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diff --git a/old/50429-0.txt b/old/50429-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 52cb80f..0000000 --- a/old/50429-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,2282 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Oxford Poetry, 1921, by Various - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: Oxford Poetry, 1921 - -Author: Various - -Editor: Alan Porter - Richard Hughes - Robert Graves - -Release Date: November 10, 2015 [EBook #50429] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OXFORD POETRY, 1921 *** - - - - -Produced by MWS, Charlie Howard, and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries) - - - - - - - - - -OXFORD POETRY - -1921 - - - - -_UNIFORM VOLUMES_ - - -3_s._ 6_d._ _net_ - 2_s._ _net_ - - Oxford Poetry 1915 - Oxford Poetry 1916 - Oxford Poetry 1917 - Oxford Poetry 1918 - Oxford Poetry 1919 - Oxford Poetry 1920 - -7_s._ 6_d._ _net_ - - Oxford Poetry 1917-19 - -BASIL BLACKWELL - - - - - OXFORD POETRY - - 1921 - - - EDITED BY - ALAN PORTER, RICHARD HUGHES, - ROBERT GRAVES - - - OXFORD BASIL BLACKWELL - MCMXXI - - - - - PRINTED AT THE - SHAKESPEARE HEAD PRESS - STRATFORD-UPON-AVON - - - - -The Editors of this year’s Oxford Poetry, the work of undergraduates -who have been in residence since the date of the last collection, have -attempted to make the volume more representative of Poetry and less -representative merely of Oxford than its predecessors. There is always -at Oxford a fashion in verse as much as in dress, and, to judge from -the bulk of contributions submitted, this fashion has not changed -materially since last noted and recorded in print. Mr Jones-Smith, of -Balliol, still writes musically of brimming chalices, vermilion lips, -chrysoprase, lotuses, arabesques and darkling spires against glimmering -skies; Miss Smith-Jones, of Somerville, is equally faithful to her -scarlet sins, beloved hearts, little clutching hands, little pattering -feet, rosaries, eternity, roundabouts, and glimmering spires against -darkling skies. Exclusion of these worn properties has given the fewer -writers than usual represented here, extended elbow room, and a chance -of showing some individual capacity for better or worse. - -Most of the pieces have already appeared serially in _The London -Mercury_, _The Spectator_, _The Westminster Gazette_, _The New -Statesman_, _The Nation and Athenæum_, _The Observer_, and the other -leading literary reviews. - -For permission to use copyright poems, our thanks are due to Messrs -Christophers, publishers of Mr Golding’s ‘Shepherd Singing Ragtime,’ -and to Messrs Sidgwick and Jackson, publishers of Mr Rickword’s new -volume ‘Behind the Eyes.’ - - - - -CONTENTS - - - F. N. W. BATESON (_Trinity_) - Trespassers Page 1 - - EDMUND BLUNDEN (_Queen’s_) - The Watermill 2 - The Scythe 4 - That Time is Gone 7 - The South-West Wind 8 - The Canal 9 - The March Bee 11 - - LOUIS GOLDING (_Queen’s_) - Ploughman at the Plough 12 - Portrait of an Artist 13 - Shepherd singing Ragtime 14 - Ghosts Gathering 18 - Silver-badged Waiter 20 - - ROBERT GRAVES (_St John’s_) - Cynics and Romantics 21 - Unicorn and the White Doe 22 - Sullen Moods 25 - Henry and Mary 27 - On the Ridge 28 - A Lover since Childhood 29 - - ROSALEEN GRAVES (_Home Student_) - Night Sounds 30 - ‘A Stronger than he shall come upon him ...’ 32 - Colour 33 - - BERTRAM HIGGINS (_B.N.C._) - White Magic 34 - - RICHARD HUGHES (_Oriel_) - Singing Furies 35 - The Sermon 37 - Tramp 38 - Gratitude 40 - Judy 42 - Ruin 43 - - ALAN PORTER (_Queen’s_) - Introduction to a Narrative Poem 44 - Summer Bathing 47 - Country Churchyard 49 - Museum 50 - Lost Lands 52 - - FRANK PREWETT (_Christ Church_) - Come Girl, and embrace 53 - I went out into the Fields 54 - Comrade, why do you weep? 56 - The Winds caress the Trees 57 - - EDGELL RICKWORD (_Pembroke_) - Complaint of a Tadpole confined in a jam-jar 58 - Regret for the Depopulation of Rural Districts 60 - Complaint after Psycho-Analysis 61 - Desire 62 - Trench Poets 63 - Winter Prophecies 64 - - - - -F. N. W. BATESON - - -TRESPASSERS - - Gauntly outlined, white and still, - Three haystacks peer above the hill; - Three aged rakes thrust sprawlingly - Fantastic tendons to the sky. - In the void and dismal yard - Farmer’s dog keeps rasping guard, - Challenging night’s trespassers, - The solemn legions of the stars; - Growling ignominious scorn - At Cancer and at Capricorn. - The yellow stars, serene and prim, - Tolerantly stare at him. - - - - -EDMUND BLUNDEN - - -THE WATERMILL - - I’ll rise at midnight and I’ll rove - Up the hill and down the drove - That leads to the old unnoticed mill, - And think of one I used to love: - There stooping to the hunching wall - I’ll stare into the rush of stars - Or bubbles that the waterfall - Brings forth and breaks in ceaseless wars. - - The shelving hills have made a fourm - Where the mill holdings shelter warm, - And here I came with one I loved - To watch the seething millions swarm. - But long ago she grew a ghost - Though walking with me every day; - Even when her beauty burned me most - She to a spectre dimmed away-- - - Until though cheeks all morning-bright - And black eyes gleaming life’s delight - And singing voice dwelt in my sense, - Herself paled on my inward sight. - She grew one whom deep waters glassed. - Then in dismay I hid from her, - And lone by talking brooks at last - I found a Love still lovelier. - - O lost in tortured days of France! - Yet still the moment comes like chance - Born in the stirring midnight’s sigh - Or in the wild wet sunset’s glance: - And how I know not but this stream - Still sounds like vision’s voice, and still - I watch with Love the bubbles gleam, - I walk with Love beside the mill. - - The heavens are thralled with cloud, yet gray - Half-moonlight swims the fields till day, - The stubbled fields, the bleaching woods;-- - Even this bleak hour is stolen away - By this shy water falling low, - And calling low the whole night through, - And calling back the long ago - And richest world I ever knew. - - The hop-kiln fingers cobweb-white - With discord dim turned left and right, - And when the wind was south and small - The sea’s far whisper drowsed the night; - Scarce more than mantling ivy’s voice - That in the tumbling water trailed. - Love’s spirit called me to rejoice - When she to nothingness had paled: - - For Love the daffodils shone here - In grass the greenest of the year, - Daffodils seemed the sunset lights - And silver birches budded clear: - And all from east to west there strode - Great shafted clouds in argent air, - The shining chariot-wheels of God, - And still Love’s moment sees them there. - - -THE SCYTHE - - A thick hot haze had choked the valley grounds - Long since, the dogday sun had gone his rounds - Like a dull coal half lit with sulky heat; - And leas were iron, ponds were clay, fierce beat - The blackening flies round moody cattle’s eyes. - Wasps on the mudbanks seemed a hornet’s size, - That on the dead roach battened. The plough’s increase - Stood under a curse. - Behold, the far release! - Old wisdom breathless at her cottage door - ‘Sounds of abundance’ mused, and heard the roar - Of marshalled armies in the silent air, - And thought Elisha stood beside her there, - And clacking reckoned ere the next nightfall - She’d turn the looking-glasses to the wall. - - Faster than armies out of the burnt void - The hour-glass clouds innumerably deployed; - And when the hay-folks next look up, the sky - Sags black above them; scarce is time to fly. - And most run for their cottages; but Ward - The mower for the inn beside the ford, - And slow strides he with shouldered scythe still bare, - While to the coverts leaps the great-eyed hare. - - As he came in, the dust snatched up and whirled - Hung high, and like a bell-rope whipped and twirled, - The brazen light glared round, the haze resolved - Into demoniac shapes bulged and convolved. - Well might poor ewes afar make bleatings wild, - Though this old trusting mower sat and smiled, - For from the hush of many days the land - Had waked itself: and now on every hand - Shrill swift alarm-notes, cries and counter-cries, - Lowings and crowings came and throbbing sighs. - Now atom lightning brandished on the moor, - Then out of sullen drumming came the roar - Of thunder joining battle east and west: - In hedge and orchard small birds durst not rest, - Flittering like dead leaves and like wisps of straws, - And the cuckoo called again, for without pause - Oncoming voices in the vortex burred. - The storm came toppling like a wave, and blurred - In grey the trees that like black steeples towered. - The sun’s last yellow died. Then who but cowered? - Down ruddying darkness floods the hideous flash, - And pole to pole the cataract whirlwinds clash. - - Alone within the tavern parlour still - Sat the gray mower, pondering his God’s will, - And flinching not to flame or bolt, that swooped - With a great hissing rain till terror drooped - In weariness: and then there came a roar - Ten-thousand-fold, he saw not, was no more-- - But life bursts on him once again, and blood - Beats droning round, and light comes in a flood. - - He stares, and sees the sashes battered awry, - The wainscot shivered, the crocks shattered, and by, - His twisted scythe, melted by its fierce foe, - Whose Parthian shot struck down the chimney. Slow - Old Ward lays hand to his old working-friend, - And thanking God Whose mercy did defend - His servant, yet must drop a tear or two - And think of times when that old scythe was new, - And stands in silent grief, nor hears the voices - Of many a bird that through the land rejoices, - Nor sees through the smashed panes the sea-green sky, - That ripens into blue, nor knows the storm is by. - - -THE TIME IS GONE - - The time is gone when we could throw - Our angle in the sleepy stream, - And nothing more desired to know - Than was it roach or was it bream? - Sitting there in such a mute delight, - The Kingfisher would come and on the rods alight. - - Or hurrying through the dewy hay - Without a thought but to make haste - We came to where the old ring lay - And bats and balls seemed heaven at least. - With our laughing and our giant strokes - The echoes clacked among the chestnuts and the oaks. - - When the spring came up we got - And out among wild Emmet Hills - Blossoms, aye and pleasures sought - And found! bloom withers, pleasure chills; - Like geographers along green brooks - We named the capes and tumbling bays and horseshoe crooks. - - But one day I found a man - Leaning on the bridge’s rail; - Dared his face as all to scan, - And awestruck wondered what could ail - An elder, blest with all the gifts of years, - In such a happy place to shed such bitter tears. - - -THE SOUTH-WEST WIND - - We stood by the idle weir, - Like bells the waters played, - The rich moonlight slept everywhere - As it would never fade: - So slept our shining peace of mind - Till rose a south-west wind. - - How sorrow comes who knows? - And here joy surely had been: - But joy like any wild wind blows - From mountains none has seen, - And still its cloudy veilings throws - On the bright road it goes. - - The black-plumed poplars swung - So softly across the sky: - The ivy sighed, the river sung, - Woolpacks were wafting high: - The moon her golden tinges flung - On these she straight was lost among. - - O south-west wind of the soul, - That brought such new delight, - And passing by in music stole - Love’s rich and trusting light, - Would that we thrilled to thy least breath - Now all is still as death. - - -THE CANAL - - There so dark and still - Slept the water, never changing, - From the glad sport in the meadows - Oft I turned me. - - Fear would strike me chill - On the clearest day in summer, - Yet I loved to stand and ponder - Hours together - - By the tarred bridge rail-- - There the lockman’s vine-clad window, - Mirrored in the tomb-like water - Stared in silence - - Till, deformed and pale - In the sunken cavern shadows, - One by one imagined demons - Scowled upon me. - - Barges passed me by, - With their unknown surly masters - And small cabins, whereon some rude - Hand had painted - - Trees and castles high. - Cheerly stepped the towing horses, - And the women sung their children - Into slumber. - - Barges, too, I saw - Drowned in mud, drowned, drowned long ages, - Their gray ribs but seen in summer, - Their names never: - - In whose silted maw - Swarmed great eels, the priests of darkness, - Old as they, who came at midnight - To destroy me. - - Like one blind and lame - Who by some new sense has vision - And strikes deadlier than the strongest - Went this water. - - Many an angler came, - Went his ways; and I would know them, - Some would smile and give me greeting, - Some kept silence-- - - Most, one old dragoon - Who had never a morning hallo, - But with stony eye strode onward - Till the water, - - On a silent noon, - That had watched him long, commanded: - Whom he answered, leaping headlong - To self-murder. - - ‘Fear and fly the spell,’ - Thus my Spirit sang beside me; - Then once more I ranged the meadows, - Yet still brooded, - - When the threefold knell - Sounded through the haze of harvest-- - Who had found the lame blind water - Swift and seeing? - - -THE MARCH BEE - - A warming wind comes to my resting-place - And in a mountain cloud the lost sun chills; - Night comes, and yet before she shows her face - The sun flings off the shadows, warm light fills - The valley and the clearings on the hills, - Bleak crow the moorcocks on the fen’s blue plashes, - But here I warm myself with these bright looks and flashes. - And like to me the merry humble bee - Puts fear aside, runs forth to meet the sun - And by the ploughlands’ shoulder comes to see - The flowers that like him best, and seems to shun - Cold countless quaking windflowers every one, - Primroses too; but makes poor grass his choice - Where small wood-strawberry blossoms nestle and rejoice. - The magpies steering round from wood to wood, - Tree-creepers flicking up to elms’ green rind, - Bold gnats that revel round my solitude - And most this pleasant bee intent to find - The new-born joy, inveigle the rich mind - Long after darkness comes cold-lipped to one - Still hearkening to the bee, still basking in the sun. - - - - -LOUIS GOLDING - - -PLOUGHMAN AT THE PLOUGH - - He behind the straight plough stands - Stalwart, firm shafts in firm hands. - - Naught he cares for wars and naught - For the fierce disease of thought. - - Only for the winds, the sheer - Naked impulse of the year, - - Only for the soil, which stares - Clean into God’s face, he cares. - - In the stark might of his deed - There is more than art or creed; - - In his wrist more strength is hid - Than the monstrous Pyramid; - - Stauncher than stern Everest - Be the muscles of his breast; - - Not the Atlantic sweeps a flood - Potent as the ploughman’s blood. - - He, his horse, his ploughshare, these - Are the only verities. - - Dawn to dusk with God he stands, - The Earth poised on his broad hands. - - -PORTRAIT OF AN ARTIST - - I have been given eyes - Which are neither foolish nor wise, - Seeing through joy or pain - Beauty alone remain. - - I have been given an ear - Which catches nothing clear, - But only along the day - A song stealing away. - - My feet and hands never could - Do anything evil or good: - Instead of these things, - A swift mouth that sings. - - -SHEPHERD SINGING RAGTIME - -(_For F. V. Branford_) - - The shepherd sings: - ’_Way down in Dixie, - Way down in Dixie, - Where the hens are dog-gone glad to lay...._’ - - With shaded eyes he stands to look - Across the hills where the clouds swoon, - He singing, leans upon his crook, - He sings, he sings no more. - The wind is muffled in the tangled hair - Of sheep that drift along the noon. - The mild sheep stare - With amber eyes about the pearl-flecked June. - Two skylarks soar - With singing flame - Into the sun whence first they came. - All else is only grasshoppers - Or a brown wing the shepherd stirs, - Who, like a slow tree moving, goes - Where the pale tide of sheep-drift flows. - - See! the sun smites - With molten lights - The turned wing of a gull that glows - Aslant the violet, the profound - Dome of the mid-June heights. - Alas! again the grasshoppers, - The birds, the slumber-winging bees, - Alas! again for those and these - Demure things drowned; - Drowned in vain raucous words men made - Where no lark rose with swift and sweet - Ascent and where no dim sheep strayed - About the stone immensities, - Where no sheep strayed and where no bees - Probed any flowers nor swung a blade - Of grass with pollened feet. - - He sings: - ‘_In Dixie, - Way down in Dixie, - Where the hens are dog-gone glad to lay - Scrambled eggs in the new-mown hay...._’ - - The herring-gulls with peevish cries - Rebuke the man who sings vain words; - His sheep-dog growls a low complaint, - Then turns to chasing butterflies. - But when the indifferent singing-birds - From midmost down to dimmest shore - Innumerably confirm their songs, - And grasshoppers make summer rhyme - And solemn bees in the wild thyme - Clash cymbals and beat gongs, - The shepherd’s words once more are faint, - Once more the alien song is thinned - Upon the long course of the wind, - He sings, he sings no more. - - Ah now the dear monotonies - Of bells that jangle on the sheep - To the low limit of the hills! - Till the blue cup of music spills - Into the boughs of lowland trees; - Till thence the lowland singings creep - Into the dreamful shepherd’s head, - Creep drowsily through his blood; - The young thrush fluting all he knows, - The ring dove moaning his false woes, - Almost the rabbit’s tiny tread, - The last unfolding bud. - But now, - Now a cool word spreads out along the sea. - Now the day’s violet is cloud-tipped with gold. - Now dusk most silently - Fills the hushed day with other wings than birds’. - Now where on foam-crest waves the seagulls rock, - To their cliff-haven go the seagulls thence. - So too the shepherd gathers in his flock, - Because birds journey to their dens, - Tired sheep to their still fold. - - A dark first bat swoops low and dips - About the shepherd who now sings - A song of timeless evenings; - For dusk is round him with wide wings, - Dusk murmurs on his moving lips. - - _There is not mortal man who knows - From whence the shepherd’s song arose: - It came a thousand years ago._ - - _Once the world’s shepherds woke to lead - The folded sheep that they might feed - On green downs where winds blow._ - - _One shepherd sang a golden word. - A thousand miles away one heard. - One sang it swift, one sang it slow._ - - _Two skylarks heard, two skylarks told - All shepherds this same song of gold - On all downs where winds blow._ - - _This is the song that shepherds must - Sing till the green downlands be dust - And tide of sheep-drift no more flow;_ - - _The song two skylarks told again - To all the sheep and shepherd men - On green downs where winds blow._ - - -GHOSTS GATHERING - - You hear no bones click, see no shaken shroud. - Though no tombs grin, you feel ghosts gathering. Crowd - - On pitiful crowd of small dead singing men - Tread the sure earth they feebly hymned; again - - With fleshless hand seize unswayed grass. They seize - Insensitive flowers which bend not. Through gross trees - - They sift. Nothing withstands them. Nothing knows - Them nor the songs they sang, their busy woes. - - ‘Hence from these ingrate things! To the towns!’ they weep, - (If ghosts have tears). You think a wrinkled heap - - Of leaves heaved, or a wing stirred, less than this. - Some chance on the midnight cities. Others miss - - The few faint lights, thin voices. Wretched these - Doomed to beat long the windy vacancies! - - Some mourn through forlorn towns. They prowl and seek - --What seek they? Who knows them? If branches creak - - And leaves flap and slow women ply their trade, - Those all are living things, but these are dead, - - All that they were, dead totally. What fool still - Knows their extinguished songs? They had their fill - Of average joys and sorrows. They learned how - - Love wilts, Death does not wilt. What more left now? - But one ghost yet of all these ghosts may find - Himself not utterly faded. - Through his blind - - Some old man’s lamp-rays probe the darkness. Sick - Of his gaunt quest, the ghost halts. The clock’s tick - - Troubles the silence. Tiredly the ghost scans - The opened book on the table. A flame fans, - - A weak wan fire floods through his subtle veins. - No, no, not wholly forgotten! Loves and pains - - Not suffered wholly for nothing! - (The old man bends - Over the book, makes notes for pious ends, - - --Some curious futile work twelve men at most - Will read and yawn over.) The dizzy ghost, - - Like some more ignorant moth circles the light... - Not suffered wholly for nothing!... ‘A sweet night!’ - - The old man mumbles.... A warmth is in the air, - He smiles, not knowing why. He moves his chair - - Closer against the table. And sitting bowed - Lovingly turns the leaves and chants aloud. - - -SILVER-BADGED WAITER - - Poor trussed-up lad, what piteous guise - Cloaks the late splendour of your eyes, - Stiffens the fleetness of your face - Into a mask of sleek disgrace, - And makes a smooth caricature - Of your taut body’s swift and sure - Poise, like a proud bird waiting one - Moment ere he taunt the sun; - Your body that stood foolish-wise - Stormed by the treasons of the skies, - Star-like that hung, deliberate - Above the dubieties of Fate, - But with an April gesture chose - Unutterable and certain woes! - And now you stand with discreet charm - Dropping the napkin round your arm, - Anticipate your tip while you - Hear the commercial travellers chew. - You shuffle with their soups and beers - Who held at heel the howling fears, - You whose young limbs were proud to dare - Challenge the black hosts of despair! - - - - -ROBERT GRAVES - - -CYNICS AND ROMANTICS - - In club and messroom let them sit - At skirmish of ingenious wit; - Deriding Love, yet not with hearts - Accorded to those healthier parts - Of grim self-mockery, but with mean - And burrowing search for things unclean, - Pretended deafness, twisted sense, - Sharp innuendoes rising thence, - And affectation of prude-shame - That shrinks from using the short name. - We are not envious of their sour - Disintegrations of Love’s power, - Their swift analysis of the stabs - Devised by virgins and by drabs - (Powder or lace or scent) to excite - A none-too-jaded appetite. - They never guess of Love as we - Have found the amazing Art to be, - Pursuit of dazzling flame, or flight - From web-hung blackness of night, - With laughter only to express - Care overborne by carelessness; - They never bridge from small to great, - From nod or glance to ideal Fate, - From clouded forehead or slow sigh - To doubt and agony looming by, - From shining gaze and hair flung free - To infinity and to eternity-- - They sneer and poke a treacherous joke - With scorn for our rusticity. - - -UNICORN AND THE WHITE DOE - - ‘Alone - Through forests evergreen, - By legend known, - By no eye seen, - Unmated - Unbaited - Untrembling between - The shifting shadows - The sudden echoes, - Deathless I go - Unheard, unseen,’ - Says the White Doe. - - Unicorn with bursting heart - Breath of love has drawn - On his desolate crags apart - At rumour of dawn, - - Has volleyed forth his pride - Twenty thousand years mute, - Tossed his horn from side to side - Lunged with his foot. - - ‘Like a storm of sand I run - Breaking the desert’s boundaries, - I go in hiding from the sun - In thick shade of trees - - Straight was the track I took - Across the plains, but here with briar - And mire the tangled alleys crook - Baulking my desire. - - Ho, there! what glinted white? - (A bough still shakes) - What was it darted from my sight - Through the forest brakes? - - Where are you fled from me? - I pursue, you fade; - I run, you hide from me - In the dark glade. - - Towering straight the trees grow, - The grass grows thick. - Where you are, I do not know, - You fly so quick.’ - - ‘Seek me not here - Lodged among mortal deer,’ - Says the White Doe, - ‘Keeping one place - Held by the ties of space,’ - Says the White Doe. - ‘I - Equally - In air - Above your bare - Hill crest, your basalt lair, - Mirage reflected drink - At the clear pool’s brink - With tigers at play - In the glare of day - Blithely I stray, - Under shadow of myrtle - With Phoenix and his Turtle - For all time true, - With Gryphons at grass - Under the Upas, - Sipping warm dew - That falls hourly new, - I, unattainable - Complete, incomprehensible - No mate for you. - In sun’s beam - Or star-gleam, - No mate for you - No mate for you,’ - Says the White Doe. - - -SULLEN MOODS - - Love, do not count your labour lost - Though I turn sullen, grim, retired - Even at your side; my thought is crossed - With fancies by old longings fired. - - And when I answer you, some days - Vaguely and wildly, do not fear - That my love goes forbidden ways - Hating the laws that bind it here. - - If I speak gruffly, this mood is - Mere indignation at my own - Shortcomings, plagues, uncertainties; - I forget the gentler tone. - - ‘You,’ now that you have come to be - My one beginning, prime and end, - I count at last as wholly ‘me,’ - Lover no longer nor yet friend. - - Friendship is flattery, though close hid; - Must I then flatter my own mind? - And must (which laws of shame forbid) - Blind love of you make self-love blind? - - Do not repay me my own coin, - The sharp rebuke, the frown, the groan; - But stir my memory to disjoin - Your emanation from my own. - - Help me to see you as before - When overwhelmed and dead, almost, - I stumbled on that secret door - Which saves the live man from the ghost. - - Be once again the distant light, - Promise of glory, not yet known - In full perfection--wasted quite - When on my imperfection thrown. - - -HENRY AND MARY - - Henry was a worthy king, - Mary was his queen, - He gave to her a snowdrop - Upon a stalk of green. - - Then all for his kindness - And all for his care - She gave him a new-laid egg - In the garden there. - - Love, can you sing? - I cannot sing. - Or story-tell? - Not one I know. - Then let us play at queen and king, - As down the garden walks we go. - - -ON THE RIDGE - - Below the ridge a raven flew, - And we heard the lost curlew - Mourning out of sight below - Mountain tops were touched with snow; - Even the long dividing plain - Showed no wealth of sheep or grain, - But fields of boulders lay like corn - And raven’s croak was shepherd’s horn - To slow cloud shadow strayed across - A pasture of thin heath and moss. - The North Wind rose; I saw him press - With lusty force against your dress, - Moulding your body’s inward grace, - And streaming off from your set face, - So now no longer flesh and blood - But poised in marble thought you stood; - O wingless Victory, loved of men, - Who could withstand your triumph then? - - -A LOVER SINCE CHILDHOOD - - Tangled in thought am I, - Stumble in speech do I? - Do I blunder and blush for the reason why? - Wander aloof do I, - Lean over gates and sigh, - Making friends with the bee and the butterfly? - - If thus and thus I do - Dazed by the thought of you, - Walking my sorrowful way in the early dew, - My heart pierced through and through - By this despair of you, - Starved for a word or a look will my hope renew. - - Give then a thought for me - Walking so miserably, - Wanting relief in the friendship or flower or tree, - Do but remember, we - Once could in love agree - Swallow your pride, let us be as we used to be. - - - - -ROSALEEN GRAVES - - -NIGHT-SOUNDS - - Faintly through my window come - Sounds of things unheard by day, - Things that nightly speak and play, - But by day again go dumb. - - Uncouth owls, with shuddering cry, - Flap great wings in horrid grief - Flap and swoop on journeys brief, - Hooting long and miserably. - - Lurching in unsteady flight - Comes a lean bat, singing shrill, - Stumbles on my window sill, - And staggers off into the night. - - Wild duck, waking on the marsh, - Din against my sleepy senses; - Like the wind on creaking fences - Comes their croaking, faint and harsh. - - There’s a little bush I hear - Muttering, frightened, half-asleep; - Now a leafy voice, more deep, - Rustles vague comfort, soothes its fear. - - Water flows not as by day. - A new tone through its voice has crept. - Streams that in daylight laughed and leapt - And had humorous things to say, - - Speak so gravely now, and mutter - Of things secret, scarcely guessed, - Winds’ and Waters’ veiled unrest, - Griefs too big for man to utter. - - Of the days before man came - The days when man shall be no more, - And Earth again be ruled by Four, - Air and Water, Earth and Flame. - - Now a sudden silence falls; - Until like rocking, silver boats - Come the curlew’s ripply notes - How far the curious music calls! - - And sweet twitters whisper clearly - From the tree tops dimly seen - Piping from the shadowy green - That the dawn is here, or nearly. - - -‘A STRONGER THAN HE SHALL COME UPON HIM...’ - - And then he was seized by one who was stronger than he, - Seized and tamed and bound and forced to obey; - From the swinging choice of evil or good he was free; - Good was no longer; evil had vanished away - He left to another the gain or loss of the day. - - Was he driven or drawn? What matter? He was content. - He yielded him, body and soul, to the whirl of War - As one yields to the high sea-wind, and is buffered, bent - To his will, when, shouting, he stamps in over the shore - Triumphant, driving all things like dust before. - - Can aught but a rock stand firm, or question his might - Who tosses the leaves and clouds from a hand so strong? - The trees and grasses bow in awe of his might, - And men in the mountains, hearing his giant-song, - Yield, and are hurried--whirled--hounded along. - - Thus he yielded to War, who was stronger than he-- - No time to think--no time to ponder and weigh-- - He was swept like a straw on the wind--and yet he knew himself free - Was it freedom or bondage, this? In truth, it were hard to say; - But, slave or king, he bowed his head to obey. - - -COLOUR - - Flowers, thick as stars, lay - Splashed about the roadway-- - Flowers nodding up and down, - Gold, lilac, fern-brown, - Colour in which to drown. - The Channel was a dark blue streak, - With pools rosy like the cheek - Of a girl too shy to speak, - And coloured clouds went tossing past, - Warm and windy, - Vivid and quaint, - Faint and eager and vast. - - Colour, thick as dust, lay - Spattered about the highway-- - Colour so bright that one would think - White, blue, cherry-pink - Were made to clutch and drink, - Colour that made one stop and say, - ‘Earth, are you Heaven to-day?’ - Colour that made one pray. - Lumps of colour, liquid and cool, - Cool and near, - Clear and gay - Tumbled about my way. - - - - -BERTRAM HIGGINS (B.N.C.) - - -WHITE MAGIC - - You came, but still, with heart full-given to gladness, - I paused, as one stands stricken ere he falls; - Not yet my fumblings swept their bounds, clogged sense its - Weakling walls. - - Quaint spaceless musings held me--idiot Mind was - Gaped and gilled like a fish to suck through slow - Tentative pores swift sweetness of strange waters’ - Ebb and flow. - - Yet how could I praise in darkness?--Life, like a sodded - Seed, moved in drought-sleep and cleft its clay - Freshly it seemed, though each sap-season spired its - Stalks into day: - - Till now (ah, deft magician!) your wand hovers - Over all Spirit--over those lost grey fields - Where one frail flower, with burning stem, glad, gradual - Petals yields; - - And whose past pitiful bitter blooms live only - In the flushed mockery of remembering lovers. - - - - -RICHARD HUGHES - - -THE SINGING FURIES - - The yellow sky grows vivid as the sun, - The sea glittering, and the hills dun. - - The stones quiver. Twenty pounds of lead - Fold upon fold, the air laps my head. - - Both eyes scorch: tongue stiff and bitter. - Flies buzz, but no birds twitter: - - Slow bullocks stand with stinging feet, - And naked fishes scarcely stir, for heat. - - White as smoke, - As jetted steam, dead clouds awoke - And quivered on the Western rim. - And then the singing started, dim - And sibilant as rime-stiff reeds - That whistle as the wind leads. - The North answered, low and clear; - The South whispered hard and sere, - And thunder muffled up like drums - Beat, whence the East-wind comes. - The heavy sky that could not weep - Is loosened: rain falls steep, - And thirty singing furies ride - To split the sky from side to side. - They sing, and lash the wet-flanked wind: - Sing, from Col to Hafod Mynd - And fling their voices half a score - Of miles along the mounded shore: - Whip loud music from a tree, - And roll their paean out to sea - Where crowded breakers fling and leap, - And strange things throb five fathoms deep. - - The sudden tempest roared and died: - The singing furies muted ride - Down wet and slippery roads to hell; - And, silent in their captors’ train - Two fishers, storm-caught on the main; - A shepherd, battered with his flocks; - A pit-boy tumbled from the rocks, - A dozen back-broke gulls, and hosts - Of shadowy, small, pathetic ghosts, - Of mice and leverets caught by flood, - Their beauty shrouded in cold mud. - - -THE SERMON - -(_Wales_ 1920). - - Like grippt stick - Still I sit: - Eyes fixed on far small eyes, - Full of it: - On the old, broad face, - The hung chin; - Heavy arms, surplice - Worn through and worn thin. - Probe I the hid mind - Under the gross flesh: - Clutch at poetic words, - Follow their mesh - Scarce heaving breath. - Clutch, marvel, wonder, - Till the words end. - - Stilled is the muttered thunder: - The hard, few people wake, - Gather their books and go-- - Whether their hearts could break - How can I know? - - -TRAMP - - When a brass sun staggers above the sky, - When feet cleave to boots, and the tongue’s dry, - And sharp dust goads the rolling eye, - Come thoughts of wine, and dancing thoughts of girls: - They shiver their white arms, and the head whirls, - And noon light is hid in their dark curls: - Noon feet stumble, and head swims. - Out shines the sun, and the thought dims, - And death, for blood, runs in the weak limbs. - - To fall on flints in the shade of tall nettles - Gives easy sleep as a bed of rose petals, - And dust drifting from the highway - As light a coverlet as down may. - The myriad feet of many-sized flies - May not open those tired eyes. - - The first wind of night - Twitches the coverlet away quite: - The first wind and large first rain - Flickers the dry pulse to life again: - Flickers the lids burning on the eyes - With sudden flashes of the slipping skies. - Hunger, oldest visionary, - Hides a devil in a tree, - Hints a glory in the clouds, - Fills the crooked air with crowds - Of ivory sightless demons singing-- - - Eyes start: straightens back: - Limbs stagger and crack: - But Brain flies, Brain soars - Up, where the Sky roars - Upon the back of cherubim: - Brain rockets up to Him. - Body gives another twist - To the slack waist-band; - In agony clenches fist - Till the nails bite the hand. - Body floats light as air, - With rain in its sparse hair: - - Brain returns, and would tell - The things he has seen well: - Body will not stir his lips: - Brain and Body come to grips. - - Deadly each hates the other - As treacherous blood-brother: - No sight, no sound shows - How the struggle goes. - - They sink at last faint in the wet gutter; - So many words to sing that the tongue cannot utter. - - -GRATITUDE - - Eternal gratitude--a long, thin word: - When meant, oftenest left unheard: - When light on the tongue, light in the purse too: - Of curious metallurgy: when coined true - It glitters not, is neither large nor small: - More worth than rubies--less, times, than a ball. - Not gift, nor willed: yet through its wide range - Buys what it buys exact, and leaves no change. - - Old Gurney had it, won on a hot day - With ale, from glib-voiced Gypsy by the way. - He held it lightly: for ’twas a rum start - To find a hedgeling who had still a heart: - So put it down for twist of a beggar’s tongue... - _He_ had not felt the heat: how the dust stung - A face June-roasted: _he_ saw not the look - Aslant the gift-mug; how the hand shook... - Yet the words rang his head, and he grew merry - And whistled from the Boar to Wrye-brook ferry, - And chaffed with Ferryman when the hawser creakt - Or slipping bilge showed where the planks leakt: - Lent hand himself, till doubly hard the barge - Butted its nose in mud of the farther marge. - When Gurney leapt to shore, he found--dismay! - He had no tuppence--(Tuppence was to pay - To sulky Ferryman)--‘Naught have I,’ says he, - ‘Naught, but the gratitude of Tammas Lee - Given one hour.’--Sulky Charon grinned: - ‘Done,’ said he. ‘Done: I take--all of it, mind.’ - ‘Done,’ cries Jan Gurney. Down the road he went, - But by the ford left all his merriment. - - This is the tale of midday chaffering: - How Charon took, and Gurney lost the thing: - How Ferryman gave it for his youngest daughter - To a tall lad who saved her out of water-- - (Being old and mean, had none of his own to give, - So passed on Tammas’; glad to see her live): - And how young Farmer paid his quarter’s rent - With that one coin, when all else was spent, - And how Squire kept it for some goldless debt... - For aught I know, it wanders current yet. - Yet Tammas was no angel in disguise: - He stole Squire’s chickens--often: he told lies, - Robbed Charon’s garden, burnt young Farmer’s ricks - And played the village many lowsy tricks. - - No children sniffled, and no dog cried - When full of oaths and smells, he died. - - -JUDY - - Sand hot to haunches: - Sun beating eyes down, - Yet they peer under lashes - At the hill’s crown: - - See how the hill slants - Up the sky halfway: - Over the top tall clouds - Poke gold and grey. - - Down: see a green field - Tipped on its short edge, - Its upper rim straggled round - By a black hedge. - - Grass bright as new brass: - Uneven dark gorse - Stuck to its own shadow - _Like Judy that black horse_. - - Birds clatter numberless, - And the breeze tells - That beanflower somewhere - Has ousted the bluebells. - - Birds clatter numberless: - In the muffled wood - Big feet move slowly: - Mean no good. - - -THE RUIN - - Gone are the coloured princes, gone echo, gone laughter: - Drips the blank roof: and the moss creeps after. - - Dead is the crumbled chimney: all mellowed to rotting - The wall-tints, and the floor-tints, from the spotting - Of the rain, from the wind and slow appetite - Of patient mould: and of the worms that bite - At beauty all their innumerable lives. - - But the sudden nip of knives, - The lady aching for her stiffening lord, - The passionate-fearful bride, - And beaded Pallor clamped to the torment-board, - --Leave they no ghosts, no memories by the stairs? - - No sheeted glimmer treading floorless ways? - No haunting melody of lovers’ airs, - Nor stealthy chill upon the noon of days? - - No: for the dead and senseless walls have long forgotten - What passionate hearts beneath the turf lie rotten. - - Only from roofs and chimneys pleasantly sliding - Tumbles the rain in the early hours, - Patters its thousand feet on the flowers, - Cools its small grey feet in the grasses. - - - - -ALAN PORTER - - -INTRODUCTION TO A NARRATIVE POEM - - The vapour, twining and twitching, seems to throw - Black, precipitous boulders to and fro - Light as a bandied scoff; and, look, the cliff-- - Whose root claws at the midworld fire with stiff - Unmolten, adamantine fingers--fails, - Lurches. Above, cold and eternal gales - Run worrying, shredding, eternal sunlight; snatch - At the heather; puff at the flocks of cotton; scratch - White scars along the bents. If strangers climb - To this plateau that buffets back slow time, - They stand awhile impotent, grey with fear, - And feel solidity’s foundation stir. - - But even here a cottage free from harms - Lies havened, hugged and sheltered by the arms - Of a narrow, green recess. A few stunt oaks, - Elders, and barren apples beard the rocks; - But, sleeker than a pool, the lawn beneath - Burns white and blue, bewildering the heath. - On a low wood-bench, rifted by years of rain, - Warped at one end, split far along the grain, - A meagre man with a waste, weary smile - Reads to a boy and girl, or plays awhile - Some quiet, grown-up game. He suddenly bows - Head between hands: no more his children rouse - Flicker or flame, by question or caress, - To break the dead, monotonous, featureless - Winter of grief. At last he rises, and, - With empty scrutiny, feet that understand - No path but falter at random, stumbles out - Where tigrish winds whirry and havoc and shout. - His back-blown hair, wet, smarting eyes, recall - The conscious pang of life; and he must fall - Faint on the ground, or whet his courage keen, - Clench all his being, prise a path between - The loud, inimical flaws. With even might - He batters on, to earth’s and air’s despite, - In storm and tumult winning peace and light. - - Yet, in these roads of quiet, muniment - From fury of nature, home from discontent - Surely of earth’s mean, trafficking miseries, - In this domain of flower and fragrance, this - Green plat of smooth, immotionable ground, - Why does the panther sorrow skulk around - And leap like fear from unsuspected fourm? - Weigh this doubt rather--if the embittered swarm - Of multitudinous grief thins ever or stays - From most unmerited sally; for in what ways - A man may tread, and fate how seeming fair, - His intimate heart is troubled, and despair - Lays present ambush. Many feel the sting - Of casual time like bramble-thorns, that bring - A not-enduring spasm: in other blood, - More sensitive, urging a froward, perilous flood, - It racks like tropic ivy, whose embrace - Turns travellers maniac; nor shall lapse of days, - Nor drug, nor simple, medicine back the mind; - They go forgetting all their manhood, find - No recollection save the venom of death - That whistles about their brain and sears their breath. - - Thus almost had it been with him, thus grief - Came turbulent, and left him no relief. - - -SUMMER BATHING - - The ruckling pool, torn grey by Pendry Weir, - Became Cocytus to my boy time fear. - Two haw-trees, pulping fat their close, green fruits - Turned cuttlefish below, wagging no roots - But narrow tentacles. Old Jacob Fry - Tells how he drained this pool one hot July - When drought had sucked the white stream thick and slow: - Fish, four-foot deep, shone thirty feet below. - Leaning to drop a stone, the farmboy whews - Bewildered that his confident ear should lose - All thud for grounding. Now he fears to stay, - And walks by whistling on another day. - - Here, when the black bees blundered in the heat - Half-drunk, rifling the fine-flurred meadowsweet, - I stripped and bathed. At first, numb for delight, - I lost all thought but this--Come, you must fight - Free from the swirl. But when blank eyes grew clear - Like a pit-pattering mouse came fluttered fear. - Now here and there slide snakish eels, now voles - Bolt hizzing over the brook to round, black holes. - These groping roots perhaps will grip my flesh - Till I grow tired of screaming: so the mesh - Will move, my bones will crackle, I sink down; - So to an end. - Or in some cave of brown - Sluttering scum and broad, plump bladder-weeds - Old fiends may sprawling meditate false deeds; - One, ware of prey, slip out lean fingers, pluck - Unusual meat through water’s rush and ruck. - - Yet, braving all, to prove wild fancy vain, - I held my breath and sank. The brook, astrain - And fierce to be free, spun snarling overhead; - Dull roars droned round, cold currents buffeted. - Proud of this daring shewn--but doubtful, too, - Of tempting fortune far--I battled through - To the root-held scroll of turf on the sagging bank, - And carefully muscled up. The sheep-field drank - The wide-spent, white-spilt sun, the wrapping air - Swung flame-like past, and, while I ran, the bare - Close-nibbled grass pushed hot against my feet. - The yeanlings rose and rushed with timid bleat - Full-tilt at the mothering ewe; fed sleek with clover, - Three cows, in mild amazement bending over - The gap-set palings, rubbed their necks or chewed. - But in mid-course I staggered, having trod - Firm on a flat and spiny thistle; stayed - Nursing my foot, half grinning, half dismayed: - Then lay full length, as light-heel time were not; - Pale fears, fantastic perils, all forgot. - - -COUNTRY CHURCHYARD - - This grave, moss-grown, marks him who once went free; - Now pent--no, portionless; from sharp life lost; - Mere mouldered bone-work. His unheeded name - - Who, curious, pausing, may decipher? See; - Thin gulled by running rain, by chipping frost - Frustrated, muffled under a yellow, same, - - Fat scurf of lichen, the dim characters - Withstand conjecture, aimless and awry. - Yet here lies one who, living, peopled earth - - With indestructible fancy. Now he hears - No nature’s music, who for hours would lie - To hear the blue-caps click their quick, small mirth. - - -MUSEUM - - The day was death. A chalk road, pale in dust, - Accused with leprous finger the long moors. - The drab, damp air so blanketed the town - No doddered oak swung leathern leaf. The chimneys - Pushed oddling pillars at the loose-hung sky. - May, pansy, lilac, dense as the night steam - Of lowland swamps, fettered the sodden air, - And, through the haze, along the ragstone houses, - Blood-lichens dulled to a rotten-apple brown. - Behind close doors pale women drooped and dragged - In customary toils. They dusted shelves - Or changed from chair to chair dull, cotton cushions: - Soon, vacantly, they bore them back and wiped - With languid arms the black, unspotted shelves. - Such mind’s own symbols of despair they went - That never movement shook a face to grief-- - At first they looked no more than cheerless women, - But dug deep in the plaster of their flesh - Those eyes were year-dead, underpouched with blue. - A word would sear the silence of a week. - Of a sudden, turning a byeway corner, a cripple, - Bloodless with age, lumbered along the road. - The motes of dust whirled at his iron-shod crutches - And quickly settled. A dog whined. The old - Cripple looked round and saw no man, but gave - A cruel, crackling chuckle, swung a yard, - And stopped to look about and laugh again. - ‘That,’ said a girl in a flat voice, ‘is God.’ - She turned and slid the table-cover straight. - Her mother could not answer, but she thought - ‘It must be Beggar Joe, gone lately mad.’ - He lumbered along the road and turned a corner. - His tapping faded and the day was death. - - -LOST LANDS - - When from this alien multitude of man - These, kind or kindred, speak in approbation - Of what I strove to write, for all my pleasure - I feel my gross dismerit and fall shamed. - - Set no regard on me: not I can pierce - Clogged air and homely falsehood in prophetic - Dream or sudden awakening. Sinewed phrases, - There are my petty troublings of weak sight. - - Shame took me once, and shame has tracked me since: - My friend spoke of a man who lives bewildered, - Even in London striding over mountains, - Through populous roads companioning the dead. - - Stars move around him and the dew falls grey; - Thin firs pry through the mist. Old fables quicken-- - Undine laughs by the waters, vague, uneasy: - Maiden Mary sings to the sleepy Child. - - Then I remembered boyhood, in whose hours - Thistles were knights, old men were murderous, daytime - Intractable as dream. I knew that either - Hid with coarse walls imaginable worlds. - - Now I am dulled, habitual now with known - Earth. Never shall other-country pathways - Bring me, familiar, through amazing valleys - Fire-white with blossom, dark with ancient boughs. - - - - -FRANK PREWETT - - - Come girl, and embrace, - And ask no more I wed thee; - Know then you are sweet of face, - Soft-limbed and fashioned lovingly;-- - Must you go marketing your charms - In cunning woman-like, - And filled with old wives’ tales’ alarms? - I tell you, girl, come embrace; - What reck we of churchling and priest - With hands on paunch and chubby face; - Behold, we are life’s pitiful least, - And we perish at the first smell - Of death, whither heaves earth - To spurn us cringing into hell. - Come girl, and embrace; - Nay, cry not, poor wretch, nor plead, - But haste, for life strikes a swift pace - And I burn with envious greed: - Know you not, fool, we are the mock, - Of gods, time, clothes, and priests? - But come, there is no time for talk. - - - I went out into the fields - In my anguish of mind, - And sought comfort of the trees - For they looked to be kind. - - ‘Alas!’ cried they, ‘who have peace?-- - We are prey that is caught, - The sun warms us, the blast chills, - And we understand not.’ - - On rolled the world with fools’ noise, - But I strode in tears’ wrack; - Would God, fools, I too were fool, - Or had light that I lack. - - I held the fields all day, - I, a madman, too; - My spirit called aloud - To sift the false from true. - - The troubled sun turned black, - Earth heaved to and fro, - Whene’er I spurned the flowers - Lifting heads to grow. - - Trees reached their hands to stay, - Whistled birds to me, - ‘Spurn one, thou spurnest all, - Brother, let things be. - - For not their heads alone - Bleed, but the stars fade - And all things grieve, for we - One fabric are made.’ - - The heavens and earth do meet - And all things are true, - So trample ye no flowers - Lest skies lose their blue. - - - Comrade, why do you weep? - Is it sorrow for a friend - Who fell, rifle in hand, - His proud stand at an end? - - The harsh thunder-lipped guns - Roll his dirge deep and slow, - Where he makes his dreamless bed, - Head to head with a foe. - - The sweet lark beats on high, - For the joy of those who sleep - In quiet embrace of earth. - Comrade, why do you weep? - - - The winds caress the trees, - Woman to man is led, - And I too have my love, - Though she comes not to bed. - - Beyond the heat of flesh, - Which has its place and day, - We hold our keen delights - In spirit, earth away. - - Mount me on high, O soul, - Expand me my desires, - So shall I clasp in love - Even the heavenly fires! - - - - -EDGELL RICKWORD - - -COMPLAINT OF A TADPOLE CONFINED IN A JAM-JAR - - What reveries of far-off days - These withered plaques of duck-weed raise! - - The creeping wretches, the crowded pond, - A death in life, no Culture, no Beyond. - - Light and No-light in dull routine; - Thought and No-thought two shades of green. - - The fair ideals all creatures need - Smothered beneath the inferior weed. - - For highest aspirations stop - With breathing, at the water’s top. - - O Fairy Metamorphosis - For Being to become What Is. - - Here ceaseless radiance fills my sphere, - The Lamp my Moon, all night, bright, near. - - And clustering on the crystal wall - Great strawberries iconistical. - - No strife to propagate the kind - But leisure to improve the mind; - - Till curious sensations range - About the tail and hint at change. - - The weed with flowers stars the sky - And monstrous forms go dimly by. - - Tail fades! The vestiges of gills - Swell with rare æther from the hills. - - Now Time reared up in rocky crests - Where flaming fowl involve their nests, - - Across the rippled Stream of Space - Throws shadows that obscure this place; - - But in the valleys pipers play: - ‘Over the hills and far away.’ - - -REGRET FOR THE DEPOPULATION OF RURAL DISTRICTS - - I have seen villages grow suddenly - From dust and stand upright in the air - With comfortable homes grouped round a spire; - And in the fields strong women bending - Down to coarse toil to nourish unborn women. - But in the gardens, languid with flowers’ fragrance - Girls linger on close lawns for unknown happenings, - Tearing a petal in long shining fingers. - So waiting whilst pear blossom apple blossom - And white plum blossom are fallen down to earth, - And the white moon fallen. Then a heap of dust - That once was named, loved and familiar - Lies unsubstantial in the eternal sunlight. - Whence faint thoughts - Stirring far down in twilight consciousness - Move dark-boughed yew-trees over graves and stars. - - -COMPLAINT AFTER PSYCHO-ANALYSIS - - Now my days are all undone, - Spirit sunken, girls forgone, - I will weave in other mesh - Than fading bone and flesh. - - Into cold deserted mind - Drag the relics of the blind; - And raise from wives none other sees - Substantial families. - - Hunt through woods of maidenhair - Tangled in the shining air - The forms of ecstasies achieved, - Not then believed. - - O Unicorns and jewelled Birds - And trampling dappled moonlight herds, - In icy glades now slain - With arrows bright as pain. - - Leap, Moon, from the berg’s pale womb! - Frail Bride, out of Earth’s tomb! - The stars are ashen cold - Beneath their gold. - - -DESIRE - - As the white sails of ships across the ocean, - The last sounds fade when the sun has declined. - I am alone. There is no motion - Rippling the clear waters in the mind. - - Only now the madrepores’ frail tentacles - Sway languidly before they fall asleep; - And waiting in their dark pinnacles - The virgin medusae watch and weep. - - Moving darkly among the forests of weed - Ancient memories drag their crinkled shells - To glades where crimson tree-trunks bleed - Thickly, and hushed are the faint sea-bells. - - Out of that silent depth loveless arising - Undine sheds on the water her shining hair, - Softly calleth her soul, devising - A fragrance of music in the air. - - -TRENCH POETS - - I knew a man, he was my chum, - But he grew blacker every day, - And would not brush the flies away, - Nor blanch however fierce the hum - Of passing shells. I used to read, - To rouse him, random things from Donne, - Like ‘Get with child a mandrake-root,’ - But you can tell he was far gone, - For he lay gaping, mackerel-eyed, - And stiff and senseless as a post, - Even when that old poet cried, - ‘I long to talk with some old lover’s ghost.’ - - I tried the Elegies one day; - But he, because he heard me say, - ‘What needst thou have more covering than a man?’ - Grinned nastily, and so I knew - The worms had got his brains at last. - There was one thing that I might do - To starve the worms; I racked my head - For healthy things and quoted _Maud_. - His grin got worse, and I could see - He laughed at passion’s purity. - - He stank so badly, though we were great chums - I had to leave him; then rats ate his thumbs. - - -WINTER PROPHECIES - - Cities with tall and graceful spires I know - Mirrored in pools and rivers silver bright, - That wither if the softest wind should blow - And by a stone are blotted out of sight. - Frailer they are than curvèd leaves of snow - Fluttering down from the dark trees of night - Slowly, and then unutterably slow, - And ceasing as most quietly comes the light. - - Water is carved like fern and stone takes on - The flush of life when flesh lies quiet as stone; - Whilst sinister and clownish, bright and wan, - With solemn affectations the old Moon - Spins dooms and weirds and meltings of the bone - And universal silence to be soon. - - - - -Transcriber’s Notes - - -Simple typographical errors were corrected. - -Page 2: “fourm” was printed that way. - -Pages 53-57: The poems of Frank Prewett are untitled except in the -Table of Contents, so two consecutive blank lines are the only visible -boundaries between them in some versions of this eBook. - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Oxford Poetry, 1921, by Various - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OXFORD POETRY, 1921 *** - -***** This file should be named 50429-0.txt or 50429-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/0/4/2/50429/ - -Produced by MWS, Charlie Howard, and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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- text-align: justify; - margin-bottom: .25em; - } - - table {width: 100%; max-width: 100%;} - - .tdl { - padding-left: .5em; - text-indent: -.5em; - padding-right: 0; - } - .tdl.sub {padding-left: 4em; text-indent: -2em;} - - p.drop-cap {text-indent: 0em; margin-bottom: .24em;} - p.drop-cap:first-letter { - float: none; - font-size: 150%; - margin-left: 0; - margin-right: 0; - text-indent: 0; - } - - p.drop-cap .smcap1 {margin-left: 0;} - p .smcap1 {font-size: 100%;} - - .smcap1 {font-variant: normal;} - -.stanza.drop-cap, p.drop-cap {text-indent: 0;} -.stanza.drop-cap:first-letter, p.drop-cap:first-letter { - float: none; - margin: 0 0 0 0; - font-size: 150%; - line-height: 1.2em; - font-weight: bold; -} - - span.smcap1 {margin-left: 0; letter-spacing: .075em;} - .stanza.drop-cap.ia:first-letter {margin-right: 0} - .stanza.drop-cap.ib:first-letter {margin-left: 0; margin-right: 0;} - .stanza.drop-cap.ig:first-letter {margin-left: 0; margin-right: 0;} - .stanza.drop-cap.ih:first-letter {margin-left: 0; 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margin-left: 0;} - .poem {display: block;} - .poem.wide {width: auto;} - .poem .stanza {page-break-inside: avoid;} - - .transnote { - page-break-inside: avoid; - margin-left: 2%; - margin-right: 2%; - margin-top: 1em; - margin-bottom: 1em; - padding: .5em; - } -} - </style> - </head> - -<body> - - -<pre> - -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Oxford Poetry, 1921, by Various - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: Oxford Poetry, 1921 - -Author: Various - -Editor: Alan Porter - Richard Hughes - Robert Graves - -Release Date: November 10, 2015 [EBook #50429] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OXFORD POETRY, 1921 *** - - - - -Produced by MWS, Charlie Howard, and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries) - - - - - - -</pre> - -<div class="hwidth"> - -<h1 class="gesperrt">OXFORD POETRY<br /> -<span class="smaller">1921</span></h1> - -<hr /> - -<div class="newpage p4 left"> -<p class="gesperrt vspace center"><span class="large"><i>UNIFORM VOLUMES</i></span></p> - -<div class="epubin2"> -<p class="center smaller">3<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i> <i>net</i> – 2<i>s.</i> <i>net</i></p> - -<div class="center"><div class="center-container"> -Oxford Poetry 1915<br /> -Oxford Poetry 1916<br /> -Oxford Poetry 1917<br /> -Oxford Poetry 1918<br /> -Oxford Poetry 1919<br /> -Oxford Poetry 1920 -</div></div> - -<p class="center smaller">7<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i> <i>net</i></p> - -<p class="p0 center">Oxford Poetry 1917–19</p> -</div> - -<p class="center large gesperrt">BASIL BLACKWELL</p> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<p class="newpage p4 vspace center gesperrt xxlarge"> -OXFORD POETRY<br /> -<span class="smaller">1921</span></p> - -<p class="p2 center gesperrt larger">EDITED BY<br /> -ALAN PORTER, RICHARD HUGHES,<br /> -ROBERT GRAVES</p> - -<p class="p2 center gesperrt larger">OXFORD BASIL BLACKWELL<br /> -MCMXXI</p> - -<hr /> - -<p class="newpage p4 center vspace"> -PRINTED AT THE<br /> -SHAKESPEARE HEAD PRESS<br /> -STRATFORD-UPON-AVON</p> - -<hr /> -</div> - -<div class="chapter hwidth2"> -<h2 title="Foreword"></h2> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">The Editors</span> of this year’s Oxford Poetry, -the work of undergraduates who have been in -residence since the date of the last collection, have -attempted to make the volume more representative -of Poetry and less representative merely of Oxford -than its predecessors. There is always at Oxford a -fashion in verse as much as in dress, and, to judge -from the bulk of contributions submitted, this fashion -has not changed materially since last noted and -recorded in print. Mr Jones-Smith, of Balliol, still -writes musically of brimming chalices, vermilion -lips, chrysoprase, lotuses, arabesques and darkling -spires against glimmering skies; Miss Smith-Jones, -of Somerville, is equally faithful to her scarlet sins, -beloved hearts, little clutching hands, little pattering -feet, rosaries, eternity, roundabouts, and glimmering -spires against darkling skies. Exclusion -of these worn properties has given the fewer writers -than usual represented here, extended elbow room, -and a chance of showing some individual capacity -for better or worse.</p> - -<p class="in0">Most of the pieces have already appeared serially in -<cite>The London Mercury</cite>, <cite>The Spectator</cite>, <cite>The Westminster -Gazette</cite>, <cite>The New Statesman</cite>, <cite>The Nation and Athenæum</cite>, -<cite>The Observer</cite>, and the other leading literary -reviews.</p> - -<p class="in0">For permission to use copyright poems, our thanks -are due to Messrs Christophers, publishers of Mr -Golding’s ‘Shepherd Singing Ragtime,’ and to -Messrs Sidgwick and Jackson, publishers of Mr -Rickword’s new volume ‘Behind the Eyes.’</p> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="hwidth"> -<div class="chapter"> -<h2><a id="CONTENTS"></a>CONTENTS</h2> - -<table summary="Contents"> - <tr> - <td class="tdl chap">F. N. W. BATESON (<i>Trinity</i>)</td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Trespassers</td> - <td class="tdr">Page <a href="#Page_1">1</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl chap">EDMUND BLUNDEN (<i>Queen’s</i>)</td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">The Watermill</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_2">2</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">The Scythe</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_4">4</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">That Time is Gone</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_7">7</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">The South-West Wind</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_8">8</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">The Canal</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_9">9</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">The March Bee</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_11">11</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl chap">LOUIS GOLDING (<i>Queen’s</i>)</td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Ploughman at the Plough</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_12">12</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Portrait of an Artist</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_13">13</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Shepherd singing Ragtime</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_14">14</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Ghosts Gathering</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_18">18</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Silver-badged Waiter</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_20">20</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl chap">ROBERT GRAVES (<i>St John’s</i>)</td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Cynics and Romantics</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_21">21</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Unicorn and the White Doe</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_22">22</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Sullen Moods</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_25">25</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Henry and Mary</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_27">27</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">On the Ridge</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_28">28</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">A Lover since Childhood</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_29">29</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl chap">ROSALEEN GRAVES (<i>Home Student</i>)</td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Night Sounds</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_30">30</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">‘A Stronger than he shall come upon him ...’</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_32">32</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Colour</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_33">33</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl chap">BERTRAM HIGGINS (<i>B.N.C.</i>)</td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">White Magic</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_34">34</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl chap">RICHARD HUGHES (<i>Oriel</i>)</td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Singing Furies</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_35">35</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">The Sermon</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_37">37</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Tramp</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_38">38</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Gratitude</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_40">40</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Judy</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_42">42</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Ruin</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_43">43</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl chap">ALAN PORTER (<i>Queen’s</i>)</td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Introduction to a Narrative Poem</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_44">44</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Summer Bathing</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_47">47</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Country Churchyard</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_49">49</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Museum</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_50">50</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Lost Lands</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_52">52</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl chap">FRANK PREWETT (<i>Christ Church</i>)</td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Come Girl, and embrace</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_53">53</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">I went out into the Fields</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_54">54</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Comrade, why do you weep?</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_56">56</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">The Winds caress the Trees</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_57">57</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl chap">EDGELL RICKWORD (<i>Pembroke</i>)</td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Complaint of a Tadpole confined in a jam-jar</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_58">58</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Regret for the Depopulation of Rural Districts</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_60">60</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Complaint after Psycho-Analysis</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_61">61</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Desire</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_62">62</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Trench Poets</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_63">63</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl sub">Winter Prophecies</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_64">64</a></td></tr> -</table> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_1">1</a></span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2><a id="F_N_W_BATESON"></a>F. N. W. BATESON</h2> -</div> - -<h3 class="nobreak">TRESPASSERS</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in6"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ig"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">Gauntly</span> outlined, white and still,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Three haystacks peer above the hill;<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r8">Three aged rakes thrust sprawlingly<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Fantastic tendons to the sky.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In the void and dismal yard<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Farmer’s dog keeps rasping guard,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Challenging night’s trespassers,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The solemn legions of the stars;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Growling ignominious scorn<br /></span> -<span class="i0">At Cancer and at Capricorn.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The yellow stars, serene and prim,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Tolerantly stare at him.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_2">2</a></span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2><a id="EDMUND_BLUNDEN"></a>EDMUND BLUNDEN</h2> -</div> - -<h3 class="nobreak">THE WATERMILL</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">I’ll</span> rise at midnight and I’ll rove<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Up the hill and down the drove<br /></span> -<span class="i2">That leads to the old unnoticed mill,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And think of one I used to love:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">There stooping to the hunching wall<br /></span> -<span class="i2">I’ll stare into the rush of stars<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Or bubbles that the waterfall<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Brings forth and breaks in ceaseless wars.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The shelving hills have made a fourm<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Where the mill holdings shelter warm,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">And here I came with one I loved<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To watch the seething millions swarm.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But long ago she grew a ghost<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Though walking with me every day;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Even when her beauty burned me most<br /></span> -<span class="i2">She to a spectre dimmed away—<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Until though cheeks all morning-bright<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And black eyes gleaming life’s delight<br /></span> -<span class="i2">And singing voice dwelt in my sense,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Herself paled on my inward sight.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">She grew one whom deep waters glassed.<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Then in dismay I hid from her,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And lone by talking brooks at last<br /></span> -<span class="i2">I found a Love still lovelier.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">O lost in tortured days of France!