Part 1

THE VEIL _and other_ POEMS

_By_

WALTER DE LA MARE

NEW YORK HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 1922

COPYRIGHT, 1922,

BY

HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

NOTE

Seven of the poems included in this collection were written for Drawings by Miss Pamela Bianco, and were first published by Mr. Heinemann in a volume entitled _Flora_. The author's thanks are due to Mr. Sydney Pawling for permission to reprint these poems; to Mr. Cyril Beaumont for the use of 'Tidings' from a Play for Children, entitled _Crossings_; and, for permission to include several other poems, to the Editors of the _London Mercury_, the _New Republic_, the _Spectator_, the _Nation_, the _Century Magazine_, the _Cambridge Magazine_, the _Literary Review_, the _Sphere_, the _New Statesman_, the _Bookman's Journal_, the _Broom_, the _Outlook_, the _Athenæum_, and the _Westminster Gazette_.

CONTENTS

PAGE THE IMP WITHIN 3 THE OLD ANGLER 5 THE WILLOW 10 TITMOUSE 11 THE VEIL 12 THE FAIRY IN WINTER 13 THE FLOWER 14 BEFORE DAWN 15 THE SPECTRE 17 THE VOICE 18 THE HOUR-GLASS 19 IN THE DOCK 20 THE WRECK 21 THE SUICIDE 22 DRUGGED 23 WHO'S THAT? 25 HOSPITAL 26 A SIGN 28 GOOD-BYE 30 THE MONOLOGUE 31 AWAKE! 34 FORGIVENESS 35 THE MOTH 36 NOT THAT WAY 37 CRAZED 39 FOG 40 _SOTTO VOCE_ 42 THE IMAGINATION'S PRIDE 44 THE WANDERERS 46 THE CORNER STONE 48 THE SPIRIT OF AIR 50 THE UNFINISHED DREAM 51 MUSIC 54 TIDINGS 56 THE SON OF MELANCHOLY 57 THE QUIET ENEMY 60 THE FAMILIAR 61 MAERCHEN 63 GOLD 64 MIRAGE 65 FLOTSAM 67 MOURN'ST THOU NOW? 68 THE GALLIASS 69 THE DECOY 70 SUNK LYONESSE 71 THE CATECHISM 72 FUTILITY 73 BITTER WATERS 74 WHO? 76 A RIDDLE 77 THE OWL 79 THE LAST COACHLOAD 80 AN EPITAPH 84

THE VEIL AND OTHER POEMS

THE IMP WITHIN

'ROUSE now, my dullard, and thy wits awake; 'Tis first of the morning. And I bid thee make— No, not a vow; we have munched our fill of these From crock of bone-dry crusts and mouse-gnawn cheese— Nay, just one whisper in that long, long ear— Awake; rejoice. Another Day is here:—

'A virgin wilderness, which, hour by hour, Mere happy idleness shall bring to flower. Barren and arid though its sands now seem, Wherein oasis becks not, shines no stream, Yet wake—and lo, 'tis lovelier than a dream.

'Plunge on, thy every footprint shall make fair Its thirsty waste; and thy foregone despair Undarken into sweet birds in the air, Whose coursing wings and love-crazed summoning cries Into infinity shall attract thine eyes.

'No...? Well, lest promise in performance faint, A less inviting prospect will I paint. I bid thee adjure thy Yesterday, and say: "As _thou_ wast, Enemy, so be To-day.— Immure me in the same close narrow room; Be hated toil the lamp to light its gloom; Make stubborn my pen; sift dust into my ink; Forbid mine eyes to see, my brain to think. Scare off the words whereon the mind is set. Make memory the power to forget. Constrain imagination; bind its wing; Forbid the unseen Enchantresses to sing. Ay, do thy worst!"

'Vexed Spectre, prythee smile. Even though that yesterday was bleak and sour, Art thou a slave beneath its thong to cower? Thou hast survived. And hither am I—again, Kindling with mockery thy o'erlaboured brain. Though scant the moments be wherein we meet, Think, what dark months would even one make sweet.

'Thy quill? Thy paper? Ah, my dear, be true. Come quick To-morrow. Until then, Adieu.'

THE OLD ANGLER

TWILIGHT leaned mirrored in a pool Where willow boughs swept green and hoar, Silk-clear the water, calm and cool, Silent the weedy shore:

There in abstracted, brooding mood One fishing sate. His painted float Motionless as a planet stood; Motionless his boat.

