m J- .:V .. ,?^ X ^^ /5^'Wfrl.^^r^^. (,011 a^ocnell Itttinetattg Slibtacg atltaca. Kent fork BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND THE GIFT OF HENRY W. SAGE 1891 Cornell University Library The original of tinis book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013611755 THE RUINED BARN AND OTHER POEMS BY THE SAME AUTHOR POEMS. Elkin Mathews, is. net. The Academy : Mr. Hugh Fisher's poems arrest attention for their.Umpid sincerity and strong personal qualities. They have no staleness, no depressing suggestion of the muse by proxy. " Faith " is a really fine poem : it has the effect of something new-bom, instinct with life and replete with decorous siurprise. A similar originality of vision and candoua: of expression will be foimd in " Conquest," " The Village Idiot," and " On a Greek Statuette." " Her eyes " is a delightful Uttle lyric, while a very captivating grace is characteristic of " The Fairy's Beseech- ing," " Of the Leaves," and " Golden Gorse." Finally, a poem concerning the flora of a piece of waste land at Aldwych is a perfect honeycomb of minute plant-lore. Katharine Tynan in The Bookman : He has in a sense arrived. There is ease and accomplishment in his poetry, and a certain quaintness which is very pleasant. The Observer : Poems that are a pleasure to read. He has the right spirit in him as may be seen from the sextet of his sonnet " For EverjTnan." And he has originality in the music of his metre to which the lovely song " Of the Leaves " bears witness, and the five good stanzas on Jean Francois Millet, which give a fine picture of the man and his work, and a fine lesson to every artist. Mr. Fisher keeps his eyes open, and he has written a poem, " Waste Ground at Aldwych," on finding fifty species of plants growing upon a vacant building site. It is a mie subject, and Mr. Fisher uses it finely. Max Plowman in The Daily News : An artist with a conscience for fine work and a determination to spare himself no labour in the effort to produce it. The Scotsman : Severe and finely moulded lyrical pieces ; careful artistry in words and solemn earnestness of feeling. THE MARRIAGE OF ILARIO. Selwyn & Blount. IS. 6d. net. The Spectator : " The Marriage of Ilario " is a play that could be passed off as Browning's, save that it would probably act very well. Birmingham Gazette : The comedy is full of happy phrase and incisive wit. The Manchester Guardian : It makes good reading, and con- ceivably, with the right actors and audience, might make good acting. The Athen^um : Written for the most part in blank verse that rises at moments to real poetical distinction. Mr. Fisher's comedy is a good deal more alive than the average poetic play. THE RUINED BARN AND OTHER POEMS BY A. HUGH FISHER LONDON SELWYN & BLOUNT 21 YORK BUILDINGS, ADELPHI, W.C. MCMXXI TO THE MEMORY OF MY FATHER I HAVE looked deep into an open grave. What saw I there Above my father's body hidden ? Blue sky in polished -wood — Hue of unclouded heaven. No more than this — no more. I have gazed far into the vault above And but to find Fathomless azure endlessly remote. No straining of the eyes could focus aught Of that inscrutable infinity. With close-shut lids I wander in my mind Down memory's vista to familiar woods That in my blindness are most visible Clothed with a myriad leaves — Bright tender recollections evergreen. And sometimes through the leaves a radiance spreads Diffusing until all dissolves away Merged in a boundless light With me and with my father. CONTENTS page The Ruined Barn 9 The Carrier 13 The Stone-breaker IS Mehintale 18 The Dark Cellar 19 A Dream . 20 The Sale . 22 The Iguanodon 24 The Outcasts . 26 The Military Medal 27 Widow ! Widow ! Drive your Cow 28 Sheffield : Winkobank Wood . 29 Gaudier-Brzeska, Vorticist 30 Semper Eadem 32 Folk Song from Little Russia . 33 Poor Polly .... 34 At St. Nicholas in Prisiac .... 35 The Traitor ...... 36 Dewpond 38 To A Young Actress .... 39 Wind Sighing 40 The Body in the Wood .... 41 To Emery Walker . 