Part 2
O my companion, O my sister Sleep, The valley is all before us, bear me on. High through the heaven of evening, hardly gone, Beyond the harbour lights, beyond the steep, Beyond the land and its lost benison To where, majestic on the darkening deep, The night comes forward from Mount Aurion. O my companion, O my sister Sleep.
Above the surf-line, into the night-breeze; Eastward above the ever-whispering seas; Through the warm airs with no more watch to keep. My day’s run out and all its dooms are graven. O dear forerunner of Death and promise of Haven. O my companion, O my sister Sleep.
XXVII
Are you the end, Despair, or the poor least Of them that cast great shadows and are lies? That dread the simple and destroy the wise, Fail at the tomb and triumph at the feast? You were not found on Olivet, dull beast, Nor in Thebaid, when the night’s agonies Dissolved to glory on the effulgent east And Jesus Christ was in the morning skies.
You did not curb the indomitable crest Of Tzerna-Gora, when the Falcon-bred Screamed over the Adriatic, and their Lord Went riding out, much angrier than the rest, To summon at ban the living and the dead And break the Mahommedan with the repeated sword.
XXVIII
But oh! not Lovely Helen, nor the pride Of that most ancient Ilium matched with doom. Men murdered Priam in his royal room And Troy was burned with fire and Hector died. For even Hector’s dreadful day was more Than all his breathing courage dared defend The armouréd light and bulwark of the war Trailed his great story to the accustomed end.
He was the city’s buttress, Priam’s Son, The Soldier born in bivouac praises great And horns in double front of battle won. Yet down he went: when unremembering fate Felled him at last with all his armour on. Hector: the horseman: in the Scæan Gate.
XXIX
The world’s a stage. The light is in one’s eyes. The Auditorium is extremely dark. The more dishonest get the larger rise; The more offensive make the greater mark. The women on it prosper by their shape, Some few by their vivacity. The men, By tailoring in breeches and in cape. The world’s a stage--I say it once again.
The scenery is very much the best Of what the wretched drama has to show, Also the prompter happens to be dumb. We drink behind the scenes and pass a jest On all our folly; then, before we go Loud cries for “Author” ... but he doesn’t come.
XXX
The world’s a stage--and I’m the Super man, And no one seems responsible for salary. I roar my part as loudly as I can And all I mouth I mouth it to the gallery. I haven’t got another rhyme in “alery” It would have made a better job, no doubt If I had left attempt at Rhyming out, Like Alfred Tennyson adapting Malory.
The world’s a stage, the company of which Has very little talent and less reading: But many a waddling heathen painted bitch And many a standing cad of gutter breeding. We sweat to learn our book: for all our pains We pass. The Chucker-out alone remains.
XXXI
The world’s a stage. The trifling entrance fee Is paid (by proxy) to the registrar. The Orchestra is very loud and free But plays no music in particular. They do not print a programme, that I know. The caste is large. There isn’t any plot. The acting of the piece is far below The very worst of modernistic rot.
The only part about it I enjoy Is what was called in English the Foyay. There will I stand apart awhile and toy With thought, and set my cigarette alight; And then--without returning to the play-- On with my coat and out into the night.
II
LYRICAL, DIDACTIC AND GROTESQUE
TO DIVES
Dives, when you and I go down to Hell, Where scribblers end and millionaires as well, We shall be carrying on our separate backs Two very large but very different packs; And as you stagger under yours, my friend, Down the dull shore where all our journeys end, And go before me (as your rank demands) Towards the infinite flat underlands, And that dear river of forgetfulness-- Charon, a man of exquisite address (For, as your wife’s progenitors could tell, They’re very strict on etiquette in Hell), Will, since you are a lord, observe, “My lord, We cannot take these weighty things aboard!” Then down they go, my wretched Dives, down-- The fifteen sorts of boots you kept for town, The hat to meet the Devil in; the plain But costly ties; the cases of champagne; The solid watch, and seal, and chain, and charm; The working model of a Burning Farm (To give the little Belials); all the three Biscuits for Cerberus; the guarantee From Lambeth that the Rich can never burn, And even promising a safe return; The admirable overcoat, designed To cross Cocytus--very warmly lined: Sweet Dives, you will leave them all behind And enter Hell as tattered and as bare As was your father when he took the air Behind a barrow-load in Leicester Square. Then turned to me, and noting one that brings With careless step a mist of shadowy things: Laughter and memories, and a few regrets, Some honour, and a quantity of debts, A doubt or two of sorts, a trust in God, And (what will seem to you extremely odd) His father’s granfer’s father’s father’s name, Unspoilt, untitled, even spelt the same; Charon, who twenty thousand times before Has ferried Poets to the ulterior shore, Will estimate the weight I bear, and cry-- “Comrade!” (He has himself been known to try His hand at Latin and Italian verse, Much in the style of Virgil--only worse) “We let such vain imaginaries pass!” Then tell me, Dives, which will look the ass-- You, or myself? Or Charon? Who can tell? They order things so damnably in Hell.
