^ A. /S^l 9-0 H- /S/9/6i/. The original of tliis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013204882 PfC C3FL? A FOOL'S "PASSION" AND OTHER POEMS. BY B. E. l C. LONDON : , EGLINGTON & CO., 78 & 78A, Great Queen St., Lincolns Inn Fields, W.C. 1892. k^ina^ CONTENTS. A Pool's " Passion " : Part I.— Out of the Dark. - - - 1 „ II.— The Sun of Love. ... .41 „ III.— Under the Dawn. ... 46 „ IV.— The Wages. .... 51 „ v.— The Sinking of the Waters. . - 57 Requiescam. .59 CiBCB Anno Domini. - .... 60 CONTEAST. . - 63 A Bargain. - - . .65 The Duel. - . 67 The Bied. ... . . 69 Recalled to Life. . - - . .70 PBINTBD AT THK OFFICES OP THE PUBLISHBES. A Fool's " Passion." PART I. — ■«- — OUT OF THE DARK. — I. 1. There is no rest upon the Earth, No solace in the sky ; From birth to death — ^from night to night, We crawl — each through his patch of light- And vanish utterly. Each fits his creed to suit his mood. And damns his brother's schism ; And why ? — the answer lips the thought : The anther of life's weed is wrought Of sensual egotism. Religion ? — Pah 1 a system, friend. For- fining down the brute. For our own sakes, not his — a shift To hoodwink God with forms — a drift Of words — a Sabbath suit. Virtue ? — A frothy ferment, friend, The lusts of self to leaven — A thankless dog who fain would tear His brother from that upper stair. To win his place in heaven. A FOOL'S "PASSION." And love ? — I cannot choose but smile To note each libertine Strain thin device to prove its birth Less from the senses that are earth, Than those that are divine. Nor vice, nor vice versd love. Forbear the cant, my friends ! In natural passions, kind for kind. Shall Nature her renewal find — And so our mission ends. For still the little earth goes round. And still our shoulders can. Despite all sage foreshadowing. Show never a sign of sprouting wing. To prove us more than man. We cannot sink and cannot rise Beyond the primal beast ; — At thirty years the -lees of gall Alone remain to me from all Life's Bacchanalian feast. And, thirty years, what sacred truths. What lessons have ye taught? That virtue is self-interest ; That to be rich is to be blest ; That honour may be bought ; That in the pungent incense-smoke Of wanton flattery Love's prudish scruples flutter down Like moths — that woman's boasted crown Is tinsel filigree. I'm weary as a player of farce, Who nightly, for his needs. Droning the self-same nothingness. Half-mourns the wished and won success That fetters while it feeds. OUT OF THE DARK. Like bitter drugs in sugary dress- Life sickens at the core ; We crunch the shell, a moment sweet,- It melts, and on the inner meat We poison evermore. Poison — but still long usage draws The sting, we must confess ; As the white poppy's wicked food Induces many a happy mood. Nor only wretchedness. And I for one would scorn to play The hypocrite, who deem Through all this elemental strife Self-love the principle of life. And pleasuring its theme. Heart-dead and weary of the brothel Town,. Where Pleasure sickens like a gorged leech. And fat Hypocrisy stands out to preach The vices of its leaner brethren down ; Broken in fortune and in spirit ill, Hating myself and' life fall'n "all oblique," Like Timon cursed of Heaven and damned of clique, I turn to Nature or for cure or kill. Oh, mother, lit with flowers and crowned with stars, Whose great blank statue-eyes, serene and calm, Reproach not, change not ; whose directing palm Each little weed, peering through leafy bars. Looks to for guidance, sure to find it good, — Oh, mother-saint, in this my bitter need. Give me the help you give to every weed. Though meaner I than the foul fungus brood ! 4 A FOOVS "PASSION.' Come then, green fields, and whimpering rivulets ! Sink, solemn woodland peace into my brain ! Give me flowers that kiss and leave no stain ; And, while all tender birds their canzonets Lilt guileless, straight I'll lay me on sweet grass, And shut my eyes and hear the leaves a'strife, And so, casting the serpent slough of life. Dream that I dream, hearing God's angels pass. 3- All noon — within my vision as I rode — The fruit-blue sea, bruised with purple wound, Sent up from hidden shores a harp-like sound, That dreamily within my ears abodci And to its verge there ran a pulse of wind, That throbbed all little sails, until they heeled. Like butterflies upon a rippled field Of blue-bells, and so dropped aslant and thinn'd To streaks of light. Sweet was the spicy air With smell of ocean-grass and tingling brine ; Sweet, sweet the lazy downs, and half-divine The warm breast of the Heavens leaning fair. Oh, hateful, Elf-maid beauty ! Smiling ruth. As soulless as the stones on yonder beach ! And yet so spirit-perfect couldst thou teach That death were one — but one step nearer truth ! Smile on, thou one with Earth, blue prostitute ! And so persuade Despair into the thought That he is more than evolution's sport — A brutish God, or an immortal brute.- Pale seenie.d the sunlight, and the water pale As Thetis' grotto — nor could more beguile. I turned, and,, riding inland many a mile, Came down at ,eve into a pleasant vale, OUT OF THE DARK. Where slept an English village, Sabbath-still. Before me, through a haze of apple-green And over faintest rose there shone serene The Western star, darkening all the hill That stood against it, into dusky brown ; A crooning ring-dove murmured from the wood, And faint from where the village cliurch upstood A sound of bells along the slopes was blown. An English hamlet, buried in green sleep. Full rich in croft and copse and barley-mow Fragrant with nutty scent — never to know The rending thoughts that make a city weep ; Never to know the fever and the pain, The dull despair and mad monotony Of fruitless introspection — never to cry On shattered faith and Gods adored in vain. Then almost it seemed good to me to live For evermore one of a simple race, — And peace came to me in that quiet place. Such as no book but Nature's own could give. How long I gazed I know not, but the moon. Like a bright memory conquering fear. Stood westward phantom-sweet — Love's pioneer Of gathering hopes that were to sparkle soon ; And goblin lights were twinkling in the town, As, following the brook's pattering feet. By copse and over brake that crushed sweet Into the dreaming glen I clambered down. Behind me the faint musk of wood-fires drove Blue on the hill with snowier moon-mists blent. And over cottage porches, raining scent. The thousand-fancied rose, bosomed in love. A FOOL'S "PASSION." III. What have I seen to-day That filled my eyes with the light of Spring, My heart with buds of May ! It was but a little thing, Yet the woods are wild with song That erst were dully quiet. And a hundred fancies throng ; And, oh ! in my heart, No longer, no longer a thing apart, The flush of a dream runs riot! What have I seen to-day That eased my brain of its load of hate. My eyes of their film of grey ! — A face — .a shadow of truth On the blind white wall of Fate, Moving solemnly on and on To a low sweet music far away — Far away As the haunted dreams of youth. Something stirred in my breast, Like a thaw of wintry sorrow ; Yesterday, sink to thy dark rest ! I wait and hope for the morrow ! OUT OF THE DARK. IV. Merle to his matey Hid in a briar, Chuckled sedate " Prithee hap nigher : Who is that fellow that stands by the gate Solemn and shrewd as a friar ? " " Tchuck ! but I think," Quo^ she — quo'' she, ^' He is a stranger, sweet, to me; But the parson^ s cherries bob and wink Over the wall. And he is the thief that would pull them all ! " Quo' she — quo'' she. Merle on the grass Under the briar : — " Cherries, my lass. He dofCt desire ; Many a day have I seen htm. pass, Eyes on the gate — no higher P " Simpleton, then," Quo' she — quo' she, ''Nevertheless a thief is he. For the parson's roses he doth ken Through the gate, And biding his time doth knowingly wait " — Quo'' she — quo' she. Thoughtful the merle. Winking and blinking : " Silence, my girl — Tchuck ! I am, thinking : Who, when the frozen white clouds unfurl. Brings crumbs and water for drinking f " 10 A FOOL'S " PASSION." " The parson's daughter" Quo' she — quo' she ; " Cherries and roses both" satd he, ^^ And eyes as blue as lake-water ; — Come, kiss me,-- chuck ! I know the fruit that he fain would pluck ! " Quo' he — quo' he. OUT OF TEE DARK. H V. We have spoken ; we have met ! Love, the Lord of dear Misrule, Made the chance and caught the fool. Exulting in his folly yet. Was she deep or wholly shy ? Startled from her wonted sphere ? Was the speedwell of her eye Rooted in a soul as dear ? Is she, like a tender greening. Conscious of no other meaning Than that it were best to stay Shadowed in her orchard dapple. Ripening, a wholesome apple. For some bumpkin's wedding-day ? Is she this, or may she be Versed in subtler coquetry ? No ! she is all shy and daring As a younger poet's thought Over leagues of fancy faring. Flower-crowned and flower-fraught ; Word-caressing, rosy-human. Fearless, too, as unastute, With one touch of wilful woman — Just the bruise that sweets the fruit. Some shy consciousness of folding In her bosom — of witholding The full secret of her lip ; Conscious, in her upward ' glancing. Of the sunlight bluely dancing In her eyes' sweet cousinship. If a thought too sweet of sweetness. This there is to compensate : Ripened to its full completeness. The bough breaks with its own rich freight ! Lilies, too, have fr^ile stems ; Jewels fall from diadems. Lily beauty, white and frail, I have marked !