Part 2

Infinite peace is hanging in the air, Infinite peace is resting on mine eyes, That just an hour ago learnt how to bear Seeing your body's flaming harmonies. The grey clouds flecked with orange are and gold, Birds unto rest are falling, falling, falling, And all the earth goes slowly into night, Steadily turning from the harshly bright Sunset. And now the wind is growing cold And in my heart a hidden voice is calling.

Say, is our sense of beauty mixed with earth When lip on lip and breast on breast we cling, When ecstasy brings short bright sobs to birth And all our pulses, both our bodies sing? When through the haze that gathers on my sight I see your eyelids, know the eyes behind See me and half not see me, when our blood Goes roaring like a deep tremendous flood, Calm and terrific in unhasty might, Is then our inner sight sealed up and blind?

Or could it be that when our blood was colder And side by side we sat with lips disparted I saw the perfect line of your resting shoulder, Your mouth, your peaceful throat with fuller-hearted, More splendid joy? Ah poignant joys all these! And rest can stab the heart as well as passion. Yea, I have known sobs choke my heart to see Your honey-coloured hair move languorously, Ruffled, not by my hands, but by the breeze, And I have prayed the rough air for compassion.

Yea, I have knelt to the unpiteous air And knelt to gods I knew not, to remove The viewless hands whose sight I could not bear Out of the wind-blown head of her I love. Ecstasy enters me and cannot speak, Seizes my hands and smites my fainting eyes And sends through all my veins a dim despair Of never apprehending all so fair And I have stood, unnerved and numb and weak, Watching your breathing bosom fall and rise.

Ah no! This joy is empty, incomplete, And sullied with a sense of too much longing, Where thoughts and fancies, sweet and bitter-sweet, And old regrets and new-born hopes come thronging. Man can see beauty for a moment's space And live, having seen her with an unfilmed eye, If all his body and all his soul in one Instant are tuned by passion to unison And I can image in your kissing face The eternal meaning of the earth and sky.

_Song in Time of Waiting._

Because the days are long for you and me, I make this song to lighten their slow time, So that the weary waiting fruitful be Or blossomed only by my limping rhyme. The days are very long And may not shortened be by any chime Of measured words or any fleeting song. Yet let us gather blossoms while we wait And sing brave tunes against the face of fate.

Day after day goes by: the exquisite Procession of the variable year, Summer, a sheaf with flowers bound up in it, And autumn, tender till the frosts appear And dry the humid skies; And winter following on, aloof, austere, Clad in the garments of a frore sunrise; And spring again. May not too many a spring Make both our voices tremble as we sing!

The days are empty, empty, and the nights Are cold and void; there is no single gleam Across the space unpeopled of delights, Save only now and then some thin-blood dream, Some stray of summer weather; The tedious hours like slow-foot laggarts seem, When you and I, my love, are not together And when I hold you in my arms at last The minutes go like April cloudlets past.

And yet no hidden charm, no desperate spell Can make these minutes longer, those less long: No force there is that yearning can impel Against the callous years which do us wrong. No words, no whispered rune, No witchery and no Thessalian song Can make that far-off, misty day more soon. The bravest tune, the most courageous rhyme Fall broken from the bastions of time.

A long and dusty road it is to tread; Few are the wayside flowers and far apart And are no sooner plucked than withered, When yearning heart is torn from yearning heart. A weary road it is And yet far off I see clear waters start And clean sweet grass and tangled traceries Of whispering leaves, that laugh to see us come, And there one day ... one day shall be our home.

The day will come. O dearest, do not doubt! It is not born as yet but I shall see Some day the fearless sunrise flashing out And know the night will give you up to me. O heart, my heart, be glad, Because the time will come at last when we Shall leave all grief and unlearn all things sad And know the joy than which none sweeter is And I shall sing a happier song than this.

_Sonnets on Separation._

I.

