FLORENCE ON A CERTAIN NIGHT
AND OTHER POEMS
By Coningsby Dawson
New York: Henry Holt and Company
1914
TO
JOHN KEATS
WHO, IN EXCUSE FOR A LIKE OCCASION,
WROTE:
"WERE I DEAD, I SHOULD LIKE A BOOK DEDICATED TO ME."
A WARNING TO THE READER
Here thou shalt find grave thought—the shade of thine Most is of earth, some little all divine. By hands God-given, mine, this tower doth thrive; Thine are the clouds which round my turrets drive.
CONTENTS
[ FLORENCE ON A CERTAIN NIGHT ]
[ TO A YOUNG GIRL WHO SAID SHE WAS NOT BEAUTIFUL ]
[ TO ENGLAND'S GREATEST SATIRIST ]
[ FROM THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD ]
FLORENCE ON A CERTAIN NIGHT
I
(October, 1504)
[Someone sings in the street below]
Fair-fleeting Youth must snatch at happiness,
He knows not if To-morrow curse or bless,
Nor round what bend upon his travel-way
The bandit Death lurks armed—of Yesterday
His palely featured griefs he knows too well;
Therefore with jests To-day, come Heaven, come Hell,
He plucks with either hand what joys he may.
Joy is a flower
White-leafd or red,
None knows which colour
Till it is dead:
White gives forth fragrance
Pure as God's breath;
Red in its dying
Yields the gatherer death.
[Leonardo da Vinci speaks]
So 'tis Lorenzo's song they sing to-night,
That haunting song which long years since he sang
When, with his gallants through the torch-
smirched dusk,
He laughing rode toward the Carnival,
And young girls loosened all abroad their hair
And flung up petals through the cool moonlight,
Some of which falling rested on his face,
Some of which falling covered up his eyes;
And girls there were who kissed his drooping
hands
And clasped his stirrups, begging him to stay,
To halt one little moment, stay with them:
"Life is so short. Delay with us a while."
But he rode on, and sang of joy and love.
Lorenzo il Magnifico is dead;
His lips are silent, and he now could halt
Oh, endlessly, if one of those fair maids
Should come to him imploring him to stay.
For twelve slow years within the sacristy
Of San Lorenzo he has never waked,
But has the rest he could not find in life—
Ungrateful now, because postponed too long.
If one should steal to him from out the past
And bending down should whisper low his name,
He would not hearken. True, she would be old,
As are all maids of that spent gala-night;
So, if he heard her, he would only smile,
For he loved only beauty in his day.
II
[ Someone sings in the street below]
Fair-fleeting Youth wends ever to the West,
He, like the sun, too soon must sink to rest.
Stars of Remorse, fast-following on his track,
Moon of Old-Age, can nothing turn ye back f
Ah, soon the golden Day'll have spent his breath!
Then comes the drear, eventless Night of Death
When Youth, no longer young, all joys must lack.
[Leonardo da Vinci speaks]
"Then comes the drear, eventless Night of Death!"
'Tis true, for who in Tuscany to-day
Dares breathe the Medicean name aloud?
When a man dies, the watchers by the bed
Close down his eye-lids, so is he once dead;
Twice dead is he whose mem'ry men dang down
To dark oblivion when his soul is fled.
Florence forgets her singer, but his song
Still echoes through her streets on autumn nights,
And pausing at the door of some old friend,
Bids him remember all the hope he had
In spacious days, before Lorenzo died . . .
It seems Lorenzo's soul crept back to earth
Re-seeking Joy he coveted in life,
Seeking the happiness he never found.
Yet, was his labour lost? Did he not find?
He sang one song which lingers in men's hearts
And, having sung, he surely solved his quest.
Who of Joy's seekers finds the flower itself,
And plucking, knows the snow-white from the red?
Not I, for I've been truant in my search;
I've pluck't the mauve of Honour and the green
Of cloistered Knowledge, yellow of Romance,
The blue which feigns a deep Tranquillity,
Scarlet of Boldness, purple of Despair,
Orange of Idleness which flaunts the sun,
And indigo of wizard Heresy—
And gray which gives to Weariness unrest.