A melancholy soul was this, With lantern jaw, gnarled hand, vague eye; Huddled in pensive solitariness He had fished existence by.

Empty his creel; stolen his bait— Impassively he angled on, Though mist now showed the evening late And daylight well-nigh gone.

Suddenly, like a tongueless bell, Downward his gaudy cork did glide; A deep, low-gathering, gentle swell Spread slowly far and wide.

Wheeped out his tackle from noiseless winch, And furtive as a thief, his thumb, With nerve intense, wound inch by inch A line no longer numb.

What fabulous spoil could thus unplayed Gape upward to a mortal air?— He stoops engrossed; his tanned cheek greyed; His heart stood still: for there,

Wondrously fairing, beneath the skin Of secretly bubbling water seen, Swims—not the silver of scale and fin— But gold immixt with green.

Deeply astir in oozy bed, The darkening mirror ripples and rocks: And lo—a wan-pale, lovely head, Hook tangled in its locks!

Cold from her haunt—a Naiad slim. Shoulder and cheek gleamed ivory white; Though now faint stars stood over him, The hour hard on night.

Her green eyes gazed like one half-blind In sudden radiance; her breast Breathed the sweet air, while gently twined, 'Gainst the cold water pressed,

Her lean webbed hands. She floated there, Light as a scentless petalled flower, Water-drops dewing from her hair In tinkling beadlike shower.

So circling sidelong, her tender throat Uttered a grieving, desolate wail; Shrill o'er the dark pool lapsed its note, Piteous as nightingale.

Ceased Echo. And he?—a life's remorse Welled to a tongue unapt to charm, But never a word broke harsh and hoarse To quiet her alarm.

With infinite stealth his twitching thumb Tugged softly at the tautened gut, Bubble-light, fair, her lips now dumb, She moved, and struggled not;

But with set, wild, unearthly eyes Pale-gleaming, fixed as if in fear, She couched in the water, with quickening sighs, And floated near.

In hollow heaven the stars were at play; Wan glow-worms greened the pool-side grass; Dipped the wide-bellied boat. His prey Gazed on; nor breathed. Alas!—

Long sterile years had come and gone; Youth, like a distant dream, was sped; Heart, hope, and eyes had hungered on.... He turned a shaking head,

And clumsily groped amid the gold, Sleek with night dews, of that tangling hair, Till pricked his finger keen and cold The barb imbedded there.

Teeth clenched, he drew his knife—'Snip, snip,'— Groaned, and sate shivering back; and she, Treading the water with birdlike dip, Shook her sweet shoulders free:

Drew backward, smiling, infatuate fair, His life's disasters in her eyes, All longing and folly, grief, despair, Daydreams and mysteries.

She stooped her brow; laid low her cheek, And, steering on that silk-tressed craft, Out from the listening, leaf-hung creek, Tossed up her chin, and laughed—

A mocking, icy, inhuman note. One instant flashed that crystal breast, Leaned, and was gone. Dead-still the boat: And the deep dark at rest.

Flits moth to flower. A water-rat Noses the placid ripple. And lo! Streams a lost meteor. Night is late, And daybreak zephyrs flow....

And he—the cheated? Dusk till morn, Insensate, even of hope forsook, He muttering squats, aloof, forlorn, Dangling a baitless hook.

THE WILLOW

LEANS now the fair willow, dreaming Amid her locks of green. In the driving snow she was parched and cold, And in midnight hath been Swept by blasts of the void night, Lashed by the rains. Now of that wintry dark and bleak No memory remains.

In mute desire she sways softly; Thrilling sap up-flows; She praises God in her beauty and grace, Whispers delight. And there flows A delicate wind from the Southern seas, Kissing her leaves. She sighs. While the birds in her tresses make merry; Burns the Sun in the skies.

TITMOUSE

IF you would happy company win, Dangle a palm-nut from a tree, Idly in green to sway and spin, Its snow-pulped kernel for bait; and see, A nimble titmouse enter in.

Out of earth's vast unknown of air, Out of all summer, from wave to wave, He'll perch, and prank his feathers fair, Jangle a glass-clear wildering stave, And take his commons there—

This tiny son of life; this spright, By momentary Human sought, Plume will his wing in the dappling light, Clash timbrel shrill and gay— And into time's enormous nought, Sweet-fed, will flit away.