The time shall be, old Wisdom says, when you Shall grow awrinkled and I, indifferent, Shall no more follow the light steps I knew Or trace you, finding out the way you went, By swinging branches and the displaced flowers Among the thickets. I no more shall stand, With careful pencil through the adoring hours Scratching your grace on paper. My still hand No more shall tremble at the touch of yours And I'll write no more songs and you'll not sing. But this is all a lie, for love endures And we shall closer kiss, remembering How budding trees turned barren in the sun Through this long week, whereof one day's now done.

II.

The time is all so short. One week is much To be without your deep and peaceful eyes, Your soft and all-contenting cheek, the touch Of well-caressing hands. O were we wise We would not love too strongly, would not bind Life into life so inextricably, That the dumb body suffers with the mind In a sad partnership this agony. For death will come and swallow up us two, You there, I here, and we shall lie apart, Out of the houses and the woods we knew. Then in the lonely grave, my dust-choked heart Out of the dust will raise, if it can speak, A threnody for this lost, lovely week.

III.

Is there no prophylactic against love? Can I with drugs not dull the ache one night? The rain is heavy and the low clouds move Over the empty home of our delight And find me in it weeping. You are far And you are now asleep. The night's so thick, Not even one stooping and compassionate star Shines on us both disparted. O be quick, Torturing days and heavy, turn your hours To minutes, melt yourselves into one day! ... The cold rain falls in swift assailing showers, Darkness is round me and light far away. I'm in our well-known room and you're shut in By strange unfriendly walls I've never seen.

IV.

Lovers that drug themselves for ecstasy Seek love too closely in an overdose, When the sweet spasm turns to agony And the quick limbs are still and the eyes close. I too, a fool, desired--to make love strong-- Absence and parting but the measure's brimmed, The dose is over-poured, the time's too long Already, though two nights have hardly dimmed My lonely eyes with the elusive sleep. O I'll remember, I'll not wish again To go with ardent limbs into this deep Sea of dejection, this dull mere of pain: We'll love our safer loves upon the shore And quest for inexperienced joys no more.

V.

Through the closed curtains comes the early sun, First a pale finger, preluding the hand. Outside more certainly the day's begun, Where bright and brighter still the chestnuts stand, Broad candles lighting up at the first fire. I stir and turn in my uneasy sleep But in my sorrow sleep's my whole desire. About the still room small lights move and creep Silently, stealthily on wall and chair, Till to strong rays and shining lights they grow, Which with their magic change the waiting air And all its sleeping motes to gold and throw A golden radiance on your empty bed, Which wakes me with vain likeness to your head.

VI.

To-morrow I shall see you come again Between the pale trees, through the sullen gate, Out of the dark and secret house of pain Where lie the unhappy and unfortunate. To-morrow you will live with me and love me, Spring will go on again, I'll see the flowers And little things, ridiculous things, shall move me To smiles or tears or verse. The world is ours To-morrow. Open heaths, tall trees, great skies, With massive clouds that fly and come again, Sweet fields, delicious rivers and the rise And fall of swelling land from the swift train We'll see together, knowing that all this Is one great room wherein we two may kiss.

VII.

We're at the world's top now. The hills around Stand proud in order with the valleys deep, The hills with pastures drest, with tall trees crowned, And the low valleys dipt in sunny sleep. A sound brims all the country up, a noise Of wheels upon the road and labouring bees And trodden heather, mixing with the voice Of small lost winds that die among the trees. And we are prone beneath the flooding sun, So drenched, so soaked in the unceasing light, That colours, sounds and your close presence are one, A texture woven up of all delight, Whose shining threads my hands may not undo, Yet one thread runs the whole bright garment through.

_The Morning Sun._

Perhaps you sleep now, fifty miles to the south, While I sit here and dream of you by night. The thick soft blankets drawn about your mouth Have made for you a nest of warm delight; Your short crisp hair is thrown abroad and spilled Upon the pillow's whiteness and your eyes Are quiet and the round soft lids are filled With sleep.

