WHEELS 1919.

FENRIS the wolf, and Jörmungand the snakeIn the slime and the swamp remorseless wait.For not the years nor human hopes can breakValhalla’s sentence thus pronounced by Fate.“These gods that are the children of men’s dreams—Virtue and honour, courage and the songsMen sing about their hearthstones—stolen gleamsIn the poor heart unbroken by its wrongs,“These gods, of man’s refusal of the beastThe half pathetic, wholly fleeting signWho in that tenderness are gods the leastWhere human weakness finds them most divine,“These pitiful gods, fabric of mankind’s tearsA dream of what all human hearts have wantedThe vision at the end of all the yearsThe holy ghost that half the world has haunted,“These gods are mortal as the heart that shaped themAnd in that hour when mankind’s heart must breakThese gods who only by that heart escaped themFall to the wolf and Jörmungand the snake.”Fate pauses, but from Hela’s halls is heardA voice is young when all the gods are dead.Balder the beautiful has one more wordThe word that even Fate must leave unsaid.“True they depart the half-gods, and the snakeAnd Fenris come. But in the heart’s defectionI, Balder, bound in Hell for that heart’s sakeI am the life and I the resurrection.“I, love, being loosed, will take my harp up—so—Singing what all the world at last will learn‘The devils come because the half-gods goBut in the end the gods, the gods return.’”

FENRIS the wolf, and Jörmungand the snakeIn the slime and the swamp remorseless wait.For not the years nor human hopes can breakValhalla’s sentence thus pronounced by Fate.

“These gods that are the children of men’s dreams—Virtue and honour, courage and the songsMen sing about their hearthstones—stolen gleamsIn the poor heart unbroken by its wrongs,

“These gods, of man’s refusal of the beastThe half pathetic, wholly fleeting signWho in that tenderness are gods the leastWhere human weakness finds them most divine,

“These pitiful gods, fabric of mankind’s tearsA dream of what all human hearts have wantedThe vision at the end of all the yearsThe holy ghost that half the world has haunted,

“These gods are mortal as the heart that shaped themAnd in that hour when mankind’s heart must breakThese gods who only by that heart escaped themFall to the wolf and Jörmungand the snake.”

Fate pauses, but from Hela’s halls is heardA voice is young when all the gods are dead.Balder the beautiful has one more wordThe word that even Fate must leave unsaid.

“True they depart the half-gods, and the snakeAnd Fenris come. But in the heart’s defectionI, Balder, bound in Hell for that heart’s sakeI am the life and I the resurrection.

“I, love, being loosed, will take my harp up—so—Singing what all the world at last will learn‘The devils come because the half-gods goBut in the end the gods, the gods return.’”

WHY d’you write about Frascati’sYou who from the balcony leaning’Neath the lure that was Astarte’sFind a negroid devil grinning.Changed indeed and almost stupidYielding to analysisNow a Piccadilly cupidHanging on a painted kiss.Now a toy in two dimensionsOperated by a stringIn your hand, whose interventionsSet the object capering.You who at the higher levelKnow love as he truly isNot the fair Assyrian devil,Not the poor idolatries,Of the savage, not the crazesSay of Shelley, and his set:But you find him (as your phrase is)Palm to palm in quiet sweat.That’s a way, O brother brotherA new way for verse to moveThere’s an older and anotherWill you listen? way of love.I from that same terrace waitingFor the music to begin“Amoureuse” anticipatingWatched a boy who blundered in.Slim he was, a little stoopingAt the shoulders as it seemed,Eyes on which the lids were droopingSeeing only what he dreamed.Where he came was noise and clatter,But the pandemoniumEither didn’t seem to matterWhere he stood or else grew dumb.And the waltz the band was creaking,Like a cluster, round his headChanged to cry “What’s music seekingSave what he has left unsaid.”And like flowers, bourgeois facesOvertaken by the tune,Pilfered unimagined gracesFrom an unimagined June.And, when once again the BabelRose, though we had never stirred,There between us at the tableAt Frascati’s was the third.What’s the good of all this anticYou’ll impatiently exclaim,Still incurably romanticStill incurably the same.Only this—that at Frascati’sIf one does not wash one’s handsThat old magic was Astarte’sGoes, before one understands.

WHY d’you write about Frascati’sYou who from the balcony leaning’Neath the lure that was Astarte’sFind a negroid devil grinning.

Changed indeed and almost stupidYielding to analysisNow a Piccadilly cupidHanging on a painted kiss.

Now a toy in two dimensionsOperated by a stringIn your hand, whose interventionsSet the object capering.

You who at the higher levelKnow love as he truly isNot the fair Assyrian devil,Not the poor idolatries,

Of the savage, not the crazesSay of Shelley, and his set:But you find him (as your phrase is)Palm to palm in quiet sweat.

