L.

“ From Satan’s hands hurl down the rod and globe.
Break Thou the spirit of the lords of lust,
Whose passions scatter an infected dust;
Reduce the men for whom the poor have bled,
Who elevate their gold as God and Bread. ”

“ Of golden suns, when nothing blacker than the shades
Of coming rain climbed up the heather-mantled height?
While the air
Breathed all the scents of all untrodden flowers,
And brooks poured silver through the glimmering glades,
Then sweetly wound through virgin ground.
Must all that beauty pass?
And must our pleasure trains
Like foul eruptions belch upon the mountain head?
Must we perforce build vulgar villa lanes,
And on sweet fields of grass
The canting scutcheons of a cheating commerce spread?
Men call you “dark.” ”

“ Flows one unebbing tide, by love and pity fed.
God’s heart is satisfied, man’s eyes are upward led,
And o’er the desert wide, the dew that’s downward shed
Drawn from that flowing tide, forms flowers white and red. ”

“ Once, the last once, His scar-gemmed Hand He lifts,
The Hand that twined the children to His knee,
Once downward bends the pitying Eye that sifts
Our chaff and grain for all eternity:
The blue immensity
Robes its Creator in a cope of light,
A cloud receives Him from their upturned sight.
p. 72Thou “alway with us”? Do the brakes of thorn
No more entangle our tormented earth,
Do women travail less when babes are born,
Costs it less sweat for men to fight with dearth,
Is life one Eden mirth,
Moves there more laughter on the purple sea,
Or richer gold across the rippling lea? ”

“ Peep through the mist that veils the strait with dew,
The sun grows bold and smites the landscape free,
The burn, the woods, the rocks of rose-red hue.
The world lies warm upon the heart of day,
The callants push their boat from off the shore,
The white gulls sail and flutter through the bay,
The jet-black daws are calling evermore.
The doves fly wheeling past their mountain wall,
The whispering pine trees weave a ceiling cool,
The rowans redden o’er the foaming fall,
The ferns keep guard around the fairies’ pool. ”

“ Through the ferns and foxgloves of the fairy dell.
Come where woodland spices smell,
Where the wild rose faintly flushes,
Sing me one more villanelle.
Rare as snowy heather bell,
Sweet as melody of thrushes
Through the ferns and foxgloves of the fairy dell.
When the shade creeps up the fell
Mid the parting sun’s last blushes,
Sing me one more villanelle.
p. 25Sing it to the curfew knell,
Where the streamlet plays with rushes
Through the ferns and foxgloves of the fairy dell. ”

“ LADY DAY NEAR BIGNOR South-Eastward where the waving line of hills
Bears up the clouds that speed like passing boats,
On one sweet spot which distant sunlight fills
A sudden silver haze descends and floats.
The trees below like lace veil glistening streams,
The gorse puts on its tiny gloves of gold,
The cattle move as though they fed in dreams,
And timid lambs are bleating in the fold. ”

“ I touch their dew and all my wounds are healed.
O Voice that speaks in every grove and street,
Above the song of birds and oaths of men,
I hear and follow Thee, although my steps
Begin a course that lies beyond my ken.
p. 82O Face returning at each Eucharist,
More close than forms that change with changing years,
I am the veil between myself and Thee,
Burn Thou the veil, and burning, kill my fears.
O Guest that comes to take away our best,
And all the loves we garner at our side,
Thou art our Best, our Home art Thou. ”

“ Of infant eyes, like stars that calm the night.
p. 74Thou art the Spirit of insurgent truth,
Thou givest buried lore a second youth,
Thou makest charity with wisdom grow,
And provest falsehood but a losing throw. ”

“ And again they never landed by the marble balustrade.
p. 13VII
THE VILLAGE CHERUB Up at the church at the edge of the moor,
Flat on the pathway that leads to the door,
Worn by the tread of the mourning and poor,
There is a face that is fit for God’s floor. ”