LIBRARY JHWERSITY Of SAN DIEGO j COLLECTED POEMS MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED LONDON BOMBAY CALCUTTA MELBOURNE THE MACMILLAN COMPANY NEW YORK BOSTON CHICAGO DALLAS SAN FRANCISCO THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD. TORONTO COLLECTED POEMS BY NORMAN GALE MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED ST. MARTIN'S STREET, LONDON 1914 COPYRIGHT NOTE I THANK Messrs. CONSTABLE for allowing me to quote extensively from A Country Muse and Song in September, and Mr. JOHN LANE for being equally kind in respect of Orchard Songs. CONTENTS FROM A COUNTRY MUSE PAGE THE APOLOGY ...... 3 THE COUNTRY FAITH ..... 5 THE INVITATION ...... 6 A COUNTRY DANCE ..... 8 A GIPSY FUNERAL . . . . . . 1 1 A CREED . . . . . . . 13 JUNE IN LONDON . . . . . . 17 EVE 19 THE SHADED POOL ...... 20 BIRDLIP ........ 23 LEAVING ALL ....... 25 To A NEST OF YOUNG THRUSHES ... 26 SPRING . . . . . . . . 33 SUMMER 34 AUTUMN ....... 35 WINTER ........ 36 THE CAVALIER'S SONG 37 viii CONTENTS LAHORE CONFECTO . A PASTORAL . A CHILD OF LONELINESS . A PICTURE To A WHITETHROAT A FUNERAL . AN OUTLINE . WERE I A STAR . MORNING IN THE ORCHARD SPRING ...... MARY VANCE . LEAFY WARWICKSHIRE To SLEEP A THRUSH IN SEVEN DIALS AN UNFINISHED PICTURE THREESCORE AND TEN A LOVE-SONG A PRIEST . A SONG ...... GONE INTO LONG FROCKS A BIRD IN THE HAND LOVE SONG . A HOUSE IN THE HEDGE SONG ...... THE WOUNDED BIRD THE CLOSING OF PARADISE CONTENTS ix FROM ORCHARD SONGS PAGE DAWN AND DARK ...... 93 AT BRANDON ....... 94 A FAREWELL ....... 06 A WALK 98 PIGEONS AT CANNON STREET . . . . 103 To ORANGES . . . . . . .106 A PASTORAL 109 To MY BROTHERS . . . . . .no A SHILLING EACH . . . . . .113 NORTH WIND AT NIGHT . . . . 116 THE BUDDING OF THE ORCHARD . . . 118 HANNIBAL, SAGUNTO CAPTO, LOQUITUR . . 120 FROM SONG IN SEPTEMBER THE DANGER . 127 To THE SWEETWILLIAM . . . . .129 THE VISIT 132 BORN DUMB . . . . . . .134 THE VOICE . . . . . . .137 DREAM AND IDEAL . . . . . .139 A CHRISTENING . . . . . .144 THE HYACINTHS 146 INVOCATIONS 150 x CONTENTS PAGI MICHAELMAS DAISIES . . . . .152 SHAKESPEARE IN THE THRUSH . . . .156 THE RESOLVE . . . . . .158 THE BARLEY-BIRDS . . . . .160 THE WRESTLING . . . . . .162 DAY OF DELIGHT . . . . . .163 RETURNING THANKS . . . . .165 THE WANDERER . . . . . .167 THE MASTERPIECE . . . . . .174 THE COMPANION . . . . . .176 THE CRUMBS . . . . . . .177 BEAN BLOSSOM . . . . . .179 To A BEB 1 80 THE BARGAIN . . . . . .182 THE CHANGES 183 THE LOVER MUSES. . . . . . 185 A COUNSEL . 187 RENEWAL . . . . . . .189 THE LINK 190 A COTTAGE MONARCHY . . . . 193 SOUTH WARWICKSHIRE . . . . .196 BELLS OF DUMBLETON 202 THE CHERRY OF LUCULLUS .... 204 JEREMY JOY 209 NOT TO BE WON . . . . . .211 To THE IDEAL 212 CONTENTS xi PAGE THE THEFT . . . . . , . . 214 To A LOVER OF BIRDS . . . . .218 To BLUE CAMPANULAS . . . . .223 GRATITUDE ....... 226 THE LOVER SPEAKS ... 228 FROM A BOOK OF QUATRAINS COUNSEL . . . . . . .233 A TRANSPOSITION . . . . . .233 THE BALANCE. . . . . . .233 THE MOUSE ....... 234 THE CHANCE 234 To A CANVASSER . . . . . .234 JEALOUS MISERY . . . . . .234 A GREAT PROFESSOR ..... 235 THE STRANGER . . . . . .235 THE CHOICE 235 A RECIPE ....... 236 THE PRIZE ....... 236 To MY CALENDAR 236 THE SWEATER ...... 237 THE CHEAT ....... 237 THE CROWN IMPERIAL ..... 237 A CHARACTER ...... 238 ENVY ........ 238 xii CONTENTS PAGE THE Kiss 238 To CROESUS . . . . . . .239 THE OLD NEST . . . . . .239 THE IDEAL . 239 THE SECOND COMING . . . . .239 A DIAMOND SPEAKS ..... 240 DEATH AT PLAY ...... 240 A COMPENSATION ...... 240 THE ESCAPE 241 IN APRIL ....... 241 FROM A COUNTRT MUSE (REVISED) THE APOLOGY CHIDE not if here you haply find The rough romance of country love ; I sing as well the brook and wind, The green below, the blue above. Here shall you reaa of spreading cress, The velvet of the sparrow's neck ; Sometimes shall glance the glowing tress, And Laura s snow without a speck ; The crab that sets the mouth awry, The chestnut with its domes of pink ; The splendid palace of the sky, The pool where drowsy cattle drink ; The stack where Colin hides to catch The milkmaid with her beaded load ; The singing lark, a poet's match, That travels up the great blue road ; The cherry whence the blackbird bold Steals ruby mouthfuls at his ease ; The glory of laburnum gold, The valiant piping of the breeze ; THE APOLOGY ) all are here. The rustic Muse Shall sing the pansy and the thrush ; ^ chide not if she sometimes choose The country tove t the country blush ! THE COUNTRY FAITH HERE in the country's heart, Where the grass is green, Life is the same sweet life As it e'er hath been. Trust in a God still lives, And the bell at morn Floats with a thought of God O'er the rising corn. God comes down in the rain, And the crop grows tall This is the country faith And the best of all ! THE INVITATION COME, thrushes, blackcaps, finches, all, To peck my Laura's bounty ! There's not a sweetheart treats you so In all this leafy county. Yes, sparrows too ! for God forbid That here in bloom and grasses My Love and I should rank you birds In low and upper classes ! Both large and little, russet, bright, I call at Laura's asking ; And we shall watch you at your feast, Upon the greensward basking ; But this must first be understood By feathered folk, and fully All sweet content ! and, blackbird, sir, Remember not to bully ! Look down these lovely cherry-aisles At fruit by bills unfretted, The thousand thousand tiny globes Our jealous gardener netted ; 6 THE INVITATION For, bandits of the air, your troops To storm the orchard muster ; And woe betide the burdened tree, And woe the scarlet cluster. My Sweetheart pressed me yesterday To give you of our plenty ; She begged two glowing trees for you From out this line of twenty : Why, birds, her cherried lips, more fair Than ever Venus parted, Need only tremble with a wish, To make me tender-hearted ! God gave us with a willing hand A share of sky and mountain, With time to idle in the grass And listen to the fountain. Our sideposts and our lintel show His mark of recollection : We pay a tithe to Him through you, The birds of our affection. You cannot come with wings too quick, With appetites too hearty, To please your hostess and your host On Laura's birthday-party. She reaches up a sunburnt hand To free her shining bounty Fall to, my birds ! and praise her name Through all this leafy county ! A COUNTRY DANCE FIDDLE away, Old Time Fiddle away, Old Fellow ! Airs for infancy, youth, and prime, Tunes both shrill and mellow. Fiddle away, Or grave or gay, For faces pink or yellow Scrape your song a lifetime long, Fiddle away. Old Fellow ! Here are country maidens' breasts As white as hedgeside may ; Here are lips as red as hips That make October gay ; Here are buckled feet, and comely Limbs unspoiled by hose that's homely, Twinkling as you play. Though your bow be fast as fire, Feet like these shall hardly tire While the stars will stay. Fiddle away, Old Time Fiddle away, Old Fellow ! 8 A COUNTRY DANCE 9 Airs for infancy, youth, and prime ', Tunes both shrill and mellow. Here's a wooden bench where sit Two old crones, in tears, Have not flung a romping leg Fully forty years ! Lovers, sons and daughters gone, Still they sadly linger on, Mingling hopes and fears, And in the merry dancing-rings There's not a bouncing maiden springs With blood allied to theirs ; And not a bearded mouth that smiles Rejoiced their hut with baby wiles Or learned their gentle prayers. Fiddle them peace, Old Time Fiddle them rest. Old Fellow ! Tunes that ring through winter rime Something of sweet and mellow. Down scented lanes that sweethearts know The homeward dancers go, And wake the birds with merry words And lapses into heel-and-toe. " Ah, come with me across the ridge And dream upon the wooden bridge," Cries John to sweet-lip Sue ; " And hear me whisper how the strains Of music tingle in my veins, Though not so much as you ! " io A COUNTRY DANCE Here softly lies in starlit eyes That story, golden as a star, Unchanged beneath the changing skies On mountain-top, by harbour bar, Wherever Venus in her car, Dove-drawn, upon her mission flies ! The lovers lean across the rail And watch the river running pale Beneath them in the silver light. Now sweeter far than this Their lips within the stream unite (O star of Love, so strangely bright !) And tremble to a kiss. Fiddle them faith, Old Time- Fiddle them !ove, Old Fellow ! Beautiful songs of 'wedded prime , Low and sweet and mellow. Let your brilliant bow Tenderly always go, And happy things on golden strings Fiddle them, dear Old Fellow ! A GIPSY FUNERAL WHILE seeking in a Warwick lane The nest a greenfinch hoped to save, I met a Gipsy group that bore An infant to the grave. In front of all the father strode, The narrow case beneath his arm : Fast down his sun-tann'd cheeks there rolled The teardrops salt and warm. His neck a scarlet kerchief bound, His chieftain's head was duly bare : His heart was in the box of deal With baby lips and hair. The mother went with tearless eyes, One hand upon the coffin laid ; The other clutched the breast that yearned To feed the little maid. A yellowhammer flew along In golden jaunts, securely fleet : None watched the living topaz fly Adown the leafy street, ii 12 A GIPSY FUNERAL I wished those times could come again When man, possessing more of worth, Had God for closer neighbour here, And prophets on the earth. Elijah would have stretched himself In faith upon the Gipsy child, And then have watched the parents smile As once the Widow smiled. Not now shall Death be forced to bear A second lighting of the lamp He snuffs beside an emperor's bed, Or in a Gipsies' camp. A CREED GOD sends no message by me. I am mute When Wisdom crouches in her farthest cave ; I love the organ, but must touch the lute. I cannot salve the sores of those who bleed ; I break no idols, smite no olden laws, And come before you with no separate creed. No controversies thrust me to the ledge Of dangerous schools and doctrines hard to learn ; Give me the whitethroat whistling in the hedge. Why should I fret myself to find out nought ? Dispute can blight the soul's eternal corn And choke its richness with the tares of thought. I am content to know that God is great, And Lord of fish and fowl, of air and sea Some little points are misty. Let them wait. '3 14 A CREED I well can wait when upland, wood, and dell Are full of speckled thrushes great with song, And foxgloves chime each purple velvet bell. Our village is encircled by sweet sound Of bee and bird and lily-loving brook : Hence, Unbelief, for this is holy ground ! At early dawn I stand upon the sod And let the lark rain this upon my soul The smaller in man's sight, the nearer God. At noon I linger by the curving stream, And watch fresh water running to the sea, The salt of which comes not into its dream. At eventide I lean across a gate, And, knowing life must set as does the sun, Muse on the angels in the Happy State. So let me live among the birds and bloom Of hazel copses and enchanted woods Till death shall toll me to the common tomb. Give me no coat of arms, no pomp, no pride, But violets only and the rustic joys That throne content along the country-side ; No subtle readings, but a trusting love, A hand to help, a heart to share in pain, And over all the cooing of the dove. A CREED 15 How sweet the hedge that hides a cunning nest, And curtains off a patient, bright -eyed thrush With five small worlds beneath her mottled breast ! Though life is growing nearer day by day, Each globe she loves is mute as yet, and till Her bosom's beauty slowly wears away. At last the thin blue veils are backward furled, Existence wakes and pipes into a bird As infant music bursts into the world. And now the mother-thrush is proud and gay ; She has her pretty cottage, and her young To feed and lull when western skies turn grey. It would be bitter work to set a snare, Catch her and hang her in a London den Unknown to sun and woodland wealth of air. As with the thrush so would it be with me If I should leave my red-tiled roof and push My country shoulders through a living sea. My song is all of birds and peasant homes, For on such themes my heart delights to dwell, And sing in sunshine till the shadow comes. 1 6 A CREED I sing of daisies and the coloured plot Where dandelions pitch their golden camp I take what is, nor pine for what is not. I am for finches and the rosy lass Who leads me where the moss is thick, and where Sweet strawberry -balls of scarlet gleam in grass. And this I know, that when I leave my birds, The lichened walls, the heartsease and the heath, I shall not wholly fail of kindly words. And while I journey to the distant Day That first shall dawn upon the eastern hills, Perchance some thrush shall sing me on my way. The Great Republic lies toward the East, And Daybreak comes when Christ with tender face Welcomes the poor in spirit who were least. JUNE IN LONDON (WITH PUPILS) BOOKS and heat, the dullard mind Reeling under Cicero ; London landscape, roof and blind Blacker e'en than London snow : Pupils coming all day long, All my pause the thought that she, She I love, my joy and song, Dreams by day and night of me. Ah, might I gather a rose with its dew For her heart on this bright June morning ! Doric of the roughest mould Planned to make a Master sour ; Thirty lines of Virgil's gold Slowly melting in an hour ; Ovid's treasure, and the gems Horace polished for our eyes, In a maze of roots and stems, Hurdy-gurdies, cabmen's cries ! Ah, might I gather a rose in its dew For her heart on this bright June morning ! 17 c 1 8 JUNE IN LONDON Envious twigs in leafy nook Catch my love's long tresses fair, E'en as Grecian branches shook Down Diana's crown of hair ! While on Caesar's bridge I stand, Fancy brings (but could they speak !) Laura's lips, and, faintly tanned, Peachy glimpses of her cheek ! Ah^ might I gather a rose in its dew For her heart on this bright June morning ! EVE A SCARLET bird upon her shoulder's snow Was perched, and whistled to his envious fellows ; A thousand tints of feathers lit the air, Bewildering greens and reds and blues and yellows. Primeval glories clustered in her form ; Uncramped her curves ; she was the joy of Beauty. An unseen angel drank her with his eyes, Then trembled to the heart. His name was Duty. While innocently naked thus she stood, With lion-whelps and tiger-cubs around her, A wall of creepers parted. From the wood Leapt Adam doubling Paradise and found her. THE SHADED POOL A LAUGHING knot of village maids Goes gaily tripping to the brook, For water-nymphs they mean to be, And seek some still, secluded nook. Here Laura goes, my own delight, And Colin's love, the madcap Jane, And half a score of goddesses Trip over daisies in the plain : Already now they loose their hair And peep from out the tangled gold, Or speed the flying foot to reach The brook that's only summer-cold ; The lovely locks stream out behind The shepherdesses on the wing, And Laura's is the wealth I love, And Laura's is the gold I sing. A-row upon the bank they pant, And all unlace the country shoe ; Their fingers tug the garter-knots To loose the hose of varied hue. The flashing knee at last appears, The lower curves of youth and grace, Whereat the girls intently scan The mazy thickets of the place. 20 THE SHADED POOL 21 But who's to see except the thrush Upon the wild crab-apple tree ? Within his branchy haunt he sits A very Peeping Tom is he ! Now music bubbles in his throat, And now he pipes the scene in song The virgins slipping from their robes, The cheated stockings lean and long, The swift-descending petticoat, The breasts that heave because they ran, The rounded arms, the brilliant limbs, The pretty necklaces of tan. Did ever amorous God in Greece, In search of some young mouth to kiss, By any river chance upon A sylvan scene as bright as this ? But though each maid is pure and fair, For one alone my heart I bring, And Laura's is the shape I love, And Laura's is the snow I sing. And now upon the brook's green brink, A milk-white bevy, lo, they stand, Half shy, half frightened, reaching back The beauty of a poising hand ! How musical their little screams When ripples kiss their shrinking feet ! And then the brook embraces all Till gold and white and water meet ! Within the streamlet's soft cool arms Delight and love and gracefulness 22 THE SHADED POOL Sport till a flock of tiny waves Swamps all the beds of floating cress ; And on his shining face are seen Great yellow lilies drifting down Beyond the ringing apple-tree, Beyond the empty homespun gown. Did ever Orpheus with his lute, When making melody of old, E'er find a stream in Attica So ripely full of pink and gold ? At last they climb the sloping bank And shake upon the thirsty soil A treasury of diamond-drops Not gained by aught of grimy toil. Again the garters clasp the hose, Again the velvet knee is hid, Again the breathless babble tells What Colin said, what Colin did. In grace upon the grass they lie And spread their tresses to the sun, And rival, musical as they, The blackbird's alto shake and run. Did ever Love, on hunting bent, Come idly humming through the hay, And, to his sudden joyfulness, Find fairer game at close of day ? Though every maid's a lily-rose, And meet to sway a sceptred king, Yet Laura's is the face I love, And Laura's are the lips I sing. BIRDLIP IN the Cotswolds is a nest With a name so dear That there's sorrow in my breast If I linger here : It is Birdlip, Birdlip, Cherry, apple, sloe 1 And it's Ah to be at Birdlip For the healing of my woe ! In the Cotswolds is a nest Of a peace so deep That it seems a truer rest Than the soul of sleep. It is Birdlip, Birdlip, Nightingales and dew ! And it's Ah to be at Birdlip, Happy nightingales, with you ! In the Cotswolds is a nest With a maid so sweet, 23 24 BIRDLIP That there's sorrow in my breast Till our bosoms meet. She's at Birdlip, Birdlip, Fragrance and delight ! And it's Ah to be at Birdlip In your arms, my Love, to-night ! LEAVING ALL IT is not well that I should move For ever in Life's easy street. How should my feet not bleed for Love ? Love's bled for me. And Love is sweet. I follow though the brambles tear, And though the mountain track is rough. How should I moan a cross to bear ? Christ went this way. It is enough. TO A NEST OF YOUNG THRUSHES DEAR little birds, you're ready now to fly, But just a word before you say good-bye, And flash across the stately fields of rye To flit afar ! Sit in a line upon that wild-rose spray, And pay attention to the things I say, Which will not last until the dying day And evening star ! You yonder, by that angry-looking thorn, Clean wings and breast to-morrow. Do not scorn The sage advice of very long years born And thin grey hairs ! And you that perch the nearest to my face, Please have the modesty and country grace To check that piping song, 'tis not the place For evening prayers. Now, little thrushes, shall we not begin Before the stonechat's clink so crisp and thin : 26 NEST OF YOUNG THRUSHES 27 Ere larks hang o'er us with that lovely din We heard last night ? Sit still, my pretty ones, for now's the time To sip of wisdom ere the winter rime Freeze summer hearts and hush the laughing chime Once loud and bright. Well, first of all, I knew you ere you came To live in this my hedge. That dear old dame, Your mother, trespassed on my lands ; small blame She's had from me ! I knew the nook she chose, and saw her beak Fetch straw and grass, and tho' we could not speak We were the best of friends, and very meek She'd ever be. And soon the tender architect, by aid Most gladly lent by him who sweetly played The part of lover sighing to a maid, Built yonder nest. Her mate and she would stand upon its side To see if it were firm and sure to bide The stress of wind when you were rocked inside Beneath her breast. 