Part 4

Beauty and Love are sisters of the heart, Love has no voice, and Beauty whispered song. Now in my own, drawn silently apart Love looked, and Beauty sang. I felt a strong Pulse on my wrist, a feeling like a pain In my quick heart, for Love with gazes long Was worshipping at Artemis, now lain Among the heaving flowers ... I longed to dart And fold her to my breast, nor saw the wrong. She lay there, a tall beauty by her spear, Her kirtle falling to her soft round knee. Her hair was like the day when evening's near, And her moist mouth might tempt the golden bee. Smile's creases ran from dimples pink and deep, And when she raised her arms I loved to see The white mounds of her muscles. Gentle sleep Threatened her far blue looks. The noisy weir Fell into a low murmuring lullaby. And then the flowers came back behind the heel Of hunted Io: she, poor maid, had fear Wide in her eyes looking half back to steal A glimpse of the loud gadfly fiercely near. In her right hand she held Planting light, And in her left her train. Artemis here Raised herself on her palms, and took a white Horn from her side and blew a silver peal Til three hounds from the coppice did appear.

The white nine left the spaces of flowers, and now Went calling thro' the wood the hunter's call. Young echoes sleeping in the hollow bough Took up the shouts and handed them to all Their sisters of the crags, 'til all the day Was filled with voices loud and musical. I followed them across a tangled way 'Til the red deer broke out and took the brow Of a wide hill in bounces like a ball. Beside swift Artemis I joined the chase; We roused up kine and scattered fleecy flocks; Crossed at a mill a swift and bubbly race; Scaled in a wood of pine the knotty rocks; Past a grey vision of a valley town; Past swains at labour in their coloured frocks; Once saw a boar upon a windy down; Once heard a cradle in a lonely place, And saw the red flash of a frightened fox.

We passed a garden where three maids in blue Were talking of a queen a long time dead. We caught a green glimpse of the sea: then thro' A town all hills; now round a wood we sped And killed our quarry in his native lair. Then Artemis spun round to me and said, "Whence come you?" and I took her long damp hair And made a ball of it, and said, "Where you Are midnight's dreams of love." She dropped her head, No word she spoke, but, panting in her side, I heard her heart. The trees were all at peace, And lifting slowly on the grey evetide A large and lovely star. Then to release Her hair, my hand dropped to her girded waist And lay there shyly. "O my love, the lease Of your existence is for ever: taste No less with me the love of earth," I cried. "Though for so short a while on lands and seas Our mortal hearts know beauty, and overblow, And we are dust upon some passing wind, Dust and a memory. But for you the snow That so long cloaks the mountains to the knees Is no more than a morning. It doth go And summer comes, and leaf upon the trees: Still you are fair and young, and nothing find In all man's story that seems long ago. I have not loved on Earth the strife for gold, Nor the great name that makes immortal man, But all that struggle upward to behold What still is left of Beauty undisgraced, The snowdrop at the heel of winter cold And shivering, and the wayward cuckoo chased By lingering March, and, in the thunder's van The poor lambs merry on the meagre wold, By-ways and cast-off things that lie therein, Old boots that trod the highways of the world, The schoolboy's broken hoop, the battered bin That heard the ragman's story, blackened places Where gipsies camped and circuses made din, Fast water and the melancholy traces Of sea tides, and poor people madly whirled Up, down, and through the black retreats of sin. These things a god might love, and stooping bless With benedictions of eternal song.-- But I have not loved Artemis the less For loving these, but deem it noble love To sing of live or dead things in distress And wake memorial memories above.

Such is the soul that comes to plead with you Oh, Artemis, to tend you in your needs. At mornings I will bring you bells of dew From honey places, and wild fish from, streams Flowing in secret places. I will brew Sweet wine of alder for your evening dreams, And pipe you music in the dusky reeds When the four distances give up their blue.

