I
BECAUSE the night was falling warm and still | |
| Upon a golden day at April’s end, | |
| I thought; I will go up the hill once more | |
| To find the face of him that I have lost, | |
| And speak with him before his ghost has flown | 5 |
| Far from the earth that might not keep him long. | |
| |
| So down the road I went, pausing to see | |
| How slow the dusk drew on, and how the folk | |
| Loitered about their doorways, well-content | |
| With the fine weather and the waxing year. | 10 |
| The miller’s house, that glimmered with grey walls, | |
| Turned me aside; and for a while I leaned | |
| Along the tottering rail beside the bridge | |
| To watch the dripping mill-wheel green with damp. | |
| The miller peered at me with shadowed eyes | 15 |
| And pallid face: I could not hear his voice | |
| For sound of the weir’s plunging. He was old. | |
| His days went round with the unhurrying wheel. | |
| |
| Moving along the street, each side I saw | |
| The humble, kindly folk in lamp-lit rooms; | 20 |
| Children at table; simple, homely wives; | |
| Strong, grizzled men; and soldiers back from war, | |
| Scaring the gaping elders with loud talk. | |
| |
| Soon all the jumbled roofs were down the hill, | |
| And I was turning up the grassy lane | 25 |
| That goes to the big, empty house that stands | |
| Above the town, half-hid by towering trees. | |
| I looked below and saw the glinting lights: | |
| I heard the treble cries of bustling life, | |
| And mirth, and scolding; and the grind of wheels. | 30 |
| An engine whistled, piercing-shrill, and called | |
| High echoes from the sombre slopes afar; | |
| Then a long line of trucks began to move. | |
| |
| It was quite still; the columned chestnuts stood | |
| Dark in their noble canopies of leaves. | 35 |
| I thought: ‘A little longer I’ll delay, | |
| And then he’ll be more glad to hear my feet, | |
| And with low laughter ask me why I’m late. | |
| The place will be too dim to show his eyes, | |
| But he will loom above me like a tree, | 40 |
| With lifted arms and body tall and strong.’ | |
| |
| There stood the empty house; a ghostly hulk | |
| Becalmed and huge, massed in the mantling dark, | |
| As builders left it when quick-shattering war | |
| Leapt upon France and called her men to fight. | 45 |
| Lightly along the terraces I trod, | |
| Crunching the rubble till I found the door | |
| That gaped in twilight, framing inward gloom. | |
| An owl flew out from under the high eaves | |
| To vanish secretly among the firs, | 50 |
| Where lofty boughs netted the gleam of stars. | |
| I stumbled in; the dusty floors were strewn | |
| With cumbering piles of planks and props and beams; | |
| Tall windows gapped the walls; the place was free | |
| To every searching gust and jousting gale; | 55 |
| But now they slept; I was afraid to speak, | |
| And heavily the shadows crowded in. | |
| |
| I called him, once; then listened: nothing moved: | |
| Only my thumping heart beat out the time. | |
| Whispering his name, I groped from room to room. | 60 |
| |
| Quite empty was that house; it could not hold | |
| His human ghost, remembered in the love | |
| That strove in vain to be companioned still. | |
| |
II
Blindly I sought the woods that I had known | |
| So beautiful with morning when I came | 65 |
| Amazed with spring that wove the hazel twigs | |
| With misty raiment of awakening green. | |
| I found a holy dimness, and the peace | |
| Of sanctuary, austerely built of trees, | |
| And wonder stooping from the tranquil sky. | 70 |
| |
| Ah! but there was no need to call his name. | |
| He was beside me now, as swift as light. | |
| I knew him crushed to earth in scentless flowers, | |
| And lifted in the rapture of dark pines. | |
| ‘For now,’ he said, ‘my spirit has more eyes | 75 |
| Than heaven has stars; and they are lit by love. | |
| My body is the magic of the world, | |
| And dawn and sunset flame with my spilt blood. | |
| My breath is the great wind, and I am filled | |
| With molten power and surge of the bright waves | 80 |
| That chant my doom along the ocean’s edge. | |
| |
| ‘Look in the faces of the flowers and find | |
| The innocence that shrives me; stoop to the stream | |
| That you may share the wisdom of my peace. | |
| For talking water travels undismayed. | 85 |
| The luminous willows lean to it with tales | |
| Of the young earth; and swallows dip their wings | |
| Where showering hawthorn strews the lanes of light. | |
| |
| ‘I can remember summer in one thought | |
| Of wind-swept green, and deeps of melting blue, | 90 |
| And scent of limes in bloom; and I can hear | |
| Distinct the early mower in the grass, | |
| Whetting his blade along some morn of June. | |
| |
| ‘For I was born to the round world’s delight, | |
| And knowledge of enfolding motherhood, | 95 |
| Whose tenderness, that shines through constant toil, | |
| Gathers the naked children to her knees. | |
| In death I can remember how she came | |
| To kiss me while I slept; still I can share | |
| The glee of childhood; and the fleeting gloom | 100 |
| When all my flowers were washed with rain of tears. | |
| |
| ‘I triumph in the choruses of birds, | |
| Bursting like April buds in gyres of song. | |
| My meditations are the blaze of noon | |
| On silent woods, where glory burns the leaves. | 105 |
| I have shared breathless vigils; I have slaked | |
| The thirst of my desires in bounteous rain | |
| Pouring and splashing downward through the dark. | |
| Loud storm has roused me with its winking glare, | |
| And voice of doom that crackles overhead. | 110 |
| I have been tired and watchful, craving rest, | |
| Till the slow-footed hours have touched my brows | |
| And laid me on the breast of sundering sleep.’ | |
| |
III
I know that he is lost among the stars, | |
| And may return no more but in their light. | 115 |
| Though his hushed voice may call me in the stir | |
| Of whispering trees, I shall not understand. | |
| Men may not speak with stillness; and the joy | |
| Of brooks that leap and tumble down green hills | |
| Is faster than their feet; and all their thoughts | 120 |
| Can win no meaning from the talk of birds. | |
| |
| My heart is fooled with fancies, being wise; | |
| For fancy is the gleaming of wet flowers | |
| When the hid sun looks forth with golden stare. | |
| Thus, when I find new loveliness to praise, | 125 |
| And things long-known shine out in sudden grace, | |
| Then will I think: ‘He moves before me now.’ | |
| So he will never come but in delight, | |
| And, as it was in life, his name shall be | |
| Wonder awaking in a summer dawn, | 130 |
And youth, that dying, touched my lips to song.
Flixécourt. May 1916. | |
