Bertram Dobell

“ When no man to his brother man shall act the part of Cain,
And none from others' loss shall seek unhallowed wealth to gain:
Oh haste, most blessèd dawn!
Then no man's interest apart from that of all shall be,
Nations no more in battle-shock shall meet on land or sea,
And universal Love shall make mankind one Family
Come soon, oh blessèd dawn!
Might we but live to see the day when ancient wrong departs,
And man no more contends with man save in the peaceful arts! ”

“ There's no alternative, alas! but 'shove,'
For 'move' and 'prove' are makeshifts at the best,
Though you must oft with them contented rest.
Suppose you write of something that doth gladden,
To find your choice is limited to 'sadden'
Or 'madden' makes you mad as any hatter,
And fit your head against the wall to batter:
Then too when you have said your love's a pattern,
It's hard to find that you must drag in 'slattern';
'Tis Hobson's choice; as also 'tis with amorous,
To which the only rhyme, alas! ”

“ The Truth of Truths perchance man ne'er may know,
Yet he the search for it may not forego:
'Tis good to climb the mountain's craggy side,
Though we reach not its pinnacle of snow.
Falsehood's a harlot with seductive smile,
Practised in every loose and wanton wile;
To every temper she doth suit herself
By flattery, cajolery, or guile:
But Truth all art or artifice disdains,
No painting uses, no false beauty feigns;
Cares not though men regardless pass her by,
And all-sufficient to herself remains. ”

“ My friend, when I can wander in the sun
Divested of my shadow, then will I
Seek from myself and mine own thoughts to run.
And strive new worlds of fancy to descry.
The poet, though a Shakespeare, is a man. ”

“ Time was I gloried in the thought of strife,
And with a dauntless breast
Opposed myself to all the storms of life—
But now I ask but Rest!
Best gift man may receive or fate bestow,
The only one that never can deceive ”

“ When an its other glories are forgot,
Here begs, in deep humility and shame,
To be, even by his friend, remembered not:
But while that friend compounded is with day,
All Time is now our poet's endless day. ”

“ And reason pleads in vain,
Even then the poet's words will reach
The heart and soothe its pain:
There's no dark corner of the soul
The poet may not scan—
Philosophers see part—the whole
Only the poet can. ”

“ Expansive, not repressive, is true life,
⁠Man passionless is scarcely man at all,
We win our way to peace through toil and strife,
⁠Nectar he shall not taste who shuns life's gall:
They never truly live who love disown—
A truth to poets and to lovers known. ”

“ Should we the truth on all occasions tell?
Say, should the sun each morn the darkness quell?
LOVE LIKE THE MOON
Love's like the changing moon, whose figure
Grows smaller if it grows not bigger. ”

“ Must we be deaf for ever; never hear
Thy voice proclaiming that relief is near?
Father! our tongues are tied; we cannot speak
Our heart-felt yearnings, howsoe'er we seek.
Our throats swell with the words we fain would say;
In murmurs hoarse and thick they die away.
When will our dumb and dark despair be o'er,
And like a rushing stream our fervent pray'rs outpour? ”

“ He who loves not
⁠Loveliness
Forfeits wholly
⁠Life's best bliss:
Grace and beauty,
⁠Eyes of fire,
No true man
⁠But must desire.
The richest gifts
⁠From nature's loom
Are youth and beauty
⁠In their bloom:
Priceless treasures! ”

“ Winter will have his reign,
But my lost summer never more
Shall I, like earth, regain.
The poet lives on love and hope,
And they his muse inspire;
When they have fled his soul is dead,
And silent is his lyre ”

“ Britain at length shall glory in thy name,
Thy fame shall ever with the ages grow,
And none shall censure thee but to their shame;
Not Omar's—or FitzGerald's—name shall shine
More brightly in the years to come than thine! ”

“ For then naught can touch me that's ill,
And no loss can my spirit bereave:
While we live joy is shadowed with fear,
And pleasure is purchased with pain;
Whatever to us is most dear
Fate forbids us to reach or retain. ”