<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Yet still the moment comes like chance<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Born in the stirring midnight’s sigh<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_3">3</a></span> -<span class="i0">Or in the wild wet sunset’s glance:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And how I know not but this stream<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Still sounds like vision’s voice, and still<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I watch with Love the bubbles gleam,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">I walk with Love beside the mill.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The heavens are thralled with cloud, yet gray<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Half-moonlight swims the fields till day,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">The stubbled fields, the bleaching woods;—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Even this bleak hour is stolen away<br /></span> -<span class="i0">By this shy water falling low,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">And calling low the whole night through,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And calling back the long ago<br /></span> -<span class="i2">And richest world I ever knew.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The hop-kiln fingers cobweb-white<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With discord dim turned left and right,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">And when the wind was south and small<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The sea’s far whisper drowsed the night;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Scarce more than mantling ivy’s voice<br /></span> -<span class="i2">That in the tumbling water trailed.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Love’s spirit called me to rejoice<br /></span> -<span class="i2">When she to nothingness had paled:<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">For Love the daffodils shone here<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In grass the greenest of the year,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Daffodils seemed the sunset lights<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And silver birches budded clear:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And all from east to west there strode<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Great shafted clouds in argent air,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The shining chariot-wheels of God,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">And still Love’s moment sees them there.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_4">4</a></span></p> - -<h3>THE SCYTHE</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ia"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">A thick</span> hot haze had choked the valley grounds<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Long since, the dogday sun had gone his rounds<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Like a dull coal half lit with sulky heat;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And leas were iron, ponds were clay, fierce beat<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The blackening flies round moody cattle’s eyes.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Wasps on the mudbanks seemed a hornet’s size,<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r4">That on the dead roach battened. The plough’s increase<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Stood under a curse.<br /></span> -<span class="i20">Behold, the far release!<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Old wisdom breathless at her cottage door<br /></span> -<span class="i0">‘Sounds of abundance’ mused, and heard the roar<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of marshalled armies in the silent air,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And thought Elisha stood beside her there,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And clacking reckoned ere the next nightfall<br /></span> -<span class="i0">She’d turn the looking-glasses to the wall.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Faster than armies out of the burnt void<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The hour-glass clouds innumerably deployed;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And when the hay-folks next look up, the sky<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Sags black above them; scarce is time to fly.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And most run for their cottages; but Ward<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The mower for the inn beside the ford,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And slow strides he with shouldered scythe still bare,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">While to the coverts leaps the great-eyed hare.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">As he came in, the dust snatched up and whirled<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Hung high, and like a bell-rope whipped and twirled,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The brazen light glared round, the haze resolved<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_5">5</a></span> -<span class="i0">Into demoniac shapes bulged and convolved.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Well might poor ewes afar make bleatings wild,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Though this old trusting mower sat and smiled,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For from the hush of many days the land<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Had waked itself: and now on every hand<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Shrill swift alarm-notes, cries and counter-cries,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Lowings and crowings came and throbbing sighs.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Now atom lightning brandished on the moor,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Then out of sullen drumming came the roar<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of thunder joining battle east and west:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In hedge and orchard small birds durst not rest,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Flittering like dead leaves and like wisps of straws,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And the cuckoo called again, for without pause<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Oncoming voices in the vortex burred.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The storm came toppling like a wave, and blurred<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In grey the trees that like black steeples towered.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The sun’s last yellow died. Then who but cowered?<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Down ruddying darkness floods the hideous flash,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And pole to pole the cataract whirlwinds clash.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Alone within the tavern parlour still<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Sat the gray mower, pondering his God’s will,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And flinching not to flame or bolt, that swooped<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With a great hissing rain till terror drooped<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In weariness: and then there came a roar<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Ten-thousand-fold, he saw not, was no more—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But life bursts on him once again, and blood<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Beats droning round, and light comes in a flood.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">He stares, and sees the sashes battered awry,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The wainscot shivered, the crocks shattered, and by,<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_6">6</a></span> -<span class="i0">His twisted scythe, melted by its fierce foe,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Whose Parthian shot struck down the chimney. Slow<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Old Ward lays hand to his old working-friend,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And thanking God Whose mercy did defend<br /></span> -<span class="i0">His servant, yet must drop a tear or two<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And think of times when that old scythe was new,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And stands in silent grief, nor hears the voices<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of many a bird that through the land rejoices,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Nor sees through the smashed panes the sea-green sky,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">That ripens into blue, nor knows the storm is by.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_7">7</a></span></p> - -<h3>THE TIME IS GONE</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ih"> -<span class="i4x"><span class="smcap1">The time</span> is gone when we could throw<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Our angle in the sleepy stream,<br /></span> -<span class="i4">And nothing more desired to know<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Than was it roach or was it bream?<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Sitting there in such a mute delight,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The Kingfisher would come and on the rods alight.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">Or hurrying through the dewy hay<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Without a thought but to make haste<br /></span> -<span class="i4">We came to where the old ring lay<br /></span> -<span class="i4">And bats and balls seemed heaven at least.<br /></span> -<span class="i4">With our laughing and our giant strokes<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The echoes clacked among the chestnuts and the oaks.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">When the spring came up we got<br /></span> -<span class="i4">And out among wild Emmet Hills<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Blossoms, aye and pleasures sought<br /></span> -<span class="i4">And found! bloom withers, pleasure chills;<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Like geographers along green brooks<br /></span> -<span class="i0">We named the capes and tumbling bays and horseshoe crooks.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">But one day I found a man<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Leaning on the bridge’s rail;<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Dared his face as all to scan,<br /></span> -<span class="i4">And awestruck wondered what could ail<br /></span> -<span class="i4">An elder, blest with all the gifts of years,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In such a happy place to shed such bitter tears.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_8">8</a></span></p> - -<h3>THE SOUTH-WEST WIND</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap iw"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">We stood</span> by the idle weir,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Like bells the waters played,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The rich moonlight slept everywhere<br /></span> -<span class="i2">As it would never fade:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">So slept our shining peace of mind<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Till rose a south-west wind.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">How sorrow comes who knows?<br /></span> -<span class="i2">And here joy surely had been:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But joy like any wild wind blows<br /></span> -<span class="i2">From mountains none has seen,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And still its cloudy veilings throws<br /></span> -<span class="i2">On the bright road it goes.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The black-plumed poplars swung<br /></span> -<span class="i2">So softly across the sky:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The ivy sighed, the river sung,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Woolpacks were wafting high:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The moon her golden tinges flung<br /></span> -<span class="i2 r4">On these she straight was lost among.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">O south-west wind of the soul,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">That brought such new delight,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And passing by in music stole<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Love’s rich and trusting light,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Would that we thrilled to thy least breath<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Now all is still as death.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_9">9</a></span></p> - -<h3>THE CANAL</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ig"> -<span class="i4x"><span class="smcap1">There</span> so dark and still<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Slept the water, never changing,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">From the glad sport in the meadows<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Oft I turned me.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">Fear would strike me chill<br /></span> -<span class="i0">On the clearest day in summer,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Yet I loved to stand and ponder<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Hours together<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">By the tarred bridge rail—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">There the lockman’s vine-clad window,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Mirrored in the tomb-like water<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Stared in silence<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">Till, deformed and pale<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In the sunken cavern shadows,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">One by one imagined demons<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Scowled upon me.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">Barges passed me by,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With their unknown surly masters<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And small cabins, whereon some rude<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Hand had painted<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">Trees and castles high.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Cheerly stepped the towing horses,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And the women sung their children<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Into slumber.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">Barges, too, I saw<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Drowned in mud, drowned, drowned long ages,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Their gray ribs but seen in summer,<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Their names never:<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_10">10</a></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">In whose silted maw<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Swarmed great eels, the priests of darkness,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Old as they, who came at midnight<br /></span> -<span class="i4">To destroy me.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">Like one blind and lame<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Who by some new sense has vision<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And strikes deadlier than the strongest<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Went this water.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">Many an angler came,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Went his ways; and I would know them,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Some would smile and give me greeting,<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Some kept silence—<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">Most, one old dragoon<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Who had never a morning hallo,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But with stony eye strode onward<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Till the water,<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">On a silent noon,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">That had watched him long, commanded:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Whom he answered, leaping headlong<br /></span> -<span class="i4">To self-murder.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">‘Fear and fly the spell,’<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Thus my Spirit sang beside me;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Then once more I ranged the meadows,<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Yet still brooded,<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">When the threefold knell<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Sounded through the haze of harvest—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Who had found the lame blind water<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Swift and seeing?<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_11">11</a></span></p> - -<h3>THE MARCH BEE</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ia"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">A warming</span> wind comes to my resting-place<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And in a mountain cloud the lost sun chills;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Night comes, and yet before she shows her face<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The sun flings off the shadows, warm light fills<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The valley and the clearings on the hills,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Bleak crow the moorcocks on the fen’s blue plashes,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But here I warm myself with these bright looks and flashes.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And like to me the merry humble bee<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Puts fear aside, runs forth to meet the sun<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And by the ploughlands’ shoulder comes to see<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The flowers that like him best, and seems to shun<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Cold countless quaking windflowers every one,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Primroses too; but makes poor grass his choice<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Where small wood-strawberry blossoms nestle and rejoice.<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r6">The magpies steering round from wood to wood,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Tree-creepers flicking up to elms’ green rind,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Bold gnats that revel round my solitude<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And most this pleasant bee intent to find<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The new-born joy, inveigle the rich mind<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Long after darkness comes cold-lipped to one<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Still hearkening to the bee, still basking in the sun.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_12">12</a></span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2><a id="LOUIS_GOLDING"></a>LOUIS GOLDING</h2> -</div> - -<h3 class="nobreak">PLOUGHMAN AT THE PLOUGH</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">He behind</span> the straight plough stands<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Stalwart, firm shafts in firm hands.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0 r8">Naught he cares for wars and naught<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For the fierce disease of thought.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Only for the winds, the sheer<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Naked impulse of the year,<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Only for the soil, which stares<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Clean into God’s face, he cares.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">In the stark might of his deed<br /></span> -<span class="i0">There is more than art or creed;<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">In his wrist more strength is hid<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Than the monstrous Pyramid;<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Stauncher than stern Everest<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Be the muscles of his breast;<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Not the Atlantic sweeps a flood<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Potent as the ploughman’s blood.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">He, his horse, his ploughshare, these<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Are the only verities.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Dawn to dusk with God he stands,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The Earth poised on his broad hands.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_13">13</a></span></p> - -<h3>PORTRAIT OF AN ARTIST</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ia"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">I have</span> been given eyes<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Which are neither foolish nor wise,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Seeing through joy or pain<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Beauty alone remain.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">I have been given an ear<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Which catches nothing clear,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But only along the day<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A song stealing away.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0 r4">My feet and hands never could<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Do anything evil or good:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Instead of these things,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A swift mouth that sings.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_14">14</a></span></p> - -<h3>SHEPHERD SINGING RAGTIME<br /> - -<span class="subhead">(<i>For F. V. Branford</i>)</span></h3> - -<div class="poem-container"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">The shepherd</span> sings:<br /></span> -<span class="i7">’<em>Way down in Dixie,</em><br /></span> -<span class="i8"><em>Way down in Dixie,</em><br /></span> -<span class="i2"><em>Where the hens are dog-gone glad to lay....