And when the white procession of the stars Crosses the night, and on their tattered wings, Above the forest, cry the loud night-jars, We'll hunt the stag upon the mountain-side, Slipping like light between the shadow bars 'Til burst of dawn makes every distance wide. Oh, Artemis--what grief the silence brings! I hear the rolling chariot of Mars!"

A LITTLE BOY IN THE MORNING

He will not come, and still I wait. He whistles at another gate Where angels listen. Ah, I know He will not come, yet if I go How shall I know he did not pass Barefooted in the flowery grass?

The moon leans on one silver horn Above the silhouettes of morn, And from their nest sills finches whistle Or stooping pluck the downy thistle. How is the morn so gay and fair Without his whistling in its air? The world is calling, I must go. How shall I know he did not pass Barefooted in the shining grass?

IN BARRACKS

TO A DISTANT ONE

Through wild by-ways I come to you, my love, Nor ask of those I meet the surest way, What way I turn I cannot go astray And miss you in my life. Though Fate may prove A tardy guide she will not make delay Leading me through strange seas and distant lands, I'm coming still, though slowly, to your hands. We'll meet one day.

There is so much to do, so little done, In my life's space that I perforce did leave Love at the moonlit trysting-place to grieve Till fame and other little things were won. I have missed much that I shall not retrieve, Far will I wander yet with much to do. Much will I spurn before I yet meet you, So fair I can't deceive.

Your name is in the whisper of the woods Like Beauty calling for a poet's song To one whose harp had suffered many a wrong In the lean hands of Pain. And when the broods Of flower eyes waken all the streams along In tender whiles, I feel most near to you:-- Oh, when we meet there shall be sun and blue Strong as the spring is strong.

THE PLACE

Blossoms as old as May I scatter here, And a blue wave I lifted from the stream. It shall not know when winter days are drear Or March is hoarse with blowing. But a-dream The laurel boughs shall hold a canopy Peacefully over it the winter long, Till all the birds are back from oversea, And April rainbows win a blackbird's song.

And when the war is over I shall take My lute a-down to it and sing again Songs of the whispering things amongst the brake, And those I love shall know them by their strain. Their airs shall be the blackbird's twilight song, Their words shall be all flowers with fresh dews hoar.-- But it is lonely now in winter long, And, God! to hear the blackbird sing once more.

MAY

She leans across an orchard gate somewhere, Bending from out the shadows to the light, A dappled spray of blossom in her hair Studded with dew-drops lovely from the night She smiles to think how many hearts she'll smite With beauty ere her robes fade from the lawn. She hears the robin's cymbals with delight, The skylark in the rosebush of the dawn.

For her the cowslip rings its yellow bell, For her the violets watch with wide blue eyes. The wandering cuckoo doth its clear name tell Thro' the white mist of blossoms where she lies Painting a sunset for the western skies. You'd know her by her smile and by her tear And by the way the swift and martin flies, Where she is south of these wild days and drear.

TO EILISH OF THE FAIR HAIR

I'd make my heart a harp to play for you Love songs within the evening dim of day, Were it not dumb with ache and with mildew Of sorrow withered like a flower away. It hears so many calls from homeland places, So many sighs from all it will remember, From the pale roads and woodlands where your face is Like laughing sunlight running thro' December.

But this it singeth loud above its pain, To bring the greater ache: whate'er befall The love that oft-times woke the sweeter strain Shall turn to you always. And should you call To pity it some day in those old places Angels will covet the loud joy that fills it. But thinking of the by-ways where your face is Sunlight on other hearts--Ah! how it kills it.

IN CAMP

CREWBAWN

White clouds that change and pass, And stars that shine awhile, Dew water on the grass, A fox upon a stile.

A river broad and deep, A slow boat on the waves, My sad thoughts on the sleep That hollows out the graves.

EVENING IN ENGLAND

From its blue vase the rose of evening drops. Upon the streams its petals float away. The hills all blue with distance hide their tops In the dim silence falling on the grey. A little wind said "Hush!" and shook a spray Heavy with May's white crop of opening bloom, A silent bat went dipping up the gloom.

