LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA RIVERSIDE £x Libris * ISAAC FOOT A A AMARANTHUS AMARANTHUS A BOOK OF LITTLE SONGS er Bernard Capes LONDON T. FISHER UNWIN ADELPHI TERRACE MCMVIII All Ris^hts Reserved "Qii'est-c'que vous lui donnerez? Compagnons dc la Marjolaine — " "De I' or, des bijoux assez,'" "ElV ti'est pas interessee." " Mon coeur je lui donnerai." " En ce cas-la, choisissez." CONTENTS Dedication Love Wanton Shall we audit hair by hair Love comes like the cuckoo Give me a lover, Saint Valentine Merle to her dear When Cloelia proved obdurate Cross my hand with a penny bright Chloe, will you hear me woo Love is give and take, says he . Mignonette, mignonette, of all flowers By day, the love she takes of him Love kept me an hour Love False She was throated like the stare . Speak low ! What do you ask, false Little Lady Dormette . Odd little merchant, quaint and fair I thought the Muse would string my We were three .... Love Gentle Phyllis, I cannot woo in rhyme , May Nature speed to woo thee . O, gentle winds that brought my love Love, though for playing Wake! Wake! .... the pet lovei lyre to me 13 14 16 17 19 20 22 23 24 26 28 31 32 33 34 36 38 41 42 43 44 45 vu VIU CONTENTS Sweet dove, I have fed you Into grey ashes fell the moon . . . . Thy step fell on the bridge of death , Poor Philomel, poor tender-wit . . . . Love Serious Whenas the speedwell of an eye She came ; and, O ! I caught her from her feet All day across the skies Who will buy a baby . O, baby ! isn't it hot, my boy O, Sun, that call'st the rose to life The little bonne, Marie Whence did our bird-soft baby come Dear God, teach my fingers ten . With pain our pretty baby cried . Where are you going, my little maid We two, and one must die Poems Various The Unpardonable Sin The Poisoner's Laboratory The Two Crows . The Passing Ghost Memories He set his teeth . 'Tis Christ his feast Heaven's Nursery . Here's a comrade blithe Somewhere there is a stream, I know The night is dark Love and Forever would wed PAGE 46 48 49 50 S3 55 56 58 59 61 63 64 65 65 66 67 71 11 76 79 83 84 85 87 91 93 95 96 >'' To R . . . iSth November, igoo. What will the world do, dearest, when ive go, And take Love with Jis to the stars above — This world, to which sweet Love himself we owe f How can we claim yet pay this debt of love ? 0, Love ! is earth's or heaven's this treasure-trove f 0, earth, for Love's sake yield thy claim of him ! " Aye, yield, cries Faith, so I the heir of Love, May fill the place and take the name of him." Faith become Love, and Love bequeathed to Faith f — Ah, happy earth, and happy stars above! Destined to conquer Time and Space and Death, When Love's in Heaven, and Faith on earth is Love! B LOVE WANTON AMARANTHUS Shall we audit, hair by hair, Cupid's golden tresses? Billet Venus on a genus? Play the doctrinaire To April shepherdesses? Sound its shallowness the brook? Analyse the roses ? Reason by phytology, Nodding o'er a book. Why the poppy dozes ? Puff ! — the wind is blowing free, The light clouds are racing ; For how things are why have a care, Seeing here they be With none of our placing ? Learning is an anxious trust Held with much contriving. Humour flies analysis. Only Dryasdust, Makes a Scheme of living, (13) 14 AMARANTHUS SPRING SONG Love comes like the Cuckoo, When Spring's lady-smocking, Unexpected, unseen, Till his voice through the green Takes April with mocking. See the freshets run over. Gold mary-buds spilling ! Not a sheath of its blade. Not a nestling delayed, But his chime is fulfilling. Spring's eyes glistened blue. When the hard time was over, Half in tears, innocent; But the passion they pent Was for him to discover. Ah, the wind on the hill. And the sedge creaking shrilly ! "Ah, the ice on the mere ! " Mocked the cuckoo : ' ' And here Is the daffodowndilly ! " LOVE WANTON 15 O love, O dear cuckoo, We doubt you and flout you, You thief of a bed ! — Yet, when all has been said, What would Spring be without you ? i6 AMARANTHUS Give me a lover, Saint Valentine, Short or tall, so a man he be. What hath hapt to the gallants' eyne, Sithen my heart is for all to see ? The tailor he dipt and he made salaam ; Then lookt the lady full in the face : — Let me close you your bodice, ma'am. Men prefer to guess at the place. He made her her bodice high and trim, To the best of his art he did his part. But when she stood up from the hands of him- Lo I it appeared she had no heart. LOVE WANTON Merle to her dear, Hid in a briar, Beckoned " Come near! Hush, little squire! Who is that fellow ? What does he here. Watching our house from the byre ? " "Tchuck! Bobolink!" Quo' he so soft : " The clothes-line hangs in the garden croft. Smocks and little frilled tuckers jink Over the wall ; And here is the rogue that would filch 'em all," Quo' he so soft. Merle on the sward Under the briar : ** Tuckers, my lord He can't require. Yet in his sharp young eyes, on my word Twinkles a thievish fire." c i8 AMARANTHUS "Well, ma'am, and well!" Quo' he , elate, " If not linen, why then the plate. A thief he is, as it's plain to tell, Holding aloof, Wi' his eye on the window under the roof." Quo' he, elate. Thoughtful the wife, Winking and blinking : " Silence, my life, Tchuck ! I am thinking. Who, when the wintry winds are rife, Brings crumbs and water for drinking ? " " The old man's dearie," Quo' he, quo' he. *' Tucker and smock and frill," said she, " And lips as sweet as the cherry. Come kiss me, chuck 1 I know the fruit that he waits to pluck ! " Quo' she, quo' she. LOVE WANTON 19 When Cloelia proved obdurate To Phaedon's fond advances, Repaid with scorn his woful state, With flout his utterances, *' Forego," he cried, " this acrid strain, From such sweet lips a schism. And dumbly quit me of my pain By posy symbolism ! " For hope, a white rose; for despair, A red, pluck to thy bosom ! " — He turned; then looked — the wilful fair Had donned a crimson blossom. But, so it chanced, within the cup A Cupid, honey-tipsy. In rage at being woken up, Thrust out and stung the gipsy. Then, all compunction for his deed. For cap to the disaster, Rubbed Phaedon's lips with honey-mead. To serve the wound for plaster. 20 AMARANTHUS Cross my hand with a penny bright." Why, pretty gipsy, why? " I saw a face in the coals last night. Whose? Would you know? Shall I whisper it? '* "O! Fie, pretty gipsy, fie! " " Cross my hand with a shilling sheen." ** Why, pretty gipsy, why? " *' I saw a coach drive over the green. Who was inside ? A silver bride? " ** Fie, pretty gipsy, fie! " " Cross my hand with a golden crown." ** Why, pretty gipsy, why? " " I saw them stand by the altar stone. Eight maids were fain To bear her train ; And the bells rang merrily." LOVE WANTON 21 ** Who was the man and who the maid? " "Fie, little lady, fie!" " Tell, tell, tell what the red coals said. Silver and gold Are known of old To lie, pretty gipsy, lie. Tell, tell, tell what the red coals said ! " "Fie, little lady, fie!" 22 AMARANTHUS Chloe, will you hear me woo ? That I promise, that I'll do. I will make thee soft slippers Of the pretty mouse's ears; Stockings, just a single pair, Spun by spiders from the air; Supple garters lightly wove Of the springey curls of Love; Gown of lace-wings, hardly felt. Clasped with my arms for belt. I will graft my thorny drouth With the sweet slip of thy mouth, Till thy loveliness shall make Buds of beauty for my sake. Like a wild hare in its form, Chloe, in thy bosom warm Sweetly, sweetly let me lie. Hearing all the world go by. LOVE WANTON 23 " Love is give and take," says he, " Every gander knows — Wear the prickle for my sake ; For thine, I'll wear the rose." ** Grazie, kind and true," says she, " For that noble dower — Only, between me and you, 7 should like the flower." 24 AMARANTHUS Mignonette, Mignonette, Of all flowers the pet — O beautiful, beautiful, sweet Mignonette ! Dear kind little blossom, Soft, soft in the bosom. Who gives to thee, takes from thee, sweet Mignonette? Was it thou at her ear that shed sweets passing by me? Is it thou in her shape, or herself that doth fly me ? Is it thou, is it she. Mignonette, Mignonette, That I follow, must follow. As the Summer the Spring, Who hides warm in the wing Of its darling the swallow ? As love chases the swallow To the eaves and the leaves High up under the roof, Mignonette, so I follow. AH ! to whose little chamber, Sweetheart ? As I clamber, I trow not, I know not What dream flew before to the room high aloof. LOVE WANTON 25 But my heart pants delight In the thought — half a fright, Half delirious sweetness — That the spirit of the flower, That the spirit of the hour Shall reveal love's completeness. 26 AM ARAN THUS CUPID AND PSYCHE By day, the love she takes of him Must mock its own dear rapture, Lest her sweet breast that aches of him Condone in thought its capture. She holds the woodland echo's breath With plaints of cruel wooing ; She chides the rifled flower beneath, That love was its undoing. The echoes hear her, meek and meet, And clap his praises after : The hoarse burn follows on her feet With an inward laughter. Her white throat throbs in light and shade To many a heart-free chansonette — And still her fire is unallayed, And still she's Amorette. Then night, and low-lie-down the call ; And all the world's aloof. Love's whispered benedictions fall Like leaves upon the roof. The high trees make a mystic close ; The garden sighs perfume ; Only the heart of a wild rose Beats in the trancM room. LOVE WANTON 27 In all the house there's not a sound. A glow-worm lights the stair. He bends to heal her lips' red wound ; He's caught into her hair. She never meant to chide the flower — She whispers dear regret. And still she owns her in his power; And still she's Amorette. 