Perchance I've clutched within this eager hand
The Death of Joy—the fatal flower of blood.
I know not. This I know, I have not trod
The quiet vale where grows the flower of white.
Like an unwise distiller of perfume
I've blended each new fragrance as it came,
Made something perfect for a day—two days;
Then ruined all by adding something fresh.
First I would be a scholar, so I learned
Latin and Greek, and Mathematic Law.
Then I would be a poet, so I wrote
"Chi non puô quel che vuol, quel che puo voglia;
Che quel che non si puô folle è volere.
Adunque saggio l'uomo è da tenere,
Che da quel che non puô sua vogler toglia."
I could not live the wisdom which I taught,
So I must be a master of design
And studied sculpture with Verocchio,
Verocchio who had his dusty shop
On Amo's banks in grand Lorenzo's time.
Thither, while yet a boy, I did resort
And out of terra-cotta caused to smile
Women whose beauty ne'er hath been surpassed,
Nor equalled in the flesh for Man's delight.
Still not content, I'd be an architect
And renovate this battered world for God,
Hurling across steep valleys, mile on mile
Through cloudland, spans of marble aqueduct;
Leading chained rivers from the mountain-heights
Down to the plains where men are wont to toil,
There I would cause these Samsons of the crags,
Scenting the sea, whose waves are unconfined,
To shake themselves as once at other times,
And rush in frenzy forward turning mills.
So would each city echo to the hum
Of loom, and web, and swift-revolving wheels.
Then, when prosperity had reached its height
And merhants cavilled at each other's gains,
I'd frame for them the iron beasts of war
And hound than on to harry and destroy—
And when our world was fallen, who but I,
Da Vinci, should stand forth to raise it up?
These were my dreams; I thought myself divine—
All this was long ago, when I was young.
Next I would make me wings, and I would fly
As do the morning birds straight t'ward the sun,
Piercing the mists, rise far above the clouds
To seek out where God walks and whom He loves.
I made me wings, but had not strength to fly.
Still discontent and tethered to this world,
I strove to wrench the secret out of Life,
And swept the far horizon of the stars
If there, at least, I might discern some sign
To tell me whence souls come, to where depart.
I, in my overhaste, pursued too far,
Seeking that vague and fabled Paradise
Where Adam and his many sons sing chaunts,
While Eve walks through them pale and deified.
I missed my track in pathless swamps of Time,
I chilled my hands against the cold-dead stars,
And lost my mind in unremembered Past,
Remote from God and out of human sight.
Lastly I took to painting down my thoughts,
And pictured for the King of Portugal
That fatal meadow in the Eden Land,
Where Man's first sweet and deadly sin was
wrought.
I, in this art, all others did excel;
Yet with success I was not satisfied
But hourly craved for the impossible—
To fashion men as real as flesh and blood.
To-day I'd toil with fire in my brain
And paint away the faults of yesterday,
And shadow forth the dreams of yesternight,
And so on through long months and weary years
Till, losing heart, I'd toss my brush aside
Leaving the thing unfinished as it was—
Adding this broken promise to my last.
There's Raphael with his wide unanxious eyes,
He does his work as though it were his play;
He never talks of fame, but sings the while
He paints the Virgin with Lord Jesus Christ—
Goes to the door, throws kisses to a child,
Goes to the window, smiles to some slim girl,
And so returns and flashes kiss and smile
Into the canvas quaking 'neath his brush,
Creating thus a masterpiece sublime.
And then there's surly Michelangelo
Who chisels Davids through the death-long night,
And paints Last Judgments through the livelong
day,
Pantingly running, pace on pace with Fame,
Racing dean-limbed toward his goal in life.
But I, poor changeling, wake, and dream, and
wake,
And dream again, retarded by desire.
I was eight years in painting at Milan
A fresco for the monks of Dominic—
And even this I hear's begun to fade;
It was a picture of that sacred feast
Our Saviour gave before he went to die.
