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diff --git a/old/53621-h/53621-h.htm b/old/53621-h/53621-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index 15b57c7..0000000 --- a/old/53621-h/53621-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,5084 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" - "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> - <head> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> - <title> - The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Complete Poems, by Francis Ledwidge. - </title> - <style type="text/css"> - -body { - margin-left: 10%; - margin-right: 10%; -} - - h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { - text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ - clear: both; -} - -p { - margin-top: .51em; - text-align: justify; - margin-bottom: .49em; -} - -.p2 {margin-top: 2em;} -.p4 {margin-top: 4em;} -.p6 {margin-top: 6em;} - -hr { - width: 33%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 2em; - margin-left: auto; - margin-right: auto; - clear: both; -} - -hr.tb {width: 45%;} -hr.chap {width: 65%} -hr.full {width: 95%;} - -hr.r5 {width: 5%; margin-top: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em;} -hr.r65 {width: 65%; margin-top: 3em; margin-bottom: 3em;} - - -table { - margin-left: auto; - margin-right: auto; -} - - .tdl {text-align: left;} - .tdr {text-align: right;} - .tdc {text-align: center;} - -.pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ - /* visibility: hidden; */ - position: absolute; - left: 92%; - font-size: smaller; - text-align: right; - color: #A9A9A9; -} /* page numbers */ - -.tabnum { - position: absolute; - left: 70%; - text-align: right; -} - -.blockquot { - margin-left: 5%; - margin-right: 10%; -} - - -.center {text-align: center;} - -.right {text-align: right;} - -.smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} - -.capt { - font-size: 0.8em; - text-align: center;} - -.caption {font-weight: bold;} - -/* Images */ -.figcenter { - margin: auto; - text-align: center; -} - -.figleft { - float: left; - clear: left; - margin-left: 0; - margin-bottom: 1em; - margin-top: 1em; - margin-right: 1em; - padding: 0; - text-align: center; -} - -.figright { - float: right; - clear: right; - margin-left: 1em; - margin-bottom: - 1em; - margin-top: 1em; - margin-right: 0; - padding: 0; - text-align: center; -} - -/* Footnotes */ -.footnotes {border: dashed 1px;} - -.footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} - -.footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} - -.fnanchor { - vertical-align: super; - font-size: .8em; - text-decoration: - none; -} - -/* Poetry */ -.poem { - margin-left:10%; - margin-right:10%; - text-align: left; -} - - - </style> - </head> -<body> - - -<pre> - -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Complete Poems of Francis Ledwidge, by -Francis Ledwidge - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: The Complete Poems of Francis Ledwidge - with Introductions by Lord Dunsany - -Author: Francis Ledwidge - -Release Date: November 28, 2016 [EBook #53621] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK COMPLETE POEMS--FRANCIS LEDWIDGE *** - - - - -Produced by Marc D'Hooghe at Free Literature (online soon -in an extended version, also linking to free sources for -education worldwide ... MOOC's, educational materials,...) -Images generously made available by the Internet Archive. - - - - - - -</pre> - - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<img src="images/cover.jpg" width="500" alt="" /> -</div> - -<h1>THE COMPLETE POEMS</h1> - -<h3>OF</h3> - -<h2>FRANCIS LEDWIDGE</h2> - - - -<h4>WITH INTRODUCTION</h4> - -<h4>BY LORD DUNSANY</h4> - - -<h5>HERBERT JENKINS LIMITED</h5> - -<h5>YORK STREET ST. JAMES'S</h5> - -<h5>LONDON S.W.1</h5> - -<h5>MCMXIX</h5> - -<hr class="full" /> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<img src="images/ledwidge.jpg" width="500" alt="" /> -<p class="capt">Francis Ledwidge</p> -</div> -<hr class="r5" /> -<p class="center" style="font-size: 0.8em;">TO</p> - -<p class="center">MY MOTHER</p> - -<p class="center" style="font-size: 0.8em;">THE FIRST SINGER I KNEW</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span></p> - - - - -<h4>INTRODUCTION TO SONGS OF THE FIELDS</h4> - - -<p class="smcap" style="margin-left: 65%;">Dunsany Castle,</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 65%;"><i>June,</i> 1914.</p> - -<p>If one who looked from a tower for a new star, watching for years the -same part of the sky, suddenly saw it (quite by chance while thinking -of other things), and knew it for the star for which he had hoped, how -many millions of men would never care?</p> - -<p>And the star might blaze over deserts and forests and seas, cheering -lost wanderers in desolate lands, or guiding dangerous quests; millions -would never know it. And a poet is no more than a star. If one has -arisen where I have so long looked for one, amongst the Irish peasants, -it can be little more than a secret that I shall share with those who -read this book because they care for poetry.</p> - -<p>I have looked for a poet amongst the Irish peasants because it seemed -to me that almost only amongst them there was in daily use a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> diction -worthy of poetry, as well a an imagination capable of dealing with the -great and simple things that are a poet's wares. Their thoughts are in -the spring-time, and all their metaphors fresh: in London no one makes -metaphors any more, but daily speech is strewn thickly with dead ones -that their users should write upon paper and give to their gardeners to -burn.</p> - -<p>In this same London, two years ago, where I was wasting June, I -received a letter one day from Mr. Ledwidge and a very old copy-book. -The letter asked whether there was any good in the verses that filled -the copy-book, the produce apparently of four or five years. It began -with a play in verse that no manager would dream of, there were -mistakes in grammar, in spelling of course, and worse—there were such -phrases as "'thwart the rolling foam," "waiting for my true love on -the lea," etc., which are vulgarly considered to be the appurtenances -of poetry; but out of these and many similar errors there arose -continually, like a mountain sheer out of marshes, that easy fluency of -shapely lines which is now so noticeable in all that he writes; that -and sudden glimpses of the fields that he seems at times to bring so -near to one that one exclaims,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> "Why, that is how Meath looks," or "It -is just like that along the Boyne in April," quite taken by surprise by -familiar things: for none of us knows, till the poets point them out, -how many beautiful things are close about us.</p> - -<p>Of pure poetry there are two kinds, that which mirrors the beauty of -the world in which our bodies are, and that which builds the more -mysterious kingdoms where geography ends and fairyland begins, with -gods and heroes at war, and the sirens singing still, and Alph going -down to the darkness from Xanadu. Mr. Ledwidge gives us the first -kind. When they have read through the profounder poets, and seen the -problem plays, and studied all the perplexities that puzzle man in the -cities, the small circle of readers that I predict for him will turn to -Ledwidge as to a mirror reflecting beautiful fields, as to a very still -lake rather on a very cloudless evening.</p> - -<p>There is scarcely a smile of Spring or a sigh of Autumn that is not -reflected here, scarcely a phase of the large benedictions of Summer; -even of Winter he gives us clear glimpses sometimes, albeit mournfully, -remembering Spring.</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 10%;"> -"In the red west the twisted moon is low,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span>And on the bubbles there are half-lit stars,<br /> -Music and twilight: and the deep blue flow<br /> -Of water: and the watching fire of Mars.<br /> -The deep fish slipping through the moonlit bars<br /> -Make death a thing of sweet dreams,—"<br /> -</p> - -<p>What a Summer's evening is here.</p> - -<p>And this is a Summer's night in a much longer poem that I have not -included in this selection, a summer's night seen by two lovers:</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 10%;"> -"The large moon rose up queenly as a flower<br /> -Charmed by some Indian pipes. A hare went by,<br /> -A snipe above them circled in the sky."<br /> -</p> - -<p>And elsewhere he writes, giving us the mood and picture of Autumn in a -single line:</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 10%;"> -"And somewhere all the wandering birds have flown."<br /> -</p> - -<p>With such simple scenes as this the book is full, giving nothing at all -to those that look for a "message," but bringing a feeling of quiet -from gleaming Irish evenings, a book to read between* the Strand and -Piccadilly Circus amidst the thunder and hootings.</p> - -<p>To every poet is given the revelation of some living thing so intimate -that he speaks, when he speaks of it, as an ambassador speaking for his -sovereign; with Homer it was the heroes, with Ledwidge it is the small -birds that sing, but in particular especially the blackbird, whose -cause he champions against all other<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> birds almost with a vehemence -such as that with which men discuss whether Mr. ——, M. P., or his -friend the Right Honourable —— is really the greater ruffian. This -is how he speaks of the blackbird in one of his earliest poems; he was -sixteen when he wrote it, in a grocer's shop in Dublin, dreaming of -Slane, where he was born; and his dreams turned out to be too strong -for the grocery business, for he walked home one night, a distance of -thirty miles:</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 10%;"> -"Above me smokes the little town<br /> -With its whitewashed walls and roofs of brown<br /> -And its octagon spire toned smoothly down<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">As the holy minds within.</span><br /> -And wondrous, impudently sweet,<br /> -Half of him passion, half conceit,<br /> -The blackbird calls adown the street,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Like the piper of Hamelin."</span><br /> -</p> - -<p>Let us not call him the Burns of Ireland, you who may like this book, -nor even the Irish John Clare, though he is more like him, for poets -are all incomparable (it is only the versifiers that resemble the great -ones), but let us know him by his own individual song: he is the poet -of the blackbird.</p> - -<p>I hope that not too many will be attracted to this book on account -of the author being a peasant, lest he come to be praised by the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> -how-interesting! school; for know that neither in any class, nor in any -country, nor in any age, shall you predict the footfall of Pegasus, who -touches the earth where he pleaseth and is bridled by whom he will.</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 75%; font-size: 0.8em;">DUNSANY.</p> - -<p><i>June, 1914.</i></p> - - -<p class="smcap" style="margin-left: 65%;" >Basingstoke Camp.</p> - -<p>I wrote this preface in such a different June, that if I sent it out -with no addition it would make the book appear to have dropped a long -while since out of another world, a world that none of us remembers -now, in which there used to be leisure.</p> - -<p>Ledwidge came last October into the 5th Battalion of the Royal -Inniskilling Fusiliers, which is in one of the divisions of Kitchener's -first army, and soon earned a lance-corporal's stripe.</p> - -<p>All his future books lie on the knees of the gods. May They not be the -only readers.</p> - -<p>Any well-informed spy can probably tell you our movements, so of such -things I say nothing.</p> - -<p> -<span style="margin-left: 65%; font-size: 0.8em;">DUNSANY,</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 50%;"><i>Captain, 5th R. Inniskilling Fusiliers.</i></span><br /> -<i>June, 1915.</i><br /> -</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span></p> - - - - -<h4>INTRODUCTION TO SONGS OF PEACE</h4> - - -<p class="smcap" style="margin-left: 60%;">Ebrington Barracks,</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 65%;"><i>September,</i> 1916.</p> - -<p>In this selection that Corporal Ledwidge has asked me to make from his -poems I have included "A Dream of Artemis," though it was incomplete -and has been hurriedly finished Were it not included on that account -many lines of extraordinary beauty would remain unseen. He asked me if -I did not think that it ended too abruptly, but so many pleasant things -ended abruptly in the summer of 1914, when this poem was being written, -that the blame for that may rest on a meaner, though more, exalted, -head than that of the poet.</p> - -<p>In this poem, as in the other one that has a classical theme, "The -Departure of Proserpine," those who remember their classics may find -faults, but I read the "Dream of Artemis" merely as an expression of -things that the poet has seen and dreamed in Meath, including a most -beautiful description of a fox-hunt in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> the north of the county, in -which he has probably taken part on foot; and in "The Departure of -Proserpine," whether conscious or not, a crystallization in verse of -an autumnal mood induced by falling leaves and exile and the possible -nearness of death.</p> - -<p>The second poem in the book was written about a little boy who used -to drive cows for some farmer past the poet's door very early every -morning, whistling as he went, and who died just before the war. I -think that its beautiful and spontaneous simplicity would cost some of -our writers gallons of midnight oil.</p> - -<p>Of the next, "To a Distant One," who will not hope that when "Fame and -other little things are won" its clear and confident prophecy will be -happily fulfilled?</p> - -<p>Quite perfect, if my judgment is of any value, is the little poem on -page <a href="#Page_175">175</a>, "In the Mediterranean—Going to the War."</p> - -<p>Another beautiful thing is "Homecoming" on page <a href="#Page_192">192</a>.</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 10%;"> -"The sheep are coming home in Greece,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Hark the bells on every hill,</span><br /> -Flock by flock and fleece by fleece."<br /> -</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span></p> - -<p>One feels that the Greeks are of some use, after all, to have -inspired—with the help of their sheep—so lovely a poem.</p> - -<p>"The Shadow People" on page <a href="#Page_205">205</a> seems to me another perfect poem. -Written in Serbia and Egypt, it shows the poet still looking -steadfastly at those fields, though so far distant then, of which he -was surely born to be the singer. And this devotion to the fields of -Meath that, in nearly all his songs, from such far places brings his -spirit home, like the instinct that has been given to the swallows, -seems to be the key-note of the book. For this reason I have named it -<i>Songs of Peace,</i> in spite of the circumstances under which they were -written.</p> - -<p>There follow poems at which some may wonder: "To Thomas McDonagh," "The -Blackbirds," "The Wedding Morning"; but rather than attribute curious -sympathies to this brave young Irish soldier I would ask his readers to -consider the irresistible attraction that a lost cause has for almost -any Irish-man.</p> - -<p>Once the swallow instinct appears again—in the poem called "The -Lure"—and a longing<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> for the South, and again in the poem called -"Song": and then the Irish fields content him again, and we find him -on the last page but one in the book making a poem for a little place -called Faughan, because he finds that its hills and woods and streams -are unsung. Surely for this if there be, as many believed, gods lesser -than Those whose business is with destiny, thunder and war, small gods -that haunt the groves, seen only at times by few, and then indistinctly -at evening, surely from gratitude they will give him peace.</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 75%; font-size: 0.8em;">DUNSANY</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span></p> - - - - -<h4><a name="INTRODUCTION_TO_LAST_SONGS" id="INTRODUCTION_TO_LAST_SONGS">INTRODUCTION TO LAST SONGS</a></h4> - - -<p class="smcap" style="margin-left: 60%;">The Hindenberg Line,</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 65%;"><i>October 9th,</i> 1917.</p> - -<p>Writing amidst rather too much noise and squalor to do justice at all -to the delicate rustic muse of Francis Ledwidge, I do not like to delay -his book any longer, nor to fail in a promise long ago made to him to -write this introduction. He has gone down in that vast maelstrom into -which poets do well to adventure and from which their country might -perhaps be wise to withhold them, but that is our Country's affair. He -has left behind him verses of great beauty, simple rural lyrics that -may be something of an anodyne for this stricken age. If ever an age -needed beautiful little songs our age needs them; and I know few songs -more peaceful and happy, or better suited to soothe the scars on the -mind of those<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> who have looked on certain places, of which the prophecy -in the gospels seems no more than an ominous hint when it speaks of the -abomination of desolation.</p> - -<p>He told me once that it was on one particular occasion, when walking -at evening through the village of Slane in summer, that he heard a -blackbird sing. The notes, he said, were very beautiful, and it is -this blackbird that he tells of in three wonderful lines in his early -poem called "Behind the Closed Eye," and it is this song perhaps more -than anything else that has been the inspiration of his brief life. -Dynasties shook and the earth shook; and the war, not yet described by -any man, revelled and wallowed in destruction around him; and Francis -Ledwidge stayed true to his inspiration, as his homeward songs will -show.</p> - -<p>I had hoped he would have seen the fame he has well deserved; but it is -hard for a poet to live to see fame even in times of peace. In these -days it is harder than ever.</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 75%; font-size: 0.8em;">DUNSANY.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span></p> - - - -<p style="font-size: 0.8em; margin-left: 10%;"> -<span class="caption">CONTENTS</span><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -SONGS OF THE FIELDS<br /> -<br /> -TO MY BEST FRIEND <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_27">27</a></span><br /> -BEHIND THE CLOSED EYE <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_29">29</a></span><br /> -BOUND TO THE MAST <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_31">31</a></span><br /> -To A LINNET IN A CAGE <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_34">34</a></span><br /> -A TWILIGHT IN MIDDLE MARCH <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_36">36</a></span><br /> -SPRING <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_38">38</a></span><br /> -DESIRE IN SPRING <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_40">40</a></span><br /> -A RAINY DAY IN APRIL <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_41">41</a></span><br /> -A SONG OF APRIL <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_44">44</a></span><br /> -THE BROKEN TRYST <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_46">46</a></span><br /> -THOUGHTS AT THE TRYSTING STILE <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_48">48</a></span><br /> -EVENING IN MAY <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_51">51</a></span><br /> -AN ATTEMPT AT A CITY SUNSET <span class="tabnum"> 53</span><br /> -WAITING <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_55">55</a></span><br /> -THE SINGER'S MUSE <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_56">56</a></span><br /> -INAMORATA <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_58">58</a></span><br /> -THE WIFE OF LLEW <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_60">60</a></span><br /> -THE HILLS <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_61">61</a></span><br /> -JUNE <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_63">63</a></span><br /> -IN MANCHESTER <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_65">65</a></span><br /> -MUSIC ON WATER <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_67">67</a></span><br /> -To M. McG. <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_70">70</a></span><br /> -IN THE DUSK <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_72">72</a></span><br /> -THE DEATH OF AILILL <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_74">74</a></span><br /> -AUGUST <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_76">76</a></span><br /> -THE VISITATION OF PEACE <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_77">77</a></span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> -BEFORE THE TEARS <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_82">82</a></span><br /> -GOD'S REMEMBRANCE <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_84">84</a></span><br /> -AN OLD PAIN <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_86">86</a></span><br /> -THE LOST ONES <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_90">90</a></span><br /> -ALL-HALLOWS EVE <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_92">92</a></span><br /> -A MEMORY <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_95">95</a></span><br /> -A SONG <span class="tabnum"> <a