Night tells her rosary of stars full soon, They drop from out her dark hand to her knees. Upon a silhouette of woods the moon Leans on one horn as if beseeching ease From all her changes which have stirred the seas. Across the ears of Toil Rest throws her veil, I and a marsh bird only make a wail.

AT SEA

CROCKNAHARNA

On the heights of Crocknaharna, (Oh, the lure of Crocknaharna) On a morning fair and early Of a dear remembered May, There I heard a colleen singing In the brown rocks and the grey. She, the pearl of Crocknaharna, Crocknaharna, Crocknaharna, Wild with girls is Crocknaharna Twenty hundred miles away.

On the heights of Crocknaharna, (Oh, thy sorrow Crocknaharna) On an evening dim and misty Of a cold November day, There I heard a woman weeping In the brown rocks and the grey. Oh, the pearl of Crocknaharna (Crocknaharna, Crocknaharna), Black with grief is Crocknaharna Twenty hundred miles away.

IN THE MEDITERRANEAN--GOING TO THE WAR

Lovely wings of gold and green Flit about the sounds I hear, On my window when I lean To the shadows cool and clear.

* * * * *

Roaming, I am listening still, Bending, listening overlong, In my soul a steadier will, In my heart a newer song.

THE GARDENER

Among the flowers, like flowers, her slow hands move Easing a muffled bell or stooping low To help sweet roses climb the stakes above, Where pansies stare and seem to whisper "Lo!" Like gaudy butterflies her sweet peas blow Filling the garden with dim rustlings. Clear On the sweet Book she reads how long ago There was a garden to a woman dear.

She makes her life one grand beatitude Of Love and Peace, and with contented eyes She sees not in the whole world mean or rude, And her small lot she trebly multiplies. And when the darkness muffles up the skies Still to be happy is her sole desire, She sings sweet songs about a great emprise, And sees a garden blowing in the fire.

IN SERBIA

AUTUMN EVENING IN SERBIA

All the thin shadows Have closed on the grass, With the drone on their dark wings The night beetles pass. Folded her eyelids, A maiden asleep, Day sees in her chamber The pallid moon peep.

From the bend of the briar The roses are torn, And the folds of the wood tops Are faded and worn. A strange bird is singing Sweet notes of the sun, Tho' song time is over And Autumn begun.

NOCTURNE

The rim of the moon Is over the corn. The beetle's drone Is above the thorn. Grey days come soon And I am alone; Can you hear my moan Where you rest, Aroon?

When the wild tree bore The deep blue cherry, In night's deep hall Our love kissed merry. But you come no more Where its woodlands call, And the grey days fall On my grief, Astore!

SPRING AND AUTUMN

Green ripples singing down the corn, With blossoms dumb the path I tread, And in the music of the morn One with wild roses on her head.

Now the green ripples turn to gold And all the paths are loud with rain, I with desire am growing old And full of winter pain.

IN GREECE

THE DEPARTURE OF PROSERPINE

Old mother Earth for me already grieves, Her morns wake weeping and her noons are dim, Silence has left her woods, and all the leaves Dance in the windy shadows on the rim Of the dull lake thro' which I soon shall pass To my dark bridal bed Down in the hollow chambers of the dead. Will not the thunder hide me if I call, Wrapt in the corner of some distant star The gods have never known? Alas! alas! My voice has left with the last wing, my fall Shall crush the flowery fields with gloom, as far As swallows fly. Would I might die And in a solitude of roses lie As the last bud's outblown. Then nevermore Demeter would be heard Wail in the blowing rain, but every shower Would come bound up with rainbows to the birds Wrapt in a dusty wing, and the dry flower Hanging a shrivelled lip. This weary change from light to darkness fills My heart with twilight, and my brightest day Dawns over thunder and in thunder spills Its urn of gladness With a sadness Through which the slow dews drip And the bat goes over on a thorny wing. Is it a dream that once I used to sing From Ægean shores across her rocky isles, Making the bells of Babylon to ring Over the wiles That lifted me from darkness to the Spring And the King Seeing his wine in blossom on the tree Danced with the queen a merry roundelay, And all the blue circumference of the day Was loud with flying song.---- --But let me pass along: What brooks it the unfree to thus delay? No secret turning leads from the gods' way.