Ten years I laboured on the Sforza horse
Which should have been my monument through
Time.
I built it huge and true in every line,
Studied anatomy to make it strong,
And set on top Francesco with his sword;
But, when the time for casting had arrived
And I had done one perfect work at last,
The hungry French across the border came,
Bringing their Gascons, who got drunk and shot
The clay of my poor Titan into space.
So were ten years of strenuous effort lost;
And now I'm painting Mona Lisa's face . . .
[Someone sings in the street below]
Seize then thy gladness ere it turns to dust,
Youth can make all acts lovely, all deeds just;
Heed not the tyrant, lean Morality,
But steer thy passion down to the purple sea,
Through winding hills where Beauty hath her home
And calls to travellers, until thou come
Unto the Deep of Lovés Satiety.
[Leonardo da Vinci speaks]
Ha-ha, my passion to the purple sea!
And yet, I'd go if Mona Lisa'd come.
We two, close-seated in one crimson boat
Would drift the yellow waters of Romance,
Glide down its stream through hills of mystery
Where Beauty roams, of which the song hath
sung,
Nor ever speak of where that tide should end.
We'd dip no oars, we'd set no hurrying sail,
But swept on the full current of desire
Would steer our course with unimpeded hands,
Watching the pleasure in each other's eyes.
Ah well, 'tis vain to talk! Two-thirds of life
Till now I've spent in spotless purity—
Affection's been retarded by desire
As has my work; my dreams have far excelled
The beauty God moulds into human shape.
The sweet perfection of the womankind
Who haunt my brain, has held me back from love.
This . . . this was so till Mona Lisa came.
Four years I've painted when it was her day,
A day of mist, of mingled rain and sun;
Four years before me silently she's sat
And smiled to see me strive to catch her smile
In liquid paint, with canvas and with brush,
So that her eyes, searching, inscrutable,
May question her sons' sons when she is dust.
I only just begin to know her face.
To learn its sudden changes I have paid
The skill'dest men in all our Tuscan vales,
Harpists, lute-players, masters of the viol,
To make soft music while on her I gaze.
For her content I ordered to be made
A fountain in the courtyard of my house
Whose waters falling, ere they dash to spray,
Smite on smooth spheres, which thus revolve and
hum
The chaunt the winds toll in our upland pines.
About the fountain's brink I caused to plant
Pale iris roots and dew-blanched narcissi,
Since white's the flower which most of all she loves.
Also about the pillars, where the sun
Lengthens the shadows when the evening fades,
I've sculptured . . .
[Someone sings in the street below]
Passion's a flower
While-leaf d or red—
None knows which colour
Till it is dead;
Love gives forth fragrance
Pure as God's breath;
Lust in Us dying
Yields the gatherer death.
[Leonardo da Vinci speaks]
And had Lorenzo sung those words to me
His voice had had no more familiar sound;
Had he turned back from lordly Paradise
To urge me on in my pursuit of Joy,
Knowing its flower almost within my hand,
He had not said those words more earnestly.
Lo, even now he stands without and I,
By leaning forward, may discerrn his face.
[Rises, goes to the window; looks out]
Nothing; the sky is covered with a cloud,
The moon's obscured and all the stars are dead.
[Cries, as though hailing someone]
Lorenzo, ho Lorenzo! Are you there?
I heard your singing. I am come, old friend.
[Listens; then to himself]
What's over there? I thought a shadow stirred.
There, over there! Beneath Piero's wall.
Hath Pagan Plato triumphed over Christ
And sent his chief apostle back to us?
Or hath Lord Christ in his compassion wrought
That kindness Dives craved of Abraham,
Sending Lorenzo here from off his breast
To bid me snatch my Joy ere Death befalls?
No . . . no, the moon shines through and makes
all plain.
This is some old Florentine Lazarus—
A soldier crippled in our Pisan wars
Who begs upon San Marco's steps by day.
Hi, here's a scudot Catch it in your cap.
D'you hear me fellow?