28 NEST OF YOUNG THRUSHES Yes, it was safe. One morning when at last The rising sun long shadows westward cast, I left my bed, and o'er the lawnland passed In splashing dew ; The quickset scratched me as I pushed my hand To help me view the home so rarely planned Four globes of blue with dots of black I scanned, And these were you ! Only when you are parents you will know The patience of your mother. Time will show By equal proof the tenderness and glow Of love she gave ! She kept you warm the while her merry mate Sat like a sentry on that unhinged gate, Truer than hearts that have no strength to wait, Be saved and save. At last her heart stirred life within the shell, And how her bosom fluttered who can tell, When first she felt that all was very well, And soon her chicks Would chirp as birds, and stare up to the sky, And marvel at the moon so fair and high That sailed across their home and sank so nigh Behind the ricks ? NEST OF YOUNG THRUSHES 29 Then were keen huntings of the early worm And other food to keep alive the germ Of being in you, make your legs grow firm And strong to hold The ground or twig when first with infant strut You left the thrushes' land of Lilliput, Half-tumbling in some awkward winter rut When over-bold. When you were sucklings, so to speak, I knew The tale of feathers almost of the crew That weathered winds that swayed them as a shrew Rocks restless child ; But then I kept my room a while, and when I next might hear the robin and the wren I found the babies nearly grown to men, And somewhat wild. And you, Miss, you it was I know your breast Were sitting watching, waiting for the rest Who, far afield, were rambling in the quest Of sights and food : You feared my coming, squeaked, o'er- balanced, fell Down at my feet, and is it fair to tell ? Wept tears of fright, or what did just as well, And did you good. 30 NEST OF YOUNG THRUSHES Your brothers laugh, but from that slight mishap I knew you well, and in my easy cap I set you, stroking you, upon my lap Till calm again. I pressed my cheek against the dainty lace That set in ruffles round your heart's warm place, And made you sweetheart for a moment's space, And lost my pain. I still am here, but you are going hence Beyond my meadow's boundary of fence Out into wonders looming large and dense, Across the sedge "To see the world." What's that? To woo, to wive, Be vagrants some, and some be plump and thrive, To fall in snares, be shot, be saved alive For next year's hedge ? And I am left. My birds, there was a year When I was gathering twigs, and, summer near, Looked for a mate, a whitethroat mate, to cheer My lonely days ; NEST OF YOUNG THRUSHES 31 But she (God rest her !) came not to my lure, For angels found her pathways that were sure And rich with blossoms white and sweet and pure In sunny ways. She won a nest. And sometimes, when I yearn For peace in peace, my slower footsteps turn And seek the house whose cheering windows burn Upon the hill ; And she, as wife and mother, still can reach Me both her hands, and even gently teach Her comely face that olden glow of peach At memory's thrill. And I could find no bird to share my nest ; Nowhere to lay my head, no gracious breast To throb for me and beat beside my rest s A low calm tune. Home is not home no baby laughter nigh, And, Hannah, well I understand the cry, " O Father, give me children, or I die Now very soon." Dear little thrushes, if you rub your eyes And gape and stretch when I philosophize, Unbend that burdened spray and lightly rise Above the thorns. 32 NEST OF YOUNG THRUSHES Above the thorns ! The thorns are far too thick, And do not grow on only rose and quick, But spring from life and poison as they prick, What dreadful yawns ! Just one thing more, one taste of mental food ; Preserve the art so little understood The golden art of simply being good, As best you may, That men, who live in gross and careless herds, Attracted by the beauty of your words, May learn bright lessons in the School of Birds From day to day. SPRING WHAT did Spring-time whisper ? O ye rivulets. Peaking from your trance so sad, Pleased to welcome fisher-lad With his little nets, Speed, for summer s in the air, Prattle, for the breeze is warm, Chatter by the otter s lair, Bubble past the ivied farm ; Wake the primrose on the banks. Bid the violet ope her eyes, Hurry in a flood of thanks Underneath serener skies ! What a revel's coming soon Fairies trooping o'er the leas, Making magic by the moon, Crowned with wood anemones ! What a haunted heart the thrush Nurses in the blackthorn bush, Full of splendid songs to sing, Cheery welcomes of the Spring Spring has come ! 33 SUMMER WHAT was Summer chanting : O ye brooks and birds, Flash and pipe in happiness. Stirring hearts that cares oppress Into shining words ! Here's the 'pollen soon to make Smudges on the woodbees coat. Here's the lily of the lake Anchored in a golden boat. Wonder at the wind that blows Odours from the forest sweet ; Marvel at the honeyed rose Heaping petals at her feet ; Hark at wood-nymphs rustling through Brakes and thickets tender-knee d ! Hark ! some shepherd pipe there blew Was it Pan upon a reed ? Oh ! the pinks and garden-spice, Nature's every fair device, Mingled in a scented hoard Expected, longed-for, and adored Summer s come ! 34 AUTUMN WHAT did Autumn murmur ? O ye sheaves of gold \ Gathered in the sunburnt field Where the sowing-labours yield Treasures manifold, Here's a jug of rare old ale Beading still the reaper s beard While he whistles down the vale As the humming farm is nearedl What a saucy knot of maids Eggs him on to kiss his prize ! What a 'pack of bouncing j ades Binds a kerchief o'er his eyes Twirls him thrice^ and bids him search Whom he may the while they pinch. Prick, and leave him in the lurch. Each one shrilling like a finch ! Ah ! the starlight country dance, Not without its rough romance Not without the fiddle's beat Speeding Cecily s flashing feet Autumn s come ! 35 WINTER WHAT did Winter mutter ? ye frozen ponds, Ring, as on the flying skate Rapid couples, maid and mate, Skim in cosy bonds ! Bless me, what a scarlet nose Comes with Robin home from school! How his pilot jacket shows Ghosts of snowballs on the wool ! Here are drifts beside the door, Flakes that melt on Laura' 's face, Shameless hurricanes that roar Anger into every place f Here's a splendid pavement-slide, Made by pourings from the jugs ; Even babies take a pride, Helping with their china mugs ! Now's the hour when chestnuts roast, Now for father s promised ghost / Children, Winter's come anew Love him, for he worships you / Winter s come / THE CAVALIER'S SONG FACES prim and starched and yellow Ne'er would meet us on the road If to Bacchus, plump and mellow, Lads would pay the debt that's owed. Pledge with me the tavern scarlet Warm upon his ample cheeks ! Shirk the toast, and be a varlet Fit for what the spigot leaks ! Here's a pint to Luck, Here's a quart to Folly ! Here's a butt to drench the slut, Hang-lip Melancholy ! If the skein of life be twisted, Bacchus can the knot untie ; If Jade Fortune turn close-fisted, Bacchus knows to melt her eye. Ho ! his giant laugh and lusty, Ho ! his nimble train of winks, Could unfreeze the desert-dusty, Mumchance, grapeless, Roundhead Sphinx ! Here's a pint to Luck, Here's a quart to Folly ! Here's a butt to souse the slut, Hang-lip Melancholy ! 37 38 THE CAVALIER'S SONG Would you beg of whitethroat Rosa, Clink a glass with Bacchus first ; If it chance the maiden shows a Black face, home, and drown the worst ! What ? A wench with sack to meddle ? Let her perish in her pout ! Tinker Love has leave to peddle While we roar the flagon out. Here's a pint to Luck, Here's a quart to Folly ! Here's a butt to drown the slut, Hang-lip Melancholy ! LABORE CONFECTO AH God, how good and sweet it is To have so fair a rest For such a weary \ weary head On suck a white, white breast ! Ah me, how sweet and good it is To leave the city's lamps, Its multitude of merchant-men, Its multitude of tramps : To find the children eager-eyed, Expectant of my tread Bright little angels scantly robed In readiness for bed ! To hear the music of a voice That welcomes me at night : To see within her eyes of love A rare and sudden light ! To watch the youngest at her heart, And hear with ecstasy His uncouth dialect of joy When calling out to me ! 39 40 LAHORE CONFECTO The finest language lacking words The world has ever had ! And how the spirit answers it ! And how the soul is glad ! Peace, peace indeed, with labour done, The babies kissed to sleep, To hear the household chronicles What made the children weep ; What dandelions grew beside The dock-plants in the lanes ; How Baby puckered up his face At stinging-nettle pains. Peace, peace indeed ! And then to sit Beside my Love's low chair, And sometimes feel her hand sometimes Her lips upon my hair. And bliss it is, returning late, To see her, half-divine, Calm as a statue-saint, asleep, And think This angel's mine. Gold, pink, and snow in one she lies Toward my vacant place, As if she hoped when she awoke At once to find my face. LAHORE CONFECTO 41 Ah God, how good and sweet it is To have so fair a rest For such a weary, weary head On such a white, white breast ! A PASTORAL ALONG the lane beside the mead Where cowslip-gold is in the grass I matched the milkmaid's easy speed, A tall and springing country lass : But though she had a merry plan To shield her from my soft replies, Love played at Catch-me-if-you-Can In Mary's eyes. A mile or twain from Varley bridge I plucked a dock-leaf for a fan, And drove away the constant midge, And cooled her forehead's strip of tan. But though the maiden would not spare My hand her pretty finger-tips, Love played at Kiss-me-if-you-Dare On Mary's lips. Since time was short and blood was bold, I drew me closer to her side, And watched her freckles change from gold To pink beneath a blushing tide. A PASTORAL 43 But though she turned her face away, How much her panting heart confessed ! Love played at Find-me-for-you-May In Mary's breast. A CHILD OF LONELINESS THE pith of faith is gone. And as there lie Along the desert shanks of lions slain, So in this world whose weeds are grown so high, Half-hid, half- seen, Faith moulders on the plain ! Tenderly take the priceless, wondrous bones, And wend away from all that plucks thy dress, And with a few chance boughs or scattered stones Build up thine altar, Child of loneliness. The Master is not only in the court Where doves are sold and money-changers cry; Nor will He leave the countryside untaught If ears be open as He passes by : In secret paths that thread the forest-land He waits to heal thee and divinely bless ; While from the hill with voice and waving hand The Shepherd calls thee, Child of loneliness. 44 A CHILD OF LONELINESS 45 He pours in oil and wine to soothe thy wound, He fills thy heart with secret sympathies ; Nowhere so barren is thy patch of ground, Nowhere so fruitless are thy cherry-trees, But He will leave the lustre of a shrine, But He will hasten at thy cry of stress, And make thy burden His, His comfort thine, His face to smile, thou Child of loneliness. But be thou faithful to thine altar set Within the temple of the stilly glade, For Christ is there, Whose heart will not forget The striving of thy soul. Be not afraid ! O priest and people mingled into one, Within thy green cathedral-aisles no less He stands above thee when, thy prayer begun, Thou callest Him, O Child of loneliness. 'Tis sweet where every downy throat's a well Of song itself to worship in the grass, Thine altar's base fast-founded on a swell Anear a glade where elms and beeches mass : There is a space for breath, and there, content, If aught should be forgiven, kneel, confess ; Over thy head the boundless firmament, God's love, God's wisdom, Child of loneliness. A PICTURE No bell and steeple let there be for me The blackbird calling from his lilac tree. Grandfather in his broadcloth goes To hear the Parson's Sunday prose ; He sleeps the sermon safely through, Behind his pillar out of view ; For never dangerous doctrine ran From Parson Tom ; he knows his man, And feeling his salvation sure He points the morals with a snore, Whereat with giggles all the girls Do shake their rows of dancing curls. Here is the flame of young romance Oft nourished by a subtle glance, And Cupid lifts beneath the nose Of Dame Theology the rose 46 A PICTURE 47 That quivers on Clarinda's heart Responsive to the looks that dart Whence Colin, tired of parables, The herdsmen's quarrel at the wells, Contents him with the lovely shape That glances through Clarinda's cape. Among the boys some bench is cut, Or one essays the traitor nut, Which pops, whereat with cheeks aflame The kernel's fumbled in his shame, And, rolling underneath a pew, Is out of reach, but still in view. And through the whispers, nut, and knife, Lot's wife, and yet again Lot's wife. Outside, his tale the blackbird spins, The tributary thrush begins To praise the blue audaciously With daring turns of melody. And now the Parson ends his prose, The hymn is sung, grandfather goes 48 A PICTURE Serenely home, and quite assured He profited, and never snored, And thumps the turfy path apace Says, sleep in Church is sheer disgrace. Now Colin, free of circumstance, Pursues Clarinda with romance, Forgiving all the herdsmen's strife, Lot's wife, and yet again Lot's wife. No bell and steeple let there be for me The blackbird calling from his lilac tree. TO A WHITETHROAT IF thou but pipe I will a pilgrim be Along the outskirt bushes of the wood : Fly forward, Whitethroat, searching still for me Some leafy shrine of utter quietude : There stay awhile and sing, Upon me fling The ditties of the woodland that I love ; And mingling with thy song Sometimes may float along The soft ejaculation of the dove. For, Whitethroat, all the loved of Long Ago Have vanished sleep ward far and far away, And in the churchyard yonder do but grow To finer dust God rest them ! day by day. So stay awhile and sing, Upon me fling The ditties of the woodland that I love ; And call to join the song From out this beechen throng The deep-toned consolation of the dove. 49 E 5 o TO A WHITETHROAT The pomp of vast cathedrals cannot ease The grief within me that will not be still. Help, natural magic of the forest trees ! Help, green enchantment of the sloping hill! And thou, my Whitethroat, sing, Upon me fling The ditties of the woodland that I love ; And may there speed along In union with thy song The mellower reflection of the dove. The Priest has spoken, and I am not healed. The organ pleaded, and my heart was cold. Where is God's widest blessing ? In the weald, Beside the sheepcotes and upon the wold. Wherefore, my Whitethroat, sing, Upon me fling The ditties of the woodland that I love ; And call from out this throng Of trees to swell thy song The gentle exclamation of the dove. A FUNERAL WE carried you one sullen winter day Along a road of no return for you, No coming back for you, O friend. We bore the body, for the soul, men say, Unviewed, had sped into the angels' view And left the world to circle to its end. We bore you on our shoulders though the wind Came o'er the hedges with a cry that made Us tremble in the mire still we bore You safe into the little church, and prayed In tears. Ah, wise in action and in words, most wise, We may not gaze into your earnest eyes And in their noble steadfastness admire Pure heart, clean mind, and flame of sacred fire To burn up evil and attain the skies ! For in a searching wind we, tearful, bore You safe into the church our spirits sore To think that we should walk with you no more ; 52 A FUNERAL And when the priest read comfort from his book, How cold it was to us who might not look Upon your face ! And then anew in tenderness we raised Your body up and placed it near the grave ; But God our strength and Christ our hope be praised That we shall gaze on you as Mary gazed On the Redeemer when He rose to save ! Slowly, as falls a tear that slowly starts From some great agony, the coffin sank, But all your heart was treasured in our hearts ; And when the Sexton from the earthen bank Dropt clods upon you, tears fell warm and fast, For though your eyes were closed and low your head, It was as if you lived and we were dead ! Whether along the lane or by the field We all sobbed homeward, hard it is to tell ! A blackbird in the coppice close-concealed Piped out of tune to grief within our breasts And jarred against the unseen bell that pealed A late lark's song still wavered overhead, Not beautiful, O Friend, for you were dead Not lovely, Friend of friends, for you were dead. AN OUTLINE As Mary walked ahead with John We heard glad voices ringing ; But suddenly there came a pause Filled up by wood-birds singing, Filled up by wild birds singing. As John came back to us alone His eyes with tears were welling. 'Twas but a simple tale he told That was not worth the telling, Ah me ! not worth the telling. 53 WERE I A STAR WERE I a star, I would not shine Save when my Love was looking forth With star-like eyes, surpassing fine And clustered glories of the north. And if a ray from me should sink Upon her face, her peerless breast, It could not tremble on the brink Of deeper lustre, truer rest. Ah, surely, if her gleaming hand Should prison this one summer night, I might come down to wonderland, Made mortal, to regain my light ! Were I a star, I would not shine Save when my Love looked up to see Star flash to star a silver sign That she was searching heaven for me. 54 MORNING IN THE ORCHARD (TO AN INVALID) THEY wake, they sing both thrush and lass ! The blackbird's in the orchard grass, And sprinkles in his rapid quest Great dewdrops on his jetty breast. The fruity acre, veiled in white Of buds and blossoms opened quite, Grows warm with sun ; and soon is heard That dear duet of bee and bird. How Nature haunts the fragrant aisles With musing skirts and happy smiles ! And how her windy whispers stir The bridal boughs in praise of her ! The scent, the hush are priests of good In such a spicy solitude ! O, where's the town and where's the mart Can cleanse me thus my foolish heart ? 