Poems of Experience | Page 6

lady, past her prime,
Behold her dreaming in her easy chair;
Gray robed, and veiled; in
laces old and rare,
Her smiling eyes see but the vanished time,
Of
splendid prowess, and of deeds sublime.
Self satisfied she sits, all unaware
That peace has flown before
encroaching care,
And through her halls stalks hunger, linked with
crime.
England, awake! from dreams of what has been,
Look on what IS, and put the past away.
Speak to your sons, until
they understand.
England, awake! for dreaming now is sin;
In all your ancient wisdom, rise to-day,
And save the glory of your
menaced land.
BE NOT ATTACHED
'Be not attached.' So runs the great command
For those who seek to
'know' and 'understand.'
Who sounds the waters of the deeper sea

Must first draw up his anchor and go free.
But not for me, that knowledge. I must wait
Until again I enter
through life's gate.
I am not brave enough to sail away
To farther
seas, and leave this beauteous bay.
Love barnacled, my anchor lies; and oh!
I would not lift it if I could,

and go
All unattached, to find those truths which lie
Far out at sea,
beneath a lonely sky.
Though peace of heart, and happiness of soul,
Await the seeker at that
farther goal,
With love and all its rapture and its pain,
Close to the
shores of earth I must remain.
Nor yet would I relinquish my sweet dream
To gain possession of the
Fact supreme.
I am attached, and well content to stay,
Learning
such truths as love may send my way.
AN EPISODE
Along the narrow Moorish street
A blue-eyed soldier strode.
(Ah, well-a-day)
Veiled from her lashes to her feet
She stepped from her abode,
(Ah, lack-a-day).
Now love may guard a favoured wife
Who leaves the harem door;
(Ah, well-a-day)
But hungry hearted is her life
When she is one of four.
(Ah, lack-a-day.)
If black eyes glow with sudden fire
And meet warm eyes of blue -
(Ah, well-a-day).
The old, old story of desire

Repeats itself anew.
(Ah, lack-a-day.)
When bugles blow the soldier flies -
Though bitter tears may fall
(Ah, lack-a-day).
A MOORISH CHILD WITH BLUE, BLUE
EYES
PLAYS IN THE HAREM HALL.
(Ah, well-a-day.)
THE VOICE OF THE VOICELESS
I am the voice of the voiceless;
Through me the dumb shall speak;
Till the deaf world's ear be made
to hear
The cry of the wordless weak.
From street, from cage, and from
kennel,
From jungle and stall, the wail
Of my tortured kin proclaims the sin
Of the mighty against the frail.
I am a ray from the centre;
And I will feed God's spark,
Till a great light glows in the night and
shows
The dark deeds done in the dark.
And full on the thoughtless sleeper
Shall flash its glaring flame,
Till he wakens to see what crimes may
be

Cloaked under an honoured name.
The same Force formed the sparrow
That fashioned man, the king;
The God of the Whole gave a spark of
soul
To furred and to feathered thing.
And I am my brother's keeper,
And I will fight his fight,
And speak the word for beast and bird,
Till the world shall set things right.
Let no voice cavil at Science -
The strong torch-bearer of God;
For brave are his deeds, though
dying creeds,
Must fall where his feet have trod.
But he who would trample
kindness
And mercy into the dust -
He has missed the trail, and his quest will
fail:
He is not the guide to trust.
For love is the true religion,
And love is the law sublime;
And all that is wrought, where love is
not,
Will die at the touch of time.
And Science, the great revealer,
Must flame his torch at the Source;
And keep it bright with that holy
light,
Or his feet shall fail on the course.

Oh, never a brute in the forest,
And never a snake in the fen,
Or ravening bird, starvation stirred,
Has hunted its prey like men.
For hunger, and fear, and passion
Alone drive beasts to slay,
But wonderful man, the crown of the plan,
Tortures, and kills, for play.
He goes well fed from his table;
He kisses his child and wife;
Then he haunts a wood, till he orphans a
brood,
Or robs a deer of its life.
He aims at a speck in the azure;
Winged love, that has flown at a call;
It reels down to die, and he lets
it lie;
His pleasure was seeing it fall.
And one there was, weary of laurels,
Of burdens and troubles of State;
So the jungle he sought, with the
beautiful thought
Of shooting a she lion's mate.
And one came down from the pulpit,
In the pride of a duty done,
And his cloth sufficed, as his emblem of
Christ,
While murder smoked out of his gun.
One strays from the haunts of fashion
With an indolent, unused brain;
But his sluggish heart feels a sudden
start

In the purpose of giving pain.
And the fluttering flock