Satires of Circumstance, Lyrics and Reveries, with Miscellaneous Pieces

THE TWO SOLDIERS

Just at the corner of the wall   We met – yes, he and I —Who had not faced in camp or hall   Since we bade home good-bye,And what once happened came back – all —   Out of those years gone by.And that strange woman whom we knew   And loved – long dead and gone,Whose poor half-perished residue,   Tombless and trod, lay yon!But at this moment to our view   Rose like a phantom wan.And in his fixed face I could see,   Lit by a lurid shine,The drama re-enact which she   Had dyed incarnadineFor us, and more.  And doubtless he   Beheld it too in mine.A start, as at one slightly known,   And with an indifferent airWe passed, without a sign being shown   That, as it real were,A memory-acted scene had thrown   Its tragic shadow there.

THE DEATH OF REGRET

I opened my shutter at sunrise,   And looked at the hill hard by,And I heartily grieved for the comrade   Who wandered up there to die.I let in the morn on the morrow,   And failed not to think of him then,As he trod up that rise in the twilight,   And never came down again.I undid the shutter a week thence,   But not until after I’d turnedDid I call back his last departure   By the upland there discerned.Uncovering the casement long later,   I bent to my toil till the gray,When I said to myself, “Ah – what ails me,   To forget him all the day!”As daily I flung back the shutter   In the same blank bald routine,He scarcely once rose to remembrance   Through a month of my facing the scene.And ah, seldom now do I ponder   At the window as heretoforeOn the long valued one who died yonder,   And wastes by the sycamore.

IN THE DAYS OF CRINOLINE

A plain tilt-bonnet on her headShe took the path across the leaze.– Her spouse the vicar, gardening, said,“Too dowdy that, for coquetries,   So I can hoe at ease.”But when she had passed into the heath,And gained the wood beyond the flat,She raised her skirts, and from beneathUnpinned and drew as from a sheath   An ostrich-feathered hat.And where the hat had hung she nowConcealed and pinned the dowdy hood,And set the hat upon her brow,And thus emerging from the wood   Tripped on in jaunty mood.The sun was low and crimson-facedAs two came that way from the town,And plunged into the wood untraced.When separately therefrom they paced   The sun had quite gone down.The hat and feather disappeared,The dowdy hood again was donned,And in the gloom the fair one nearedHer home and husband dour, who conned   Calmly his blue-eyed blonde.“To-day,” he said, “you have shown good sense,A dress so modest and so meekShould always deck your goings henceAlone.”  And as a recompense   He kissed her on the cheek.

THE ROMAN GRAVEMOUNDS

By Rome’s dim relics there walks a man,Eyes bent; and he carries a basket and spade;I guess what impels him to scrape and scan;Yea, his dreams of that Empire long decayed.“Vast was Rome,” he must muse, “in the world’s regard,Vast it looms there still, vast it ever will be;”And he stoops as to dig and unmine some shardLeft by those who are held in such memory.But no; in his basket, see, he has broughtA little white furred thing, stiff of limb,Whose life never won from the world a thought;It is this, and not Rome, that is moving him.And to make it a grave he has come to the spot,And he delves in the ancient dead’s long home;Their fames, their achievements, the man knows not;The furred thing is all to him – nothing Rome!“Here say you that Cæsar’s warriors lie? —But my little white cat was my only friend!Could she but live, might the record dieOf Cæsar, his legions, his aims, his end!”Well, Rome’s long rule here is oft and againA theme for the sages of history,And the small furred life was worth no one’s pen;Yet its mourner’s mood has a charm for me. November 1910.

THE WORKBOX

“See, here’s the workbox, little wife,   That I made of polished oak.”He was a joiner, of village life;   She came of borough folk.He holds the present up to herAs with a smile she nearsAnd answers to the profferer,“’Twill last all my sewing years!”“I warrant it will.  And longer too.’Tis a scantling that I gotOff poor John Wayward’s coffin, whoDied of they knew not what.“The shingled pattern that seems to ceaseAgainst your box’s rimContinues right on in the pieceThat’s underground with him.“And while I worked it made me thinkOf timber’s varied doom;One inch where people eat and drink,The next inch in a tomb.“But why do you look so white, my dear,And turn aside your face?You knew not that good lad, I fear,Though he came from your native place?”“How could I know that good young man,Though he came from my native town,When he must have left there earlier thanI was a woman grown?”“Ah no.  I should have understood!It shocked you that I gaveTo you one end of a piece of woodWhose other is in a grave?”“Don’t, dear, despise my intellect,Mere accidental thingsOf that sort never have effectOn my imaginings.”Yet still her lips were limp and wan,Her face still held aside,As if she had known not only John,But known of what he died.

