Part 2
Nor the continuous eastward roll of earth, Half, in the energy of day aware; Half, where the sweeping shadow curves its girth, Within night’s darkened temple cowled in prayer.
No deep misgivings, no mysterious faith; Your very god was passed from hand to hand; You had no inkling of the nobler breath Blown on the spark you could not understand.
VII
“The little spark within the heart of man. How should you know the desperate clutch of fingers That feel the moment slipping, feel the dear Infrequent moment slipping as it lingers,
The flaming hour ironic in its fleetness, The rush of vision swift beyond belief? Near, as the dead to the incredulous living; So dead, the heart is rigid with its grief.
What would you offer me as compensation After your sloth had blanketed my fire? Your deepest peace, satiety Lethean; Your aim, diversion; and your spur, desire.
Tragic, or merry, be the body’s passion, Ordained or gay; not, not the sordid mean! Your soul’s a skinny waif, that was not driven To sin, but sought small solaces unclean.
You struck no fire from flint; you neither knew Fasting nor feasting; vigour, nor a kiss; The silk pavilioned bed of Aphrodite, Or woodland hardihood of Artemis.
VIII
“Ashamed of tolerance, but more ashamed Of hot intolerance; who hold the snare Less perilous when fraudulently named; Forgetting folly, while remembering care; Who shun the sinner with averted eyes; Mistrust the impulse, danger in its breath; Who think truth wholly truth, lies wholly lies; Who never lived, but duly wept at death;
Who could not gaily stake the cherished whole Upon the spinning coin’s fantastic turn; Who count the moneyed value of your soul, And give, but, giving, claim the just return.
IX
“I’ll dip contempt’s broad ladle for a measure Lest I accept reprieve in such a guise, Such cheap attainment where I most despise, Or lull disquiet by such sham of pleasure.
Love, amongst counterfeits and marsh-light gleams Already arch-impostor, doubly aped By lust, to parody (most rarely shaped), The consummation of our difficult dreams!”
HOME
NIGHT. _To H. G. N._
MOONLIGHT through lattice throws a chequered square; Night! and I wake in my low-ceilinged room To lovely silence deep with harmony; Sweet are the flutes of night-time, sweet the spell Lies between day and day. This wise old night, That, unreproachful, gives the pause to strife! The murmurous diapason of the dark Within the house made quick and intimate By tiny noise--a bat? a mouse? a moth Bruising against the ceiling? or a bird Nested beneath the eaves? night, grave and huge Outside with swell of sighing through the boughs, Whispering far over unscythèd meadows, Dying in dim cool cloisters of the woods.
I have been absent. I have found unchanged The oaks, the slope and order of the fields; I knew the wealden fragrance, and that old Dear stubborn enemy of mine, the clay. Nothing to mark the difference of year But young wheat springing where I left the roots, And last year’s pasture browned to this year’s plough; Last year the crop was niggard on the orchard, But blossom now foretells the weighted branches, And the great stack, that like a galleon Rode beneath furled tarpaulins last July, Showed its bare brushwood as I passed to-day. Where the sun rises, that I know of old; Knowledge precedes me round the turn of the lane, And I could take you where the orchids grow Friendly with cowslips; where the bluebell pulls Smooth from its bulb, bleached where it grew concealed, Hidden from light; the tiny brook is eager, Quick with spring rains, bright April rains, and fills The pool where drowsy cattle slouch to drink.
Familiar! oh, familiar! native speech Comes not more readily than that dear sense Of bend and depth of country. This is Kent, Unflaunting England, where the steaming mould, Not plaintive, not regretful, lies content That leaves should spring from sacrifice of leaves.
My Saxon weald! my cool and candid weald! Dear God! the heart, the very heart of me That plays and strays, a truant in strange lands, Always returns and finds its inward peace, Its swing of truth, its measure of restraint, Here among meadows, orchards, lanes, and shaws. Take me then close, O branches, take me close; Whisper me all the secrets of the sap, You branches fragile, tentative, that stretch Your moonlit blossom to my open window, Messengers of the gentle weald, encroaching So shyly on the shelter of the house; Cradle me, hammock me amongst you; let Night’s quietude so drench my sleepy spirit That morning shall not rob me of that calm. Your buds against my pulses; so I lie Wakeful as though in tree-tops, and the sap Creeps through my blood, up from the scented earth.
