Collected Poems Volume I Part 36

And like the slow beats of some t.i.tan heart Buried beneath immeasurable woes, The forging-hammers thudded through the dream:_

Huge on a fallen tree, Lost in the darkness of primeval woods, Enceladus, earth-born Enceladus, The naked giant, brooded all alone.

Born of the lower earth, he knew not how, Born of the mire and clay, he knew not when, Brought forth in darkness, and he knew not why!

Thus, like a wind, went by a thousand years.

Anhungered, yet no comrade of the wolf, And cold, but with no power upon the sun, A master of this world that mastered him!

Thus, like a cloud, went by a thousand years.

_Who_ chained this other giant in his heart That heaved and burned like Etna? Heavily He bent his brows and wondered and was dumb.

And, like one wave, a thousand years went by.

He raised his matted head and scanned the stars.

He stood erect! He lifted his uncouth arms!

With inarticulate sounds his uncouth lips Wrestled and strove--_I am full-fed, and yet I hunger!

Who set this fiercer famine in my maw?_

_Can I eat moons, gorge on the Milky Way, Swill sunsets down, or sup the wash of the dawn Out of the rolling swine-troughs of the sea?

Can I drink oceans, lie beneath the mountains, And nuzzle their heavy boulders like a cub Sucking the dark teats of the tigress? Who, Who set this deeper hunger in my heart?_ And the dark forest echoed--_Who? Ah, who?_

"_I hunger!_"

And the night-wind answered him, "Hunt, then, for food."

"_I hunger!_"

And the sleek gorged lioness Drew nigh him, dripping freshly from the kill, Redder her lolling tongue, whiter her fangs, And gazed with ignorant eyes of golden flame.

"_I hunger!_"

Like a breaking sea his cry Swept through the night. Against his swarthy knees She rubbed the red wet velvet of her ears With mellow thunders of unweeting bliss, Purring--_Ah, seek, and you shall find.

Ah, seek, and you shall slaughter, gorge, ah seek, Seek, seek, you shall feed full, ah seek, ah seek._

Enceladus, earth-born Enceladus, Bewildered like a desert-pilgrim, saw A rosy City, opening in the clouds, The hunger-born mirage of his own heart, Far, far above the world, a home of G.o.ds, Where One, a G.o.ddess, veiled in the sleek waves Of her deep hair, yet glimmering golden through, Lifted, with radiant arms, ambrosial food For hunger such as this! Up the dark hills, He rushed, a thunder-cloud, Urged by the famine of his heart. He stood High on the topmost crags, he hailed the G.o.ds In thunder, and the clouds re-echoed it!

He hailed the G.o.ds!

And like a sea of thunder round their thrones Washing, a midnight sea, his earth-born voice Besieged the halls of heaven! He hailed the G.o.ds!

They laughed, he heard them laugh!

With echo and re-echo, far and wide, A golden sea of mockery, they laughed!

Enceladus, earth-born Enceladus, Laid hold upon the rosy Gates of Heaven, And shook them with gigantic sooty hands, Asking he knew not what, but not for alms; And the Gates, opened as in jest; And, like a sooty jest, he stumbled in.

Round him the G.o.ds, the young and scornful G.o.ds, Cl.u.s.tered and laughed to mark the ravaged face, The brutal brows, the deep and dog-like eyes, The blunt black nails, and back with burdens bowed.

And, when they laughed, he snarled with uncouth lips And made them laugh again.

"_Whence comest thou?_"

He could not speak!

How should he speak whose heart within him heaved And burned like Etna? Through his mouth there came A sound of ice-bergs in a frozen sea Of tears, a sullen region of black ice Rending and breaking, very far away.

They laughed!

He stared at them, bewildered, and they laughed Again, "_Whence comest thou?_"

He could not speak!

But through his mouth a moan of midnight woods, Where wild beasts lay in wait to slaughter and gorge, A moan of forest-caverns where the wolf Brought forth her litter, a moan of the wild earth In travail with strange shapes of mire and clay, Creatures of clay, clay images of the G.o.ds, That hungered like the G.o.ds, the most high G.o.ds, But found no food, and perished like the beasts.

