The Ballad of St. Barbara Part 2

THE TRINKETS

A wandering world of rivers, A wavering world of trees, If the world grow dim and dizzy With all changes and degrees, It is but Our Lady's mirror Hung dreaming in its place, s.h.i.+ning with only shadows Till she wakes it with her face.

The standing whirlpool of the stars, The wheel of all the world, Is a ring on Our Lady's finger With the suns and moons empearled With stars for stones to please her Who sits playing with her rings With the great heart that a woman has And the love of little things.

Wings of the whirlwind of the world From here to Ispahan, Spurning the flying forests Are light as Our Lady's fan: For all things violent here and vain Lie open and all at ease Where G.o.d has girded heaven to guard Her holy vanities.

THE PHILANTHROPIST

_(With apologies to a beautiful poem.)_

Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe decrease By cautious birth-control and die in peace) Mellow with learning lightly took the word That marked him not with them that love the Lord, And told the angel of the book and pen "Write me as one that loves his fellow-men: For them alone I labour; to reclaim The ragged roaming Bedouin and to tame To ordered service; to uproot their vine Who mock the Prophet, being mad with wine, Let daylight through their tents and through their lives, Number their camels, even count their wives, Plot out the desert into streets and squares; And count it a more fruitful work than theirs Who lift a vain and visionary love To your vague Allah in the skies above."

Gently replied the angel of the pen: "Labour in peace and love your fellow-men: And love not G.o.d, since men alone are dear, Only fear G.o.d; for you have cause to fear."

ON THE DOWNS

When you came over the top of the world In the great day on the Downs, The air was crisp and the clouds were curled, When you came over the top of the world, And under your feet were spire and street And seven English towns.

And I could not think that the pride was perished As you came over the down; Liberty, chivalry, all we cherished, Lost in a rattle of pelf and perished; Or the land we love that you walked above Withering town by town.

For you came out on the dome of the earth Like a vision of victory, Out on the great green dome of the earth As the great blue dome of the sky for girth, And under your feet the s.h.i.+res could meet And your eyes went out to sea.

Under your feet the towns were seven, Alive and alone on high, Your back to the broad white wall of heaven; You were one and the towns were seven, Single and one as the soaring sun And your head upheld the sky.

And I thought of a thundering flag unfurled And the roar of the burghers' bell: Beacons crackled and bolts were hurled As you came over the top of the world; And under your feet were chance and cheat And the slime of the slopes of h.e.l.l.

It has not been as the great wind spoke On the great green down that day: We have seen, wherever the wide wind spoke, Slavery slaying the English folk: The robbers of land we have seen command The rulers of land obey.

We have seen the gigantic golden worms In the garden of paradise: We have seen the great and the wise make terms With the peace of snakes and the pride of worms, and them that plant make covenant With the locust and the lice.

And the wind blows and the world goes on And the world can say that we, Who stood on the cliffs where the quarries shone, Stood upon clouds that the sun shone on: And the clouds dissunder and drown in thunder The news that will never be.

Lady of all that have loved the people, Light over roads astray, Maze of steading and street and steeple, Great as a heart that has loved the people: Stand on the crown of the soaring down, Lift up your arms and pray.

Only you I have not forgotten For wreck of the world's renown, Rending and ending of things gone rotten, Only the face of you unforgotten: And your head upthrown in the skies alone As you came over the down.

THE RED SEA

Our souls shall be Leviathans In purple seas of wine When drunkenness is dead with death, And drink is all divine; Learning in those immortal vats What mortal vineyards mean; For only in heaven we shall know How happy we have been.

Like clouds that wallow in the wind Be free to drift and drink; Tower without insolence when we rise, Without surrender sink: Dreams dizzy and crazy we shall know And have no need to write Our blameless blasphemies of praise, Our nightmares of delight.

For so in such misshapen shape The vision came to me, Where such t.i.tanian dolphins dark Roll in a sunset sea: Dark with dense colours, strange and strong As terrible true love, Haloed like fish in phospher light The holy monsters move.

Measure is here and law, to learn, When honour rules it so, To lift the gla.s.s and lay it down Or break the gla.s.s and go.

But when the world's New Deluge boils From the New Noah's vine, Our souls shall be Leviathans In sanguine seas of wine.

FOR A WAR MEMORIAL

_(Suggested Inscription probably not selected by the Committee.)_

The hucksters haggle in the mart The cars and carts go by; Senates and schools go droning on; For dead things cannot die.

A storm stooped on the place of tombs With bolts to blast and rive; But these be names of many men The lightning found alive.

If usurers rule and rights decay And visions view once more Great Carthage like a golden sh.e.l.l Gape hollow on the sh.o.r.e,

Still to the last of crumbling time Upon this stone be read How many men of England died To prove they were not dead.

MEMORY

If I ever go back to Baltimore, The city of Maryland, I shall miss again as I missed before A thousand things of the world in store, The story standing in every door That beckons with every hand.

I shall not know where the bonds were riven And a hundred faiths set free, Where a wandering cavalier had given Her hundredth name to the Queen of Heaven, And made oblation of feuds forgiven To Our Lady of Liberty.

I shall not travel the tracks of fame Where the war was not to the strong; When Lee the last of the heroes came With the Men of the South and a flag like flame, And called the land by its lovely name In the unforgotten song.

If ever I cross the sea and stray To the city of Maryland, I will sit on a stone and watch or pray For a stranger's child that was there one day: And the child will never come back to play, And no-one will understand.

THE ENGLISH GRAVES