Ships in Harbour Part 2

The way of Spring with little steepled towns Is such a shy, transforming sorcery Of special lights and swift, incredible crowns, That grave men wonder how such things may be.

No friendly spire, no daily-trodden way But somehow alters in the April air, Grown dearer still, on some enchanted day, For s.h.i.+ning garments they have come to wear.

The way the spring comes to our Town is such That something quickens in the hearts of men, Turning them lovers at its subtle touch, Till they must lift their heads again--again-- As lovers do, with frank, adoring eyes, Where the long street of lifted steeples lies.

IV

WATCHERS

I think those townsmen, sleeping on the hill, Are never careless how the Town may fare, But jealous of her quiet beauty still, Her ways and worth are things for which they care: For shuttered house, and gateways and the gra.s.s, And how the streets, tree-bordered all and cool, Are still a pleasant way for folks to pa.s.s: Men at their work and children home from school.

I cannot doubt that they are pleased to see Their planted elms grown dearer year by year: Their living witness unto such as we ...

And they are less regretful when they hear Some name we speak, some tale we tell again, Of days when they were warm and living men.

V

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

These morning streets, the lawns of windy gra.s.s, And spires that wear the sunlight like a crown, The square where busy, happy people pa.s.s: The living soul that lights the little Town,-- These have been s.h.i.+ning beauty for my mind, And joy, and friends.h.i.+p, and a tale to tell, And these have been a presence that is kind, A quiet music and a healing well.

Men who were lovers in the olden time, Who praised the beauty of bright hair and brow, And left a little monument of rhyme,-- Wrought not more tenderly than I would, now, To turn some changing syllables of praise For her whose quiet beauty fills my days.

VI

THE TOWNSMAN

Here would I leave some subtle part of me, A moving presence through the friendly Town, Abiding still, and happy still to be Where thoughtful men pa.s.s daily up and down;-- An essence stirring on the ways they fare, Haunting the drifted sunlight where they go, Till one might mark a Something on the air, Most near and kind--though why, he would not know.

Happy, if it may chance, where two shall meet, Pausing to pa.s.s the friendly, idle word, In the hushed twilight of the evening street, I might stand by, a secret, silent Third,-- Most happy listener, if I hear them tell How, with the Town--and them--it still is well.

AFTER SUMMER RAIN

All day the rain has filled the apple-trees, And stilled the orchard gra.s.ses of their mirth, Turning these acres green and silvered seas That drowned the summer musics of the earth.

Now that this clearer twilight takes the hill, This thin, belated radiance, moving by, Bird-calls return, and odours, rainy still, And colours glinting through the earth and sky.

Here where I watch the robins from the lane, That pirouette and preen among the leaves, These swift, wet-winged arrivals in the rain Have spilled a wisdom from their dripping eaves,-- And beauty still is more than daily bread, For fevered minds, and hearts discomforted.

THE KINGS ARE Pa.s.sING DEATHWARD

The Kings are pa.s.sing deathward in the dark Of days that had been splendid where they went; Their crowns are captive and their courts are stark Of purples that are ruinous, now, and rent.

For all that they have seen disastrous things: The shattered pomp, the split and shaken throne, They cannot quite forget the way of Kings: Gravely they pa.s.s, majestic and alone.

With thunder on their brows, their faces set Toward the eternal night of restless shapes, They walk in awful splendour, regal yet, Wearing their crimes like rich and kingly capes....

Curse them or taunt, they will not hear or see; The Kings are pa.s.sing deathward: let them be.

RENEWAL

Strange that this body in its lifted state Of independent will and power and l.u.s.t, Should still attest that kins.h.i.+p, dimmed of late, Its ancient, honoured brotherhood with dust;-- So that when Spring is quickening in the clay, Stirring dumb particles the way she fares, This foolish flesh is no less moved than they, To sweet, unreasoned happiness, like theirs.

Not seed and soil alone, but heart and mind Are somehow swayed, till sober, earnest men, In quick renewal with their dusty kind, Grow foolish-fond, like lads at play again....

So April, stirring blindly through the earth, Can move us to a blind, unthinking mirth.

RESPONDIT

Apple-tree, apple-tree, what is it worth: Beauty and pa.s.sion and red-lipped mirth, Fas.h.i.+oned of fire and the blossoming earth,-- Gone in a transient spring?

Spending and spilling your wealth through the gra.s.s, Coiner of coins that must rust and pa.s.s,-- Knowing the end is--alas, and alas!

What may a poet sing?

"Sing of the dust that is blossomy boughs, Dust that is more than your thought allows; Sing you for ever impossible vows Unto the springs to be.

"Dust in the dust is for fire and birth, Beauty and pa.s.sion and red-lipped mirth, Fas.h.i.+oned of dust for the blossoming earth,-- Even of you and me."

JEWELS

The sea has worn her s.h.i.+ps like precious stones, That marked her bosom's tremulous unrest; And for their loss no pendant moon atones That rides eternally upon her breast.

For sunk armadas or a little boat She still is wistful as a jewelled queen, Who bears the burning memory at her throat, Of barque and sloop and brilliant brigantine.

The epic chanted to each sounding cave Is all of fleets gone down by lonely sh.o.r.es,-- The s.h.i.+ning spars, the sails, the light they gave, Now scattered darkly on her grievous floors;-- And all the sea's long moan is like a sigh For ruined s.h.i.+ps remembered where they lie.

CHORUS

Always it was the old songs moved us most, For always there were other voices near, A silver singing threading like a ghost, A thinner music than our ears could hear; So that we sang more softly than we might, As leaving room for some expected tone; Our singing was half listening in the night, For other singing drowned along our own,