Part 5

Dreams will be swift and few Ere that last night be done, And gradual silences In each long interim Of halting time awake Confuse all conscious sense. Shadows will grow more dim, And sound and scent forsake The dark ere dawn commence,

In the new morning then, So fixed the stare and fast, The calm unseeing eye Will never close again.

. . . .

I shall come back at last To this dark house to die.

WALTER DE LA MARE

THE LISTENERS

"Is there anybody there?" said the Traveller, Knocking on the moonlit door; And his horse in the silence champed the grasses Of the forest's ferny floor: And a bird flew up out of the turret, Above the Traveller's head: And he smote upon the door again a second time; "Is there anybody there?" he said. But no one descended to the Traveller; No head from the leaf-fringed sill Leaned over and looked into his grey eyes, Where he stood perplexed and still. But only a host of phantom listeners That dwelt in the lone house then Stood listening in the quiet of the moonlight To that voice from the world of men: Stood thronging the faint moon beams on the dark stair, That goes down to the empty hall, Hearkening in an air stirred and shaken By the lonely traveller's call. And he felt in his heart their strangeness, Their stillness answering his cry, While his horse moved, cropping the dark turf, 'Neath the starred and leafy sky; For he suddenly smote on the door, even Louder, and lifted his head:-- "Tell them I came, and no one answered, That I kept my word," he said. Never the least stir made the listeners, Though every word he spake Fell echoing through the shadowiness of the still house From the one man left awake: Ay, they heard his foot upon the stirrup, And the sound of iron on stone And how the silence surged softly backward When the plunging hoofs were gone.

ARABIA

Far are the shades of Arabia, Where the Princes ride at noon, 'Mid the verdurous vales and thickets, Under the ghost of the moon; And so dark is that vaulted purple Flowers in the forest rise And toss into blossom 'gainst the phantom stars Pale in the noonday skies.

Sweet is the music of Arabia In my heart, when out of dreams I still in the thin clear mirk of dawn Descry her gliding streams; Hear her strange lutes on the green banks Ring loud with the grief and delight Of the dim-silked, dark-haired Musicians In the brooding silence of night.

They haunt me--her lutes and her forests; No beauty on earth I see But shadowed with that dream recalls Her loveliness to me. Still eyes look coldly upon me, Cold voices whisper and say-- "He is crazed with the spell of far Arabia, They have stolen his wits away."

MUSIC

When music sounds, gone is the earth I know, And all her lovely things even lovelier grow; Her flowers in vision flame, her forest trees Lift burdened branches, stilled with ecstasies.

When music sounds, out of the water rise Naiads whose beauty dims my waking eyes, Rapt in strange dream burns each enchanted face, With solemn echoing stirs their dwelling-place.

When music sounds, all that I was I am Ere to this haunt of brooding dust I came; And from Time's woods break into distant song The swift-winged hours, as I hasten along.

THE SCRIBE

What lovely things hand hath made, The smooth-plumed bird In its emerald shade, The seed of the grass, The speck of stone Which the wayfaring ant Stirs, and hastes on.

Though I should sit By some tarn in Thy hills, Using its ink As the spirit wills To write of Earth's wonders Its live willed things, Flit would the ages On soundless wings Ere unto Z My pen drew nigh, Leviathan told, And the honey-fly; And still would remain My wit to try--My worn reeds broken. The dark tarn dry, All words forgotten-- Thou, Lord, and I.

THE GHOST

"Who knocks?" "I, who was beautiful Beyond all dreams to restore, I from the roots of the dark thorn am hither, And knock on the door."

"Who speaks?" "I--once was my speech Sweet as the bird's on the air, When echo lurks by the waters to heed; 'Tis I speak thee fair."

"Dark is the hour!" "Aye, and cold." "Lone is my house." "Ah, but mine?" "Sight, touch, lips, eyes gleamed in vain." "Long dead these to thine."

Silence. Still faint on the porch Broke the flames of the stars. In gloom groped a hope-wearied hand Over keys, bolts, and bars.