44 THE RUINED BARN The autumn leaves of whispering willows Like tiny flames are burning golden Beside a barn forlorn and silent By whose bare rafters mine eyes are holden : Timbers that once, before men brought them here, Roamed on the sea another hemisphere. To-day through tattered thatch I watched a seagull : little did it reck How seagulls 6nce had skimmed that orlop deck Fat gobbets flung from salted hands to snatch. Like ashes in a hearth disused In careless litter lie confused An adder's scarf, a jointless flail, A rusting scythe and, on a nail. Some shrivelled skin just holds together A wind-worn tassel of bone and feather That once in rapture of winged desire Hung on the air, free hovering fire. Of a June morning when the frisking hare Forgot timidity in dew-drenched grass. Gathered about those ready opened doors The company of shearers clean and trim. Then close-pent flocks with constant bleating Were by the shepherds passed through hurdled alleys Strewn with fresh nettles, to the central space Where each man in his place Stood ready on the rugged polished ground. Warm daylight flooded Through the wide doorway gable-hooded. Sound blent with mellowed sound from floor to rafter, The hiss of sharpening stone On steel with strayed bees' drone, The cluck of clipping with the thud of hooves. And with the tweet of swallows in the eaves Fleece-laden, brown-armed women's laughter. At harvest time unwonted strangers came : Dark olive faces of the wandering tribe That scorns house-cover and our mattressed beds, And Irish casuals from grey, distant hills That watch forever where Atlantis drowned. Then East and West under this roof As in one nest slumbered and dreamed. Speak old lanthorn — ^you must remember Of all the times that you were lit At least that one when the babe was born Here in the barn one cold grey morn. None heeded you though the daylight grew And gaunt grey shadows on wall and rafter Paled and withdrew, and the tallow dip Flickered and flared to the end in socket. At the living treasure, the child brought forth From her mother pocket, the gipsy stared : Not with pain — that was well over — Not with pleasure — no joy could move her — Not with pride — that was laid aside — But jet eyes wide with a vast calm wonder. Look ! it was in that corner yonder. Ever of old in winter time When the world was white with rime, 10 Or the sun in opal glow Gleamed without on boundless snow, Sheaves were laid upon this floor In even rows from door to door. Slowly with a rhythmic beat, Tingling with a welcome heat, Moved the thresher with his flail, Golden grain about his feet. Three times each year was feasting — Shearing, Harvest and Christmastide — And merry sounds in such a barn A song, while merry hearts abide. Here were the trestles and here was the board And here sat the master with his men And this was the song with one accord They sang and sang and sang again : " Turn the bowl over, over and over, Life's a dry crust, but to-night we're in clover : I've been to London and I've been a rover : Brim the bowl, drain the bowl, turn thebowl over ! " Like careless letters scribbled on the sky Or children's stitches in a wavering line A flock of plovers moves towards the hills. They change not with the years, they note no change Though men in new ways work and barns decay. Seedlip and sickle, winnowing sieve and flail Unheeded pass away — an epoch dies. Grown weak and weaker now thy ruined walls Sink down as surely as a sail that falls When the wind ceases and the cords are loosed. II No monument will be thine — the passing hour Heeds thee as little as fruit the vanished flower. Yet hast thou been the barn this verse records Though now no more than its remembered words. THE CARRIER For twenty years this very night My man has now been ill ; 'Tis strange a palsy so severe Should be so slow to kill. It was that cruel year the cold Came in a sudden speU, So hard that everythiiig about Was frozen but our well. Some sheep lay dead upon the liiount And ten died in the fold, But he would go to Pavenham And blamed me for a scold. At night we could not go to bed For what his lateness bode : My lids were shut when some one said, " There's wheels upon the road." I listened in the noiseless night : The world seemed in a shroud ; But when I heard those muffled wheels My heart went clanging loud. The horse had stopped — our voices died Unanswered in the frost, And when we found him in the cart We thought hk life was lost. He had no breath — ^his flesh was blue — We rubbed his hands with snow, Eagerly looking for a sign, Since we did need him so. 13 Out of that swoon he came