href="#Page_99">99</a></span><br /> -A FEAR <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_101">101</a></span><br /> -THE COMING POET <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_102">102</a></span><br /> -THE VISION ON THE BRINK <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_104">104</a></span><br /> -To LORD DUNSANY <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_106">106</a></span><br /> -ON AN OATEN STRAW <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_108">108</a></span><br /> -EVENING IN FEBRUARY <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_109">109</a></span><br /> -THE SISTER <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_110">110</a></span><br /> -BEFORE THE WAR OF COOLEY <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_112">112</a></span><br /> -LOW-MOON LAND <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_115">115</a></span><br /> -THE SORROW OF FINDEBAR <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_117">117</a></span><br /> -ON DREAM WATER <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_120">120</a></span><br /> -THE DEATH OF SUALTEM <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_121">121</a></span><br /> -THE MAID IN LOW-MOON LAND <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_125">125</a></span><br /> -THE DEATH OF LEAG, CUCHULAIN'S CHARIOTEER <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_126">126</a></span><br /> -THE PASSING OF CAOILTE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_129">129</a></span><br /> -GROWING OLD <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_131">131</a></span><br /> -AFTER MY LAST SONG <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_133">133</a></span><br /> -<br /> -SONGS OF PEACE<br /> -<br /> -AT HOME<br /> -<br /> -A DREAM OF ARTEMIS <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_137">137</a></span><br /> -A LITTLE BOY IN THE MORNING <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_152">152</a></span><br /> -<br /> -IN BARRACKS<br /> -<br /> -TO A DISTANT ONE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_157">157</a></span><br /> -THE PLACE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_159">159</a></span><br /> -MAY <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_161">161</a></span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> -TO ELLISH OF THE FAIR HAIR <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_163">163</a></span><br /> -<br /> -IN CAMP<br /> -<br /> -CREWBAWN <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_167">167</a></span><br /> -EVENING IN ENGLAND <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_168">168</a></span><br /> -<br /> -AT SEA<br /> -<br /> -CROCKNAHARNA <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_173">173</a></span><br /> -IN THE MEDITERRANEAN—GOING TO THE WAR <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_175">175</a></span><br /> -THE GARDENER <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_176">176</a></span><br /> -<br /> -IN SERBIA<br /> -<br /> -AUTUMN EVENING IN SERBIA <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_181">181</a></span><br /> -NOCTURNE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_183">183</a></span><br /> -SPRING AND AUTUMN <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_185">185</a></span><br /> -<br /> -IN GREECE<br /> -<br /> -THE DEPARTURE OF PROSERPINE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_189">189</a></span><br /> -THE HOME-COMING OF THE SHEEP <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_192">192</a></span><br /> -WHEN LOVE AND BEAUTY WANDER AWAY <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_194">194</a></span><br /> -<br /> -IN HOSPITAL IN EGYPT<br /> -<br /> -MY MOTHER <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_199">199</a></span><br /> -SONG <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_201">201</a></span><br /> -TO ONE DEAD <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_202">202</a></span><br /> -THE RESURRECTION <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_204">204</a></span><br /> -THE SHADOW PEOPLE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_205">205</a></span><br /> -<br /> -IN BARRACKS<br /> -<br /> -AN OLD DESIRE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_209">209</a></span><br /> -THOMAS McDONAGH <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_210">210</a></span><br /> -THE WEDDING MORNING <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_211">211</a></span><br /> -THE BLACKBIRDS <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_213">213</a></span><br /> -THE LURE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_215">215</a></span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> -THRO' BOGAC BAN <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_217">217</a></span><br /> -FATE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_218">218</a></span><br /> -EVENING CLOUDS <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_220">220</a></span><br /> -SONG <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_222">222</a></span><br /> -THE HERONS <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_223">223</a></span><br /> -IN THE SHADOWS <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_224">224</a></span><br /> -THE SHIPS OF ARCADY <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_225">225</a></span><br /> -AFTER <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_227">227</a></span><br /> -To ONE WEEPING <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_228">228</a></span><br /> -A DREAM DANCE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_229">229</a></span><br /> -BY FAUGHAN <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_230">230</a></span><br /> -IN SEPTEMBER <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_232">232</a></span><br /> -<br /> -LAST SONGS<br /> -<br /> -TO AN OLD QUILL OF LORD DUNSANY'S <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_235">235</a></span><br /> -TO A SPARROW <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_238">238</a></span><br /> -OLD CLO' <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_240">240</a></span><br /> -YOUTH <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_242">242</a></span><br /> -THE LITTLE CHILDREN <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_243">243</a></span><br /> -AUTUMN <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_245">245</a></span><br /> -IRELAND <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_247">247</a></span><br /> -LADY FAIR <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_249">249</a></span><br /> -AT A POET'S GRAVE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_251">251</a></span><br /> -AFTER COURT MARTIAL <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_252">252</a></span><br /> -A MOTHER'S SONG <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_253">253</a></span><br /> -AT CURRABWEE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_254">254</a></span><br /> -SONG-TIME IS OVER <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_256">256</a></span><br /> -UNA BAWN <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_257">257</a></span><br /> -SPRING LOVE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_258">258</a></span><br /> -SOLILOQUY <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_259">259</a></span><br /> -DAWN <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_261">261</a></span><br /> -CEOL SIDHE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_262">262</a></span><br /> -THE RUSHES <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_264">264</a></span><br /> -THE DEAD KINGS <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_266">266</a></span><br /> -IN FRANCE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_269">269</a></span><br /> -HAD I A GOLDEN POUND <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_270">270</a></span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span>FAIRIES <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_271">271</a></span><br /> -IN A CAFÉ <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_272">272</a></span><br /> -SPRING <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_273">273</a></span><br /> -PAN <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_275">275</a></span><br /> -WITH FLOWERS <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_276">276</a></span><br /> -THE FIND <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_277">277</a></span><br /> -A FAIRY HUNT <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_278">278</a></span><br /> -TO ONE WHO COMES NOW AND THEN <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_280">280</a></span><br /> -THE SYLPH <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_283">283</a></span><br /> -HOME <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_284">284</a></span><br /> -THE LANAWN SHEE <span class="tabnum"><a href="#Page_285">285</a></span><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a><br /><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span><br /> -</p> - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<p style="margin-left: 10%;"> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a><br /><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> -SONGS OF THE FIELDS<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -TO MY BEST FRIEND<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I love the wet-lipped wind that stirs the hedge<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And kisses the bent flowers that drooped for rain,</span><br /> -That stirs the poppy on the sun-burned ledge<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And like a swan dies singing, without pain.</span><br /> -The golden bees go buzzing down to stain<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The lilies' frills, and the blue harebell rings,</span><br /> -And the sweet blackbird in the rainbow sings.<br /> -<br /> -Deep in the meadows I would sing a song,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The shallow brook my tuning-fork, the birds</span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> -My masters; and the boughs they hop along<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Shall mark my time: but there shall be no words</span><br /> -For lurking Echo's mock; an angel herds<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Words that I may not know, within, for you,</span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> -Words for the faithful meet, the good and true.<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -BEHIND THE CLOSED EYE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I walk the old frequented ways<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That wind around the tangled braes,</span><br /> -I live again the sunny days<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Ere I the city knew.</span><br /> -<br /> -And scenes of old again are born,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The woodbine lassoing the thorn,</span><br /> -And drooping Ruth-like in the corn<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The poppies weep the dew.</span><br /> -<br /> -Above me in their hundred schools<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The magpies bend their young to rules,</span><br /> -And like an apron full of jewels<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The dewy cobweb swings.</span><br /> -<br /> -And frisking in the stream below<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The troutlets make the circles flow,</span><br /> -And the hungry crane doth watch them grow<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">As a smoker does his rings.</span><br /> -<br /> -Above me smokes the little town,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">With its whitewashed walls and roofs of brown</span><br /> -And its octagon spire toned smoothly down<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">As the holy minds within.</span><br /> -<br /> -And wondrous impudently sweet,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Half of him passion, half conceit,</span><br /> -The blackbird calls adown the street<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Like the piper of Hamelin.</span><br /> -<br /> -I hear him, and I feel the lure<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Drawing me back to the homely moor,</span><br /> -I'll go and close the mountains' door<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">On the city's strife and din.</span><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -BOUND TO THE MAST<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -When mildly falls the deluge of the grass,<br /> -And meads begin to rise like Noah's flood,<br /> -And o'er the hedgerows flow, and onward pass,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Dribbling thro' many a wood;</span><br /> -When hawthorn trees their flags of truce unfurl,<br /> -And dykes are spitting violets to the breeze;<br /> -When meadow larks their jocund flight will curl<br /> -From Earth's to Heaven's leas;<br /> -<br /> -Ah! then the poet's dreams are most sublime,<br /> -A-sail on seas that know a heavenly calm,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> -And in his song you hear the river's rhyme,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">And the first bleat of the lamb.</span><br /> -Then when the summer evenings fall serene,<br /> -Unto the country dance his songs repair,<br /> -And you may meet some maids with angel mien,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Bright eyes and twilight hair.</span><br /> -<br /> -When Autumn's crayon tones the green leaves sere,<br /> -And breezes honed on icebergs hurry past;<br /> -When meadow-tides have ebbed and woods grow drear,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">And bow before the blast;</span><br /> -When briars make semicircles on the way;<br /> -When blackbirds hide their flutes and cower and die;<br /> -When swollen rivers lose themselves and stray<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Beneath a murky sky;</span><br /> -<br /> -Then doth the poet's voice like cuckoo's break,<br /> -And round his verse the hungry lapwing grieves,<br /> -And melancholy in his dreary wake<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">The funeral of the leaves.</span><br /> -Then when the Autumn dies upon the plain,<br /> -Wound in the snow alike his right and wrong,<br /> -The poet sings,—albeit a sad strain,—<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Bound to the Mast of Song.</span><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -TO A LINNET IN A CAGE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -When Spring is in the fields that stained your wing,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And the blue distance is alive with song,</span><br /> -And finny quiets of the gabbling spring<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Rock lilies red and long,</span><br /> -At dewy daybreak, I will set you free<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">In ferny turnings of the woodbine lane,</span><br /> -Where faint-voiced echoes leave and cross in glee<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The hilly swollen plain.</span><br /> -<br /> -In draughty houses you forget your tune,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The modulator of the changing hours.</span><br /> -You want the wide air of the moody noon.<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And the slanting evening showers.</span><br /> -So I will loose you, and your song shall fall<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">When morn is white upon the dewy pane,</span><br /> -Across my eyelids, and my soul recall<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">From worlds of sleeping pain.</span><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -A TWILIGHT IN MIDDLE MARCH<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Within the oak a throb of pigeon wings<br /> -Fell silent, and grey twilight hushed the fold,<br /> -And spiders' hammocks swung on half-oped things<br /> -That shook like foreigners upon our cold.<br /> -A gipsy lit a fire and made a sound<br /> -Of moving tins, and from an oblong moon<br /> -The river seemed to gush across the ground<br /> -To the cracked metre of a marching tune.<br /> -<br /> -And then three syllables of melody<br /> -Dropped from a blackbird's flute, and died apart<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> -Far in the dewy dark. No more but three,<br /> -Yet sweeter music never touched a heart<br /> -Neath the blue domes of London. Flute and reed,<br /> -Suggesting feelings of the solitude<br /> -When will was all the Delphi I would heed,<br /> -Lost like a wind within a summer wood<br /> -From little knowledge where great sorrows brood.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -SPRING<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -The dews drip roses on the meadows<br /> -Where the meek daisies dot the sward.<br /> -And Æolus whispers through the shadows,<br /> -"Behold the handmaid of the Lord!"<br /> -The golden news the skylark waketh<br /> -And 'thwart the heavens his flight is curled;<br /> -Attend ye as the first note breaketh<br /> -And chrism droppeth on the world.<br /> -<br /> -The velvet dusk still haunts the stream<br /> -Where Pan makes music light and gay.<br /> -The mountain mist hath caught a beam<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> -And slowly weeps itself away.<br /> -The young leaf bursts its chrysalis<br /> -And gem-like hangs upon the bough,<br /> -Where the mad throstle sings in bliss<br /> -O'er earth's rejuvenated brow.<br /> -<br /> -ENVOI<br /> -<br /> -Slowly fall, O golden sands,<br /> -Slowly fall and let me sing,<br /> -Wrapt in the ecstasy of youth,<br /> -The wild delights of Spring.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -DESIRE IN SPRING<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I love the cradle songs the mothers sing<br /> -In lonely places when the twilight drops,<br /> -The slow endearing melodies that bring<br /> -Sleep to the weeping lids; and, when she stops,<br /> -I love the roadside birds upon the tops<br /> -Of dusty hedges in a world of Spring.<br /> -<br /> -And when the sunny rain drips from the edge<br /> -Of midday wind, and meadows lean one way,<br /> -And a long whisper passes thro' the sedge,<br /> -Beside the broken water let me stay,<br /> -While these old airs upon my memory play.<br /> -And silent changes colour up the hedge.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -A RAINY DAY IN APRIL<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -When the clouds shake their hyssops, and the rain<br /> -Like holy water falls upon the plain,<br /> -'Tis sweet to gaze upon the springing grain<br /> -And see your harvest born.<br /> -<br /> -And sweet the little breeze of melody,<br /> -The blackbird puffs upon the budding tree,<br /> -While the wild poppy lights upon the lea<br /> -And blazes 'mid the corn.<br /> -<br /> -The skylark soars the freshening shower to hail,<br /> -And the meek daisy holds aloft her pail,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> -And Spring all radiant by the wayside pale,<br /> -Sets up her rock and reel.<br /> -<br /> -See how she weaves her mantle fold on fold,<br /> -Hemming the woods and carpeting the wold.<br /> -Her warp is of the green, her woof the gold,<br /> -The spinning world her wheel.<br /> -<br /> -By'n by above the hills a pilgrim moon<br /> -Will rise to light upon the midnight noon,<br /> -But still she plieth to the lonesome tune<br /> -Of the brown meadow rail.<br /> -<br /> -No heavy dreams upon her eyelids weigh,<br /> -Nor do her busy fingers ever stay;<br /> -She knows a fairy prince is on the way<br /> -And the meek daisy holds aloft her pail,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> -<br /> -To deck the pathway that his feet must tread,<br /> -To fringe the 'broidery of the roses' bed,<br /> -To show the Summer she but sleeps,—not dead,<br /> -This is her fixed duty.<br /> -<br /> -ENVOI<br /> -<br /> -To-day while leaving my dear home behind,<br /> -My eyes with salty homesick teardrops blind,<br /> -The rain fell on me sorrowful and kind<br /> -Like angels' tears of pity.<br /> -<br /> -'Twas* then I heard the small birds' melodies,<br /> -And saw the poppies' bonfire on the leas,<br /> -As Spring came whispering thro' the leafing trees<br /> -Giving to me my ditty.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -A SONG OF APRIL<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -The censer of the eglantine was moved<br /> -By little lane winds, and the watching faces<br /> -Of garden flowerets, which of old she loved,<br /> -Peep shyly outward from their silent places.<br /> -But when the sun arose the flowers grew bolder,<br /> -And site will be in white, I thought, and she<br /> -Will have a cuckoo on her either shoulder,<br /> -And woodbine twines and fragrant wings of pea.<br /> -<br /> -And I will meet her on the hills of South,<br /> -And I will lead her to a northern water,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> -My wild one, the sweet beautiful uncouth,<br /> -The eldest maiden of the Winter's daughter.<br /> -And down the rainbows of her noon shall slide<br /> -Lark music, and the little sunbeam people,<br /> -And nomad wings shall fill the river side,<br /> -And ground winds rocking in the lily's steeple.