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diff --git a/26785.txt b/26785.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b2f01d4 --- /dev/null +++ b/26785.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9354 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Modern British Poetry, by Various + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere 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 + + +Title: Modern British Poetry + +Author: Various + +Editor: Louis Untermeyer + +Release Date: October 6, 2008 [EBook #26785] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MODERN BRITISH POETRY *** + + + + +Produced by David Starner, Suzanne Lybarger and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + +------------------------------------------------------------+ + | Transcriber's Note: | + | | + | Obvious typographical errors have been corrected in | + | this text. For a complete list, please see the bottom of | + | this document. | + +------------------------------------------------------------+ + + + + +MODERN BRITISH +POETRY + +EDITED BY +LOUIS UNTERMEYER + +Author of "_Challenge_," "_Including Horace_," +"_Modern American Poetry_," etc. + + +NEW YORK + +HARCOURT, BRACE & COMPANY + +COPYRIGHT, 1920, BY +HARCOURT, BRACE AND HOWE, INC. + +PRINTED IN THE U. S. A. BY +THE QUINN & BODEN COMPANY +RAHWAY, N. J. + + + + +ACKNOWLEDGMENTS + + +For permission to reprint the material in this volume, the editor +wishes, first of all, to acknowledge his debt to those poets whose +co-operation has been of such assistance not only in finally +determining upon the choice of their poems, but in collecting dates, +biographical data, etc. Secondly, he wishes to thank the publishers, +most of whom are holders of the copyrights. The latter indebtedness is +specifically acknowledged to: + + DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY and A. P. WATT & SON-- + + For "The Return" from _The Five Nations_ and for "An + Astrologer's Song" from _Rewards and Fairies_ by Rudyard + Kipling. Thanks also are due to Mr. Kipling himself for + personal permission to reprint these poems. + + DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY and MARTIN SECKER-- + + For the poem from _Collected Poems_ by James Elroy Flecker. + + E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY-- + + For the poems from _The Old Huntsman_, _Counter-Attack_ and + _Picture Show_ by Siegfried Sassoon. + + FOUR SEAS COMPANY-- + + For poems from _War and Love_ by Richard Aldington and _The + Mountainy Singer_ by Seosamh MacCathmhaoil (Joseph + Campbell). + + HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY-- + + For poems from _Peacock Pie_ and _The Listeners_ by Walter + de la Mare and _Poems_ by Edward Thomas. + + HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY-- + + For two poems from _Poems, 1908-1919_, by John Drinkwater, + both of which are used by permission of, and by special + arrangement with, Houghton Mifflin Company, the authorized + publishers. + + B. W. HUEBSCH-- + + For the selections from _Chamber Music_ by James Joyce, + _Songs to Save a Soul_ and _Before Dawn_ by Irene + Rutherford McLeod, _Amores, Look! We Have Come Through!_, + and _New Poems_ by D. H. Lawrence. + + ALFRED A. KNOPF-- + + For poems from _The Collected Poems of William H. Davies_, + _Fairies and Fusiliers_ by Robert Graves, _The Queen of + China and Other Poems_ by Edward Shanks, and _Poems: First + Series_ by J. C. Squire. + + JOHN LANE COMPANY-- + + For the selections from _Poems_ by G. K. Chesterton, + _Ballads and Songs_ by John Davidson, _The Collected Poems + of Rupert Brooke_, _Admirals All_ by Henry Newbolt, _Herod_ + and _Lyrics and Dramas_ by Stephen Phillips, _The Hope of + the World and Other Poems_ by William Watson, and _In Cap + and Bells_ by Owen Seaman. + + THE LONDON MERCURY-- + + For "Going and Staying" by Thomas Hardy and "The House That + Was" by Laurence Binyon. + + THE MACMILLAN COMPANY-- + + For the selections from _Fires_ and _Borderlands and + Thoroughfares_ by Wilfrid Wilson Gibson, _Poems_ by Ralph + Hodgson, the sonnet from _Good Friday and Other Poems_ by + John Masefield, and the passage (entitled in this volume + "Rounding the Horn") from "Dauber" in _The Story of a + Round-House_ by John Masefield. + + G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS-- + + For the title poem from _In Flanders Fields_ by John McCrae. + + THE POETRY BOOKSHOP (England)-- + + For two excerpts from _Strange Meetings_ by Harold Monro and + for the poems from the biennial anthologies, _Georgian + Poetry_. + + CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS-- + + For the quotations from _Poems_ by William Ernest Henley. + + FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY-- + + For the poem from _Ardours and Endurances_ by Robert + Nichols. + + LONGMANS, GREEN & CO., as the representatives of B. H. + BLACKWELL, of Oxford-- + + For a poem by Edith Sitwell from _The Mother_. + + + + +CONTENTS + + + PAGE + +INTRODUCTORY xi + +THOMAS HARDY (1840- ) + In Time of "The Breaking of Nations" 3 + Going and Staying 4 + The Man He Killed 4 + +ROBERT BRIDGES (1844- ) + Winter Nightfall 5 + Nightingales 7 + +ARTHUR O'SHAUGHNESSY (1844-1881) + Ode 8 + +WILLIAM ERNEST HENLEY (1849-1903) + Invictus 10 + The Blackbird 10 + A Bowl of Roses 11 + Before 11 + Margaritae Sorori 12 + +ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON (1850-1894) + Summer Sun 13 + Winter-Time 14 + Romance 15 + Requiem 16 + +ALICE MEYNELL (1850- ) + A Thrush Before Dawn 16 + +FIONA MACLEOD (_William Sharp_) (1855-1905) + The Valley of Silence 18 + The Vision 19 + +OSCAR WILDE (1856-1900) + Requiescat 20 + Impression du Matin 21 + +JOHN DAVIDSON (1857-1909) + A Ballad of Hell 22 + Imagination 26 + +WILLIAM WATSON (1858- ) + Ode in May 28 + Estrangement 30 + Song 31 + +FRANCIS THOMPSON (1859-1907) + Daisy 32 + To Olivia 34 + An Arab Love-Song 35 + +A. E. HOUSMAN (1859- ) + Reveille 36 + When I Was One-and-Twenty 37 + With Rue My Heart is Laden 38 + To An Athlete Dying Young 38 + "Loveliest of Trees" 39 + +DOUGLAS HYDE (1860- ) + I Shall Not Die for Thee 40 + +AMY LEVY (1861-1889) + Epitaph 42 + In the Mile End Road 42 + +KATHARINE TYNAN HINKSON (1861- ) + Sheep and Lambs 43 + All-Souls 44 + +OWEN SEAMAN (1861- ) + To An Old Fogey 45 + Thomas of the Light Heart 47 + +HENRY NEWBOLT (1862- ) + Drake's Drum 49 + +ARTHUR SYMONS (1865- ) + In the Wood of Finvara 50 + Modern Beauty 51 + +WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS (1865- ) + The Lake Isle of Innisfree 53 + The Song of the Old Mother 53 + The Cap and Bells 54 + An Old Song Resung 55 + +RUDYARD KIPLING (1865- ) + Gunga Din 57 + The Return 61 + The Conundrum of the Workshops 63 + An Astrologer's Song 66 + +RICHARD LE GALLIENNE (1866- ) + A Ballad of London 69 + Regret 70 + +LIONEL JOHNSON (1867-1902) + Mystic and Cavalier 71 + To a Traveller 73 + +ERNEST DOWSON (1867-1900) + To One in Bedlam 74 + You Would Have Understood Me 75 + +"A. E." (_George William Russell_) (1867- ) + The Great Breath 76 + The Unknown God 77 + +STEPHEN PHILLIPS (1868-1915) + Fragment from "Herod" 78 + Beautiful Lie the Dead 78 + A Dream 79 + +LAURENCE BINYON (1869- ) + A Song 79 + The House That Was 80 + +ALFRED DOUGLAS (1870- ) + The Green River 81 + +T. STURGE MOORE (1870- ) + The Dying Swan 82 + Silence Sings 82 + +WILLIAM H. DAVIES (1870- ) + Days Too Short 84 + The Moon 85 + The Villain 85 + The Example 86 + +HILAIRE BELLOC (1870- ) + The South Country 87 + +ANTHONY C. DEANE (1870- ) + The Ballad of the _Billycock_ 90 + A Rustic Song 92 + +J. M. SYNGE (1871-1909) + Beg-Innish 95 + A Translation from Petrarch 96 + To the Oaks of Glencree 96 + +NORA HOPPER CHESSON (1871-1906) + A Connaught Lament 97 + +EVA GORE-BOOTH (1872- ) + The Waves of Breffny 98 + Walls 99 + +MOIRA O'NEILL + A Broken Song 99 + Beauty's a Flower 100 + +JOHN MCCRAE (1872-1918) + In Flanders Fields 101 + +FORD MADOX HUEFFER (1873- ) + Clair de Lune 102 + There Shall Be More Joy 104 + +WALTER DE LA MARE (1873- ) + The Listeners 106 + An Epitaph 107 + Tired Tim 108 + Old Susan 108 + Nod 109 + +G. K. CHESTERTON (1874- ) + Lepanto 111 + A Prayer in Darkness 118 + The Donkey 119 + +WILFRID WILSON GIBSON (1878- ) + Prelude 120 + The Stone 121 + Sight 124 + +JOHN MASEFIELD (1878- ) + A Consecration 126 + Sea-Fever 127 + Rounding the Horn 128 + The Choice 131 + Sonnet 132 + +LORD DUNSANY (1878- ) + Songs from an Evil Wood 133 + +EDWARD THOMAS (1878-1917) + If I Should Ever By Chance 136 + Tall Nettles 137 + Fifty Faggots 137 + Cock-Crow 138 + +SEUMAS O'SULLIVAN (1879- ) + Praise 139 + +RALPH HODGSON + Eve 140 + Time, You Old Gipsy Man 142 + The Birdcatcher 144 + The Mystery 144 + +HAROLD MONRO (1879- ) + The Nightingale Near the House 145 + Every Thing 146 + Strange Meetings 149 + +T. M. KETTLE (1880-1916) + To My Daughter Betty, The Gift of God 150 + +ALFRED NOYES (1880- ) + Sherwood 151 + The Barrel-Organ 154 + Epilogue 161 + +PADRAIC COLUM (1881- ) + The Plougher 162 + An Old Woman of the Roads 164 + +JOSEPH CAMPBELL (_Seosamh MacCathmhaoil_) (1881- ) + I Am the Mountainy Singer 165 + The Old Woman 166 + +JAMES STEPHENS (1882- ) + The Shell 167 + What Tomas An Buile Said In a Pub 168 + To the Four Courts, Please 169 + +JOHN DRINKWATER (1882- ) + Reciprocity 170 + A Town Window 170 + +JAMES JOYCE (1882- ) + I Hear an Army 171 + +J. C. SQUIRE (1884- ) + A House 172 + +LASCELLES ABERCROMBIE (1884- ) + From "Vashti" 175 + Song 176 + +JAMES ELROY FLECKER (1884-1915) + The Old Ships 178 + +D. H. LAWRENCE (1885- ) + People 180 + Piano 180 + +JOHN FREEMAN (1885- ) + Stone Trees 181 + +SHANE LESLIE (1886- ) + Fleet Street 183 + The Pater of the Cannon 183 + +FRANCES CORNFORD (1886- ) + Preexistence 184 + +ANNA WICKHAM + The Singer 186 + Reality 186 + Song 187 + +SIEGFRIED SASSOON (1886- ) + To Victory 189 + Dreamers 190 + The Rear-Guard 190 + Thrushes 191 + Aftermath 192 + +RUPERT BROOKE (1887-1915) + The Great Lover 195 + Dust 198 + The Soldier 200 + +W. M. LETTS (1887- ) + Grandeur 201 + The Spires of Oxford 203 + +FRANCIS BRETT YOUNG + Lochanilaun 204 + +F. S. FLINT + London 205 + +EDITH SITWELL + The Web of Eros 206 + Interlude 207 + +F. W. HARVEY (1888- ) + The Bugler 208 + +T. P. CAMERON WILSON (1889-1918) + Sportsmen in Paradise 209 + +W. J. TURNER (1889- ) + Romance 210 + +PATRICK MACGILL (1890) + By-the-Way 211 + Death and the Fairies 212 + +FRANCIS LEDWIDGE (1891-1917) + An Evening in England 213 + Evening Clouds 214 + +IRENE RUTHERFORD MCLEOD (1891- ) + "Is Love, then, so Simple" 215 + Lone Dog 215 + +RICHARD ALDINGTON (1892- ) + Prelude 216 + Images 217 + At the British Museum 218 + +EDWARD SHANKS (1892- ) + Complaint 219 + +OSBERT SITWELL (1892- ) + The Blind Pedlar 220 + Progress 221 + +ROBERT NICHOLS (1893- ) + Nearer 222 + +CHARLES H. SORLEY (1895-1915) + Two Sonnets 223 + To Germany 225 + +ROBERT GRAVES (1895- ) + It's a Queer Time 226 + A Pinch of Salt 227 + I Wonder What It Feels Like to be Drowned? 228 + The Last Post 229 + +INDEX OF AUTHORS AND POEMS 231 + + + + +INTRODUCTORY + +_The New Influences and Tendencies_ + + +Mere statistics are untrustworthy; dates are even less dependable. +But, to avoid hairsplitting, what we call "modern" English literature +may be said to date from about 1885. A few writers who are decidedly +"of the period" are, as a matter of strict chronology, somewhat +earlier. But the chief tendencies may be divided into seven periods. +They are (1) The decay of Victorianism and the growth of a purely +decorative art, (2) The rise and decline of the AEsthetic Philosophy, +(3) The muscular influence of Henley, (4) The Celtic revival in +Ireland, (5) Rudyard Kipling and the ascendency of mechanism in art, +(6) John Masefield and the return of the rhymed narrative, (7) The war +and the appearance of "The Georgians." It may be interesting to trace +these developments in somewhat greater detail. + + +THE END OF VICTORIANISM + +The age commonly called Victorian came to an end about 1885. It was an +age distinguished by many true idealists and many false ideals. It +was, in spite of its notable artists, on an entirely different level +from the epoch which had preceded it. Its poetry was, in the main, not +universal but parochial; its romanticism was gilt and tinsel; its +realism was as cheap as its showy glass pendants, red plush, parlor +chromos and antimacassars. The period was full of a pessimistic +resignation (the note popularized by Fitzgerald's Omar Khayyam) and a +kind of cowardice or at least a negation which, refusing to see any +glamour in the actual world, turned to the Middle Ages, King Arthur, +the legend of Troy--to the suave surroundings of a dream-world instead +of the hard contours of actual experience. + +At its worst, it was a period of smugness, of placid and pious +sentimentality--epitomized by the rhymed sermons of Martin Farquhar +Tupper, whose _Proverbial Philosophy_ was devoured with all its +cloying and indigestible sweetmeats by thousands. The same tendency is +apparent, though far less objectionably, in the moralizing lays of +Lord Thomas Macaulay, in the theatrically emotionalized verses of +Robert Buchanan, Edwin Arnold and Sir Lewis Morris--even in the lesser +later work of Alfred Tennyson. + +And, without Tupper's emptiness or absurdities, the outworn platitudes +again find their constant lover in Alfred Austin, Tennyson's successor +as poet laureate. Austin brought the laureateship, which had been held +by poets like Ben Jonson, Dryden, Southey and Wordsworth, to an +incredibly low level; he took the thinning stream of garrulous poetic +conventionality, reduced it to the merest trickle--and diluted it. + +The poets of a generation before this time were fired with such ideas +as freedom, a deep and burning awe of nature, an insatiable hunger for +truth in all its forms and manifestations. The characteristic poets of +the Victorian Era, says Max Plowman, "wrote under the dominance of +churchliness, of 'sweetness and light,' and a thousand lesser theories +that have not truth but comfort for their end." + +The revolt against this and the tawdriness of the period had already +begun; the best of Victorianism can be found not in men who were +typically Victorian, but in pioneers like Browning and writers like +Swinburne, Rossetti, William Morris, who were completely out of +sympathy with their time. + +But it was Oscar Wilde who led the men of the now famous 'nineties +toward an aesthetic freedom, to champion a beauty whose existence was +its "own excuse for being." Wilde's was, in the most outspoken manner, +the first use of aestheticism as a slogan; the battle-cry of the group +was actually the now outworn but then revolutionary "Art for Art's +sake"! And, so sick were people of the shoddy ornaments and drab +ugliness of the immediate past, that the slogan won. At least, +temporarily. + + +THE RISE AND DECLINE OF THE AESTHETIC PHILOSOPHY + +_The Yellow Book_, the organ of a group of young writers and artists, +appeared (1894-97), representing a reasoned and intellectual reaction, +mainly suggested and influenced by the French. The group of +contributors was a peculiarly mixed one with only one thing in common. +And that was a conscious effort to repudiate the sugary airs and prim +romantics of the Victorian Era. + +Almost the first act of the "new" men was to rouse and outrage their +immediate predecessors. This end-of-the-century desire to shock, +which was so strong and natural an impulse, still has a place of its +own--especially as an antidote, a harsh corrective. Mid-Victorian +propriety and self-satisfaction crumbled under the swift and energetic +audacities of the sensational younger authors and artists; the old +walls fell; the public, once so apathetic to _belles lettres_, was +more than attentive to every phase of literary experimentation. The +last decade of the nineteenth century was so tolerant of novelty in +art and ideas, that it would seem, says Holbrook Jackson in his +penetrative summary, _The Eighteen-Nineties_, "as though the declining +century wished to make amends for several decades of artistic +monotony. It may indeed be something more than a coincidence that +placed this decade at the close of a century, and _fin de siecle_ may +have been at once a swan song and a death-bed repentance." + +But later on, the movement (if such it may be called), surfeited with +its own excesses, fell into the mere poses of revolt; it degenerated +into a half-hearted defense of artificialities. + +It scarcely needed W. S. Gilbert (in _Patience_) or Robert Hichens (in +_The Green Carnation_) to satirize its distorted attitudinizing. It +strained itself to death; it became its own burlesque of the bizarre, +an extravaganza of extravagance. "The period" (I am again quoting +Holbrook Jackson) "was as certainly a period of decadence as it was a +period of renaissance. The decadence was to be seen in a perverse and +finicking glorification of the fine arts and mere artistic virtuosity +on the one hand, and a militant commercial movement on the other.... +The eroticism which became so prevalent in the verse of many of the +younger poets was minor because it was little more than a pose--not +because it was erotic.... It was a passing mood which gave the poetry +of the hour a hothouse fragrance; a perfume faint yet unmistakable and +strange." + +But most of the elegant and disillusioned young men overshot their +mark. Mere health reasserted itself; an inherent repressed vitality +sought new channels. Arthur Symons deserted his hectic Muse, Richard +Le Gallienne abandoned his preciosity, and the group began to +disintegrate. The aesthetic philosophy was wearing thin; it had already +begun to fray and reveal its essential shabbiness. Wilde himself +possessed the three things which he said the English would never +forgive--youth, power and enthusiasm. But in trying to make an +exclusive cult of beauty, Wilde had also tried to make it evade +actuality; he urged that art should not, in any sense, be a part of +life but an escape from it. "The proper school to learn art in is not +Life--but Art." And in the same essay ("The Decay of Lying") he wrote, +"All bad Art comes from returning to Life and Nature, and elevating +them into ideals." Elsewhere he said, "The first duty in life is to be +as artificial as possible. What the second duty is no one has +discovered." + +Such a cynical and decadent philosophy could not go unchallenged. Its +aristocratic blue-bloodedness was bound to arouse the red blood of +common reality. This negative attitude received its answer in the work +of that yea-sayer, W. E. Henley. + + +WILLIAM ERNEST HENLEY + +Henley repudiated this languid aestheticism; he scorned a negative art +which was out of touch with the world. His was a large and sweeping +affirmation. He felt that mere existence was glorious; life was +coarse, difficult, often dangerous and dirty, but splendid at the +heart. Art, he knew, could not be separated from the dreams and +hungers of man; it could not flourish only on its own essences or +technical accomplishments. To live, poetry would have to share the +fears, angers, hopes and struggles of the prosaic world. And so Henley +came like a swift salt breeze blowing through a perfumed and +heavily-screened studio. He sang loudly (sometimes even too loudly) of +the joy of living and the courage of the "unconquerable soul." He was +a powerful influence not only as a poet but as a critic and editor. In +the latter capacity he gathered about him such men as Robert Louis +Stevenson, Rudyard Kipling, Thomas Hardy, H. G. Wells, W. B. Yeats, T. +E. Brown, J. M. Barrie. None of these men were his disciples, but none +of them came into contact with him without being influenced in some +way by his sharp and positive personality. A pioneer and something of +a prophet, he was one of the first to champion the paintings of +Whistler and to proclaim the genius of the sculptor Rodin. + +If at times Henley's verse is imperialistic, over-muscular and +strident, his noisy moments are redeemed not only by his delicate +lyrics but by his passionate enthusiasm for nobility in whatever cause +it was joined. He never disdained the actual world in any of its +moods--bus-drivers, hospital interiors, scrubwomen, a panting train, +the squalor of London's alleys, all found a voice in his lines--and +his later work contains more than a hint of the delight in science and +machinery which was later to be sounded more fully in the work of +Rudyard Kipling. + + +THE CELTIC REVIVAL AND J. M. SYNGE + +In 1889, William Butler Yeats published his _Wanderings of Oisin_; in +the same year Douglas Hyde, the scholar and folk-lorist, brought out +his _Book of Gaelic Stories_. + +The revival of Gaelic and the renascence of Irish literature may be +said to date from the publication of those two books. The fundamental +idea of both men and their followers was the same. It was to create a +literature which would express the national consciousness of Ireland +through a purely national art. They began to reflect the strange +background of dreams, politics, suffering and heroism that is +immortally Irish. This community of fellowship and aims is to be found +in the varied but allied work of William Butler Yeats, "A. E." (George +W. Russell), Moira O'Neill, Lionel Johnson, Katharine Tynan, Padraic +Colum and others. The first fervor gone, a short period of dullness +set in. After reanimating the old myths, surcharging the legendary +heroes with a new significance, it seemed for a while that the +movement would lose itself in a literary mysticism. But an increasing +concern with the peasant, the migratory laborer, the tramp, followed; +an interest that was something of a reaction against the influence of +Yeats and his mystic otherworldliness. And, in 1904, the Celtic +Revival reached its height with John Millington Synge, who was not +only the greatest dramatist of the Irish Theatre, but (to quote such +contrary critics as George Moore and Harold Williams) "one of the +greatest dramatists who has written in English." Synge's poetry, +brusque and all too small in quantity, was a minor occupation with him +and yet the quality and power of it is unmistakable. Its content is +never great but the raw vigor in it was to serve as a bold banner--a +sort of a brilliant Jolly Roger--for the younger men of the following +period. It was not only this dramatist's brief verses and his +intensely musical prose but his sharp prefaces that were to exercise +such an influence. + +In the notable introduction to the _Playboy of the Western World_, +Synge declared, "When I was writing _The Shadow of the Glen_ some +years ago, I got more aid than any learning could have given me from a +chink in the floor of the old Wicklow house where I was staying, that +let me hear what was being said by the servant girls in the kitchen. +This matter is, I think, of some importance; for in countries where +the imagination of the people, and the language they use, is rich and +living, it is possible for a writer to be rich and copious in his +words--and at the same time to give the reality which is at the root +of all poetry, in a natural and comprehensive form." This quotation +explains his idiom, possibly the sharpest-flavored and most vivid in +modern literature. + +As to Synge's poetic power, it is unquestionably greatest in his +plays. In _The Well of the Saints_, _The Playboy of the Western World_ +and _Riders to the Sea_ there are more poignance, beauty of form and +richness of language than in any piece of dramatic writing since +Elizabethan times. Yeats, when he first heard Synge's early one-act +play, _The Shadow of the Glen_, is said to have exclaimed "Euripides." +A half year later when Synge read him _Riders to the Sea_, Yeats again +confined his enthusiasm to a single word:--"AEschylus!" Years have +shown that Yeats's appreciation was not as exaggerated as many might +suppose. + +But although Synge's poetry was not his major concern, numbering only +twenty-four original pieces and eighteen translations, it had a +surprising effect upon his followers. It marked a point of departure, +a reaction against both the too-polished and over-rhetorical verse of +his immediate predecessors and the dehumanized mysticism of many of +his associates. In that memorable preface to his _Poems_ he wrote what +was a slogan, a manifesto and at the same time a classic _credo_ for +all that we call the "new" poetry. "I have often thought," it begins, +"that at the side of poetic diction, which everyone condemns, modern +verse contains a great deal of poetic material, using 'poetic' in the +same special sense. The poetry of exaltation will be always the +highest; but when men lose their poetic feeling for ordinary life and +cannot write poetry of ordinary things, their exalted poetry is likely +to lose its strength of exaltation in the way that men cease to build +beautiful churches when they have lost happiness in building shops.... +Even if we grant that exalted poetry can be kept successfully by +itself, the strong things of life are needed in poetry also, to show +that what is exalted or tender is not made by feeble blood." + + +RUDYARD KIPLING + +New tendencies are contagious. But they also disclose themselves +simultaneously in places and people where there has been no point of +contact. Even before Synge published his proofs of the keen poetry in +everyday life, Kipling was illuminating, in a totally different +manner, the wealth of poetic material in things hitherto regarded as +too commonplace for poetry. Before literary England had quite +recovered from its surfeit of Victorian priggishness and +pre-Raphaelite delicacy, Kipling came along with high spirits and a +great tide of life, sweeping all before him. An obscure Anglo-Indian +journalist, the publication of his _Barrack-room Ballads_ in 1892 +brought him sudden notice. By 1895 he was internationally famous. +Brushing over the pallid attempts to revive a pallid past, he rode +triumphantly on a wave of buoyant and sometimes brutal joy in the +present. Kipling gloried in the material world; he did more--he +glorified it. He pierced the coarse exteriors of seemingly prosaic +things--things like machinery, bridge-building, cockney soldiers, +slang, steam, the dirty by-products of science (witness "M'Andrews +Hymn" and "The Bell Buoy")--and uncovered their hidden glamour. +"Romance is gone," sighed most of his contemporaries, + + "... and all unseen + Romance brought up the nine-fifteen." + +That sentence (from his poem "The King") contains the key to the +manner in which the author of _The Five Nations_ helped to rejuvenate +English verse. + +Kipling, with his perception of ordinary people in terms of ordinary +life, was one of the strongest links between the Wordsworth-Browning +era and the latest apostles of vigor, beginning with Masefield. There +are occasional and serious defects in Kipling's work--particularly in +his more facile poetry; he falls into a journalistic ease that tends +to turn into jingle; he is fond of a militaristic drum-banging that is +as blatant as the insularity he condemns. But a burning, if sometimes +too simple faith, shines through his achievements. His best work +reveals an intensity that crystallizes into beauty what was originally +tawdry, that lifts the vulgar and incidental to the place of the +universal. + + +JOHN MASEFIELD + +All art is a twofold revivifying--a recreation of subject and a +reanimating of form. And poetry becomes perennially "new" by returning +to the old--with a different consciousness, a greater awareness. In +1911, when art was again searching for novelty, John Masefield created +something startling and new by going back to 1385 and _The Canterbury +Pilgrims_. Employing both the Chaucerian model and a form similar to +the practically forgotten Byronic stanza, Masefield wrote in rapid +succession, _The Everlasting Mercy_ (1911), _The Widow in the Bye +Street_ (1912), _Dauber_ (1912), _The Daffodil Fields_ (1913)--four +astonishing rhymed narratives and four of the most remarkable poems +of our generation. Expressive of every rugged phase of life, these +poems, uniting old and new manners, responded to Synge's proclamation +that "the strong things of life are needed in poetry also ... and it +may almost be said that before verse can be human again it must be +brutal." + +Masefield brought back to poetry that mixture of beauty and brutality +which is its most human and enduring quality. He brought back that +rich and almost vulgar vividness which is the very life-blood of +Chaucer, of Shakespeare, of Burns, of Villon, of Heine--and of all +those who were not only great artists but great humanists. As a purely +descriptive poet, he can take his place with the masters of sea and +landscape. As an imaginative realist, he showed those who were +stumbling from one wild eccentricity to another to thrill them, that +they themselves were wilder, stranger, far more thrilling than +anything in the world--or out of it. Few things in contemporary poetry +are as powerful as the regeneration of Saul Kane (in _The Everlasting +Mercy_) or the story of _Dauber_, the tale of a tragic sea-voyage and +a dreaming youth who wanted to be a painter. The vigorous description +of rounding Cape Horn in the latter poem is superbly done, a +masterpiece in itself. Masefield's later volumes are quieter in tone, +more measured in technique; there is an almost religious ring to many +of his Shakespearian sonnets. But the swinging surge is there, a +passionate strength that leaps through all his work from _Salt Water +Ballads_ (1902) to _Reynard the Fox_ (1919). + + +"THE GEORGIANS" AND THE YOUNGER MEN + +There is no sharp statistical line of demarcation between Masefield +and the younger men. Although several of them owe much to him, most of +the younger poets speak in accents of their own. W. W. Gibson had +already reinforced the "return to actuality" by turning from his first +preoccupation with shining knights, faultless queens, ladies in +distress and all the paraphernalia of hackneyed mediaeval romances, to +write about ferrymen, berry-pickers, stone-cutters, farmers, printers, +circus-men, carpenters--dramatizing (though sometimes theatricalizing) +the primitive emotions of uncultured and ordinary people in +_Livelihood_, _Daily Bread_ and _Fires_. This intensity had been +asking new questions. It found its answers in the war; repressed +emotionalism discovered a new outlet. One hears its echoes in the +younger poets like Siegfried Sassoon, with his poignant and unsparing +poems of conflict; in Robert Graves, who reflects it in a lighter and +more fantastic vein; in James Stephens, whose wild ingenuities are +redolent of the soil. And it finds its corresponding opposite in the +limpid and unperturbed loveliness of Ralph Hodgson; in the ghostly +magic and the nursery-rhyme whimsicality of Walter de la Mare; in the +quiet and delicate lyrics of W. H. Davies. Among the others, the +brilliant G. K. Chesterton, the facile Alfred Noyes, the romantic +Rupert Brooke (who owes less to Masefield and his immediate +predecessors than he does to the passionately intellectual Donne), the +introspective D. H. Lawrence and the versatile J. C. Squire, are +perhaps best known to American readers. + +All of the poets mentioned in the foregoing paragraph (with the +exception of Noyes) have formed themselves in a loose group called +"The Georgians," and an anthology of their best work has appeared +every two years since 1913. Masefield, Lascelles Abercrombie and John +Drinkwater are also listed among the Georgian poets. When their first +collection appeared in March, 1913, Henry Newbolt, a critic as well as +poet, wrote: "These younger poets have no temptation to be false. They +are not for making something 'pretty,' something up to the standard of +professional patterns.... They write as grown men walk, each with his +own unconscious stride and gesture.... In short, they express +themselves and seem to steer without an effort between the dangers of +innovation and reminiscence." The secret of this success, and for that +matter, the success of the greater portion of English poetry, is not +an exclusive discovery of the Georgian poets. It is their inheritance, +derived from those predecessors who, "from Wordsworth and Coleridge +onward, have worked for the assimilation of verse to the manner and +accent of natural speech." In its adaptability no less than in its +vigor, modern English poetry is true to its period--and its past. + + * * * * * + +This collection is obviously a companion volume to _Modern American +Poetry_, which, in its restricted compass, attempted to act as an +introduction to recent native verse. _Modern British Poetry_ covers +the same period (from about 1870 to 1920), follows the same +chronological scheme, but it is more amplified and goes into far +greater detail than its predecessor. + +The two volumes, considered together, furnish interesting contrasts; +they reveal certain similarities and certain strange differences. +Broadly speaking, modern American verse is sharp, vigorously +experimental; full of youth and its occasional--and natural--crudities. +English verse is smoother, more matured and, molded by centuries of +literature, richer in associations and surer in artistry. Where the +American output is often rude, extremely varied and uncoordinated (being +the expression of partly indigenous, partly naturalized and largely +unassimilated ideas, emotions, and races), the English product is +formulated, precise and, in spite of its fluctuations, true to its past. +It goes back to traditions as old as Chaucer (witness the narratives of +Masefield and Gibson) or tendencies as classic as Drayton, Herrick and +Blake--as in the frank lyrics of A. E. Housman, the artless lyricism of +Ralph Hodgson, the naif wonder of W. H. Davies. And if English poetry +may be compared to a broad and luxuriating river (while American poetry +might be described as a sudden rush of unconnected mountain torrents, +valley streams and city sluices), it will be inspiring to observe how +its course has been temporarily deflected in the last forty years; how +it has swung away from one tendency toward another; and how, for all its +bends and twists, it has lost neither its strength nor its nobility. + +L. U. + +New York City. +January, 1920. + + + + +MODERN BRITISH POETRY + + + + +_Thomas Hardy_ + + +Thomas Hardy was born in 1840, and has for years been famous on both +sides of the Atlantic as a writer of intense and sombre novels. His +_Tess of the D'Urbervilles_ and _Jude the Obscure_ are possibly his +best known, although his _Wessex Tales_ and _Life's Little Ironies_ +are no less imposing. + +It was not until he was almost sixty, in 1898 to be precise, that +Hardy abandoned prose and challenged attention as a poet. _The +Dynasts_, a drama of the Napoleonic Wars, is in three parts, nineteen +acts and one hundred and thirty scenes, a massive and most amazing +contribution to contemporary art. It is the apotheosis of Hardy the +novelist. Lascelles Abercrombie calls this work, which is partly a +historical play, partly a visionary drama, "the biggest and most +consistent exhibition of fatalism in literature." While its powerful +simplicity and tragic impressiveness overshadow his shorter poems, +many of his terse lyrics reveal the same vigor and impact of a strong +personality. His collected poems were published by The Macmillan +Company in 1919 and reveal another phase of one of the greatest living +writers of English. + + +IN TIME OF "THE BREAKING OF NATIONS" + + Only a man harrowing clods + In a slow silent walk, + With an old horse that stumbles and nods + Half asleep as they stalk. + + Only thin smoke without flame + From the heaps of couch grass: + Yet this will go onward the same + Though Dynasties pass. + + Yonder a maid and her wight + Come whispering by; + War's annals will fade into night + Ere their story die. + + +GOING AND STAYING + + The moving sun-shapes on the spray, + The sparkles where the brook was flowing, + Pink faces, plightings, moonlit May,-- + These were the things we wished would stay; + But they were going. + + Seasons of blankness as of snow, + The silent bleed of a world decaying, + The moan of multitudes in woe,-- + These were the things we wished would go; + But they were staying. + + +THE MAN HE KILLED + +(_From "The Dynasts"_) + + "Had he and I but met + By some old ancient