— I shall prevail ! 12 A FOOL'S "PASSION." VI. Sing, linnet, full and clear ! Is she not sweet my dear? She makes the woodland echoes sweet With song-birds calling after ; The hoarse hum ripples at her feet With a low changed laughter ; Her white throat throbs in light and shade To many an old-world madrtgal. My faith ! by whim and whimsical^ She is a darling maid! Sing, nightingale, sing clear ! Is she not sweet my dear ? Sweeter than thought in the heart of night, When the rose stars bud aloof, ' And the low footfalls of the angels throng Over the silent roof; When the soft breeze dwells on the hly^s hp, And the garden's all perfume, And a thousand mystic memories steal Into the tranced room. Sing, robin, rich and clear ! Is she not sweet my dear ? Sweetest in part of her ! Go to the heart of her For the warm honey, Till thy rose dutiful Yield to thee, beautiful. Smiling and sunny. Then may you, lovingly, Tenderly, movingly. Knowing her sweetness. OUT OF TEE DARK. 13 Wear thy rose as a friend FaithpiUy to the end In her completeness. Sweet thrush, the dark is near ! Have you no song for her ? May Nature speed to woo thee By lawn and holloie grove, All flowers lean unto thee, Nor life unkind subdue thee With scarcity of love ! May day its treasures bring thee, And, when its sands have/ run My voice to slumber sing thee, And every starlet fling thee The glory of a Sun. 14 A FOOL'S "PASSION." VII. As mummied grain, Bared in the thousand-year-old brain Of some Osirian king, At kiss of heaven Grows quick, with a new wonder riven, And hves again, My dusty heart. Pulseless so long, hath felt the tender smart Of green thoughts at the core Stirring, most sweet, A.nd pushing to the light that floods with heat Their every part. OUT OF THE DARK. 15 VIII. Yesterday (enviable doom ! ) They toasted her in the " Horse and Groom," The village parson's beauty, His one ewe lamb, as the cant term goes ; And I laughed as, beaker in hand, I rose And pledged her my humble duty. Well, she is pretty, as I have seen, A dairy Hebe, a lavender queen Of still-room shelves and presses ; Sweet as the simples she garners, simple As the sweets she gathers beneath her wimple And hides in her cotton dresses ; And yet, in her glance, her smile, her pout, A very woman, without a doubt. An integral force potential Of Nature's bungling, far-fetched plan To make, for the chaste increase of man. So wanton a lure essential. Not to my foolish springtide brain That leap of sentiment comes again — That swift, sweet indecision That raised the ghost of a fairer mood When, beautiful shape of Hesh and blood. She crossed my lifted vision. Blue rifts come to a desolate sky When the hoarse storm has gone breathless by. To terraced echoes blowing, That fill the heart with a peace so. full. The hell of life itself flames dull In the silence of their showing. So with the pure girl-face that crossed My life, I had thought too conscience-tossed To yield an old sensation. 16 A FOOL'S "PASSION." Well, it was sweet while it savoured most — And now I laugh to hear her the toast Of a tap-room congregation. Yet, laugh as I will, the thought comes still 'Twere as dark a deed as ever wrought ill To foul her to my level ; She seems at least a thing so pure. The devil might go to her for cure Of all that makes him devil. OUT OF THE DARK. 17 IX. Youth, and; beauty and trust — A fig for the hypocrite cant ! Shattered belief, and a sneer for grief That whimpers for more gold-dust ; Then — the devil is yet extant. Wine, and surfeit, and lust. And every devils' ill ; Nausea then for the beast in his den ; A year and a day of disgust. Then — sin has charms for him still. A burning scirocco dust : I dreamed of the choked earth dead ! But a green thought broke through the hateful smoke, And the light of a million flowers awoke. And the wind came in one gust ; — Then I knew that it lived instead. 18 A FOOL'S "PASSION." X. There comes to me now and again, In dreary gusts of fright, The plash of a sodden, windless night, A dumb street, echoing rain ; A low-roofed court to a graveyard gate-^' Horror beyond inarticulate. It steals on me unawares ; I see, as I lie awake, That hoarse-throat, hiccuping gas jet shake The shadows into squares Over the glimpsing stones aghast. And the sleek long pavement shining past. Does it now, as then, lie thick With hovel on hutch beyond ? A foul street set in a foetid pond, A sewer of frowzy brick ? Was it weeks, was it months or years ago I stood in that midnight haunt of woe ? Only, I call to mind, I had fled from the flare and din Of the streets, from the rose- white bosom of sin, In loathing of piy kind. Had fled in a horror beyond controul From myself and my shameful, shameful soul. Myself! and what self, was here ?— In vain that myself I fled 1 No corpse of the crowd of felen dead That stalked me, mad with fear. By gibbering railing, broken fence. By tenements reeking pestilence. By dens of white disease, Was half such a thing accurst As I, sick, hunted quarry, who burst, OUT OF TSE DARK. With shaking heart and knees, Into that silent court of death And saw my soul pant gray on my breath. Once more, in a hideous dreamy My tortured nerves' constraint Slackens and leaves me deathly faint,, While, like a knocking steam In a fur-choked pipe, my pulses din,. Beating a terrible music in. Ah, Christ 1 How the vision grows ! Like a corpse-fire, green as grass, Stealing towards the window-glass Of a room that labours close With the strangled breath of the nearly dead And the staring watcher beside the bed. Again from that sombre place' The God of men stands forth,. A cruelty, not of hate or wrath,. But of undetermined space, An aimless essay, fall'n awry, Of Nature's crude philosophy. Only myself to blame ! That blank, blind, vacant thing, That Moloch idol with wooden wing^ Set in a gilded frame — That churchman^s deity proved to be A cypher in my destiny. That was the worst of all — Only myself to blame ! The winter to freeze, the summer flame' At no God's beck and call ; The soul to issue ; to strive — to pass Like a film from a breathed-on looking-glass. 30 A POOL'S "PASSION." Almost I laughed aloud At the idiotcy of my race, Its hungry clamour of creed and place, Its struggle to grasp a cloud. Already I felt a thing remote As the ring of the muzzle chilled my throat. For I knew the meaning now Of the threats long-muttered apart, In echoing deep rooms of my heart, By voices that were low Till they broke bounds, like a devil's birth. And wrought on me with terrible mirth. Unnerved, unfleshed, — unversed In the simple valour of good, I knew ho magic to turn the flood Of terror ; at its worst I spun before it, to fall at last. Like leaves in the van of a screaming blast. Ran it not ever thus. The course of the suicide ? Maddening nerves, long overtried By license crapulous ; The long, mazed struggle, the dreadful fear— Of what ? no tangible thing or clear. And so, through the nerves unmanned. Yet strong to anticipate The timed advance of a worser fate, I raised a guilty hand — And only the touch of a finger bend Waited on life like a crooked friend. God ! what a horrible cry ! The dead vault rang with the shock. And my. quaking hand shook free of the stock OUT OF THE DARK. 21 In loathing ecstasy, And through me went like a spaSm-breath One awful fainting terror of death. Not here in this sordid Hell !— I saw the spattered brain, The blood steam up with the steaming rain. The stark thing laid in a shell For curious gaping fools to try. And cackle over, and wonder why ! It flashed on the shriek aghast ; It gave my madness pause. Whence was the cry and what the cause ? Only I know it passed — Suicide, murder, child-bed scream — And woke me from a sickening dream ; A dream that, in gasps of fright. When the day stares dense with Fate, Or the wind, like the voice of a dead playmate. Calls to me from the night. Haunts me still and will ever be A tangible, hateful memory. For somehow I know, I feel, The weft of my soul is strained ; And I dread one thought, and my heart is pained, And my frighted senses reel At the thought that in the years to be •The answer will come to that cry and me. A FOOL'S "PASSION." XI. Can God be God, Hearing from His white throne, Resplendent, Argus-eyed, His fainting children moan — Can God be God, And, hearing them groanj Deride ? Can God be God, And see all-gentle Love, His beautiful first-born. That He made trusting, prove But itself, and fall — And never move To warn ? There is no God To save this pretty weed So stainless in its bed ; There is no God — Agreed ! I'd pluck it fain — Yet somehow the deed I dread. OUT OF TEE DARK. 23 XII. Beast ! with thy dull rake-wit for the lie That calls a grin to thy kind's beast mouth ; Not even the petty excuse of youth Shall serve thee here for thy perfidy. Easy to hug thy wit and crow At innocence caught in thy subtle net I Humorous, too ! and yet— and yet The laugh is not only with thee, I vow. For a time will come when thy life's dull edge Shall saw at thy soul to its wild despair I Better one memory sweet and fair Than a thousand triumphs of sacrilege I Would she cast one look, let fall one tear Appealing for him to the judgment-seat, Who wrought her ruin, fine hypocrite, With the nicest art of a connoisseur ? Not in a passion of love he wrought, But cautiously, calmly set to work, Canting of " Nature's Laws " with a smirk, Garbling the sweetness of each pure thought. " Aye ! the proprieties had thfeir use. Uses of state that were all to praise ; But God smiled ever on Nature's ways, Keeping his anger for their abuse. " God, through Love, His own synonym. Burst like a flower on wakened youth ; Were God truth, then Love was a truth. Drawing his nature of love from Him. " And would He have given us each his share Of passion, forbidding us passion's cure ? Have lent Himself as a subtle lure To the sin He had bid us most beware ? 