Collected Poems Volume II Part 4

VI

Poised between me, light, time, eternity, So tinged with all, that in its delicate brain Kindling it as a lamp with her bright wings Day-long, night-long, young Ariel sits and sings Echoing the lucid sea, Listening it echo her own unearthly strain, Watching through lucid walls the world's rich tide, One light, one substance with her own, rise and subside.

VII

And over soft brown woods, limpid, serene, Puffing its fans the Nautilus went its way, And from a hundred salt and weedy shelves Peered little horned faces of sea-elves: The prawn darted, half-seen, Thro' watery sunlight, like a pale green ray, And all around, from soft green waving bowers, Creatures like fruit out-crept from fluted sh.e.l.ls like flowers.

VIII

And, over all, that glowing mirror spread The splendour of its heaven-reflecting gleams, A level wealth of tints, calm as the sky That broods above our own mortality: The temporal seas had fled, And ah, what hopes, what fears, what mystic dreams Could ruffle it now from any deeper deep?

Content in its own bounds it slept a changeless sleep.

IX

Suddenly, from that heaven beyond belief, Suddenly, from that world beyond its ken, Das.h.i.+ng great billows o'er its rosy bars, s.h.i.+vering its dreams into a thousand stars, Flooding each sun-dried reef With waves of colour, (as once, for mortal men Bethesda's angel) with blue eyes, wide and wild, Naked into the pool there stepped a little child.

X

Her red-gold hair against the far green sea Blew thickly out: her slender golden form Shone dark against the richly waning West As with one hand she splashed her glistening breast, Then waded up to her knee And frothed the whole pool into a fairy storm!...

So, stooping through our skies, of old, there came Angels that once could set this world's dark pool a-flame,

XI

From which the seas of faith have ebbed away, Leaving the lonely sh.o.r.e too bright, too bare, While mirrored softly in the smooth wet sand A deeper sunset sees its blooms expand But all too phantom-fair, Between the dark brown rocks and sparkling spray Where the low ripples pleaded, shrank and sighed, And tossed a moment's rainbow heavenward ere they died.

XII

Stoop, starry souls, incline to this dark coast, Where all too long, too faithlessly, we dream.

Stoop to the world's dark pool, its crags and scars, Its yellow sands, its rosy harbour-bars, And soft green wastes that gleam But with some glorious drifting G.o.d-like ghost Of cloud, some vaguely pa.s.sionate crimson stain: Rend the blue waves of heaven, shatter our sleep again!

THE ISLAND HAWK

(A SONG FOR THE FIRST LAUNCHING OF HIS MAJESTY'S AERIAL NAVY)

I

_Chorus_-- _s.h.i.+ps have swept with my conquering name Over the waves of war, Swept thro' the Spaniards' thunder and flame To the splendour of Trafalgar: On the blistered decks of their great renown, In the wind of my storm-beat wings, Hawkins and Hawke went sailing down To the harbour of deep-sea kings!

By the storm-beat wings of the hawk, the hawk, Bent beak and pitiless breast, They clove their way thro' the red sea-fray: Who wakens me now to the quest?_

II

Hushed are the whimpering winds on the hill, Dumb is the shrinking plain, And the songs that enchanted the woods are still As I shoot to the skies again!

Does the blood grow black on my fierce bent beak, Does the down still cling to my claw?

Who brightened these eyes for the prey they seek?

Life, I follow thy law!

_For I am the hawk, the hawk, the hawk!

Who knoweth my pitiless breast?

Who watcheth me sway in the wild wind's way?

Flee--flee--for I quest, I quest._

III

As I glide and glide with my peering head, Or swerve at a puff of smoke, Who watcheth my wings on the wind outspread, Here--gone--with an instant stroke?

Who toucheth the glory of life I feel As I buffet this great glad gale, Spire and spire to the cloud-world, wheel, Loosen my wings and sail?

_For I am the hawk, the island hawk, Who knoweth my pitiless breast?

Who watcheth me sway in the sun's bright way?

Flee--flee--for I quest, I quest._

IV

Had they given me "Cloud-cuckoo-city" to guard Between mankind and the sky, Tho' the dew might s.h.i.+ne on an April sward, Iris had ne'er pa.s.sed by!

Swift as her beautiful wings might be From the rosy Olympian hill, Had Epops entrusted the gates to me Earth were his kingdom still.

_For I am the hawk, the archer, the hawk!

Who knoweth my pitiless breast?

Who watcheth me sway in the wild wind's way?

Flee--flee--for I quest, I quest._

V

My mate in the nest on the high bright tree Blazing with dawn and dew, She knoweth the gleam of the world and the glee As I drop like a bolt from the blue; She knoweth the fire of the level flight As I skim, close, close to the ground, With the long gra.s.s las.h.i.+ng my breast and the bright Dew-drops flas.h.i.+ng around.

_She watcheth the hawk, the hawk, the hawk, (O, the red-blotched eggs in the nest!) Watcheth him sway in the sun's bright way; Flee--flee--for I quest, I quest._

VI

She builded her nest on the high bright wold, She was taught in a world afar, The lore that is only an April old Yet old as the evening star; Life of a far off ancient day In an hour unhooded her eyes; In the time of the budding of one green spray She was wise as the stars are wise.

_Brown flower of the tree of the hawk, the hawk, On the old elm's burgeoning breast, She watcheth me sway in the wild wind's way; Flee--flee--for I quest, I quest._

VII

Spirit and sap of the sweet swift Spring, Fire of our island soul, Burn in her breast and pulse in her wing While the endless ages roll; Avatar--she--of the perilous pride That plundered the golden West, Her glance is a sword, but it sweeps too wide For a rumour to trouble her rest.

_She goeth her glorious way, the hawk, She nurseth her brood alone; She will not swoop for an owlet's whoop, She hath calls and cries of her own._