Illuminated with one breath. The maimed, +Tom, tortured, winter-visaged, suddenly +Had stature; to the world's wonderment, +Fair features, grace of mien, nor least +The comic dimples round her April mouth, +Sprung of her intimate humanity. +She stood before mankind the very South +Rapt out of frost to flowery drapery; +Unshadowed save when somewhiles she looked East. + +IX + +Let but the rational prevail, +Our footing is on ground though all else fail: +Our kiss of Earth is then a plight +To walk within her Laws and have her light. +Choice of the life or death lies in ourselves; +There is no fate but when unreason lours. +This Land the cheerful toiler delves, +The thinker brightens with fine wit, +The lovelier grace as lyric flowers, +Those rosed and starred revolving Twelves +Shall nurse for effort infinite +While leashed to brain the heart of France the Fair +Beats tempered music and its lead subserves. +Washed from her eyes the Napoleonic glare, +Divinely raised by that in her divine, +Not the clear sight of Earth's blunt actual swerves +When her lost look, as on a wave of wine, +Rolls Eastward, and the mother-flag descries +Caress with folds and curves +The fortress over Rhine, +Beneath the one tall spire. +Despite her brooding thought, her nightlong sighs, +Her anguish in desire, +She sees, above the brutish paw +Alert on her still quivering limb - +As little in past time she saw, +Nor when dispieced as prey, +As victrix when abhorred - +A Grand Germania, stout on soil; +Audacious up the ethereal dim; +The forest's Infant; the strong hand for toil; +The patient brain in twilights when astray; +Shrewdest of heads to foil and counterfoil; +The sceptic and devout; the potent sword; +With will and armed to help in hewing way +For Europe's march; and of the most golden chord +Of the Heliconian lyre +Excellent mistress. Yea, she sees, and can admire; +Still seeing in what walks the Gallia leads; +And with what shield upon Alsace-Lorraine +Her wary sister's doubtful look misreads +A mother's throbs for her lost: so loved: so near: +Magnetic. Hard the course for her to steer, +The leap against the sharpened spikes restrain. +For the belted Overshadower hard the course, +On whom devolves the spirit's touchstone, Force: +Which is the strenuous arm, to strike inclined, +That too much adamantine makes the mind; +Forgets it coin of Nature's rich Exchange; +Contracts horizons within present sight: +Amalekite to-day, across its range +Indisputable; to-morrow Simeonite. + +X + +The mother who gave birth to Jeanne; +Who to her young Angelical sprang; +Who lay with Earth and heard the notes she sang, +And heard her truest sing them; she may reach +Heights yet unknown of nations; haply teach +A thirsting world to learn 'tis 'she who can.' + +She that in History's Heliaea pleads +The nation flowering conscience o'er the beast; +With heart expurged of rancour, tame of greeds; +With the winged mind from fang and claw released; - +Will such a land be seen? It will be seen; - +Shall stand adjudged our foremost and Earth's Queen. +Acknowledgement that she of God proceeds +The invisible makes visible, as his priest, +To her is yielded by a world reclaimed. +And stands she mutilated, fancy-shamed, +Yet strong in arms, yet strong in self-control, +Known valiant, her maternal throbs repressed, +Discarding vengeance, Giant with a soul; - +My faith in her when she lay low +Was fountain; now as wave at flow +Beneath the lights, my faith in God is best; - +On France has come the test +Of what she holds within +Responsive to Life's deeper springs. +She above the nations blest +In fruitful and in liveliest, +In all that servant earth to heavenly bidding brings, +The devotee of Glory, she may win +Glory despoiling none, enrich her kind, +Illume her land, and take the royal seat +Unto the strong self-conqueror assigned. +But ah, when speaks a loaded breath the double name, +Humanity's old Foeman winks agrin. +Her constant Angel eyes her heart's quick beat, +The thrill of shadow coursing through her frame. +Like wind among the ranks of amber wheat. +Our Europe, vowed to unity or torn, +Observes her face, as shepherds note the morn, +And in a ruddy beacon mark an end +That for the flock in their grave hearing rings. +Specked overhead the imminent vulture wings +At poise, one fatal movement indiscreet, +Sprung from the Aetna passions' mad revolts, +Draws down; the midnight hovers to descend; +And dire as Indian noons of ulcer heat +Anticipating tempest and the bolts, +Hangs curtained terrors round her next day's door, +Death's emblems for the breast of Europe flings; +The breast that waits a spark to fire her store. +Shall, then, the great vitality, France, +Signal the backward step once more; +Again a Goddess Fortune trace +Amid the Deities, and pledge to chance +One whom we never could replace? +Now may she tune her nature's many strings +To noble harmony, be seen, be known. + +It was the foreign France, the unruly, feared; +Little for all her witcheries endeared; +Theatrical of arrogance, a sprite +With gaseous vapours overblown, +In her conceit of power ensphered, +Foredoomed to violate and atone; +Her the grim conqueror's iron might +Avengeing clutched, distrusting rent; +Not that sharp intellect with fire endowed +To cleave our webs, run lightnings through our cloud; +Not virtual France, the France benevolent, +The chivalrous, the many-stringed, sublime +At intervals, and oft in sweetest chime; +Though perilously instrument, +A breast for any having godlike gleam. +This France could no antagonist disesteem, +To spurn at heel and confiscate her brood. +Albeit a waverer between heart and mind, +And laurels won from sky or plucked from blood, +Which wither all the wreath when intertwined, +This cherishable France she may redeem. +Beloved of Earth, her heart should feel at length +How much unto Earth's offspring it doth owe. +Obstructions are for levelling, have we strength; +'Tis poverty of soul conceived a foe. +Rejected be the wrath that keeps unhealed +Her panting wound; to higher Courts appealed +The wrongs discerned of higher: Europe waits: +She chooses God or gambles with the Fates. +Shines the new Helen in Alsace-Lorraine, +A darker river severs Rhine and Rhone, +Is heard a deadlier Epic of the twain; +We see a Paris burn +Or France Napoleon. + +For yet he breathes whom less her heart forswears +While trembles its desire to thwart her mind: +The Tyrant lives in Victory's return. +What figure with recurrent footstep fares +Around those memoried tracks of scarlet mud, +To sow her future from an ashen urn +By lantern-light, as dragons' teeth are sown? +Of bleeding pride the piercing seer is blind. +But, cleared her eyes of that ensanguined scud +Distorting her true features, to be shown +Benignly luminous, one who bears +Humanity at breast, and she might learn +How surely the excelling generous find +Renouncement is possession. Sure +As light enkindles light when heavenly earthly mates, +The flame of pure immits the flame of pure, +Magnanimous magnanimous creates. +So to majestic beauty stricken rears +Hard-visaged rock against the risen glow; +And men are in the secret with the spheres, +Whose glory is celestially to bestow. + +Now nation looks to nation, that may live +Their common nurseling, like the torrent's flower, +Shaken by foul Destruction's fast-piled heap. +On France is laid the proud initiative +Of sacrifice in one self-mastering hour, +Whereby more than her lost one will she reap; +Perchance the very lost regain, +To count it less than her superb reward. +Our Europe, where is debtor each to each, +Pass measure of excess, and war is Cain, +Fraternal from the Seaman's beach, +From answering Rhine in grand accord, +From Neva beneath Northern cloud, +And from our Transatlantic Europe loud, +Will hail the rare example for their theme; +Give response, as rich foliage to the breeze; +In their entrusted nurseling know them one: +Like a brave vessel under press of steam, +Abreast the winds and tides, on angry seas, +Plucked by the heavens forlorn of present sun, +Will drive through darkness, and, with faith supreme, +Have sight of haven and the crowded quays. + + + +THE CAGEING OF ARES + + + +[Iliad, v. V. 385--Dedicated to the Council at The Hague.] + +How big of breast our Mother Gaea laughed +At sight of her boy Giants on the leap +Each over other as they neighboured home, +Fronting the day's descent across green slopes, +And up fired mountain crags their shadows danced. +Close with them in their fun, she scarce could guess, +Though these two billowy urchins reeked of craft, +It signalled some adventurous master-trick +To set Olympians buzzing in debate, +Lest it might be their godhead undermined, +The Tyranny menaced. Ephialtes high +On shoulders of his brother Otos waved +For the bull-bellowings given to grand good news, +Compact, complexioned in his gleeful roar +While Otos aped the prisoner's wrists and knees, +With doleful sniffs between recurrent howls; +Till Gaea's lap receiving them, they stretched, +And both upon her bosom shaken to speech, +Burst the hot story out of throats of both, +Like rocky head-founts, baffling in their glut +The hurried spout. And as when drifting storm +Disburdened loses clasp of here and yon +A peak, a forest mound, a valley's gleam +Of grass and the river's crooks and snaky coils, +Signification marvellous she caught, +Through gurglings of triumphant jollity, +Which now engulphed and now gave eye; at last +Subsided, and the serious naked deed, +With mountain-cloud of laughter banked around, +Stood in her sight confirmed: she could believe +That these, her sprouts of promise, her most prized, +These two made up of lion, bear and fox, +Her sportive, suckling mammoths, her young joy, +Still by the reckoning infants among men, +Had done the deed to strike the Titan host +In envy dumb, in envious heart elate: +These two combining strength and craft had snared, +Enmeshed, bound fast with thongs, discreetly caged +The blood-shedder, the terrible Lord of War; +Destroyer, ravager, superb in plumes; +The barren furrower of anointed fields; +The scarlet heel in towns, foul smoke to sky, +Her hated enemy, too long her scourge: +Great Ares. And they gagged his trumpet mouth +When they had seized on his implacable spear, +Hugged him to reedy helplessness despite +His godlike fury startled from amaze. +For he had eyed them nearing him in play, +The giant cubs, who gambolled and who snarled, +Unheeding his fell presence, by the mount +Ossa, beside a brushwood cavern; there +On Earth's original fisticuffs they called +For ease of sharp dispute: whereat the God, +Approving, deemed that sometime trained to arms, +Good servitors of Ares they would be, +And ply the pointed spear to dominate +Their rebel restless fellows, villain brood +Vowed to defy Immortals. So it chanced +Amusedly he watched them, and as one +The lusty twain were on him and they had him. +Breath to us, Powers of air, for laughter loud! +Cock of Olympus he, superb in plumes! +Bound like a wheaten sheaf by those two babes! +Because they knew our Mother Gaea loathed him, +Knew him the famine, pestilence and waste; +A desolating fire to blind the sight +With splendour built of fruitful things in ashes; +The gory chariot-wheel on cries for justice; +Her deepest planted and her liveliest voice, +Heard from the babe as from the broken crone. +Behold him in his vessel of bronze encased, +And tumbled down the cave. But rather look - +Ah, that the woman tattler had not sought, +Of all the Gods to let her secret fly, +Hermes, after the thirteen songful months! +Prompting the Dexterous to work his arts, +And shatter earth's delirious holiday, +Then first, as where the fountain runs a stream, +Resolving to composure on its throbs. +But see her in the Seasons through that year; +That one glad year and the fair opening month. +Had never our Great Mother such sweet face! +War