28 AMARANTHUS Love kept me an hour From all hours that pass ; In her breast, like a flower, She stored it, sweet, fragrant, Of all time the vagrant, Alas, and alas I Of all time the flower, Of all hours that pass, For me was that hour, When I cared claim it. And kiss it and shame it, Alas, and alas ! I dared not, sweet hour — I let thee go pass ; And heaven is my dower. My crown is stars seven : I am a saint in heaven, Alas, and alas ! LOVE FALSE LOVE FALSE 31 She was throated like the stare — Well-a-day ! She was white as buds of May — Well-a-day ! And all with their sweet scent Her bodie was besprent, That to kiss her was a joy beyond compare. If her mouth the scarlet hips — Well-a-day ! Would for redness all dismay — Well-a-day I Ah ! it took its comely stain From the truths that she had slain ; For falser than the serpent were her lips. Once with passion I did rave — Well-a-day ! Now I will not, tJiough she say Well-a-day I For the cry of damned Love All her beauty doth disprove, And her heart it is a stone above his grave. 32 AMARANTHUS Speak low ! What do you ask, false love ? Speak low I Sin cannot speak too low. The night-wind stealing to thy bosom, The dead star dropping like a blossom, Less voiceless be than thou ! Low, lower yet, false love, if to confess What guilt, what shameful need ? God, who can hear the budding grass. And flake kiss flake in the snowy pass. Your secret else will heed. Ah ! thou art silent, not from love, but fear, And true love knows no fear. Creeping, soft-footed, in the dust. It is not love, but conscious lust. Which dreads that God shall hear. LOVE FALSE 33 " Little Lady Dormette, Hark to my crying ! Would not you come to me Though I were dying, Little Lady Dormette? Kiss my hot eyes, Make them forget! Little Lady Dormette, Why have you left me? Sure not to lie with him That hath bereft me, Little Lady Dormette ? O, do not kiss him, Lest he forget! Little Lady Dormette, Thee I so grieve for ; If thou forsakest me, What shall I live for! Little Lady Dormette, Crush thy heart to mine, Make it forget! " E 34 AMARANTHUS " Odd little merchant, quaint and fair, What are the goods thou criest there? '* " Reeds from the river's kissing wet; Flute a bee and flageolet ; " Sweet fife pitched to the wanton's note; Piccolo tuned at Venus' throat; " Bird-calls shaped from the bianco flour; Whistles, for love, of Vherbe d' amour ; ** Pandean pipes, red lips to pout! Here on the grass I'll turn 'em out." " Merchant, what was the stick let fall, Shrunk, dry^ withered, the last of all ? " *' That? But a phantom voice, my prince. Put your lips to it; hear — and wince I " Music dead as the boxwood row From which it was cut long years ago — LOVE FALSE 35 " Cut by Lancelot, sweet and green, From under the heart of his Dorine. " How she leaned to him over the hedge, Hear, if you will — your teeth on edge. " 'Tis a garrulous pipe. There's more beside, Of a love betrayed and a girl that died. " Men will be men and women frail. The song goes wheezy, and something stale. ** Put it away like rusty weeds, And choose ye one of my tuneful reeds." '* Flageolet and flute a hec, Merchant, little of these I reck. *' Little I reck of the wanton reed; This voice from the past is all my need. ** Is all my need for its ancient teen — Ah, love and youth, and the boxwood green I And my no longer, but God's Dorine! " 36 AM ARAN THUS I THOUGHT the Muse would string my lyre ; That Love would kneel to me, Shameful with half-expressed desire A poet's love to be. My rhymes were uttered but to die ; No man would look thereon ; And Love laughed at my vanity And left me woebegone. Thereat I held my soul as dead And quit of the rhyming lust. I wrapped my heart in sheeted lead, And threw my pen in the dust. Now a woman who walked alone Trod on it where it lay — And straight the barren style was sown With blossoms thick as May. Then I dipt the point in my laden heart And left the pen to its will, While I thought of her who scorned the part She played in my soul's ill. LOVE FALSE 37 And now (because of my bitter fate Whereof I make my moan) — And now the world proclaims me great Because my heart is a stone. 