Country Sentiment | Page 5

black beard spoke and said to me,?"Human frailty though you be,?Yet shout and crack your whip, be harsh!?They'll obey you in the end:?Hill and field, river and marsh?Shall obey you, hop and skip?At the terrour of your whip,?To your gales of anger bend."
The pale beard spoke and said in turn?"True: a prize goes to the stern,?But sing and laugh and easily run?Through the wide airs of my plain,?Bathe in my waters, drink my sun,?And draw my creatures with soft song;?They shall follow you along?Graciously with no doubt or pain."
Then speaking from his double head?The glorious fearful monster said?"I am YES and I am NO,?Black as pitch and white as snow,?Love me, hate me, reconcile?Hate with love, perfect with vile,?So equal justice shall be done?And life shared between moon and sun.?Nature for you shall curse or smile:?A poet you shall be, my son."
ROCKY ACRES.
This is a wild land, country of my choice,?With harsh craggy mountain, moor ample and bare.?Seldom in these acres is heard any voice?But voice of cold water that runs here and there?Through rocks and lank heather growing without care.?No mice in the heath run nor no birds cry?For fear of the dark speck that floats in the sky.
He soars and he hovers rocking on his wings,?He scans his wide parish with a sharp eye,?He catches the trembling of small hidden things,?He tears them in pieces, dropping from the sky:?Tenderness and pity the land will deny,?Where life is but nourished from water and rock?A hardy adventure, full of fear and shock.
Time has never journeyed to this lost land,?Crakeberries and heather bloom out of date,?The rocks jut, the streams flow singing on either hand,?Careless if the season be early or late.?The skies wander overhead, now blue, now slate:?Winter would be known by his cold cutting snow?If June did not borrow his armour also.
Yet this is my country be loved by me best,?The first land that rose from Chaos and the Flood,?Nursing no fat valleys for comfort and rest,?Trampled by no hard hooves, stained with no blood.?Bold immortal country whose hill tops have stood?Strongholds for the proud gods when on earth they go,?Terror for fat burghers in far plains below.
ADVICE TO LOVERS.
I knew an old man at a Fair?Who made it his twice-yearly task?To clamber on a cider cask?And cry to all the yokels there:--
"Lovers to-day and for all time?Preserve the meaning of my rhyme:?Love is not kindly nor yet grim?But does to you as you to him.
"Whistle, and Love will come to you,?Hiss, and he fades without a word,?Do wrong, and he great wrong will do,?Speak, he retells what he has heard.
"Then all you lovers have good heed?Vex not young Love in word or deed:?Love never leaves an unpaid debt,?He will not pardon nor forget."
The old man's voice was sweet yet loud?And this shows what a man was he,?He'd scatter apples to the crowd?And give great draughts of cider, free.
NEBUCHADNEZZAR'S FALL.
Frowning over the riddle that Daniel told,?Down through the mist hung garden, below a feeble sun,?The King of Persia walked: oh, the chilling cold!?His mind was webbed with a grey shroud vapour-spun.
Here for the pride of his soaring eagle heart,?Here for his great hand searching the skies for food,?Here for his courtship of Heaven's high stars he shall smart, Nebuchadnezzar shall fall, crawl, be subdued.
Hot sun struck through the vapour, leaf strewn mould?Breathed sweet decay: old Earth called for her child.?Mist drew off from his mind, Sun scattered gold,?Warmth came and earthy motives fresh and wild.
Down on his knees he sinks, the stiff-necked King,?Stoops and kneels and grovels, chin to the mud.?Out from his changed heart flutter on startled wing?The fancy birds of his Pride, Honour, Kinglihood.
He crawls, he grunts, he is beast-like, frogs and snails?His diet, and grass, and water with hand for cup.?He herds with brutes that have hooves and horns and tails,?He roars in his anger, he scratches, he looks not up.
GIVE US RAIN.
"Give us Rain, Rain," said the bean and the pea,?"Not so much Sun,?Not so much Sun."?But the Sun smiles bravely and encouragingly,?And no rain falls and no waters run.
"Give us Peace, Peace," said the peoples oppressed,?"Not so many Flags,?Not so many Flags."?But the Flags fly and the Drums beat, denying rest,?And the children starve, they shiver in rags.
ALLIE.
Allie, call the birds in,?The birds from the sky.?Allie calls, Allie sings,?Down they all fly.?First there came?Two white doves?Then a sparrow from his nest,?Then a clucking bantam hen,?Then a robin red-breast.
Allie, call the beasts in,?The beasts, every one.?Allie calls, Allie sings,?In they all run.?First there came?Two black lambs,?Then a grunting Berkshire sow,?Then a dog without a tail,?Then a red and white cow.
Allie, call the fish up,?The fish from the stream.?Allie calls, Allie sings,?Up they all swim.?First there came?Two gold fish,?A minnow and a miller's thumb,?Then a pair of loving trout,?Then the twisted eels come.
Allie, call the children,?Children