That’s a way, O brother brotherA new way for verse to moveThere’s an older and anotherWill you listen? way of love.

I from that same terrace waitingFor the music to begin“Amoureuse” anticipatingWatched a boy who blundered in.

Slim he was, a little stoopingAt the shoulders as it seemed,Eyes on which the lids were droopingSeeing only what he dreamed.

Where he came was noise and clatter,But the pandemoniumEither didn’t seem to matterWhere he stood or else grew dumb.

And the waltz the band was creaking,Like a cluster, round his headChanged to cry “What’s music seekingSave what he has left unsaid.”

And like flowers, bourgeois facesOvertaken by the tune,Pilfered unimagined gracesFrom an unimagined June.

And, when once again the BabelRose, though we had never stirred,There between us at the tableAt Frascati’s was the third.

What’s the good of all this anticYou’ll impatiently exclaim,Still incurably romanticStill incurably the same.

Only this—that at Frascati’sIf one does not wash one’s handsThat old magic was Astarte’sGoes, before one understands.

AT full afternoon slowly the branchesStirred as of old and fragrant with flowersTouched with a breath of wind look down and wonderTo where—far below—is the delicate water.Here should be peace as was peace and splendourOf hearts’ first stirrings, the eye to the hillsTurned, the call of the perilous marginsLife just beginning, but life well begun.Here by the well we played (you remember)(Then too the grasses grew at the edgesTempting small hands but tempt now no longer)Here by the well we dreamed after playing.Have you forgotten (or has death no mercy)How bright the days were and how the eveningSofter than sleep laid her mysteriousHands on the garden soothing and changing.Here at the well side we loved after dreamingSince we had played by it, since we had dreamed.Here at the well side love that was wakenedSank like a stone, but leaving no ripple.Here are our shapes that play dream love quarrel,Here are our dreams (and if there were dreamers,If we were not like our visions a dream)All is not over—is all then over?Here is the well and the delicate waterFar below gleaming, the starred white branchesFragrant with flowers. Here is the noontide,Even the grasses grow at the edges.What then is gone? If we were the dreamers(And not a dream) then all must be over.I an old man cold, fruitless and lonely,Watch by the water, which you cannot see.But if we two are dreams of a dreamer,All is not over, and here togetherAge falls from me, and from you the mantleDeath seemed to cast, and here by the well sideLifted again is the voice of your singing,Golden again are the perilous margins,Sweet are your eyes and young and immortalOur hearts are set to the day and the hills.

AT full afternoon slowly the branchesStirred as of old and fragrant with flowersTouched with a breath of wind look down and wonderTo where—far below—is the delicate water.

Here should be peace as was peace and splendourOf hearts’ first stirrings, the eye to the hillsTurned, the call of the perilous marginsLife just beginning, but life well begun.Here by the well we played (you remember)(Then too the grasses grew at the edgesTempting small hands but tempt now no longer)Here by the well we dreamed after playing.

Have you forgotten (or has death no mercy)How bright the days were and how the eveningSofter than sleep laid her mysteriousHands on the garden soothing and changing.Here at the well side we loved after dreamingSince we had played by it, since we had dreamed.Here at the well side love that was wakenedSank like a stone, but leaving no ripple.

Here are our shapes that play dream love quarrel,Here are our dreams (and if there were dreamers,If we were not like our visions a dream)All is not over—is all then over?

Here is the well and the delicate waterFar below gleaming, the starred white branchesFragrant with flowers. Here is the noontide,Even the grasses grow at the edges.What then is gone? If we were the dreamers(And not a dream) then all must be over.I an old man cold, fruitless and lonely,Watch by the water, which you cannot see.

But if we two are dreams of a dreamer,All is not over, and here togetherAge falls from me, and from you the mantleDeath seemed to cast, and here by the well sideLifted again is the voice of your singing,Golden again are the perilous margins,Sweet are your eyes and young and immortalOur hearts are set to the day and the hills.

NOT I, oh Christ, not I betrayed theeBut He was traitor, He who made theeBorn of a village carpenterWith such immortal longings stirAs stretched beyond the world and foundIn God himself the final wound.Through me thou wast by soldiers takenBy Him, by Him on the Cross forsaken.

BE quiet birdBe silent allThat e’er were heardAnd cease to call.Drop perfume roseAnd flowers whitePut off your showsFor see ’tis night.Soft creatures slowBegin to pass,And thousands growFrom out the grass.With deep low whirrThe air is fullAnd through the firThe moon shines cool.There is no painSorrow is deadSlow Charles’ wainWheels overhead.There is no griefAll things have easeNo bough or leafStirs on the trees.

BE quiet birdBe silent allThat e’er were heardAnd cease to call.

Drop perfume roseAnd flowers whitePut off your showsFor see ’tis night.

Soft creatures slowBegin to pass,And thousands growFrom out the grass.

