Read Ebook: By Still Waters: Lyrical Poems Old and New by Russell George William

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Prelude A Summer Night Creation Dusk Night Dawn Day Dana Remembrance The Hour of the King The Winds of Angus Reflections The Dawn of Darkness Natural Magic In the Womb Forgiveness A Woman's Voice Parting A Prayer The Heroes Recall Blindness Brotherhood A New Being The Man to the Angel Endurance The Vesture of the Soul The Twilight of Earth The Dream The Parting of Ways Song The Virgin Mother

The Manager of the Dun Emer Press has to thank Mr. John Lane for permission to reprint ten poems from Homeward Songs by the Way and nine poems from The Earth Breath, also Messrs. Macmillan & Co. for permission to reprint seven poems from The Divine Vision.

Oh, be not led away, Lured by the colour of the sun-rich day. The gay romance of song Unto the spirit life doth not belong: Though far-between the hours In which the Master of Angelic powers Lightens the dusk within The holy of holies, be it thine to win Rare vistas of white light, Half parted lips through which the Infinite Murmurs her ancient story, Harkening to whom the wandering planets hoary Waken primeval fires, With deeper rapture in celestial choirs Breathe, and with fleeter motion Wheel in their orbits through the surgeless ocean. So hearken thou like these, Intent on her, mounting by slow degrees, Until thy song's elation Echoes her multitudinous meditation.

A SUMMER NIGHT

Her mist of primroses within her breast Twilight hath folded up, and o'er the west, Seeking remoter valleys long hath gone, Not yet hath come her sister of the dawn. Silence and coolness now the earth enfold: Jewels of glittering green, long mists of gold, Hazes of nebulous silver veil the height, And shake in tremors through the shadowy night. Heard through the stillness, as in whispered words, The wandering God-guided wings of birds Ruffle the dark. The little lives that lie Deep hid in grass join in a long-drawn sigh More softly still; and unheard through the blue The falling of innumerable dew, Lifts with grey fingers all the leaves that lay Burned in the heat of the consuming day. The lawns and lakes lie in this night of love, Admitted to the majesty above. Earth with the starry company hath part; The waters hold all heaven within their heart, And glimmer o'er with wave-lips everywhere Lifted to meet the angel lips of air. The many homes of men shine near and far; Peace-laden as the tender evening star, The late home-coming folk anticipate Their rest beyond the passing of the gate, And tread with sleep-filled hearts on drowsy feet. Oh, far away and wonderful and sweet All this, all this. But far too many things Obscuring, as a cloud of seraph wings Blinding the seeker for the Lord behind, I fall away in weariness of mind, And think how far apart are I and you, Beloved, from those spirit children who Felt but one single Being long ago, Whispering in gentleness and leaning low Out of its majesty, as child to child. I think upon it all with heart grown wild. Hearing no voice, howe'er my spirit broods. No whisper from the dense infinitudes, This world of myriad things whose distance awes. Ah me; how innocent our childhood was!

CREATION

As one by one the veils took flight, The day withdrew, the stars came up: The spirit issued dark and bright, Filling thy beauty like a cup.

Sacred thy laughter on the air, Holy thy lightest word that fell, Proud the innumerable hair That waved at the enchanter's spell.

Oh Master of the Beautiful, Creating us from hour to hour, Give me this vision to the full To see in lightest things thy power!

This vision give, no heaven afar, No throne, and yet I will rejoice, Knowing beneath my feet a star, Thy word in every wandering voice.

DUSK

Dusk wraps the village in its dim caress; Each chimney's vapour, like a thin grey rod, Mounting aloft through miles of quietness, Pillars the skies of God.

Far up they break or seem to break their line, Mingling their nebulous crests that bow and nod Under the light of those fierce stars that shine Out of the calm of God.

Only in clouds and dreams I felt those souls In the abyss, each fire hid in its clod, From which in clouds and dreams the spirit rolls Into the vast of God.

NIGHT

Heart-hidden from the outer things I rose; The spirit woke anew in nightly birth Unto the vastness where forever glows The star-soul of the earth.

There all alone in primal ecstasy, Within her depths where revels never tire, The Olden Beauty shines: each thought of me Is veined through with its fire.

And all my thoughts are throngs of living souls; They breathe in me, heart unto heart allied; Their joy undimmed, though when the morning tolls The planets may divide.

DAWN

Still as the holy of holies breathes the vast Within its crystal depths the stars grow dim; Fire on the altar of the hills at last Burns on the shadowy rim.

Moments that holds all moments; white upon The verge it trembles; then like mists of flowers Break from the fairy fountain of the dawn The hues of many hours.

Thrown downward from that high companionship Of dreaming inmost heart with inmost heart, Into the common daily ways I slip, My fire from theirs apart.

DAY

In day from some titanic past it seems As if a thread divine of memory runs; Born ere the Mighty One began his dreams, Or yet were stars and suns.

But here an iron will has fixed the bars; Forgetfulness falls on earth's myriad races: No image of the proud and morning stars Looks at us from their faces.

Yet yearning still to reach to those dim heights, Each dream remembered is a burning-glass, Where through to darkness from the Light of Lights Its rays in splendour pass.