A face peered. All the grey night In chaos of vacancy shone; Nought but vast sorrow was there-- The sweet cheat gone.

CLEAR EYES

Clear eyes so dim at last, And cheeks outlive their rose. Time, heedless of the past, No loving kindness knows; Chill unto mortal lip Still Lethe flows.

Griefs, too, but brief while stay, And sorrow, being o'er, Its salt tears shed away, Woundeth the heart no more. Stealthily lave these waters That solemn shore.

Ah, then, sweet face burn on, While yet quick memory lives! And Sorrow, ere thou art gone, Know that my heart forgives-- Ere yet, grown cold in peace, It loves not, nor grieves.

FARE WELL

When I lie where shades of darkness Shall no more assail mine eyes, Nor the rain make lamentation When the wind sighs; How will fare the world whose wonder Was the very proof of me? Memory fades, must the remembered Perishing be?

Oh, when this my dust surrenders Hand, foot, lip to dust again, May those loved and loving faces Please other men! May the rusting harvest hedgerow Still the Traveller's Joy entwine, And as happy children gather Posies once mine.

Look thy last on all things lovely, Every hour. Let no night Seal thy sense in deathly slumber Till to delight Thou have paid thy utmost blessing; Since that all things thou wouldst praise Beauty took from those who loved them In other days.

ALL THAT'S PAST

Very old are the woods; And the buds that break Out of the briar's boughs, When March winds wake, So old with their beauty are-- Oh, no man knows Through what wild centuries Roves back the rose.

Very old are the brooks; And the rills that rise When snow sleeps cold beneath The azure skies Sing such a history Of come and gone, Their every drop is as wise As Solomon.

Very old are we men; Our dreams are tales Told in dim Eden By Eve's nightingales; We wake and whisper awhile, But, the day gone by, Silence and sleep like fields Of Amaranth lie.

THE SONG OF THE MAD PRINCE

Who said, "Peacock Pie"? The old King to the sparrow: Who said, "Crops are ripe"? Rust to the harrow: Who said, "Where sleeps she now? Where rests she now her head, Bathed in Eve's loveliness"?-- That's what I said.

Who said, "Ay, mum's the word"? Sexton to willow: Who said, "Green dust for dreams, Moss for a pillow"? Who said, "All Time's delight Hath she for narrow bed; Life's troubled bubble broken"?-- That's what I said.

JOHN DRINKWATER

BIRTHRIGHT

Lord Rameses of Egypt sighed Because a summer evening passed; And little Ariadne cried That summer fancy fell at last To dust; and young Verona died When beauty's hour was overcast.

Theirs was the bitterness we know Because the clouds of hawthorn keep So short a state, and kisses go To tombs unfathomably deep, While Rameses and Romeo And little Ariadne sleep.

MOONLIT APPLES

At the top of the house the apples are laid in rows, And the skylight lets the moonlight in, and those Apples are deep-sea apples of green. There goes A cloud on the moon in the autumn night.

A mouse in the wainscot scratches, and scratches, and then There is no sound at the top of the house of men Or mice; and the cloud is blown, and the moon again Dapples the apples with deep-sea light.

They are lying in rows there, under the gloomy beams; On the sagging floor; they gather the silver streams Out of the moon, those moonlit apples of dreams, And quiet is the steep stair under.

In the corridors under there is nothing but sleep, And stiller than ever on orchard boughs they keep Tryst with the moon, and deep is the silence, deep On moon-washed apples of wonder.

R. C. K. ENSOR

ODE TO REALITY

O Real, O That Which Is, Beyond all earthly bliss My spirit prays to be at one with Thee; Away from that which seems, From unenduring dreams, From vain pursuits and vainer meeds set free.

How rosy to our eyes The mists of error rise, The proud pavilions that we weave at will I How glittering the ray Of that illusive day, The hills how grand, the vales how green and still!

And how inviting yet The service of deceit, Paid by the crowd that does not understand, Parents and friends and foes All bowing down to those Who against Thee have lifted up their hand!

