Chapter 2

I have no hope to make you live in rhyme Or with your beauty to enrich the years-- Enough for me this now, this present time; The greater claim for greater sonneteers. But O how covetous I am of NOW-- Dear human minutes, marred by human pains-- I want to know your lips, your cheek, your brow, And all the miracles your heart contains. I wish to study all your changing face, Your eyes, divinely hurt with tenderness; I hope to win your dear unstinted grace For these blunt rhymes and what they would express. Then may you say, when others better prove:-- "_Theirs for their style I'll read, his for his love._"

II

When all my trivial rhymes are blotted out, Vanished our days, so precious and so few, If some should wonder what we were about And what the little happenings we knew: I wish that they might know how, night by night, My pencil, heavy in the sleepy hours, Sought vainly for some gracious way to write How much this love is ours, and only ours. How many evenings, as you drowsed to sleep, I read to you by tawny candle-glow, And watched you down the valley dim and deep Where poppies and the April flowers grow. Then knelt beside your pillow with a prayer, And loved the breath of pansies in your hair.

PEDOMETER

My thoughts beat out in sonnets while I walk, And every evening on the homeward street I find the rhythm of my marching feet Throbs into verses (though the rhyme may balk.) I think the sonneteers were walking men: The form is dour and rigid, like a clamp, But with the swing of legs the tramp, tramp, tramp Of syllables begins to thud, and then-- Lo! while you seek a rhyme for _hook_ or _crook_ Vanished your shabby coat, and you are kith To all great walk-and-singers--Meredith, And Shakespeare, Wordsworth, Keats, and Rupert Brooke! Free verse is poor for walking, but a sonnet-- O marvellous to stride and brood upon it!

ARS DURA

How many evenings, walking soberly Along our street all dappled with rich sun, I please myself with words, and happily Time rhymes to footfalls, planning how they run; And yet, when midnight comes, and paper lies Clean, white, receptive, all that one can ask, Alas for drowsy spirit, weary eyes And traitor hand that fails the well loved task!

Who ever learned the sonnet's bitter craft But he had put away his sleep, his ease, The wine he loved, the men with whom he laughed, To brood upon such thankless tricks as these? And yet, such joy does in that craft abide He greets the paper as the groom the bride!

O. HENRY--APOTHECARY

"O. Henry" once worked in a drug-store in Greensboro, N. C.

Where once he measured camphor, glycerine, Quinine and potash, peppermint in bars, And all the oils and essences so keen That druggists keep in rows of stoppered jars-- Now, blender of strange drugs more volatile, The master pharmacist of joy and pain Dispenses sadness tinctured with a smile And laughter that dissolves in tears again.

O brave apothecary! You who knew What dark and acid doses life prefers, And yet with friendly face resolved to brew These sparkling potions for your customers-- In each prescription your Physician writ You poured your rich compassion and your wit!

FOR THE CENTENARY OF KEATS'S SONNET (1816)

"On First Looking Into Chapman's Homer."

I knew a scientist, an engineer, Student of tensile strengths and calculus, A man who loved a cantilever truss And always wore a pencil on his ear. My friend believed that poets all were queer, And literary folk ridiculous; But one night, when it chanced that three of us Were reading Keats aloud, he stopped to hear.

Lo, a new planet swam into his ken! His eager mind reached for it and took hold. Ten years are by: I see him now and then, And at alumni dinners, if cajoled, He mumbles gravely, to the cheering men:-- _Much have I travelled in the realms of gold_.

TWO O'CLOCK

Night after night goes by: and clocks still chime And stars are changing patterns in the dark, And watches tick, and over-puissant Time Benumbs the eager brain. The dogs that bark, The trains that roar and rattle in the night, The very cats that prowl, all quiet find And leave the darkness empty, silent quite: Sleep comes to chloroform the fretting mind.

So all things end: and what is left at last? Some scribbled sonnets tossed upon the floor, A memory of easy days gone past, A run-down watch, a pipe, some clothes we wore-- And in the darkened room I lean to know How warm her dreamless breath does pause and flow.