inn, + We should have sat us down to wet + Right many a nipperkin! + + "But ranged as infantry, + And staring face to face, + I shot at him as he at me, + And killed him in his place. + + "I shot him dead because-- + Because he was my foe, + Just so: my foe of course he was; + That's clear enough; although + + "He thought he'd 'list, perhaps, + Off-hand like--just as I-- + Was out of work--had sold his traps-- + No other reason why. + + "Yes; quaint and curious war is! + You shoot a fellow down + You'd treat, if met where any bar is, + Or help to half-a-crown." + + + + +_Robert Bridges_ + + +Robert Bridges was born in 1844 and educated at Eton and Corpus +Christi College, Oxford. After traveling extensively, he studied +medicine in London and practiced until 1882. Most of his poems, like +his occasional plays, are classical in tone as well as treatment. He +was appointed poet laureate in 1913, following Alfred Austin. His +command of the secrets of rhythm and a subtle versification give his +lines a firm delicacy and beauty of pattern. + + +WINTER NIGHTFALL + + The day begins to droop,-- + Its course is done: + But nothing tells the place + Of the setting sun. + + The hazy darkness deepens, + And up the lane + You may hear, but cannot see, + The homing wain. + + An engine pants and hums + In the farm hard by: + Its lowering smoke is lost + In the lowering sky. + + The soaking branches drip, + And all night through + The dropping will not cease + In the avenue. + + A tall man there in the house + Must keep his chair: + He knows he will never again + Breathe the spring air: + + His heart is worn with work; + He is giddy and sick + If he rise to go as far + As the nearest rick: + + He thinks of his morn of life, + His hale, strong years; + And braves as he may the night + Of darkness and tears. + + +NIGHTINGALES + + Beautiful must be the mountains whence ye come, + And bright in the fruitful valleys the streams, wherefrom + Ye learn your song: + Where are those starry woods? O might I wander there, + Among the flowers, which in that heavenly air + Bloom the year long! + + Nay, barren are those mountains and spent the streams: + Our song is the voice of desire, that haunts our dreams, + A throe of the heart, + Whose pining visions dim, forbidden hopes profound, + No dying cadence nor long sigh can sound, + For all our art. + + Alone, aloud in the raptured ear of men + We pour our dark nocturnal secret; and then, + As night is withdrawn + From these sweet-springing meads and bursting boughs of May, + Dream, while the innumerable choir of day + Welcome the dawn. + + + + +_Arthur O'Shaughnessy_ + + +The Irish-English singer, Arthur William Edgar O'Shaughnessy, was born +in London in 1844. He was connected, for a while, with the British +Museum, and was transferred later to the Department of Natural +History. His first literary success, _Epic of Women_ (1870), promised +a brilliant future for the young poet, a promise strengthened by his +_Music and Moonlight_ (1874). Always delicate in health, his hopes +were dashed by periods of illness and an early death in London in +1881. + +The poem here reprinted is not only O'Shaughnessy's best, but is, +because of its perfect blending of music and message, one of the +immortal classics of our verse. + + +ODE + + We are the music-makers, + And we are the dreamers of dreams, + Wandering by lone sea-breakers, + And sitting by desolate streams; + World-losers and world-forsakers, + On whom the pale moon gleams: + Yet we are the movers and shakers + Of the world for ever, it seems. + + With wonderful deathless ditties + We build up the world's great cities, + And out of a fabulous story + We fashion an empire's glory: + One man with a dream, at pleasure, + Shall go forth and conquer a crown; + And three with a new song's measure + Can trample an empire down. + + We, in the ages lying + In the buried past of the earth, + Built Nineveh with our sighing, + And Babel itself with our mirth; + And o'erthrew them with prophesying + To the old of the new world's worth; + For each age is a dream that is dying, + Or one that is coming to birth. + + + + +_William Ernest Henley_ + + +William Ernest Henley was born in 1849 and was educated at the Grammar +School of Gloucester. From childhood he was afflicted with a +tuberculous disease which finally necessitated the amputation of a +foot. His _Hospital Verses_, those vivid precursors of current free +verse, were a record of the time when he was at the infirmary at +Edinburgh; they are sharp with the sights, sensations, even the actual +smells of the sickroom. In spite (or, more probably, because) of his +continued poor health, Henley never ceased to worship strength and +energy; courage and a triumphant belief in a harsh world shine out of +the athletic _London Voluntaries_ (1892) and the lightest and most +musical lyrics in _Hawthorn and Lavender_ (1898). + +The bulk of Henley's poetry is not great in volume. He has himself +explained the small quantity of his work in a Preface to his _Poems_, +first published by Charles Scribner's Sons in 1898. "A principal +reason," he says, "is that, after spending the better part of my life +in the pursuit of poetry, I found myself (about 1877) so utterly +unmarketable that I had to own myself beaten in art, and to indict +myself to journalism for the next ten years." Later on, he began to +write again--"old dusty sheaves were dragged to light; the work of +selection and correction was begun; I burned much; I found that, +after all, the lyrical instinct had slept--not died." + +After a brilliant and varied career (see Preface), devoted mostly to +journalism, Henley died in 1903. + + +INVICTUS + + Out of the night that covers me, + Black as the Pit from pole to pole, + I thank whatever gods may be + For my unconquerable soul. + + In the fell clutch of circumstance + I have not winced nor cried aloud. + Under the bludgeonings of chance + My head is bloody, but unbowed. + + Beyond this place of wrath and tears + Looms but the Horror of the shade, + And yet the menace of the years + Finds, and shall find, me unafraid. + + It matters not how strait the gate, + How charged with punishments the scroll, + I am the master of my fate: + I am the captain of my soul. + + +THE BLACKBIRD + + The nightingale has a lyre of gold, + The lark's is a clarion call, + And the blackbird plays but a boxwood flute, + But I love him best of all. + + For his song is all of the joy of life, + And we in the mad, spring weather, + We two have listened till he sang + Our hearts and lips together. + + +A BOWL OF ROSES + + It was a bowl of roses: + There in the light they lay, + Languishing, glorying, glowing + Their life away. + + And the soul of them rose like a presence, + Into me crept and grew, + And filled me with something--some one-- + O, was it you? + + +BEFORE + + Behold me waiting--waiting for the knife. + A little while, and at a leap I storm + The thick sweet mystery of chloroform, + The drunken dark, the little death-in-life. + The gods are good to me: I have no wife, + No innocent child, to think of as I near + The fateful minute; nothing all-too dear + Unmans me for my bout of passive strife. + + Yet I am tremulous and a trifle sick, + And, face to face with chance, I shrink a little: + My hopes are strong, my will is something weak. + Here comes the basket? Thank you. I am ready + But, gentlemen my porters, life is brittle: + You carry Caesar and his fortunes--Steady! + + +MARGARITAE SORORI + + A late lark twitters from the quiet skies; + And from the west, + Where the sun, his day's work ended, + Lingers as in content, + There falls on the old, grey city + An influence luminous and serene, + A shining peace. + + The smoke ascends + In a rosy-and-golden haze. The spires + Shine, and are changed. In the valley + Shadows rise. The lark sings on. The sun, + Closing his benediction, + Sinks, and the darkening air + Thrills with a sense of the triumphing night-- + Night with her train of stars + And her great gift of sleep. + + So be my passing! + My task accomplished and the long day done, + My wages taken, and in my heart + Some late lark singing, + Let me be gathered to the quiet west, + The sundown splendid and serene, + Death. + + + + +_Robert Louis Stevenson_ + + +Robert Louis Stevenson was born at Edinburgh in 1850. He was at first +trained to be a lighthouse engineer, following the profession of his +family. However, he studied law instead; was admitted to the bar in +1875; and abandoned law for literature a few years later. + +Though primarily a novelist, Stevenson has left one immortal book of +poetry which is equally at home in the nursery and the library: _A +Child's Garden of Verses_ (first published in 1885) is second only to +Mother Goose's own collection in its lyrical simplicity and universal +appeal. _Underwoods_ (1887) and _Ballads_ (1890) comprise his entire +poetic output. As a genial essayist, he is not unworthy to be ranked +with Charles Lamb. As a romancer, his fame rests securely on +_Kidnapped_, the unfinished masterpiece, _Weir of Hermiston_, and that +eternal classic of youth, _Treasure Island_. + +Stevenson died after a long and dogged fight with his illness, in the +Samoan Islands in 1894. + + +SUMMER SUN + + Great is the sun, and wide he goes + Through empty heaven without repose; + And in the blue and glowing days + More thick than rain he showers his rays. + + Though closer still the blinds we pull + To keep the shady parlour cool, + Yet he will find a chink or two + To slip his golden fingers through. + + The dusty attic, spider-clad, + He, through the keyhole, maketh glad; + And through the broken edge of tiles + Into the laddered hay-loft smiles. + + Meantime his golden face around + He bares to all the garden ground, + And sheds a warm and glittering look + Among the ivy's inmost nook. + + Above the hills, along the blue, + Round the bright air with footing true, + To please the child, to paint the rose, + The gardener of the World, he goes. + + +WINTER-TIME + + Late lies the wintry sun a-bed, + A frosty, fiery sleepy-head; + Blinks but an hour or two; and then, + A blood-red orange, sets again. + + Before the stars have left the skies, + At morning in the dark I rise; + And shivering in my nakedness, + By the cold candle, bathe and dress. + + Close by the jolly fire I sit + To warm my frozen bones a bit; + Or with a reindeer-sled, explore + The colder countries round the door. + + When to go out, my nurse doth wrap + Me in my comforter and cap; + The cold wind burns my face, and blows + Its frosty pepper up my nose. + + Black are my steps on silver sod; + Thick blows my frosty breath abroad; + And tree and house, and hill and lake, + Are frosted like a wedding-cake. + + +ROMANCE + + I will make you brooches and toys for your delight + Of bird-song at morning and star-shine at night. + I will make a palace fit for you and me, + Of green days in forests and blue days at sea. + + I will make my kitchen, and you shall keep your room, + Where white flows the river and bright blows the broom, + And you shall wash your linen and keep your body white + In rainfall at morning and dewfall at night. + + And this shall be for music when no one else is near, + The fine song for singing, the rare song to hear! + That only I remember, that only you admire, + Of the broad road that stretches and the roadside fire. + + +REQUIEM + + Under the wide and starry sky + Dig the grave and let me lie: + Glad did I live and gladly die, + And I laid me down with a will. + + This be the verse you 'grave for me: + _Here he lies where he long'd to be; + Home is the sailor, home from the sea, + And the hunter home from the hill._ + + + + +_Alice Meynell_ + + +Alice Meynell was born in London in 1850. She was educated at home and +spent a great part of her childhood in Italy. She has written little, +but that little is on an extremely high plane; her verses are simple, +pensive and always distinguished. The best of her work is in _Poems_ +(1903). + + +A THRUSH BEFORE DAWN + + A voice peals in this end of night + A phrase of notes resembling stars, + Single and spiritual notes of light. + What call they at my window-bars? + The South, the past, the day to be, + An ancient infelicity. + + Darkling, deliberate, what sings + This wonderful one, alone, at peace? + What wilder things than song, what things + Sweeter than youth, clearer than Greece, + Dearer than Italy, untold + Delight, and freshness centuries old? + + And first first-loves, a multitude, + The exaltation of their pain; + Ancestral childhood long renewed; + And midnights of invisible rain; + And gardens, gardens, night and day, + Gardens and childhood all the way. + + What Middle Ages passionate, + O passionless voice! What distant bells + Lodged in the hills, what palace state + Illyrian! For it speaks, it tells, + Without desire, without dismay, + Some morrow and some yesterday. + + All-natural things! But more--Whence came + This yet remoter mystery? + How do these starry notes proclaim + A graver still divinity? + This hope, this sanctity of fear? + _O innocent throat! O human ear!_ + + + + +_Fiona Macleod_ + +(_William Sharp_) + + +William Sharp was born at Garthland Place, Scotland, in 1855. He wrote +several volumes of biography and criticism, published a book of plays +greatly influenced by Maeterlinck (_Vistas_) and was editor of "The +Canterbury Poets" series. + +His feminine _alter ego_, Fiona Macleod, was a far different +personality. Sharp actually believed himself possessed of another +spirit; under the spell of this other self, he wrote several volumes +of Celtic tales, beautiful tragic romances and no little unusual +poetry. Of the prose stories written by Fiona Macleod, the most +barbaric and vivid are those collected in _The Sin-Eater and Other +Tales_; the longer _Pharais, A Romance of the Isles_, is scarcely less +unique. + +In the ten years, 1882-1891, William Sharp published four volumes of +rather undistinguished verse. In 1896 _From the Hills of Dream_ +appeared over the signature of Fiona Macleod; _The Hour of Beauty_, an +even more distinctive collection, followed shortly. Both poetry and +prose were always the result of two sharply differentiated moods +constantly fluctuating; the emotional mood was that of Fiona Macleod, +the intellectual and, it must be admitted the more arresting, was that +of William Sharp. + +He died in 1905. + + +THE VALLEY OF SILENCE + + In the secret Valley of Silence + No breath doth fall; + No wind stirs in the branches; + No bird doth call: + As on a white wall + A breathless lizard is still, + So silence lies on the valley + Breathlessly still. + + In the dusk-grown heart of the valley + An altar rises white: + No rapt priest bends in awe + Before its silent light: + But sometimes a flight + Of breathless words of prayer + White-wing'd enclose the altar, + Eddies of prayer. + + +THE VISION + + In a fair place + Of whin and grass, + I heard feet pass + Where no one was. + + I saw a face + Bloom like a flower-- + Nay, as the rainbow-shower + Of a tempestuous hour. + + It was not man, or woman: + It was not human: + But, beautiful and wild, + Terribly undefiled, + I knew an unborn child. + + + + +_Oscar Wilde_ + + +Oscar Wilde was born at Dublin, Ireland, in 1856, and even as an +undergraduate at Oxford he was marked for a brilliant career. When he +was a trifle over 21 years of age, he won the Newdigate Prize with his +poem _Ravenna_. + +Giving himself almost entirely to prose, he speedily became known as a +writer of brilliant epigrammatic essays and even more brilliant +paradoxical plays such as _An Ideal Husband_ and _The Importance of +Being Earnest_. His aphorisms and flippancies were quoted everywhere; +his fame as a wit was only surpassed by his notoriety as an aesthete. +(See Preface.) + +Most of his poems in prose (such as _The Happy Prince_, _The Birthday +of the Infanta_ and _The Fisherman and His Soul_) are more imaginative +and richly colored than his verse; but in one long poem, _The Ballad +of Reading Gaol_ (1898), he sounded his deepest, simplest and most +enduring note. Prison was, in many ways, a regeneration for Wilde. It +not only produced _The Ballad of Reading Gaol_ but made possible his +most poignant piece of writing, _De Profundis_, only a small part of +which has been published. _Salome_, which has made the author's name a +household word, was originally written in French in 1892 and later +translated into English by Lord Alfred Douglas, accompanied by the +famous illustrations by Aubrey Beardsley. More recently this heated +drama, based on the story of Herod and Herodias, was made into an +opera by Richard Strauss. + +Wilde's society plays, flashing and cynical, were the forerunners of +Bernard Shaw's audacious and far more searching ironies. One sees the +origin of a whole school of drama in such epigrams as "The history of +woman is the history of the worst form of tyranny the world has ever +known: the tyranny of the weak over the strong. It is the only tyranny +that lasts." Or "There is only one thing in the world worse than being +talked about, and that is not being talked about." + +Wilde died at Paris, November 30, 1900. + + +REQUIESCAT + + Tread lightly, she is near + Under the snow, + Speak gently, she can hear + The daisies grow. + + All her bright golden hair + Tarnished with rust, + She that was young and fair + Fallen to dust. + + Lily-like, white as snow, + She hardly knew + She was a woman, so + Sweetly she grew. + + Coffin-board, heavy stone, + Lie on her breast; + I vex my heart alone, + She is at rest. + + Peace, peace; she cannot hear + Lyre or sonnet; + All my life's buried here, + Heap earth upon it. + + +IMPRESSION DU MATIN + + The Thames nocturne of blue and gold + Changed to a harmony in grey; + A barge with ochre-coloured hay + Dropt from the wharf: and chill and cold + + The yellow fog came creeping down + The bridges, till the houses' walls + Seemed changed to shadows, and St. Paul's + Loomed like a bubble o'er the town. + + Then suddenly arose the clang + Of waking life; the streets were stirred + With country waggons; and a bird + Flew to the glistening roofs and sang. + + But one pale woman all alone, + The daylight kissing her wan hair, + Loitered beneath the gas lamps' flare, + With lips of flame and heart of stone. + + + + +_John Davidson_ + + +John Davidson was born at Barrhead, Renfrewshire, in 1857. His +_Ballads and Songs_ (1895) and _New Ballads_ (1897) attained a sudden +but too short-lived popularity, and his great promise was quenched by +an apathetic public and by his own growing disillusion and despair. +His sombre yet direct poetry never tired of repeating his favorite +theme: "Man is but the Universe grown conscious." + +Davidson died by his own hand in 1909. + + +A BALLAD OF HELL + + 'A letter from my love to-day! + Oh, unexpected, dear appeal!' + She struck a happy tear away, + And broke the crimson seal. + + 'My love, there is no help on earth, + No help in heaven; the dead-man's bell + Must toll our wedding; our first hearth + Must be the well-paved floor of hell.' + + The colour died from out her face, + Her eyes like ghostly candles shone; + She cast dread looks about the place, + Then clenched her teeth and read right on. + + 'I may not pass the prison door; + Here must I rot from day to day, + Unless I wed whom I abhor, + My cousin, Blanche of Valencay. + + 'At midnight with my dagger keen, + I'll take my life; it must be so. + Meet me in hell to-night, my queen, + For weal and woe.' + + She laughed although her face was wan, + She girded on her golden belt, + She took her jewelled ivory fan, + And at her glowing missal knelt. + + Then rose, 'And am I mad?' she said: + She broke her fan, her belt untied; + With leather girt herself instead, + And stuck a dagger at her side. + + She waited, shuddering in her room, + Till sleep had fallen on all the house. + She never flinched; she faced her doom: + They two must sin to keep their vows. + + Then out into the night she went, + And, stooping, crept by hedge and tree; + Her rose-bush flung a snare of scent, + And caught a happy memory. + + She fell, and lay a minute's space; + She tore the sward in her distress; + The dewy grass refreshed her face; + She rose and ran with lifted dress. + + She started like a morn-caught ghost + Once when the moon came out and stood + To watch; the naked road she crossed, + And dived into the murmuring wood. + + The branches snatched her streaming cloak; + A live thing shrieked; she made no stay! + She hurried to the trysting-oak-- + Right well she knew the way. + + Without a pause she bared her breast, + And drove her dagger home and fell, + And lay like one that takes her rest, + And died and wakened up in hell. + + She bathed her spirit in the flame, + And near the centre took her post; + From all sides to her ears there came + The dreary anguish of the lost. + + The devil started at her side, + Comely, and tall, and black as jet. + 'I am young Malespina's bride; + Has he come hither yet?' + + 'My poppet, welcome to your bed.' + 'Is Malespina here?' + 'Not he! To-morrow he must wed + His cousin Blanche, my dear!' + + 'You lie, he died with me to-night.' + 'Not he! it was a plot' ... 'You lie.' + 'My dear, I never lie outright.' + 'We died at midnight, he and I.' + + The devil went. Without a groan + She, gathered up in one fierce prayer, + Took root in hell's midst all alone, + And waited for him there. + + She dared to make herself at home + Amidst the wail, the uneasy stir. + The blood-stained flame that filled the dome, + Scentless and silent, shrouded her. + + How long she stayed I cannot tell; + But when she felt his perfidy, + She marched across the floor of hell; + And all the damned stood up to see. + + The devil stopped her at the brink: + She shook him off; she cried, 'Away!' + 'My dear, you have gone mad, I think.' + 'I was betrayed: I will not stay.' + + Across the weltering deep she ran; + A stranger thing was never seen: + The damned stood silent to a man; + They saw the great gulf set between. + + To her it seemed a meadow fair; + And flowers sprang up about her feet + She entered heaven; she climbed the stair + And knelt down at the mercy-seat. + + Seraphs and saints with one great voice + Welcomed that soul that knew not fear. + Amazed to find it could rejoice, + Hell raised a hoarse, half-human cheer. + + +IMAGINATION + +(_From "New Year's Eve"_) + + There is a dish to hold the sea, + A brazier to contain the sun, + A compass for the galaxy, + A voice to wake the dead and done! + + That minister of ministers, + Imagination, gathers up + The undiscovered Universe, + Like jewels in a jasper cup. + + Its flame can mingle north and south; + Its accent with the thunder strive; + The ruddy sentence of its mouth + Can make the ancient dead alive. + + The mart of power, the fount of will, + The form and mould of every star, + The source and bound of good and ill, + The key of all the things that are, + + Imagination, new and strange + In every age, can turn the year; + Can shift the poles and lightly change + The mood of men, the world's career. + + + + +_William Watson_ + + +William Watson was born at Burley-in-Wharfedale, Yorkshire, August 2, +1858. He achieved his first wide success through his long and eloquent +poems on Wordsworth, Shelley, and Tennyson--poems that attempted, and +sometimes successfully, to combine the manners of these masters. _The +Hope of the World_ (1897) contains some of his most characteristic +verse. + +It was understood that he would be appointed poet laureate upon the +death of Alfred Austin. But some of his radical and semi-political +poems are supposed to have displeased the powers at Court, and the +honor went to Robert Bridges. His best work, which is notable for its +dignity and moulded imagination, may be found in _Selected Poems_, +published in 1903 by John Lane Co. + + +ODE IN MAY[1] + + Let me go forth, and share + The overflowing Sun + With one wise friend, or one + Better than wise, being fair, + Where the pewit wheels and dips + On heights of bracken and ling, + And Earth, unto her leaflet tips, + Tingles with the Spring. + + What is so sweet and dear + As a prosperous morn in May, + The confident prime of the day, + And the dauntless youth of the year, + When nothing that asks for bliss, + Asking aright, is denied, + And half of the world a bridegroom is, + And half of the world a bride? + + The Song of Mingling flows, + Grave, ceremonial, pure, + As once, from lips that endure, + The cosmic descant rose, + When the temporal lord of life, + Going his golden way, + Had taken a wondrous maid to wife + That long had said him nay. + + For of old the Sun, our sire, + Came wooing the mother of men, + Earth, that was virginal then, + Vestal fire to his fire. + Silent her bosom and coy, + But the strong god sued and pressed; + And born of their starry nuptial joy + Are all that drink of her breast. + + And the triumph of him that begot, + And the travail of her that bore, + Behold, they are evermore + As warp and weft in our lot. + We are children of splendour and flame, + Of shuddering, also, and tears. + Magnificent out of the dust we came, + And abject from the Spheres. + + O bright irresistible lord, + We are fruit of Earth's womb, each one, + And fruit of thy loins, O Sun, + Whence first was the seed outpoured. + To thee as our Father we bow, + Forbidden thy Father to see, + Who is older and greater than thou, as thou + Art greater and older than we. + + Thou art but as a word of his speech, + Thou art but as a wave of his hand; + Thou art brief as a glitter of sand + 'Twixt tide and tide on his beach; + Thou art less than a spark of his fire, + Or a moment's mood of his soul: + Thou art lost in the notes on the lips of his choir + That chant the chant of the Whole. + + +ESTRANGEMENT[2] + + So, without overt breach, we fall apart, + Tacitly sunder--neither you nor I + Conscious of one intelligible Why, + And both, from severance, winning equal smart. + So, with resigned and acquiescent heart, + Whene'er your name on some chance lip may lie, + I seem to see an alien shade pass by, + A spirit wherein I have no lot or part. + + Thus may a captive, in some fortress grim, + From casual speech betwixt his warders, learn + That June on her triumphal progress goes + Through arched and bannered woodlands; while for him + She is a legend emptied of concern, + And idle is the rumour of the rose. + + +SONG + + April, April, + Laugh thy girlish laughter; + Then, the moment after, + Weep thy girlish tears, + April, that mine ears + Like a lover greetest, + If I tell thee, sweetest, + All my hopes and fears. + April, April, + Laugh thy golden laughter, + But, the moment after, + Weep thy golden tears! + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] From _The Hope of the World_ by William Watson. Copyright, 1897, +by John Lane Company. Reprinted by permission of the publishers. + +[2] From _The Hope of the World_ by William Watson. Copyright, 1897, +by John Lane Company. Reprinted by permission of the publishers. + + + + +_Francis Thompson_ + + +Born in 1859 at Preston, Francis Thompson was educated at Owen's +College, Manchester. Later he tried all manner of strange ways of +earning a living. He was, at various times, assistant in a boot-shop, +medical student, collector for a book seller and homeless vagabond; +there was a period in his life when he sold matches on the streets of +London. He was discovered in terrible poverty (having given up +everything except poetry and opium) by the editor of a magazine to +which he had sent some verses the year before. Almost immediately +thereafter he became famous. His exalted mysticism is seen at its +purest in "A Fallen Yew" and "The Hound of Heaven." Coventry Patmore, +the distinguished poet of an earlier period, says of the latter poem, +which is unfortunately too long to quote, "It is one of the very few +_great_ odes of which our language can boast." + +Thompson died, after a fragile and spasmodic life, in St. John's Wood +in November, 1907. + + +DAISY + + Where the thistle lifts a purple crown + Six foot out of the turf, + And the harebell shakes on the windy hill-- + O breath of the distant surf!-- + + The hills look over on the South, + And southward dreams the sea; + And with the sea-breeze hand in hand + Came innocence and she. + + Where 'mid the gorse the raspberry + Red for the gatherer springs; + Two children did we stray and talk + Wise, idle, childish things. + + She listened with big-lipped surprise, + Breast-deep 'mid flower and spine: + Her skin was like a grape whose veins + Run snow instead of wine. + + She knew not those sweet words she spake, + Nor knew her own sweet way; + But there's never a bird, so sweet a song + Thronged in whose throat all day. + + Oh, there were flowers in Storrington + On the turf and on the spray; + But the sweetest flower on Sussex hills + Was the Daisy-flower that day! + + Her beauty smoothed earth's furrowed face. + She gave me tokens three:-- + A look, a word of her winsome mouth, + And a wild raspberry. + + A berry red, a guileless look, + A still word,--strings of sand! + And yet they made my wild, wild heart + Fly down to her little hand. + + For standing artless as the air, + And candid as the skies, + She took the berries with her hand, + And the love with her sweet eyes. + + The fairest things have fleetest end, + Their scent survives their close: + But the rose's scent is bitterness + To him that loved the rose. + + She looked a little wistfully, + Then went her sunshine way:-- + The sea's eye had a mist on it, + And the leaves fell from the day. + + She went her unremembering way, + She went and left in me + The pang of all the partings gone, + And partings yet to be. + + She left me marvelling why my soul + Was sad that she was glad; + At all the sadness in the sweet, + The sweetness in the sad. + + Still, still I seemed to see her, still + Look up with soft replies, + And take the berries with her hand, + And the love with her lovely eyes. + + Nothing begins, and nothing ends, + That is not paid with moan, + For we are born in other's pain, + And perish in our own. + + +TO OLIVIA + + I fear to love thee, Sweet, because + Love's the ambassador of loss; + White flake of childhood, clinging so + To my soiled raiment, thy shy snow + At tenderest touch will shrink and go. + Love me not, delightful child. + My heart, by many snares beguiled, + Has grown timorous and wild. + It would fear thee not at all, + Wert thou not so harmless-small. + Because thy arrows, not yet dire, + Are still unbarbed with destined fire, + I fear thee more than hadst thou stood + Full-panoplied in womanhood. + + +AN ARAB LOVE-SONG + + The hunched camels of the night[3] + Trouble the bright + And silver waters of the moon. + The Maiden of the Morn will soon + Through Heaven stray and sing, + Star gathering. + + Now while the dark about our loves is strewn, + Light of my dark, blood of my heart, O come! + And night will catch her breath up, and be dumb. + + Leave thy father, leave thy mother + And thy brother; + Leave the black tents of thy tribe apart! + Am I not thy father and thy brother, + And thy mother? + And thou--what needest with thy tribe's black + tents + Who hast the red pavilion of my heart? + +FOOTNOTES: + +[3] (Cloud-shapes observed by travellers in the East.) + + + + +_A. E. Housman_ + + +A. E. Housman was born March 26, 1859, and, after a classical +education, he was, for ten years, a Higher Division Clerk in H. M. +Patent Office. Later in life, he became a teacher. + +Housman has published only one volume of original verse, but that +volume (_A Shropshire Lad_) is known wherever modern English poetry is +read. Originally published in 1896, when Housman was almost 37, it is +evident that many of these lyrics were written when the poet was much +younger. Echoing the frank pessimism of Hardy and the harder cynicism +of Heine, Housman struck a lighter and more buoyant note. Underneath +his dark ironies, there is a rustic humor that has many subtle +variations. From a melodic standpoint, _A Shropshire Lad_ is a +collection of exquisite, haunting and almost perfect songs. + +Housman has been a professor of Latin since 1892 and, besides his +immortal set of lyrics, has edited Juvenal and the books of Manilius. + + +REVEILLE + + Wake: the silver dusk returning + Up the beach of darkness brims, + And the ship of sunrise burning + Strands upon the eastern rims. + + Wake: the vaulted shadow shatters, + Trampled to the floor it spanned, + And the tent of night in tatters + Straws the sky-pavilioned land. + + Up, lad, up, 'tis late for lying: + Hear the drums of morning play; + Hark, the empty highways crying + "Who'll beyond the hills away?" + + Towns and countries woo together, + Forelands beacon, belfries call; + Never lad that trod on leather + Lived to feast his heart with all. + + Up, lad: thews that lie and cumber + Sunlit pallets never thrive; + Morns abed and daylight slumber + Were not meant for man alive. + + Clay lies still, but blood's a rover; + Breath's a ware that will not keep. + Up, lad: when the journey's over + There'll be time enough to sleep. + + +WHEN I WAS ONE-AND-TWENTY + + When I was one-and-twenty + I heard a wise man say, + "Give crowns and pounds and guineas + But not your heart away; + Give pearls away and rubies + But keep your fancy free." + But I was one-and-twenty, + No use to talk to me. + + When I was one-and-twenty + I heard him say again, + "The heart out of the bosom + Was never given in vain; + 'Tis paid with sighs a-plenty + And sold for endless rue." + And I am two-and-twenty, + And oh, 'tis true, 'tis true. + + +WITH RUE MY HEART IS LADEN + + With rue my heart is laden + For golden friends I had, + For many a rose-lipt maiden + And many a lightfoot lad. + + By brooks too broad for leaping + The lightfoot boys are laid; + The rose-lipt girls are sleeping + In fields where roses fade. + + +TO AN ATHLETE DYING YOUNG + + The time you won your town the race + We chaired you through the market-place; + Man and boy stood cheering by, + And home we brought you shoulder-high. + + To-day, the road all runners come, + Shoulder-high we bring you home, + And set you at your threshold down, + Townsman of a stiller town. + + Smart lad, to slip betimes away + From fields where glory does not stay, + And early though the laurel grows + It withers quicker than the rose. + + Eyes the shady night has shut + Cannot see the record cut, + And silence sounds no worse than cheers + After earth has stopped the ears: + + Now you will not swell the rout + Of lads that wore their honours out, + Runners whom renown outran + And the name died before the man. + + So set, before its echoes fade, + The fleet foot on the sill of shade, + And hold to the low lintel up + The still-defended challenge-cup. + + And round that early-laurelled head + Will flock to gaze the strengthless dead, + And find unwithered on its curls + The garland briefer than a girl's. + + +"LOVELIEST OF TREES" + + Loveliest of trees, the cherry now + Is hung with bloom along the bough, + And stands about the woodland ride + Wearing white for Eastertide. + + Now, of my threescore years and ten, + Twenty will not come again, + And take from seventy springs a score, + It only leaves me fifty more. + + And since to look at things in bloom + Fifty springs are little room, + About the woodlands I will go + To see the cherry hung with snow. + + + + +_Douglas Hyde_ + + +Doctor Douglas Hyde was born in Roscommon County, Ireland in, as +nearly as can be ascertained, 1860. One of the most brilliant Irish +scholars of his day, he has worked indefatigably for the cause of his +native letters. He has written a comprehensive history of Irish +literature; has compiled, edited and translated into English the _Love +Songs of Connaught_; is President of The Irish National Literary +Society; and is the author of innumerable poems in Gaelic--far more +than he ever wrote in English. His collections of Irish folk-lore and +poetry were among the most notable contributions to the Celtic +revival; they were (see Preface), to a large extent, responsible for +it. Since 1909 he has been Professor of Modern Irish in University +College, Dublin. + +The poem which is here quoted is one of his many brilliant and +reanimating translations. In its music and its peculiar rhyme-scheme, +it reproduces the peculiar flavor as well