Ah, but on whomsoever Amid such glib endeavour Thy light has shined in sudden sovereignty, He who has fallen and heard Thy spirit-searching word: _Why kick against the pricks? Why outrage Me?

He can no longer stay There in the easy way, No longer please himself with make-believe, No longer shape at will The forms of good and ill And what he shall reject and what receive.

Nor may he dwell content In self-aggrandisement, To the deep wrong of modern Mammon blind; Nor can he drown his cares Among the doctrinaires, Who think by sowing hate to save mankind.

For every scheme of vision He sees as the condition Not of the truest only but the best-- The riches of all wealth, The beauty of Beauty's self-- That on Thee and within Thee it should rest.

By Thee our bounds are set; Thou madest us; and yet O Mother, when we strain to see Thy face, Still dost Thou tease our prying With masks and mystifying, Still hold us at arm's length from Thy embrace!

Yet would I rather in act Plough with the iron Fact And earn at least some harvest that is bread, Than rich and popular In gay Imposture's car Dazzle mankind and leave them still unfed.

Rather would I in thought Miss all that I had sought, Still pining on Negation's desert isle, Than with the current float In Pragmatism's boat Down to the fatal shore where sirens smile.

Rather would I be thrown Against Thine altar-stone, Unsanctified, unpitied, unreprieved, Than in some other shrine Sup the priests' meat and wine, Taking the wages of a world deceived.

JAMES ELROY FLECKER

_Born 1884_ _Died 1915_

RIOUPEROUX

High and solemn mountains guard Riouperoux, --Small untidy village where the river drives a mill: Frail as wood anemones, white, and frail were you, And drooping a little, like the slender daffodil.

Oh I will go to France again, and tramp the valley through, And I will change these gentle clothes for clog and corduroy, And work with the mill-hands of black Rioupéroux, And walk with you, and talk with you, like any other boy.

WAR SONG OF THE SARACENS

We are they who come faster than fate: we are they who ride early or late: We storm at your ivory gate: Pale Kings of the Sunset, beware! Not on silk nor in samet we lie, not in curtained solemnity die Among women who chatter and cry, and children who mumble a prayer. But we sleep by the ropes of the camp, and we rise with a shout, and we tramp With the sun or the moon for a lamp, and the spray of the wind in our hair.

From the lands, where the elephants are, to the forts of Merou and Balghar, Our steel we have brought and our star to shine on the ruins of Rum. We have marched from the Indus to Spain, and by God we will go there again; We have stood on the shore of the plain where the Waters of Destiny boom. A mart of destruction we made at Jalula where men were afraid, For death was a difficult trade, and the sword was a broker of doom;

And the Spear was a Desert Physician who cured not a few of ambition, And drave not a few to perdition with medicine bitter and strong: And the shield was a grief to the fool and as bright as a desolate pool, And as straight as the rock of Stamboul when their cavalry thundered along: For the coward was drowned with the brave when our battle sheered up like a wave, And the dead to the desert we gave, and the glory to God in our song.

THE OLD SHIPS

I have seen old ships sail like swans asleep Beyond the village which men still call Tyre, With leaden age o'ercargoed, dipping deep For Famagusta and the hidden sun That rings black Cyprus with a lake of fire; And all those ships were certainly so old Who knows how oft with squat and noisy gun, Questing brown slaves or Syrian oranges, The pirate Genoese Hell-raked them till they rolled Blood, water, fruit and corpses up the hold. But now through friendly seas they softly run, Painted the mid-sea blue or shore-sea green, Still patterned with the vine and grapes in gold.

But I have seen, Pointing her shapely shadows from the dawn And image tumbled on a rose-swept bay, A drowsy ship of some yet older day; And, wonder's breath indrawn, Thought I--who knows--who knows--but in that same (Fished up beyond _Ææa,_ patched up new --Stern painted brighter blue--) That talkative, bald-headed seaman came (Twelve patient comrades sweating at the oar) From Troy's doom-crimson shore, And with great lies about his wooden horse Set the crew laughing, and forgot his course.

