Songs Before Sunrise Part 21

Till the red-gold harvest-rows For miles through shudder and shine In the wind's breath, fed with the sun, A thousand spear-heads as one Bowed as for battle to close Line in rank against line With place and station to keep Till all men's hands at a sign Put in the sickles and reap.

A thousand spear-heads as one Wave as with swing of the sea When the mid tide sways at its height; For the hour is for harvest or fight In face of the just calm sun, As the signal in season may be And the lot in the helm may leap When chance shall shake it; but ye, Put in the sickles and reap.

For the hour is for harvest or fight To clothe with raiment of red; O men sore stricken of hours, Lo, this one, is not it ours To glean, to gather, to smite?

Let none make risk of his head Within reach of the clean scythe-sweep, When the people that lay as the dead Put in the sickles and reap.

Lo, this one, is not it ours, Now the ruins of dead things rattle As dead men's bones in the pit, Now the kings wax lean as they sit Girt round with memories of powers, With musters counted as cattle And armies folded as sheep Till the red blind husbandman battle Put in the sickles and reap?

Now the kings wax lean as they sit, The people grow strong to stand; The men they trod on and spat, The dumb dread people that sat As corpses cast in a pit, Rise up with G.o.d at their hand, And thrones are hurled on a heap, And strong men, sons of the land, Put in the sickles and reap.

The dumb dread people that sat All night without screen for the night, All day without food for the day, They shall give not their harvest away, They shall eat of its fruit and wax fat: They shall see the desire of their sight, Though the ways of the seasons be steep, They shall climb with face to the light, Put in the sickles and reap.

ODE ON THE INSURRECTION IN CANDIA

STR. 1

I laid my laurel-leaf At the white feet of grief, Seeing how with covered face and plumeless wings, With unreverted head Veiled, as who mourns his dead, Lay Freedom couched between the thrones of kings, A wearied lion without lair, And bleeding from base wounds, and vexed with alien air.

STR. 2

Who was it, who, put poison to thy mouth, Who lulled with craft or chant thy vigilant eyes, O light of all men, lamp to north and south, Eastward and westward, under all men's skies?

For if thou sleep, we perish, and thy name Dies with the dying of our ephemeral breath; And if the dust of death o'ergrows thy flame, Heaven also is darkened with the dust of death.

If thou be mortal, if thou change or cease, If thine hand fail, or thine eyes turn from Greece, Thy firstborn, and the firstfruits of thy fame, G.o.d is no G.o.d, and man is moulded out of shame.

STR. 3

Is there change in the secret skies, In the sacred places that see The divine beginning of things, The weft of the web of the world?

Is Freedom a worm that dies, And G.o.d no G.o.d of the free?

Is heaven like as earth with her kings And time as a serpent curled Round life as a tree?

From the steel-bound snows of the north, From the mystic mother, the east, From the sands of the fiery south, From the low-lit clouds of the west, A sound of a cry is gone forth; Arise, stand up from the feast, Let wine be far from the mouth, Let no man sleep or take rest, Till the plague hath ceased.

Let none rejoice or make mirth Till the evil thing be stayed, Nor grief be lulled in the lute, Nor hope be loud on the lyre; Let none be glad upon earth.

O music of young man and maid, O songs of the bride, be mute.

For the light of her eyes, her desire, Is the soul dismayed.

It is not a land new-born That is scourged of a stranger's hand, That is rent and consumed with flame.

We have known it of old, this face, With the cheeks and the tresses torn, With shame on the brow as a brand.

We have named it of old by name, The land of the royallest race, The most holy land.

STR. 4

Had I words of fire, Whose words are weak as snow; Were my heart a lyre Whence all its love might flow In the mighty modulations of desire, In the notes wherewith man's pa.s.sion worships woe;

Could my song release The thought weak words confine, And my grief, O Greece, Prove how it worships thine; It would move with pulse of war the limbs of peace, Till she flushed and trembled and became divine.

