Chapter IV: Front Matter (4)

I did but glance upon those anchored ships. Even as my thought had told, I saw her plain; Tense, like a supple athlete with lean hips, Swiftness at pause, the 'Wanderer' come again--

Come as of old a queen, untouched by Time, Resting the beauty that no seas could tire, Sparkling, as though the midnight's rain were rime, Like a man's thought transfigured into fire.

And as I looked, one of her men began To sing some simple tune of Christmas Day; Among her crew the song spread, man to man, Until the singing rang across the bay;

And soon in other anchored ships the men Joined in the singing with clear throats, until The farm-boy heard it up the windy glen, Above the noise of sheep-bells on the hill.

Over the water came the lifted song-- Blind pieces in a mighty game we swing; Life's battle is a conquest for the strong; The meaning shows in the defeated thing.

* * * * *

HAROLD MONRO

MILK FOR THE CAT

When the tea is brought at five o'clock, And all the neat curtains are drawn with care, The little black cat with bright green eyes Is suddenly purring there.

At first she pretends, having nothing to do, She has come in merely to blink by the grate, But, though tea may be late or the milk may be sour, She is never late.

And presently her agate eyes Take a soft large milky haze, And her independent casual glance Becomes a stiff, hard gaze.

Then she stamps her claws or lifts her ears, Or twists her tail and begins to stir, Till suddenly all her lithe body becomes One breathing, trembling purr.

The children eat and wriggle and laugh, The two old ladies stroke their silk: But the cat is grown small and thin with desire, Transformed to a creeping lust for milk.

The white saucer like some full moon descends At last from the clouds of the table above; She sighs and dreams and thrills and glows, Transfigured with love.

She nestles over the shining rim, Buries her chin in the creamy sea; Her tail hangs loose; each drowsy paw Is doubled under each bending knee.

A long, dim ecstasy holds her life; Her world is an infinite shapeless white, Till her tongue has curled the last holy drop, Then she sinks back into the night,

Draws and dips her body to heap Her sleepy nerves in the great arm-chair, Lies defeated and buried deep Three or four hours unconscious there.

OVERHEARD ON A SALTMARSH

Nymph, nymph, what are your beads?

Green glass, goblin. Why do you stare at them?

Give them me.

No.

Give them me. Give them me.

No.

Then I will howl all night in the reeds, Lie in the mud and howl for them.

Goblin, why do you love them so?

They are better than stars or water, Better than voices of winds that sing, Better than any man's fair daughter, Your green glass beads on a silver ring.

Hush, I stole them out of the moon.

Give me your beads, I want them.

No.

I will howl in a deep lagoon For your green glass beads, I love them so. Give them me. Give them.

No.

CHILDREN OF LOVE

The holy boy Went from his mother out in the cool of the day Over the sun-parched fields And in among the olives shining green and shining grey.

There was no sound, No smallest voice of any shivering stream. Poor sinless little boy, He desired to play and to sing; he could only sigh and dream.

Suddenly came Running along to him naked, with curly hair, That rogue of the lovely world, That other beautiful child whom the virgin Venus bare.

The holy boy Gazed with those sad blue eyes that all men know. Impudent Cupid stood Panting, holding an arrow and pointing his bow.

(Will you not play? Jesus, run to him, run to him, swift for our joy. Is he not holy, like you? Are you afraid of his arrows, O beautiful dreaming boy?)

And now they stand Watching one another with timid gaze; Youth has met youth in the wood, But holiness will not change its melancholy ways.

Cupid at last Draws his bow and softly lets fly a dart. Smile for a moment, sad world!-- It has grazed the white skin and drawn blood from the sorrowful heart.

Now, for delight, Cupid tosses his locks and goes wantonly near; But the child that was born to the cross Has let fall on his cheek, for the sadness of life, a compassionate tear.

Marvellous dream! Cupid has offered his arrows for Jesus to try; He has offered his bow for the game. But Jesus went weeping away, and left him there wondering why.

