“Willyou 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.”
Lastnight when I kissed you,My soul caught alight;And oh! how I missed youThe rest of the night—Till Love in derisionSmote sleep with his wings,And gave me in visionImpossible things.
A night that was clouded,Long windows asleep;Dark avenues crowdedWith 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 lightAnd 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 thunderOf postchaise a-speed . . .My woman, my wonder,My ultimate need!
We two matched for matingCame, handclasped, at last,Where the blacksmith was waitingTo fetter us fast . . .At the touch of the fetterThe dream snapped and fell—And I woke to your letterThat bade me farewell.
Yourdear desired grace,Your hands, your lips of red,The wonder of your perfect faceWill fade, like sweet rose-petals shed,When you are dead.
Your beautiful hairDust 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 eyesWill be closed up with clay;But all the magic they comprise,The hopes, the dreams, the ecstasiesPass not away.
All I desire and seeWill be a carrion thing;But all that you have been to meIs, and can never cease to be.O Grave! where is thy victory?Where, Death, thy sting?
Therewas 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 frostOnly, driven by the ice-wind, lonely,In a world of strangers, in the welterOf the puddles and the spiteful wind and sleet,Blinded by the spitting hailstones, lostIn 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.
Inthe 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.”
Then you drain the dark cup, and, half-drugged as you lieIn 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-bearerWho holds, like a monstrance, the sun in his hands.”
Maryof Magdala came to bed;There were no soft curtains round her head;She had no mother to hold of worthThe 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 TheeTo 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 wellThat the pains I bear are the pains of hell;But the thought of the child that sin has givenIs like the thought of the airs of Heaven.”
Mary of Magdala held her breathIn 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 fairIn the little garments that babies wear?”
There came two angels with quiet wingsAnd hands that were full of baby things;And the new-born child was bathed and dressedAnd laid again on his mother’s breast.
“Now who will sign on his brow the markTo 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.”
Thiswas our house. To this we cameLighted 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 knewThe 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 hungThe spider’s ghostly cloth is flung;The beetle and the woodlouse creepWhere 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!
Sunriseis in your eyes, and in your heartThe hope and bright desire of morn and May.My eyes are full of shadow, and my partOf life is yesterday.
Yet lend my hand your hand, and let us sitAnd see your life unfolding like a scroll,Rich with illuminated blazon, fitFor your arm-bearing soul.
My soul bears arms too, but the scroll’s rolled tight,Yet the one strip of faded brightness shownProclaims that when ’twas splendid in the lightIts blazon matched your own.
Thewine 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 knewThe hues of wrong and right;We slept among the roses throughThe 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 saidThat now the young men hear!
Thisis 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 wallsHung them with cloth of splendour,And still the rose she dropped recallsThe graces that attend her.
The same poor room, so dull and bareBefore, in consecration,She breathed upon its common airThe true transfiguration . . .?This room the same to which she cameFor one immortal minute?—How can it ever be the sameSince she has once been in it!
WhenI lived in the village of youthThere were lilies in all the orchards,Flowers in the orange-gardensFor 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 youthThe doors, all the doors, stood open;We went in and out of them laughing,Laughing and calling each otherTo 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 ageWhere 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 hearthstoneWhere memories lie like ashesUpon a hearth that is cold;
And they from the village of youthRun by our doorsteps laughing,Calling, to shew each otherThe 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 themAnd will not shew them to us—To us who are old and have nothingBut the white, still, heaped-up ashesOn the hearth where the fire went outA very long time ago.
Ihada mistress; I loved her.She left me with memories bitter,Corroding, eating my heartAs the acid eats into the steelEtching the portrait triumphant.Intolerable, indelible,Never to be effaced.
A wife was mine to my heart,Beautiful flower of my garden,Lily I worshipped by day,Scented rose of my nights.Now the night wind sighingBlows white rose petals onlyOver the bed where she sleepsDreamless alone.
I had a son; I loved him.Mother of God, bear witnessHow all my manhood loved himAs thy womanhood loved thy Son!When he was grown to his manhoodHe crucified my heart,And even as it hung bleedingHe laughed with his bold companions,Mocked and turned awayWith laughter into the night.