at last, But never more to be The man we minded in the past With children on his knee. He's just a stomach with two eyes That follow me about And keep a never-ending watch When I go in or out. " A babe again ? " No — not like that No more than twilight's dawn. You can't tell me a thing that's spoilt Is like a child new-born. News of his kindred stirs him not : He's children in the war, But cares as little for their lot As that old broken jar. The emmet creeping in the earth, The blindworm in the sand, Is not, though but so little worth, So far from what was planned. I think that when he goes at last And lies beneath the sod. Those eyes will draw me to him soon To get him used to God. 14 THE STONE-BREAKER The wind blows cold by Dortray's Mill And cold on churchyard bones ; But colder yet on Ember Hill, Where Inskip breaks the stones. He gathers them from lonely fields Wliere, high upon the ridge, Some farmer in some former scheme Of barren acreage Ploughed up the virgin springy turf To learn by anxious toil You cannot grow a generous crop On unproductive soil. That dense sweet turf, those unpeaked hills So famous for their flocks, Are rarely tilled, though Inskip reaps His harvest of the rocks. He seldoiii meets a face except His own in dew-pan glass, Or shepherd's with his panting dog Alert upon the grass. From Petersfield to Beachy Head There is no dwelling-place Other than Inskip's humble shed That could those crests deface. White clouds or cawing rooks that pass Affect him, if at all, IS As Kttle as they do the grass Whereon their shadows fall. He never wonders why or how Or looks beyond his lot, Or meditates " If I were King," Or 'acts what he is not. He sleeps without a dream at night ; Works hard for little wage, And builds his flints to that stick's height. His master's casual gauge. Sometimes he comes on arrowheads — His master pays for those ; Though just precisely what they are Old Inskip hardly knows. And yet some man who shaped such flints As none could now alive, Through countless generations gone May still in him survive. Or is it blood of ancient Tyre Or cities lost in sand Passed on through ages of desire, Tl;iat throbs in Inskip's hand As here in rugged shape he stands One man against the sky — The stone-breaker 6n Ember Hill, Who asks not how or why ? i6 Profound the peace in which he dwells Of stillness immanent ^ So smooth, so rounded are those downs As lives that are content. H.B.P. 17 MEHINTALE I SAW a bath at Pompeii With a little round of azure sky Over my head through a baby dome : I saw the Pantheon's roof at Rome Where a larger round takes what may come Of moon or sunshine, rain or snow And lets it fall on men below While the four seasons ebb and flow. But when upon Mahinda's bed I lay alone in far Ceylon I saw bare rock above my head Though right and left I gazed upon Great skies that o'er the forest hung In folds magnificently flung. A pungency my nostrils knew Of half-burned incense-sticks : a few Left in one angle of the stone No moss had ever overgrown Showed where deft hands of devotees Had placed them, quailing at the knees On that high stairway narrow and steep Whence they beheld the carven length Where Buddha's servant void of strength Bearing the word of light Reclined after his flight. Oh ! smooth and gentle bed of stone No dearer comfort have I known Than thy cool stillness calm and deep Where, by the tale the sages keep, Mahinda laid him down to sleep. |8 THE DARK CELLAR Never alone : they would not tread The narrow creaking kitchen stair Because of that dark cellar dread And who was hiding there. But when my sisters challenged me, Though not less terrified than they, My courage gathered to the proof Finding itself at bay. With quaking heart and strangled breath Down every awful stair I went Until, the horrid danger past, I shouted in content. Last night, though thirty years have fled, I dreamed that all of us were there : Two that are living, two that are dead And I, below that stair. And while they said no single word I slowly lifted up my hand Toward that dreaded door as if Obeying some command. But ere my fingers touched the latch The door was opened from behind, And from within out of the dark, Crept a cold wind. 19 A DREAM Through moving gates of milky glass Grown amber-green like chrysoprase, Fearful of