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diff --git a/31184.txt b/31184.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..92832a9 --- /dev/null +++ b/31184.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3300 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Poems, by G.K. Chesterton + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Poems + +Author: G.K. Chesterton + +Release Date: February 5, 2010 [EBook #31184] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POEMS *** + + + + +Produced by Marc D'Hooghe + + + + +POEMS + +by + +G.K. CHESTERTON + +NEW YORK + +1916 + + + + +BY THE SAME AUTHOR + +The Napoleon of Notting Hill: A Romance. With illustrations by Graham +Robertson. + +Heretics. + +Orthodoxy. + +All Things Considered. + +George Bernard Shaw. An illustrated biography. + +The Ball and the Cross. + +The Ballad of the White Horse. + +The Innocence of Father Brown. Illustrated. + +The Wisdom of Father Brown. + +Manalive. + +The Flying Inn. + +JOHN LANE COMPANY PUBLISHERS NEW YORK + + + + +CONTENTS + + +THREE DEDICATIONS + +TO EDMUND CLERIHEW BENTLEY +TO HILAIRE BELLOC +TO M. E. W. + +WAR POEMS + +LEPANTO +THE MARCH OF THE BLACK MOUNTAIN 1913 +BLESSED ARE THE PEACEMAKERS +THE WIFE OF FLANDERS +THE CRUSADER RETURNS FROM CAPTIVITY + +LOVE POEMS + +GLENCOE +LOVE'S TRAPPIST +CONFESSIONAL +MUSIC +THE DELUGE +THE STRANGE MUSIC +THE GREAT MINIMUM +THE MORTAL ANSWERS +A MARRIAGE SONG +BAY COMBE + +RELIGIOUS POEMS + +THE WISE MEN +THE HOUSE OF CHRISTMAS +A SONG OF GIFTS TO GOD +THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN +A HYMN FOR THE CHURCH MILITANT +THE BEATIFIC VISION +THE TRUCE OF CHRISTMAS +A HYMN +A CHRISTMAS SONG FOR THREE GUILDS +THE NATIVITY +A CHILD OF THE SNOWS +A WORD + +RHYMES FOR THE TIMES + +ANTICHRIST, OR THE REUNION OF CHRISTENDOM: AN ODE +THE REVOLUTIONIST, OR LINES TO A STATESMAN +THE SHAKESPEARE MEMORIAL +THE HORRIBLE HISTORY OF JONES +THE NEW FREETHINKER +IN MEMORIAM P.D. +SONNET WITH THE COMPLIMENTS OF THE SEASON +A SONG OF SWORDS +A SONG OF DEFEAT +SONNET +AFRICA +THE DEAD HERO +AN ELECTION ECHO +THE SONG OF THE WHEELS +THE SECRET PEOPLE + +MISCELLANEOUS POEMS + +LOST +BALLAD OF THE SUN +TRANSLATION FROM DU BELLAY +THE HIGHER UNITY +THE EARTH'S VIGIL +ON RIGHTEOUS INDIGNATION +WHEN I CAME BACK TO FLEET STREET +A CIDER SONG +THE LAST HERO + +BALLADES + +BALLADE D'UNE GRANDE DAME +A BALLADE OF AN ANTI-PURITAN +A BALLADE OF A BOOK-REVIEWER +A BALLADE OF SUICIDE +A BALLADE OF THE FIRST RAIN + + + + + + I + + THREE DEDICATIONS + + + TO EDMUND CLERIHEW BENTLEY + + THE DEDICATION OF _THE MAN WHO WAS THURSDAY_ + + + A cloud was on the mind of men, and wailing went the weather, + Yea, a sick cloud upon the soul when we were boys together. + Science announced nonentity and art admired decay; + The world was old and ended: but you and I were gay. + Round us in antic order their crippled vices came-- + Lust that had lost its laughter, fear that had lost its shame. + Like the white lock of Whistler, that lit our aimless gloom, + Men showed their own white feather as proudly as a plume. + Life was a fly that faded, and death a drone that stung; + The world was very old indeed when you and I were young. + They twisted even decent sin to shapes not to be named: + Men were ashamed of honour; but we were not ashamed. + Weak if we were and foolish, not thus we failed, not thus; + When that black Baal blocked the heavens he had no hymns from us. + Children we were--our forts of sand were even as weak as we, + High as they went we piled them up to break that bitter sea. + Fools as we were in motley, all jangling and absurd, + When all church bells were silent our cap and bells were heard. + + Not all unhelped we held the fort, our tiny flags unfurled; + Some giants laboured in that cloud to lift it from the world. + I find again the book we found, I feel the hour that flings + Far out of fish-shaped Paumanok some cry of cleaner things; + And the Green Carnation withered, as in forest fires that pass, + Roared in the wind of all the world ten million leaves of grass; + Or sane and sweet and sudden as a bird sings in the rain + Truth out of Tusitala spoke and pleasure out of pain. + Yea, cool and clear and sudden as a bird sings in the grey, + Dunedin to Samoa spoke, and darkness unto day, + But we were young; we lived to see God break their bitter charms, + God and the good Republic come riding back in arms: + We have seen the city of Mansoul, even as it rocked, relieved--Blessed + are they who did not see, but being blind, believed. + + This is a tale of those old fears, even of those emptied hells, + And none but you shall understand the true thing that it tells-- + Of what colossal gods of shame could cow men and yet crash, + Of what huge devils hid the stars, yet fell at a pistol flash. + The doubts that were so plain to chase, so dreadful to withstand-- + Oh, who shall understand but you; yea, who shall understand? + The doubts that drove us through the night as we two talked amain, + And day had broken on the streets e'er it broke upon the brain. + Between us, by the peace of God, such truth can now be told; + Yea, there is strength in striking root, and good in growing old. + We have found common things at last, and marriage and a creed. + And I may safely write it now, and you may safely read. + + + + TO HILAIRE BELLOC + + THE DEDICATION OF _THE NAPOLEON OF NOTTING HILL_ + + + For every tiny town or place + God made the stars especially; + Babies look up with owlish face + And see them tangled in a tree: + You saw a moon from Sussex Downs, + A Sussex moon, untravelled still, + I saw a moon that was the town's, + The largest lamp on Campden Hill. + + Yea, Heaven is everywhere at home. + The big blue cap that always fits, + And so it is (be calm; they come + To goal at last, my wandering wits), + So it is with the heroic thing; + This shall not end for the world's end, + And though the sullen engines swing, + Be you not much afraid, my friend. + + This did not end by Nelson's urn + Where an immortal England sits-- + Nor where your tall young men in turn + Drank death like wine at Austerlitz. + And when the pedants bade us mark + What cold mechanic happenings + Must come; our souls said in the dark, + "Belike; but there are likelier things." + + Likelier across these flats afar, + These sulky levels smooth and free, + The drums shall crash a waltz of war + And Death shall dance with Liberty; + Likelier the barricades shall blare + Slaughter below and smoke above, + And death and hate and hell declare + That men have found a thing to love. + + Far from your sunny uplands set + I saw the dream; the streets I trod, + The lit straight streets shot out and met + The starry streets that point to God; + The legend of an epic hour + A child I dreamed, and dream it still, + Under the great grey water-tower + That strikes the stars on Campden Hill + + + + TO _M. E. W_. + + + Words, for alas my trade is words, a barren burst of rhyme, + Rubbed by a hundred rhymesters, battered a thousand times, + Take them, you, that smile on strings, those nobler sounds than mine, + The words that never lie, or brag, or flatter, or malign. + + I give a hand to my lady, another to my friend, + To whom you too have given a hand; and so before the end + We four may pray, for all the years, whatever suns beset, + The sole two prayers worth praying--to live and not forget. + + The pale leaf falls in pallor, but the green leaf turns to gold; + We that have found it good to be young shall find it good to be old; + Life that bringeth the marriage bell, the cradle and the grave, + Life that is mean to the mean of heart, and only brave to the brave. + + In the calm of the last white winter, when all the past is ours, + Old tears are frozen as jewels, old storms frosted as flowers. + Dear Lady, may we meet again, stand up again, we four, + Beneath the burden of the years, and praise the earth once more. + + + + + + II + + WAR POEMS + + + LEPANTO + + + White founts falling in the Courts of the sun, + And the Soldan of Byzantium is smiling as they run; + There is laughter like the fountains in that face of all men feared, + It stirs the forest darkness, the darkness of his beard, + It curls the blood-red crescent, the crescent of his lips, + For the inmost sea of all the earth is shake with his ships. + They have dared the white republics up the cape of Italy, + They have dashed the Adriatic round the Lion of the Sea, + And the Pope has cast his arms abroad for agony and loss, + And called the kings of Christendom for swords about the Cross. + The cold queen of England is looking in the glass; + The shadow of the Valois is yawning at the Mass; + From evening isles fantastical rings faint the Spanish gun, + And the Lord upon the Golden Horn is laughing in the sun. + + Dim drums throbbing, in the hills half heard, + Where only on a nameless throne a crownless prince has stirred, + Where, risen from a doubtful seat and half attainted stall, + The last knight of Europe takes weapons from the wall, + The last and lingering troubadour to whom the bird has sung, + That once went singing southward when all the world was young. + In that enormous silence, tiny and unafraid, + Comes up along a winding road the noise of the Crusade. + + Strong gongs groaning as the guns boom far, + Don John of Austria is going to the war, + Stiff flags straining in the night-blasts cold + In the gloom black-purple, in the glint old-gold, + Torchlight crimson on the copper kettle-drums, + Then the tuckets, then the trumpets, then the cannon, and he comes. + Don John laughing in the brave beard curled. + Spuming of his stirrups like the thrones of all the world, + Holding his head up for a flag of all the free. + Love-light of Spain--hurrah! + Death-light of Africa! + Don John of Austria + Is riding to the sea. + + Mahound is in his paradise above the evening star, + _(Don John of Austria is going to the war.)_ + He moves a mighty turban on the timeless houri's knees, + His turban that is woven of the sunsets and the seas. + He shakes the peacock gardens as he rises from his ease, + And he strides among the tree-tops and is taller than the trees, + And his voice through all the garden is a thunder sent to bring + Black Azrael and Ariel and Ammon on the wing. + Giants and the Genii, + Multiplex of wing and eye, + Whose strong obedience broke the sky + When Solomon was king. + + They rush in red and purple from the red clouds of the morn, + From temples where the yellow gods shut up their eyes in scorn; + They rise in green robes roaring from the green hells of the sea + Where fallen skies and evil hues and eyeless creatures be; + On them the sea-valves cluster and the grey sea-forests curl, + Splashed with a splendid sickness, the sickness of the pearl; + They swell in sapphire smoke out of the blue cracks of the ground,-- + They gather and they wonder and give worship to Mahound. + And he saith, "Break up the mountains where the hermit-folk can hide, + And sift the red and silver sands lest bone of saint abide, + And chase the Giaours flying night and day, not giving rest, + For that which was our trouble comes again out of the west. + We have set the seal of Solomon on all things under sun, + Of knowledge and of sorrow and endurance of things done, + But a noise is in 'the mountains, in the mountains, and I know + The voice that shook our palaces--four hundred years ago: + It is he that saith not 'Kismet'; it is he that knows not Fate; + It is Richard, it is Raymond, it is Godfrey in the gate! + It is he whose loss is laughter when he counts the wager worth, + Put down your feet upon him, that our peace be on the earth." + For he heard drums groaning and he heard guns jar, + _(Don John of Austria is going to the war.)_ + Sudden and still--hurrah! + Bolt from Iberia! + Don John of Austria + Is gone by Alcalar. + + St. Michael's on his Mountain in the sea-roads of the north + _(Don John of Austria is girt and going forth.)