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE BROKEN TRYST<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -The dropping words of larks, the sweetest tongue<br /> -That sings between the dusks, tell all of you;<br /> -The bursting white of Peace is all along<br /> -Wing-ways, and pearly droppings of the dew<br /> -Emberyl the cobwebs' greyness, and the blue<br /> -Of hiding violets, watching for your face,<br /> -Listen for you in every dusky place.<br /> -<br /> -You will not answer when I call your name,<br /> -But in the fog of blossom do you hide<br /> -To change my doubts into a red-faced shame<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span>By'n by when you are laughing by my side?<br /> -Or will you never come, or have you died,<br /> -And I in anguish have forgotten all?<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span>And shall the world now end and the heavens fall?<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THOUGHTS AT THE TRYSTING STILE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Come, May, and hang a white flag on each thorn,<br /> -Make truce with earth and heaven; the April child<br /> -Now hides her sulky face deep in the morn<br /> -Of your new flowers by the water wild<br /> -And in the ripples of the rising grass,<br /> -And rushes bent to let the south wind pass<br /> -On with her tumult of swift nomad wings,<br /> -And broken domes of downy dandelion.<br /> -Only in spasms now the blackbird sings.<br /> -The hour is all a-dream.<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 13em;">Nets of woodbine</span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> -Throw woven shadows over dreaming flowers,<br /> -And dreaming, a bee-luring lily bends<br /> -Its tender bell where blue dyke-water cowers<br /> -Thro' briars, and folded ferns, and gripping ends<br /> -Of wild convolvulus.<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 11em;">The lark's sky-way</span><br /> -Is desolate.<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 7.5em;">I watch an apple-spray</span><br /> -Beckon across a wall as if it knew<br /> -I wait the calling of the orchard maid.<br /> -<br /> -Inly I feel that she will come in blue,<br /> -With yellow on her hair, and two curls strayed<br /> -Out of her comb's loose stocks, and I shall steal<br /> -Behind and lay my hands upon her eyes,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> -"Look not, but be my Psyche!"<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 17em;">And her peal</span><br /> -Of laughter will ring far, and as she tries<br /> -For freedom I will call her names of flowers<br /> -That climb up walls; then thro' the twilight hours<br /> -We'll talk about the loves of ancient queens,<br /> -And kisses like wasp-honey, false and sweet,<br /> -And how we are entangled in love's snares<br /> -Like wind-looped flowers.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -EVENING IN MAY<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -There is nought tragic here, tho' night uplifts<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A narrow curtain where the footlights burned,</span><br /> -But one long act where Love each bold heart sifts<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And blushes in the dark, but has not spurned</span><br /> -The strong resolve of noon. The maiden's head<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Is brown upon the shoulder of her youth,</span><br /> -Hearts are exchanged, long pent up words are said,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Blushes burn out at the long tale of truth.</span><br /> -<br /> -The blackbird blows his yellow flute so strong,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And rolls away the notes in careless glee,</span><br /> -It breaks the rhythm of the thrushes' song,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And puts red shame upon his rivalry.</span><br /> -The yellowhammers on the roof tiles beat<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Sweet little dulcimers to broken time,</span><br /> -And here the robin with a heart replete<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Has all in one short plagiarised rhyme.</span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -AN ATTEMPT AT A CITY SUNSET<br /> -<br /> -<span style="font-size: 0.8em;">(TO J. K. Q.)</span><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -There was a quiet glory in the sky<br /> -When thro' the gables sank the large red sun,<br /> -And toppling mounts of rugged cloud went by<br /> -Heavy with whiteness, and the moon had won<br /> -Her way above the woods, with her small star<br /> -Behind her like the cuckoo's little mother....<br /> -It was the hour when visions from some far<br /> -Strange Eastern dreams like twilight bats take wing<br /> -Out of the ruin of memories.<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 15em;">O brother</span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> -Of high song, wand'ring where the Muses fling<br /> -Rich gifts as prodigal as winter rain,<br /> -Like stepping-stones within a swollen river<br /> -The hidden words are sounding in my brain,<br /> -Too wild for taming; and I must for ever<br /> -Think of the hills upon the wilderness,<br /> -And leave the city sunset to your song.<br /> -For there I am a stranger like the trees<br /> -That sigh upon the traffic all day long.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -WAITING<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -A strange old woman on the wayside sate,<br /> -Looked far away and shook her head and sighed.<br /> -And when anon, close by, a rusty gate<br /> -Loud on the warm winds cried,<br /> -She lifted up her eyes and said, "You're late."<br /> -Then shook her head and sighed.<br /> -<br /> -And evening found her thus, and night in state<br /> -Walked thro' the starlight, and a heavy tide<br /> -Followed the yellow moon around her wait,<br /> -And morning walked in wide.<br /> -She lifted up her eyes and said, "You're late."<br /> -Then shook her head and sighed.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE SINGER'S MUSE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I brought in these to make her kitchen sweet,<br /> -Haw blossoms and the roses of the lane.<br /> -Her heart seemed in her eyes so wild they beat<br /> -With welcome for the boughs of Spring again.<br /> -She never heard of Babylon or Troy,<br /> -She read no book, but once saw Dublin town;<br /> -Yet she made a poet of her servant boy<br /> -And from Parnassus earned the laurel crown.<br /> -<br /> -If Fame, the Gorgon, turns me into stone<br /> -Upon some city square, let someone place<br /> -Thorn blossoms and lane roses newly blown<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> -Beside my feet, and underneath them trace:<br /> -"His heart was like a bookful of girls' song,<br /> -With little loves and mighty Care's alloy.<br /> -These did he bring his muse, and suffered long,<br /> -Her bashful singer and her servant boy."<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -INAMORATA<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -The bees were holding levees in the flowers,<br /> -Do you remember how each puff of wind<br /> -Made every wing a hum? My hand in yours<br /> -Was listening to your heart, but now<br /> -The glory is all faded, and I find<br /> -No more the olden mystery of the hours<br /> -When you were lovely and our hearts would bow<br /> -Each to the will of each, but one bright day<br /> -Is stretching like an isthmus in a bay<br /> -From the glad years that I have left behind.<br /> -<br /> -I look across the edge of things that were<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> -And you are lovely in the April ways,<br /> -Holy and mute, the sigh of my despair....<br /> -I hear once more the linnets' April tune<br /> -Beyond the rainbow's warp, as in the days<br /> -You brought me facefuls of your smiles to share<br /> -Some of your new-found wonders.... Oh when soon<br /> -I'm wandering the wide seas for other lands,<br /> -Sometimes remember me with folded hands,<br /> -And keep me happy in your pious prayer.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE WIFE OF LLEW<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -And Gwydion said to Math, when it was Spring:<br /> -"Come now and let us make a wife for Llew."<br /> -And so they broke broad boughs yet moist with dew,<br /> -And in a shadow made a magic ring:<br /> -They took the violet and the meadow-sweet<br /> -To form her pretty face, and for her feet<br /> -They built a mound of daisies on a wing,<br /> -And for her voice they made a linnet sing<br /> -In the wide poppy blowing for her mouth.<br /> -And over all they chanted twenty hours.<br /> -And Llew came singing from the azure south<br /> -And bore away his wife of birds and flowers.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE HILLS<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -The hills are crying from the fields to me,<br /> -And calling me with music from a choir<br /> -Of waters in their woods where I can see<br /> -The bloom unfolded on the whins like fire.<br /> -And, as the evening moon climbs ever higher<br /> -And blots away the shadows from the slope,<br /> -They cry to me like things devoid of hope.<br /> -<br /> -Pigeons are home. Day droops. The fields are cold.<br /> -Now a slow wind comes labouring up the sky<br /> -With a small cloud long steeped in sunset gold,<br /> -Like Jason with the precious fleece anigh<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> -The harbour of Iolcos. Day's bright eye<br /> -Is filmed with the twilight, and the rill<br /> -Shines like a scimitar upon the hill.<br /> -<br /> -And moonbeams drooping thro' the coloured wood<br /> -Are full of little people winged white.<br /> -I'll wander thro' the moon-pale solitude<br /> -That calls across the intervening night<br /> -With river voices at their utmost height,<br /> -Sweet as rain-water in the blackbird's flute<br /> -That strikes the world in admiration mute.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -JUNE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Broom out the floor now, lay the fender by,<br /> -And plant this bee-sucked bough of woodbine there,<br /> -And let the window down. The butterfly<br /> -Floats in upon the sunbeam, and the fair<br /> -Tanned face of June, the nomad gipsy, laughs<br /> -Above her widespread wares, the while she tells<br /> -The farmers' fortunes in the fields, and quaffs<br /> -The water from the spider-peopled wells.<br /> -<br /> -The hedges are all drowned in green grass seas,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> -And bobbing poppies flare like Elmor's light,<br /> -While siren-like the pollen-stainéd bees<br /> -Drone in the clover depths. And up the height<br /> -The cuckoo's voice is hoarse and broke with joy.<br /> -And on the lowland crops the crows make raid,<br /> -Nor fear the clappers of the farmer's boy,<br /> -Who sleeps, like drunken Noah, in the shade.<br /> -<br /> -And loop this red rose in that hazel ring<br /> -That snares your little ear, for June is short<br /> -And we must joy in it and dance and sing,<br /> -And from her bounty draw her rosy worth.<br /> -Ay! soon the swallows will be flying south,<br /> -The wind wheel north to gather in the snow,<br /> -Even the roses spilt on youth's red mouth<br /> -Will soon blow down the road all roses go.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -IN MANCHESTER<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -There is a noise of feet that move in sin<br /> -Under the side-faced moon here where I stray,<br /> -Want by me like a Nemesis. The din<br /> -Of noon is in my ears, but far away<br /> -My thoughts are, where Peace shuts the black-birds' wings<br /> -And it is cherry time by all the springs.<br /> -<br /> -And this same moon floats like a trail of fire<br /> -Down the long Boyne, and darts white arrows thro'<br /> -The mill wood; her white skirt is on the weir,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> -She walks thro' crystal mazes of the dew,<br /> -And rests awhile upon the dewy slope<br /> -Where I will hope again the old, old hope.<br /> -<br /> -With wandering we are worn my muse and I,<br /> -And, if I sing, my song knows nought of mirth.<br /> -I often think my soul is an old lie<br /> -In sackcloth, it repents so much of birth.<br /> -But I will build it yet a cloister home<br /> -Near the peace of lakes when I have ceased to roam.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -MUSIC ON WATER<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Where does Remembrance weep when we forget?<br /> -From whither brings she back an old delight?<br /> -Why do we weep that once we laughed? and yet<br /> -Why are we sad that once our hearts were light?<br /> -I sometimes think the days that we made bright<br /> -Are damned within us, and we hear them yell,<br /> -Deep in the solitude of that wide hell,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> -Because we welcome in some new regret.<br /> -<br /> -I will remember with sad heart next year<br /> -This music and this water, but to-day<br /> -Let me be part of all this joy. My ear<br /> -Caught far-off music which I bid away,<br /> -The light of one fair face that fain would stay<br /> -Upon the heart's broad canvas, as the Face<br /> -On Mary's towel, lighting up the place.<br /> -Too sad for joy, too happy for a tear.<br /> -<br /> -Methinks I see the music like a light<br /> -Low on the bobbing water, and the fields<br /> -Yellow and brown alternate on the height,<br /> -Hanging in silence there like battered shields,<br /> -Lean forward heavy with their coloured yields<br /> -As if they paid it homage; and the strains,<br /> -Prisoners of Echo, up the sunburnt plains<br /> -Fade on the cross-cut to a future night.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> -<br /> -In the red West the twisted moon is low,<br /> -And on the bubbles there are half-lit stars:<br /> -Music and twilight and the deep blue flow<br /> -Of water: and the watching fire of Mars:<br /> -The deep fish slipping thro' the moonlit bars<br /> -Make Death a thing of sweet dreams, life a mock.<br /> -And the soul patient by the heart's loud clock<br /> -Watches the time, and thinks it wondrous slow.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -TO M. McG.<br /> -<br /> -<span style="font-size: 0.8em;">(WHO CAME ONE DAY WHEN WE WERE ALL</span><br /> -<span style="font-size: 0.8em;">GLOOMY AND CHEERED US WITH SAD MUSIC)</span><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -We were all sad and could not weep,<br /> -Because our sorrow had not tears:<br /> -You came a silent thing like Sleep,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And stole away our fears.</span><br /> -<br /> -Old memories knocking at each heart<br /> -Troubled us with the world's great lie:<br /> -You sat a little way apart<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And made a fiddle cry,</span><br /> -<br /> -And April with her sunny showers<br /> -Came laughing up the fields again:<br /> -White wings went flashing thro' the hours<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">So lately full of pain.</span><br /> -<br /> -And rivers full of little lights<br /> -Came down the fields of waving green:<br /> -Our immemorial delights<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Stole in on us unseen.</span><br /> -<br /> -For this may Good Luck let you loose<br /> -Upon her treasures many years,<br /> -And Peace unfurl her flag of truce<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To any threat'ning fears.</span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -IN THE DUSK<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Day hangs its light between two dusks, my heart,<br /> -Always beyond the dark there is the blue.<br /> -Sometime we'll leave the dark, myself and you,<br /> -And revel in the light for evermore.<br /> -But the deep pain of you is aching smart,<br /> -And a long calling weighs upon you sore.<br /> -<br /> -Day hangs its light between two dusks, and song<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> -Is there at the beginning and the end.<br /> -You, in the singing dusk, how could you wend<br /> -The songless way Contentment fleetly wings?<br /> -But in the dark your beauty shall be strong,<br /> -Tho' only one should listen how it sings.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE DEATH OF AILILL<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -When there was heard no more the war's loud sound,<br /> -And only the rough corn-crake filled the hours,<br /> -And hill winds in the furze and drowsy flowers,<br /> -Maeve in her chamber with her white head bowed<br /> -On Ailill's heart was sobbing: "I have found<br /> -The way to love you now," she said, and he<br /> -Winked an old tear away and said: "The proud<br /> -Unyielding heart loves never." And then she:<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> -"I love you now, tho' once when we were young<br /> -We walked apart like two who were estranged<br /> -Because I loved you not, now all is changed."<br /> -And he who loved her always called her name<br /> -And said: "You do not love me, 'tis your tongue<br /> -Talks in the dusk; you love the blazing gold<br /> -Won in the battles, and the soldier's fame.<br /> -You love the stories that are often told<br /> -By poets in the hall." Then Maeve arose<br /> -And sought her daughter Findebar: "O, child,<br /> -Go tell your father that my love went wild<br /> -With all my wars in youth, and say that now<br /> -I love him stronger than I hate my foes...."<br /> -And Findebar unto her father sped<br /> -And touched him gently on the rugged brow,<br /> -And knew by the cold touch that he was dead.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -AUGUST<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -She'll come at dusky first of day,<br /> -White over yellow harvest's song.<br /> -Upon her dewy rainbow way<br /> -She shall be beautiful and strong.<br /> -The lidless eye of noon shall spray<br /> -Tan on her ankles in the hay,<br /> -Shall kiss her brown the whole day long.<br /> -<br /> -I'll know her in the windrows, tall<br /> -Above the crickets of the hay.<br /> -I'll know her when her odd eyes fall,<br /> -One May-blue, one November-grey.<br /> -I'll watch her from the red barn wall<br /> -Take down her rusty scythe, and call,<br /> -And I will follow her away.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE VISITATION OF PEACE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I closed the book of verse where Sorrow wept<br /> -Above Love's broken fane where Hope once prayed,<br /> -And thought of old trysts broken and trysts kept<br /> -Only to chide my fondness. Then I strayed<br /> -Down a green coil of lanes where murmuring wings<br /> -Moved up and down like lights upon the sea,<br /> -Searching for calm amid untroubled things<br /> -Of wood and water. The industrious bee<br /> -Sang in his barn within the hollow beech,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> -And in a distant haggard a loud mill<br /> -Hummed like a war of hives. A whispered speech<br /> -Of corn and wind was on the yellow hill,<br /> -And tattered scarecrows nodded their assent<br /> -And waved their arms like orators. The brown<br /> -Nude beauty of the Autumn sweetly bent<br /> -Over the woods, across the little town.<br /> -<br /> -I sat in a retreating shade beside<br /> -The river, where it fell across a weir<br /> -Like a white mane, and in a flourish wide<br /> -Roars by an island field and thro' a tier<br /> -Of leaning sallies, like an avenue<br /> -When the moon's flambeau hunts the shadows out<br /> -And strikes the borders white across the dew.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> -Where little ringlets ended, the fleet trout<br /> -Fed on the water moths. A marsh hen crossed<br /> -On flying wings and swimming feet to where<br /> -Her mate was in the rushes forest, tossed<br /> -On the heaving dusk like swallows in the air.<br /> -<br /> -Beyond the river a walled rood of graves<br /> -Hung dead with all its hemlock wan and sere,<br /> -Save where the wall was broken and long waves<br /> -Of yellow grass flowed outward like a weir,<br /> -As if the dead were striving for more room<br /> -And their old places in the scheme of things;<br /> -For sometimes the thought comes that the brown tomb<br /> -Is not the end of all our labourings,<br /> -But we are born once more of wind and rain,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> -To sow the world with harvest young and strong,<br /> -That men may live by men 'til the stars wane,<br /> -And still sweet music fill the blackbird's song.<br /> -<br /> -But O for truths about the soul denied.<br /> -Shall I meet Keats in some wild isle of balm,<br /> -Dreaming beside a tarn where green and wide<br /> -Boughs of sweet cinnamon protect the calm<br /> -Of the dark water? And together walk<br /> -Thro' hills with dimples full of water where<br /> -White angels rest, and all the dead years talk<br /> -About the changes of the earth? Despair<br /> -Sometimes takes hold of me but yet I hope<br /> -To hope the old hope in the better times<br /> -When I am free to cast aside the rope<br /> -That binds me to all sadness 'till my rhymes<br /> -Cry like lost birds. But O, if I should die<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> -Ere this millennium, and my hands be crossed<br /> -Under the flowers I loved, the passers-by<br /> -Shall scowl at me as one whose soul is lost.<br /> -<br /> -But a soft peace came to me when the West<br /> -Shut its red door and a thin streak of moon<br /> -Was twisted on the twilight's dusky breast.<br /> -It wrapped me up as sometimes a sweet tune<br /> -Heard for the first time wraps the scenes around,<br /> -That we may have their memories when some hand<br /> -Strikes it in other times and hopes unbound<br /> -Rising see clear the everlasting land.