Poems By the Way Part 12

And though within it no birds sing, And though no pillared house is there, And though the apple-boughs are bare Of fruit and blossom, would to G.o.d Her feet upon the green gra.s.s trod, And I beheld them as before.

There comes a murmur from the sh.o.r.e, And in the close two fair-streams are, Drawn from the purple hills afar, Drawn down unto the restless sea: Dark hills whose heath-bloom feeds no bee, Dark sh.o.r.e no ship has ever seen, Tormented by the billows green Whose murmur comes unceasingly Unto the place for which I cry.

For which I cry both day and night, For which I let slip all delight, Whereby I grow both deaf and blind, Careless to win, unskilled to find, And quick to lose what all men seek.

Yet tottering as I am and weak, Still have I left a little breath To seek within the jaws of death An entrance to that happy place, To seek the unforgotten face, Once seen, once kissed, once reft from me Anigh the murmuring of the sea.

MOTHER AND SON.

Now sleeps the land of houses, and dead night holds the street, And there thou liest, my baby, and sleepest soft and sweet; My man is away for awhile, but safe and alone we lie, And none heareth thy breath but thy mother, and the moon looking down from the sky On the weary waste of the town, as it looked on the gra.s.s-edged road Still warm with yesterday's sun, when I left my old abode; Hand in hand with my love, that night of all nights in the year; When the river of love o'erflowed and drowned all doubt and fear, And we two were alone in the world, and once if never again, We knew of the secret of earth and the tale of its labour and pain.

Lo amidst London I lift thee, and how little and light thou art, And thou without hope or fear thou fear and hope of my heart!

Lo here thy body beginning, O son, and thy soul and thy life; But how will it be if thou livest, and enterest into the strife, And in love we dwell together when the man is grown in thee, When thy sweet speech I shall hearken, and yet 'twixt thee and me Shall rise that wall of distance, that round each one doth grow, And maketh it hard and bitter each other's thought to know.

Now, therefore, while yet thou art little and hast no thought of thine own, I will tell thee a word of the world; of the hope whence thou hast grown; Of the love that once begat thee, of the sorrow that hath made Thy little heart of hunger, and thy hands on my bosom laid.

Then mayst thou remember hereafter, as whiles when people say All this hath happened before in the life of another day; So mayst thou dimly remember this tale of thy mother's voice, As oft in the calm of dawning I have heard the birds rejoice, As oft I have heard the storm-wind go moaning through the wood; And I knew that earth was speaking, and the mother's voice was good.

Now, to thee alone will I tell it that thy mother's body is fair, In the guise of the country maidens Who play with the sun and the air; Who have stood in the row of the reapers in the August afternoon, Who have sat by the frozen water in the high day of the moon, When the lights of the Christmas feasting were dead in the house on the hill, And the wild geese gone to the salt-marsh had left the winter still.

Yea, I am fair, my firstling; if thou couldst but remember me!

The hair that thy small hand clutcheth is a goodly sight to see; I am true, but my face is a snare; soft and deep are my eyes, And they seem for men's beguiling fulfilled with the dreams of the wise.

Kind are my lips, and they look as though my soul had learned Deep things I have never heard of, my face and my hands are burned By the lovely sun of the acres; three months of London town And thy birth-bed have bleached them indeed, "But lo, where the edge of the gown"

(So said thy father) "is parting the wrist that is white as the curd From the brown of the hand that I love, bright as the wing of a bird."

Such is thy mother, O firstling, yet strong as the maidens of old, Whose spears and whose swords were the warders of homestead, of field and of fold.

Oft were my feet on the highway, often they wearied the gra.s.s; From dusk unto dusk of the summer three times in a week would I pa.s.s To the downs from the house on the river through the waves of the blossoming corn.

Fair then I lay down in the even, and fresh I arose on the morn, And scarce in the noon was I weary.

Ah, son, in the days of thy strife, If thy soul could but harbour a dream of the blossom of my life!

It would be as the sunlit meadows beheld from a tossing sea, And thy soul should look on a vision of the peace that is to be.

Yet, yet the tears on my cheek!

and what is this doth move My heart to thy heart, beloved, save the flood of yearning love?

For fair and fierce is thy father, and soft and strange are his eyes That look on the days that shall be with the hope of the brave and the wise.

It was many a day that we laughed, as over the meadows we walked, And many a day I hearkened and the pictures came as he talked; It was many a day that we longed, and we lingered late at eve Ere speech from speech was sundered, and my hand his hand could leave.