_ + Where the grey seas glitter and the sharp tides shift + And the sea-folk labour and the red sails lift. + He shakes his lance of iron and he claps his wings of stone; + The noise is gone through Normandy; the noise is gone alone; + The North is full of tangled things and texts and aching eyes + And dead is all the innocence of anger and surprise, + And Christian killeth Christian in a narrow dusty + And Christian dreadeth Christ that hath a newer face of doom, + And Christian hateth Mary that God kissed in Galilee, + But Don John of Austria is riding to the sea. + Don John calling through the blast and the eclipse + Crying with the trumpet, with the trumpet of his lips, + Trumpet that sayeth ha! + _Domino gloria_! + Don John of Austria + Is shouting to the ships. + + King Philip's in his closet with the Fleece about his neck + _(Don John of Austria is armed upon the deck.)_ + The walls are hung with velvet that is black and soft as sin, + And little dwarfs creep out of it and little dwarfs creep in. + He holds a crystal phial that has colours like the moon, + He touches, and it tingles, and he trembles very + And his face is as a fungus of a leprous white and grey + Like plants in the high houses that are shuttered from the day. + And death is in the phial and the end of noble work, + But Don John of Austria has fired upon the Turk. + Don John's hunting, and his hounds have bayed--Booms + away past Italy the rumour of his raid. + Gun upon gun, ha! ha! + Gun upon gun, hurrah! + Don John of Austria + Has loosed the cannonade. + + The Pope was in his chapel before day or battle broke, + _(Don John of Austria is hidden in the smoke.)_ + The hidden room in man's house where God sits all the year, + The secret window whence the world looks small and very dear. + He sees as in a mirror on the monstrous twilight sea + The crescent of his cruel ships whose name is mystery; + They fling great shadows foe-wards, making Cross and Castle dark, + They veil the plumed lions on the galleys of St. Mark; + And above the ships are palaces of brown, black-bearded chiefs, + And below the ships are prisons, where with multitudinous griefs, + Christian captives sick and sunless, all a labouring race repines + Like a race in sunken cities, like a nation in the mines. + They are lost like slaves that swat, and in the skies of morning hung + The stair-ways of the tallest gods when tyranny was young. + They are countless, voiceless, hopeless as those fallen or fleeing on + Before the high Kings' horses in the granite of Babylon. + And many a one grows witless in his quiet room in hell + Where a yellow face looks inward through the lattice of his cell, + And he finds his God forgotten, and he seeks no more a sign_(But + Don John of Austria has burst the battle-line!)_ + Don John pounding from the slaughter-painted poop, + Purpling all the ocean like a bloody pirate's sloop, + Scarlet running over on the silvers and the golds, + Breaking of the hatches up and bursting of the holds, + Thronging of the thousands up that labour under sex + White for bliss and blind for sun and stunned for liberty. + _Vivat Hispania!_ + _Domino Gloria!_ + Don John of Austria + Has set his people free! + + Cervantes on his galley sets the sword back in the sheath + _(Don John of Austria rides homeward with a wreath.)_ + And he sees across a weary land a straggling road in Spain, + Up which a lean and foolish knight for ever rides in vain, + And he smiles, but not as Sultans smile, and settles back the blade.... + _(But Don John of Austria rides home from the Crusade_.) + + + + THE MARCH OF THE BLACK MOUNTAIN 1913 + + + What will there be to remember + Of us in the days to be? + Whose faith was a trodden ember + And even our doubt not free; + Parliaments built of paper, + And the soft swords of gold + That twist like a waxen taper + In the weak aggressor's hold; + A hush around Hunger, slaying + A city of serfs unfed; + What shall we leave for a saying + To praise us when we are dead? + But men shall remember the Mountain + That broke its forest chains, + And men shall remember the Mountain + When it arches against the plains: + And christen their children from it + And season and ship and street, + When the Mountain came to Mahomet + And looked small before his feet. + + His head was as high as the crescent + Of the moon that seemed his crown, + And on glory of past and present + The light of his eyes looked down; + One hand went out to the morning + Over Brahmin and Buddhist slain, + And one to the West in scorning + To point at the scars of Spain; + One foot on the hills for warden + By the little Mountain trod; + And one was in a garden + And stood on the grave of God. + But men shall remember the Mountain, + Though it fall down like a tree, + They shall see the sign of the Mountain + Faith cast into the sea; + Though the crooked swords overcome it + And the Crooked Moon ride free, + When the Mountain comes to Mahomet + It has more life than he. + + But what will there be to remember + Or what will there be to see-- + Though our towns through a long November + Abide to the end and be? + Strength of slave and mechanic + Whose iron is ruled by gold, + Peace of immortal panic, + Love that is hate grown cold-- + Are these a bribe or a warning + That we turn not to the sun, + Nor look on the lands of morning + Where deeds at last are done? + Where men shall remember the Mountain + When truth forgets the plain-- + And walk in the way of the Mountain + That did not fail in vain; + Death and eclipse and comet, + Thunder and seals that rend: + When the Mountain came to Mahomet; + Because it was the end. + + + + BLESSED ARE THE PEACEMAKERS + + + Of old with a divided heart + I saw my people's pride expand, + Since a man's soul is torn apart + By mother earth and fatherland. + + I knew, through many a tangled tale, + Glory and truth not one but two: + King, Constable, and Amirail + Took me like trumpets: but I knew + + A blacker thing than blood's own dye + Weighed down great Hawkins on the sea; + And Nelson turned his blindest eye + On Naples and on liberty. + + Therefore to you my thanks, O throne, + O thousandfold and frozen folk, + For whose cold frenzies all your own + The Battle of the Rivers broke; + + Who have no faith a man could mourn. + Nor freedom any man desires; + But in a new clean light of scorn + Close up my quarrel with my sires; + + Who bring my English heart to me, + Who mend me like a broken toy; + Till I can see you fight and flee, + And laugh as if I were a boy. + + + THE WIFE OF FLANDERS + + + Low and brown barns thatched and repatched and tattered + Where I had seven sons until to-day, + A little hill of hay your spur has scattered.... + This is not Paris. You have lost the way. + + You, staring at your sword to find it brittle, + Surprised at the surprise that was your plan, + Who shaking and breaking barriers not a little + Find never more the death-door of Sedan. + + Must I for more than carnage call you claimant, + Paying you a penny for each son you slay? + Man, the whole globe in gold were no repayment + For what _you_ have lost. And how shall I repay? + + What is the price of that red spark that caught me + From a kind farm that never had a name? + What is the price of that dead man they brought me? + For other dead men do not look the same. + + How should I pay for one poor graven steeple + Whereon you shattered what you shall not know, + How should I pay you, miserable people? + How should I pay you everything you owe?34 + + Unhappy, can I give you back your honour? + Though I forgave would any man forget? + While all the great green land has trampled on her + The treason and terror of the night we met. + + Not any more in vengeance or in pardon + An old wife bargains for a bean that's hers. + You have no word to break: no heart to harden. + Ride on and prosper. You have lost your spurs. + + + + THE CRUSADER RETURNS FROM CAPTIVITY + + + I have come forth alive from the land of purple and poison and glamour, + Where the charm is strong as the torture, being chosen to change the mind; + Torture of wordless dance and wineless feast without clamour, + Palace hidden in palace, garden with garden behind; + + Women veiled in the sun, or bare as brass in the shadows, + And the endless eyeless patterns where each thing seems an eye.... + And my stride is on Caesar's sand where it slides to the English meadows, + To the last low woods of Sussex and the road that goes to Rye. + + In the cool and careless woods the eyes of the eunuchs burned not, + But the wild hawk went before me, being free to return or roam, + The hills had broad unconscious backs; and the tree-tops turned not, + And the huts were heedless of me: and I knew I was at home. + + And I saw my lady afar and her holy freedom upon her, + A head, without veil, averted, and not to be turned with charms, + And I heard above bannerets blown the intolerant trumpets of honour, + That usher with iron laughter the coming of Christian arms. + + My shield hangs stainless still; but I shall not go where they praise it, + A sword is still at my side, but I shall not ride with the King. + Only to walk and to walk and to stun my soul and amaze it, + A day with the stone and the sparrow and every marvellous thing. + + I have trod the curves of the Crescent, in the maze of them that adore it, + Curved around doorless chambers and unbeholden abodes, + But I walk in the maze no more; on the sign of the cross I swore it, + The wild white cross of freedom, the sign of the white cross-roads. + + And the land shall leave me or take, and the Woman take me or leave me, + There shall be no more Night, or nightmares seen in a glass; + But Life shall hold me alive, and Death shall never deceive me + As long as I walk in England in the lanes that let me pass. + + + + + + III + + LOVE POEMS + + + GLENCOE + + + The star-crowned cliffs seem hinged upon the sky, + The clouds are floating rags across them curled, + They open to us like the gates of God + Cloven in the last great wall of all the world. + + I looked, and saw the valley of my soul + Where naked crests fight to achieve the skies, + Where no grain grows nor wine, no fruitful thing, + Only big words and starry blasphemies. + + But you have clothed with mercy like a moss + The barren violence of its primal wars, + Sterile although they be and void of rule, + You know my shapeless crags have Wed the stars. + + How shall I thank you, O courageous heart. + That of this wasteful world you had no fear; + But bade it blossom in clear faith and sent + Your fair flower-feeding rivers: even as here + + The peat burns brimming from their cups of stone + Glow brown and blood-red down the vast decline + As if Christ stood on yonder clouded peak + And turned its thousand waters into wine. + + + + LOVE'S TRAPPIST + + + There is a place where lute and lyre are broken. + Where scrolls are torn and on a wild wind go, + Where tablets stand wiped naked for a token, + Where laurels wither and the daisies grow. + + Lo: I too join the brotherhood of silence, + I am Love's Trappist and you ask in vain, + For man through Love's gate, even as through Death's gate, + Goeth alone and comes not back again. + + Yet here I pause, look back across the threshold. + Cry to my brethren, though the world be old, + Prophets and sages, questioners and doubters, + O world, old world, the best hath ne'er been told! + + + + CONFESSIONAL + + + Now that I kneel at the throne, O Queen, + Pity and pardon me. + Much have I striven to sing the same, + Brother of beast and tree; + Yet when the stars catch me alone + Never a linnet sings-- + And the blood of a man is a bitter voice + And cries for foolish things. + + Not for me be the vaunt of woe; + Was not I from a boy + Vowed with the helmet and spear and spur + To the blood-red banner of joy? + A man may sing his psalms to a stone, + Pour his blood for a weed, + But the tears of a man are a sudden thing, + And come not of his creed. + + Nay, but the earth is kind to me, + Though I cry for a Star, + Leaves and grasses, feather and flower, + Cover the foolish scar, + Prophets and saints and seraphim + Lighten the load with song, + And the heart of a man is a heavy load + For a man to bear along. + + + + MUSIC + + + Sounding brass and tinkling cymbal, + He that made me sealed my ears, + And the pomp of gorgeous noises, + Waves of triumph, waves of tears, + + Thundered empty round and past me, + Shattered, lost for ever more, + Ancient gold of pride and passion, + Wrecked like treasure on a shore. + + But I saw her cheek and forehead + Change, as at a spoken word, + And I saw her head uplifted + Like a lily to the Lord. + + Nought is lost, but all transmuted, + Ears are sealed, yet eyes have seen; + Saw her smiles (O soul be worthy!), + Saw her tears (O heart be clean!). + + + + THE DELUGE + + + Though giant rains put out the sun, + Here stand I for a sign. + Though Earth be filled with waters dark, + My cup is filled with wine. + Tell to the trembling priests that here + Under the deluge rod, + One nameless, tattered, broken man + Stood up and drank to God. + + Sun has been where the rain is now, + Bees in the heat to hum, + Haply a humming maiden came, + Now let the Deluge come: + Brown of aureole, green of garb, + Straight as a golden rod, + Drink to the throne of thunder now! + Drink to the wrath of God. + + High in the wreck I held the cup, + I clutched my rusty sword, + I cocked my tattered feather + To the glory of the Lord. + Not undone were the heaven and earth, + This hollow world thrown up, + Before one man had stood up straight! + And drained it like a cup. + + + + THE STRANGE MUSIC + + + Other loves may sink and settle, other loves may loose and slack, + But I wander like a minstrel with a harp upon his back, + Though the harp be on my bosom, though I finger and I fret, + Still, my hope is all before me: for I cannot play it yet. + + In your strings is hid a music that no hand hath ere let fall, + In your soul is sealed a pleasure that you have not known at all; + Pleasure subtle as your spirit, strange and slender as your frame, + Fiercer than the pain that folds you, softer than your sorrow's name. + + Not as mine, my soul's anointed, not as mine the rude and light + Easy mirth of many faces, swaggering pride of song and fight; + Something stranger, something sweeter, something waiting you afar, + Secret as your stricken senses, magic as your sorrows are. + + But on this, God's harp supernal, stretched but to be stricken once. + Hoary Time is a beginner, Life a bungler, Death a dunce. + But I will not fear to match them--no, by God, I will not fear, + I will learn you, I will play you and the stars stand still to hear. + + + + THE GREAT MINIMUM + + + It is something to have wept as we have wept, + It is something to have done as we have done, + It is something to have watched when all men slept, + And seen the stars which never see the sun. + + It is something to have smelt the mystic rose, + Although it break and leave the thorny rods, + It is something to have hungered once as those + Must hunger who have ate the bread of gods. + + To have seen you and your unforgotten face, + Brave as a blast of trumpets for the fray. + Pure as white lilies in a watery space, + It were something, though you went from me to-day. + + To have known the things that from the weak are furled, + Perilous ancient passions, strange and high; + It is something to be wiser than the world, + It is something to be older than the sky. + + In a time of sceptic moths and cynic rusts, + And fatted lives that of their sweetness tire, + In a world of flying loves and fading lusts, + It is something to be sure of a desire. + + Lo, blessed are our ears for they have heard; + Yea, blessed are our eyes for they have seen: + Let thunder break on man and beast and bird + And the lightning. It is something to have been. + + + + THE MORTAL ANSWERS + + + .................COME AWAY-- + WITH THE FAIRIES, HAND IN HAND, + FOR THE WORLD IS MORE FULL OF WEEPING + THAN YOU CAN UNDERSTAND. + + _W.B. Yeats_. + + From the Wood of the Old Wives' Fables + They glittered out of the grey, + And with all the Armies of Elf-land + I strove like a beast at bay; + + With only a right arm wearied, + Only a red sword worn, + And the pride of the House of Adam + That holdeth the stars in scorn. + + For they came with chains of flowers + And lilies lances free, + There in the quiet greenwood + To take my grief from me. + + And I said, "Now all is shaken + When heavily hangs the brow, + When the hope of the years is taken + The last star sunken. Now-- + + "Hear, you chattering cricket, + Hear, you spawn of the sod, + The strange strong cry in the darkness + Of one man praising God, + + "That out of the night and nothing + With travail of birth he came + To stand one hour in the sunlight + Only to say her name. + + "Falls through her hair the sunshine + In showers; it touches, see, + Her high bright cheeks in turning; + Ah, Elfin Company, + + "The world is hot and cruel, + We are weary of heart and hand. + But the world is more full of glory + Than you can understand." + + + + A MARRIAGE SONG + + + Why should we reck of hours that rend + While we two ride together? + The heavens rent from end to end + Would be but windy weather, + The strong stars shaken down in spate + Would be a shower of spring, + And we should list the trump of fate + And hear a linnet sing. + + We break the line with stroke and luck, + The arrows run like rain, + If you be struck, or I be struck, + There's one to strike again. + If you befriend, or I befriend, + The strength is in us twain, + And good things end and bad things end, + And you and I remain. + + Why should we reck of ill or well + While we two ride together? + The fires that over Sodom fell + Would be but sultry weather. + Beyond all ends to all men given + Our race is far and fell, + We shall but wash our feet in heaven, + And warm our hands in hell. + + Battles unborn and vast shall view + Our faltered standards stream, + New friends shall come and frenzies new. + New troubles toil and teem; + New friends shall pass and still renew + One truth that does not seem, + That I am I, and you are you, + And Death a morning dream. + + Why should we reck of scorn or praise + While we two ride together? + The icy air of godless days + Shall be but wintry weather. + If hell were highest, if the heaven + Were blue with devils blue, + I should have guessed that all was even, + If I had dreamed of you. + + Little I reck of empty prides, + Of creeds more cold than clay; + To nobler ends and longer rides, + My lady rides to-day. + To swing our swords and take our sides + In that all-ending fray + When stars fall down and darkness hides, + When God shall turn to bay. + + Why should we reck of grin and groan + While we two ride together? + The triple thunders of the throne + Would be but stormy weather. + For us the last great fight shall roar, + Upon the ultimate plains, + And we shall turn and tell once more + Our love in English lanes. + + + + BAY COMBE + + + With leaves below and leaves above, + And groping under tree and tree, + I found the home of my true love, + Who is a wandering home for me. + + Who, lost in ruined worlds aloof, + Bore the dread dove wings like a roof; + Who, past the last lost stars of space + Carried the fire-light on her face. + + Who, passing as in idle hours, + Tamed the wild weeds to garden flowers; + Stroked the strange whirlwind's whirring wings, + And made the comets homely things. + + Where she went by upon her way + The dark was dearer than the day; + Where she paused in heaven or hell, + The whole world's tale had ended well. + + _With leaves below and leaves above._ + _And groping under tree and tree,_ + _I found the home of my true love,_ + _Who is a wandering home for me_. + + Where she was flung, above, beneath, + By the rude dance of life and death, + Grow she at Gotham--die at Rome, + Between the pine trees is her home. + + In some strange town, some silver morn, + She may have wandered to be born; + Stopped at some motley crowd impressed, + And called them kinsfolk for a jest. + + If we again En goodness thrive, + And the dead saints become alive, + Then pedants bald and parchments brown + May claim her blood for London town. + + _But leaves below and leaves above._ + _And groping under tree and tree,_ + _I found the home of my true love,_ + _Who is a wandering home for me_. + + The great gravestone she may pass by, + And without noticing, may die; + The streets of silver Heaven may tread, + With her grey awful eyes unfed. + + The city of great peace in pain + May pass, until she find again + This little house of holm and fir + God built before the stars for her. + + Here in the fallen leaves is furled + Her secret centre of the world. + We sit and feel in dusk and dun + The stars swing round us like a sun. + + _For leaves below and leaves above._ + _And groping under tree and tree,_ + _I found the home of my true love._ + _Who is a wandering home for me_. + + + + + + IV + + RELIGIOUS POEMS + + + THE WISE MEN + + + Step softly, under snow or rain, + To find the place where men can pray; + The way is all so very plain + That we may lose the way. + + Oh, we have learnt to peer and pore + On tortured puzzles from our youth, + We know all labyrinthine lore, + We are the three wise mert of yore, + And we know all things but the truth. + + We have gone round and round the hill, + And lost the wood among the trees, + And learnt long names for every ill, + And served the mad gods, naming still + The Furies the Eumenides. + + The gods of violence took the veil + Of vision and philosophy, + The Serpent that brought all men bale, + He bites his own accursed tail, + And calls himself Eternity. + + Go humbly ... it has hailed and snowed ... + With voices low and lanterns lit; + So very simple is the road, + That we may stray from it. + + The world grows terrible and white, + And blinding white the breaking day; + We walk bewildered in the light, + For something is too large for sight, + And something much too plain to say. + + The Child that was ere worlds begun + (... We need but walk a little way, + We need but see a latch undone,...) + The Child that played with moon and sun + Is playing with a little hay. + + The house from which the heavens are fed, + The old strange house that is our own, + Where tricks of words are never said. + And Mercy is as plain as bread, + And Honour is as hard as stone. + + Go humbly; humble are the skies, + And low and large and fierce the Star; + So very near the Manger lies + That we may travel far. + + Hark! Laughter like a lion wakes + To roar to the resounding plain, + And the whole heaven shouts and shakes, + For God Himself is born again, + And we are little children walking + Through the snow and rain. + + + + THE HOUSE OF CHRISTMAS + + + There fared a mother driven forth + Out of an inn to roam; + In the place where she was homeless + All men are at home. + The crazy stable close at hand, + With shaking timber and shifting sand, + Grew a stronger thing to abide and stand + Than the square stones of Rome. + + For men are homesick in their homes, + And strangers under the sun, + And they lay their heads in a foreign land + Whenever the day is done. + Here we have battle and blazing eyes, + And chance and honour and high surprise, + Where the yule tale was begun. + + A Child in a foul stable, + Where the beasts feed and foam; + Only where He was homeless + Are you and I at home; + We have hands that fashion and heads that + But our hearts we lost--how long ago! + In a place no chart nor ship can show + Under the sky's dome. + + This world is wild as an old wives' tale, + And strange the plain things are, + The earth is enough and the air is enough + For our wonder and our war; + But our rest is as far as the fire-drake swings + And our peace is put in impossible things + Where clashed and thundered unthinkable wings + Round an incredible star. + + To an open house in the evening + Home shall men come, + To an older place than Eden + And a taller town than Rome. + To the end of the way of the wandering star, + To the things that cannot be and that are, + To the place where God was homeless + And all men are at home. + + + + A SONG OF GIFTS TO GOD + + + When the first Christmas presents came, the straw where Christ was rolled + Smelt sweeter than their frankincense, burnt brighter than their gold, + And a wise man said, "We will not give; the thanks would be but cold." + + "Nay," said the next, "To all new gifts, to this gift or another, + Bends the high gratitude of God; even as He now, my brother, + Who had a Father for all time, yet thanks Him for a Mother. + + "Yet scarce for Him this yellow stone or prickly-smells and sparse. + Who holds the gold heart of the sun that fed these timber bars, + Nor any scentless lily lives for One that smells the stars." + + Then spake the third of the Wise Men; the wisest of the three: + "We may not with the widest lives enlarge His liberty, + Whose wings are wider than the world. It is not He, but we. + + "We say not He has more to gain, but we have more to lose. + Less gold shall go astray, we say, less gold, if thus we choose, + Go to make harlots of the Greeks and hucksters of the Jews. + + "Less clouds before colossal feet redden in the under-light, + To the blind gods from Babylon less incense burn to-night, + To the high beasts of Babylon, whose mouths make mock of right." + + Babe of the thousand birthdays, we that are young yet grey, + White with the centuries, still can find no better thing to say, + We that with sects and whims and wars have wasted Christmas Day. + + Light Thou Thy censer to Thyself, for all our fires are dim, + Stamp Thou Thine image on our coin, for Caesar's face grows dim, + And a dumb devil of pride and greed has taken hold of him. + + We bring Thee back great Christendom, churches and towns and towers. + And if our hands are glad, O God, to cast them down like flowers, + 'Tis not that they enrich Thine hands, but they are saved from ours. + + + + THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN + + + Said the Lord God, "Build a house, + Build it in the gorge of death, + Found it in the throats of hell. + Where the lost sea muttereth, + Fires and whirlwinds, build it well." + + Laboured sternly flame and wind, + But a little, and they cry, + "Lord, we doubt of this Thy will, + We are blind and murmur why," + And the winds are murmuring still. + + Said the Lord God, "Build a house, + Cleave its treasure from the earth, + With the jarring powers of hell + Strive with formless might and mirth, + Tribes and war-men, build it well." + + Then the raw red sons of men + Brake the soil, and lopped the wood, + But a little and they shrill, + "Lord, we cannot view Thy good," + And the wild men clamour still. + + Said the Lord God, "Build a house, + Smoke and iron, spark and steam, + Speak and vote and buy and sell; + Let a new world throb and stream, + Seers and makers, build it well." + + Strove the cunning men and strong, + But a little and they cry, + "Lord, mayhap we are but clay, + And we cannot know the why," + And the wise men doubt to-day. + + Yet though worn and deaf and blind, + Force and savage, king and seer + Labour still, they know not why; + At the dim foundation here, + Knead and plough and think and ply. + + Till at last, mayhap, hereon, + Fused of passion and accord, + Love its crown and peace its stay + Rise the city of the Lord + That we darkly build to-day. + + + + A HYMN FOR THE CHURCH MILITANT + + + Great God, that bowest sky and star, + Bow down our towering thoughts to thee, + And grant us in a faltering war + The firm feet of humility. + + Lord, we that snatch the swords of flame, + Lord, we that cry about Thy car. + We too are weak with pride and shame, + We too are as our foemen are. + + Yea, we are mad as they are mad, + Yea, we are blind as they are blind, + Yea, we are very sick and sad + Who bring good news to all mankind. + + The dreadful joy Thy Son has sent + Is heavier than any care; + We find, as Cain his punishment, + Our pardon more than we can bear. + + Lord, when we cry Thee far and near + And thunder through all lands unknown + The gospel into every ear, + Lord, let us not forget our own. + + Cleanse us from ire of creed or class, + The anger of the idle tings; + Sow in our souls, like living grass, + The laughter of all lowly things. + + + + THE BEATIFIC VISION + + + Then Bernard smiled at me, that I should gaze + But I had gazed already; caught the view, + Faced the unfathomable ray of rays + Which to itself and by itself is true. + + Then was my vision mightier than man's speech; + Speech snapt before it like a flying spell; + And memory and all that time can teach + Before that splendid outrage failed and fell. + + As when one dreameth and remembereth not + Waking, what were his pleasures or his pains, + With every feature of the dream forgot, + The printed passion of the dream remains:-- + + Even such am I; within whose thoughts resides + No picture of that sight nor any part + Nor any memory: in whom abides + Only a happiness within the heart, + + A secret happiness that soaks the heart + As hills are soaked by slow unsealing snow, + Or secret as that wind without a chart + Whereon did the wild leaves of Sibyl go. + + O light uplifted from all mortal knowing, + Send back a little of that glimpse of thee. + That of its glory I may kindle glowing + One tiny spark for all men yet to be. + + + + THE TRUCE OF CHRISTMAS + + + Passionate peace is in the sky-- + And in the snow in silver sealed + The beasts are perfect in the field, + And men seem men so suddenly-- + (But take ten swords and ten times ten + And blow the bugle in praising men; + For we are for all men under the sun, + And they are against us every one; + And misers haggle and madmen clutch, + And there is peril in praising much. + And we have the terrible tongues uncurled + That praise the world to the sons of the world.) + + The idle humble hill and wood + Are bowed upon the sacred birth, + And for one little hour the earth + Is lazy with the love of good-- + (But ready are you, and ready am I, + If the battle blow and the guns go by; + For we are for all men under the sun, + And they are against us every one; + And the men that hate herd all together, + To pride and gold, and the great white feather + And the thing is graven in star and stone + That the men who love are all alone.) + + Hunger is hard and time is tough, + But bless the beggars and kiss the kings, + For hope has broken the heart of things, + And nothing was ever praised enough. + (But bold the shield for a sudden swing + And point the sword when you praise a thing, + For we are for all men under the sun, + And they are against us every one; + And mime and merchant, thane and thrall + Hate us because we love them all; + Only till Christmastide go by + Passionate peace is in the sky.) + + + + A HYMN + + + O God of earth and altar, + Bow down and hear our cry + Our earthly rulers falter, + Our people drift and die; + The walls of gold entomb us, + The swords of scorn divide, + Take not thy thunder from us, + But take away our pride. + + From all that terror teaches, + From lies of tongue and pen, + From all the easy speeches + That comfort cruel men, + From sale and profanation + Of honour and the sword, + From sleep and from damnation, + Deliver us, good Lord! + + Tie in a living tether + The prince and priest and thrall, + Bind all our lives together, + Smite us and save us all; + In ire and exultation + Aflame with faith, and free, + Lift up a living nation, + A single sword to thee. + + + + A CHRISTMAS SONG FOR THREE GUILDS + + TO BE SUNG A LONG TIME AGO--OR HENCE + + _THE CARPENTERS_ + + + St. Joseph to the Carpenters said on a Christmas Day: + "The master shall have patience and the prentice shall obey; + And your word unto your women shall be nowise hard or wild: + For the sake of me, your master, who have worshipped Wife and Child. + But softly you shall frame the fence, and softly carve the door, + And softly plane the table--as to spread it for the poor, + And all your thoughts be soft and white as the wood of the white tree. + But if they tear the Charter, Jet the tocsin speak for me! + Let the wooden sign above your shop be prouder to be scarred + Than the lion-shield of Lancelot that hung at Joyous Garde." + + _THE SHOEMAKERS_ + + St. Crispin to the shoemakers said on a Christmastide: + "Who fashions at another's feet will get no good of pride. + They were bleeding on the Mountain, the feet that brought good news, + The latchet of whose shoes we were not worthy to unloose. + See that your feet offend not, nor lightly lift your head, + Tread softly on the sunlit roads the bright dust of the dead. + Let your own feet be shod with peace; be lowly all your lives. + But if they touch the Charter, ye shall nail it with your knives. + And the bill-blades of the commons drive in all as dense array + As once a crash of arrows came, upon St. Crispin's Day." + + _THE PAINTERS_ + + St. Luke unto the painters on Christmas Day he said: + "See that the robes are white you dare to dip in gold and red; + For only gold the kings can give, and only blood the saints; + And his high task grows perilous that mixes them in paints. + Keep you the ancient order; follow the men that knew + The labyrinth of black and whits, the maze of green and blue; + Paint mighty things, paint paltry things, paint silly things or sweet. + But if men break the Charter, you may slay them in the street. + And if you paint one post for them, then ... but you know it well, + You paint a harlot's face to drag all heroes down to hell." + + _ALL TOGETHER_ + + Almighty God to all mankind on Christmas Day said He: + "I rent you from the old red hills and, rending, made you free. + There was charter, there was challenge; in a blast of breath I gave; + You can be all things other; you cannot be a slave. + You shall be tired and tolerant of fancies as they fade, + But if men doubt the Charter, ye shall call on the Crusade-- + Trumpet and torch and catapult, cannon and bow and blade, + Because it was My challenge to all the things I made." + + + + THE NATIVITY + + + The thatch on the roof was as golden, + Though dusty the straw was and old, + The wind had a peal as of trumpets, + Though blowing and barren and cold, + The mother's hair was a glory + Though loosened and torn, + For under the eaves in the gloaming + A child was born. + + Have a myriad children been quickened. + Have a myriad children grown old, + Grown gross and unloved and embittered, + Grown cunning and savage and cold? + God abides In a terrible patience, + Unangered, unworn, + And again for the child that was squandered + A child is born. + + What know we of aeons behind us, + Dim dynasties lost long ago, + Huge empires, like dreams unremembered, + Huge cities for ages laid low? + This at least--that with blight and with blessing + With flower and with thorn, + Love was there, and his cry was among them, + "A child is born." + + Though the darkness be noisy with systems, + Dark fancies that fret and disprove, + Still the plumes stir around us, above us + The wings of the shadow of love: + Oh! princes and priests, have ye seen it + Grow pale through your scorn. + Huge dawns sleep before us, deep changes, + A child is born. + + And the rafters of toil still are gilded + With the dawn of the star of the heart, + And the wise men draw near in the twilight, + Who are weary of learning and art, + And the face of the tyrant is darkened. + His spirit is torn, + For a new King is enthroned; yea, the sternest, + A child is born. + + And the mother still joys for the whispered + First stir of unspeakable things, + Still feels that high moment unfurling + Red glory of Gabriel's wings. + Still the babe of an hour is a master + Whom angels adorn, + Emmanuel, prophet, anointed, + A child is born. + + And thou, that art still in thy cradle, + The sun being crown for thy brow. + Make answer, our flesh, make an answer, + Say, whence art thou come--who art thou? + Art thou come back on earth for our teaching + To train or to warn--? + Hush--how may we know?