Strange, he does not stay,
But hastens on as if he . . . there, he's gone.
Perchance he's mad or deaf, or blind and mad.
And yet methought that, when he turned to go,
His face looked upward, so it caught the light;
And it was like to one . . .
[Comes hack from the window and sits down]
Ah well,
I'll think no more of spirits and of ghosts;
Let the dead past go bury up its dead.
I'll think of Mona Lisa's face alone . . .
Of Mona Lisa's face.
Just now I said
One thing I knew, that I had never trod
The quiet vale where grows the flower of white.
'Twas false. Four years I've lived and wandered
there
And seen my flower, but feared to break its stem.
Dear God, thou knowest how often I have prayed
That this temptation might not make me fall—
Yea, I have asked for death's deliverance.
Is this thy answer, that it is no sin
For men to gather that which most they love?
So be it. Silence answers every prayer;
Thy voice hath spoken—I am satisfied.
Men say in Florence, while I watched her face,
That I bewitched her, so her very eyes
Grew in expression like unto my own,
So that her hands took on my restless ways,
So that her mouth hath altered in its smile
And, when I paint her face, I paint my own.
Then let that be God's answer to my prayer.
Ah, she is like me, she is very like!
God made her for the sister of my soul;
He would not have His plans jerked out of joint
By one mistake, because she chanced to wed
Her bankrupt father's sternest creditor
To save his name—and this, some years ago;
Therefore He sent His singer here to-night
That he, in words I loved, might tell me so.
Certainly God is good and very great.
'Tis said her husband hath returned this night,
Passing at sundown through the southern gate
From Naples, where last spring he went to sell
Certain Sicilian cattle which he had.
(He sold, I'll warrant, at the highest price),
So, if the husband's come, then she is home.
That day she left me, 'twas an April day,
One of her days of mingled mist and sun,
I well remember how she paused and gazed
Full in my eyes, as if forbidden love
Were vainly seeking words which shame denied;
Then suddenly she stooped, and her lips brushed
My forehead. God gave gentle words ; she prayed,
"May the Christ-Mother have you in her care"—
Nothing besides. Passionately I rose up,
Willing for her sake to be crucified;
Stretched forth my arms to snatch her to my
breast,
And found her gone—the courtyard filled with sun.
Six months have passed since then—six tortured
months!
There hangs her portrait, it has felt no brush
Since on that April mom she went away;
And now the empty courtyard's filled with night,
And back to Florence Mona Lisa's come.
To-morrow I will go to her and say,
"Lisa, here take my life for it is yours.
Do with it as you will; but do not stay
To add, subtract, and reckon up its cost.
Act a brave part and, if your love's like mine,
We need not fear; for what we lose we gain,
And, though we gain much, still to-day's to-day
And, while we tarry, one day's love is lost."
Ah, would that I might speak those words to-night
For, while I halt, another night is gone—
Crush'd to a mem'ry 'neath the heel of Time.
I'm minded even now to venture forth,
To go to her, although the hour is late;
And through the darkness, when she hears me call,
Only to say to her this one word, "Come."
Thus unto men speak Birth, Fate, Love and Death,
The four great captains of this brief campaign;
Casting a shadow at the soul's tent-door,
Each in his turn beckons and whispers, "Come."
And I to her am Death, Birth, Love and Fate;
And she to me is Love, and only Love.
I'll go to her. How can I longer wait?
Her nearer presence sets my blood aflame;
I'll seize my flower . . .
[Commences to descend the stairway, then pauses]
Ah, the song again!
[Someone sings in the street below]
Let naught of fear Youth's laughing steps delay,
Aye, gather gladness; pluck it while ye may—
We burn not if To-morrow curse or Hess.
Who cares—one red bud more, one white bud less?
Only we burn that love was meant to spend,
And this we burn, that each life hath its end;
Therefore, O Youth, snatch all thy happiness.
[Descends slowly; passes out into the street]
[Leonardo da Vinci speaks]
There's truth in every line that song hath sung.