Those three I loved and lost;But there was one who loved meWith all the fire of her heart.Mine was the sacred altarWhere she burnt her life for my worship.She was my slave, my servant;Mine all she had, all she was,All she could suffer, could be.That was the love of my life,I did not say, “She loves me”;I was so used to her loveI never asked its name,Till, feeling the wind blow coldWhere all the doors were left open,And seeing a fireless hearthAnd the garden deserted and weed-grownThat once was full of flowers for me,I said, “What has changed? What is itThat has made all the clocks stop?”Thus I asked and they answered:“It is thy mother who is dead.”
And now I am alone.My son, too, some day will standHere, where I stand and weep.He too will weep, knowing too lateThe love that wrapped round his life.Dear God spare him this:Let him never know how I loved him,For he was always weak.He could not endure as I can.Mother, my dear, ask GodTo grant me this, for my son!
Thatwas the skylark we heardSinging so high,The little quivering birdWe saw, and the sky.The earth was drenched with sun,The sky was drenched with song;We lay in the grass and listened,Long and long and long.
I said, “What a spell it isHas made her riseTo pour out her world of blissIn that world of skies!”You said, “What a spell must passBetween sky and plain,Since she finds in this world of grassHer nest again!”
Grayis the sea, and the skies are gray;They are ghosts of our blue, bright yesterday;And gray are the breasts of the gulls that screamLike tortured souls in an evil dream.
There is white on the wings of the sea and sky,And white are the gulls’ wings wheeling by,And white, like snow, is the pall that liesWhere love weeps over his memories.
For the dead is dead, and its shroud is wroughtOf good unfound and of wrong unsought;Yet from God’s good magic there ever springsThe resurrection of holy things.
See—the gold and blue of our yesterdayIn the eyes and the hair of a child at play;And the spell of joy that our youth beguiledIs woven anew in the laugh of the child.
AwallGray and tall,And a sky of gray,And a twilight cold;And that is allThat my eyes behold.But I know that unseen,Beyond the wall,On a lawn of greenWhite blossoms fallIn the waning light;And beyond the lawnCurtains are drawnFrom windows bright.And within she moves with her gracious handsAnd the heart that loves and that understands,Waiting to succour poor souls in need,And to bind with her blessing the hearts that bleed.
I know it all, though I cannot see;But the tired-out tramp,Dirty and ill,In the evening’s damp,In the Spring’s clean chill,Knows not that thereIs the heart to careFor such as I and for such as he.He slouches along, and sees aloneThe gray of the sky and the gray of the stone.
Lord, when my eyes see nothing but greyIn all Thy world that is now so green,I will bethink me of this spring dayAnd the house of welcome, known yet unseen;The wall that concealsAnd the faith that reveals.
Nowthat the sunlight dies in my eyes,And the moonlight grows in my hair,I who was never very wise,Never was very fair,Virgin and martyr all my life,What has life left to giveMe—who was never mother nor wife,Never got leave to live?
Nothing of life could I clasp or claim,Nothing could steal or save.So when you come to carve my name,Give me life in my grave.To keep me warm when I sleep aloneA lie is little to give;Call me “Magdalen” on my stone,Though I died and did not live.
It’sall for nothing: I’ve lost him now.I suppose it had to be;But oh, I never thought it of him,Nor he never thought it of me.And all for a kiss on your evening out,And a field where the grass was down . . .And he ’as gone to God-knows-where,And I may go on the town.
The worst of all was the thing he saidThe night that he went away;He said he’d ’a married me right enoughIf I hadn’t ’a been so gay.Me—gay! When I’d cried, and I’d asked him not,But he said he loved me so;An’ whatever he wanted seemed right to me . . .An’ how was a girl to know?
Well, the river is deep, and drowned folk sleep sound,An’ it might be the best to do;But when he made me a light-o’-loveHe made me a mother too.I’ve had enough sin to last my time,If ’twas sin as I got it by,But it ain’t no sin to stand by his kidAnd work for it till I die.