THE COMMERCIAL TRAVELLER

Ah very sweet! If news should come to you Some afternoon, while waiting for our eve, That the great Manager had made me leave To travel on some territory new; And that, whatever homeward winds there blew, I could not touch your hand again, nor heave The logs upon our hearth and bid you weave Some wistful tale before the flames that grew....

Then, when the sudden tears had ceased to blind Your pansied eyes, I wonder if you could Remember rightly, and forget aright? Remember just your lad, uncouthly good, Forgetting when he failed in spleen or spite? Could you remember him as always kind?

THE WEDDED LOVER

I read in our old journals of the days When our first love was April-sweet and new, How fair it blossomed and deep-rooted grew Despite the adverse time; and our amaze At moon and stars and beauty beyond praise That burgeoned all about us: gold and blue The heaven arched us in, and all we knew Was gentleness. We walked on happy ways.

They said by now the path would be more steep, The sunsets paler and less mild the air; Rightly we heeded not: it was not true. We will not tell the secret--let it keep. I know not how I thought those days so fair These being so much fairer, spent with you.

TO YOU, REMEMBERING THE PAST

When we were parted, sweet, and darkness came, I used to strike a match, and hold the flame Before your picture; and would breathless mark The answering glimmer of the tiny spark That brought to life the magic of your eyes, Their wistful tenderness, their glad surprise.

Holding that mimic torch before your shrine I used to light your eyes and make them mine; Watch them like stars set in a lonely sky, Whisper my heart out, yearning for reply; Summon your lips from far across the sea Bidding them live a twilight hour with me.

Then, when the match was shrivelled into gloom, Lo--you were with me in the darkened room.

THE LAST SONNET

Suppose one knew that never more might one Put pen to sonnet, well loved task; that now These fourteen lines were all he could allow To say his message, be forever done; How he would scan the word, the line, the rhyme, Intent to sum in dearly chosen phrase The windy trees, the beauty of his days, Life's pride and pathos in one verse sublime. How bitter then would be regret and pang For former rhymes he dallied to refine, For every verse that was not crystalline.... And if belike this last one feebly rang, Honour and pride would cast it to the floor Facing the judge with what was done before.

THE WAR

IRONY

Anton Lang, the _Christus_ of Oberammergau, has not been called upon to fight in the German army. NEWS ITEM.

So War hath still some ruth? some sense of shame? The Crown of Thorns hath reverence even now? For when the summons to that village came, They spared the Christ of Oberammergau.

Enlist the actors of that sacred mime-- Paul, Peter, Pilate--Judas too, I trow; Spurn Christ of Galilee, but (O sublime!) Revere the Christ of Oberammergau.

TO A FRENCH BABY

Marcel Gaillard, Baby number 6 in _Life's_ fund for French war-orphans

What unsaid messages arise Behind your clear and wondering eyes, O grave and tiny citizen? And who, of wise and valiant men, Can answer those mute questionings? I think the captains and the kings Might well kneel in humility Before you on your mother's knee, As knelt, beside a stable door, Other great men, long before.

In you, poor little lad, one sees All children and all mothers' knees: All voices inarticulate That cry against the hymns of hate; All homes, by Thames or Rhine or Seine, Where cradles will not rock again.

AFTER HEARING GERMAN MUSIC

What pang of beauty is in all these songs, Flooding the heart with painful bliss within-- Was this the folk to which Von Kluck belongs, The land of poison gas and Zeppelin?

Most gifted race the world has ever known, Now bleeding in the dust of rank despairs,-- Was it for this men builded at Cologne, Kant wrote at midnight, Schumann dreamed his airs?

IN MEMORY OF THE AMERICAN AVIATORS KILLED IN FRANCE

Not at their own dear country's call, But answering another voice, They gave to Liberty their all, Nor faltered in the choice.

Their young and ardent hearts were coined Into a golden seal for France; Above their graves two flags are joined; They lie beyond mischance.

And we, remembering whence came Our Goddess where the sea-tide runs, Nobly acquit the noble claim France has upon our sons.