38 AMARANTHUS We were three, Thou, and I, and he. We three pledged to be one Then and alway Till time was done. Shadow of him wert thou, Thrown by the Sun Small at his feet, my sweet, Small, since our lovely day At its meridian shone. We were three, Thou, and mother, and he— We two and thou Alone. And now — And now, dear God, But one! Night and the empty street — Baby under the sod — And he- Standing out in the sun, With another's soul at his feet. LOVE GENTLE LOVE GENTLE 41 Phyllis, I cannot woo in rhyme, As courtlier gallants woo With utterances sweet as thyme And melting as the dew. An arm to shield, a loving tongue, Strong faith and lealty — These, my true-heart, are all the song That I could make for thee. And yet, although the rhyming art I might not thee contrive, I'd print upon thy lips, sweetheart, A poem that should live. 42 AMARANTHUS May Nature speed to woo thee By lawn and hollow grove, All flowers lean unto thee, Nor life unkind subdue thee With scarcity of love. May day its treasures bring thee, And when its sands have run, The thrush to slumber sing thee, And every starlet fling thee The glory of a sun. LOVE GENTLE 43 O, GENTLE winds that brought my love to me ! Sweet tired, happy winds ! Cling ye, like bats, to wall and tower and tree, The whiles I sing to ye, Dear winds, That sang my love to me. Freighted so often with my labouring sighs, Unload ye now, sweet winds. And rest your weary fans, while I devise The gentlest lullabies, Dear winds, To kiss to sleep your eyes. For death ye've changed me life ; bought love with care. O , sleep and dream, dear winds ! Wise merchants of my cargo of despair, Dream on, and with me share, Dear winds. The love my love can spare. gy kind permission of Messrs, Dean & ^qh. 44 AMARANTHUS Love, though for playing In laps of roses; Love, though for straying Whither love chooses — Curious visitor, Probing inquisitor — Love makes his home in a quiet heart. Back from his feasting, Honey-bemired, Back he'll come questing, Sated and tired ; Seeking of peacefulness Old sense of easefulness. Wearying sick for his quiet heart. Who in her garden Waiteth him throbbing ? Such cry for pardon Moves her to sobbing. Arms soft as gossamer Stretch and embosom her. Love's weary wings round her quiet heart. LOVE GENTLE 45 Wake! Wake! The rills gush in the fields, The buds throw their shields, And life is reborn for love's sake. The joy of the sky- Calls the lark up on high ; The honey-bees wing from their bields. I hear at my window the voice of the South ; And my frost waits to melt on the bud of your mouth. Wake! Wake! Call me out to the green, O, my heart ! O, my queen ! Let your love be reborn for my sake, Like the gush of the rills, Like the light on the hills, And the voice of the laverock between. Sun, honey and song are the needs of my drouth; And all are to find in one kiss of your mouth. 46 AMARANTHUS ** Sweet dove, I have fed you with milk-bread and corn : Look out from your tree, And tell me who winds in the forest his horn, And what do you see ? ' ' *' I see a brave huntsman go riding across A blue glade of hyacinth fretted with moss." " Dear dove, you have sipped the rose-dew from my hand : Look out from your tree. And tell me who sings of the rose of the land, And what he may be ? " " By his golden apparel he rides like a lord, And he carols a song as he crosses the ford." *' Sweet dove, I have warmed you to life in my breast, When the winter was dree : Peep warily over the rim of your nest — = Is he comely to see? " LOVE GENTLE 47 " His face is as pink as the salt marish-mallow, And he kisses his hand as he rides up the fallow." " Dear dove, does he come from the north or the south?" *' He may answer you that, with his lips to your mouth." 48 AMARANTHUS Into grey ashes fell the moon, And all its glimmering stars Flew up, and went out one by one, Blown against heaven's bars. Like a puff of smoke from a foundered ship A cloud rolled to the sky ; I thought it the last breath of the moon Extinguished utterly. But Love laughed, and blew on the cloud — And there was a burning rim, Like as the fire that God's own breath Blows quick, when hope is dim. Out of the cloud that was the old The little moon was born. Ah I never and never my moon is dead, And never my hope's forlorn. LOVE GENTLE 49 Thy step fell on the bridge of Death, And Love he sobbed on the hither side- But that was long and long ago ; And long ago his tears were dried. The hearts that to their dreams of thee Vowed each its residue of life ! — Now, who, of all that sobbed with Love, But lives and joys in babe and wife ? Such rush-light souls, ignoble flames ! Forget, great ghost, their suit of thee. But no — thou gav'st them of thy fire ; Their children are the fruit of thee. And I, thou never smil'dst upon — What claim in heaven is mine to make ? Ah 1 thou art dead a score of years, And I am lonely for thy sake. so AMARANTHUS Poor Philomel, poor tender-wit, Is finished with life's fever ; No love, but she was kind to it, And no harm did she ever. The holy dead lie straight as stone ; But not with them her place