Chapter C: L. M

In the dark womb where I began My mother's life made me a man. Through all the months of human birth Her beauty fed my common earth. I cannot see, nor breathe, nor stir, But through the death of some of her.

Down in the darkness of the grave She cannot see the life she gave. For all her love, she cannot tell Whether I use it ill or well, Nor knock at dusty doors to find Her beauty dusty in the mind.

If the grave's gates could be undone, She would not know her little son, I am so grown. If we should meet She would pass by me in the street, Unless my soul's face let her see My sense of what she did for me.

What have I done to keep in mind My debt to her and womankind? What woman's happier life repays Her for those months of wretched days? For all my mouthless body leeched Ere Birth's releasing hell was reached?

What have I done, or tried, or said In thanks to that dear woman dead? Men triumph over women still, Men trample women's rights at will, And man's lust roves the world untamed.

* * * * *

O grave, keep shut lest I be shamed.

WASTE

No rose but fades: no glory but must pass:
No hue but dims: no precious silk but frets.
Her beauty must go underneath the grass,
Under the long roots of the violets.

O, many glowing beauties Time has hid
In that dark, blotting box the villain sends.
He covers over with a coffin-lid
Mothers and sons, and foes and lovely friends.

Maids that were redly-lipped and comely-skinned,
Friends that deserved a sweeter bed than clay,
All are as blossoms blowing down the wind,
Things the old envious villain sweeps away.

And though the mutterer laughs and church bells toll, Death brings another April to the soul.

THIRD MATE

All the sheets are clacking, all the blocks are whining, The sails are frozen stiff and the wetted decks are shining; The reef's in the topsails, and it's coming on to blow, And I think of the dear girl I left long ago.

Grey were her eyes, and her hair was long and bonny, Golden was her hair, like the wild bees' honey. And I was but a dog, and a mad one to despise, The gold of her hair and the grey of her eyes.

There's the sea before me, and my home's behind me, And beyond there the strange lands where nobody will mind me, No one but the girls with the paint upon their cheeks, Who sell away their beauty to whomsoever seeks.

There'll be drink and women there, and songs and laughter, Peace from what is past and from all that follows after; And a fellow will forget how a woman lies awake, Lonely in the night watch crying for his sake.

Black it blows and bad and it howls like slaughter, And the ship she shudders as she takes the water. Hissing flies the spindrift like a wind-blown smoke, And I think of a woman and a heart I broke.

THE WILD DUCK

Twilight. Red in the west. Dimness. A glow on the wood. The teams plod home to rest. The wild duck come to glean. O souls not understood, What a wild cry in the pool; What things have the farm ducks seen That they cry so--huddle and cry?

Only the soul that goes. Eager. Eager. Flying. Over the globe of the moon, Over the wood that glows. Wings linked. Necks a-strain, A rush and a wild crying.

* * *

A cry of the long pain In the reeds of a steel lagoon. In a land that no man knows.

CHRISTMAS, 1903

O, the sea breeze will be steady, and the tall ship's going trim, And the dark blue skies are paling, and the white stars burning dim; The long night watch is over, and the long sea-roving done, And yonder light is the Start Point light, and yonder comes the sun.

O, we have been with the Spaniards, and far and long on the sea; But there are the twisted chimneys, and the gnarled old inns on the quay. The wind blows keen as the day breaks, the roofs are white with the rime, And the church-bells ring as the sun comes up to call men in to Prime.

The church-bells rock and jangle, and there is peace on the earth. Peace and good will and plenty and Christmas games and mirth. O, the gold glints bright on the wind-vane as it shifts above the squire's house, And the water of the bar of Salcombe is muttering about the bows.

O, the salt sea tide of Salcombe, it wrinkles into wisps of foam, And the church-bells ring in Salcombe to ring poor sailors home. The belfry rocks as the bells ring, the chimes are merry as a song, They ring home wandering sailors who have been homeless long.

THE WORD

My friend, my bonny friend, when we are old,
And hand in hand go tottering down the hill,
May we be rich in love's refined gold,
May love's gold coin be current with us still.

May love be sweeter for the vanished days,
And your most perfect beauty still as dear
As when your troubled singer stood at gaze
In the dear March of a most sacred year.

May what we are be all we might have been,
And that potential, perfect, O my friend,
And may there still be many sheafs to glean
In our love's acre, comrade, till the end.

And may we find, when ended is the page, Death but a tavern on our pilgrimage.

* * * * *

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