with her, gentle war with her, each day +Her sons and daughters urged; at eve were flung, +On the morrow stood to challenge; in their strength +Renewed, indomitable; whereof they won, +From hourly wrestlings up to shut of lids, +Her ready secret: the abounding life +Returned for valiant labour: she and they +Defeated and victorious turn by turn; +By loss enriched, by overthrow restored. +Exchange of powers of this conflict came; +Defacement none, nor ever squandered force. +Is battle nature's mandate, here it reigned, +As music unto the hand that smote the strings; +And she the rosier from their showery brows, +They fruitful from her ploughed and harrowed breast. +Back to the primal rational of those +Who suck the teats of milky earth, and clasp +Stability in hatred of the insane, +Man stepped; with wits less fearful to pronounce +The mortal mind's concept of earth's divorced +Above; those beautiful, those masterful, +Those lawless. High they sit, and if descend, +Descend to reap, not sowing. Is it just? +Earth in her happy children asked that word, +Whereto within their breast was her reply. +Those beautiful, those masterful, those lawless, +Enjoy the life prolonged, outleap the years; +Yet they ('twas the Great Mother's voice inspired +The audacious thought), they, glorious over dust, +Outleap not her; disrooted from her soar, +To meet the certain fate of earth's divorced, +And clap lame wings across a wintry haze, +Up to the farthest bourne: immortal still, +Thenceforth innocuous; lovelier than when ruled +The Tyranny. This her voice within them told, +When softly the Great Mother chid her sons +Not of the giant brood, who did create +Those lawless Gods, first offspring of our brain +Set moving by an abject blood, that waked +To wanton under elements more benign, +And planted aliens on Olympian heights; - +Imagination's cradle poesy +Become a monstrous pressure upon men; - +Foes of good Gaea; until dispossessed +By light from her, born of the love of her, +Their lordship the illumined brain rejects +For earth's beneficent, the sons of Law, +Her other name. So spake she in their heart, +Among the wheat-blades proud of stalk; beneath +Young vine-leaves pushing timid fingers forth, +Confidently to cling. And when brown corn +Swayed armied ranks with softened cricket song, +With gold necks bent for any zephyr's kiss; +When vine-roots daily down a rubble soil +Drank fire of heaven athirst to swell the grape; +When swelled the grape, and in it held a ray, +Rich issue of the embrace of heaven and earth; +The very eye of passion drowsed by excess, +And yet a burning lion for the spring; +Then in that time of general cherishment, +Sweet breathing balm and flutes by cool wood-side, +He the harsh rouser of ire being absent, caged, +Then did good Gaea's children gratefully +Lift hymns to Gods they judged, but praised for peace, +Delightful Peace, that answers Reason's call +Harmoniously and images her Law; +Reflects, and though short-lived as then, revives, +In memories made present on the brain +By natural yearnings, all the happy scenes; +The picture of an earth allied to heaven; +Between them the known smile behind black masks; +Rightly their various moods interpreted; +And frolic because toilful children borne +With larger comprehension of Earth's aim +At loftier, clearer, sweeter, by their aid. + + + +THE NIGHT-WALK + + + +Awakes for me and leaps from shroud +All radiantly the moon's own night +Of folded showers in streamer cloud; +Our shadows down the highway white +Or deep in woodland woven-boughed, +With yon and yon a stem alight. + +I see marauder runagates +Across us shoot their dusky wink; +I hear the parliament of chats +In haws beside the river's brink; +And drops the vole off alder-banks, +To push his arrow through the stream. +These busy people had our thanks +For tickling sight and sound, but theme +They were not more than breath we drew +Delighted with our world's embrace: +The moss-root smell where beeches grew, +And watered grass in breezy space; +The silken heights, of ghostly bloom +Among their folds, by distance draped. +'Twas Youth, rapacious to consume, +That cried to have its chaos shaped: +Absorbing, little noting, still +Enriched, and thinking it bestowed; +With wistful looks on each far hill +For something hidden, something owed. +Unto his mantled sister, Day +Had given the secret things we sought +And she was grave and saintly gay; +At times she fluttered, spoke her thought; +She flew on it, then folded wings, +In meditation passing lone, +To breathe around the secret things, +Which have no word, and yet are known; +Of thirst for them are known, as air +Is health in blood: we gained enough +By this to feel it honest fare; +Impalpable, not barren, stuff. + +A pride of legs in motion kept +Our spirits to their task meanwhile, +And what was deepest dreaming slept: +The posts that named the swallowed mile; +Beside the straight canal the hut +Abandoned; near the river's source +Its infant chirp; the shortest cut; +The roadway missed; were our discourse; +At times dear poets, whom some view +Transcendent or subdued evoked +To speak the memorable, the true, +The luminous as a moon uncloaked; +For proof that there, among earth's dumb, +A soul had passed and said our best. +Or it might be we chimed on some +Historic favourite's astral crest, +With part to reverence in its gleam, +And part to rivalry the shout: +So royal, unuttered, is youth's dream +Of power within to strike without. +But most the silences were sweet, +Like mothers' breasts, to bid it feel +It lived in such divine conceit +As envies aught we stamp for real. + +To either then an untold tale +Was Life, and author, hero, we. +The chapters holding peaks to scale, +Or depths to fathom, made our glee; +For we were armed of inner fires, +Unbled in us the ripe desires; +And passion rolled a quiet sea, +Whereon was Love the phantom sail. + + + +AT THE CLOSE + + + +To Thee, dear God of Mercy, both appeal, +Who straightway sound the call to arms. Thou know'st; +And that black spot in each embattled host, +Spring of the blood-stream, later wilt reveal. +Now is it red artillery and white steel; +Till on a day will ring the victor's boast, +That 'tis Thy chosen towers uppermost, +Where Thy rejected grovels under heel. +So in all times of man's descent insane +To brute, did strength and craft combining strike, +Even as a God of Armies, his fell blow. +But at the close he entered Thy domain, +Dear God of Mercy, and if lion-like +He tore the fall'n, the Eternal was his Foe. + + + +A GARDEN IDYL + + + +With sagest craft Arachne worked +Her web, and at a corner lurked, +Awaiting what should plump her soon, +To case it in the death-cocoon. +Sagaciously her home she chose +For visits that would never close; +Inside my chalet-porch her feast +Plucked all the winds but chill North-east. + +The finished structure, bar on bar, +Had snatched from light to form a star, +And struck on sight, when quick with dews, +Like music of the very Muse. +Great artists pass our single sense; +We hear in seeing, strung to tense; +Then haply marvel, groan mayhap, +To think such beauty means a trap. +But Nature's genius, even man's +At best, is practical in plans; +Subservient to the needy thought, +However rare the weapon wrought. +As long as Nature holds it good +To urge her creatures' quest for food +Will beauty stamp the just intent +Of weapons upon service bent. +For beauty is a flower of roots +Embedded lower than our boots; +Out of the primal strata springs, +And shows for crown of useful things + +Arachne's dream of prey to size +Aspired; so she could nigh despise +The puny specks the breezes round +Supplied, and let them shake unwound; +Assured of her fat fly to come; +Perhaps a blue, the spider's plum; +Who takes the fatal odds in fight, +And gives repast an appetite, +By plunging, whizzing, till his wings +Are webbed, and in the lists he swings, +A shrouded lump, for her to see +Her banquet in her victory. + +This matron of the unnumbered threads, +One day of dandelions' heads +Distributing their gray perruques +Up every gust, I watched with looks +Discreet beside the chalet-door; +And gracefully a light wind bore, +Direct upon my webster's wall, +A monster in the form of ball; +The mildest captive ever snared, +That neither struggled nor despaired, +On half the net invading hung, +And plain as in her mother tongue, +While low the weaver cursed her lures, +Remarked, "You have me; I am yours." + +Thrice magnified, in phantom shape, +Her dream of size she saw, agape. +Midway the vast round-raying beard +A desiccated midge appeared; +Whose body pricked the name of meal, +Whose hair had growth in earth's unreal; +Provocative of dread and wrath, +Contempt and horror, in one froth, +Inextricable, insensible, +His poison presence there would dwell, +Declaring him her dream fulfilled, +A catch to compliment the skilled; +And she reduced to beaky skin, +Disgraceful among kith and kin + +Against her corner, humped and aged, +Arachne wrinkled, past enraged, +Beyond disgust or hope in guile. +Ridiculously volatile +He seemed to her last spark of mind; +And that in pallid ash declined +Beneath the blow by knowledge dealt, +Wherein throughout her frame she felt +That he, the light wind's libertine, +Without a scoff, without a grin, +And mannered like the courtly few, +Who merely danced when light winds blew, +Impervious to beak and claws, +Tradition's ruinous Whitebeard was; +Of whom, as actors in old scenes, +Had grannam weavers warned their weans, +With word, that less than feather-weight, +He smote the web like bolt of Fate. + +This muted drama, hour by hour, +I watched amid a world in flower, +Ere yet Autumnal threads had laid +Their gray-blue o'er the grass's blade, +And still along the garden-run +The blindworm stretched him, drunk of sun. +Arachne crouched unmoved; perchance +Her visitor performed a dance; +She puckered thinner; he the same +As when on that light wind he came. + +Next day was told what deeds of night +Were done; the web had vanished quite; +With it the strange opposing pair; +And listless waved on vacant air, +For her adieu to heart's content, +A solitary filament. + + + +A READING OF LIFE--THE VITAL CHOICE + + + +I + +Or shall we run with Artemis +Or yield the breast to Aphrodite? +Both are mighty; +Both give bliss; +Each can torture if divided; +Each claims worship undivided, +In her wake would have us wallow. + +II + +Youth must offer on bent knees +Homage unto one or other; +Earth, the mother, +This decrees; +And unto the pallid Scyther +Either points us shun we either +Shun or too devoutly follow. + + + +A READING OF LIFE--WITH THE HUNTRESS + + + +Through the water-eye of night, +Midway between eve and dawn, +See the chase, the rout, the flight +In deep forest; oread, faun, +Goat-foot, antlers laid on neck; +Ravenous all the line for speed. +See yon wavy sparkle beck +Sign of the Virgin Lady's lead. +Down her course a serpent star +Coils and shatters at her heels; +Peals the horn exulting, peals +Plaintive, is it near or far. +Huntress, arrowy to pursue, +In and out of woody glen, +Under cliffs that tear the blue, +Over torrent, over fen, +She and forest, where she skims +Feathery, darken and relume: +Those are her white-lightning limbs +Cleaving loads of leafy gloom. +Mountains hear her and call back, +Shrewd with night: a frosty wail +Distant: her the emerald vale +Folds, and wonders in her track. +Now her retinue is lean, +Many rearward; streams the chase +Eager forth of covert; seen +One hot tide the rapturous race. +Quiver-charged and crescent-crowned, +Up on a flash the lighted mound +Leaps she, bow to shoulder, shaft +Strung to barb with archer's craft, +Legs like plaited lyre-chords, feet +Songs to see, past pitch of sweet. +Fearful swiftness they outrun, +Shaggy wildness, grey or dun, +Challenge, charge of tusks elude: +Theirs the dance to tame the