THE SACRILEGE A BALLAD-TRAGEDY

(Circa 182-)

Part I

“I have a Love I love too wellWhere Dunkery frowns on Exon Moor;I have a Love I love too well,   To whom, ere she was mine,‘Such is my love for you,’ I said,‘That you shall have to hood your headA silken kerchief crimson-red,   Wove finest of the fine.’“And since this Love, for one mad moon,On Exon Wild by Dunkery Tor,Since this my Love for one mad moon   Did clasp me as her king,I snatched a silk-piece red and rareFrom off a stall at Priddy Fair,For handkerchief to hood her hair   When we went gallanting.“Full soon the four weeks neared their endWhere Dunkery frowns on Exon Moor;And when the four weeks neared their end,   And their swift sweets outwore,I said, ‘What shall I do to ownThose beauties bright as tulips blown,And keep you here with me alone   As mine for evermore?’“And as she drowsed within my vanOn Exon Wild by Dunkery Tor —And as she drowsed within my van,   And dawning turned to day,She heavily raised her sloe-black eyesAnd murmured back in softest wise,‘One more thing, and the charms you prize   Are yours henceforth for aye.“‘And swear I will I’ll never goWhile Dunkery frowns on Exon MoorTo meet the Cornish Wrestler Joe   For dance and dallyings.If you’ll to yon cathedral shrine,And finger from the chest divineTreasure to buy me ear-drops fine,   And richly jewelled rings.’“I said: ‘I am one who has gathered gearFrom Marlbury Downs to Dunkery Tor,Who has gathered gear for many a year   From mansion, mart and fair;But at God’s house I’ve stayed my hand,Hearing within me some command —Curbed by a law not of the land   From doing damage there.’“Whereat she pouts, this Love of mine,As Dunkery frowns on Exon Moor,And still she pouts, this Love of mine,   So cityward I go.But ere I start to do the thing,And speed my soul’s imperillingFor one who is my ravishing   And all the joy I know,“I come to lay this charge on thee —On Exon Wild by Dunkery Tor —I come to lay this charge on thee   With solemn speech and sign:Should things go ill, and my life payFor botchery in this rash assay,You are to take hers likewise – yea,   The month the law takes mine.“For should my rival, Wrestler Joe,Where Dunkery frowns on Exon Moor —My reckless rival, Wrestler Joe,   My Love’s possessor be,My tortured spirit would not rest,But wander weary and distrestThroughout the world in wild protest:   The thought nigh maddens me!”

Part II

Thus did he speak – this brother of mine —On Exon Wild by Dunkery Tor,Born at my birth of mother of mine,   And forthwith went his wayTo dare the deed some coming night.I kept the watch with shaking sight,The moon at moments breaking bright,   At others glooming gray.For three full days I heard no soundWhere Dunkery frowns on Exon Moor,I heard no sound at all around   Whether his fay prevailed,Or one malign the master were,Till some afoot did tidings bearHow that, for all his practised care,   He had been caught and jailed.They had heard a crash when twelve had chimedBy Mendip east of Dunkery Tor,When twelve had chimed and moonlight climbed;   They watched, and he was trackedBy arch and aisle and saint and knightOf sculptured stonework sheeted whiteIn the cathedral’s ghostly light,   And captured in the act.Yes; for this Love he loved too wellWhere Dunkery sights the Severn shore,All for this Love he loved too well   He burst the holy bars,Seized golden vessels from the chestTo buy her ornaments of the best,At her ill-witchery’s request   And lure of eyes like stars.When blustering March confused the skyIn Toneborough Town by Exon Moor,When blustering March confused the sky   They stretched him; and he died.Down in the crowd where I, to seeThe end of him, stood silently,With a set face he lipped to me —   “Remember.”  “Ay!” I cried.By night and day I shadowed herFrom Toneborough Deane to Dunkery Tor,I shadowed her asleep, astir,   And yet I could not bear —Till Wrestler Joe anon beganTo figure as her chosen man,And took her to his shining van —   To doom a form so fair!He made it handsome for her sake —And Dunkery smiled to Exon Moor —He made it handsome for her sake,   Painting it out and in;And on the door of apple-greenA bright brass knocker soon was seen,And window-curtains white and clean   For her to sit within.And all could see she clave to himAs cleaves a cloud to Dunkery Tor,Yea, all could see she clave to him,   And every day I said,“A pity it seems to part those twoThat hourly grow to love more true:Yet she’s the wanton woman who   Sent one to swing till dead!”That blew to blazing all my hate,While Dunkery frowned on Exon Moor,And when the river swelled, her fate   Came to her pitilessly.I dogged her, crying: “Across that plankThey use as bridge to reach yon bankA coat and hat lie limp and dank;   Your goodman’s, can they be?”She paled, and went, I close behind —And Exon frowned to Dunkery Tor,She went, and I came up behind   And tipped the plank that boreHer, fleetly flitting across to eyeWhat such might bode.  She slid awry;And from the current came a cry,   A gurgle; and no more.How that befell no mortal knewFrom Marlbury Downs to Exon Moor;No mortal knew that deed undue   But he who schemed the crime,Which night still covers.. But in dreamThose ropes of hair upon the streamHe sees, and he will hear that scream   Until his judgment-time.