And the G.o.ds laughed,-- _Art thou, then, such a G.o.d?_ And, like a leaf Unfolding in dark woods, in his deep brain A sudden memory woke; and like an ape He nodded, and all heaven with laughter rocked, While Artemis cried out with scornful lips,-- _Perchance He is the Maker of you all!_

Then, piteously outstretching calloused hands, He sank upon his knees, his huge gnarled knees, And echoed, falteringly, with slow harsh tongue,-- _Perchance, perchance, the Maker of you all._

They wept with laughter! And Aphrodite, she, With keener mockery than white Artemis Who smiled aloof, drew nigh him unabashed In all her blinding beauty. Carelessly, As o'er the brute brows of a stalled ox Across that sooty muzzle and brawny breast, Contemptuously, she swept her golden hair In one deep wave, a many-millioned scourge Intolerable and beautiful as fire; Then turned and left him, reeling, gasping, dumb, While heaven re-echoed and re-echoed, _See, Perchance, perchance, the Maker of us all!_

Enceladus, earth-born Enceladus, Rose to his feet, and with one terrible cry "_I hunger_," rushed upon the scornful G.o.ds And strove to seize and hold them with his hands, And still the laughter deepened as they rolled Their clouds around them, baffling him. But once, Once with a shout, in his gigantic arms He crushed a slippery splendour on his breast And felt on his harsh skin the cool smooth peaks Of Aphrodite's bosom. One black hand Slid down the naked snow of her long side And bruised it where he held her. Then, like snow Vanishing in a furnace, out of his arms The splendour suddenly melted, and a roll Of thunder split the dream, and headlong down He fell, from heaven to earth; while, overhead The young and scornful G.o.ds--he heard them laugh!-- Toppled the crags down after him. He lay Supine. They plucked up Etna by the roots And buried him beneath it. His broad breast Heaved, like that other giant in his heart, And through the crater burst his fiery breath, But could not burst his bonds. And so he lay Breathing in agony thrice a thousand years.

Then came a Voice, he knew not whence, "Arise, Enceladus!" And from his heart a crag Fell, and one arm was free, and one thought free, And suddenly he awoke, and stood upright, Shaking the mountains from him like a dream; And the tremendous light and awful truth Smote, like the dawn, upon his blinded eyes, That out of his first wonder at the world, Out of his own heart's deep humility, And simple worship, he had fashioned G.o.ds Of cloud, and heaven out of a hollow sh.e.l.l.

And groping now no more in the empty s.p.a.ce Outward, but inward in his own deep heart, He suddenly felt the secret gates of heaven Open, and from the infinite heavens of hope Inward, a voice, from the innermost courts of Love, Rang--_Thou shall have none other G.o.ds but Me._

Enceladus, the foul Enceladus, When the clear light out of that inward heaven Whose gates are only inward in the soul, Showed him that one true Kingdom, said, "I will stretch My hands out once again. And, as the G.o.d That made me is the Heart within my heart, So shall my heart be to this dust and earth A G.o.d and a creator. I will strive With mountains, fires and seas, wrestle and strive, Fashion and make, and that which I have made In anguish I shall love as G.o.d loves me."

_In the Black Country, from a little window, Waking at dawn, I saw those giant Shafts --O great dark word out of our elder speech, Long since the poor man's kingly heritage-- The Shapings, the dim Sceptres of Creation, The Shafts like columns of wan-hope arise To waste, on the blear sky, their slow sad wreaths Of smoke, their infinitely sad slow prayers.

Then, as the dawn crimsoned, the sordid clouds, The puddling furnaces, the mounds of slag, The cinders, and the sand-beds and the rows Of wretched roofs, a.s.sumed a majesty Beyond all majesties of earth or air; Beauty beyond all beauty, as of a child In rags, upraised thro' the still gold of heaven, With wasted arms and hungering eyes, to bring The armoured seraphim down upon their knees And teach eternal G.o.d humility; The solemn beauty of the unfulfilled Moving towards fulfilment on a height Beyond all heights; the dreadful beauty of hope; The naked wrestler struggling from the rock Under the sculptor's chisel; the rough ma.s.s Of clay more glorious for the poor blind face And bosom that half emerge into the light, More glorious and august, even in defeat, Than that too cold dominion G.o.d foreswore To bear this pa.s.sionate universal load, This Calvary of Creation, with mankind._

IN THE COOL OF THE EVENING

I

In the cool of the evening, when the low sweet whispers waken, When the labourers turn them homeward, and the weary have their will, When the censers of the roses o'er the forest-aisles are shaken, Is it but the wind that cometh o'er the far green hill?

II

For they say 'tis but the sunset winds that wander through the heather, Rustle all the meadow-gra.s.s and bend the dewy fern; They say 'tis but the winds that bow the reeds in prayer together, And fill the shaken pools with fire along the shadowy burn.

III

In the beauty of the twilight, in the Garden that He loveth, They have veiled His lovely vesture with the darkness of a name!

Thro' His Garden, thro' His Garden it is but the wind that moveth, No more; but O, the miracle, the miracle is the same!

IV

In the cool of the evening, when the sky is an old story Slowly dying, but remembered, ay, and loved with pa.s.sion still, Hush!... the fringes of His garment, in the fading golden glory, Softly rustling as He cometh o'er the far green hill.

A ROUNDHEAD'S RALLYING SONG

I