Who dies for France, for us he dies, For all that gentle is and fair: God prosper, in those shell-torn skies, Our chivalry of air.

THE FLAGS ON FIFTH AVENUE

Above the stately roofs, wind-lifted, high, A lane of vivid colour in the sky, They ripple cleanly, seen of every eye.

This is your flag: none other: yours alone: Yours then to honour: and where it is flown By your devotion let your heart be known.

Feeble the man who dare not bow the knee Before some symbol greater far than he-- This is no pomp and no idolatry.

Emblem of youth, and hope, and strength held true By honour, and by wise forbearance, too-- God bless the flags along the Avenue!

"THEY"

Whoso has gift of simple speech Of measured words and plain, To him be given it to teach The sadness of Lorraine.

She asked but sun and rain to bless Her blue enfolding hills, And time, to heal the old distress Of dim-remembered ills.

The fields, the vineyards and the lathe, The river, loved so well-- O sunset pools and lads that bathe Along the green Moselle.

One whispered word--curt, bitter, brief, Lives now in black Lorraine, One word that sums her whole of grief-- Dead children, women slain.

The cure's blood that stained the road, The village burned away, The needless horrors men abode Are all in one word--_they_.

BALLAD OF FRENCH RIVERS

Of streams that men take honour in The Frenchman looks to three, And each one has for origin The hills of Burgundy; And each has known the quivers Of blood and tears and pain-- O gallant bleeding rivers, The Marne, the Meuse, the Aisne.

Says Marne: "My poplar fringes Have felt the Prussian tread, The blood of brave men tinges My banks with lasting red; Let others ask due credit, But France has me to thank; Von Kluck himself has said it:-- I turned the Boche's flank!"

Says Meuse: "I claim no winning, No glory on the stage, Save that, in the beginning I strove to save Liege. Alas that Frankish rivers Should share such shame as mine-- In spite of all endeavours I flow to join the Rhine!"

Says Aisne: "My silver shallows Are salter than the sea, The woe of Rheims still hallows My endless tragedy. Of rivers rich in story That run through green Champagne, In agony and glory The chief am I, the Aisne!"

Now there are greater waters That Frenchmen all hold dear-- The Rhone, with many daughters, That runs so icy clear; There's Moselle, deep and winy, There's Loire, Garonne and Seine, But O the valiant tiny-- The Marne, the Meuse, the Aisne!

PEASANT AND KING

What the Peasants of Europe Are Thinking

You who put faith in your banks and brigades, Drank and ate largely, slept easy at night, Hoarded your lyddite and polished the blades, Let down upon us this blistering blight-- You who played grandly the easiest game, Now can you shoulder the weight of the same? Say, can _you_ fight?

Here is the tragedy: losing or winning Who profits a copper? Who garners the fruit? From bloodiest ending to futile beginning Ours is the blood, and the sorrow to boot. Muster your music, flutter your flags, Ours are the hunger, the wounds, and the rags. Say, can _you_ shoot?

Down in the muck and despair of the trenches Comes not the moment of bitterest need; Over the sweat and the groans and the stenches There is a joy in the valorous deed-- But, lying wounded, what one forgets You and your ribbons and d----d epaulettes-- Say, do _you_ bleed?

This is _your_ game: it was none of our choosing-- We are the pawns with whom you have played. Yours is the winning and ours is the losing, But, when the penalties have to be paid, We who are left, and our womenfolk, too, Rulers of Europe, will settle with you-- You, and your trade. _October_, 1914.

TILL TWISTON WENT

Till Twiston went, the war still seemed A far-off thing: a nightmare dreamed, Some bruit or fable half-believed, Too hideous to be conceived.

His letter came: the memories throng Of days that made the friendship strong-- The oar he won, the ties he wore, His love of china, fairy lore, (And flappers); and his honest eyes; His stammer, his absurdities; His marmalade, his bitter beer, And all that made him quaint and dear.

