Selected Poems (Penguin Classics) (30 page)

Lost in the night at last. We, lone and left

Silent through centuries, ever and anon

Venture to probe again the vault bereft

Of all now save the lesser lights, a mist

Of multitudinous points, yet suns, men say –

And this leaps ruby, this lurks amethyst,

But where may hide what came and loved our clay?

[50] How shall the sage detect in yon expanse

The star which chose to stoop and stay for us?

Unroll the records! Hailed ye such advance

Indeed, and did your hope evanish thus?

Watchers of twilight, is the worst averred?

We shall not look up, know ourselves are seen,

Speak, and be sure that we again are heard,

Acting or suffering, have the disk’s serene

Reflect our life, absorb an earthly flame,

Nor doubt that, were mankind inert and numb,

[60] Its core had never crimsoned all the same,

Nor, missing ours, its music fallen dumb?

Oh, dread succession to a dizzy post,

Sad sway of sceptre whose mere touch appals,

Ghastly dethronement, cursed by those the most

On whose repugnant brow the crown next falls!

Third Speaker

I

Witless alike of will and way divine,

How heaven’s high with earth’s low should intertwine!

Friends, I have seen through your eyes: now use mine!

II

Take the least man of all mankind, as I;

[70] Look at his head and heart, find how and why

He differs from his fellows utterly:

III

Then, like me, watch when nature by degrees

Grows alive round him, as in Arctic seas

(They said of old) the instinctive water flees

IV

Toward some elected point of central rock,

As though, for its sake only, roamed the flock

Of waves about the waste: awhile they mock

V

With radiance caught for the occasion, – hues

Of blackest hell now, now such reds and blues

[80] As only heaven could fitly interfuse, –

VI

The mimic monarch of the whirlpool, king

O’ the current for a minute: then they wring

Up by the roots and oversweep the thing,

VII

And hasten off, to play again elsewhere

The same part, choose another peak as bare,

They find and flatter, feast and finish there.

VIII

When you see what I tell you, – nature dance

About each man of us, retire, advance,

As though the pageant’s end were to enhance

IX

[90] His worth, and – once the life, his product, gained –

Roll away elsewhere, keep the strife sustained,

And show thus real, a thing the North but feigned –

X

When you acknowledge that one world could do

All the diverse work, old yet ever new,

Divide us, each from other, me from you, –

XI

Why, where’s the need of Temple, when the walls

O’ the world are that? What use of swells and falls

From Levites’ choir, Priests’ cries, and trumpet-calls?

XII

That one Face, far from vanish, rather grows,

[100] Or decomposes but to recompose,

Become my universe that feels and knows.

House

I

Shall I sonnet-sing you about myself?

Do I live in a house you would like to see?

Is it scant of gear, has it store of pelf?

‘Unlock my heart with a sonnet-key?’

II

Invite the world, as my betters have done?

‘Take notice: this building remains on view,

Its suites of reception every one,

Its private apartment and bedroom too;

III

‘For a ticket, apply to the Publisher.’

[10] No: thanking the public, I must decline.

A peep through my window, if folk prefer;

But, please you, no foot over threshold of mine!

IV

I have mixed with a crowd and heard free talk

In a foreign land where an earthquake chanced:

And a house stood gaping, naught to balk

Man’s eye wherever he gazed or glanced.

V

The whole of the frontage shaven sheer,

The inside gaped: exposed to day,

Right and wrong and common and queer,

[20] Bare, as the palm of your hand, it lay.

VI

The owner? Oh, he had been crushed, no doubt!

‘Odd tables and chairs for a man of wealth!

What a parcel of musty old books about!

He smoked, – no wonder he lost his health!

VII

‘I doubt if he bathed before he dressed.

A brasier? – the pagan, he burned perfumes!

You see it is proved, what the neighbours guessed:

His wife and himself had separate rooms.’

VIII

Friends, the goodman of the house at least

[30] Kept house to himself till an earthquake came:

’Tis the fall of its frontage permits you feast

On the inside arrangement you praise or blame.

IX

Outside should suffice for evidence:

And whoso desires to penetrate

Deeper, must dive by the spirit-sense –

No optics like yours, at any rate!

X

‘Hoity toity! A street to explore,

Your house the exception!
“With this same key

Shakespeare unlocked his heart,”
once more!’

[40] Did Shakespeare? If so, the less Shakespeare he!

Saint Martin’s Summer

I

No protesting, dearest!

Hardly kisses even!

   Don’t we both know how it ends?

How the greenest leaf turns serest,

Bluest outbreak – blankest heaven,

   Lovers – friends?

II

You would build a mansion,

I would weave a bower

   – Want the heart for enterprise.

[10] Walls admit of no expansion:

Trellis-work may haply flower

   Twice the size.

III

What makes glad Life’s Winter?

New buds, old blooms after.

   Sad the sighing ‘How suspect

Beams would ere mid-Autumn splinter,

Rooftree scarce support a rafter,

   Walls lie wrecked?’