rude; +Beast, and beast in manhood tame, +Follow we their silver flame. +Pride of flesh from bondage free, +Reaping vigour of its waste, +Marks her servitors, and she +Sanctifies the unembraced. +Nought of perilous she reeks; +Valour clothes her open breast; +Sweet beyond the thrill of sex; +Hallowed by the sex confessed. +Huntress arrowy to pursue, +Colder she than sunless dew, +She, that breath of upper air; +Ay, but never lyrist sang, +Draught of Bacchus never sprang +Blood the bliss of Gods to share, +High o'er sweep of eagle wings, +Like the run with her, when rings +Clear her rally, and her dart, +In the forest's cavern heart, +Tells of her victorious aim. +Then is pause and chatter, cheer, +Laughter at some satyr lame, +Looks upon the fallen deer, +Measuring his noble crest; +Here a favourite in her train, +Foremost mid her nymphs, caressed; +All applauded. Shall she reign +Worshipped? O to be with her there! +She, that breath of nimble air, +Lifts the breast to giant power. +Maid and man, and man and maid, +Who each other would devour +Elsewhere, by the chase betrayed, +There are comrades, led by her, +Maid-preserver, man-maker. + + + +A READING OF LIFE--WITH THE PERSUADER + + + +Who murmurs, hither, hither: who +Where nought is audible so fills the ear? +Where nought is visible can make appear +A veil with eyes that waver through, +Like twilight's pledge of blessed night to come, +Or day most golden? All unseen and dumb, +She breathes, she moves, inviting flees, +Is lost, and leaves the thrilled desire +To clasp and strike a slackened lyre, +Till over smiles of hyacinth seas, +Flame in a crystal vessel sails +Beneath a dome of jewelled spray, +For land that drops the rosy day +On nights of throbbing nightingales. + +Landward did the wonder flit, +Or heart's desire of her, all earth in it. +We saw the heavens fling down their rose; +On rapturous waves we saw her glide; +The pearly sea-shell half enclose; +The shoal of sea-nymphs flush the tide; +And we, afire to kiss her feet, no more +Behold than tracks along a startled shore, +With brightened edges of dark leaves that feign +An ambush hoped, as heartless night remain. + +More closely, warmly: hither, hither! she, +The very she called forth by ripened blood +For its next breath of being, murmurs; she, +Allurement; she, fulfilment; she, +The stream within us urged to flood; +Man's cry, earth's answer, heaven's consent; O she, +Maid, woman and divinity; +Our over-earthly, inner-earthly mate +Unmated; she, our hunger and our fruit +Untasted; she our written fate +Unread; Life's flowering, Life's root: +Unread, divined; unseen, beheld; +The evanescent, ever-present she, +Great Nature's stern necessity +In radiance clothed, to softness quelled; +With a sword's edge of sweetness keen to take +Our breath for bliss, our hearts for fulness break. + +The murmur hushes down, the veil is rent. +Man's cry, earth's answer, heaven's consent, +Her form is given to pardoned sight, +And lets our mortal eyes receive +The sovereign loveliness of celestial white; +Adored by them who solitarily pace, +In dusk of the underworld's perpetual eve, +The paths among the meadow asphodel, +Remembering. Never there her face +Is planetary; reddens to shore sea-shell +Around such whiteness the enamoured air +Of noon that clothes her, never there. +Daughter of light, the joyful light, +She stands unveiled to nuptial sight, +Sweet in her disregard of aid +Divine to conquer or persuade. +A fountain jets from moss; a flower +Bends gently where her sunset tresses shower. +By guerdon of her brilliance may be seen +With eyelids unabashed the passion's Queen. + +Shorn of attendant Graces she can use +Her natural snares to make her will supreme. +A simple nymph it is, inclined to muse +Before the leader foot shall dip in stream: +One arm at curve along a rounded thigh; +Her firm new breasts each pointing its own way +A knee half bent to shade its fellow shy, +Where innocence, not nature, signals nay. +The bud of fresh virginity awaits +The wooer, and all roseate will she burst: +She touches on the hour of happy mates; +Still is she unaware she wakens thirst. + +And while commanding blissful sight believe +It holds her as a body strained to breast, +Down on the underworld's perpetual eve +She plunges the possessor dispossessed; +And bids believe that image, heaving warm, +Is lost to float like torch-smoke after flame; +The phantom any breeze blows out of form; +A thirst's delusion, a defeated aim. + +The rapture shed the torture weaves; +The direst blow on human heart she deals: +The pain to know the seen deceives; +Nought true but what insufferably feels. +And stabs of her delicious note, +That is as heavenly light to hearing, heard +Through shelter leaves, the laughter from her throat, +We answer as the midnight's morning's bird. + +She laughs, she wakens gleeful cries; +In her delicious laughter part revealed; +Yet mother is she more of moans and sighs, +For longings unappeased and wounds unhealed. +Yet would she bless, it is her task to bless: +Yon folded couples, passing under shade, +Are her rich harvest; bidden caress, caress, +Consume the fruit in bloom; not disobeyed. +We dolorous complainers had a dream, +Wrought on the vacant air from inner fire, +We saw stand bare of her celestial beam +The glorious Goddess, and we dared desire. + +Thereat are shown reproachful eyes, and lips +Of upward curl to meanings half obscure; +And glancing where a wood-nymph lightly skips +She nods: at once that creature wears her lure. +Blush of our being between birth and death: +Sob of our ripened blood for its next breath: +Her wily semblance nought of her denies; +Seems it the Goddess runs, the Goddess hies, +The generous Goddess yields. And she can arm +Her dwarfed and twisted with her secret charm; +Benevolent as Earth to feed her own. +Fully shall they be fed, if they beseech. +But scorn she has for them that walk alone; +Blanched men, starved women, whom no arts can pleach. +The men as chief of criminals she disdains, +And holds the reason in perceptive thought. +More pitiable, like rivers lacking rains, +Kissing cold stones, the women shrink for drought. +Those faceless discords, out of nature strayed, +Rank of the putrefaction ere decayed, +In impious singles bear the thorny wreaths: +Their lives are where harmonious Pleasure breathes +For couples crowned with flowers that burn in dew. +Comes there a tremor of night's forest horn +Across her garden from the insaner crew, +She darkens to malignity of scorn. +A shiver courses through her garden-grounds: +Grunt of the tusky boar, the baying hounds, +The hunter's shouts, are heard afar, and bring +Dead on her heart her crimsoned flower of Spring. +These, the irreverent of Life's design, +Division between natural and divine +Would cast; these vaunting barrenness for best, +In veins of gathered strength Life's tide arrest; +And these because the roses flood their cheeks, +Vow them in nature wise as when Love speaks. +With them is war; and well the Goddess knows +What undermines the race who mount the rose; +How the ripe moment, lodged in slumberous hours, +Enkindled by persuasion overpowers: +Why weak as are her frailer trailing weeds, +The strong when Beauty gleams o'er Nature's needs, +And timely guile unguarded finds them lie. +They who her sway withstand a sea defy, +At every point of juncture must be proof; +Nor look for mercy from the incessant surge +Her forces mixed of craft and passion urge +For the one whelming wave to spring aloof. +She, tenderness, is pitiless to them +Resisting in her godhead nature's truth. +No flower their face shall be, but writhen stem; +Their youth a frost, their age the dirge for youth. +These miserably disinclined, +The lamentably unembraced, +Insult the Pleasures Earth designed +To people and beflower the waste. +Wherefore the Pleasures pass them by: +For death they live, in life they die. + +Her head the Goddess from them turns, +As from grey mounds of ashes in bronze urns. +She views her quivering couples unconsoled, +And of her beauty mirror they become, +Like orchard blossoms, apple, pear and plum, +Free of the cloud, beneath the flood of gold. +Crowned with wreaths that burn in dew, +Her couples whirl, sun-satiated, +Athirst for shade, they sigh, they wed, +They play the music made of two: +Oldest of earth, earth's youngest till earth's end: +Cunninger than the numbered strings, +For melodies, for harmonies, +For mastered discords, and the things +Not vocable, whose mysteries +Are inmost Love's, Life's reach of Life extend. + +Is it an anguish overflowing shame +And the tongue's pudency confides to her, +With eyes of embers, breath of incense myrrh, +The woman's marrow in some dear youth's name, +Then is the Goddess tenderness +Maternal, and she has a sister's tones +Benign to soothe intemperate distress, +Divide despair from hope, and sighs from moans. +Her gentleness imparts exhaling ease +To those of her milk-bearer votaries +As warm of bosom-earth as she; of the source +Direct; erratic but in heart's excess; +Being mortal and ill-matched for Love's great force; +Like green leaves caught with flames by his impress. +And pray they under skies less overcast, +That swiftly may her star of eve descend, +Her lustrous morning star fly not too fast, +To lengthen blissful night will she befriend. + +Unfailing her reply to woman's voice +In supplication instant. Is it man's, +She hears, approves his words, her garden scans, +And him: the flowers are various, he has choice. +Perchance his wound is deep; she listens long; +Enjoys what music fills the plaintive song; +And marks how he, who would be hawk at poise +Above the bird, his plaintive song enjoys. + +She reads him when his humbled manhood weeps +To her invoked: distraction is implored. +A smile, and he is up on godlike leaps +Above, with his bright Goddess owned the adored. +His tales of her declare she condescends; +Can share his fires, not always goads and rends: +Moreover, quits a throne, and must enclose +A queenlier gem than woman's wayside rose. +She bends, he quickens; she breathes low, he springs +Enraptured; low she laughs, his woes disperse; +Aloud she laughs and sweeps his varied strings. +'Tis taught him how for touch of mournful verse +Rarely the music made of two ascends, +And Beauty's Queen some other way is won. +Or it may solve the riddle, that she lends +Herself to all, and yields herself to none, +Save heavenliest: though claims by men are raised +In hot assurance under shade of doubt: +And numerous are the images bepraised +As Beauty's Queen, should passion head the rout. + +Be sure the ruddy hue is Love's: to woo +Love's Fountain we must mount the ruddy hue. +That is her garden's precept, seen where shines +Her blood-flower, and its unsought neighbour pines. +Daughter of light, the joyful light, +She bids her couples face full East, +Reflecting radiance, even when from her feast +Their outstretched arms brown deserts disunite, +The lion-haunted thickets hold apart. +In love the ruddy hue declares great heart; +High confidence in her whose aid is lent +To lovers lifting the tuned instrument, +Not one of rippled strings and funeral tone. +And doth the man pursue a tightened zone, +Then be it as the Laurel God he runs, +Confirmed to win, with countenance the Sun's. + +Should pity bless the tremulous voice of woe +He lifts for pity, limp his offspring show. +For him requiring woman's arts to please +Infantile tastes with babe reluctances, +No race of giants! In the woman's veins +Persuasion ripely runs, through hers the pains. +Her choice of him, should kind occasion nod, +Aspiring blends the Titan with the God; +Yet unto dwarf and mortal, she, submiss +In her high Lady's mandate, yields the kiss; +And is it needed that Love's daintier brute +Be snared as hunter, she will tempt pursuit. +She is great Nature's ever intimate +In breast, and doth as ready handmaid