Part 2

Without them the awakening world is dark With dust and mire; Yet as they went they flung to us a spark, A thread of fire.

To guide us while beneath the sombre skies Faltering we tread, Until for us like morning stars shall rise The deathless dead.

JULIAN GRENFELL

Because of you we will be glad and gay, Remembering you, we will be brave and strong; And hail the advent of each dangerous day, And meet the last adventure with a song. And, as you proudly gave your jewelled gift, We'll give our lesser offering with a smile, Nor falter on that path where, all too swift, You led the way and leapt the golden stile.

Whether new paths, new heights to climb you find, Or gallop through the unfooted asphodel, We know you know we shall not lag behind, Nor halt to waste a moment on a fear; And you will speed us onward with a cheer, And wave beyond the stars that all is well.

PIERRE

I saw you starting for another war, The emblem of adventure and of youth, So that men trembled, saying: He forsooth Has gone, has gone, and shall return no more. And then out there, they told me you were dead Taken and killed; how was it that I knew, Whatever else was true, that was not true? And then I saw you pale upon your bed,

Scarcely a year ago, when you were sent Back from the margin of the dim abyss; For Death had sealed you with a warning kiss, And let you go to meet a nobler fate: To serve in fellowship, O fortunate: To die in battle with your regiment.

HILAIRE BELLOC

THE SOUTH COUNTRY

When I am living in the Midlands That are sodden and unkind, I light my lamp in the evening: My work is left behind; And the great hills of the South Country Come back into my mind.

The great hills of the South Country They stand along the sea; And it's there walking in the high woods That I could wish to be, And the men that were boys when I was a boy Walking along with me.

The men that live in North England I saw them for a day; Their hearts are set upon the waste fells, Their skies are fast and grey; From their castle-walls a man may see The mountains far away.

The men that live in West England They see the Severn strong, A-rolling on rough water brown Light aspen leaves along. They have the secret of the Rocks, And the oldest kind of song.

But the men that live in the South Country Are the kindest and most wise, They get their laughter from the loud surf, And the faith in their happy eyes Comes surely from our Sister the Spring When over the sea she flies; The violets suddenly bloom at her feet, She blesses us with surprise.

I never get between the pines But I smell the Sussex air; Nor I never come on a belt of sand But my home is there. And along the sky the line of the Downs So noble and so bare.

A lost thing could I never find, Nor a broken thing mend: And I fear I shall be all alone When I get towards the end. Who will there be to comfort me Or who will be my friend?

I will gather and carefully make my friends Of the men of the Sussex Weald, They watch the stars from silent folds, They stiffly plough the field, By them and the God of the South Country My poor soul shall be healed.

If I ever become a rich man, Of if ever I grow to be old, I will build a house with deep thatch To shelter me from the cold, And there shall the Sussex songs be sung And the story of Sussex told.

I will hold my house in the high wood Within a walk of the sea, And the men that were boys when I was a boy Shall sit and drink with me.

THE NIGHT

Most holy Night, that still dost keep The keys of all the doors of sleep, To me when my tired eyelids close Give thou repose.

And let the far lament of them That chant the dead day's requiem Make in my ears, who wakeful lie, Soft lullaby.

Let them that knaw the horned moth By my bedside their memories clothe. So shall I have new dreams and blest In my brief rest.

Fold your great wings about my face, Hide dawning from my resting-place, And cheat me with your false delight, Most Holy Night.

SONG

INVITING THE INFLUENCE OF A YOUNG LADY UPON THE OPENING YEAR.

I

You wear the morning like your dress And all with mastery crowned; When as you walk your loveliness. Goes shining all around. Upon your secret, smiling way Such new contents were found, The Dancing Loves made holiday On that delightful ground.

II

Then summon April forth, and send Commandment through the flowers; About our woods your grace extend A queen of careless hours. For oh, not Vera veiled in vain, Nor Dian's sacred Ring, With all her royal nymphs in train Could so lead on the Spring.

THE FALSE HEART

I said to Heart, "How goes it?" Heart replied: "Right as a Ribstone Pippin!" But it lied.

HANNAKER MILL (1913)

Sally is gone that was so kindly; Sally is gone from Hannaker Hill, And the briar grows ever since then so blindly; And ever since then the clapper is still... And the sweeps have fallen from Hannaker Mill.

Hannaker Hill is in desolation; Ruin a-top and a field unploughed. And Spirits that call on a falling nation, Spirits that loved her calling aloud, Spirits abroad in a windy cloud.

Spirits that call and no one answers-- Hannaker's down and England's done. Wind and thistle for pipe and dancers, And never a ploughman under the sun: Never a ploughman, never a one.