</em>’<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">With shaded eyes he stands to look<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Across the hills where the clouds swoon,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">He singing, leans upon his crook,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">He sings, he sings no more.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The wind is muffled in the tangled hair<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of sheep that drift along the noon.<br /></span> -<span class="i2">The mild sheep stare<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With amber eyes about the pearl-flecked June.<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Two skylarks soar<br /></span> -<span class="i2">With singing flame<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Into the sun whence first they came.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">All else is only grasshoppers<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Or a brown wing the shepherd stirs,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Who, like a slow tree moving, goes<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Where the pale tide of sheep-drift flows.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">See! the sun smites<br /></span> -<span class="i2">With molten lights<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The turned wing of a gull that glows<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Aslant the violet, the profound<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Dome of the mid-June heights.<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_15">15</a></span> -<span class="i0">Alas! again the grasshoppers,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The birds, the slumber-winging bees,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Alas! again for those and these<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Demure things drowned;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Drowned in vain raucous words men made<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Where no lark rose with swift and sweet<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Ascent and where no dim sheep strayed<br /></span> -<span class="i0">About the stone immensities,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Where no sheep strayed and where no bees<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Probed any flowers nor swung a blade<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Of grass with pollened feet.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">He sings:<br /></span> -<span class="i10">‘<em>In Dixie,</em><br /></span> -<span class="i6"><em>Way down in Dixie,</em><br /></span> -<span class="i2"><em>Where the hens are dog-gone glad to lay</em><br /></span> -<span class="i2"><em>Scrambled eggs in the new-mown hay....</em>’<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The herring-gulls with peevish cries<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Rebuke the man who sings vain words;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">His sheep-dog growls a low complaint,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Then turns to chasing butterflies.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But when the indifferent singing-birds<br /></span> -<span class="i0">From midmost down to dimmest shore<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Innumerably confirm their songs,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And grasshoppers make summer rhyme<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And solemn bees in the wild thyme<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Clash cymbals and beat gongs,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The shepherd’s words once more are faint,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Once more the alien song is thinned<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Upon the long course of the wind,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">He sings, he sings no more.<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_16">16</a></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Ah now the dear monotonies<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of bells that jangle on the sheep<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To the low limit of the hills!<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Till the blue cup of music spills<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Into the boughs of lowland trees;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Till thence the lowland singings creep<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Into the dreamful shepherd’s head,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Creep drowsily through his blood;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The young thrush fluting all he knows,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The ring dove moaning his false woes,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Almost the rabbit’s tiny tread,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">The last unfolding bud.<br /></span> -<span class="i12">But now,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Now a cool word spreads out along the sea.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Now the day’s violet is cloud-tipped with gold.<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Now dusk most silently<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Fills the hushed day with other wings than birds’.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Now where on foam-crest waves the seagulls rock,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To their cliff-haven go the seagulls thence.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">So too the shepherd gathers in his flock,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Because birds journey to their dens,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Tired sheep to their still fold.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">A dark first bat swoops low and dips<br /></span> -<span class="i0">About the shepherd who now sings<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A song of timeless evenings;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For dusk is round him with wide wings,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Dusk murmurs on his moving lips.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza italic"> -<span class="i2">There is not mortal man who knows<br /></span> -<span class="i2">From whence the shepherd’s song arose:<br /></span> -<span class="i4">It came a thousand years ago.<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_17">17</a></span> -</div><div class="stanza italic"> -<span class="i2">Once the world’s shepherds woke to lead<br /></span> -<span class="i2">The folded sheep that they might feed<br /></span> -<span class="i4">On green downs where winds blow.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza italic"> -<span class="i2">One shepherd sang a golden word.<br /></span> -<span class="i2">A thousand miles away one heard.<br /></span> -<span class="i4">One sang it swift, one sang it slow.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza italic"> -<span class="i2">Two skylarks heard, two skylarks told<br /></span> -<span class="i2">All shepherds this same song of gold<br /></span> -<span class="i4">On all downs where winds blow.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza italic"> -<span class="i2">This is the song that shepherds must<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Sing till the green downlands be dust<br /></span> -<span class="i4">And tide of sheep-drift no more flow;<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza italic"> -<span class="i2">The song two skylarks told again<br /></span> -<span class="i2">To all the sheep and shepherd men<br /></span> -<span class="i4">On green downs where winds blow.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_18">18</a></span></p> - -<h3>GHOSTS GATHERING</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem wide"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">You hear</span> no bones click, see no shaken shroud.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Though no tombs grin, you feel ghosts gathering. Crowd<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">On pitiful crowd of small dead singing men<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Tread the sure earth they feebly hymned; again<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">With fleshless hand seize unswayed grass. They seize<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Insensitive flowers which bend not. Through gross trees<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">They sift. Nothing withstands them. Nothing knows<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Them nor the songs they sang, their busy woes.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">‘Hence from these ingrate things! To the towns!’ they weep,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">(If ghosts have tears). You think a wrinkled heap<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Of leaves heaved, or a wing stirred, less than this.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Some chance on the midnight cities. Others miss<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The few faint lights, thin voices. Wretched these<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Doomed to beat long the windy vacancies!<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Some mourn through forlorn towns. They prowl and seek<br /></span> -<span class="i0">—What seek they? Who knows them? If branches creak<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">And leaves flap and slow women ply their trade,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Those all are living things, but these are dead,<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">All that they were, dead totally. What fool still<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Knows their extinguished songs? They had their fill<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_19">19</a></span> -<span class="i0">Of average joys and sorrows. They learned how<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Love wilts, Death does not wilt. What more left now?<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But one ghost yet of all these ghosts may find<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Himself not utterly faded.<br /></span> -<span class="i26">Through his blind<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Some old man’s lamp-rays probe the darkness. Sick<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of his gaunt quest, the ghost halts. The clock’s tick<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Troubles the silence. Tiredly the ghost scans<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The opened book on the table. A flame fans,<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">A weak wan fire floods through his subtle veins.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">No, no, not wholly forgotten! Loves and pains<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Not suffered wholly for nothing!<br /></span> -<span class="i32">(The old man bends<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Over the book, makes notes for pious ends,<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">—Some curious futile work twelve men at most<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Will read and yawn over.) The dizzy ghost,<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Like some more ignorant moth circles the light...<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Not suffered wholly for nothing!... ‘A sweet night!’<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The old man mumbles.... A warmth is in the air,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">He smiles, not knowing why. He moves his chair<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Closer against the table. And sitting bowed<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Lovingly turns the leaves and chants aloud.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_20">20</a></span></p> - -<h3>SILVER-BADGED WAITER</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">Poor</span> trussed-up lad, what piteous guise<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Cloaks the late splendour of your eyes,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Stiffens the fleetness of your face<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Into a mask of sleek disgrace,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And makes a smooth caricature<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of your taut body’s swift and sure<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Poise, like a proud bird waiting one<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Moment ere he taunt the sun;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Your body that stood foolish-wise<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Stormed by the treasons of the skies,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Star-like that hung, deliberate<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Above the dubieties of Fate,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But with an April gesture chose<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Unutterable and certain woes!<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And now you stand with discreet charm<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Dropping the napkin round your arm,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Anticipate your tip while you<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Hear the commercial travellers chew.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">You shuffle with their soups and beers<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Who held at heel the howling fears,<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r6">You whose young limbs were proud to dare<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Challenge the black hosts of despair!<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_21">21</a></span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2><a id="ROBERT_GRAVES"></a>ROBERT GRAVES</h2> -</div> - -<h3 class="nobreak">CYNICS AND ROMANTICS</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">In club</span> and messroom let them sit<br /></span> -<span class="i0">At skirmish of ingenious wit;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Deriding Love, yet not with hearts<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Accorded to those healthier parts<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of grim self-mockery, but with mean<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r4">And burrowing search for things unclean,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Pretended deafness, twisted sense,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Sharp innuendoes rising thence,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And affectation of prude-shame<br /></span> -<span class="i0">That shrinks from using the short name.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">We are not envious of their sour<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Disintegrations of Love’s power,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Their swift analysis of the stabs<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Devised by virgins and by drabs<br /></span> -<span class="i0">(Powder or lace or scent) to excite<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A none-too-jaded appetite.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">They never guess of Love as we<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Have found the amazing Art to be,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Pursuit of dazzling flame, or flight<br /></span> -<span class="i0">From web-hung blackness of night,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With laughter only to express<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Care overborne by carelessness;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">They never bridge from small to great,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">From nod or glance to ideal Fate,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">From clouded forehead or slow sigh<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To doubt and agony looming by,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">From shining gaze and hair flung free<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To infinity and to eternity—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">They sneer and poke a treacherous joke<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With scorn for our rusticity.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_22">22</a></span></p> - -<h3>UNICORN AND THE WHITE DOE</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in1"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ib al"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">‘Alone</span><br /></span> -<span class="i0">Through forests evergreen,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">By legend known,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">By no eye seen,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Unmated<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Unbaited<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Untrembling between<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The shifting shadows<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The sudden echoes,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Deathless I go<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Unheard, unseen,’<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Says the White Doe.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Unicorn with bursting heart<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Breath of love has drawn<br /></span> -<span class="i0">On his desolate crags apart<br /></span> -<span class="i2">At rumour of dawn,<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Has volleyed forth his pride<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Twenty thousand years mute,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Tossed his horn from side to side<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Lunged with his foot.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">‘Like a storm of sand I run<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Breaking the desert’s boundaries,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I go in hiding from the sun<br /></span> -<span class="i2">In thick shade of trees<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_23">23</a></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Straight was the track I took<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Across the plains, but here with briar<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And mire the tangled alleys crook<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Baulking my desire.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Ho, there! what glinted white?<br /></span> -<span class="i2">(A bough still shakes)<br /></span> -<span class="i0">What was it darted from my sight<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Through the forest brakes?<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Where are you fled from me?<br /></span> -<span class="i2">I pursue, you fade;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I run, you hide from me<br /></span> -<span class="i2">In the dark glade.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Towering straight the trees grow,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">The grass grows thick.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Where you are, I do not know,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">You fly so quick.’<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">‘Seek me not here<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Lodged among mortal deer,’<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Says the White Doe,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">‘Keeping one place<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Held by the ties of space,’<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Says the White Doe.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">‘I<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Equally<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In air<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Above your bare<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Hill crest, your basalt lair,<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_24">24</a></span> -<span class="i0">Mirage reflected drink<br /></span> -<span class="i0">At the clear pool’s brink<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With tigers at play<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In the glare of day<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Blithely I stray,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Under shadow of myrtle<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With Phoenix and his Turtle<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For all time true,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With Gryphons at grass<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Under the Upas,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Sipping warm dew<br /></span> -<span class="i0">That falls hourly new,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I, unattainable<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Complete, incomprehensible<br /></span> -<span class="i0">No mate for you.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In sun’s beam<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Or star-gleam,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">No mate for you<br /></span> -<span class="i0">No mate for you,’<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Says the White Doe.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_25">25</a></span></p> - -<h3>SULLEN MOODS</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap il"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">Love</span>, do not count your labour lost<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Though I turn sullen, grim, retired<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Even at your side; my thought is crossed<br /></span> -<span class="i2">With fancies by old longings fired.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">And when I answer you, some days<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Vaguely and wildly, do not fear<br /></span> -<span class="i0">That my love goes forbidden ways<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Hating the laws that bind it here.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">If I speak gruffly, this mood is<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Mere indignation at my own<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Shortcomings, plagues, uncertainties;<br /></span> -<span class="i2">I forget the gentler tone.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">‘You,’ now that you have come to be<br /></span> -<span class="i2">My one beginning, prime and end,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I count at last as wholly ‘me,’<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Lover no longer nor yet friend.