Chapter III

Lust spoils the sunlight
And narrows the day;
Love widens
Time to Eternity which alone can hold it!

THE PHILOSOPHER VISITS THE NIGHT CLUB

Fair and worthless things that die
Praising their goddess Vanity
Here gather. Like a violin
Many a sweetly-scented Sin
Whispers. Many a bright-wreathed Folly,
Finding its roses turned to holly,
Seeks with Pleasure’s aid to fend
That Boredom which is Folly’s end.
Wherefore the violins make moan.

For these “the visible world” alone
Exists; and “ah that it should pass!”
They cry, and fill a trembling glass.
“Here’s to Beauty!” (surnamed Lust)
They cry; and e’er it falls to dust,
“Love it,” they cry, “and hug it well.”

“To whatsoever heaven or hell
Fate builds for fools, these surely go,”
Thought the moralist watching this tinsel show.
“Yet is it not difficult to know
Who best deserve the name of Fool,
These or those more respectable
Most moral folks I know so well?...
_These_ make of living a foolish sham,
_These_ play a silly blind man’s game,
Chasing bubbles like a fool.
But the others like a sullen mule
Play at nothing at all, and so
Think they’re good because they’re dull--
Where, in the name of sense, will _they_ go?”

Upon which curious reflection
The sad and wondering sage arose,
Paid for his drink and blew his nose,
Brushed the confetti from his clothes,
And shuffled forth in deep dejection.

MISERERE DOMINE

Three things a man can do without:
Debtors, a scolding wife, and gout.
First hates for what (he knows) they’ve got,
Second for what (she knows) he’s not,
The third of this unholy lot
Hates him and all he hateth not,
Brisk walking and the pewter pot,
Sound sleep and jovial company.
Who suffers these well may cry, God wot--
Miserere Domine!

NOW, IF I WERE RICH

Now, if I were rich,
And lord of the manor,
My limbs might all twitch.
Now, if I were rich
I might marry a--witch,
And lose every tanner
That made me so rich,
And lord of the manor.

(_But I wish I were rich,
And lord of the manor!_)

THE RABBLE FATES--TO HELL WITH THEM!

They fling at me stones and mud,
My clothes are tattered and foul,
My face is covered in blood;
But they haven’t hurt my soul.

They have beaten me sore--in truth
No part of me stands whole!
They have stolen away my youth:
But they could not steal my soul.

Robbed, baffled, and broken,
Something lives in me whole;
And I hold by that for a token
That they cannot conquer my soul.

Let them thrash me with knotted sorrow,
Stone me with sharp regret;
I shall be their king on a morrow,
My soul is a monarch yet.

THE LAUGHTER OF LITTLE BABIES

The laughter of little babies
Who chuckle and crow
Is the laugh of a stream
Which needs must flow
Into black caverns; on its way
Reflecting briefly the blue of day.

The mirth of little babies
Who chuckle and nod
Is the mirth of a spirit
Remembering odd
Scraps of the tales and heavenly mirth
He shall never remember again on Earth.

PETITION TO THE ALMIGHTY

My sins of scarlet I pray Thee wash away,
For they were done in passion and hot blood,
When youth was lord of me nor understood
The glory of the beauty of Thy way.
So pardon them; but, Lord, if I have stood
The enemy of any destitute,
Done cruelty to any man or brute,
Or nailed Thy poor upon a cross of wood,
Or on a cross of gold, or iron, O, smite!
Smite with Thy rod and cast me from Thy sight.

LAST WORD

Let no man call me coward that I will die
And dip no more my bread in living’s foul
And muddy stream; but, God, accept my soul
Which into air so soon must wandering fly.
For I have never hated you at all,
You brother men, albeit that you must
Hate all such dust as is not of your dust,
Content for power to strive and hate and brawl.

But to you who have laughed and holpen one another,
You few gay valiant souls amid the rabble,
I say--“God knows I have loved you!” Then forgive
Me in whose heart is no more power to live:
Who must with this poor gesture break the bubble
Which held us here on Earth brother to brother.

VANITY OF VANITIES

We spend our days for things which profit not,
We set our heart on things.
When sense is edged and blood of youth is hot,
And when stiff age like ice about us clings,
We spend our days for that which profits not,
We set our heart on things.

More worthy was the blasphemous disdain
Of all God’s world of sense by stubborn saint,
Ungrateful of the sunlight and the rain,
Untouched by colours bending rainbows paint.
More worthy was the pagan ignorance
Of all save what a world of sense discloses:
That found his soul above the starry dance,
This in a sweet but fading heaven of roses.
But us no heaven of saint nor flower delights;
When sense is edged and blood of youth is hot
We spend our days for things which profit not,
And in the last cold days and lonely nights
Wherewith our little span of living closes,
We set our heart on things.

What profits it, you futile little men
Who, furry-coated, tethering the lightning,
From here to London ride and back again?
What profits it, you whose fat hands are tightening
Upon the lives of others? Nay, but tell
What would you profit gaining all the world?
(And if there were no hell)
What have you seen of loveliness unfurled
In heaven above or on the earth below?
Speak! What have you to show?

What do you profit? If you drove a car
Through Paradise you would not hear the wings!
Did Michael leave the gates of God ajar
(As he has done!) what would you crave but things?
More houses, maybe, with a telephone,
To call your own!

And you, my brothers, in the dim-lit mine,
Or in the town, or on the tumbling sea,
Who carry in your ears the hungry whine
Of wolves which hunt the woods of Poverty:
What profit you, if under that same sign
As they who grind you down you too advance?
If on the tide of chance
You (swept away)
Do even as they?

For close about us whir the angel wings,
And near beside us sound the throbbing strings
Of Paradise. The song of Brotherhood
With flowers springs, and sings through all the air
To that high place where Jacob’s ladder stood
Tethered to chanting stars. We only dare
Ignore God’s message, we alone of all
His children scorn Love’s joyous festival,
Spending our days for that which profits not,
Setting our heart on things.

When sense is edged and blood of Youth is hot,
And when stiff age like ice about us clings,
We spend our days for things which profit not,
We set our heart on things.

TRIOLET

Flesh triumphs awhile,
And after, the spirit.
By force and by guile
Flesh triumphs awhile,
Then finds but a pile
Of grave-earth to inherit
Flesh triumphs awhile
And after, the spirit.

FIRE

(REVISED VERSION[1])