THE ABBEY MASON

(Inventor of the “Perpendicular” Style of Gothic Architecture)

The new-vamped Abbey shaped apaceIn the fourteenth century of grace;(The church which, at an after date,Acquired cathedral rank and state.)Panel and circumscribing wallOf latest feature, trim and tall,Rose roundabout the Norman coreIn prouder pose than theretofore,Encasing magically the oldWith parpend ashlars manifold.The trowels rang out, and traceryAppeared where blanks had used to be.Men toiled for pleasure more than pay,And all went smoothly day by day,Till, in due course, the transept partEngrossed the master-mason’s art.– Home-coming thence he tossed and turnedThroughout the night till the new sun burned.“What fearful visions have inspiredThese gaingivings?” his wife inquired;“As if your tools were in your handYou have hammered, fitted, muttered, planned;“You have thumped as you were working hard:I might have found me bruised and scarred.“What then’s amiss.  What eating careLooms nigh, whereof I am unaware?”He answered not, but churchward went,Viewing his draughts with discontent;And fumbled there the livelong dayTill, hollow-eyed, he came away.– ’Twas said, “The master-mason’s ill!”And all the abbey works stood still.Quoth Abbot Wygmore: “Why, O whyDistress yourself?  You’ll surely die!”The mason answered, trouble-torn,“This long-vogued style is quite outworn!“The upper archmould nohow servesTo meet the lower tracery curves:“The ogees bend too far awayTo give the flexures interplay.“This it is causes my distress.So it will ever be unless“New forms be found to supersedeThe circle when occasions need.“To carry it out I have tried and toiled,And now perforce must own me foiled!“Jeerers will say: ‘Here was a manWho could not end what he began!’”– So passed that day, the next, the next;The abbot scanned the task, perplexed;The townsmen mustered all their witTo fathom how to compass it,But no raw artistries availedWhere practice in the craft had failed.– One night he tossed, all open-eyed,And early left his helpmeet’s side.Scattering the rushes of the floorHe wandered from the chamber doorAnd sought the sizing pile, whereonStruck dimly a cadaverous dawnThrough freezing rain, that drenched the boardOf diagram-lines he last had scored —Chalked phantasies in vain begotTo knife the architectural knot —In front of which he dully stood,Regarding them in hopeless mood.He closelier looked; then looked again:The chalk-scratched draught-board faced the rain,Whose icicled drops deformed the linesInnumerous of his lame designs,So that they streamed in small white threadsFrom the upper segments to the headsOf arcs below, uniting themEach by a stalactitic stem.– At once, with eyes that struck out sparks,He adds accessory cusping-marks,Then laughs aloud.  The thing was doneSo long assayed from sun to sun.– Now in his joy he grew awareOf one behind him standing there,And, turning, saw the abbot, whoThe weather’s whim was watching too.Onward to Prime the abbot went,Tacit upon the incident.– Men now discerned as days revolvedThe ogive riddle had been solved;Templates were cut, fresh lines were chalkedWhere lines had been defaced and balked,And the work swelled and mounted higher,Achievement distancing desire;Here jambs with transoms fixed between,Where never the like before had been —There little mullions thinly sawnWhere meeting circles once were drawn.“We knew,” men said, “the thing would goAfter his craft-wit got aglow,“And, once fulfilled what he has designed,We’ll honour him and his great mind!”When matters stood thus poised awhile,And all surroundings shed a smile,The master-mason on an eveHomed to his wife and seemed to grieve.– “The abbot spoke to me to-day:He hangs about the works alway.“He knows the source as well as IOf the new style men magnify.“He said: ‘You pride yourself too muchOn your creation.  Is it such?“‘Surely the hand of God it isThat conjured so, and only His! —“‘Disclosing by the frost and rainForms your invention chased in vain;“‘Hence the devices deemed so greatYou copied, and did not create.’“I feel the abbot’s words are just,And that all thanks renounce I must.“Can a man welcome praise and pelfFor hatching art that hatched itself?.“So, I shall own the deft designIs Heaven’s outshaping, and not mine.”“What!” said she.  “Praise your works ensureTo throw away, and quite obscure“Your beaming and beneficent star?Better you leave things as they are!