55 56 MORNING IN THE ORCHARD The comfort of the air is full, The thrush's sermon is not dull. What fine persuasion ! And how fair His leafy altar in the pear ! The country is a poem writ By God, and few decipher it ; Come, hear the mellow thrush translate The silence of his mother-mate ! He's in the apple-blossom now With golden chant on silver bough ; His wants are little so be mine ! A worm for loaf and dew for wine. O let my cellar be the hill Whence flows the unpolluted rill, That all my Caecuban may be Sweet Nature's, and her own the key ! Give me my daily home-made bread, A wife's dear bosom for my head ; A flagon bubbling from the well, The wood for church, the finch for bell ; A son to clasp my finger tight, God's care to nest him through the night ; His mother's hand to gentle me When that my head is on her knee. MORNING IN THE ORCHARD 57 Here can I walk a lovely land, And smooth the fledgling with my hand ; Can track the runnel to its source Past raspberry canes and lovers' gorse. But you, dear friend, upon your bed Must dream activities instead, While robbers bring the hedge's bliss In haste for you to stroke and kiss. Yet you may have approaches fine To angel secrets and divine, While we who stride the dewy sod Be far less clearly taught of God. Who knows ? Within your mind may be A perfect orchard fair to see, And Fancy's fruit be sweeter far Than all our pears and apples are. SPRING ALL the lanes are lyric, All the bushes sing ; You are at your kissing, Spring ! Romping with your children, Do not fail to bring Mary to the haystack, Spring ! Froth upon her fingers, Bosom for a king, Speed her from the milking, Spring ! MARY VANCE WHEN I was young, and had the skill To learn the tune of Cupid's making, And teach my sweetheart from the hill A pretty trick for dear escaping ; When by the constant lavender, Or gipsy rose she stayed to parley, O, cheerly went my feet to her Along the road to Varley. Ah, Mary Vance, when you with me Were keeping starlit company, The mile of bliss, The laugh and kiss From Shepperton to Varley ! Not warm enough my lips to keep The lips of Death from cold caresses ! O weary head, to never sleep Upon her heart, amid her tresses ! No more we watch the foam of light Run lipping over seas of barley, For Death the Harvester by night Went down the road to Varley ! 59 60 MARY VANCE Ah, Mary Vance, when you with me Were keeping starlit company, The mile of sweet Between the wheat From Shepperton to Varley ! LEAFY WARWICKSHIRE WHY will your mind for ever go To meads in sunny Greece ? Our song-birds have as fine a flow, Our sheep as fair a fleece ; Among our hills the honey-bee, And in the leaning pear I tell you there is Arcady In leafy Warwickshire. Our maids can match Diana's shape, And thread the woodland way ; They sing, and from the trees escape Birds musical as they : As Orpheus once Eurydice, The thrush he draws my dear I tell you there is Arcady In leafy Warwickshire. Our English fountains are not mute, And Fancy's ear may catch The mellow airs of pipe and flute Where blushing maidens snatch 61 62 LEAFY WARWICKSHIRE The hasty garb lest shepherds see Their bosoms soft and clear I tell you there is Arcady In leafy Warwickshire. Apollo's in the winding lane ! And Cupid with his smile Comes splendidly across the plain To walk with us a mile : The milkmaid's kiss, the country peace Delight us living here, Content to barter all of Greece For leafy Warwickshire ! TO SLEEP ALAS ! how far away it seems Since in an Arcady of dreams Beside a shaded pool I met My early, only love again ! Her face with little drops was wet Like pansy petals after rain ; But when she saw me by the reeds With love enough to feast her needs, Her glowing mouth, that miracle, Of rose and sun, did blossom sweet, And at her girdle-band in joy Her traitor heart the swiftlier beat : It stirred that tender sea to rise, The waves of snow to surge and start : They ran unchecked a moment's space, Then broke in beauty on my heart ! It was a dream, but, Love, how sweet Till Wakeful ness on velvet feet Cast shadows over all our bliss And crept between the coming kiss. But thou, O Sleep, bend down and give My fevered frame apparent death ; 63 64 TO SLEEP Receive my hands, caress my brow, And send the incense of thy breath About my temples while I weep, Sleep, lest thou shouldst not hear me, Sleep. On aching balls that roam the room Thus set thy seals as one who stirs About the bedside of the dead And weighs down rebel lids of eyes That look beyond for Paradise With silver circles from a purse : And when thy spell is on me cast, And thou from out my chamber passed, If haply Wakefulness be near Say not that I am sleeping, dear, For oftentimes, methinks, her mood Is wry, and not to do me good. God, 'twould better be if she To wake me should delay too long, And find with face all still and cold Me unresponsive to her song ! The blind grows pale with dawn, and hark ! It is the matin of the lark. Though there be virtue in thy touch 1 will not pray thee overmuch, Lest I should weary thee, and be Cast out of all thy love by thee ; And, Sleep, I will not moan or weep If thou wilt come to-morrow, Sleep. A THRUSH IN SEVEN DIALS act of nature is here disregarded} HERE in this den of smoke and filth They caged a thrush's broken heart ; Yet when the sun, as if by stealth, Shone, or a milkman's rattling cart Shook all her narrow wickerwork, The bird would chirp, and very soon To passing Jew, or Dane, or Turk Sing some remembered forest-tune. Alas ! the halting notes that rang In emulation of her mate Who in the shadowed evening sang Beside the five-barred spinney-gate Were thin and false. But yet the song Gained pathos from its lessened spell, Since this proclaimed aloud the wrong Of shutting thrushes up in hell ! But sometimes, heartened to forget The crime of her captivity, The songster o'er the city's fret Flung strains of bird-divinity, 65 F 66 A THRUSH IN SEVEN DIALS And tried to stretch her tattered wings, And poise above the constant perch, And drown the poor imaginings Of sparrows on the murky church. She marvelled much that they so small, So scant of music, plainly drest, Should swoop at will from wall to wall, While she, whose melody and breast Had fluttered whitethroats in the wood, Should hang upon a rusty nail And chirp to great-eyed boys who stood To hear her sing in rain or hail. As if upon the very brink Of freedom, she would sometimes fill The air with joy, and seem to think The road a stream, the church a hill. Thus lifted from the truth, she sang The song that never knows defeat, Till all the grimy district rang With tales of moss and meadowsweet. And then for days she would not shake A single utterance from her store, Despite the outcast imps who spake, Like Oliver, to ask for more. In fluffy listlessness she sat And dreamed of all the grassy west How she had feared the parson's cat, And how she built the earliest nest ! A THRUSH IN SEVEN DIALS 67 Sometimes a French piano hurled Metallic scales adown the street, That seemed to buffet all her world, By being hard and shrill and fleet ! No maddened music of this kind Could tempt the thrush to rivalry : She pecked an inch of apple-rind And waited till the din went by. There, from a tiny patch of sun, She made an April for her heart ! Imagined twigs, and sat thereon, Though shaken by the coaling cart. And there she wondered how to build As once she built, when free to roam, Because her aching heart was filled With dreams of motherhood and home. And if perchance disdain or pride Or brooding made her chantings fail, Sing, bird ! an ugly villain cried, And swung her fiercely on her nail. This was the man whose crafty net And craftier brain had meshed her wings 'Twas not for such her music set The song of her imaginings ! Ah ! leave them in the wilderness, Or in the bush, or in the brake. Let them in liberty possess The haunts God fashioned for their sake ! 68 A THRUSH IN SEVEN DIALS And all the glories of their throats Shall sound more glorious when they rise In flights and waves of noble notes To stir your hearts and dim your eyes. AN UNFINISHED PICTURE 'Tis Mary the milkmaid singing, A-singing, a-singing So rarely and sweet that the lark at her feet, All ready to start with a song in his heart, Presses closer the nest with his warm little breast, Forgetting his lay as he drinks in the sweet Pure music of Mary singing. 'Tis Mary the milkmaid singing, A-singing, a-singing So rarely and plain that a man in the lane Grows flushed in the face standing still in his place, And moves his red lips as the melody slips In a lovely and tender and womanly strain From Mary the milkmaid singing. 'Tis Richard the keeper whistling, A-whistling, a-whistling So rarely and clear for the milkmaid to hear ! 69 70 AN UNFINISHED PICTURE And she with a start puts her hand to the heart That leaps in the nest of that tremulous breast Beating time to the rollicking tune drawing near With Richard the keeper whistling. THREESCORE AND TEN SILENT he sits from day to day, With eyes as dull as smoky glass, And wonders in a childish way At shadows on the grass. Or else the spark of memory Lights to his chair, now quick, now slow, The shades of what he used to be, The ghosts of Long Ago : Remembrances of velvet cheeks, And blushes that are Cupid's spies Revealing what a shy heart speaks To lovers' burning eyes. And as they glide in dumb review He stretches out his withered hand, Desiring you, O Joy, and you, O Love, to hear and stand. " Once more," he cries to Time, "once more To rise at dawn and swiftly start To find my milkmaid as of yore And press against her heart ! 71 72 THREESCORE AND TEN " Again," he cries to Time, " again To swing my boy upon my knee, And kiss the scented cherry-stain On lips upraised to me ! " Again to call for Joan, and hear Her steps obedient to the call ; But not again the depthless fear, The one thing worst of all " The narrow coffin and the face Cold, comfortless, and sightless there, And whiter than the filmy lace Her breast was wont to bear ! " Ah, Life, that dost begin so fair With eager heart and tender kiss And strokings of Love's golden hair, That thou shouldst come to this This that a broken man should watch And pray for just one day one more While Death is trifling with the latch, And fumbling at the door ! A LOVE-SONG TO think, O to think as I see her stand there With the rose that I plucked, in her glorious hair, In the robe that I love, So demure and so neat, 1 am lord of her lips and her eyes and her feet ! O to think, O to think when the last hedge is leapt, When the blood is awakened that dreamingly slept, I shall make her heart throb In its cradle of lace, As the lord of her hair and her breast and her face ! O to think, O to think when our wedding- bells ring, When our love's at the summer but life's at the spring, I shall guard her asleep As my hound guards her glove, Being lord of her life and her heart and her love ! 73 A PRIEST NATURE and he went ever hand in hand Across the hills and down the lonely lane ; They captured starry shells upon the strand And lay enchanted by the musing main. So She, who loved him for his love of her, Made him the heir to traceries and signs On tiny children nigh too small to stir In great green plains of hazel leaf or vines. She taught the trouble of the nightingale ; Revealed the velvet secret of the rose ; She breathed divinity into his heart, That rare divinity of watching those Slow steps by which a nettle learns to dart The puny poison of its little throes. Her miracles of motion, butterflies, Rubies and sapphires skimming lily crests, Carved on a yellow petal with their eyes Tranced by the beauty of their powdered breasts, Seen in the mirror of a drop of dew, He loved as friends and as a friend he knew. The dust of gold and scarlet underwings More precious was to him than nuggets torn 74 A PRIEST 75 From all invaded treasure-crypts of time, And every floating, painted, silver beam Drew him to roses where it stayed to dream, Or down sweet avenues of scented lime. And Nature trained him tenderly to know The rain of melodies in coverts heard. Let him but catch the cadences that flow From hollybush or lilac, elm or sloe, And he would mate the music with the bird. The faintest song a redstart ever sang Was redstart's murmur, and the whitethroat knew No trick of bridal emphasis that rang Doubtful on ears unaided by the view. But in his glory, as a pure young priest In that great temple, only roofed by stars, An angel hastened from the sacred East To reap the wisest and to leave the least. And as he moaned upon the couch of death, Breathing away his little share of breath, All suddenly he sprang upright in bed ! Life, like a ray, poured fresh into his face, Flooding the hollow cheeks with passing grace. He listened long, then pointed up above ; Laughed a low laugh of boundless joy and love That was a plover called, he softly said, And on his wife's breast fell, serenely dead. A SONG I SAW a weeping maiden A-searching in the morn For Love, who tells the rosebud Too little of the thorn : She sought him on the hill-top And o'er the dewy lea ; But he was standing in the shade, Was waiting there with me. He sang not in the meadow, He piped not near the stream, Nor hid in ferny forest, This darling of her dream : He slept not in the poppies, He stooped not in the rye ; But called to her from out my heart, And yet she passed him by. 76 GONE INTO LONG FROCKS SHE'S a woman ! The gracious girl's in longer dresses, And desecrating hands have piled In one bright crown her flying tresses ; But yesterday she was a child, And joined to mine her frank caresses, Perched in a radiant bundle on my knee To stroke my face or kiss it suddenly. She's a woman ! O thievish Time, to steal my pleasure, Her weight, her fingers in my hair ! No more she dangles at her leisure A shapely limb from out the pear. Still, in a statelier way this treasure Colours my life, and from the tomboy age Gives me her eyes and voice for heritage. 77 A BIRD IN THE HAND LOOK at this ball of intractable fluff, Panting and staring with piteous eyes ! What a rebellion of heart ! what a ruff Tickles my hand as the missel-thrush tries, Pecking my hand with her termagant bill, How to escape (and I love her, the sweet !) Back where the clustering oaks on the hill Climb to the blue with their branches, and meet ! Nay, polished beak, you are pecking a friend ! Bird of the grassland, you bleed at the wing! Stay with me, love ; in captivity mend Wrong that was wrought by the boy and his sling. Would that a Priest of the Birds might arise, Wonderful words on his lips to persuade Reasoning creatures to leave to the skies Song at its purest, a-throb in the glade ! Bow, woodland heart, to the yoke for a while ! Soon shall the lyrics of wind in the trees 78 A BIRD IN THE HAND 79 Stir you to pipe in the green forest-aisle God send me there with the grass to my knees ! Trusting to-day an affectionate breast Full of its duty to welcome and share, Build from the twigs of my friendship a nest Not to be plundered, Delight of the air ! LOVE SONG HER breast is snow with sun thereon, Her eyes than Indian stars more fair ; Her little ears are pink pearls caught In glossy nets of falling hair. I love her robe that skims the grass, I love those lips that shine with glee ; But most I love the wise young heart Uncaptured in captivity. No tame and tutored echo she Of all upon her lover's lips : She scorns to bear across her soul The changeless shadow of eclipse ! But, full of fire and living help, Discovers to my blinder eyes Green alleys that will lead me on To peace and Paradise. 80 A HOUSE IN THE HEDGE ALL architecture done, And housekeeping begun, The mother warms with joy Her coming maid or boy. Her husband in a tree Pours out his heart in glee, And tells the evening star How blue his treasures are. Crescendos of delight From blackthorn take their flight, And then the calmer stress Of whispered loveliness. His wife so meek is pent Within the leafy tent, And God instructs her breast To linger on the nest. At last in tangled quick There cries the sudden chick ; Within the maze of thorn To birds a son is born ! 81 G 82 A HOUSE IN THE HEDGE With baby chirp and cheep Three other children peep. O commonwealth of bills For unimagined trills, Old Time shall bring you up Together in a cup ! And then in season due Shall sons be born to you ! So Spring next year shall fledge The infants of the hedge ; These very stars shall look On love's unfingered nook. With fatherly delight The bird shall thrill the night ; To mound and mead be lent The voices of content. If every human nest Contained so pure a breast, If every husband gave To home the merry stave, Methinks that life would pass More sweet for lad and lass, And, piercing deeps of blue, God's smile come radiant through. SONG FIRST the fine, faint, dreamy motion Of the tender blood Circling in the veins of children This is Life, the bud. Next the fresh, advancing beauty Growing from the gloom, Waking eyes and fairer bosom This is Life, the bloom. Then the pain that follows after, Grievous to be borne, Pricking, steeped in subtle poison This is Love, the thorn. THE WOUNDED BIRD ROSE coming home Had a bird in her breast ; In the garden that's mine Was a robin for guest ; He had piped in her path, and my dove Gave him rest. Rose coming home Had her palms at her throat ; And I heard from the lace Such a musical note Of the bird that wore scarlet in front Of his coat. Rose in my room Let me peep in the nest Where the robin was nursed ; And he pecked when I pressed On his velvety pate ! He was warm In her breast. 