THE VEIL

I think and think; yet still I fail— Why does this lady wear a veil? Why thus elect to mask her face Beneath that dainty web of lace? The tip of a small nose I see, And two red lips, set curiously Like twin-born cherries on one stem, And yet she has netted even them. Her eyes, it's plain, survey with ease Whatever to glance upon they please. Yet, whether hazel, grey, or blue, Or that even lovelier lilac hue, I cannot guess: why—why deny Such beauty to the passer-by? Out of a bush a nightingale May expound his song; beneath that veil A happy mouth no doubt can make English sound sweeter for its sake. But then, why muffle in, like this, What every blossomy wind would kiss? Why in that little night disguise A daybreak face, those starry eyes?

THE FAIRY IN WINTER

(For a drawing by Dorothy Puvis Lathrop)

THERE was a Fairy—flake of winter— Who, when the snow came, whispering, Silence, Sister crystal to crystal sighing, Making of meadow argent palace, Night a star-sown solitude, Cried 'neath her frozen eaves, 'I burn here!'

Wings diaphanous, beating bee-like, Wand within fingers, locks enspangled, Icicle foot, lip sharp as scarlet, She lifted her eyes in her pitch-black hollow— Green as stalks of weeds in water— Breathed: stirred.

Rilled from her heart the ichor, coursing, Flamed and awoke her slumbering magic. Softlier than moth's her pinions trembled; Out into blackness, light-like, she flittered, Leaving her hollow cold, forsaken.

In air, o'er crystal, rang twangling night-wind. Bare, rimed pine-woods murmured lament.

THE FLOWER

HORIZON to horizon, lies outspread The tenting firmament of day and night; Wherein are winds at play; and planets shed Amid the stars their gentle gliding light.

The huge world's sun flames on the snow-capped hills; Cindrous his heat burns in the sandy plain; With myriad spume-bows roaring ocean swills The cold profuse abundance of the rain.

And man—a transient object in this vast, Sighs o'er a universe transcending thought, Afflicted by vague bodings of the past, Driven toward a future, unforeseen, unsought.

Yet, see him, stooping low to naked weed That meeks its blossom in his anxious eye, Mark how he grieves, as if his heart did bleed, And wheels his wondrous features to the sky; As if, transfigured by so small a grace, He sought Companion in earth's dwelling-place.

BEFORE DAWN

DIM-BERRIED is the mistletoe With globes of sheenless grey, The holly mid ten thousand thorns Smoulders its fires away; And in the manger Jesu sleeps This Christmas Day.

Bull unto bull with hollow throat Makes echo every hill, Cold sheep in pastures thick with snow The air with bleatings fill; While of his mother's heart this Babe Takes His sweet will.

All flowers and butterflies lie hid, The blackbird and the thrush Pipe but a little as they flit Restless from bush to bush; Even to the robin Gabriel hath Cried softly, 'Hush!'

Now night is astir with burning stars In darkness of the snow; Burdened with frankincense and myrrh And gold the Strangers go Into a dusk where one dim lamp Burns faintly, Lo!

No snowdrop yet its small head nods, In winds of winter drear; No lark at casement in the sky Sings matins shrill and clear; Yet in this frozen mirk the Dawn Breathes, Spring is here!

THE SPECTRE

IN cloudy quiet of the day, While thrush and robin perched mute on spray, A spectre by the window sat, Brooding thereat.

He marked the greenness of the Spring, Daffodil blowing, bird a-wing— Yet dark the house the years had made Within that Shade.

Blinded the rooms wherein no foot falls. Faded the portraits on the walls. Reverberating, shakes the air A river there.

Coursing in flood, its infinite roars; From pit to pit its water pours; And he, with countenance unmoved, Hears cry:—'Beloved,

'Oh, ere the day be utterly spent, Return, return, from banishment. The night thick-gathers. Weep a prayer For the true and fair.'

THE VOICE

'WE are not often alone, we two,' Mused a secret voice in my ear, As the dying hues of afternoon Lapsed into evening drear.

A withered leaf, wafted on in the street, Like a wayless spectre, sighed; Aslant on the roof-tops a sickly moon Did mutely abide.

Yet waste though the shallowing day might seem, And fainter than hope its rose, Strangely that speech in my thoughts welled on; As water in-flows:

Like remembered words once heard in a room Wherein death kept far-away tryst; 'Not often alone, we two; but thou, How sorely missed!'