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Friendship is flattery, though close hid;<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Must I then flatter my own mind?<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And must (which laws of shame forbid)<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Blind love of you make self-love blind?<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Do not repay me my own coin,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">The sharp rebuke, the frown, the groan;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But stir my memory to disjoin<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Your emanation from my own.<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_26">26</a></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Help me to see you as before<br /></span> -<span class="i2">When overwhelmed and dead, almost,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I stumbled on that secret door<br /></span> -<span class="i2 r4">Which saves the live man from the ghost.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Be once again the distant light,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Promise of glory, not yet known<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In full perfection—wasted quite<br /></span> -<span class="i2">When on my imperfection thrown.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_27">27</a></span></p> - -<h3>HENRY AND MARY</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">Henry</span> was a worthy king,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Mary was his queen,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">He gave to her a snowdrop<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Upon a stalk of green.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Then all for his kindness<br /></span> -<span class="i2">And all for his care<br /></span> -<span class="i0">She gave him a new-laid egg<br /></span> -<span class="i2">In the garden there.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Love, can you sing?<br /></span> -<span class="i18">I cannot sing.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Or story-tell?<br /></span> -<span class="i14 r6">Not one I know.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Then let us play at queen and king,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">As down the garden walks we go.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_28">28</a></span></p> - -<h3>ON THE RIDGE</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">Below</span> the ridge a raven flew,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And we heard the lost curlew<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Mourning out of sight below<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Mountain tops were touched with snow;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Even the long dividing plain<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Showed no wealth of sheep or grain,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But fields of boulders lay like corn<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And raven’s croak was shepherd’s horn<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To slow cloud shadow strayed across<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A pasture of thin heath and moss.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The North Wind rose; I saw him press<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With lusty force against your dress,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Moulding your body’s inward grace,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And streaming off from your set face,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">So now no longer flesh and blood<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r4">But poised in marble thought you stood;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">O wingless Victory, loved of men,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Who could withstand your triumph then?<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_29">29</a></span></p> - -<h3>A LOVER SINCE CHILDHOOD</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in1"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ig"> -<span class="i4x"><span class="smcap1">Tangled</span> in thought am I,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Stumble in speech do I?<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Do I blunder and blush for the reason why?<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Wander aloof do I,<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Lean over gates and sigh,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Making friends with the bee and the butterfly?<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">If thus and thus I do<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Dazed by the thought of you,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Walking my sorrowful way in the early dew,<br /></span> -<span class="i4">My heart pierced through and through<br /></span> -<span class="i4">By this despair of you,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Starved for a word or a look will my hope renew.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i4">Give then a thought for me<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Walking so miserably,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Wanting relief in the friendship or flower or tree,<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Do but remember, we<br /></span> -<span class="i4">Once could in love agree<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Swallow your pride, let us be as we used to be.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_30">30</a></span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2><a id="ROSALEEN_GRAVES"></a>ROSALEEN GRAVES</h2> -</div> - -<h3 class="nobreak">NIGHT-SOUNDS</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">Faintly</span> through my window come<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Sounds of things unheard by day,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Things that nightly speak and play,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But by day again go dumb.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Uncouth owls, with shuddering cry,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Flap great wings in horrid grief<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Flap and swoop on journeys brief,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Hooting long and miserably.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Lurching in unsteady flight<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Comes a lean bat, singing shrill,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Stumbles on my window sill,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And staggers off into the night.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Wild duck, waking on the marsh,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Din against my sleepy senses;<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Like the wind on creaking fences<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Comes their croaking, faint and harsh.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">There’s a little bush I hear<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Muttering, frightened, half-asleep;<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Now a leafy voice, more deep,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Rustles vague comfort, soothes its fear.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Water flows not as by day.<br /></span> -<span class="i2">A new tone through its voice has crept.<br /></span> -<span class="i2 r4">Streams that in daylight laughed and leapt<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And had humorous things to say,<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_31">31</a></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Speak so gravely now, and mutter<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Of things secret, scarcely guessed,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Winds’ and Waters’ veiled unrest,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Griefs too big for man to utter.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Of the days before man came<br /></span> -<span class="i2">The days when man shall be no more,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">And Earth again be ruled by Four,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Air and Water, Earth and Flame.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Now a sudden silence falls;<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Until like rocking, silver boats<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Come the curlew’s ripply notes<br /></span> -<span class="i0">How far the curious music calls!<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">And sweet twitters whisper clearly<br /></span> -<span class="i2">From the tree tops dimly seen<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Piping from the shadowy green<br /></span> -<span class="i0">That the dawn is here, or nearly.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_32">32</a></span></p> - -<h3>‘A STRONGER THAN HE SHALL COME UPON HIM...’</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem wide"><div class="stanza drop-cap al"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">And</span> then he was seized by one who was stronger than he,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Seized and tamed and bound and forced to obey;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">From the swinging choice of evil or good he was free;<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Good was no longer; evil had vanished away<br /></span> -<span class="i2">He left to another the gain or loss of the day.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Was he driven or drawn? What matter? He was content.<br /></span> -<span class="i2">He yielded him, body and soul, to the whirl of War<br /></span> -<span class="i0">As one yields to the high sea-wind, and is buffered, bent<br /></span> -<span class="i2">To his will, when, shouting, he stamps in over the shore<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Triumphant, driving all things like dust before.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Can aught but a rock stand firm, or question his might<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Who tosses the leaves and clouds from a hand so strong?<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The trees and grasses bow in awe of his might,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">And men in the mountains, hearing his giant-song,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Yield, and are hurried—whirled—hounded along.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Thus he yielded to War, who was stronger than he—<br /></span> -<span class="i2">No time to think—no time to ponder and weigh—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">He was swept like a straw on the wind—and yet he knew himself free<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Was it freedom or bondage, this? In truth, it were hard to say;<br /></span> -<span class="i2">But, slave or king, he bowed his head to obey.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_33">33</a></span></p> - -<h3>COLOUR</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">Flowers</span>, thick as stars, lay<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Splashed about the roadway—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Flowers nodding up and down,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Gold, lilac, fern-brown,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Colour in which to drown.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The Channel was a dark blue streak,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With pools rosy like the cheek<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Of a girl too shy to speak,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And coloured clouds went tossing past,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Warm and windy,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Vivid and quaint,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Faint and eager and vast.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Colour, thick as dust, lay<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Spattered about the highway—<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r4">Colour so bright that one would think<br /></span> -<span class="i0">White, blue, cherry-pink<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Were made to clutch and drink,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Colour that made one stop and say,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">‘Earth, are you Heaven to-day?’<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Colour that made one pray.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Lumps of colour, liquid and cool,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Cool and near,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Clear and gay<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Tumbled about my way.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_34">34</a></span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2><a id="BERTRAM_HIGGINS_BNC"></a>BERTRAM HIGGINS (B.N.C.)</h2> -</div> - -<h3 class="nobreak">WHITE MAGIC</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">You</span> came, but still, with heart full-given to gladness,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I paused, as one stands stricken ere he falls;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Not yet my fumblings swept their bounds, clogged sense its<br /></span> -<span class="i10">Weakling walls.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Quaint spaceless musings held me—idiot Mind was<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Gaped and gilled like a fish to suck through slow<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Tentative pores swift sweetness of strange waters’<br /></span> -<span class="i10">Ebb and flow.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Yet how could I praise in darkness?—Life, like a sodded<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r8">Seed, moved in drought-sleep and cleft its clay<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Freshly it seemed, though each sap-season spired its<br /></span> -<span class="i10">Stalks into day:<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Till now (ah, deft magician!) your wand hovers<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Over all Spirit—over those lost grey fields<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Where one frail flower, with burning stem, glad, gradual<br /></span> -<span class="i10">Petals yields;<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">And whose past pitiful bitter blooms live only<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In the flushed mockery of remembering lovers.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_35">35</a></span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2><a id="RICHARD_HUGHES"></a>RICHARD HUGHES</h2> -</div> - -<h3 class="nobreak">THE SINGING FURIES</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">The yellow</span> sky grows vivid as the sun,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The sea glittering, and the hills dun.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The stones quiver. Twenty pounds of lead<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Fold upon fold, the air laps my head.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Both eyes scorch: tongue stiff and bitter.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Flies buzz, but no birds twitter:<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Slow bullocks stand with stinging feet,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And naked fishes scarcely stir, for heat.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i2">White as smoke,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">As jetted steam, dead clouds awoke<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And quivered on the Western rim.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And then the singing started, dim<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And sibilant as rime-stiff reeds<br /></span> -<span class="i0">That whistle as the wind leads.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The North answered, low and clear;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The South whispered hard and sere,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And thunder muffled up like drums<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Beat, whence the East-wind comes.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The heavy sky that could not weep<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Is loosened: rain falls steep,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And thirty singing furies ride<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To split the sky from side to side.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">They sing, and lash the wet-flanked wind:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Sing, from Col to Hafod Mynd<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_36">36</a></span> -<span class="i0">And fling their voices half a score<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of miles along the mounded shore:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Whip loud music from a tree,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And roll their paean out to sea<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Where crowded breakers fling and leap,<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r6">And strange things throb five fathoms deep.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The sudden tempest roared and died:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The singing furies muted ride<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Down wet and slippery roads to hell;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And, silent in their captors’ train<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Two fishers, storm-caught on the main;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A shepherd, battered with his flocks;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A pit-boy tumbled from the rocks,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A dozen back-broke gulls, and hosts<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of shadowy, small, pathetic ghosts,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of mice and leverets caught by flood,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Their beauty shrouded in cold mud.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_37">37</a></span></p> - -<h3>THE SERMON<br /> - -<span class="subhead">(<i>Wales</i> 1920).</span></h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap il"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">Like</span> grippt stick<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Still I sit:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Eyes fixed on far small eyes,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Full of it:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">On the old, broad face,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The hung chin;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Heavy arms, surplice<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Worn through and worn thin.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Probe I the hid mind<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Under the gross flesh:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Clutch at poetic words,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Follow their mesh<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Scarce heaving breath.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Clutch, marvel, wonder,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Till the words end.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Stilled is the muttered thunder:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The hard, few people wake,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Gather their books and go—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Whether their hearts could break<br /></span> -<span class="i0">How can I know?<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_38">38</a></span></p> - -<h3>TRAMP</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap iw"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">When</span> a brass sun staggers above the sky,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">When feet cleave to boots, and the tongue’s dry,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And sharp dust goads the rolling eye,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Come thoughts of wine, and dancing thoughts of girls:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">They shiver their white arms, and the head whirls,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And noon light is hid in their dark curls:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Noon feet stumble, and head swims.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Out shines the sun, and the thought dims,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And death, for blood, runs in the weak limbs.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">To fall on flints in the shade of tall nettles<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Gives easy sleep as a bed of rose petals,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And dust drifting from the highway<br /></span> -<span class="i0">As light a coverlet as down may.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The myriad feet of many-sized flies<br /></span> -<span class="i0">May not open those tired eyes.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The first wind of night<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Twitches the coverlet away quite:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The first wind and large first rain<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Flickers the dry pulse to life again:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Flickers the lids burning on the eyes<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With sudden flashes of the slipping skies.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Hunger, oldest visionary,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Hides a devil in a tree,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Hints a glory in the clouds,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Fills the crooked air with crowds<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of ivory sightless demons singing—<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_39">39</a></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Eyes start: straightens back:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Limbs stagger and crack:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But Brain flies, Brain soars<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Up, where the Sky roars<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Upon the back of cherubim:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Brain rockets up to Him.