IV

You are young, my princess!

[20] I am hardly older:

    Yet – I steal a glance behind.

Dare I tell you what convinces

Timid me that you, if bolder,

   Bold – are blind?

V

Where we plan our dwelling

Glooms a graveyard surely!

   Headstone, footstone moss may drape, –

Name, date, violets hide from spelling, –

But, though corpses rot obscurely,

[30]    Ghosts escape.

VI

Ghosts! O breathing Beauty,

Give my frank word pardon!

   What if I – somehow, somewhere –

Pledged my soul to endless duty

Many a time and oft? Be hard on

   Love – laid there?

VII

Nay, blame grief that’s fickle,

Time that proves a traitor,

   Chance, change, all that purpose warps, –

[40] Death who spares to thrust the sickle

Laid Love low, through flowers which later

   Shroud the corpse!

VIII

And you, my winsome lady,

Whisper with like frankness!

   Lies nothing buried long ago?

Are yon – which shimmer ‘mid the shady

Where moss and violet run to rankness –

   Tombs or no?

IX

Who taxes you with murder?

[50] My hands are clean – or nearly!

   Love being mortal needs must pass.

Repentance? Nothing were absurder.

Enough: we felt Love’s loss severely;

   Though now – alas!

X

Love’s corpse lies quiet therefore,

    Only Love’s ghost plays truant,

    And warns us have in wholesome awe

Durable mansionry; that’s wherefore

I weave but trellis-work, pursuant

    [60] – Life, to law.

XI

The solid, not the fragile,

Tempts rain and hail and thunder.

    If bower stand firm at Autumn’s close,

Beyond my hope, – why, boughs were agile;

If bower fall flat, we scarce need wonder

    Wreathing – rose!

XII

So, truce to the protesting,

So, muffled be the kisses!

    For, would we but avow the truth,

[70] Sober is genuine joy. No jesting!

Ask else Penelope, Ulysses –

   Old in youth!

XIII

For why should ghosts feel angered?

Let all their interference

    Be faint march-music in the air!

‘Up! Join the rear of us the vanguard!

Up, lovers, dead to all appearance,

    Laggard pair!’

XIV

The while you clasp me closer,

The while I press you deeper,

   [80] As safe we chuckle, – under breath,

Yet all the slyer, the jocoser, –

‘So, life can boast its day, like leap-year,

    Stolen from death!’

XV

Ah me – the sudden terror!

Hence quick – avaunt, avoid me,

    You cheat, the ghostly flesh-disguised!

Nay, all the ghosts in one! Strange error!

So, ’twas Death’s self that clipped and coyed me,

    [90] Loved – and lied!

XVI

Ay, dead loves are the potent!

Like any cloud they used you,

    Mere semblance you, but substance they!

Build we no mansion, weave we no tent!

Mere flesh – their spirit interfused you!

    Hence, I say!

XVII

All theirs, none yours the glamour!

Theirs each low word that won me,

    Soft look that found me Love’s, and left

[100] What else but you – the tears and clamour

That’s all your very own! Undone me –

   Ghost-bereft!

Ned Bratts

’Twas Bedford Special Assize, one daft Midsummer’s Day:

A broiling blasting June, – was never its like, men say.

Corn stood sheaf-ripe already, and trees looked yellow as that;

Ponds drained dust-dry, the cattle lay foaming around each flat.

Inside town, dogs went mad, and folk kept bibbing beer

While the parsons prayed for rain. ’Twas horrible, yes – but queer:

Queer – for the sun laughed gay, yet nobody moved a hand

To work one stroke at his trade: as given to understand

That all was come to a stop, work and such worldly ways,

[10] And the world’s old self about to end in a merry blaze.

Midsummer’s Day moreover was the first of Bedford Fair,

With Bedford Town’s tag-rag and bobtail a-bowsing there.

But the Court House, Quality crammed: through doors ope, windows wide,

High on the Bench you saw sit Lordships side by side.

There frowned Chief Justice Jukes, fumed learned Brother Small,

And fretted their fellow Judge: like threshers, one and all,

Of a reek with laying down the law in a furnace. Why?

Because their lungs breathed flame – the regular crowd forbye –

From gentry pouring in – quite a nosegay, to be sure!

[20] How else could they pass the time, six mortal hours endure

Till night should extinguish day, when matters might haply mend?

Meanwhile no bad resource was – watching begin and end

Some trial for life and death, in a brisk five minutes’ space,

And betting which knave would ’scape, which hang, from his sort of face.

So, their Lordships toiled and moiled, and a deal of work was done

(I warrant) to justify the mirth of the crazy sun,

As this and ’tother lout, struck dumb at the sudden show

Of red robes and white wigs, boggled nor answered ‘Boh!’

When asked why he, Tom Styles, should not – because Jack Nokes

[30] Had stolen the horse – be hanged: for Judges must have their jokes,