TARANTELLA

Do you remember an Inn, Miranda? Do you remember an Inn? And the tedding and the spreading Of the straw for a bedding, And the fleas that tease in the High Pyrenees, And the wine that tasted of the tar? And the cheers and the jeers of the young muleteers (Under the dark of the vine verandah)? Do you remember an Inn, Miranda, Do you remember an Inn? And the cheers and the jeers of the young muleteers Who hadn't got a penny, And who weren't paying any, And the hammer at the doors and the Din? And the Hip! Hop! Hap! Of the clap Of the hands to the twirl and the swirl Of the girl gone chancing, Glancing, Dancing, Backing and advancing, Snapping of the clapper to the spin Out and in-- And the Ting, Tong, Tang of the guitar! Do you remember an Inn, Miranda? Do you remember an Inn?

Never more; Miranda, Never more. Only the high peaks hoar: And Aragon a torrent at the door. No sound In the walls of the Halls where falls The tread Of the feet of the dead to the ground. No sound: Only the boom Of the far Waterfall like Doom.

ON A DEAD HOSTESS

Of this bad world the loveliest and the best Has smiled, and said good-night, and gone to rest.

EDMUND BLUNDEN

ALMSWOMEN

At Quincey's moat the squandering village ends, And there in the almshouse dwell the dearest friends Of all the village, two old dames that cling As close as any trueloves in the spring. Long, long ago they passed three-score-and-ten, And in this doll's house lived together then; All things they have in common being so poor, And their one fear, Death's shadow at the door. Each sundown makes them mournful, each sunrise Brings back the brightness in their failing eyes.

How happy go the rich fair-weather days When on the roadside folk stare in amaze At such a honeycomb of fruit and flowers As mellows round their threshold; what long hours They gloat upon their steepling hollyhocks, Bee's balsams, feathery southernwood and stocks, Fiery dragons'-mouths, great mallow leaves For salves, and lemon plants in bushy sheaves, Shagged Esau's Hands with five green finger-tips! Such old sweet names are ever on their lips. As pleased as little children where these grow In cobbled pattens and worn gowns they go, Proud of their wisdom when on gooseberry shoots They stuck egg-shells to fright from coming fruits The brisk-billed rascals; waiting still to see Their neighbour owls saunter from tree to tree Or in the hushing half-light mouse the lane Long-winged and lordly.

But when those hours wane Indoors they ponder, scared by the harsh storm Whose pelting saracens on the window swarm, And listen for the mail to clatter past And church clock's deep bay withering on the blast; They feed the fire that flings a freakish light On pictured kings and queens grotesquely bright, Platters and pitchers, faded calendars, And graceful hour-glass trim with lavenders. Many a time they kiss and cry, and pray Both may be summoned in the self-same day, And wiseman linnet tinkling in his cage End too with them the friendship of old age, And all together leave their treasured room Some bell-like evening when the May's in bloom.

GLEANING

Along the baulk the grasses drenched in dews Soak through the morning gleaners' clumsy shoes, And cloying cobwebs trammel their brown cheeks While from the shouldering sun the dewfog reeks. Then soon begun, on ground where yesterday The rakers' warning-sheaf forbade their way, Hard clucking dames in great white hoods make haste To cram their lap-bags with the barley waste, Scrambling as if a thousand were but one, Careless of stabbing thistles. Now the sun Gulps up the dew and dries the stubs, and scores Of tiny people trundle out of doors Among the stiff stalks, where the scratched hands Red ants and blackamoors and such as fly; Tunbellied, too, with legs a finger long, The spider harvestman; the churlish, strong Black scorpion, prickled earwig, and that mite Who shuts up like a leaden shot in fright And lies for dead. And still before the rout The young rats and the field mice whisk about And from the trod whisp out the leveret darts Bawled at by boys that pass with blundering carts Top-heavy to the red-tiled barns. And still The children feed their cornsacks with goodwill, And farm wives ever faster stoop and flounce. The hawk drops down a plummet's speed to pounce The nibbling mouse or resting lark away, The lost mole tries to pierce the mattocked clay In agony and terror of the sun.

The dinner hour and its grudged leisure won, All sit below the pollards on the dykes, Rasped with the twinge of creeping barley spikes: Sweet beyond telling now the small beer goes From the hooped hardwood bottles, the wasp knows, And even hornets whizz from the eaten ash-- Then crusts are dropt and switches snatched to slash, While, safe in shadow of the apron thrown Aside the bush which years before was grown To snap the poacher's nets, the baby sleeps. Now toil returns, in red-hot fluttering light, And far afield the weary rabble creeps, Oft clutching blind wheat black among the white, That smutches where it touches quick as soot--Oft gaping where the landrail seems afoot, Who with such magic throws his baffling speech, Far off he sounds when scarce beyond arm's reach. Mongrels are left to mind the morning's gain, But squinting knaves can slouch to steal the grain; Now close the farm the fields are gleaned agen, Where the boy droves the turkey and white hen To pick the shelled sweet corn; their hue and cry Answers the gleaners' gabble, and sows trudge With little pigs to play and rootle there And all the fields are full of din and blare.

