Twenty | Page 5

mind of things forgot,?Bride of a dream, Saint Bride, Saint Bride.
About you and about you thunders?The wise young public on its 'bus,?Exploding all your faery blunders,?Explaining neatly--"_Thus and thus?Hath science banished heaven now,?And see--your Groom is crucified--_"?On heaven's breast you lean your brow?And laugh, and love--Saint Bride, Saint Bride.
THE SLAVE OF GOD
The finest fruit God ever made?Hangs from the Tree of Heaven blue.?It hangs above the steel sea blade?That cuts the world's great globe in two.
The keenest eye that ever saw?Stares out of Heaven into mine,?Spins out my heart, and seems to draw?My soul's elastic very fine.
The greatest beacon ever fired?Stands up on Heaven's Hill to show?The limit of the thing desired,?Beyond which man may never go.

At midnight, when the night did dance?Along the hours that led to morning,?I saw a little boat advance?Towards the great moon's beacon warning.
(The moon, God's Slave, who lights her torch,?Lest men should slip between the bars,?And run aground on Heav'n, and scorch?To death upon a bank of stars.)
The little boat, on leaning keel,?Sang up the mountains of the sea,?Bearing a man who hoped to steal?God's Slave from out eternity.
"_My love, I see you through my tears.?No pity in your face I see.?I have sailed far across the years:?Stretch out, stretch out your arms to me._
"_My love, I have an island seen,?So shadowed, God's most piercing star?Shall never see where we have been,?Shall never whisper where we are._
"_There we will wander, you and I,?Down guilty and delightful ways,?While palm-trees plait their fingers high?Against your God's enormous gaze._
"_For oh--the joy of two and two?Your Paradise shall never see,?The ecstasy of me and you,?The white delight of you and me._
"_I know the penalty--the clutch?Of God's great rocks upon my keel.?Drowned in the ocean of Too Much--?So ends your thief--yet let me steal...._"
The Slave of God she froze her face,?The Slave of God she paid no heed,?And, thund'ring down high Heaven's space,?Loud angels mocked the sailor's greed.
The diamond sun arose, and tossed?A billion gems across the sea.?"_The Slave of God is lost, is lost,?The Slave of God is lost to me...._"
He grounded on the common beach,?He trod the little towns of men,?And God remov��d from his reach?The cup of Heaven's passion then,?And gave him vulgar love and speech,?And gave him threescore years and ten.
TRUE PROMISES
You promised War and Thunder and Romance.?You promised true, but we were very blind?And very young, and in our ignorance?We never called to mind?That truth is seldom kind.
You promised love, immortal as a star.?You promised true, yet how the truth can lie!?For now we grope for hands where no hands are,?And, deathless, still we cry,?Nor hope for a reply.
You promised harvest and a perfect yield.?You promised true, for on the harvest morn,?Behold a reaper strode across the field,?And man of woman born?Was gathered in as corn.
You promised honour and ordeal by flame.?You promised true. In joy we trembled lest?We should be found unworthy when it came;?But--oh--we never guessed?The fury of the test!
You promised friends and songs and festivals.?You promised true. Our friends, who still are young,?Assemble for their feasting in those halls?Where speaks no human tongue.?And thus our songs are sung.
THE CORNISHMAN
At sunset, when the high sea span?About the rocks a web of foam,?I saw the ghost of a Cornishman?Come home.?I saw the ghost of a Cornishman?Run from the weariness of war,?I heard him laughing as he ran?Across his unforgotten shore.?The great cliff, gilded by the west,?Received him as an honoured guest.?The green sea, shining in the bay,?Did drown his dreadful yesterday.
Come home, come home, you million ghosts,?The honest years shall make amends,?The sun and moon shall be your hosts,?The everlasting hills your friends.?And some shall seek their mothers' faces,?And some shall run to trysting places,?And some to towns, and others yet?Shall find great forests in their debt.?Oh, I would siege the golden coasts?Of space, and climb high heaven's dome,?So I might see those million ghosts?Come home.
FIVE SMOOTH STONES
It was young David, lord of sheep and cattle,?Pursued his fate, the April fields among,?Singing a song of solitary battle,?A loud mad song, for he was very young.
Vivid the air--and something more than vivid,--?Tall clouds were in the sky--and something more,--?The light horizon of the spring was livid?With a steel smile that showed the teeth of war.
It was young David mocked the Philistine.?It was young David laughed beside the river.?There came his mother--his and yours and mine--?With five smooth stones, and dropped them in his quiver.
You never saw so green-and-gold a fairy.?You never saw such very April eyes.?She sang him sorrow's song to make him wary,?She gave him five smooth stones to make him wise.
_The first stone is love, and that shall fail you.?The second stone is hate, and that shall fail you.?The third stone is knowledge, and that shall fail you.?The fourth stone is prayer, and that shall fail you.?The fifth stone shall not fail