Spirituality

Could Homer come himself, distress’d and poor,
And tune his harp at Rhedicina’s door,
The rich old vixen would exclaim (I fear),
“Begone! no tramper gets a farthing here.”

Mille fiate, o dolce mia guerrera.

HIS HEART, REJECTED BY LAURA, WILL PERISH, UNLESS SHE RELENT.


    A thousand times, sweet warrior, have I tried,
Proffering my heart to thee, some peace to gain
From those bright eyes, but still, alas! in vain,
To such low level stoops not thy chaste pride.
If others seek the love thus thrown aside,
Vain were their hopes and labours to obtain;
The heart thou spurnest I alike disdain,
To thee displeasing, 'tis by me denied.
But if, discarded thus, it find not thee
Its joyless exile willing to befriend,
Alone, untaught at others' will to wend,
Soon from life's weary burden will it flee.
How heavy then the guilt to both, but more
To thee, for thee it did the most adore.

MACGREGOR.


...

Here is a tale for any man or woman:
A fool sought Death; and braved him with his bauble
Among the graves. At last he heard a hobble,
And something passed him, monstrous, super-human.
And by a tomb, that reared a broken column,
He heard it stop. And then Gargantuan laughter
Shattered the hush. Deep silence followed after,
Filled with the stir of bones, cadaverous, solemn.
Then said the fool:"Come! show thyself, old prancer!
I'll have a bout with thee. I, too, can clatter
My wand and motley. Come now! Death and Folly,
See who's the better man." There was no answer;
Only his bauble broke; a serious matter
To the poor fool who died of melancholy.

(February 15 - September 28, 1894)


To V. G.

That day we brought our Beautiful One to lie
In the green peace within your gates, he came
To give us greeting, boyish and kind and shy,
And, stricken as we were, we blessed his name:
Yet, like the Creature of Light that had been ours,
Soon of the sweet Earth disinherited,
He too must join, even with the Year's old flowers,
The unanswering generations of the Dead.
So stand we friends for you, who stood our friend
Through him that day; for now through him you know
That though where love was, love is till the end,
Love, turned of death to longing, like a foe,
Strikes: when the ruined heart goes forth to crave
Mercy of the high, austere, unpitying Grave.

Dey was talkin' in de cabin, dey was talkin' in de hall;
But I listened kin' o' keerless, not a-t'inkin' 'bout it all;
An' on Sunday, too, I noticed, dey was whisp'rin' mighty much,
Stan'in' all erroun' de roadside w'en dey let us out o' chu'ch.
But I did n't t'ink erbout it 'twell de middle of de week,
An' my 'Lias come to see me, an' somehow he could n't speak.
Den I seed all in a minute whut he 'd come to see me for;--
Dey had 'listed colo'ed sojers an' my 'Lias gwine to wah.

Oh, I hugged him, an' I kissed him, an' I baiged him not to go;
But he tol' me dat his conscience, hit was callin' to him so,
An' he could n't baih to lingah w'en he had a chanst to fight
For de freedom dey had gin him an' de glory of de right.
So he kissed me, an' he lef me, w'en I 'd p'omised to b...

The dying need but little, dear, --
A glass of water's all,
A flower's unobtrusive face
To punctuate the wall,

A fan, perhaps, a friend's regret,
And certainly that one
No color in the rainbow
Perceives when you are gone.

Oh, what was it he meant
By his question as he went?
"I am making a loom,
'T will be up in April's bloom;
If you think it may be,
Spin for me!"

Oh, what shall I believe?
Does he think himself to weave?
And the yarn that I spin,
Lo, he thinks to weave it in?
And so soon as the Spring
Flowers shall bring?

And he laughed when he'd done;
Oh, he is so full of fun.
Dare I trust all my skein
To so young and wild a swain? -
May God help to bind in
All I spin!

This war's a waste of slurry, and its atmosphere is mud,
All is bog from here to sunset. Wadin' through
We're the victims of a thicker sort of universal flood,
With discomforts that old Noah never knew.

We have dubbed our trench The Cecil. There's a brass-plate and a dome,
And a quagmire where the doormat used to be,
If you're calling, second Tuesday is our reg'lar day at home,
So delighted if you'll toddle in to tea!

There is mud along the corridors enough to bog a cow;
In the air there hangs a musty kind of woof;
There's a frog-pond in the parlour, and the kitchen is a slough.
She has neither doors nor windows, nor a roof.

When they post our bald somnambulist as missing from his flat
We take soundings for the digger with a prop.
By the day the board ...

Over and over the task was set,
    Over and over I slighted the work,
But ever and alway I knew that yet
    I must face and finish the toil I shirk.

Over and over the whip of pain
    Has spurred and punished with blow on blow;
As ever and alway I tried in vain
    To shun the labour I hated so.

Over and over I came this way
    For just one purpose:    O stubborn soul!
Turn with a will to your work to-day,
    And learn the lesson of SELF-CONTROL.