as the meter of the West +Irish original. + + +I SHALL NOT DIE FOR THEE + + For thee, I shall not die, + Woman of high fame and name; + Foolish men thou mayest slay + I and they are not the same. + + Why should I expire + For the fire of an eye, + Slender waist or swan-like limb, + Is't for them that I should die? + + The round breasts, the fresh skin, + Cheeks crimson, hair so long and rich; + Indeed, indeed, I shall not die, + Please God, not I, for any such. + + The golden hair, the forehead thin, + The chaste mien, the gracious ease, + The rounded heel, the languid tone,-- + Fools alone find death from these. + + Thy sharp wit, thy perfect calm, + Thy thin palm like foam o' the sea; + Thy white neck, thy blue eye, + I shall not die for thee. + + Woman, graceful as the swan, + A wise man did nurture me. + Little palm, white neck, bright eye, + I shall not die for ye. + + + + +_Amy Levy_ + + +Amy Levy, a singularly gifted Jewess, was born at Clapham, in 1861. A +fiery young poet, she burdened her own intensity with the sorrows of +her race. She wrote one novel, _Reuben Sachs_, and two volumes of +poetry--the more distinctive of the two being half-pathetically and +half-ironically entitled _A Minor Poet_ (1884). After several years of +brooding introspection, she committed suicide in 1889 at the age of +28. + + +EPITAPH + +(_On a commonplace person who died in bed_) + + This is the end of him, here he lies: + The dust in his throat, the worm in his eyes, + The mould in his mouth, the turf on his breast; + This is the end of him, this is best. + He will never lie on his couch awake, + Wide-eyed, tearless, till dim daybreak. + Never again will he smile and smile + When his heart is breaking all the while. + He will never stretch out his hands in vain + Groping and groping--never again. + Never ask for bread, get a stone instead, + Never pretend that the stone is bread; + Nor sway and sway 'twixt the false and true, + Weighing and noting the long hours through. + Never ache and ache with the choked-up sighs; + This is the end of him, here he lies. + + +IN THE MILE END ROAD + + How like her! But 'tis she herself, + Comes up the crowded street, + How little did I think, the morn, + My only love to meet! + + Who else that motion and that mien? + Whose else that airy tread? + For one strange moment I forgot + My only love was dead. + + + + +_Katharine Tynan Hinkson_ + + +Katharine Tynan was born at Dublin in 1861, and educated at the +Convent of St. Catherine at Drogheda. She married Henry Hinkson, a +lawyer and author, in 1893. Her poetry is largely actuated by +religious themes, and much of her verse is devotional and yet +distinctive. In _New Poems_ (1911) she is at her best; graceful, +meditative and with occasional notes of deep pathos. + + +SHEEP AND LAMBS + + All in the April morning, + April airs were abroad; + The sheep with their little lambs + Pass'd me by on the road. + + The sheep with their little lambs + Pass'd me by on the road; + All in an April evening + I thought on the Lamb of God. + + The lambs were weary, and crying + With a weak human cry; + I thought on the Lamb of God + Going meekly to die. + + Up in the blue, blue mountains + Dewy pastures are sweet: + Rest for the little bodies, + Rest for the little feet. + + Rest for the Lamb of God + Up on the hill-top green; + Only a cross of shame + Two stark crosses between. + + All in the April evening, + April airs were abroad; + I saw the sheep with their lambs, + And thought on the Lamb of God. + + +ALL-SOULS + + The door of Heaven is on the latch + To-night, and many a one is fain + To go home for one's night's watch + With his love again. + + Oh, where the father and mother sit + There's a drift of dead leaves at the door + Like pitter-patter of little feet + That come no more. + + Their thoughts are in the night and cold, + Their tears are heavier than the clay, + But who is this at the threshold + So young and gay? + + They are come from the land o' the young, + They have forgotten how to weep; + Words of comfort on the tongue, + And a kiss to keep. + + They sit down and they stay awhile, + Kisses and comfort none shall lack; + At morn they steal forth with a smile + And a long look back. + + + + +_Owen Seaman_ + + +One of the most delightful of English versifiers, Owen Seaman, was +born in 1861. After receiving a classical education, he became +Professor of Literature and began to write for Punch in 1894. In 1906 +he was made editor of that internationally famous weekly, remaining in +that capacity ever since. He was knighted in 1914. As a writer of +light verse and as a parodist, his agile work has delighted a +generation of admirers. Some of his most adroit lines may be found in +his _In Cap and Bells_ (1902) and _The Battle of the Bays_ (1892). + + +TO AN OLD FOGEY + +(_Who Contends that Christmas is Played Out_) + + O frankly bald and obviously stout! + And so you find that Christmas as a fete + Dispassionately viewed, is getting out + Of date. + + The studied festal air is overdone; + The humour of it grows a little thin; + You fail, in fact, to gather where the fun + Comes in. + + Visions of very heavy meals arise + That tend to make your organism shiver; + Roast beef that irks, and pies that agonise + The liver; + + Those pies at which you annually wince, + Hearing the tale how happy months will follow + Proportioned to the total mass of mince + You swallow. + + Visions of youth whose reverence is scant, + Who with the brutal _verve_ of boyhood's prime + Insist on being taken to the pant- + -omime. + + Of infants, sitting up extremely late, + Who run you on toboggans down the stair; + Or make you fetch a rug and simulate + A bear. + + This takes your faultless trousers at the knees, + The other hurts them rather more behind; + And both effect a fracture in your ease + Of mind. + + My good dyspeptic, this will never do; + Your weary withers must be sadly wrung! + Yet once I well believe that even you + Were young. + + Time was when you devoured, like other boys, + Plum-pudding sequent on a turkey-hen; + With cracker-mottos hinting of the joys + Of men. + + Time was when 'mid the maidens you would pull + The fiery raisin with profound delight; + When sprigs of mistletoe seemed beautiful + And right. + + Old Christmas changes not! Long, long ago + He won the treasure of eternal youth; + _Yours_ is the dotage--if you want to know + The truth. + + Come, now, I'll cure your case, and ask no fee:-- + Make others' happiness this once your own; + All else may pass: that joy can never be + Outgrown! + + +THOMAS OF THE LIGHT HEART + + Facing the guns, he jokes as well + As any Judge upon the Bench; + Between the crash of shell and shell + His laughter rings along the trench; + He seems immensely tickled by a + Projectile while he calls a "Black Maria." + + He whistles down the day-long road, + And, when the chilly shadows fall + And heavier hangs the weary load, + Is he down-hearted? Not at all. + 'Tis then he takes a light and airy + View of the tedious route to Tipperary.[4] + + His songs are not exactly hymns; + He never learned them in the choir; + And yet they brace his dragging limbs + Although they miss the sacred fire; + Although his choice and cherished gems + Do not include "The Watch upon the Thames." + + He takes to fighting as a game; + He does no talking, through his hat, + Of holy missions; all the same + He has his faith--be sure of that; + He'll not disgrace his sporting breed, + Nor play what isn't cricket. There's his creed. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[4] "_It's a long way to Tipperary_," the most popular song of the +Allied armies during the World's War. + + + + +_Henry Newbolt_ + + +Henry Newbolt was born at Bilston in 1862. His early work was frankly +imitative of Tennyson; he even attempted to add to the Arthurian +legends with a drama in blank verse entitled _Mordred_ (1895). It was +not until he wrote his sea-ballads that he struck his own note. With +the publication of _Admirals All_ (1897) his fame was widespread. The +popularity of his lines was due not so much to the subject-matter of +Newbolt's verse as to the breeziness of his music, the solid beat of +rhythm, the vigorous swing of his stanzas. + +In 1898 Newbolt published _The Island Race_, which contains about +thirty more of his buoyant songs of the sea. Besides being a poet, +Newbolt has written many essays and his critical volume, _A New Study +of English Poetry_ (1917), is a collection of articles that are both +analytical and alive. + + +DRAKE'S DRUM + + Drake he's in his hammock an' a thousand mile away, + (Capten, art tha sleepin' there below?) + Slung atween the round shot in Nombre Dios Bay, + An' dreamin' arl the time o' Plymouth Hoe. + Yarnder lumes the island, yarnder lie the ships, + Wi' sailor lads a-dancin' heel-an'-toe, + An' the shore-lights flashin', an' the night-tide dashin' + He sees et arl so plainly as he saw et long ago. + + Drake he was a Devon man, an' ruled the Devon seas, + (Capten, art tha sleepin' there below?), + Rovin' tho' his death fell, he went wi' heart at ease, + An' dreamin' arl the time o' Plymouth Hoe, + "Take my drum to England, hang et by the shore, + Strike et when your powder's runnin' low; + If the Dons sight Devon, I'll quit the port o' Heaven, + An' drum them up the Channel as we drummed them long ago." + + Drake he's in his hammock till the great Armadas come, + (Capten, art tha sleepin' there below?), + Slung atween the round shot, listenin' for the drum, + An' dreamin' arl the time o' Plymouth Hoe. + Call him on the deep sea, call him up the Sound, + Call him when ye sail to meet the foe; + Where the old trade's plyin' an' the old flag flyin', + They shall find him, ware an' wakin', as they found him long ago. + + + + +_Arthur Symons_ + + +Born in 1865, Arthur Symons' first few publications revealed an +intellectual rather than an emotional passion. Those volumes were full +of the artifice of the period, but Symons's technical skill and +frequent analysis often saved the poems from complete decadence. His +later books are less imitative; the influence of Verlaine and +Baudelaire is not so apparent; the sophistication is less cynical, the +sensuousness more restrained. His various collections of essays and +stories reflect the same peculiar blend of rich intellectuality and +perfumed romanticism that one finds in his most characteristic poems. + +Of his many volumes in prose, _Spiritual Adventures_ (1905), while +obviously influenced by Walter Pater, is by far the most original; a +truly unique volume of psychological short stories. The best of his +poetry up to 1902 was collected in two volumes, _Poems_, published by +John Lane Co. _The Fool of the World_ appeared in 1907. + + +IN THE WOOD OF FINVARA + + I have grown tired of sorrow and human tears; + Life is a dream in the night, a fear among fears, + A naked runner lost in a storm of spears. + + I have grown tired of rapture and love's desire; + Love is a flaming heart, and its flames aspire + Till they cloud the soul in the smoke of a windy fire. + + I would wash the dust of the world in a soft green flood; + Here between sea and sea, in the fairy wood, + I have found a delicate, wave-green solitude. + + Here, in the fairy wood, between sea and sea, + I have heard the song of a fairy bird in a tree, + And the peace that is not in the world has flown to me. + + +MODERN BEAUTY + + I am the torch, she saith, and what to me + If the moth die of me? I am the flame + Of Beauty, and I burn that all may see + Beauty, and I have neither joy nor shame, + But live with that clear light of perfect fire + Which is to men the death of their desire. + + I am Yseult and Helen, I have seen + Troy burn, and the most loving knight lie dead. + The world has been my mirror, time has been + My breath upon the glass; and men have said, + Age after age, in rapture and despair, + Love's poor few words, before my image there. + + I live, and am immortal; in my eyes + The sorrow of the world, and on my lips + The joy of life, mingle to make me wise; + Yet now the day is darkened with eclipse: + Who is there still lives for beauty? Still am I + The torch, but where's the moth that still dares die? + + + + +_William Butler Yeats_ + + +Born at Sandymount, Dublin, in 1865, the son of John B. Yeats, the +Irish artist, the greater part of William Butler Yeats' childhood was +spent in Sligo. Here he became imbued with the power and richness of +native folk-lore; he drank in the racy quality through the quaint +fairy stories and old wives' tales of the Irish peasantry. (Later he +published a collection of these same stories.) + +It was in the activities of a "Young Ireland" society that Yeats +became identified with the new spirit; he dreamed of a national poetry +that would be written in English and yet would be definitely Irish. In +a few years he became one of the leaders in the Celtic revival. He +worked incessantly for the cause, both as propagandist and playwright; +and, though his mysticism at times seemed the product of a cult rather +than a Celt, his symbolic dramas were acknowledged to be full of a +haunting, other-world spirituality. (See Preface.) _The Hour Glass_ +(1904), his second volume of "Plays for an Irish Theatre," includes +his best one-act dramas with the exception of his unforgettable _The +Land of Heart's Desire_ (1894). _The Wind Among the Reeds_ (1899) +contains several of his most beautiful and characteristic poems. + +Others who followed Yeats have intensified the Irish drama; they have +established a closer contact between the peasant and poet. No one, +however, has had so great a part in the shaping of modern drama in +Ireland as Yeats. His _Deirdre_ (1907), a beautiful retelling of the +great Gaelic legend, is far more dramatic than the earlier plays; it +is particularly interesting to read with Synge's more idiomatic play +on the same theme, _Deirdre of the Sorrows_. + +The poems of Yeats which are quoted here reveal him in his most lyric +and musical vein. + + +THE LAKE ISLE OF INNISFREE + + I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree, + And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made; + Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honey bee, + And live alone in the bee-loud glade. + + And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow, + Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings; + There midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow, + And evening full of the linnet's wings. + + I will arise and go now, for always night and day + I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore; + While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray, + I hear it in the deep heart's core. + + +THE SONG OF THE OLD MOTHER + + I rise in the dawn, and I kneel and blow + Till the seed of the fire flicker and glow. + And then I must scrub, and bake, and sweep, + Till stars are beginning to blink and peep; + But the young lie long and dream in their bed + Of the matching of ribbons, the blue and the red, + And their day goes over in idleness, + And they sigh if the wind but lift up a tress. + While I must work, because I am old + And the seed of the fire gets feeble and cold. + + +THE CAP AND BELLS + + A Queen was beloved by a jester, + And once when the owls grew still + He made his soul go upward + And stand on her window sill. + + In a long and straight blue garment, + It talked before morn was white, + And it had grown wise by thinking + Of a footfall hushed and light. + + But the young queen would not listen; + She rose in her pale nightgown, + She drew in the brightening casement + And pushed the brass bolt down. + + He bade his heart go to her, + When the bats cried out no more, + In a red and quivering garment + It sang to her through the door. + + The tongue of it sweet with dreaming + Of a flutter of flower-like hair, + But she took up her fan from the table + And waved it off on the air. + + 'I've cap and bells,' he pondered, + 'I will send them to her and die.' + And as soon as the morn had whitened + He left them where she went by. + + She laid them upon her bosom, + Under a cloud of her hair, + And her red lips sang them a love song. + The stars grew out of the air. + + She opened her door and her window, + And the heart and the soul came through, + To her right hand came the red one, + To her left hand came the blue. + + They set up a noise like crickets, + A chattering wise and sweet, + And her hair was a folded flower, + And the quiet of love her feet. + + +AN OLD SONG RESUNG + + Down by the salley gardens my love and I did meet; + She passed the salley gardens with little snow-white feet. + She bid me take love easy, as the leaves grow on the tree; + But I, being young and foolish, with her would not agree. + + In a field by the river my love and I did stand, + And on my leaning shoulder she laid her snow-white hand. + She bid me take life easy, as the grass grows on the weirs; + But I was young and foolish, and now am full of tears. + + + + +_Rudyard Kipling_ + + +Born at Bombay, India, December 30, 1865, Rudyard Kipling, the author +of a dozen contemporary classics, was educated in England. He +returned, however, to India and took a position on the staff of "The +Lahore Civil and Military Gazette," writing for the Indian press until +about 1890, when he went to England, where he has lived ever since, +with the exception of a short sojourn in America. + +Even while he was still in India he achieved a popular as well as a +literary success with his dramatic and skilful tales, sketches and +ballads of Anglo-Indian life. + +_Soldiers Three_ (1888) was the first of six collections of short +stories brought out in "Wheeler's Railway Library." They were followed +by the far more sensitive and searching _Plain Tales from the Hills_, +_Under the Deodars_ and _The Phantom 'Rikshaw_, which contains two of +the best and most convincing ghost-stories in recent literature. + +These tales, however, display only one side of Kipling's extraordinary +talents. As a writer of children's stories, he has few living equals. +_Wee Willie Winkie_, which contains that stirring and heroic fragment +"Drums of the Fore and Aft," is only a trifle less notable than his +more obviously juvenile collections. _Just-So Stories_ and the two +_Jungle Books_ (prose interspersed with lively rhymes) are classics +for young people of all ages. _Kim_, the novel of a super-Mowgli grown +up, is a more mature masterpiece. + +Considered solely as a poet (see Preface) he is one of the most +vigorous and unique figures of his time. The spirit of romance surges +under his realities. His brisk lines conjure up the tang of a +countryside in autumn, the tingle of salt spray, the rude sentiment of +ruder natures, the snapping of a banner, the lurch and rumble of the +sea. His poetry is woven of the stuff of myths; but it never loses its +hold on actualities. Kipling himself in his poem "The Benefactors" +(from _The Years Between_ [1919]) writes: + + Ah! What avails the classic bent + And what the cultured word, + Against the undoctored incident + That actually occurred? + +Kipling won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1907. His varied poems +have finally been collected in a remarkable one-volume _Inclusive +Edition_ (1885-1918), an indispensable part of any student's library. +This gifted and prolific creator, whose work was affected by the war, +has frequently lapsed into bombast and a journalistic imperialism. At +his best he is unforgettable, standing mountain-high above his host of +imitators. His home is at Burwash, Sussex. + + +GUNGA DIN + + You may talk o' gin an' beer + When you're quartered safe out 'ere, + An' you're sent to penny-fights an' Aldershot it; + But if it comes to slaughter + You will do your work on water, + An' you'll lick the bloomin' boots of 'im that's got it + Now in Injia's sunny clime, + Where I used to spend my time + A-servin' of 'Er Majesty the Queen, + Of all them black-faced crew + The finest man I knew + Was our regimental _bhisti_,[5] Gunga Din. + + It was "Din! Din! Din! + You limping lump o' brick-dust, Gunga Din! + Hi! _slippy hitherao!_ + Water, get it! _Panee lao!_[6] + You squidgy-nosed old idol, Gunga Din!" + + The uniform 'e wore + Was nothin' much before, + An' rather less than 'arf o' that be'ind, + For a twisty piece o' rag + An' a goatskin water-bag + Was all the field-equipment 'e could find. + When the sweatin' troop-train lay + In a sidin' through the day, + Where the 'eat would make your bloomin' eyebrows crawl, + We shouted "_Harry By!_"[7] + Till our throats were bricky-dry, + Then we wopped 'im 'cause 'e couldn't serve us all. + + It was "Din! Din! Din! + You 'eathen, where the mischief 'ave you been? + You put some _juldees_[8] in it, + Or I'll _marrow_[9] you this minute, + If you don't fill up my helmet, Gunga Din!" + + 'E would dot an' carry one + Till the longest day was done, + An' 'e didn't seem to know the use o' fear. + If we charged or broke or cut, + You could bet your bloomin' nut, + 'E'd be waitin' fifty paces right flank rear. + With 'is _mussick_[10] on 'is back, + 'E would skip with our attack, + An' watch us till the bugles made "Retire." + An' for all 'is dirty 'ide, + 'E was white, clear white, inside + When 'e went to tend the wounded under fire! + + It was "Din! Din! Din!" + With the bullets kickin' dust-spots on the green. + When the cartridges ran out, + You could 'ear the front-files shout: + "Hi! ammunition-mules an' Gunga Din!" + + I sha'n't forgit the night + When I dropped be'ind the fight + With a bullet where my belt-plate should 'a' been. + I was chokin' mad with thirst, + An' the man that spied me first + Was our good old grinnin', gruntin' Gunga Din. + 'E lifted up my 'ead, + An' 'e plugged me where I bled, + An' 'e guv me 'arf-a-pint o' water--green; + It was crawlin' an' it stunk, + But of all the drinks I've drunk, + I'm gratefullest to one from Gunga Din. + + It was "Din! Din! Din! + 'Ere's a beggar with a bullet through 'is spleen; + 'E's chawin' up the ground an' 'e's kickin' all around: + For Gawd's sake, git the water, Gunga Din!" + + 'E carried me away + To where a _dooli_ lay, + An' a bullet come an' drilled the beggar clean. + 'E put me safe inside, + An' just before 'e died: + "I 'ope you liked your drink," sez Gunga Din. + So I'll meet 'im later on + In the place where 'e is gone-- + Where it's always double drill and no canteen; + 'E'll be squattin' on the coals + Givin' drink to pore damned souls, + An' I'll get a swig in Hell from Gunga Din! + + Din! Din! Din! + You Lazarushian-leather Gunga Din! + Tho' I've belted you an' flayed you, + By the livin' Gawd that made you, + You're a better man than I am, Gunga Din! + + +THE RETURN[11] + + Peace is declared, and I return + To 'Ackneystadt, but not the same; + Things 'ave transpired which made me learn + The size and meanin' of the game. + I did no more than others did, + I don't know where the change began; + I started as a average kid, + I finished as a thinkin' man. + + _If England was what England seems + An not the England of our dreams, + But only putty, brass, an' paint, + 'Ow quick we'd drop 'er!_ But she ain't! + + Before my gappin' mouth could speak + I 'eard it in my comrade's tone; + I saw it on my neighbour's cheek + Before I felt it flush my own. + An' last it come to me--not pride, + Nor yet conceit, but on the 'ole + (If such a term may be applied), + The makin's of a bloomin' soul. + + Rivers at night that cluck an' jeer, + Plains which the moonshine turns to sea, + Mountains that never let you near, + An' stars to all eternity; + An' the quick-breathin' dark that fills + The 'ollows of the wilderness, + When the wind worries through the 'ills-- + These may 'ave taught me more or less. + + Towns without people, ten times took, + An' ten times left an' burned at last; + An' starvin' dogs that come to look + For owners when a column passed; + An' quiet, 'omesick talks between + Men, met by night, you never knew + Until--'is face--by shellfire seen-- + Once--an' struck off. They taught me, too. + + The day's lay-out--the mornin' sun + Beneath your 'at-brim as you sight; + The dinner-'ush from noon till one, + An' the full roar that lasts till night; + An' the pore dead that look so old + An' was so young an hour ago, + An' legs tied down before they're cold-- + These are the things which make you know. + + Also Time runnin' into years-- + A thousand Places left be'ind-- + An' Men from both two 'emispheres + Discussin' things of every kind; + So much more near than I 'ad known, + So much more great than I 'ad guessed-- + An' me, like all the rest, alone-- + But reachin' out to all the rest! + + So 'ath it come to me--not pride, + Nor yet conceit, but on the 'ole + (If such a term may be applied), + The makin's of a bloomin' soul. + But now, discharged, I fall away + To do with little things again.... + Gawd, 'oo knows all I cannot say, + Look after me in Thamesfontein! + + _If England was what England seems + An' not the England of our dreams, + But only putty, brass, an' paint, + 'Ow quick we'd chuck 'er!_ But she ain't! + + +THE CONUNDRUM OF THE WORKSHOPS + + When the flush of a newborn sun fell first on Eden's + green and gold, + Our father Adam sat under the Tree and scratched with + a stick in the mold; + And the first rude sketch that the world had seen was + joy to his mighty heart, + Till the Devil whispered behind the leaves: "It's pretty, + but is it Art?" + + Wherefore he called to his wife and fled to fashion + his work anew-- + The first of his race who cared a fig for the first, most + dread review; + And he left his lore to the use of his sons--and that was + a glorious gain + When the Devil chuckled: "Is it Art?" in the ear of + the branded Cain. + + They builded a tower to shiver the sky and wrench the + stars apart, + Till the Devil grunted behind the bricks: "It's striking, + but is it Art?" + The stone was dropped by the quarry-side, and the idle + derrick swung, + While each man talked of the aims of art, and each in + an alien tongue. + + They fought and they talked in the north and the south, + they talked and they fought in the west, + Till the waters rose on the jabbering land, and the poor + Red Clay had rest-- + Had rest till the dank blank-canvas dawn when the dove + was preened to start, + And the Devil bubbled below the keel: "It's human, but + is it Art?" + + The tale is old as the Eden Tree--as new as the new-cut + tooth-- + For each man knows ere his lip-thatch grows he is + master of Art and Truth; + And each man hears as the twilight nears, to the beat of + his dying heart, + The Devil drum on the darkened pane: "You did it, + but was it Art?" + + We have learned to whittle the Eden Tree to the shape + of a surplice-peg, + We have learned to bottle our parents twain in the yolk + of an addled egg, + We know that the tail must wag the dog, as the horse + is drawn by the cart; + But the Devil whoops, as he whooped of old: "It's clever, + but is it Art?" + + When the flicker of London's sun falls faint on the club- + room's green and gold, + The sons of Adam sit them down and scratch with their + pens in the mold-- + They scratch with their pens in the mold of their graves, + and the ink and the anguish start + When the Devil mutters behind the leaves: "It's pretty, + but is it art?" + + Now, if we could win to the Eden Tree where the four + great rivers flow, + And the wreath of Eve is red on the turf as she left it + long ago, + And if we could come when the sentry slept, and softly + scurry through, + By the favor of God we might know as much--as our + father Adam knew. + + +AN ASTROLOGER'S SONG[12] + + To the Heavens above us + O look and behold + The Planets that love us + All harnessed in gold! + What chariots, what horses + Against us shall bide + While the Stars in their courses + Do fight on our side? + + All thought, all desires, + That are under the sun, + Are one with their fires, + As we also are one: + All matter, all spirit, + All fashion, all frame, + Receive and inherit + Their strength from the same. + + (Oh, man that deniest + All power save thine own, + Their power in the highest + Is mightily shown. + Not less in the lowest + That power is made clear. + Oh, man, if thou knowest, + What treasure is here!) + + Earth quakes in her throes + And we wonder for why! + But the blind planet knows + When her ruler is nigh; + And, attuned since Creation + To perfect accord, + She thrills in her station + And yearns to her Lord. + + The waters have risen, + The springs are unbound-- + The floods break their prison, + And ravin around. + No rampart withstands 'em, + Their fury will last, + Till the Sign that commands 'em + Sinks low or swings past. + + Through abysses unproven + And gulfs beyond thought, + Our portion is woven, + Our burden is brought. + Yet They that prepare it, + Whose Nature we share, + Make us who must bear is + Well able to bear. + + Though terrors o'ertake us + We'll not be afraid. + No power can unmake us + Save that which has made. + Nor yet beyond reason + Or hope shall we fall-- + All things have their season, + And Mercy crowns all! + + Then, doubt not, ye fearful-- + The Eternal is King-- + Up, heart, and be cheerful, + And lustily sing:-- + _What chariots, what horses + Against us shall bide + While the Stars in their courses + Do fight on our side?_ + +FOOTNOTES: + +[5] The _bhisti_, or water-carrier, attached to regiments in India, is +often one of the most devoted of the Queen's servants. He is also +appreciated by the men. + +[6] Bring water swiftly. + +[7] Tommy Atkins' equivalent for "O Brother!" + +[8] Speed. + +[9] Hit you. + +[10] Water-skin. + +[11] From _The Five Nations_ by Rudyard Kipling. Copyright by +Doubleday, Page & Co. and A. P. Watt & Son. + +[12] From _Rewards and Fairies_ by Rudyard Kipling. Copyright by +Doubleday, Page and Co. and A. P. Watt & Son. + + + + +_Richard Le Gallienne_ + + +Richard Le Gallienne, who, in spite of his long residence in the +United States, must be considered an English poet, was born at +Liverpool in 1866. He entered on a business career soon after leaving +Liverpool College, but gave up commercial life to become a man of +letters after five or six years. + +His early work was strongly influenced by the artificialities of the +aesthetic movement (see Preface); the indebtedness to Oscar Wilde is +especially evident. A little later Keats was the dominant influence, +and _English Poems_ (1892) betray how deep were Le Gallienne's +admirations. His more recent poems in _The Lonely Dancer_ (1913) show +a keener individuality and a finer lyrical passion. His prose fancies +are well known--particularly _The Book Bills of Narcissus_ and the +charming and high-spirited fantasia, _The Quest of the Golden Girl_. + +Le Gallienne came to America about 1905 and has lived ever since in +Rowayton, Conn., and New York City. + + +A BALLAD OF LONDON + + Ah, London! London! our delight, + Great flower that opens but at night, + Great City of the midnight sun, + Whose day begins when day is done. + + Lamp after lamp against the sky + Opens a sudden beaming eye, + Leaping alight on either hand, + The iron lilies of the Strand. + + Like dragonflies, the hansoms hover, + With jeweled eyes, to catch the lover; + The streets are full of lights and loves, + Soft gowns, and flutter of soiled doves. + + The human moths about the light + Dash and cling close in dazed delight, + And burn and laugh, the world and wife, + For this is London, this is life! + + Upon thy petals butterflies, + But at thy root, some say, there lies, + A world of weeping trodden things, + Poor worms that have not eyes or wings. + + From out corruption of their woe + Springs this bright flower that charms us so, + Men die and rot deep out of sight + To keep this jungle-flower bright. + + Paris and London, World-Flowers twain + Wherewith the World-Tree blooms again, + Since Time hath gathered Babylon, + And withered Rome still withers on. + + Sidon and Tyre were such as ye, + How bright they shone upon the tree! + But Time hath gathered, both are gone, + And no man sails to Babylon. + + +REGRET + + One asked of regret, + And I made reply: + To have held the bird, + And let it fly; + To have seen the star + For a moment nigh, + And lost it + Through a slothful eye; + To have plucked the flower + And cast it by; + To have one only hope-- + To die. + + + + +_Lionel Johnson_ + + +Born in 1867, Lionel Johnson received a classical education at Oxford, +and his poetry is a faithful reflection of his studies in Greek and +Latin literatures. Though he allied himself with the modern Irish +poets, his Celtic origin is a literary myth; Johnson, having been +converted to Catholicism in 1891, became imbued with Catholic and, +later, with Irish traditions. His verse, while sometimes strained and +over-decorated, is chastely designed, rich and, like that of the +Cavalier poets of the seventeenth century, mystically devotional. +_Poems_ (1895) contains his best work. Johnson died in 1902. + + +MYSTIC AND CAVALIER + + Go from me: I am one of those who fall. + What! hath no cold wind swept your heart at all, + In my sad company? Before the end, + Go from me, dear my friend! + + Yours are the victories of light: your feet + Rest from good toil, where rest is brave and sweet: + But after warfare in a mourning gloom, + I rest in clouds of doom. + + Have you not read so, looking in these eyes? + Is it the common light of the pure skies, + Lights up their shadowy depths? The end is set: + Though the end be not yet. + + When gracious music stirs, and all is bright, + And beauty triumphs through a courtly night; + When I too joy, a man like other men: + Yet, am I like them, then? + + And in the battle, when the horsemen sweep + Against a thousand deaths, and fall on sleep: + Who ever sought that sudden calm, if I + Sought not? yet could not die! + + Seek with thine eyes to pierce this crystal sphere: + Canst read a fate there, prosperous and clear? + Only the mists, only the weeping clouds, + Dimness and airy shrouds. + + Beneath, what angels are at work? What powers + Prepare the secret of the fatal hours? + See! the mists tremble, and the clouds are stirred: + When comes the calling word? + + The clouds are breaking from the crystal ball, + Breaking and clearing: and I look to fall. + When the cold winds and airs of portent sweep, + My spirit may have sleep. + + O rich and sounding voices of the air! + Interpreters and prophets of despair: + Priests of a fearful sacrament! I come, + To make with you mine home. + + +TO A TRAVELLER + + The mountains, and the lonely death at last + Upon the lonely mountains: O strong friend! + The wandering over, and the labour passed, + Thou art indeed at rest: + Earth gave thee of her best, + That labour and this end. + + Earth was thy mother, and her true son thou: + Earth called thee to a knowledge of her ways, + Upon the great hills, up the great streams: now + Upon earth's kindly breast + Thou art indeed at rest: + Thou, and thine arduous days. + + Fare thee well, O strong heart! The tranquil night + Looks calmly on thee: and the sun pours down + His glory over thee, O heart of might! + Earth gives thee perfect rest: + Earth, whom thy swift feet pressed: + Earth, whom the vast stars crown. + + + + +_Ernest Dowson_ + + +Ernest Dowson was born at Belmont Hill in Kent in 1867. His +great-uncle was Alfred Domett (Browning's "Waring"), who was at one +time Prime Minister of New Zealand. Dowson, practically an invalid all +his life, was reckless with himself and, as disease weakened him more +and more, hid himself in miserable surroundings; for almost two years +he lived in sordid supper-houses known as "cabmen's shelters." He +literally drank himself to death. + +His delicate and fantastic poetry was an attempt to escape from a +reality too big and brutal for him. His passionate lyric, "I have been +faithful to thee, Cynara! in my fashion," a triumph of despair and +disillusion, is an outburst in which Dowson epitomized himself--"One +of the greatest lyrical poems of our time," writes Arthur Symons, "in +it he has for once said everything, and he has said it to an +intoxicating and perhaps immortal music." + +Dowson died obscure in 1900, one of the finest of modern minor poets. +His life was the tragedy of a weak nature buffeted by a strong and +merciless environment. + + +TO ONE IN BEDLAM + + With delicate, mad hands, behind his sordid bars, + Surely he hath his posies, which they tear and twine; + Those scentless wisps of straw that, miserable, line + His strait, caged universe, whereat the dull world stares. + + Pedant and pitiful. O, how his rapt gaze wars + With their stupidity! Know they what dreams divine + Lift his long, laughing reveries like enchanted wine, + And make his melancholy germane to the stars'? + + O lamentable brother! if those pity thee, + Am I not fain of all thy lone eyes promise me; + Half a fool's kingdom, far from men who sow and reap, + All their days, vanity? Better than mortal flowers, + Thy moon-kissed roses seem: better than love or sleep, + The star-crowned solitude of thine oblivious hours! + + +YOU WOULD HAVE UNDERSTOOD ME + + You would have understood me, had you waited; + I could have loved you, dear! as well as he: + Had we not been impatient, dear! and fated + Always to disagree. + + What is the use of speech? Silence were fitter: + Lest we should still be wishing things unsaid. + Though all the words we ever spake were bitter, + Shall I reproach you, dead? + + Nay, let this earth, your portion, likewise cover + All the old anger, setting us apart: + Always, in all, in truth was I your lover; + Always, I held your heart. + + I have met other women who were tender, + As you were cold, dear! with a grace as rare. + Think you, I turned to them, or made surrender, + I who had found you fair? + + Had we been patient, dear! ah, had you waited, + I had fought death for you, better than he: + But from the very first, dear! we were fated + Always to disagree. + + Late, late, I come to you, now death discloses + Love that in life was not to be our part: + On your low lying mound between the roses, + Sadly I cast my heart. + + I would not waken you: nay! this is fitter; + Death and the darkness give you unto me; + Here we who loved so, were so cold and bitter, + Hardly can disagree. + + + + +"_A. E._" + +(_George William Russell_) + + +At Durgan, a tiny town in the north of Ireland, George William Russell +was born in 1867. He moved to Dublin when he was 10 years old and, as +a young man, helped to form the group that gave rise to the Irish +Renascence--the group of which William Butler Yeats, Doctor Douglas +Hyde, Katharine Tynan and Lady Gregory were brilliant members. Besides +being a splendid mystical poet, "A. E." is a painter of note, a fiery +patriot, a distinguished sociologist, a public speaker, a student of +economics and one of the heads of the Irish Agricultural Association. + +The best of his poetry is in _Homeward Songs by the Way_ (1894) and +_The Earth Breath and Other Poems_. Yeats has spoken of these poems as +"revealing in all things a kind of scented flame consuming them from +within." + + +THE GREAT BREATH + + Its edges foamed with amethyst and rose, + Withers once more the old blue flower of day: + There where the ether like a diamond glows, + Its petals fade away. + + A shadowy tumult stirs the dusky air; + Sparkle the delicate dews, the distant snows; + The great deep thrills--for through it everywhere + The breath of Beauty blows. + + I saw how all the trembling ages past, + Moulded to her by deep and deeper breath, + Near'd to the hour when Beauty breathes her last + And knows herself in death. + + +THE UNKNOWN GOD + + Far up the dim twilight fluttered + Moth-wings of vapour and flame: + The lights danced over the mountains, + Star after star they came. + + The lights grew thicker unheeded, + For silent and still were we; + Our hearts were drunk with a beauty + Our eyes could never see. + + + + +_Stephen Phillips_ + + +Born in 1868, Stephen Phillips is best known as the author of _Herod_ +(1900), _Paola and Francesca_ (1899), and _Ulysses_ (1902); a poetic +playwright who succeeded in reviving, for a brief interval, the blank +verse drama on the modern stage. Hailed at first with extravagant and +almost incredible praise, Phillips lived to see his most popular +dramas discarded and his new ones, such as _Pietro of Siena_ (1910), +unproduced and unnoticed. + +Phillips failed to "restore" poetic drama because he was, first of +all, a lyric rather than a dramatic poet. In spite of certain moments +of rhetorical splendor, his scenes are spectacular instead of +emotional; his inspiration is too often derived from other models. He +died in 1915. + + +FRAGMENT FROM "HEROD" + + _Herod speaks_: + I dreamed last night of a dome of beaten gold + To be a counter-glory to the Sun. + There shall the eagle blindly dash himself, + There the first beam shall strike, and there the moon + Shall aim all night her argent archery; + And it shall be the tryst of sundered stars, + The haunt of dead and dreaming Solomon; + Shall send a light upon the lost in Hell, + And flashings upon faces without hope.