STANZAS WRITTEN ON BATTERSEA BRIDGE DURING A SOUTH-WESTERLY GALE
The woods and downs have caught the mid-December, The noisy woods and high sea-downs of home; The wind has found me and I do remember The strong scent of the foam.
Woods, darlings of my wandering feet, another Possesses you, another treads the Down; The South West Wind that was my elder brother Has come to me in town.
The wind is shouting from the hills of morning, I do remember and I will not stay. I’ll take the Hampton road without a warning And get me clean away.
The Channel is up, the little seas are leaping, The tide is making over Arun Bar; And there’s my boat, where all the rest are sleeping And my companions are.
I’ll board her, and apparel her, and I’ll mount her, My boat, that was the strongest friend to me-- That brought my boyhood to its first encounter And taught me the wide sea.
Now shall I drive her, roaring hard a’ weather, Right for the salt and leave them all behind; We’ll quite forget the treacherous streets together And find--or shall we find?
There is no Pilotry my soul relies on Whereby to catch beneath my bended hand, Faint and beloved along the extreme horizon That unforgotten land.
We shall not round the granite piers and paven To lie to wharves we know with canvas furled. My little Boat, we shall not make the haven-- It is not of the world.
Somewhere of English forelands grandly guarded It stands, but not for exiles, marked and clean; Oh! not for us. A mist has risen and marred it:-- My youth lies in between.
So in this snare that holds me and appals me, Where honour hardly lives nor loves remain, The Sea compels me and my County calls me, But stronger things restrain.
* * * * *
England, to me that never have malingered, Nor spoken falsely, nor your flattery used, Nor even in my rightful garden lingered:-- What have you not refused?
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, Or 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 FANATIC
Last night in Compton Street, Soho, A man whom many of you know Gave up the ghost at half past nine. That evening he had been to dine At Gressington’s--an act unwise, But not the cause of his demise. The doctors all agree that he Was touched with cardiac atrophy Accelerated (more or less) By lack of proper food, distress, Uncleanliness, and loss of sleep. He was a man that could not keep His money (when he had the same) Because of creditors who came And took it from him; and he gave So freely that he could not save. But all the while a sort of whim Persistently remained with him, Half admirable, half absurd: To keep his word, to keep his word.... By which he did not mean what you And I would mean (of payments due Or punctual rental of the Flat-- He was a deal too mad for that) But--as he put it with a fine Abandon, foolish or divine-- But “That great word which every man Gave God before his life began.” It was a sacred word, he said, Which comforted the pathless dead And made God smile when it was shown Unforfeited, before the Throne. And this (he said) he meant to hold In spite of debt, and hate, and cold; And this (he said) he meant to show As passport to the Wards below. He boasted of it and gave praise To his own self through all his days. He wrote a record to preserve How steadfastly he did not swerve From keeping it; how stiff he stood Its guardian, and maintained it good. He had two witnesses to swear He kept it once in Berkeley Square. (Where hardly anything survives) And, through the loneliest of lives He kept it clean, he kept it still, Down to the last extremes of ill. So when he died, of many friends Who came in crowds from all the ends Of London, that it might be known They knew the man who died alone, Some, who had thought his mood sublime And sent him soup from time to time, Said, “Well, you cannot make them fit The world, and there’s an end of it!” But others, wondering at him, said: “The man that kept his word is dead!” Then angrily, a certain third Cried, “Gentlemen, he kept his word. And as a man whom beasts surround Tumultuous, on a little mound Stands Archer, for one dreadful hour, Because a Man is born to Power-- And still, to daunt the pack below, Twangs the clear purpose of his bow, Till overwhelmed he dares to fall: So stood this bulwark of us all. He kept his word as none but he Could keep it, and as did not we. And round him as he kept his word To-day’s diseased and faithless herd, A moment loud, a moment strong, But foul forever, rolled along.”
THE EARLY MORNING
The moon on the one hand, the dawn on the other: The moon is my sister, the dawn is my brother. The moon on my left and the dawn on my right. My brother, good morning: my sister, good night.
OUR LORD AND OUR LADY
They warned Our Lady for the Child That was Our blessed Lord, And She took Him into the desert wild, Over the camel’s ford.
And a long song She sang to Him And a short story told: And She wrapped Him in a woollen cloak To keep Him from the cold.
But when Our Lord was grown a man The Rich they dragged Him down, And they crucified Him in Golgotha, Out and beyond the Town.
They crucified Him on Calvary, Upon an April day; And because He had been her little Son She followed Him all the way.
Our Lady stood beside the Cross, A little space apart, And when She heard Our Lord cry out A sword went through Her Heart.
They laid Our Lord in a marble tomb, Dead, in a winding sheet. But Our Lady stands above the world With the white Moon at Her feet.
COURTESY
Of Courtesy, it is much less Than Courage of Heart or Holiness, Yet in my Walks it seems to me That the Grace of God is in Courtesy.
On Monks I did in Storrington fall, They took me straight into their Hall; I saw Three Pictures on a wall, And Courtesy was in them all.
The first the Annunciation; The second the Visitation; The third the Consolation, Of God that was Our Lady’s Son.
The first was of Saint Gabriel; On Wings a-flame from Heaven he fell; And as he went upon one knee He shone with Heavenly Courtesy.
Our Lady out of Nazareth rode-- It was Her month of heavy load; Yet was Her face both great and kind, For Courtesy was in Her Mind.
The third it was our Little Lord, Whom all the Kings in arms adored; He was so small you could not see His large intent of Courtesy.
Our Lord, that was Our Lady’s Son, Go bless you, People, one by one; My Rhyme is written, my work is done.
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 chaunt the dead day’s requiem Make in my ears, who wakeful lie, Soft lullaby.
Let them that guard the horned moon By my bedside their memories croon. 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.
THE LEADER
The sword fell down: I heard a knell; I thought that ease was best, And sullen men that buy and sell Were host: and I was guest. All unashamed I sat with swine, We shook the dice for war, The night was drunk with an evil wine-- But she went on before.
_She rode a steed of the sea-foam breed,_ _All faery was her blade,_ _And the armour on her tender limbs_ _Was of the moonshine made._
By God that sends the master-maids, I know not whence she came, But the sword she bore to save the soul Went up like an altar flame Where a broken race in a desert place Call on the Holy Name.
_We strained our eyes in the dim day-rise,_ _We could not see them plain;_ _But two dead men from Valmy fen_ _Rode at her bridle-rein._
I hear them all, my fathers call, I see them how they ride, And where had been that rout obscene Was an army straight with pride. A hundred thousand marching men, Of squadrons twenty score, And after them all the guns, the guns, But she went on before.
_Her face was like a king’s command_ _When all the swords are drawn._ _She stretched her arms and smiled at us,_ _Her head was higher than the hills._ _She led us to the endless plains._ _We lost her in the dawn._
A BIVOUAC
I
You came without a human sound, You came and brought my soul to me; I only woke, and all around They slumbered on the firelit ground, Beside the guns in Burgundy.
II
I felt the gesture of your hands, You signed my forehead with the Cross; The gesture of your holy hands Was bounteous--like the misty lands Along the Hills in Calvados.
III
But when I slept I saw your eyes, Hungry as death, and very far. I saw demand in your dim eyes Mysterious as the moons that rise At midnight, in the Pines of Var.