But oh! the long days and the death-long nightsWhen I feel it move and turn,And cry alone in my single bedAnd count what a girl can earnTo buy the baby the bits of thingsHeought to ha’ bought, by rights;And wonder whether he thinks of Us . . .And if he sleeps sound o’ nights.
Ifounda starving cat in the street:It cried for food and a place by the fire.I carried it home, and I strove to meetThe claims of its desire.
And since its desire was a little fish,A little hay and a little milk,I gave it cream in a silver dishAnd a basket lined with silk.
And when we came to the grateful pauseWhen it should have fawned on the hand that fed,It turned to a devil all teeth and claws,Scratched me and bit me and fled.
To pay for the fish and the milk and the hayWith a purr had been an easy task:But its hate and my blood were required to payFor the gifts that it did not ask.
Whereare you—you whose loving breathAlone can stay my soul from death?The world’s so wide, I seek it through,Yet—dare I dream to win to you?Perhaps your dear desirèd feetPass me in this grey muddy street.Your face, it may be, has its shrineIn that dull house that’s next to mine.But I believe, O Life, O Fate,That when I call on Death and waitOne moment at the unclosing gateI shall turn back for one last gazeAlong the trampled, sordid ways,And in the sunset see at last,Just as the barred gate holds me fast,Your face, your face, too late.
Ifyou were here,Hopes, dreams, ambitions, faith would disappear,Drowned in your eyes; and I should touch your hand,Forgetting all that now I understand.For you confuse my life with memoriesOf unrememberable ecstasiesWhich were, and are not, and can never be; . . .Ah! keep the whole earth between you and me.
Whenthe bearing and doing are over,And no more is to do or bear,God will see us and judge usThe kind of men we were;And our sins, so ugly and heavy,We shall drag them into His sight,And throw them down at the foot of the throne,Foul on the steps of light.
We shall not be shamed or frightened,Though the angels are all at hand,For He will look at our burden,And He will understand.He will turn to the little angels,Agog to hear and obey,And point to the festering sin-loadsWith, “Take that rubbish away!”
Then the steps will be cleared of the burdensThat we threw down at His feet;And we shall be washed in the tears of Christ,And our tears bathe His feet.And the harvest of all our sinningThat moment’s shame will reap—When we look in the eyes that love usAnd know we have made them weep.
Good-bye, good-bye; it is not hard to part!You have my heart—the heart that leaps to hearYour name called by an echo in a dream;You have my soul that, like an untroubled stream,Reflects your soul that leans so dear, so near—Your heartbeats set the rhythm for my heart.
What more could Life give if we gave her leaveTo give, and Life should give us leave to take?Only each other’s arms, each other’s eyes,Each other’s lips, the clinging secreciesThat are but as the written words to makeRecords of what the heart and soul achieve.
This, only this we yield, my love, my friend,To Fate’s implacable eyes and withering breath.We still are yours and mine, though, by Time’s theft,My arms are empty and your arms bereft.It is not hard to part—not harder than Death;And each of us must face Death in the end!
Underthe shadow of a hawthorn brake,Where bluebells draw the sky down to the wood,Where, ’mid brown leaves, the primroses awakeAnd hidden violets smell of solitude;Beneath green leaves bright-fluttered by the wingOf fleeting, beautiful, immortal Spring,I should have said, “I love you,” and your eyesHave said, “I, too . . . ” The gods saw otherwise.
For this is winter, and the London streetsAre full of soldiers from that far, fierce frayWhere life knows death, and where poor glory meetsFull-face with shame, and weeps and turns away.And in the broken, trampled foreign woodIs horror, and the terrible scent of blood,And love shines tremulous, like a drowning star,Under the shadow of the wings of war.
1916.
NowDeath is near, and very near,In this wild whirl of horror and fear,When round the vessel of our StateRoll the great mountain waves of hate.God! We have but one prayer to-day—O Father, teach us how to pray.
For prayer is strong, and very strong;But we have turned from Thee so longTo follow gods that have no powerSave in the safe and sordid hour,That to Thy feet we have lost the way . . .O Father, teach us how to pray.
We have done ill, and very ill,Set up our will against Thy will.That our soft lives might gorge, full-fed,We stole our brothers’ daily bread.Lord, we are sorry we went astray—O Father, teach us how to pray.