So steals the time past, so they glean and gloat; The hobby-horses whir, the moth's dust coat Blends with the stubble, scarlet soldiers fly In airy pleasure; but the gleaners' eye Sees little but their spoil, or robin flower Ever on tenterhooks to shun the shower, Their weather-prophet never known astray; When he folds up, then toward the hedge glean they. But now the dragon of the sky droops, pales, And wandering in the wet grey western vales, Stumbles, and passes, and the gleaning's done. The farmer, with fat hares slung on his gun, Gives folk goodnight as down the ruts they pull The creaking two-wheeled hand carts bursting full, And whimpering children cease their teasing squalls, While left alone the supping partridge calls-- Till all at home is stacked from mischief's way To thrash and dress the first wild, windy day, And each good wife crowns weariness with pride, With such small riches more than satisfied.

GORDON BOTTOMLEY

THE PLOUGHMAN

Under the long fell's stony eaves The ploughman, going up and down, Ridge after ridge man's tide-mark leaves, And turns the hard grey soil to brown.

Striding, he measures out the earth In lines of life, to rain and sun; And every year that comes to birth Sees him still striding on and on.

The seasons change, and then return; Yet still, in blind, unsparing ways, However I may shrink or yearn, The ploughman measures out my days.

His acre brought forth roots last year; This year it bears the gloomy grain; Next Spring shall seedling grass appear; Then roots and corn and grass again.

Five times the young corn's pallid green I have seen spread and change and thrill; Five times the reapers I have seen Go creeping up the far-off hill:

And, as the unknowing ploughman climbs Slowly and inveterately, I wonder long how many times The corn will spring again for me.

BABEL: THE GATE OF THE GOD

Lost towers impend, copeless primeval props Of the new threatening sky, and first rude digits Of awe remonstrance and uneasy power Thrust out by man when speech sank back in his throat: Then had the last rocks ended bubbling up And rhythms of change within the heart begun By a blind need that would make Springs and Winters; Pylons and monoliths went on by ages, Mycenae and Great Zimbabwe came about; Cowed hearts in This conceived a pyramid That leaned to hold itself upright, a thing Foredoomed to limits, death and an easy apex; Then postulants for the stars' previous wisdom Standing on Carthage must get nearer still; While in Chaldea an altitude of God Being mooted, and a Saurian unearthed Upon a mountain stirring a surmise Of floods and alterations of the sea, A round-walled tower must rise upon Senaai Temple and escape to God the ascertained. These are decayed like Time's teeth in his mouth, Black cavities and gaps, yet earth is darkened By their deep-sunken and unfounded shadows And memories of man's earliest theme of towers.

Space--the old source of time--should be undone, Eternity defined, by men who trusted Another tier would equal them with God. A city of grimed brick-kilns, squat truncations, Hunched like spread toads yet high beneath their circles Of low packed smoke, assemblages of thunder That glowed upon their under sides by night And lit like storm small shadowless workmen's toil. Meaningless stumps, unturned bare roots, remained In fields of mashy mud and trampled leaves, While, if a horse died hauling, plasterers Knelt on a plank to clip its sweaty coat. A builder leans across the last wide courses; His unadjustable unreaching eyes Fail under him before his glances sink On the clouds' upper layers of sooty curls Where some long lightening goes like swallow downward, But at the wider gallery next below Recognize master masons with pricked parchments: That builder then, as one who condescends Unto the sea and all that is beneath him, His hairy breast on the wet mortar calls "How many fathoms is it yet to heaven!" On the next eminence the orgulous King Nimrond stands up conceiving he shall live To conquer God, now that he knows where God is: His eager hands push up the tower in thought... Again, his shaggy inhuman height strides down Among the carpenters because he has seen One shape an eagle-woman on a door-post: He drives his spear-beam through him for wasted day.

Little men hurrying, running here and there, Within the dark and stifling walls, dissent From every sound, and shoulder empty hods: "The God's great altar should stand in the crypt Among our earth's foundations"--"The God's great altar Must be the last far coping of our work"-- "It should inaugurate the broad main stair"-- "Or end it"--"It must stand toward the East!" But here a grave contemptuous youth cries out "Womanish babblers, how can we build God's altar Ere we divine its foreordained true shape?" Then one "It is a pedestal for deeds"-- "'Tis more and should be hewn like the King's brow"-- "It has the nature of a woman's bosom"-- "The tortoise, first created, signifies it"-- "A blind and rudimentary navel shows The source of worship better than horned moons." Then a lean giant "Is not a calyx needful?"-- "Because round grapes on statues well expressed Become the nadir of incense, nodal lamps, Yet apes have hands that but and carved red crystals"-- "Birds molten, touchly tale veins bronze buds crumble Ablid ublai ghan isz rad eighar ghaurl ..." Words said too often seemed such ancient sounds That men forget them or were lost in them; The guttural glottis-chasms of language reached A rhythm, a gasp, were curves of immortal thought.