TO THE BALLIOL MEN STILL IN AFRICA
Years ago when I was at Balliol, Balliol men--and I was one-- Swam together in winter rivers, Wrestled together under the sun. And still in the heart of us, Balliol, Balliol, Loved already, but hardly known, Welded us each of us into the others: Called a levy and chose her own.
Here is a House that armours a man With the eyes of a boy and the heart of a ranger, And a laughing way in the teeth of the world And a holy hunger and thirst for danger: Balliol made me, Balliol fed me, Whatever I had she gave me again: And the best of Balliol loved and led me. God be with you, Balliol men.
I have said it before, and I say it again, There was treason done, and a false word spoken, And England under the dregs of men, And bribes about, and a treaty broken: But angry, lonely, hating it still, I wished to be there in spite of the wrong. My heart was heavy for Cumnor Hill And the hammer of galloping all day long.
Galloping outward into the weather, Hands a-ready and battle in all: Words together and wine together And song together in Balliol Hall. Rare and single! Noble and few!... Oh! they have wasted you over the sea! The only brothers ever I knew, The men that laughed and quarrelled with me.
* * * * *
Balliol made me, Balliol fed me, Whatever I had she gave me again; And the best of Balliol loved and led me, God be with you, Balliol men.
VERSES TO A LORD WHO, IN THE HOUSE OF LORDS, SAID THAT THOSE WHO OPPOSED THE SOUTH AFRICAN ADVENTURE CONFUSED SOLDIERS WITH MONEY-GRUBBERS
You thought because we held, my lord, An ancient cause and strong, That therefore we maligned the sword: My lord, you did us wrong.
We also know the sacred height Up on Tugela side, Where those three hundred fought with Beit And fair young Wernher died.
The daybreak on the failing force, The final sabres drawn: Tall Goltman, silent on his horse, Superb against the dawn.
The little mound where Eckstein stood And gallant Albu fell, And Oppenheim, half blind with blood Went fording through the rising flood-- My Lord, we know them well.
The little empty homes forlorn, The ruined synagogues that mourn, In Frankfort and Berlin; We knew them when the peace was torn-- We of a nobler lineage born-- And now by all the gods of scorn We mean to rub them in.
THE REBEL
There is a wall of which the stones Are lies and bribes and dead men’s bones. And wrongfully this evil wall Denies what all men made for all, And shamelessly this wall surrounds Our homesteads and our native grounds.
But I will gather and I will ride, And I will summon a countryside, And many a man shall hear my halloa Who never had thought the horn to follow; And many a man shall ride with me Who never had thought on earth to see High Justice in her armoury.
When we find them where they stand, A mile of men on either hand, I mean to charge from right away And force the flanks of their array, And press them inward from the plains, And drive them clamouring down the lanes, And gallop and harry and have them down, And carry the gates and hold the town. Then shall I rest me from my ride With my great anger satisfied.
Only, before I eat and drink, When I have killed them all, I think That I will batter their carven names, And slit the pictures in their frames, And burn for scent their cedar door, And melt the gold their women wore, And hack their horses at the knees, And hew to death their timber trees, And plough their gardens deep and through-- And all these things I mean to do For fear perhaps my little son Should break his hands, as I have done.
THE PROPHET LOST IN THE HILLS AT EVENING
Strong God which made the topmost stars To circulate and keep their course, Remember me; whom all the bars Of sense and dreadful fate enforce.
Above me in your heights and tall, Impassable the summits freeze, Below the haunted waters call Impassable beyond the trees.
I hunger and I have no bread. My gourd is empty of the wine. Surely the footsteps of the dead Are shuffling softly close to mine!
It darkens. I have lost the ford. There is a change on all things made. The rocks have evil faces, Lord, And I am awfully afraid.
Remember me: the Voids of Hell Expand enormous all around. Strong friend of souls, Emmanuel, Redeem me from accursed ground.
The long descent of wasted days, To these at last have led me down; Remember that I filled with praise The meaningless and doubtful ways That lead to an eternal town.
I challenged and I kept the Faith, The bleeding path alone I trod; It darkens. Stand about my wraith, And harbour me--almighty God.
THE END OF THE ROAD