“ In your spirit so fervent there burns ever-glowing
That love for the lovely which never can wane.
Leave 'success' to the sordid and 'slim' money-spinner,
His wealth is the price of the sale of his soul ”

“ Why spend yourself then in a bootless toil?
Is't to please man the nightingale doth sing,
Or shines the sun because it loves earth's soil?
Beauty from things external doth not spring,
Nowhere doth it exist save in the soul. ”

“ Of the foe's assault in front,
'Tis harder much our doubtings and our fears to subjugate;
But we never will despair,
We will dare and ever dare,
Till our constancy and courage win at last the smile of fate! ”

“ ON RECEIVING A PRESENT OF ROSES
Roses to one so old and grey,
So worn with toil and thought and time!
Surely the gift has gone astray,
For 'tis with youth that roses rhyme;
I'm no Anacreon in sooth
That can time's ravages defy ”

“ THE CRY OF HUMANITY
Oh what a weary pilgrimage I've paced
In learning only that I've nothing learned!
What will o' th' wisps and shadows have I chased!
For what unworthy objects have I yearned!
How vainly searched for truth in falsehood's mines!
What trust I've given only to be betrayed! ”

“ Gifted as he who doth our past illume,
Or who shall ev'n his wondrous powers exceed,
And so th' Arch-Poet's rank and fame assume?
Yes! her past exploits nature can repeat,
Though she loves best new miracles to prove,
And howsoe'er she seems our hopes to cheat
Doth ever forward to new victories move. ”

“ But such a dream as he alone could know:
And wisdom at the end began to stream
Upon him with a mild and steady glow:
Alas! that death should then his victim claim,
Even in that hour when he himself became! ”

“ Spite of himself his vulgar soul he shows,
Which to no great ideal allegiance owes,
But ever doth by self's mean compass steer:
So self-convicted and condemned he stands,
Despite the multitude's loud-clapping hands. ”

“ And wing with joy time's weary flight:
To analyse our joys away
Is but mere folly to display;
If all our joys are but illusions
Our sorrows also are delusions:
If nature cheats us into grief
Should we not thank her for relief? ”

“ As creatures full of fiery life we see:
Thine own strong soul thou usest to inform
These scenic puppets with the breath of life,
So that we see them, passion-breathing, warm,
Through all the gamut of their nature's strife ”

“ Whose wealth the faster it is spent
The richer doth remain.
"Stars crown me with their aureole,
The sea flows through my veins,
The heavens clothe me, and my soul
Infinity contains. [1]
"I look beyond Earth's petty span,
And worlds of light I see,
Where, cleansed from sin and suffering, man
Ascends to deity,
"Until, at variance no more
With the eternal Will,
I see him, strife and effort o'er,
His destiny fulfil."
1902
↑ "You never enjoy the world aright till the sea itself floweth in your veins, till you are clothed with the heavens and crowned with the stars."—Thomas Traherne. ”

“ Cease to complain and life's full glory see:
I grant you seem most wretched; but in truth
If you are so, why God and I can find
Excellent reasons for it: in good sooth
He who denies all's well is deaf and blind. ”

“ Flashed forth from eye to eye:
"I love, but must my love suppress"—
"O cruel destiny."
"Ah! had we only met before.
When we to love were free!"
"Wretched we must be evermore,
None so forlorn as we!"
"Our secret love our eyes alone,
And not our lips may tell." ”

“ Some day the sun will rise, but I shall rise
No more its warmth and radiance to enjoy,
But lie, a cold unconscious sacrifice
To treacherous time's fierce passion to destroy:
And shall the world when I am gone proceed
All heedlessly on its accustomed way? ”

“ We listen ever with delight intense,
And drink it in as drinks the dew the flower:
The hours go by and yet we sit entranced,
And rise at last unwearied and unsated,
Our joy in life rekindled or enhanced,
In spirit and in senses recreated. ”

“ In waking dreams we pass the day,
And dreams the hours of darkness sway,
(Day-dreams or night-dreams—who can guess
Whether their truth is more or less?)
Perchance even Death is but a dream,
And fleshless skulls with visions teem.
The Gods we pray to and adore
Are shadows of our dreams—no more ”

