XXXVIWhite in the moon the long road lies,The moon stands blank above;White in the moon the long road liesThat leads me from my love.Still hangs the hedge without a gust,Still, still the shadows stay:My feet upon the moonlit dustPursue the ceaseless way.The world is round, so travellers tell,And straight though reach the track,Trudge on, trudge on, 'twill all be well,The way will guide one back.But ere the circle homeward hiesFar, far must it remove:White in the moon the long road liesThat leads me from my love.
XXXVIIAs through the wild green hills of WyreThe train ran, changing sky and shire,And far behind, a fading crest,Low in the forsaken westSank the high-reared head of Clee,My hand lay empty on my knee.Aching on my knee it lay:That morning half a shire awaySo many an honest fellow's fistHad well-nigh wrung it from the wrist.Hand, said I, since now we partFrom fields and men we know by heart,From strangers' faces, strangers' lands,-Hand, you have held true fellows' hands.Be clean then; rot before you doA thing they'd not believe of you.You and I must keep from shameIn London streets the Shropshire name;On banks of Thames they must not saySevern breeds worse men than they;And friends abroad must bear in mindFriends at home they leave behind.Oh, I shall be stiff and coldWhen I forget you, hearts of gold;The land where I shall mind you notIs the land where all's forgot.And if my foot returns no moreTo Teme nor Corve nor Severn shore,Luck, my lads, be with you stillBy falling stream and standing hill,By chiming tower and whispering tree,Men that made a man of me.About your work in town and farmStill you'll keep my head from harm,Still you'll help me, hands that gaveA grasp to friend me to the grave.
XXXVIIIThe winds out of the west land blow,My friends have breathed them there;Warm with the blood of lads I knowComes east the sighing air.It fanned their temples, filled their lungs,Scattered their forelocks free;My friends made words of it with tonguesThat talk no more to me.Their voices, dying as they fly,Thick on the wind are sown;The names of men blow soundless by,My fellows' and my own.Oh lads, at home I heard you plain,But here your speech is still,And down the sighing wind in vainYou hollo from the hill.The wind and I, we both were there,But neither long abode;Now through the friendless world we fareAnd sigh upon the road.
XXXIX'Tis time, I think by Wenlock townThe golden broom should blow;The hawthorn sprinkled up and downShould charge the land with snow.Spring will not wait the loiterer's timeWho keeps so long away;So others wear the broom and climbThe hedgerows heaped with may.Oh tarnish late on Wenlock Edge,Gold that I never see;Lie long, high snowdrifts in the hedgeThat will not shower on me.
XLInto my heart an air that killsFrom yon far country blows:What are those blue remembered hills,What spires, what farms are those?That is the land of lost content,I see it shining plain,The happy highways where I wentAnd cannot come again.
XLIIn my own shire, if I was sadHomely comforters I had:The earth, because my heart was sore,Sorrowed for the son she bore;And standing hills, long to remain,Shared their short-lived comrade's pain.And bound for the same bourn as I,On every road I wandered by,Trod beside me, close and dear,The beautiful and death-struck year:Whether in the woodland brownI heard the beechnut rustle down,And saw the purple crocus paleFlower about the autumn dale;Or littering far the fields of MayLady-smocks a-bleaching lay,And like a skylit water stoodThe bluebells in the azured wood.Yonder, lightening other loads,The seasons range the country roads,But here in London streets I kenNo such helpmates, only men;And these are not in plight to bear,If they would, another's care.They have enough as 'tis: I seeIn many an eye that measures meThe mortal sickness of a mindToo unhappy to be kind.Undone with misery, all they canIs to hate their fellow man;And till they drop they needs must stillLook at you and wish you ill.
XLIITHE MERRY GUIDEOnce in the wind of morningI ranged the thymy wold;The world-wide air was azureAnd all the brooks ran gold.There through the dews beside meBehold a youth that trod,With feathered cap on forehead,And poised a golden rod.With mien to match the morningAnd gay delightful guiseAnd friendly brows and laughterHe looked me in the eyes.Oh whence, I asked, and whither?He smiled and would not say,And looked at me and beckonedAnd laughed and led the way.And with kind looks and laughterAnd nought to say besideWe two went on together,I and my happy guide.Across the glittering pasturesAnd empty upland stillAnd solitude of shepherdsHigh in the folded hill,By hanging woods and hamletsThat gaze through orchards downOn many a windmill turningAnd far-discovered town,With gay regards of promiseAnd sure unslackened strideAnd smiles and nothing spokenLed on my merry guide.By blowing realms of woodlandWith sunstruck vanes afieldAnd cloud-led shadows sailingAbout the windy weald,By valley-guarded grangesAnd silver waters wide,Content at heart I followedWith my delightful guide.And like the cloudy shadowsAcross the country blownWe two face on for ever,But not we two alone.With the great gale we journeyThat breathes from gardens thinned,Borne in the drift of blossomsWhose petals throng the wind;Buoyed on the heaven-heard whisperOf dancing leaflets whirledFrom all the woods that autumnBereaves in all the world.And midst the fluttering legionOf all that ever diedI follow, and before usGoes the delightful guide,With lips that brim with laughterBut never once respond,And feet that fly on feathers,And serpent-circled wand.
