Chapter I: REACH my hand to thee!

Stoop; take my hand in thine;
Lead me where I would be,
Father divine.
I do not even know
The way I want to go,
The way that leads to rest:
But, Thou who knowest me,
Lead where I cannot see,
Thou knowest best.

Toys, worthless, yet desired,
Drew me afar to roam.
Father, I am so tired;
I am come home.
The love I held so cheap
I see, so dear, so deep,
So almost understood.
Life is so cold and wild,
I am thy little child—
I _will_ be good.

THE SKYLARK

“. . . a dripping shower of notes from the softening blue. It is the
skylark come.”—ROBERT À FIELD, in the _New Age_.

“IT is the skylark come.” For shame!
Robert-à-Cockney is thy name:
Robert-à-Field would surely know
That skylarks, bless them, never go!

. . . . .

Love of my life, bear witness here
How we have heard them all the year;
How to the skylark’s song are set
The days we never can forget.
At Rustington, do you remember?
We heard the skylarks in December;
In January above the snow
They sang to us by Hurstmonceux
Once in the keenest airs of March
We heard them near the Marble Arch;
Their April song thrilled Tonbridge air;
May found them singing everywhere;
And oh, in Sheppey, how their tune
Rhymed with the bean-flower scent in June.
One unforgotten day at Rye
They sang a love-song in July;
In August, hard by Lewes town,
They sang of joy ’twixt sky and down;
And in September’s golden spell
We heard them singing on Scaw Fell.
October’s leaves were brown and sere,
But skylarks sang by Teston Weir;
And in November, at Mount’s Bay,
They sang upon our wedding day!

. . . . .

Mr.-à-Field, go forth, go forth,
Go east and west and south and north;
You’ll always find the furze in flower,
Find every hour the lovers’ hour,
And, by my faith in love and rhyme,
The skylark singing all the time!

SATURDAY SONG

THEY talk about gardens of roses,
And moonlight over the sea,
And mountains and snow
And sunsetty glow,
But I know what is best for me.
The prettiest sight I know,
Worth all your roses and snow,
Is the blaze of light on a Saturday night,
When the barrows are set in a row.

I’ve heard of bazaars in India
All glitter and spices and smells,
But they don’t compare
With the naphtha flare
And the herrings the coster sells;
And the oranges piled like gold,
The cucumbers lean and cold,
And the red and white block-trimmings
And the strawberries fresh and ripe,
And the peas and beans,
And the sprouts and greens,
And the ’taters and trotters and tripe.

And the shops where they sell the chairs,
The mangles and tables and bedding,
And the lovers go by in pairs,
And look—and think of the wedding.
And your girl has her arm in yours,
And you whisper and make her blush.
Oh! the snap in her eyes—and her smiles and her sighs
As she fancies the purple plush!

And you haven’t a penny to spend,
But you dream that you’ve pounds and pounds;
And arm in arm with your only friend
You make your Saturday rounds:
And you see the cradle bright
With ribbon—lace—pink and white;
And she stops her laugh
And you drop your chaff
In the light of the Saturday night.
And the world is new
For her and you—
A little bit of all-right.

THE CHAMPION

YOUNG and a conqueror, once on a day,
Wild white Winter rode out this way;
With his sword of ice and his banner of snow
Vanquished the Summer and laid her low.

Winter was young then, young and strong;
Now he is old, he has reigned too long.
He shall be routed, he shall be slain;
Summer shall come to her own again!

See the champion of Summer wake
Little armies in field and brake:
“Cruel and cold has King Winter been;
Fight for the Summer, fight for the Queen!”

First the aconite dots the mould
With little round cannon-balls of gold;
Then, to help in the winter’s rout,
Regiments of crocuses march out.

See the swords of the flag-leaves shine;
See the shield of the celandine,
And daffodil lances green and keen,
To fight for the Summer, fight for the Queen.

Silver triumphant the snowdrop swings
Banners that mock at defeated kings;
And wherever the green of the new grass peers,
See the array of victorious spears.

