第 5 节
作者:雨来不躲      更新:2024-04-18 10:46      字数:9322
  By natural yearnings; all the happy scenes;
  The picture of an earth allied to heaven;
  Between them the known smile behind black masks;
  Rightly their various moods interpreted;
  And frolic because toilful children borne
  With larger comprehension of Earth's aim
  At loftier; clearer; sweeter; by their aid。
  Poem: The Night…Walk
  Awakes for me and leaps from shroud
  All radiantly the moon's own night
  Of folded showers in streamer cloud;
  Our shadows down the highway white
  Or deep in woodland woven…boughed;
  With yon and yon a stem alight。
  I see marauder runagates
  Across us shoot their dusky wink;
  I hear the parliament of chats
  In haws beside the river's brink;
  And drops the vole off alder…banks;
  To push his arrow through the stream。
  These busy people had our thanks
  For tickling sight and sound; but theme
  They were not more than breath we drew
  Delighted with our world's embrace:
  The moss…root smell where beeches grew;
  And watered grass in breezy space;
  The silken heights; of ghostly bloom
  Among their folds; by distance draped。
  'Twas Youth; rapacious to consume;
  That cried to have its chaos shaped:
  Absorbing; little noting; still
  Enriched; and thinking it bestowed;
  With wistful looks on each far hill
  For something hidden; something owed。
  Unto his mantled sister; Day
  Had given the secret things we sought
  And she was grave and saintly gay;
  At times she fluttered; spoke her thought;
  She flew on it; then folded wings;
  In meditation passing lone;
  To breathe around the secret things;
  Which have no word; and yet are known;
  Of thirst for them are known; as air
  Is health in blood:  we gained enough
  By this to feel it honest fare;
  Impalpable; not barren; stuff。
  A pride of legs in motion kept
  Our spirits to their task meanwhile;
  And what was deepest dreaming slept:
  The posts that named the swallowed mile;
  Beside the straight canal the hut
  Abandoned; near the river's source
  Its infant chirp; the shortest cut;
  The roadway missed; were our discourse;
  At times dear poets; whom some view
  Transcendent or subdued evoked
  To speak the memorable; the true;
  The luminous as a moon uncloaked;
  For proof that there; among earth's dumb;
  A soul had passed and said our best。
  Or it might be we chimed on some
  Historic favourite's astral crest;
  With part to reverence in its gleam;
  And part to rivalry the shout:
  So royal; unuttered; is youth's dream
  Of power within to strike without。
  But most the silences were sweet;
  Like mothers' breasts; to bid it feel
  It lived in such divine conceit
  As envies aught we stamp for real。
  To either then an untold tale
  Was Life; and author; hero; we。
  The chapters holding peaks to scale;
  Or depths to fathom; made our glee;
  For we were armed of inner fires;
  Unbled in us the ripe desires;
  And passion rolled a quiet sea;
  Whereon was Love the phantom sail。
  Poem: The Hueless Love
  Unto that love must we through fire attain;
  Which those two held as breath of common air;
  The hands of whom were given in bond elsewhere;
  Whom Honour was untroubled to restrain。
  Midway the road of our life's term they met;
  And one another knew without surprise;
  Nor cared that beauty stood in mutual eyes;
  Nor at their tardy meeting nursed regret。
  To them it was revealed how they had found
  The kindred nature and the needed mind;
  The mate by long conspiracy designed;
  The flower to plant in sanctuary ground。
  Avowed in vigilant solicitude
  For either; what most lived within each breast
  They let be seen:  yet every human test
  Demanding righteousness approved them good。
  She leaned on a strong arm; and little feared
  Abandonment to help if heaved or sank
  Her heart at intervals while Love looked blank;
  Life rosier were she but less revered。
  An arm that never shook did not obscure
  Her woman's intuition of the bliss …
  Their tempter's moment o'er the black abyss;
  Across the narrow plank … he could abjure。
  Then came a day that clipped for him the thread;
  And their first touch of lips; as he lay cold;
  Was all of earthly in their love untold;
  Beyond all earthly known to them who wed。
  So has there come the gust at South…west flung
  By sudden volt on eves of freezing mist;
  When sister snowflake sister snowdrop kissed;