... The birds are restless underneath the eaves, Down in the byre the uneasy cattle stir, And through the fret of branches grows the dawn.
A SAXON SONG
Tools with the comely names, Mattock and scythe and spade, Couth and bitter as flames, Clean, and bowed in the blade,-- A man and his tools make a man and his trade.
Breadth of the English shires, Hummock and kame and mead, Tang of the reeking byres, Land of the English breed,-- A man and his land make a man and his creed.
Leisurely flocks and herds, Cool-eyed cattle that come Mildly to wonted words, Swine that in orchards roam,-- A man and his beasts make a man and his home.
Children sturdy and flaxen Shouting in brotherly strife, Like the land they are Saxon, Sons of a man and his wife,-- For a man and his loves make a man and his life.
FROM A DIARY, JANUARY 1918
JOY have I had of life this vigorous day Since sunrise when I took the wealden way, And my fair country as I rapid strode Lay round the turn of the familiar road In mists diaphanous as seas in foam.
And all the orchards cried me welcome home.
I drove the spade that turned the heavy loam, Bending the winter to the needs of spring, The soft air winnowing The thistledown that blew along the hedge. A little moorhen rippled in the sedge; A distant sheep-dog barked; the day was still, For summer’s ghost in winter lay upon the hill. I worked in peace; an aeroplane above Crooned through the heaven coloured like a dove.
Within the house I lit a fire And coaxed the friendly kettle on to boil. My boots were heavy with the wealden soil, My hunger eager from the glow of toil. Fresh bread had I; brown eggs; a little meat; Clear water, and an apple sweet. Freedom I drank for my delirious wine, And Shelley gave me company divine. What more could heart desire?
And when the orange of the sunset burned, I laid aside my tools and townward turned, Seeing across the uplands of the Weald The ploughteams straining on the half-brown field. I sang aloud; my limbs were rich with health, As brooding winter rich with summer’s wealth.
BEECHWOODS AT KNOLE
HOW do I love you, beech trees, in the autumn, Your stone-grey columns a cathedral nave Processional above the earth’s brown glory!
I was a child, and loved the knurly tangle Of roots that coiled above a scarp like serpents, Where I might hide my treasure with the squirrels.
I was a child, and splashed my way in laughter Through drifts of leaves, where underfoot the beechnuts Split with crisp crackle to my great rejoicing.
Red are the wooded slopes below Shock Tavern, Red is the bracken on the sandy Furze-field, Red are the herds of deer by Bo-Pit Meadows,
The tawny deer that nightly through the beechwoods Roar out their challenge, carrying their antlers Proudly beneath the antlered moonlit branches.
I was a child, and heard the red deer’s challenge Prowling and baying underneath my window, Never a cry so haughty or so mournful.
LEOPARDS AT KNOLE
LEOPARDS on the gable-ends, Leopards on the painted stair, Stiff the blazoned shield they bear, Or and gules, a bend of vair, Leopards on the gable-ends, Leopards everywhere.
Guard and vigil in the night While the ancient house is sleeping They three hundred years are keeping, Nightly from their stations leaping, Shadows black in moonlight bright, Roof to gable creeping.
Rigid when the day returns, Up aloft in sun or rain Leopards at their posts again Watch the shifting pageant’s train; And their jewelled colour burns In the window-pane.
Often on the painted stair, As I passed abstractedly, Velvet footsteps, two and three, Padded gravely after me. --There was nothing, nothing there, Nothing there to see.
APRIL
WHEN evening sun had beat the rain And skies were washed so primrose-clean, We swung the orchard gate again To let the cattle down the lane;
To let with ripened udders pass The heavy milch-cows one by one, And underfoot the blossom was Like scattered snow upon the grass.
The steep wet road was like a shield After the rain; and, slouching on, We idly grumbled at the yield Of apple-orchards in the Weald.