Daffodil trumpets soon shall sound
Over the garden’s battle-ground,
And lovely ladies crowd out to see
The long procession of victory.

Little daisies with snowy frills,
Courtly tulips and sweet jonquils,
Primrose and cowslip, friends well met
With white wood-sorrel and violet.

Hundreds of milkmaids by field and fold;
Thousands of buttercups licked with gold;
Budding hedges and woods and trees—
Spring brings freedom and life to these.

Then the triumphant Spring shall ride
Over the happy countryside;
Deep in the woods the birds shall sing:
“The King is dead—long live the King!”

But Spring is no king, but a faithful knight;
He will ride on through the meadows bright
Till at Summer’s feet he shall light him down
And lay at her feet the royal crown.

She will lean down where the roses twine
Between the may-trees’ silver shine,
And look in the eyes of the dying knight
Who led his army and won her fight.

She will stoop to his lips and say,
“Oh, live, O love! O my true love, stay!”
While he smiles and sighs her arms between
And dies for the Summer, dies for the Queen.

THE GARDEN REFUSED

THERE is a garden made for our delight,
Where all the dreams we dare not dream come true.
I know it, but I do not know the way.
We slip and tumble in the doubtful night,
Where everything is difficult and new,
And clouds our breath has made obscure the day.

The blank unhappy towns, where sick men strive,
Still doing work that yet is never done;
The hymns to Gold that drown their desperate voice;
The weeds that grow where once corn stood alive,
The black injustice that puts out the sun:
These are our portion, since they are our choice.

Yet there the garden blows with rose on rose,
The sunny, shadow-dappled lawns are there;
There the immortal lilies, heavenly sweet.
O roses, that for us shall not unclose!
O lilies, that we shall not pluck or wear!
O dewy lawns untrodden by our feet!

THESE LITTLE ONES

“WHAT of the garden I gave?”
God said to me;
“Hast thou been diligent to foster and save
The life of flower and tree?
How have the roses thriven,
The lilies I have given,
The pretty scented miracles that Spring
And Summer come to bring?

“My garden is fair and dear,”
I said to God;
“From thorns and nettles I have kept it clear.
Green-trimmed its sod.
The rose is red and bright,
The lily a live delight;
I have not lost a flower of all the flowers
That blessed my hours.”

“What of the child I gave?”
God said to me;
“The little, little one I died to save
And gave in trust to thee?
How have the flowers grown
That in its soul were sown,
The lovely living miracles of youth
And hope and joy and truth?”

“The child’s face is all white,”
I said to God;
“It cries for cold and hunger in the night:
Its little feet have trod
The pavement muddy and cold.
It has no flowers to hold,
And in its soul the flowers you set are dead.”
“Thou fool!” God said.

THE DESPOT

THE garden mould was damp and chill;
Winter had had his brutal will
Since over all the year’s content
His devastating legions went.

The Spring’s bright banners came: there woke
Millions of little growing folk
Who thrilled to know the winter done,
Gave thanks, and strove towards the sun.

Not so the elect; reserved, and slow
To trust a stranger-sun and grow,
They hesitated, cowered and hid,
Waiting to see what others did.

Yet even they, a little, grew,
Put out prim leaves to day and dew,
And lifted level formal heads
In their appointed garden beds.

The gardener came: he coldly loved
The flowers that lived as he approved,
That duly, decorously grew
As he, the despot, meant them to.

He saw the wildlings flower more brave
And bright than any cultured slave;
Yet, since he had not set them there,
He hated them for being fair.

So he uprooted, one by one,
The free things that had loved the sun,
The happy, eager, fruitful seeds
Who had not known that they were weeds.

THE MAGIC RING

YOUR touch on my hand is fire,
Your lips on my lips are flowers.
My darling, my one desire,
Dear crown of my days and hours.
Dear crown of each hour and day
Since ever my life began.
Ah! leave me—ah! go away—
We two are woman and man.

To lie in your arms and see
The stars melt into the sun;
Till there is no you and me,
Since you and I are one.
To loose my soul to your breath,
To bare my heart to your life—
It is death, it is death, it is death!
I am not your wife.

