Sword Blades and Poppy Seed Part 4

Storm-Racked

How should I sing when buffeting salt waves And stung with bitter surges, in whose might I toss, a c.o.c.klesh.e.l.l? The dreadful night Marshals its undefeated dark and raves In brutal madness, reeling over graves Of vanquished men, long-sunken out of sight, Sent wailing down to glut the ghoulish sprite Who haunts foul seaweed forests and their caves.

No parting cloud reveals a watery star, My cries are washed away upon the wind, My cramped and blistering hands can find no spar, My eyes with hope o'erstrained, are growing blind.

But painted on the sky great visions burn, My voice, oblation from a shattered urn!

Convalescence

From out the dragging vastness of the sea, Wave-fettered, bound in sinuous, seaweed strands, He toils toward the rounding beach, and stands One moment, white and dripping, silently, Cut like a cameo in lazuli, Then falls, betrayed by shifting sh.e.l.ls, and lands p.r.o.ne in the jeering water, and his hands Clutch for support where no support can be.

So up, and down, and forward, inch by inch, He gains upon the sh.o.r.e, where poppies glow And sandflies dance their little lives away.

The sucking waves r.e.t.a.r.d, and tighter clinch The weeds about him, but the land-winds blow, And in the sky there blooms the sun of May.

Patience

Be patient with you?

When the stooping sky Leans down upon the hills And tenderly, as one who soothing stills An anguish, gathers earth to lie Embraced and girdled. Do the sun-filled men Feel patience then?

Be patient with you?

When the snow-girt earth Cracks to let through a spurt Of sudden green, and from the muddy dirt A snowdrop leaps, how mark its worth To eyes frost-hardened, and do weary men Feel patience then?

Be patient with you?

When pain's iron bars Their rivets tighten, stern To bend and break their victims; as they turn, Hopeless, there stand the purple jars Of night to spill oblivion. Do these men Feel patience then?

Be patient with you?

You! My sun and moon!

My basketful of flowers!

My money-bag of shining dreams! My hours, Windless and still, of afternoon!

You are my world and I your citizen.

What meaning can have patience then?

Apology

Be not angry with me that I bear Your colours everywhere, All through each crowded street, And meet The wonder-light in every eye, As I go by.

Each plodding wayfarer looks up to gaze, Blinded by rainbow haze, The stuff of happiness, No less, Which wraps me in its glad-hued folds Of peac.o.c.k golds.

Before my feet the dusty, rough-paved way Flushes beneath its gray.

My steps fall ringed with light, So bright, It seems a myriad suns are strown About the town.

Around me is the sound of steepled bells, And rich perfumed smells Hang like a wind-forgotten cloud, And shroud Me from close contact with the world.

I dwell impearled.

You blazon me with jewelled insignia.

A flaming nebula Rims in my life. And yet You set The word upon me, unconfessed To go unguessed.

A Pet.i.tion

I pray to be the tool which to your hand Long use has shaped and moulded till it be Apt for your need, and, unconsideringly, You take it for its service. I demand To be forgotten in the woven strand Which grows the multi-coloured tapestry Of your bright life, and through its tissues lie A hidden, strong, sustaining, grey-toned band.

I wish to dwell around your daylight dreams, The railing to the stairway of the clouds, To guard your steps securely up, where streams A faery moonshine washing pale the crowds Of pointed stars. Remember not whereby You mount, protected, to the far-flung sky.

A Blockhead

Before me lies a ma.s.s of shapeless days, Unseparated atoms, and I must Sort them apart and live them. Sifted dust Covers the formless heap. Reprieves, delays, There are none, ever. As a monk who prays The sliding beads asunder, so I thrust Each tasteless particle aside, and just Begin again the task which never stays.

And I have known a glory of great suns, When days flashed by, pulsing with joy and fire!

Drunk bubbled wine in goblets of desire, And felt the whipped blood laughing as it runs!

Spilt is that liquor, my too hasty hand Threw down the cup, and did not understand.

Stupidity

Dearest, forgive that with my clumsy touch I broke and bruised your rose.

I hardly could suppose It were a thing so fragile that my clutch Could kill it, thus.

It stood so proudly up upon its stem, I knew no thought of fear, And coming very near Fell, overbalanced, to your garment's hem, Tearing it down.

Now, stooping, I upgather, one by one, The crimson petals, all Outspread about my fall.