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -BEFORE THE TEARS<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -You looked as sad as an eclipséd moon<br /> -Above the sheaves of harvest, and there lay<br /> -A light lisp on your tongue, and very soon<br /> -The petals of your deep blush fell away;<br /> -White smiles that come with an uneasy grace<br /> -From inner sorrow crossed your forehead fair,<br /> -When the wind passing took your scattered hair<br /> -And flung it like a brown shower in my face.<br /> -<br /> -Tear-fringéd* winds that fill the heart's low sighs<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> -And never break upon the bosom's pain,<br /> -But blow unto the windows of the eyes<br /> -Their misty promises of silver rain,<br /> -Around your loud heart ever rose and fell.<br /> -I thought 'twere better that the tears should come<br /> -And strike your every feeling wholly numb,<br /> -So thrust my hand in yours and shook fare-well.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -GOD'S REMEMBRANCE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -There came a whisper from the night to me<br /> -Like music of the sea, a mighty breath<br /> -From out the valley's dewy mouth, and Death<br /> -Shook his lean bones, and every coloured tree<br /> -Wept in the fog of morning. From the town<br /> -Of nests among the branches one old crow<br /> -With gaps upon his wings flew far away.<br /> -And, thinking of the golden summer glow,<br /> -I heard a blackbird whistle half his lay<br /> -Among the spinning leaves that slanted down.<br /> -<br /> -And I who am a thought of God's now long<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> -Forgotten in His Mind, and desolate<br /> -With other dreams long over, as a gate<br /> -Singing upon the wind the anvil song,<br /> -Sang of the Spring when first He dreamt of me<br /> -In that old town all hills and signs that creak:—<br /> -And He remembered me as something far<br /> -In old imaginations, something weak<br /> -With distance, like a little sparking star<br /> -Drowned in the lavender of evening sea.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -AN OLD PAIN<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -What old, old pain is this that bleeds anew?<br /> -What old and wandering dream forgotten long<br /> -Hobbles back to my mind? With faces two,<br /> -Like Janus of old Rome, I look about,<br /> -And yet discover not what ancient wrong<br /> -Lies unrequited still. No speck of doubt<br /> -Upon to-morrow's promise. Yet a pain<br /> -Of some dumb thing is on me, and I feel<br /> -How men go mad, how faculties do reel<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> -When these old querns turn round within the brain.<br /> -<br /> -'Tis something to have known one day of joy,<br /> -Now to remember when the heart is low,<br /> -An antidote of thought that will destroy<br /> -The asp bite of Regret. Deep will I drink<br /> -By'n by the purple cups that overflow,<br /> -And fill the shattered heart's urn to the brink.<br /> -But some are dead who laughed! Some scattered are<br /> -Around the sultry breadth of foreign zones.<br /> -You, with the warm clay wrapt about your bones,<br /> -Are nearer to me than the live afar.<br /> -<br /> -My heart has grown as dry as an old crust,<br /> -Deep in book lumber and moth-eaten wood,<br /> -So long it has forgot the old love lust,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> -So long forgot the thing that made youth dear,<br /> -Two blue love lamps, a heart exceeding good,<br /> -And how, when first I heard that voice ring clear<br /> -Among the sering hedges of the plain,<br /> -I knew not which from which beyond the corn,<br /> -The laughter by the callow twisted thorn,<br /> -The jay-thrush whistling in the haws for rain.<br /> -<br /> -I hold the mind is the imprisoned soul,<br /> -And all our aspirations are its own<br /> -Struggles and strivings for a golden goal,<br /> -That wear us out like snow men at the thaw.<br /> -And we shall make our Heaven where we have sown<br /> -Our purple longings. Oh! can the loved dead draw<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> -Anear us when we moan, or watching wait<br /> -Our coming in the woods where first we met,<br /> -The dead leaves falling on their wild hair wet,<br /> -Their hands upon the fastenings of the gate?<br /> -<br /> -This is the old, old pain come home once more,<br /> -Bent down with answers wild and very lame<br /> -For all my delving in old dog-eared lore<br /> -That drove the Sages mad. And boots the world<br /> -Aught for their wisdom? I have asked them, tame,<br /> -And watched the Earth by its own self be hurled<br /> -Atom by atom into nothingness,<br /> -Loll out of the deep canyons, drops of fixe,<br /> -And kindle on the hills its funeral pyre,<br /> -And all we learn but shows we know the less.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE LOST ONES<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Somewhere is music from the linnets, bills,<br /> -And thro' the sunny flowers the bee-wings drone,<br /> -And white bells of convolvulus on hills<br /> -Of quiet May make silent ringing, blown<br /> -Hither and thither by the wind of showers,<br /> -And somewhere all the wandering birds have flown;<br /> -And the brown breath of Autumn chills the flowers.<br /> -<br /> -But where are all the loves of long ago?<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> -Oh, little twilight ship blown up the tide,<br /> -Where are the faces laughing in the glow<br /> -Of morning years, the lost ones scattered wide?<br /> -Give me your hand, Oh brother, let us go<br /> -Crying about the dark for those who died.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -ALL-HALLOWS EVE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -The dreadful hour is sighing for a moon<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To light old lovers to the place of tryst,</span><br /> -And old footsteps from blessed acres soon<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">On old known pathways will be lightly prest;</span><br /> -And winds that went to eavesdrop since the noon,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Kinking<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> at some old tale told sweetly brief,</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Will give a cowslick<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> to the yarrow leaf,<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a></span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> -And sling the round nut from the hazel down.<br /> -<br /> -And there will be old yarn balls,<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> and old spells<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">In broken lime-kilns, and old eyes will peer</span><br /> -For constant lovers in old spidery wells,<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And old embraces will grow newly dear.</span><br /> -And some may meet old lovers in old dells,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And some in doors ajar in towns light-lorn;—</span><br /> -But two will meet beneath a gnarly thorn<br /> -Deep in the bosom of the windy fells.<br /> -<br /> -Then when the night slopes home and white-faced day<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Yawns in the east there will be sad farewells;</span><br /> -And many feet will tap a lonely way<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Back to the comfort of their chilly cells,</span><br /> -And eyes will backward turn and long to stay<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Where love first found them in the clover bloom—</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">But one will never seek the lonely tomb,</span><br /> -And two will linger at the tryst alway.<br /> -</p> - - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p class="p2"><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Provincially a kind of laughter.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> A curl of hair thrown back from the forehead: used metaphorically -here, and itself a metaphor taken from the curl of a -cow's tongue.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> Maidens on Hallows Eve pull leaves of yarrow, and, saying -over them certain words, put them under their pillows and so -dream of their true-loves.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> They also throw balls of yarn (which must be black) over -their left shoulders into old lime-kilns, holding one end and then -winding it in till they feel it somehow caught, and expect to see -in the darkness the face of their lover.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> Also they look for his face in old wells.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span></p></div> - - - - -<p class="p6" style="margin-left: 10%;"> -A MEMORY<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Low sounds of night that drip upon the ear,<br /> -The plumed lapwing's cry, the curlew's call,<br /> -Clear in the far dark heard, a sound as drear<br /> -As raindrops pelted from a nodding rush<br /> -To give a white wink once and broken fall<br /> -Into a deep dark pool: they pain the hush,<br /> -As if the fiery meteor's slanting lance<br /> -Had found their empty craws: they fill with sound<br /> -The silence, with the merry round,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> -The sounding mazes of a last year's dancer<br /> -<br /> -I thought to watch the stars come spark by spark<br /> -Out on the muffled night, and watch the moon<br /> -Go round the full, and turn upon the dark,<br /> -And sharpen towards the new, and waiting watch<br /> -The grand Kaleidoscope of midnight noon<br /> -Change colours on the dew, where high hills notch<br /> -The low and moony sky. But who dare cast<br /> -One brief hour's horoscope, whose tunéd* ear<br /> -Makes every sound the music of last year?<br /> -Whose hopes are built up in the door of Past?<br /> -<br /> -No, not more silent does the spider stitch<br /> -A cobweb on the fern, nor fogdrops fall<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> -On sheaves of harvest when the night is rich<br /> -With moonbeams, than the spirits of delight<br /> -Walk the dark passages of Memory's hall.<br /> -We feel them not, but in the wastes of night<br /> -We hear their low-voiced mediums, and we rise<br /> -To wrestle old Regrets, to see old faces,<br /> -To meet and part in old tryst-trodden places<br /> -With breaking heart, and emptying of eyes.<br /> -<br /> -I feel the warm hand on my shoulder light,<br /> -I hear the music of a voice that words<br /> -The slow time of the feet, I see the white<br /> -Arms slanting, and the dimples fold and fill....<br /> -I hear wing-flutters of the early birds,<br /> -I see the tide of morning landward spill,<br /> -The cloaking maidens, hear the voice that tells<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> -"You'd never know" and "Soon perhaps again,"<br /> -With white teeth biting down the inly pain,<br /> -Then sounds of going away and sad farewells<br /> -<br /> -A year ago! It seems but yesterday.<br /> -Yesterday! And a hundred years! All one.<br /> -'Tis laid a something finished, dark, away,<br /> -To gather mould upon the shelves of Time.<br /> -What matters hours or æons when 'tis gone?<br /> -And yet the heart will dust it of its grime,<br /> -And hover round it in a silver spell,<br /> -Be lost in it and cry aloud in fear;<br /> -And like a lost soul in a pious ear,<br /> -Hammer in mine a never easy bell.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -A SONG<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -My heart has flown on wings to you, away<br /> -In the lonely places where your footsteps lie<br /> -Full up of stars when the short showers of day<br /> -Have passed like ancient sorrows. I would fly<br /> -To your green solitude of woods to hear<br /> -You singing in the sounds of leaves and birds;<br /> -But I am sad below the depth of words<br /> -That nevermore we two shall draw anear.<br /> -<br /> -Had I but wealth of land and bleating flocks<br /> -And barnfuls of the yellow harvest yield,<br /> -And a large house with climbing hollyhocks<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span> -And servant maidens singing in the field,<br /> -You'd love me; but I own no roaming herds,<br /> -My only wealth is songs of love for you,<br /> -And now that you are lost I may pursue<br /> -A sad life deep below the depth of words.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -A FEAR<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I roamed the woods to-day and seemed to hear,<br /> -As Dante heard, the voice of suffering trees.<br /> -The twisted roots seemed bare contorted knees,<br /> -The bark was full of faces strange with fear.<br /> -<br /> -I hurried home still wrapt in that dark spell,<br /> -And all the night upon the world's great lie<br /> -I pondered, and a voice seemed whisp'ring nigh,<br /> -"You died long since, and all this thing is hell!"<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE COMING POET<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -"Is it far to the town?" said the poet,<br /> -As he stood 'neath the groaning vane,<br /> -And the warm lights shimmered silver<br /> -On the skirts of the windy rain.<br /> -"There are those who call me," he pleaded,<br /> -"And I'm wet and travel sore."<br /> -But nobody spoke from the shelter.<br /> -And he turned from the bolted door.<br /> -<br /> -And they wait in the town for the poet<br /> -With stones at the gates, and jeers,<br /> -But away on the wolds of distance<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> -In the blue of a thousand years<br /> -He sleeps with the age that knows him,<br /> -In the clay of the unborn, dead,<br /> -Rest at his weary insteps,<br /> -Fame at his crumbled head.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE VISION ON THE BRINK<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -To-night when you sit in the deep hours alone,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And from the sleeps you snatch wake quick and feel</span><br /> -You hear my step upon the threshold-stone,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">My hand upon the doorway latchward steal,</span><br /> -Be sure 'tis but the white winds of the snow,<br /> -For I shall come no more<br /> -<br /> -And when the candle in the pane is wore,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And moonbeams down the hill long shadows throw,</span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> -When night's white eyes are in the chinky door,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Think of a long road in a valley low,</span><br /> -Think of a wanderer in the distance far,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Lost like a voice among the scattered hills.</span><br /> -<br /> -And when the moon has gone and ocean spills<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Its waters backward from the trysting bar,</span><br /> -And in dark furrows of the night there tills<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A jewelled plough, and many a falling star</span><br /> -Moves you to prayer, then will you think of me<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">On the long road that will not ever end.</span><br /> -<br /> -Jonah is hoarse in Nineveh—I'd lend<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">My voice to save the town—and hurriedly</span><br /> -Goes Abraham with murdering knife, and Ruth<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Is weary in the corn.... Yet will I stay,</span><br /> -For one flower blooms upon the rocks of truth,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">God is in all our hurry and delay.</span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -TO LORD DUNSANY<br /> -<br /> -<span style="font-size: 0.8em;">(ON HIS RETURN FROM EAST AFRICA)</span><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -For you I knit these lines, and on their ends<br /> -Hang little tossing bells to ring you home.<br /> -The music is all cracked, and Poesy tends<br /> -To richer blooms than mine; but you who roam<br /> -Thro' coloured gardens of the highest muse,<br /> -And leave the door ajar sometimes that we<br /> -May steal small breathing things of reds and blues<br /> -And things of white sucked empty by the bee,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> -Will listen to this bunch of bells from me.<br /> -<br /> -My cowslips ring you welcome to the land<br /> -Your muse brings honour to in many a tongue,<br /> -Not only that I long to clasp your hand,<br /> -But that you're missed by poets who have sung<br /> -And viewed with doubt the music of their verse<br /> -All the long winter, for you love to bring<br /> -The true note in and say the wise thing terse,<br /> -And show what birds go lame upon a wing,<br /> -And where the weeds among the flowers do spring.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -ON AN OATEN STRAW<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -My harp is out of tune, and so I take<br /> -An oaten straw some shepherd dropped of old.<br /> -It is the hour when Beauty doth awake<br /> -With trembling limbs upon the dewy cold.<br /> -And shapes of green show where the woolly fold<br /> -Slept in the winding shelter of the brake.<br /> -<br /> -This I will pipe for you, how all the year<br /> -The one I love like Beauty takes her way.<br /> -Wrapped in the wind of winter she doth cheer<br /> -The loud woods like a sunbeam of the May.<br /> -This I will pipe for you the whole blue day<br /> -Seated with Pan upon the mossy weir.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -EVENING IN FEBRUARY<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -The windy evening drops a grey<br /> -Old eyelid down across the sun,<br /> -The last crow leaves the ploughman's way<br /> -And happy lambs make no more fun.<br /> -<br /> -Wild parsley buds beside my feet,<br /> -A doubtful thrush makes hurried tune,<br /> -The steeple in the village street<br /> -Doth seem to pierce the twilight moon.<br /> -<br /> -I hear and see those changing charms,<br /> -For all—my thoughts are fixed upon<br /> -The hurry and the loud alarms<br /> -Before the fall of Babylon.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE SISTER<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I saw the little quiet town,<br /> -And the whitewashed gables on the hill,<br /> -And laughing children coming down<br /> -The laneway to the mill.<br /> -<br /> -Wind-blushes up their faces glowed,<br /> -And they were happy as could be,<br /> -The wobbling water never flowed<br /> -So merry and so free.<br /> -<br /> -One little maid withdrew aside<br /> -To pick a pebble from the sands.<br /> -Her golden hair was long and wide,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span> -And there were dimples on her hands.<br /> -<br /> -And when I saw her large blue eyes,<br /> -What was the pain that went thro' me?<br /> -Why did I think on Southern skies<br /> -And ships upon the sea?<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -BEFORE THE WAR OF COOLEY<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -At daybreak Maeve rose up from where she prayed<br /> -And took her prophetess across her door<br /> -To gaze upon her hosts. Tall spear and blade<br /> -Burnished for early battle dimly shook<br /> -The morning's colours, and then Maeve said:<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 22em;">"Look</span><br /> -And tell me how you see them now."<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 20.5em;">And then</span><br /> -The woman that was lean with knowledge said:<br /> -"There's crimson on them, and there's dripping red."<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> -And a tall soldier galloped up the glen<br /> -With foam upon his boot, and halted there<br /> -Beside old Maeve. She said, "Not yet," and turned<br /> -Into her blazing dun, and knelt in prayer<br /> -One solemn hour, and once again she came<br /> -And sought her prophetess. With voice that mourned,<br /> -"How do you see them now?" she asked.<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 21em;">"All lame</span><br /> -And broken in the noon." And once again<br /> -The soldier stood before her.<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 19em;">"No, not yet."</span><br /> -Maeve answered his inquiring look and turned<br /> -Once more unto her prayer, and yet once more<br /> -"How do you see them now?" she asked.<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 22em;">"All wet</span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> -With storm rains, and all broken, and all tore<br /> -With midnight wolves." And when the soldier came<br /> -Maeve said, "It is the hour." There was a flash<br /> -Of trumpets in the dim, a silver flame<br /> -Of rising shields, loud words passed down the ranks,<br /> -And twenty feet they saw the lances leap.<br /> -They passed the dun with one short noisy dash.<br /> -And turning proud Maeve gave the wise one thanks,<br /> -And sought her chamber in the dun to weep.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -LOW-MOON LAND<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I often look when the moon is low<br /> -Thro' that other window on the wall,<br /> -At a land all beautiful under snow,<br /> -Blotted with shadows that come and go<br /> -When the winds rise up and fall.<br /> -And the form of a beautiful maid<br /> -In the white silence stands,<br /> -And beckons me with her hands.