The hours will come and will go,
But never again such an hour
When the tides immortal flow
And life is a flood, a flower . . .
Wait for the ring; it is strong,
It has a magic of might
To make all that was splendid and wrong
Sordid and right.

PHILOSOPHY

THE sulky sage scarce condescends to see
This pretty world of sun and grass and leaves;
To him ’tis all illusion—only he
Is real amid the visions he perceives.

No sage am I, and yet, by Love’s decree,
To me the world’s a masque of shadows too,
And I a shadow also—since to me
The only real thing in life is—you.

THE WHIRLIGIG OF TIME

BEFORE your feet,
My love, my sweet,
Behold! your slave bows down;
And in his hands
From other lands
Brings you another crown.

For in far climes,
In bygone times,
Myself was royal too:
Oh, I have been
A king, my queen,
Who am a slave for you!

MAGIC

WHAT was the spell she wove for me?
Life was a common useful thing,
An eligible building site
To hold a house to shelter me.
There were no woodlands whispering;
No unimagined dreams at night
About that house had folded wing,
Disordering my life for me.

I was so safe until she came
With starry secrets in her eyes,
And on her lips the word of power.
—Like to the moon of May she came,
That makes men mad who were born wise—
Within her hand the only flower
Man ever plucked from Paradise;
So to my half-built house she came.

She turned my useful plot of land
Into a garden wild and fair,
Where stars in garlands hung like flowers:
A moonlit, lonely, lovely land.
Dim groves and glimmering fountains there
Embraced a secret bower of bowers,
And in its rose-ringed heart we were
Alone in that enchanted land.

What was the spell I wove for her,
Her mad dear magic to undo?
The red rose dies, the white rose dies,
The garden spits me forth with her
On the old suburban road I knew.
My house is gone, and by my side
A stranger stands with angry eyes
And lips that swear I ruined her.

WINDFLOWERS

WHEN I was little and good
I walked in the dappled wood
Where light white windflowers grew,
And hyacinths heavy and blue.

The windflowers fluttered light,
Like butterflies white and bright;
The bluebells tremulous stood
Deep in the heart of the wood.

I gathered the white and the blue,
The wild wet woodland through,
With hands too silly and small
To clasp and carry them all.

Some dropped from my hands and died
By the home-road’s grassy side;
And those that my fond hands pressed
Died even before the rest.

AS IT IS

IF you and I
Had wings to fly—
Great wings like seagulls’ wings—
How would we soar
Above the roar
Of loud unneeded things!

We two would rise
Through changing skies
To blue unclouded space,
And undismayed
And unafraid
Meet the sun face to face.

But wings we know not;
The feathers grow not
To carry us so high;
And low in the gloom
Of a little room
We weep and say good-bye.

BEFORE WINTER

THE wind is crying in the night,
Like a lost child;
The waves break wonderful and white
And wild.
The drenched sea-poppies swoon along
The drenched sea-wall,
And there’s an end of summer and of song—
An end of all.

The fingers of the tortured boughs
Gripped by the blast
Clutch at the windows of your house
Closed fast.
And the lost child of love, despair,
Cries in the night,
Remembering how once those windows were
Open and bright.

THE VAULT AFTER SEDGMOOR

YOU need not call at the Inn;
I have ordered my bed:
Fair linen sheets therein
And a tester of lead.
No musty fusty scents
Such as inn chambers keep,
But tapestried with content
And hung with sleep.

My Inn door bears no bar
Set up against fear.
The guests have journeyed far,
They are glad to be here.
Where the damp arch curves up grey,
Long, long shall we lie;
Good King’s men all are they,
A King’s man I.

Old Giles, in his stone asleep,
Fought at Poictiers.
Piers Ralph and Roger keep
The spoil of their fighting years.
I shall lie with my folk at last
In a quiet bed;
I shall dream of the sword held fast
In a round-capped head.

Good tale of men all told
My Inn affords;
And their hands peace shall hold
That once held swords.
And we who rode and ran
On many a loyal quest
Shall find the goal of man—
A bed, and rest.