The hand that wrote it's twelve years turned to
dust,
The brain's become a hollow nothingness—
A little grayness lying in a skull;
And yet Lorenzo guides my steps to-night
Unto my love as truly as in life.
Oh wonderful and strange that men should die
And, being buried, still should talk with us!
When I am free, and future ages come
To stand amazed before the girl I loved,
Then I will speak with them, say thus and thus,
And, though departed, never shall be dead.
For this I'll paint her portrait till 'tis done,
Singing, like Raphael, from gray dawn to dusk,
Pausing to kiss her forehead, lips, throat, eyes,
Learning their beauty, where mine own lips touch;
So I, like Angelo, with measured stride
Will race with Fame, until the prize is won.
Yea, men attain most only when they love.
"But steer thy passion down to the purple sea,"
(How went the song?) "Until at length thou come
Unto the Deep of Love's Satiety."
Truly, that is the way that brave men love:
Reckless of blame, despising consequence,
Not counting on a better day to come,
Seizing with warrior-hands their Joy at once.
And love in life is everything to us,
And I have failed because I have not loved.
But, when her soft arms go about my neck
And I grow pale before her great desire,
A new success will pass into my blood
And I'll be strong . . .
Ah, someone's coming up!
I'll draw into the shadow of this gate;
Perhaps he'll pass. I seem to know his tread.
No good! He's seen me; I must seek the light.
Is't you Vitelli?
[Vitelli]
Leonardo?
[Leonardo da Vinci]
Yes.
[Vitelli speaks]
Well, how's the painting? Is her portrait done?
Whose portrait? Why, the one of Lisa's face.
Not finished! What, 'tis only just begun?
Well, that's a pity. Four years seems some time
To gape before a canvas with a brush.
Beg pardon. This is what I meant to say:
That since you could not paint her in her life,
You'll scarce be more successful now she's
dead . . .
You did not know? . . . Why, she's been dead
three months.
CENTURIES AGO
In the solemn twilight, centuries ago,
God walked in His Garden, all His stars below;
God was very lonely, so He caused to grow
Man, in some ways like Him, centuries ago.
Man roamed through the twilight, centuries ago,
Always thinking, thinking—wishing he might know
Who it was that made him; then God caused to
grow
Woman, who was half-God, centuries ago.
These, within God's Garden, centuries ago,
Stood beneath the twilight calling very low
To some voice to answer, whereby they might
know
Had God really made them—centuries ago.
Thus whilst they were listening, centuries ago,
Solemn feet drew nigh them, treading very slow;
Solemn hands so touched them that they caused to
grow
Something that was All-God, centuries ago.
Then they left God's Garden, centuries ago.
Scarcely dared to question, never hoped to know,
Who it was that touched them, causing thus to
grow
That small child, so like them—centuries ago.
HIS MOTHER
I bore him in my breast—
Yes, it was I.
My mother's hands impressed
Stars of the sky
On to his infant sight,
As we watched night by night,
Jesus and I.
I taught him how to pray;
Yes, it was I
Gave him the words to say.
God drawing nigh,
We two walked hand-in-hand
Close to God's Hidden Land,
Jesus and I.
This little son of mine
Fell from the sky;
God made him all divine—
Yet there was I.
I came to bear his loss,
He came to take his cross—
He came to die.
Thus we went hand-in-hand,
My son and I,
Up to God's Hidden Land—
Went up to die.
He entered in to reign
And came not back again—
Yet there was I.
PERHAPS
"Perhaps tomorrow, but not today.
I am young and life is long," she said;
And she smiled to herself and tossed her head—
She scarcely cared that he went away.
Perhaps tomorrow, but not today."
Perhaps tomorrow, perhaps today,"
She laughed; and the green things rose from bed
And lived their moment. But still she said,
Till the sky grew old and the world grew gray,
Perhaps tomorrow, but not today."
Neither tomorrow, nor yet today."
Night fell. She heard the voice and sped,
And followed his steps, till she found Love dead.
The forest muttered, as it would say,
Neither tomorrow, nor any day."