is. We kissed and left her all alone To sleep among the daisies. With folded hands the dead so meek Look upward to their crosses. But Philomel has laid her cheek To slumber in the mosses. Now roots the blue thyme in her breast That was so sweet and sunny ; Now bee-winged Loves come there to feast On strains of burning honey. All day the church-bells boom and call — They shall not overtake her; No hymn but shepherd's madrigal, No God but Love shall wake her. Her silver ribbon'd crook hath she. Pray Christ to her be given To find th*e hills of Arcady, And fold white lambs in Heaven. LOVE SERIOUS LOVE SERIOUS 53 Whenas the speedwell of an eye Shall root within a soul as shy ; When beauty spare to scorn and flout, Because itself itself doth doubt — Cuckoo ! Cuckoo ! Vanity shall cease its fairing ; Maids be maids beyond comparing — Cuckoo calls. When Phebe shall rebuke her glass For flattering a simple lass; And Bonnibel no longer ply The arts of conscious pudency — Cuckoo ! Cuckoo ! Vanity shall end its fairing ; Maids be maids beyond comparing — Cuckoo calls. When coined love shall cease to lend Itself unto a worldly end, And every Joan shall learn to judge How careless gift makes after grudge — Cuckoo I Cuckoo ! Vanity shall cease its fairing ; Maids be maids beyond comparing — Cuckoo calls, \ 54 AMARANTHUS Then, Phebe, let the cuckoo call, And answer, darling, not at all. If of yourself yourself is sure, In vain shall vanity allure; In vain, in vain Love misterm for love his sporting. Selfish Blue-beard come a-courting All in vain. LOVE SERIOUS 55 She came ; and, O ! I caught her from her feet, And lived a thousand lives in one short hour, Because her arms were kind, her lips were sweet, Because her heart swelled like a sheathed flower. And soul to soul we panted, each to each, Leaving- our broken phrases Love to mend. Who laughed to fit the fragments of our speech Into : " Nought comes between us to the end." And, lo ! a little while, and, though the light Of Love's unclouded rapture holds her eyes, And though the oath we kissed to keep that night, We smothered kissing — as a corn-rose dies Yielding her petals up like drops of blood To the wind's passion, for her seeds' behest, Our broken oath hath broken into bud, And flowers between us on its mother's breast. 56 AMARANTHUS All day across the skies Swept cloudy argosies Their canvas hard a'strain ; But fleet on fleet, with anchors weighed, Drove proudly by, nor ever stayed To land the little soul I prayed, And prayed of them in vain. But, with the hush of even, In all the winds of heaven A sudden truce abode — And, lo ! far down and silver-pale, Below the rack, behind the gale, A little moon, with crescent sail And starry cordage, rode. So small a craft, I ween, So great was never seen In bearing love's desire. It came and stood above my roof ; And all its plates were silver-proof ; And from its bows about the loof Down dropt a spark of fire. LOVE SERIOUS 57 I gave a sigh in the dark ; I heard a cry in the dark That thrilled me through and through. Sink down, vain argosies, in noon Your useless hulks ! My little moon Has dared all heaven to bring the boon I asked in vain of you. H 58 AMARANTHUS LOVE AT AUCTION " Who will buy a baby ? ♦ Make your offers all. Each sprouting toe's a bud of rose, Each fist an elf's puff-ball. She cannot speak for laughing ; Like any top she'll hum. At worst a pout she'll measure out By biting rule of thumb. Who'll buy, who'll buy a baby For a pillow to his heart? " Little hoy bidder : — " I'll take the thing for a gold-curl ring And my broken horse and cart." LOVE SERIOUS 59 DROWZYDOZE To G. W. C. 1894. O, BABY ! isn't it hot, my boy, And aren't we sleepy all, From mum and dad and their little lad To puss on the garden wall ? That window glass like dazzling brass Strikes fire across the street ; And the aspens fizzing outside the door Seem frying in the heat. Winky-winky, blinky-blinky, Lulla-lullaby, sleep, boy ! All things are dumb ; and the fat small thumb Out of the bud mouth trails ; And the beady eyes of little house-mice Are shut upon their tails ; And the brown snail licks the garden bricks For moss to cool his tongue ; And the world turns round without a sound — Not even a bell's ding-dong. Winky-winky, blinky-blinky, Lulla-lullaby, sleep, boy 1 6o AMARANTHUS Now homing motes like tiny boats Swim over sleepy eyes ; And their freight, it seems, is shining dreams For heads of a little size. They come from the Land of Nod, my son ; Their sails are the red corn-rose ; And they drop their anchors one by one In the pool of Drowzydoze. Winky-winky, blinky-blinky, Lulla-luUaby, sleep, boy ! LOVE SERIOUS 6i TO N. C. C. August, 1900. O, Sun, that call'st the rose to life, Why hatch the canker