what might be my doom, I found myself in velvet gloom — I knew not if of spacious hall Or narrow tomb's contracted wall. And while I diffidently stood Enquiring of my neighbourhood, Believing every sense was keyed Up to the nadir of my need — Beyond my heart's reverberating sound That I shotdd hear the most profound Far murmur — as in some sea cave Lost nereids, frightened and forlorn, Alert to catch some triton's horn Hear wandering gurnards gliding through the wave — That my keen palate was aware For any flavour in the air, My nostrils ready to perceive The faintest odour of reprieve. That all my flesh and every hair Would feel the subtlest presence there And that the lenses of my eyes Had never been so cleanly wise — In that shy deep obscurity Appearing on all sides of me Like moths' eyes round some odorous flower That queens a garden in a midnight hour, A thousand dual points of light Pricked the tense urgence of my sight And with a more familiar sheen Grew bolder seeing they were seen. 20 Then slow accretive knowledge came Those freezing pairs were each the same — That nothing distant was or far — Each glimmering brace — each pale twin star As in some mirror's multiple Li^e facets of some shish-mahal Were but reflections of my own Companioned by the dark and by the dark alone. 21 THE SALE Who seeks this unfrequented lane f What alien voices fill the air ? Why does the wicket close in vain While strangers tread the cottage stair ? With open door, each well-swept room Invites to enter all who care ; Unlocked, each cupboard's cleanly gloom Defies a search for secrets there. But she who garnished them is gone : Her cloth and besom unemployed : The very fullness of the throng But stresses that essential void. Sole heir, an absent kinsman claims. Remote in dwelling — not in blood. All that was hers, and sordid aims Decree what love might have withstood. In all their poverty forlorn Her least possessions are displayed, The very hassock, old and worn. Whereon she had so often prayed. Who never loved her chatter so That those who did and had preferred To show respect by speaking low, Must shout in order to be heard. The mercy seat's a Windsor chair ; The auctioneer with curt remark Sits down and then with reverent care Places his cash-box for the ark. Z2 They trafficked for the highest bid The jar she oft with herbs had filled ; The coffer where one Christmas hid The child a sudden fever killed. And when the last poor price is paid And homeward each his habit calls, On desolation undismayed Unmarred the hush of evening falls. Through casements bare with borrowed light On empty walls the harvest moon Draws out of branches in the night An undecipherable rune. »3 THE IGUANODON Not with the artist fury Diviner fire^ Of a Michael Angelo's Creative ire, Stormily breathless, That like a cloud set flowing The marble bright In flakes snow-white About the statue glowing, glowing In beauty deathless. But chipping with loose fist At the cold rock revealing The shape it was concealing, The old geologist With tardy fingers. Patiently curbing Each thought disturbing, Fearing evasion, On heels of new occasion Warily lingers. Consider these — Within the block The sculptpr first the statue sees. The fossil hunter in the roc^ Can but grope with servile skiU Blindly, tentatively try, Following outward form, to pry \yhat's beyond : the sculptor knows — Not his merely to suppose Waiting on external will. H Art's nature loveliest, Not nature*s art, Makes beauty her behest : Without such in his heart Man fails his chiefest trust. Science is Art's helpmate Reading out of the dust Tales that were to be tol4. Hear theni but yet rejoice To have heard a mightier voice Crying to-day as of old " Create ! Create ! " THE OUTCASTS You live in rooms, and so do I, Friends may frequent where we are banned Convention with forbidding hand Drives love beneath the sky. Two homeless wanderers night by night, Past many and many a home we tramp. While others rest by hearth and lamp, We learn the open air's delight. We pass and leave the homes of men. We tread cool turf beneath bright stars, We hear the churring of night- jars, We hear the bittern in the fen. We know the silence of the woods. We know the secrets of the hills. We know wide lakes and little rills, And sky's innumerable moods. We know wild places dew impearled, We know deep dells and mossy dells. We know the scent of heather bells. We know the beauty of the world — Perhaps it was, that pondering this The sweetness of His ways untrod. Convention, too, was made by God, To give us more than common bliss. 