The Poems of William Watson Part 4

(DECEMBER 1, 1890)

In the wild and lurid desert, in the thunder-travelled ways, 'Neath the night that ever hurries to the dawn that still delays, There she clutches at illusions, and she seeks a phantom goal With the unattaining pa.s.sion that consumes the unsleeping soul: And calamity enfolds her, like the shadow of a ban, And the n.i.g.g.ardness of Nature makes the misery of man: And in vain the hand is stretched to lift her, stumbling in the gloom, While she follows the mad fen-fire that conducts her to her doom.

THE LUTE-PLAYER

She was a lady great and splendid, I was a minstrel in her halls.

A warrior like a prince attended Stayed his steed by the castle walls.

Far had he fared to gaze upon her.

"O rest thee now, Sir Knight," she said.

The warrior wooed, the warrior won her, In time of snowdrops they were wed.

I made sweet music in his honour, And longed to strike him dead.

I pa.s.sed at midnight from her portal, Throughout the world till death I rove: Ah, let me make this lute immortal With rapture of my hate and love!

"AND THESE--ARE THESE INDEED THE END"

And these--are these indeed the end, This grinning skull, this heavy loam?

Do all green ways whereby we wend Lead but to yon ign.o.ble home?

Ah well! Thine eyes invite to bliss; Thy lips are hives of summer still.

I ask not other worlds while this Proffers me all the sweets I will.

THE RUSS AT KARA

O King of kings, that watching from Thy throne Sufferest the monster of Ust-Kara's hold, With bosom than Siberia's wastes more cold, And hear'st the wail of captives crushed and p.r.o.ne, And sett'st no sign in heaven! Shall naught atone For their wild pangs whose tale is yet scarce told, Women by uttermost woe made deadly bold, In the far dungeon's night that hid their moan?

Why waits Thy shattering arm, nor smites this Power Whose beak and talons rend the unshielded breast, Whose wings shed terror and a plague of gloom, Whose ravin is the hearts of the oppressed; Whose brood are h.e.l.l-births--Hate that bides its hour, Wrath, and a people's curse that loathe their doom?

LIBERTY REJECTED

About this heart thou hast Thy chains made fast, And think'st thou I would be Therefrom set free, And forth unbound be cast?

The ocean would as soon Entreat the moon Unsay the magic verse That seals him hers From silver noon to noon.

She stooped her pearly head Seaward, and said: "Would'st thou I gave to thee Thy liberty, In Time's youth forfeited?"

And from his inmost hold The answer rolled: "Thy bondman to remain Is sweeter pain, Dearer an hundredfold."

LIFE WITHOUT HEALTH

Behold life builded as a goodly house And grown a mansion ruinous With winter blowing through its crumbling walls!

The master paceth up and down his halls, And in the empty hours Can hear the tottering of his towers And tremor of their bases underground.

And oft he starts and looks around At creaking of a distant door Or echo of his footfall on the floor, Thinking it may be one whom he awaits And hath for many days awaited, Coming to lead him through the mouldering gates Out somewhere, from his home dilapidated.

TO A FRIEND

CHAFING AT ENFORCED IDLENESS FROM INTERRUPTED HEALTH

Soon may the edict lapse, that on you lays This dire compulsion of infertile days, This hardest penal toil, reluctant rest!

Meanwhile I count you eminently blest, Happy from labours heretofore well done, Happy in tasks auspiciously begun.

For they are blest that have not much to rue-- That have not oft mis-heard the prompter's cue, Stammered and stumbled and the wrong parts played, And life a Tragedy of Errors made.

"WELL HE SLUMBERS, GREATLY SLAIN"

Well he slumbers, greatly slain, Who in splendid battle dies; Deep his sleep in midmost main Pillowed upon pearl who lies.

Ease, of all good gifts the best, War and wave at last decree: Love alone denies us rest, Crueller than sword or sea.

AN EPISTLE

(To N.A.)

So, into Cornwall you go down, And leave me loitering here in town.

For me, the ebb of London's wave, Not ocean-thunder in Cornish cave.

My friends (save only one or two) Gone to the glistening marge, like you,-- The opera season with blare and din Dying sublime in _Lohengrin_,-- Houses darkened, whose blinded panes All thoughts, save of the dead, preclude,-- The parks a puddle of tropic rains,-- Clubland a pensive solitude,-- For me, now you and yours are flown, The fellowship of books alone!

For you, the snaky wave, upflung With writhing head and hissing tongue; The weed whose tangled fibres tell Of some inviolate deep-sea dell; The faultless, secret-chambered sh.e.l.l, Whose sound is an epitome Of all the utterance of the sea; Great, basking, twinkling wastes of brine; Far clouds of gulls that wheel and swerve In unanimity divine, With undulation serpentine, And wondrous, consentaneous curve, Flashing in sudden silver sheen, Then melting on the sky-line keen; The world-forgotten coves that seem Lapt in some magic old sea-dream, Where, shivering off the milk-white foam, Lost airs wander, seeking home, And into clefts and caverns peep, Fissures paven with powdered sh.e.l.l, Recesses of primeval sleep, Tranced with an immemorial spell; The granite fangs eternally Rending the blanch'd lips of the sea; The breaker clutching land, then hurled Back on its own tormented world; The mountainous upthunderings, The glorious energy of things, The power, the joy, the cosmic thrill, Earth's ecstasy made visible, World-rapture old as Night and new As sunrise;--this, all this, for you!

So, by Atlantic breezes fanned, You roam the limits of the land, And I in London's world abide, Poor flotsam on the human tide!-- Nay, rather, isled amid the stream-- Watching the flood--and, half in dream Guessing the sources whence it rose, And musing to what Deep it flows.

For still the ancient riddles mar Our joy in man, in leaf, in star.

The Whence and Whither give no rest, The Wherefore is a hopeless quest; And the dull wight who never thinks,-- Who, chancing on the sleeping Sphinx, Pa.s.ses unchallenged,--fares the best!

But ill it suits this random verse The high enigmas to rehea.r.s.e, And touch with desultory tongue Secrets no man from Night hath wrung.

We ponder, question, doubt--and pray The Deep to answer Yea or Nay; And what does the engirdling wave, The undivulging, yield us, save Aspersion of bewildering spray?

We do but dally on the beach, Writing our little thoughts full large, While Ocean with imperious speech Derides us trifling by the marge.

Nay, we are children, who all day Beside the unknown waters play, And dig with small toy-spade the sand, Thinking our trenches wondrous deep, Till twilight falls, and hand-in-hand Nurse takes us home, well tired, to sleep; Sleep, and forget our toys, and be Lulled by the great unsleeping sea.

Enough!--to Cornwall you go down, And I tag rhymes in London town.

TO AUSTIN DOBSON