BELLUM AMORIS
Oh, the romance of it,
Soul-thrilling trance of it,
Though lives are lost which no love can restore!
Hearts ride a-prance at it,
Taking their chance at it—
Wing-thriven hearts to the seat of Love's War.
Sorrow is theirs in store;
This they know well before,
Yet do they ride from the West and the East
Hoping for this at least,
Out from the West and East,
Glory with death at the end of the war.
Should they return again,
Life sings the old refrain,
Mystery, madness and mirth at the core:
Patter of falling rain,
Dawnings which wax and wane,
Life which is war at the end of Love's War.
Thunders have ceased to roar,
Terrors they knew before
When they rode out from the East and the West.
Though passions will not rest,
Love, which is always best,
Honours brave lips at the end of the war.
QUEEN MARY OF HEAVEN
She sits in God's garden,
Queen Mary of Heaven,
Where birds sing their steven
Hid in the cool tree;
And all the gold day-time,
From morning till even,
Earth's little strange children
Play round her knee.
Earth's lost little children
She binds to her bosom,
Each wind-gathered blossom,
Till mothers are free
To steal to God's Garden
And name them and loose them—
In Eden's green garden,
'Neath Mary's tree.
A BRAVE LIFE
The arid loneliness of life he knew,
The doubtful darkness of the starless night,
And fear lest he should never see the sight
Of dawn and God the Father breaking through.
Brave offspring of a disenchanted age
He lived as though illusion were not dead;
His was the pain of faiths discredited
Which with new knowledge civil battles wage.
In all his deeds for righteous quests he stood
And we, who watched his face and heard his voice,
Dreamed of the Christ; we had not any choice,
In loving him we knew that God was good—
We knew. And thus, beneath the hooded sky,
Lightly we followed where his pain had made
A path for us; if one should fall, he stayed
To raise him, lest his frailer hope should die.
Ofttimes when summer's day had ceased to shine
And on our London roofs the moon looked down,
We two would wander through the gas-lit town
Speaking in whispers of the things divine;
Or in love's stillness, high above the strife,
We found our spirits strangely catching fire,
And told of that " unspeakable desire
After the knowledge of the buried life."
He knows its secret now; the morning mist
Drifts up the road where his last footprint lies;
And I, as ever when a Christ-man dies,
Stand awe-struck, asking, "Was not this the
Christ?"
His soul craved God. I think we always knew
He would be with us but a little while.
Night vanished; dawn broke—when he saw God
smile
Back like a homing-bird to God he flew.
THE MOON-MOTHER
The world is a child who roams all day
Through windswept meadows of gold and gray.
The gold flowers fade; he foils to sleep,
And night is his cradle wide and deep.
The moon-mother creeps from behind God's throne
And steals up the skies to protect her own.
She leans her breast 'gainst his cradle-rim
While her small star-children gaze down on him.
Stars are his brothers; clouds his dreams;
His mother's arms are the pale moon-beams.
When meadows again grow gold and gray,
He wakes from sleep and runs forth to play.
But every night from behind God's throne
The moon-mother steals to protect her own.
TO A YOUNG GIRL WHO SAID SHE WAS NOT BEAUTIFUL
It's not her hair and it's not her feet,
Nor the way she walks with her head held high;
It's not because her eye-brows meet
Like a bird's wings over a glimpse of sky;
And it isn't her voice like April bloom
Rustling through an orchard's gloom—
It's none of these; not her wide gray eye,
Nor her crumpled mouth like a rose-bud red
Round which the snows of the jasmine spread.
Though her long white hands
Are like lilies of Lent,
Palely young and purely bent
O'er her breast, where God stands,
It's none of these.
Flowers and trees
With her to compare
Are too little rare.
Though the grass yearns up to touch her feet,
She is loved for this—she is sweet, sweet, sweet.
HALLOWE'EN
Hark to the patter of the rain,
Voices of dead things come again:
Feet that rustle the lush wet grass,
Lips that mutter, "Alas! Alas!"
And shadows that grope o'er my window-pane.