46 THE MILITARY MEDAL The schoolmaster's wife in the stillness could see In the grey. cottage an old woman sitting. " Oh why, Mrs. Kennicot, are you not knitting, And what is that paper you hold on your knee ? " " He's gone and I knew it," she said between sobbing, "And never a raisin-cake sent him this year. They tell me his name's in the paper, my dear ! Ah, many's the mothers this war will be robbing." " Nay — ^put out of mind such a thought of the grave " (The schoolmaster's wife was alarmed at her pallor) " This tells the rewards they have given for valour And here is Jim's name in the list of the brave." " I can't understand'en — ^it don't say he's dead, dear ? " " No, no, it's a medal for saving his gun." " Ah well, if that's all, there's no more to be said, dear," Sighed old Mrs. Kennicot wanting her son. " Maybe — ^what they do in the war there's no knowing. There never was anything brave about him ; They may keep all the shiniest medals that's going And welcome, if only they'd send back my Jim." 87 WIDOW! WIDOW! DRIVE YOUR COW Widow ! Widow ! drive your cow That loiters in the lane As idle as the tears that now But rise to fall in vain ! Thy heart with other griefs may burn, With other joys be gay, But never will thy man return Who's dead in France to-day. But you could not have known it yet, 'Twas only now I heard His duty's last demand was met — 'Tis mine to bring you word. For months no message could we get, His fate you could not know; Some other cause made those eyes wet : Just absence ? — Was it so .? And yet 'twas anger more than grief That lined your puckered brow — Because young Chandler — cunning thief — Passed by with Sally Howe. They said his chest was far from right — He's only half a lung And neither brave enough to fight Nor wicked — to be hung. Before the war he had no chance With any kind of woman, But now their men are all in France They say " at least he's human." 28 SHEFFIELD : WINKOBANK WOOD " Each, day of the Strike, the sky is clearer over Sheffield." — Daily Paper. Are thy dewdrops not clearer and iDrighter ? Thy leaf-buds more green ? Are the snows of thy blackthorns not whiter Than ages have seen ? Dost thou feel that less sombre above thee Blue skies do thee good, While the winds woo thy branches that love thee Oh Winkobank Wood ! Is it doomed — the industrial forest That spouts to the skies The smoke thou abhorrest, That darkens thine eyes — Are they dying — the fires That have glowed from afar With the lust of desires Of the fury of war ? »9 GAUDIER-BRZESKA, Vorticist A SCULPTOR he — ^half Frenchman and half Pole — Who died for France that June at twenty-three. Too soon ! How much too soon ! " Form without form of things — A music for the eye " — That was his studied dream. Beating rebellious wings Of gifted eager youth In search of finer truth Than just to represent Things known or seen or meant, " Such art but petrifies, However eloquent," He claimed, " semblance that dies Even with seeing eyes." Seeking a new ideal. Energy — ^feeling — skill He fused to carve a rhythmic hymeneal Of consciousness and will : Songs conjured out of stone — Pseans of passionate felicity Fixed yet forever free. The critic stands confused Before this interplay Of carven curving planes. Sure that keen purpose lay And magic of man's mind These subtle shapes behind ; Yet baffled, feeling blind. Will time the doubt dispel In spite of what befell ? P They laughed those years ago, The critics at the show, With tolerant interest. " A youth with youth's wild craze To flout tradition's ways All eager to amaze." They cried, " Maturity will curb and change him, Such courage, boyish zest, Merged in a manhood's best A few years hence, will show us how to range him." And Brzeska died for France That June at twenty-three. For France that means to all The sense of harmony. For France that means the art Of measure, taste and form, Saneness of mind, the purity of thought ; For France that for the world This flag of grace unfurled ; For Her young Brzeska fought. For all these things he lived, For Her who gave them — died. 31 SEMPER EADEM Still at the vintage season The vinegrowers of France Make offering to Bacchus With music and with dance. His name was changed — ^what matter I At some usurper's will — The god they call St. Denis Is Dionysus still. 