Then I wept when I was alone, and I longed till the daylight came; And down the stairs I stole, and there was our housekeeping dame (No mother of me, the foundling) kindling the fire betimes Ere the haymaking folk went forth to the meadows down by the limes; All things I saw at a glance; the quickening fire-tongues leapt Through the crackling heap of sticks, and the sweet smoke up from it crept, And close to the very hearth the low sun flooded the floor, And the cat and her kittens played in the sun by the open door.

The garden was fair in the morning, and there in the road he stood Beyond the crimson daisies and the bush of southernwood.

Then side by side together through the grey-walled place we went, And O the fear departed, and the rest and sweet content!

Son, sorrow and wisdom he taught me, and sore I grieved and learned As we twain grew into one; and the heart within me burned With the very hopes of his heart.

Ah, son, it is piteous, But never again in my life shall I dare to speak to thee thus; So may these lonely words about thee creep and cling, These words of the lonely night in the days of our wayfaring.

Many a child of woman to-night is born in the town, The desert of folly and wrong; and of what and whence are they grown?

Many and many an one of wont and use is born; For a husband is taken to bed as a hat or a ribbon is worn.

Prudence begets her thousands; "good is a housekeeper's life, So shall I sell my body that I may be matron and wife."

"And I shall endure foul wedlock and bear the children of need."

Some are there born of hate, many the children of greed.

"I, I too can be wedded, though thou my love hast got."

"I am fair and hard of heart, and riches shall be my lot."

And all these are the good and the happy, on whom the world dawns fair.

O son, when wilt thou learn of those that are born of despair, As the fabled mud of the Nile that quickens under the sun With a growth of creeping things, half dead when just begun?

E'en such is the care of Nature that man should never die, Though she breed of the fools of the earth, and the dregs of the city sty.

But thou, O son, O son, of very love wert born, When our hope fulfilled bred hope, and fear was a folly outworn.

On the eve of the toil and the battle all sorrow and grief we weighed, We hoped and we were not ashamed, we knew and we were not afraid.

Now waneth the night and the moon; ah, son, it is piteous That never again in my life shall I dare to speak to thee thus.

But sure from the wise and the simple shall the mighty come to birth; And fair were my fate, beloved, if I be yet on the earth When the world is awaken at last, and from mouth to mouth they tell Of thy love and thy deeds and thy valour, and thy hope that nought can quell.

THUNDER IN THE GARDEN.

When the boughs of the garden hang heavy with rain And the blackbird reneweth his song, And the thunder departing yet rolleth again, I remember the ending of wrong.

When the day that was dusk while his death was aloof Is ending wide-gleaming and strange For the clearness of all things beneath the world's roof, I call back the wild chance and the change.

For once we twain sat through the hot afternoon While the rain held aloof for a while, Till she, the soft-clad, for the glory of June Changed all with the change of her smile.

For her smile was of longing, no longer of glee, And her fingers, entwined with mine own, With caresses unquiet sought kindness of me For the gift that I never had known.

Then down rushed the rain, and the voice of the thunder Smote dumb all the sound of the street, And I to myself was grown nought but a wonder, As she leaned down my kisses to meet.

That she craved for my lips that had craved her so often, And the hand that had trembled to touch, That the tears filled her eyes I had hoped not to soften In this world was a marvel too much.

It was dusk 'mid the thunder, dusk e'en as the night, When first brake out our love like the storm, But no night-hour was it, and back came the light While our hands with each other were warm.

And her smile killed with kisses, came back as at first As she rose up and led me along, And out to the garden, where nought was athirst, And the blackbird renewing his song.

Earth's fragrance went with her, as in the wet gra.s.s, Her feet little hidden were set; She bent down her head, 'neath the roses to pa.s.s, And her arm with the lily was wet.

In the garden we wandered while day waned apace And the thunder was dying aloof; Till the moon o'er the minster-wall lifted his face, And grey gleamed out the lead of the roof.

Then we turned from the blossoms, and cold were they grown: In the trees the wind westering moved; Till over the threshold back fluttered her gown, And in the dark house was I loved.

THE G.o.d OF THE POOR.

There was a lord that hight Maltete, Among great lords he was right great, On poor folk trod he like the dirt, None but G.o.d might do him hurt.

_Deus est Deus pauperum_.

With a grace of prayers sung loud and late Many a widow's house he ate; Many a poor knight at his hands Lost his house and narrow lands.

_Deus est Deus pauperum_.