Now in this hour of desperate strifeFor England’s life, her very life,Teach us to pray that life may beA new life, beautiful to Thee,And in Thy hands that life to lay.O Father, teach us how to pray.
1915.
Go, since you must, but, Dearest, knowThat, Honour having bid you go,Your honour, if your life be spent,Shall have a costly monument.
This heart, that fire and roses isBeneath the magic of your kiss,Shall turn to marble if you dieAnd be your deathless effigy.
1914.
TheSpirit of Darkness, the Prince of the Power of the Air,The terror that walketh by night, and the horror by day,The legions of Evil, alert and awake and aware,Press round him each hour; and I pray here alone, far away.
God! call up Thy legions to fight on the side of my love,Let the seats of the mighty be cast down before him, O Lord,Send strong wings of angels to shield him beneath and above,Let glorious Michael unsheath his implacable sword.
Let the whole host of Heaven take part with my dear in his fight,That the armies of Hell may be scattered like chaff in the blast,And the trumpets of Heaven blow fair for the triumph of Right.Inspire him, protect him, and bring him home victor at last.
But if—ah, dear God, give me strength to withhold nothing now!—If the life of my life be required for Thy splendid design,Give his country the laurels, though cold and uncrowned be his brow . . .Thou gavest Thy Son for the world, and shallInot give mine?
1914.
OnceI made for you songs,Rondels, triolets, sonnets;Verse that my love deemed due,Verse that your love found fair.Now the wide wings of warHang, like a hawk’s, over England,Shadowing meadows and groves;And the birds and the lovers are mute.
Yet there’s a thing to sayBefore I go into battle,Not now a poet’s wordBut a man’s word to his mate:Dear, if I come back never,Be it your pride that we gaveThe hope of our hearts, each other,For the sake of the Hope of the World.
1915.
Lastyear the fields were all glad and gayWith silver daisies and silver may;There were kingcups gold by the river’s edgeAnd primrose stars under every hedge.
This year the fields are trampled and brown,The hedges are broken and beaten down,And where the primroses used to growAre little black crosses set in a row.
And the flower of hopes, and the flowers of dreams,The noble, fruitful, beautiful schemes,The tree of life with its fruit and bud,Are trampled down in the mud and the blood.
The changing seasons will bring againThe magic of Spring to our wood and plain:Though the Spring be so green as never was seenThe crosses will still be black in the green.
The God of battles shall judge the foeWho trampled our country and laid her low . . .God! hold our hands on the reckoning day,Lest all we owe them we should repay.
1915.
Nowthe sprinkled blackthorn snowLies along the lovers’ laneWhere last year we used to go—Where we shall not go again.
In the hedge the buds are new,By our wood the violets peer—Just like last year’s violets, too,But they have no scent this year.
Every bird has heart to singOf its nest, warmed by its breast;We had heart to sing last spring,But we never built our nest.
Presently red roses blownWill make all the garden gay . . .Not yet have the daisies grownOn your clay.
1916.
Thiswas my little sonWho leapt and laughed on my knee:Body we made with love,Soul made with love by Thee.This was the mysteryIn which I worshipped Thy grace;This was the sign to me—The unveiling of Thy face . . .This, that lies under Thy skiesNaked as on that dayWhen the floor of heaven gave wayAnd the glory of God shone through,When the world was made newAnd Thy word was made flesh for me . . .He lies there, bare to Thy skies,O Lord God, see!
Body that was in mineA secret, sacred spell,Little hands I have kissedTrampled by beasts in Hell . . .Growing beauty and grace . . .Oh, head that lay on my bosom . . .Broken, battered, shattered . . .Body that grew like a blossom!All that was promised meOn my life’s royal day.Every promise broken—Only a ghost, and clay!
O God, I kneel at Thy feet;I lay my hands in Thine:Thou gavest Thy Son for the world,And shallInot give mine?Only—O God, have pity!All my defences are down:God, I accept the Cross,Lethimhave the Crown!