With deep low whirrThe air is fullAnd through the firThe moon shines cool.

There is no painSorrow is deadSlow Charles’ wainWheels overhead.

There is no griefAll things have easeNo bough or leafStirs on the trees.

AT NOONTIDE SEEKING.

CAN love being love and therefore magicalWhen summer and the roses lie between,Find back to spring? Or shall he know at allThe places where his golden feet have beenAt noontide seeking. Shall he know againThe tune of dawn, the unconditioned sky,The world before the coming of the rain,That like a shadow waited and went by,Soft like a God and like a God aflame?Ah will he find that murmur at your lips,Still see you standing, as the morning stands,With fingers stretched that touched and fled and cameTo mine again, warm to the tender lipsOnce lilies and now roses—Oh your hands?

AN ACCUSATION.

WHAT have you given, love, to those who gaveAll for your sake? What gift to weigh the worthOf those who, having all, did nothing save,But for a kiss made jetsam of the earth?What answer have you for the thronging ghosts—Gentlemen of high heart, who were not braveBecause of you? What for the stricken hostsOf those who, seeking truth, embraced the graveYour magic sets about the brain? What wayOf answer have you for the fallen tearsOf those who heard you calling, and, once strongAs being pure, became the body’s prey?What answer, O sweet God, to all the yearsThat worshipped you and crowned you, and were wrong?

THE TREMBLING BRIM.

LOVE, if remorseless, needeth no defence,(You say) for though he waste our lives it seemsA moment spent with love is recompense,For all the might have beens of all our dreams.Yet is there something in the might have beenWas never yet in love. O trembling brimOf the far country, that our eyes have seen,Have seen and turned from for the sake of him.Are there no pleasant places, no strange deedsWaiting the comer? Is there no great seaWatched by immaculate angels who attendOur sails that linger? No red star that leadsTo where beyond all passion shaken freeWe follow the great road that has no end?

ALL things are true of love, save these things only,That at the long day’s end when love is over,He’s of love cheated who was once a lover,And she, by love once visited, left lonely.The dream is done, but here’s no cause for sorrowWhen beauty’s seal is on the dream descending.Beauty is mortal, beauty has an ending,Beauty and love alone need no to-morrow.All other things—courage and truth and virtue—Have the one doom, the lust for the immortal.Love only, with lost beauty, life outpaces,Cold, though they burn, untroubled, though they hurt you,And white, like gods, when through the sculptured portalThe starshine enter and the moon’s cold graces.

GOD gave us bodies for suffering and for strangers,To have their will of. We divided wakenTo find the heart that won through all its dangersBy the stained body at the dawn forsaken.We said of love “The body, and its langoursAre but a little thing, though sweet. UnshakenBehold the heart!” Fools! Who forgot the angersOf blood despised and the heart overtakenBy the gross hands of lust even at the portalOf bliss. And not for any tears is alteredLove thus betrayed, yet though betrayed, immortal,Struggling for ever and for ever haltered.God gave us bodies; let them write in heaven“Love we forgive, but God is not forgiven.”

YOU sang, Ronsard, in your imperial layHélène, and sang as only you would dareThat she would cry, in reading, old and grey“Ronsard sang this of me when I was fair.”That was youth spoke, Ronsard, who will not stayTo wonder if his own divine despairMay not with losing loveliness outweighKisses, that given, melt upon the air.If youth but knew, Ronsard! The things that seemWould he not barter for the things that are,And leave his mistress to embrace her dreamExchange her lips for her lost beauty’s star?Losing Hélène youth finds the lovelier truth,If youth but knew! But then he were not youth.

LOVE, lay aside your lute and leave the rosesThat with the bays are twined. No time for sweepingThe strings now in the hush of the heart, nor reapingSummer’s fulfilment. For the daylight closesWith laying on of hands and the heart shriven,And mystical washing away of sorrow,So there is neither yesterday nor morrowBut quiet and the world to healing given.And if such peace o’er lute and roses driftedWould seem to beggar love of coronationThus in the darkness fallen on an ending,See! Than the sun, whose golden hands were liftedIn heaven, now cloaked, more lovely seek her station,The moon consummate in her place ascending.

EVEN tho’ love were done, shall we complainIf in the world there’s hidden lovelinessBorn of that love, and not a lost caressBut makes us poorer to the common gain?This beauty may adorn with deeper stainThe cool first jonquil, or with light redressThe vision of a star, and thus confessThat love, though lost, is never lost in vain.And if for others we have lit this flame,While us the gloom invests of dying embers,Being so separate, your heart remembers,As mine, the world before the wonder came,For that sweet change we spent our hearts in heaven,Thus briefly won, thus lost, and thus forgiven.