<br /> -<br /> -And when the cares of the day are laid,<br /> -Like sacred things, in the mart away,<br /> -I dream of the low-moon land and the maid<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> -Who will not weary of waiting, or jade<br /> -Of calling to me for aye.<br /> -And I would go if I knew the sea<br /> -That lips the shore where the moon is low,<br /> -For a longing is on me that will not go.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE SORROW OF FINDEBAR<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -"Why do you sorrow, child? There is loud cheer<br /> -In the wide halls, and poets red with wine<br /> -Tell of your eyebrows and your tresses long,<br /> -And pause to let your royal mother hear<br /> -The brown bull low amid her silken kine.<br /> -And you who are the harpstring and the song<br /> -Weep like a memory born of some old pain."<br /> -<br /> -And Findebar made answer, "I have slain<br /> -More than Cuculain's sword, for I have been<br /> -The promised meed of every warrior brave<br /> -In Tain Bo Cualigne wars, and I am sad<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> -As is the red banshee that goes to keen<br /> -Above the wet dark of the deep brown grave,<br /> -For the warm loves that made my memory glad."<br /> -<br /> -And her old nurse bent down and took a wild<br /> -Curl from her eye and hung it on her ear,<br /> -And said, "The woman at the heavy quern,<br /> -Who weeps that she will never bring a child,<br /> -And sees her sadness in the coming year,<br /> -Will roll up all her beauty like a fern;<br /> -Not you, whose years stretch purple to the end."<br /> -<br /> -And Findebar, "Beside the broad blue bend<br /> -Of the slow river where the dark banks slope<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> -Wide to the woods sleeps Ferdia apart.<br /> -I loved him, and then drove him for pride's sake<br /> -To early death, and now I have no hope,<br /> -For mine is Maeve's proud heart, Ailill's kind heart,<br /> -And that is why it pines and will not break."<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -ON DREAM WATER<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -And so, o'er many a league of sea<br /> -We sang of those we left behind.<br /> -Our ship split thro' the phosphor free,<br /> -Her white sails pregnant with the wind,<br /> -And I was wondering in my mind<br /> -How many would remember me.<br /> -<br /> -Then red-edged dawn expanded wide,<br /> -A stony foreland stretched away,<br /> -And bowed capes gathering round the tide<br /> -Kept many a little homely bay.<br /> -O joy of living there for aye,<br /> -O Soul so often tried!<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE DEATH OF SUALTEM<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -After the brown bull passed from Cooley's fields<br /> -And all Muirevne was a wail of pain,<br /> -Sualtem came at evening thro' the slain<br /> -And heard a noise like water rushing loud,<br /> -A thunder like the noise of mighty shields.<br /> -And in his dread he shouted: "Earth is bowed,<br /> -The heavens are split and stars make war with stars<br /> -And the sea runs in fear!"<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 14em;">For all his scars</span><br /> -He hastened to Dun Dealgan, and there found<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> -It was his son, Cuculain, making moan.<br /> -His hair was red with blood, and he was wound<br /> -In wicker full of grass, and a cold stone<br /> -Was on his head.<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 9em;">"Cuculain, is it so?"</span><br /> -Sualtem said, and then, "My hair is snow,<br /> -My strength leaks thro' my wounds, but I will die<br /> -Avenging you."<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 8.5em;">And then Cuculain said:</span><br /> -"Not so, old father, but take horse and ride<br /> -To Emain Macha, and tell Connor this."<br /> -Sualtem from his red lips took a kiss,<br /> -And turned the stone upon Cuculain's head.<br /> -The Lia-Macha with a heavy sigh<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> -Ran up and halted by his wounded side.<br /> -In Emain Macha to low lights and song<br /> -Connor was dreaming of the beauteous Maeve.<br /> -He saw her as at first, by Shannon's wave,<br /> -Her insteps in the water, mounds of white.<br /> -It was in Spring, and music loud and strong<br /> -Rocked all the coloured woods, and the blue height<br /> -Of heaven was round the lark, and in his heart<br /> -There was a pain of love.<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 13.5em;">Then with a start</span><br /> -He wakened as a loud voice from below<br /> -Shouted, "The land is robbed, the women shamed,<br /> -The children stolen, and Cuculain low!"<br /> -Then Connor rose, his war-worn soul inflamed,<br /> -And shouted down for Cathbad; then to greet<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> -The messenger he hurried to the street.<br /> -And there he saw Sualtem shouting still<br /> -The message of Muirevne 'mid the sound<br /> -Of hurried Ducklings and uneasy horse.<br /> -At sight of him the Lia-Macha wheeled,<br /> -So that Sualtem fell upon his shield,<br /> -And his grey head came shouting to the ground.<br /> -They buried him by moonlight on the hill,<br /> -And all about him waves the heavy gorse.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE MAID IN LOW-MOON LAND<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I know not where she be, and yet<br /> -I see her waiting white and tall.<br /> -Her eyes are blue, her lips are wet,<br /> -And move as tho' they'd love to call.<br /> -I see her shadow on the wall<br /> -Before the changing moon has set.<br /> -<br /> -She stands there lovely and alone<br /> -And up her porch blue creepers swing.<br /> -The world she moves in is her own,<br /> -To sun and shade and hasty wing.<br /> -And I would wed her in the Spring,<br /> -But only I sit here and moan.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE DEATH OF LEAG. CUCHULAIN'S CHARIOTEER<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span style="font-size: 0.8em;">CONALL</span><br /> -<br /> -"I only heard the loud ebb on the sand,<br /> -The high ducks talking in the chilly sky.<br /> -The voices that you fancied floated by<br /> -Were wind notes, or the whisper on the trees.<br /> -But you are still so full of war's red din,<br /> -You hear impatient hoof-beats up the land<br /> -When the sea's changing, or a lisping breeze<br /> -Is playing on the waters of the linn."<br /> -<br /> -<span style="font-size: 0.8em;">LEAG</span><br /> -<br /> -"I hear Cuchulain's voice, and Emer's voice,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> -The Lia Macha's neigh, the chariot's wheels,<br /> -Farther away a bell bough's drowsy peals;<br /> -And sleep lays heavy thumbs upon my eyes.<br /> -I hear Cuchulain sing above the chime<br /> -Of One Who comes to make the world rejoice,<br /> -And comes again to blot away the skies,<br /> -To wipe away the world and roll up Time."<br /> -<br /> -<span style="font-size: 0.8em;">CONALL</span><br /> -<br /> -"In the dark ground forever mouth to mouth<br /> -They kiss thro' all the changes of the world,<br /> -The grey sea fogs above them are unfurled<br /> -At evening when the sea walks with the moon,<br /> -And peace is with them in the long cairn shut.<br /> -You loved him as the swallow loves the South,<br /> -And Love speaks with you since the evening put<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> -Mist and white dews upon short shadowed noon."<br /> -<br /> -<span style="font-size: 0.8em;">LEAG</span><br /> -<br /> -"Sleep lays his heavy thumbs upon my eyes,<br /> -Shuts out all sounds and shakes me at the wrists.<br /> -By Nanny water where the salty mists<br /> -Weep o'er Riangabra let me stand deep<br /> -Beside my father. Sleep lays heavy thumbs<br /> -Upon my eyebrows, and I hear the sighs<br /> -Of far loud waters, and a troop that comes<br /> -With boughs of bells——"<br /> -<br /> -<span style="font-size: 0.8em;">CONALL</span><br /> -<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 7em;">"They come to you with sleep."</span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE PASSING OF CAOILTE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -'Twas just before the truce sang thro' the din<br /> -Caoilte, the thin man, at the war's red end<br /> -Leaned from the crooked ranks and saw his friend<br /> -Fall in the farther fury; so when truce<br /> -Halted advancing spears the thin man came<br /> -And bending by pale Oscar called his name;<br /> -And then he knew of all who followed Finn,<br /> -He only felt the cool of Gavra's dews.<br /> -<br /> -And Caoilte, the thin man, went down the field<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> -To where slow water moved among the whins,<br /> -And sat above a pool of twinkling fins<br /> -To court old memories of the Fenian men,<br /> -Of how Finn's laugh at Conan's tale of glee<br /> -Brought down the rowan's boughs on Knoc-naree,<br /> -And how he made swift comets with his shield<br /> -At moonlight in the Fomar's rivered glen.<br /> -<br /> -And Caoilte, the thin man, was weary now,<br /> -And nodding in short sleeps of half a dream:<br /> -There came a golden barge down middle stream,<br /> -And a tall maiden coloured like a bird<br /> -Pulled noiseless oars, but not a word she said.<br /> -And Caoilte, the thin man, raised up his head<br /> -And took her kiss upon his throbbing brow,<br /> -And where they went away what man has heard?<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -GROWING OLD<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -We'll fill a Provence bowl and pledge us deep<br /> -The memory of the far ones, and between<br /> -The soothing pipes, in heavy-lidded sleep,<br /> -Perhaps we'll dream the things that once have been.<br /> -'Tis only noon and still too soon to die,<br /> -Yet we are growing old, my heart and I.<br /> -<br /> -A hundred books are ready in my head<br /> -To open out where Beauty bent a leaf.<br /> -What do we want with Beauty? We are wed<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> -Like ancient Proserpine to dismal grief.<br /> -And we are changing with the hours that fly,<br /> -And growing odd and old, my heart and I.<br /> -<br /> -Across a bed of bells the river flows,<br /> -And roses dawn, but not for us; we want<br /> -The new thing ever as the old thing grows<br /> -Spectral and weary on the hills we haunt.<br /> -And that is why we feast, and that is why<br /> -We're growing odd and old, my heart and I.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -AFTER MY LAST SONG<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Where I shall rest when my last song is over<br /> -The air is smelling like a feast of wine;<br /> -And purple breakers of the windy clover<br /> -Shall roll to cool this burning brow of mine;<br /> -And there shall come to me, when day is told<br /> -The peace of sleep when I am grey and old.<br /> -<br /> -I'm wild for wandering to the far-off places<br /> -Since one forsook me whom I held most dear.<br /> -I want to see new wonders and new faces<br /> -Beyond East seas; but I will win back here<br /> -When my last song is sung, and veins are cold<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> -As thawing snow, and I am grey and old.<br /> -<br /> -Oh paining eyes, but not with salty weeping,<br /> -My heart is like a sod in winter rain;<br /> -Ere you will see those baying waters leaping<br /> -Like hungry hounds once more, how many a pain<br /> -Shall heal; but when my last short song is trolled<br /> -You'll sleep here on wan cheeks grown thin and old.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a><br /><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> -SONGS OF PEACE AT HOME<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -A DREAM OF ARTEMIS<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -There was soft beauty on the linnet's tongue<br /> -To see the rainbow's coloured bands arch wide.<br /> -The thunder darted his red fangs among<br /> -South mountains, but the East was like a bride<br /> -Drest for the altar at her mother's door<br /> -Weeping between two loves. The fields were pied<br /> -With May's munificence of flowers, that wore<br /> -The fashion of the days when Eve was young,<br /> -God's kirtles, ere the first sweet summer died.<br /> -The blackbird in a thorn of waving white<br /> -Sang bouquets of small tunes that bid me turn<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span> -From twilight wanderings thro' some old delight<br /> -I heard in my far memory making mourn.<br /> -Such music fills me with a joy half pain,<br /> -And beats a track across my life I spurn<br /> -In sober moments. Ah, this wandering brain<br /> -Could play its hurdy-gurdy all the night<br /> -To vagrant joys of days beyond the bourn.<br /> -<br /> -I heard the river warble sweetly nigh<br /> -To meet the warm salt tide below the weir,<br /> -And saw a coloured line of cows pass by,—<br /> -And then a voice said quickly, "Iris here!"<br /> -"What message now hath Hera?" then I woke,<br /> -An exile in Arcadia, and a spear<br /> -Flashed by me, and ten nymphs fleet-footed broke<br /> -Out of the coppice with a silver cry,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> -Into the bow of lights to disappear.<br /> -<br /> -For one blue minute then there was no sound<br /> -Save water-noise, slow round a rushy bend,<br /> -And bird-delight, and ripples on the ground<br /> -Of windy flowers that swelling would ascend<br /> -The coloured hill and break all beautiful<br /> -And, falling backwards, to the woods would send<br /> -The full tide of their love. What soft moons pull<br /> -Their moving fragrance? did I ask, and found<br /> -Sad Io in far Egypt met a friend.—<br /> -It was my body thought so, far away<br /> -In the grey future, not the wild bird tied<br /> -That is the wandering soul. Behind the day<br /> -We may behold thee, soft one, hunted wide<br /> -By the loud gadfly; but the truant soul<br /> -Knows thee before thou lay by night's dark side,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> -Wed to the dimness; long before its dole<br /> -Was meted it, to be thus pound in clay—<br /> -That daubs its whiteness and offends its pride.<br /> -<br /> -There were loud questions in the rainbow's end,<br /> -And hurried answers, and a sound of spears.<br /> -And through the yellow blaze I saw one bend<br /> -Down on a trembling white knee, and her tears<br /> -Fell down in globes of light, and her small mouth<br /> -Was filled up with a name unspoken. Years<br /> -Of waiting love, and all their long, long drought<br /> -Of kisses parched her lips, and did she spend<br /> -Her eyes blue candles searching thro' her fears.<br /> -"She hath loved Ganymede, the stolen boy."<br /> -Said one, and then another, "Let us sing<br /> -To Zeus that he may give her living joy<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> -Above Olympus, where the cool hill-spring<br /> -Of Lethe bubbles up to bathe the heart<br /> -Sorrow's lean fingers bruised. There eagles wing<br /> -To eyries in the stars, and when they part<br /> -Their broad dark wings a wind is born to buoy<br /> -The bee home heavy in the far evening."<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -HYMN TO ZEUS<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -"God, whose kindly hand doth sow<br /> -The rainbow showers on hill and lawn,<br /> -To make the young sweet grasses grow<br /> -And fill the udder of the fawn.<br /> -Whose light is life of leaf and flower,<br /> -And all the colours of the birds.<br /> -Whose song goes on from hour to hour<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> -Upon the river's liquid words.<br /> -Reach out a golden beam of thine<br /> -And touch her pain. Your finger-tips<br /> -Do make the violets' blue eclipse<br /> -Like milk upon a daisy shine.<br /> -<br /> -God, who lights the little stars,<br /> -And over night the white dew spills.<br /> -Whose hand doth move the season's cars<br /> -And clouds that mock our pointed hills.<br /> -Whose bounty fills the cow-trod wold,<br /> -And fills with bread the warm brown sod.<br /> -Who brings us sleep, where we grow old<br /> -'Til sleep and age together nod.<br /> -<br /> -Reach out a beam and touch the pain<br /> -A heart has oozed thro' all the years.<br /> -Your pity dries the morning's tears<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> -And fills the world with joy again!"<br /> -The rainbow's lights were shut, and all the maids<br /> -Stood round the sad nymph in a snow-white ring,<br /> -She rising spoke, "A blue and soft light bathes<br /> -Me to the fingers. Lo, I upward swing!"<br /> -And round her fell a mantle of blue light.<br /> -"Watch for me on the forehead of evening."<br /> -And lifting beautiful went out of sight.<br /> -And all the flowers flowed backward from the glades,<br /> -An ebb of colours redolent of Spring.<br /> -<br /> -Beauty and Love are sisters of the heart,<br /> -Love has no voice, and Beauty whispered song.<br /> -Now in my own, drawn silently apart<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> -Love looked, and Beauty sang. I felt a strong<br /> -Pulse on my wrist, a feeling like a pain<br /> -In my quick heart, for Love with gazes long<br /> -Was worshipping at Artemis, now lain<br /> -Among the heaving flowers ... I longed to dart<br /> -And fold her to my breast, nor saw the wrong.<br /> -She lay there, a tall beauty by her spear,<br /> -Her kirtle falling to her soft round knee.<br /> -Her hair was like the day when evening's near,<br /> -And her moist mouth might tempt the golden bee.<br /> -Smile's creases ran from dimples pink and deep,<br /> -And when she raised her arms I loved to see<br /> -The white mounds of her muscles. Gentle sleep<br /> -Threatened her far blue looks. The noisy weir<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> -Fell into a low murmuring lullaby.<br /> -And then the flowers came back behind the heel<br /> -Of hunted Io: she, poor maid, had fear<br /> -Wide in her eyes looking half back to steal<br /> -A glimpse of the loud gadfly fiercely near.<br /> -In her right hand she held Planting light,<br /> -And in her left her train. Artemis here<br /> -Raised herself on her palms, and took a white<br /> -Horn from her side and blew a silver peal<br /> -Til three hounds from the coppice did appear.<br /> -<br /> -The white nine left the spaces of flowers, and now<br /> -Went calling thro' the wood the hunter's call.<br /> -Young echoes sleeping in the hollow bough<br /> -Took up the shouts and handed them to all<br /> -Their sisters of the crags, 'til all the day<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> -Was filled with voices loud and musical.<br /> -I followed them across a tangled way<br /> -'Til the red deer broke out and took the brow<br /> -Of a wide hill in bounces like a ball.<br /> -Beside swift Artemis I joined the chase;<br /> -We roused up kine and scattered fleecy flocks;<br /> -Crossed at a mill a swift and bubbly race;<br /> -Scaled in a wood of pine the knotty rocks;<br /> -Past a grey vision of a valley town;<br /> -Past swains at labour in their coloured frocks;<br /> -Once saw a boar upon a windy down;<br /> -Once heard a cradle in a lonely place,<br /> -And saw the red flash of a frightened fox.<br /> -<br /> -We passed a garden where three maids in blue<br /> -Were talking of a queen a long time dead.<br /> -We caught a green glimpse of the sea: then thro'<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> -A town all hills; now round a wood we sped<br /> -And killed our quarry in his native lair.<br /> -Then Artemis spun round to me and said,<br /> -"Whence come you?" and I took her long damp hair<br /> -And made a ball of it, and said, "Where you<br /> -Are midnight's dreams of love." She dropped her head,<br /> -No word she spoke, but, panting in her side,<br /> -I heard her heart. The trees were all at peace,<br /> -And lifting slowly on the grey evetide<br /> -A large and lovely star. Then to release<br /> -Her hair, my hand dropped to her girded waist<br /> -And lay there shyly. "O my love, the lease<br /> -Of your existence is for ever: taste<br /> -No less with me the love of earth," I cried.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> -"Though for so short a while on lands and seas<br /> -Our mortal hearts know beauty, and overblow,<br /> -And we are dust upon some passing wind,<br /> -Dust and a memory. But for you the snow<br /> -That so long cloaks the mountains to the knees<br /> -Is no more than a morning. It doth go<br /> -And summer comes, and leaf upon the trees:<br /> -Still you are fair and young, and nothing find<br /> -In all man's story that seems long ago.<br /> -I have not loved on Earth the strife for gold,<br /> -Nor the great name that makes immortal man,<br /> -But all that struggle upward to behold<br /> -What still is left of Beauty undisgraced,<br /> -The snowdrop at the heel of winter cold<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span> -And shivering, and the wayward cuckoo chased<br /> -By lingering March, and, in the thunder's van<br /> -The poor lambs merry on the meagre wold,<br /> -By-ways and cast-off things that lie therein,<br /> -Old boots that trod the highways of the world,<br /> -The schoolboy's broken hoop, the battered bin<br /> -That heard the ragman's story, blackened places<br /> -Where gipsies camped and circuses made din,<br /> -Fast water and the melancholy traces<br /> -Of sea tides, and poor people madly whirled<br /> -Up, down, and through the black retreats of sin.<br /> -These things a god might love, and stooping bless<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span> -With benedictions of eternal song.