24 A FOOL'S "PASSION." "For himself, he felt the twin pact of love Needed no formula a la mode ; A thousand churches had each its code Of morals and, damning its brothers', throve. " Where was the harm of it ? let men show ; Only abuse of it led to blame " — Dog 1 did you falter and stop in shame, When the fair rose flushed to her very brow ? Had you said enough ? had you sown your tare ? The strange fear wrought in her troubled eyes, Though you gave the lie tenfold to your lies Had lost you your chance of Heaven there ! What if it had ! yet the sooty breath Of your spoken soul had grimed the soft Sweet pink and white of the garden croft, And cankered its summer fruit beneath. Never again, though the day should shine And the moonless nights lie sweet on her heart, Never again should she have her part In the ignorance that was half divine. Man 1 we will grant you were man so near As, in very anguish of burning shame. To laugh it oiF as a jest, so lame That the echo that mocked it laughed to hear. But the half-smile born on her quivering mouth And the pleading doubt of her wistful eye Shall haunt your heart till it die, till it die, With the thought of a finish to happy youth. And thou its slayer, of all on earth ! Scroll this deep in thy brain : " Perchance, Born of the womb of her ignorance, My soul hath murdered what gave it birth I " OUT OF THE DARK. 35 Not to know, as of brutes the least^ Nature is but that coward's cry Who, shirking Life's problems, gives the lie To his own, wrought for him out of beast ! Not to see that the thing you load Foul with the bloom of a harlot's paint, Gives no license, knows due restraint, And works out ever its ordered road I Sophistry all, that will such deny ! Own it — acknowledge it — take it in I Do what you can to undo your sin, And leave the rest to Eternity ^6 A POOL'S "PASSION." XIII. Fronting the gloom, a silent beauty grows ; As when, against a wall of misty wood, Where nothing living was, a Dryad ^hows — A sudden silvern ghost, no thing of blood — One tranced moment, and is so withdrawn. Absorbed into the luminous slant of dawn. Wonderful soul awakened I through the mist Shining evasive, glinting as with frost 1 Soul, shall I turn, in no pursuit persist. Or plunge and seek thee ere thy trace is lost? Nay ! having seen thee, true heart of my heart. The old life endeth, now I know thou art. ' Say I have learned my lesson, paid my toll ; That so I leave her, larger for the grace. The tender teaching of her milk-white soul. And never more look on her earnest face ; Leave her to feel my shadow, my untruth Lying near all the sunshine of her youth ! And thus the end ? — Ah, no 1 for there is more — A spirit standing in the arch of life, A something that was never there before No less to her than me. Maid I Mother 1 Wife I And I out in the cold and devil's mire. Who, at the very least, lent her my fire? Yet were my plans so wrought out to confuse The Saints of her sweet soul with sophistry, I know not now the godlier course to choose ; Which were unselfishness most deep — to fly, To leave her, losing Heaven at a blow. Or stay, mine own foul teaching to undo. OUT OF THE DARK. 37 XIV. The sun flickers down like a burnt-out town in a distant glimmer of fire ; Shadows immeasurable as death engulph all wold and wood, Stilling small winds yet discussing the issues of day in thickets of briar, Silencing voice of bird and beast in the hush of a potent good. Fairer and nobler than death I no decay is here in these dreamless glooms But lends itself to a fuller life, to a brighter more perfect form ; The dry twig nurses a seed, where the. dead trunk tumbles the primrose blooms. And low on the sleeping bosom of earth the night of flowers is warm. Here only in dark-bound woods is the perfect know- ledge of fragrant peace, Peace with the dimple of Love's last kiss on the smile of her quiet lips. For here man comes not, or wandering hither aweary from day's release. Steps with the step of a ghost, and a thought in his bosom of life's eclipse. And here is my sanctuary ; here, where the moon- lamp swings at the altar shrine Of sacred life, whose secret is hid in the pyx of the flower bud ; Where the slough of sin is cast for awhile in the struggle of hope divine, And the smell of the sap in the wholesome trees runs cool in the fevered blood. 38 A FOOL'S "PASSION." Yet the great dark holds a presence — whose? (Fair Christ of the Churchmen, say !) Mute and invisible still, as the current that seizes the swimmer, borne .By fathomless depths of sorrow and doubt and whirl- ing pools of dismay. Till he strand with a heavy shock on the lonelier shores of the garrulous morn. Where shall I find me rest ? In the grave ? — We are creatures of nerve, not will. And the thousand issues that made me one must ever remain of me ; I may die, niay dissolve from the shape I bear and be wedded to horrors still A thousandfold, for the primal curse is not to die, but be. Hark 1 what a flute-wild sound, like a sudden ex- quisite cry from a star, Streams through the cloistered close of the wood and dies in its roof above, Sweet as the voice of a far-off wave that breaks on sunny bar, Strong as the sweep of a zither string and true as the chord of Love ! Like the ring of the last voice heard on earth, wh?n God shall look from the sky. And the rush of life shall cease with a shock and silence be lord of all. When the spectral dead shall rise like a mist and the sun throb dim and die — So thrilled the voice to a wondrous pause in the birth of its madrigal. OUT OF THE DARK. 29 And sudden the whole dark wood seemed thick with a glimmer of moving shapes And eyes and flickering faces wrought in a woof of leaf and moon, Old mystic lights I once floated to round the heads of silent capes, Old thoughts, old wandering fancies dreamed in a summer afternoon. Till I could sob at the thought- of them, and the pity of hope and strife. But more at my own dark soul with its wilful stoop from sheltering good ; For, whatever may be our estimate of the principle of life, We myriads are but one in dopm, and should be so in blood. Then, the voice again ! with a passionate ring defiant of disbelief. Jubilant growing and sweetening forth in ecstasy not of rote ; Ah 1 beautiful sad dream-bird of night, thou hast won my heart to grief ; None but an angel sped thee to earth, and Farewell has kissed thy throat. Ah I sing to me, sweet ! not of life, not of death, but of dreams that I knew of old. When thought grew green as the meadow grass and man was never a clod ; While I stand like a leper who leans outside the church-wall dim and cold. And hears the throb of the music strike through the roof as far as God. 30 A FOOL'S "PASSION." Thrill ! Tremble and thrill I The stars glisten ; The heart of the world is still. Thrill 1 Stirs a hope in the sombre mind — Listen 1 But a twitter — a breath ! (Faint-falling echoes rebound) Thrill-thrill Comes a voice from the jaws of Death, Like the faint, far cry of an April wind To a frozen waste, ere the gates of Spring • Fall back with a clanging sound. Thrill ! The forest dark hums ! Thrill, thrill !— Hush, With a \vild leap it comes From her throat, from her throat ! And the moon brushes stars from her eyelids like flowers. And turns the pale curve of her ear to the note That trips on the scale of the jubilant hours ; Then down the lit tunnels of wood-ways she steals, And the glow-worm shines green in the print of her heels. Thrill, thrill with a will I while fropi plaited bough- bush The diamond elf-dust down-glitters in showers From butterfly things, whose chrysolite wings Make the music of noon in lofty tree towers. Come away ! Come away \ From the strife and the mflan, From the dust of the town and the sweat of the day ; J am pouring my heart out alone, alone ; r am pouring my heart out alone \ OUT OF THE DARK. SI Happy, happy I! Sweet tyrant of the night, Who drown the heart in melody And kill with all delight. Happy, happy 1 1 Who wakes while the world swoons Hath never need of guile ; Not once in all my moons Have I done aught of vile. Happy, happy 1 1 Come death I Come pleasant death Presently with ding-dong ; I'll bid away my breath On the burden of a song. Happy, happy I\ Bury me in the night, With all the stars above — There will be fust one lost delight And one thought less of love. Happy, happy /I Happy ? In truth. Whene'er the cushat's croon Wakes thee amongst thy leaves, and bids thee trim Thy sleek grey throat for vespers ; when the moon Lies like a pearl in the shell of night, and dim Gather the shrouded fancies of the fields ; When all th^ dusty roar of labour yields And softens into silence at thy hymn ; Ah, happy little priest of haunted wood, Chaunting thy midnight mass in ecstasy, What hast thou known, what ever understood Of day's grim fever and the strickens' cry ? What known of aught but this — thy voice must sorrow Between the dove's dream and the lark's good- morrow To some sweet, solemn purpose by-and-by ? 