--knowing only + A child is born. + + + + A CHILD OF THE SNOWS + + + There is heard a hymn when the panes dim + And never before or again, + When the nights are strong with a darkness long, + And the dark is alive with rain. + + Never we know but in sleet and in snow, + The place where the great fires are, + That the midst of the earth is a raging mirth + And the heart of the earth a star. + + And at night we win to the ancient inn + Where the child in the frost is furled, + We follow the feet where all souls meet + At the inn at the end of the world. + + The gods lie dead where the leaves lie red, + For the flame of the sun is flown. + The gods lie cold where the leaves lie gold. + And a Child comes forth alone. + + + + A WORD + + + A word came forth in Galilee, a word like to a star; + It climbed and rang and blessed and burnt wherever brave hearts are; + A word of sudden secret hope, of trial and increase + Of wrath and pity fused in fire, and passion kissing peace. + A star that o'er the citied world beckoned, a sword of flame; + A star with myriad thunders tongued: a mighty word there came. + + The wedge's dart passed into it, the groan of timberwains, + The ringing of the rivet nails, the shrieking of the planes; + The hammering on the roofs at morn, the busy workshop roar; + The hiss of shavings drifted deep along the windy floor; + The heat-browned toiler's crooning song, the hum of human worth-- + Mingled of all the noise of crafts, the ringing word went forth. + + The splash of nets passed into it, the grind of sand and shell, + The boat-hook's clash, the boat-oars' jar, the cries to buy and sell, + The flapping of the landed shoals, the canvas crackling free, + And through all varied notes and cries, the roaring of the sea, + The noise of little lives and brave, of needy lives and high; + In gathering all the throes of earth, the living word went by. + + Earth's giant sins bowed down to it, in Empire's huge eclipse, + When darkness sat above the thrones, seven thunders on her lips, + The woe of cities entered it, the clang of idols' falls, + The scream of filthy Caesars stabbed high in their brazen halls, + The dim hoarse Hoods of naked men, the worldrealms snapping girth, + The trumpets of Apocalypse, the darkness of the earth: + + The wrath that brake the eternal lamp and hid the eternal hill, + A world's destruction loading, the word went onward still-- + The blaze of creeds passed into it, the hiss of horrid fires, + The headlong spear, the scarlet cross, the hair-shirt and the briars, + The cloistered brethren's thunderous chaunt, the errant champion's song, + The shifting of the crowns and thrones, the tangle of the strong. + + The shattering fall of crest and crown and shield and cross and cope, + The tearing of the gauds of time, the blight of prince and pope, + The reign of ragged millions leagued to wrench a loaded debt, + Loud with the many throated roar, the word went forward yet. + The song of wheels passed into it, the roaring and the smoke + The riddle of the want and wage, the fogs that burn and choke. + The breaking of the girths of gold, the needs that creep and swell. + The strengthening hope, the dazing light, the deafening evangel, + Through kingdoms dead and empires damned, through changes without cease, + With earthquake, chaos, born and fed, rose,--and the word was "Peace." + + + + + + V + + RHYMES FOR THE TIMES + + + ANTICHRIST, OR THE REUNION OF CHRISTENDOM: AN ODE + + + "A BILL WHICH HAS SHOCKED THE CONSCIENCE OF + EVERY CHRISTIAN COMMUNITY IN EUROPE."-- + _Mr. F.E. Smith_, ON THE WELSH DISESTABLISHMENT BILL. + + Are they clinging to their crosses, + F.E. Smith, + Where the Breton boat-fleet tosses, + Are they, Smith? + Do they, fasting, tramping, bleeding, + Wait the news from this our city? + Groaning "That's the Second Reading!" + Hissing "There is still Committed" + If the voice of Cecil falters, + If McKenna's point has pith, + Do they tremble for their altars? + Do they, Smith? + + Russian peasants round their pope + Huddled, Smith, + Hear about it all, I hope, + Don't they, Smith? + In the mountain hamlets clothing + Peaks beyond Caucasian pales, + Where Establishment means nothing + And they never heard of Wales, + Do they read it all in Hansard + With a crib to read it with-- + "Welsh Tithes: Dr. Clifford Answered," + Really, Smith? + + In the lands where Christians were, + F.E. Smith, + In the little lands laid bare, + Smith, O Smith! + Where the Turkish bands are busy, + And the Tory name is blessed + Since they hailed the Cross of Dizzy + On the banners from the West! + Men don't think it half so hard if + Islam burns their kin and kith, + Since a curate lives in Cardiff + Saved by Smith. + + It would greatly, I must own, + Soothe me, Smith, + If you left this theme alone, + Holy Smith! + For your legal cause or civil + You fight well and get your fee; + For your God or dream or devil + You will answer, not to me. + Talk about the pews and steeples + And the Cash that goes therewith! + But the souls of Christian peoples.... + --Chuck it, Smith! + + + + THE REVOLUTIONIST: OR LINES TO A STATESMAN + + + "I WAS NEVER STANDING BY WHILE A REVOLUTION + WAS GOING ON."--_Speech by the Rt. Hon. Walter + Long_. + + When Death was on thy drums, Democracy, + And with one rush of slaves the world was free, + In that high dawn that Kings shall not forget, + A void there was and Walter was not yet. + Through sacked Versailles, at Valmy in the fray, + They did without him in some kind of way; + Red Christendom all Walterless they cross, + And in their fury hardly feel their loss.... + Fades the Republic; faint as Roland's horn, + Her trumpets taunt us with a sacred scorn.... + Then silence fell; and Mr. Long was born. + + From his first hours in his expensive cot + He never saw the tiniest viscount shot. + In deference to his wealthy parents' whim + The wildest massacres were kept from him. + The wars that dyed Pall Mall and Brompton red + Passed harmless o'er that one unconscious head: + For all that little Long could understand + The rich might still be rulers of the land. + Vain are the pious arts of parenthood, + Foiled Revolution bubbled in his blood; + Until one day (the babe unborn shall rue it) + The Constitution bored him and he slew it. + + If I were wise and good and rich and strong-- + Fond, impious thought, if I were Walter Long-- + If I could water sell like molten gold, + And make grown people do as they are told, + If over private fields and wastes as wide + As a Greek city for which heroes died, + I owned the houses and the men inside-- + If all this hung on one thin thread of habit + I would not revolutionize a rabbit. + + I would sit tight with all my gifts and glories, + And even preach to unconverted Tories, + That the fixed system that our land inherits, + Viewed from a certain standpoint, has its merits. + I'd guard the laws like any Radical, + And keep each precedent, however small, + However subtle, misty, dusty, dreamy, + Lest man by chance should look at me and see me; + Lest men should ask what madman made me lord + Of English ploughshares and the English sword; + Lest men should mark how sleepy is the nod + That drills the dreadful images of God! + + Walter, be wise! avoid the wild and new, + The Constitution is the game for you. + Walter, beware! scorn not the gathering throng + It suffers, yet it may not suffer wrong, + It suffers, yet it cannot suffer Long. + And if you goad it these grey rules to break, + For a few pence, see that you do not wake + Death and the splendour of the scarlet cap, + Boston and Valmy, Yorktown and Jemmappes, + Freedom in arms, the riding and the routing, + The thunder of the captains and the shouting, + All that lost riot that you did not share--And + when that riot comes--you _will_ be there. + + + + THE SHAKESPEARE MEMORIAL + + + Lord Lilac thought it rather rotten + That Shakespeare should be quite + And therefore got on a Committee + With several chaps out of the city. + And Shorter and Sir Herbert Tree, + Lord Rothschild and Lord Rosebery + And F.C.G. and Comyns Carr, + Two dukes and a dramatic star, + Also a clergyman now dead; + And while the vain world careless sped + Unheeding the heroic name-- + The souls most fed with Shakespeare's flame + Still sat unconquered in a ring, + Remembering him like anything. + + Lord Lilac did not long remain. + Lord Lilac did not come again. + He softly lit a cigarette + And sought some other social set + Where, in some other knots or rings, + People were doing cultured things, + --Miss Zwilt's Humane Vivarium + --The little men that paint on gum + --The exquisite Gorilla Girl.... + He sometimes, in this giddy whirl + (Not being really bad at heart), + Remembered Shakespeare with a start-- + But not with that grand constancy + Of Clement Shorter, Herbert Tree, + Lord Rosebery and Comyns Carr + And all the other names there are; + Who stuck like limpets to the spot, + Lest they forgot, lest they forgot. + + Lord Lilac was of slighter stuff; + Lord Lilac had had quite enough. + + + + THE HORRIBLE HISTORY OF JONES + + + Jones had a dog; it had a chain; + Not often worn, not causing pain; + But, as the I.K.L. had passed + Their "Unleashed Cousins Act" at last, + Inspectors took the chain away; + Whereat the canine barked "hurray"! + At which, of course, the S.P.U. + (Whose Nervous Motorists' Bill was through), + Were forced to give the dog in charge + For being Audibly at Large. + None, you will say, were now annoyed, + Save haply Jones--the yard was void. + But something being in the lease + About "alarms to aid police," + The U.S.U. annexed the yard + For having no sufficient guards + Now if there's one condition + The C.C.P. are strong upon + It is that every house one buys + Must have a yard for exercise; + So Jones, as tenant, was unfit. + His state of health was proof of it. + Two doctors of the T.T.U.'s + Told him his legs from long disuse, + Were atrophied; and saying "So + From step to higher step we go + Till everything is New and True," + They cut his legs off and withdrew. + You know the E.T.S.T.'s views + Are stronger than the T.T.U.'s: + And soon (as one may say) took wing + The Arms, though not the Man, I sing. + To see him sitting limbless there + Was more than the K.K. could bear + "In mercy silence with all speed + That mouth there are no hands to feed; + What cruel sentimentalist, + O Jones, would doom thee to exist-- + Clinging to selfish Selfhood yet? + Weak one! Such reasoning might upset + The Pump Act, and the accumulation + Of all constructive legislation; + Let us construct you up a bit--" + The head fell off when it was hit: + Then words did rise and honest doubt, + And four Commissions sat about + Whether the slash that left him dead + Cut off his body or his head. + + An author in the Isle of Wight + Observed with unconcealed delight + A land of old and just renown + Where Freedom slowly broadened down + From Precedent to Precedent.... + And this, I think, was what he meant. + + + + THE NEW FREETHINKER + + + John Grubby, who was short and stout + And troubled with religious doubt, + Refused about the age of three + To sit upon the curate's knee; + (For so the eternal strife must rage + Between the spirit of the age + And Dogma, which, as is well known. + Does simply hate to be outgrown). + Grubby, the young idea that shoots, + Outgrew the ages like old boots; + While still, to all appearance, small, + Would have no Miracles at all; + And just before the age of ten + Firmly refused Free Will to men. + The altars reeled, the hen-ens shook, + Just as he read of in the book; + Flung from his house went forth the youth + Alone with tempests and the Truth, + Up to the distant city and dim + Where his papa had bought for him + A partnership in Chepe and Deer + Worth, say, twelve hundred pounds a year. + But he was resolute. Lord Brute + Had found him useful; and Lord Loot, + With whom few other men would act, + Valued his promptitude and tact; + Never did even philanthropy + Enrich a man more rapidly: + Twas he that stopped the Strike in Coal, + For hungry children racked his soul; + To end their misery there and then + He filled the mines with Chinamen-- + Sat in that House that broke the Kings, + And voted for all sores of things-- + And rose from Under-Sec. to Sec. + Some grumbled. Growlers who gave less + Than generous worship to