  And one passed out; and one the bell…head hung。
  Poem: Song In The Songless
  They have no song; the sedges dry;
  And still they sing。
  It is within my breast they sing;
  As I pass by。
  Within my breast they touch a string;
  They wake a sigh。
  There is but sound of sedges dry;
  In me they sing。
  Poem: Union In Disseverance
  Sunset worn to its last vermilion he;
  She that star overhead in slow descent:
  That white star with the front of angel she;
  He undone in his rays of glory spent
  Halo; fair as the bow…shot at his rise;
  He casts round her; and knows his hour of rest
  Incomplete; were the light for which he dies;
  Less like joy of the dove that wings to nest。
  Lustrous momently; near on earth she sinks;
  Life's full throb over breathless and abased:
  Yet stand they; though impalpable the links;
  One; more one than the bridally embraced。
  Poem: The Burden Of Strength
  If that thou hast the gift of strength; then know
  Thy part is to uplift the trodden low;
  Else in a giant's grasp until the end
  A hopeless wrestler shall thy soul contend。
  Poem: The Main Regret
  'Written for the Charing Cross Album'
  I。
  Seen; too clear and historic within us; our sins of omission
  Frown when the Autumn days strike us all ruthlessly bare。
  They of our mortal diseases find never healing physician;
  Errors they of the soul; past the one hope to repair。
  II。
  Sunshine might we have been unto seed under soil; or have scattered
  Seed to ascendant suns brighter than any that shone。
  Even the limp…legged beggar a sick desperado has flattered
  Back to a half…sloughed life cheered by the mere human tone。
  Poem: Alternation
  Between the fountain and the rill
  I passed; and saw the mighty will
  To leap at sky; the careless run;
  As earth would lead her little son。
  Beneath them throbs an urgent well;
  That here is play; and there is war。
  I know not which had most to tell
  Of whence we spring and what we are。
  Poem: Hawarden
  When comes the lighted day for men to read
  Life's meaning; with the work before their hands
  Till this good gift of breath from debt is freed;
  Earth will not hear her children's wailful bands
  Deplore the chieftain fall'n in sob and dirge;
  Nor they look where is darkness; but on high。
  The sun that dropped down our horizon's verge;
  Illumes his labours through the travelled sky;
  Now seen in sum; most glorious; and 'tis known
  By what our warrior wrought we hold him fast。
  A splendid image built of man has flown;
  His deeds inspired of God outstep a Past。
  Ours the great privilege to have had one
  Among us who celestial tasks has done。
  Poem: At The Close
  To Thee; dear God of Mercy; both appeal;
  Who straightway sound the call to arms。  Thou know'st;
  And that black spot in each embattled host;
  Spring of the blood…stream; later wilt reveal。
  Now is it red artillery and white steel;
  Till on a day will ring the victor's boast;
  That 'tis Thy chosen towers uppermost;
  Where Thy rejected grovels under heel。
  So in all times of man's descent insane
  To brute; did strength and craft combining strike;
  Even as a God of Armies; his fell blow。
  But at the close he entered Thy domain;
  Dear God of Mercy; and if lion…like
  He tore the fall'n; the Eternal was his Foe。
  Poem: Forest History
  I。
  Beneath the vans of doom did men pass in。
  Heroic who came out; for round them hung
  A wavering phantom's red volcano tongue;
  With league…long lizard tail and fishy fin:
  II。
  Old Earth's original Dragon; there retired
  To his last fastness; overthrown by few。
  Him a laborious thrust of roadway slew。
  Then man to play devorant straight was fired。
  III。
  More intimate became the forest fear
  While pillared darkness hatched malicious life
  At either elbow; wolf or gnome or knife
  And wary slid the glance from ear to ear。
  IV。
  In chillness; like a clouded lantern…ray;
  The forest's heart of fog on mossed morass;
  On purple pool and silky cotton…grass;
  Revealed where lured the swallower byway。
  V。
  Dead outlook; flattened back with hard rebound
  Off walls of distance; left each mounted height。
  It seemed a giant hag…fiend; churning spite
  Of humble human being; held the ground。
  VI。
  Through friendless wastes; through treacherous woodland; slow
  The feet sustained by track of feet pursued
  Pained steps; and found the common bro