A Cluster of Grapes Part 7

LAURENCE HOUSMAN

THE FELLOW-TRAVELLERS

Fellow-travellers here with me, Loose for good each other's loads!

Here we come to the cross-roads: Here must parting be.

Where will you five be to-night?

Where shall I? we little know: Loosed from you, I let you go Utterly from sight.

Far away go taste and touch, Far go sight, and sound, and smell.

Fellow-Travellers, fare you well,-- You I loved so much.

THE SETTLERS

How green the earth, how blue the sky, How pleasant all the days that pa.s.s, Here where the British settlers lie Beneath their cloaks of gra.s.s!

Here ancient peace resumes her round, And rich from toil stand hill and plain; Men reap and store; but they sleep sound, The men who sowed the grain.

Hard to the plough their hands they put, And wheresoe'er the soil had need The furrow drave, and underfoot They sowed themselves for seed.

Ah! not like him whose hand made yield The brazen kine with fiery breath, And over all the Colchian field Strewed far the seeds of death;

Till, as day sank, awoke to war The seedlings of the dragon's teeth, And death ran multiplied once more Across the hideous heath.

But rich in flocks be all these farms, And fruitful be the fields which hide Brave eyes that loved the light, and arms That never clasped a bride!

O willing hearts turned quick to clay, Glad lovers holding death in scorn, Out of the lives ye cast away The coming race is born.

SONG

Sleep lies in every cup Of land or flower: Look how the earth drains up Her evening hour!

Each face that once so laughed, Now fain would lift Lips to Life's sleeping-draught, The goodlier gift.

Oh, whence this overflow, This flood of rest?

What vale of healing so Unlocks her breast?

What land, to give us right Of refuge, yields To the sharp scythes of light Her poppied fields?

Nay, wait! our turn to make Amends grows due!

Another day will break, We must give too!

EMILIA STUART LORIMER

LOVE SONGS

I

White-dreaming face of my dear, Waken; the dawn is here.

Ope, oh so misty eyes; Keep ope, and recognize!

Mouth, o'er the far sleep-sea Spread now thy smile-wings for me.

II

Take from me the little flowers And the bright-eyed beasts and the birds; And the babies, oh G.o.d, take away; Hearken my praying-words; Empty my road of them, Empty my house and my arm, For black is my heart with hate, And I would not these come to harm.

STORM

Twigs of despair on the high trees uplifted, Torn cloud flying behind; Whistling wind through the dead leaves drifted; Oho! my mind With you is racked and ruined and rifted.

Waves of the angry firth high-flying, Rainstorm striping the sea, Sleet-mist shrouding the hills; day dying; Now around me Closes the darkness of night in, wild crying.

G.o.d of the storm, in thy storm's heart unmeted My shallop-soul rideth where roars The swirling water-spout--rides undefeated; No rudder, no oars; Only within, thy small image seated.

JAMES A. MACKERETH

TO A BLACKBIRD ON NEW YEAR'S DAY

Hail, truant with song-troubled breast-- Thou welcome and bewildering guest!

Blithe troubadour, whose laughing note Brings Spring into a poet's throat,-- Flute, feathered joy! thy painted bill Foretells the daffodil.

Enchanter, 'gainst the evening star Singing to worlds where dreamers are, That makes upon the leafless bough A solitary vernal vow-- Sing, lyric soul! within thy song The love that lures the rose along!

The snowdrop, hearing, in the dell Doth tremble for its virgin bell; The crocus feels within its frame The magic of its folded flame; And many a listening patience lies And pushes toward its paradise.

Young love again on golden gales Scents hawthorn blown down happy dales; The phantom cuckoo calls forlorn From limits of the haunted morn;-- Sing, elfin heart! thy notes to me Are bells that ring in Faery!

Again the world is young, is young, And silence takes a silver tongue; The echoes catch the lyric mood Of laughing children in the wood: Blithe April trips in winter's way And nature, wondering, dreams of May.

Sing on, thou dusky fount of life!

G.o.d love thee for a merry sprite!