8 4 THE CLOSING OF PARADISE THE Gods who toss their bounties down To willing laps, To some gave villas nested high Among the foliage of the sky Of Alp or soaring Apennine ; To some a Sabine farm ; to some The pillared porches of a home With marble vaults for priceless wine, And slaves, whose tributary line Saluted Consuls late from Rome. The Gods who toss their bounties down To willing laps, To some sent all felicities Of native statues, foreign frieze, And gold to bribe the poet's lyre ; To some upon the inland sea A pleasure-ship near Sicily, Where harps and echoes long have rung, And bards in busy vineyards sung For maidens purple to the knee. 85 86 THE CLOSING OF PARADISE The Gods who toss their bounties down To willing laps Gave me the joy of being free Gave me the gift of poverty ! No eagle, sinking from the sun At eventime, discerns afar The flashing of a golden star On roof of mine, or slaves who press With all the pomp of slavishness To help me from my gilded car. The Gods who toss their bounties down To willing laps Gave me no treasure-house of pearls, No bevy of slim dancing-girls, But finer gifts outshining these A little wood whose paths are few, Some trees made bright with fruit and dew ; And lastly, O my child so fair With masses of resplendent hair, They, gracious, dowered me with you ! The Gods who toss their bounties down To willing laps Exalted me beyond my kind With all the mercies of a mind That does not hungry gape for change. The blackbird of a yesterday, So it unlearns no liquid Jay, To-morrow can entice my feet As pilgrims after piping sweet Across the drying lines of hay. THE CLOSING OF PARADISE 87 The Gods who toss their bounties down To willing laps, To her who left a stately house To comfort me gave marvellous Rare glimpses of pure maidenhood : A benediction was her face, Her heart a very tender place Where love conceived the potent rule To ache for others, merciful Beyond the boundaries of race. The Gods who toss their bounties down To willing laps Instilled in her the simple taste Of seeking in a country waste For Nature's hidden handiwork : She knew all secrets of the sedge, The Lords-and-Ladies in the hedge, What stripling blackbird first essayed To fly from home, and half dismayed Piped pitiful upon the edge. The Gods who toss their bounties down To willing laps In uncontrolled abundancy, Decreed that praise of bud and bee Should be the duty of her lips. The thunder of the world roared on, Nor shook our stars that nightly won The worship of our eager eyes Sweeping the kingdom of the skies Deserted by the westward sun. 88 THE CLOSING OF PARADISE The Gods who toss their bounties down To willing laps Conspired to mould a million shapes Crocus and grasses, seas and capes To wake deep echoes in our hearts. What rare divine imaginings Conceived the ivy-spray that clings To other miracles, the trees ! How magical those great decrees That sent us roses, birds, and springs ! The Gods who toss their bounties down To willing laps Neither forget the violet's scent, Nor planets in the firmament The outposts of a mystery ! They gave to man the undefiled Bright rivulets and waters wild ; They wrought at noble gifts above, And, for the pinnacle of love, They fashioned him a little child. The Gods who toss their bounties down To willing laps Remembered, and a wailing cry Smote at my heart so tenderly The master-miracle was ours ! He prospered in his tiny bed, And when my angel bent her head, Translating all his uncouth cries By knowledge motherhood supplies, My penitence arose and fled. THE CLOSING OF PARADISE 89 The Gods who toss their bounties down To willing laps All suddenly announced a hate Of me, my wood, my simple gate, The glory of my cherry-trees ! But when for grief I scarce could speak, Love, coming closer, kissed my cheek, And, with the genius of caress, By pretty acts of tenderness Made peace more near and earth less bleak. The Gods who toss their bounties down To willing laps Thought as they bent from heaven to see, This man is happier than we. These grasping Gods were not ashamed To steal from me my Love's caress And her, the fount of happiness, Rainbow and sunshine of my soul Till all embittered nations roll Where gods nor curse again nor bless. Ah, silent melodies of joy, So sadly dumb ! Ah, for the wilderness of life With no oasis, lasting strife With love's triumphant memory ! The memory of her ! Ye great, Who mock me and my rustic gate, I am the rich man of you all ! What are your turrets, broad and tall, Compared with her who died of late ? FROM ORCHARD SONGS (GREATLY REVISED) DAWN AND DARK GOD with His million cares Went to the left or right, Leaving our world ; and the day Grew night. Back from a sphere He came Over a starry lawn, Looked at our world ; and the dark Grew dawn. 93 AT BRANDON ON the ivied house the starling Clapped his beak as we went by, And the chaffinch, homeward flying, Slipped in loops across the sky. Here and there a hermit poplar Musing on his stature stood, And we heard, advancing farther, Unseen wings within the wood. What a lesson is the forest For a brotherhood of life ! What a green rebuke for nations Ever ready for the strife ! Here within a space no longer Than a blackbird floats unfanned, Oak and elm and beech, the chieftains, Spire in peace above the land. Here we heard the windy shepherd Making cloudy lambkins pass Over Nature's pupils dreaming With their mistress in the grass. As we lay a stockdove fluttered, Settled on a branch in view, 94 AT BRANDON 95 And we saw her comely plumpness Lined against the evening blue, Till she spied beneath her pouting Shapes that are the pulse of flight Thought us enemies, and melted Very softly out of sight Westward, where a wall of blackness Stood before a yellow lake, While along the inky summit Crawled a great and golden snake ! Here we heard the whitethroats homing From the rambles of the day ; Heard the prophet thrush proclaiming Divination from his spray. Bringing back his song from spaces Where the world is faintly seen, To his field the lark descended, Seeking slumber in the green. Multitudes of gossip creatures Darkness gathered to repose ; But we drank of Nature's silence Till the huntress moon arose Till Diana, lap and bosom Finely full of stolen light, By her beautiful unbending Made a lover of the night. A FAREWELL GOOD-BYE, little maid, You're too old for my knee ! You are dressed in a frock 'tis a torture to see ; And the skirt has invaded The hose that concealed The limbs that went twinkling From forest to field. But a week, and I saw a quick flash of your knee As you jumped at the brook In a moment of daring, Unworried by caring For sudden concealment Of virgin revealment. And now, in a dress 'tis a torture to see, You will learn how to sink From the sky to the earth (Losing stars), and to think Custom better than worth, And slowly bewilder the angel Devoted to you from your birth. 96 A FAREWELL 97 Already you hear the Society sheep As they jump one by one through the decorous holes, Thinking more of their wool than they think of their souls. In a year you will blush If I speak of your rush At the brook and the fence, And with tutored pretence Talk the tattle that grows at an afternoon tea. Yet only last week you were begging to be In a damson, for loot ! And, afar in the green, Brightly golden, was seen The head that I loved so, the fairest of fruit ! No more shall I follow, no more shall you flee, For now, in a dress 'tis a torture to see, You who were yesterday Wild as a finch They gird and be-pinch. Farewell to the days when your tresses were free Good-bye, little maid, You're too old for my knee ! H A WALK Cow-HoNEYBOURNE, that dost survey The profile of the great green range So seeming near, so far away, It was from out thy sleepy heart My friend and I did start To tramp toward the temple of the hills, Past poising hawks, past little gossip rills, To win the Cotswolds, and enjoy thereon The fine frugality of winter sun. The great tit in the apple-tree Delayed us long ; The shrill staccato song The creeper chirped amid his industry Drew us from pollard unto pollard, till We drank our fill Of that white-feathered patch, his breast, His busy bill That with detective skill Stabbed at each crevice in the wood In search of food. 98 A WALK 99 'Twas through an orchard valley that we passed, And all the pear-tree boles were painted white ; Small wonder if the pinky maid, A kiss half-melted on her lips, Should shrink at night When not embraced About her waist By Dick the ploughman's arms ; For ghostly, ghostly in the gloom These whitened files of pear-trees loom Beside the farm. We strode toward the succour of the hills, And came to Weston at the middle day. We hymned the rural loveliness With glowing words, And made response with clumsy human lips To all the easy chattering of the birds. The hedge's darkly purple top We praised ; The verdure of the coming crop ; The glazed And glorious bulwark of the beech ; The wind that with clear Cotswold speech Addressed the poplar gustily The poplar that would rather be A spire to pierce the blue Than lend its secret energy To grow In liberal breadth below. ioo A WALK The lane that led us upward now was steep, And slowlier we stept. Ah ! how the peace of God was there ! And how the country slept ! Ten leagues away the city's filth That gnaws our faculties by stealth, And we were free Of towns and townbred slavery. Nothing between our lowliness And God on high ! Here in this pure encampment of repose The grass can watch the sky, And all the acres of exceeding blue Look down upon the dew ; No hell of manufactured fog Can come betwixt these two. We stood upon the forehead of the hills, And lifted up our hearts in prayer ; And as we halted, reverent, Meseemed that Nature o'er us bent, That she did bid us sup From bread she gave and from her cup. There at her large communion did we feast, Herself the Substance and herself the Priest. The immaterial wine she poured, And standing on the Cotswold sward Administered to us Beneath the unsupported sky Her sacrament of scenery. A WALK 101 Thus made her child, I inly felt My risen soul again possess Its zenith, like a lark ; Accumulated baseness melt, And on the inner dark A newborn rainbow press Courageous colours. I perceived How quickly I had grieved : How obstinately borne a useless load Where fingerposts were false upon the road ; How readily had penned my spirit in a cave ; How seldom been a god, how often been a slave. Mouse -grey and half -asleep, the village showed Its neighboured thatches. Musingly we strode Toward its dreaminess, both tasting as we went The cup of an imagined sacrament. That night it was as if we slept Within an Angel's tent, Among his benedictions. How many years have withered, like the leaves In Autumn's languid illness, since the hour When Nature used for us her secret vine And never-sickled wheat ! Yet only when at last we meet The Worker of the Dark Design, 102 A WALK That cannot be a masterpiece till we are dead, Shall we, the blest communicants, forget The Altar and the Wine, The Priestess and the Bread. PIGEONS AT CANNON STREET YE pigeons of the Station with your loveliness of hues, Some in opal tints resplendent, some in filmy fluff" of blues, As ye bravely circle downward, peck the cabmen's alms, unshot, 1 could think you living colours falling on this dull stone plot. Here, the friends of men and horses, ye serenely find your food, Every happy mother bringing son or daughter from her brood ; Rough the act and strange the tumult that can stir you from your rest, Making all the yard a rainbow with the light of wing and breast. Ye are birds in Babylon whose sires were babies in the tree ; Once the bright eyes of your nation saw beneath them romp in glee 103 io 4 PIGEONS AT CANNON STREET Little roes that chased the fawns, and tusky boars that stabbed the dog Where the lovely leagues of azure sparkled innocent of fog. Tho' the wilderness of mortar, tho' the miles of brick and slate Dawn by dawn are seen for ever as the comrades of your fate, In the fairy-tales of pigeons, in the folk- songs, in the lore, Are not green and grassy counties mingled sweetly as of yore ? Surely when the windy gods come roaring from the sea and wold, Creeping closely to some elder ye will ask him tales of old How the piping shepherd gathered all his lambs at death of light ; How the fields were fat with increase ; how the were-wolf snarled at night. London pigeons, many brothers, many sisters have I seen Flying woodward in the evening to their palaces of green : Tho' I closelier scan your feathers, more I love the wild surprise Of your Warwickshire relations mounting sudden to the skies. PIGEONS AT CANNON STREET 105 O the peaty moorland odours and the sparkling sweep of lawn ! O the last thin shade of darkness melting on the lips of dawn ! These are gifts of God your kindred spy and ponder from their trees While the mower's scythe is making golden haloes round his knees ! 'Twixt the rows of mangold-wurzels, careful cousins I can see Strutting stately, pecking, wary, ready for the hill or tree : Ye, methinks, have lost your birthright, lost your heritage of dew, Lost the verdant county acres and the freedom of the blue ! TO ORANGES You thousand yellow worlds from Spain Upon a barrow piled, And bartered for the timid pence Of some desirous child, How well your smooth and shining spheres Recall the years When by that sunny inland sea I dreamed great dreams that may not be Translated to reality ! Throughout the gradual day You fade away, As dreams. Hoarsely the invitation of your master goes Adown the street ; With careless-cunning hand he throws To children's innocence Some value for their pence ; And his proud pyramid of fruit From apex unto base descends ; Each golden atom blends With all the large and general life That throbs through London strife. 106 TO ORANGES 107 You ride to far suburban homes In Arabella's cosy muff The one that Cousin Herbert gave, All newness, warmth, and fluff! The haggard merchant rushing by Thinks sweetly of his nursery Where Ralph and Jenny watch the rain Becloud the pane. If he should miss the train ! The Coster, cordial, winks ; God bless the babes, the merchant thinks, If I should lose the six There's one at seven, And these will make a little heaven For those two angels whom I love ! Off goes his glove ! Out comes a threepenny bit ! And the abysses of the bag are lit By leaping rounds of yellow rain Soft tumbling circles fresh from Spain ! O Spanish captives in the Strand, That pour the south along the street, A man in pleasantness may stand And read your history awhile : Thus you have made me smile, And made me sigh, For as you go, go I. My pyramid of hours grows less, Fewer the lips that laugh, The hands that bless, io8 TO ORANGES And rarely comes a greeting kind To make my heart the quicker beat. I am not fruit, but rind, You golden exiles of the street, That, severed from your parent land, Convey the south Along the Babel length of Strand ! A PASTORAL COME you, Mary, there's a dear ! Mind no more the plaguy dairy ! Milk can never match your white Come you, Mary ! All the music of my scythe Sang you in the heated meadow ; And I thought your shape behind Every shadow ! Down with pails, and bring those lips (Roseleaves in the happy dairy) To the chestnut where we kiss Come you, Mary ! 109 TO MY BROTHERS MY brothers, who must ache and stoop O'er wordy tasks in London town, How scantly Laura trips for you A poem in a gown ! How rare if Grub Street grew a lawn ! How sweet if Nature's Jap could spare A dandelion for the Strand, A cowslip for Mayfair ! But here, from flutes of seeming gold, There rings in easy confidence The blackbirds' bright philosophy On apple-spray or fence : For ploughmen wending home from toil Some patriot thrush outpours his Jay, And voices, wildly eloquent, The diary of his day. These feathered poets you may hear Remembering the lane's romance, All hung in wicker hells to chirp Thin ghosts of utterance : no TO MY BROTHERS in But where the gusts of liberty Make Ragged Robin wisely bend They quicken hedgerows with their song, Melodiously unpenned. If souls of mighty singers leave The vacant body to its hush, Does Shelley linger in the lark, Or Keats possess the thrush ? The end is undecaying doubt, And in some blackbird's bosom still Great Tennyson may sweeten eve By whistling on the hill. Come, brothers, to this clean delight, And watch the velvet-headed tit. Here's honest sorrel in the grass And sturdy cuckoo-spit : What shepherds hear you shall not miss, And at deliverance of dawn Shall see a miracle of bloom Across the sparkling lawn. The forest musically begs To fan you with its leafy love ; Come, fall asleep upon this moss, Entreated by the dove ! Here shall that sweet conservative, Dear Mother Nature, lend to you Her lovely rural elements Beneath the primal blue. ii2 TO MY BROTHERS My brothers, who must ache and stoop O'er wordy tasks in London town, How scantly Laura trips for you A poem in a gown ! How good if Fleet Street grew a lawn ! How sweet if garden-plots could spare A bed of cloves to scent the Strand, A cowslip for May fair ! A SHILLING EACH How shall a man or woman pass unstirred ? A shilling^ these ! One shilling, cage and bird ! I vow to birds my pennies ! I will pinch, Redeeming redstart, yellowhammer, finch. So they recover all their greens and blues, Threadbare my coat shall be and old my shoes. Give me to fill my hand with Jiving fluff, And toss the life to heaven joy enough ! Give me to stroke each shining head ; to feel The wild-bird in the captive make appeal. Ah, blackbird, blackbird, do not fear to see How misty Laura's grey-blue eyes can be ! Her trembling lips must consecrate your flight With murmurings and kisses. Then, good- night ! 113 i 1 14 A SHILLING EACH Behold her gift of cherries for your bill ! Peck here in peace and take your fruity fill. No thoughtless man shall rob you of the sky And share our loaf. We frown and pass him by. Our hearts have grieved to see you where we find The core of life less treasured than the rind. Our souls have quivered with indignant rage To hear a ruffian curse you in your cage. So we have vowed to spend with care ; to pinch For linnet, lark and starling, thrush and finch. Though Laura's homespun fade, she has her will The woodland hears a once familiar bill. What need to care for shabbiness that shows ? Redemption stands in feathers on a rose. Lovers of Christ, how long shall it be said That what He bade us do is only read ? Lovers of Christ, how comes it that to-day The grief of birds is chosen for your play ? A SHILLING EACH 115 As Christ exceeded all of us in worth, So we exceed the lower lives of earth. As mercy poured from Him whose love we seek, So should it pour from us to help the weak. If freedmen use their freedom to condemn A life to what was death-in-life for them, They wound the noble hand that turned of yore The key of sorrow in their dungeon door. How shall a man or woman pass unstirred ? A shilling, these ! One shilling, cage and bird I NORTH WIND AT NIGHT GOOD it is when northern winds come blowing from the ice and bear, Shouting round the lofty steeple till the opal stars can hear ; Good it is in shifting dusks to feel the polar thunder-flail Lashing at the weary forehead with its knots of biting hail : Hurricanes that blow the foxes over leagues toward their prey, Roaring sagas of the mainland, songs of crashing ice at play ; Hurricanes with ghostly chorus of the Norsemen grim and stark Hurling oaths at giant foemen hacking furious in the dark. In the lulls between the wrangle of the tempest and the floe Sweet it is to fancy love-songs of the patient Eskimo. 116 NORTH WIND AT NIGHT 117 Speeding, warm at heart, across the rugged purity of plain, Love beneath his furs as constant as beneath the ice the main. How I joy to hear the sinews of the god of northern blast Crackle as his fingers fasten on the icy hilt and vast ! Rushing over wold and valley, dusky dells and uplands bleak, How he flings his frozen gauntlet at the challenge of my cheek ! Could he dash the dew about me from the blooms of other stars, Pansies from the lap of Venus, speary rushes down from Mars, More I'd love his gusty onset than the woman-breeze that brings Scent of harems and the radiant Persian roses on its wings. Northland god, your tears of fury drive upon my freshened cheeks While the roadside branch above me writhes in agony and creaks. As we wrestle at the midnight, breast to breast, and hand to hand, Care and pain depart like swallows lifting to a friendly land. THE BUDDING OF THE ORCHARD AH ! the budding of the orchard Is a heralding of June ; Of the woodlark's brighter bosom, And the clearness of his tune. Hid by thorny quick, the sparrow Tends her sapphire eggs in peace Till the voice of every oval Sounds the chirping of release. And the grass beside the river Grows the long cool green of joy For the man who hears it whisper How he frolicked when a boy. Ah ! the budding of the orchard Is a promise to my hope Of again beholding twilight Lose the lambs upon the slope. I shall see the cowshed mosses, And the milkmaid's freckled arms ; I shall hear the horse-bells tinkle, And the cocks approve the farms. 