THE HOMECOMING OF THE SHEEP

The sheep are coming home in Greece, Hark the bells on every hill! Flock by flock, and fleece by fleece, Wandering wide a little piece Thro' the evening red and still, Stopping where the pathways cease, Cropping with a hurried will.

Thro' the cotton-bushes low Merry boys with shouldered crooks Close them in a single row, Shout among them as they go With one bell-ring o'er the brooks. Such delight you never know Reading it from gilded books.

Before the early stars are bright Cormorants and sea-gulls call, And the moon comes large and white Filling with a lovely light The ferny curtained waterfall. Then sleep wraps every bell up tight And the climbing moon grows small.

WHEN LOVE AND BEAUTY WANDER AWAY

When Love and Beauty wander away, And there's no more hearts to be sought and won, When the old earth limps thro' the dreary day, And the work of the Seasons cry undone: Ah! what shall we do for a song to sing, Who have known Beauty, and Love, and Spring?

When Love and Beauty wander away, And a pale fear lies on the cheeks of youth, When there's no more goal to strive for and pray, And we live at the end of the world's untruth: Ah! what shall we do for a heart to prove, Who have known Beauty, and Spring, and Love?

IN HOSPITAL IN EGYPT

MY MOTHER

God made my mother on an April day, From sorrow and the mist along the sea, Lost birds' and wanderers' songs and ocean spray And the moon loved her wandering jealously.

Beside the ocean's din she combed her hair, Singing the nocturne of the passing ships, Before her earthly lover found her there And kissed away the music from her lips.

She came unto the hills and saw the change That brings the swallow and the geese in turns. But there was not a grief she deeméd strange, For there is that in her which always mourns.

Kind heart she has for all on hill or wave Whose hopes grew wings like ants to fly away. I bless the God Who such a mother gave This poor bird-hearted singer of a day.

SONG

Nothing but sweet music wakes My Beloved, my Beloved. Sleeping by the blue lakes, My own Beloved!

Song of lark and song of thrush, My Beloved! my Beloved! Sing in morning's rosy bush, My own Beloved!

When your eyes dawn blue and clear, My Beloved! my Beloved! You will find me waiting here, My own Beloved!

TO ONE DEAD

A blackbird singing On a moss upholstered stone, Bluebells swinging, Shadows wildly blown, A song in the wood, A ship on the sea. The song was for you And the ship was for me.

A blackbird singing I hear in my troubled mind, Bluebells swinging I see in a distant wind. But sorrow and silence Are the wood's threnody, The silence for you And the sorrow for me.

THE RESURRECTION

My true love still is all that's fair, She is flower and blossom blowing free, For all her silence lying there She sings a spirit song to me.

New lovers seek her in her bower, The rain, the dew, the flying wind, And tempt her out to be a flower, Which throws a shadow on my mind.

THE SHADOW PEOPLE

Old lame Bridget doesn't hear Fairy music in the grass When the gloaming's on the mere And the shadow people pass: Never hears their slow grey feet Coming from the village street Just beyond the parson's wall, Where the clover globes are sweet And the mushroom's parasol Opens in the moonlit rain. Every night I hear them call From their long and merry train. Old lame Bridget says to me, "It is just your fancy, child," She cannot believe I see Laughing faces in the wild, Hands that twinkle in the sedge Bowing at the water's edge Where the finny minnows quiver, Shaping on a blue wave's ledge Bubble foam to sail the river. And the sunny hands to me Beckon ever, beckon ever. Oh! I would be wild and free And with the shadow people be.

IN BARRACKS

AN OLD DESIRE

I searched thro' memory's lumber-room And there I found an old desire, I took it gently from the gloom To cherish by my scanty tire.

And all the night a sweet-voiced one, Sang of the place my loves abide, Til Earth leaned over from the dawn And hid the last star in her side.