wait, +Until perverted by her senseless male, +She plays the winding snake, the shrinking snail, +The flying deer, all tricks of evil fame, +Elusive to allure, since he grew tame. + +Hence has the Goddess, Nature's earliest Power, +And greatest and most present, with her dower +Of the transcendent beauty, gained repute +For meditated guile. She laughs to hear +A charge her garden's labyrinths scarce confute, +Her garden's histories tell of to all near. +Let it be said, But less upon her guile +Doth she rely for her immortal smile. +Still let the rumour spread, and terror screens +To push her conquests by the simplest means. +While man abjures not lustihead, nor swerves +From earth's good labours, Beauty's Queen he serves. + +Her spacious garden and her garden's grant +She offers in reward for handsome cheer: +Choice of the nymphs whose looks will slant +The secret down a dewy leer +Of corner eyelids into haze: +Many a fair Aphrosyne +Like flower-bell to honey-bee: +And here they flicker round the maze +Bewildering him in heart and head: +And here they wear the close demure, +With subtle peeps to reassure: +Others parade where love has bled, +And of its crimson weave their mesh: +Others to snap of fingers leap, +As bearing breast with love asleep. +These are her laughters in the flesh. +Or would she fit a warrior mood, +She lights her seeming unsubdued, +And indicates the fortress-key. +Or is it heart for heart that craves, +She flecks along a run of waves +The one to promise deeper sea. + +Bands of her limpid primitives, +Or patterned in the curious braid, +Are the blest man's; and whatsoever he gives, +For what he gives is he repaid. +Good is it if by him 'tis held +He wins the fairest ever welled +From Nature's founts: she whispers it: Even I +Not fairer! and forbids him to deny, +Else little is he lover. Those he clasps, +Intent as tempest, worshipful as prayer, - +And be they doves or be they asps, - +Must seem to him the sovereignty fair; +Else counts he soon among life's wholly tamed. +Him whom from utter savage she reclaimed, +Half savage must he stay, would he be crowned +The lover. Else, past ripeness, deathward bound, +He reasons; and the totterer Earth detests, +Love shuns, grim logic screws in grasp, is he. +Doth man divide divine Necessity +From Joy, between the Queen of Beauty's breasts +A sword is driven; for those most glorious twain +Present her; armed to bless and to constrain. +Of this he perishes; not she, the throned +On rocks that spout their springs to the sacred mounts. +A loftier Reason out of deeper founts +Earth's chosen Goddess bears: by none disowned +While red blood runs to swell the pulse, she boasts, +And Beauty, like her star, descends the sky; +Earth's answer, heaven's consent unto man's cry, +Uplifted by the innumerable hosts. + +Quickened of Nature's eye and ear, +When the wild sap at high tide smites +Within us; or benignly clear +To vision; or as the iris lights +On fluctuant waters; she is ours +Till set of man: the dreamed, the seen; +Flushing the world with odorous flowers: +A soft compulsion on terrene +By heavenly: and the world is hers +While hunger after Beauty spurs. + +So is it sung in any space +She fills, with laugh at shallow laws +Forbidding love's devised embrace, +The music Beauty from it draws. + + + +A READING OF LIFE--THE TEST OF MANHOOD + + + +Like a flood river whirled at rocky banks, +An army issues out of wilderness, +With battle plucking round its ragged flanks; +Obstruction in the van; insane excess +Oft at the heart; yet hard the onward stress +Unto more spacious, where move ordered ranks, +And rise hushed temples built of shapely stone, +The work of hands not pledged to grind or slay. +They gave our earth a dress of flesh on bone; +A tongue to speak with answering heaven gave they. +Then was the gracious birth of man's new day; +Divided from the haunted night it shone. + +That quiet dawn was Reverence; whereof sprang +Ethereal Beauty in full morningtide. +Another sun had risen to clasp his bride: +It was another earth unto him sang. + +Came Reverence from the Huntress on her heights? +From the Persuader came it, in those vales +Whereunto she melodiously invites, +Her troops of eager servitors regales? +Not far those two great Powers of Nature speed +Disciple steps on earth when sole they lead; +Nor either points for us the way of flame. +From him predestined mightier it came; +His task to hold them both in breast, and yield +Their dues to each, and of their war be field. + +The foes that in repulsion never ceased, +Must he, who once has been the goodly beast +Of one or other, at whose beck he ran, +Constrain to make him serviceable man; +Offending neither, nor the natural claim +Each pressed, denying, for his true man's name. + +Ah, what a sweat of anguish in that strife +To hold them fast conjoined within him still; +Submissive to his will +Along the road of life! +And marvel not he wavered if at whiles +The forward step met frowns, the backward smiles. +For Pleasure witched him her sweet cup to drain; +Repentance offered ecstasy in pain. +Delicious licence called it Nature's cry; +Ascetic rigours crushed the fleshly sigh; +A tread on shingle timed his lame advance +Flung as the die of Bacchanalian Chance, +He of the troubled marching army leaned +On godhead visible, on godhead screened; +The radiant roseate, the curtained white; +Yet sharp his battle strained through day, through night. + +He drank of fictions, till celestial aid +Might seem accorded when he fawned and prayed; +Sagely the generous Giver circumspect, +To choose for grants the egregious, his elect; +And ever that imagined succour slew +The soul of brotherhood whence Reverence drew. + +In fellowship religion has its founts: +The solitary his own God reveres: +Ascend no sacred Mounts +Our hungers or our fears. +As only for the numbers Nature's care +Is shown, and she the personal nothing heeds, +So to Divinity the spring of prayer +From brotherhood the one way upward leads. +Like the sustaining air +Are both for flowers and weeds. +But he who claims in spirit to be flower, +Will find them both an air that doth devour. + +Whereby he smelt his treason, who implored +External gifts bestowed but on the sword; +Beheld himself, with less and less disguise, +Through those blood-cataracts which dimmed his eyes, +His army's foe, condemned to strive and fail; +See a black adversary's ghost prevail; +Never, though triumphs hailed him, hope to win +While still the conflict tore his breast within. + +Out of that agony, misread for those +Imprisoned Powers warring unappeased, +The ghost of his black adversary rose, +To smother light, shut heaven, show earth diseased. +And long with him was wrestling ere emerged +A mind to read in him the reflex shade +Of its fierce torment; this way, that way urged; +By craven compromises hourly swayed. + +Crouched as a nestling, still its wings untried, +The man's mind opened under weight of cloud. +To penetrate the dark was it endowed; +Stood day before a vision shooting wide. +Whereat the spectral enemy lost form; +The traversed wilderness exposed its track. +He felt the far advance in looking back; +Thence trust in his foot forward through the storm. + +Under the low-browed tempest's eye of ire, +That ere it lightened smote a coward heart, +Earth nerved her chastened son to hail athwart +All ventures perilous his shrouded Sire; +A stranger still, religiously divined; +Not yet with understanding read aright. +But when the mind, the cherishable mind, +The multitude's grave shepherd, took full flight, +Himself as mirror raised among his kind, +He saw, and first of brotherhood had sight: +Knew that his force to fly, his will to see, +His heart enlarged beyond its ribbed domain, +Had come of many a grip in mastery, +Which held conjoined the hostile rival twain, +And of his bosom made him lord, to keep +The starry roof of his unruffled frame +Awake to earth, to heaven, and plumb the deep +Below, above, aye with a wistful aim. + +The mastering mind in him, by tempests blown, +By traitor inmates baited, upward burned; +Perforce of growth, the Master mind discerned, +The Great Unseen, nowise the Dark Unknown. +To whom unwittingly did he aspire +In wilderness, where bitter was his need: +To whom in blindness, as an earthy seed +For light and air, he struck through crimson mire. +But not ere he upheld a forehead lamp, +And viewed an army, once the seeming doomed, +All choral in its fruitful garden camp, +The spiritual the palpable illumed. + +This gift of penetration and embrace, +His prize from tidal battles lost or won, +Reveals the scheme to animate his race: +How that it is a warfare but begun; +Unending; with no Power to interpose; +No prayer, save for strength to keep his ground, +Heard of the Highest; never battle's close, +The victory complete and victor crowned: +Nor solace in defeat, save from that sense +Of strength well spent, which is the strength renewed. +In manhood must he find his competence; +In his clear mind the spiritual food: +God being there while he his fight maintains; +Throughout his mind the Master Mind being there, +While he rejects the suicide despair; +Accepts the spur of explicable pains; +Obedient to Nature, not her slave: +Her lord, if to her rigid laws he bows; +Her dust, if with his conscience he plays knave, +And bids the Passions on the Pleasures browse:- +Whence Evil in a world unread before; +That mystery to simple springs resolved. +His God the Known, diviner to adore, +Shows Nature's savage riddles kindly solved. +Inconscient, insensitive, she reigns +In iron laws, though rapturous fair her face. +Back to the primal brute shall he retrace +His path, doth he permit to force her chains +A soft Persuader coursing through his veins, +An icy Huntress stringing to the chase: +What one the flash disdains; +What one so gives it grace. + +But is he rightly manful in her eyes, +A splendid bloodless knight to gain the skies, +A blood-hot son of Earth by all her signs, +Desireing and desireable he shines; +As peaches, that have caught the sun's uprise +And kissed warm gold till noonday, even as vines. +Earth fills him with her juices, without fear +That she will cast him drunken down the steeps. +All woman is she to this man most dear; +He sows for bread, and she in spirit reaps: +She conscient, she sensitive, in him; +With him enwound, his brave ambition hers: +By him humaner made; by his keen spurs +Pricked to race past the pride in giant limb, +Her crazy adoration of big thews, +Proud in her primal sons, when crags they hurled, +Were thunder spitting lightnings on the world +In daily deeds, and she their evening Muse. + +This man, this hero, works not to destroy; +This godlike--as the rock in ocean stands; - +He of the myriad eyes, the myriad hands +Creative; in his edifice has joy. +How strength may serve for purity is shown +When he himself can scourge to make it clean. +Withal his pitch of pride would not disown +A sober world that walks the balanced mean +Between its tempters, rarely overthrown: +And such at times his army's march has been. + +Near is he to great Nature in the thought +Each changing Season intimately saith, +That nought save apparition knows the death; +To the God-lighted mind of man 'tis nought. +She counts not loss a word of any weight; +It may befal his passions and his greeds +To lose their treasures, like the vein that bleeds, +But life gone breathless will she reinstate. + +Close on the heart of Earth his bosom beats, +When he the mandate lodged in it obeys, +Alive to breast a future wrapped in haze, +Strike camp, and onward, like the wind's cloud-fleets. +Unresting she, unresting he, from change +To change, as rain of cloud, as fruit of rain; +She feels her blood-tree throbbing in her grain, +Yet skyward branched, with loftier mark and range. + +No miracle the sprout of wheat from clod, +She knows, nor growth of man in grisly