success, + The little printers in Dundee + Who got ten years for blasphemy, + (Although he let them off with seven) + Respect him rather less than heaven. + No matter. This can still be said: + Never to supernatural dread, + Never to unseen deity, + Did Sir John Grubby bend the knee; + Never did dream of hell or wrath + Turn Viscount Grubby from his path; + Nor was he bribed by fabled bliss + To kneel to any world but this. + The curate lives in Camden Town, + His lap still empty of renown, + And still across the waste of years + John Grubby, in the House of Peers, + Faces that curate, proud and free, + And never sits upon his knee. + + + + IN MEMORIAM P.D. + + NICE, JANUARY 30, 1914. + + + If any in an island cradle curled + Of comfort, may make offerings to you, + Who in the day of all denial blew + A bugle through the blackness of the world, + + An English hand would touch your shroud, in trust + That truth again be told in English speech. + And we too yet may practise what we preach, + Though it were practising the bayonet thrust. + + Cutting that giant neck from sand to sand, + From sea to sea; it was a little thing + Beside your sudden shout and sabre-swing + That cut the throat of thieves in every land. + + Heed not if half-wits mock your broken blade: + Mammon our master doeth all things ill. + You are the Fool that charged a windmill. Still, + The Miller is a Knave; and was afraid. + + Lay down your sword. Ruin will know her own. + Let each small statesman sow his weak wild oat, + Or turn his coat to decorate his coat, + Or take the throne and perish by the throne. + + Lay down your sword. And let the White Flag fade + To grey; and let the Red Flag fade to pink, + For these that climb and climb; and cannot sink + So deep as death and honour, Deroulede. + + + + SONNET WITH THE COMPLIMENTS OF THE SEASON + + + TO A POPULAR LEADER MUCH TO BE CONGRATULATED + ON THE AVOIDANCE OF A STRIKE AT CHRISTMAS. + + I know you. You will hail the huge release, + Saying the sheathing of a thousand swords, + In silence and injustice, well accords + With Christmas bells. And you will gild with grease + The papers, the employers, the police, + And vomit up the void your windy words + To your New Christ; who bears no whip of cords + For them that traffic in the doves of peace. + + The feast of friends, the candle-fruited tree, + I have not failed to honour. And I say + It would be better for such men as we, + And we be nearer Bethlehem, it we lay + Shot dead on scarlet snows for liberty, + Dead in the daylight upon Christmas Day. + + + + A SONG OF SWORDS + + + "A DROVE OF CATTLE CAME INTO A VILLAGE CALLED + SWORDS, AND WAS STOPPED BY THE RIOTERS."---_Daily Paper_. + + In the place called Swords on the Irish road + It is told for a new renown + How we field the horns of the cattle, and how + We will hold the horns of the devil now + Ere the lord of bell, with the horn on his brow, + Is crowned in Dublin town + + Light in the East and light in the West, + And light on the cruel lords, + On the souls that suddenly all men knew, + And the green flag flew and the red flag flew, + And many a wheel of the world stopped, too, + When the cattle were stopped at Swords. + + Be they sinners or less than saints + That smite in the street for rage, + We know where the shame shines bright; we know + You that they smite at, you their foe, + Lords of the lawless wage and low. + This is your lawful wage. + + You pinched a child to a torture price + That you dared not name in words; + So black a jest was the silver bit + That your own speech shook for the shame of + And the coward was plain as a cow they hit + When the cattle have strayed at Swords. + + The wheel of the torment of wives went round + To break men's brotherhood; + You gave the good Irish blood to grease + The clubs of your country's enemies; + You saw the brave man beat to the knees: + And you saw that it was good. + + The rope of the rich is long and long-- + The longest of hangmen's cords; + But the kings and crowds are holding their bream, + In a giant shadow o'er all beneath + Where God stands holding the scales of Death + Between the cattle and Swords. + + Haply the lords that hire and lend, + The lowest of all men's lords, + Who sell their kind like kine at a fair. + Will find no head of their cattle there; + But faces of men where cattle were: + Faces of men--and Swords. + + And the name shining and terrible, + The sternest of all man's words, + Still mark that place to seek or shun, + In the streets where the struggling cattle run-- + Grass and a silence of judgment done + In the place that is called Swords. + + + + A SONG OF DEFEAT + + + The line breaks and the guns go under, + The lords and the lackeys ride the plain; + I draw deep breaths of the dawn and thunder, + And the whole of my heart grows young again. + For our Chiefs said "Done," and I did not deem it; + Our Seers said "Peace," and it was not peace; + Earth will grow worse till men redeem it, + And wars more evil, ere all wars cease. + But the old flags reel and the old drums rattle. + As once in my life they throbbed and reeled; + I have found ray youth in the lost battle, + I have found my heart on the battlefield. + For we that fight till the world is free, + We are not easy in victory: + We have known each other too long, my brother, + And fought each other, the world and we. + + And I dream of the days when work was scrappy, + And rare in our pockets the mark of the mint, + When we were angry and poor and happy, + And proud of seeing our names in print. + For so they conquered and so we scattered, + When the Devil rode and his dogs smelt gold, + And the peace of a harmless folk was shattered; + When I was twenty and odd years old. + When the mongrel men that the market classes + Had slimy hands upon England's rod, + And sword in hand upon Afric's passes + Her last Republic cried to God. + For the men no lords can buy or sell, + They sit not easy when all goes well. + They have said to each other what naught can smother, + They have seen each other, our souls and hell. + + It is all as of old; the empty clangour. + The Nothing scrawled on a five-foot page, + The huckster who, mocking holy anger, + Painfully paints his face with rage. + And the faith of the poor is faint and partial, + And the pride of the rich is all for sale, + And the chosen heralds of England's Marshal + Are the sandwich-men of the "Daily Mail." + And the niggards that dare not give are glutted, + And the feeble that dare not fail are strong, + So while the City of Toil is gutted, + I sit in the saddle and sing my song. + For we that fight till the world is free, + We have no comfort in victory; + We have read each other as Cain his brother, + We know each other, these slaves and we. + + + + SONNET + + + ON HEARING A LANDLORD ACCUSED (FALSELY, FOR + ALL THE BARD CAN SAY) OF NEGLECTING ONE OF THE + NUMEROUS WHITE HORSES THAT WERE OR WERE NOT + CONNECTED WITH ALFRED THE GREAT + + If you have picked your lawn of leaves and snails, + If you have told your valet, even with oaths, + Once a week or so, to brush your clothes. + If you have dared to clean your teeth, or nails, + While the Horse upon the holy mountain fails-- + Then God that Alfred to his earth betrothes + Send on you screaming all that honour loathes, + Horsewhipping, Hounsditch, debts, and _Daily Mails_. + + Can you not even conserve? For if indeed + The White Horse fades; then closer creeps the fight + When we shall scour the face of England white, + Plucking such men as you up like a weed, + And fling them far beyond a shaft shot right + When Wessex went to battle for the creed. + + + + AFRICA + + + A sleepy people, without priests or kings, + Dreamed here, men say, to drive us to the sea: + O let us drive ourselves! For it is free + And smells of honour and of English things. + How came we brawling by these bitter springs, + We of the North?--two kindly nations--we? + Though the dice rattles and the clear coin rings, + Here is no place for living men to be. + Leave them the gold that worked and whined for it, + Let them that have no nation anywhere + Be native here, and fat and full of bread; + But we, whose sins were human, we will quit + The land of blood, and leave these vultures there, + Noiselessly happy, feeding on the dead. + + + + THE DEAD HERO + + + We never saw you, like our sires, + For whom your face was Freedom's face, + Nor know what office-tapes and wires + With such strong cords may interlace; + We know not if the statesmen then + Were fashioned as the sort we see, + We know that not under your ken + Did England laugh at Liberty. + + Yea, this one thing is known of you, + We know that not till you were dumb, + Not till your course was thundered through, + Did Mammon see his kingdom come. + The songs of theft, the swords of hire, + The clerks that raved, the troops that ran + The empire of the world's desire, + The dance of all the dirt began. + + The happy jewelled alien men + Worked then but as a little leaven; + From some more modest palace then + The Soul of Dives stank to Heaven. + But when they planned with lisp and leer + Their careful war upon the weak, + They smote your body on its bier, + For surety that you could not speak. + + A hero in the desert died; + Men cried that saints should bury him. + And round the grave should guard and ride, + A chivalry of Cherubim. + God said: "There is a better place, + A nobler trophy and more tall; + The beasts that fled before his face + Shall come to make his funeral. + + "The mighty vermin of the void + That hid them from his bended bow, + Shall crawl from caverns overjoyed, + Jackal and snake and carrion crow. + And perched above the vulture's eggs, + Reversed upon its hideous head, + A blue-faced ape shall wave its legs + To tell the world that he is dead." + + + + AN ELECTION ECHO 1906 + + + This is their trumpet ripe and rounded, + They have burnt the wheat and gathered the chaff, + And we that have fought them, we that have watched them, + Have we at least not cause to laugh? + + Never so low at least we stumbled-- + Dead we have been but not so dead + As these that live on the life they squandered, + As these that drink of the blood they shed. + + We never boasted the thing we blundered, + We never Haunted the thing that fails, + We never quailed from the living laughter, + To howl to the dead who tell no tales, + + 'Twas another finger at least that pointed + Our wasted men or our emptied bags, + It was not we that sounded the trumpet + In front of the triumph of wrecks and rags. + + Fear not these, they have made their bargain, + They have counted the cost of the last of raids, + They have staked their lives on the things that live not, + They have burnt their house for a fire that fades. + + Five years ago and we might have feared them, + Been drubbed by the coward and taught by the dunce; + Truth may endure and be told and re-echoed, + But a lie can never be young but once. + + Five years ago and we might have feared them; + Now, when they lift the laurelled brow, + There shall naught go up from our hosts assembled + But a laugh like thunder. We know them now. + + + + THE SONG OF THE WHEELS + + WRITTEN DURING A FRIDAY AND SATURDAY IN AUGUST 1911. + + + King Dives he was waiting in his garden all alone, + Where his flowers are made of iron and his trees are made of stone, + And his hives are full of thunder and the lightning leaps and kills, + For the mills of God grind slowly; and he works with other mills. + Dives found a mighty silence; and he missed the throb and leap, + The noise of all the sleepless creatures singing him to sleep. + And he said: "A screw has fallen--or a bolt has slipped aside-- + Some little thing has shifted": and the little things replied: + + "Call upon the wheels, master, call upon the wheels; + We are taking rest, master, finding how it feels, + Strict the law of thine and mine: theft we ever shun-- + All the wheels are thine, master--tell the wheels to run! + Yea, the Wheels are mighty gods--set them going then! + We are only men, master, have you heard of men? + + "O, they live on earth like fishes, and a gasp is all their breath. + God for empty honours only gave them death and scorn of death, + And you walk the worms for carpet and you tread a stone that squeals-- + Only, God that made them worms did not make them wheels. + Man shall shut his heart against you and you shall not find the spring. + Man who wills the thing he wants not, the intolerable thing-- + Once he likes his empty belly better than your empty head + Earth and heaven are dumb before him: he is stronger than the dead. + + "Call upon the wheels, master, call upon the wheels, + Steel is beneath your hand, stone beneath your heels, + Steel will never laugh aloud, hearing what we heard, + Stone will never break its heart, mad with hope deferred-- + Men of tact that arbitrate, slow reform that heals-- + Save the stinking grease, master, save it for the wheels. + + "King Dives in the garden, we have naught to give or hold-- + (Even while the baby came alive the rotten sticks were sold.) + The savage knows a cavern and the peasants keep a plot, + Of all the things that men have had--lo! we have them not. + Not a scrap of earth where ants could lay their eggs-- + Only this poor lump of earth that walks about on legs-- + Only this poor wandering mansion, only these two walking trees. + Only hands and hearts and stomachs--what have you to do with these? + You have engines big and burnished, tall beyond our fathers' ken, + Why should you make peace and traffic with such feeble folk as men? + + "Call upon the wheels, master, call upon the wheels, + They are deaf to demagogues, deaf to crude appeals; + Are our hands our own, master?