118 BUDDING OF THE ORCHARD 119 And the evening air will bring me, As it brings the soul of musk, A belief that long-lost angels Are returning through the dusk. HANNIBAL, SAGUNTO CAPTO, LOQUITUR THANKS to your pith Saguntum is destroyed ! 'Tis time to pipe the songs of Carthage now ; To muse upon the world within her streets, The tinkling in some soft and sandy place Of camel cavalcades whose spicy loads Make fragrant leagues for those who march behind. The Gods are gracious. I enrich you all With pastoral dawns and twilights of repose. Go, make the girdled hearts revolt with joy, And hear your valour published to the stars ; Hide in the sheath the gapped and greedy blade That drank the plenty of Saguntum veins ! What of the siege, my heroes ? Was it long ? What of the sack, my heroes ? Was it good ? Each sword has won a virgin ; every man White witching arms to tie him round with love. Has not the wine run freely in the camp ? Or have I niggardly denied the can 120 HANNIBAL LOQUITUR 121 Its island-cluster of canary beads That hissed and sparkled gaily while you roared Great soldier-songs that rumbled in the hills ? Your beards were hung with purple dewdrops then, Drops of the wine that splashed the naked knees Of girls who sped it round your garrulous fires. Take back this history of roaring fight, Take home your scars to Carthage ; show the trench Saguntum bullies dug upon your cheeks, Till youths, midway between the boy and man, Shall itch to glut beside their country's sons A thirsty blade throughout our next campaign, And maidens sing you in their fountain-songs. For how the dame's recovered cheek will flush At news of hostile handiwork ! to learn Her husband's mightier arm confused the foe! Your sons will reap incentives, and each wound Will be a lamp to guide the coming brood To follow glory upward to a scar. The striplings of the land will charge at play With girlish swords and baby javelins, And prick a fancied Roman from the bush. 122 HANNIBAL LOQUITUR 'Tis thus the glamour grows ; for stirring tales Of onset, and the death-grip day by day, Of peril, rescue, booty and applause Are trumpets to the blood and signal fires To warn the sprouting heroes of our kin. I am a man of battle, and I yearn To see young tigers lap their early blood, So here I make a harvest of my plans And loot the hours of possible design. Gods ! if the soul of Carthage should not feel That glory waiting past the Pyrenees ! Should dwindle to a passive, womanish thing, And, barren, shirk the dominating task ! But when your stiffened fingers scarce stretch out, For gripping iron handles, it is ill To let the shadow of another war Fall thus across your pleasure. Let me trust. Home to the mellow homeland songs and dance, For standards, scars upon your daring cheeks ! for a sight of Carthage ! Homing braves, 1 charge you bear me when the Spring's at bud Sweet gossip of my mistress and my wife ! She sits eternal by the lusting sea And stares upon the wilderness of blue, Kept by the beating of a million hearts ! Within her gates unrivalled maidens blush Whose necks are clasped by chiming orna- ments ; HANNIBAL LOQUITUR 123 They look to Spain, and supplicate the Gods To bring you home to kisses from the war. Go, dream beside their beauty ! Go, and take The throbbing sweethearts in your potent arms Arms that can help an empire to be set, Babe of an empire, in this Spanish West. Each with his lips against some sleeping cheek Forget the clank of armour and the shrill Quick scream of arrows, and the wind The stone makes coming from the monstrous sling ; But when the branch begins to feel the leaf At push and pout in her, forsake those lips Are rivals of your greatness, and look up At Glory's signpost ! Once again Intrust you to the mouthings of the deep, Placating first, by prayers and gifts of worth, The sea-god looking through his opal roof. Come back to me with even sharper swords, And not one pinch of all the excellence You showed of old lost in the realm of ease ; Forgetting not the soul of all my need, Sweet gossip of my mistress and my wife Carthage I took in trust from Hasdrubal, Carthage I widen, love, and glorify. So, with good news of her, and you in trim To swing her steel as staunchly as of old, I doubt not we shall fright the Eagle yet, And pour our language through the streets of Rome ! FROM SONG IN SEPTEMBER THE DANGER How soon the prophet stars decree That you shall fall at last to me I know not. This at least I know, That many worlds must come and go Before enchantment brings us both Together for our long-lost troth. Often I push my books away, To search (there's heartbreak in the play) A map of star-embroidered sky, And finger space where you and I Shall whisper of an ancient grief, And kiss it into unbelief. World after world shall I be vexed To miss you, and shall try the next In patient valour. Slowly nears Your kiss. And what's a billion years For me to pay if, when I turn The golden corner, I discern 127 128 THE DANGER (A little pinched by want of mirth) The face that shook my life on earth ? Fast shall I run to see if you Still wear those eyes of grey in blue. The danger is, my heart may beat Too loud, and kill me at your feet. TO THE SWEETWILLIAM I SEARCH the poet's honied lines, And not in vain, for columbines ; And not in vain for other flowers That sanctify the many bowers Unsanctified by human souls. See where the larkspur lifts among The thousand blossoms finely sung, Still blossoming in the fragrant scrolls ! Charity, eglantine, and rue And love-in-a-mist are all in view, With coloured cousins ; but where are you, Sweetwilliam ? The lily and the rose have books Devoted to their lovely looks, And wit has fallen in vital showers Through England's most miraculous hours To keep them fresh a thousand years. The immortal library can show The violet's well-thumbed folio Stained tenderly by girls in tears. 129 K. 130 TO THE SWEET WILLIAM The shelf where Genius stands in view Has brier and daffodil and rue And love-lies-bleeding ; but not you, Sweetwilliam. Thus, if I seek the classic line For marybuds, 'tis, Shakespeare, thine ! And ever is the primrose born 'Neath Goldsmith's overhanging thorn. In Herrick's breastknot I can see The appleblossom, fresh and fair As when he plucked and put it there, Heedless of Time's anthology. So flower by flower comes into view, Kept fadeless by the Olympian dew For startled eyes ; and yet not you, Sweetwilliam. Too seldom named ! And never so As makes the astonished heart to go With deer-like leapings ! Horace found A name unsuited to the bound His gleaming satires had to bear : Even so, methinks, a want of grace In country calling lost a place In poesy for one so fair. How chancily a blossom slips From ballad sunshine to eclipse, Being short of honey for the lips, Sweetwilliam ! TO THE SWEETWILLIAM 131 Though gods of song have let you be, Bloom in my little book for me. Unwont to stoop or lean, you show An undefeated heart, and grow As pluckily as cedars. Heat And cold, and winds that make Tumbledown sallies, cannot shake Your resolution to be sweet. Then take this song, be it born to die Ere yet the unwedded butterfly Has glimpsed a darling in the sky, Sweetwilliam ! THE VISIT WHEN the Snowdrop goes to Town In her little grandmotherly bonnet, With only a ribbon of light By a miracle fastened upon it, She takes for the world to wear Such a charm in the lapel of duty As gives of the earth and the air, And consoles by its Puritan beauty. When the Snowdrop goes to Town In her little grandmotherly bonnet, How many delight in the grace Of the exquisite trimming upon it ! They look her deep in the eyes, And the bird of their memory, trilling Simplicity's far-away skies, Takes the heart with unbearable thrilling. When the Snowdrop goes to Town In her little grandmotherly bonnet, With only a glamour of earth And a magic of heaven upon it, 132 THE VISIT 133 Look at the rainbow of Spring In the eyes of the happy beholders ! Cares in a covey take wing, And weariness falls from the shoulders. BORN DUMB MY little love ! My little speechless child ! Can I forget my woman's heart, and be For ever mute to grief, for ever mild ? Is it not hard to bear the falling rod, When such an ailment for these baby lips Divinely suits the policy of God ? The lambs that play too long at hide-and-seek Have tongues that ask for mothers; these, I know, Learn lovely meanings when the children speak. The mother comes from far across the field And calls assurance to her anxious child, As I had answered had my lamb appealed ! But I shall never hear that storied speech, That lovely language whose expression is Defiance of all rules that man may teach ; 134 BORN DUMB 135 Nor hear against my heart a son's content When for his mouth the willing milk is kind, And for his lips my fountain is well spent. I have brought silence to my husband's knee ! And he (O baby, baby, try to speak !) So greatly counted on thy mimicry Of words his wit prepared to plague thy lips, Ready to kiss that rosebud impotence, Thy mouth, and garner all thy precious slips. " Fairest," he used to say, " when I am worn In days to come with writing, you shall bring A bud of April on your shoulder borne, And he shall chatter to my chain, or tear My latest lyric, or shall cry to touch The raining splendours of your ravished hair, Until he dwindle and his eyes grow dim, And we can worship him before the fire, And kiss each other many thanks for him. There in your cradling lap we will undress Our rosy son, together praying God To fill his life with strength and sacredness. Then I will have him at my heart awhile " (O baby, baby, baby, try to speak !) " And watch the fading of his sleepy smile 136 BORN DUMB Till dimples cannot follow kisses pressed Upon the pouting slumber of his mouth, And I restore his beauty to your breast." Ah, dearest husband, but the child is dumb ! The lamb outspeaks him, and the day -old thrush. How shall I voice this terror when you come ? My travail was for silence, and my dove Can only watch his mother's moving lips, And never give her back a word of love. Husband, steer homeward ! Husband, come, And let me weep the truth upon your knee The child of our enchantment is born dumb ! THE VOICE As I went down the hill I heard The laughter of the countryside ; For, rain being past, the whole land stirred With new emotion, like a bride. I scarce had left the grassy lane, When something made me catch my breath : A woman called, and called again, Elizabeth ! Elizabeth ! It was my mother's name. A part Of wounded memory sprang to tears, And the few violets of my heart Shook in the wind of happier years. Quicker than magic came the face That once was sun and moon for me ; The garden shawl, the cap of lace, The collie's head against her knee. Mother, who findest out a way To pass the sentinels, and stand Behind my chair at close of day, To touch me almost with thy hand, 138 THE VOICE Deep in my breast how sure, how clear, The lamp of love burns on till death ! How trembles if I chance to hear Elizabeth ! Elizabeth ! DREAM AND IDEAL DIANA with her limbs of dream, Her wavering heart of lily-stuff, For long had mocked me with the gleam Too sweet, and yet not sweet enough. Hundreds of times my fevered hands Had fallen almost on the slope Of shoulder that was swift to be At once the pulse and death of hope. Stayed by her hair in hazels caught, She fed my blood with honeydew, And turning for a second showed Her deep-down eyes of larkspur blue. So near her lips, I smelled the breath Could shame the bush of lavender, Till all my body rang a peal Of lovely bells in praise of her. But as I stretched my arms to take The Goddess from the hazel snare, Once more with laughter she was gone, Once more she frolicked otherwhere, O'erleaped a streamlet's gush of blue And left me quivering as I thought How nearly had the dream come true. 139 1 40 DREAM AND IDEAL But as I follow wideawake The fragrant girl without a name Who at the edge of being runs Between the light and dark, and calls Across the distance for my sake, So in the courses of my dreams I hunted tireless, and beheld The Goddess in a thousand gleams Flash on her woodland way unquelled, And sometimes on a hillock stand, Horn-shaping there a sun-kissed hand To set against her lips and blow Across the whitebells' dancing snow, To keep me to my hunting true, The music of a girl's halloo. Sometimes she held her bosom close Against the beech-tree's flank of grey, And joyed to watch me bear the chase Beyond the marvel of her face, Till it was safe again to use The same, or else some other, ruse : As when in hyacinths she pressed Upon a couch of earth the breast Had wisely mingled snow and sun To shake thy heart, Endymion ! Or when among the ferns she drooped Her lovely length, and slyly stooped To watch me eagerly employ My eyes to sack a leafy Troy ; Or when she used divinely well Her royal right of miracle, DREAM AND IDEAL 141 Changing her body into stone, To ivy-spray her glittering zone, And making mosses of her hair. E'en as I rested by the rock The buried beauties in a flock Rushed back again to flesh, and flew Along a pathway out of view, While back to me the Goddess sent Through lovely hand to horn-shape bent The music of a girl's halloo. And once she floated sweet and cool, To lilies changing, in a pool. Then, since the blossoms did appear Too splendid for the plant to bear Strange flowering of Diana's hair ! I waded down the talking stream Toward the cups of golden beam. Sudden the blooms together leapt To make a mass of hair was swept By Zephyr to the shoulders bright, And in a flash I saw the leaves In curves of loveliness unite, And next the Goddess leap to land, Shake little rainbows on the strand, Lift to her mouth a horn-shaped hand, Then in the foliage rush away To try once more her cunning play. By early morn the chase was done. I woke. My room was kissed by sun, And birds about the neck of day i 4 2 DREAM AND IDEAL Were hanging pearls of roundelay. Aroused, I watched the fading gleam Of all had glittered in my dream, And thought how in my waking hours My heart went hunting ceaselessly Surprises, hopings, tricks, and flowers, Because I follow wideawake A fragrant girl without a name Who at the edge of being runs Between the light and dark, and calls Across the distance for my sake. She is the hopeless touched by Hope ; For thus on man the cheat is played That helps him hour by hour to cope Against his dooming, undismayed. Deep in the heart of him there glows A spark by which he warms his soul, Believing faintly that his part Is somehow blessed beyond the whole. He makes a garden rich in flowers, In rainbows, nightingales, and streams, In which he spends his lotos-hours Beneath a sky in tune with dreams. 'Tis not a mother he creates In fancy for his blessing there, But with his wanting self he mates The girl of joy without compare. For her he plucks forbidden fruit, For her he leaves his paradise, For her he bends his aching eyes DREAM AND IDEAL 143 Along the edge of world, and, mute, A thousand times in spirit dies. For though he carry from the vale Nor rose's bud nor nightingale, No whit he minds the Angel's blade, That cannot keep him from his maid. So in the rougher world he fares Among his blisses and despairs, Compelled to treasure in the heart A deathless hoping that his part Is somehow blessed beyond the whole, And searching thicket, stream, and bole While hunting, hunting ceaselessly Surprises, tremblings, tricks, and flowers, Because he follows wideawake A fragrant girl without a name Who at the edge of being runs Between the light and dark, and calls Across the distance for his sake. A CHRISTENING THEY took him to the hoary church, And waited near the font awhile, With something new of sacredness In handclasp, whisper, look and smile. The glorious mantle of a saint, Set in a stained-glass window, poured A beam of scarlet light across The child they offered to the Lord. The mother, never quite content With any folding of his gown, So smoothed him that his limpid eyes No longer^kept the eyelids down. Then she who mothered him in God Shaped an ungiven kiss ; and now The trusted Vicar came to sign The Cross of Christ upon his brow. But he, unwitting how his frock Was puckered, or his sash awry, Gazed at a Shepherd with a lamb Beneath a glassy spread of sky ; 144 A CHRISTENING 145 And then, before the reverent priest Had marked him soldier, kinsman, heir, He lifted up his weakling arms Toward the Saviour imaged there. 'Twas felt by all who saw him thus Enrol himself, at unawares, That Heaven accepted him without The drops of water and the prayers ; But when between his little brows The sign of Calvary was pressed, They knew that Christ had found a place For Christopher upon His breast. THE HYACINTHS TAKE the good ashplant ; stuff the old grey cap Deep in your pocket. Now that breakfast's done, Out to the field of clover by the gap, And be accepted of the early sun ! See you that mass of Oakland banked in peace Beyond the poplar family on the right ? There shall you find a kingdom of release From half a city's arrogance and spite. Keep now the proper angel at your side To touch the spirit to a heavenly mood, That you may share, as something deified, The sense of morning holiness in the wood. Behold that pear-tree, edged with radiant sky, Still as an Oread open-lipped in rest ! Tread softly, friend ! The Enchanter must be nigh, For me to feel such pathos in my breast. 146 THE HYACINTHS 147 Methinks, if we could linger in this place Till fall the early veilings of the gloom, At last might show the never-coming face Of Him whose delicate temple is the bloom. Now onward by the ploughman's narrow track Across the field of growing bread, till there, A hundred yards beyond the forester's stack, The wood lies waiting with its drowsy air. This lower part the honeysuckle loves, Enwreathing hazels, climbing lofty trees To show its golden horns to infant doves And be a fragrant playmate for the breeze. Next comes the clearing where, when April shakes Her bosom free of bloom in forest and wold, The falling of the primrose bounty makes The oaks seem rooted in a soil of gold. And next the clearing where, in middle May (To think of them in sunshine !) can be found This holy wood's miraculous display Of hyacinths flooding half a mile of ground. Yon path is best, as keeping back the sight ; For I would have this Mediterranean Sea Of dark blue blossoming hurriedly delight The friend who shall be drowned in it with me. 1 48 THE HYACINTHS How often half a loveliness is lost To those who search it by the easier way ! The common paths and eminences cost A price the poet's heart would break to pay. Behold them ! Breathe them ! Where amazed you stand With quivering eyelids, often have I stood To see a shipless ocean on dry land Becalmed in May within a Warwickshire wood. Here let us sit and play with perished time, When gods were elbowing gods, and startled girls Were gathered as sweet as clusters of the lime To kiss the heroes webbed within their curls. Retreat ten thousand years from all that now Prevents the demi-god, till you with me In fancy hear beneath a thornless bough The bird that best remembers Arcady. Forget each fallen star, believed by Youth Too brilliant-born to dwindle from the sky ; The lies that in the domino of Truth Persuaded us to let Reflection die. Forget them all ; then, musing here with me, Awake the coloured pageantries of Greece, And watch across this billowy breadth of sea A shadowy Argo steering to the Fleece. THE HYACINTHS 149 For who can link this beauty with the day In which our doom compels us to lament The broken limbs of gods upon the way That ever draws us farther from content ? Not you, not I. Insensibly we use, When face to face with loveliness such as this, The fine-spun ropes of dreamihead, and choose The crags that lead us back to Time's abyss. Be fortunate travelling backward ! Even reach, As friend for friend desires, the limit of quest ; And, having glimpsed a sight too great for speech, Leap up with immortality in your breast ! INVOCATIONS COME along, Springtime, your apron full of flowers Gathered in the sweetest of your dew-delighted bowers ! Come with budded bosom and with singing lips apart Blossom in the hedgerow, blossom in my heart ! Come along, Summer, with heaven in your eyes ! Tell me in what hyacinths with frolic pulsing lies The Oread of my worship, that is both a balm and smart Tell it to the woodbird, tell it to my heart ! Come along, Autumn, with deeper breast than Spring's ! Teach the honied wood-girl all the joy that giving brings ; Carol of the scythe-blade, roll the creaking cart, Lift your moon in cornfields, lift her in my heart ! 