brute; +But he, the flower at head and soil at root, +Is miracle, guides he the brute to God. +And that way seems he bound; that way the road, +With his dark-lantern mind, unled, alone, +Wearifully through forest-tracts unsown, +He travels, urged by some internal goad. + +Dares he behold the thing he is, what thing +He would become is in his mind its child; +Astir, demanding birth to light and wing; +For battle prompt, by pleasure unbeguiled. +So moves he forth in faith, if he has made +His mind God's temple, dedicate to truth. +Earth's nourishing delights, no more gainsaid, +He tastes, as doth the bridegroom rich in youth. +Then knows he Love, that beckons and controls; +The star of sky upon his footway cast; +Then match in him who holds his tempters fast, +The body's love and mind's, whereof the soul's. +Then Earth her man for woman finds at last, +To speed the pair unto her goal of goals. + +Or is't the widowed's dream of her new mate? +Seen has she virulent days of heat in flood; +The sly Persuader snaky in his blood; +With her the barren Huntress alternate; +His rough refractory off on kicking heels +To rear; the man dragged rearward, shamed, amazed; +And as a torrent stream where cattle grazed, +His tumbled world. What, then, the faith she feels? +May not his aspect, like her own so fair +Reflexively, the central force belie, +And he, the once wild ocean storming sky, +Be rebel at the core? What hope is there? + +'Tis that in each recovery he preserves, +Between his upper and his nether wit, +Sense of his march ahead, more brightly lit; +He less the shaken thing of lusts and nerves; +With such a grasp upon his brute as tells +Of wisdom from that vile relapsing spun. +A Sun goes down in wasted fire, a Sun +Resplendent springs, to faith refreshed compels. + + + +THE HUELESS LOVE + + + +Unto that love must we through fire attain, +Which those two held as breath of common air; +The hands of whom were given in bond elsewhere; +Whom Honour was untroubled to restrain. + +Midway the road of our life's term they met, +And one another knew without surprise; +Nor cared that beauty stood in mutual eyes; +Nor at their tardy meeting nursed regret. + +To them it was revealed how they had found +The kindred nature and the needed mind; +The mate by long conspiracy designed; +The flower to plant in sanctuary ground. + +Avowed in vigilant solicitude +For either, what most lived within each breast +They let be seen: yet every human test +Demanding righteousness approved them good. + +She leaned on a strong arm, and little feared +Abandonment to help if heaved or sank +Her heart at intervals while Love looked blank, +Life rosier were she but less revered. + +An arm that never shook did not obscure +Her woman's intuition of the bliss - +Their tempter's moment o'er the black abyss, +Across the narrow plank--he could abjure. + +Then came a day that clipped for him the thread, +And their first touch of lips, as he lay cold, +Was all of earthly in their love untold, +Beyond all earthly known to them who wed. + +So has there come the gust at South-west flung +By sudden volt on eves of freezing mist, +When sister snowflake sister snowdrop kissed, +And one passed out, and one the bell-head hung. + + + +UNION IN DISSEVERANCE + + + +Sunset worn to its last vermilion he; +She that star overhead in slow descent: +That white star with the front of angel she; +He undone in his rays of glory spent + +Halo, fair as the bow-shot at his rise, +He casts round her, and knows his hour of rest +Incomplete, were the light for which he dies, +Less like joy of the dove that wings to nest. + +Lustrous momently, near on earth she sinks; +Life's full throb over breathless and abased: +Yet stand they, though impalpable the links, +One, more one than the bridally embraced. + + + +SONG IN THE SONGLESS + + + +They have no song, the sedges dry, +And still they sing. +It is within my breast they sing, +As I pass by. +Within my breast they touch a string, +They wake a sigh. +There is but sound of sedges dry; +In me they sing. + + + +THE BURDEN OF STRENGTH + + + +If that thou hast the gift of strength, then know +Thy part is to uplift the trodden low; +Else in a giant's grasp until the end +A hopeless wrestler shall thy soul contend. + + + +THE MAIN REGRET + + + +[Written for the Charing Cross Album] + +I + +Seen, too clear and historic within us, our sins of omission +Frown when the Autumn days strike us all ruthlessly bare. +They of our mortal diseases find never healing physician; +Errors they of the soul, past the one hope to repair. + +II + +Sunshine might we have been unto seed under soil, or have scattered +Seed to ascendant suns brighter than any that shone. +Even the limp-legged beggar a sick desperado has flattered +Back to a half-sloughed life cheered by the mere human tone. + + + +ALTERNATION + + + +Between the fountain and the rill +I passed, and saw the mighty will +To leap at sky; the careless run, +As earth would lead her little son. + +Beneath them throbs an urgent well, +That here is play, and there is war. +I know not which had most to tell +Of whence we spring and what we are. + + + +FOREST HISTORY + + + +I + +Beneath the vans of doom did men pass in. +Heroic who came out; for round them hung +A wavering phantom's red volcano tongue, +With league-long lizard tail and fishy fin: + +II + +Old Earth's original Dragon; there retired +To his last fastness; overthrown by few. +Him a laborious thrust of roadway slew. +Then man to play devorant straight was fired. + +III + +More intimate became the forest fear +While pillared darkness hatched malicious life +At either elbow, wolf or gnome or knife +And wary slid the glance from ear to ear. + +IV + +In chillness, like a clouded lantern-ray, +The forest's heart of fog on mossed morass, +On purple pool and silky cotton-grass, +Revealed where lured the swallower byway. + +V + +Dead outlook, flattened back with hard rebound +Off walls of distance, left each mounted height. +It seemed a giant hag-fiend, churning spite +Of humble human being, held the ground. + +VI + +Through friendless wastes, through treacherous woodland, slow +The feet sustained by track of feet pursued +Pained steps, and found the common brotherhood +By sign of Heaven indifferent, Nature foe. + +VII + +Anon a mason's work amazed the sight, +And long-frocked men, called Brothers, there abode. +They pointed up, bowed head, and dug and sowed; +Whereof was shelter, loaf, and warm firelight. + +VIII + +What words they taught were nails to scratch the head. +Benignant works explained the chanting brood. +Their monastery lit black solitude, +As one might think a star that heavenward led. + +IX + +Uprose a fairer nest for weary feet, +Like some gold flower nightly inward curled, +Where gentle maidens fled a roaring world, +Or played with it, and had their white retreat. + +X + +Into big books of metal clasps they pored. +They governed, even as men; they welcomed lays. +The treasures women are whose aim is praise, +Was shown in them: the Garden half restored. + +XI + +A deluge billow scoured the land off seas, +With widened jaws, and slaughter was its foam. +For food, for clothing, ambush, refuge, home, +The lesser savage offered bogs and trees. + +XII + +Whence reverence round grey-haired story grew: +And inmost spots of ancient horror shone +As temples under beams of trials bygone; +For in them sang brave times with God in view. + +XIII + +Till now trim homesteads bordered spaces green, +Like night's first little stars through clearing showers. +Was rumoured how a castle's falcon towers +The wilderness commanded with fierce mien. + +XIV + +Therein a serious Baron stuck his lance; +For minstrel songs a beauteous Dame would pout. +Gay knights and sombre, felon or devout, +Pricked onward, bound for their unsung romance. + +XV + +It might be that two errant lords across +The block of each came edged, and at sharp cry +They charged forthwith, the better man to try. +One rode his way, one couched on quiet moss. + +XVI + +Perchance a lady sweet, whose lord lay slain, +The robbers into gruesome durance drew. +Swift should her hero come, like lightning's blue! +She prayed for him, as crackling drought for rain. + +XVII + +As we, that ere the worst her hero haps, +Of Angels guided, nigh that loathly den: +A toady cave beside an ague fen, +Where long forlorn the lone dog whines and yaps. + +XVIII + +By daylight now the forest fear could read +Itself, and at new wonders chuckling went. +Straight for the roebuck's neck the bowman spent +A dart that laughed at distance and at speed. + +XIX + +Right loud the bugle's hallali elate +Rang forth of merry dingles round the tors; +And deftest hand was he from foreign wars, +But soon he hailed the home-bred yeoman mate. + +XX + +Before the blackbird pecked the turf they woke; +At dawn the deer's wet nostrils blew their last. +To forest, haunt of runs and prime repast, +With paying blows, the yokel strained his yoke. + +XXI + +The city urchin mooned on forest air, +On grassy sweeps and flying arrows, thick +As swallows o'er smooth streams, and sighed him sick +For thinking that his dearer home was there. + +XXII + +Familiar, still unseized, the forest sprang +An old-world echo, like no mortal thing. +The hunter's horn might wind a jocund ring, +But held in ear it had a chilly clang. + +XXIII + +Some shadow lurked aloof of ancient time; +Some warning haunted any sound prolonged, +As though the leagues of woodland held them wronged +To hear an axe and see a township climb. + +XXIV + +The forest's erewhile emperor at eve +Had voice when lowered heavens drummed for gales. +At midnight a small people danced the dales, +So thin that they might dwindle through a sieve + +XXV + +Ringed mushrooms told of them, and in their throats, +Old wives that gathered herbs and knew too much. +The pensioned forester beside his crutch, +Struck showers from embers at those bodeful notes. + +XXVI + +Came then the one, all ear, all eye, all heart; +Devourer, and insensibly devoured; +In whom the city over forest flowered, +The forest wreathed the city's drama-mart. + +XXVII + +There found he in new form that Dragon old, +From tangled solitudes expelled; and taught +How blindly each its antidote besought; +For either's breath the needs of either told. + +XXVIII + +Now deep in woods, with song no sermon's drone, +He showed what charm the human concourse works: +Amid the press of men, what virtue lurks +Where bubble sacred wells of wildness lone. + +XXIX + +Our conquest these: if haply we retain +The reverence that ne'er will overrun +Due boundaries of realms from Nature won, +Nor let the poet's awe in rapture wane. + + + +THE INVECTIVE OF ACHILLES--Iliad, i. 149 + + + +"Heigh me! brazen of front, thou glutton for plunder, how can one, +Servant here to thy mandates, heed thee among our Achaians, +Either the mission hie on or stoutly do fight with the foemen? +I, not hither I fared on account of the spear-armed Trojans, +Pledged to the combat; they unto me have in nowise a harm done; +Never have they, of a truth, come lifting my horses or oxen; +Never in deep-soiled Phthia, the nurser of heroes, my harvests +Ravaged, they; for between us is numbered full many a darksome +Mountain, ay, therewith too the stretch of the windy sea-waters. +O hugely shameless! thee did we follow to hearten thee, justice +Pluck from the Dardans for him, Menelaos, thee too, thou dog-eyed! +Whereof little thy thought is, nought whatever thou reckest. +Worse, it is thou whose threat 'tis to ravish my prize from me, +portion +Won with much labour, the which my gift from the sons of Achaia. +Never, in sooth, have I known my prize equal thine when Achaians +Gave some flourishing populous Trojan town up to pillage. +Nay, sure, mine were the hands did most in the storm of the combat, +Yet when came peradventure share of the booty amongst us, +Bigger to thee went the prize, while I some small