33 A FOOL'S "PASSION." But" tell me this — for even through thy night Some phantom of Love's self . seems still to move — Whence came he ? From the realms of churlish light That throw such shifting shadows ? Hath he wove Passion with sick fruition, for a jest To tickle Gods withal ? or lived he blest In Heaven, ere man on earth called Sorrow Love ? Love is with poetry gtrt ; Love hath the sinews of song. Ah I greater than Death ! though a faltering breath May blow thee, sweet bubble, along, No tempest may do thee a hurt. Love is the soul of the. harp ; Love is the power of my note ; With the dawn of despair came His voice on the air. When the birth cry of woman rang sharp, He smothered the shriek in her throat. He came on the anguish of need ; He came when the spect^ of Fate From nothingness wrought the pale terror of thought. He broke the strong bars of the gate That prisoned the soul, like a reed. The myriad forces that su ay The composite wonder -of man May baffle the skill of your scientist still; But the principle binding them., can Be one, and one only, for aye. Love, and none else, could create ! Ye walk in the truth from your birth, And turn so aside in your idiot pride, That nothing shall meet ye on earth But what ye have fashioned from Hate. OUT OF THE DARK. 33 Ah, blind ! and most wilfuU-y blind! Self-torturer, beating thy brain ! Thy balance was cast by sweet Love, and at last Only He sh-^ll reclaim thee again. And clean thy recalcitrant mind. See ! He awaiteth thee, dumb, At the turn oj thy darkening road. Hast thou honoured Him truthfully, gratefully, sooth- fully. After thy stateliest code ? So shall He smile as you come. So shall he smile. Yea, little nightingale ! We rail on life, nor, railing, reverence death ; We sow the blight and reap the bitter bale. And curse that Nature sometime sickeneth ; We poison her clear well of poetry, That others following may drink and die ; And limit Truth to vision, and a breath. Ah ! should we all, though bitter hard beset. Like thee, with deathless music traverse space. Singing, The soul, the soul hath pinions yet Wherewith to fly the learned commonplace ! — Already I see, far down the level gloom. Like a living flower thrown beside a tomb, A rose of dawn — the ensign of our race. 34 A FOOL'S "PASSION." XV. Ah, let me dream and breathe of love ! I am not cold, not I ; I thought my heart was a desert spring The sand of Time sucked dry. Yet hath it reached the wondrous thing A way of horrors by. Sweet, sweet, shall I bring thee a blight ? The plans of Heaven are dim — Here man dies curs'd for a grandsire's crime ; Here lust destroys for a whim. Shall I tread thee down in the under slime, My own dear love, if I seek to climb By way of thee to HIM. OUT OF THE DARK. 35 XVI. The air is wild with words, with words, Dim ghosts of thought with thought at strife ; Yet three there are convey the rest — A Trinity made manifest — And one is Life. Blown like a bubble through the sky, A thousand changing breezes move The colours on Life's surface ; hence All passions his course influence — Yet Life is Love. Thou dearest Trinity in one ! Winged with poetry, rainbow-shod ! Sweet syllogism, so inwove That speech is Life^ that Life is Loie, And Love is God/ 36 A FOOL'S "PASSION." XVII. God ! I believe 1 Dear saints ! I pray ! The sick stone melteth from my heart. Dare I more than the angels dare ? Punish me for the dreadful share I took in the world's wrong yesterday — Punish me any other way, But rive not me and my maid apart ! Henceforth, shamed in Thy pitying, Reading life as an old-world lore To a music sorrowful, sad and sweet, I kneel me down at my dear love's feet And worship Thee through a tender thing Thy grace hath wrought, unwavering. My crimes are great as my need is sore. OUT OF THE DARK. 37 xviri. Here in the woods ! — All night I went By scented clearing and mossy shelf, Chasing a shadow, till, faint and spent, I drove it to stand, and — it was myself! Then it looked and spoke, and its voice was weak As lovers parting at their last tryst : " Your path, friend, is not far to seek ; Take it and go, in the name of Christ ! " The earth is wide, yet its roads are plain To Honour, that shines through a maze confused ; Back to thy restless world again, But not to the life you so misused ! " Strive and do in the ranks of those Whose rugged bosoms are unbedecked Of honours and ribbons, whose order knows Only the star of self-respect. " Learn of the ignorant, groping blind For light you deny them in their despair ; How shall they wake to the better mind Who are wont to see sin triumph there ? " Learn by suffering, seven times tried. To pity and minister unto pain ; Then, by suffering purified. Back shalt thou come, to woo again I " To woo, as a manly suitor should. Who offers his best and knows it the least He can lay at the feet of that womanhood That yields him the soul of her stainless breast." Dark shadow, I will go — Seven times to prove ; Yet, I fain would know. Shadow, ere I go. 38 A FOOL'S "PASSION." If I have her love. Never word was spoken Such to make secure ; Not one little sign ; No exchange of token — Nothing to ensure Her sweet soul was. mine. Yet, I feel you are right. Am I called to the fight, In the cause of the good thew and sinew to smite ? Now a little breeze hums through the gates of the dawn Like a dim battle horn ; And faint from the East moans a tangle of sound — Dream-babble of voices as heard in a swound ; And sudden a white beacon flares ! And the world is awake, from the flower on the ground To the crest the mid-forest trees bears ! Oh, my love ! Oh, my love ! have I wronged you past recall ? I will yield you my whole life, returning purged of its guilt ; All my soul, that yet is thine of right who gave it to me ; all My thoughts and my endeavours, to do with them as thou wilt. I cannot say, Forget me ! that were sole unselfishness Beyond me, kneeling newly at the dais of thy love ; Oh 1 be tender, thinking of me, pitiful to my dis- tress ; For I strove to make amends and suffered greatly as I strove ! Something there went down the wind In a drift of feathers ? Thridding the wood, like a trail of smoke, To its perch in the dying oak. Owl ! the day shall strike thee blind I What is that that on thy mind Solemnly foregathers? OUT OF THE DARK. 39 Hoo-hoo ! koo-koo ! Can T see in the dark f The ship goes down when the ghost-dogs hark! The death-watch taps at the hed-wood rails And the sick man dreameth of coffin nails I And /, white wizard of love's disporting^ Follow the fool who comes from courting And shout at his ear, Hoo-hoo I Hoo-hoo ! hoo-hoo ! Oan I see in the dark f Aye ! and that good resolve's a spark Spun from the fire of lusty youth, That goes out with a breath, like truth I What darling, for all her modest roses, Is half so pure as the ass supposes Who kneels at her shrine f Hoo-hoo ! Hoo-hoo 1 hoo-hoo I Can I see in the dark ? Go to, young penitent ! (save the mark ! ) Are you then that that you do aver ? You fool not yourself as you fool her ! I graduate in the open college Of Nature, and my best owlish knowledge I lay at your honour'' s shoe — Hoo-hoo-oo-oo-oo-o ! I will not listen I the sweet dawn so Rolls over all, like a wave uncurled. Soft by the waking fields I go To look my last on her little world. A faint scent comes from the privet hedge ; A twitter of birds from the ghostly croft ; And there is a rose on her window ledge That I shall remember long and oft. A picture to keep in my aching heart ! And mine eyes are scorched with their blinding tears ; Better, my darling, so to part. Than leave unredeemed the wasted years. 40 A FOOL'S "PASSION." But sometime, for all this bitter pain That maketh my life wax sick and wan — Sometime, my sweet, I shall come again ; Shall come and shall claim thee, a better man ! THE SUN OF LOVE. 41 PART 11. THE SUN OF LOVE. Night settles down on the jarring town ; as of old Thunderous roars through the flare of the smoking streets, Lashing its narrow channel to mud of gold, The torrent of life, with its shams and its counter- feits. Here, as of old, the brazen egotist blares ; The sick dog cowers ; the harlot flaunts to her trade ; Here Nature hath little part in her own affairs. And all, from the King to the Alderman, are self- made. But now, like a captive who goes to his iron toil Full to the heart of ' To-morrow they set me free I ' I can sing, I can laugh ; for my hate of the stream's turmoil Grows weak in the promise of rest and of liberty. And thought of release makes pain itself unreal — To the wooer, as once to the martyr torn on the rack — Is it braved for God or the love of a simple girl ; And only its anguish rends him looking back. 'Tis the inward mind ! that sees through the blazing lamps A window glimmer beneath sweet-haunted eaves ; That smells through the sloughing mud the forests damps. And under the crash of wheels hears sound of leaves. 