And though we muckle have to do Yet love must needs come breaking through, And now and then the office hum Dies like a mist, ... and there will come An Oxford breakfast scene: the quad All blue and grey outside--O God-- And there sits Twiston at the feast Proclaiming he will be a priest! I see his eyes, his homely neb-- Ring, telephones, and cut the web!

And when it's over, will there be In his grey house above the Dee A mug to drain? Will we renew The dreams of all we hoped to do? Our Cotswold tramps? And will there still Be flappers in the surf at Rhyl? O how I counted on the hour When he would see the Woolworth Tower, And how we set our hearts upon The steep grey walls of Carcassonne!

TO RUDYARD KIPLING

For His Fiftieth Birthday (December 30, 1915)

Lord of our noble English tongue, Who holdest seizin of our speech, Whose epic Mowgli first did reach The valves of all our hearts when young--

Master of every grace and ire, Wide as the salt-winged fulmar gulls That circle England's battle hulls, Your songs have fanned the Imperial fire.

By Oak and Ash and Thorns, by all Old memories of Sussex sod, To you we pile the altar clod And ask a new Recessional.

TO A U-BOAT

With Apologies to William Blake

Tiger, tiger of the seas, King of scarlet butcheries, What infernal hand and eye Planned your dread machinery?

Men of Hamburg, Bremen, Kiel, Watch the gauge and turn the wheel, Proud, perhaps, to have defiled Oceans, to destroy a child.

With your thunderbolt you strike Cargo, women, all alike-- Stain with red God's clean green sea, Call it "naval victory."

U-boat, U-boat, as you grope With your half-blind periscope, Lo, your hateful trail we mark, Send you to your kin, the shark!

KITCHENER

No man in England slept, the night he died: The harsh, stern spirit passed without a pang, And freed of mortal clogs his message rang. In every wakeful mind the challenge cried: _Think not of me: one servant less or more Means nothing now: hold fast the greater thing-- Strike hard, love truth, serve England and the King!_

Servant of England, soldier to the core, What does it matter where his body fall? What does it matter where they build the tomb? Five million men, from Calais to Khartoum, These are his wreath and his memorial.

MARCH 1915

_Pussy willow, pussy willow Do you bloom in Belgium now?_

Tiny furry little catkins Where the Meuse runs green and clear, Do the children run to pick you In this springtime of the year? Do they stroke you and caress you Kiss the silky balls of fur, Take you to the priest to bless you And pretend to hear you purr? Do their small hot fingers wilt you? (Sweethearts, you remember how--)

_Pussy willow, pussy willow, Do you bloom in Belgium now?_

DEAD SHIPS

We are not sudden haters; but by dint Of many horrors all our hearts are quick. We are not ready writers, with the trick Of rhyming just to see our words in print. Nor are we fast forgetters: there remain Bitter and shameful in our memory Old murders that made horrible the sea And tinged clean water with a red, red stain. _Titanic_: she went down for love of speed; The _Eastland_--curse her!--just for dirty greed; But there are ships whose names are yet more rank. The years have passed, but still our hearts are sick To think of the cool cruelty that sank The _Lusitania_ and the _Arabic_.

ENGLAND, JULY 1913

To Rupert Brooke

O England, England ... that July How placidly the days went by!

Two years ago (how long it seems) In that dear England of my dreams I loved and smoked and laughed amain And rode to Cambridge in the rain. A careless godlike life was there! To spin the roads with _Shotover_, To dream while punting on the Cam, To lie, and never give a damn For anything but comradeship And books to read and ale to sip, And shandygaff at every inn When _The Gorilla_ rode to Lynn! O world of wheel and pipe and oar In those old days before the War. O poignant echoes of that time! I hear the Oxford towers chime, The throbbing of those mellow bells And all the sweet old English smells-- The Deben water, quick with salt, The Woodbridge brew-house and the malt; The Suffolk villages, serene With lads at cricket on the green, And Wytham strawberries, so ripe, And _Murray's Mixture_ in my pipe!