150 INVOCATIONS 151 Come along, Winter, with mutterings of ice, Cold to make the lover turn to kiss his darling thrice ! Leap from rosy heavens at the evenfall, and start Cleansing all the hedgerow, cleansing all my heart ! MICHAELMAS DAISIES 'Tis more than mid-October, yet along the narrow garden The daisies loved of Michaelmas keep sturdily in flower ; For, though the evenings sharply fall, they find a way to harden The crop of comely blossoming that makes for me a bower. The honey-hunters, diligent, are searching them for sweetness ; A pair of handsome bluetits flash their colours on a stem (Exponents of the art of standing upside-down with neatness) While two entranced Red Admirals gaze stonily at them. The rose has faded bedward, there to dream of scarlet duty When June is kissing England at the flower- tide of the year ; 152 MICHAELMAS DAISIES 153 The gladiolus in his bulb considers plans for beauty To flame along the border when his miracle is clear. Yet autumn wears an apron, and the apron's sweet with lendings Of colours matched with comeliness of blossom and of leaf ; And daisies dear to Michaelmas, with dances and with bendings, Forbid my heart to weary for the Summer's beauteous sheaf. The garden's fate not narrowly resembles my condition, With Spring and Summer gone afield delight- ing other places ; Where towered the hollyhock of Hope, the larkspur of Ambition, Unvaunting blossoms, pale but sweet, have learned to show their faces. Though Time has thinned my lavender and plucked my reddest roses, (He's welcome to the buttonhole he gathered in my ground !) His picking of a loveliness fresh loveliness uncloses Some overshadowed pansy that my heart had never found. 154 MICHAELMAS DAISIES What though he made a nosegay of the fairest and the tallest ? My loving fingers still can tend some simples in the dusk. 'Tis easy to be patient. I will think the best is smallest, And water here good-humouredly my little pot of musk. Old Time has made a nosegay. He is welcome to his plucking Of tiger-lilies, lad's-love, and the tall cathedral spires Of lupins, and snapdragons where the bee is fond of sucking, And all the flowery likenesses of Youth and Youth's desires. Old Time has got my nosegay ; but the gloaming finds me cheery, Because the gloaming is itself a flower of lovely hue ! The more I look at what remains, the less the world seems dreary, For quiet breathes at Michaelmas, and well- worn friends are true. Ah, quiet breathes at Michaelmas, and Love, his bosom sober, Has got the perfect song by heart and hums it all the day, MICHAELMAS DAISIES 155 To thrill me without feverings and teach how mid-October Gives angels for the blossoms that old Time has borne away. SHAKESPEARE IN THE THRUSH WHO sings so more than passing sweet Within his ample cage of green, Together mingling natural heat With what is serious and serene ? It is my Lord the speckled Thrush, Compelling heart and soul to hear ; And never has a bird for me So mellowed coppice, bush or tree, Since first I strayed to Warwickshire ! 'Tis not a thrush alone that sings, But some one adding to the bird A spirit in exchange for wings To carry here his lovely word. Listen the human in the thrush Above the bird-soul rising clear, As if this county's Heart of Song Were beating now divinely strong In his recovered Warwickshire ! 156 SHAKESPEARE IN THE THRUSH 157 There went a touch of Hamlet ! There, In loops of alto, Beatrice ran Her lapwing course, as fragrant-fair As ever maid since time began ! And hark ! It wanted but the note Of her who pressed in fun and fear By woodland ways for love. The bough Is bending with immortals now, And gods go large in Warwickshire ! THE RESOLVE WHEN I think of all the mercies she has shown ; Of all the beauties given, of all the magic flown ; Of tenderness in blossom ; of secrets breathed in trust ; Of joys and smiles and fragrances recovered from the dust In Melancholy's lumber-room and vivified to grace ; And how the world was sparkling when a girl of brave desires Beneath her little frostings showed the brill- iance of her fires, I determine I will hold me, till I rest among my sires, As the soldier of her lily hood and captain of her face. When I think of that white clover of her neck ; Of many dimpled curvings, and each with- out a speck ; 158 THE RESOLVE 159 Of exquisite fragilities ; of intonations sweet ; Of all the comely loading of the perfect little feet That often tried so very hard to match my eager pace ; And remember how she fingered on my brow the troubled mark, Forgot herself, and changed for me her bosom to a lark, I determine I will hold me, till I go to test the dark, As the soldier of her lilyhood and captain of her face. When I think of all the trouble of my heart While blackness took our story, and Love must have us part ; Of how she bent in patience ; of how her lovely head Fell forward, as a lily falls when youth and prime are sped And bees go careless past the flower was once a darling place ; And remember how, in yielding to a torrent of surprise, She flung her arms around my neck and kissed me to the skies, I determine I will hold me, till the hour when memory dies, As the soldier of her lilyhood and captain of her face. THE BARLEY-BIRDS ASSUREDLY the barley-birds Were speaking in the alder-trees The list of unimpressive words They use for their simplicities. Rob hurried back, on hearing this, So fast, he seemed to skim the ground, For Nance had promised him a kiss For every barley-bird he found. Stay there, stay there, you barley-birds. Till Nancy comes to count you ! He glimpsed her by the pillar'd rock That shows the summit, where a breeze Began to toss the playmate frock Of billowy muslin to her knees. She trembled when, across the brook Below the heather-bearing crest, A runner leaped and boldly took The hillside slanting from her breast. Stay there, stay there, you barley-birds, Till Nancy comes to count you ! 160 THE BARLEY-BIRDS 161 They went the way that Robin signed, Toward the clump of alder-trees, Unwitting how there walked behind A Boy no taller than their knees, Who bit his rose-red lips, to force His giggles back, while in his eyes Gleamed sparks enough to fire the gorse That camped in gold on Stillford Rise. Stay there, stay there, you barley-birds^ Till Nancy comes to count you ! Rob shouted. From the branchy place A little flock of siskins flew To find another home apace, Their tell-tale feathering clear in view ! The freckled godling rarely trips To such a jig of honied words As there he tuned while Nancy's lips Paid one by one for barley-birds. But Robin, Robin, how unfair To count each bird twice over ! M THE WRESTLING IN starlight Jacob, tough and stern, Still felt the sinewy angel stand, As rock against the leaping burn, Till he was ready for the turn Should lay the shepherd on the sand. For not one furious night alone, But year-long hath my wrestle been With thee, dark Angel, who hast known The trick to touch me on the bone And stretch me conquered on the green. Yet when I think of how I fared Within thy undefeated grip, I glory in the battle dared Against a Chief who nobly spared To touch me earlier on the hip. 162 DAY OF DELIGHT TARRY no longer, Maid most sweet To bind thy tresses in array, For I can hear in sunshine beat The sanguine heart of holiday. Come in thy homespun frock to me Than velvets of a queen more fair, And let this gipsy weather be The cordial playmate of thy hair. The hyacinth and the harebell blue Are married in the cloudless dome ; The lark is almost out of view Above the wife that keeps his home. I grant the bird on fire with song, And yet despise his narrow zest : Could he but hear how broad and strong The chant that thunders in my breast ! For I to-day with thee am paired To wander woods and follow streams, With brow and spirit finely bared, And heart unpacked of fevering dreams. 163 164 DAY OF DELIGHT And where beside some leisured brook Moss spreads an emerald counterpane, Deep in thy soul my soul shall look For heaven and angels ; not in vain. Then shall it profit me to learn Thy starry stature, and to fear That of a sudden thou may'st burn A lamp too bright for me to bear. And when in Mother Mary's fold The eyes of lambkins, silver-fleeced, Begin to sparkle as of old Along the hillside of the east, Home will I take thee, and entrust Thine excellence to solitude, Incredulous that man is dust, And sure of angels in the wood. Tarry no longer, Maid most sweet, To bind thy tresses in array, For I can hear in sunshine beat The sanguine heart of holiday. RETURNING THANKS TAKE me up, to put me down In the fields of Long Ago, Where my mother's holiday gown Always made me think of snow. Set me at her side again, Little taller than her knee, On my mouth a cherry-stain Thank you, thank you. Memory ! Grant the mother and the child There to search in singing hope Strawberries sweet by being wild All along the hillside slope. Make the brother streamlets rush Bright as comets to the sea, Warbling almost like a thrush Thank you y thank you. Memory ! Comes again the Enchanter's wood, Loved by me afraid to love, Where as still as mice we stood Listening for the drowsy dove. 165 1 66 RETURNING THANKS Never shall my heart forget Mingled fear and lullaby, Laughing lips and lashes wet Thank you, thank you. Memory ! But the dragon ! seeming true Most because he never came Hungry in the oaks and threw Double tongues of yard-long flame Not to know themselves at all, This is children's destiny ; Late in life the veilings fall, Showing childhood, Memory. Up the hillside in the sun, Past the home and garden-place, Past my little self I run, Till I kiss my mother's face. Was it thus she took the light Long ago in summer glee, Lovelier than a star at night ? Thank you, thank you, Memory ! THE WANDERER WHICH way soever you present Your lovely self, in any spot, You bring to me delightedness ; as when you lean Against the bare and disciplined apricot, To smile it into buds ; and tell how in the year That last we spent in flying round the sun It bore so large and prosperous a family No fewer than seventy-three ! And voice a hope that in the coming prime Of apricots the bounteousness of that time Will be repeated for your friends and you In days renowned for gold and white and blue. To see you in the early April light, Affectionate to all the plants that make The garden's general bliss, And kneeling down to kiss The crown imperial's baby height, Or whispering incantations to a blossom still Kept prisoner by a leisure-loving daffodil, Is of itself a garden such as might provoke 167 1 68 THE WANDERER A god to bite his underlip beneath an Olympian oak. Or when you run, As Atalanta knew not how, On hearing that a nightingale Upon the bridal hawthorn's quivering bough, Tired of the fast of stillness, drowning the voice Of Prudence, though aware of you and me, Conveys his heart to song with reckless bravery ; Believing that the very moon's a bird Desirous to be heard, And venturing wife and eggs to fling into the sky The first and loudest word. The moon is silent, and the nightingale wins; But more I gain than ever he can gain, For I can watch you, lovely as you are, Grow lovelier in the rain Of ecstasies ; Till, using flesh and blood and tune And secrets far too old to be ancestral lore, Methinks Creation, as fondling a delicate leaf, Re-touches you : That curve of lip was never so before ; And never was the whiteness of your face so warm ; And never did your far-come eyes outpour THE WANDERER 169 Such streams of worship ; never with so wild a grace Your tidal heart thus beat upon the loosening cliffs of lace. Or when at evenfall you sit And share yourself with ivory notes, Till sound is edged as sharply as a sword, And cleaves my bosom for a spirit that floats Out of a ravished heaven a Shape to flit Among my griefs and bid them learn of it. What you are then no language may reveal ; Words blunder down like jointless gods Along the old-fashioned footpaths of the world, And lie in the dust of failure, past accord. How then shall you be measured, if earthly joys And heaven and angels prove as weak as toys To serve for measures ? You seem to be escaping while you stay Contented here ; You move within a shroud Of guardian cloud, Yet shine more brightly than a day Supremely clear ; Your movements as you breathe away the hours Among the attendant flowers Inform the butterflies in motion there 1 70 THE WANDERER How best to weave in the fine silk of the air A pattern never copied otherwhere, And make me sorrow for the poets whose song, For lack of revelation such as mine, Bore but a poverty of Nymphs and Naiads along. Which way soever you present Your lovely self, you bring to me A blessedness innocent of fire. 'Tis not for maids like you that Orpheus sounds His heart upon a lyre. Ten thousand lilied queens have died to make you such As Purity almost doubts to be her child ; Till now, too fine to be desired, And but to be admired As loveliness conquering loveliness ; Unmeet for earth, unmeet for Heaven ; Mysteriously far from marriage-bed And cradle here, from holidays and fragrances In Paradise, You cause me wonder how you chance to be A contradiction of mortality Disguised as mortal, showing earth -sweet eyes, And lifting up a delicate earth-sweet head, Yet seeming to prove by unexplainable signs, Not wittingly given, THE WANDERER 171 That when you travel away you will not pause Till you can fold your wings at last in a heaven beyond our Heaven. Refreshment comes whenever I can be A watcher of your strong fragility, Without a pang of sense to urge My spirit to decline from spirit to flesh ; Amazed to see you give to common things Of everyday life the gift of wings. You walk as if about to rise Above the earth and swim the skies. By many lovely signallings we guess How you, a fragile wanderer, came Faring most leisurely along a wilderness With stars for gold oases, Through silvermist continents freaked with flowers Of comets blooming as they fly ; Till here at last, made weary by the foam Of nebula, you chose a home, Consenting to be pressed Against a mother's breast, And growing, befriended by the magic and the mild, A hallowed child, Searching for absent flowers upon the height, And wondering at the tinge of darkness in our light. 172 THE WANDERER My hearthstone could not bear your tread ; 'Twould crumble 'neath the lightness ; and my house Would burn to ashes in your purity. I will not ask the God beyond our God Who let you go to gather dreams Among immensities, And dignify this fair but feverish earth Upon your knees, To touch you with the warmness of mankind, That fixes at the cradle-point the Pole of Love And makes the heart perceive, the eyes become as blind ; For all the air around you seems to beat With news of Passion's irretrievable defeat. You stand for wisdom hidden from the wise ; For flashings in the dark ; for such a mirth As still demands an altar in the eyes ; And heavens more lucid than the heaven we prize. All who have known you shall proclaim The beauty of your sojourning here ; Your style and name Shall be the food of Legend, and in ages yet to fall The children shall be told how once there came, Out of a heaven lovelier than the heaven commonly preached As the soul's abiding-place, THE WANDERER 173 A wanderer lit by a grace That was then for the first time reached. At the velvety end of day In many a girl's soft eyes Your memoried star shall arise ; And much that was lost to the home from which you strayed Shall evermore blossom with fragrant appeal and delight In the humbly beautiful gardens of beautiful souls. THE MASTERPIECE 'TWAS blush of morning as I went Along the old grey road, Acknowledging the riches lent By heaven, the debt I owed. While there in thankfulness I said My bosom's genial prayers, A sturdy throstle overhead, As though a cheapjack calling wares, Cried, ' Lilac ! Lilac ! Lilac ! ' And there, not many yards away, A lovely lilac showed The girlishness of her array To me upon the road. At once assembled to depart A flock of petty cares, And, quicker than the thrush, my heart, As though a cheapjack calling wares, Cried, ' Lilac / Lilac f Lilac / ' 'Twas then I felt a perfect thrill Possess me while I strode, As eager as the thrush to trill, Along the old grey road : 174 THE MASTERPIECE 175 For though the bridal cherries bring Delight with neighbour pears, The top of magic comes when Spring, Made vocal by her fragrant wares, Cries ' Lilac ! Lilac ! Lilac ! ' THE COMPANION WINTER is here, And the music gone, But the bird in my breast Goes singing on. Often he sings In a sweet half-hour What is told in a year By star and flower. Wrinkled and grey By the touch of time, I am young if I lend My heart to rhyme. Stay, if you can, Little bird of blue, Till I get me to bed With dark and dew. 176 THE CRUMBS OFTEN I watch, when violets are in season, Maids in the hedgeside (watching is no treason !) Bending with palms of sunshine on their tresses, Held by the thorns curved fondly in their dresses, While there they seek in winter leaves and chill The flowers can make their bosoms sweeter still. Them do I often dare to follow, hoping Blooms have escaped for my less lovely groping ; Often discover in some dead-leaf chamber, Swathed all around by skeletons of amber Mouldered not yet entirely by decay, Blue flowers preserved from eyes more blue than they. And thus along the lyric side of hedges Bounding Song's kingdom, past her fluent sedges, 177 N 1 78 THE CRUMBS Slowly I tread the prints of noble Masters Singing the natural blisses and disasters ; Half sad, half happy, when my glances find How bare the country left by them behind. Hope will not sleep. It seems I needs must follow, Surely as frost and snow the exiled swallow, Hoping to see a vision in the rushes, Catch newer meanings in the hearts of thrushes, And reach a hand to beauty not yet torn From quick, or from the honeysuckle's horn. BEAN BLOSSOM Go you forward, if you will, Go you forward, if you can ; I am all for standing still, Here to love a lovely plan. Go you forward, if you will, Hopes of praise and lordship wreathing ; I stay here, to have my fill, Now the beanfield's breathing. Jf you linger, only sigh ; If you linger, only dream Heaven itself is floating by In a blossom-bearing stream. If you linger, only sigh Fancies of so fair a wreathing As can fitly take the sky Now the beanfield's breathing. 