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Read Ebook: Collected Poems 1901-1918 in Two Volumes. Volume I. by De La Mare Walter
Font size: Background color: Text color: Add to tbrJar First Page Next PageEbook has 644 lines and 25300 words, and 13 pagesPOEMS: 1906 LYRICAL POEMS-- SHADOW UNREGARDING THEY TOLD ME SORCERY THE CHILDREN OF STARE AGE THE GLIMPSE REMEMBRANCE TREACHERY IN VAIN THE MIRACLE KEEP INNOCENCY THE PHANTOM VOICES THULE THE BIRTHNIGHT: TO F. THE DEATH-DREAM "WHERE IS THY VICTORY?" FOREBODING VAIN FINDING NAPOLEON ENGLAND TRUCE EVENING NIGHT THE UNIVERSE GLORIA MUNDI IDLENESS GOLIATH CHARACTERS FROM SHAKESPEARE-- FALSTAFF MACBETH BANQUO MERCUTIO JULIET'S NURSE IAGO IMOGEN POLONIUS OPHELIA HAMLET SONNETS-- THE HAPPY ENCOUNTER APRIL SEA-MAGIC THE MARKET-PLACE ANATOMY EVEN IN THE GRAVE BRIGHT LIFE HUMANITY VIRTUE MEMORIES OF CHILDHOOD-- REVERIE THE MASSACRE ECHO FEAR THE MERMAIDS MYSELF AUTUMN WINTER ENVOI: TO MY MOTHER THE LISTENERS: 1914 MOTLEY: 1918 POEMS: 1906 TO HENRY NEWBOLT LYRICAL POEMS THEY TOLD ME They told me Pan was dead, but I Oft marvelled who it was that sang Down the green valleys languidly Where the grey elder-thickets hang. Sometimes I thought it was a bird My soul had charged with sorcery; Sometimes it seemed my own heart heard Inland the sorrow of the sea. But even where the primrose sets The seal of her pale loveliness, I found amid the violets Tears of an antique bitterness. SORCERY "What voice is that I hear Crying across the pool?" "It is the voice of Pan you hear, Crying his sorceries shrill and clear, In the twilight dim and cool." "What song is it he sings, Echoing from afar; While the sweet swallow bends her wings, Filling the air with twitterings, Beneath the brightening star?" The woodman answered me, His faggot on his back:-- "Seek not the face of Pan to see; Flee from his clear note summoning thee To darkness deep and black!" "He dwells in thickest shade, Piping his notes forlorn Of sorrow never to be allayed; Turn from his coverts sad Of twilight unto morn!" The woodman passed away Along the forest path; His ax shone keen and grey In the last beams of day: And all was still as death:-- Only Pan singing sweet Out of Earth's fragrant shade; I dreamed his eyes to meet, And found but shadow laid Before my tired feet. Comes no more dawn to me, Nor bird of open skies. Only his woods' deep gloom I see Till, at the end of all, shall rise, Afar and tranquilly, Death's stretching sea. THE CHILDREN OF STARE Winter is fallen early On the house of Stare; Birds in reverberating flocks Haunt its ancestral box; Bright are the plenteous berries In clusters in the air. Still is the fountain's music, The dark pool icy still, Whereupon a small and sanguine sun Floats in a mirror on, Into a West of crimson, From a South of daffodil. 'Tis strange to see young children In such a wintry house; Like rabbits' on the frozen snow Their tell-tale footprints go; Their laughter rings like timbrels 'Neath evening ominous: Their small and heightened faces Like wine-red winter buds; Their frolic bodies gentle as Flakes in the air that pass, Frail as the twirling petal From the briar of the woods. Above them silence lours, Still as an arctic sea; Light fails; night falls; the wintry moon Glitters; the crocus soon Will ope grey and distracted On earth's austerity: AGE This ugly old crone-- Every beauty she had When a maid, when a maid. Her beautiful eyes, Too youthful, too wise, Seemed ever to come To so lightless a home, Cold and dull as a stone. And her cheeks--who would guess Cheeks cadaverous as this Once with colours were gay As the flower on its spray? Who would ever believe Aught could bring one to grieve So much as to make Lips bent for love's sake So thin and so grey? O Youth, come away! As she asks in her lone, This old, desolate crone. She loves us no more; She is too old to care For the charms that of yore Made her body so fair. Past repining, past care, She lives but to bear One or two fleeting years Earth's indifference: her tears Have lost now their heat; Her hands and her feet Now shake but to be Shed as leaves from a tree; And her poor heart beats on Like a sea--the storm gone. THE GLIMPSE Art thou asleep? or have thy wings Wearied of my unchanging skies? Or, haply, is it fading dreams Are in my eyes? Not even an echo in my heart Tells me the courts thy feet trod last, Bare as a leafless wood it is, The summer past. My inmost mind is like a book The reader dulls with lassitude, Wherein the same old lovely words Sound poor and rude. Yet through this vapid surface, I Seem to see old-time deeps; I see, Past the dark painting of the hour, Life's ecstasy. Only a moment; as when day Is set, and in the shade of night, Through all the clouds that compassed her, Stoops into sight Pale, changeless, everlasting Dian, Gleams on the prone Endymion, Troubles the dulness of his dreams: And then is gone. REMEMBRANCE The sky was like a waterdrop In shadow of a thorn, Clear, tranquil, beautiful, Dark, forlorn. Lightning along its margin ran; A rumour of the sea Rose in profundity and sank Into infinity. Lofty and few the elms, the stars In the vast boughs most bright; I stood a dreamer in a dream In the unstirring night. Not wonder, worship, not even peace Seemed in my heart to be: Only the memory of one, Of all most dead to me. TREACHERY She had amid her ringlets bound Green leaves to rival their dark hue; How could such locks with beauty bound Dry up their dew, Wither them through and through? She had within her dark eyes lit Sweet fires to burn all doubt away; Yet did those fires, in darkness lit, Burn but a day, Not even till twilight stay. She had within a dusk of words A vow in simple splendour set; How, in the memory of such words, Could she forget That vow--the soul of it? IN VAIN I knocked upon thy door ajar, While yet the woods with buds were grey; Nought but a little child I heard Warbling at break of day. I knocked when June had lured her rose To mask the sharpness of its thorn; Knocked yet again, heard only yet Thee singing of the morn. The frail convolvulus had wreathed Its cup, but the faint flush of eve Lingered upon thy Western wall; Thou hadst no word to give. Once yet I came; the winter stars Above thy house wheeled wildly bright; Footsore I stood before thy door-- Wide open into night. Add to tbrJar First Page Next Page |
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