42 A FOOVS "PASSION." That sees the naked moon, in her shame of youth, Turn her back on the polished, slanderous town And bend to the lonely, far-oiF fields, where Truth Raineth her simple perfume daily down. Oh, my innocent love, sweet-browed as April ! say, What hast thou wrought of me, ravel of passions red. That pity infinite brims my heart to-day For the sorrow to which I erst contributed 1 Here, as of old I move, but, not as of old. Purging my cynic tribute of unbelief Into the rolling sewer of mud and gold, But owning my God at last, like the dying thief. Pardon and pity and love ! Oh, that all might share In the jubilant song of my new-born happiness — all! It is good to be good and forgiven — yet, have a care ! Exulting righteousness often leans to its fall. Yet, I eat out my soul in the silent rapture of praise. And I fain would sweeten my sweet in another's ear ; I will send for my heart's Achates of worser days And speak in her honour that is to me so dear. And he, who knows ! may listen, laugh once or twice And soften for all his scorn (for the rogue hath A blufFness of sentiment, sweet to good advice) And walk in my darling's shade by the better path. " So," quoth he, " it is said and done ! " (Midnight tolled to us unaware ; A dull fog stood at the pane And felt like a blind thing on the glass, Dim with the sobbing rain ; While underneath in the square An ague shook in the jets of gas). THE SUN OF LOVE. 43 "So," quoth he, "it is said and done !" And he turned with a staring smile And lit at the flame his cigarette : And then again, in an instant's while: " We've run in harness many a mile, Comrade of old, when the pace was vile, And in harness we'll journey yet."" I looked at the boyish face, Barred with a brand of sordid light ; And something — some inner grace. That had made its beauty of old so bright, Had yielded its careless place To a shadow of what ? a wounding trace Of some inward-eating blight. Fruitful of evil, he and I, Less than a year ago ; Bound to a pact of devilry — The only wedlock, by strumpets' He We swore we would ever know 1 Less than a year ago ! But a sun of youth in his boyish heart — Nursery memories yet aglow — Saved him then from the worser part Of my studied iniquity. And, returning, I thought to mould him still To my newer, as to my older will. An error ! the night had closed ; The sun of his youth had set. I found a man where I left a boy. Hard in the devil's net; His only creed to enjoy — destroy If thus the pursuit disposed. And so had I bared my breast To the sneer of cynical unbelief. Scornful of man's love, woman's grief, Contemptuous as to the rest. And the dog of anger had risen grim — 44 A FOOL'S "PASSION." " Fool that I was to reveal my soul To a thing so devoid of self-controul ! " In my passion I cried to him. Sudden he stood at ray side : " Who was it taught me " he said, "That self-controul, in a world of self. Was a viitue best for the dead ? To put my heart on the shelf. That so might my passions, un-self-denied. Be true to the ' Horror we deified ' ! Who was it stamped from my chilling soul The last dim spark of its self-controul f I tell you," he cried, " by the God above, Thfese months have finished your labour of love ! '' And now to hear your mouth crammed With sweets of heart-sickening cant. Prating of innocence, ranting of rant — Is it nobler to stay with him you have damned. Or her whom the dear angels want ? " Go to thy country wench I But, remember our pact of old ! This virtue will give to a single wrench. Take thy lamb from the fold ; Use her ; abuse her — a year or a day ; Then trudge thee back from the wold To me and thy pleasanter devil's way ! " I struck at him — blindly struck I He caught me by the wrist. And " Are you mad ? " he hissed ; " Good tutor, you cross your luck ! But I shall remember 1 " A bitter groan Fell from my lips — and I was alone. TEE SUN OF LOVE. 45 The fog closed in on my brain : Below was a dull door slammed. Is it nobler to stay with him you have damned, Or in thine abasement gain Heaven, by clinging to her whom you sought To destroy, to undo, for thy pitiful sport ! 46 A FOOL'S "PASSION." PART III. UNDER THE DAWN. I. I cannot but think, if I be good, God will forgive me at last, And bury me all my wicked past At the foot of- his own sweet rood ; And, lifting his curse from that coterie I led to its ruin, lift it from me. Long have I striven, studied long To fit myself for my part Of keeper to one dear country heart. That waits, like a bird of song, For her own lord's coming, among the leaves, Knowing not how in a world of wrong He for his sweet mate grieves. Yet, sometimes for all my patient love, A horror of doubt creeps in ; Am I secure of my woodland dove? Of the haven I thought to win ? Finding myself such a thing for my scorn. Do I realize how through my fire of false heat She, too, may have fathomed my meanness, have borne In her heart but contempt for me there at her feet? It is true that we met, that she moved to my word. That she humbled her wilful at the throne of my will ; Yet her lips their shy vassalage failed to fulfil. And no tribute was mine, self-invested their lord. UNDER TEE DAWN. 47 Ah ! but this must remain ! though my shadow shall move From her life ; though she turned from me, glad to be free, I have lived in her secret sweet bosom, and she, Though she take or reject it, hath lived in my love ; And the past is the past. Yet, an inner voice crieth : 'It were well to have bound lier to thee ere thy going 1 Who shall know what replaces his image, who lieth To Love, and so leaves her, for chance's undoing I ' Nay! a thousand times, no! She is God's happy blossom. And the blight that unwithered her, soldered her purity ; It were well I should go I till remorse's full surety, Seven times refined, shall be meet for her bosom. Through this long year of loneliness, living atonement, Drawn conscript of Hell, have I wen my exemption, With only the vision of her, whose dethronement I sought, to obtain me my lost soul's redemption ? How it all seems a dream ! that far bower of my darling. With the sun kissing sweet my rose straight on her dimple, On her warm curls shot brown as the breast of a starling. On her innocent eyes and her chin in its wimple. Soft dream, what had been this drear time without thee ! When the snow hid the roof ; when the sparrows were frozen In the town ; when the cold sun of March came to cozen The moth from its shell and the bud from the tree ; 48 A FOOL'S "PASSION." When the rain fell by day ; when by night the wind tumbled On the hollow house walls, thinning off to a screech As it broke in its flood, like a wave that hath stumbled. And screams as it draws from the grasp of the beach ; When the easterly blast shivered down the long pavement ; When the moon lit the blind with a wan phosphorescence. And the wakeful despaired for the realms of pleasance. And the sleep that should give him release of depravement. Through the flowerless dust of a weariful Summer Have I toiled, and the vision hath been with me ever ; And now, with the Autumn — oh, blessed new- comer ! — I pause in my labour : " Little sweet rustic neighbour. Has the time come at last for reward of my fever ? " For I cannot but think — have I been good, God hath forgiven at last, ' And buried me all my wicked past At the foot of his own sweet rood ; And lifted his curse, and bid me speed, In his own dear name, by the way I came, Back to the woods in tender shame. For the love I do so need. UNDER THE DAWN. 49 To-morrow, by road I fare ! To-morrow, by field and lane I gallop me back in the sharp, sweet air To my own love again 1 Like a fairy prince of old, Decked with a diamond spur, I shall ride me over the furzy leas — Under the burning autumn trees — Thridding the purple wold ; Where, smelling the Spring on the laverock's wing, Pale pretty violfets stir Deep in the scented mould. For me a .flickering rain of gold, And a rose in my cap for her ! Am I awake at last ? Scarce can I realize That the drear, dead days are over and past ; That such sweet lips and eyes Wait me — desire me, pricking fast. Away from the city's furnace-blast. Against Time as he flies. Love, 'twas a trial sore! But that is over and gone ; I have gathered the fruits of a better lore To lay at thy feet alone ; Have ordered my life and my fortune, sweet. As most for thy purity should be meet. And, oh 1 I long for the woods I (Sure, I was born their child ! ) No heliotrope for languid moods. No housed exotics of bluest bloods Breathe sweet as a woodland wild I No city voice hath as good a tone As that of the haunted forest's drone. so A FOOL'S "PASSION." And thou I the fairy of all ! Who, hid in thy garden green, Hast taught me to know the true from the mean, The rose-bud from the gall — How wilt thou meet me? How wilt thou greet me ? Not, I hope — Oh, not, I hope, as a terror half foreseen I Die down, red sun, on thy hearth ! The breath of to-morrow's breeze • Shall fan into flame the smouldering trees For food of thy fire's girth 1 Meanwhile, though the white moon freeze The vault of the stony sky, There's never a happier soul on earth Than I, sweetheart, than 1 1 THE WAGES. 