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Body gives another twist<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To the slack waist-band;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In agony clenches fist<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Till the nails bite the hand.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Body floats light as air,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With rain in its sparse hair:<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Brain returns, and would tell<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The things he has seen well:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Body will not stir his lips:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Brain and Body come to grips.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Deadly each hates the other<br /></span> -<span class="i0">As treacherous blood-brother:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">No sight, no sound shows<br /></span> -<span class="i0">How the struggle goes.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">They sink at last faint in the wet gutter;<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r4">So many words to sing that the tongue cannot utter.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_40">40</a></span></p> - -<h3>GRATITUDE</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">Eternal</span> gratitude—a long, thin word:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">When meant, oftenest left unheard:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">When light on the tongue, light in the purse too:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of curious metallurgy: when coined true<br /></span> -<span class="i0">It glitters not, is neither large nor small:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">More worth than rubies—less, times, than a ball.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Not gift, nor willed: yet through its wide range<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Buys what it buys exact, and leaves no change.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Old Gurney had it, won on a hot day<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With ale, from glib-voiced Gypsy by the way.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">He held it lightly: for ’twas a rum start<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To find a hedgeling who had still a heart:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">So put it down for twist of a beggar’s tongue...<br /></span> -<span class="i0"><em>He</em> had not felt the heat: how the dust stung<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A face June-roasted: <em>he</em> saw not the look<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Aslant the gift-mug; how the hand shook...<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Yet the words rang his head, and he grew merry<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And whistled from the Boar to Wrye-brook ferry,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And chaffed with Ferryman when the hawser creakt<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Or slipping bilge showed where the planks leakt:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Lent hand himself, till doubly hard the barge<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Butted its nose in mud of the farther marge.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">When Gurney leapt to shore, he found—dismay!<br /></span> -<span class="i0">He had no tuppence—(Tuppence was to pay<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To sulky Ferryman)—‘Naught have I,’ says he,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">‘Naught, but the gratitude of Tammas Lee<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Given one hour.’—Sulky Charon grinned:<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_41">41</a></span> -<span class="i0">‘Done,’ said he. ‘Done: I take—all of it, mind.’<br /></span> -<span class="i0">‘Done,’ cries Jan Gurney. Down the road he went,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But by the ford left all his merriment.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">This is the tale of midday chaffering:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">How Charon took, and Gurney lost the thing:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">How Ferryman gave it for his youngest daughter<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To a tall lad who saved her out of water—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">(Being old and mean, had none of his own to give,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">So passed on Tammas’; glad to see her live):<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And how young Farmer paid his quarter’s rent<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With that one coin, when all else was spent,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And how Squire kept it for some goldless debt...<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For aught I know, it wanders current yet.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Yet Tammas was no angel in disguise:<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r4">He stole Squire’s chickens—often: he told lies,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Robbed Charon’s garden, burnt young Farmer’s ricks<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And played the village many lowsy tricks.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">No children sniffled, and no dog cried<br /></span> -<span class="i0">When full of oaths and smells, he died.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_42">42</a></span></p> - -<h3>JUDY</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">Sand</span> hot to haunches:<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Sun beating eyes down,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Yet they peer under lashes<br /></span> -<span class="i2">At the hill’s crown:<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">See how the hill slants<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Up the sky halfway:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Over the top tall clouds<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Poke gold and grey.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Down: see a green field<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Tipped on its short edge,<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r4">Its upper rim straggled round<br /></span> -<span class="i2">By a black hedge.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Grass bright as new brass:<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Uneven dark gorse<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Stuck to its own shadow<br /></span> -<span class="i2"><em>Like Judy that black horse</em>.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Birds clatter numberless,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">And the breeze tells<br /></span> -<span class="i0">That beanflower somewhere<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Has ousted the bluebells.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Birds clatter numberless:<br /></span> -<span class="i2">In the muffled wood<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Big feet move slowly:<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Mean no good.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_43">43</a></span></p> - -<h3>THE RUIN</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem wide"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">Gone</span> are the coloured princes, gone echo, gone laughter:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Drips the blank roof: and the moss creeps after.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Dead is the crumbled chimney: all mellowed to rotting<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The wall-tints, and the floor-tints, from the spotting<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of the rain, from the wind and slow appetite<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of patient mould: and of the worms that bite<br /></span> -<span class="i0">At beauty all their innumerable lives.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">But the sudden nip of knives,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The lady aching for her stiffening lord,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The passionate-fearful bride,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And beaded Pallor clamped to the torment-board,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">—Leave they no ghosts, no memories by the stairs?<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">No sheeted glimmer treading floorless ways?<br /></span> -<span class="i0">No haunting melody of lovers’ airs,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Nor stealthy chill upon the noon of days?<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">No: for the dead and senseless walls have long forgotten<br /></span> -<span class="i0">What passionate hearts beneath the turf lie rotten.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Only from roofs and chimneys pleasantly sliding<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Tumbles the rain in the early hours,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Patters its thousand feet on the flowers,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Cools its small grey feet in the grasses.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_44">44</a></span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2><a id="ALAN_PORTER"></a>ALAN PORTER</h2> -</div> - -<h3 class="nobreak">INTRODUCTION TO A NARRATIVE POEM</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">The vapour</span>, twining and twitching, seems to throw<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Black, precipitous boulders to and fro<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Light as a bandied scoff; and, look, the cliff—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Whose root claws at the midworld fire with stiff<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Unmolten, adamantine fingers—fails,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Lurches. Above, cold and eternal gales<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Run worrying, shredding, eternal sunlight; snatch<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r8">At the heather; puff at the flocks of cotton; scratch<br /></span> -<span class="i0">White scars along the bents. If strangers climb<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To this plateau that buffets back slow time,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">They stand awhile impotent, grey with fear,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And feel solidity’s foundation stir.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">But even here a cottage free from harms<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Lies havened, hugged and sheltered by the arms<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of a narrow, green recess. A few stunt oaks,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Elders, and barren apples beard the rocks;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But, sleeker than a pool, the lawn beneath<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Burns white and blue, bewildering the heath.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">On a low wood-bench, rifted by years of rain,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Warped at one end, split far along the grain,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A meagre man with a waste, weary smile<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Reads to a boy and girl, or plays awhile<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Some quiet, grown-up game. He suddenly bows<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Head between hands: no more his children rouse<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Flicker or flame, by question or caress,<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_45">45</a></span> -<span class="i0">To break the dead, monotonous, featureless<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Winter of grief. At last he rises, and,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With empty scrutiny, feet that understand<br /></span> -<span class="i0">No path but falter at random, stumbles out<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Where tigrish winds whirry and havoc and shout.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">His back-blown hair, wet, smarting eyes, recall<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The conscious pang of life; and he must fall<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Faint on the ground, or whet his courage keen,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Clench all his being, prise a path between<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The loud, inimical flaws. With even might<br /></span> -<span class="i0">He batters on, to earth’s and air’s despite,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In storm and tumult winning peace and light.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Yet, in these roads of quiet, muniment<br /></span> -<span class="i0">From fury of nature, home from discontent<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Surely of earth’s mean, trafficking miseries,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In this domain of flower and fragrance, this<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Green plat of smooth, immotionable ground,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Why does the panther sorrow skulk around<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And leap like fear from unsuspected fourm?<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Weigh this doubt rather—if the embittered swarm<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of multitudinous grief thins ever or stays<br /></span> -<span class="i0">From most unmerited sally; for in what ways<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A man may tread, and fate how seeming fair,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">His intimate heart is troubled, and despair<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Lays present ambush. Many feel the sting<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of casual time like bramble-thorns, that bring<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A not-enduring spasm: in other blood,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">More sensitive, urging a froward, perilous flood,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">It racks like tropic ivy, whose embrace<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_46">46</a></span> -<span class="i0">Turns travellers maniac; nor shall lapse of days,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Nor drug, nor simple, medicine back the mind;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">They go forgetting all their manhood, find<br /></span> -<span class="i0">No recollection save the venom of death<br /></span> -<span class="i0">That whistles about their brain and sears their breath.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Thus almost had it been with him, thus grief<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Came turbulent, and left him no relief.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_47">47</a></span></p> - -<h3>SUMMER BATHING</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">The ruckling</span> pool, torn grey by Pendry Weir,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Became Cocytus to my boy time fear.<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r8">Two haw-trees, pulping fat their close, green fruits<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Turned cuttlefish below, wagging no roots<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But narrow tentacles. Old Jacob Fry<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Tells how he drained this pool one hot July<br /></span> -<span class="i0">When drought had sucked the white stream thick and slow:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Fish, four-foot deep, shone thirty feet below.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Leaning to drop a stone, the farmboy whews<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Bewildered that his confident ear should lose<br /></span> -<span class="i0">All thud for grounding. Now he fears to stay,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And walks by whistling on another day.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Here, when the black bees blundered in the heat<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Half-drunk, rifling the fine-flurred meadowsweet,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I stripped and bathed. At first, numb for delight,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I lost all thought but this—Come, you must fight<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Free from the swirl. But when blank eyes grew clear<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Like a pit-pattering mouse came fluttered fear.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Now here and there slide snakish eels, now voles<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Bolt hizzing over the brook to round, black holes.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">These groping roots perhaps will grip my flesh<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Till I grow tired of screaming: so the mesh<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Will move, my bones will crackle, I sink down;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">So to an end.<br /></span> -<span class="i12">Or in some cave of brown<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_48">48</a></span> -<span class="i0">Sluttering scum and broad, plump bladder-weeds<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Old fiends may sprawling meditate false deeds;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">One, ware of prey, slip out lean fingers, pluck<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Unusual meat through water’s rush and ruck.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Yet, braving all, to prove wild fancy vain,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I held my breath and sank. The brook, astrain<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And fierce to be free, spun snarling overhead;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Dull roars droned round, cold currents buffeted.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Proud of this daring shewn—but doubtful, too,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of tempting fortune far—I battled through<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To the root-held scroll of turf on the sagging bank,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And carefully muscled up. The sheep-field drank<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The wide-spent, white-spilt sun, the wrapping air<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Swung flame-like past, and, while I ran, the bare<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Close-nibbled grass pushed hot against my feet.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The yeanlings rose and rushed with timid bleat<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Full-tilt at the mothering ewe; fed sleek with clover,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Three cows, in mild amazement bending over<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The gap-set palings, rubbed their necks or chewed.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But in mid-course I staggered, having trod<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Firm on a flat and spiny thistle; stayed<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Nursing my foot, half grinning, half dismayed:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Then lay full length, as light-heel time were not;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Pale fears, fantastic perils, all forgot.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_49">49</a></span></p> - -<h3>COUNTRY CHURCHYARD</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in1"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">This</span> grave, moss-grown, marks him who once went free;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Now pent—no, portionless; from sharp life lost;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Mere mouldered bone-work. His unheeded name<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Who, curious, pausing, may decipher? See;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Thin gulled by running rain, by chipping frost<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Frustrated, muffled under a yellow, same,<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Fat scurf of lichen, the dim characters<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Withstand conjecture, aimless and awry.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Yet here lies one who, living, peopled earth<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">With indestructible fancy. Now he hears<br /></span> -<span class="i0">No nature’s music, who for hours would lie<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r8">To hear the blue-caps click their quick, small mirth.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_50">50</a></span></p> - -<h3>MUSEUM</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in1"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">The</span> day was death. A chalk road, pale in dust,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Accused with leprous finger the long moors.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The drab, damp air so blanketed the town<br /></span> -<span class="i0">No doddered oak swung leathern leaf. The chimneys<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Pushed oddling pillars at the loose-hung sky.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">May, pansy, lilac, dense as the night steam<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of lowland swamps, fettered the sodden air,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And, through the haze, along the ragstone houses,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Blood-lichens dulled to a rotten-apple brown.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Behind close doors pale women drooped and dragged<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r8">In customary toils. They dusted shelves<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Or changed from chair to chair dull, cotton cushions:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Soon, vacantly, they bore them back and wiped<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With languid arms the black, unspotted shelves.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Such mind’s own symbols of despair they went<br /></span> -<span class="i0">That never movement shook a face to grief—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">At first they looked no more than cheerless women,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But dug deep in the plaster of their flesh<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Those eyes were year-dead, underpouched with blue.