* * * * *

JAMES STEPHENS

THE RIVALS

I heard a bird at dawn
Singing sweetly on a tree,
That the dew was on the lawn,
And the wind was on the lea;
But I didn't listen to him,
For he didn't sing to me.

I didn't listen to him,
For he didn't sing to me
That the dew was on the lawn
And the wind was on the lea;
I was singing at the time
Just as prettily as he.

I was singing all the time,
Just as prettily as he,
About the dew upon the lawn
And the wind upon the lea;
So I didn't listen to him
And he sang upon a tree.

THE GOAT PATHS

The crooked paths go every way
Upon the hill--they wind about
Through the heather in and out
Of the quiet sunniness.
And there the goats, day after day,
Stray in sunny quietness,
Cropping here and cropping there,
As they pause and turn and pass,
Now a bit of heather spray,
Now a mouthful of the grass.

In the deeper sunniness, In the place where nothing stirs, Quietly in quietness, In the quiet of the furze, For a time they come and lie Staring on the roving sky.

If you approach they run away,
They leap and stare, away they bound,
With a sudden angry sound,
To the sunny quietude;
Crouching down where nothing stirs
In the silence of the furze,
Couching down again to brood
In the sunny solitude.

If I were as wise as they I would stray apart and brood, I would beat a hidden way Through the quiet heather spray To a sunny solitude;

And should you come I'd run away,
I would make an angry sound,
I would stare and turn and bound
To the deeper quietude,
To the place where nothing stirs
In the silence of the furze.

In that airy quietness
I would think as long as they;
Through the quiet sunniness
I would stray away to brood
By a hidden beaten way
In a sunny solitude.

I would think until I found
Something I can never find,
Something lying on the ground,
In the bottom of my mind.

THE SNARE

(To A.E.)

I hear a sudden cry of pain!
There is a rabbit in a snare:
Now I hear the cry again,
But I cannot tell from where.

But I cannot tell from where
He is calling out for aid;
Crying on the frightened air,
Making everything afraid.

Making everything afraid,
Wrinkling up his little face,
As he cries again for aid;
And I cannot find the place!

And I cannot find the place
Where his paw is in the snare:
Little one! Oh, little one!
I am searching everywhere.

IN WOODS AND MEADOWS

Play to the tender stops, though cheerily:
Gently, my soul, my song: let no one hear:
Sing to thyself alone; thine ecstasy
Rising in silence to the inward ear
That is attuned to silence: do not tell
A friend, a bird, a star, lest they should say--
_He danced in woods and meadows all the day,
Waving his arms, and cried as evening fell,
'O, do not come,' and cried, 'O, come, thou queen,
And walk with me unwatched upon the green
Under the sky.'_

DEIRDRE

Do not let any woman read this verse; It is for men, and after them their sons And their sons' sons.

The time comes when our hearts sink utterly; When we remember Deirdre and her tale, And that her lips are dust.

Once she did tread the earth: men took her hand;. They looked into her eyes and said their say, And she replied to them.

More than a thousand years it is since she Was beautiful: she trod the waving grass; She saw the clouds.

A thousand years! The grass is still the same, The clouds as lovely as they were that time When Deirdre was alive.

But there has never been a woman born Who was so beautiful, not one so beautiful Of all the women born.

Let all men go apart and mourn together; No man can ever love her; not a man Can ever be her lover.

No man can bend before her: no man say-- What could one say to her? There are no words That one could say to her!

Now she is but a story that is told Beside the fire! No man can ever be The friend of that poor queen.

* * * * *

LASCELLES ABERCROMBIE

THE END OF THE WORLD

PERSONS

HUFF, the Farmer. SOLLERS, the Wainwright. MERRICK, the Smith. VINE, the Publican. SHALE, the Labourer. A DOWSER. MRS HUFF. WARP, the Molecatcher. Men and Women of the Village.'