ARCADY IN ENGLAND
I met some children in a wood, A happy and tumultuous rout That came with many a wanton shout And darted hither and about (As in a stream the fickle trout), To ease their pagan lustihood.
And in their midst they led along A goat with wreaths about his neck That they had taken pains to deck To join the bacchanalian throng.
And one of them was garlanded With strands of wild convolvulus About his ringlets riotous, And carried rowan-berries red.
And one, the eldest of the band, Whose life was seven summers glad, Was all in flowered muslin clad, And naked dancing feet she had To lead the sylvan saraband. With hazel skin and coral bead A gipsy dryad of the mead She seemed; she led the gay stampede With fruited branches in her hand.
For all were bearing autumn fruit; Some, apples on the loaded bough, And pears that on the orchard’s brow With damask-plums are hanging now; And much they had of woodland loot, Of berries black and berries blue, Of fircones, and of medlars too; And one, who bore no plunder, blew On reeds like an Arcadian flute.
They passed, and still I stood knee-deep In thymy grass to watch their train. They wound along the wooded lane And crossed a streamlet with a leap, And as I saw them once again They passed a shepherd and his sheep.
And you might think, I made this song For joy of song as I strode along One day between the Kentish shaws, Slashing at scarlet hips and haws. But thinking so, you nothing know Of children taken unawares, Of tinkers’ tents among the gorse, The poor lean goat, the hobbled horse, And painted vans for country fairs.
TESTAMENT
WHEN I am dead, let not my limbs be given To rot amongst the dead I never knew, But cast my ashes wide under wide heaven, Or to my garden let me still be true,
And, like the ashes I was wont to save Preciously from the hearth beneath my fire, Lighten the soil with mine. Not, not the grave! I loved the soil I fought, and this is my desire.
SONNET
THIS little space which scented box encloses Is blue with lupins and is sweet with thyme. My garden all is overblown with roses, My spirit all is overblown with rhyme, And like a drunken honeybee I waver From house to garden and again to house, And, undetermined which delight to favour, On verse and rose alternately carouse.
Adam, were you, in your primeval plenty, A poet and a gardener in one? Did you with easy songs the blossoms sheave, In Eden where the blooms by ten and twenty Sprang up beneath the magic of the sun, To deck the brows of your capricious Eve?
FULL MOON
SHE was wearing the coral taffeta trousers Someone had brought her from Ispahan, And the little gold coat with pomegranate blossoms, And the coral-hafted feather fan; But she ran down a Kentish lane in the moonlight, And skipped in the pool of the moon as she ran.
She cared not a rap for all the big planets, For Betelgeuse or Aldebaran, And all the big planets cared nothing for her, That small impertinent charlatan; But she climbed on a Kentish stile in the moonlight, And laughed at the sky through the sticks of her fan.
AD ASTRA
AD ASTRA
I
CONQUEROR! what have you seen in the heavens? Star-dust is in your hair. Say, have you woken the sleeping thunder And taken it unaware? Come on the storm as a wild beast crouching, And mocked at it in its lair?
Ridden the wind as a riotous charger, Your hand in his mane entwined, As a new unbroken Pegasus, That a master had divined? A boast for a man to bring down from heaven, “I have bridled the wild East wind!”
Gazed in the mirror of unshed dew-ponds, Bathed in the rivers of rain? Caught at the meteor’s sparks in passing, And flung them to earth for grain? Dropped in the wake of the scattered handfuls To the morning earth again?
How have you raced with the car of Apollo, A trial of strength indeed, He in his golden chariot standing And lashing his golden steed, You with your glimmering wings of silver And unconquerable speed?
What of the sirens that dwell in the heavens In a palace of cloud and air? As a lover of nymphs inviolate, Of sirens with rainbow hair, Have you dwelt like a new Odysseus With the sirens of the air?
Speak! have you guarded Diana’s uprising From a couch of mist and sheen? Speak! have you watched Diana’s disrobing After her reign as queen? Speak! for your eyes are eloquent With the mysteries they have seen.
