When Winter Comes to Main Street Part 25

"Lady Ann (_to a friend of proved discretion_): You have toiled all the way here again? Do you know, I feel I am only beginning to find out who my true friends are? I am much, much better.... On Friday I am to be allowed on to the sofa and by the end of next week Dr. Richardson promises to let me go back to Mount Street. Of course I should have liked the operation to take place there--it is one's frame and setting, but, truly honestly, Arthur and I have not been in a position to have any painting or papering done for so long.... The surgeon insisted on a nursing home. Apparatus and so on and so forth.... Quite between ourselves I fancy that they make a very good thing out of these homes; but I am so thankful to be well again that I would put up with almost any imposition....

"Everything went off too wonderfully. Perhaps you have seen my brother Brackenbury? Or Ruth? Ah, I am sorry; I should have been vastly entertained to hear what they were saying, what they dared say. Ruth did indeed offer to pay the expenses of the operation--the belated p.r.i.c.k of conscience!--and it was on the tip of my tongue to say we are not yet dependent on her spasmodic charity. Also, that I can keep my lips closed about Brackenbury without expecting a--tip? But they know I can't afford to refuse 500.... If they, if everybody would only leave one alone! Spied on, whispered about....

"The papers made such an absurd stir! If you are known by name as occupying any little niche, the world waits gaping below. I suppose I ought to be flattered, but for days there were callers, letters, telephone-messages. Like Royalty _in extremis_.... And I never pretended that the operation was in any sense critical....

"Do you know, beyond saying that, I would much rather not talk about it?

This very modern frankness.... Not you, of course! But when a man like my brother-in-law Spenworth strides in here a few hours before the anaesthetic is administered and says 'What is the matter with you? Much ado about nothing, I call it.' ... That from Arthur's brother to Arthur's wife, when, for all he knew, he might never see her alive again.... I prefer just to say that everything went off most satisfactorily and that I hope now to be better than I have been for years...."

BOOKS BY STEPHEN MCKENNA

THE RELUCTANT LOVER SHEILA INTERVENES THE SIXTH SENSE SONIA: BETWEEN TWO WORLDS NINETY-SIX HOURS' LEAVE MIDAS AND SON SONIA MARRIED LADY LILITH THE EDUCATION OF ERIC LANE THE SECRET VICTORY WHILE I REMEMBER THE CONFESSIONS OF A WELL-MEANING WOMAN

SOURCES ON STEPHEN MCKENNA

_Who's Who_ [In England].

Private Information.

CHAPTER XXII

POETS AND PLAYWRIGHTS

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I have to tell about a number of poets and, regarding poets, I agree with a very clever woman I know who declares that poetry is the most personal of the arts and who further says that it is manifestly inadequate to talk about a poet's work without giving a sample of his poetry. So, generally, I shall quote one of the shorter poems or a pa.s.sage from a longer poem.

John Dos Pa.s.sos, known for _Three Soldiers_ and for _Rosinante to the Road Again_, will be still more variously known to those who read his book of verse, _A Pushcart at the Curb_. This book bears a relation to _Rosinante_, the contents grouping themselves under these general headings:

Winter in Castile Nights by Ba.s.sano Translations from the Spanish of Antonio Machado Vagones de Tercera Quai de la Tournelle Of Foreign Travel Phases of the Moon

I will select for quotation the sixth or final poem dedicated to A. K.

McC. from the section ent.i.tled "Quai de la Tournelle,"

This is a garden where through the russet mist of cl.u.s.tered trees and strewn November leaves, they crunch with vainglorious heels of ancient vermilion the dry dead of spent summer's greens, and stalk with mincing sceptic steps, and sound of snuffboxes snapping to the capping of an epigram, in fluffy attar-scented wigs ...

the exquisite Augustans.

Christopher Morley is too well-known as a poet to require any explicit account in this place. I shall remind you of the pleasure of reading him by quoting the "Song For a Little House" from his book, _The Rocking Horse_, and also a short verse from his _Translations from the Chinese_.

I'm glad our house is a little house, Not too tall nor too wide: I'm glad the hovering b.u.t.terflies Feel free to come inside.

Our little house is a friendly house, It is not shy or vain; It gossips with the talking trees, And makes friends with the rain.

And quick leaves cast a shimmer of green, Against our whited walls, And in the phlox, the courteous bees, Are paying duty calls.

But there is a different temper--or, if you like, tempering--to the verse in _Translations from the Chinese_. I quote "A National Frailty":

The American people Were put into the world To a.s.sist foreign lecturers.

When I visited them They filled crowded halls To hear me tell them Great Truths Which they might as well have read In their own prophet Th.o.r.eau.

They paid me, for this, Three hundred dollars a night, And ten of their mandarins Invited me to visit at Newport.

My agent told me If I would wear Chinese costume on the platform It would be five hundred.