-- + And I will think in gold and dream in silver, + Imagine in marble and conceive in bronze, + Till it shall dazzle pilgrim nations + And stammering tribes from undiscovered lands, + Allure the living God out of the bliss, + And all the streaming seraphim from heaven. + + +BEAUTIFUL LIE THE DEAD + + Beautiful lie the dead; + Clear comes each feature; + Satisfied not to be, + Strangely contented. + + Like ships, the anchor dropped, + Furled every sail is; + Mirrored with all their masts + In a deep water. + + +A DREAM + + My dead love came to me, and said: + 'God gives me one hour's rest, + To spend with thee on earth again: + How shall we spend it best?' + + 'Why, as of old,' I said; and so + We quarrelled, as of old: + But, when I turned to make my peace, + That one short hour was told. + + + + +_Laurence Binyon_ + + +Laurence Binyon was born at Lancaster, August 10, 1869, a cousin of +Stephen Phillips; in _Primavera_ (1890) their early poems appeared +together. Binyon's subsequent volumes showed little distinction until +he published _London Visions_, which, in an enlarged edition in 1908, +revealed a gift of characterization and a turn of speech in surprising +contrast to his previous academic _Lyrical Poems_ (1894). His _Odes_ +(1901) contains his ripest work; two poems in particular, "The +Threshold" and "The Bacchanal of Alexander," are glowing and unusually +spontaneous. + +Binyon's power has continued to grow; age has given his verse a new +sharpness. "The House That Was," one of his most recent poems, +appeared in _The London Mercury_, November, 1919. + + +A SONG + + For Mercy, Courage, Kindness, Mirth, + There is no measure upon earth. + Nay, they wither, root and stem, + If an end be set to them. + + Overbrim and overflow, + If your own heart you would know; + For the spirit born to bless + Lives but in its own excess. + + +THE HOUSE THAT WAS + + Of the old house, only a few crumbled + Courses of brick, smothered in nettle and dock, + Or a squared stone, lying mossy where it tumbled! + Sprawling bramble and saucy thistle mock + What once was firelit floor and private charm + Where, seen in a windowed picture, hills were fading + At dusk, and all was memory-coloured and warm, + And voices talked, secure from the wind's invading. + + Of the old garden, only a stray shining + Of daffodil flames amid April's cuckoo-flowers, + Or a cluster of aconite mixt with weeds entwining! + But, dark and lofty, a royal cedar towers + By homely thorns: whether the white rain drifts + Or sun scorches, he holds the downs in ken, + The western vale; his branchy tiers he lifts, + Older than many a generation of men. + + + + +_Alfred Douglas_ + + +Lord Alfred Douglas was born in 1870 and educated at Magdalen College, +Oxford. He was the editor of _The Academy_ from 1907 to 1910 and was +at one time the intimate friend of Oscar Wilde. One of the minor +poets of "the eighteen-nineties," several of his poems rise above his +own affectations and the end-of-the-century decadence. _The City of +the Soul_ (1899) and _Sonnets_ (1900) contain his most graceful +writing. + + +THE GREEN RIVER + + I know a green grass path that leaves the field + And, like a running river, winds along + Into a leafy wood, where is no throng + Of birds at noon-day; and no soft throats yield + Their music to the moon. The place is sealed, + An unclaimed sovereignty of voiceless song, + And all the unravished silences belong + To some sweet singer lost, or unrevealed. + + So is my soul become a silent place.... + Oh, may I wake from this uneasy night + To find some voice of music manifold. + Let it be shape of sorrow with wan face, + Or love that swoons on sleep, or else delight + That is as wide-eyed as a marigold. + + + + +_T. Sturge Moore_ + + +Thomas Sturge Moore was born March 4, 1870. He is well known not only +as an author, but as a critic and wood-engraver. As an artist, he has +achieved no little distinction and has designed the covers for the +poetry of W. B. Yeats and others. As a poet, the greater portion of +his verse is severely classical in tone, academic in expression but, +of its kind, distinctive and intimate. Among his many volumes, the +most outstanding are _The Vinedresser and Other Poems_ (1899), _A +Sicilian Idyll_ (1911) and _The Sea Is Kind_ (1914). + + +THE DYING SWAN + + O silver-throated Swan + Struck, struck! A golden dart + Clean through thy breast has gone + Home to thy heart. + Thrill, thrill, O silver throat! + O silver trumpet, pour + Love for defiance back + On him who smote! + And brim, brim o'er + With love; and ruby-dye thy track + Down thy last living reach + Of river, sail the golden light-- + Enter the sun's heart--even teach + O wondrous-gifted Pain, teach Thou + The God of love, let him learn how! + + +SILENCE SINGS + + So faint, no ear is sure it hears, + So faint and far; + So vast that very near appears + My voice, both here and in each star + Unmeasured leagues do bridge between; + Like that which on a face is seen + Where secrets are; + Sweeping, like veils of lofty balm, + Tresses unbound + O'er desert sand, o'er ocean calm, + I am wherever is not sound; + And, goddess of the truthful face, + My beauty doth instil its grace + That joy abound. + + + + +_William H. Davies_ + + +According to his own biography, William H. Davies was born in a +public-house called Church House at Newport, in the County of +Monmouthshire, April 20, 1870, of Welsh parents. He was, until Bernard +Shaw "discovered" him, a cattleman, a berry-picker, a panhandler--in +short, a vagabond. In a preface to Davies' second book, _The +Autobiography of a Super-Tramp_ (1906), Shaw describes how the +manuscript came into his hands: + +"In the year 1905 I received by post a volume of poems by one William +H. Davies, whose address was The Farm House, Kensington, S. E. I was +surprised to learn that there was still a farmhouse left in +Kensington; for I did not then suspect that the Farm House, like the +Shepherdess Walks and Nightingale Lane and Whetstone Parks of Bethnal +Green and Holborn, is so called nowadays in irony, and is, in fact, a +doss-house, or hostelry, where single men can have a night's lodging, +for, at most, sixpence.... The author, as far as I could guess, had +walked into a printer's or stationer's shop; handed in his manuscript; +and ordered his book as he might have ordered a pair of boots. It was +marked 'price, half a crown.' An accompanying letter asked me very +civilly if I required a half-crown book of verses; and if so, would I +please send the author the half crown: if not, would I return the +book. This was attractively simple and sensible. I opened the book, +and was more puzzled than ever; for before I had read three lines I +perceived that the author was a real poet. His work was not in the +least strenuous or modern; there was indeed no sign of his ever having +read anything otherwise than as a child reads.... Here, I saw, was a +genuine innocent, writing odds and ends of verse about odds and ends +of things; living quite out of the world in which such things are +usually done, and knowing no better (or rather no worse) than to get +his book made by the appropriate craftsman and hawk it round like any +other ware." + +It is more than likely that Davies' first notoriety as a tramp-poet +who had ridden the rails in the United States and had had his right +foot cut off by a train in Canada, obscured his merits as a genuine +singer. Even his early _The Soul's Destroyer_ (1907) revealed that +simplicity which is as _naif_ as it is strange. The volumes that +followed are more clearly melodious, more like the visionary wonder of +Blake, more artistically artless. + +With the exception of "The Villain," which has not yet appeared in +book form, the following poems are taken from _The Collected Poems of +W. H. Davies_ (1916) with the permission of the publisher, Alfred A. +Knopf. + + +DAYS TOO SHORT + + When primroses are out in Spring, + And small, blue violets come between; + When merry birds sing on boughs green, + And rills, as soon as born, must sing; + + When butterflies will make side-leaps, + As though escaped from Nature's hand + Ere perfect quite; and bees will stand + Upon their heads in fragrant deeps; + + When small clouds are so silvery white + Each seems a broken rimmed moon-- + When such things are, this world too soon, + For me, doth wear the veil of Night. + + +THE MOON + + Thy beauty haunts me heart and soul, + Oh, thou fair Moon, so close and bright; + Thy beauty makes me like the child + That cries aloud to own thy light: + The little child that lifts each arm + To press thee to her bosom warm. + + Though there are birds that sing this night + With thy white beams across their throats, + Let my deep silence speak for me + More than for them their sweetest notes: + Who worships thee till music fails, + Is greater than thy nightingales. + + +THE VILLAIN + + While joy gave clouds the light of stars, + That beamed where'er they looked; + And calves and lambs had tottering knees, + Excited, while they sucked; + While every bird enjoyed his song, + Without one thought of harm or wrong-- + I turned my head and saw the wind, + Not far from where I stood, + Dragging the corn by her golden hair, + Into a dark and lonely wood. + + +THE EXAMPLE + + Here's an example from + A Butterfly; + That on a rough, hard rock + Happy can lie; + Friendless and all alone + On this unsweetened stone. + + Now let my bed be hard, + No care take I; + I'll make my joy like this + Small Butterfly; + Whose happy heart has power + To make a stone a flower. + + + + +_Hilaire Belloc_ + + +Hilaire Belloc, who has been described as "a Frenchman, an Englishman, +an Oxford man, a country gentleman, a soldier, a satirist, a democrat, +a novelist, and a practical journalist," was born July 27, 1870. After +leaving school he served as a driver in the 8th Regiment of French +Artillery at Toul Meurthe-et-Moselle, being at that time a French +citizen. He was naturalized as a British subject somewhat later, and +in 1906 he entered the House of Commons as Liberal Member for South +Salford. + +As an author, he has engaged in multiple activities. He has written +three satirical novels, one of which, _Mr. Clutterbuck's Election_, +sharply exposes British newspapers and underground politics. His _Path +to Rome_ (1902) is a high-spirited and ever-delightful travel book +which has passed through many editions. His historical studies and +biographies of _Robespierre_ and _Marie Antoinette_ (1909) are +classics of their kind. As a poet he is only somewhat less engaging. +His _Verses_ (1910) is a rather brief collection of poems on a wide +variety of themes. Although his humorous and burlesque stanzas are +refreshing, Belloc is most himself when he writes either of malt +liquor or his beloved Sussex. Though his religious poems are full of a +fine romanticism, "The South Country" is the most pictorial and +persuasive of his serious poems. His poetic as well as his spiritual +kinship with G. K. Chesterton is obvious. + + +THE SOUTH COUNTRY + + When I am living in the Midlands + That are sodden and unkind, + I light my lamp in the evening: + My work is left behind; + And the great hills of the South Country + Come back into my mind. + + The great hills of the South Country + They stand along the sea; + And it's there walking in the high woods + That I could wish to be, + And the men that were boys when I was a boy + Walking along with me. + + The men that live in North England + I saw them for a day: + Their hearts are set upon the waste fells, + Their skies are fast and grey; + From their castle-walls a man may see + The mountains far away. + + The men that live in West England + They see the Severn strong, + A-rolling on rough water brown + Light aspen leaves along. + They have the secret of the Rocks, + And the oldest kind of song. + + But the men that live in the South Country + Are the kindest and most wise, + They get their laughter from the loud surf, + And the faith in their happy eyes + Comes surely from our Sister the Spring + When over the sea she flies; + The violets suddenly bloom at her feet, + She blesses us with surprise. + + I never get between the pines + But I smell the Sussex air; + Nor I never come on a belt of sand + But my home is there. + And along the sky the line of the Downs + So noble and so bare. + + A lost thing could I never find, + Nor a broken thing mend: + And I fear I shall be all alone + When I get towards the end. + Who will there be to comfort me + Or who will be my friend? + + I will gather and carefully make my friends + Of the men of the Sussex Weald; + They watch the stars from silent folds, + They stiffly plough the field. + By them and the God of the South Country + My poor soul shall be healed. + + If I ever become a rich man, + Or if ever I grow to be old, + I will build a house with deep thatch + To shelter me from the cold, + And there shall the Sussex songs be sung + And the story of Sussex told. + + I will hold my house in the high wood + Within a walk of the sea, + And the men that were boys when I was a boy + Shall sit and drink with me. + + + + +_Anthony C. Deane_ + + +Anthony C. Deane was born in 1870 and was the Seatonian prizeman in +1905 at Clare College, Cambridge. He has been Vicar of All Saints, +Ennismore Gardens, since 1916. His long list of light verse and +essays includes several excellent parodies, the most delightful being +found in his _New Rhymes for Old_ (1901). + + +THE BALLAD OF THE _BILLYCOCK_ + + It was the good ship _Billycock_, with thirteen men aboard, + Athirst to grapple with their country's foes,-- + A crew, 'twill be admitted, not numerically fitted + To navigate a battleship in prose. + + It was the good ship _Billycock_ put out from Plymouth Sound, + While lustily the gallant heroes cheered, + And all the air was ringing with the merry bo'sun's singing, + Till in the gloom of night she disappeared. + + But when the morning broke on her, behold, a dozen ships, + A dozen ships of France around her lay, + (Or, if that isn't plenty, I will gladly make it twenty), + And hemmed her close in Salamander Bay. + + Then to the Lord High Admiral there spake a cabin-boy: + "Methinks," he said, "the odds are somewhat great, + And, in the present crisis, a cabin-boy's advice is + That you and France had better arbitrate!" + + "Pooh!" said the Lord High Admiral, and slapped his manly chest, + "Pooh! That would be both cowardly and wrong; + Shall I, a gallant fighter, give the needy ballad-writer + No suitable material for song?" + + "Nay--is the shorthand-writer here?--I tell you, one and all, + I mean to do my duty, as I ought; + With eager satisfaction let us clear the decks for action + And fight the craven Frenchmen!" So they fought. + + And (after several stanzas which as yet are incomplete, + Describing all the fight in epic style) + When the _Billycock_ was going, she'd a dozen prizes towing + (Or twenty, as above) in single file! + + Ah, long in glowing English hearts the story will remain, + The memory of that historic day, + And, while we rule the ocean, we will picture with emotion + The _Billycock_ in Salamander Bay! + + _P.S._--I've lately noticed that the critics--who, I think, + In praising _my_ productions are remiss-- + Quite easily are captured, and profess themselves enraptured, + By patriotic ditties such as this, + + For making which you merely take some dauntless Englishmen, + Guns, heroism, slaughter, and a fleet-- + Ingredients you mingle in a metre with a jingle, + And there you have your masterpiece complete! + + Why, then, with labour infinite, produce a book of verse + To languish on the "All for Twopence" shelf? + The ballad bold and breezy comes particularly easy-- + I mean to take to writing it myself! + + +A RUSTIC SONG + + Oh, I be vun of the useful troibe + O' rustic volk, I be; + And writin' gennelmen due descroibe + The doin's o' such as we; + I don't knaw mooch o' corliflower plants, + I can't tell 'oes from trowels, + But 'ear me mix ma consonants, + An' moodle oop all ma vowels! + + I talks in a wunnerful dialect + That vew can hunderstand, + 'Tis Yorkshire-Zummerzet, I expect, + With a dash o' the Oirish brand; + Sometimes a bloomin' flower of speech + I picks from Cockney spots, + And when releegious truths I teach, + Obsairve ma richt gude Scots! + + In most of the bukes, 'twas once the case + I 'adn't got much to do, + I blessed the 'eroine's purty face, + An' I seed the 'ero through; + But now, I'm juist a pairsonage! + A power o' bukes there be + Which from the start to the very last page + Entoirely deal with me! + + The wit or the point o' what I spakes + Ye've got to find if ye can; + A wunnerful difference spellin' makes + In the 'ands of a competent man! + I mayn't knaw mooch o' corliflower plants, + I mayn't knaw 'oes from trowels, + But I does ma wark, if ma consonants + Be properly mixed with ma vowels! + + + + +_J. M. Synge_ + + +The most brilliant star of the Celtic revival was born at Rathfarnham, +near Dublin, in 1871. As a child in Wicklow, he was already fascinated +by the strange idioms and the rhythmic speech he heard there, a native +utterance which was his greatest delight and which was to be rich +material for his greatest work. He did not use this folk-language +merely as he heard it. He was an artist first and last, and as an +artist he bent and shaped the rough material, selecting with great +fastidiousness, so that in his plays every speech is, as he himself +declared all good speech should be, "as fully flavored as a nut or +apple." Even in _The Tinker's Wedding_ (1907), possibly the least +important of his plays, one is arrested by snatches like: + + "That's a sweet tongue you have, Sarah Casey; but if sleep's + a grand thing, it's a grand thing to be waking up a day the + like of this, when there's a warm sun in it, and a kind air, + and you'll hear the cuckoos singing and crying out on the + top of the hill." + +For some time, Synge's career was uncertain. He went to Germany half +intending to become a professional musician. There he studied the +theory of music, perfecting himself meanwhile in Gaelic and Hebrew, +winning prizes in both of these languages. Yeats found him in France +in 1898 and advised him to go to the Aran Islands, to live there as if +he were one of the people. "Express a life," said Yeats, "that has +never found expression." Synge went. He became part of the life of +Aran, living upon salt fish and eggs, talking Irish for the most part +but listening also to that beautiful English which, to quote Yeats +again, "has grown up in Irish-speaking districts and takes its +vocabulary from the time of Malory and of the translators of the +Bible, but its idiom and vivid metaphor from Irish." The result of +this close contact was five of the greatest poetic prose dramas not +only of his own generation, but of several generations preceding it. +(See Preface.) + +In _Riders to the Sea_ (1903), _The Well of the Saints_ (1905), and +_The Playboy of the Western World_ (1907) we have a richness of +imagery, a new language startling in its vigor, a wildness and passion +that contrast strangely with the suave mysticism and delicate +spirituality of his associates in the Irish Theatre. + +Synge's _Poems and Translations_ (1910), a volume which was not issued +until after his death, contains not only his few hard and earthy +verses, but also Synge's theory of poetry. The translations, which +have been rendered in a highly intensified prose, are as racy as +anything in his plays; his versions of Villon and Petrarch are +remarkable for their adherence to the original and still radiate the +poet's own personality. + +Synge died, just as he was beginning to attain fame, at a private +hospital in Dublin March 24, 1909. + + +BEG-INNISH + + Bring Kateen-beug and Maurya Jude + To dance in Beg-Innish,[13] + And when the lads (they're in Dunquin) + Have sold their crabs and fish, + Wave fawny shawls and call them in, + And call the little girls who spin, + And seven weavers from Dunquin, + To dance in Beg-Innish. + + I'll play you jigs, and Maurice Kean, + Where nets are laid to dry, + I've silken strings would draw a dance + From girls are lame or shy; + Four strings I've brought from Spain and France + To make your long men skip and prance, + Till stars look out to see the dance + Where nets are laid to dry. + + We'll have no priest or peeler in + To dance in Beg-Innish; + But we'll have drink from M'riarty Jim + Rowed round while gannets fish, + A keg with porter to the brim, + That every lad may have his whim, + Till we up sails with M'riarty Jim + And sail from Beg-Innish. + + +A TRANSLATION FROM PETRARCH + +(_He is Jealous of the Heavens and the Earth_) + +What a grudge I am bearing the earth that has its arms about her, and +is holding that face away from me, where I was finding peace from +great sadness. + +What a grudge I am bearing the Heavens that are after taking her, and +shutting her in with greediness, the Heavens that do push their bolt +against so many. + +What a grudge I am bearing the blessed saints that have got her sweet +company, that I am always seeking; and what a grudge I am bearing +against Death, that is standing in her two eyes, and will not call me +with a word. + + +TO THE OAKS OF GLENCREE + + My arms are round you, and I lean + Against you, while the lark + Sings over us, and golden lights, and green + Shadows are on your bark. + + There'll come a season when you'll stretch + Black boards to cover me; + Then in Mount Jerome I will lie, poor wretch, + With worms eternally. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[13] (The accent is on the last syllable.) + + + + +_Nora Hopper Chesson_ + + +Nora Hopper was born in Exeter on January 2, 1871, and married W. H. +Chesson, a well-known writer, in 1901. Although the Irish element in +her work is acquired and incidental, there is a distinct if somewhat +fitful race consciousness in _Ballads in Prose_ (1894) and _Under +Quickened Boughs_ (1896). She died suddenly April 14, 1906. + + +A CONNAUGHT LAMENT + + I will arise and go hence to the west, + And dig me a grave where the hill-winds call; + But O were I dead, were I dust, the fall + Of my own love's footstep would break my rest! + + My heart in my bosom is black as a sloe! + I heed not cuckoo, nor wren, nor swallow: + Like a flying leaf in the sky's blue hollow + The heart in my breast is, that beats so low. + + Because of the words your lips have spoken, + (O dear black head that I must not follow) + My heart is a grave that is stripped and hollow, + As ice on the water my heart is broken. + + O lips forgetful and kindness fickle, + The swallow goes south with you: I go west + Where fields are empty and scythes at rest. + I am the poppy and you the sickle; + My heart is broken within my breast. + + + + +_Eva Gore-Booth_ + + +Eva Gore-Booth, the second daughter of Sir Henry Gore-Booth and the +sister of Countess Marcievicz, was born in Sligo, Ireland, in 1872. +She first appeared in "A. E."'s anthology, _New Songs_, in which so +many of the modern Irish poets first came forward. + +Her initial volume, _Poems_ (1898), showed practically no +distinction--not even the customary "promise." But _The One and the +Many_ (1904) and _The Sorrowful Princess_ (1907) revealed the gift of +the Celtic singer who is half mystic, half minstrel. Primarily +philosophic, her verse often turns to lyrics as haunting as the two +examples here reprinted. + + +THE WAVES OF BREFFNY + + The grand road from the mountain goes shining to the sea, + And there is traffic on it and many a horse and cart, + But the little roads of Cloonagh are dearer far to me + And the little roads of Cloonagh go rambling through my heart. + + A great storm from the ocean goes shouting o'er the hill, + And there is glory in it; and terror on the wind: + But the haunted air of twilight is very strange and still, + And the little winds of twilight are dearer to my mind. + + The great waves of the Atlantic sweep storming on their way, + Shining green and silver with the hidden herring shoal; + But the little waves of Breffny have drenched my heart in spray, + And the little waves of Breffny go stumbling through my soul. + + +WALLS + + Free to all souls the hidden beauty calls, + The sea thrift dwelling on her spray-swept height, + The lofty rose, the low-grown aconite, + The gliding river and the stream that brawls + Down the sharp cliffs with constant breaks and falls-- + All these are equal in the equal light-- + All waters mirror the one Infinite. + + God made a garden, it was men built walls; + But the wide sea from men is wholly freed; + Freely the great waves rise and storm and break, + Nor softlier go for any landlord's need, + Where rhythmic tides flow for no miser's sake + And none hath profit of the brown sea-weed, + But all things give themselves, yet none may take. + + + + +_Moira O'Neill_ + + +Moira O'Neill is known chiefly by a remarkable little collection of +only twenty-five lyrics, _Songs from the Glens of Antrim_ (1900), +simple tunes as unaffected as the peasants of whom she sings. The best +of her poetry is dramatic without being theatrical; melodious without +falling into the tinkle of most "popular" sentimental verse. + + +A BROKEN SONG + + '_Where am I from?_' From the green hills of Erin. + '_Have I no song then?_' My songs are all sung. + '_What o' my love?_' 'Tis alone I am farin'. + Old grows my heart, an' my voice yet is young. + + '_If she was tall?_' Like a king's own daughter. + '_If she was fair?_' Like a mornin' o' May. + When she'd come laughin' 'twas the runnin' wather, + When she'd come blushin' 'twas the break o' day. + + '_Where did she dwell?_' Where one'st I had my dwellin'. + '_Who loved her best?_' There's no one now will know. + '_Where is she gone?_' Och, why would I be tellin'! + Where she is gone there I can never go. + + +BEAUTY'S A FLOWER + + _Youth's for an hour, + Beauty's a flower, + But love is the jewel that wins the world._ + + Youth's for an hour, an' the taste o' life is sweet, + Ailes was a girl that stepped on two bare feet; + In all my days I never seen the one as fair as she, + I'd have lost my life for Ailes, an' she never cared for me. + + Beauty's a flower, an' the days o' life are long, + There's little knowin' who may live to sing another song; + For Ailes was the fairest, but another is my wife, + An' Mary--God be good to her!--is all I love in life. + + _Youth's for an hour, + Beauty's a flower, + But love is the jewel that wins the world._ + + + + +_John McCrae_ + + +John McCrae was born in Guelph, Ontario, Canada, in 1872. He was +graduated in arts in 1894 and in medicine in 1898. He finished his +studies at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore and returned to Canada, joining +the staff of the Medical School of McGill University. He was a +lieutenant of artillery in South Africa (1899-1900) and was in charge +of the Medical Division of the McGill Canadian General Hospital during +the World War. After serving two years, he died of pneumonia, January, +1918, his volume _In Flanders Fields_ (1919) appearing posthumously. + +Few who read the title poem of his book, possibly the most widely-read +poem produced by the war, realize that it is a perfect rondeau, one of +the loveliest (and strictest) of the French forms. + + +IN FLANDERS FIELDS + + In Flanders fields the poppies blow + Between the crosses, row on row, + That mark our place; and in the sky + The larks, still bravely singing, fly + Scarce heard amid the guns below. + + We are the Dead. Short days ago + We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, + Loved and were loved, and now we lie + In Flanders fields. + + Take up our quarrel with the foe: + To you from failing hands we throw + The torch; be yours to hold it high. + If ye break faith with us who die + We shall not sleep, though poppies grow + In Flanders fields. + + + + +_Ford Madox Hueffer_ + + +Ford Madox Hueffer was born in 1873 and is best known as the author of +many novels, two of which, _Romance_ and _The Inheritors_, were +written in collaboration with Joseph Conrad. He has written also +several critical studies, those on Rossetti and Henry James being the +most notable. His _On Heaven and Other Poems_ appeared in 1916. + + +CLAIR DE LUNE + + I + + I should like to imagine + A moonlight in which there would be no machine-guns! + + For, it is possible + To come out of a trench or a hut or a tent or a church all in ruins: + To see the black perspective of long avenues + All silent. + The white strips of sky + At the sides, cut by the poplar trunks: + The white strips of sky + Above, diminishing-- + The silence and blackness of the avenue + Enclosed by immensities of space + Spreading away + Over No Man's Land.... + + For a minute ... + For ten ... + There will be no star shells + But the untroubled stars, + There will be no _Very_ light + But the light of the quiet moon + Like a swan. + And silence.... + + Then, far away to the right thro' the moonbeams + "_Wukka Wukka_" will go the machine-guns, + And, far away to the left + _Wukka Wukka_. + And sharply, + _Wuk_ ... _Wuk_ ... and then silence + For a space in the clear of the moon. + + II + + I should like to imagine + A moonlight in which the machine-guns of trouble + Will be silent.... + + Do you remember, my dear, + Long ago, on the cliffs, in the moonlight, + Looking over to Flatholme + We sat ... Long ago!... + And the things that you told me ... + Little things in the clear of the moon, + The little, sad things of a life.... + + We shall do it again + Full surely, + Sitting still, looking over at Flatholme. + Then, far away to the right + Shall sound the Machine Guns of trouble + _Wukka-wukka!