And your feet, which have trod in unlaboured fields, Are with wingèd sandals shod, And the hawthorn stick at the touch of your hand Has turned to a wingèd rod, And your eyes and lips are burnished gold With the kiss of the bright sun-god.
II
SON of the morning, son of the daybreak, Son of the stars and sky, Son of the clean untrodden places, Son of the air am I.
I am the sailor of the heavens, And the Viking of the gale, The cloud-built galleon is my vessel, And the bellying cloud my sail.
I am the reaper of the heavens, With the sickle moon in my hand. I am the minstrel of the heavens, With the birds that rise from land.
I am the hunter of the heavens, With the night-hounds for my pack, Lord of unbroken solitudes That I am the first to track.
Son of the tempest, son of the moonlight, Son of the silver sky, Son of the clean untrodden places, Son of the air am I.
FROM “A MASQUE OF YOUTH” A MOCK-HEROIC POEM
FROM “A MASQUE OF YOUTH”
[_The scene is laid in a circular space of grass in a garden, enclosed by a stone balustrade broken at intervals by statues of sylvan deities. A background of cypresses. An assembly of dim figures._
_Right, the_ MUSE OF TRAGEDY _upon a raised throne. Centre, a great convoluted shell, in which a naked youth lies sleeping_.]
MELPOMENE. (_She is crowned with vine-leaves, shod with the cothurnus, and carries in her hand a tragic mask_.)
[Sidenote: _She addresses the assembly._]
O population beautiful and strange Haunting the curtained boundaries of youth, Children among immortals, swift of range, Light-footed, gay of glance, evasive, shy, Truth robed in fantasy, truth in untruth That all men apprehend and most pass by, --You that come crowding and inquisitive With covert laugh, quick hands, and eyes that live, Wingèd and whispering and fugitive, Wide generosities and proud beliefs, Flamboyant hopes and lovely rainbow griefs, Rare reverence, lusty audacity, Faith with bound eyes, arrogant certainty, Slim fancy with her finger to her lips, Bright-haired adventure, mother of all ships, Pale wanton nymphs, quarry of men and gods,
[Sidenote: _She addresses the assembly._]
AND dappled centaurs from the dappled woods,-- Draw near.--Here lies, that all may see him well, A naked Youth within a conchèd shell, Asleep, in nudity most beautiful. His arm is flung beneath his lovely head, He sleeps as sound as in his mortal bed; Yet him the dolphins hither bore And all the waters founted with their spouting, The river-horses galloped by the shore, And little wine-drunk sons of love ran shouting, But he lies victim to the poppy-bell.
[Sidenote: _She tells the occasion of the masque._]
NOW set I forth in briefest argument The causes of our present tournament, Saying how tender Grief and laughing Joy Strove for possession of the mortal boy, --As once upon the traveller of old The sun shone warmly and the wind blew cold,-- And ages long endured their pleasant strife Renewed with each young adolescent life, And neither triumphed, for in early years Youth freely gave to Grief his secret tears (Grief for grief’s sake, which youth to Youth endears), And sorrows of his melancholy heart, And Joy, her garlands drooping, stood apart; Till Love drew near to play his part.
[Sidenote: _She tells of Youth in Love._]
AH! then forgotten were the mournful days. Youth crowned his head with flowers and with bays; He flung the leopard-skin about his loins, And bracelets jangled at his wrists like coins, Nor was the triumph of his singing mute When at his lips the windy flute Mingled its treble with the chords of praise And melody hung scented round his ways. Proud in his beauty and his sinews’ girth He strode in strength and conquest on the earth, Or measured down the terraced olive-groves Intrepid footsteps with the centaur’s hooves. The pleasant valleys echoed with his mirth, And in the morning resonant and still His voice was heard like music on the hill.
So ever ran the course of youth the same, And Joy and Grief strove on; Grief could not claim That Love had played unfairly in the game Since often some poor weeping love-lorn child Returned to her with sorrow wild, And cast his broken flute upon the ground And all his ornaments with tears defiled.
Now Joy this pretty mortal boy has found And brought him hither, that by our consent The rivals try their strength, and one be crowned. Conditional thereon, that Love be bound To take no action in the tournament.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: _They press forward round the shell._]
1ST SPIRIT.