—<br /> -But I have not loved Artemis the less<br /> -For loving these, but deem it noble love<br /> -To sing of live or dead things in distress<br /> -And wake memorial memories above.<br /> -<br /> -Such is the soul that comes to plead with you<br /> -Oh, Artemis, to tend you in your needs.<br /> -At mornings I will bring you bells of dew<br /> -From honey places, and wild fish from, streams<br /> -Flowing in secret places. I will brew<br /> -Sweet wine of alder for your evening dreams,<br /> -And pipe you music in the dusky reeds<br /> -When the four distances give up their blue.<br /> -<br /> -And when the white procession of the stars<br /> -Crosses the night, and on their tattered wings,<br /> -Above the forest, cry the loud night-jars,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> -We'll hunt the stag upon the mountain-side,<br /> -Slipping like light between the shadow bars<br /> -'Til burst of dawn makes every distance wide.<br /> -Oh, Artemis—what grief the silence brings!<br /> -I hear the rolling chariot of Mars!"<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -A LITTLE BOY IN THE MORNING<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -He will not come, and still I wait.<br /> -He whistles at another gate<br /> -Where angels listen. Ah, I know<br /> -He will not come, yet if I go<br /> -How shall I know he did not pass<br /> -Barefooted in the flowery grass?<br /> -<br /> -The moon leans on one silver horn<br /> -Above the silhouettes of morn,<br /> -And from their nest sills finches whistle<br /> -Or stooping pluck the downy thistle.<br /> -How is the morn so gay and fair<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span> -Without his whistling in its air?<br /> -The world is calling, I must go.<br /> -How shall I know he did not pass<br /> -Barefooted in the shining grass?<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a><br /><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a><br /><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span>IN BARRACKS<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -TO A DISTANT ONE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Through wild by-ways I come to you, my love,<br /> -Nor ask of those I meet the surest way,<br /> -What way I turn I cannot go astray<br /> -And miss you in my life. Though Fate may prove<br /> -A tardy guide she will not make delay<br /> -Leading me through strange seas and distant lands,<br /> -I'm coming still, though slowly, to your hands.<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 4em;">We'll meet one day.</span><br /> -<br /> -There is so much to do, so little done,<br /> -In my life's space that I perforce did leave<br /> -Love at the moonlit trysting-place to grieve<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> -Till fame and other little things were won.<br /> -I have missed much that I shall not retrieve,<br /> -Far will I wander yet with much to do.<br /> -Much will I spurn before I yet meet you,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 4em;">So fair I can't deceive.</span><br /> -<br /> -Your name is in the whisper of the woods<br /> -Like Beauty calling for a poet's song<br /> -To one whose harp had suffered many a wrong<br /> -In the lean hands of Pain. And when the broods<br /> -Of flower eyes waken all the streams along<br /> -In tender whiles, I feel most near to you:—<br /> -Oh, when we meet there shall be sun and blue<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 4em;">Strong as the spring is strong.</span><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE PLACE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Blossoms as old as May I scatter here,<br /> -And a blue wave I lifted from the stream.<br /> -It shall not know when winter days are drear<br /> -Or March is hoarse with blowing. But a-dream<br /> -The laurel boughs shall hold a canopy<br /> -Peacefully over it the winter long,<br /> -Till all the birds are back from oversea,<br /> -And April rainbows win a blackbird's song.<br /> -<br /> -And when the war is over I shall take<br /> -My lute a-down to it and sing again<br /> -Songs of the whispering things amongst the brake,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> -And those I love shall know them by their strain.<br /> -Their airs shall be the blackbird's twilight song,<br /> -Their words shall be all flowers with fresh dews hoar.—<br /> -But it is lonely now in winter long,<br /> -And, God! to hear the blackbird sing once more.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -MAY<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -She leans across an orchard gate somewhere,<br /> -Bending from out the shadows to the light,<br /> -A dappled spray of blossom in her hair<br /> -Studded with dew-drops lovely from the night<br /> -She smiles to think how many hearts she'll smite<br /> -With beauty ere her robes fade from the lawn.<br /> -She hears the robin's cymbals with delight,<br /> -The skylark in the rosebush of the dawn.<br /> -<br /> -For her the cowslip rings its yellow bell,<br /> -For her the violets watch with wide blue eyes.<br /> -The wandering cuckoo doth its clear name tell<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> -Thro' the white mist of blossoms where she lies<br /> -Painting a sunset for the western skies.<br /> -You'd know her by her smile and by her tear<br /> -And by the way the swift and martin flies,<br /> -Where she is south of these wild days and drear.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -TO EILISH OF THE FAIR HAIR<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I'd make my heart a harp to play for you<br /> -Love songs within the evening dim of day,<br /> -Were it not dumb with ache and with mildew<br /> -Of sorrow withered like a flower away.<br /> -It hears so many calls from homeland places,<br /> -So many sighs from all it will remember,<br /> -From the pale roads and woodlands where your face is<br /> -Like laughing sunlight running thro' December.<br /> -<br /> -But this it singeth loud above its pain,<br /> -To bring the greater ache: whate'er befall<br /> -The love that oft-times woke the sweeter strain<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> -Shall turn to you always. And should you call<br /> -To pity it some day in those old places<br /> -Angels will covet the loud joy that fills it.<br /> -But thinking of the by-ways where your face is<br /> -Sunlight on other hearts—Ah! how it kills it.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a><br /><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span>IN CAMP<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -CREWBAWN<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -White clouds that change and pass,<br /> -And stars that shine awhile,<br /> -Dew water on the grass,<br /> -A fox upon a stile.<br /> -<br /> -A river broad and deep,<br /> -A slow boat on the waves,<br /> -My sad thoughts on the sleep<br /> -That hollows out the graves.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -EVENING IN ENGLAND<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -From its blue vase the rose of evening drops.<br /> -Upon the streams its petals float away.<br /> -The hills all blue with distance hide their tops<br /> -In the dim silence falling on the grey.<br /> -A little wind said "Hush!" and shook a spray<br /> -Heavy with May's white crop of opening bloom,<br /> -A silent bat went dipping up the gloom.<br /> -<br /> -Night tells her rosary of stars full soon,<br /> -They drop from out her dark hand to her knees.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> -Upon a silhouette of woods the moon<br /> -Leans on one horn as if beseeching ease<br /> -From all her changes which have stirred the seas.<br /> -Across the ears of Toil Rest throws her veil,<br /> -I and a marsh bird only make a wail.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a><br /><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a><br /><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> -AT SEA<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -CROCKNAHARNA<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -On the heights of Crocknaharna,<br /> -(Oh, the lure of Crocknaharna)<br /> -On a morning fair and early<br /> -Of a dear remembered May,<br /> -There I heard a colleen singing<br /> -In the brown rocks and the grey.<br /> -She, the pearl of Crocknaharna,<br /> -Crocknaharna, Crocknaharna,<br /> -Wild with girls is Crocknaharna<br /> -Twenty hundred miles away.<br /> -<br /> -On the heights of Crocknaharna,<br /> -(Oh, thy sorrow Crocknaharna)<br /> -On an evening dim and misty<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> -Of a cold November day,<br /> -There I heard a woman weeping<br /> -In the brown rocks and the grey.<br /> -Oh, the pearl of Crocknaharna<br /> -(Crocknaharna, Crocknaharna),<br /> -Black with grief is Crocknaharna<br /> -Twenty hundred miles away.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -IN THE MEDITERRANEAN—GOING TO THE WAR<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Lovely wings of gold and green<br /> -Flit about the sounds I hear,<br /> -On my window when I lean<br /> -To the shadows cool and clear.<br /> -<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">* * * * *</span><br /> -<br /> -Roaming, I am listening still,<br /> -Bending, listening overlong,<br /> -In my soul a steadier will,<br /> -In my heart a newer song.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE GARDENER<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Among the flowers, like flowers, her slow hands move<br /> -Easing a muffled bell or stooping low<br /> -To help sweet roses climb the stakes above,<br /> -Where pansies stare and seem to whisper "Lo!"<br /> -Like gaudy butterflies her sweet peas blow<br /> -Filling the garden with dim rustlings. Clear<br /> -On the sweet Book she reads how long ago<br /> -There was a garden to a woman dear.<br /> -<br /> -She makes her life one grand beatitude<br /> -Of Love and Peace, and with contented eyes<br /> -She sees not in the whole world mean or rude,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> -And her small lot she trebly multiplies.<br /> -And when the darkness muffles up the skies<br /> -Still to be happy is her sole desire,<br /> -She sings sweet songs about a great emprise,<br /> -And sees a garden blowing in the fire.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a><br /><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a><br /><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> -IN SERBIA<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -AUTUMN EVENING IN SERBIA<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -All the thin shadows<br /> -Have closed on the grass,<br /> -With the drone on their dark wings<br /> -The night beetles pass.<br /> -Folded her eyelids,<br /> -A maiden asleep,<br /> -Day sees in her chamber<br /> -The pallid moon peep.<br /> -<br /> -From the bend of the briar<br /> -The roses are torn,<br /> -And the folds of the wood tops<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> -Are faded and worn.<br /> -A strange bird is singing<br /> -Sweet notes of the sun,<br /> -Tho' song time is over<br /> -And Autumn begun.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -NOCTURNE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -The rim of the moon<br /> -Is over the corn.<br /> -The beetle's drone<br /> -Is above the thorn.<br /> -Grey days come soon<br /> -And I am alone;<br /> -Can you hear my moan<br /> -Where you rest, Aroon?<br /> -<br /> -When the wild tree bore<br /> -The deep blue cherry,<br /> -In night's deep hall<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> -Our love kissed merry.<br /> -But you come no more<br /> -Where its woodlands call,<br /> -And the grey days fall<br /> -On my grief, Astore!<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -SPRING AND AUTUMN<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Green ripples singing down the corn,<br /> -With blossoms dumb the path I tread,<br /> -And in the music of the morn<br /> -One with wild roses on her head.<br /> -<br /> -Now the green ripples turn to gold<br /> -And all the paths are loud with rain,<br /> -I with desire am growing old<br /> -And full of winter pain.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a><br /><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a><br /><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> -IN GREECE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE DEPARTURE OF PROSERPINE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Old mother Earth for me already grieves,<br /> -Her morns wake weeping and her noons are dim,<br /> -Silence has left her woods, and all the leaves<br /> -Dance in the windy shadows on the rim<br /> -Of the dull lake thro' which I soon shall pass<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 4em;">To my dark bridal bed</span><br /> -Down in the hollow chambers of the dead.<br /> -Will not the thunder hide me if I call,<br /> -Wrapt in the corner of some distant star<br /> -The gods have never known?<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Alas! alas!</span><br /> -My voice has left with the last wing, my fall<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> -Shall crush the flowery fields with gloom, as far<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 4em;">As swallows fly.</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Would I might die</span><br /> -And in a solitude of roses lie<br /> -As the last bud's outblown.<br /> -Then nevermore Demeter would be heard<br /> -Wail in the blowing rain, but every shower<br /> -Would come bound up with rainbows to the birds<br /> -Wrapt in a dusty wing, and the dry flower<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Hanging a shrivelled lip.</span><br /> -This weary change from light to darkness fills<br /> -My heart with twilight, and my brightest day<br /> -Dawns over thunder and in thunder spills<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Its urn of gladness</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 4em;">With a sadness</span><br /> -Through which the slow dews drip<br /> -And the bat goes over on a thorny wing.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> -Is it a dream that once I used to sing<br /> -From Ægean shores across her rocky isles,<br /> -Making the bells of Babylon to ring<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Over the wiles</span><br /> -That lifted me from darkness to the Spring<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 4em;">And the King</span><br /> -Seeing his wine in blossom on the tree<br /> -Danced with the queen a merry roundelay,<br /> -And all the blue circumference of the day<br /> -Was loud with flying song.——<br /> -—But let me pass along:<br /> -What brooks it the unfree to thus delay?<br /> -No secret turning leads from the gods' way.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE HOMECOMING OF THE SHEEP<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -The sheep are coming home in Greece,<br /> -Hark the bells on every hill!<br /> -Flock by flock, and fleece by fleece,<br /> -Wandering wide a little piece<br /> -Thro' the evening red and still,<br /> -Stopping where the pathways cease,<br /> -Cropping with a hurried will.<br /> -<br /> -Thro' the cotton-bushes low<br /> -Merry boys with shouldered crooks<br /> -Close them in a single row,<br /> -Shout among them as they go<br /> -With one bell-ring o'er the brooks.<br /> -Such delight you never know<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> -Reading it from gilded books.<br /> -<br /> -Before the early stars are bright<br /> -Cormorants and sea-gulls call,<br /> -And the moon comes large and white<br /> -Filling with a lovely light<br /> -The ferny curtained waterfall.<br /> -Then sleep wraps every bell up tight<br /> -And the climbing moon grows small.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -WHEN LOVE AND BEAUTY WANDER AWAY<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -When Love and Beauty wander away,<br /> -And there's no more hearts to be sought and won,<br /> -When the old earth limps thro' the dreary day,<br /> -And the work of the Seasons cry undone:<br /> -Ah! what shall we do for a song to sing,<br /> -Who have known Beauty, and Love, and Spring?<br /> -<br /> -When Love and Beauty wander away,<br /> -And a pale fear lies on the cheeks of youth,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> -When there's no more goal to strive for and pray,<br /> -And we live at the end of the world's untruth:<br /> -Ah! what shall we do for a heart to prove,<br /> -Who have known Beauty, and Spring, and Love?<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a><br /><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span> -IN HOSPITAL IN EGYPT<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -MY MOTHER<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -God made my mother on an April day,<br /> -From sorrow and the mist along the sea,<br /> -Lost birds' and wanderers' songs and ocean spray<br /> -And the moon loved her wandering jealously.<br /> -<br /> -Beside the ocean's din she combed her hair,<br /> -Singing the nocturne of the passing ships,<br /> -Before her earthly lover found her there<br /> -And kissed away the music from her lips.<br /> -<br /> -She came unto the hills and saw the change<br /> -That brings the swallow and the geese in turns.<br /> -But there was not a grief she deeméd strange,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span> -For there is that in her which always mourns.<br /> -<br /> -Kind heart she has for all on hill or wave<br /> -Whose hopes grew wings like ants to fly away.<br /> -I bless the God Who such a mother gave<br /> -This poor bird-hearted singer of a day.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -SONG<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Nothing but sweet music wakes<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">My Beloved, my Beloved.</span><br /> -Sleeping by the blue lakes,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">My own Beloved!</span><br /> -<br /> -Song of lark and song of thrush,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">My Beloved! my Beloved!</span><br /> -Sing in morning's rosy bush,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">My own Beloved!</span><br /> -<br /> -When your eyes dawn blue and clear,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">My Beloved! my Beloved!</span><br /> -You will find me waiting here,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">My own Beloved!</span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -TO ONE DEAD<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -A blackbird singing<br /> -On a moss upholstered stone,<br /> -Bluebells swinging,<br /> -Shadows wildly blown,<br /> -A song in the wood,<br /> -A ship on the sea.<br /> -The song was for you<br /> -And the ship was for me.<br /> -<br /> -A blackbird singing<br /> -I hear in my troubled mind,<br /> -Bluebells swinging<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span> -I see in a distant wind.<br /> -But sorrow and silence<br /> -Are the wood's threnody,<br /> -The silence for you<br /> -And the sorrow for me.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE RESURRECTION<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -My true love still is all that's fair,<br /> -She is flower and blossom blowing free,<br /> -For all her silence lying there<br /> -She sings a spirit song to me.<br /> -<br /> -New lovers seek her in her bower,<br /> -The rain, the dew, the flying wind,<br /> -And tempt her out to be a flower,<br /> -Which throws a shadow on my mind.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE SHADOW PEOPLE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Old lame Bridget doesn't hear<br /> -Fairy music in the grass<br /> -When the gloaming's on the mere<br /> -And the shadow people pass:<br /> -Never hears their slow grey feet<br /> -Coming from the village street<br /> -Just beyond the parson's wall,<br /> -Where the clover globes are sweet<br /> -And the mushroom's parasol<br /> -Opens in the moonlit rain.<br /> -Every night I hear them call<br /> -From their long and merry train.<br /> -Old lame Bridget says to me,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> -"It is just your fancy, child,"<br /> -She cannot believe I see<br /> -Laughing faces in the wild,<br /> -Hands that twinkle in the sedge<br /> -Bowing at the water's edge<br /> -Where the finny minnows quiver,<br /> -Shaping on a blue wave's ledge<br /> -Bubble foam to sail the river.<br /> -And the sunny hands to me<br /> -Beckon ever, beckon ever.<br /> -Oh! I would be wild and free<br /> -And with the shadow people be.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a><br /><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span> -IN BARRACKS<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -AN OLD DESIRE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I searched thro' memory's lumber-room<br /> -And there I found an old desire,<br /> -I took it gently from the gloom<br /> -To cherish by my scanty tire.<br /> -<br /> -And all the night a sweet-voiced one,<br /> -Sang of the place my loves abide,<br /> -Til Earth leaned over from the dawn<br /> -And hid the last star in her side.<br /> -<br /> -And often since, when most alone,<br /> -I ponder on my old desire,<br /> -But never hear the sweet-voiced one,<br /> -And there are ruins in my fire.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THOMAS McDONAGH<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -He shall not hear the bittern cry<br /> -In the wild sky, where he is lain,<br /> -Nor voices of the sweeter birds<br /> -Above the wailing of the rain.<br /> -<br /> -Nor shall he know when loud March blows<br /> -Thro' slanting snows her fanfare shrill,<br /> -Blowing to flame the golden cup<br /> -Of many an upset daffodil.