_ + And, far away to the left, under Flatholme, + _Wukka-wuk!..._ + + I wonder, my dear, can you stick it? + As we should say: "Stick it, the Welch!" + In the dark of the moon, + Going over.... + + +"THERE SHALL BE MORE JOY ..." + + The little angels of Heaven + Each wear a long white dress, + And in the tall arcadings + Play ball and play at chess; + + With never a soil on their garments, + Not a sigh the whole day long, + Not a bitter note in their pleasure, + Not a bitter note in their song. + + But they shall know keener pleasure, + And they shall know joy more rare-- + Keener, keener pleasure + When you, my dear, come there. + + * * * * * + + The little angels of Heaven + Each wear a long white gown, + And they lean over the ramparts + Waiting and looking down. + + + + +_Walter De la Mare_ + + +The author of some of the most haunting lyrics in contemporary poetry, +Walter De la Mare, was born in 1873. Although he did not begin to +bring out his work in book form until he was over 30, he is, as Harold +Williams has written, "the singer of a young and romantic world, a +singer even for children, understanding and perceiving as a child." De +la Mare paints simple scenes of miniature loveliness; he uses +thin-spun fragments of fairy-like delicacy and achieves a grace that +is remarkable in its universality. "In a few words, seemingly artless +and unsought" (to quote Williams again), "he can express a pathos or a +hope as wide as man's life." + +De la Mare is an astonishing joiner of words; in _Peacock Pie_ (1913) +he surprises us again and again by transforming what began as a +child's nonsense-rhyme into a suddenly thrilling snatch of music. A +score of times he takes things as casual as the feeding of chickens or +the swallowing of physic, berry-picking, eating, hair-cutting--and +turns them into magic. These poems read like lyrics of William +Shakespeare rendered by Mother Goose. The trick of revealing the +ordinary in whimsical colors, of catching the commonplace off its +guard, is the first of De la Mare's two magics. + +This poet's second gift is his sense of the supernatural, of the +fantastic other-world that lies on the edges of our consciousness. +_The Listeners_ (1912) is a book that, like all the best of De la +Mare, is full of half-heard whispers; moonlight and mystery seem +soaked in the lines, and a cool wind from Nowhere blows over them. +That most magical of modern verses, "The Listeners," and the brief +music of "An Epitaph" are two fine examples among many. In the first +of these poems there is an uncanny splendor. What we have here is the +effect, the thrill, the overtones of a ghost story rather than the +narrative itself--the less than half-told adventure of some new Childe +Roland heroically challenging a heedless universe. Never have silence +and black night been reproduced more creepily, nor has the symbolism +of man's courage facing the cryptic riddle of life been more memorably +expressed. + +De la Mare's chief distinction, however, lies not so much in what he +says as in how he says it; he can even take outworn words like +"thridding," "athwart," "amaranthine" and make them live again in a +poetry that is of no time and of all time. He writes, it has been +said, as much for antiquity as for posterity; he is a poet who is +distinctively in the world and yet not wholly of it. + + +THE LISTENERS + + 'Is there anybody there?' said the Traveller, + Knocking on the moonlit door; + And his horse in the silence champed the grasses + Of the forest's ferny floor. + And a bird flew up out of the turret, + Above the Traveller's head: + And he smote upon the door again a second time; + 'Is there anybody there?' he said. + But no one descended to the Traveller; + No head from the leaf-fringed sill + Leaned over and looked into his grey eyes, + Where he stood perplexed and still. + But only a host of phantom listeners + That dwelt in the lone house then + Stood listening in the quiet of the moonlight + To that voice from the world of men: + Stood thronging the faint moonbeams on the dark stair, + That goes down to the empty hall, + Hearkening in an air stirred and shaken + By the lonely Traveller's call. + And he felt in his heart their strangeness, + Their stillness answering his cry, + While his horse moved, cropping the dark turf, + 'Neath the starred and leafy sky; + For he suddenly smote on the door, even + Louder, and lifted his head:-- + 'Tell them I came, and no one answered, + That I kept my word,' he said. + Never the least stir made the listeners, + Though every word he spake + Fell echoing through the shadowiness of the still house + From the one man left awake: + Ay, they heard his foot upon the stirrup, + And the sound of iron on stone, + And how the silence surged softly backward, + When the plunging hoofs were gone. + + +AN EPITAPH + + Here lies a most beautiful lady, + Light of step and heart was she; + I think she was the most beautiful lady + That ever was in the West Country. + + But beauty vanishes; beauty passes; + However rare--rare it be; + And when I crumble, who will remember + This lady of the West Country? + + +TIRED TIM + + Poor tired Tim! It's sad for him. + He lags the long bright morning through, + Ever so tired of nothing to do; + He moons and mopes the livelong day, + Nothing to think about, nothing to say; + Up to bed with his candle to creep, + Too tired to yawn; too tired to sleep: + Poor tired Tim! It's sad for him. + + +OLD SUSAN + + When Susan's work was done, she'd sit + With one fat guttering candle lit, + And window opened wide to win + The sweet night air to enter in; + There, with a thumb to keep her place + She'd read, with stern and wrinkled face. + Her mild eyes gliding very slow + Across the letters to and fro, + While wagged the guttering candle flame + In the wind that through the window came. + And sometimes in the silence she + Would mumble a sentence audibly, + Or shake her head as if to say, + 'You silly souls, to act this way!' + And never a sound from night I'd hear, + Unless some far-off cock crowed clear; + Or her old shuffling thumb should turn + Another page; and rapt and stern, + Through her great glasses bent on me + She'd glance into reality; + And shake her round old silvery head, + With--'You!--I thought you was in bed!'-- + Only to tilt her book again, + And rooted in Romance remain. + + +NOD + + Softly along the road of evening, + In a twilight dim with rose, + Wrinkled with age, and drenched with dew + Old Nod, the shepherd, goes. + + His drowsy flock streams on before him, + Their fleeces charged with gold, + To where the sun's last beam leans low + On Nod the shepherd's fold. + + The hedge is quick and green with briar, + From their sand the conies creep; + And all the birds that fly in heaven + Flock singing home to sleep. + + His lambs outnumber a noon's roses, + Yet, when night's shadows fall, + His blind old sheep-dog, Slumber-soon, + Misses not one of all. + + His are the quiet steeps of dreamland, + The waters of no-more-pain; + His ram's bell rings 'neath an arch of stars, + "Rest, rest, and rest again." + + + + +_G. K. Chesterton_ + + +This brilliant journalist, novelist, essayist, publicist and lyricist, +Gilbert Keith Chesterton, was born at Campden Hill, Kensington, in +1874, and began his literary life by reviewing books on art for +various magazines. He is best known as a writer of flashing, +paradoxical essays on anything and everything, like _Tremendous +Trifles_ (1909), _Varied Types_ (1905), and _All Things Considered_ +(1910). But he is also a stimulating critic; a keen appraiser, as in +his volume _Heretics_ (1905) and his analytical studies of Robert +Browning, Charles Dickens, and George Bernard Shaw; a writer of +strange and grotesque romances like _The Napoleon of Notting Hill_ +(1906), _The Man Who Was Thursday_ (1908), which Chesterton himself +has subtitled "A Nightmare," and _The Flying Inn_ (1914); the author +of several books of fantastic short stories, ranging from the wildly +whimsical narratives in _The Club of Queer Trades_ (1905) to that +amazing sequence _The Innocence of Father Brown_ (1911)--which is a +series of religious detective stories! + +Besides being the creator of all of these, Chesterton finds time to be +a prolific if sometimes too acrobatic newspaperman, a lay preacher in +disguise (witness _Orthodoxy_ [1908], _What's Wrong with the World?_ +[1910], _The Ball and the Cross_ [1909]), a pamphleteer, and a poet. +His first volume of verse, _The Wild Knight and Other Poems_ (1900), a +collection of quaintly-flavored and affirmative verses, was followed +by _The Ballad of the White Horse_ (1911), one long poem which, in +spite of Chesterton's ever-present didactic sermonizing, is possibly +the most stirring creation he has achieved. This poem has the swing, +the vigor, the spontaneity, and, above all, the ageless simplicity of +the true narrative ballad. + +Scarcely less notable is the ringing "Lepanto" from his later _Poems_ +(1915) which, anticipating the banging, clanging verses of Vachel +Lindsay's "The Congo," is one of the finest of modern chants. It is +interesting to see how the syllables beat, as though on brass; it is +thrilling to feel how, in one's pulses, the armies sing, the feet +tramp, the drums snarl, and all the tides of marching crusaders roll +out of lines like: + + "Strong gongs groaning as the guns boom far, + Don John of Austria is going to the war; + Stiff flags straining in the night-blasts cold + In the gloom black-purple, in the glint old-gold; + Torchlight crimson on the copper kettle-drums, + Then the tuckets, then the trumpets, then the cannon, and he comes...." + +Chesterton, the prose-paradoxer, is a delightful product of a +skeptical age. But it is Chesterton the poet who is more likely to +outlive it. + + +LEPANTO[14] + + White founts falling in the Courts of the sun, + And the Soldan of Byzantium is smiling as they run; + There is laughter like the fountains in that face of all men feared, + It stirs the forest darkness, the darkness of his beard; + It curls the blood-red crescent, the crescent of his lips; + For the inmost sea of all the earth is shaken with his ships. + They have dared the white republics up the capes of Italy, + They have dashed the Adriatic round the Lion of the Sea, + And the Pope has cast his arms abroad for agony and loss, + And called the kings of Christendom for swords about the Cross. + The cold queen of England is looking in the glass; + The shadow of the Valois is yawning at the Mass; + From evening isles fantastical rings faint the Spanish gun, + And the Lord upon the Golden Horn is laughing in the sun. + + Dim drums throbbing, in the hills half heard, + Where only on a nameless throne a crownless prince has stirred, + Where, risen from a doubtful seat and half attainted stall, + The last knight of Europe takes weapons from the wall, + The last and lingering troubadour to whom the bird has sung, + That once went singing southward when all the world was young. + In that enormous silence, tiny and unafraid, + Comes up along a winding road the noise of the Crusade. + Strong gongs groaning as the guns boom far, + Don John of Austria is going to the war, + Stiff flags straining in the night-blasts cold + In the gloom black-purple, in the glint old-gold, + Torchlight crimson on the copper kettle-drums, + Then the tuckets, then the trumpets, then the cannon, and he comes. + Don John laughing in the brave beard curled, + Spurning of his stirrups like the thrones of all the world, + Holding his head up for a flag of all the free. + Love-light of Spain--hurrah! + Death-light of Africa! + Don John of Austria + Is riding to the sea. + + Mahound is in his paradise above the evening star, + (_Don John of Austria is going to the war._) + He moves a mighty turban on the timeless houri's knees, + His turban that is woven of the sunsets and the seas. + He shakes the peacock gardens as he rises from his ease, + And he strides among the tree-tops and is taller than the trees; + And his voice through all the garden is a thunder sent to bring + Black Azrael and Ariel and Ammon on the wing. + Giants and the Genii, + Multiplex of wing and eye, + Whose strong obedience broke the sky + When Solomon was king. + + They rush in red and purple from the red clouds of the morn, + From the temples where the yellow gods shut up their eyes in scorn; + They rise in green robes roaring from the green hells of the sea + Where fallen skies and evil hues and eyeless creatures be, + On them the sea-valves cluster and the grey sea-forests curl, + Splashed with a splendid sickness, the sickness of the pearl; + They swell in sapphire smoke out of the blue cracks of the ground,-- + They gather and they wonder and give worship to Mahound. + And he saith, "Break up the mountains where the hermit-folk can hide, + And sift the red and silver sands lest bone of saint abide, + And chase the Giaours flying night and day, not giving rest, + For that which was our trouble comes again out of the west. + We have set the seal of Solomon on all things under sun, + Of knowledge and of sorrow and endurance of things done. + But a noise is in the mountains, in the mountains, and I know + The voice that shook our palaces--four hundred years ago: + It is he that saith not 'Kismet'; it is he that knows not Fate; + It is Richard, it is Raymond, it is Godfrey at the gate! + It is he whose loss is laughter when he counts the wager worth, + Put down your feet upon him, that our peace be on the earth." + For he heard drums groaning and he heard guns jar, + (_Don John of Austria is going to the war._) + Sudden and still--hurrah! + Bolt from Iberia! + Don John of Austria + Is gone by Alcalar. + + St. Michael's on his Mountain in the sea-roads of the north + (_Don John of Austria is girt and going forth._) + Where the grey seas glitter and the sharp tides shift + And the sea-folk labour and the red sails lift. + He shakes his lance of iron and he claps his wings of stone; + The noise is gone through Normandy; the noise is gone alone; + The North is full of tangled things and texts and aching eyes, + And dead is all the innocence of anger and surprise, + And Christian killeth Christian in a narrow dusty room, + And Christian dreadeth Christ that hath a newer face of doom, + And Christian hateth Mary that God kissed in Galilee,-- + But Don John of Austria is riding to the sea. + Don John calling through the blast and the eclipse + Crying with the trumpet, with the trumpet of his lips, + Trumpet that sayeth _ha_! + _Domino gloria!_ + Don John of Austria + Is shouting to the ships. + + King Philip's in his closet with the Fleece about his neck + (_Don John of Austria is armed upon the deck._) + The walls are hung with velvet that is black and soft as sin, + And little dwarfs creep out of it and little dwarfs creep in. + He holds a crystal phial that has colours like the moon, + He touches, and it tingles, and he trembles very soon, + And his face is as a fungus of a leprous white and grey + Like plants in the high houses that are shuttered from the day, + And death is in the phial and the end of noble work, + But Don John of Austria has fired upon the Turk. + Don John's hunting, and his hounds have bayed-- + Booms away past Italy the rumour of his raid. + Gun upon gun, ha! ha! + Gun upon gun, hurrah! + Don John of Austria + Has loosed the cannonade. + + The Pope was in his chapel before day or battle broke, + (_Don John of Austria is hidden in the smoke._) + The hidden room in man's house where God sits all the year, + The secret window whence the world looks small and very dear. + He sees as in a mirror on the monstrous twilight sea + The crescent of his cruel ships whose name is mystery; + They fling great shadows foe-wards, making Cross and Castle dark, + They veil the plumed lions on the galleys of St. Mark; + And above the ships are palaces of brown, black-bearded chiefs, + And below the ships are prisons, where with multitudinous griefs, + Christian captives sick and sunless, all a labouring race repines + Like a race in sunken cities, like a nation in the mines. + They are lost like slaves that sweat, and in the skies of morning hung + The stair-ways of the tallest gods when tyranny was young. + They are countless, voiceless, hopeless as those fallen or fleeing on + Before the high Kings' horses in the granite of Babylon. + And many a one grows witless in his quiet room in hell + Where a yellow face looks inward through the lattice of his cell, + And he finds his God forgotten, and he seeks no more a sign-- + (_But Don John of Austria has burst the battle-line!_) + Don John pounding from the slaughter-painted poop, + Purpling all the ocean like a bloody pirate's sloop, + Scarlet running over on the silvers and the golds, + Breaking of the hatches up and bursting of the holds, + Thronging of the thousands up that labour under sea + White for bliss and blind for sun and stunned for liberty. + _Vivat Hispania!_ + _Domino Gloria!_ + Don John of Austria + Has set his people free! + + Cervantes on his galley sets the sword back in the sheath + (_Don John of Austria rides homeward with a wreath._) + And he sees across a weary land a straggling road in Spain, + Up which a lean and foolish knight for ever rides in vain, + And he smiles, but not as Sultans smile, and settles back the blade.... + (_But Don John of Austria rides home from the Crusade._) + + +A PRAYER IN DARKNESS + + This much, O heaven--if I should brood or rave, + Pity me not; but let the world be fed, + Yea, in my madness if I strike me dead, + Heed you the grass that grows upon my grave. + + If I dare snarl between this sun and sod, + Whimper and clamour, give me grace to own, + In sun and rain and fruit in season shown, + The shining silence of the scorn of God. + + Thank God the stars are set beyond my power, + If I must travail in a night of wrath, + Thank God my tears will never vex a moth, + Nor any curse of mine cut down a flower. + + Men say the sun was darkened: yet I had + Thought it beat brightly, even on--Calvary: + And He that hung upon the Torturing Tree + Heard all the crickets singing, and was glad. + + +THE DONKEY + + "The tattered outlaw of the earth, + Of ancient crooked will; + Starve, scourge, deride me: I am dumb, + I keep my secret still. + + "Fools! For I also had my hour; + One far fierce hour and sweet: + There was a shout about my ears, + And palms before my feet." + +FOOTNOTES: + +[14] From _Poems_ by G. K. Chesterton. Copyright by the John Lane Co. +and reprinted by permission of the publishers. + + + + +_Wilfrid Wilson Gibson_ + + +Born at Hexam in 1878, Wilfrid Wilson Gibson has published almost a +dozen books of verse--the first four or five (see Preface) being +imitative in manner and sentimentally romantic in tone. With _The +Stonefolds_ (1907) and _Daily Bread_ (1910), Gibson executed a +complete right-about-face and, with dramatic brevity, wrote a series +of poems mirroring the dreams, pursuits and fears of common humanity. +_Fires_ (1912) marks an advance in technique and power. And though in +_Livelihood_ (1917) Gibson seems to be theatricalizing and merely +exploiting his working-people, his later lyrics recapture the veracity +of such memorable poems as "The Old Man," "The Blind Rower," and "The +Machine." _Hill-Tracks_ (1918) attempts to capture the beauty of +village-names and the glamour of the English countryside. + + +PRELUDE + + As one, at midnight, wakened by the call + Of golden-plovers in their seaward flight, + Who lies and listens, as the clear notes fall + Through tingling silence of the frosty night-- + Who lies and listens, till the last note fails, + And then, in fancy, faring with the flock + Far over slumbering hills and dreaming dales, + Soon hears the surges break on reef and rock; + And, hearkening, till all sense of self is drowned + Within the mightier music of the deep, + No more remembers the sweet piping sound + That startled him from dull, undreaming sleep; + So I, first waking from oblivion, heard, + With heart that kindled to the call of song, + The voice of young life, fluting like a bird, + And echoed that light lilting; till, ere long, + Lured onward by that happy, singing-flight, + I caught the stormy summons of the sea, + And dared the restless deeps that, day and night, + Surge with the life-song of humanity. + + +THE STONE[15] + + "And will you cut a stone for him, + To set above his head? + And will you cut a stone for him-- + A stone for him?" she said. + + Three days before, a splintered rock + Had struck her lover dead-- + Had struck him in the quarry dead, + Where, careless of the warning call, + He loitered, while the shot was fired-- + A lively stripling, brave and tall, + And sure of all his heart desired ... + A flash, a shock, + A rumbling fall ... + And, broken 'neath the broken rock, + A lifeless heap, with face of clay; + And still as any stone he lay, + With eyes that saw the end of all. + + I went to break the news to her; + And I could hear my own heart beat + With dread of what my lips might say + But, some poor fool had sped before; + And flinging wide her father's door, + Had blurted out the news to her, + Had struck her lover dead for her, + Had struck the girl's heart dead in her, + Had struck life, lifeless, at a word, + And dropped it at her feet: + Then hurried on his witless way, + Scarce knowing she had heard. + + And when I came, she stood, alone + A woman, turned to stone: + And, though no word at all she said, + I knew that all was known. + + Because her heart was dead, + She did not sigh nor moan, + His mother wept: + She could not weep. + Her lover slept: + She could not sleep. + Three days, three nights, + She did not stir: + Three days, three nights, + Were one to her, + Who never closed her eyes + From sunset to sunrise, + From dawn to evenfall: + Her tearless, staring eyes, + That seeing naught, saw all. + + The fourth night when I came from work, + I found her at my door. + "And will you cut a stone for him?" + She said: and spoke no more: + But followed me, as I went in, + And sank upon a chair; + And fixed her grey eyes on my face, + With still, unseeing stare. + And, as she waited patiently, + I could not bear to feel + Those still, grey eyes that followed me, + Those eyes that plucked the heart from me, + Those eyes that sucked the breath from me + And curdled the warm blood in me, + Those eyes that cut me to the bone, + And pierced my marrow like cold steel. + + And so I rose, and sought a stone; + And cut it, smooth and square: + And, as I worked, she sat and watched, + Beside me, in her chair. + Night after night, by candlelight, + I cut her lover's name: + Night after night, so still and white, + And like a ghost she came; + And sat beside me in her chair; + And watched with eyes aflame. + + She eyed each stroke; + And hardly stirred: + She never spoke + A single word: + And not a sound or murmur broke + The quiet, save the mallet-stroke. + + With still eyes ever on my hands, + With eyes that seemed to burn my hands, + My wincing, overwearied hands, + She watched, with bloodless lips apart, + And silent, indrawn breath: + And every stroke my chisel cut, + Death cut still deeper in her heart: + The two of us were chiselling, + Together, I and death. + + And when at length the job was done, + And I had laid the mallet by, + As if, at last, her peace were won, + She breathed his name; and, with a sigh, + Passed slowly through the open door: + And never crossed my threshold more. + + Next night I laboured late, alone, + To cut her name upon the stone. + + +SIGHT[16] + + By the lamplit stall I loitered, feasting my eyes + On colours ripe and rich for the heart's desire-- + Tomatoes, redder than Krakatoa's fire, + Oranges like old sunsets over Tyre, + And apples golden-green as the glades of Paradise. + + And as I lingered, lost in divine delight, + My heart thanked God for the goodly gift of sight + And all youth's lively senses keen and quick ... + When suddenly, behind me in the night, + I heard the tapping of a blind man's stick. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[15] From _Fires_ by Wilfrid Wilson Gibson. Copyright, 1912, by The +Macmillan Co. Reprinted by permission of the publishers. + +[16] From _Borderlands and Thoroughfares_ by Wilfrid Wilson Gibson. +Copyright, 1915, by The Macmillan Company. Reprinted by permission of +the publishers. + + + + +_John Masefield_ + + +John Masefield was born June 1, 1878, in Ledbury, Hertfordshire. He +was the son of a lawyer but, being of a restless disposition, he took +to the sea at an early age and became a wanderer for several years. At +one time, in 1895, to be exact, he worked for a few months as a sort +of third assistant barkeeper and dish-washer in Luke O'Connor's +saloon, the Columbia Hotel, in New York City. The place is still there +on the corner of Sixth and Greenwich Avenues. + +The results of his wanderings showed in his early works, _Salt-Water +Ballads_ (1902), _Ballads_ (1903), frank and often crude poems of +sailors written in their own dialect, and _A Mainsail Haul_ (1905), a +collection of short nautical stories. In these books Masefield +possibly overemphasized passion and brutality but, underneath the +violence, he captured that highly-colored realism which is the poetry +of life. + +It was not until he published _The Everlasting Mercy_ (1911) that he +became famous. Followed quickly by those remarkable long narrative +poems, _The Widow in the Bye Street_ (1912), _Dauber_ (1912), and _The +Daffodil Fields_ (1913), there is in all of these that peculiar blend +of physical exulting and spiritual exaltation that is so striking, and +so typical of Masefield. Their very rudeness is lifted to a plane of +religious intensity. (See Preface.) Pictorially, Masefield is even +more forceful. The finest moment in _The Widow in the Bye Street_ is +the portrayal of the mother alone in her cottage; the public-house +scene and the passage describing the birds following the plough are +the most intense touches in _The Everlasting Mercy_. Nothing more +vigorous and thrilling than the description of the storm at sea in +_Dauber_ has appeared in current literature. + +The war, in which Masefield served with the Red Cross in France and on +the Gallipoli peninsula (of which campaign he wrote a study for the +government), softened his style; _Good Friday and Other Poems_ (1916) +is as restrained and dignified a collection as that of any of his +contemporaries. _Reynard the Fox_ (1919) is the best of his new manner +with a return of the old vivacity. + +Masefield has also written several novels of which _Multitude and +Solitude_ (1909) is the most outstanding; half a dozen plays, ranging +from the classical solemnity of _Pompey the Great_ to the hot and racy +_Tragedy of Nan_; and one of the freshest, most creative critiques of +_Shakespeare_ (1911) in the last generation. + + +A CONSECRATION + + Not of the princes and prelates with periwigged charioteers + Riding triumphantly laurelled to lap the fat of the years,-- + Rather the scorned--the rejected--the men hemmed in with the spears; + + The men of the tattered battalion which fights till it dies, + Dazed with the dust of the battle, the din and the cries. + The men with the broken heads and the blood running into their eyes. + + Not the be-medalled Commander, beloved of the throne, + Riding cock-horse to parade when the bugles are blown, + But the lads who carried the koppie and cannot be known. + + Not the ruler for me, but the ranker, the tramp of the road, + The slave with the sack on his shoulders pricked on with the goad, + The man with too weighty a burden, too weary a load. + + The sailor, the stoker of steamers, the man with the clout, + The chantyman bent at the halliards putting a tune to the shout, + The drowsy man at the wheel and the tired look-out. + + Others may sing of the wine and the wealth and the mirth, + The portly presence of potentates goodly in girth;-- + Mine be the dirt and the dross, the dust and scum of the earth! + + Theirs be the music, the colour, the glory, the gold; + Mine be a handful of ashes, a mouthful of mould. + Of the maimed, of the halt and the blind in the rain and the cold-- + Of these shall my songs be fashioned, my tales be told. + + AMEN. + + +SEA-FEVER + + I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky, + And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by, + And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking, + And a grey mist on the sea's face and a grey dawn breaking. + + I must down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide + Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied; + And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying, + And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the seagulls crying. + + I must down to the seas again to the vagrant gypsy life. + To the gull's way and the whale's way where the wind's + like a whetted knife; + And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover, + And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over. + + +ROUNDING THE HORN + +(_From "Dauber"_)[17] + + Then came the cry of "Call all hands on deck!" + The Dauber knew its meaning; it was come: + Cape Horn, that tramples beauty into wreck, + And crumples steel and smites the strong man dumb. + Down clattered flying kites and staysails; some + Sang out in quick, high calls: the fair-leads skirled, + And from the south-west came the end of the world.... + + "Lay out!" the Bosun yelled. The Dauber laid + Out on the yard, gripping the yard, and feeling + Sick at the mighty space of air displayed + Below his feet, where mewing birds were wheeling. + A giddy fear was on him; he was reeling. + He bit his lip half through, clutching the jack. + A cold sweat glued the shirt upon his back. + + The yard was shaking, for a brace was loose. + He felt that he would fall; he clutched, he bent, + Clammy with natural terror to the shoes + While idiotic promptings came and went. + Snow fluttered on a wind-flaw and was spent; + He saw the water darken. Someone yelled, + "Frap it; don't stay to furl! Hold on!" He held. + + Darkness came down--half darkness--in a whirl; + The sky went out, the waters disappeared. + He felt a shocking pressure of blowing hurl + The ship upon her side. The darkness speared + At her with wind; she staggered, she careered; + Then down she lay. The Dauber felt her go, + He saw her yard tilt downwards. Then the snow + + Whirled all about--dense, multitudinous, cold-- + Mixed with the wind's one devilish thrust and shriek, + Which whiffled out men's tears, defeated, took hold, + Flattening the flying drift against the cheek. + The yards buckled and bent, man could not speak. + The ship lay on her broadside; the wind's sound + Had devilish malice at having got her downed. + + * * * * * + + How long the gale had blown he could not tell, + Only the world had changed, his life had died. + A moment now was everlasting hell. + Nature an onslaught from the weather side, + A withering rush of death, a frost that cried, + Shrieked, till he withered at the heart; a hail + Plastered his oilskins with an icy mail.... + + "Up!" yelled the Bosun; "up and clear the wreck!" + The Dauber followed where he led; below + He caught one giddy glimpsing of the deck + Filled with white water, as though heaped with snow. + He saw the streamers of the rigging blow + Straight out like pennons from the splintered mast, + Then, all sense dimmed, all was an icy blast. + + Roaring from nether hell and filled with ice, + Roaring and crashing on the jerking stage, + An utter bridle given to utter vice, + Limitless power mad with endless rage + Withering the soul; a minute seemed an age. + He clutched and hacked at ropes, at rags of sail, + Thinking that comfort was a fairy tale, + + Told long ago--long, long ago--long since + Heard of in other lives--imagined, dreamed-- + There where the basest beggar was a prince. + To him in torment where the tempest screamed, + Comfort and warmth and ease no longer seemed + Things that a man could know; soul, body, brain, + Knew nothing but the wind, the cold, the pain. + + +THE CHOICE + + The Kings go by with jewelled crowns; + Their horses gleam, their banners shake, their spears are many. + The sack of many-peopled towns + Is all their dream: + The way they take + Leaves but a ruin in the brake, + And, in the furrow that the ploughmen make, + A stampless penny; a tale, a dream. + + The Merchants reckon up their gold, + Their letters come, their ships arrive, their freights are glories: + The profits of their treasures sold + They tell and sum; + Their foremen drive + Their servants, starved to half-alive, + Whose labours do but make the earth a hive + Of stinking glories; a tale, a dream. + + The Priests are singing in their stalls, + Their singing lifts, their incense burns, their praying clamours; + Yet God is as the sparrow falls, + The ivy drifts; + The votive urns + Are all left void when Fortune turns, + The god is but a marble for the kerns + To break with hammers; a tale, a dream. + + O Beauty, let me know again + The green earth cold, the April rain, the quiet waters figuring sky, + The one star risen. + So shall I pass into the feast + Not touched by King, Merchant, or Priest; + Know the red spirit of the beast, + Be the green grain; + Escape from prison. + + +SONNET[18] + + Is there a great green commonwealth of Thought + Which ranks the yearly pageant, and decides + How Summer's royal progress shall be wrought, + By secret stir which in each plant abides? + Does rocking daffodil consent that she, + The snowdrop of wet winters, shall be first? + Does spotted cowslip with the grass agree + To hold her pride before the rattle burst? + And in the hedge what quick agreement goes, + When hawthorn blossoms redden to decay, + That Summer's pride shall come, the Summer's rose, + Before the flower be on the bramble spray? + Or is it, as with us, unresting strife, + And each consent a lucky gasp for life? + +FOOTNOTES: + +[17] From _The Story of a Round-House_ by John Masefield. Copyright, +1913, by The Macmillan Company. Reprinted by permission of the +publishers. + +[18] From _Good Friday and Other Poems_ by John Masefield. Copyright, +1916, by The Macmillan Company. Reprinted by permission of the +publishers. + + + + +_Lord Dunsany_ + + +Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, Lord Dunsany, was born July 24, +1878, and was educated at Eton and Sandhurst. He is best known as an +author of fantastic fairy tales and even more fantastic plays. _The +Gods of the Mountain_ (1911) and _The Golden Doom_ (1912) are highly +dramatic and intensely poetic. _A Night at an Inn_ (1916) is that +peculiar novelty, an eerie and poetical melodrama. + +Dunsany's prime quality is a romantic and highly colored imagination +which is rich in symbolism. After the World War, in which the +playwright served as captain in the Royal Innis-killing Fusiliers, +Dunsany visited America and revised the reissue of his early tales and +prose poems collected in his _The Book of Wonder_. + + +SONGS FROM AN EVIL WOOD + + I + + There is no wrath in the stars, + They do not rage in the sky; + I look from the evil wood + And find myself wondering why. + + Why do they not scream out + And grapple star against star, + Seeking for blood in the wood + As all things round me are? + + They do not glare like the sky + Or flash like the deeps of the wood; + But they shine softly on + In their sacred solitude. + + To their high, happy haunts + Silence from us has flown, + She whom we loved of old + And know it now she is gone. + + When will she come again, + Though for one second only? + She whom we loved is gone + And the whole world is lonely. + + And the elder giants come + Sometimes, tramping from far + Through the weird and flickering light + Made by an earthly star. + + And the giant with his club, + And the dwarf with rage in his breath, + And the elder giants from far, + They are all the children of Death. + + They are all abroad to-night + And are breaking the hills with their brood,-- + And the birds are all asleep + Even in Plug Street Wood! + + II + + Somewhere lost in the haze + The sun goes down in the cold, + And birds in this evil wood + Chirrup home as of old; + + Chirrup, stir and are still, + On the high twigs frozen and thin. + There is no more noise of them now, + And the long night sets in. + + Of all the wonderful things + That I have seen in the wood + I marvel most at the birds + And their wonderful quietude. + + For a giant smites with his club + All day the tops of the hill, + Sometimes he rests at night, + Oftener he beats them still. + + And a dwarf with a grim black mane + Raps with repeated rage + All night in the valley below + On the wooden walls of his cage. + + III + + I met with Death in his country, + With his scythe and his hollow eye, + Walking the roads of Belgium. + I looked and he passed me by. + + Since he passed me by in Plug Street, + In the wood of the evil name, + I shall not now lie with the heroes, + I shall not share their fame; + + I shall never be as they are, + A name in the lands of the Free, + Since I looked on Death in Flanders + And he did not look at me. + + + + +_Edward Thomas_ + + +Edward Thomas, one of the little-known but most individual of modern +English poets, was born in 1878. For many years before he turned to +verse, Thomas had a large following as a critic and author of travel +books, biographies, pot-boilers. Hating his hack-work, yet unable to +get free of it, he had so repressed his creative ability that he had +grown doubtful concerning his own power. It needed something foreign +to stir and animate what was native in him. So when Robert Frost, the +New England poet, went abroad in 1912 for two years and became an +intimate of Thomas's, the English critic began to write poetry. +Loving, like Frost, the _minutiae_ of existence, the quaint and casual +turn of ordinary life, he caught the magic of the English countryside +in its unpoeticized quietude. Many of his poems are full of a slow, +sad contemplation of life and a reflection of its brave futility. It +is not disillusion exactly; it is rather an absence of illusion. +_Poems_ (1917), dedicated to Robert Frost, is full of Thomas's +fidelity to little things, things as unglorified as the unfreezing of +the "rock-like