A Midsummer Holiday and Other Poems | Page 9

heaven's own sun that storming clouds bedim,
Was all his life.
Life and the clouds are vanished: hate and fear
Have had their span?Of time to hunt, and are not: he is here,
The sunlike man.
City superb that hadst Columbus first
For sovereign son,?Be prouder that thy breast hath later nurst
This mightier one.
Glory be his for ever, while his land
Lives and is free,?As with controlling breath and sovereign hand
He bade her be.
Earth shows to heaven the names by thousands told
That crown her fame,?But highest of all that heaven and earth behold
Mazzini's name.
_LES CASQUETS._
From the depths of the waters that lighten and darken?With change everlasting of life and of death,?Where hardly by noon if the lulled ear hearken?It hears the sea's as a tired child's breath,?Where hardly by night if an eye dare scan it?The storm lets shipwreck be seen or heard,?As the reefs to the waves and the foam to the granite
Respond one merciless word,
Sheer seen and far, in the sea's live heaven,?A seamew's flight from the wild sweet land,?White-plumed with foam if the wind wake, seven?Black helms as of warriors that stir not stand.?From the depths that abide and the waves that environ?Seven rocks rear heads that the midnight masks,?And the strokes of the swords of the storm are as iron
On the steel of the wave-worn casques.
Be night's dark word as the word of a wizard,?Be the word of dawn as a god's glad word,?Like heads of the spirits of darkness visored?That see not for ever, nor ever have heard,?These basnets, plumed as for fight or plumeless,?Crowned of the storm and by storm discrowned,?Keep ward of the lists where the dead lie tombless
And the tale of them is not found.
Nor eye may number nor hand may reckon?The tithes that are taken of life by the dark,?Or the ways of the path, if doom's hand beckon,?For the soul to fare as a helmless bark--?Fare forth on a way that no sign showeth,?Nor aught of its goal or of aught between,?A path for her flight which no fowl knoweth,
Which the vulture's eye hath not seen.
Here still, though the wave and the wind seem lovers?Lulled half asleep by their own soft words,?A dream as of death in the sun's light hovers,?And a sign in the motions and cries of the birds.?Dark auguries and keen from the sweet sea-swallows?Strike noon with a sense as of midnight's breath,?And the wing that flees and the wing that follows
Are as types of the wings of death.
For here, when the night roars round, and under?The white sea lightens and leaps like fire,?Acclaimed of storm and applauded in thunder,?Sits death on the throne of his crowned desire.?Yea, hardly the hand of the god might fashion?A seat more strong for his strength to take,?For the might of his heart and the pride of his passion
To rejoice in the wars they make.
When the heart in him brightens with blitheness of battle?And the depth of its thirst is fulfilled with strife,?And his ear with the ravage of bolts that rattle,?And the soul of death with the pride of life,?Till the darkness is loud with his dark thanksgiving?And wind and cloud are as chords of his hymn,?There is nought save death in the deep night living
And the whole night worships him.
Heaven's height bows down to him, signed with his token,?And the sea's depth, moved as a heart that yearns,?Heaves up to him, strong as a heart half broken,?A heart that breaks in a prayer that burns?Of cloud is the shrine of his worship moulded,?But the altar therein is of sea-shaped stone,?Whereon, with the strength of his wide wings folded,
Sits death in the dark, alone.
He hears the word of his servant spoken,?The word that the wind his servant saith,?Storm writes on the front of the night his token,?That the skies may seem to bow down to death?But the clouds that stoop and the storms that minister?Serve but as thralls that fulfil their tasks;?And his seal is not set save here on the sinister
Crests reared of the crownless casques.
Nor flame nor plume of the storm that crowned them?Gilds or quickens their stark black strength.?Life lightens and murmurs and laughs right round them,?At peace with the noon's whole breadth and length,?At one with the heart of the soft-souled heaven,?At one with the life of the kind wild land:?But its touch may unbrace not the strengths of the seven
Casques hewn of the storm-wind's hand.
No touch may loosen the black braced helmlets?For the wild elves' heads of the wild waves wrought.?As flowers on the sea are her small green realmlets,?Like heavens made out of a child's heart's thought;?But these as thorns of her desolate places,?Strong fangs that fasten and hold lives fast:?And the vizors are framed as for formless faces
That a dark dream sees go past.
Of fear and of fate are the frontlets fashioned,?And the heads behind them are dire and dumb.?When