<br /> -<br /> -But when the Dark Cow leaves the moor,<br /> -And pastures poor with greedy weeds,<br /> -Perhaps he'll hear her low at morn<br /> -Lifting her horn in pleasant meads.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE WEDDING MORNING<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Spread the feast, and let there be<br /> -Such music heard as best beseems<br /> -A king's son coming from the sea<br /> -To wed a maiden of the streams.<br /> -<br /> -Poets, pale for long ago,<br /> -Bring sweet sounds from rock and flood,<br /> -You by echo's accent know<br /> -Where the water is and wood.<br /> -<br /> -Harpers whom the moths of Time<br /> -Bent and wrinkled dusty brown,<br /> -Her chains are falling with a chime,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span> -Sweet as bells in Heaven town.<br /> -<br /> -But, harpers, leave your harps aside,<br /> -And, poets, leave awhile your dreams.<br /> -The storm has come upon the tide<br /> -And Cathleen weeps among her streams.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE BLACKBIRDS<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I heard the Poor Old Woman say:<br /> -"At break of day the fowler came,<br /> -And took my blackbirds from their songs<br /> -Who loved me well thro shame and blame.<br /> -<br /> -No more from lovely distances<br /> -Their songs shall bless me mile by mile,<br /> -Nor to white Ashbourne call me down<br /> -To wear my crown another while.<br /> -<br /> -With bended flowers the angels mark<br /> -For the skylark the place they lie,<br /> -From there its little family<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span> -Shall dip their wings first in the sky.<br /> -<br /> -And when the first surprise of flight<br /> -Sweet songs excite, from the far dawn<br /> -Shall there come blackbirds loud with love,<br /> -Sweet echoes of the singers gone.<br /> -<br /> -But in the lonely hush of eve<br /> -Weeping I grieve the silent bills."<br /> -I heard the Poor Old Woman say<br /> -In Derry of the little hills.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE LURE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I saw night leave her halos down<br /> -On Mitylene's dark mountain isle,<br /> -The silhouette of one fair town<br /> -Like broken shadows in a pile.<br /> -And in the farther dawn I heard<br /> -The music of a foreign bird.<br /> -<br /> -In fields of shady angles now<br /> -I stand and dream in the half dark:<br /> -The thrush is on the blossomed bough,<br /> -Above the echoes sings the lark,<br /> -And little rivers drop between<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> -Hills fairer than dark Mitylene.<br /> -<br /> -Yet something calls me with no voice<br /> -And wakes sweet echoes in my mind;<br /> -In the fair country of my choice<br /> -Nor Peace nor Love again I find,<br /> -Nor anything of rest I know<br /> -When south-east winds are blowing low.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THRO' BOGAC BAN<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I met the Silent Wandering Man,<br /> -Thro' Bogac Ban he made his way,<br /> -Humming a slow old Irish tune,<br /> -On Joseph Plunkett's wedding day.<br /> -<br /> -And all the little whispering things<br /> -That love the springs of Bogac Ban,<br /> -Spread some new rumour round the dark<br /> -And turned their faces from the dawn.<br /> -<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">* * * * *</span><br /> -<br /> -My hand upon my harp I lay,<br /> -I cannot say what things I know;<br /> -To meet the Silent Wandering Man<br /> -Of Bogac Ban once more I go.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -FATE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Lugh made a stir in the air<br /> -With his sword of cries,<br /> -And fairies thro' hidden ways<br /> -Came from the skies,<br /> -And their spells withered up the fair<br /> -And vanquished the wise.<br /> -<br /> -And old lame Balor came down<br /> -With his gorgon eye<br /> -Hidden behind its lid,<br /> -Old, withered and dry.<br /> -He looked on the wattle town,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span> -And the town passed by.<br /> -<br /> -These things I know in my dreams,<br /> -The crying sword of Lugh,<br /> -And Balor's ancient eye<br /> -Searching me through,<br /> -Withering up my songs<br /> -And my pipe yet new.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -EVENING CLOUDS<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -A little flock of clouds go down to rest<br /> -In some blue corner off the moon's highway,<br /> -With shepherd winds that shook them in the West<br /> -To borrowed shapes of earth, in bright array,<br /> -Perhaps to weave a rainbow's gay festoons<br /> -Around the lonesome isle which Brooke has made<br /> -A little England full of lovely noons,<br /> -Or dot it with his country's mountain shade.<br /> -<br /> -Ah, little wanderers, when you reach that isle<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> -Tell him, with dripping dew, they have not failed,<br /> -What he loved most; for late I roamed awhile<br /> -Thro' English fields and down her rivers sailed;<br /> -And they remember him with beauty caught<br /> -From old desires of Oriental Spring<br /> -Heard in his heart with singing overwrought;<br /> -And still on Purley Common gooseboys sing.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -SONG<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -The winds are scented with woods after rain,<br /> -And a raindrop shines in the daisy's eye.<br /> -Shall we follow the swallow again, again,<br /> -Ah! little yearning thing, you and I?<br /> -<br /> -You and I to the South again,<br /> -And heart! Oh, heart, how you shall sigh,<br /> -For the kind soft wind that follows the rain,<br /> -And the raindrop shed from the daisy's eye.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE HERONS<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -As I was climbing Ardan Mor<br /> -From the shore of Sheelan lake,<br /> -I met the herons coming down<br /> -Before the water's wake.<br /> -<br /> -And they were talking in their flight<br /> -Of dreamy ways the herons go<br /> -When all the hills are withered up<br /> -Nor any waters flow.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -IN THE SHADOWS<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -The silent music of the flowers<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wind-mingled shall not fail to cheer</span><br /> -The lonely hours<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">When I no more am here.</span><br /> -<br /> -Then in some shady willow place<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Take up the book my heart has made,</span><br /> -And hide your face<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Against my name which was a shade.</span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -THE SHIPS OF ARCADY<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Thro' the faintest filigree<br /> -Over the dim waters go<br /> -Little ships of Arcady<br /> -When the morning moon is low.<br /> -<br /> -I can hear the sailors' song<br /> -From the blue edge of the sea,<br /> -Passing like the lights along<br /> -Thro' the dusky filigree.<br /> -<br /> -Then where moon and waters meet<br /> -Sail by sail they pass away,<br /> -With little friendly winds replete<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span> -Blowing from the breaking day.<br /> -<br /> -And when the little ships have flown,<br /> -Dreaming still of Arcady<br /> -I look across the waves, alone<br /> -In the misty filigree.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -AFTER<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -And in the after silences<br /> -Of flower-lit distances I'll be,<br /> -And who would find me travels far<br /> -In lands unsung of minstrelsy.<br /> -Strong winds shall cross my secret way,<br /> -And planet mountains hide my goal,<br /> -I shall go on from pass to pass,<br /> -By monstrous rocks, a lonely soul.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -TO ONE WEEPING<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Maiden, these are sacred tears,<br /> -Let me not disturb your grief!<br /> -Had I but your bosom's fears<br /> -I should weep, nor seek relief.<br /> -<br /> -My woe is a silent woe<br /> -'Til I give it measured rhyme,<br /> -When the blackbird's flute is low<br /> -In my heart at singing time.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -A DREAM DANCE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Maeve held a ball on the dún,<br /> -Cuculain and Eimer were there,<br /> -In the light of an old broken moon<br /> -I was dancing with Deirdre the fair.<br /> -<br /> -How loud was the laughter of Finn<br /> -As he blundered about thro' a reel,<br /> -Tripping up Caoilte the thin,<br /> -Or jostling the dreamy Aleel.<br /> -<br /> -And when the dance ceased for a song,<br /> -How sweet was the singing of Fand,<br /> -We could hear her far, wandering along,<br /> -My hand in that beautiful hand.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -BY FAUGHAN<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -For hills and woods and streams unsung<br /> -I pipe above a rippled cove.<br /> -And here the weaver autumn hung<br /> -Between the hills a wind she wove<br /> -From sounds the hills remember yet<br /> -Of purple days and violet.<br /> -<br /> -The hills stand up to trip the sky,<br /> -Sea-misted, and along the tops<br /> -Wing after wing goes summer by,<br /> -And many a little roadway stops<br /> -And starts, and struggles to the sea,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> -Cutting them up in filigree.<br /> -<br /> -Twixt wind and silence Faughan flows,<br /> -In music broken over rocks,<br /> -Like mingled bells the poet knows<br /> -Ring in the fields of Eastern flocks.<br /> -And here this song for you I find<br /> -Between the silence and the wind.<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -IN SEPTEMBER<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Still are the meadowlands, and still<br /> -Ripens the upland corn,<br /> -And over the brown gradual hill<br /> -The moon has dipped a horn.<br /> -<br /> -The voices of the dear unknown<br /> -With silent hearts now call,<br /> -My rose of youth is overblown<br /> -And trembles to the fall.<br /> -<br /> -My song forsakes me like the birds<br /> -That leave the rain and grey,<br /> -I hear the music of the words<br /> -My lute can never say.<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a><br /><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> -LAST SONGS<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -TO AN OLD QUILL OF LORD DUNSANY'S<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Before you leave my hands' abuses<br /> -To lie where many odd things meet you,<br /> -Neglected darkling of the Muses,<br /> -I, the last of singers, greet you.<br /> -<br /> -Snug in some white wing they found you,<br /> -On the Common bleak and muddy,<br /> -Noisy goslings gobbling round you<br /> -In the pools of sunset, ruddy.<br /> -<br /> -Have you sighed in wings untravelled<br /> -For the heights where others view the<br /> -Bluer widths of heaven, and marvelled<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> -At the utmost top of Beauty?<br /> -<br /> -No! it cannot be; the soul you<br /> -Sigh with craves nor begs of us.<br /> -From such heights a poet stole you<br /> -From a wing of Pegasus.<br /> -<br /> -You have been where gods were sleeping<br /> -In the dawn of new creations,<br /> -Ere they woke to woman's weeping<br /> -At the broken thrones of nations.<br /> -<br /> -You have seen this old world shattered<br /> -By old gods it disappointed,<br /> -Lying up in darkness, battered<br /> -By wild comets, unanointed.<br /> -<br /> -But for Beauty unmolested<br /> -Have you still the sighing olden?<br /> -I know mountains heather-crested,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span> -Waters white, and waters golden.<br /> -<br /> -There I'd keep you, in the lowly<br /> -Beauty-haunts of bird and poet,<br /> -Sailing in a wing, the holy<br /> -Silences of lakes below it.<br /> -<br /> -But I leave you by where no man<br /> -Finds you, when I too be gone<br /> -From the puddles on this common<br /> -Over the dark Rubicon.<br /> -<br /> -<i>Londonderry,</i><br /> -<i>September 18th, 1916.</i><br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -TO A SPARROW<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Because you have no fear to mingle<br /> -Wings with those of greater part,<br /> -So like me, with song I single<br /> -Your sweet impudence of heart.<br /> -<br /> -And when prouder feathers go where<br /> -Summer holds her leafy show,<br /> -You still come to us from nowhere<br /> -Like grey leaves across the snow.<br /> -<br /> -In back ways where odd and end go<br /> -To your meals you drop down sure,<br /> -Knowing every broken window<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span> -Of the hospitable poor.<br /> -<br /> -There is no bird half so harmless,<br /> -None so sweetly rude as you,<br /> -None so common and so charmless,<br /> -None of virtues nude as you.<br /> -<br /> -But for all your faults I love you,<br /> -For you linger with us still,<br /> -Though the wintry winds reprove you<br /> -And the snow is on the hill.<br /> -<br /> -<i>Londonderry,</i><br /> -<i>September 20th, 1916.</i><br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -OLD CLO'<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I was just coming in from the garden,<br /> -Or about to go fishing for eels,<br /> -And, smiling, I asked you to pardon<br /> -My boots very low at the heels.<br /> -And I thought that you never would go,<br /> -As you stood in the doorway ajar,<br /> -For my heart would keep saying, "Old Clo',<br /> -You're found out at last as you are."<br /> -<br /> -I was almost ashamed to acknowledge<br /> -That I was the quarry you sought,<br /> -For was I not bred in a college<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span> -And reared in a mansion, you thought.<br /> -And now in the latest style cut<br /> -With fortune more kinder I go<br /> -To welcome you half-ways. Ah! but<br /> -I was nearer the gods when "Old Clo'."<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -YOUTH<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -She paved the way with perfume sweet<br /> -Of flowers that moved like winds alight,<br /> -And never weary grew my feet<br /> -Wandering through the spring's delight.<br /> -<br /> -She dropped her sweet fife to her lips<br /> -And lured me with her melodies,<br /> -To where the great big wandering ships<br /> -Put out into the peaceful seas.<br /> -<br /> -But when the year grew chill and brown,<br /> -And all the wings of Summer flown,<br /> -Within the tumult of a town<br /> -She left me to grow old alone.<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -THE LITTLE CHILDREN<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Hunger points a bony finger<br /> -To the workhouse on the hill,<br /> -But the little children linger<br /> -While there's flowers to gather still<br /> -For my sunny window sill.<br /> -<br /> -In my hands I take their faces,<br /> -Smiling to my smiles they run.<br /> -Would that I could take their places<br /> -Where the murky bye-ways shun<br /> -The benedictions of the sun.<br /> -<br /> -How they laugh and sing returning<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span> -Lightly on their secret way.<br /> -While I listen in my yearning<br /> -Their laughter fills the windy day<br /> -With gladness, youth and May.<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -AUTUMN<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Now leafy winds are blowing cold,<br /> -And South by West the sun goes down,<br /> -A quiet huddles up the fold<br /> -In sheltered corners of the brown.<br /> -<br /> -Like scattered fire the wild fruit strews<br /> -The ground beneath the blowing tree,<br /> -And there the busy squirrel hews<br /> -His deep and secret granary.<br /> -<br /> -And when the night comes starry clear,<br /> -The lonely quail complains beside<br /> -The glistening waters on the mere<br /> -Where widowed Beauties yet abide.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> -<br /> -And I, too, make my own complaint<br /> -Upon a reed I plucked in June,<br /> -And love to hear it echoed faint<br /> -Upon another heart in tune.<br /> -<br /> -<i>Londonderry,</i><br /> -<i>September 29th, 1916.</i><br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -IRELAND<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I called you by sweet names by wood and linn,<br /> -You answered not because my voice was new,<br /> -And you were listening for the hounds of Finn<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">And the long hosts of Lugh.</span><br /> -<br /> -And so, I came unto a windy height<br /> -And cried my sorrow, but you heard no wind,<br /> -For you were listening to small ships in flight,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">And the wail on hills behind.</span><br /> -<br /> -And then I left you, wandering the war<br /> -Armed with will, from distant goal to goal,<br /> -To find you at the last free as of yore,<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 2em;"> -Or die to save your soul.</span><br /> -<br /> -And then you called to us from far and near<br /> -To bring your crown from out the deeps of time,<br /> -It is my grief your voice I couldn't hear<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">In such a distant clime.</span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -LADY FAIR<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Lady fair, have we not met<br /> -In our lives elsewhere?<br /> -Darkling in my mind to-night<br /> -Faint fair faces dare<br /> -Memory's old unfaithfulness<br /> -To what was true and fair.<br /> -Long of memory is Regret,<br /> -But what Regret has taken flight<br /> -Through my memory's silences?<br /> -Lo! I turn it to the light.<br /> -'Twas but a pleasure in distress,<br /> -Too faint and far off for redress.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span> -But some light glancing in your hair<br /> -And in the liquid of your eyes<br /> -Seem to murmur old good-byes<br /> -In our lives elsewhere.<br /> -Have we not met, Lady fair?<br /> -<br /> -<i>Londonderry,</i><br /> -<i>October 27th, 1916.</i><br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -AT A POET'S GRAVE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -When I leave down this pipe my friend<br /> -And sleep with flowers I loved, apart,<br /> -My songs shall rise in wilding things<br /> -Whose roots are in my heart.<br /> -<br /> -And here where that sweet poet sleeps<br /> -I hear the songs he left unsung,<br /> -When winds are fluttering the flowers<br /> -And summer-bells are rung.<br /> -<br /> -<i>November, 1916.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -AFTER COURT MARTIAL<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -My mind is not my mind, therefore<br /> -I take no heed of what men say,<br /> -I lived ten thousand years before<br /> -God cursed the town of Nineveh.<br /> -<br /> -The Present is a dream I see<br /> -Of horror and loud sufferings,<br /> -At dawn a bird will waken me<br /> -Unto my place among the kings.<br /> -<br /> -And though men called me a vile name,<br /> -And all my dream companions gone,<br /> -'Tis I the soldier bears the shame.<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Not I the king of Babylon.</span><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -A MOTHER'S SONG<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Little ships of whitest pearl<br /> -With sailors who were ancient kings,<br /> -Come over the sea when my little girl<br /> -Sings.<br /> -<br /> -And if my little girl should weep,<br /> -Little ships with torn sails<br /> -Go headlong down among the deep<br /> -Whales.<br /> -<br /> -<i>November, 1916.</i><br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -AT CURRABWEE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Every night at Currabwee<br /> -Little men with leather hats<br /> -Mend the boots of Faery<br /> -From the tough wings of the bats.<br /> -So my mother told to me,<br /> -And she is wise you will agree.<br /> -<br /> -Louder than a cricket's wing<br /> -All night long their hammer's glee<br /> -Times the merry songs they sing<br /> -Of Ireland glorious and free.<br /> -So I heard Joseph Plunkett say,<br /> -You know he heard them but last May.<br /> -<br /> -And when the night is very cold<br /> -They warm their hands against the light<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span> -Of stars that make the waters gold<br /> -Where they are labouring all the night.<br /> -So Pearse said, and he knew the truth,<br /> -Among the stars he spent his youth.<br /> -<br /> -And I, myself, have often heard<br /> -Their singing as the stars went by,<br /> -For am I not of those who reared<br /> -The banner of old Ireland high,<br /> -From Dublin town to Turkey's shores,<br /> -And where the Vardar loudly roars?<br /> -<br /> -<i>December, 1916.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -SONG-TIME IS OVER<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I will come no more awhile,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">O Song-time is over.</span><br /> -A fire is burning in my heart,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">I was ever a rover.</span><br /> -<br /> -You will hear me no more awhile,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The birds are dumb,</span><br /> -And a voice in the distance calls<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">"Come," and "Come,"</span><br /> -<br /> -<i>December 13th, 1916.