It was so old a ship--who knows, who knows? --And yet so beautiful, I watched in vain To see the mast burst open with a rose, And the whole deck put on its leaves again.

STILLNESS

When the words rustle no more, And the last work's done, When the bolt lies deep in the door, And Fire, our Sun, Falls on the dark-laned meadows of the floor;

When from the clock's last chime to the next chime Silence beats his drum, And Space with gaunt grey eyes and her brother Time Wheeling and whispering come, She with the mould of form and he with the loom of rhyme:

Then twittering out in the night my thought-birds flee, I am emptied of all my dreams: I only hear Earth turning, only see Ether's long bankless streams, And only know I should drown if you laid not your hand on me.

AREIYA

This place was formed divine for love and us to dwell; This house of brown stone built for us to sleep therein; Those blossoms haunt the rocks that we should see and smell; Those old rocks break the hill that we the heights should win.

Those heights survey the sea that there our thoughts should sail Up the steep wall of wave to touch the Syrian sky: For us that sky at eve fades out of purple pale, Pale as the mountain mists beneath our house that lie.

In front of our small house are brown stone arches three; Behind it, the low porch where all the jasmine grows; Beyond it, red and green, the gay pomegranate tree; Around it, like love's arms, the summer and the rose.

Within it sat and wrote in minutes soft and few This worst and best of songs, one who loves it, and you.

THE QUEEN'S SONG

Had I the power To Midas given of old To touch a flower And leave the petals gold I then might touch thy face, Delightful boy, And leave a metal grace, A graven joy.

Thus would I slay,-- Ah, desperate device! The vital day That trembles in thine eyes, And let the red lips close Which sang so well, And drive away the rose To leave a shell.

Then I myself, Rising austere and dumb On the high shelf Of my half-lighted room, Would place the shining bust And wait alone, Until I was but dust, Buried unknown.

Thus in my love For nations yet unborn, I would remove From our two lives the morn, And muse on loveliness In mine arm-chair, Content should Time confess How sweet you were.

BRUMANA

Oh shall I never never be home again? Meadows of England shining in the rain Spread wide your daisied lawns: your ramparts green With briar fortify, with blossom screen Till my far morning--and O streams that slow And pure and deep through plains and playlands go, For me your love and all your kingcups store, And--dark militia of the southern shore, Old fragrant friends--preserve me the last lines Of that long saga which you sung me, pines, When, lonely boy, beneath the chosen tree I listened, with my eyes upon the sea.

O traitor pines, you sang what life has found The falsest of fair tales. Earth blew a far-horn prelude all around, That native music of her forest home, While from the sea's blue fields and syren dales Shadows and light noon-spectres of the foam Riding the summer gales On aery viols plucked an idle sound.

Hearing you sing, O trees, Hearing you murmur, "There are older seas, That beat on vaster sands, Where the wise snailfish move their pearly towers To carven rocks and sculptured promont'ries," Hearing you whisper, "Lands Where blaze the unimaginable flowers."

Beneath me in the valley waves the palm, Beneath, beyond the valley, breaks the sea; Beneath me sleep in mist and light and calm Cities of Lebanon, dream-shadow-dim, Where Kings of Tyre and Kings of Tyre did rule In ancient days in endless dynasty, And all around the snowy mountains swim Like mighty swans afloat in heaven's pool.

But I will walk upon the wooded hill Where stands a grove, O pines, of sister pines, And when the downy twilight droops her wing And no sea glimmers and no mountain shines My heart shall listen still. For pines are gossip pines the wide world through And full of runic tales to sigh or sing.

'Tis ever sweet through pine to see the sky Mantling a deeper gold or darker blue. 'Tis ever sweet to lie On the dry carpet of the needles brown, And though the fanciful green lizard stir And windy odours light as thistledown Breathe from the lavdanon and lavender, Half to forget the wandering and pain, Half to remember days that have gone by, And dream and dream that I am home again!