In those dear days, in those dear days, All pleasant lay the country ways; The echoes of our stalwart mirth Went echoing wide around the earth And in an endless bliss of sun We lay and watched the river run. And you by Cam and I by Isis Were happy with our own devices.

Ah, can we ever know again Such friends as were those chosen men, Such men to drink, to bike, to smoke with, To worship with, or lie and joke with? Never again, my lads, we'll see The life we led at twenty-three. Never again, perhaps, shall I Go flashing bravely down the High To see, in that transcendent hour, The sunset glow on Magdalen Tower.

Dear Rupert Brooke, your words recall Those endless afternoons, and all Your Cambridge--which I loved as one Who was her grandson, not her son. O ripples where the river slacks In greening eddies round the "backs"; Where men have dreamed such gallant things Under the old stone bridge at _King's_, Or leaned to feed the silver swans By the tennis meads at _John's_. O Granta's water, cold and fresh, Kissing the warm and eager flesh Under the willow's breathing stir-- The bathing pool at _Grantchester_.... What words can tell, what words can praise The burly savour of those days!

Dear singing lad, those days are dead And gone for aye your golden head; And many other well-loved men Will never dine in Hall again. I too have lived remembered hours In Cambridge; heard the summer showers Make music on old _Heffer's_ pane While I was reading Pepys or Taine. Through _Trumpington_ and _Grantchester_ I used to roll on _Shotover_; At _Hauxton Bridge_ my lamp would light And sleep in _Royston_, for the night. Or to _Five Miles from Anywhere_ I used to scull; and sit and swear While wasps attacked my bread and jam Those summer evenings on the Cam. (O crispy English cottage-loaves Baked in ovens, not in stoves! O white unsalted English butter O satisfaction none can utter!) ...

To think that while those joys I knew In Cambridge, I did not know you. _July_ 1915.

TO THE OXFORD MEN IN THE WAR

Often, on afternoons grey and sombre, When clouds lie low and dark with rain, A random bell strikes a chord familiar And I hear the Oxford chimes again. Never I see a swift stream running Cold and full from shore to shore, But I think of Isis, and remember The leaping boat and the throbbing oar.

O my brothers, my more than brothers-- Lost and gone are those days indeed: Where are the bells, the gowns, the voices, All that made us one blood and breed? Gone--and in many an unknown pitfall You have swinked, and died like men-- And here I sit in a quiet chamber Writing on paper with a pen.

O my brothers, my more than brothers-- Big, intolerant, gallant boys! Going to war as into a boatrace, Full of laughter and fond of noise! I can imagine your smile: how eager, Nervous for the suspense to be done-- And I remember the Iffley meadows, The crew alert for the starting gun.

Old grey city, O dear grey city, How young we were, and how close to Truth! We envied no one, we hated no one, All was magical to our youth. Still, in the hall of the Triple Roses, The cannel casts its ruddy span, And still the garden gate discloses The message _Manners Makyth Man_.

Then I recall that an Oxford college, Setting a stone for those who have died, Nobly remembered all her children-- Even those on the German side. That was Oxford! and that was England! Fight your enemy, fight him square; But in justice, honour, and pity Even the enemy has his share. _November_ 1916.

FOR THE PRESENT TIME

"If the trumpet speak with an uncertain sound, Who shall prepare himself for the battle?"

In all this time of agony How does this mighty nation drift: Our blood is red upon the sea, The foe is merciless and swift. We doubt, we sway, And day by day Our hearts are thicker with distrust.... We would, should, could, can, may--we must!

So many divers voices call, And cloud our souls with dull dismay: O when shall cry, clear over all, The Voice that none can disobey? My country, speak! In no oblique Uncertain tone; be this our cry: If Honour is not ours, we die.

My country, speak! They lie who say That we are soft with love of home; For still, in all the ancient way, Our ships shall kiss the perilled foam. Yea, slow to wrath, But lo, our path Leads straight at last, and blithe to tread: We shall live better, having bled. _March_ 1917.

AMERICA, 1917

Dynamo of strength uncurbed, Boundless might, undisciplined; Energies still undisturbed, Power, unharnessed as the wind--