51 PART IV. ■*■ THE WAGES. I, Damned deeper than Judas ! This harsh life hath, indeed, taken to jerking My soul by rusty, screaming grooves Down endless, tortuous labyrinths of night. As from a whirligig, droning, monotonous organ, A monstrous discord jars my sordid days into dust — A crushing-mill for already broken things. Rolled on a wheeling club of teeth am I, Like a martyr, without a martyr's stainless robe, white hope. But this is my meet punishment. I wrought, and here's the fruit. Once I was haunted by a hateful dream, that my choking mouth rained dust ; I coughed, and out it came ; I was neither man nor ghost ! Night after night — night after night ! Well ! it has come true ! I spit a dusty venom, and the fair flower dies. Alack ! I cannot think ! I want to know who did it — but, after all, 'twas I ! I sowed the black harvest that another reaped ; And God shall look ^^ He wrought, but thou art the man ! " God, forsooth ! Aye, yes ; for she taught me ! Well, I must turn and go ! I cannot find it in the blankness of all things even to laugh. 52 A FOOL'S "PASSION." I have not asked his name ! Yet, it is common talk ! Tush, fool 1 weak self-deception I Thou know'st his threat, who owed to thee his ruin ! Thou puU'dst and piled the flax, and sent him with his torch To light it — a sweet torch — Eros' own — and his a dainty hand ! Thee she never loved, poor ass ! thou did'st but dazzle Her eyes at first, blinding them to thine after virtues. But thy disease had nipped her ; thou should'st have killed Rather than sought to cure her of the scab. That fell and left all seeming fair above the inner- eating wound. Am I raving! Am I raving ! I have not even said what ails 1 She's gone ! that's all ! And how gone, let her grey-faced father's drooping life, Let the babbling gossip of village gammers tell. And he, who wrought upon my happy secret I He, whom I would have loved as well virtuous as bad- Aye, better ; while I hugged that newer life, And toiled by day and dreamed of her by night. Thinking " She singeth in the garden now I " or " Now, Perchance, her rosy cheek is red — blest hope ! recalling Words upon thoughts — mine image, my better gentleness ! " Was there — grown part of her life — shouldering me out — Holding her hand, her face — conscious of her white breast — admitted to — ! God ! strike me dead ere I think farther ! Or, living, yield him into my hands ! THE WAGES. S3 By town and by waste to pursue him ! To torture, to unnerve, to undo him ; God I yield him into my hands ! I care not if mine was the crime at the first ! Shall ^« go unpunished who wrought out the worst ? God ! give him into my hands ! All else is chaos of utter despairing, No hope of remedy ; no power of repairing — God ! yield him into my hands ! Oh I God ! yield him into my hands 1 S4 A FOOL'S "PASSION." Poo?; ghost ! poor ghost ! what feelest thou ? Poor ghost I poor soul ! whither stealest thou ? I feel nothing ; I am dead. The long year have I sped, Looking for what ? — who knows ? Sometimes the moon shines dim, And I think that she weeps for him Who ever silent goes By town, and river, and sea ; For never resteth he From morning to day's close ! But most the sun doth drink At his veins most cruelly, And will not let him think. And I wish that God might pity This white ghost of the city ; For to no soul — saving one — Would he breathe aught of harm. Even once /lis heart was warm, That now is turned to stone. Yet, for all he aimless seemeth. Like a man that dreameth. He will know — yes, he will know When, someday, in the cloud Of the rolling, hurrying crowd. The face he seeks shall show ; And there, maybe, the dull, tired thing Shall cease his endless wandering. He passed me there in the sleet. And I caught him by the throat I We met in a dreary waste, remote From the flash and roar of the street — An iron meeting, with none to hark — And the river sobbed from the drifting dark. THE WAGES. 55 He fought at my gripping hand, But God gave him no choice : " At last ! " I said, in a quiet voice, " We shall score this wrong from the land ! Together, my friend, my friend and I Will go to our judgment loyally I " He bit and tore at me hard. And I laughed there in his face. " Why did you come to this sordid place Of all in the Devil's ward? This villainous, frowzy hole," I said, " When the World was yours to choose instead ? " There was never help to seek — No shop ; not a dwelling-house ; I had him safe as a cat a mouse. He signed that he wished to speak. I loosed the hand, that held like a leech — " Now," I said, " for your dying speech ! " " Only a word I " he choked — " This — damn you, you canting fool ! Who thought her fire like yours would cool. If left a day unstoked ; Who hoped to mumble yet keep his cake, To speak the parson and think the rake." " Yes, it is true," I said ; And my fingers closed on the stock. And the sleet shone white on the pistol lock As the barrel gleamed at his head. "And is this all that you wish to say?" " Not all ! " he groaned, and his face was gray. " You asked me. Why was I here ? Well, fuel your hell with this : I wearied of your pale country miss At the dead end of the year ; I bid her away, with a handsome fee ; Yet ever since hath she haunted me ! " so A FOOL'S "PASSION." The river moaned like a weir — I did not strike him dead. " To-night she would make a scene," he said, " And I had to follow her here ; And here, to her frivolous last appeal I answered by treading her underheel " God I God ! — as he spoke. The answer came to that cry I had heard in a horrible night gone by — An echo that wailed and broke ! And my heart burst bounds, as a babe the womb, And I leapt to the voice through the ringing gloom 1 There, like a drift of weed. So desolate sorrow-girt, The sweet, stained flower, that I had hurt And left in its utmost need — The hope of my manhood, and its dream, Swirled to her death on the iron stream ! Now on my beating breast ; Senseless as yet, thank God ! — Awake from this last sick period. Poor flower, you shall find rest ! For here, as I kneel with my sin alone, I see with clear eyes how to atone. THE SINKING OF THE WATERS. 57 PART V. THE SINKING OF THE WATERS. The new year comes by a lane of snow To her and me in a stranger place, The star of peace on his shining brow, A passionless love in his face. Solemnly glitter the broad blue fields And the frosty brambles fleeced with white ; Solemnly, silently, sweetly yields To dawn the long load of night. And solemnly, under the Norman porch, Solemnly, solemnly, we join hands, Down in the little lonely church On the frozen meadow-lands. And I look on my wife, and her wistful eyes Try like a dumb hurt thing to speak ; " Is (h's, too, a lie in a world of lies, Oh, master ? for I am weak." And a wild sob chokes in my throat, and her thin Poor face I bend down hard on my breast : "Here it was that thou learn'd'st to sin. And here, an thou wilt, shalt rest I " Oh, wife 1 what am I, in the name of God, To scorn my rose for its cruel stain. Who have walked over virtue iron-shod. And made a jest of its pain ? 58 A FOOL'S "PASSION." " Who am I, from the dead black mire, Where only I wriggled to slime and sting, To lift up my venom'd head and aspire To flight with an angel's wing ? " Who may climb through atoning years apace By brier and rock, as the ivies do, Yet never even reach to the place That thou hast fallen to ! " Dare I say we are. one 1 nor dread The curse of the thought that, what ensures Thy soul from sinking to mine, instead Of mine clifnbing up to yours ? " Dear, we must move to the end of life. Very patient and very quiet ; Glad for this solemn peace, my wife, Sad for the times of riot. " But each to each such a helpmate, dear. As never sweet purity made more kind ; Till the long way ends, and the dim is clear. And the burden is resigned. " Oh, hark I how the blithe birds sing and cry ! Though the grim frost stiffen their pretty throats ;- Our bridal chorus that, by and by, When the last long winter of time shall lie On our hearts, shall prelude Eternity In a whirl of passionate notes 1 " REQUIESCAM. 59 Requiescam. Whene'er that Life shall lay me with her dead Fallen like moonlight on her mountain-steep, Let not the least small dream of hours far sped, No thought of thought, no care for " once was " creep Into the solemn pathos of my sleep. Shut out the memory of eyes that weep ; Shut out the fool's laugh, and each hope that fled Wailing into the impenetrable deep. I ask no Heaven ; I dread no Hell but hers, And that shall pass, with all its hate and blight ; Speech be no more, and Time be still alway. Only, from out the wreck and waste of years. Scrolled like a star on one black wall of night. Be this truth clear — " She loved him for a day ! " 60 CIRCE ANNO DOMINI. Circe Anno Domini. All day the lone -(Eolian winds sang softly down the dreamy glades ; All day the humming-drift of foam came shorewards ; and the dim cascades Slid noiseless down the tranced hills. Forest on forest clomb the height, Ghostlike, receding echo-faint as love-songs lost in the infinite. Then, in a low, charmed voice she crooned : " Sweet to abide nor suffer change I Ah, strange ! To love and lose with never a wound ! " About her carven palace walls a thousand blossoming lilies brake ; Within, a thousand years of love had wrought, for utter beauty's sake, Triumphs of art for her blue eyes, and for her feet rich stained floors. And ever in her ears sweet moan of music down dim corridors ; Till, in the clustered dark of even. Her rapture found a vent in song : " As long Mine isle abideth as Love's own heaven ! " Waking in the large dreamless night, a sound of rowlocks from the sea Echoed and passed ; naked she rose, and from the casement gleamingly Looked wonder-eyed. A thousand stars flashed signal- fires from deep to deep ; Dark-pooled the violet ocean welled, unruffled but of ancient sleep CIRCE ANNO DOMINI. 