3« FOLK SONG FROM LITTLE RUSSIA Through the wood, through the wood, through the wood green A girl with a black bull ploughing is seen. She ploughs and she ploughs and she ploughs half the field. Then calls a young Cossack some music to yield. He plays on his fiddle and winks with his eye, And who in the world can riddle me why ? Does he wink at her bull, does he wink at her plough, Or is it her hair and her bonny white brow ? R.B.P. 33 POOR POLLY Poor Polly's cut off all her hair And frightened all the house By jumping to the bottom stair And lying still as any mouse. They say she has not been herself Since Missus Bazell died, And tending her came just on top Of nursing crazy old McBride. Then Polly laid out Mary Vetch ; And, though she was so small, Yet death is death, and three a month Too much for PoUy after all. Some thint they'll have her put away Like Loo from Luckem farm ; But lor ! there's not a living soul That Polly would do any harm ! 34 AT ST. NICHOLAS IN PRISIAC On the altar-rail of St. Nicholas Church Two little angels with wings of wood, Each on the top of a slender perch Stand in the stillness watching the Rood. Little twin angels gowned in blue, These are the words of a song for you : " Praise ! praise ! for all days To the man that made us with his hands Many come from many lands To gaze, gaze, and go their ways. " Gloom, gloom has hidden his doom ; Where he lies no man can tell. / Pray we a rose and a little bluebol, Bloom, bloom, about his tomb. " In making us he praised the Lord, Who made the man and made the tree, And till the woodworm like a sword Smites us to dust his prayer are we." 35 THE TRAITOR " What is it makes the king's heart sore ? " " Ask of the huntsman at the door," Whispered the rushes on the floor. " Huntsman, what is it ails the king ? " " He learned but now of a cursed thing, And bade me wait for his wayfaring." " Why rides the king to-night so late ? " The forest murmured, " Love and hate Move men of high and low estate." " Why wakes Earl Athol with face so worn ? " "' " 'T is the silver sound of that winding horn," Quoth the arras gray in early morn. " What was the secret he now has told, ? " " How love once made him overbold To cheat his king," said cup of gold. " He was sent to learn at her father's hall If the tales of her beauty were true at all," Sang a harp upon the wall. " And the sly carl told with a cunning knack She'd a comely face, but a crooked back, We know," cried the chessmen, white and black. " But what is it now he bids his wife ? " " Disguise her beauty and save his life," Said a bowl of stain with nut -husks rife. 36 " Why burns such fire in the lady's eyes ? " " The heart's wrath flames when the heart's love dies," Wailed the trodden threads of her broideries. " Why goes she now to her wedding-chest ? " " To seek what dresses array her best," Answered a brooch on her heaving breast. " Keefs the king silence while she bears Mead and meat for the travellers ? " " He sees and plans," said the ashwood spears. " Where go these two with hidden hate As if they were still affectionate ? " " The king comnnands," creaked rusty gate. " Go they to hunt as huntsmen should ? " " Yea, hunt if the king deem hunting good; — Perhaps each other," sighed Wherwell Wood. " Which of the two the fight will win, The man of right or the man of sin ? " " The king," cried sharp-ground javelin. " Why rides he back to AthoVs tower ? " " To snatch a widow from her bower," Laughed shakfen thorn-tree's snow-white shower. " On the king^s cheek why falls that tear ? " " Kings cannot conquer beauty ; here He found her dead," replied the bier. 37 DEWPOND I SAW among the hills appear A dimple of the earth, Where lay a pool of water clear When water was in dearth. Small sun-bleached pebbles girdled it A span-wide whiteness round, And billowing grass did like a sea On every side abound. Three thistles hung their heavy heads Like lazy sentinels, The balmy air was sweet with scent Of thyme and heather-bells. I bent to gaze within the pool, And saw reflected there A