The Poems of William Watson Part 14

ENGLAND MY MOTHER

I

England my mother, Wardress of waters.

Builder of peoples, Maker of men,--

Hast thou yet leisure Left for the muses?

Heed'st thou the songsmith Forging the rhyme?

Deafened with tumults, How canst thou hearken?

Strident is faction, Demos is loud.

Lazarus, hungry, Menaces Dives; Labour the giant Chafes in his hold.

Yet do the songsmiths Quit not their forges; Still on life's anvil Forge they the rhyme.

Still the rapt faces Glow from the furnace: Breath of the smithy Scorches their brows.

Yea, and thou hear'st them?

So shall the hammers Fashion not vainly Verses of gold.

II

Lo, with the ancient Roots of man's nature, Twines the eternal Pa.s.sion of song.

Ever Love fans it, Ever Life feeds it, Time cannot age it; Death cannot slay.

Deep in the world-heart Stand its foundations, Tangled with all things, Twin-made with all.

Nay, what is Nature's Self, but an endless Strife toward music, Euphony, rhyme?

Trees in their blooming, Tides in their flowing, Stars in their circling, Tremble with song.

G.o.d on His throne is Eldest of poets: Unto His measures Moveth the Whole.

III

Therefore deride not Speech of the muses, England my mother, Maker of men.

Nations are mortal, Fragile is greatness; Fortune may fly thee, Song shall not fly.

Song the all-girdling, Song cannot perish: Men shall make music, Man shall give ear.

Not while the choric Chant of creation Floweth from all things, Poured without pause,

Cease we to echo Faintly the descant Whereto for ever Dances the world.

IV

So let the songsmith Proffer his rhyme-gift, England my mother, Maker of men.

Gray grows thy count'nance, Full of the ages; Time on thy forehead Sits like a dream:

Song is the potion All things renewing, Youth's one elixir, Fountain of morn.

Thou, at the world-loom Weaving thy future, Fitly may'st temper Toil with delight.

Deemest thou, labour Only is earnest?

Grave is all beauty, Solemn is joy.

Song is no bauble-- Slight not the songsmith, England my mother, Maker of men.

NIGHT

In the night, in the night, When thou liest alone, Ah, the sounds that are blown In the freaks of the breeze, By the spirit that sends The voice of far friends With the sigh of the seas In the night!

In the night, in the night, When thou liest alone, Ah, the ghosts that make moan From the days that are sped: The old dreams, the old deeds, The old wound that still bleeds, And the face of the dead In the night!

In the night, in the night, When thou liest alone, With the gra.s.s and the stone O'er thy chamber so deep, Ah, the silence at last, Life's dissonance past, And only pure sleep In the night!

THE FUGITIVE IDEAL

As some most pure and n.o.ble face, Seen in the thronged and hurrying street, Sheds o'er the world a sudden grace, A flying odour sweet, Then, pa.s.sing, leaves the cheated sense Baulked with a phantom excellence;

So, on our soul the visions rise Of that fair life we never led: They flash a splendour past our eyes, We start, and they are fled: They pa.s.s, and leave us with blank gaze, Resigned to our ign.o.ble days.

"THE FORESTERS"

(Lines written on the appearance of Lord Tennyson's drama.)

Clear as of old the great voice rings to-day, While Sherwood's oak-leaves twine with Aldworth's bay: The voice of him the master and the sire Of one whole age and legion of the lyre, Who sang his morning-song when Coleridge still Uttered dark oracles from Highgate Hill, And with new-launched argosies of rhyme Gilds and makes brave this sombreing tide of time.

Far be the hour when lesser brows shall wear The laurel glorious from that wintry hair-- When he, the sovereign of our lyric day, In Charon's shallop must be rowed away, And hear, scarce heeding, 'mid the plash of oar, The _ave atque vale_ from the sh.o.r.e!

To him nor tender nor heroic muse Did her divine confederacy refuse: To all its moods the lyre of life he strung, And notes of death fell deathless from his tongue.

Himself the Merlin of his magic strain, He bade old glories break in gloom again; And so exempted from oblivious doom, Through him these days shall fadeless break in bloom.

SONG