179 TO A BEE COLUMBUS in velvet, This afternoon sunny How lyric your voyage To islands of honey ! To ports full of pollen, Deliciously looming, You fly ; and my garden's America blooming ! Campanula belfries In delicate duty Proclaim at your coming The sweet of their beauty ; The pansies are wishing You momently nearer, And rosemary voices Call quicker and clearer. And sirens are singing From blossomy stations Of larkspurs and lilies, Of musk and carnations. 180 TO A BEE 181 Till coming of candle The soul of your labours Is earnestly kissing These exquisite neighbours. The rose in her bounty Shall fondle and feed you Till friends in the cottage Of honeycomb need you ; And yet, if the morrow Fall fragrant and sunny, Shall have for unloading Fresh cargoes of honey. Columbus in velvet, Fly hurriedly over The blossoming beanfield, The red and white clover, To find in this garden, Deliciously looming, A mainland of honey, America blooming ! THE BARGAIN I COUNTED blisses, tortures, shames, The sweet of birds, the sea, the sky, The spirit's clean and filthy flames, The right to live, the boon to die, And looking in God's face I vowed The bargain fair, and raised the load. But I am wiser now than then, Who bargained long before the spear Too pointed for the worst of men Laid low my mother on the bier. I looked again at God, and said, ' It was not fair.' God bowed His head. 182 THE CHANGES WHAT bird^ if you could be a bird, Would you desire to be ? Such was the questioning I heard Behind the tulip-tree, Where Nance and Meg and Jenny sat, All showing careless inches Of stocking to the hungry gnat, And chirped like fifty finches ! I thereupon began to think What changes best would suit : For Meg, who's plump, I chose a pink, To hop among the fruit. For freckled Jenny's birdlike change, Because she's never-resting, I picked the busy quaketail's range Of flirt and cheep and questing. Too hard the cherryfinch's peck For Nance to wear his shape ; Too red the robin's flooded neck, Too brown the titlark's nape. 183 1 84 THE CHANGES As feathering well the dearest third According to my fancy, A whitethroat seemed the only bird For whiter-throated Nancy ! THE LOVER MUSES SHE must not think of me as less The servant of her loveliness Because she frowns when I eclipse An inch of beauty with my lips. Because within the barn I dared To kiss her gloveless fingers, bared While she and I, being weather-bound, Were sitting deep in hay, she frowned. How deeper far had been the line On brows as fresh as eglantine If I had ventured to express An act of honied daringness ! Some girls being quick to mellow ; some As gradual as the slowest plum, The gods instructed man to take A leap, or how with skill to ache. I must not startle her with deeds To match the pulses of my needs, For she will never be so warm As those whom Love can take by storm. 185 1 86 THE LOVER MUSES But I must ponder words and ways To colour charmingly her days, That often she may think how fair Her haunt would be if I were there. And next, when happy thoughts begin To spread a flush beneath her skin In silent praise of what I seem, 'Twere best to let her dream, and dream ; For many bees of dreaming know The trick of honey, and bestow, As nimble little gods, the cells Where Love, who's fond of honey, dwells. A COUNSEL (TO A FRIEND) WHEN Daphne's angel, shamming death, Is faithless, never twit In syllables of angry breath The child for want of wit. Reproach her in the cunning way Was shown for thee of old : If speech be silvern, wise men say That silence shall be gold. 'Tis best to lift that ornament Upon the mantelpiece, And note how metal, wisely bent, Can shape a faun of Greece. While praising in thy heart the curves Thou fondlest with thine eyes, Keep watch for Daphne's ebbing nerves And clover-coming sighs. Be patient. Thou at last shalt see Her bosom's ragged tide, Growing weaker by the strength of thee, In loveliness subside. 187 1 88 A COUNSEL She touches wistfully the faun, To tell that in her south Thy star is up. Accept the dawn, And drink it on her mouth ! RENEWAL r lAKE notice, Cupid ! Far too long My heart has quivered at your song, And brooded, brooded on the curls And dimples of disastrous girls. The time has come to sit and see Bright youngsters, used as Love used me, All begging heartache for a loaa To drag along your hilly road. This I said yesterday, before Clarinda drove me to adore The little violet rivers in The lilied country of her skin, And bade her cherried underlip (Heart-wounding mischiefmaker !) slip To pathos, while her sea-blue eyes Swam in a mist of melted sighs. 189 THE LINK LABOUR past Hercules ! With golden broom The sun has swept the playmate stars to doom, And, glittering on my pillow like a gem, Has changed the glow of dream to daylight's gloom. I rouse, once more in bonds of callous clay, Too wildered yet to note how dull the day ; I turn, and for one lovely instant see The shape of her with whom all night I lay. Thanks, Tender Heart, that somewhere from the deep Of Space hast tossed a wonder into sleep, That sufferers of the daylight may rejoice Their dearest festivals in dreams to keep ! Against the bend of blueness overhead She flits who scattered lilies in my bed ; Who bargained well with Wretchedness for me, And nightlong dared the Keeper of the Dead. 190 THE LINK 191 How shall the Tulip with her glances bright Tempt me to bear the punishment of light, When such a radiance as can flood my soul Is poured magicianly by dreams at night ? And how shall Philomel, by song oppressed, At starfall seek to lure me from my rest, When haply, lost in slumber, I may hear Young Cupid harping in that clovered breast ? Out of the camp of spirits rush apace, Girl with the hands as soft as foam of lace ! Sound the low sob of rapture, and again Upon my pillow trust that flowering face ! Thou whisperest clearly. There is much to tell Of rainbows standing on the dark of Hell ; Of new-come travellers, hardly sure of bliss, And haunted by the tolling of a bell. And thou hast seen the jewels in the hilt Of Michael's sword ; and even heard the lilt Of countless angels turning to a beam The dockyard where the mighty stars are built. Look deeply in my eyes ere Morning scars The breathing East with all his crimson bars, That once again my heart may leap to know How poor is Heaven ! how rich my bed with stars ! 192 THE LINK Since live I must, I live unsoured and brave Till Time dig deep ; for Time's the digging slave. Fixed as the doorway to my dead, I know That somewhere in the background smiles the grave. Honour for ever to the King who saith The soul shall breathe in creatures made of breath ! But triple honour be for ever His Who by a stroke of genius thought of death ! A COTTAGE MONARCHY WHY should he ask to share the fate Of those to noisier issues lent ? 'Tis work enough to legislate Where Love's the only Government. A cottage is the Council Room, Round which the finch and throstle sing ; No threats of war gigantic loom, Only one Subject calls him King. This Citizen so sweet and brown Can yet his very Empress be ; She speaks not seldom from the Throne, That simple throne his happy knee. And here no Opposition grows From dewy dawn to dewy dusk ; They pass a Bill to train the rose, And move Amendments for the musk. Where studious cowslips learn the field, And redstarts flutter in their nook ; Where reverence lives, and faith is pealed From village spires, they read the book 193 194 A COTTAGE MONARCHY Whose leaves Dame Nature loves to turn, From snowdrop preface to the notes ; Contented in a mass of fern, Or happy on a sheaf of oats. Here music's native to the hedge, And heavenly bounteousness of rills Croons undersong among the sedge, And cools the giant feet of hills. 'Tis good to see the lambs leap up With jerky legs, as if to try Their foreheads on the buttercup That blooms so fiercely in the sky ! And good it is on lawny slope To sit and watch the brooklet run Past orchards where the pippins hope To turn as golden as the sun. It curves in silver from the glade With primrose port and cressy cape, Delighting by its reach of shade And vagrant loveliness of shape. Ah, happy countryman ! How sweet To follow quiet, dwell with rest, And ever in your green retreat Be sure of wonder in the breast ! A COTTAGE MONARCHY 195 And sure of her whose grace and tact, In Sessions well and wisely spent, Have helped to pass the finest Act Of Love's successful Government. SOUTH WARWICKSHIRE NOT thirty miles away from here In beauty dwells South Warwickshire, Her paradise of blossom lit By unseen angels, watching it. How well I know the feast is spread, Though I must be unbanqueted, By spirits of the workshop held To miss what never was excelled ! The country has a thousand brides To give to Phoebus, where he rides Along his billowy moors of blue For all his destined girls to view. The orchards are the maids, so drest As for an unclasped maid is best, And in their girlishness they stand To feel the Sungod's stroking hand. By hillside and by stream, I swear No other maids are grouped so fair As those that in my memory look Across the pages of the book That keeps me slave when I should shout For joy in freedom, till flew out The blackbird from his nook of rest Within the apple's fragrant breast. 196 SOUTH WARWICKSHIRE 197 By hillside and by stream, I swear This book shall yield, and I be there, When twice again the moon has poured On trees the treasure of her lord ; To kiss the darkling lips of night, To pluck, as 'twere a flower, delight, And keep it on my pillow spread, That happy dreams may bless my bed ; For often, if too long I live Where ferny fountains never give The tinkle that in music slips From water's heart to water's lips ; Or if too long the troubled air Be laden with a load of care Not lightened by the song of nymphs That in the wood are mine to glimpse, My bed is crowded night and night With shapes of thirst and shapes of fright, Till from its pillows I arise With ghosts of torture in my eyes, And slowly cleanse my darkened breast The farther I withdraw from rest. By dawn and daffodil, I swear To sleep no more till I am there Among thine intimate controls, Thy clovery acres, bosoming knolls, Thy cowslip families in the vale That most allures the nightingale, (Who calls to Joy and Grief to hear Alternately) South Warwickshire ! 198 SOUTH WARWICKSHIRE Long, long ago there was a maid Of Love, the Hunter, sore afraid, Who quicklier ran the fiercer burned His passion, till at last she turned From girl to fountain, since she felt Within her heart no wish to melt And, clasped in sinewy arms, to lie And kiss the moon adown the sky. Along the glade she sudden poured The beauty by the god adored. In sparkles went her heavenly eyes, In rounded waves the bird-soft thighs ; A lift of water proved her breast Was flowing with the lovely rest, That made the very mosses sure 'Twas freshness other than the pure Salute of rainclouds from the hill Conveyed in whispers by a rill. Methinks the stream that most of all Can soothe me by its waterfall, In days that saw a multitude Of gods and girls at lovely feud When England's Arcady shone clear Among thy lanes, South Warwickshire, Was born of some divine escape From human to the streamlet's shape. So winningly it moves along Its little to a larger song I needs must think a maid as fair As Arethusa passes there ; For neither cloud nor spring could give SOUTH WARWICKSHIRE 199 The quality is there to live As wonder bidding fancy view The curve of shoulder breaking through The water, or the foamy fleck Where peeps the girl's unconquered neck. My refuge this, when I can throw The world away, and happy go To share with bloom and nightingale This shadow of a heavenly vale, Where flesh to spirit seems to turn While senses holier move, and burn To pierce the zenith, that at last The face of Him who rules the Vast Shall smile a comrade's smile, and be A beckoning to Eternity. My refuge this, when heart and brain Too fiercely hold the city's pain, And need to taste the natural good In streamlets stored and in the wood, As honey in the comb, for man To gather, if he will, or can. Beholding, as I peaceful lie, The bluebells weave their lowly sky, As if to signal to the land Where radiant kinsfolk seem to stand, I feel prepared again to lean Above my task, though I have been But briefly happy for an hour 'Twixt easeful and laborious flower ; 200 SOUTH WARWICKSHIRE So quickly can thy sweet and strange The downward-looking spirit change From sloth of heart, or thrills of fear, Or tottering faith, South Warwickshire If as a ghost I may return To what I lovingly discern, I will not seek a narrow range Within a lone and memoried grange, But widely will I ever go Beneath the orchard's lifted snow, That, by the branches dimly felt, Meseems too fairy-frail to melt. Under the apple will I lie And watch again the threads of sky To patterns unfamiliar twined By spirits weaving in the wind. However softly they may weave, The steadfast shape they cannot give, For though the air be still as death The apple trembles, taking breath ; Or else she gently laughs to hear A frolic whispered by the pear ; Or shrinks a little to let by Some evil, chilling to the sky. Howe'er it be, the pattern breaks, Come larger pools and smaller lakes, Then larger lakes and smaller pools To him who face and spirit cools Beneath the apple, hardly sure If he her beauty can endure. SOUTH WARWICKSHIRE 201 Be it mine to have good share of this Delicious painfulness of bliss (Unsure of ancestry) that gleams With magic stolen from extremes ; Read wonders as I could not read When I was flesh and blood indeed ; List flower-folk chant along the lane To clouds the prayer that brings the rain ; See in the oak a spirit shine With radiance little less than mine ; And many a voice of Godship hear Delightedly, South Warwickshire ! BELLS OF DUMBLETON So frankly had the cowslips come To make the hill a bower, 'Twas hard in stepping not to tread To death a lovely flower. As deep I drank the sweetened air, And joyed to be alone, With broad and honest counsel rang The bells of Dumbleton. Trust in Love ! Lean on Christ ! Come to God, Friend ! The candid throats of Dumbleton, Alike in energy, Across the miles of meadowland Together called to me. Devoted long ago to Christ, They labour and beseech, Persuading by their mellowness As far as they can reach. Trust in Love ! Lean on Christ ! Come to God, Friend ! BELLS OF DUMBLETON 203 Methought that as I lingered there, Beside the green-grey fence, The stainless lips of Dumbleton Bemoaned my negligence ; For louder still across the shire The belfry sounded clear A collect for my lazy heart And sleeping soul to hear. Trust in Love ! Lean on Christ ! Come to God, Friend ! THE CHERRY OF LUCULLUS IN the days when Rome was hungry, and, as robber of the world, Sent her legions on a bloody quest of false and sullied glory, She debased the famished residents that dreamed of blood at home By a pageantry of plunder when her Arms returned from thieving. So along the noble causeways tramped the stalwarts of the sword, With a criss-cross patterning of scars upon their necks and faces ; And among them and behind them limped in chains the conquered braves Who had shouted hymns of homeland as they rushed against the legions. While the gods allowed a cataract of sunshine to be poured On the devilry of mischief that had issued from the human, The procession of destroyers, with the spoil of broken hearts, Made a blot upon the universe that blemishes for ever. 204 THE CHERRY OF LUCULLUS 205 Was it little, thus to hector in a land beyond their right ? Was it little, thus to shame the skies by bludgeoning the weaker ? But the sequel ! For the mob was there in coarsely candid throngs To deride the fettered nobles and to spit at stained princesses. When I turn the page of Livy and of records such as his My indignant veins seem bursting with a rapid flood of horror, Till I weary for an interval of swords con- signed to rust, And for visitings, however brief, of graciousness in triumph. Ah, Lucullus, if a flaming Judge shall ever cry to you For a plea imperative enough to quarter condemnation, Humbly whisper how, confusedly, you tried to clear your soul When you brought the cordial Cherry home to Italy from Pontus ! It is told how thoroughly you marched, how ruthlessly you broke Mithridates to your pleasure on the wheel of degradation, Till at last you gave the signal for the clover- fields of home 206 THE CHERRY OF LUCULLUS To the rearing drove of stallions, to the flock of stolen virgins. But the forefront of your Triumph, when the mob came out to stare And to smear a kennel -Latin on the broken herd from Asia, Was a Cherry-tree, ennobled to the leader- ship, and brought To prevail more gloriously at Rome than Rome had done in Pontus. As an image from a temple, so the Cherry moved in state Through the causeways of a city to be vanquished by her fairness, While Lucullus from his chariot leaned to swear to radiant friends That the Cherry was the loveliest prize of all his lovely prizes. 'Twas a flowering of his bosom, 'twas a waking of disgust At the Eagle with a victim's life for ever in its talons ; So I praise him to my comrades when the whiteheart in July Bids me think of how Lucullus brought his leafy spoil from Pontus. As you thumb old England's fo/io, scarce a leaf will fail to bear At its foot the flaming signatures of Daring and of Glory. THE CHERRY OF LUCULLUS 207 Tou will hear the Saxon fighter hoarsely panting near the Sphinx, And his cousins looting idols from the Orient -pagodas. They devour the foreign hillsides, in despite of wasps of lead, As they chew the hard tobacco, as they hum to absent darlings^ Grinning widely at the vinegar V expression worn by Death, Till the bayonet jars the breastbone of the plundered Little Peoples. So they tell me. But the signatures I find upon the leaf Rarely thrill me with the noble touch that means authentic thrilling, For I seem confused by voices that reveal a wavering doubt In the heart of the magicians who have signed the coloured pages. What the seed that grows for Nations many harvestfields of loss, Ask of Glory, ask of Daring (since they muse awhile unbloodied) They will whisper that the active seed of Feebleness is Force, As they shed a tear for Empires long ago reduced to Dustbins. See the nations falsely bowing when they hear the name of Christ 208 THE CHERRY OF LUCULLUS In the sanctified cathedrals where the hypo- crites are seeming To be raimented in whiteness from the Testament of Love, While the shot- torn standards on the walls denounce the Christ they worship. Ah, Lucullus, there was stirring misty trouble in your mind When you gave the sword the background, when you dignified the Cherry ; But the Nations have forgotten this, and gospellings of renown, And are flaunting in their open palms the Thirty Silver Pieces. Little Fatherland of Britons, it were well for us to search In the pages of our History with diligence and longing, Not to boast about the graveyards we have filled across the seas, Not to count the women widowed, nor the babies we have orphaned, But in hope to find a tree of grace show green within the Book, And to hear the warbling of a bird arisen from noble nesting, That the generations yet to come shall find amid our stains Such a signal of repentance as the Cherry of Lucullus. JEREMY JOY (In the Cleveland district of Yorkshire the misselthrush is so called.) RED Winter, with a sigh and shrug, First listens to the sound, And then begins to roll the rug Of fairy lambswool from the ground. The Spirit of Flowers along the sky With far-away plumes is winging, And, full of faith, on a tree close by, Sir Jeremy Joy is singing. Here's once again the sweet surprise Of what is old, yet new ! The crocus lifting to the skies His dew-glass wet with radiant dew. My body a nest of pulses seems, Like meadow-born lambs a-springing, And into my heart flock purple dreams, For Jeremy Joy is singing. The year-long wanderers from my breast Come lovely home to me, With pale-green palms together pressed, As if they begged for charity. 