By all that my love has borne,By all that all mothers bear,By the infinite patient anguish,By the never-ceasing prayer,By the thoughts that cut like a living knife,By the tears that are never dry,Take what he died to win You—God, take Your victory!
We have watched on till the light burned low,And watched the dawn awake;We have lived hardly and hardly faredFor our sons’ sake.All that was good in Thy earth,All that taught us of Heaven,All that we had in the worldWe have given.We pray with empty handsAnd hearts that are stiff with pain.O God! O God! O God!Let the sacrifice not be vain.This is his blood, Lord, see!His blood that was shed for Thee;Thy banner is dyed in that red tideLord, take Thy victory!
God! give Thine angels powerTo fight as he fought,To scatter the hosts of evil,To bring their boastings to naught—Gabriel with trumpet of battle . . .Michael, who wields Thy sword . . .Breathe Thou Thy spirit upon them,Put forth Thy strength, O Lord.See, Lord, this is his body,Broken for Thee, for Thee . . .My son, my little son,Who leapt and laughed on my knee.
IfJesus came to London,Came to London to-day,He would not go to the West End,He would come down our way;He’d talk with the children dancingTo the organ out in the street,And say he was their big Brother,And give them something to eat.
He wouldn’t go to the mansionsWhere the charitable live;He’d come to the tenement housesWhere we ain’t got nothing to give.He’d come so kind and so homely,And treat us to beer and bread,And tell us how we ought to behave;And we’d try to mind what He said.
In the warm bright West End churchesThey sing and preach and pray,They call us “Beloved brethren,”But they do not act that way.And when He came to the church doorHe’d call out loud and free,“You stop that preaching and prayingAnd show what you’ve done for Me.”
Then they’d say, “O Lord, we have givenTo the poor both blankets and tracts,And we’ve tried to make them sober,And we’ve tried to teach them facts.But they will sneak round to the drink-shop,And pawn the blankets for beer,And we find them very ungrateful,But still we persevere.”
Then He would say, “I told youThe time I was here before,That you were all of you brothers,All you that I suffered for.I won’t go into your churches,I’ll stop in the sun outside.You bring out the men your brothers,The men for whom I died!”
Out of our beastly lodgings,From arches and doorways about,They’d have to do as He told them,They’d have to call us out.Millions and millions and millions,Thick and crawling like flies,We should creep out to the sunshineAnd not be afraid of His eyes.
He’d see what God’s image looks likeWhen men have dealt with the same,Wrinkled with work that is never done,Swollen and dirty with shame.He’d see on the children’s foreheadThe branded gutter-signThat marks the girls to be harlots,That dooms the boys to be swine.
Then He’d say, “What’s the good of churchesWhen these have nowhere to sleep?And how can I hear you prayingWhen they are cursing so deep?I gave My Blood and My BodyThat they might have bread and wine,And you have taken your share and theirsOf these good gifts of mine!”
Then some of the rich would be sorry,And all would be very scared,And they’d say, “But we never knew, Lord!”And He’d say, “You never cared!”And some would be sick and shamefulBecause they’d know that they knew,And the best would say, “We were wrong, Lord.Now tell us what to do!”
I think He’d be sitting, likely,For someone ’ud bring Him a chair,With a common kid cuddled up on His kneeAnd the common sun on His hair;And they’d be standing before Him,And He’d say, “You know that you knew.Why haven’t you worked for your brothersThe same as I worked for you?
“For since you’re all of you brothersIt’s clear as God’s blessed sunThat each must work for the others,Not thousands work for one.And the ones that have lived bone-idleIf they want Me to hear them pray,Let them go and work for their livingsThe only honest way!
“I’ve got nothing new to tell you,You know what I always said—But you’ve built their bones into churchesAnd stolen their wine and bread;You with My Name on your foreheads,Liar, and traitor, and knave,You have lived by the death of your brothers,These whom I died to save!”
I wish He would come and say it;Perhaps they’d believe it then,And work like men for their livingsAnd let us work like men.Brothers? They don’t believe it,The lie on their lips is red.They’ll never believe till He comes again,Or till we rise from the dead!
Printed by the Anchor Press,Ltd.,Tiptree,Essex,England.