blessed thing bore +Off to the ships, my share of reward for my toil in the bloodshed! +So now go I to Phthia, for better by much it beseems me +Homeward go with my beaked ships now, and I hold not in prospect, +I being outraged, thou mayst gather here plunder and wealth-store." + + + +THE INVECTIVE OF ACHILLES--Iliad, i. 225 + + + +"Bibber besotted, with scowl of a cur, having heart of a deer, thou! +Never to join to thy warriors armed for the press of the conflict, +Never for ambush forth with the princeliest sons of Achaia +Dared thy soul, for to thee that thing would have looked as a death- +stroke. +Sooth, more easy it seems, down the lengthened array of Achaians, +Snatch at the prize of the one whose voice has been lifted against +thee. +Ravening king of the folk, for that thou hast thy rule over abjects; +Else, son of Atreus, now were this outrage on me thy last one. +Nay, but I tell thee, and I do swear a big oath on it likewise: +Yea, by the sceptre here, and it surely bears branches and leaf-buds +Never again, since first it was lopped from its trunk on the +mountains, +No more sprouting; for round it all clean has the sharp metal +clipped off +Leaves and the bark; ay, verify now do the sons of Achaia, +Guardian hands of the counsels of Zeus, pronouncing the judgement, +Hold it aloft; so now unto thee shall the oath have its portent; +Loud will the cry for Achilles burst from the sons of Achaia +Throughout the army, and thou chafe powerless, though in an anguish, +How to give succour when vast crops down under man-slaying Hector +Tumble expiring; and thou deep in thee shalt tear at thy heart- +strings, +Rage-wrung, thou, that in nought thou didst honour the flower of +Achaians." + + + +MARSHALLING OF THE ACHAIANS--Iliad, ii 455 + + + +Like as a terrible fire feeds fast on a forest enormous, +Up on a mountain height, and the blaze of it radiates round far, +So on the bright blest arms of the host in their march did the +splendour +Gleam wide round through the circle of air right up to the sky- +vault. +They, now, as when swarm thick in the air multitudinous winged +flocks, +Be it of geese or of cranes or the long-necked troops of the wild- +swans, +Off that Asian mead, by the flow of the waters of Kaistros; +Hither and yon fly they, and rejoicing in pride of their pinions, +Clamour, shaped to their ranks, and the mead all about them +resoundeth; +So those numerous tribes from their ships and their shelterings +poured forth +On that plain of Scamander, and horrible rumbled beneath them +Earth to the quick-paced feet of the men and the tramp of the horse- +hooves. +Stopped they then on the fair-flower'd field of Scamander, their +thousands +Many as leaves and the blossoms born of the flowerful season. +Even as countless hot-pressed flies in their multitudes traverse, +Clouds of them, under some herdsman's wonning, where then are the +milk-pails +Also, full of their milk, in the bountiful season of spring-time; +Even so thickly the long-haired sons of Achaia the plain held, +Prompt for the dash at the Trojan host, with the passion to crush +them. +Those, likewise, as the goatherds, eyeing their vast flocks of +goats, know +Easily one from the other when all get mixed o'er the pasture, +So did the chieftains rank them here there in their places for +onslaught, +Hard on the push of the fray; and among them King Agamemnon, +He, for his eyes and his head, as when Zeus glows glad in his +thunder, +He with the girdle of Ares, he with the breast of Poseidon. + + + +AGAMEMNON IN THE FIGHT--Iliad, xi, 148 + + + +These, then, he left, and away where ranks were now clashing the +thickest, +Onward rushed, and with him rushed all of the bright-greaved +Achaians. +Foot then footmen slew, that were flying from direful compulsion, +Horse at the horsemen (up from off under them mounted the dust- +cloud, +Up off the plain, raised up cloud-thick by the thundering horse- +hooves) +Hewed with the sword's sharp edge; and so meanwhile Lord Agamemnon +Followed, chasing and slaughtering aye, on-urgeing the Argives. + +Now, as when fire voracious catches the unclipped wood-land, +This way bears it and that the great whirl of the wind, and the +scrubwood +Stretches uptorn, flung forward alength by the fire's fury rageing, +So beneath Atreides Agamemnon heads of the scattered +Trojans fell; and in numbers amany the horses, neck-stiffened, +Rattled their vacant cars down the roadway gaps of the war-field, +Missing the blameless charioteers, but, for these, they were +outstretched +Flat upon earth, far dearer to vultures than to their home-mates. + + + +PARIS AND DIOMEDES--Iliad, xi, 378 + + + +So he, with a clear shout of laughter, +Forth of his ambush leapt, and he vaunted him, uttering thiswise: +"Hit thou art! not in vain flew the shaft; how by rights it had +pierced thee +Into the undermost gut, therewith to have rived thee of life-breath! +Following that had the Trojans plucked a new breath from their +direst, +They all frighted of thee, as the goats bleat in flight from a +lion." +Then unto him untroubled made answer stout Diomedes: +"Bow-puller, jiber, thy bow for thy glorying, spyer at virgins! +If that thou dared'st face me here out in the open with weapons, +Nothing then would avail thee thy bow and thy thick shot of arrows. +Now thou plumest thee vainly because of a graze of my footsole; +Reck I as were that stroke from a woman or some pettish infant. +Aye flies blunted the dart of the man that's emasculate, +noughtworth! +Otherwise hits, forth flying from me, and but strikes it the +slightest, +My keen shaft, and it numbers a man of the dead fallen straightway. +Torn, troth, then are the cheeks of the wife of that man fallen +slaughtered, +Orphans his babes, full surely he reddens the earth with his blood- +drops, +Rotting, round him the birds, more numerous they than the women." + + + +HYPNOS ON IDA--Iliad, xiv, 283 + + + +They then to fountain-abundant Ida, mother of wild beasts, +Came, and they first left ocean to fare over mainland at Lektos, +Where underneath of their feet waved loftiest growths of the +woodland. +There hung Hypnos fast, ere the vision of Zeus was observant, +Mounted upon a tall pine-tree, tallest of pines that on Ida +Lustily spring off soil for the shoot up aloft into aether. +There did he sit well-cloaked by the wide-branched pine for +concealment, +That loud bird, in his form like, that perched high up in the +mountains, +Chalkis is named by the Gods, but of mortals known as Kymindis. + + + +CLASH IN ARMS OF THE ACHAIANS AND TROJANS--Iliad, xvii, 426 + + + +Not the sea-wave so bellows abroad when it bursts upon shingle, +Whipped from the sea's deeps up by the terrible blast of the +Northwind; +Nay, nor is ever the roar of the fierce fire's rush so arousing, +Down along mountain-glades, when it surges to kindle a woodland; +Nay, nor so tonant thunders the stress of the gale in the oak-trees' +Foliage-tresses high, when it rages to raveing its utmost; +As rose then stupendous the Trojan's cry and Achaians', +Dread upshouting as one when together they clashed in the conflict. + + + +THE HORSES OF ACHILLES--Iliad, xvii, 426 + + + +So now the horses of Aiakides, off wide of the war-ground, +Wept, since first they were ware of their charioteer overthrown +there, +Cast down low in the whirl of the dust under man-slaying Hector. +Sooth, meanwhile, then did Automedon, brave son of Diores, +Oft, on the one hand, urge them with flicks of the swift whip, and +oft, too, +Coax entreatingly, hurriedly; whiles did he angrily threaten. +Vainly, for these would not to the ships, to the Hellespont +spacious, +Backward turn, nor be whipped to the battle among the Achaians. +Nay, as a pillar remains immovable, fixed on the tombstone, +Haply, of some dead man or it may be a woman there-under; +Even like hard stood they there attached to the glorious war-car, +Earthward bowed with their heads; and of them so lamenting incessant +Ran the hot teardrops downward on to the earth from their eyelids, +Mourning their charioteer; all their lustrous manes dusty-clotted, +Right side and left of the yoke-ring tossed, to the breadth of the +yoke-bow. +Now when the issue of Kronos beheld that sorrow, his head shook +Pitying them for their grief, these words then he spake in his +bosom; +"Why, ye hapless, gave we to Peleus you, to a mortal +Master; ye that are ageless both, ye both of you deathless! +Was it that ye among men most wretched should come to have heart- +grief? +'Tis most true, than the race of these men is there wretcheder +nowhere +Aught over earth's range found that is gifted with breath and has +movement." + + + +THE MARES OF THE CAMARGUE--From the 'Mireio' of Mistral + + + +A hundred mares, all white! their manes +Like mace-reed of the marshy plains +Thick-tufted, wavy, free o' the shears: +And when the fiery squadron rears +Bursting at speed, each mane appears +Even as the white scarf of a fay +Floating upon their necks along the heavens away. + +O race of humankind, take shame! +For never yet a hand could tame, +Nor bitter spur that rips the flanks subdue +The mares of the Camargue. I have known, +By treason snared, some captives shown; +Expatriate from their native Rhone, +Led off, their saline pastures far from view: + +And on a day, with prompt rebound, +They have flung their riders to the ground, +And at a single gallop, scouring free, +Wide-nostril'd to the wind, twice ten +Of long marsh-leagues devour'd, and then, +Back to the Vacares again, +After ten years of slavery just to breathe salt sea + +For of this savage race unbent, +The ocean is the element. +Of old escaped from Neptune's car, full sure, +Still with the white foam fleck'd are they, +And when the sea puffs black from grey, +And ships part cables, loudly neigh +The stallions of Camargue, all joyful in the roar; + +And keen as a whip they lash and crack +Their tails that drag the dust, and back +Scratch up the earth, and feel, entering their flesh, where he, +The God, drives deep his trident teeth, +Who in one horror, above, beneath, +Bids storm and watery deluge seethe, +And shatters to their depths the abysses of the sea. + +Cant. iv. + + + +'ATKINS' + + + +Yonder's the man with his life in his hand, +Legs on the march for whatever the land, +Or to the slaughter, or to the maiming, +Getting the dole of a dog for pay. +Laurels he clasps in the words 'duty done,' +England his heart under every sun:- +Exquisite humour! that gives him a naming +Base to the ear as an ass's bray. + + + +THE VOYAGE OF THE 'OPHIR' + + + +Men of our race, we send you one +Round whom Victoria's holy name +Is halo from the sunken sun +Of her grand Summer's day aflame. +The heart of your loved Motherland, +To them she loves as her own blood, +This Flower of Ocean bears in hand, +Assured of gift as good. + +Forth for our Southern shores the fleet +Which crowns a nation's wisdom steams, +That there may Briton Briton greet, +And stamp as fact Imperial dreams. +Across the globe, from sea to sea, +The long smoke-pennon trails above, +Writes over sky how wise will be +The Power that trusts to love. + +A love that springs from heart and brain +In union gives for ripest fruit +The concord Kings and States in vain +Have sought, who played the lofty brute, +And fondly deeming they possessed, +On force relied, and found it break: +That truth once scored on Britain's breast +Now keeps her mind awake. + +Australian, Canadian, +To tone old veins with streams of youth, +Our trust be on the best in man +Henceforth, and we shall prove that truth. +Prove to a world of brows down-bent +That in the Britain thus endowed, +Imperial means beneficent, +And strength to service vowed. + + + +THE CRISIS + + + +Spirit of Russia, now has come +The day when thou canst not be dumb. +Around thee foams the torrent tide, +Above thee its fell fountain, Pride. +The senseless rock awaits thy word +To crumble; shall it be