XLIIITHE IMMORTAL PARTWhen I meet the morning beam,Or lay me down at night to dream,I hear my bones within me say,"Another night, another day.""When shall this slough of sense be cast,This dust of thoughts be laid at last,The man of flesh and soul be slainAnd the man of bone remain?""This tongue that talks, these lungs that shout,These thews that hustle us about,This brain that fills the skull with schemes,And its humming hive of dreams,-""These to-day are proud in powerAnd lord it in their little hour:The immortal bones obey controlOf dying flesh and dying soul."" 'Tis long till eve and morn are gone:Slow the endless night comes on,And late to fulness grows the birthThat shall last as long as earth.""Wanderers eastward, wanderers west,Know you why you cannot rest?'Tis that every mother's sonTravails with a skeleton.""Lie down in the bed of dust;Bear the fruit that bear you must;Bring the eternal seed to light,And morn is all the same as night.""Rest you so from trouble sore,Fear the heat o' the sun no more,Nor the snowing winter wild,Now you labour not with child.""Empty vessel, garment cast,We that wore you long shall last.-Another night, another day."So my bones within me say.Therefore they shall do my willTo-day while I am master still,And flesh and soul, now both are strong,Shall hale the sullen slaves along,Before this fire of sense decay,This smoke of thought blow clean away,And leave with ancient night aloneThe stedfast and enduring bone.
XLIVShot? so quick, so clean an ending?Oh that was right, lad, that was brave:Yours was not an ill for mending,'Twas best to take it to the grave.Oh you had forethought, you could reason,And saw your road and where it led,And early wise and brave in seasonPut the pistol to your head.Oh soon, and better so than laterAfter long disgrace and scorn,You shot dead the household traitor,The soul that should not have been born.Right you guessed the rising morrowAnd scorned to tread the mire you must:Dust's your wages, son of sorrow,But men may come to worse than dust.Souls undone, undoing others,-Long time since the tale began.You would not live to wrong your brothers:Oh lad, you died as fits a man.Now to your grave shall friend and strangerWith ruth and some with envy come:Undishonoured, clear of danger,Clean of guilt, pass hence and home.Turn safe to rest, no dreams, no waking;And here, man, here's the wreath I've made:'Tis not a gift that's worth the taking,But wear it and it will not fade.
XLVIf it chance your eye offend you,Pluck it out, lad, and be sound:'Twill hurt, but here are salves to friend you,And many a balsam grows on ground.And if your hand or foot offend you,Cut it off, lad, and be whole;But play the man, stand up and end you,When your sickness is your soul.
XLVIBring, in this timeless grave to throw,No cypress, sombre on the snow;Snap not from the bitter yewHis leaves that live December through;Break no rosemary, bright with rimeAnd sparkling to the cruel clime;Nor plod the winter land to lookFor willows in the icy brookTo cast them leafless round him: bringNo spray that ever buds in spring.But if the Christmas field has keptAwns the last gleaner overstept,Or shrivelled flax, whose flower is blueA single season, never two;Or if one haulm whose year is o'erShivers on the upland frore,-Oh, bring from hill and stream and plainWhatever will not flower again,To give him comfort: he and thoseShall bide eternal bedfellowsWhere low upon the couch he liesWhence he never shall arise.
XLVIITHE CARPENTER'S SON"Here the hangman stops his cart:Now the best of friends must part.Fare you well, for ill fare I:Live, lads, and I will die.""Oh, at home had I but stayed'Prenticed to my father's trade,Had I stuck to plane and adze,I had not been lost, my lads.""Then I might have built perhapsGallows-trees for other chaps,Never dangled on my own,Had I but left ill alone.""Now, you see, they hang me high,And the people passing byStop to shake their fists and curse;So 'tis come from ill to worse.""Here hang I, and right and leftTwo poor fellows hang for theft:All the same's the luck we prove,Though the midmost hangs for love.""Comrades all, that stand and gaze,Walk henceforth in other ways;See my neck and save your own:Comrades all, leave ill alone.""Make some day a decent end,Shrewder fellows than your friend.Fare you well, for ill fare I:Live, lads, and I will die."