We shall not stand to the toast
Of Love or King;
We be all too tired to boast
About anything.
We be dumb that did jest and sing;
We rest who laboured and warred . . .
Shout once, shout once for the King.
Shout once for the sword!

SURRENDER

OH, the nights were dark and cold,
When my love was gone.
And life was hard to hold
When my love was gone.
I was wise, I never gave
What they teach a girl to save,
But I wished myself his slave
When my love was gone.

I was all alone at night
When my love came home.
Oh, what thought of wrong or right
When my love came home?
I flung the door back wide
And I pulled my love inside;
There was no more shame or pride
When my love came home.

VALUES

DID you deceive me? Did I trust
A heart of fire to a heart of dust?
What matter? Since once the world was fair,
And you gave me the rose of the world to wear.

That was the time to live for! Flowers,
Sunshine and starshine and magic hours,
Summer about me, Heaven above,
And all seemed immortal, even Love.

Well, the mortal rose of your love was worth
The pains of death and the pains of birth;
And the thorns may be sharper than death—who knows?—
That crowd round the stem of a deathless rose.

IN THE PEOPLE’S PARK

MANY’S the time I’ve found your face
Fresh as a bunch of flowers in May,
Waiting for me at our own old place
At the end of the working day.
Many’s the time I’ve held your hand
On the shady seat in the People’s Park,
And blessed the blaring row of the band
And kissed you there in the dark.

Many’s the time you promised true,
Swore it with kisses, swore it with tears:
“I’ll marry no one without it’s you—
If we have to wait for years.”
And now it’s another chap in the Park
That holds your hand like I used to do;
And I kiss another girl in the dark,
And try to fancy it’s you!

WEDDING DAY

THE enchanted hour,
The magic bower,
Where, crowned with roses,
Love love discloses.

“Kiss me, my lover;
Doubting is over,
Over is waiting;
Love lights our mating!”

“But roses wither,
Chill winds blow hither,
One thing all say, dear,
Love lives a day, dear!”

“Heed those old stories?
New glowing glories
Blot out those lies, love!
Look in my eyes, love!

“Ah, but the world knows—
Naught of the true rose;
Back the world slips, love!
Give me your lips, love!

“Even were their lies true,
Yet were you wise to
Swear, at Love’s portal,
The god’s immortal.”

THE LAST DEFEAT

ACROSS the field of day
In sudden blazon lay
The pallid bar of gold
Borne on the shield of day.
Night had endured so long,
And now the Day grew strong
With lance of light to hold
The Night at bay.

So on my life’s dull night
The splendour of your light
Traversed the dusky shield
And shone forth golden bright.
Your colours I have worn
Through all the fight forlorn,
And these, with life, I yield,
To-night, to Night.

MAY DAY

“WILL you go a-maying, a-maying, a-maying,
Come and be my Queen of May and pluck the may with me?
The fields are full of daisy buds and new lambs playing,
The bird is on the nest, dear, the blossom’s on the tree.”

“If I go with you, if I go a-maying,
To be your Queen and wear my crown this May-day bright,
Hand in hand straying, it must be only playing,
And playtime ends at sunset, and then good-night.

“For I have heard of maidens who laughed and went a-maying,
Went out queens and lost their crowns and came back slaves.
I will be no young man’s slave, submitting and obeying,
Bearing chains as those did, even to their graves.”

“If you come a-maying, a-straying, a-playing,
We will pluck the little flowers, enough for you and me;
And when the day dies, end our one day’s playing,
Give a kiss and take a kiss and go home free.”

GRETNA GREEN

LAST night when I kissed you,
My soul caught alight;
And oh! how I missed you
The rest of the night—
Till Love in derision
Smote sleep with his wings,
And gave me in vision
Impossible things.

A night that was clouded,
Long windows asleep;
Dark avenues crowded
With secrets to keep.
A terrace, a lover,
A foot on the stair;
The waiting was over,
The lady was there.

