Chapter D: H. Lawrence contributes what may be considered, except for

_Patterns_, the most notable poem in the book, _Erinnyes_, although again why it should be called Imagism is a mystery. It is certainly, however, a poem, and a profound and beautiful one. In its form and its long, slow, melancholy rhythm it suggests Aldington’s _Choricos_, and the theme is the same—Death. Here are five stanzas:

There are so many dead,
Many have died unconsenting,
Theirs ghosts are angry, unappeased.

They come back, over the white sea, in the mist,
Invisible, trooping home, the unassuaged ghosts
Endlessly returning on the uneasy sea.

What do they want, the ghosts, what is it
They demand as they stand in menace over against us?
How shall we now appease whom we have raised up?

Must we open the doors, and admit them, receive them home,
And in the silence, reverently, welcome them,
And give them place and honour and service meet?

For one year’s space, attend on our angry dead,
Soothe them with service and honour, and silence meet,
Strengthen, prepare them for the journey hence,
Then lead them to the gates of the unknown,
And bid farewell, oh stately travellers,
And wait till they are lost upon our sight.

There is another poem of Lawrence’s called _Perfidy_ that gives an elusive sense of horror and calamity. This effect lies partially in the five-line stanza formation with the first, third, and fourth lines rhyming. There is no particular reason for calling this poem Imagism either; but we have agreed by now, I trust, that is not our first consideration. No less a person than Miss Lowell herself gives us justification in this viewpoint, for in a review of the poems of Aldington and Flint in the June _Poetry Review_ she says, “Let us take these little volumes as poetry pure and simple, forgetting schools and creeds.”

There are thirty-two poems in all in the book. One person will like this one best, another that. Suffice that the book is a valuable contribution to contemporary literature.

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[1] _Some Imagist Poets, 1916: An Annual Anthology. Boston:
Houghton Mifflin._

Three Imagist Poets

JOHN GOULD FLETCHER

(_Continued from the May issue_)