XLVIIIBe still, my soul, be still; the arms you bear are brittle,Earth and high heaven are fixt of old and founded strong.Think rather,-call to thought, if now you grieve a little,The days when we had rest, O soul, for they were long.Men loved unkindness then, but lightless in the quarryI slept and saw not; tears fell down, I did not mourn;Sweat ran and blood sprang out and I was never sorry:Then it was well with me, in days ere I was born.Now, and I muse for why and never find the reason,I pace the earth, and drink the air, and feel the sun.Be still, be still, my soul; it is but for a season:Let us endure an hour and see injustice done.Ay, look: high heaven and earth ail from the prime foundation;All thoughts to rive the heart are here, and all are vain:Horror and scorn and hate and fear and indignation-Oh why did I awake? when shall I sleep again?
XLIXThink no more, lad; laugh, be jolly:Why should men make haste to die?Empty heads and tongues a-talkingMake the rough road easy walking,And the feather pate of follyBears the falling sky.Oh, 'tis jesting, dancing, drinkingSpins the heavy world around.If young hearts were not so clever,Oh, they would be young for ever:Think no more; 'tis only thinkingLays lads underground.
LClunton and Clunbury,Clungunford and Clun,Are the quietest placesUnder the sun.In valleys of springs of rivers,By Ony and Teme and Clun,The country for easy livers,The quietest under the sun,We still had sorrows to lighten,One could not be always glad,And lads knew trouble at KnightonWhen I was a Knighton lad.By bridges that Thames runs under,In London, the town built ill,'Tis sure small matter for wonderIf sorrow is with one still.And if as a lad grows olderThe troubles he bears are more,He carries his griefs on a shoulderThat handselled them long before.Where shall one halt to deliverThis luggage I'd lief set down?Not Thames, not Teme is the river,Nor London nor Knighton the town:'Tis a long way further than Knighton,A quieter place than Clun,Where doomsday may thunder and lightenAnd little 'twill matter to one.
LILoitering with a vacant eyeAlong the Grecian gallery,And brooding on my heavy ill,I met a statue standing still.Still in marble stone stood he,And stedfastly he looked at me."Well met," I thought the look would say,"We both were fashioned far away;We neither knew, when we were young,These Londoners we live among."Still he stood and eyed me hard,An earnest and a grave regard:"What, lad, drooping with your lot?I too would be where I am not.I too survey that endless lineOf men whose thoughts are not as mine.Years, ere you stood up from rest,On my neck the collar prest;Years, when you lay down your ill,I shall stand and bear it still.Courage, lad, 'tis not for long:Stand, quit you like stone, be strong."So I thought his look would say;And light on me my trouble lay,And I slept out in flesh and boneManful like the man of stone.
LIIFar in a western brooklandThat bred me long agoThe poplars stand and trembleBy pools I used to know.There, in the windless night-time,The wanderer, marvelling why,Halts on the bridge to hearkenHow soft the poplars sigh.He hears: long since forgottenIn fields where I was known,Here I lie down in LondonAnd turn to rest alone.There, by the starlit fences,The wanderer halts and hearsMy soul that lingers sighingAbout the glimmering weirs.
LIIITHE TRUE LOVERThe lad came to the door at night,When lovers crown their vows,And whistled soft and out of sightIn shadow of the boughs."I shall not vex you with my faceHenceforth, my love, for aye;So take me in your arms a spaceBefore the east is grey.""When I from hence away am pastI shall not find a bride,And you shall be the first and lastI ever lay beside."She heard and went and knew not why;Her heart to his she laid;Light was the air beneath the skyBut dark under the shade."Oh do you breathe, lad, that your breastSeems not to rise and fall,And here upon my bosom prestThere beats no heart at all?""Oh loud, my girl, it once would knock,You should have felt it then;But since for you I stopped the clockIt never goes again.""Oh lad, what is it, lad, that dripsWet from your neck on mine?What is it falling on my lips,My lad, that tastes of brine?""Oh like enough 'tis blood, my dear,For when the knife has slitThe throat across from ear to ear'Twill bleed because of it."Under the stars the air was lightBut dark below the boughs,The still air of the speechless night,When lovers crown their vows.
LIVWith rue my heart is ladenFor golden friends I had,For many a rose-lipt maidenAnd many a lightfoot lad.By brooks too broad for leapingThe lightfoot boys are laid;The rose-lipt girls are sleepingIn fields where roses fade.
LVWestward on the high-hilled plainsWhere for me the world began,Still, I think, in newer veinsFrets the changeless blood of man.Now that other lads than IStrip to bathe on Severn shore,They, no help, for all they try,Tread the mill I trod before.There, when hueless is the westAnd the darkness hushes wide,Where the lad lies down to restStands the troubled dream beside.There, on thoughts that once were mine,Day looks down the eastern steep,And the youth at morning shineMakes the vow he will not keep.