What a flight, what a night!
The hoofs splashed and pounded.
Dark fainted in light
And the first bird-notes sounded.
You slept on my shoulder,
Shy night hid your face;
But dawn, bolder, colder,
Beheld our embrace.

Your lips of vermilion,
Your ravishing shape,
The flogging postillion,
The village agape,
The rattle and thunder
Of postchaise a-speed . . .
My woman, my wonder,
My ultimate need!

We two matched for mating
Came, handclasped, at last,
Where the blacksmith was waiting
To fetter us fast . . .
At the touch of the fetter
The dream snapped and fell—
And I woke to your letter
That bade me farewell.

THE ETERNAL

YOUR dear desired grace,
Your hands, your lips of red,
The wonder of your perfect face
Will fade, like sweet rose-petals shed,
When you are dead.

Your beautiful hair
Dust in the dust will lie—
But not the light I worship there,
The gold the sunshine crowns you by—
This will not die.

Your beautiful eyes
Will be closed up with clay;
But all the magic they comprise,
The hopes, the dreams, the ecstasies
Pass not away.

All I desire and see
Will be a carrion thing;
But all that you have been to me
Is, and can never cease to be.
O Grave! where is thy victory?
Where, Death, thy sting?

THE POINT OF VIEW: I.

I

THERE was never winter, summer only: roses,
Pink and white and red,
Shining down the warm rich garden closes;
Quiet trees and lawns of dappled shadow,
Silver lilies, whisper of mignonette,
Cloth-of-gold of buttercups outspread;
Good gold sun that kissed me when we met,
Shadows of floating clouds on sunny meadow.
In the hay-field, scented, grey,
Loving life and love, I lay;
By fresh airs blown, drifted into sleep;
Slept and dreamed there. Winter was the dream.

II

Summer never was, was always winter only;
Cold and ice and frost
Only, driven by the ice-wind, lonely,
In a world of strangers, in the welter
Of the puddles and the spiteful wind and sleet,
Blinded by the spitting hailstones, lost
In a bitter unfamiliar street,
I found a doorway, crouched there for just shelter,
Crouched and fought in vain for breath,
Cursed the cold and wished for death;
Crouched there, gathered somehow warmth to sleep;
Slept and dreamed there. Summer was the dream.

THE POINT OF VIEW: II.

I

IN the wood of lost causes, the valley of tears,
Old hopes, like dead leaves, choke the difficult way;
Dark pinions fold dank round the soul, and it hears:
“It is night, it is night, it has never been day;
Thou hast dreamed of the day, of the rose of delight;
It was always dead leaves and the heart of the night.
Drink deep then, and rest, O thou foolish wayfarer,
For night, like a chalice, holds sleep in her hands.”

II

Then you drain the dark cup, and, half-drugged as you lie
In the arms of despair that is masked as delight,
You thrill to the rush of white wings, and you hear:
“It is day, it is day, it has never been night!
Thou hast dreamed of the night and the wood of lost leaves;
It was always noon, June, and red roses in sheaves,
Unlock the blind lids, and behold the light-bearer
Who holds, like a monstrance, the sun in his hands.”

MARY OF MAGDALA

MARY of Magdala came to bed;
There were no soft curtains round her head;
She had no mother to hold of worth
The little baby she brought to birth.

Mary of Magdala groaned and prayed:
“O God, I am very much afraid;
For out of my body, by sin defiled,
Thou biddest me make a little child.

“O God, I have turned my face from Thee
To that which the angels may not see;
How can I make, from my deep disgrace,
A child whose angel shall see Thy face?

“O God, I have sinned, and I know well
That the pains I bear are the pains of hell;
But the thought of the child that sin has given
Is like the thought of the airs of Heaven.”

Mary of Magdala held her breath
In the clutch of pain like the pains of Death,
And through her heart, like the mortal knife,
Went the pang of joy and the pang of life.

“We two are two alone,” said she,
“And we are two who should be three;
Now who will clothe my baby fair
In the little garments that babies wear?”

There came two angels with quiet wings
And hands that were full of baby things;
And the new-born child was bathed and dressed
And laid again on his mother’s breast.