Poor outcast souls, you saw my light
And thought that I, on such a night,
Would pity take and bid you in
To warm your hands, so palely thin,
Before my fire which blazeth bright.
You come from hells of ice-cold clay
So pent that, striving every way,
You may not stir the coffin-lid;
And well you know that, if you did,
Darkness would come and not the day.
Darkness! With you 'tis ever dark;
No joy of skyward-mounting lark
Or blue of swallow on the wing
Can penetrate and comfort bring
You, where you lie all cramp'd and stark.
Deep sunk beneath the secret mould,
You hear the worm his length unfold
And slime across your frail roof-plank,
And tap, and vanish, like the rank
Foul memory of a sin untold.
And this your penance in the tomb:
To weave upon the mind's swift loom
White robes, to garb remorsefully
A Better Life—which may not be
Or, when it comes, may seal your doom.
Thus, side by side, through all the year,
Yet just apart, you wake and hear,
As men on land the ocean's strum,
Your Dead World's hushed delirium
Which, sounding distant, yet is near.
So near that, could he lean aside,
The bridegroom well might touch his bride
And reach her flesh, which once was fair,
And, slow across the pale lips where
He kissed her, feel his fingers glide.
So distant, that he can but weep
Whene'er she moans his name in sleep:
A cold-grown star, with light all spent,
She gropes the abyssmal firmament.
He hears her surging in the Deep.
Ever throughout the year 'tis thus
Till drones the dream-toned Angelus
Of Hallowe'en; then, underground,
Unto dead ears its voice doth sound
Like Christ's voice, crying, "Lazarus."
Palsied with haste the dead men rise
Groaning, because their unused eyes
Can scarce endure Earth's blackest night;
It wounds them as 'twere furious light
And stars were flame-clouds in the skies.
What tenderness and sad amaze
Must grieve lost spirits when they gaze
Beneath a withered moon, and view
The ancient happiness they knew—
The live, sweet world and all its ways!
Ho, Deadmen! for a night you're free
Till Dawn leads back Captivity.
To make your respite seem more dear
Mutter throughout your joy this fear:
"Who knows, within the coming year,
That God, our gaoler, may not die;
Then, who'll remember where we lief
Who then will come to set us free f
Through all the ages this may be
Our final night of liberty."
Aye, hoard your moments miserly.
And yet .... and yet, it is His rain
That drives against my window-pane.
Oh, surely all Earth's dead have rest
And stretch at peace in God's own breast,
And never can return again!
And yet . . . .
UNSEEN
Oh mother, why are you weeping
When aLl the world's asleeping?
Rest ye, rest ye, mother,
I am near, dear, near.
Not beneath the moon-drenched grass
Do I turn to hear you pass—
You would see me walk beside you, if your eyes
saw dear.
Oh mother, why are you crying?
There was no loss in dying.
Rest ye, rest ye, mother,
Have no fear, no fear.
Still long hangs my golden hair,
But the body that I wear
Treads more kindly and more lightly, could you
hear, dear, hear.
She has stayed her eyes from weeping;
She is sleeping, sweetly sleeping.
Rest ye, weary mother,
I am here, dear, here.
Now the dawn-wind fans her cheek,
And she knows not that I speak—
But my arms are warm about her, could her eyes
see clear.
WHY THEY LOVED HIM
So kindly was His love to us,
(We had not heard of love before),
That all our life grew glorious
When He had halted at our door.
So meekly did He love us men,
Though blind we were with shameful sin,
He touched our eyes with tears, and then
Led God's tall angels flaming in.
He dwelt with us a little space,
As mothers do in childhood's years;
And still we can discern His face
Wherever Joy or Love appears.
He made our virtues all His own,
And lent them grace we could not give;
And now our world seems His alone,
And while we live He seems to live.
He took our sorrows and our pain,
And hid their torture in His breast;
Till we received them back again
To find on each His grief impressed.
He clasped our children in His arms,
And showed us where their beauty shone;
He took from us our gray alarms,
And put Death's icy armor on.