HYALI

Στὸ Γυαλὶ στὸ γαλἄζιο βρἄχο

Island in blue of summer floating on, Little brave sister of the Sporades, Hail and farewell! I pass, and thou art gone, So fast in fire the great boat beats the seas.

But slowly fade, soft Island! Ah to know Thy town and who the gossips of thy town, What flowers flash in thy meadows, what winds blow Across thy mountain when the sun goes down.

There is thy market, where the fisher throws His gleaming fish that gasp in the death-bright dawn: And there thy Prince's house, painted old rose, Beyond the olives, crowns its slope of lawn.

And is thy Prince so rich that he displays At festal board the flesh of sheep and kine? Or dare he--summer days are long hot days-- Load up with Asian snow his Coan wine?

Behind a rock, thy harbour, whence a noise Of tarry sponge-boats hammered lustily: And from that little rock thy naked boys Like burning arrows shower upon the sea.

And there by the old Greek chapel--there beneath A thousand poppies that each sea-wind stirs And cyclamen, as honied and white as death, Dwell deep in earth the elder islanders.

***

Thy name I know not, Island, but _his_ name I know, and why so proud thy mountain stands, And what thy happy secret, and Who came Drawing his painted galley up thy sands.

For my Gods--Trident Gods who deep and pale Swim in the Latmian Sound, have murmured thus: "To such an island came with a pompous sail On his first voyage young Herodotus."

Since then--tell me no tale how Romans built, Saracens plundered--or that bearded lords Rowed by to fight for Venice, and here spilt Their blood across the bay that keeps their swords.

That old Greek day was all thy history: For that did Ocean poise thee as a flower. Farewell: this boat attends not such as thee: Farewell: I was thy lover for an hour!

Farewell! But I who call upon thy caves Am far like thee,--like thee, unknown and poor. And yet my words are music as thy waves, And like thy rocks shall down through time endure.

THE GOLDEN JOURNEY TO SAMARKAND

PROLOGUE

We who with songs beguile your pilgrimage And swear that Beauty lives though lilies die, We Poets of the proud old lineage Who sing to find your hearts, we know not why,--

What shall we tell you? Tales, marvellous tales Of ships and stars and isles where good men rest, Where nevermore the rose of sunset pales, And winds and shadows fall toward the West:

And there the world's first huge white-bearded kings In dim glades sleeping, murmur in their sleep, And closer round their breasts the ivy clings, Cutting its pathway slow and red and deep.

And how beguile you? Death has no repose Warmer and deeper than that Orient sand Which hides the beauty and bright faith of those Who made the Golden Journey to Samarkand.

And now they wait and whiten peaceably, Those conquerors, those poets, those so fair: They know time comes, not only you and I, But the whole world shall whiten, here or there;

When those long caravans that cross the plain With dauntless feet and sound of silver bells Put forth no more for glory or for gain, Take no more solace from the palm-girt wells,

When the great markets by the sea shut fast All that calm Sunday that goes on and on: When even lovers find their peace at last, And Earth is but a star, that once had shone.

EPILOGUE

_At the Gate of the Sun, Bagdad, in olden time_

THE MERCHANTS (_together_)

Away, for we are ready to a man! Our camels sniff the evening and are glad. Lead on, O Master of the Caravan: Lead on the Merchant-Princes of Bagdad.

THE CHIEF DRAPER

Have we not Indian carpets dark as wine, Turbans and sashes, gowns and bows and veils, And broideries of intricate design, And printed hangings in enormous bales?

THE CHIEF GROCER

We have rose-candy, we have spikenard, Mastic and terebinth and oil and spice, And such sweet jams meticulously jarred As God's own Prophet eats in Paradise.

THE PRINCIPAL JEWS

And we have manuscripts in peacock styles By Ali of Damascus; we have swords Engraved with storks and apes and crocodiles, And heavy beaten necklaces, for Lords.

THE MASTER OF THE CARAVAN

But you are nothing but a lot of Jews.

THE PRINCIPAL JEWS

Sir, even dogs have daylight, and we pay.

THE MASTER OF THE CARAVAN