(Once she held for true This truth of sacred strain; Though blood drip like dew And life run down like rain, It is better that war spare but one or two Than that many live, and liberty be slain.)

Then with fierce increase And bitter mother's mirth, From the womb of peace, A womb that yearns for birth, As a man-child should deliverance come to Greece, As a saviour should the child be born on earth.

STR. 5

O that these my days had been Ere white peace and shame were wed Without torch or dancers' din Round the unsacred marriage-bed!

For of old the sweet-tongued law, Freedom, clothed with all men's love, Girt about with all men's awe, With the wild war-eagle mated The white breast of peace the dove, And his ravenous heart abated And his windy wings were furled In an eyrie consecrated Where the snakes of strife uncurled, And her soul was soothed and sated With the welfare of the world.

ANT. 1

But now, close-clad with peace, While war lays hand on Greece, The kingdoms and their kings stand by to see; "Aha, we are strong," they say, "We are sure, we are well," even they; "And if we serve, what ails ye to be free?

We are warm, clothed round with peace and shame; But ye lie dead and naked, dying for a name."

ANT. 2

O kings and queens and nations miserable, O fools and blind, and full of sins and fears, With these it is, with you it is not well; Ye have one hour, but these the immortal years.

These for a pang, a breath, a pulse of pain, Have honour, while that honour on earth shall be: Ye for a little sleep and sloth shall gain Scorn, while one man of all men born is free.

Even as the depth more deep than night or day, The sovereign heaven that keeps its eldest way, So without chance or change, so without stain, The heaven of their high memories shall nor wax nor wane.

ANT. 3

As the soul on the lips of the dead Stands poising her wings for flight, A bird scarce quit of her prison, But fair without form or flesh, So stands over each man's head A splendour of imminent light, A glory of fame rearisen, Of day rearisen afresh From the h.e.l.ls of night.

In the hundred cities of Crete Such glory was not of old, Though her name was great upon earth And her face was fair on the sea.

The words of her lips were sweet, Her days were woven with gold, Her fruits came timely to birth; So fair she was, being free, Who is bought and sold.

So fair, who is fairer now With her children dead at her side, Unsceptred, unconsecrated, Unapparelled, unhelped, unpitied, With blood for gold on her brow, Where the towery tresses divide; The goodly, the golden-gated, Many-crowned, many-named, many-citied, Made like as a bride.

And these are the bridegroom's gifts; Anguish that straitens the breath, Shame, and the weeping of mothers, And the suckling dead at the breast, White breast that a long sob lifts; And the dumb dead mouth, which saith, How long, and how long, my brothers?"

And wrath which endures not rest, And the pains of death.

ANT. 4

Ah, but would that men, With eyelids purged by tears, Saw, and heard again With consecrated ears, All the clamour, all the splendour, all the slain, All the lights and sounds of war, the fates and fears;

Saw far off aspire, With crash of mine and gate, From a single pyre The myriad flames of fate, Soul by soul transfigured in funereal fire, Hate made weak by love, and love made strong by hate.

Children without speech, And many a nursing breast; Old men in the breach, Where death sat down a guest; With triumphant lamentation made for each, Let the world salute their ruin and their rest.

In one iron hour The crescent flared and waned, As from tower to tower, Fire-scathed and sanguine-stained, Death, with flame in hand, an open bloodred flower, Pa.s.sed, and where it bloomed no bloom of life remained.

ANT. 5

Hear, thou earth, the heavy-hearted Weary nurse of waning races; From the dust of years departed, From obscure funereal places, Raise again thy sacred head, Lift the light up of thine eyes Where are they of all thy dead That did more than these men dying In their G.o.dlike Grecian wise?

Not with garments rent and sighing, Neither gifts of myrrh and gold, Shall their sons lament them lying, Lest the fame of them wax cold; But with lives to lives replying, And a worship from of old.

EPODE