YOU from Givenchy, since no years can hardenThe beautiful dead, when holy twilight reachesThe sleeping cedar and the copper beeches,Return to walk again in Wadham Garden.We, growing old, grow stranger to the College,Symbol of youth, where we were young together,But you, beyond the reach of time and weather,Of youth in death for ever keep the knowledge.We hoard our youth, we hoard our youth, and fear it,But you, who freely gave what we have hoarded,Are with the final goal of youth rewardedThe road to travel and the traveller’s spirit.And, therefore, when for us the stars go down,Your star is steady over Oxford Town.

DEAR English heart, the open waterways,The sea that is aware of liberty,And your great ships, her servitors, the seaDeep, as your depths, saying of pomp and blaze,“These things are not for us,” since other daysReturn, and when the flag is shaken free,Cold captains, Drake and Nelson, watch with thee,Whose eyes, of boastings cleared and empty praise,Beyond the wrecked armadas find the soulThat unto battle brings our captains’ test:“Triumph is good, but honour still is best.Conquest of what is evil, and no goalOf self-advancement. For the world set freeThe ships of England keep the English sea.”

SOLDIERS that after struggle in the nightSee the cold stars assume their shining place,Watch the sweet moon and her unaltered graceMocking with peace the battle-tortured sight,Think these not careless. These were not less whiteLong years ago upon the upturned faceOf other soldiers also of your raceWho on those fields fought such another fight,These stars, this moon, in their high citadelOf heaven are witness in the Low Country,Whose lights are the mere lights of historyFalling on you, these on your fathers fell.See through the reek and horror, shining through,Cold lights indeed, but lights of Waterloo!

THIS then was love of women. O how littleRemembered, being free! Say she was tenderAnd had a lure of the hands. Here ruthless splendourOutlures that lure. And, look you, love was brittleThat broke, and none could heal it, being sated.But this is lasting, this is always strangerEach terrible new dawn, for each new dangerMay be the last of all. O, we have waitedOn love like cowards, and the worshipped womanEnslaved and shamed us. But that shame is over.We are with death acquainted, and to riotAnd call of blood and tenderness and humanRegrets, he does succeed this final loverWhose love is freedom and whose gift is quiet.

THE chestnut trees in Bushey Park are litThis year as always since the spring knows naughtOf war and death, and still the shadows flitAcross the dappled grass and burnish it.And still at night the moon in stately sortIs tranquil with the avenues, and lightsThe sleeping palace, as on other nightsOf springs long past; but searching for the roseIn vain, the dawn a little whisper knows:“Where are the flowers that were at Hampton Court?”Two years ago when all the trees were greenThe old red walls were unto to summer brought,By joyous bands of lilies and the leanDaffodils danced before or ran between.Where are they gone these blooms of good report?And where the lad and where the laughing maidWho came to wonder and to love who stayed?For a lost flower is a little thingBut a lost lover is the end of spring.“Where are the flowers that were at Hampton Court?”Ah! spring these flowers are growing otherwhere,In a new soil a changing radiance taught,Born of the soul and nourished of the air,Sweeter though scentless and unseen more fair.Where are they gone these blooms of good report?Is it perhaps that where the Tigris flowsThere blooms an unaccustomed English rose?And where the guns have killed the spring in FranceThe English lilies break a silver lance?“Where are the flowers that were at Hampton Court?”If thus the flowers, where are those who hereThemselves fresh flowers with the springtime fraught,Saw the first leaves in Bushey Park appearThe dead swept leaves the leaves of yesteryear?Where are they gone those lads of good report?It may be they are sleeping; it may beStrange lands have taken them or a strange sea.But wheresoever in the world they lieAn English voice till that world ends will cry“Here are the flowers that were at Hampton Court?”

Two years ago when all the trees were greenThe old red walls were unto to summer brought,By joyous bands of lilies and the leanDaffodils danced before or ran between.Where are they gone these blooms of good report?And where the lad and where the laughing maidWho came to wonder and to love who stayed?For a lost flower is a little thingBut a lost lover is the end of spring.“Where are the flowers that were at Hampton Court?”

Ah! spring these flowers are growing otherwhere,In a new soil a changing radiance taught,Born of the soul and nourished of the air,Sweeter though scentless and unseen more fair.Where are they gone these blooms of good report?Is it perhaps that where the Tigris flowsThere blooms an unaccustomed English rose?And where the guns have killed the spring in FranceThe English lilies break a silver lance?“Where are the flowers that were at Hampton Court?”

If thus the flowers, where are those who hereThemselves fresh flowers with the springtime fraught,Saw the first leaves in Bushey Park appearThe dead swept leaves the leaves of yesteryear?Where are they gone those lads of good report?It may be they are sleeping; it may beStrange lands have taken them or a strange sea.But wheresoever in the world they lieAn English voice till that world ends will cry“Here are the flowers that were at Hampton Court?”

Printed at The Vincent Works, Oxford.

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