But I shall watch until sunrise Creeps into chilly clouds and heavy air, Across the lands where you sleep and I wake, And I shall know the sun has seen you there, Unmoving though the winter morning break. Next, you will lift your hands and rub your eyes And turn to sleep again but wake and start And feel, half dreaming, with a dear surprise, My hand in the sunbeam touching at your heart.

Persuasion.

Still must your hands withhold your loveliness? Is your soul jealous of your body still? The fair white limbs beneath the clouding dress Are such hard forms as you alone could fill With life and sweetness. Such a harmony Is yours as music and the thought expressed By the musician: have no rivalry Between your soul and the shape in which it's drest. Kisses or words, both sensual, which shall be The burning symbol of the love we bear? My art is words, yours song, but still must we Be mute and songless, seeing how love is fair. Both our known arts being useless, we must turn To love himself and his old practice learn.

_Apology._

Have I slept and failed to hear you calling? Cry again, belov'd; for sleep is heavy, Curtaining away the golden sunlight, Shutting out the blue sky and the breezes, Sealing up my ears to all you tell me. Cry again! your voice shall pierce the clumsy Leaden folds that sleep has wrapt about me, Cry again! accomplish what the singing, Hours old now on all the trees and bushes, And the wind and sun could not accomplish. Lo! I waste good hours of love and kisses While the sun and you have spilt your glory Freely on me lying unregarding. In the happy islands, where no sunset Stains the waters with a morbid splendour, Where the open skies are blue for ever, I might stay for years and years unsleeping, Living for divinest conversation, Music, colour, scent and sense unceasing, Entering by eye and ear and nostril. Ah, but flesh is flesh and I am mortal! Cry again and do not leave me sleeping.

_The Golden Moment._

Along the branches of the laden tree The ripe fruit smiling hang. The afternoon Is emptied of all things done and things to be. Low in the sky the inconspicuous moon Stares enviously upon the mellow earth, That mocks her barren girth.

Ripe blackberries and long green trailing grass Are motionless beneath the heavy light: The happy birds and creeping things that pass Go fitfully and stir as if in fright, That they have broken on some mystery In bramble or in tree.

This is no hour for beings that are maiden; The spring is virgin, lightly afraid and cold, But now the whole round earth is ripe and laden And stirs beneath her coverlet of gold And in her agony a moment calls... A heavy apple falls.

_Bramber._

Before the downs in their great horse-shoes rise, I know a village where the Adur runs, Blown by sweet winds and by beneficent suns Visited and made ripe beneath kind skies. Light and delight are in the children's eyes And there the mothers sit, the fortunate ones, Blest in their daughters, happy in their sons, And the old men are beautiful and wise.

There stand the downs, great, close, tall, friendly, still, Linked up by grassy saddles, hill on hill, And steep the village in unending peace And to the north the plains in order lie, Heavy with crops and woods alternately And lively with low sounds that never cease.

_Now would I be._

Now would I be in that removèd place Where the dim sunlight hardly comes at all And branches of the young trees interlace And long swathes of the brambles twine and fall; A space between the hedgerow and a road Not trod by foot of any known to me, Where now and then a cart with scented load Goes sleepy down the lane with creaking axle-tree.

And there I'd lie upon the tumbled leaves, Watching a square of the all else hidden sky, And made such songs a drowsy mind believes To be most perfect music. So would I Keep my face heavenwards and bless eternity, Wherein my heart could be as glad as this And lazily I'd bid all men come hither And in my dreams I'd tell them what they miss, Living in hate and work and all foul weather.

And still my happy dreams would go, Like children in a cowslip field Chasing rich-winged insects to and fro To see what rare delights they yield....

... O I am tired of working to be cheated And sick of barriers that will not fall, Of ancient prudent words too much repeated And worn-out dreams that come not true at all. I know too well what things they are that ail me; To fight is nothing but to see Thus at the last my own hand fail me Is agony.