Man with his bricks was building, building yet, Where dawn and midnight mingled and woke no birds, In the last courses, building past his knowledge A wall that swung--for towers can have no tops, No chord can mete the universal segment, Earth has no basis. Yet the yielding sky, Invincible vacancy, was there discovered-- Though piled-up bricks should pulp the sappy balks, Weight generate a secrecy of heat, Cankerous charring, crevices' fronds of flame.

THE END OF THE WORLD

The snow had fallen many nights and days; The sky was come upon the earth at last, Sifting thinly down as endlessly As though within the system of blind planets Something had been forgot or overdriven. The dawn now seemed neglected in the grey Where mountains were unbuilt and shadowless trees Rootlessly paused or hung upon the air. There was no wind, but now and then a sigh Crossed that dry falling dust and rifted it Through crevices of slate and door and casement. Perhaps the new moon's time was even past. Outside, the first white twilights were too void Until a sheep called once, as to a lamb, And tenderness crept everywhere from it; But now the flock must have strayed far away. The lights across the valley must be veiled, The smoke lost in the greyness or the dusk. For more than three days now the snow had thatched That cow-house roof where it had ever melted With yellow stains from the beasts' breath inside; But yet a dog howled there, though not quite lately. Someone passed down the valley swift and singing, Yes, with locks spreaded like a son of morning; But if he seemed too tall to be a man It was that men had been so long unseen, Or shapes loom larger through a moving snow. And he was gone and food had not been given him. When snow slid from an overweighted leaf Shaking the tree, it might have been a bird Slipping in sleep or shelter, whirring wings; Yet never bird fell out, save once a dead one-- And in two days the snow had covered it. The dog had howled again--or thus it seemed Until a lean fox passed and cried no more. All was so safe indoors where life went on Glad of the close enfolding snow--O glad To be so safe and secret at its heart, Watching the strangeness of familiar things. They knew not what dim hours went on, went For while they slept the clock stopt newly wound As the cold hardened. Once they watched the road, Thinking to be remembered. Once they doubted If they had kept the sequence of the days, Because they heard not any sound of bells. A butterfly, that hid until the Spring Under a ceiling's shadow, dropt, was dead. The coldness seemed more nigh, the coldness deepened As a sound deepens into silences; It was of earth and came not by the air; The earth was cooling and drew down the sky. The air was crumbling. There was no more sky. Rails of a broken bed charred in the grate, And when he touched the bars he thought the sting Came from their heat--he could not feel such cold ... She said "O do not sleep, Heart, heart of mine, keep near me. No, no; sleep. I will not lift his fallen, quiet eyelids, Although I know he would awaken then--He closed them thus but now of his own will. He can stay with me while I do not lift them."

ATLANTIS

What poets sang in Atlantis? Who can tell The epics of Atlantis or their names? The sea hath its own murmurs, and sounds not The secrets of its silences beneath, And knows not any cadences enfolded When the last bubbles of Atlantis broke Among the quieting of its heaving floor.

O, years and tides and leagues and all their billows Can alter not man's knowledge of men's hearts-- While trees and rocks and clouds include our being We know the epics of Atlantis still: A hero gave himself to lesser men, Who first misunderstood and murdered him, And then misunderstood and worshipped him; A woman was lovely and men fought for her, Towns burnt for her, and men put men in bondage, But she put lengthier bondage on them all; A wanderer toiled among all the isles That fleck this turning star or shifting sea, Or lonely purgatories of the mind, In longing for his home or his lost love.

Poetry is founded on the hearts of men: Though in Nirvana or the Heavenly courts The principle of beauty shall persist, Its body of poetry, as the body of man, Is but a terrene form, a terrene use, That swifter being will not loiter with; And, when mankind is dead and the world cold, Poetry's immortality will pass.

NEW YEAR'S EVE, 1913

O, Cartmel bells ring soft to-night, And Cartmel bells ring clear But I lie far away to-night, Listening with my dear;

Listening in a frosty land Where all the bells are still And the small-windowed bell-towers stand Dark under heath and hill.

I thought that, with each dying year, As long as life should last The bells of Cartmel I should hear Ring out an aged past:

The plunging, mingling sounds increase Darkness's depth and height, The hollow valley gains more peace And ancientness to-night:

The loveliness, the fruitfulness, The power of life lived there Return, revive, more closely press Upon that midnight air.

But many deaths have place in men Before they come to die; Joys must be used and spent, and then Abandoned and passed by.

Earth is not ours; no cherished space Can hold us from life's flow, That bears us thither and thence by ways We knew not we should go.