61 And lonely to its utmost verge. Then fear leapt in her like a flame I "It came Of dreaming," she whispered, "by the surge !"• But all the dim morn following she looked and went as one amazed. The lustrous wanton in her eyes burning to ashes as she gazed On flaking marble, crumbling gods, wrought tripods yellowing with rust, On painted walls and gorgeous tapestries swift powder- ing into dust ; Until at length the anguish^ fell From her lips parted in a shriek ; ''What freak Is this," she cried, " of Heaves or Hell I " But when the long dusk day shut inwards, darkening ever on itself. The fountain withered in the court, the green moss faded on the shelf ; And oft it seemed dead voices shook and echoed on from stair to stair, And rustling footsteps passed unseen, and unseen hands were busy there Moving like wind about the gloom. And shadowy faces peered and went. That lent New terror to the dark-cornered room. Suddenly then she rose and, panting, sought a cham- ber far apart, Fragrant of heavy-scented amber-seed and glorious with art, Wherein, in a bowl of hyacinth-stone, white water, frothing foam of blood, In a silvern alcove, near to the glow of a swarthy- fuming brazier stood ; 62] CIRCE ANNO DOMINI. And thither she bent her frayfed eyes And her bloodless lips : " White oil," she said, " What dread New shape to thy mirror doth arise ? '' Wavering up from the crimson yeast a face like a bubble rose to sight — Innocent, baby-blossoming lips and sweet eyes blue as the lazulite ; And, bickering round the bowl there ran wan letters wrought of a nameless tongue — " THE UNKNOWN GOD " ! then she shrieked, " He Cometh at last 1 He cometh at last ! " and flung Herself on the pavement, lying prone. Her white limbs shaken with ague fear : " Here, here My power vanisheth ! " she made moan. Then, in a sudden shame, of her lustrous naked beauty made aware. About her large white bosom she clutched her heavy ropes of scented hair ; And, lo ! a cold wind creaked the doors and whirled the gathering dust abroad : "I go ! " she panted ; " be merciful, if I suffer and atone, sweet Lord, sweet Lord ! " And the breaker crashed on the shore beneath, And presently brake the doleful morn Forlorn On the island desolate all as death. * * * # Who was it dried the Saviour's feet, and kissed them sobbing, in after years ? Vision of Christ ! If the world grows dim. Thy king- dom shines, through the mist of tears ! CONTRAST. 63 Contrast. Below — a throaty river running full ; An ancient sluice weed-locked with tangle-choke ; A great green elm, swart-armed as a troll, Dipping and bowing to the water-stroke ; A part-sunk barge, deep-broidered with red moss, Whereon the sedge-wren lilts her hurried lay ; A withy bed, green-shadowless and gray, Chilling the river coldness half across. Further, a mile of hedge and sloping corn ; A smell of good rare soil and lusty yields ; A thought of laughter, like a faery horn. Blowing from distant reapers down the fields ; A scarlet kirtle in the garden croft ; A dove-cote rising through the pictured trees ; A haunting drone of honey-mouthed bees — A darling world, warm-breathing, verdure soft. Under a sky rough-tumbled as a girl. All flying drapery and mad blue eyes, All colour, gaiety, and happy whirl. All sunny life and breezy witcheries. II. Above — a pallid shimmer on a pane ; A staring blind ; a window dusty-barred ; A thin scream wrung from anguish of a vane ; A whine dull-lifting from a kennel-yard. Like winter moaning in a frozen sedge ; A silence struck through all a stony house ; Echoes some passing footfall may arouse To dim resentment, as of sacrilege. 84 CONTRAST. A face upon a pillow, backward thrown, Stiffened and yellow as discoloured brass ; And, by the lonely chimney, ebbing down. The voiceless torrent of an hour-glass. A BARGAIN. 65 A Bargain. Eh I little minister of grace, You think me bad, I know, To bid you ' God speed 1 ' with your Sunday face, Yet never offer to go With mummy and you to the holy place. As Heaven bids us do. Heaven I for all your innocence It rings hard, said like that. Doesn't it, dear ? Yet I'm immense, And you a tuppeny brat, And only lately born ; And I should know better at my great age, , When you at your little one are so sage — And I love your noble scorn. , Given some sense, two blue eyes given, It is so easy to see Heaven ! Yet, bearded fellows like me Find it hard to see, little chap — Find it hard to see. All on account of the beard, I think. That draws the sight from the eyes. When our rough cheeks were white and pink We did not look with a jaundiced blink On half a world turned yellow. Ah ! it is good to see the skies With seven-year eyes, old fellow I But, old as we are, we are not too old To learn from such as you. You say that is Heaven in the blue. And what you say, dear, must be true. A BARGAIN. For you are fresh from the fold ; Nor, as yet, have you so far come That, back in the distance, blue and gold, You may not know your home. And here is a bargain, sweet-and-seven : By way of the classical map I'll guide you up Parnassus ; And you, dear little chap — If God will together class us — Shall lead me up to your own rare Heaven. THE DUEL. 78 The Duel. What time the soul and body- Fought a long winter's day, Quoth Soul : " My friend, you're shoddy ! "- " Your too-affected way Sickens me ! " grunted Body. " Assimilate 1 No, never, For all my kind endeavour Could I with you," said Soul j And bellowed Body loudly: " You are not of me ! proudly I spurn your vain controul ! " Then, cunningly Soul dipping Caught Body by the wrists ; And Body caught Soul tripping — It seemed a hopeless coil To reconcile or foil, Such quick antagonists. When byward came Love panting : — " For shame ! " He cried, " Ye two I Can each, for all His vaunting, Without the other do ? " " I brought him Beauty, Vision And Knowledge ! " Soul decreed. " Come, let's have fair division ! This much I do concede. And also that you brought, perchance. Disease, discomfort, pain," Cried Body, *' to my bane — 6S THE DUEL. Once happy in my ignorance, Now never so again. The earth was mine ; nor less Was I the child of earth. Pure mindless happiness, That all things would caress — You, amongst others, who would cess Virtue, and innocence dispossess — Was mine by right of birth. Yau came unasked — maybe A pariah for your deeds — And wrought with utter sophistry On simpleness's creeds." Then fiercer rose the warlike tide, And shriller grew Love's cry : " At least, ye twain, rest satisfied With an armed neutrality ! " His grief could not abate them. His anger or His charms ; He could not separate .them For all His potent arms. When, as He strove so sore. Under His shoulder glode A gray-cold hand and frore And wrinkled as a toad ; And a' finger stole from Body to Soul And light on each abode. Welcome, at last, dear heart I Where Love failed, strong of breath. As this book witnesseth. Two fair Truths, unassimilate. Two weary prisoners chained in hate Each to the other, broke apart At the first kind touch of Death. THE BIRD. 69 The Bird. — ( The house was cold as a well ; I heard a soft bird call : " Triwit ! triwit I my heart is split ! The snow drifts into the hall — And where is my Bonnibel ? " " The milk is froze in the dairy ; The cow in the stall moans silly ; — Though the yellow head snugs warm in its bed, The little pink toes grow chilly, ' And Bonnibel wakes, Canary ! '' " My faith I in very good time, sir ! If love make her forgetful, He had best quit who wrought of it A thing to drive me fretful I There 1 take and keep my rhyme, sir I " Prithee wake up above, ma'am 1 I lack sweet seed and tipple ! If these you'll bring to your piping thing, Your frozen little cripple — This fellow may have your love, ma'am I " 70 RECALLED TO LIFE. Recalled to Life. The long, sweet land of Death I Ah, woe is me ! Pacing, poor shadow, on the verge of Time ! He heard the hammer of the death bell chime, And stretched him to his good rest slumberously ; Most solemn, most profound, and most alone. He slept a kindlier sleep than he had ever known. * * * * The dark, warm land of Death I No more, no mor e Its blessed bed white-curtained from all thought ! Again strikes in the poison, fire-fraught, The sordid struggle, the sick panic-war Of nerve and brain with all that is distress Screaming itself hoarse to a dumb wilderness. Where was the germ of life that would not die. And growled, and woke and harried me afoot. When, curled about by many a yew-tree root, I felt my muffled soul give forth a cry ! No certain glint of light struck through the pall ; Only I knew stupendous darkness was not all. A dry quick thunder drummed upon my brain, A griding sound of inharmonious spheres ; I shook the dust of centuries from my ears ; I felt my labouring spirit moan in pain ; Hearing the frayed vault crumble overhead, Half spirit and half man, I sudden rose and fled. Whither, poor ghost ? Aye, whither ? To