LVITHE DAY OF BATTLE"Far I hear the bugle blowTo call me where I would not go,And the guns begin the song,'Soldier, fly or stay for long.'""Comrade, if to turn and flyMade a soldier never die,Fly I would, for who would not?'Tis sure no pleasure to be shot.""But since the man that runs awayLives to die another day,And cowards' funerals, when they comeAre not wept so well at home.""Therefore, though the best is bad,Stand and do the best my lad;Stand and fight and see your slain,And take the bullet in your brain."
LVIIYou smile upon your friend to-day,To-day his ills are over;You hearken to the lover's say,And happy is the lover.'Tis late to hearken, late to smile,But better late than never:I shall have lived a little whileBefore I die for ever.
LVIIIWhen I came last to LudlowAmidst the moonlight pale,Two friends kept step beside me,Two honest lads and hale.Now Dick lies long in the churchyard,And Ned lies long in jail,And I come home to LudlowAmidst the moonlight pale.
LIXTHE ISLE OF PORTLANDThe star-filled seas are smooth to-nightFrom France to England strown;Black towers above the Portland lightThe felon-quarried stone.On yonder island, not to rise,Never to stir forth free,Far from his folk a dead lad liesThat once was friends with me.Lie you easy, dream you light,And sleep you fast for aye;And luckier may you find the nightThan ever you found the day.
LXNow hollow fires burn out to black,And lights are guttering low:Square your shoulders, lift your pack,And leave your friends and go.Oh never fear, man, nought's to dread,Look not left nor right:In all the endless road you treadThere's nothing but the night.
LXIHUGHLEY STEEPLEThe vane on Hughley steepleVeers bright, a far-known sign,And there lie Hughley people,And there lie friends of mine.Tall in their midst the towerDivides the shade and sun,And the clock strikes the hourAnd tells the time to none.To south the headstones cluster,The sunny mounds lie thick;The dead are more in musterAt Hughley than the quick.North, for a soon-told number,Chill graves the sexton delves,And steeple-shadowed slumberThe slayers of themselves.To north, to south, lie parted,With Hughley tower above,The kind, the single-hearted,The lads I used to love.And, south or north, 'tis onlyA choice of friends one knows,And I shall ne'er be lonelyAsleep with these or those.
LXII"Terence, this is stupid stuff:You eat your victuals fast enough;There can't be much amiss, 'tis clear,To see the rate you drink your beer.But oh, good Lord, the verse you make,It gives a chap the belly-ache.The cow, the old cow, she is dead;It sleeps well, the horned head:We poor lads, 'tis our turn nowTo hear such tunes as killed the cow.Pretty friendship 'tis to rhymeYour friends to death before their timeMoping melancholy mad:Come, pipe a tune to dance to, lad."Why, if 'tis dancing you would be,There's brisker pipes than poetry.Say, for what were hop-yards meant,Or why was Burton built on Trent?Oh many a peer of England brewsLivelier liquor than the Muse,And malt does more than Milton canTo justify God's ways to man.Ale, man, ale's the stuff to drinkFor fellows whom it hurts to think:Look into the pewter potTo see the world as the world's not.And faith, 'tis pleasant till 'tis past:The mischief is that 'twill not last.Oh I have been to Ludlow fairAnd left my necktie God knows where,And carried half-way home, or near,Pints and quarts of Ludlow beer:Then the world seemed none so bad,And I myself a sterling lad;And down in lovely muck I've lain,Happy till I woke again.Then I saw the morning sky:Heigho, the tale was all a lie;The world, it was the old world yet,I was I, my things were wet,And nothing now remained to doBut begin the game anew.Therefore, since the world has stillMuch good, but much less good than ill,And while the sun and moon endureLuck's a chance, but trouble's sure,I'd face it as a wise man would,And train for ill and not for good.'Tis true the stuff I bring for saleIs not so brisk a brew as ale:Out of a stem that scored the handI wrung it in a weary land.But take it: if the smack is sour,The better for the embittered hour;It should do good to heart and headWhen your soul is in my soul's stead;And I will friend you, if I may,In the dark and cloudy day.There was a king reigned in the East:There, when kings will sit to feast,They get their fill before they thinkWith poisoned meat and poisoned drink.He gathered all that springs to birthFrom the many-venomed earth;First a little, thence to more,He sampled all her killing store;And easy, smiling, seasoned sound,Sate the king when healths went round.They put arsenic in his meatAnd stared aghast to watch him eat;They poured strychnine in his cupAnd shook to see him drink it up:They shook, they stared as white's their shirt:Them it was their poison hurt.-I tell the tale that I heard told.Mithridates, he died old.
LXIIII Hoed and trenched and weeded,And took the flowers to fair:I brought them home unheeded;The hue was not the wear.So up and down I sow themFor lads like me to find,When I shall lie below them,A dead man out of mind.Some seed the birds devour,And some the season mars,But here and there will flowerThe solitary stars,And fields will yearly bear themAs light-leaved spring comes on,And luckless lads will wear themWhen I am dead and gone.