“Now who will sign on his brow the mark
To keep him safe from the Powers of the Dark?
Who will my baby’s sponsor be?”
“I, the Lord God, who died for thee.”

“Now who will comfort him if he cry;
And who will suckle him by and bye?
For my hands are cold and my breasts are dry,
And I think that my time has come to die.”

“I will dandle thy son as a mother may;
And his lips shall lie where my own Son’s lay.
Come, dear little one, come to me;
The Mother of God shall suckle thee.”

Mary of Magdala laughed and sighed;
“I never deserved a child,” she cried.
“Dear God, I am ready to go to hell,
Since with my little one all is well.”

Then the Son of Mary did o’er her lean.
“Poor mother, thy tears have washed thee clean.
Thy last poor pains, they will soon be done,
And My Mother shall give thee back thy son.”

Frozen grass for a bearing bed,
A halo of frost round a woman’s head,
And pious folks who looked and said:
“A drab and her brat that are better dead.”

THE HOME-COMING

THIS was our house. To this we came
Lighted by love with torch aflame,
And in this chamber, door locked fast,
I held you to my heart at last.

This was our house. In this we knew
The worst that Time and Fate can do.
You left the room bare, wide the door;
You did not love me any more.

Where once the kind warm curtain hung
The spider’s ghostly cloth is flung;
The beetle and the woodlouse creep
Where once I loved your lovely sleep.

Yet so the vanished spell endures,
That this, our house, still, still is yours.
Here, spite of all these years apart,
I still can hold you to my heart!

AGE TO YOUTH

SUNRISE is in your eyes, and in your heart
The hope and bright desire of morn and May.
My eyes are full of shadow, and my part
Of life is yesterday.

Yet lend my hand your hand, and let us sit
And see your life unfolding like a scroll,
Rich with illuminated blazon, fit
For your arm-bearing soul.

My soul bears arms too, but the scroll’s rolled tight,
Yet the one strip of faded brightness shown
Proclaims that when ’twas splendid in the light
Its blazon matched your own.

IN AGE

THE wine of life was rough and new,
But sweet beyond belief,
And wrong was false, and right was true—
The rose was in the leaf.

In that good sunlight well we knew
The hues of wrong and right;
We slept among the roses through
The long enchanted night.

Now to our eyes, made dim with years,
Right intertwines with wrong.
How can we hear, with these tired ears,
The old, the magic song?

But this we know—wine once was red,
Roses were red and dear;
Once in our ears the truths were said
That now the young men hear!

WHITE MAGIC

THIS is the room to which she came,
And Spring itself came with her;
She stirred the fire of life to flame,
She called all music hither.
Her glance upon the lean white walls
Hung them with cloth of splendour,
And still the rose she dropped recalls
The graces that attend her.

The same poor room, so dull and bare
Before, in consecration,
She breathed upon its common air
The true transfiguration . . .?
This room the same to which she came
For one immortal minute?—
How can it ever be the same
Since she has once been in it!

FROM THE PORTUGUESE

I

WHEN I lived in the village of youth
There were lilies in all the orchards,
Flowers in the orange-gardens
For brides to wear in their hair.
It was always sunshine and summer,
Roses at every lattice,
Dreams in the eyes of maidens,
Love in the eyes of men.

When I lived in the village of youth
The doors, all the doors, stood open;
We went in and out of them laughing,
Laughing and calling each other
To shew each other our fairings,
The new shawl, the new comb, the new fan,
The new rose, the new lover.

Now I live in the town of age
Where are no orchards, no gardens.
Here, too, all the doors stand open,
But no one goes in or goes out.
We sit alone by the hearthstone
Where memories lie like ashes
Upon a hearth that is cold;

And they from the village of youth
Run by our doorsteps laughing,
Calling, to shew each other
The new shawl, the new comb, the new fan,
The new rose, the new lover.

Once we had all these things—
We kept them from the old people,
And now the young people have them
And will not shew them to us—
To us who are old and have nothing
But the white, still, heaped-up ashes
On the hearth where the fire went out
A very long time ago.

II