THE HOUR-GLASS

THOU who know'st all the sorrows of this earth— I pray Thee, ponder, ere again Thou turn Thine hour-glass over again, since one sole birth, To poor clay-cold humanity, makes yearn A heart at passion with life's endless coil. Thou givest thyself too strait a room therein. For so divine a tree too poor a soil. For so great agony what small peace to win. Cast from that Ark of Heaven which is Thy home The raven of hell may wander without fear; But sadly wings the dove o'er floods to roam, Nought but one tender sprig his eyes to cheer. Nay, Lord, I speak in parables. But see! 'Tis stricken Man in Men that pleads with Thee.

IN THE DOCK

PALLID, mis-shapen he stands. The world's grimed thumb, Now hooked securely in his matted hair, Has haled him struggling from his poisonous slum And flung him mute as fish close-netted there. His bloodless hands entalon that iron rail. He gloats in beastlike trance. His settling eyes From staring face to face rove on—and quail. Justice for carrion pants; and these the flies. Voice after voice in smooth impartial drone Erects horrific in his darkening brain A timber framework, where agape, alone Bright life will kiss good-bye the cheek of Cain. Sudden like wolf he cries; and sweats to see When howls man's soul, it howls inaudibly.

THE WRECK

STORM and unconscionable winds once cast On grinding shingle, masking gap-toothed rock, This ancient hulk. Rent hull, and broken mast, She sprawls sand-mounded, of sea birds the mock. Her sailors, drowned, forgotten, rot in mould, Or hang in stagnant quiet of the deep; The brave, the afraid into one silence sold; Their end a memory fainter than of sleep. She held good merchandise. She paced in pride The uncharted paths men trace in ocean's foam. Now laps the ripple in her broken side, And zephyr in tamarisk softly whispers, Home. The dreamer scans her in the sea-blue air, And, sipping of contrast, finds the day more fair.

THE SUICIDE

DID these night-hung houses, Of quiet, starlit stone, Breathe not a whisper—'Stay, Thou unhappy one; Whither so secret away?'

Sighed not the unfriending wind, Chill with nocturnal dew, 'Pause, pause, in thy haste, O thou distraught! I too Tryst with the Atlantic waste.'

Steep fell the drowsy street; In slumber the world was blind: Breathed not one midnight flower Peace in thy broken mind?— 'Brief, yet sweet, is life's hour.'

Syllabled thy last tide— By as dark moon stirred, And doomed to forlorn unrest— Not one compassionate word?... 'Cold is this breast.'

DRUGGED

INERT in his chair, In a candle's guttering glow; His bottle empty, His fire sunk low; With drug-sealed lids shut fast, Unsated mouth ajar, This darkened phantasm walks Where nightmares are:

In a frenzy of life and light, Crisscross—a menacing throng— They gibe, they squeal at the stranger, Jostling along, Their faces cadaverous grey. While on high from an attic stare Horrors, in beauty apparelled, Down the dark air.

A stream gurgles over its stones, The chambers within are a-fire. Stumble his shadowy feet Through shine, through mire; And the flames leap higher. In vain yelps the wainscot mouse; In vain beats the hour; Vacant, his body must drowse Until daybreak flower—

Staining these walls with its rose, And the draughts of the morning shall stir Cold on cold brow, cold hands. And the wanderer Back to flesh house must return. Lone soul—in horror to see, Than dream more meagre and awful, Reality.

WHO'S THAT?

WHO'S that? Who's that?... Oh, only a leaf on the stone; And the sigh of the air in the fire. Yet it seemed, as I sat, Came company—not my own; Stood there, with ardent gaze over dark, bowed shoulder thrown Till the dwindling flames leaped higher, And showed fantasy flown.

Yet though the cheat is clear— From transient illusion grown; In the vague of my mind those eyes Still haunt me. One stands so near I could take his hand, and be gone:— No more in this house of dreams to sojourn aloof, alone: Could sigh, with full heart, and arise, And choke, 'Lead on.'

HOSPITAL

WELCOME! Enter! This is the Inn at the Cross Roads, Sign of the _Rising Sun_, of the _World's End_: Ay, O Wanderer, footsore, weary, forsaken, Knock, and we will open to thee—Friend.

Gloomy our stairs of stone, obscure the portal; Burdened the air with a breath from the further shore; Yet in our courtyard plays an invisible fountain, Ever flowers unfading nod at the door.

Ours is much company, and yet none is lonely; Some with a smile may pay and some with a sigh; So all be healed, restored, contented—it is no matter— So all be happy at heart to bid good-bye.

But know, our clocks are the world's; Night's wings are leaden, Pain languidly sports with the hours; have courage, sir! We wake but to bring thee slumber, our drowsy syrups Sleep beyond dreams on the weary will confer.