“Why, think awhile.  Had not your zestIn your loved craft curtailed your rest —“Had you not gone there ere the dayThe sun had melted all away!”– But, though his good wife argued so,The mason let the people knowThat not unaided sprang the thoughtWhereby the glorious fane was wrought,But that by frost when dawn was dimThe method was disclosed to him.“Yet,” said the townspeople thereat,“’Tis your own doing, even with that!”But he – chafed, childlike, in extremes —The temperament of men of dreams —Aloofly scrupled to admitThat he did aught but borrow it,And diffidently made requestThat with the abbot all should rest.– As none could doubt the abbot’s word,Or question what the church averred,The mason was at length believedOf no more count than he conceived,And soon began to lose the fameThat late had gathered round his name.– Time passed, and like a living thingThe pile went on embodying,And workmen died, and young ones grew,And the old mason sank from viewAnd Abbots Wygmore and Staunton wentAnd Horton sped the embellishment.But not till years had far progressedChanced it that, one day, much impressed,Standing within the well-graced aisle,He asked who first conceived the style;And some decrepit sage detailedHow, when invention nought availed,The cloud-cast waters in their whimCame down, and gave the hint to himWho struck each arc, and made each mould;And how the abbot would not holdAs sole begetter him who appliedForms the Almighty sent as guide;And how the master lost renown,And wore in death no artist’s crown.– Then Horton, who in inner thoughtHad more perceptions than he taught,Replied: “Nay; art can but transmute;Invention is not absolute;“Things fail to spring from nought at call,And art-beginnings most of all.“He did but what all artists do,Wait upon Nature for his cue.”– “Had you been here to tell them soLord Abbot, sixty years ago,“The mason, now long underground,Doubtless a different fate had found.“He passed into oblivion dim,And none knew what became of him!“His name?  ’Twas of some common kindAnd now has faded out of mind.”The Abbot: “It shall not be hid!I’ll trace it.”.. But he never did.– When longer yet dank death had wormedThe brain wherein the style had germedFrom Gloucester church it flew afar —The style called Perpendicular. —To Winton and to WestminsterIt ranged, and grew still beautifuller:From Solway Frith to Dover StrandIts fascinations starred the land,Not only on cathedral wallsBut upon courts and castle halls,Till every edifice in the isleWas patterned to no other style,And till, long having played its part,The curtain fell on Gothic art.– Well: when in Wessex on your rounds,Take a brief step beyond its bounds,And enter Gloucester: seek the quoinWhere choir and transept interjoin,And, gazing at the forms there flungAgainst the sky by one unsung —The ogee arches transom-topped,The tracery-stalks by spandrels stopped,Petrified lacework – lightly linedOn ancient massiveness behind —Muse that some minds so modest beAs to renounce fame’s fairest fee,(Like him who crystallized on this spotHis visionings, but lies forgot,And many a mediaeval oneWhose symmetries salute the sun)While others boom a baseless claim,And upon nothing rear a name.

THE JUBILEE OF A MAGAZINE

(To the Editor)

Yes; your up-dated modern page —All flower-fresh, as it appears —Can claim a time-tried lineage,That reaches backward fifty years(Which, if but short for sleepy squires,Is much in magazines’ careers).– Here, on your cover, never tiresThe sower, reaper, thresher, whileAs through the seasons of our siresEach wills to work in ancient styleWith seedlip, sickle, share and flail,Though modes have since moved many a mile!The steel-roped plough now rips the vale,With cog and tooth the sheaves are won,Wired wheels drum out the wheat like hail;But if we ask, what has been doneTo unify the mortal lotSince your bright leaves first saw the sun,Beyond mechanic furtherance – whatAdvance can rightness, candour, claim?Truth bends abashed, and answers not.Despite your volumes’ gentle aimTo straighten visions wry and wrong,Events jar onward much the same!– Had custom tended to prolong,As on your golden page engrained,Old processes of blade and prong,And best invention been retainedFor high crusades to lessen tearsThroughout the race, the world had gained!.But too much, this, for fifty years.