--how the doctors doubt! + Are our legs our own, master? wheels can run without-- + Prove the points are delicate--they will understand. + All the wheels are loyal; see how still they stand!" + + King Dives he was walking in his garden in the sun, + He shook his hand at heaven, and he called the wheels to run, + And the eyes of him were hateful eyes, the lips of him were curled, + And he called upon his father that is lord below the world, + Sitting in the Gate of Treason, in the gate of broken seals, + "Bend and bind them, bend and bind them, bend and bind them into wheels, + Then once more in all my garden there may swing and sound and sweep-- + The noise of all the sleepless things that sing the soul to sleep." + + _Call upon the wheels, master, call upon the wheels._ + _Weary grow the holidays when you miss the meals,_ + _Through the Gate of Treason, through the gate within,_ + _Cometh fear and greed of fame, cometh deadly sin;_ + _If a man grow faint, master, take him ere he kneels._ + _Take him, break him, rend him, end him, roll him, crush him with the wheels._ + + + + THE SECRET PEOPLE + + + Smile at us, pay us, pass us; but do not quite forget. + For we are the people of England, that never has spoken yet. + There is many a fat farmer that drinks less cheerfully, + There is many a free French peasant who is richer and sadder than we. + There are no folk in the whole world so helpless or so wise. + There is hunger in our bellies, there is laughter in our eyes; + You laugh at us and love us, both mugs and eyes are wet: + Only you do not know us. For we have not spoken yet. + + The fine French kings came over in a flutter of flags and dames. + We liked their smiles and battles, but we never could say their names. + The blood ran red to Bosworth and the High French lords went down; + There was naught but a naked people under a naked crown. + + And the eyes of the King's Servants turned terribly every way, + And the gold of the King's Servants rose higher every day. + They burnt the homes of the shaven men, that had been quaint and kind, + Till there was no bed in a monk's house, nor food that man could find. + The inns of God where no man paid, that were the wall of the weak, + The King's Servants ate them all. And Still we did not speak. + + And the face of the King's Servants grew greater than the King: + He tricked them, and they trapped him, and stood round him in a ring. + The new grave lords closed round him, that had eaten the abbey's fruits. + And the men of the new religion, with their bibles in their boots. + We saw their shoulders moving, to menace or discuss, + And some were pure and some were vile; but none took heed of us. + We saw the King as they killed him, and his face was proud and pale; + And a few men talked of freedom, while England talked of ale. + + A war that we understood not came over the world and woke + Americans, Frenchmen, Irish; but we knew not the things they spoke. + They talked about rights and nature and peace and the people's reign: + And the squires, our masters, bade us fight; and never scorned us again. + Weak if we be for ever, could none condemn us then; + Men called us serfs and drudges; men knew that we were men. + In foam and flame at Trafalgar, on Albuera plains, + We did and died like lions, to keep ourselves in chains, + We lay in living ruins; firing and fearing not + The strange fierce face of the Frenchmen who knew for what they fought, + And the man who seemed to be more than man we strained against and broke; + And we broke our own rights with him. And still we never spoke. + + Our patch of glory ended; we never heard guns again. + But the squire seemed struck in the saddle; he was foolish, as if in pain + He leaned on a staggering lawyer, he clutched a cringing Jew, + He was stricken; it may be, after all, he was stricken at Waterloo. + Or perhaps the shades of the shaven men, whose spoil is in his house, + Come back in shining shapes at last to spoil his last carouse: + We only know the last sad squires ride slowly towards the sea. + And a new people takes the land: and still it is not we. + + They have given us into the hand of the new unhappy lords, + Lords without anger and honour, who dare not carry their swords. + They fight by shuffling papers; they have bright dead alien eyes; + They look at our labour and laughter as a tired man looks at flies. + And the load 01 their loveless pity is worse than the ancient wrongs, + Their doors are shut in the evening; and they know no songs. + + We hear men speaking for us of new laws strong and sweet, + Yet is there no man speaketh as we speak in the street. + It may be we shall rise the last as Frenchmen rose the first, + Our wrath come after Russia's wrath and our wrath be the worst. + It may be we are meant to mark with our riot and our rest + God's scorn for all men governing. It may be beer is best. + But we are the people of England; and we have not spoken yet. + Smile at us, pay us, pass us. But do not quite forget. + + + + + + VI + + MISCELLANEOUS POEMS + + + LOST + + + So you have gained the golden crowns, so you have piled together + The laurels and the jewels, the pearls out of the blue, + But I will beat the bounding drum and I will fly the feather + For all the glory I have lost, the good I never knew. + + I saw the light of morning pale on princely human faces, + In tales irrevocably gone, in final night enfurled, + I saw the tail of flying fights, a glimpse of burning blisses, + And laughed to think what I had lost--the wealth of all the world. + + Yea, ruined in a royal game I was before my cradle; + Was ever gambler hurling gold who lost such things as I? + The purple moth that died an hour ere I was born of + That great green sunset God shall make three days after I die. + + When all the lights are lost and done, when all the skies are broken, + Above the ruin of the stars my soul shall sit in state, + With a brain made rich, with the irrevocable sunsets, + And a closed heart happy in the fullness of a fate. + + So you have gained the golden crowns and grasped the golden weather, + The kingdoms and the hemispheres that all men buy and sell, + But I will lash the leaping drum and swing the flaring feather, + For the light of seven heavens that are lost to me like hell. + + + + BALLAD OF THE SUN + + + O well for him that loves the sun + That sees the heaven-race ridden or run, + The splashing seas of sunset won, + And shouts for victory. + + God made the sun to crown his head, + And when death's dart at last is sped, + At least it will not find him dead, + And pass the carrion by. + + O ill for him that loves the sun; + Shall the sun stoop for anyone? + Shall the sun weep for hearts undone + Or heavy souls that pray? + + Not less for us and everyone + Was that white web of splendour spun; + O well for him who loves the sun + Although the sun should slay. + + + + TRANSLATION FROM DU BELLAY + + + Happy, who like Ulysses or that lord + Who raped the fleece, returning full and sage, + With usage and the world's wide reason stored, + With his own kin can wait the end of age. + When shall I see, when shall I see, God knows! + My little village smoke; or pass the door, + The old dear door of that unhappy house + That is to me a kingdom and much more? + Mightier to me the house my fathers made + Than your audacious heads, O Halls of Rome! + More than immortal marbles undecayed, + The thin sad slates that cover up my home; + More than your Tiber is my Loire to me, + Than Palatine my little Lyre there; + And more than all the winds of all the sea + The quiet kindness of the Angevin air. + + + + THE HIGHER UNITY + + + "The Rev. Isaiah Bunter has disappeared into the interior + of the Solomon Islands, and it is feared that he may have + been devoured by the natives, as there has been a considerable + revival of religious customs among the Polynesians." + _A real paragraph from a real Paper; only the names altered._ + + It was Isaiah Bunter + Who sailed to the world's end, + And spread religion in a way + That he did not intend. + + He gave, if not the gospel-feast, + At least a ritual meal; + And in a highly painful sense + He was devoured with zeal. + + And who are we (as Henson says) + That we should close the door? + And should not Evangelicals + All jump at shedding Gore? + + And many a man will melt in man, + Becoming one, not two, + When smacks across the startled earth + The Kiss of Kikuyu. + + When Man is the Turk, and the Atheist, + Essene, Erastian Whig, + And the Thug and the Druse and the Catholic, + And the crew of the Captain's gig. + + + + THE EARTH'S VIGIL + + + The old earth keepeth her watch the same. + Alone in a voiceless void doth stand, + Her orange flowers in her bosom flame, + Her gold ring in her hand. + The surfs of the long gold-crested morns + Break ever more at her great robe's hem, + And evermore come the bleak moon-horns. + But she keepeth not watch for them. + + She keepeth her watch through the awns, + But the heart of her groweth not old, + For the peal of the bridegroom's paeans, + And the tale she once was told. + + The nations shock and the cities reel, + The empires travail and rive and rend, + And she looks on havoc and smoke and steel, + And knoweth it is not the end. + The faiths may choke and the powers despair, + The powers re-arise and the faiths renew, + She is only a maiden, waiting there, + For the love whose word is true. + + She keepeth her watch through the aeons, + But the heart of her groweth not old, + For the peal of the bridegroom's paeans, + And the tale she once was told. + + Through the cornfield's gleam and the cottage shade, + They wait unwearied, the young and old, + Mother for child and man for maid. + For a love that once was told. + The hair grows grey under thatch or slates, + The eyes grow dim behind lattice panes, + The earth-race wait as the old earth waits, + And the hope in the heart remains. + + She keepeth her watch through the aeons, + But the heart of her groweth not old, + For the peal of the bridegroom's paeans, + And the tale she once was told. + + God's gold ring on her hand is bound, + She fires with blossom the grey hill-sides, + Her fields are quickened, her forests crowned, + While the love of her heart abides, + And we from the fears that fret and mar + Look up in hours and behold awhile + Her face, colossal, mid star on star, + Still looking forth with a smile. + + She keepeth her watch through the sons, + But the heart of her groweth not old, + For the peal of the