mud," a child's path, a list of quaint-sounding +villages, birds' nests uncovered by the autumn wind, dusty +nettles--the lines glow with a deep and almost abject reverence for +the soil. + +Thomas was killed at Arras, at an observatory outpost, on Easter +Monday, 1917. + + +IF I SHOULD EVER BY CHANCE + + If I should ever by chance grow rich + I'll buy Codham, Cockridden, and Childerditch, + Roses, Pyrgo, and Lapwater, + And let them all to my elder daughter. + The rent I shall ask of her will be only + Each year's first violets, white and lonely, + The first primroses and orchises-- + She must find them before I do, that is. + But if she finds a blossom on furze + Without rent they shall all for ever be hers, + Codham, Cockridden, and Childerditch, + Roses, Pyrgo and Lapwater,-- + I shall give them all to my elder daughter. + + +TALL NETTLES + + Tall nettles cover up, as they have done + These many springs, the rusty harrow, the plough + Long worn out, and the roller made of stone: + Only the elm butt tops the nettles now. + + This corner of the farmyard I like most: + As well as any bloom upon a flower + I like the dust on the nettles, never lost + Except to prove the sweetness of a shower. + + +FIFTY FAGGOTS + + There they stand, on their ends, the fifty faggots + That once were underwood of hazel and ash + In Jenny Pinks's Copse. Now, by the hedge + Close packed, they make a thicket fancy alone + Can creep through with the mouse and wren. Next Spring + A blackbird or a robin will nest there, + Accustomed to them, thinking they will remain + Whatever is for ever to a bird. + This Spring it is too late; the swift has come, + 'Twas a hot day for carrying them up: + Better they will never warm me, though they must + Light several Winters' fires. Before they are done + The war will have ended, many other things + Have ended, maybe, that I can no more + Foresee or more control than robin and wren. + + +COCK-CROW + + Out of the wood of thoughts that grows by night + To be cut down by the sharp axe of light,-- + Out of the night, two cocks together crow, + Cleaving the darkness with a silver blow: + And bright before my eyes twin trumpeters stand, + Heralds of splendour, one at either hand, + Each facing each as in a coat of arms:-- + The milkers lace their boots up at the farms. + + + + +_Seumas O'Sullivan_ + + +James Starkey was born in Dublin in 1879. Writing under the pseudonym +of Seumas O'Sullivan, he contributed a great variety of prose and +verse to various Irish papers. His reputation as a poet began with +his appearance in _New Songs_, edited by George Russell ("A. E."). +Later, he published _The Twilight People_ (1905), _The Earth Lover_ +(1909), and _Poems_ (1912). + + +PRAISE + + Dear, they are praising your beauty, + The grass and the sky: + The sky in a silence of wonder, + The grass in a sigh. + + I too would sing for your praising, + Dearest, had I + Speech as the whispering grass, + Or the silent sky. + + These have an art for the praising + Beauty so high. + Sweet, you are praised in a silence, + Sung in a sigh. + + + + +_Ralph Hodgson_ + + +This exquisite poet was born in Northumberland about 1879. One of the +most graceful of the younger word-magicians, Ralph Hodgson will retain +his freshness as long as there are lovers of such rare and timeless +songs as his. It is difficult to think of any anthology of English +poetry compiled after 1917 that could omit "Eve," "The Song of Honor," +and that memorable snatch of music, "Time, You Old Gypsy Man." One +succumbs to the charm of "Eve" at the first reading; for here is the +oldest of all legends told with a surprising simplicity and still more +surprising freshness. This Eve is neither the conscious sinner nor the +Mother of men; she is, in Hodgson's candid lines, any young, English +country girl--filling her basket, regarding the world and the serpent +itself with a mild and childlike wonder. + +Hodgson's verses, full of the love of all natural things, a love that +goes out to + + "an idle rainbow + No less than laboring seas," + +were originally brought out in small pamphlets, and distributed by +_Flying Fame_. + + +EVE + + Eve, with her basket, was + Deep in the bells and grass, + Wading in bells and grass + Up to her knees. + Picking a dish of sweet + Berries and plums to eat, + Down in the bells and grass + Under the trees. + + Mute as a mouse in a + Corner the cobra lay, + Curled round a bough of the + Cinnamon tall.... + Now to get even and + Humble proud heaven and + Now was the moment or + Never at all. + + "Eva!" Each syllable + Light as a flower fell, + "Eva!" he whispered the + Wondering maid, + Soft as a bubble sung + Out of a linnet's lung, + Soft and most silverly + "Eva!" he said. + + Picture that orchard sprite; + Eve, with her body white, + Supple and smooth to her + Slim finger tips; + Wondering, listening, + Listening, wondering, + Eve with a berry + Half-way to her lips. + + Oh, had our simple Eve + Seen through the make-believe! + Had she but known the + Pretender he was! + Out of the boughs he came, + Whispering still her name, + Tumbling in twenty rings + Into the grass. + + Here was the strangest pair + In the world anywhere, + Eve in the bells and grass + Kneeling, and he + Telling his story low.... + Singing birds saw them go + Down the dark path to + The Blasphemous Tree. + + Oh, what a clatter when + Titmouse and Jenny Wren + Saw him successful and + Taking his leave! + How the birds rated him, + How they all hated him! + How they all pitied + Poor motherless Eve! + + Picture her crying + Outside in the lane, + Eve, with no dish of sweet + Berries and plums to eat, + Haunting the gate of the + Orchard in vain.... + Picture the lewd delight + Under the hill to-night-- + "Eva!" the toast goes round, + "Eva!" again. + + +TIME, YOU OLD GIPSY MAN + + Time, you old gipsy man, + Will you not stay, + Put up your caravan + Just for one day? + + All things I'll give you + Will you be my guest, + Bells for your jennet + Of silver the best, + Goldsmiths shall beat you + A great golden ring, + Peacocks shall bow to you, + Little boys sing, + Oh, and sweet girls will + Festoon you with may. + Time, you old gipsy, + Why hasten away? + + Last week in Babylon, + Last night in Rome, + Morning, and in the crush + Under Paul's dome; + Under Paul's dial + You tighten your rein-- + Only a moment, + And off once again; + Off to some city + Now blind in the womb, + Off to another + Ere that's in the tomb. + + Time, you old gipsy man, + Will you not stay, + Put up your caravan + Just for one day? + + +THE BIRDCATCHER + + When flighting time is on, I go + With clap-net and decoy, + A-fowling after goldfinches + And other birds of joy; + + I lurk among the thickets of + The Heart where they are bred, + And catch the twittering beauties as + They fly into my Head. + + +THE MYSTERY + + He came and took me by the hand + Up to a red rose tree, + He kept His meaning to Himself + But gave a rose to me. + + I did not pray Him to lay bare + The mystery to me, + Enough the rose was Heaven to smell, + And His own face to see. + + + + +_Harold Monro_ + + +The publisher of the various anthologies of Georgian Poetry, Harold +Monro, was born in Brussels in 1879. He describes himself as "author, +publisher, editor and book-seller." Monro founded The Poetry Bookshop +in London in 1912, a unique establishment having as its object a +practical relation between poetry and the public, and keeping in stock +nothing but poetry, the drama, and books connected with these +subjects. His quarterly _Poetry and Drama_ (discontinued during the +war and revived in 1919 as _The Monthly Chapbook_), was in a sense the +organ of the younger men; and his shop, in which he has lived for the +last seven years except while he was in the army, became a genuine +literary center. + +Of Monro's books, the two most important are _Strange Meetings_ (1917) +and _Children of Love_ (1919). "The Nightingale Near the House," one +of the loveliest of his poems, is also one of his latest and has not +yet appeared in any of his volumes. + + +THE NIGHTINGALE NEAR THE HOUSE + + Here is the soundless cypress on the lawn: + It listens, listens. Taller trees beyond + Listen. The moon at the unruffled pond + Stares. And you sing, you sing. + + That star-enchanted song falls through the air + From lawn to lawn down terraces of sound, + Darts in white arrows on the shadowed ground; + And all the night you sing. + + My dreams are flowers to which you are a bee + As all night long I listen, and my brain + Receives your song; then loses it again + In moonlight on the lawn. + + Now is your voice a marble high and white, + Then like a mist on fields of paradise, + Now is a raging fire, then is like ice, + Then breaks, and it is dawn. + + +EVERY THING + + Since man has been articulate, + Mechanical, improvidently wise, + (Servant of Fate), + He has not understood the little cries + And foreign conversations of the small + Delightful creatures that have followed him + Not far behind; + Has failed to hear the sympathetic call + Of Crockery and Cutlery, those kind + Reposeful Teraphim + Of his domestic happiness; the Stool + He sat on, or the Door he entered through: + He has not thanked them, overbearing fool! + What is he coming to? + + But you should listen to the talk of these. + Honest they are, and patient they have kept; + Served him without his Thank you or his Please ... + I often heard + The gentle Bed, a sigh between each word, + Murmuring, before I slept. + The Candle, as I blew it, cried aloud, + Then bowed, + And in a smoky argument + Into the darkness went. + + The Kettle puffed a tentacle of breath:-- + "Pooh! I have boiled his water, I don't know + Why; and he always says I boil too slow. + He never calls me 'Sukie, dear,' and oh, + I wonder why I squander my desire + Sitting submissive on his kitchen fire." + + Now the old Copper Basin suddenly + Rattled and tumbled from the shelf, + Bumping and crying: "I can fall by myself; + Without a woman's hand + To patronize and coax and flatter me, + I understand + The lean and poise of gravitable land." + It gave a raucous and tumultuous shout, + Twisted itself convulsively about, + Rested upon the floor, and, while I stare, + It stares and grins at me. + + The old impetuous Gas above my head + Begins irascibly to flare and fret, + Wheezing into its epileptic jet, + Reminding me I ought to go to bed. + + The Rafters creak; an Empty-Cupboard door + Swings open; now a wild Plank of the floor + Breaks from its joist, and leaps behind my foot. + Down from the chimney, half a pound of Soot + Tumbles and lies, and shakes itself again. + The Putty cracks against the window-pane. + + A piece of Paper in the basket shoves + Another piece, and toward the bottom moves. + My independent Pencil, while I write, + Breaks at the point: the ruminating Clock + Stirs all its body and begins to rock, + Warning the waiting presence of the Night, + Strikes the dead hour, and tumbles to the plain + Ticking of ordinary work again. + + You do well to remind me, and I praise + Your strangely individual foreign ways. + You call me from myself to recognize + Companionship in your unselfish eyes. + I want your dear acquaintances, although + I pass you arrogantly over, throw + Your lovely sounds, and squander them along + My busy days. I'll do you no more wrong. + + Purr for me, Sukie, like a faithful cat. + You, my well trampled Boots, and you, my Hat, + Remain my friends: I feel, though I don't speak, + Your touch grow kindlier from week to week. + It well becomes our mutual happiness + To go toward the same end more or less. + There is not much dissimilarity, + Not much to choose, I know it well, in fine, + Between the purposes of you and me, + And your eventual Rubbish Heap, and mine. + + +STRANGE MEETINGS + + If suddenly a clod of earth should rise, + And walk about, and breathe, and speak, and love, + How one would tremble, and in what surprise + Gasp: "Can you move?" + + I see men walking, and I always feel: + "Earth! How have you done this? What can you be?" + I can't learn how to know men, or conceal + How strange they are to me. + + + + +_T. M. Kettle_ + + +Thomas M. Kettle was born at Artane County, Dublin, in 1880 and was +educated at University College, where he won the Gold Medal for +Oratory. His extraordinary faculty for grasping an intricate problem +and crystallizing it in an epigram, or scoring his adversaries with +one bright flash, was apparent even then. He was admitted to the bar +in 1905 but soon abandoned the law to devote himself to journalism, +which, because of his remarkable style, never remained journalism in +his hands. In 1906 he entered politics; in 1910 he was re-elected for +East Tyrone. Even his bitterest opponents conceded that Tom Kettle (as +he was called by friend and enemy) was the most honorable of fighters; +they acknowledged his honesty, courage and devotion to the cause of a +United Ireland--and respected his penetrating wit. He once spoke of a +Mr. Healy as "a brilliant calamity" and satirized a long-winded +speaker by saying, "Mr. Long knows a sentence should have a beginning, +but he quite forgets it should also have an end." + +"An Irish torch-bearer" (so E. B. Osborn calls him), Kettle fell in +action at Ginchy, leading his Fusiliers in September, 1916. The +uplifted poem to his daughter was written shortly before his death. + + +TO MY DAUGHTER BETTY, THE GIFT OF GOD + + In wiser days, my darling rosebud, blown + To beauty proud as was your mother's prime, + In that desired, delayed, incredible time, + You'll ask why I abandoned you, my own, + And the dear heart that was your baby throne, + To dice with death. And oh! they'll give you rhyme + And reason: some will call the thing sublime, + And some decry it in a knowing tone. + So here, while the mad guns curse overhead, + And tired men sigh with mud for couch and floor, + Know that we fools, now with the foolish dead, + Died not for flag, nor King, nor Emperor,-- + But for a dream, born in a herdsman's shed, + And for the secret Scripture of the poor. + + + + +_Alfred Noyes_ + + +Alfred Noyes was born at Staffordshire, September 16, 1880. He is one +of the few contemporary poets who have been fortunate enough to write +a kind of poetry that is not only saleable but popular with many +classes of people. + +His first book, _The Loom of Years_ (1902), was published when he was +only 22 years old, and _Poems_ (1904) intensified the promise of his +first publication. Swinburne, grown old and living in retirement, was +so struck with Noyes's talent that he had the young poet out to read +to him. Unfortunately, Noyes has not developed his gifts as deeply as +his admirers have hoped. His poetry, extremely straightforward and +rhythmical, has often degenerated into cheap sentimentalities and +cheaper tirades; it has frequently attempted to express programs and +profundities far beyond Noyes's power. + +What is most appealing about his best verse is its ease and +heartiness; this singer's gift lies in the almost personal bond +established between the poet and his public. People have such a good +time reading his vivacious lines because Noyes had such a good time +writing them. Rhyme in a thumping rhythm seems to be not merely his +trade but his morning exercise. Noyes's own relish filled and +quickened glees and catches like _Forty Singing Seamen_ (1907), the +lusty choruses in _Tales of the Mermaid Tavern_ (1913), and the +genuinely inspired nonsense of the earlier _Forest of Wild Thyme_ +(1905). + +The least popular work of Noyes is, as a unified product, his most +remarkable performance. It is an epic in twelve books of blank verse, +_Drake_ (1908), a glowing pageant of the sea and England's drama upon +it. It is a spirited echo of the maritime Elizabethans; a vivid and +orchestral work interspersed with splendid lyric passages and brisk +songs. The companion volume, an attempted reconstruction of the +literary phase of the same period, is less successful; but these +_Tales of the Mermaid Tavern_ (which introduce Shakespeare, Marlowe, +Drayton, Raleigh, Ben Jonson, and other immortals) are alive and +colorful, if somewhat too insistently rollicking and smoothly lilting. + +His eight volumes were assembled in 1913 and published in two books of +_Collected Poems_ (Frederick A. Stokes Company). + + +SHERWOOD + + Sherwood in the twilight, is Robin Hood awake? + Grey and ghostly shadows are gliding through the brake; + Shadows of the dappled deer, dreaming of the morn, + Dreaming of a shadowy man that winds a shadowy horn. + + Robin Hood is here again: all his merry thieves + Hear a ghostly bugle-note shivering through the leaves, + Calling as he used to call, faint and far away, + In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day. + + Merry, merry England has kissed the lips of June: + All the wings of fairyland were here beneath the moon; + Like a flight of rose-leaves fluttering in a mist + Of opal and ruby and pearl and amethyst. + + Merry, merry England is waking as of old, + With eyes of blither hazel and hair of brighter gold: + For Robin Hood is here again beneath the bursting spray + In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day. + + Love is in the greenwood building him a house + Of wild rose and hawthorn and honeysuckle boughs; + Love it in the greenwood: dawn is in the skies; + And Marian is waiting with a glory in her eyes. + + Hark! The dazzled laverock climbs the golden steep: + Marian is waiting: is Robin Hood asleep? + Round the fairy grass-rings frolic elf and fay, + In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day. + + Oberon, Oberon, rake away the gold, + Rake away the red leaves, roll away the mould, + Rake away the gold leaves, roll away the red, + And wake Will Scarlett from his leafy forest bed. + + Friar Tuck and Little John are riding down together + With quarter-staff and drinking-can and grey goose-feather; + The dead are coming back again; the years are rolled away + In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day. + + Softly over Sherwood the south wind blows; + All the heart of England hid in every rose + Hears across the greenwood the sunny whisper leap, + Sherwood in the red dawn, is Robin Hood asleep? + + Hark, the voice of England wakes him as of old + And, shattering the silence with a cry of brighter gold, + Bugles in the greenwood echo from the steep, + _Sherwood in the red dawn, is Robin Hood asleep?_ + + Where the deer are gliding down the shadowy glen + All across the glades of fern he calls his merry men; + Doublets of the Lincoln green glancing through the May, + In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day; + + Calls them and they answer: from aisles of oak and ash + Rings the _Follow! Follow!_ and the boughs begin to crash; + The ferns begin to flutter and the flowers begin to fly; + And through the crimson dawning the robber band goes by. + + _Robin! Robin! Robin!_ All his merry thieves + Answer as the bugle-note shivers through the leaves: + Calling as he used to call, faint and far away, + In Sherwood, in Sherwood, about the break of day. + + + THE BARREL-ORGAN + + There's a barrel-organ carolling across a golden street + In the City as the sun sinks low; + And the music's not immortal; but the world has made it sweet + And fulfilled it with the sunset glow; + And it pulses through the pleasures of the City and the pain + That surround the singing organ like a large eternal light; + And they've given it a glory and a part to play again + In the Symphony that rules the day and night. + + And now it's marching onward through the realms of old romance, + And trolling out a fond familiar tune, + And now it's roaring cannon down to fight the King of France, + And now it's prattling softly to the moon. + And all around the organ there's a sea without a shore + Of human joys and wonders and regrets; + To remember and to recompense the music evermore + For what the cold machinery forgets ... + + Yes; as the music changes, + Like a prismatic glass, + It takes the light and ranges + Through all the moods that pass; + Dissects the common carnival + Of passions and regrets, + And gives the world a glimpse of all + The colours it forgets. + + And there _La Traviata_ sighs + Another sadder song; + And there _Il Trovatore_ cries + A tale of deeper wrong; + And bolder knights to battle go + With sword and shield and lance, + Than ever here on earth below + Have whirled into--a dance!-- + + Go down to Kew in lilac-time, in lilac-time, in lilac-time; + Go down to Kew in lilac-time (it isn't far from London!) + And you shall wander hand in hand with love in summer's wonderland; + Go down to Kew in lilac-time (it isn't far from London!) + + The cherry-trees are seas of bloom and soft perfume and sweet perfume, + The cherry-trees are seas of bloom (and oh, so near to London!) + And there they say, when dawn is high and all the world's + a blaze of sky + The cuckoo, though he's very shy, will sing a song for London. + + The nightingale is rather rare and yet they say you'll hear him there + At Kew, at Kew in lilac-time (and oh, so near to London!) + The linnet and the throstle, too, and after dark the long halloo + And golden-eyed _tu-whit, tu-whoo_ of owls that ogle London. + + For Noah hardly knew a bird of any kind that isn't heard + At Kew, at Kew in lilac-time (and oh, so near to London!) + And when the rose begins to pout and all the chestnut spires are out + You'll hear the rest without a doubt, all chorusing for London:-- + + _Come down to Kew in lilac-time, in lilac-time, in lilac-time; + Come down to Kew in lilac-time (it isn't far from London!) + And you shall wander hand in hand with love in summer's wonderland; + Come down to Kew in lilac-time (is isn't far from London!)_ + + And then the troubadour begins to thrill the golden street, + In the city as the sun sinks low; + And in all the gaudy busses there are scores of weary feet + Marking time, sweet time, with a dull mechanic beat, + And a thousand hearts are plunging to a love they'll never meet, + Through the meadows of the sunset, through the poppies and the wheat, + In the land where the dead dreams go. + + Verdi, Verdi, when you wrote _Il Trovatore_ did you dream + Of the City when the sun sinks low, + Of the organ and the monkey and the many-coloured stream + On the Piccadilly pavement, of the myriad eyes that seem + To be litten for a moment with a wild Italian gleam + As _A che la morte_ parodies the world's eternal theme + And pulses with the sunset-glow? + + There's a thief, perhaps, that listens with a face of frozen stone + In the City as the sun sinks low; + There's a portly man of business with a balance of his own, + There's a clerk and there's a butcher of a soft reposeful tone, + And they're all of them returning to the heavens they have known: + They are crammed and jammed in busses and--they're each of them alone + In the land where the dead dreams go. + + There's a labourer that listens to the voices of the dead + In the City as the sun sinks low; + And his hand begins to tremble and his face is rather red + As he sees a loafer watching him and--there he turns his head + And stares into the sunset where his April love is fled, + For he hears her softly singing and his lonely soul is led + Through the land where the dead dreams go ... + + There's a barrel-organ carolling across a golden street + In the City as the sun sinks low; + Though the music's only Verdi there's a world to make it sweet + Just as yonder yellow sunset where the earth and heaven meet + Mellows all the sooty City! Hark, a hundred thousand feet + Are marching on to glory through the poppies and the wheat + In the land where the dead dreams go. + + So it's Jeremiah, Jeremiah, + What have you to say + When you meet the garland girls + Tripping on their way? + All around my gala hat + I wear a wreath of roses + (A long and lonely year it is + I've waited for the May!) + If any one should ask you, + The reason why I wear it is-- + My own love, my true love is coming home to-day. + + And it's buy a bunch of violets for the lady + (_It's lilac-time in London; it's lilac-time in London!_) + Buy a bunch of violets for the lady; + While the sky burns blue above: + + On the other side the street you'll find it shady + (_It's lilac-time in London; it's lilac-time in London!_) + But buy a bunch of violets for the lady, + And tell her she's your own true love. + + There's a barrel-organ carolling across a golden street + In the City as the sun sinks glittering and slow; + And the music's not immortal; but the world has made it sweet + And enriched it with the harmonies that make a song complete + In the deeper heavens of music where the night and morning meet, + As it dies into the sunset glow; + + And it pulses through the pleasures of the City and the pain + That surround the singing organ like a large eternal light, + And they've given it a glory and a part to play again + In the Symphony that rules the day and night. + + And there, as the music changes, + The song runs round again; + Once more it turns and ranges + Through all its joy and pain: + Dissects the common carnival + Of passions and regrets; + And the wheeling world remembers all + The wheeling song forgets. + + Once more _La Traviata_ sighs + Another sadder song: + Once more _Il Trovatore_ cries + A tale of deeper wrong; + Once more the knights to battle go + With sword and shield and lance + Till once, once more, the shattered foe + Has whirled into--a dance! + + _Come down to Kew in lilac-time, in lilac-time, in lilac-time; + Come down to Kew in lilac-time (it isn't far from London!) + And you shall wander hand in hand with Love in summer's wonderland, + Come down to Kew in lilac-time (it isn't far from London!)_ + + +EPILOGUE + +(_From "The Flower of Old Japan"_) + + Carol, every violet has + Heaven for a looking-glass! + + Every little valley lies + Under many-clouded skies; + Every little cottage stands + Girt about with boundless lands. + Every little glimmering pond + Claims the mighty shores beyond-- + Shores no seamen ever hailed, + Seas no ship has ever sailed. + + All the shores when day is done + Fade into the setting sun, + So the story tries to teach + More than can be told in speech. + + Beauty is a fading flower, + Truth is but a wizard's tower, + Where a solemn death-bell tolls, + And a forest round it rolls. + + We have come by curious ways + To the light that holds the days; + We have sought in haunts of fear + For that all-enfolding sphere: + And lo! it was not far, but near. + We have found, O foolish-fond, + The shore that has no shore beyond. + + Deep in every heart it lies + With its untranscended skies; + For what heaven should bend above + Hearts that own the heaven of love? + + Carol, Carol, we have come + Back to heaven, back to home. + + + + +_Padraic Colum_ + + +Padraic Colum was born at Longford, Ireland (in the same county as +Oliver Goldsmith), December 8, 1881, and was educated at the local +schools. At 20 he was a member of a group that created the Irish +National Theatre, afterwards called The Abbey Theatre. + +Colum began as a dramatist with _Broken Soil_ (1904), _The Land_ +(1905), _Thomas Muskerry_ (1910), and this early dramatic influence +has colored much of his work, his best poetry being in the form of +dramatic lyrics. _Wild Earth_, his most notable collection of verse, +first appeared in 1909, and an amplified edition of it was published +in America in 1916. + + +THE PLOUGHER + + Sunset and silence! A man: around him earth savage, + earth broken; + Beside him two horses--a plough! + + Earth savage, earth broken, the brutes, the dawn man + there in the sunset, + And the Plough that is twin to the Sword, that is founder + of cities! + + "Brute-tamer, plough-maker, earth-breaker! Can'st hear? + There are ages between us. + "Is it praying you are as you stand there alone in the + sunset? + + "Surely our sky-born gods can be naught to you, earth + child and earth master? + "Surely your thoughts are of Pan, or of Wotan, or Dana? + + "Yet, why give thought to the gods? Has Pan led your + brutes where they stumble? + "Has Dana numbed pain of the child-bed, or Wotan put + hands to your plough? + + "What matter your foolish reply! O, man, standing + lone and bowed earthward, + "Your task is a day near its close. Give thanks to the + night-giving God." + + * * * * * + + Slowly the darkness falls, the broken lands blend + with the savage; + The brute-tamer stands by the brutes, a head's breadth + only above them. + + A head's breadth? Ay, but therein is hell's depth, and + the height up to heaven, + And the thrones of the gods and their halls, their chariots, + purples, and splendors. + + +AN OLD WOMAN OF THE ROADS + + O, to have a little house! + To own the hearth and stool and all! + The heaped up sods upon the fire, + The pile of turf against the wall! + + To have a clock with weights and chains + And pendulum swinging up and down! + A dresser filled with shining delph, + Speckled and white and blue and brown! + + I could be busy all the day + Clearing and sweeping hearth and floor, + And fixing on their shelf again + My white and blue and speckled store! + + I could be quiet there at night + Beside the fire and by myself, + Sure of a bed and loth to leave + The ticking clock and the shining delph! + + Och! but I'm weary of mist and dark, + And roads where there's never a house nor bush, + And tired I am of bog and road, + And the crying wind and the lonesome hush! + + And I am praying to God on high, + And I am praying Him night and day, + For a little house--a house of my own-- + Out of the wind's and the rain's way. + + + + +_Joseph Campbell_ + +(_Seosamh MacCathmhaoil_) + + +Joseph Campbell was born in Belfast in 1881, and is not only a poet +but an artist; he made all the illustrations for _The Rushlight_ +(1906), a volume of his own poems. Writing under the Gaelic form of +his name, he has published half a dozen books of verse, the most +striking of which is _The Mountainy Singer_, first published in Dublin +in 1909. + + +I AM THE MOUNTAINY SINGER + + I am the mountainy singer-- + The voice of the peasant's dream, + The cry of the wind on the wooded hill, + The leap of the fish in the stream. + + Quiet and love I sing-- + The carn on the mountain crest, + The _cailin_ in her lover's arms, + The child at its mother's breast. + + Beauty and peace I sing-- + The fire on the open hearth, + The _cailleach_ spinning at her wheel, + The plough in the broken earth. + + Travail and pain I sing-- + The bride on the childing bed, + The dark man laboring at his rhymes, + The eye in the lambing shed. + + Sorrow and death I sing-- + The canker come on the corn, + The fisher lost in the mountain loch, + The cry at the mouth of morn. + + No other life I sing, + For I am sprung of the stock + That broke the hilly land for bread, + And built the nest in the rock! + + +THE OLD WOMAN + + As a white candle + In a holy place, + So is the beauty + Of an aged face. + + As the spent radiance + Of the winter sun, + So is a woman + With her travail done, + + Her brood gone from her, + And her thoughts as still + As the waters + Under a ruined mill. + + + + +_James Stephens_ + + +This unique personality was born in Dublin in February, 1882. Stephens +was discovered in an office and saved from clerical slavery by George +Russell ("A. E."). Always a poet, Stephens's most poetic moments are +in his highly-colored prose. And yet, although the finest of his +novels, _The Crock of Gold_ (1912), contains more wild phantasy and +quaint imagery than all his volumes of verse, his _Insurrections_ +(1909) and _The Hill of Vision_ (1912) reveal a rebellious spirit that +is at once hotly ironic and coolly whimsical. + +Stephens's outstanding characteristic is his delightful blend of +incongruities--he combines in his verse the grotesque, the buoyant and +the profound. No fresher or more brightly vigorous imagination has +come out of Ireland since J. M. Synge. + + +THE SHELL + + And then I pressed the shell + Close to my ear + And listened well, + And straightway like a bell + Came low and clear + The slow, sad murmur of the distant seas, + Whipped by an icy breeze + Upon a shore + Wind-swept and desolate. + It was a sunless strand that never bore + The footprint of a man, + Nor felt the weight + Since time began + Of any human quality or stir + Save what the dreary winds and waves incur. + And in the hush of waters was the sound + Of pebbles rolling round, + For ever rolling with a hollow sound. + And bubbling sea-weeds as the waters go + Swish to and fro + Their long, cold tentacles of slimy grey. + There was no day, + Nor ever came a night + Setting the stars alight + To wonder at the moon: + Was twilight only and the frightened croon, + Smitten to whimpers, of the dreary wind + And waves that journeyed blind-- + And then I loosed my ear ... O, it was sweet + To hear a cart go jolting down the street. + + + WHAT TOMAS AN BUILE SAID IN A PUB + + I saw God. Do you doubt it? + Do you dare to doubt it? + I saw the Almighty Man. His hand + Was resting on a mountain, and + He looked upon the World and all about it: + I saw him plainer than you see me now, + You mustn't doubt it. + + He was not satisfied; + His look was all dissatisfied. + His beard swung on a wind far out of sight + Behind the world's curve, and there was light + Most fearful from His forehead, and He sighed, + "That star went always wrong, and from the start + I was dissatisfied." + + He lifted up His hand-- + I say He heaved a dreadful hand + Over the spinning Earth. Then I said, "Stay, + You must not strike it, God; I'm in the way; + And I will never move from where I stand." + He said, "Dear child, I feared that you were dead," + And stayed His hand. + + +TO THE FOUR COURTS, PLEASE + + The driver rubbed at his nettly chin + With a huge, loose forefinger, crooked and black, + And his wobbly, violet lips sucked in, + And puffed out again and hung down slack: + One fang shone through his lop-sided smile, + In his little pouched eye flickered years of guile. + + And the horse, poor beast, it was ribbed and forked, + And its ears hung down, and its eyes were old, + And its knees were knuckly, and as we talked + It swung the stiff neck that could scarcely hold + Its big, skinny head up--then I stepped in, + And the driver climbed to his seat with a grin. + + God help the horse and the driver too, + And the people and beasts who have never a friend, + For the driver easily might have been you, + And the horse be me by a different end. + And nobody knows how their days will cease, + And the poor, when they're old, have little of peace. + + + + +_John Drinkwater_ + + +Primarily a poetic dramatist, John Drinkwater, born in 1882, is best +known as the author of _Abraham Lincoln--A Play_ (1919) founded on +Lord Charnwood's masterly and analytical biography. He has published +several volumes of poems, most of them meditative and elegiac in mood. + +The best of his verses have been collected in _Poems, 1908-19_, and +the two here reprinted are used by permission, and by special +arrangement with Houghton Mifflin Company, the authorized publishers. + + +RECIPROCITY + + I do not think that skies and meadows are + Moral, or that the fixture of a star + Comes of a quiet spirit, or that trees + Have wisdom in their windless silences. + Yet these are things invested in my mood + With constancy, and peace, and fortitude; + That in my troubled season I can cry + Upon the wide composure of the sky, + And envy fields, and wish that I might be + As little daunted as a star or tree. + + +A TOWN WINDOW + + Beyond my window in the night + Is but a drab inglorious street, + Yet there the frost and clean starlight + As over Warwick woods are sweet. + + Under the grey drift of the town + The crocus works among the mould + As eagerly as those that crown + The Warwick spring in flame and gold. + + And when the tramway down the hill + Across the cobbles moans and rings, + There is about my window-sill + The tumult of a thousand wings. + + + + +_James Joyce_ + + +James Joyce was born at Dublin, February 2, 1882, and educated in +Ireland. He is best known as a highly sensitive and strikingly +original writer of prose, his most celebrated works being _Dubliners_ +(1914) and the novel, _A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man_ +(1916). His one volume of verse, _Chamber Music_, was published in +this