HOW richly stirs his craving blood to-night For songs of freedom all among the stars! Thoughts like a flock of birds in summer light Circle beyond the reach of lifted arms, And deeds beyond the scope of life’s alarms Float into sight, And pass, yet undefined, through heaven’s bars.
2ND SPIRIT.
IT is the hour of twilight, still, profound, When dreams and visions in their legions fly On fancy’s horses mounted, robed and crowned With streaming flames, an aureole of fire, And pass, the eagle shapes of man’s desire, Towards the sunset bound, In wingèd ride across the evening sky.
3RD SPIRIT.
HE stirs disquieted, he stirs again. The stamping hoofs of that proud galaxy In passing struck from space the spangled rain And flung the ardent fragments down to him That scorched his mortal soul through vision dim. O shackled soul in pain Tortured by glimpses of divinity!
2ND SPIRIT.
WHAT shall we sing in praise of youth? the free, The clarion years, the redolent years of youth? Youth that loved gold and scarlet pageantry And caught the fringe upon the robe of truth?
1ST SPIRIT.
GAY youth, that goes, with some familiar friend, On quest of hopes heroic, quest of shores Untravelled, with the heart of conquerors, Eager and brave, and talking without end Of high, magnificent, and cleanly things Rich as the sunset, swift as cormorants’ wings That sweep the waters,--youth, whose destiny Sails like a ship upon a virgin sea.
2ND SPIRIT.
WHOSE heart is as a glowing forge at night Wherein the blacksmith, gleaming with his sweat Like some gigantic negro in the light Of angry fires that touch his limbs of jet, Strikes at the clanging anvil of his thought.
3RD SPIRIT.
SING to him, sing! till he be so distraught, So drunken and enraptured, That all his heart be captured.
FOLLY (_to_ ADVENTURE).
GIPSY, what have you in your pack Bound with old thongs across your back? Poplin, dimity, huckaback, Who draws the prize?
Tumble your treasures out on the grass: A wine-dark ruby, a shine of brass, Aladdin’s lamp, and a magic glass, And a last surprise.
Dip in your hands, you wayward crew, The peddler caters for all of you; You press, like a crowd of girls, anew, With your eager eyes; Dip in your hands, there are treasures free, Curious pearls, and chalcedony, And the cap of invisibility, But the thing you will none of you ever see Is the last surprise.
IMAGINATION.
I am the swift omnipotent magician; All bounty’s in my gift, all songs unsung, All slumbering chords, all undiscovered crafts Baffling their premature interpreters; No law’s beyond my searching; I’ll condemn No vice, despise no sorrow, scorn no joy, Deride no virtue, throw no stone at Pilate, But sweep my mantle round humanity And round the pomp of nature; naught I’ll find Too mean, too great, too little, or too spacious; Mine be the secrets both of hearts and stars, (Small, measureless hearts; great, measurable stars;) And love’s old barbarous reiteration I’ll tolerate, and the great self-less peace Like the deep sea’s perpetual repose.
I’ll not be parsimonious of my wealth. I’ll fill your heaven with many coloured moons And hang such variable tides upon them As strew the astonished fish along the shores. I’ll bring the planets nearer: I’ll attract Saturn within his hoop of shining rings; I’ll summon a great conclave of the comets Which hitherto were strangers to each other, And man, at nightfall standing on the crest Of a familiar hill, shall marvelling stare Into an unfamiliar firmament. I’ll show you Jupiter’s rebel satellite That on the outer fringe of measured space Backwards revolves, striving against the law That chains her anger to an irksome orbit.
I’ll dry the seas and bring the unknown lands To light, that on unchristened continents Man stray dry-foot from Africa to Asia. Oh, what new rivers then, what deep, deep lakes, What caverns and what cliffs, what strange ravines, What deserts, what denuded leagues of plain, Should offer to his swarming multitude! Peaks shall be islands, islands shall be peaks, When I reverse the ordering and make A mountainous Pacific continent, A Himalayan archipelago.