In speaking of the late Joyce Kilmer, the temptation is inescapable to quote his "Trees"; after all, it is his best known and best loved poem--in certain moments it is his best poem! But instead, I will desert his volume, _Trees and Other Poems_, and from his other book, _Main Street and Other Poems_, I will quote the first two stanzas of Kilmer's "Houses"--a poem written for his wife:

When you shall die and to the sky Serenely, delicately go, Saint Peter, when he sees you there, Will clash his keys and say: "Now talk to her, Sir Christopher!

And hurry, Michelangelo!

She wants to play at building, And you've got to help her play!"

Every architect will help erect A palace on a lawn of cloud, With rainbow beams and a sunset roof, And a level star-tiled floor; And at your will you may use the skill Of this gay angelic crowd, When a house is made you will throw it down, And they'll build you twenty more.

Mrs. Kilmer is the author of two volumes of verse which have sold rather more than John Masefield usually sells--at least, until the publication of _Reynard the Fox. Candles That Burn_ created her audience and _Vigils_ has been that audience's renewed delight. From _Vigils_ I take the poem "The Touch of Tears." In it "Michael" is, of course, her own son:

Michael walks in autumn leaves, Rustling leaves and fading gra.s.ses, And his little music-box Tinkles faintly as he pa.s.ses.

It's a gay and jaunty tune If the hands that play were clever: Michael plays it like a dirge, Moaning on and on forever.

While his happy eyes grow big, Big and innocent and soulful, Wistful, halting little notes Rise, unutterably doleful, Telling of all childish griefs-- Baffled babies sob forsaken, Birds fly off and bubbles burst, Kittens sleep and will not waken.

Michael, it's the touch of tears.

Though you sing for very gladness, Others will not see your mirth; They will mourn your fancied sadness.

Though you laugh at them in scorn, Show your happy heart for token, Michael, you'll protest in vain-- They will swear your heart is broken!

I think I have said elsewhere that J. C. Squire prefers his serious poems to those parodies of which he is such an admitted master. It seems only decent to defer, in this place, to the author's own feeling in the matter.

Mr. Squire is the author of _The Birds and Other Poems_ and _Poems: Second Series_. My present choice is the beginning and the close of the poem, "Harlequin"--which is in both books:

Moonlit woodland, veils of green, Caves of empty dark between; Veils of green from rounded arms Drooping, that the moonlight charms: Tranced the trees, gra.s.s beneath Silent ...

Like a stealthy breath, Mask and wand and silver skin Sudden enters Harlequin.

Hist! Hist! Watch him go, Leaping limb and pointing toe, Slender arms that float and flow, Curving wand above, below; Flying, gliding, changing feet; Onset merging in retreat.

Not a shadow of sound there is But his motion's gentle hiss, Till one fluent arm and hand Suddenly circles, and the wand Taps a bough far overhead, "Crack," and then all noise is dead.

For he halts, and for a s.p.a.ce Stands erect with upward face, Taut and tense to the white Message of the Moon's light.

He was listening; he was there; Flash! he went. To the air He a waiting ear had bent, Silent; but before he went Something somewhere else to seek, He moved his lips as though to speak.

And we wait, and in vain, For he will not come again.

Earth, gra.s.s, wood, and air, As we stare, and we stare, Which that fierce life did hold, Tired, dim, void, cold.

Milton Raison is a young writer, known especially to readers of The Bookman, whose verse has appeared in various magazines. A Russian, Milton Raison went to sea as a boy--he is scarcely more than a boy now. His first book of verse, _Spindrift_, carries a preface by William McFee. I quote:

"There is a Latin sharpness of mentality manifested in these clearly, sardonically etched portraits of a ship's crew. The whimsical humour revealed in final lines is a portent, in the present writer's opinion, of a talent which will probably come to maturity in a very different field.

Indeed it may be, though it is too early to dogmatise, that these poems are but the early efflorescence of a gift for vigorous prose narrative.

"Mr. Milton Raison has settled for himself, with engaging prompt.i.tude, that a seafaring career provides the inspiration he craves. The influence of Masefield is strong upon him, and some of his verses are plainly derivative. As already hinted, it is too early to say definitely how this plan will succeed. In his diary, kept while on a voyage to South America, a doc.u.ment remarkable for its descriptive power and a certain crude and virginal candour, one may discover an embryo novelist struggling with the inevitable limitations of youth. But in his simple and nave poems, whether they give us some bizarre and catastrophic picture of seamen, or depict the charming emotions of a sensitive adolescence, there is a pa.s.sion for experiment and humility of intellect which promises well enough for a young man in his teens."

I find it particularly difficult to choose a poem for citation from this book. Perhaps I shall do as well as I can, with only s.p.a.ce to quote one poem, if I give you "Vision":