face that o'er my shoulder peeped Framed in a mist of hair. I quickly turned to greet that face. And none at all was nigh ; I looked towards the pool again, And lo ! the earth was dry. 38 TO A YOUNG ACTRESS To be and not to be — and falsely true Before the mirror of a thousand eyes, Resist, love, languish and adventure through A world that nightly dies. To run the gamut of emotion's lyre Yet never lose thy will's supreme control : To turn each strand of life into a wire. And play upon thy soul. To know at highest reach of thy success Those glistering leaves that stead thee for a home Must lose themselves in Time's vast wilderness When cold winds come. Had Shakespeare dreamed that ever man's desire Would mar his stage with what had never been, Would he have fashioned with divinest fire Juliet or Imogen ? There is no sacrifice that men demand Holds half the loveliness of thy young heart : Oh would that I, with but a poet's hand, Could snatch thee from thy art ! 39 WIND SIGHING The wind is sighing round the house. And very few small stars are out, Like timid mice that peep and peer, To see if I am sitting here. The sighing of the wind creeps in — A little voice so sad and thin As if a fairy weak and ill Were moaning on the window-sill. I looked to see if one was there. And in the glimmering light her hair Was covered with a cold white frost, I thought in pity she was lost. 40 THE BODY IN THE WOOD From shrouded skies with mournful sound Slanted the raw rain. Whipping the river vale And the fields of winter wheat : It turned the laugh of the hills To a wan grey smile of pain, But though it stung his face The shepherd scorned its beat. A coughing chorus now Uprose from huddled sheep, A raucous noise that drowned The song of the little bells. Some, bolder, push their way Beyond the cloven steep Into a beechen copse Of dim dry dells. For these the shepherd sought In the shelter of the wood ; But little did he dream What soon his quest would bring. Into that pallid gloom He had not gone a rood When suddenly he came Upon a dreadful thing. Out of his throat escaped The wordless cry of fear : Wrung by a like dismay The sheepdog too gave tongue. For there upon the mould With beechmast for a bier Lay a man's body More foul than dung. What he had been death Had changed into decay : What was left retained Hints of what had been : Hair so brown that told of youth, Teeth in bold display, Limbs of manly build Nowhere small or mean. Idly telling now Truth but twice a day, Hung on loosened chain The watch he had possessed. Golden coins fallen From rotted pockets lay Near one gnawed thighbone Fronds of fern caressed. Those holes that once contained Seeing and brightness Now drew the shepherd's gaze Nearer and nearer : Till a mere gossamer Of infinite lightness, Touching his own cheek Turned him to all that was dearer. Breasting the brushwood then. Stumbling towards light. Out of the wood he came Calling though none should heed. 42 On he went down the steep hill, In headlong flight, Anywhere by any way That to live men might lead. No loss of human kind Had yet assailed him ; Though at the lambing time He had seen ewes die. Watching a wounded hare Cry till its eyes grew dim, Veiled in the glaze of death, Had not seemed cruelty. Now from forgotten days Unheeded pinions flocked. Darkening the skies of his mind So that it wandered in vain. Knowledge had curdled joy : All life was mocked : Death gave the gladdest song Grief for refrain. None knew or after learned That dead man's tale. Nor would the shepherd claim His gold but left it alone. Fearing some future day He should have to wail " Finger ! Finger ! Not at me Point your lean bone ! " 43 TO EMERY WALKER The thrush, exultant in this warmer air, Sings every dawn without a thought or care And later greets, though never dreaming why, The scouts of colour in each sunset sky : And I that care so much and know so well, Though with less music, in these lines would tell The warmth of friendship rising in my heart Whene'er I think on thee where'er thou art. Behold the room in which I sit and scrawl — The little room whose white distempered wall Scarce shows behind the crowded books and frames Whose contents bear such dear remembered names. Strang, Holroyd and their master old Legros : Holbein and Diirer, Michelangelo : Puvis : Hokusai : Titian the divine : Vivacious Hals, Ingres of imperious line : Rembrandt with all the others in his wake — Moore, Clausen, Millet, Meryon, Shannon, Blake. (Yet more I lack for Cameron have I none And want a Whistler, Geddes and a Bone) Then books and books with manyabinding bruised. And on the trestle table, half confused, A mass of papers, letters, poems, biUs — Though more of these are, in the shape of spills. Waiting to carry Epimethean fire When heedlessly I let my pipe expire. Like prisoned azure from some mountain tarn Each side our Buddha brought from old Pagan The magic philtres of the etcher's craft Gleam, and a burnisher vdthout a haft Reflects the gleam and shines in it again As mortal lovers share each other's pain. My porcelain baths and more alchemic tools 44 Fill out the tale as by the Dutchman's rules, And on those shelves above yon cedar chest The copper plates I vi^orry lie at rest. No etching for to-day ; but this from me To bring my thought of much I owe to thee — A letter written in a tragic time Yet by its subject fit for happy rhyme. When last we met — more than a year ago — Your genial face wore all its wonted glow The night you told us in the Guild-room's walls That you were keeping vigil at St. Paul's. While tyrants flog the beaten steeds of war And force their servile subjects 'neath its car, While Freedom leads to Peace and growing light I see thee stand a watcher in the night Beside the curve of Wren's majestic dome, Calm sentinel alert for what may come. Or did you yield to forty winks of sleep And dream a god had given you to keep, While all the rest in cataclysmic flood Was being drowned in waves of human blood, Two triumphs of each age's every craft Secure upon a vasty heaven-roofed raft ? And did they march to your protecting ark In endless close procession to embark, A strange infinity of chosen pairs To tread the slippery garbage of Paul's stairs ? Colossal Pageant ! and the first methinks A pyramid of Memphis and the Sphinx — Its cryptic guardian — arisen from the sand To follow what time fears though mortals planned. Then towers of Khorsabad and Babylon Perrot and Chipiez ne'er set eyes upon : Assyrian kings " assailing " as their wont : 4S Assyrian bulls with yet more mighty front : Two open Hittite excavated Halls With rows of carven figures on their walls : Ionian fanes from out the isles of Greece : Great tombs from Susa and Persepolis : Temples from Troados in Asia Minor And others straight from Paestum and ^Egina : Then hosts of statues from the Golden Age Each pair progressing by some subtle stage Until the aspiration and the dream Perfection gained in Pheidias supreme. Enough ! or I am lost in such array As needs a week for but a brief survey : Nor could a lantern-show at Clifford's Inn More than a portion of such length begin. Enough ! or you will weary of my screed : Enough ? — ^Perfection were enough indeed Were it not various as the grains of sand Where Aphrodite's foot first touched the strand And left its impress — various as are All the wild flowers that follow Ceres' car, The insects of innumerable kinds That seek their sweetness and the myriad winds ; And so in art of porringers or spires Each diverse phase diverse perfection fires. But — an you dreamed or no — St. Paul's is safe, And, though the rascals naked Rheims yet strafe, Okey says Venice was just saved in time ; And let's all hope the dreadful tale of crime Is near its end. Then shalt enjoy at last Leisure deserved from many a decade past. And in some peaceful ancient hermitage rU see thee with thy books, a golden page Beneath thy finger parrot on thine arm) 46 Of England's Mayday poet or the psalm I saw you print that day at number three Where your great printing presses used to be, 2wple in spacmg and in type august With the ripe knowledge you retained in trust From Master Mortis, adding tahis store By faithful use compelled to gather more. Rest and enjoy the guerdon, hale and strong, And live to grant the guild thy guidance long, ,Then shall thy memory remain so green It^all thy presence be though thou thyself unseen. 47 Printed in Great Britain by Butler & Tanner Frame and London Cornell University Library PR6011.I79R9 The ruined barn, and other poems. 3 1924 013 611 755 P2«^t^?^?^. .S?*^ --r:v.i.^^\ ^^f-^'^ '^ 'Sir f'v i^M:.j?e;i!