O for that corner by the hummocked marshes, Visited hardly by the cynic sun, Where nothing clear and nothing bright or harsh is, Where labour and the ache of it are done, Where naught is ended and where naught begun!

_Midwinter Madness._

A month or twain to live on honeycomb Is pleasant--but to eat it for a year Is simply beastly. Thus the poet spake, Feeling how sticky all his stomach was With hivings of ten thousand cheated bees. O wisdom that could shape immortal words And frame a diet for dyspeptic man! But what of turnips? Come, a lyric now Upon the luscious roots unsung as yet, (Not roots I know but stalks; still, never mind, Metre and sauce will suit them just as well) Or shall we speak of omelettes? Muse, begin! To feed a fortnight on transmuted eggs Would doubtless be both comforting and cheap But oh, the nausea on the fourteenth day! I'd rather read a book by Ezra Pound Then choke the seven hundredth omelette down, Just as I'd rather read some F. S. Flint Than live a month or twain on honeycomb.

O Ezra Pound! O omelette of the world! Concocted with strange herbs from dead Provence, Garlic from Italy and spice from Greece, Having suffered a rare Pound-change on the way, How rarely shouldst thou taste, were not the eggs Laid in America and hither brought Too late. I don't like omelettes made with fowls. Take hence this Pound and put him to the test, Try him with acid, see if he turn black As will the best old silver, when enraged At touching fungi of the baser sort. (Forgive digression. These similitudes Entrance me and I lose myself in them, As schoolboys, picking flowers by the way, Escape the angry usher's vigilance And then, concealed behind a hedge or shed, Produce the awesome pipe or thrice-lit fag And make themselves incredibly unwell.) My brain is bubbling and the thoughts will out, But, Ezra Pound! they turn again to thee, As surely as the lode-stone to the Pole Or as the dog to what he hath cast up (A simile of Solomon's, not mine) And your shock head of damp, unwholesome hay, Such as, the cunning farmer oft declares, When stacked, will perish by spontaneous fire, Frequents my dreams and makes them ludicrous. Thou most ridiculous sprite! Thou ponderous fairy! Bourgeois Bohemian! Innocent Verlaine! I read in _The Booksellers' Circular_ That, in the University of Pa. (Or Kans. or Col. or Mass, or Tex. or Ont. --A line of normal pattern, Saintsbury) You hold a fellowship in (O merciful gods!) Romanics, which strange word interpreted Means, I suppose, the Romance languages. Doubtless they read Italian in Pa. And some may speak French fluently in Ont. But German, Ezra! There's the bloody rub, It's not Romance and it is hard to learn And Heine, though an easy-going chap, Would doubtless trounce you soundly if he knew The sorry hash that you have made of him. But no! you're not for immortality, Not even such as that of Freiligrath, Enshrined, together with his _Mohrenfurst_, In unrelenting amber. I hold you here, In a soap-bubble's iridescent walls, The whimsy of a long midwinter night, And give you immortality enough. Thou sorry brat! Thou transatlantic clown! That seek'st to ape the treadless Ariel And out-top Shelley in an aeroplane, Take the all-obvious padding from your pants And cut your hair and go to Pa. again (Or Kans. or Col. or Mass, or Tex. or Ont. Or even Oomp. if such a place exist) And take with you the poets you admire, Both Yeats and Flint to charm the folk of Oomp. And write again for _Munsey's Magazine_ Of your good brother Everyone. (Just God! Am even I of his relationship?) So end as you began or even worse: No matter, so 'tis in America.

_At a Lecture._

The lecturer took his place and looked At the eager women's faces, Then he cleared his throat and he jetted out A stream of commonplaces.

He fondled Wordsworth and patted Shelley And said with his hand on his heart He would brook no interference from morals In any matter of art.

He finished at last and strode away Over the naked boards, Erect in his conscious majesty Back to the House of Lords.

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