unheard? +Already, like a tempest-sun, +That shoots the flare and shuts to dun, +Thy land 'twixt flame and darkness heaves, +Showing the blade wherewith Fate cleaves, +If mortals in high courage fail +At the one breath before the gale. +Those rulers in all forms of lust, +Who trod thy children down to dust +On the red Sunday, know right well +What word for them thy voice would spell, +What quick perdition for them weave, +Did they in such a voice believe. +Not thine to raise the avenger's shriek, +Nor turn to them a Tolstoi cheek; +Nor menace him, the waverer still, +Man of much heart and little will, +The criminal of his high seat, +Whose plea of Guiltless judges it. +For him thy voice shall bring to hand +Salvation, and to thy torn land, +Seen on the breakers. Now has come +The day when thou canst not be dumb, +Spirit of Russia:- those who bind +Thy limbs and iron-cap thy mind, +Take thee for quaking flesh, misdoubt +That thou art of the rabble rout +Which cries and flees, with whimpering lip, +From reckless gun and brutal whip; +But he who has at heart the deeds +Of thy heroic offspring reads +In them a soul; not given to shrink +From peril on the abyss's brink; +With never dread of murderous power; +With view beyond the crimson hour; +Neither an instinct-driven might, +Nor visionary erudite; +A soul; that art thou. It remains +For thee to stay thy children's veins, +The countertides of hate arrest, +Give to thy sons a breathing breast, +And Him resembling, in His sight, +Say to thy land, Let there be Light. + + + +OCTOBER 21, 1905 + + + +The hundred years have passed, and he +Whose name appeased a nation's fears, +As with a hand laid over sea; +To thunder through the foeman's ears +Defeat before his blast of fire; +Lives in the immortality +That poets dream and noblest souls desire. + +Never did nation's need evoke +Hero like him for aid, the while +A Continent was cannon-smoke +Or peace in slavery: this one Isle +Reflecting Nature: this one man +Her sea-hound and her mortal stroke, +With war-worn body aye in battle's van. + +And do we love him well, as well +As he his country, we may greet, +With hand on steel, our passing bell +Nigh on the swing, for prelude sweet +To the music heard when his last breath +Hung on its ebb beside the knell, +And VICTORY in his ear sang gracious Death. + +Ah, day of glory! day of tears! +Day of a people bowed as one! +Behold across those hundred years +The lion flash of gun at gun: +Our bitter pride; our love bereaved; +What pall of cloud o'ercame our sun +That day, to bear his wreath, the end achieved. + +Joy that no more with murder's frown +The ancient rivals bark apart. +Now Nelson to brave France is shown +A hero after her own heart: +And he now scanning that quick race, +To whom through life his glove was thrown, +Would know a sister spirit to embrace. + + + +THE CENTENARY OF GARIBALDI + + + +We who have seen Italia in the throes, +Half risen but to be hurled to ground, and now +Like a ripe field of wheat where once drove plough +All bounteous as she is fair, we think of those +Who blew the breath of life into her frame: +Cavour, Mazzini, Garibaldi: Three: +Her Brain, her Soul, her Sword; and set her free +From ruinous discords, with one lustrous aim. + +That aim, albeit they were of minds diverse, +Conjoined them, not to strive without surcease; +For them could be no babblement of peace +While lay their country under Slavery's curse. + +The set of torn Italia's glorious day +Was ever sunrise in each filial breast. +Of eagle beaks by righteousness unblest +They felt her pulsing body made the prey. + +Wherefore they struck, and had to count their dead. +With bitter smile of resolution nerved +To try new issues, holding faith unswerved, +Promise they gathered from the rich blood shed. + +In them Italia, visible to us then +As living, rose; for proof that huge brute Force +Has never being from celestial source, +And is the lord of cravens, not of men. + +Now breaking up the crust of temporal strife, +Who reads their acts enshrined in History, sees +That Tyrants were the Revolutionaries, +The Rebels men heart-vowed to hallowed life. + +Pure as the Archangel's cleaving Darkness thro', +The Sword he sees, the keen unwearied Sword, +A single blade against a circling horde, +And aye for Freedom and the trampled few. + +The cry of Liberty from dungeon cell, +From exile, was his God's command to smite, +As for a swim in sea he joined the fight, +With radiant face, full sure that he did well. + +Behold a warrior dealing mortal strokes, +Whose nature was a child's: amid his foes +A wary trickster: at the battle's close, +No gentler friend this leopard dashed with fox. + +Down the long roll of History will run +The story of these deeds, and speed his race +Beneath defeat more hotly to embrace +The noble cause and trust to another sun. + +And lo, that sun is in Italia's skies +This day, by grace of his good sword in part. +It beckons her to keep a warrior heart +For guard of beauty, all too sweet a prize. + +Earth gave him: blessed be the Earth that gave. +Earth's Master crowned his honest work on earth: +Proudly Italia names his place of birth: +The bosom of Humanity his grave. + + + +THE WILD ROSE + + + +High climbs June's wild rose, +Her bush all blooms in a swarm; +And swift from the bud she blows, +In a day when the wooer is warm; +Frank to receive and give, +Her bosom is open to bee and sun: +Pride she has none, +Nor shame she knows; +Happy to live. + +Unlike those of the garden nigh, +Her queenly sisters enthroned by art; +Loosening petals one by one +To the fiery Passion's dart +Superbly shy. +For them in some glory of hair, +Or nest of the heaving mounds to lie, +Or path of the bride bestrew. +Ever are they the theme for song. +But nought of that is her share. +Hardly from wayfarers tramping along, +A glance they care not to renew. + +And she at a word of the claims of kin +Shrinks to the level of roads and meads: +She is only a plain princess of the weeds, +As an outcast witless of sin: +Much disregarded, save by the few +Who love her, that has not a spot of deceit, +No promise of sweet beyond sweet, +Often descending to sour. +On any fair breast she would die in an hour. +Praises she scarce could bear, +Were any wild poet to praise. +Her aim is to rise into light and air. +One of the darlings of Earth, no more, +And little it seems in the dusty ways, +Unless to the grasses nodding beneath; +The bird clapping wings to soar, +The clouds of an evetide's wreath. + + + +THE CALL + + + +Under what spell are we debased +By fears for our inviolate Isle, +Whose record is of dangers faced +And flung to heel with even smile? +Is it a vaster force, a subtler guile? + +They say Exercitus designs +To match the famed Salsipotent +Where on her sceptre she reclines; +Awake: but were a slumber sent +By guilty gods, more fell his foul intent. + +The subtler web, the vaster foe, +Well may we meet when drilled for deeds: +But in these days of wealth at flow, +A word of breezy warning breeds +The pained responses seen in lakeside reeds. + +We fain would stand contemplative, +All innocent as meadow grass; +In human goodness fain believe, +Believe a cloud is formed to pass; +Its shadows chase with draughts of hippocras. + +Others have gone; the way they went +Sweet sunny now, and safe our nest. +Humanity, enlightenment, +Against the warning hum protest: +Let the world hear that we know what is best. + +So do the beatific speak; +Yet have they ears, and eyes as well; +And if not with a paler cheek, +They feel the shivers in them dwell, +That something of a dubious future tell. + +For huge possessions render slack +The power we need to hold them fast; +Save when a quickened heart shall make +Our people one, to meet what blast +May blow from temporal heavens overcast. + +Our people one! Nor they with strength +Dependent on a single arm: +Alert, and braced the whole land's length, +Rejoicing in their manhood's charm +For friend or foe; to succour, not to harm. + +Has ever weakness won esteem? +Or counts it as a prized ally? +They who have read in History deem +It ranks among the slavish fry, +Whose claim to live justiciary Fates deny. + +It can not be declared we are +A nation till from end to end +The land can show such front to war +As bids a crouching foe expend +His ire in air, and preferably be friend. + +We dreading him, we do him wrong; +For fears discolour, fears invite. +Like him, our task is to be strong; +Unlike him, claiming not by might +To snatch an envied treasure as a right. + +So may a stouter brotherhood +At home be signalled over sea +For righteous, and be understood, +Nay, welcomed, when 'tis shown that we +All duties have embraced in being free. + +This Britain slumbering, she is rich; +Lies placid as a cradled child; +At times with an uneasy twitch, +That tells of dreams unduly wild. +Shall she be with a foreign drug defiled? + +The grandeur of her deeds recall; +Look on her face so kindly fair: +This Britain! and were she to fall, +Mankind would breathe a harsher air, +The nations miss a light of leading rare. + + + +ON COMO + + + +A rainless darkness drew o'er the lake +As we lay in our boat with oars unshipped. +It seemed neither cloud nor water awake, +And forth of the low black curtain slipped +Thunderless lightning. Scoff no more +At angels imagined in downward flight +For the daughters of earth as fabled of yore: +Here was beauty might well invite +Dark heavens to gleam with the fire of a sun +Resurgent; here the exchanged embrace +Worthy of heaven and earth made one. + +And witness it, ye of the privileged space, +Said the flash; and the mountains, as from an abyss +For quivering seconds leaped up to attest +That given, received, renewed was the kiss; +The lips to lips and the breast to breast; +All in a glory of ecstasy, swift +As an eagle at prey, and pure as the prayer +Of an infant bidden joined hands uplift +To be guarded through darkness by spirits of air, +Ere setting the sails of sleep till day. +Slowly the low cloud swung, and far +It panted along its mirrored way; +Above loose threads one sanctioning star, +The wonder of what had been witnessed, sealed, +And with me still as in crystal glassed +Are the depths alight, the heavens revealed, +Where on to the Alps the muteness passed. + + + +MILTON--DECEMBER 9, 1608: DECEMBER 9, 1908 + + + +What splendour of imperial station man, +The Tree of Life, may reach when, rooted fast, +His branching stem points way to upper air +And skyward still aspires, we see in him +Who sang for us the Archangelical host, +Made Morning, by old Darkness urged to the abyss; +A voice that down three centuries onward rolls; +Onward will roll while lives our English tongue, +In the devout of music unsurpassed +Since Piety won Heaven's ear on Israel's harp. + +The face of Earth, the soul of Earth, her charm, +Her dread austerity; the quavering fate +Of mortals with blind hope by passion swayed, +His mind embraced, the while on trodden soil, +Defender of the Commonwealth, he joined +Our temporal fray, whereof is vital fruit, +And, choosing armoury of the Scholar, stood +Beside his peers to raise the voice for Freedom: +Nor has fair Liberty a champion armed +To meet on heights or plains the Sophister +Throughout the ages, equal to this man, +Whose spirit breathed high Heaven, and drew thence +The ethereal sword to smite. + +Were England sunk +Beneath the shifting tides, her heart, her brain, +The smile she wears, the faith she holds, her best, +Would live full-toned in the grand delivery +Of his cathedral speech: an utterance +Almost divine, and such as Hellespont, +Crashing its breakers under Ida's frown, +Inspired: yet worthier he, whose instrument +Was by comparison the coarse reed-pipe; +Whereof have come the marvellous harmonies, +Which, with his lofty theme, of infinite range, +Abash, entrance, exalt. + +We need him now, +This latest Age in repetition