THE SATIN SHOES

“If ever I walk to church to wed,   As other maidens use,And face the gathered eyes,” she said,   “I’ll go in satin shoes!”She was as fair as early day   Shining on meads unmown,And her sweet syllables seemed to play   Like flute-notes softly blown.The time arrived when it was meet   That she should be a bride;The satin shoes were on her feet,   Her father was at her side.They stood within the dairy door,   And gazed across the green;The church loomed on the distant moor,   But rain was thick between.“The grass-path hardly can be stepped,   The lane is like a pool!” —Her dream is shown to be inept,   Her wish they overrule.“To go forth shod in satin soft   A coach would be required!”For thickest boots the shoes were doffed —   Those shoes her soul desired.All day the bride, as overborne,   Was seen to brood apart,And that the shoes had not been worn   Sat heavy on her heart.From her wrecked dream, as months flew on,   Her thought seemed not to range.“What ails the wife?” they said anon,   “That she should be so strange?”.Ah – what coach comes with furtive glide —   A coach of closed-up kind?It comes to fetch the last year’s bride,   Who wanders in her mind.She strove with them, and fearfully ran   Stairward with one low scream:“Nay – coax her,” said the madhouse man,   “With some old household theme.”“If you will go, dear, you must fain   Put on those shoes – the pairMeant for your marriage, which the rain   Forbade you then to wear.”She clapped her hands, flushed joyous hues;   “O yes – I’ll up and rideIf I am to wear my satin shoes   And be a proper bride!”Out then her little foot held she,   As to depart with speed;The madhouse man smiled pleasantly   To see the wile succeed.She turned to him when all was done,   And gave him her thin hand,Exclaiming like an enraptured one,   “This time it will be grand!”She mounted with a face elate,   Shut was the carriage door;They drove her to the madhouse gate,   And she was seen no more.Yet she was fair as early day   Shining on meads unmown,And her sweet syllables seemed to play   Like flute-notes softly blown.

EXEUNT OMNES

I   Everybody else, then, going,And I still left where the fair was?.Much have I seen of neighbour loungers   Making a lusty showing,   Each now past all knowing.II   There is an air of blanknessIn the street and the littered spaces;Thoroughfare, steeple, bridge and highway   Wizen themselves to lankness;   Kennels dribble dankness.III   Folk all fade.  And whither,As I wait alone where the fair was?Into the clammy and numbing night-fog   Whence they entered hither.   Soon do I follow thither! June 2, 1913.

A POET

Attentive eyes, fantastic heed,Assessing minds, he does not need,Nor urgent writs to sup or dine,Nor pledges in the roseate wine.For loud acclaim he does not careBy the august or rich or fair,Nor for smart pilgrims from afar,Curious on where his hauntings are.But soon or later, when you hearThat he has doffed this wrinkled gear,Some evening, at the first star-ray,Come to his graveside, pause and say:“Whatever the message his to tell,Two bright-souled women loved him well.”Stand and say that amid the dim:It will be praise enough for him. July 1914.

POSTSCRIPT “MEN WHO MARCH AWAY”

(SONG OF THE SOLDIERS)

What of the faith and fire within us   Men who march away   Ere the barn-cocks say   Night is growing gray,To hazards whence no tears can win us;What of the faith and fire within us   Men who march away?Is it a purblind prank, O think you,   Friend with the musing eye,   Who watch us stepping by   With doubt and dolorous sigh?Can much pondering so hoodwink you!Is it a purblind prank, O think you,   Friend with the musing eye?Nay.  We well see what we are doing,   Though some may not see —   Dalliers as they be —   England’s need are we;Her distress would leave us rueing:Nay.  We well see what we are doing,   Though some may not see!In our heart of hearts believing   Victory crowns the just,   And that braggarts must   Surely bite the dust,Press we to the field ungrieving,In our heart of hearts believing   Victory crowns the just.Hence the faith and fire within us   Men who march away   Ere the barn-cocks say   Night is growing gray,To hazards whence no tears can win us:Hence the faith and fire within us   Men who march away. September 5, 1914.