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -UNA BAWN<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Una Bawn, the days are long,<br /> -And the seas I cross are wide,<br /> -I must go when Ireland needs,<br /> -And you must bide.<br /> -<br /> -And should I not return to you<br /> -When the sails are on the tide,<br /> -'Tis you will find the days so long,<br /> -Una Bawn, and I must bide.<br /> -<br /> -<i>December 13th, 1916.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -SPRING LOVE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I saw her coming through the flowery grass,<br /> -Round her swift ankles butterfly and bee<br /> -Blent loud and silent wings; I saw her pass<br /> -Where foam-bows shivered on the sunny sea.<br /> -<br /> -Then came the swallow crowding up the dawn,<br /> -And cuckoo-echoes filled the dewy South.<br /> -I left my love upon the hill, alone,<br /> -My last kiss burning on her lovely mouth.<br /> -<br /> -B.E.F.—<i>December 26th, 1916.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -SOLILOQUY<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -When I was young I had a care<br /> -Lest I should cheat me of my share<br /> -Of that which makes it sweet to strive<br /> -For life, and dying still survive,<br /> -A name in sunshine written higher<br /> -Than lark or poet dare aspire.<br /> -<br /> -But I grew weary doing well,<br /> -Besides, 'twas sweeter in that hell,<br /> -Down with the loud banditti people<br /> -Who robbed the orchards, climbed the steeple<br /> -For jackdaws' eggs and made the cock<br /> -Crow ere 'twas daylight on the clock.<br /> -I was so very bad the neighbours<br /> -Spoke of me at their daily labours.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> -<br /> -And now I'm drinking wine in France,<br /> -The helpless child of circumstance.<br /> -To-morrow will be loud with war,<br /> -How will I be accounted for?<br /> -<br /> -It is too late now to retrieve<br /> -A fallen dream, too late to grieve<br /> -A name unmade, but not too late<br /> -To thank the gods for what is great;<br /> -A keen-edged sword, a soldier's heart,<br /> -Is greater than a poet's art.<br /> -And greater than a poet's fame<br /> -A little grave that has no name.<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -DAWN<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Quiet miles of golden sky,<br /> -And in my heart a sudden flower.<br /> -I want to clap my hands and cry<br /> -For Beauty in her secret bower.<br /> -<br /> -Quiet golden miles of dawn—Smiling<br /> -all the East along;<br /> -And in my heart nigh fully blown<br /> -A little rose-bud of a song.<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -CEOL SIDHE<a name="FNanchor_1_6" id="FNanchor_1_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_6" class="fnanchor">[1]</a><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -When May is here, and every morn<br /> -Is dappled with pied bells,<br /> -And dewdrops glance along the thorn<br /> -And wings flash in the dells,<br /> -I take my pipe and play a tune<br /> -Of dreams, a whispered melody,<br /> -For feet that dance beneath the moon<br /> -In fairy jollity.<br /> -<br /> -And when the pastoral hills are grey<br /> -And the dim stars are spread,<br /> -A scamper fills the grass like play<br /> -Of feet where fairies tread.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span> -And many a little whispering thing<br /> -Is calling to the Shee.<br /> -The dewy bells of evening ring,<br /> -And all is melody.<br /> -<br /> -<i>France,</i><br /> -<i>December 29th, 1916.</i><br /> -</p> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p class="p2"><a name="Footnote_1_6" id="Footnote_1_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_6"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Fairy music.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span></p></div> - - - - -<p class="p6" style="margin-left: 10%;" > -THE RUSHES<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -The rushes nod by the river<br /> -As the winds on the loud waves go,<br /> -And the things they nod of are many,<br /> -For it's many the secret they know.<br /> -<br /> -And I think they are wise as the fairies<br /> -Who lived ere the hills were high,<br /> -They nod so grave by the river<br /> -To everyone passing by.<br /> -<br /> -If they would tell me their secrets<br /> -I would go by a hidden way,<br /> -To the rath when the moon retiring<br /> -Dips dim horns into the gray.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span> -<br /> -And a fairy-girl out of Leinster<br /> -In a long dance I should meet,<br /> -My heart to her heart beating,<br /> -My feet in rhyme with her feet.<br /> -<br /> -<i>France,</i><br /> -<i>January 6th, 1917.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -THE DEAD KINGS<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -All the dead kings came to me<br /> -At Rosnaree, where I was dreaming.<br /> -A few stars glimmered through the morn,<br /> -And down the thorn the dews were streaming.<br /> -<br /> -And every dead king had a story<br /> -Of ancient glory, sweetly told.<br /> -It was too early for the lark,<br /> -But the starry dark had tints of gold.<br /> -<br /> -I listened to the sorrows three<br /> -Of that Eirë passed into song.<br /> -A cock crowed near a hazel croft,<br /> -And up aloft dim larks winged strong.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span> -<br /> -And I, too, told the kings a story<br /> -Of later glory, her fourth sorrow:<br /> -There was a sound like moving shields<br /> -In high green fields and the lowland furrow.<br /> -<br /> -And one said: "We who yet are kings<br /> -Have heard these things lamenting inly."<br /> -Sweet music flowed from many a bill<br /> -And on the hill the morn stood queenly.<br /> -<br /> -And one said: "Over is the singing,<br /> -And bell bough ringing, whence we come;<br /> -With heavy hearts we'll tread the shadows,<br /> -In honey meadows birds are dumb."<br /> -<br /> -And one said: "Since the poets perished<br /> -And all they cherished in the way,<br /> -Their thoughts unsung, like petal showers<br /> -Inflame the hours of blue and gray."<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span> -<br /> -And one said: "A loud tramp of men<br /> -We'll hear again at Rosnaree."<br /> -A bomb burst near me where I lay.<br /> -I woke, 'twas day in Picardy.<br /> -<br /> -<i>France,</i><br /> -<i>January 7th, 1917.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -IN FRANCE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -The silence of maternal hills<br /> -Is round me in my evening dreams;<br /> -And round me music-making bills<br /> -And mingling waves of pastoral streams.<br /> -<br /> -Whatever way I turn I find<br /> -The path is old unto me still.<br /> -The hills of home are in my mind,<br /> -And there I wander as I will.<br /> -<br /> -<i>February 3rd, 1917.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[Pg 270]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -HAD I A GOLDEN POUND<br /> -<br /> -(AFTER THE IRISH)<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Had I a golden pound to spend,<br /> -My love should mend and sew no more.<br /> -And I would buy her a little quern,<br /> -Easy to turn on the kitchen floor.<br /> -<br /> -And for her windows curtains white,<br /> -With birds in flight and flowers in bloom,<br /> -To face with pride the road to town,<br /> -And mellow down her sunlit room.<br /> -<br /> -And with the silver change we'd prove<br /> -The truth of Love to life's own end,<br /> -With hearts the years could but embolden,<br /> -Had I a golden pound to spend.<br /> -<br /> -<i>February 5th, 1917.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[Pg 271]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -FAIRIES<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Maiden-poet, come with me<br /> -To the heaped up cairn of Maeve,<br /> -And there we'll dance a fairy dance<br /> -Upon a fairy's grave.<br /> -<br /> -In and out among the trees,<br /> -Filling all the night with sound,<br /> -The morning, strung upon her star,<br /> -Shall chase us round and round.<br /> -<br /> -What are we but fairies too,<br /> -Living but in dreams alone,<br /> -Or, at the most, but children still,<br /> -Innocent and overgrown?<br /> -<br /> -<i>February 6th,</i> 1917.<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[Pg 272]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -IN A CAFÉ<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Kiss the maid and pass her round,<br /> -Lips like hers were made for many.<br /> -Our loves are far from us to-night,<br /> -But these red lips are sweet as any.<br /> -<br /> -Let no empty glass be seen<br /> -Aloof from our good table's sparkle,<br /> -At the acme of our cheer<br /> -Here are francs to keep the circle.<br /> -<br /> -They are far who miss us most—Sip<br /> -and kiss—how well we love them,<br /> -Battling through the world to keep<br /> -Their hearts at peace, their God above them.<br /> -<br /> -<i>February 11th, 1917.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[Pg 273]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -SPRING<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Once more the lark with song and speed<br /> -Cleaves through the dawn, his hurried bars<br /> -Fall, like the flute of Ganymede<br /> -Twirling and whistling from the stars.<br /> -<br /> -The primrose and the daffodil<br /> -Surprise the valleys, and wild thyme<br /> -Is sweet on every little hill,<br /> -When lambs come down at folding time.<br /> -<br /> -In every wild place now is heard<br /> -The magpie's noisy house, and through<br /> -The mingled tunes of many a bird<br /> -The ruffled wood-dove's gentle coo.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[Pg 274]</a></span> -<br /> -Sweet by the river's noisy brink<br /> -The water-lily bursts her crown,<br /> -The kingfisher comes down to drink<br /> -Like rainbow jewels falling down.<br /> -<br /> -And when the blue and grey entwine<br /> -The daisy shuts her golden eye,<br /> -And peaces-wraps all those hills of mine<br /> -Safe in my dearest memory.<br /> -<br /> -<i>France,</i><br /> -<i>March 8th, 1917.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[Pg 275]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -PAN<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -He knows the safe ways and unsafe<br /> -And he will lead the lambs to fold,<br /> -Gathering them with his merry pipe,<br /> -The gentle and the overbold.<br /> -<br /> -He counts them over one by one,<br /> -And leads them back by cliff and steep,<br /> -To grassy hills where dawn is wide,<br /> -And they may run and skip and leap.<br /> -<br /> -And just because he loves the lambs<br /> -He settles them for rest at noon,<br /> -And plays them on his oaten pipe<br /> -The very wonder of a tune.<br /> -<br /> -<i>France,</i><br /> -<i>March 11th, 1917.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[Pg 276]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -WITH FLOWERS<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -These have more language than my song,<br /> -Take them and let them speak for me.<br /> -I whispered them a secret thing<br /> -Down the green lanes of Allary.<br /> -<br /> -You shall remember quiet ways<br /> -Watching them fade, and quiet eyes,<br /> -And two hearts given up to love,<br /> -A foolish and an overwise.<br /> -<br /> -<i>France,</i><br /> -<i>April, 1917.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[Pg 277]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -THE FIND<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I took a reed and blew a tune,<br /> -And sweet it was and very clear<br /> -To be about a little thing<br /> -That only few hold dear.<br /> -<br /> -Three times the cuckoo named himself,<br /> -But nothing heard him on the hill,<br /> -Where I was piping like an elf<br /> -The air was very still.<br /> -<br /> -'Twas all about a little thing<br /> -I made a mystery of sound,<br /> -I found it in a fairy ring<br /> -Upon a fairy mound.<br /> -<br /> -<i>June 2nd, 1917.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[Pg 278]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -A FAIRY HUNT<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Who would hear the fairy horn<br /> -Calling all the hounds of Finn<br /> -Must be in a lark's nest born<br /> -When the moon is very thin.<br /> -<br /> -I who have the gift can hear<br /> -Hounds and horn and tally ho,<br /> -And the tongue of Bran as clear<br /> -As Christmas bells across the snow.<br /> -<br /> -And beside my secret place<br /> -Hurries by the fairy fox,<br /> -With the moonrise on his face,<br /> -Up and down the mossy rocks.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[Pg 279]</a></span> -<br /> -Then the music of a horn<br /> -And the flash of scarlet men,<br /> -Thick as poppies in the corn<br /> -All across the dusky glen.<br /> -<br /> -Oh! the mad delight of chase!<br /> -Oh! the shouting and the cheer!<br /> -Many an owl doth leave his place<br /> -In the dusty tree to hear.<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[Pg 280]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -TO ONE WHO COMES NOW AND THEN<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -When you come in, it seems a brighter fire<br /> -Crackles upon the hearth invitingly,<br /> -The household routine which was wont to tire<br /> -Grows full of novelty.<br /> -<br /> -You sit upon our home-upholstered chair<br /> -And talk of matters wonderful and strange,<br /> -Of books, and travel, customs old which dare<br /> -The gods of Time and Change.<br /> -<br /> -Till we with inner word our care refute<br /> -Laughing that this our bosoms yet assails,<br /> -While there are maidens dancing to a flute<br /> -In Andalusian vales.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[Pg 281]</a></span> -<br /> -And sometimes from my shelf of poems you take<br /> -And secret meanings to our hearts disclose,<br /> -As when the winds of June the mid bush shake<br /> -We see the hidden rose.<br /> -<br /> -And when the shadows muster, and each tree<br /> -A moment flutters, full of shutting wings,<br /> -You take the fiddle and mysteriously<br /> -Wake wonders on the strings.<br /> -<br /> -And in my garden, grey with misty flowers,<br /> -Low echoes fainter than a beetle's horn<br /> -Fill all the corners with it, like sweet showers<br /> -Of bells, in the owl's morn.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[Pg 282]</a></span> -<br /> -Come often, friend, with welcome and surprise<br /> -We'll greet you from the sea or from the town;<br /> -Come when you like and from whatever skies<br /> -Above you smile or frown.<br /> -<br /> -<i>Belgium,</i><br /> -<i>July 22nd, 1917</i>.<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[Pg 283]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -THE SYLPH<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -I saw you and I named a flower<br /> -That lights with blue a woodland space,<br /> -I named a bird of the red hour<br /> -And a hidden fairy place.<br /> -<br /> -And then I saw you not, and knew<br /> -Dead leaves were whirling down the mist,<br /> -And something lost was crying through<br /> -An evening of amethyst.<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[Pg 284]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -HOME<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -A burst of sudden wings at dawn,<br /> -Faint voices in a dreamy noon,<br /> -Evenings of mist and murmurings,<br /> -And nights with rainbows of the moon.<br /> -<br /> -And through these things a wood-way dim,<br /> -And waters dim, and slow sheep seen<br /> -On uphill paths that wind away<br /> -Through summer sounds and harvest green.<br /> -<br /> -This is a song a robin sang<br /> -This morning on a broken tree,<br /> -It was about the little fields<br /> -That call across the world to me.<br /> -<br /> -<i>Belgium,</i><br /> -<i>July, 1917.</i><br /> -<br /> -<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[Pg 285]</a></span> -<br /> -<br /> -THE LANAWN SHEE<br /> -<br /> -<br /> -Powdered and perfumed the full bee<br /> -Winged heavily across the clover,<br /> -And where the hills were dim with dew,<br /> -Purple and blue the west leaned over.<br /> -<br /> -A willow spray dipped in the stream,<br /> -Moving a gleam of silver ringing,<br /> -And by a finny creek a maid<br /> -Filled all the shade with softest singing.<br /> -<br /> -Listening, my heart and soul at strife,<br /> -On the edge of life I seemed to hover,<br /> -For I knew my love had come at last,<br /> -That my joy was past and my gladness over.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[Pg 286]</a></span> -<br /> -I tiptoed gently tip and stooped<br /> -Above her looped and shining tresses,<br /> -And asked her of her kin and name,<br /> -And why she came from fairy places.<br /> -<br /> -She told me of a sunny coast<br /> -Beyond the most adventurous sailor,<br /> -Where she had spent a thousand years<br /> -Out of the fears that now assail her.<br /> -<br /> -And there, she told me, honey drops<br /> -Out of the tops of ash and willow,<br /> -And in the mellow shadow Sleep<br /> -Doth sweetly keep her poppy pillow.<br /> -<br /> -Nor Autumn with her brown line marks<br /> -The time of larks, the length of roses,<br /> -But song-time there is over never<br /> -Nor flower-time ever, ever closes.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[Pg 287]</a></span> -<br /> -And wildly through uncurling ferns<br /> -Fast water turns down valleys singing,<br /> -Filling with scented winds the dales,<br /> -Setting the bells of sleep a-ringing.<br /> -<br /> -And when the thin moon lowly sinks,<br /> -Through cloudy chinks a silver glory<br /> -Lingers upon the left of night<br /> -Till dawn delights the meadows hoary.<br /> -<br /> -And by the lakes the skies are white,<br /> -(Oh, the delight!) when swans are coming,<br /> -Among the flowers sweet joy-bells peal,<br /> -And quick bees wheel in drowsy humming.<br /> -<br /> -The squirrel leaves her dusty house<br /> -And in the boughs makes fearless gambol,<br /> -And, falling down in fire-drops, red,<br /> -The fruit is shed from every bramble.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[Pg 288]</a></span> -<br /> -Then, gathered all about the trees<br /> -Glad galaxies of youth are dancing,<br /> -Treading the perfume of the flowers,<br /> -Filling the hours with mazy glancing.<br /> -<br /> -And when the dance is done, the trees<br /> -Are left to Peace and the brown woodpecker,<br /> -And on the western slopes of sky<br /> -The day's blue eye begins to flicker.<br /> -<br /> -But at the sighing of the leaves,<br /> -When all earth grieves for lights departed<br /> -An ancient and a sad desire<br /> -Steals in to tire the human-hearted.<br /> -<br /> -No fairy aid can save them now<br /> -Nor turn their prow upon the ocean,<br /> -The hundred years that missed each heart<br /> -Above them start their wheels in motion.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[Pg 289]</a></span> -<br /> -And so our loves are lost, she sighed,<br /> -And far and wide we seek new treasure,<br /> -For who on Time or Timeless hills<br /> -Can live the ills of loveless leisure?<br /> -<br /> -("Fairer than Usna's youngest son,<br /> -O, my poor one, what flower-bed holds you?<br /> -Or, wrecked upon the shores of home,<br /> -What wave of foam with white enfolds you?<br /> -<br /> -"You rode with kings on hills of green,<br /> -And lovely queens have served you banquet,<br /> -Sweet wine from berries bruised they brought<br /> -And shyly sought the lips which drank it.<br /> -<br /> -"But in your dim grave of the sea<br /> -There shall not be a friend to love you.<br /> -And ever heedless of your loss<br /> -The earth ships cross the storms above you.<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[Pg 290]</a></span> -<br /> -"And still the chase goes on, and still<br /> -The wine shall spill, and vacant places<br />** -Be given over to the new<br /> -As love untrue keeps changing faces.<br /> -<br /> -"And I must wander with my song<br /> -Far from the young till Love returning,<br /> -Brings me the beautiful reward<br /> -Of some heart stirred by my long yearning.")<br /> -<br /> -Friend, have you heard a bird lament<br /> -When sleet is sent for April weather?<br /> -As beautiful she told her grief,<br /> -As down through leaf and flower I led her.<br /> -<br /> -And friend, could I remain unstirred<br /> -Without a word for such a sorrow?<br /> -Say, can the lark forget the cloud<br /> -When poppies shroud the seeded furrow?<br /> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[Pg 291]</a></span> -<br /> -Like a poor widow whose late grief<br /> -Seeks for relief in lonely byeways,<br /> -The moon, companionless and dim,<br /> -Took her dull rim through starless highways.<br /> -<br /> -I was too weak with dreams to feel<br /> -Enchantment steal with guilt upon me,<br /> -She slipped, a flower upon the wind,<br /> -And laughed to find how she had won me.<br /> -<br /> -From hill to hill, from land to land,<br /> -Her lovely hand is beckoning for me,<br /> -I follow on through dangerous zones,<br /> -Cross dead men's bones and oceans stormy.<br /> -<br /> -Some day I know she'll wait at last<br /> -And lock me fast in white embraces,<br /> -And down mysterious ways of love<br /> -We two shall move to fairy places.<br /> -<br /> -<i>Belgium,</i><br /> -<i>July, 1917.</i><br /> -</p> - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the 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