brood ? To link the honey with the knife, Hot master, is it good ? How better we, strange neighbour Sun, If thou wouldst sheathe thy blade, And mould thine actions every one To please my little maid. Here's innocence enough to graft A world with love of love. O, take thine arrow from its haft, And use it so to prove. O, learn when first thou'rt risen up. Forbearance of her face ; And still with grass and buttercup Make soft her dwelling-place. O, follow on her daily round ; And sink alone for this, That all her daisies on the ground May purse their lips to kiss. 62 AMARANTHUS Dread angel with the flaming sword, Keep fast thine Eden dour. But hast thou mission from the Lord To strike the exile's flower ? Not so revolt forgets itself ; Not so will cease to burn. Put back thy brand upon the shelf, And set us love to learn. We took our fate ; make no complaint ; We till oujr alien soil. We but desire without taint The fruitage of our toil. Why, look, look here I couldst ever find A type more winning sweet? Do all for her — and so mankind Will come to kiss God's feet. LOVE SERIOUS 63 The little bonne, Marie. (A moi, mon foupon!) Spoke to her doll so wee : (A vioi, mon foupon!) " Hush, little son, sweet thing! But wouldst thou be a king ? " (A moi, mon poupon!) *' Thy sceptre grows in the mere," (A moi, mon poupon!) ** Thy crown in the blossoming brere." (A moi, mon poupon!) " And under the passion flower vShall be Thy bed and bower." (A moi, mon poupon!) A rose she pinned at his side, (A moi, mon poupon!) And one to each foot she tied ; (A moi, mon poupon!) His cot she lined with rue, And she named him her Jesu. (A moi, mon poupon!) 64 AMARANTHUS HER COMING Whence did our bird-soft baby come ? How learned to prattle of this for home ? Some sleepy nurse-angel let her stray, And she found herself in the world one day. She heard nurse calling, and further fled : She hid herself in our cabbage bed. There we came on her fast asleep, What could we do but take and keep, Carry her in and up the stair ? She would have died of cold out there. She woke at once in a little fright ; But Love beckoned her from the light — Lure we had lit, for dear love fain ; She had seen it shine through the window pane; Lure we had kindled of flame and bliss, To catch such a little ghost-moth as this. LOVE SERIOUS 65 Ah, me ! it shrivelled her pretty wing. Here she must stay, poor thing, poor thing ! HER PRAYER Dear God, teach my fingers ten — Teeny-weeny half-score men — What Thy pleasure, what their work, Day by day in shine or murk. Two for pins to twist my curls Into spun-silk spires and whorls; Two to learn where not to hold ; Two to earn their belts of gold ; Two, the wee-est of the set — Dear God, let them play as yet. And the thumbs, though squat and small, They shall be the props of all. Solemn, sturdy, staunch and stiff, Always ready — that is if In my mouth they be not slid, Like bees in sweet flowers hid. Grimy, impish though they ben, Dear God, they're Thy little men. See them here together raise Little steeple to Thy praise. HER EPITAPH With pain our pretty baby cried. God called her, and she smiled and died. 66 AMARANTHUS Where are you going, my little maid ? You will be lost in the dark outside — You, who your face, at some fancied shade, Must always in mummy's bosom hide. There, the frog in my throat ! it shall croak no more. Did it fret you, sweet? I will sing so gay Of the poor sad toys in the nursery drawer, Waiting for baby to come and play. No med'cine in heaven ? and we who feign To love you ; and yet will not let you rest ? Baby, 'twas God that invented pain To claim the cure and be written blest. Not by me, no, unless both He take. My pain, too, earned its remedy. Baby, O, baby, for mumsey's sake ! God does not love you so well as I. LOVE SERIOUS 67 We two. And one must die First. O, not I ! For then you only Would be lonely. Who reaches first the goal Takes prize and fame, The loser pays the toll. It is the game. Dear, I would have you win, For I can tell, You'd use your triumph well, Who know you out and in. You would not rest Your saints among, Until you'd wrung From them the promise blest That death in pleasant guise Should close mine eyes. 68 AMARANTHUS But I (it is man's way), If first to heaven won, Should laugh " Well done! " And, having gained, should say, *' What terror now shall bode Since I have shown the road ? " And happy, being dead, Fear thrown aside, Should make scorn of your dread Unjustified, Should bask within the light, Thinking, *' Her night, The darker drawn, Ensures the happier dawn." Then go, sweetheart, I'm selfish. Go thou first, Leave me to play the part That only seems accurst. Leave me, and smiling say ** He does but play When bowing to the stress Of loneliness." POEMS— VARIOUS POEMS— VARIOUS 71 THE UNPARDONABLE SIN In the night, full in the face of it, By a soul appalling The unspeakable, the unpardonable sin Was sped beyond recalling. A wind, like never another wind That rises on the dark, Answered, and fell like a hissing star, His living soul its mark. Down, straight from the Polar Star It dropped as heavy as lead, And, touching no hair of his wife beside. Smote the man in his' bed. A mocking ghost, he rose in the dawn To learn the best or worst : He sought his own image in the glass ; But he looked at his wife first. 