thy home Of old-day memories and little griefs ? There, while you slept, the Spring of all beliefs. RECALLED TO LIFE. 11 The great white Angel had in silence come, Spoken the word and stopped the pulse of all — And life, in one dense hush, hath followed to His call. And thou ! Nor quick nor dead, what lot was thine ? To rest forgotten in the monstrous rout ; To slumber, till the horror found thee out And entered to thee lying there supine. Pale ward of all despair and anguish-strife, Sad derelict, abandoned with the wreck of life ! I felt the terror beat upon my soul — A large wild agony, of hope bereft ; Where was the old kind earth that I had left, Clanging with giant life from pole to pole ? Here only its gaunt parody could I trace, Grating, a cind'rous ruin, down the winds of space. I looked and shuddered — screamed, for life was fled I I saw a world of ashes, sere and wan — A world of builded monuments of man. Honoured and quickened of the million dead. Now spectral all and thick with leprous crust. Staring from sightless windows over leagues of dust. And ever, from gutted roof and iron rail, A shrivelled fungus hung in heavy lids — The loathsome aftermath of human deeds While yet the dead were new from their travail ; And ivy, stiff as parchment and as grey, Cloaked the dumb walls, as stonily beset as they. No echo answered through the long, sad street, No drip of water tinkled underground ; There was no least small voice above, around, Nor any distant pattering of feet — No dead, no dying fallen by the way ; — Only, and always only ashes and decay. 72 RECALLED TO LIFE. The very graveyards, thronged with ashen stones, In silence shriller than an idiot's laugh From monumental brass and epitaph Spoke of ' forsaken,' even of their bones ! " Not lost but gone before ! " Ah, Christ ! the jest Beat like a swarm of poisoned arrows on my breast. No glint of colour broke the ghastJy waste, For all the sweet day's hearth was spent and cold ; The very atmosphere was stiff with mould. Stringent as brass, and acrid to the taste ; And over the whole world — town, bill, and gorge — A burnt sun glowed and dusk'd, like charcoal in a forge. The thousand thousand interests of man ; His storied volumes, hidden chamber-deep ; His plans awaking and his dreams asleep ; His written history since Time began — What worth for having been, though undestroyed, Flung and abandoned to an unresponsive void. I fled, the awful silence in my ears, My frantic eyes beseeching road and field For one, but one small evidence revealed Of man, the man of laughter and of tears ; Like him who paced a legendary land, I could have wept to find a footprint in the sand. Have wept ? Alas ! as shadows weep in dreams. Tearless, for all the springs of life were dry ; Emptied, the cloudless terror of the sky. Stagnant, the hushed dead music of the streams ; And, fallen deep its thousand shores among. The sunk sea laboured dying like a wasted lung. How far I fled — how measureless my woe — How centuries were wrinked to a span, I knew not in my doom of timeless man — RECALLED TO LIFE. 73 How could I in that dayless' desert know ? Only I felt in my most long distress The famished light wax still appreciably less. Beggared— and robbed, a beggar 1 God— oh, God ! The advancing horror of that endless night I Leave me my poor last heaven — my little light ! The glimmering ashes of the waste' untrod ! I shrieked, and shrieked — but ever, to my cry. The dark glow dipped a moment as in mockery. Sick with despair, I covered my sad eyes, Burning with dusky fever, and fled on ; The mountains came about me, thick and wan. And half I loved them for their memories. And half that they, of nature scarped and gray, Were independent of that scrofulous decay. And here my hideous burden seemed less, As one with Nature's fall'n divinity. That, dauntless yet, in ruin dared the sky. Majestic still in right of loneliness. Forlorn I gazed, an atom most remote. And, looking — all my heart leapt flaming to my throat. Near, in a gloomy hollow of the hills. Set stark with mournful crags and ruined trees. His lagging arms hung over his bent knees, His drooping posture eloquent of ills, A figure, soft as Melancholy's own, Sat, with bowed head and heart, upon a tumbled stone. Naked he was as marble, and as cold, His tender skin pale-bleached, and his hair, Drawn in sweet circles down his forehead fair, Half faded, like quicksilver-spoiled gold ; A near-quenched torch, swung from his listless hand. Dropped tears of pale green fire that sputtered on the sand, 74 RECALLED TO LIFE. T trembled, and my heart went thick and fast, Panting in wild amazement ! Ah 1 the joy 1 The rapture and brief heaven without alloy ! The ecstasy, from loneliness aghast I To some old vein of music running warm, Down, down I stole on tiptoe to that silent form. He heard — he rose and turned — his startled eyes Opened like flowers in an April wind ; He stared as one who, knowing himself blind, Sees things unearthly, fairer than man's skies. Shine of a sudden without call or beck — Then, with a loud, wild cry, he clung about my neck. And I ! — through all his blanched loveliness. And thin, poor bosom throbbing hot and cold, I knew him for the tender Love of old. The child of man, his co-mate in distress. " I am that Love ! " he cried all piteously, " And art thou also so forlorn a thing as I ? " Why hast thou stayed, when all the rest are fled ? They mount the stars ; I sorrow on the earth — The poor blind mother-soil who gave them birth. And fondled them, and' wept them lying dead ! The great voice cried, ' Come, follow me 1 I go ! ' One, without pause, they followed ; therefore I grieve so. '• I had no part in fires above the sun ; I knew no light of truth like a summer noon ; The brown, warm field, the meadow stars of June Were dearer to me than a new Heaven won ; My passion, my religion — my despair, Now that the dry stalks wither in the changeless He turned his gray face yearning to mine own ; His voice swelled out most pitifully drear,. Like cry for mercy to a torturer. RECALLED TO LIFE. 75 " I cannot weep," he said, " my brain is stone ! " Thereat my sorrow melted into his ; " Poor love 1 " I cried, " poor soul ! to pass from Heaven to this I " " Heaven I " he moaned ; " the flowering earth was mine ; The myriad-coloured bell-glass of all song ; The anthem hall of birds. The sweet year long T wrought among its roses red as wine. The moon stepped softly on for me above ; For me the wan stars smiled — the city lights of love " Then came the voice — and all the world was still. One heavy rustle of great shadow flight, And — silence dreadfuller than any night Fell in a moment over swale and hill. And I — the earth I sang so passion-sweet Held me, fain following, stubborn, by the feet. " Abandoned, pinionless, by all whom I Had winged for flight to whither they have flown ! That man should leave me ghastlily alone — Spurn me, abhor me in mine agony I Oh, cruel, cruel 1 that no hand was trailed To clutch mine, prayerful, as the living Heavenward paled ! " Only again the voice monotonous. Filling the empty cellars of dead Time — ' Thou, who hast leased thy spurious sublime To earthly tenants, travestying Us, The Pure, the Passionless, the Cold of Thought, Stay on — stay ever with the ruin thou hast wrought I " And, woe 1 as at the crashing of a gate, A chord of thunder slammed among the hills. And silence came — the silence that now fills The abandoned world and God's accomplished hate I Ah, wretched me ! if thus to evil bid, I wrought in awful ignorance of what I did. re RECALLED^ TO LIFE. " And I loved man " — he looked into my face, So wan, and sweet, and sad, I could have wept, Were sorrowing tears to be ; then softly stept. Leading me down, to his hard resting place, And, stooping, " See," he whispered, " lying there The one thing left to lonely me in my despair." Snatched from the wreck of dead realities, How, by what means, I knew not, wondering. There lay — no glittering treasure, no bright thing, No volume stol'n from man's thought-sanctuaries To lend despair some philosophic hue, But only — child of simpleness I — a baby's shoe. How fall'n ? from whom ? Perhaps the tender-born, Clutched by its dam in dim instinctive dread. When that far call re-echoed overhead, Had crowed and kicked one little foot forlorn I No matter whence, no matter what the cause, It lay, the one whole relic of all the life that was. Sombrely sank the light on crag and plain — Pale Love and I sought each the other's face ; "It goes," I whispered, "in a little space; But Love art thou, and, sweet Love, we are twain. My God, my faith in the great days gone by, Breathe on the living torch of thine own deity I " Love, though the world be never world of ours. Drifting a ruin under blackened skies, We will repeople it with memories, And wander in the past through song-swept bowers ; Thy fervent speech, rekindling life from dust. In time shall light again the fires of this cold crust I ' I felt his heart throb deep into mine own — A shuddering tremor shook the dying Earth ; No mighty travail of that second birth, But only a last spasm and a groan. • Clinging together, like twins in a dead womb. We passed into the darkness and our heavy doom. THE END. PR3991.C3F6r"'™""^'-"'"^ A fool's "passion", and other poems, 3 1924 013 204 882