DANA

I am the tender voice calling 'Away,' Whispering between the beatings of the heart, And inaccessible in dewy eyes I dwell, and all unkissed on lovely lips, Lingering between white breasts inviolate, And fleeting ever from the passionate touch, I shine afar, till men may not divine Whether it is the stars or the beloved They follow with wrapt spirit. And I weave My spells at evening, folding with dim caress, Aerial arms and twilight dropping hair, The lonely wanderer by wood or shore, Till, filled with some deep tenderness, he yields, Feeling in dreams for the dear mother heart He knew, ere he forsook the starry way, And clings there, pillowed far above the smoke And the dim murmur from the duns of men. I can enchant the trees and rocks, and fill The dumb brown lips of earth with mystery, Make them reveal or hide the god. I breathe A deeper pity than all love, myself Mother of all, but without hands to heal: Too vast and vague, they know me not. But yet I am the heartbreak over fallen things, The sudden gentleness that stays the blow, And I am in the kiss that foemen give Pausing in battle, and in the tears that fall Over the vanquished foe, and in the highest; Among the Danaan gods, I am the last Council of mercy in their hearts where they Mete justice from a thousand starry thrones.

REMEMBRANCE

There were many burning hours on the heart-sweet tide, And we passed away from ourselves, forgetting all The immortal moods that faded, the god who died, Hastening away to the King on a distant call.

There were ruby dews were shed when the heart was riven, And passionate pleading and prayers to the dead we had wronged; And we passed away unremembering and unforgiven, Hastening away to the King for the peace we longed.

Love unremembered and heart-ache we left behind, We forsook them, unheeding, hastening away in our flight; We knew the hearts we had wronged of old we would find When we came to the fold of the King for rest in the night.

THE HOUR OF THE KING

Who would think this quiet breather From the world had taken flight? Yet within the form we see there Wakes the golden King to-night.

Out upon the face of faces He looked forth before his sleep: Now he knows the starry races Haunters of the ancient deep;

On the Bird of Diamond Glory Floats in mystic floods of song: As he lists Time's triple story Seems but as a day is long.

From the mightier Adam falling To his image dwarfed in clay, He will at our voices calling Come to this side of the day.

When he wakes, the dreamy-hearted, He will know not whence he came, And the light from which he parted Be the seraph's sword of flame,

And behind it hosts supernal Guarding the lost paradise, And the tree of life eternal From the weeping human eyes.

THE WINDS OF ANGUS

The grey road whereupon we trod became as holy ground: The eve was all one voice that breathed its message with no sound: And burning multitudes pour through my heart, too bright, too blind, Too swift and hurried in their flight to leave their tale behind. Twin gates unto that living world, dark honey-coloured eyes The lifting of whose lashes flushed the face with paradise-- Beloved, there I saw within their ardent rays unfold The likeness of enraptured birds that flew from deeps of gold To deeps of gold within my breast to rest or there to be Transfigured in the light, or find a death to life in me. So love, a burning multitude, a seraph wind which blows From out the deep of being to the deep of being goes: And sun and moon and starry fires and earth and air and sea Are creatures from the deep let loose who pause in ecstasy, Or wing their wild and heavenly way until again they find The ancient deep and fade therein, enraptured, bright and blind.

REFLECTIONS

How shallow is this mere that gleams! Its depth of blue is from the skies; And from a distant sun the dreams And lovely light within your eyes.

We deem our love so infinite Because the Lord is everywhere, And love awakening is made bright And bathed in that diviner air.

We go on our enchanted way And deem our hours immortal hours, Who are but shadow kings that play With mirrored majesties and powers.

THE DAWN OF DARKNESS

Come earth's little children pit-pat from their burrows on the hill; Hangs within the gloom its weary head the shining daffodil. In the valley underneath us through the fragrance flit along Over fields and over hedgerows little quivering drops of song. All adown the pale blue mantle of the mountains far away Stream the tresses of the twilight flying in the wake of day. Night comes; soon alone shall fancy follow sadly in her flight Where the fiery dust of evening, shaken from the feet of light, Thrusts its monstrous barriers between the pure, the good, the true, That our weeping eyes may strain for, but shall never after view. Only yester eve I watched with heart at rest the nebulae Looming far within the shadowy shining of the Milky Way; Finding in the stillness joy and hope for all the sons of men; Now what silent anguish fills a night more beautiful than then. For earth's age of pain has come, and all her sister planets weep, Thinking of her fires of morning passing into dreamless sleep. In this cycle of great sorrow for the moments that we last We too shall be linked by weeping to the greatness of her past: But the coming race shall know not, and the fount of tears shall dry, And the arid heart of man be arid as the desert sky. So within my mind the darkness dawned and round me everywhere Hope departed with the twilight, leaving only dumb despair.

NATURAL MAGIC

We are tired who follow after Phantasy and truth that flies: You with only look and laughter Stain our hearts with richest dyes.

When you break upon our study Vanish all our frosty cares; As the diamond deep grows ruddy, Filled with morning unawares.

All unwise in thought or duty-- Still our wisdom envies you: We who lack the living beauty Half our secret knowledge rue.

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