'jz AMARANTHUS The face of himself was the face of himself, The face of yesterday ; But the face of his wife was a dreadful face, A thing to hate and slay. He turned with a curse, he turned with a prayer • To meet his child at the door ; But the face of his child was a dreadful face, A thing to strike and abhor. Now, thus should he know, and for ever and ever The curse of the Holy Ghost : Himself to all should seem as himself. But to him all else seem lost. POEMS— VARIOUS 73 THE POISONER'S LABORATORY. It stinks and slinks within a holt Some ancient horror doth enthral ; Where plunged the dreadful thunderbolt A deep well gasps beside the wall. Fit matrix for a venomed breed, Its labours yield without a sound ; There very silence run to seed In fungus bubbles from the ground. These spawns are larded all with grease The chimney vomits down on them. By night and day that does not cease Thick-pouring through a crusted phlegm. And, festering round the poison core, A mile the wood is gangrenous With blotched leaf and husked sore And growths of cankering polypus. Year-long the damned thicket, grown Enamoured of its own complaint, About the lazar-house hath blown In leprous flowers and seeds of taint. K 74 AMARANTHUS Strange fruits that never grew before, Like hanging tumours gorged with blood, Loll apoplectic by the door, Or fall and burst upon its wood. Sometimes the stealthy hatch will ope', And through the slit a squalid claw Protrude and in the fungus grope, And clutch a handful and withdraw. Sometimes behind the glaze of glass A face inhuman, masked with glaze Itself, glares deathly and doth pass, Leaving who peers in sick amaze. For never soul shall steal unscann'd To look on him that brews within. The bellows purr beneath his hand — Dear God, it is a wicked sin ! The chimney heaves an acrid spleen ; The very air is seized awry. No creature whom those fumes obscene Encompass but must surely die. * A knight came ringing steel-astride. He felt the horror on his cheek. POEMS— VARIOUS 75 ** Way for the winds of God ! " he cried, And drove a tunnel through the reek. The furnace vaulted into flame; The walls were burst and boiled away. Christ's woe upon the place of shame, Forejudged e'en of Judgment Day ! 76 AMARANTHUS THE TWO CROWS They were two daggled crows up a tree — Heigho I Famished and cold as crows could be, Down by the greenwood side 1 Says she: " Shall you and I foregather, Yet once more when the Spring comes, father ? Heigho I " says she. Below sat a woman sore distrest — Heigho I She held a dead child unto her breast, Down by the greenwood side O ! And still as she held, she made her moan : *' Sweet, sweet baby, don't leave me alone! Don't O! " said she. He was putting an edge to his bill — Heigho ! She " dressed " up to him, coaxing still, Down by the greenwood side O ! " Blackguard, dear," of a sudden said she : *' What became of our fledglings three? Heigho! " said she. POEMS— VARIOUS 77 He flirted his wings, his beak he clapped — Heigho I " One he was shot, and one was trapped Down by the greenwood side O ! And the third I killed, and picked her brain. So you'd have us to mate in the Spring again, Heh, crow? " said he. He cockt an eye to the foot of the tree — Heigho ! " Girls make passable meat," said he, *' When nothing else may serve, O I Always resourceful, Soot, my pop ! (When do you think she there will drop?) " — ** Heigho ! " said she. She turned from him with a pensive cluck — Heigho ! *' Blackguard," she said — and there she stuck, Down by the greenwood side O ! He paused in his task, with sideling head : " Well, what's the matter with you ? " he said. ** Heh, crow? " said he. ** I wish," she began — and stopped again — Heigho ! " Out with it, Sooty, and make it plain ! " Says he, with a thund'ring scowl O ! 