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A word would sear the silence of a week.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of a sudden, turning a byeway corner, a cripple,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Bloodless with age, lumbered along the road.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The motes of dust whirled at his iron-shod crutches<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And quickly settled. A dog whined. The old<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Cripple looked round and saw no man, but gave<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A cruel, crackling chuckle, swung a yard,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And stopped to look about and laugh again.<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_51">51</a></span> -<span class="i0">‘That,’ said a girl in a flat voice, ‘is God.’<br /></span> -<span class="i0">She turned and slid the table-cover straight.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Her mother could not answer, but she thought<br /></span> -<span class="i0">‘It must be Beggar Joe, gone lately mad.’<br /></span> -<span class="i0">He lumbered along the road and turned a corner.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">His tapping faded and the day was death.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_52">52</a></span></p> - -<h3>LOST LANDS</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap iw"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">When</span> from this alien multitude of man<br /></span> -<span class="i0">These, kind or kindred, speak in approbation<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of what I strove to write, for all my pleasure<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I feel my gross dismerit and fall shamed.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Set no regard on me: not I can pierce<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Clogged air and homely falsehood in prophetic<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Dream or sudden awakening. Sinewed phrases,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">There are my petty troublings of weak sight.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Shame took me once, and shame has tracked me since:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">My friend spoke of a man who lives bewildered,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Even in London striding over mountains,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Through populous roads companioning the dead.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Stars move around him and the dew falls grey;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Thin firs pry through the mist. Old fables quicken—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Undine laughs by the waters, vague, uneasy:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Maiden Mary sings to the sleepy Child.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Then I remembered boyhood, in whose hours<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Thistles were knights, old men were murderous, daytime<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Intractable as dream. I knew that either<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Hid with coarse walls imaginable worlds.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Now I am dulled, habitual now with known<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Earth. Never shall other-country pathways<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Bring me, familiar, through amazing valleys<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Fire-white with blossom, dark with ancient boughs.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_53">53</a></span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2><a id="FRANK_PREWETT"></a>FRANK PREWETT</h2> -</div> - -<h3 title="Come Girl, and embrace" class="nobreak"></h3> -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ig"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">Come</span> girl, and embrace,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And ask no more I wed thee;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Know then you are sweet of face,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Soft-limbed and fashioned lovingly;—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Must you go marketing your charms<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In cunning woman-like,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And filled with old wives’ tales’ alarms?<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I tell you, girl, come embrace;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">What reck we of churchling and priest<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With hands on paunch and chubby face;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Behold, we are life’s pitiful least,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And we perish at the first smell<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of death, whither heaves earth<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To spurn us cringing into hell.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Come girl, and embrace;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Nay, cry not, poor wretch, nor plead,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But haste, for life strikes a swift pace<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And I burn with envious greed:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Know you not, fool, we are the mock,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of gods, time, clothes, and priests?<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But come, there is no time for talk.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_54">54</a></span></p> - -<h3 title="I went out into the Fields" class="newpage"></h3> -<div class="p2 poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ia"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">I went</span> out into the fields<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In my anguish of mind,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And sought comfort of the trees<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For they looked to be kind.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">‘Alas!’ cried they, ‘who have peace?—<br /></span> -<span class="i0">We are prey that is caught,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The sun warms us, the blast chills,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And we understand not.’<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">On rolled the world with fools’ noise,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But I strode in tears’ wrack;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Would God, fools, I too were fool,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Or had light that I lack.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">I held the fields all day,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I, a madman, too;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">My spirit called aloud<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To sift the false from true.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The troubled sun turned black,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Earth heaved to and fro,<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r4">Whene’er I spurned the flowers<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Lifting heads to grow.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Trees reached their hands to stay,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Whistled birds to me,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">‘Spurn one, thou spurnest all,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Brother, let things be.<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_55">55</a></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">For not their heads alone<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Bleed, but the stars fade<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And all things grieve, for we<br /></span> -<span class="i0">One fabric are made.’<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The heavens and earth do meet<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And all things are true,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">So trample ye no flowers<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Lest skies lose their blue.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_56">56</a></span></p> - -<h3 title="Comrade, why do you weep?" class="newpage"></h3> -<div class="p2 poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ig"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">Comrade</span>, why do you weep?<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Is it sorrow for a friend<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Who fell, rifle in hand,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">His proud stand at an end?<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The harsh thunder-lipped guns<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Roll his dirge deep and slow,<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r4">Where he makes his dreamless bed,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Head to head with a foe.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The sweet lark beats on high,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For the joy of those who sleep<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In quiet embrace of earth.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Comrade, why do you weep?<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_57">57</a></span></p> - -<h3 title="The Winds caress the Trees" class="newpage"></h3> -<div class="p2 poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ig"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">The</span> winds caress the trees,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Woman to man is led,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And I too have my love,<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r4">Though she comes not to bed.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Beyond the heat of flesh,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Which has its place and day,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">We hold our keen delights<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In spirit, earth away.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Mount me on high, O soul,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Expand me my desires,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">So shall I clasp in love<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Even the heavenly fires!<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_58">58</a></span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2><a id="EDGELL_RICKWORD"></a>EDGELL RICKWORD</h2> -</div> - -<h3 class="nobreak">COMPLAINT OF A TADPOLE CONFINED IN A JAM-JAR</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ig"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">What</span> reveries of far-off days<br /></span> -<span class="i0">These withered plaques of duck-weed raise!<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The creeping wretches, the crowded pond,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">A death in life, no Culture, no Beyond.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Light and No-light in dull routine;<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r4">Thought and No-thought two shades of green.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The fair ideals all creatures need<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Smothered beneath the inferior weed.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">For highest aspirations stop<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With breathing, at the water’s top.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">O Fairy Metamorphosis<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For Being to become What Is.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Here ceaseless radiance fills my sphere,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The Lamp my Moon, all night, bright, near.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">And clustering on the crystal wall<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Great strawberries iconistical.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">No strife to propagate the kind<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But leisure to improve the mind;<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Till curious sensations range<br /></span> -<span class="i0">About the tail and hint at change.<br /></span><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_59">59</a></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">The weed with flowers stars the sky<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And monstrous forms go dimly by.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Tail fades! The vestiges of gills<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Swell with rare æther from the hills.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Now Time reared up in rocky crests<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Where flaming fowl involve their nests,<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Across the rippled Stream of Space<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Throws shadows that obscure this place;<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">But in the valleys pipers play:<br /></span> -<span class="i0">‘Over the hills and far away.’<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_60">60</a></span></p> - -<h3>REGRET FOR THE DEPOPULATION OF RURAL DISTRICTS</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ia"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">I have</span> seen villages grow suddenly<br /></span> -<span class="i0">From dust and stand upright in the air<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With comfortable homes grouped round a spire;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And in the fields strong women bending<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Down to coarse toil to nourish unborn women.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But in the gardens, languid with flowers’ fragrance<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Girls linger on close lawns for unknown happenings,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Tearing a petal in long shining fingers.<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r4">So waiting whilst pear blossom apple blossom<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And white plum blossom are fallen down to earth,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And the white moon fallen. Then a heap of dust<br /></span> -<span class="i0">That once was named, loved and familiar<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Lies unsubstantial in the eternal sunlight.<br /></span> -<span class="i10">Whence faint thoughts<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Stirring far down in twilight consciousness<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Move dark-boughed yew-trees over graves and stars.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_61">61</a></span></p> - -<h3>COMPLAINT AFTER PSYCHO-ANALYSIS</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">Now</span> my days are all undone,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Spirit sunken, girls forgone,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I will weave in other mesh<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Than fading bone and flesh.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Into cold deserted mind<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Drag the relics of the blind;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And raise from wives none other sees<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Substantial families.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0 r4">Hunt through woods of maidenhair<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Tangled in the shining air<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The forms of ecstasies achieved,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Not then believed.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">O Unicorns and jewelled Birds<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And trampling dappled moonlight herds,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">In icy glades now slain<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With arrows bright as pain.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Leap, Moon, from the berg’s pale womb!<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Frail Bride, out of Earth’s tomb!<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The stars are ashen cold<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Beneath their gold.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_62">62</a></span></p> - -<h3>DESIRE</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap al"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">As</span> the white sails of ships across the ocean,<br /></span> -<span class="i2">The last sounds fade when the sun has declined.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I am alone. There is no motion<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Rippling the clear waters in the mind.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Only now the madrepores’ frail tentacles<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Sway languidly before they fall asleep;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And waiting in their dark pinnacles<br /></span> -<span class="i2">The virgin medusae watch and weep.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Moving darkly among the forests of weed<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Ancient memories drag their crinkled shells<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r6">To glades where crimson tree-trunks bleed<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Thickly, and hushed are the faint sea-bells.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Out of that silent depth loveless arising<br /></span> -<span class="i2">Undine sheds on the water her shining hair,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Softly calleth her soul, devising<br /></span> -<span class="i2">A fragrance of music in the air.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_63">63</a></span></p> - -<h3>TRENCH POETS</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in4"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ia"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">I knew</span> a man, he was my chum,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But he grew blacker every day,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And would not brush the flies away,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Nor blanch however fierce the hum<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Of passing shells. I used to read,<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r4">To rouse him, random things from Donne,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Like ‘Get with child a mandrake-root,’<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But you can tell he was far gone,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For he lay gaping, mackerel-eyed,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And stiff and senseless as a post,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Even when that old poet cried,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">‘I long to talk with some old lover’s ghost.’<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">I tried the Elegies one day;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">But he, because he heard me say,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">‘What needst thou have more covering than a man?’<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Grinned nastily, and so I knew<br /></span> -<span class="i0">The worms had got his brains at last.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">There was one thing that I might do<br /></span> -<span class="i0">To starve the worms; I racked my head<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For healthy things and quoted <cite>Maud</cite>.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">His grin got worse, and I could see<br /></span> -<span class="i0">He laughed at passion’s purity.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">He stank so badly, though we were great chums<br /></span> -<span class="i0">I had to leave him; then rats ate his thumbs.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_64">64</a></span></p> - -<h3>WINTER PROPHECIES</h3> - -<div class="poem-container in2"> -<div class="poem"><div class="stanza drop-cap ig"> -<span class="i0x"><span class="smcap1">Cities</span> with tall and graceful spires I know<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Mirrored in pools and rivers silver bright,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">That wither if the softest wind should blow<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And by a stone are blotted out of sight.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Frailer they are than curvèd leaves of snow<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Fluttering down from the dark trees of night<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Slowly, and then unutterably slow,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And ceasing as most quietly comes the light.<br /></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">Water is carved like fern and stone takes on<br /></span> -<span class="i0 r4">The flush of life when flesh lies quiet as stone;<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Whilst sinister and clownish, bright and wan,<br /></span> -<span class="i0">With solemn affectations the old Moon<br /></span> -<span class="i0">Spins dooms and weirds and meltings of the bone<br /></span> -<span class="i0">And universal silence to be soon.<br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -</div> - -<div class="chapter hwidth2"> -<div class="transnote"> -<h2 class="nobreak p1"><a id="Transcribers_Notes"></a>Transcriber’s Notes</h2> - -<p>Simple typographical errors were corrected.</p> - -<p>Page <a href="#Page_2">2</a>: “fourm” was printed that way.</p> - -<p>Pages <a href="#FRANK_PREWETT">53–57</a>: The poems of Frank Prewett are untitled except in -the Table of Contents, so two consecutive blank lines are the -only visible boundaries between them in some versions of this eBook.</p> -</div></div> - - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Oxford Poetry, 1921, by Various - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OXFORD POETRY, 1921 *** - -***** This file should be named 50429-h.htm or 50429-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/0/4/2/50429/ - -Produced by MWS, Charlie Howard, and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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