209 P 210 JEREMY JOY The woodland whispers of the foam Of flowers alert for bringing The snow-bound bee from his honeycomb, For Jeremy Joy is singing. Who comes from Cleveland, he will know The bonny bird I mean, And in his breast may cheerier go His heart for some thrice-happy scene : Perchance he went by prosperous farms And bells of rivulets ringing, To bend his neck for young love's arms When Jeremy Joy was singing ! NOT TO BE WON 'Tis said there flashes in her wit A starry glow That lights a thought, and keeps it lit As folly's foe. It may be so ; I only know Her silences are exquisite. 'Tis said she easily commands, As to and fro She moves among adoring bands, Desire to grow. It may be so ; I only know She makes a heaven where she stands. 'Tis said that early in the year My Love will go A world away, with all that's dear In overflow. It may be so ; I only know She breaks my heart by staying here. 211 TO THE IDEAL '7/s a long lane that has no turning. True. How long the lane that somewhere turns to you ! Between the hedge of hopes, the hedge of fears, My feet have walked for more than twenty years, But still the road runs straight, and still I see Its narrowing line grow small in front of me. Sometimes I meet a pilgrim coming back With craven heart along the noble track. I never ask how far ahead he quailed ; For he and I grew foemen when he failed. Onward I move, with this to cheer my mind : No one as yet has passed me from behind. I must not sit beside a lulling stream Unless it flows toward my dearest dream. 212 TO THE IDEAL 213 1 must not wince, when going past the farms, If Colin hold his milkmaid in his arms. The perfect eyes are those that cannot shine Their best till fed confusedly by mine. Suppose I live three heartbeats in their sight Before they melt to light concealed by light ; Shall those not seem three ages of desire So paid as Love can never pay with fire ? ' Ti s a long lane that has no turning. True. How long the lane that somewhere turns to you ! THE THEFT WHEN Celia, coming from the stream In lovely disarray, Had sight of Cupid deep adream Where she was wont to lay Her body on a bed of moss Before she dressed again, She vowed to punish by a loss The god of tender pain. While innocently there he kept The truce of sleep, the maid, As soft as Arethusa, crept Along the bird-sweet glade. By chance the clover of her breast And every treble bird So mingled with the soul of rest That Cupid never stirred. Then Celia delicately threw Her shadow on the lad, And from his pearly quiver drew The single shaft he had. 214 THE THEFT 215 When thus she held in merriment The solitary dart, Above the trespasser she bent And lightly pricked his heart. No fluttered thrush could ever rise More swiftly from the ground Than Cupid, sparkling with surprise, Sprang up, and gazed around. Before him stood a maid as tall As Venus, and as fair, Whose heart was playing rise-and-fall Beneath a stream of hair. She made such sweetness in the wood That even Cupid felt His pulses falter to the mood Of godship pleased to melt : His undcrlip was shaking, why He knew not ; and he wept. The arrow stolen from his thigh Had pricked him as he slept. Had Celia leaned with all her weight Upon the shaft, this plan Had shown the dimpled god the fate His arrows bear to man : So girlishly she'd held the boy Beneath the point of pain That soon, with sparkles of annoy, He sought his own again. 2i 6 THE THEFT He leaped, and with a sudden whirl Of arms took Celia's knee, Beginning thence to climb the girl As though she were a tree. His arms embraced her by the hips ; An elbow stabbed her side ; He barely failed her mouth with lips Cherried and deified. But though the god's impatient knees Were drumming on her breast, Not even then did Celia please To satisfy his quest. So, learning how his little strength Would never mend his loss, Adown the thief s delicious length Slid Cupid to the moss. Thereat began a parleying Between the god and girl About the theft of wood and wing From out the case of pearl, Till, swearing by his mother's heart Of honey, Cupid cried His willingness to aim the dart As Celia should decide. Then Celia, while the earliest speck Of radiant blushing came, Flung both her arms round Cupid's neck And whispered him a name. THE THEFT 217 And when he promised they should be As fond as dove and dove She kissed the arrow charmingly And gave it back to Love. TO A LOVER OF BIRDS ACROSS the window ropes of nuts, Unshelled and threaded on a line, In darkling days of frozen ruts Bring birds to breakfast and to dine. From ivy cottages the tit A sudden puff of feathered bliss, A pouncing joy of green and blue That even men may long to kiss The dewfall's lightness in his flit, Comes with a hope of seeds to you. I think when God, the robin's friend, Put winter sunset on his breast And Christmas carols in his throat, He sent for man a tuneful test To try his gentleness by note And marvel of the perfect coat. And God, who gave to us the throng Of birds to pipe the Spring along, And from His starry magic bent To dower with wings and heart and voice The creatures that in grace can match The snowflake's exquisite descent, 218 TO A LOVER OF BIRDS 219 In glory watching shall rejoice When in your garden's narrow patch From Hunger's claw His birds you snatch And send them bedward well content. Tits, robins, sparrows, starlings, all Fly down to food from branch and wall, And in a circle ringed by wire They chirp and chime, a happy quire ! The metal saviour link by link Makes black Grimalkin pause and blink Dissatisfaction, while the tits Return to boughs, forsake the bits. O lucky plan to baulk the greed Of tigers of a smaller breed ! The portly chaffinch, safely fenced, Perceives the danger, stealthy, dumb, But, hopping till the crisis, pecks (What faith in wire !) the final crumb. Grimalkin springs ; the chaffinch, fled, Derides his foe from overhead ; Satiric chirps, ironic twits In chorus with the saucy tits. No bosomful of thanks and praise Can e'er be set in chiming words Too prettily for him who thinks Of Christmas-boxes for the birds. And God, who gave the birdfolk song To draw the feet of Spring along The lovely avenue of birth, And dowered with heart and wing and voice 220 TO A LOVER OF BIRDS The creatures that in softness match The lips of snow when kissing earth, From glory gazing shall rejoice That in your garden's narrow patch You lift of Bounty's door the latch, And light at Pity's lamp your mirth. But what is here ? Can fairy fruits Be children borne by apple-roots ? Upon a homely English tree There swings a tropic nut ; and see The titmouse stabbing safe and calm The darling of the coco-palm ! Among the ivy, partly cut That beaks may have the foreign food, Is set a milkwhite bowl of nut For birdlings in a nutty mood. The bluetit in the cavern goes And digs the kernel ; pretty throes Of all that's visible his tail Are witnesses that it is well Within the tawny dome of shell. A soft-foot maid might capture there The tit delighted by his fare, If she but stole, yet hardly stirred, To close this Canaan of the bird ! The news is out ! The news is out ! From city orchards round about Come haggard starlings, robins red, And birds with blue upon the head. TO A LOVER OF BIRDS 221 The nut between the branches clings ; From many an apple-bough there swings A netted bag that kindness fills For anxious crops and horny bills. 'Tis here, removed from fright and foes, The chaffinch Aldermanic grows ! The bullfinch wins a comely round From coco-nut and suet found Where man's a friend, where boys are meek, Where Paradise is at his beak ! What wonder if the birds all come From cousin pear, from neighbour plum ? What wonder if your branches sway With feathered flutes about to pay By lovely airs the winter debt They owe for plumpness in a net ? Before the pane the titmouse cuts The unclasped necklaces of nuts, Or perched attentive on a tree Lets drop staccato notes of glee When in your hand you bring the bowl In which you stir the wonted dole. O proper spending of your pence ! O bounty bearing fresh delight ! May Orpheus and Apollo bring Their hearty best for you in Spring ! And may the cole-tit line a shell With mattress for his promised young, That in your mothering apple-boughs A nest of melodies be swung ! 222 TO A LOVER OF BIRDS A plot of bird-delighted lawn Shall make you happiness enough, With chaffinch matins at the dawn And dewfall on the sparrow's ruff. So shall your winter care be paid By thrushes warbling unafraid, And bounty ere the time of trills Be given back by honest birds In music pouring from their bills. Moreover, God, who gave the throng Of birds to pipe the Spring along, And from a bridge of rainbow bent To dower with heart and wing and voice The creatures that in grace can match The snowflake's exquisite descent, From glory gazing shall rejoice When in your garden's narrow patch, Lifting of Bounty's door the latch, From Hunger's claw His birds you snatch, And send all bedward, well content. TO BLUE CAMPANULAS WE will not speak, and yet shall go Between us, blue campanulas, A hundred thoughts as white as snow On mountains till the time of glow Compels it thunderously to flow To valleys, blue campanulas. We have, it seems, the self-same whim To move us, blue campanulas, As in this corner cool and dim We watch the sun's departing rim And listen to the evening hymn Of thrushes, blue campanulas. For quietness is what I ask Of Bounty, blue campanulas, When labour gives me leave to bask And wonder, wonder if a task As noiseless waits behind the mask Of Life Renewed, campanulas. 223 224 TO BLUE CAMPANULAS Our duty shines to us as clear As Sirius, blue campanulas : 'Tis best while we are dwelling here Betwixt the cradle and the bier To bloom as if the Love were near That sent us, blue campanulas. However humble we may seem, Or world-forgot, campanulas, Above us there is One to deem We add a brightness to the beam Of love, and help the wondrous scheme A little, blue campanulas. Though some may think that I should start Away from you, campanulas, To urge with them a noisier part In dust and shoutings of the mart, The Angel of the Quiet Heart Prevents me, blue campanulas. He gives me errands, that my feet Go sorrowward, campanulas, And shows me in my lonely seat The way to add the taste of sweet To bitter bread the sufferers eat In bitterer tears, campanulas. TO BLUE CAMPANULAS 225 So you and I will here remain As gossips, blue campanulas, To brighten those who come in pain To look for sunbeams after rain, Till we are wanted once again Where Love belongs, campanulas. GRATITUDE TAKE hold, my bird, of the cherry bough And lift thy throat to the sun, For the rainbow month is with us now, And thy building has begun. Sing in the cherry the darling breast Of the mate shall warm thy chicks When the moonlight kisses and cuddles the nest In the thorn by the two tall ricks. I love to hear thee carry the song Three octaves up at a time, For it helps my wearying heart along Better than reason or rhyme. Firm be thy faith that a sweeter wife In a bush has never sat, With her ears alert for the chirrup of life, And her eyes for the farmyard cat. Of maids I wish thee only a pair In sky-blue cabinets furled, But of sons be thine a handsomer share, To mellow with song the world ! 226 GRATITUDE 227 And what if the active family beak Both cherry and strawberry take ? No miserly word will I ever speak, For this beautiful ballad's sake ! THE LOVER SPEAKS I HEAR her bringing, while I pass Behind the cedar on the grass, The music of her feet. How charmingly Diana's pace Suits Warwickshire ! and how her face (Unmatched in heaven) is sweet ! I watch her as she gives the day A reason for its pulse ; and stay In hope to see the birth Of Love's miraculous unrest, To melt for me that snowbound breast Of living sky and earth. I shall not yet be blessed to hold In shaking palms those locks of gold That lamp her in the day, And, dimmed by starfall, in her bed Prevent a darkness, richly spread In perfect disarray. 'Tis only when in slumber gleam The false but brilliant lights of dream, When shadowy pulses stir, 228 THE LOVER SPEAKS 229 That I in flimsy godship take The lips to beggar kings and make The round world fall to her. Ah, never-equalled shadow, change To substance ! Finely range, And give me (since I stood So long in faith to ghostly charms) This girl to falter in my arms And tingle in my blood. If dreams come true, this cedar'd lawn Shall be a kingdom in the dawn Of Love's bewildered mirth : The world shall have a heavenly gleam, While heaven itself shall droop, and seem A paler sort of earth ! FROM A BOOK OF QUATRAINS 231 COUNSEL You say she melts your soul to dream ; That when she dances, theatres sigh. Beelzebub's familiar scheme When baiting soul-traps ! Fly, boy, fly ! A TRANSPOSITION THE oyster had an illness. Doom Attacked him with serious pearl. How strange to fondle in this room His suffering hung on the neck of a girl ! THE BALANCE THE Body said to the Soul one day, " Here's the bill of your board and lodging. Pay ! " Said the Soul, " Though I fared on broken bits, I have dusted your conscience. Call it quits ! " 233 234 QUATRAINS THE MOUSE IN lavender-coloured silk once more To dare the run of luck she goes. Right bravely on the larder floor The bloody dice of death she throws. THE CHANCE ALL will be fused again, and all Again to various shapings fall. Beloved, what a chance for joy If you come girl and I come boy ! TO A CANVASSER BEGONE ! May Ariel confound Your Urban District hocus-pocus ! My vote's for Spring. Resume your round, And leave me to my purple crocus. JEALOUS MISERY HAD all my charms been conquered by a grace Unspeakable, I'd scorn to show distress. But, gods ! the flaxen hair, the dollish face, The saucer-seeming eyes of Happiness ! QUATRAINS 235 A GREAT PROFESSOR THAT piteous fall of underlip ! That sudden- coming hollow Of bosom, ere the wave returns and little tremblings follow ! When Love was schooling women, in the first of golden ages, He taught a piece of syntax of a kind to gravel sages. THE STRANGER A CRISIS came. Before I could dart To safety my soul rocked to and fro, And hurriedly out of a door in my heart A person ran whom I did not know. THE CHOICE " How," said God to His Child at play, " How shall I clothe the coming day ? " " Bathe it first," said the Child, " in dew, Then dress it in white and gold and blue.' 236 QUATRAINS A RECIPE TAKE a pinch of demi-god and half an ounce of gnome, Mix with flesh and blood and nerves as closely as you can ; Add a shred or two of sky, a clod or two of loam, With appetites like harpies, and there you have him MAN ! THE PRIZE SINEWY Life and sinewy Death Stayed tug-of-war, to get their breath. Sudden they glimpsed me ; and their eyes, Caught unprepared, revealed the prize. TO MY CALENDAR How often have I reached my hand To tear a paper day from thee Without a single thought of him Who daily tears a day from me ! QUATRAINS 237 THE SWEATER Now the orchid's pinned, and he lets go slack In a blood-coloured car his rottening soul, With a sealskin graveyard upon his back, And a corpse or two in his buttonhole. THE CHEAT I HAD cheated the Vineyard. The Wagemaster came With a bag of small silver to pay me my dues. As he looked in my heart, how I reddened with shame At the blood on the money I dared not refuse ! THE CROWN IMPERIAL THAT humbleness may not take wing, But be with gold and splendour granted, 'Twere best for every thoughtful king To have thee near his window planted. 238 QUATRAINS A CHARACTER ON Monday (God bless her !) she makes my heart gay, On Tuesday (Confound her !) she makes my heart wince : To express her in fruits, 'twere convenient to say She is sometimes a strawberry, sometimes a quince. ENVY As the Grave and the Cradle met one day, The Grave cried out to his smiling cousin, " Still at your tricks ! Where I get six, Your blankets and bottle attract a dozen ! " THE KISS I HAVE captured a girl in the middle of tears, And have lived in a coffin for fifty years ; I am Empire-Maker and Empire-Breaker, Doctor, Midwife, and Undertaker. QUATRAINS 239 TO CROESUS THOUGH men with noisy purses come, And arrogance of wealth increases, The only unforgotten sum Is Thirty Silver Pieces. THE OLD NEST THOUGH I seem to you now but a rag forlorn, Rain-swept, wind-swept, bitter of plight, I have stood as an empire fixed in the thorn For a king and a queen at the heart of delight. THE IDEAL AH ! cheat me always at the bend Of every lane, as thou hast done These many years, to keep thy friend As eager as the sun. THE SECOND COMING THE Saviour came. With trembling lips He counted Europe's battleships. " Yet millions lack their daily bread. So much for Calvary ! " He said. 2 4 o QUATRAINS A DIAMOND SPEAKS HE who tore me from the earth choked graveward in despair ; He who stabbed his mate for me, hemp got him by the throat ! She who paid with lovely limbs to buy me for her hair Huddles in the rubbish at the bottom of the moat. DEATH AT PLAY HE blows through the keyhole to waver my candle, And seems to be pricking my spine with a pin As he stoops at the doorway to rattle the handle And make me believe he intends to come in. A COMPENSATION HOWEVER fiercely Fortune struck At Abel on the Syrian plain, He had one starry piece of luck He did not murder Cain. QUATRAINS 241 THE ESCAPE ANOTHER yard ! Another foot ! And then another inch ! The lovestruck godling in his arms bright Arethusa felt : She stabbed him with her grey-blue eyes, she pecked him like a finch, Then melted in another way than girls are wont to melt. IN APRIL MARK how the listening landscape heeds The chapters bright and brief When Spring lifts up her voice and reads The Gospel of Saint Leaf ! Printed by R. & R. CLARK, LIMITED, Edinburgh NEW VOLUMES OF POEMS THE WORKS OF TENNYSON. With Notes by the Author. 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