cries: +For Belial, the adroit, is in our midst; +Mammon, more swoln to squeeze the slavish sweat +From hopeless toil: and overshadowingly +(Aggrandized, monstrous in his grinning mask +Of hypocritical Peace,) inveterate Moloch +Remains the great example. + +Homage to him +His debtor band, innumerable as waves +Running all golden from an eastern sun, +Joyfully render, in deep reverence +Subscribe, and as they speak their Milton's name, +Rays of his glory on their foreheads bear. + + + +IRELAND + + + +Fire in her ashes Ireland feels +And in her veins a glow of heat. +To her the lost old time, appeals +For resurrection, good to greet: +Not as a shape with spectral eyes, +But humanly maternal, young +In all that quickens pride, and wise +To speak the best her bards have sung. + +You read her as a land distraught, +Where bitterest rebel passions seethe. +Look with a core of heart in thought, +For so is known the truth beneath. +She came to you a loathing bride, +And it has been no happy bed. +Believe in her as friend, allied +By bonds as close as those who wed. + +Her speech is held for hatred's cry; +Her silence tells of treason hid: +Were it her aim to burst the tie, +She sees what iron laws forbid. +Excess of heart obscures from view +A head as keen as yours to count. +Trust her, that she may prove her true +In links whereof is love the fount. + +May she not call herself her own? +That is her cry, and thence her spits +Of fury, thence her graceless tone +At justice given in bits and bits. +The limbs once raw with gnawing chains +Will fret at silken when God's beams +Of Freedom beckon o'er the plains +From mounts that show it more than dreams. + +She, generous, craves your generous dole; +That will not rouse the crack of doom. +It ends the blundering past control +Simply to give her elbow-room. +Her offspring feels they are a race, +To be a nation is their claim; +Yet stronger bound in your embrace +Than when the tie was but a name. + +A nation she, and formed to charm, +With heart for heart and hands all round. +No longer England's broken arm, +Would England know where strength is found. +And strength to-day is England's need; +To-morrow it may be for both +Salvation: heed the portents, heed +The warnings; free the mind from sloth. + +Too long the pair have danced in mud, +With no advance from sun to sun. +Ah, what a bounding course of blood +Has England with an Ireland one! +Behold yon shadow cross the downs, +And off away to yeasty seas. +Lightly will fly old rancour's frowns +When solid with high heart stand these. + + + +THE YEARS HAD WORN THEIR SEASONS' BELT + + + +The years had worn their seasons' belt, +From bud to rosy prime, +Since Nellie by the larch-pole knelt +And helped the hop to climb. + +Most diligent of teachers then, +But now with all to learn, +She breathed beyond a thought of men, +Though formed to make men burn. + +She dwelt where 'twixt low-beaten thorns +Two mill-blades, like a snail, +Enormous, with inquiring horns, +Looked down on half the vale. + +You know the grey of dew on grass +Ere with the young sun fired, +And you know well the thirst one has +For the coming and desired. + +Quick in our ring she leapt, and gave +Her hand to left, to right. +No claim on her had any, save +To feed the joy of sight. + +For man and maid a laughing word +She tossed, in notes as clear +As when the February bird +Sings out that Spring is near. + +Of what befell behind that scone, +Let none who knows reveal. +In ballad days she might have been +A heroine rousing steel. + +On us did she bestow the hour, +And fixed it firm in thought; +Her spirit like a meadow flower +That gives, and asks for nought. + +She seemed to make the sunlight stay +And show her in its pride. +O she was fair as a beech in May +With the sun on the yonder side. + +There was more life than breath can give, +In the looks in her fair form; +For little can we say we live +Until the heart is warm. + + + +FRAGMENTS + + + +Open horizons round, +O mounting mind, to scenes unsung, +Wherein shall walk a lusty Time: +Our Earth is young; +Of measure without bound; +Infinite are the heights to climb, +The depths to sound. + + +A wilding little stubble flower +The sickle scorned which cut for wheat, +Such was our hope in that dark hour +When nought save uses held the street, +And daily pleasures, daily needs, +With barren vision, looked ahead. +And still the same result of seeds +Gave likeness 'twixt the live and dead. + + +From labours through the night, outworn, +Above the hills the front of morn +We see, whose eyes to heights are raised, +And the world's wise may deem us crazed. +While yet her lord lies under seas, +She takes us as the wind the trees' +Delighted leafage; all in song +We mount to her, to her belong. + + +This love of nature, that allures to take +Irregularity for harmony +Of larger scope than our hard measures make, +Cherish it as thy school for when on thee +The ills of life descend. + + + +IL Y A CENT ANS + + + +That march of the funereal Past behold; +How Glory sat on Bondage for its throne; +How men, like dazzled insects, through the mould +Still worked their way, and bled to keep their own. + +We know them, as they strove and wrought and yearned; +Their hopes, their fears; what page of Life they wist: +At whiles their vision upon us was turned, +Baffled by shapes limmed loosely on thick mist. + +Beneath the fortress bulk of Power they bent +Blunt heads, adoring or in shackled hate, +All save the rebel hymned him; and it meant +A world submitting to incarnate Fate. + +From this he drew fresh appetite for sway, +And of it fell: whereat was chorus raised, +How surely shall a mad ambition pay +Dues to Humanity, erewhile amazed. + +'Twas dreamed by some the deluge would ensue, +So trembling was the tension long constrained; +A spirit of faith was in the chosen few, +That steps to the millennium had been gained. + +But mainly the rich business of the hour, +Their sight, made blind by urgency of blood, +Embraced; and facts, the passing sweet or sour, +To them were solid things that nought withstood. + +Their facts are going headlong on the tides, +Like commas on a line of History's page; +Nor that which once they took for Truth abides, +Save in the form of youth enlarged from age. + +Meantime give ear to woodland notes around, +Look on our Earth full-breasted to our sun: +So was it when their poets heard the sound, +Beheld the scene: in them our days are one. + +What figures will be shown the century hence? +What lands intact? We do but know that Power +From piety divorced, though seen immense, +Shall sink on envy of the humblest flower. + +Our cry for cradled Peace, while men are still +The three-parts brute which smothers the divine, +Heaven answers: Guard it with forethoughtful will, +Or buy it; all your gains from War resign. + +A land, not indefensibly alarmed, +May see, unwarned by hint of friendly gods, +Between a hermit crab at all points armed, +And one without a shell, decisive odds. + + + +YOUTH IN AGE + + + +Once I was part of the music I heard +On the boughs or sweet between earth and sky, +For joy of the beating of wings on high +My heart shot into the breast of the bird. + +I hear it now and I see it fly, +And a life in wrinkles again is stirred, +My heart shoots into the breast of the bird, +As it will for sheer love till the last long sigh. + + + +TO A FRIEND LOST (TOM TAYLOR) + + + +When I remember, friend, whom lost I call, +Because a man beloved is taken hence, +The tender humour and the fire of sense +In your good eyes; how full of heart for all, +And chiefly for the weaker by the wall, +You bore that lamp of sane benevolence; +Then see I round you Death his shadows dense +Divide, and at your feet his emblems fall. +For surely are you one with the white host, +Spirits, whose memory is our vital air, +Through the great love of Earth they had: lo, these, +Like beams that throw the path on tossing seas, +Can bid us feel we keep them in the ghost, +Partakers of a strife they joyed to share. + + + +M. M. + + + +Who call her Mother and who calls her Wife +Look on her grave and see not Death but Life. + + + +THE LADY C. M. + + + +To them that knew her, there is vital flame +In these the simple letters of her name. +To them that knew her not, be it but said, +So strong a spirit is not of the dead. + + + +ON THE TOMBSTONE OF +JAMES CHRISTOPHER WILSON +(d. APRIL 11, 1884) +IN HEADLEY CHURCHYARD, SURREY + + + +Thou our beloved and light of Earth hast crossed +The sea of darkness to the yonder shore. +There dost thou shine a light transferred, not lost, +Through love to kindle in our souls the more. + + + +GORDON OF KHARTOUM + + + +Of men he would have raised to light he fell: +In soul he conquered with those nerveless hands. +His country's pride and her abasement knell +The Man of England circled by the sands. + + + +J. C. M. + + + +A fountain of our sweetest, quick to spring +In fellowship abounding, here subsides: +And never passage of a cloud on wing +To gladden blue forgets him; near he hides. + + + +THE EMPEROR FREDERICK OF OUR TIME + + + +With Alfred and St. Louis he doth win +Grander than crowned head's mortuary dome: +His gentle heroic manhood enters in +The ever-flowering common heart for home. + + + +ISLET THE DACHS + + + +Our Islet out of Helgoland, dismissed +From his quaint tenement, quits hates and loves. +There lived with us a wagging humourist +In that hound's arch dwarf-legged on boxing-gloves. + + + +ON HEARING THE NEWS FROM VENICE +(THE DEATH OF ROBERT BROWNING) + + + +Now dumb is he who waked the world to speak, +And voiceless hangs the world beside his bier. +Our words are sobs, our cry of praise a tear: +We are the smitten mortal, we the weak. +We see a spirit on Earth's loftiest peak +Shine, and wing hence the way he makes more clear: +See a great Tree of Life that never sere +Dropped leaf for aught that age or storms might wreak. +Such ending is not Death: such living shows +What wide illumination brightness sheds +From one big heart, to conquer man's old foes: +The coward, and the tyrant, and the force +Of all those weedy monsters raising heads +When Song is murk from springs of turbid source. + +December 13, 1889. + + + +HAWARDEN + + + +When comes the lighted day for men to read +Life's meaning, with the work before their hands +Till this good gift of breath from debt is freed, +Earth will not hear her children's wailful bands +Deplore the chieftain fall'n in sob and dirge; +Nor they look where is darkness, but on high. +The sun that dropped down our horizon's verge +Illumes his labours through the travelled sky, +Now seen in sum, most glorious; and 'tis known +By what our warrior wrought we hold him fast. +A splendid image built of man has flown; +His deeds inspired of God outstep a Past. +Ours the great privilege to have had one +Among us who celestial tasks has done. + + + +AT THE FUNERAL +FEBRUARY 2, 1901 + + + +Her sacred body bear: the tenement +Of that strong soul now ranked with God's Elect +Her heart upon her people's heart she spent; +Hence is she Royalty's lodestar to direct. + +The peace is hers, of whom all lands have praised +Majestic virtues ere her day unseen. +Aloft the name of Womanhood she raised, +And gave new readings to the Title, Queen. + + + +ANGELA BURDETT-COUTTS + + + +Long with us, now she leaves us; she has rest +Beneath our sacred sod: +A woman vowed to Good, whom all attest, +The daylight gift of God. + + + +THE YEAR'S SHEDDINGS + + + +The varied colours are a fitful heap: +They pass in constant service though they sleep; +The self gone out of them, therewith the pain: +Read that, who still to spell our earth remain. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Etext of Poems, by George Meredith, Volume 3 + diff --git a/old/pmgm310.zip b/old/pmgm310.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f101a39 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/pmgm310.zip |
