Poems and Ballads (Third Series) | Page 4

and brands.
V
A commonweal arrayed and crowned?With gold and purple, girt with steel?At need, that foes must fear or feel,?We find her, as our fathers found,?Earth's lordliest commonweal.
VI
And now that fifty years are flown?Since in a maiden's hand the sign?Of empire that no seas confine?First as a star to seaward shone,?We see their record shine.
VII
A troubled record, foul and fair,?A simple record and serene,?Inscribes for praise a blameless queen,?For praise and blame an age of care?And change and ends unseen.
VIII
Hope, wide of eye and wild of wing,?Rose with the sundawn of a reign?Whose grace should make the rough ways plain,?And fill the worn old world with spring,?And heal its heart of pain.
IX
Peace was to be on earth; men's hope?Was holier than their fathers had,?Their wisdom not more wise than glad:?They saw the gates of promise ope,?And heard what love's lips bade.
X
Love armed with knowledge, winged and wise,?Should hush the wind of war, and see,?They said, the sun of days to be?Bring round beneath serener skies?A stormless jubilee.
XI
Time, in the darkness unbeholden?That hides him from the sight of fear?And lets but dreaming hope draw near,?Smiled and was sad to hear such golden?Strains hail the all-golden year.
XII
Strange clouds have risen between, and wild?Red stars of storm that lit the abyss?Wherein fierce fraud and violence kiss?And mock such promise as beguiled?The fiftieth year from this.
XIII
War upon war, change after change,?Hath shaken thrones and towers to dust,?And hopes austere and faiths august?Have watched in patience stern and strange?Men's works unjust and just.
XIV
As from some Alpine watch-tower's portal?Night, living yet, looks forth for dawn,?So from time's mistier mountain lawn?The spirit of man, in trust immortal,?Yearns toward a hope withdrawn.
XV
The morning comes not, yet the night?Wanes, and men's eyes win strength to see?Where twilight is, where light shall be?When conquered wrong and conquering right?Acclaim a world set free.
XVI
Calm as our mother-land, the mother?Of faith and freedom, pure and wise,?Keeps watch beneath unchangeful skies,?When hath she watched the woes of other?Strange lands with alien eyes?
XVII
Calm as she stands alone, what nation?Hath lacked an alms from English hands??What exiles from what stricken lands?Have lacked the shelter of the station?Where higher than all she stands?
XVIII
Though time discrown and change dismantle?The pride of thrones and towers that frown,?How should they bring her glories down--?The sea cast round her like a mantle,?The sea-cloud like a crown?
XIX
The sea, divine as heaven and deathless,?Is hers, and none but only she?Hath learnt the sea's word, none but we?Her children hear in heart the breathless?Bright watchword of the sea.
XX
Heard not of others, or misheard?Of many a land for many a year,?The watchword Freedom fails not here?Of hearts that witness if the word?Find faith in England's ear.
XXI
She, first to love the light, and daughter?Incarnate of the northern dawn,?She, round whose feet the wild waves fawn?When all their wrath of warring water?Sounds like a babe's breath drawn,
XXII
How should not she best know, love best,?And best of all souls understand?The very soul of freedom, scanned?Far off, sought out in darkling quest?By men at heart unmanned?
XXIII
They climb and fall, ensnared, enshrouded,?By mists of words and toils they set?To take themselves, till fierce regret?Grows mad with shame, and all their clouded?Red skies hang sunless yet.
XXIV
But us the sun, not wholly risen?Nor equal now for all, illumes?With more of light than cloud that looms;?Of light that leads forth souls from prison?And breaks the seals of tombs.
XXV
Did not her breasts who reared us rear?Him who took heaven in hand, and weighed?Bright world with world in balance laid??What Newton's might could make not clear?Hath Darwin's might not made?
XXVI
The forces of the dark dissolve,?The doorways of the dark are broken:?The word that casts out night is spoken,?And whence the springs of things evolve?Light born of night bears token.
XXVII
She, loving light for light's sake only,?And truth for only truth's, and song?For song's sake and the sea's, how long?Hath she not borne the world her lonely?Witness of right and wrong?
XXVIII
From light to light her eyes imperial?Turn, and require the further light,?More perfect than the sun's in sight,?Till star and sun seem all funereal?Lamps of the vaulted night.
XXIX
She gazes till the strenuous soul?Within the rapture of her eyes?Creates or bids awake, arise,?The light she looks for, pure and whole?And worshipped of the wise.
XXX
Such sons are hers, such radiant hands?Have borne abroad her lamp of old,?Such mouths of honey-dropping gold?Have sent across all seas and lands?Her fame as music rolled.
XXXI
As music made of rolling thunder?That hurls through heaven its heart sublime,?Its heart of joy, in charging chime,?So ring the songs that round and under?Her temple surge and climb.
XXXII
A temple not by men's hands builded,?But moulded of the spirit, and wrought?Of passion and imperious thought;?With light beyond all sunlight gilded,?Whereby the sun seems nought.
XXXIII
Thy shrine, our mother, seen for fairer?Than even thy natural face, made fair?With kisses of thine April air?Even now, when spring thy banner-bearer?Took up thy sign to