    'Tis much desired, you judges of the town
    Would pass a vote to put all prologues down:
    For who can show me, since they first were writ,
    They e'er converted one hard-hearted wit?
    Yet the world's mended well; in former days
    Good prologues were as scarce as now good plays.
    For the reforming poets of our age,
    In this first charge, spend their poetic rage:
    Expect no more when once the prologue's done:
    The wit is ended ere the play's begun.
    You now have habits, dances, scenes, and rhymes;
    High language often; ay, and sense, sometimes.
    As for a clear contrivance, doubt it now;
    They blow out candles to give light to the plot.
    And for surprise, two bloody-minded men
    Fight till they die, then rise and dance agai...

O Patriot Statesman, be thou wise to know
The limits of resistance, and the bounds
Determining concession; still be bold
Not only to slight praise but suffer scorn;
And be thy heart a fortress to maintain
The day against the moment, and the year
Against the day; thy voice, a music heard
Thro’ all the yells and counter-yells of feud
And faction, and thy will, a power to make
This ever-changing world of circumstance,
In changing, chime with never-changing Law.

How many times these low feet staggered,
Only the soldered mouth can tell;
Try! can you stir the awful rivet?
Try! can you lift the hasps of steel?

Stroke the cool forehead, hot so often,
Lift, if you can, the listless hair;
Handle the adamantine fingers
Never a thimble more shall wear.

Buzz the dull flies on the chamber window;
Brave shines the sun through the freckled pane;
Fearless the cobweb swings from the ceiling --
Indolent housewife, in daisies lain!

PLATE I
Rixa super mero

They sat by their wine in the tavern that night,
But not in good fellowship true:
The Rhenish was strong and the Burgundy bright,
And hotter the argument grew.

'I asked your consent when I first sought her hand,
Nor did you refuse to agree,
Tho' her father declared that the half of his land
Her dower at our wedding should be.'

'No dower shall be given (the brother replied)
With a maiden of beauty so rare,
Nor yet shall my father my birthright divide,
Our lands with a foeman to share.'

The knight stood erect in the midst of the hall,
And sterner his visage became,
'Now, shame and dishonour my 'scutcheon befall
If thus I relinquish my claim."

The brother then drained a tall goblet of wine,
And ...

(MARCH 31ST, 1909)

    'Tis a sad fate
        To watch the world fighting,
    All that is most fair
        Ruthlessly blighting,
            Blighting, ah! blighting.

    When such a thought cometh
        Let us not pine,
    But gather old friends
        Round the red wine--
            Oh! pour the red wine!

    And there we'll talk
        And warm our wits
    With Eastern fallacies
        Out of old Fitz!
            British old Fitz!

    See him, half statesman--
        Philosopher too--
    Half ancient mariner
        In baggy blue--
            Such baggy blue!

    Whimsical, wistful,
        Haughty, forsooth:
    Indolent always, yet
        Ardent in truth,
          ...

When labor is light and the morning is fair,
I find it a pleasure beyond all compare
To hitch up my nag and go hurrying down
And take Katie May for a ride into town;
For bumpety-bump goes the wagon,
But tra-la-la-la our lay.
There's joy in a song as we rattle along
In the light of the glorious day.

A coach would be fine, but a spring wagon's good;
My jeans are a match for Kate's gingham and hood;
The hills take us up and the vales take us down,
But what matters that? we are riding to town,
And bumpety-bump goes the wagon,
But tra-la-la-la sing we.
There's never a care may live in the air
That is filled with the breath of our glee.

And after we've started, there's naught can repress
The thrill of our hearts in their wild happiness;
The hea...

Comin' or goin' still they spread the news,
About America how grand it is,
The wonders that are waitin' you to choose
And gold that common that like sand it is.
"And here you stick," says they. "Like some old tree
Stuck in the bog belaboured by all seasons.
What's ailin' ye?" says they. Well, leave them be,
I have me reasons.

There's Cormac's Hugh come back with all his talk,
Spreadin' and spendin' like a king he is.
The people flockin' down the way he'll walk,
Till in the middle of a ring he is.
But where's that one whose face was like a rose
The day he went, betwixt her tears and teasin's?
Married these five years--gone where no man knows,
Faith, I've me reasons.

"A likely lad," they say. "What's ailin' you,
The gold and riches over there it...

They's a kind o' feel in the air, to me.
    When the Chris'mas-times sets in.
That's about as much of a mystery
As ever I've run ag'in! -
Fer instunce, now, whilse I gain in weight
And gineral health, I swear
They's a goneness somers I can't quite state -
A kind o' feel in the air.

They's a feel in the Chris'mas-air goes right
To the spot where a man lives at! -
It gives a feller a' appetite -
They ain't no doubt about that! -
And yit they's somepin' - I don't know what -
That follers me, here and there,
And ha'nts and worries and spares me not -
A kind o' feel in the air!

They's a feel, as I say, in the air that's jest
As blame-don sad as sweet! -
In the same ra-sho as I feel the best

Child, lover, servant, master of Romance,
To you she showed, not splendid of attire,
With gaud and grace, but all to your desire
In lonelier hues of solemn radiance!
Long years you followed her, and at her glance,
As at some word, divinely sweet or dire,
Beheld the souls of men, in shapes of fire,
Through veiling flesh look out to her askance.

You saw the brand upon unbranded breast;
From evil heart you saw the witches wind;
You saw dark passion breed in frolic youth;
And yet, with sight all delicate and blest,
You knew the primrose of a maiden's mind,
You took of shame the grave white flower of truth!