And often since, when most alone, I ponder on my old desire, But never hear the sweet-voiced one, And there are ruins in my fire.

THOMAS McDONAGH

He shall not hear the bittern cry In the wild sky, where he is lain, Nor voices of the sweeter birds Above the wailing of the rain.

Nor shall he know when loud March blows Thro' slanting snows her fanfare shrill, Blowing to flame the golden cup Of many an upset daffodil.

But when the Dark Cow leaves the moor, And pastures poor with greedy weeds, Perhaps he'll hear her low at morn Lifting her horn in pleasant meads.

THE WEDDING MORNING

Spread the feast, and let there be Such music heard as best beseems A king's son coming from the sea To wed a maiden of the streams.

Poets, pale for long ago, Bring sweet sounds from rock and flood, You by echo's accent know Where the water is and wood.

Harpers whom the moths of Time Bent and wrinkled dusty brown, Her chains are falling with a chime, Sweet as bells in Heaven town.

But, harpers, leave your harps aside, And, poets, leave awhile your dreams. The storm has come upon the tide And Cathleen weeps among her streams.

THE BLACKBIRDS

I heard the Poor Old Woman say: "At break of day the fowler came, And took my blackbirds from their songs Who loved me well thro shame and blame.

No more from lovely distances Their songs shall bless me mile by mile, Nor to white Ashbourne call me down To wear my crown another while.

With bended flowers the angels mark For the skylark the place they lie, From there its little family Shall dip their wings first in the sky.

And when the first surprise of flight Sweet songs excite, from the far dawn Shall there come blackbirds loud with love, Sweet echoes of the singers gone.

But in the lonely hush of eve Weeping I grieve the silent bills." I heard the Poor Old Woman say In Derry of the little hills.

THE LURE

I saw night leave her halos down On Mitylene's dark mountain isle, The silhouette of one fair town Like broken shadows in a pile. And in the farther dawn I heard The music of a foreign bird.

In fields of shady angles now I stand and dream in the half dark: The thrush is on the blossomed bough, Above the echoes sings the lark, And little rivers drop between Hills fairer than dark Mitylene.

Yet something calls me with no voice And wakes sweet echoes in my mind; In the fair country of my choice Nor Peace nor Love again I find, Nor anything of rest I know When south-east winds are blowing low.

THRO' BOGAC BAN

I met the Silent Wandering Man, Thro' Bogac Ban he made his way, Humming a slow old Irish tune, On Joseph Plunkett's wedding day.

And all the little whispering things That love the springs of Bogac Ban, Spread some new rumour round the dark And turned their faces from the dawn.

* * * * *

My hand upon my harp I lay, I cannot say what things I know; To meet the Silent Wandering Man Of Bogac Ban once more I go.

FATE

Lugh made a stir in the air With his sword of cries, And fairies thro' hidden ways Came from the skies, And their spells withered up the fair And vanquished the wise.

And old lame Balor came down With his gorgon eye Hidden behind its lid, Old, withered and dry. He looked on the wattle town, And the town passed by.

These things I know in my dreams, The crying sword of Lugh, And Balor's ancient eye Searching me through, Withering up my songs And my pipe yet new.

EVENING CLOUDS

A little flock of clouds go down to rest In some blue corner off the moon's highway, With shepherd winds that shook them in the West To borrowed shapes of earth, in bright array, Perhaps to weave a rainbow's gay festoons Around the lonesome isle which Brooke has made A little England full of lovely noons, Or dot it with his country's mountain shade.

Ah, little wanderers, when you reach that isle Tell him, with dripping dew, they have not failed, What he loved most; for late I roamed awhile Thro' English fields and down her rivers sailed; And they remember him with beauty caught From old desires of Oriental Spring Heard in his heart with singing overwrought; And still on Purley Common gooseboys sing.

SONG

The winds are scented with woods after rain, And a raindrop shines in the daisy's eye. Shall we follow the swallow again, again, Ah! little yearning thing, you and I?