bridegroom's paeans, + And the tale she once was told. + + + + ON RIGHTEOUS INDIGNATION + + + When Adam went from Paradise + He saw the Sword and ran; + The dreadful shape, the new device, + The pointed end of Paradise, + And saw what Peril is and Price, + And knew he was a man. + + When Adam went from Paradise, + He turned him back and cried + For a little flower from Paradise; + There came no flower from Paradise; + The woods were dark in Paradise, + And not a bird replied. + + For only comfort or contempt, + For jest or great reward, + Over the walls of Paradise, + The flameless gates of Paradise, + The dumb shut doors of Paradise, + God flung the flaming sword. + + It burns the hand that holds it + More than the skull it scores; + It doubles like a snake and stings, + Yet he in whose hand it swings + He is the most masterful of things, + A scorner of the stars. + + + + WHEN I CAME BACK TO FLEET STREET + + + When I came back to Fleet Street, + Through a sunset nook at night, + And saw the old Green Dragon + With the windows all alight, + And hailed the old Green Dragon + And the Cock I used to know, + Where all good fellows were my friends + A little while ago; + + I had been long in meadows, + And the trees took hold of me, + And the still towns in the beech-woods, + Where men were meant to be. + But old things held; the laughter, + The long unnatural night, + And all the truth they talk in hell, + And all the lies they write. + + For I came back to Fleet Street, + And not in peace I came; + A cloven pride was in my heart, + And half my love was shame. + I came to fight in fairy-tale, + Whose end shall no man know-- + To fight the old Green Dragon + Until the Cock shall crow! + + Under the broad bright windows + Of men I serve no more, + The groaning of the old great wheels + Thickened to a throttled roar; + All buried things broke upward; + And peered from its retreat, + Ugly and silent, like an elf, + The secret of the street. + + They did not break the padlocks, + Or clear the wall away. + The men in debt that drank of old + Still drink in debt to-day; + Chained to the rich by ruin, + Cheerful in chains, as then + When old unbroken Pickwick walked + Among the broken men. + + Still he that dreams and rambles + Through his own elfin air, + Knows that the street's a prison, + Knows that the gates are there: + Still he that scorns or struggles + Sees, frightful and afar. + All that they leave of rebels + Rot high on Temple Bar. + + All that I loved and hated, + All that I shunned and knew, + Clears in broad battle lightning, + Where they, and I, and you, + Run high the barricade that breaks + The barriers of the street, + And shout to them that shrink within, + The Prisoners of the Fleet. + + + + A CIDER SONG + + _To J.S.M._ + + + EXTRACT FROM A ROMANCE WHICH IS NOT YET + WRITTEN AND PROBABLY NEVER WILL BE. + + The wine they drink in Paradise + They make in Haute Lorraine; + God brought it burning from the sod + To be a sign and signal rod + That they that drink the blood of God + Shall never thirst again. + + The wine they praise in Paradise + They make in Ponterey, + The purple wine of Paradise, + But we have better at the price; + It's wine they praise in Paradise, + It's cider that they pray. + + The wine they want in Paradise + They find in Plodder's End, + The apple wine of Hereford, + Of Hafod Hill and Hereford, + Where woods went down to Hereford, + And there I had a friend. + + The soft feet of the blessed go + In the soft western vales, + The road the silent saints accord, + The road from Heaven to Hereford, + Where the apple wood of Hereford + Goes all the way to Wales. + + + + THE LAST HERO + + + The wind blew out from Bergen from the dawning to the day, + There was a wreck of trees and fall of towers a score of miles away, + And drifted like a livid leaf I go before its tide, + Spewed out of house and stable, beggared of flag and bride. + The heavens are bowed about my head, shouting like seraph wars. + With rains that might put out the sun and clean the sky of stars, + Rains like the fall of ruined seas from secret worlds above, + The roaring of the rains of God none but the lonely love. + Feast in my hall, O foemen, and eat and drink and drain, + You never loved the sun in heaven as I have loved the rain. + + The chance of battle changes--so may all battle be; + I stole my lady bride from them, they stole her back from me. + I rent her from her red-roofed hall, I rode and saw arise + More lovely than the living flowers the hatred in her eyes. + She never loved me, never bent, never was less divine; + The sunset never loved me; the wind was never mine. + Was it all nothing that she stood imperial in duresse? + Silence itself made softer with the sweeping of her dress. + O you who drain the cup of life, O you who wear the crown, + You never loved a woman's smile as I have loved her frown. + + The wind blew out from Bergen from the dawning to the day, + They ride and run with fifty spears to break and bar my way, + I shall not die alone, alone, but kin to all the powers. + As merry as the ancient sun and fighting like the flowers. + How white their steel, how bright their eyes! I love each laughing knave. + Cry high and bid him welcome to the banquet of the brave. + Yea, I will bless them as they bend and love them where they lie, + When on their skulls the sword I swing falls shattering from the sky. + The hour when death is like a light and blood is like a rose,-- + You never loved your friends, my friends, as I shall love my foes. + + Know you what earth shall lose to-night, what rich, uncounted loans, + What heavy gold of tales untold you bury with my bones? + My loves in deep dim meadows, my ships that rode at ease, + Ruffling the purple plumage of strange and secret seas. + To see this fair earth as it is to me alone was given, + The blow that breaks my brow to-night shall break the dome of heaven. + The skies I saw, the trees I saw after no eyes shall see. + To-night I die the death of God; the stars shall die with me: + One sound shall sunder all the spears and break the trumpet's breath: + You never laughed in all your life as I shall laugh in death. + + + + + + VII + + BALLADES + + + BALLADE D'UNE GRANDE DAME + + + Heaven shall forgive you Bridge at dawn, + The clothes you wear--or do not wear-- + And Ladies' Leap-frog on the lawn + And dyes and drugs, and _petits verres._ + Your vicious things shall melt in air ... + ... But for the Virtuous Things you do, + The Righteous Work, the Public Care, + It shall not be forgiven you. + + Because you could not even yawn + When your Committees would prepare + To have the teeth of paupers drawn, + Or strip the slums of Human Hair; + Because a Doctor Otto Maehr + Spoke of "a segregated few"-- + And you sat smiling in your chair-- + It shall not be forgiven you. + + Though your sins cried to---Father Vaughan, + These desperate you could not spare + Who steal, with nothing left to pawn; + You caged a man up like a bear + For ever in a jailor's care + Because his sins were more than _two_ ... + ... I know a house in Hoxton where + It shall not be forgiven you. + + ENVOI + + Princess, you trapped a guileless Mayor + To meet some people that you knew ... + When the Last Trumpet rends the air + It shall not be forgiven you. + + + + A BALLADE OF AN ANTI-PURITAN + + + They spoke of Progress spiring round, + Of Light and Mrs. Humphry Ward-- + It is not true to say I frowned, + Or ran about the room and roared; + I might have simply sat and snored-- + I rose politely in the club + And said, "I feel a little bored; + Will someone take me to a pub?" + + The new world's wisest did surround + Me; and it pains me to record + I did not think their views profound, + Or their conclusions well assured; + The simple life I can't afford, + Besides, I do not like the grub-- + I wait a mash and sausage, "scored"-- + Will someone take me to a pub? + + I know where Men can still be found, + Anger and clamorous accord, + And virtues growing from the ground, + And fellowship of beer and board, + And song, that is a sturdy cord. + And hope, that is a hardy shrub, + And goodness, that is God's last word-- + Will someone take me to a pub? + + ENVOI + + Prince, Bayard would have smashed his sword + To see the sort of knights you dub--Is + that the last of them--O Lord! + Will someone take me to a pub? + + + + A BALLADE OF A BOOK-REVIEWER + + + I have not read a rotten page + Of "Sex-Hate" or "The Social Test," + And here comes "Husks" and "Heritage".... + O Moses, give us all a rest! + "Ethics of Empire"!... I protest + I will not even cut the strings, + I'll read "Jack Redskin on the Quest" + And feed my brain with better things. + + Somebody wants a Wiser Age + (He also wants me to invest); + Somebody likes the Finnish Stage + Because the Jesters do not jest; + And grey with dust is Dante's crest, + The bell of Rabelais soundless swings; + And the winds come out of the west + And feed my brain with better things. + + Lord of our laughter and our rage. + Look on us with our sins oppressed! + I, too, have trodden mine heritage, + Wickedly wearying of the best. + Burn from my brain and from my breast + Sloth, and the cowardice that clings, + And stiffness and the soul's arrest: + And feed my brain with better things. + + ENVOI + + Prince, you are host and I am guest, + Therefore I shrink from cavillings.... + But I should have that fizz suppressed + And feed my brain with better things. + + + + A BALLADE OF SUICIDE + + + The gallows in my garden, people say, + Is new and neat and adequately tall. + I tie the noose on in a knowing way + As one that knots his necktie for a ball; + But just as all the neighbours--on the wall-- + Are drawing a long breath to shout "Hurray!" + The strangest whim has seized me.... After all + I think I will not hang myself to-day. + + To-morrow is the time I get my pay--My + uncle's sword is hanging in the hall-- + I see a little cloud all pink and grey-- + Perhaps the rector's mother will _not_ call-- + I fancy that I heard from Mr. Gall + That mushrooms could be cooked another way-- + I never read the works of Juvenal-- + I think I will not hang myself to-day. + + The world will have another washing day; + The decadents decay; the pedants pall; + And H.G. Wells has found that children play. + And Bernard Shaw discovered that they squall; + Rationalists are growing rational-- + And through thick woods one finds a stream astray, + So secret that the very sky seems small-- + I think I will not hang myself to-day. + + ENVOI + + Prince, I can hear the trumpet of Germinal, + The tumbrils toiling up the terrible way; + Even to-day your royal head may fall-- + I think I will not hang myself to-day. + + + + A BALLADE OF THE FIRST RAIN + + + The sky is blue with summer and the sun, + The woods are brown as autumn with the tan, + It might as well be Tropics and be done, + I might as well be born a copper Khan; + I fashion me an oriental fan + Made of the wholly unreceipted bills + Brought by the ice-man, sleeping in his van + (A storm is coming on the Chiltern Hills). + + I read the Young Philosophers for fun + --Fresh as our sorrow for the late Queen Anne-- + The Dionysians whom a pint would stun, + The Pantheists who never heard of Pan. + --But through my hair electric needles ran, + And on my book a gout of water spills, + And on the skirts of heaven the guns began + (A storm is coming on the Chiltern Hills). + + O fields of England, cracked and dry and dun, + O soul of England, sick of words, and wan!-- + The clouds grow dark;--the down-rush has begun. + --It comes, it comes, as holy darkness can, + Black as with banners, ban and arriere-ban; + A falling laughter all the valley fills, + Deep as God's thunder and the thirst of man: + (A storm is coming on the Chiltern Hills). + + ENVOI + + Prince, Prince-Elective on the modern plan + Fulfilling such a lot of People's Wills, + You take the Chiltern Hundreds while you can-- + A storm is coming on the Chiltern Hills. + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Poems, by G.K. 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