country in 1918. + + +I HEAR AN ARMY + + I hear an army charging upon the land, + And the thunder of horses plunging, foam about their knees: + Arrogant, in black armour, behind them stand, + Disdaining the reins, with fluttering whips, the charioteers. + + They cry unto the night their battle-name: + I moan in sleep when I hear afar their whirling laughter. + They cleave the gloom of dreams, a blinding flame, + Clanging, clanging upon the heart as upon an anvil. + + They come shaking in triumph their long, green hair: + They come out of the sea and run shouting by the shore. + My heart, have you no wisdom thus to despair? + My love, my love, my love, why have you left me alone? + + + + +_J. C. Squire_ + + +Jack Collings Squire was born April 2, 1884, at Plymouth, of Devonian +ancestry. He was educated at Blundell's and Cambridge University, and +became known first as a remarkably adroit parodist. His _Imaginary +Speeches_ (1912) and _Tricks of the Trade_ (1917) are amusing parodies +and, what is more, excellent criticism. He edited _The New Statesman_ +for a while and founded _The London Mercury_ (a monthly of which he is +editor) in November, 1919. Under the pseudonym "Solomon Eagle" he +wrote a page of literary criticism every week for six years, many of +these papers being collected in his volume, _Books in General_ (1919). + +His original poetry is intellectual but simple, sometimes metaphysical +and always interesting technically in its fluent and variable rhythms. +A collection of his best verse up to 1919 was published under the +title, _Poems: First Series_. + + +A HOUSE + + Now very quietly, and rather mournfully, + In clouds of hyacinth the sun retires, + And all the stubble-fields that were so warm to him + Keep but in memory their borrowed fires. + + And I, the traveller, break, still unsatisfied, + From that faint exquisite celestial strand, + And turn and see again the only dwelling-place + In this wide wilderness of darkening land. + + The house, that house, O now what change has come to it. + Its crude red-brick facade, its roof of slate; + What imperceptible swift hand has given it + A new, a wonderful, a queenly state? + + No hand has altered it, that parallelogram, + So inharmonious, so ill-arranged; + That hard blue roof in shape and colour's what it was; + No, it is not that any line has changed. + + Only that loneliness is now accentuate + And, as the dusk unveils the heaven's deep cave, + This small world's feebleness fills me with awe again, + And all man's energies seem very brave. + + And this mean edifice, which some dull architect + Built for an ignorant earth-turning hind, + Takes on the quality of that magnificent + Unshakable dauntlessness of human kind. + + Darkness and stars will come, and long the night will be, + Yet imperturbable that house will rest, + Avoiding gallantly the stars' chill scrutiny, + Ignoring secrets in the midnight's breast. + + Thunders may shudder it, and winds demoniac + May howl their menaces, and hail descend: + Yet it will bear with them, serenely, steadfastly, + Not even scornfully, and wait the end. + + And all a universe of nameless messengers + From unknown distances may whisper fear, + And it will imitate immortal permanence, + And stare and stare ahead and scarcely hear. + + It stood there yesterday; it will to-morrow, too, + When there is none to watch, no alien eyes + To watch its ugliness assume a majesty + From this great solitude of evening skies. + + So lone, so very small, with worlds and worlds around, + While life remains to it prepared to outface + Whatever awful unconjectured mysteries + May hide and wait for it in time and space. + + + + +_Lascelles Abercrombie_ + + +Lascelles Abercrombie was born in 1884. Like Masefield, he gained his +reputation rapidly; totally unknown until 1909, upon the publication +of _Interludes and Poems_, he was recognized as one of the greatest +metaphysical poets of his period. _Emblems of Love_ (1912), the ripest +collection of his blank verse dialogues, justified the enthusiasm of +his admirers. + +Many of Abercrombie's poems, the best of which are too long to quote, +are founded on scriptural themes, but his blank verse is not biblical +either in mood or manner. It is the undercurrent rather than the +surface of his verse which moves with a strong religious conviction. +Abercrombie's images are daring and brilliant; his lines, sometimes +too closely packed, glow with a dazzling intensity that is warmly +spiritual and fervently human. + + +FROM "VASHTI" + + What thing shall be held up to woman's beauty? + Where are the bounds of it? Yea, what is all + The world, but an awning scaffolded amid + The waste perilous Eternity, to lodge + This Heaven-wander'd princess, woman's beauty? + The East and West kneel down to thee, the North + And South; and all for thee their shoulders bear + The load of fourfold space. As yellow morn + Runs on the slippery waves of the spread sea, + Thy feet are on the griefs and joys of men + That sheen to be thy causey. Out of tears + Indeed, and blitheness, murder and lust and love, + Whatever has been passionate in clay, + Thy flesh was tempered. Behold in thy body + The yearnings of all men measured and told, + Insatiate endless agonies of desire + Given thy flesh, the meaning of thy shape! + What beauty is there, but thou makest it? + How is earth good to look on, woods and fields, + The season's garden, and the courageous hills, + All this green raft of earth moored in the seas? + The manner of the sun to ride the air, + The stars God has imagined for the night? + What's this behind them, that we cannot near, + Secret still on the point of being blabbed, + The ghost in the world that flies from being named? + Where do they get their beauty from, all these? + They do but glaze a lantern lit for man, + And woman's beauty is the flame therein. + + +SONG + +(_From "Judith"_) + + Balkis was in her marble town, + And shadow over the world came down. + Whiteness of walls, towers and piers, + That all day dazzled eyes to tears, + Turned from being white-golden flame, + And like the deep-sea blue became. + Balkis into her garden went; + Her spirit was in discontent + Like a torch in restless air. + Joylessly she wandered there, + And saw her city's azure white + Lying under the great night, + Beautiful as the memory + Of a worshipping world would be + In the mind of a god, in the hour + When he must kill his outward power; + And, coming to a pool where trees + Grew in double greeneries, + Saw herself, as she went by + The water, walking beautifully, + And saw the stars shine in the glance + Of her eyes, and her own fair countenance + Passing, pale and wonderful, + Across the night that filled the pool. + And cruel was the grief that played + With the queen's spirit; and she said: + "What do I here, reigning alone? + For to be unloved is to be alone. + There is no man in all my land + Dare my longing understand; + The whole folk like a peasant bows + Lest its look should meet my brows + And be harmed by this beauty of mine. + I burn their brains as I were sign + Of God's beautiful anger sent + To master them with punishment + Of beauty that must pour distress + On hearts grown dark with ugliness. + But it is I am the punisht one. + Is there no man, is there none, + In whom my beauty will but move + The lust of a delighted love; + In whom some spirit of God so thrives + That we may wed our lonely lives. + Is there no man, is there none?"-- + She said, "I will go to Solomon." + + + + +_James Elroy Flecker_ + + +Another remarkable poet whose early death was a blow to English +literature, James Elroy Flecker, was born in London, November 5, 1884. +Possibly due to his low vitality, Flecker found little to interest him +but a classical reaction against realism in verse, a delight in verbal +craftsmanship, and a passion for technical perfection--especially the +deliberate technique of the French Parnassians whom he worshipped. +Flecker was opposed to any art that was emotional or that "taught" +anything. "The poet's business," he declared, "is not to save the soul +of man, but to make it worth saving." + +The advent of the war began to make Flecker's verse more personal and +romantic. The tuberculosis that finally killed him at Davos Platz, +Switzerland, January 3, 1915, forced him from an Olympian disinterest +to a deep concern with life and death. He passionately denied that he +was weary of living "as the pallid poets are," and he was attempting +higher flights of song when his singing ceased altogether. + +His two colorful volumes are _The Golden Journey to Samarkand_ (1913) +and _The Old Ships_ (1915). + + +THE OLD SHIPS + + I have seen old ships sail like swans asleep + Beyond the village which men still call Tyre, + With leaden age o'ercargoed, dipping deep + For Famagusta and the hidden sun + That rings black Cyprus with a lake of fire; + And all those ships were certainly so old-- + Who knows how oft with squat and noisy gun, + Questing brown slaves or Syrian oranges, + The pirate Genoese + Hell-raked them till they rolled + Blood, water, fruit and corpses up the hold. + But now through friendly seas they softly run, + Painted the mid-sea blue or shore-sea green, + Still patterned with the vine and grapes in gold. + + But I have seen, + Pointing her shapely shadows from the dawn + And image tumbled on a rose-swept bay, + A drowsy ship of some yet older day; + And, wonder's breath indrawn, + Thought I--who knows--who knows--but in that same + (Fished up beyond Aeaea, patched up new + --Stern painted brighter blue--) + That talkative, bald-headed seaman came + (Twelve patient comrades sweating at the oar) + From Troy's doom-crimson shore, + And with great lies about his wooden horse + Set the crew laughing, and forgot his course. + + It was so old a ship--who knows, who knows? + --And yet so beautiful, I watched in vain + To see the mast burst open with a rose, + And the whole deck put on its leaves again. + + + + +_D. H. Lawrence_ + + +David Herbert Lawrence, born in 1885, is one of the most +psychologically intense of the modern poets. This intensity, ranging +from a febrile morbidity to an exalted and almost frenzied mysticism, +is seen even in his prose works--particularly in his short stories, +_The Prussian Officer_ (1917), his analytical _Sons and Lovers_ +(1913), and the rhapsodic novel, _The Rainbow_ (1915). + +As a poet he is often caught in the net of his own emotions; his +passion thickens his utterance and distorts his rhythms, which +sometimes seem purposely harsh and bitter-flavored. But within his +range he is as powerful as he is poignant. His most notable volumes of +poetry are _Amores_ (1916), _Look! We Have Come Through!_ (1918), and +_New Poems_ (1920). + + +PEOPLE + + The great gold apples of light + Hang from the street's long bough + Dripping their light + On the faces that drift below, + On the faces that drift and blow + Down the night-time, out of sight + In the wind's sad sough. + + The ripeness of these apples of night + Distilling over me + Makes sickening the white + Ghost-flux of faces that hie + Them endlessly, endlessly by + Without meaning or reason why + They ever should be. + + +PIANO + + Softly, in the dusk, a woman is singing to me; + Taking me back down the vista of years, till I see + A child sitting under the piano, in the boom of the + tingling strings + And pressing the small, poised feet of a mother who + smiles as she sings. + + In spite of myself, the insidious mastery of song + Betrays me back, till the heart of me weeps to belong + To the old Sunday evenings at home, with winter outside + And hymns in the cosy parlour, the tinkling piano our guide. + + So now it is vain for the singer to burst into clamour + With the great black piano appassionato. The glamour + Of childish days is upon me, my manhood is cast + Down in the flood of remembrance, I weep like a child for the past. + + + + +_John Freeman_ + + +John Freeman, born in 1885, has published several volumes of +pleasantly descriptive verse. The two most distinctive are _Stone +Trees_ (1916) and _Memories of Childhood_ (1919). + + +STONE TREES + + Last night a sword-light in the sky + Flashed a swift terror on the dark. + In that sharp light the fields did lie + Naked and stone-like; each tree stood + Like a tranced woman, bound and stark. + Far off the wood + With darkness ridged the riven dark. + + And cows astonished stared with fear, + And sheep crept to the knees of cows, + And conies to their burrows slid, + And rooks were still in rigid boughs, + And all things else were still or hid. + From all the wood + Came but the owl's hoot, ghostly, clear. + + In that cold trance the earth was held + It seemed an age, or time was nought. + Sure never from that stone-like field + Sprang golden corn, nor from those chill + Grey granite trees was music wrought. + In all the wood + Even the tall poplar hung stone still. + + It seemed an age, or time was none ... + Slowly the earth heaved out of sleep + And shivered, and the trees of stone + Bent and sighed in the gusty wind, + And rain swept as birds flocking sweep. + Far off the wood + Rolled the slow thunders on the wind. + + From all the wood came no brave bird, + No song broke through the close-fall'n night, + Nor any sound from cowering herd: + Only a dog's long lonely howl + When from the window poured pale light. + And from the wood + The hoot came ghostly of the owl. + + + + +_Shane Leslie_ + + +Shane Leslie, the only surviving son of Sir John Leslie, was born at +Swan Park, Monaghan, Ireland, in 1886 and was educated at Eton and the +University of Paris. He worked for a time among the Irish poor and was +deeply interested in the Celtic revival. During the greater part of a +year he lectured in the United States, marrying an American, Marjorie +Ide. + +Leslie has been editor of _The Dublin Review_ since 1916. He is the +author of several volumes on Irish political matters as well as _The +End of a Chapter_ and _Verses in Peace and War_. + + +FLEET STREET + + I never see the newsboys run + Amid the whirling street, + With swift untiring feet, + To cry the latest venture done, + But I expect one day to hear + Them cry the crack of doom + And risings from the tomb, + With great Archangel Michael near; + And see them running from the Fleet + As messengers of God, + With Heaven's tidings shod + About their brave unwearied feet. + + +THE PATER OF THE CANNON + + Father of the thunder, + Flinger of the flame, + Searing stars asunder, + _Hallowed be Thy Name!_ + + By the sweet-sung quiring + Sister bullets hum, + By our fiercest firing, + _May Thy Kingdom come!_ + + By Thy strong apostle + Of the Maxim gun, + By his pentecostal + Flame, _Thy Will be done!_ + + Give us, Lord, good feeding + To Thy battles sped-- + Flesh, white grained and bleeding, + _Give for daily bread!_ + + + + +_Frances Cornford_ + + +The daughter of Francis Darwin, third son of Charles Darwin, Mrs. +Frances Macdonald Cornford, whose husband is a Fellow and Lecturer of +Trinity College, was born in 1886. She has published three volumes of +unaffected lyrical verse, the most recent of which, _Spring Morning_, +was brought out by The Poetry Bookshop in 1915. + + +PREEXISTENCE + + I laid me down upon the shore + And dreamed a little space; + I heard the great waves break and roar; + The sun was on my face. + + My idle hands and fingers brown + Played with the pebbles grey; + The waves came up, the waves went down, + Most thundering and gay. + + The pebbles, they were smooth and round + And warm upon my hands, + Like little people I had found + Sitting among the sands. + + The grains of sand so shining-small + Soft through my fingers ran; + The sun shone down upon it all, + And so my dream began: + + How all of this had been before, + How ages far away + I lay on some forgotten shore + As here I lie to-day. + + The waves came shining up the sands, + As here to-day they shine; + And in my pre-pelasgian hands + The sand was warm and fine. + + I have forgotten whence I came, + Or what my home might be, + Or by what strange and savage name + I called that thundering sea. + + I only know the sun shone down + As still it shines to-day, + And in my fingers long and brown + The little pebbles lay. + + + + +_Anna Wickham_ + + +Anna Wickham, one of the most individual of the younger women-poets, +has published two distinctive volumes, _The Contemplative Quarry_ +(1915) and _The Man with a Hammer_ (1916). + + +THE SINGER + + If I had peace to sit and sing, + Then I could make a lovely thing; + But I am stung with goads and whips, + So I build songs like iron ships. + + Let it be something for my song, + If it is sometimes swift and strong. + + +REALITY + + Only a starveling singer seeks + The stuff of songs among the Greeks. + Juno is old, + Jove's loves are cold; + Tales over-told. + By a new risen Attic stream + A mortal singer dreamed a dream. + Fixed he not Fancy's habitation, + Nor set in bonds Imagination. + There are new waters, and a new Humanity. + For all old myths give us the dream to be. + We are outwearied with Persephone; + Rather than her, we'll sing Reality. + + +SONG + + I was so chill, and overworn, and sad, + To be a lady was the only joy I had. + I walked the street as silent as a mouse, + Buying fine clothes, and fittings for the house. + + But since I saw my love + I wear a simple dress, + And happily I move + Forgetting weariness. + + + + +_Siegfried Sassoon_ + + +Siegfried Loraine Sassoon, the poet whom Masefield hailed as "one of +England's most brilliant rising stars," was born September 8, 1886. He +was educated at Marlborough and Clare College, Cambridge, and was a +captain in the Royal Welsh Fusiliers. He fought three times in France, +once in Palestine, winning the Military Cross for bringing in wounded +on the battlefield. + +His poetry divides itself sharply in two moods--the lyric and the +ironic. His early lilting poems were without significance or +individuality. But with _The Old Huntsman_ (1917) Sassoon found his +own idiom, and became one of the leading younger poets upon the +appearance of this striking volume. The first poem, a long monologue +evidently inspired by Masefield, gave little evidence of what was to +come. Immediately following it, however, came a series of war poems, +undisguised in their tragedy and bitterness. Every line of these +quivering stanzas bore the mark of a sensitive and outraged nature; +there was scarcely a phrase that did not protest against the +"glorification" and false glamour of war. + +_Counter-Attack_ appeared in 1918. In this volume Sassoon turned +entirely from an ordered loveliness to the gigantic brutality of war. +At heart a lyric idealist, the bloody years intensified and twisted +his tenderness till what was stubborn and satiric in him forced its +way to the top. In _Counter-Attack_ Sassoon found his angry outlet. +Most of these poems are choked with passion; many of them are torn +out, roots and all, from the very core of an intense conviction; they +rush on, not so much because of the poet's art but almost in spite of +it. A suave utterance, a neatly-joined structure would be out of place +and even inexcusable in poems like "The Rear-Guard," "To Any Dead +Officer," "Does It Matter?"--verses that are composed of love, fever +and indignation. + +Can Sassoon see nothing glorious or uplifting in war? His friend, +Robert Nichols, another poet and soldier, speaks for him in a preface. +"Let no one ever," Nichols quotes Sassoon as saying, "from henceforth +say one word in any way countenancing war. It is dangerous even to +speak of how here and there the individual may gain some hardship of +soul by it. For war is hell, and those who institute it are criminals. +Were there even anything to say for it, it should not be said; for its +spiritual disasters far outweigh any of its advantages...." Nichols +adds his approval to these sentences, saying, "For myself, this is the +truth. War does not ennoble, it degrades." + +Early in 1920 Sassoon visited America. At the same time he brought out +his _Picture Show_ (1920), a vigorous answer to those who feared that +Sassoon had "written himself out" or had begun to burn away in his own +fire. Had Rupert Brooke lived, he might have written many of these +lacerated but somehow exalted lines. Sassoon's three volumes are the +most vital and unsparing records of the war we have had. They +synthesize in poetry what Barbusse's _Under Fire_ spreads out in +panoramic prose. + + +TO VICTORY + + Return to greet me, colours that were my joy, + Not in the woeful crimson of men slain, + But shining as a garden; come with the streaming + Banners of dawn and sundown after rain. + + I want to fill my gaze with blue and silver, + Radiance through living roses, spires of green, + Rising in young-limbed copse and lovely wood, + Where the hueless wind passes and cries unseen. + + I am not sad; only I long for lustre,-- + Tired of the greys and browns and leafless ash. + I would have hours that move like a glitter of dancers, + Far from the angry guns that boom and flash. + + Return, musical, gay with blossom and fleetness, + Days when my sight shall be clear and my heart rejoice; + Come from the sea with breadth of approaching brightness, + When the blithe wind laughs on the hills with uplifted voice. + + +DREAMERS + + Soldiers are citizens of death's gray land, + Drawing no dividend from time's to-morrows. + In the great hour of destiny they stand, + Each with his feuds, and jealousies, and sorrows. + Soldiers are sworn to action; they must win + Some flaming, fatal climax with their lives. + Soldiers are dreamers; when the guns begin + They think of firelit homes, clean beds, and wives. + + I see them in foul dug-outs, gnawed by rats, + And in the ruined trenches, lashed with rain, + Dreaming of things they did with balls and bats, + And mocked by hopeless longing to regain + Bank-holidays, and picture shows, and spats, + And going to the office in the train. + + +THE REAR-GUARD + + Groping along the tunnel, step by step, + He winked his prying torch with patching glare + From side to side, and sniffed the unwholesome air. + + Tins, boxes, bottles, shapes too vague to know, + A mirror smashed, the mattress from a bed; + And he, exploring fifty feet below + The rosy gloom of battle overhead. + + Tripping, he grabbed the wall; saw someone lie + Humped at his feet, half-hidden by a rug, + And stooped to give the sleeper's arm a tug. + "I'm looking for headquarters." No reply. + "God blast your neck!" (For days he'd had no sleep.) + "Get up and guide me through this stinking place." + Savage, he kicked a soft, unanswering heap, + And flashed his beam across the livid face + Terribly glaring up, whose eyes yet wore + Agony dying hard ten days before; + And fists of fingers clutched a blackening wound. + Alone he staggered on until he found + Dawn's ghost that filtered down a shafted stair + To the dazed, muttering creatures underground + Who hear the boom of shells in muffled sound. + At last, with sweat of horror in his hair, + He climbed through darkness to the twilight air, + Unloading hell behind him step by step. + + +THRUSHES + + Tossed on the glittering air they soar and skim, + Whose voices make the emptiness of light + A windy palace. Quavering from the brim + Of dawn, and bold with song at edge of night, + They clutch their leafy pinnacles and sing + Scornful of man, and from his toils aloof + Whose heart's a haunted woodland whispering; + Whose thoughts return on tempest-baffled wing; + Who hears the cry of God in everything, + And storms the gate of nothingness for proof. + + +AFTERMATH + + _Have you forgotten yet?..._ + For the world's events have rumbled on since those gagged days, + Like traffic checked a while at the crossing of city ways: + And the haunted gap in your mind has filled with thoughts that flow + Like clouds in the lit heavens of life; and you're a man + reprieved to go, + Taking your peaceful share of Time, with joy to spare. + _But the past is just the same,--and War's a bloody game.... + Have you forgotten yet?... + Look down, and swear by the slain of the War that you'll never forget._ + + Do you remember the dark months you held the sector at Mametz,-- + The nights you watched and wired and dug and piled + sandbags on parapets? + Do you remember the rats; and the stench + Of corpses rotting in front of the front-line trench,-- + And dawn coming, dirty-white, and chill with a hopeless rain? + Do you ever stop and ask, "Is it all going to happen again?" + + Do you remember that hour of din before the attack,-- + And the anger, the blind compassion that seized and shook you then + As you peered at the doomed and haggard faces of your men? + Do you remember the stretcher-cases lurching back + With dying eyes and lolling heads, those ashen-grey + Masks of the lads who once were keen and kind and gay? + + _Have you forgotten yet?... + Look up, and swear by the green of the Spring that you'll + never forget._ + + + + +_Rupert Brooke_ + + +Possibly the most famous of the Georgians, Rupert Brooke, was born at +Rugby in August, 1887, his father being assistant master at the +school. As a youth, Brooke was keenly interested in all forms of +athletics; playing cricket, football, tennis, and swimming as well as +most professionals. He was six feet tall, his finely molded head +topped with a crown of loose hair of lively brown; "a golden young +Apollo," said Edward Thomas. Another friend of his wrote, "to look at, +he was part of the youth of the world. He was one of the handsomest +Englishmen of his time." His beauty overstressed somewhat his +naturally romantic disposition; his early poems are a blend of +delight in the splendor of actuality and disillusion in a loveliness +that dies. The shadow of John Donne lies over his pages. + +This occasional cynicism was purged, when after several years of +travel (he had been to Germany, Italy and Honolulu) the war came, +turning Brooke away from + + "A world grown old and cold and weary ... + And half men, and their dirty songs and dreary, + And all the little emptiness of love." + +Brooke enlisted with a relief that was like a rebirth; he sought a new +energy in the struggle "where the worst friend and enemy is but +Death." After seeing service in Belgium, 1914, he spent the following +winter in a training-camp in Dorsetshire and sailed with the British +Mediterranean Expeditionary Force in February, 1915, to take part in +the unfortunate Dardenelles Campaign. + +Brooke never reached his destination. He died of blood-poison at +Skyros, April 23, 1915. His early death was one of England's great +literary losses; Lascelles Abercrombie, W. W. Gibson (with both of +whom he had been associated on the quarterly, _New Numbers_), Walter +De la Mare, the Hon. Winston Spencer Churchill, and a host of others +united to pay tribute to the most brilliant and passionate of the +younger poets. + +Brooke's sonnet-sequence, _1914_ (from which "The Soldier" is taken), +which, with prophetic irony, appeared a few weeks before his death, +contains the accents of immortality. And "The Old Vicarage, +Grantchester" (unfortunately too long to reprint in this volume), is +fully as characteristic of the lighter and more playful side of +Brooke's temperament. Both these phases are combined in "The Great +Lover," of which Abercrombie has written, "It is life he loves, and +not in any abstract sense, but all the infinite little familiar +details of life, remembered and catalogued with delightful zest." + + +THE GREAT LOVER[19] + + I have been so great a lover: filled my days + So proudly with the splendour of Love's praise, + The pain, the calm, and the astonishment, + Desire illimitable, and still content, + And all dear names men use, to cheat despair, + For the perplexed and viewless streams that bear + Our hearts at random down the dark of life. + Now, ere the unthinking silence on that strife + Steals down, I would cheat drowsy Death so far, + My night shall be remembered for a star + That outshone all the suns of all men's days. + Shall I not crown them with immortal praise + Whom I have loved, who have given me, dared with me + High secrets, and in darkness knelt to see + The inenarrable godhead of delight? + Love is a flame;--we have beaconed the world's night. + A city:--and we have built it, these and I. + An emperor:--we have taught the world to die. + So, for their sakes I loved, ere I go hence, + And the high cause of Love's magnificence, + And to keep loyalties young, I'll write those names + Golden for ever, eagles, crying flames, + And set them as a banner, that men may know, + To dare the generations, burn, and blow + Out on; the wind of Time, shining and streaming.... + These I have loved: + White plates and cups, clean-gleaming, + Ringed with blue lines; and feathery, faery dust; + Wet roofs, beneath the lamp-light; the strong crust + Of friendly bread; and many-tasting food; + Rainbows; and the blue bitter smoke of wood; + And radiant raindrops couching in cool flowers; + And flowers themselves, that sway through sunny hours, + Dreaming of moths that drink them under the moon; + Then, the cool kindliness of sheets, that soon + Smooth away trouble; and the rough male kiss + Of blankets; grainy wood; live hair that is + Shining and free; blue-massing clouds; the keen + Unpassioned beauty of a great machine; + The benison of hot water; furs to touch; + The good smell of old clothes; and other such-- + The comfortable smell of friendly fingers, + Hair's fragrance, and the musty reek that lingers + About dead leaves and last year's ferns.... + Dear names, + And thousand others throng to me! Royal flames; + Sweet water's dimpling laugh from tap or spring; + Holes in the ground; and voices that do sing: + Voices in laughter, too; and body's pain, + Soon turned to peace; and the deep-panting train; + Firm sands; the little dulling edge of foam + That browns and dwindles as the wave goes home; + And washen stones, gay for an hour; the cold + Graveness of iron; moist black earthen mould; + Sleep; and high places; footprints in the dew; + And oaks; and brown horse-chestnuts, glossy-new; + And new-peeled sticks; and shining pools on grass;-- + All these have been my loves. And these shall pass. + Whatever passes not, in the great hour, + Nor all my passion, all my prayers, have power + To hold them with me through the gate of Death. + They'll play deserter, turn with the traitor breath, + Break the high bond we made, and sell Love's trust + And sacramented covenant to the dust. + --Oh, never a doubt but, somewhere, I shall wake, + And give what's left of love again, and make + New friends, now strangers.... + But the best I've known, + Stays here, and changes, breaks, grows old, is blown + About the winds of the world, and fades from brains + Of living men, and dies. + Nothing remains. + + O dear my loves, O faithless, once again + This one last gift I give: that after men + Shall know, and later lovers, far-removed + Praise you, "All these were lovely"; say, "He loved." + + +DUST[20] + + When the white flame in us is gone, + And we that lost the world's delight + Stiffen in darkness, left alone + To crumble in our separate night; + + When your swift hair is quiet in death, + And through the lips corruption thrust + Has stilled the labour of my breath-- + When we are dust, when we are dust!-- + + Not dead, not undesirous yet, + Still sentient, still unsatisfied, + We'll ride the air, and shine and flit, + Around the places where we died, + + And dance as dust before the sun, + And light of foot, and unconfined, + Hurry from road to road, and run + About the errands of the wind. + + And every mote, on earth or air, + Will speed and gleam, down later days, + And like a secret pilgrim fare + By eager and invisible ways, + + Nor ever rest, nor ever lie, + Till, beyond thinking, out of view, + One mote of all the dust that's I + Shall meet one atom that was you. + + Then in some garden hushed from wind, + Warm in a sunset's afterglow, + The lovers in the flowers will find + A sweet and strange unquiet grow + + Upon the peace; and, past desiring, + So high a beauty in the air, + And such a light, and such a quiring, + And such a radiant ecstasy there, + + They'll know not if it's fire, or dew, + Or out of earth, or in the height, + Singing, or flame, or scent, or hue, + Or two that pass, in light, to light, + + Out of the garden higher, higher ... + But in that instant they shall learn + The shattering fury of our fire, + And the weak passionless hearts will burn + + And faint in that amazing glow, + Until the darkness close above; + And they will know--poor fools, they'll know!-- + One moment, what it is to love. + + +THE SOLDIER[21] + + If I should die, think only this of me; + That there's some corner of a foreign field + That is for ever England. There shall be + In that rich earth a richer dust concealed; + A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware, + Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam, + A body of England's breathing English air, + Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home. + + And think, this heart, all evil shed away, + A pulse in the eternal mind, no less + Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given; + Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day; + And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness, + In hearts at peace, under an English heaven. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[19] From _The Collected Poems of Rupert Brooke_. Copyright, 1915, by +John Lane Company and reprinted by permission. + +[20] From _The Collected Poems of Rupert Brooke_. Copyright, 1915, by +John Lane Company and reprinted by permission. + +[21] From _The Collected Poems of Rupert Brooke_. Copyright, 1915, by +John Lane Company and reprinted by permission. + + + + +_Winifred M. Letts_ + + +Winifred M. Letts was born in Ireland in 1887, and her early work +concerned itself almost entirely with the humor and pathos found in +her immediate surroundings. Her _Songs from Leinster_ (1913) is her +most characteristic collection; a volume full of the poetry of simple +people and humble souls. Although she has called herself "a back-door +sort of bard," she is particularly effective in the old ballad measure +and in her quaint portrayal of Irish peasants rather than of Gaelic +kings and pagan heroes. She has also written three novels, five books +for children, a later volume of _Poems of the War_ and, during the +conflict, served as a nurse at various base hospitals. + + +GRANDEUR + + Poor Mary Byrne is dead, + An' all the world may see + Where she lies upon her bed + Just as fine as quality. + + She lies there still and white, + With candles either hand + That'll guard her through the night: + Sure she never was so grand. + + She holds her rosary, + Her hands clasped on her breast. + Just as dacint as can be + In the habit she's been dressed. + + In life her hands were red + With every sort of toil, + But they're white now she is dead, + An' they've sorra mark of soil. + + The neighbours come and go, + They kneel to say a prayer, + I wish herself could know + Of the way she's lyin' there. + + It was work from morn till night, + And hard she earned her bread: + But I'm thinking she's a right + To be aisy now she's dead. + + When other girls were gay, + At wedding or at fair, + She'd be toiling all the day, + Not a minyit could she spare. + + An' no one missed her face, + Or sought her in a crowd, + But to-day they throng the place + Just to see her in her shroud. + + The creature in her life + Drew trouble with each breath; + She was just "poor Jim Byrne's wife"-- + But she's lovely in her death. + + I wish the dead could see + The splendour of a wake, + For it's proud herself would be + Of the keening that they make. + + Och! little Mary Byrne, + You welcome every guest, + Is it now you take your turn + To be merry with the rest? + + I'm thinking you'd be glad, + Though the angels make your bed, + Could you see the care we've had + To respect you--now you're dead. + + +THE SPIRES OF OXFORD + + I saw the spires of Oxford + As I was passing by, + The grey spires of Oxford + Against the pearl-grey sky. + My heart was with the Oxford men + Who went abroad to die. + + The years go fast in Oxford, + The golden years and gay, + The hoary Colleges look down + On careless boys at play. + But when the bugles sounded war + They put their games away. + + They left the peaceful river, + The cricket-field, the quad, + The shaven lawns of Oxford, + To seek a bloody sod-- + They gave their merry youth away + For country and for God. + + God rest you, happy gentlemen, + Who laid your good lives down, + Who took the khaki and the gun + Instead of cap and gown. + God bring you to a fairer place + Than even Oxford town. + + + + +_Francis Brett Young_ + + +Francis Brett Young, who is a novelist as well as a poet, and who has +been called, by _The Manchester Guardian_, "one of the promising +evangelists of contemporary poetry," has written much that is both +graceful and grave. There is music and a message in his lines that +seem to have as their motto: "Trust in the true and fiery spirit of +Man." Best known as a writer of prose, his most prominent works are +_Marching on Tanga_ and _The Crescent Moon_. + +Brett Young's _Five Degrees South_ (1917) and his _Poems 1916-18_ +(1919) contain the best of his verse. + + +LOCHANILAUN + + This is the image of my last content: + My soul shall be a little lonely lake, + So hidden that no shadow of man may break + The folding of its mountain battlement; + Only the beautiful and innocent + Whiteness of sea-born cloud drooping to shake + Cool rain upon the reed-beds, or the wake + Of churned cloud in a howling wind's descent. + For there shall be no terror in the night + When stars that I have loved are born in me, + And cloudy darkness I will hold most fair; + But this shall be the end of my delight:-- + That you, my lovely one, may stoop and see + Your image in the mirrored beauty there. + + + + +_F. S. Flint_ + + +Known chiefly as an authority on modern French poetry, F. S. Flint has +published several volumes of original imagist poems, besides having +translated works of Verhaeren and Jean de Bosschere. + + +LONDON + + London, my beautiful, + it is not the sunset + nor the pale green sky + shimmering through the curtain + of the silver birch, + nor the quietness; + it is not the hopping + of birds + upon the lawn, + nor the darkness + stealing over all things + that moves me. + + But as the moon creeps slowly + over the tree-tops + among the stars, + I think of her + and the glow her passing + sheds on men. + + London, my beautiful, + I will climb + into the branches + to the moonlit tree-tops, + that my blood may be cooled + by the wind. + + + + +_Edith Sitwell_ + + +Edith Sitwell was born at Scarborough, in Yorkshire, and is the sister +of the poets, Osbert and Sacheverell Sitwell. In 1914 she came to +London and has devoted herself to literature ever since, having edited +the various anthologies of _Wheels_ since 1916. Her first book, _The +Mother and Other Poems_ (1915), contains some of her best work, +although _Clowns' Houses_ (1918) reveals a more piquant idiom and a +sharper turn of mind. + + +THE WEB OF EROS + + Within your magic web of hair, lies furled + The fire and splendour of the ancient world; + The dire gold of the comet's wind-blown hair; + The songs that turned to gold the evening air + When all the stars of heaven sang for joy. + The flames that burnt the cloud-high city Troy. + The maenad fire of spring on the cold earth; + The myrrh-lit flame that gave both death and birth + To the soul Phoenix; and the star-bright shower + That came to Danae in her brazen tower.... + Within your magic web of hair lies furled + The fire and splendour of the ancient world. + + +INTERLUDE + + Amid this hot green glowing gloom + A word falls with a raindrop's boom.... + + Like baskets of ripe fruit in air + The bird-songs seem, suspended where + + Those goldfinches--the ripe warm lights + Peck slyly at them--take quick flights. + + My feet are feathered like a bird + Among the shadows scarcely heard; + + I bring you branches green with dew + And fruits that you may crown anew + + Your whirring waspish-gilded hair + Amid this cornucopia-- + + Until your warm lips bear the stains + And bird-blood leap within your veins. + + + + +_F. W. Harvey_ + + +Harvey was a lance-corporal in the English army and was in the German +prison camp at Guetersloh when he wrote _The Bugler_, one of the +isolated great poems written during the war. Much of his other verse +is haphazard and journalistic, although _Gloucestershire Friends_ +contains several lines that glow with the colors of poetry. + + +THE BUGLER + + God dreamed a man; + Then, having firmly shut + Life like a precious metal in his fist + Withdrew, His labour done. Thus did begin + Our various divinity and sin. + For some to ploughshares did the metal twist, + And others--dreaming empires--straightway cut + Crowns for their aching foreheads. Others beat + Long nails and heavy hammers for the feet + Of their forgotten Lord. (Who dares to boast + That he is guiltless?) Others coined it: most + Did with it--simply nothing. (Here again + Who cries his innocence?) Yet doth remain + Metal unmarred, to each man more or less, + Whereof to fashion perfect loveliness. + + For me, I do but bear within my hand + (For sake of Him our Lord, now long forsaken) + A simple bugle such as may awaken + With one high morning note a drowsing man: + That wheresoe'er within my motherland + That sound may come, 'twill echo far and wide + Like pipes of battle calling up a clan, + Trumpeting men through beauty to God's side. + + + + +_T. P. Cameron Wilson_ + + +"Tony" P. Cameron Wilson was born in South Devon in 1889 and was +educated at Exeter and Oxford. He wrote one novel besides several +articles under the pseudonym _Tipuca_, a euphonic combination of the +first three initials of his name. + +When the war broke out he was a teacher in a school at Hindhead, +Surrey; and, after many months of gruelling conflict, he was given a +captaincy. He was killed in action by a machine-gun bullet March 23, +1918, at the age of 29. + + +SPORTSMEN IN PARADISE + + They left the fury of the fight, + And they were very tired. + The gates of Heaven were open quite, + Unguarded and unwired. + There was no sound of any gun, + The land was still and green; + Wide hills lay silent in the sun, + Blue valleys slept between. + + They saw far-off a little wood + Stand up against the sky. + Knee-deep in grass a great tree stood; + Some lazy cows went by ... + There were some rooks sailed overhead, + And once a church-bell pealed. + "_God! but it's England_," someone said, + "_And there's a cricket-field!_" + + + + +_W. J. Turner_ + + +W. J. Turner was born in 1889 and, although little known until his +appearance in _Georgian Poetry 1916-17_, has written no few delicate +and fanciful poems. _The Hunter_ (1916) and _The Dark Wind_ (1918) +both contain many verses as moving and musical as his splendid lines +on "Death," a poem which is unfortunately too long to quote. + + +ROMANCE + + When I was but thirteen or so + I went into a golden land, + Chimborazo, Cotopaxi + Took me by the hand. + + My father died, my brother too, + They passed like fleeting dreams, + I stood where Popocatapetl + In the sunlight gleams. + + I dimly heard the master's voice + And boys far-off at play,-- + Chimborazo, Cotopaxi + Had stolen me away. + + I walked in a great golden dream + To and fro from school-- + Shining Popocatapetl + The dusty streets did rule. + + I walked home with a gold dark boy + And never a word I'd say, + Chimborazo, Cotopaxi + Had taken my speech away. + + I gazed entranced upon his face + Fairer than any flower-- + O shining Popocatapetl + It was thy magic hour: + + The houses, people, traffic seemed + Thin fading dreams by day; + Chimborazo, Cotopaxi, + They had stolen my soul away! + + + + +_Patrick MacGill_ + + +Patrick MacGill was born in Donegal in 1890. He was the son of +poverty-stricken peasants and, between the ages of 12 and 19, he +worked as farm-servant, drainer, potato-digger, and navvy, becoming +one of the thousands of stray "tramp-laborers" who cross each summer +from Ireland to Scotland to help gather in the crops. Out of his +bitter experiences and the evils of modern industrial life, he wrote +several vivid novels (_The Rat Pit_ is an unforgettable document) and +the tragedy-crammed _Songs of the Dead End_. He joined the editorial +staff of _The Daily Express_ in 1911; was in the British army during +the war; was wounded at Loos in 1915; and wrote his _Soldier Songs_ +during the conflict. + + +BY-THE-WAY + + These be the little verses, rough and uncultured, which + I've written in hut and model, deep in the dirty ditch, + On the upturned hod by the palace made for the idle rich. + + Out on the happy highway, or lines where the engines go, + Which fact you may hardly credit, still for your doubts 'tis so, + For I am the person who wrote them, and surely to God, I know! + + Wrote them beside the hot-plate, or under the chilling skies, + Some of them true as death is, some of them merely lies, + Some of them very foolish, some of them otherwise. + + Little sorrows and hopings, little and rugged rhymes, + Some of them maybe distasteful to the moral men of our times, + Some of them marked against me in the Book of the Many Crimes. + + These, the Songs of a Navvy, bearing the taint of the brute, + Unasked, uncouth, unworthy out to the world I put, + Stamped with the brand of labor, the heel of a navvy's boot. + + +DEATH AND THE FAIRIES + + Before I joined the Army + I lived in Donegal, + Where every night the Fairies + Would hold their carnival. + + But now I'm out in Flanders, + Where men like wheat-ears fall, + And it's Death and not the Fairies + Who is holding carnival. + + + + +_Francis Ledwidge_ + + +Francis Ledwidge was born in Slane, County Meath, Ireland, in 1891. +His brief life was fitful and romantic. He was, at various times, a +miner, a grocer's clerk, a farmer, a scavenger, an experimenter in +hypnotism, and, at the end, a soldier. He served as a lance-corporal +on the Flanders front and was killed in July, 1917, at the age of 26 +years. + +Ledwidge's poetry is rich in nature imagery; his lines are full of +color, in the manner of Keats, and unaffectedly melodious. + + +AN EVENING IN ENGLAND + + From its blue vase the rose of evening drops; + Upon the streams its petals float away. + The hills all blue with distance hide their tops + In the dim silence falling on the grey. + A little wind said "Hush!" and shook a spray + Heavy with May's white crop of opening bloom; + A silent bat went dipping in the gloom. + + Night tells her rosary of stars full soon, + They drop from out her dark hand to her knees. + Upon a silhouette of woods, the moon + Leans on one horn as if beseeching ease + From all her changes which have stirred the seas. + Across the ears of Toil, Rest throws her veil. + I and a marsh bird only make a wail. + + +EVENING CLOUDS + + A little flock of clouds go down to rest + In some blue corner off the moon's highway, + With shepherd-winds that shook them in the West + To borrowed shapes of earth, in bright array, + Perhaps to weave a rainbow's gay festoons + Around the lonesome isle which Brooke has made + A little England full of lovely noons, + Or dot it with his country's mountain shade. + + Ah, little wanderers, when you reach that isle[22] + Tell him, with dripping dew, they have not failed, + What he loved most; for late I roamed a while + Thro' English fields and down her rivers sailed; + And they remember him with beauty caught + From old desires of Oriental Spring + Heard in his heart with singing overwrought; + And still on Purley Common gooseboys sing. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[22] The island of Skyros where Rupert Brooke was buried. (See page +194.) + + + + +_Irene Rutherford McLeod_ + + +Irene Rutherford McLeod, born August 21, 1891, has written three +volumes of direct and often distinguished verse, the best of which may +be found in _Songs to Save a Soul_ (1915) and _Before Dawn_ (1918). +The latter volume is dedicated to A. de Selincourt, to whom she was +married in 1919. + + +"IS LOVE, THEN, SO SIMPLE" + + Is love, then, so simple my dear? + The opening of a door, + And seeing all things clear? + I did not know before. + + I had thought it unrest and desire + Soaring only to fall, + Annihilation and fire: + It is not so at all. + + I feel no desperate will, + But I think I understand + Many things, as I sit quite still, + With Eternity in my hand. + + +LONE DOG + + I'm a lean dog, a keen dog, a wild dog, and lone; + I'm a rough dog, a tough dog, hunting on my own; + I'm a bad dog, a mad dog, teasing silly sheep; + I love to sit and bay the moon, to keep fat souls from sleep. + + I'll never be a lap dog, licking dirty feet, + A sleek dog, a meek dog, cringing for my meat, + Not for me the fireside, the well-filled plate, + But shut door, and sharp stone, and cuff and kick, and hate. + + Not for me the other dogs, running by my side, + Some have run a short while, but none of them would bide. + O mine is still the lone trail, the hard trail, the best, + Wide wind, and wild stars, and hunger of the quest! + + + + +_Richard Aldington_ + + +Richard Aldington was born in England in 1892, and educated at Dover +College and London University. His first poems were published in +England in 1909; _Images Old and New_ appeared in 1915. Aldington and +"H. D." (Hilda Doolittle, his American wife) are conceded to be two of +the foremost imagist poets; their sensitive, firm and clean-cut lines +put to shame their scores of imitators. Aldington's _War and Love_ +(1918), from which "Prelude" is taken, is somewhat more regular in +pattern; the poems in this latter volume are less consciously artistic +but warmer and more humanly searching. + + +PRELUDE + + How could I love you more? + I would give up + Even that beauty I have loved too well + That I might love you better. + + Alas, how poor the gifts that lovers give-- + I can but give you of my flesh and strength, + I can but give you these few passing days + And passionate words that, since our speech began, + All lovers whisper in all ladies' ears. + + I try to think of some one lovely gift + No lover yet in all the world has found; + I think: If the cold sombre gods + Were hot with love as I am + Could they not endow you with a star + And fix bright youth for ever in your limbs? + Could they not give you all things that I lack? + + You should have loved a god; I am but dust. + Yet no god loves as loves this poor frail dust. + + +IMAGES + + I + + Like a gondola of green scented fruits + Drifting along the dank canals of Venice, + You, O exquisite one, + Have entered into my desolate city. + + II + + The blue smoke leaps + Like swirling clouds of birds vanishing. + So my love leaps forth toward you, + Vanishes and is renewed. + + III + + A rose-yellow moon in a pale sky + When the sunset is faint vermilion + In the mist among the tree-boughs + Art thou to me, my beloved. + + IV + + A young beech tree on the edge of the forest + Stands still in the evening, + Yet shudders through all its leaves in the light air + And seems to fear the stars-- + So are you still and so tremble. + + V + + The red deer are high on the mountain, + They are beyond the last pine trees. + And my desires have run with them. + + VI + + The flower which the wind has shaken + Is soon filled again with rain; + So does my heart fill slowly with tears, + O Foam-Driver, Wind-of-the-Vineyards, + Until you return. + + +AT THE BRITISH MUSEUM + + I turn the page and read: + "I dream of silent verses where the rhyme + Glides noiseless as an oar." + The heavy musty air, the black desks, + The bent heads and the rustling noises + In the great dome + Vanish ... + And + The sun hangs in the cobalt-blue sky, + The boat drifts over the lake shallows, + The fishes skim like umber shades through the undulating weeds, + The oleanders drop their rosy petals on the lawns, + And the swallows dive and swirl and whistle + About the cleft battlements of Can Grande's castle.... + + + + +_Edward Shanks_ + + +Edward Shanks was born in London in 1892 and educated at Trinity +College, Cambridge. He has reviewed verse and _belles lettres_ for +several years for various English publications, and is at present +assistant editor of _The London Mercury_. His _The Queen of China and +Other Poems_ appeared late in 1919. + + +COMPLAINT + + When in the mines of dark and silent thought + Sometimes I delve and find strange fancies there, + With heavy labour to the surface brought + That lie and mock me in the brighter air, + Poor ores from starved lodes of poverty, + Unfit for working or to be refined, + That in the darkness cheat the miner's eye, + I turn away from that base cave, the mind. + Yet had I but the power to crush the stone + There are strange metals hid in flakes therein, + Each flake a spark sole-hidden and alone, + That only cunning, toilsome chemists win. + All this I know, and yet my chemistry + Fails and the pregnant treasures useless lie. + + + + +_Osbert Sitwell_ + + +Born in London, December 6th, 1892, Osbert Sitwell (son of Sir George +Sitwell and brother of Edith Sitwell) was educated at Eton and became +an officer in the Grenadier Guards, with whom he served in France for +various periods from 1914 to 1917. + +His first contributions appeared in _Wheels_ (an annual anthology of a +few of the younger radical writers, edited by his sister) and +disclosed an ironic and strongly individual touch. That impression is +strengthened by a reading of _Argonaut and Juggernaut_ (1920), where +Sitwell's cleverness and satire are fused. His most remarkable though +his least brilliant poems are his irregular and fiery protests against +smugness and hypocrisy. But even Sitwell's more conventional poetry +has a freshness of movement and definiteness of outline. + + +THE BLIND PEDLAR + + I stand alone through each long day + Upon these pavers; cannot see + The wares spread out upon this tray + --For God has taken sight from me! + + Many a time I've cursed the night + When I was born. My peering eyes + Have sought for but one ray of light + To pierce the darkness. When the skies + + Rain down their first sweet April showers + On budding branches; when the morn + Is sweet with breath of spring and flowers, + I've cursed the night when I was born. + + But now I thank God, and am glad + For what I cannot see this day + --The young men cripples, old, and sad, + With faces burnt and torn away; + + Or those who, growing rich and old, + Have battened on the slaughter, + Whose faces, gorged with blood and gold, + Are creased in purple laughter! + + +PROGRESS + + The city's heat is like a leaden pall-- + Its lowered lamps glow in the midnight air + Like mammoth orange-moths that flit and flare + Through the dark tapestry of night. The tall + Black houses crush the creeping beggars down, + Who walk beneath and think of breezes cool, + Of silver bodies bathing in a pool; + Or trees that whisper in some far, small town + Whose quiet nursed them, when they thought that gold + Was merely metal, not a grave of mould + In which men bury all that's fine and fair. + When they could chase the jewelled butterfly + Through the green bracken-scented lanes or sigh + For all the future held so rich and rare; + When, though they knew it not, their baby cries + Were lovely as the jewelled butterflies. + + + + +_Robert Nichols_ + + +Robert Nichols was born on the Isle of Wight in 1893. His first +volume, _Invocations_ (1915), was published while he was at the front, +Nichols having joined the army while he was still an undergraduate at +Trinity College, Oxford. After serving one year as second lieutenant +in the Royal Field Artillery, he was incapacitated by shell shock, +visiting America in 1918-19 as a lecturer. His _Ardours and +Endurances_ (1917) is the most representative work of this poet, +although his new volume, _The Flower of Flame_ (1920), shows a steady +advance in power. + + +NEARER + + Nearer and ever nearer ... + My body, tired but tense, + Hovers 'twixt vague pleasure + And tremulous confidence. + + Arms to have and to use them + And a soul to be made + Worthy, if not worthy; + If afraid, unafraid. + + To endure for a little, + To endure and have done: + Men I love about me, + Over me the sun! + + And should at last suddenly + Fly the speeding death, + The four great quarters of heaven + Receive this little breath. + + + + +_Charles Hamilton Sorley_ + + +Charles Hamilton Sorley, who promised greater things than any of the +younger poets, was born at Old Aberdeen in May, 1895. He studied at +Marlborough College and University College, Oxford. He was finishing +his studies abroad and was on a walking-tour along the banks of the +Moselle when the war came. Sorley returned home to receive an +immediate commission in the 7th Battalion of the Suffolk Regiment. In +August, 1915, at the age of 20, he was made a captain. On October 13, +1915, he was killed in action near Hulluch. + +Sorley left but one book, _Marlborough and Other Poems_. The verse +contained in it is sometimes rough but never rude. Although he admired +Masefield, loveliness rather than liveliness was his aim. Restraint, +tolerance, and a dignity unusual for a boy of 20, distinguish his +poetry. + + +TWO SONNETS + + I + + Saints have adored the lofty soul of you. + Poets have whitened at your high renown. + We stand among the many millions who + Do hourly wait to pass your pathway down. + + You, so familiar, once were strange: we tried + To live as of your presence unaware. + But now in every road on every side + We see your straight and steadfast signpost there. + + I think it like that signpost in my land + Hoary and tall, which pointed me to go + Upward, into the hills, on the right hand, + Where the mists swim and the winds shriek and blow, + A homeless land and friendless, but a land + I did not know and that I wished to know. + + II + + Such, such is Death: no triumph: no defeat: + Only an empty pail, a slate rubbed clean, + A merciful putting away of what has been. + + And this we know: Death is not Life effete, + Life crushed, the broken pail. We who have seen + So marvellous things know well the end not yet. + + Victor and vanquished are a-one in death: + Coward and brave: friend, foe. Ghosts do not say, + "Come, what was your record when you drew breath?" + But a big blot has hid each yesterday + So poor, so manifestly incomplete. + And your bright Promise, withered long and sped, + Is touched; stirs, rises, opens and grows sweet + And blossoms and is you, when you are dead. + + +TO GERMANY + + You are blind like us. Your hurt no man designed, + And no man claimed the conquest of your land. + But gropers both, through fields of thought confined, + We stumble and we do not understand. + You only saw your future bigly planned, + And we the tapering paths of our own mind, + And in each other's dearest ways we stand, + And hiss and hate. And the blind fight the blind. + + When it is peace, then we may view again + With new-won eyes each other's truer form + And wonder. Grown more loving-kind and warm + We'll grasp firm hands and laugh at the old pain, + When it is peace. But until peace, the storm, + The darkness and the thunder and the rain. + + + + +_Robert Graves_ + + +Robert Graves was born July 26, 1895. One of "the three rhyming +musketeers" (the other two being the poets Siegfried Sassoon and +Robert Nichols), he was one of several writers who, roused by the war +and giving himself to his country, refused to glorify warfare or chant +new hymns of hate. Like Sassoon, Graves also reacts against the storm +of fury and blood-lust (see his poem "To a Dead Boche"), but, +fortified by a lighter and more whimsical spirit, where Sassoon is +violent, Graves is volatile; where Sassoon is bitter, Graves is almost +blithe. + +An unconquerable gayety rises from his _Fairies and Fusiliers_ (1917), +a surprising and healing humor that is warmly individual. In _Country +Sentiment_ (1919) Graves turns to a fresh and more serious simplicity. +But a buoyant fancy ripples beneath the most archaic of his ballads +and a quaintly original turn of mind saves them from their own echoes. + + +IT'S A QUEER TIME + + It's hard to know if you're alive or dead + When steel and fire go roaring through your head. + + One moment you'll be crouching at your gun + Traversing, mowing heaps down half in fun: + The next, you choke and clutch at your right breast-- + No time to think--leave all--and off you go ... + To Treasure Island where the Spice winds blow, + To lovely groves of mango, quince and lime-- + Breathe no good-bye, but ho, for the Red West! + It's a queer time. + + You're charging madly at them yelling "Fag!" + When somehow something gives and your feet drag. + You fall and strike your head; yet feel no pain + And find ... you're digging tunnels through the hay + In the Big Barn, 'cause it's a rainy day. + Oh, springy hay, and lovely beams to climb! + You're back in the old sailor suit again. + It's a queer time. + + Or you'll be dozing safe in your dug-out-- + A great roar--the trench shakes and falls about-- + You're struggling, gasping, struggling, then ... _hullo_! + Elsie comes tripping gaily down the trench, + Hanky to nose--that lyddite makes a stench-- + Getting her pinafore all over grime. + Funny! because she died ten years ago! + It's a queer time. + + The trouble is, things happen much too quick; + Up jump the Boches, rifles thump and click, + You stagger, and the whole scene fades away: + Even good Christians don't like passing straight + From Tipperary or their Hymn of Hate + To Alleluiah-chanting, and the chime + Of golden harps ... and ... I'm not well to-day ... + It's a queer time. + + +A PINCH OF SALT + + When a dream is born in you + With a sudden clamorous pain, + When you know the dream is true + And lovely, with no flaw nor stain, + O then, be careful, or with sudden clutch + You'll hurt the delicate thing you prize so much. + + Dreams are like a bird that mocks, + Flirting the feathers of his tail. + When you seize at the salt-box, + Over the hedge you'll see him sail. + Old birds are neither caught with salt nor chaff: + They watch you from the apple bough and laugh. + + Poet, never chase the dream. + Laugh yourself, and turn away. + Mask your hunger; let it seem + Small matter if he come or stay; + But when he nestles in your hand at last, + Close up your fingers tight and hold him fast. + + +I WONDER WHAT IT FEELS LIKE TO BE DROWNED? + + Look at my knees, + That island rising from the steamy seas! + The candle's a tall lightship; my two hands + Are boats and barges anchored to the sands, + With mighty cliffs all round; + They're full of wine and riches from far lands.... + _I wonder what it feels like to be drowned?_ + + I can make caves, + By lifting up the island and huge waves + And storms, and then with head and ears well under + Blow bubbles with a monstrous roar like thunder, + A bull-of-Bashan sound. + The seas run high and the boats split asunder.... + _I wonder what it feels like to be drowned?_ + + The thin soap slips + And slithers like a shark under the ships. + My toes are on the soap-dish--that's the effect + Of my huge storms; an iron steamer's wrecked. + The soap slides round and round; + He's biting the old sailors, I expect.... + _I wonder what it feels like to be drowned?_ + + +THE LAST POST + + The bugler sent a call of high romance-- + "Lights out! Lights out!" to the deserted square. + On the thin brazen notes he threw a prayer: + "God, if it's _this_ for me next time in France, + O spare the phantom bugle as I lie + Dead in the gas and smoke and roar of guns, + Dead in a row with other broken ones, + Lying so stiff and still under the sky-- + Jolly young Fusiliers, too good to die ..." + The music ceased, and the red sunset flare + Was blood about his head as he stood there. + + + + +INDEX + + +_Names of Authors are in Capitals. Titles of Poems are in Italics._ + +ABERCROMBIE, LASCELLES, xxiv, 174-177 + +"A. E.," xvii, 76-77 + +_Aftermath_, 192 + +ALDINGTON, RICHARD, 216-219 + +_All-Souls_, 44 + +_An Athlete Dying Young, To_, 38 + +_An Old Fogey, To_, 45 + +_Arab Love-Song, An_, 35 + +_Astrologer's Song, An_, 66 + +_At the British Museum_, 218 + +_A Traveller, To_, 72 + +AUSTIN, ALFRED, xii, 5, 27 + + +_Ballad of Hell, A_, 22 + +_Ballad of London, A_, 69 + +_Ballad of the Billycock, The_, 90 + +_Barrel-Organ, The_, 154 + +_Beautiful Lie the Dead_, 78 + +_Beauty's a Flower_, 100 + +_Before_, 11 + +_Beg-Innish_, 95 + +BELLOC, HILAIRE, 86-89 + +BINYON, LAURENCE, 79-80 + +_Birdcatcher, The_, 144 + +_Blackbird, The_, 10 + +_Blind Pedlar, The_, 220 + +_Bowl of Roses, A_, 11 + +BRIDGES, ROBERT, 5-7 + +_Broken Song, A_, 99 + +BROOKE, RUPERT, xxiii, 193-200 + +_Bugler, The_, 208 + +_By-the-Way_, 211 + + +CAMPBELL, JOSEPH, 165-166 + +_Cap and Bells, The_, 54 + +CHESSON, NORA (_see Nora Hopper_) + +CHESTERTON, G. K., xxiii, 110-119 + +_Choice, The_, 131 + +_Clair de Lune_, 102 + +_Cock-Crow_, 138 + +COLUM, PADRAIC, xvii, 162-165 + +_Complaint_, 219 + +_Connaught Lament, A_, 97 + +_Consecration, A_, 126 + +_Conundrum of the Workshops, The_, 63 + +CORNFORD, FRANCES, 184-186 + + +_Daisy_,32 + +_Dauber_, xxii, 128 + +DAVIDSON, JOHN, 22-27 + +DAVIES, W. H., xxiii, xxv, 83-86 + +_Days Too Short_, 84 + +DEANE, ANTHONY C., 89-93 + +_Death and the Fairies_, 212 + +DE LA MARE, WALTER, xxiii, 105-110 + +_Donkey, The_, 119 + +DOUGLAS, ALFRED, 80-81 + +DOWSON, ERNEST, 73-76 + +_Drake's Drum_, 49 + +_Dream, A_, 79 + +_Dreamers_, 190 + +DRINKWATER, JOHN, xxiv, 170-171 + +DUNSANY, EDWARD LORD, 133-136 + +_Dust_,198 + +_Dying-Swan, The_, 82 + + +_Epilogue_, 161 + +_Epitaph_, 42 + +_Epitaph, An_, 107 + +_Estrangement_, 30 + +_Eve_, 140 + +_Evening Clouds_, 214 + +_Evening in England, An_, 213 + +_Everlasting Mercy, The_, xxii + +_Every Thing_, 146 + +_Example, The_, 86 + + +_Fifty Faggots_,137 + +FLECKER, JAMES ELROY, 178-179 + +_Fleet Street_, 183 + +FLINT, F. S., 205-206 + +FREEMAN, JOHN, 181-182 + + +GEORGIANS, THE, xi, xxiii-xxiv + +_Germany, To_, 225 + +GIBSON, W. W., xxiii, xxv, 119-125 + +GILBERT, W. S., xiv + +_Going and Staying_, 4 + +GORE-BOOTH, EVA, 98-99 + +_Grandeur_, 201 + +GRAVES, ROBERT, xxiii, 225-229 + +_Great Breath, The_, 76 + +_Great Lover, The_, 195 + +_Green River, The_, 81 + +_Gunga Din_, 57 + + +HARDY, THOMAS, xvi, 3-4 + +HARVEY, F. W., 208 + +HENLEY, W. E., xi, xv-xvii, 9-13 + +_"Herod," Fragment from_, 78 + +HINKSON, KATHARINE TYNAN, xvii, 43-45 + +HODGSON, RALPH, xxiii, xxv, 139-144 + +HOPPER, NORA, 97 + +_House, A_, 172 + +_House that Was, The_, 80 + +HOUSMAN, A. E., xxv, 36-40 + +HUEFFER, F. M., 102-105 + +HYDE, DOUGLAS, xvii, 40-41 + + +_I am the Mountainy Singer_, 165 + +_I Hear an Army_, 171 + +_I Shall not Die for Thee_, 40 + +_I Wonder What It Feels Like to be Drowned?_, 228 + +_If I Should Ever Grow Rich_, 136 + +_Images_, 217 + +_Imagination_, 26 + +_Impression du Matin_, 21 + +_In Flanders Fields_, 101 + +_Interlude_, 207 + +_In the Mile End Road_, 42 + +_In the Wood of Finvara_, 50 + +_In Time of "The Breaking of Nations_," 3 + +_Invictus_, 10 + +"_Is Love, then, so simple_," 215 + +_It's a Queer Time_, 226 + + +JACKSON, HOLBROOK, xiv-xv + +JOHNSON, LIONEL, xvii, 71-73 + +JOYCE, JAMES, 171 + +KETTLE, T. M., 149-150 + +KIPLING, RUDYARD, xi, xx-xxi, 56-68 + +_Lake Isle of Innisfree, The_, 53 + +_Last Post, The_, 229 + +LAWRENCE, D. H., xxiii, 179-181 + +LEDWIDGE, FRANCIS, 213-214 + +LE GALLIENNE, RICHARD, xv, 68-70 + +_Lepanto_, 111 + +LESLIE, SHANE, 183-184 + +LETTS, W. M., 200-204 + +LEVY, AMY, 41-43 + +_Listeners, The_, 106 + +_Lochanilaun_, 204 + +_London_, 205 + +_Lone Dog_, 215 + +"_Loveliest of Trees_," 39 + + +MACCATHMHAOIL, SEOSAMH (_see Joseph Campbell_) + +MACGILL, PATRICK, 211-213 + +MACLEOD, FIONA, 18-19 + +MCLEOD, IRENE R., 215-216 + +MCCRAE, JOHN, 101 + +_Man He Killed, The_, 4 + +_Margaritae Sorori_, 12 + +MASEFIELD, JOHN, xi, xxi-xxii, xxv, 125-132 + +MEYNELL, ALICE, 16-17 + +_Modern Beauty_, 51 + +MONRO, HAROLD, 144-149 + +_Moon, The_, 85 + +MOORE, GEORGE, xviii + +MOORE, T. STURGE, 81-83 + +_My Daughter Betty, To_, 150 + +_Mystery, The_, 144 + +_Mystic and Cavalier_, 71 + + +_Nearer_, 222 + +NEWBOLT, HENRY, xxiv, 49-50 + +NICHOLS, ROBERT, 222-223, 225 + +_Nightingale near the House, The_, 145 + +_Nightingales_, 7 + +_Nod_, 109 + +NOYES, ALFRED, xxiii, 150-162 + + +_Oaks of Glencree, To the_, 96 + +_Ode_, 8 + +_Ode in May_, 28 + +_Old Ships, The_, 178 + +_Old Song Resung, An_, 55 + +_Old Susan_, 108 + +_Old Woman, The_, 166 + +_Old Woman of the Roads, An_, 164 + +_Olivia, To_, 34 + +_One in Bedlam, To_, 74 + +O'NEILL, MOIRA, xvii, 99-100 + +O'SHAUGHNESSY, ARTHUR, 8-9 + +O'SULLIVAN, SEUMAS, 138-139 + + +_Pater of the Cannon, The_, 183 + +_People_, 180 + +PHILLIPS, STEPHEN, 77-79 + +_Piano_, 180 + +_Pinch of Salt, A_, 227 + +_Plougher The_, 162 + +_Praise_, 139 + +_Prayer in Darkness, A_, 118 + +_Preexistence_, 184 + +_Prelude_, 120 + +_Prelude_, 216 + +_Progress_, 221 + + +_Reality_, 186 + +_Rear-Guard, The_, 190 + +_Reciprocity_, 170 + +_Regret_, 70 + +_Requiem_, 16 + +_Requiescat_, 20 + +_Return, The_, 61 + +_Reveille_, 36 + +_Romance_, 15 + +_Romance_, 210 + +_Rounding the Horn_, 128 + +RUSSELL, GEORGE W. (_see "A. E."_) + +_Rustic Song, A_, 92 + + +SASSOON, SIEGFRIED, xxiii, 187-193, 225 + +SEAMAN, OWEN, 45-48 + +_Sea-Fever_, 127 + +SHANKS, EDWARD, 219-220 + +SHARP, WILLIAM (_see Fiona MacLeod_) + +SHAW, G. B., 20, 83 + +_Sheep and Lambs_, 43 + +_Shell, The_, 167 + +_Sherwood_, 151 + +_Sight_, 124 + +_Silence Sings_, 82 + +_Singer, The_, 186 + +SITWELL, EDITH, 206-207 + +SITWELL, OSBERT, 220-222 + +_Soldier, The_, 200 + +_Song_, 31 + +_Song_, 187 + +_Song, A_, 79 + +_Song_ (_from "Judith"_), 176 + +_Song of the Old Mother, The_, 53 + +_Songs from an Evil Wood_, 133 + +_Sonnet_,132 + +SORLEY, CHARLES HAMILTON, 223-225 + +_South Country, The_, 87 + +_Spires of Oxford, The_, 203 + +_Sportsmen in Paradise_, 209 + +SQUIRE, J. C., xxiv, 172-174 + +STEPHENS, JAMES, xxiii, 167-169 + +STEVENSON, R. L., xvi, 13-16 + +_Stone, The_, 121 + +_Stone Trees_, 181 + +_Strange Meetings_, 149 + +_Summer Sun_, 13 + +SYMONS, ARTHUR, xv, 50-51 + +SYNGE, J. M., xviii-xx, xxii, 93-96 + + +_Tall Nettles_, 137 + +TENNYSON, ALFRED, xii, 49 + +"_There Shall be more Joy_," 104 + +THOMAS, EDWARD, 136-138 + +_Thomas of the Light Heart_, 47 + +THOMPSON, FRANCIS, 31-35 + +_Thrush before Dawn, A_, 16 + +_Thrushes_, 191 + +_Time, You old Gipsy Man_, 142 + +_Tired Tim_, 108 + +_To The Four Courts, Please_, 169 + +_Town Window, A_, 170 + +_Translation from Petrarch, A_, 96 + +TUPPER, MARTIN F., xii + +TURNER, W. J., 210-211 + +_Two Sonnets_, 223 + +TYNAN, KATHARINE (HINKSON), xvii, 43-45 + + +_Unknown God, The_, 77 + + +_Valley of Silence, The_, 18 + +_"Vashti," From_, 175 + +VICTORIANS, THE, xi-xiii, xx + +_Victory, To_, 189 + +_Villain, The_, 85 + +_Vision, The_, 19 + + +_Walls_, 99 + +WATSON, WILLIAM, 27-31 + +_Waves of Breffny, The_, 98 + +_Web of Eros, The_, 206 + +_What Tomas an Buile Said_, 168 + +_When I Was One-and-Twenty_, 37 + +WICKHAM, ANNA, 186-187 + +WILDE, OSCAR, xiii-xv, 19-22, 68 + +WILLIAMS, HAROLD, xviii, 105 + +WILSON, T. P. C., 209 + +_Winter Nightfall_, 5 + +_Winter-Time_, 14 + +_With Rue my Heart is Laden_, 38 + + +YEATS, W. B., xvi, xvii-xix, 52-56, 94 + +YOUNG, FRANCIS BRETT, 204 + +_You Would Have Understood Me_, 75 + + +--------------------------------------------------------------+ + | Transcriber's Notes: | + | | + | Page xv: artistocratic amended to aristocratic | + | Page 21: _s_ added to St. Paul's | + | Page 40: Collge amended to College | + | Page 71: sevententh amended to seventeenth | + | Page 84: naif amended to naif | + | Page 184: PREEXISTENCE amended to PREEXISTENCE (as per poem | + | title in the Table of Contents) | + | Page 147: double quotes inside double quotes amended to | + | single quotes | + | Page 209: comma added after "someone said" | + | Page 233: comma added after _Nightingales_ | + | Page 234: Comma added after _Winter Nightfall_. | + | _State The_ amended to _Stone, The_ | + | | + | Hyphenation has been retained as is. | + +--------------------------------------------------------------+ + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Modern British Poetry, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MODERN BRITISH POETRY *** + +***** This file should be named 26785.txt or 26785.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/6/7/8/26785/ + +Produced by David Starner, Suzanne Lybarger and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions 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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