“ All the joys of life be thine,
Boundless love and pride be mine!
Gladdest of all living things,
Happier than queens or kings!
In thy little cot upcurled,
Sweetest creature in the world!
Wealth or glory for a night
Or a day may give delight,
Day and night and night and day
Lasts a mother's joy alway. ”

“ Zephyr, filled with the ancient fire,
As eagerly doth Flora court;
The bee yet shews his old desire
With lilies in the mom to sport.
While love is present in the heart
The Golden Age can ne'er depart. ”

“ A spark of her divinest energy,
With power to create the world of Art,
And intellect to solve all mystery:
So great and yet so little! blessed and cursed,—
Nature's most noble offspring—yet her worst! ”

“ Through laughter's loudest outburst clear
The wail of anguish you may hear;
Youth oft enough to sorrow bows,
To age no respite it allows.
We grieve for vanished joys of yore.
We grieve for friends that are no more. ”

“ The brave must needs honour and love the brave,
Though they are ranked against themselves in fight,
And only cowards at those foemen rave
Who manfully do blow for blow requite:
Shame then on those who libel the brave men
Who fight for all that is to them most dear ”

“ No jarring note doth fret my soul, which sings
A song of perfect and unmingled joy.
The world before has never seemed so fair,
No murmur of its miseries I hear:
Can I have reached a nobler region where
There is no sorrow, suffering, or fear? ”

“ And all our sorrows and our joys
With thine were interweaved.
Still with thy growth our love increased,
And still we watched with pride
Thy body and thy mind expand—
Oh! that thou shouldst have died! ”

“ Alas! how many sad Farewells
Even in a happy life are taken!
How often sound Death's tolling bells
Our sorrow and regret to waken!
Yet who would choose to be unmoved
When death our dearest from us rendeth? ”

“ What strange necessity compels mankind
To yearn for objects not to be attained?
To all their benefits and blessings blind
Nothing will please bat what can ne'er be gained,
Or which when gained will give but little pleasure,
Like a child's toy, the plaything of an hour,
Then cast aside, no longer thought a treasure—
Reach them or reach them not, the grapes are sour:
This all men prove, and yet by proof untaught. ”

“ As lovers will sometimes each other rally
With many a bantering and witty sally,
Their tender accents all the time revealing
The love that lurks beneath their words' concealing.—
I want no better, more expressive tongue
Than that in which our master, Shakespeare, sung ”

“ How clear of every shadow is its fame,
(Not clearer thine, dear Artist-Poet Blake!)
Tis such as he restore our faith in man,
When human baseness makes us most despair,
Lifting our thoughts—how few are those who can!—
Into purer and diviner air. ”

“ HYMN OF THE PANTHEIST
Wondrous essence, Being's stay,
Light that shineth night and day;
Power that doth all uphold,
Spirit that doth all enfold;
Heart of peace in maddest strife,
Joy of Joy and Life of Life ”

“ Of passions which to countless ills betray,
The bookworm's passion brings no keen repentance,
And if he spends he still retains his wealth;
Indulgence in it never yet did sentence
A man to vain regrets and ruined health. ”

“ To gain ingratitude,
Wherefore the path of peace I choose,
Where no false shows delude.
"Ambition's but a will o' th' wisp,
Wealth's but a pedlar's pack,
Beauty is but a shining lure
The souls of men to wreck. ”

“ With a moral to equip it;
So I my moral will unfold
For you to read—or skip it.
Most men, departing from the rôles
Nature for them intended,
Have wandered widely from their goals,
And to worse things descended. ”

“ Sport of ever-adverse fate,
Helpless, hopeless, desolate!
Wherefore do I linger here,
Naught to hope for, all to fear?
Disarmed, defeated, comfort gone,
Why await another dawn?
Courage then and end thy woe. . . . ”

“ And such fantastic actions perpetrate,
We lose the power to tell the false from true,
And all our nature grows sophisticate:
Such has been, is, and—must I say?—shall be
The tragic lot of poor humanity. ”