So gentle were His ways with us
That crippled souls had ceased to sigh;
On them He laid His hands, and thus
They gloried at His passing by.
Without reproof or word of blame,
As mothers do in childhood's years,
He kissed our lips, in spite of shame,
And stayed the passage of our tears.
So tender was His love to us,
(We had not learnt to love before),
That we grew like to Him, and thus
Men sought His grace in us once more.
April fields and England's flowers,
English friends and April showers,
April voices o'er the sea
Calling, calling unto me:
Oh, why tarry, why delay!
Hither lies the meadow-way;
No such meadows shalt thou see,
Oh, come back to Arcady."
Happy English Arcady
Thou art calling, calling me
Through thin flutes as frail as Pan
Fingered, when long since he ran
Careless as these foreign flowers,
Trailing through these tropic bowers
All their largess of gold leaf,
Piling splendors sheaf on sheaf.
Some there be who think Pan dead,
Say his nymphs and flutings sped;
I know better, I have seen
Where his racing feet have been.
Still I hear the dead god's voice—
England's; Had my soul the choice,
It should wade through starry bloom
Knee-deep to the brown-burnt broom.
April fields and April flowers,
April friends and April showers,
England shouting o'er the sea,
Calling, calling unto me.
CHILDISH TRAVELLING
Ah, little child, as you lie in my breast,
Leaning your hair of gold close to my face,
Flushed in the gathering glow of the West,
Where shall we travel—to what joyous place?
Shall we refashion our castles in Spain,
Or sail to the Indies with Sinbad again,
Or noiselessly drift to where tired stars wane—
Shall it be Africa, Sinbad or Spain?
Speak, little child, and together we'll go
Back to the musical dreamlands we know.
Dear little child, you have wandered to rest.
While you are sleeping I wonder and think
Where you will go, and what land will be best
Treading for such baby feet, and I shrink.
Should they be hillsides of laughing and song,
Or gardens of mercy and righting of wrong,
Of weeping, or triumph, or love growing strong,
Journeys of shouting, of sorrow or song?
I can but love you and kiss your gold hair,
Happy in hoping that Christ may be there.
THE IVORY LATCH
Rattle the Ivory Latch of Love
And who will unbar the gate?
Ask no questions, my dearest love,
But wait—wait—wait.
Ah, will she be haughty Isabeau,
Pale Isodore, or Kate?
Hush, dearest dear, some day you'll know,
Be not importunate.
Perchance I might love Isodore,
I think I could love Kate;
I have no fears for Isabeau
Should she unbar the gate.
Perchance she may be Isabeau,
Perhaps she will be Kate;
But which, dear heart, you'll never know,
Till you have learned to wait.
THE ONCE SUNG SONG
Christ along the Road to Fame,
When all birds were singing,
Pluck't white lilies as He came,
Set the blue-bells ringing;
Poppies flared in strident flame
When they heard His singing.
Further up the Road to Fame
Birds grew still in sorrow;
Though His feet were very lame
Courage did He borrow,
Singing as He onward came,
Dreaming of the morrow.
Crimsoned by the Road of Fame
Christ passed sick and dying.
Through the hedges, red with shame,
Crippled men there lying,
Seeing how He singing came,
Marvelled at their sighing.
Distant down the Road to Fame,
When all else ceased singing,
Messengers of music came—
Little echoes winging
Withered hearts with wings of flame—
Fragments of Christ's singing.
SPRING
Sing, sing,
Spring and birth!
A maid shall be mother of all the earth.
Winter's bones lie bare and bleak,
Scattered white on the mountain peak.
Through stark woods the Madonna Spring
Glides with her unborn offering.
Where she treads dead flowers stir
And raise their heads to gaze after her,
And trees make dense their boughs with green
That her motherhood may not be seen.
Summer lies hid 'neath her girlish breast;
Till her babe is bom she shall find no rest.
Yet is she glad in her wandering
And weaves meek songs 'gainst her mothering.
Birth, birth,
Lave and mirth!
Spring is Madonna of all the earth.