78 AMARANTHUS " Only," she answered — " I'm so bereft — Our one wee henny — you might have left " " That's low," said he. She edged to his side, with a croak and quake — Heigho ! " Blackguard ! " she said : " For the poor chick's sake Shan't we forego this meal O ? " He withered her then with a single look : — ** You for a mate again, you rook ! Bye-low! " said he. POEMS— VARIOUS 79 THE PASSING GHOST Through the caves of night dumfounded, By bUnd negation bounded, In the weary round of doom I have reached the ancient room— The old famiHar room Once I slept in who am dead. Is there someone in the bed? There is someone in my stead. Yet I shiver with delight, So emerged upon the sight From the throbbing And the sobbing Of the icy wells of night. See the dark a sweet release To the sleeper as he sleeps : Of the dark to win surcease. See the spectre how he weeps Dusty flakes from withered eyes — Ashes from a charnel spring I— With the whisper of sunrise He must be upon the wing. 8o AMARANTHUS Ere the daisy lifts its lashes ; Ere the dawn the roof-tree washes, He must turn him in affright; He must turn him from the light To the throbbing And the sobbing Of the icy wells of night. To follow, as I shiver, Night round the world for ever, That — that is my doom. Yet I have reached the room, And so may reach again : — O, ecstasy in pain I O, wild taper in my gloom ! Is he dreaming, as I shake Standing here ? He doth awake, Slumber-warm, content-replete, Sees the light across the ceiling Like a jack-o'-lanthorn stealing From the waggon in the street ; — Turns him happy with a sigh, Thinking " Day comes by and by." POEMS— VARIOUS 81 Yes, to him with all delight : — And my hollow heart is shaken By the thoughts that new awaken From the throbbing And the sobbing Of the icy wells of night. To follow, as I shiver. Night round the world for ever And the silence of the moon Is my spectral dead high-noon : And the stars alway — Rowelled spurs that goad Me on my dark road — Drive me from the day. When the morning horn makes thunder, When the cow wakes in her stall, When a happy wind comes under The doorway in the hall, When the twitter of the lark Seems the turning of the wards In the lock of the close dark, And a sound comes from the fords ; 82 AMARANTHUS When a shapeless blot doth bloom In the blackness of the room From the casement — in abasement I must turn me to my doom : I must turn me in affright To the throbbing And the sobbing Of the icy wells of night I must turn me to my doom : — Yet I have reached the room, And so may reach again, Winning ecstasy in pain. Seeing light within the gloom. POEMS'-VARIOUS 83 MEMORIES Sighs on the twilight ; faces fancy-kist ; The sunset on the lonely hills ; the smell Of pillowing thyme ; the moon behind the mist, And throbbings of the love-sick Philomel — Farewell ! Farewell ! They speak of what, Far off and very long ago, Farewell ? As I came by the fields, a weary lark Straight on a thread of song from heaven fell ; And both mine eyes with sudden tears were dark, And something caught my heart-strings like a knell. Farewell ! Farewell ! He sang of what. Far off and very long ago. Farewell ? I walk on graves ; the dead beneath my feet Moan 'midst their roots of yew and immortelle: '* What cry was that? What dream so far and sweet ? What world ? What time, ere death-in-life befell ?" Farewell ! Farewell ! O, nevermore! O, never, never, never more. Farewell I 84 AMARANTHUS He set his teeth to a wintry reed, Chattered his fingers on the stops. God's love ! we saw the prun'd vine bleed ; The lark broke song from an April mead, The butterfly lit the copse. He thrummed an air on a ribboned lute; His breast was tanned and bare to the sun. God's fear ! we saw the world drop mute ; The snow fell white over man and brute Before he half was done. Ah ! who sings truest of all doth sing Of flowers, in winter ; snow, in spring. POEMS— VARIOUS 85 " 'Tis Christ His feast," said Short to Long. " Let's pass the night in drink and song." (( The liquor must not be too mild For toasting of that holy Child," Said Long. " Them Jews was blind," said he; " But not so ' blind ' as we will be." They drank Him once, and twice, and thrice; The main brace they began to splice. A child's voice wailed outside the door ; " O, let me enter, I implore ! " 'Tis freezing cold, and dark, and dire. O, let me warm me at your fire ! " *' No place for children here," said Long, And bid him ** cut his lucky " strong. " We're keeping of Christ Jesus' feast. Clear out," said Short, " you little beast! " They sang to " David's royal Son," And not till all the drink was done 86 AMARANTHUS Abstained ; then staggered to the door, And sobered at the sight they saw. Stark on the snow Christ baby lay. 'Twas Him those sots had cursed away. Now tell me, what availed them, then, To keep Christ out and Christmas in ? POEMS— VARIOUS 87 HEAVEN'S NURSERY ») " Sinner, sinner, whence do you come? " From the bitter earth they called my home.' *' Sinner, sinner, why do you wait ? " *' I fear to l^nock at the golden gate : " My crimes were heavy ; my doom is sure, And I dread the anguish I must endure."