Classic Poem

II

I AM tired of the wind —
Oh, wind, wind, be quiet . . .
I am burdened by the days
Of wailing and long riot.
The heavy trees are thinned;
The clouds lose their ways . . .
There's no rest in my mind.

When the wind falls the rain falls;
The air has no more breath.
The ceaseless " Hush" of rain
Is what eternity saith.
The hills grown near and tall
Let down a misty mane . . .
Endlessness weighs on all.

V

The dew-light lingers yet —
A grey bloom on the meads —
While here and there a jet
Of moon-pale cowslip cedes
A scent none heeds

Of haytime yet to come:
Adown the ebbing wold
Belated wild bees hum
Smeared on the thighs with cold
Mellifluous gold.

A soft brown thrush, content,
Threads through the thin green blades;
Dim opal cobwebs, rent,
Fling flashing filmy threads
In tender shades

Upon its sides; a thrush
Flutes in yon night of firs;
Some slow stream's fading flush
Quivers and disappears
Afar; nought stirs.

VI

W HERE is that tomb of Antony's?
Is Cleopatra there?
Have the old desert's atomies
Silted among her hair?
Is even her last dark throne-room sacked;
Have delvers hastily unpacked
Some nameless mummy with shut eyes,
And sold the vanished fair?

Nay, but she walked again to-night:
So whence is her return?
Can nothing end her? Asps do bite,
But 'tis our breasts that burn.
Puft Antony is soon forgot
(He was well ridded, was he not?):
His ruinous mate for peril's bright,
Secure no man can spurn.

VII

M Y moon was lit in an hour of lilies;
The apple-trees seemed older than ever.
It rose from matted trees that sever
The oats from the meadow, and woke the fillies
That reared in dew and gleamed with dew
And ran like water and shadow, and cried;
It moistened and veiled the oats yet new,
And seemed to drip long drops of the tide,
Of the mother-sea so lately left.
Feathers of flower were each bereft
Of colour and stem, and floated low;
Another lily opened then
And lost a little gold dust; but when
The lime-boughs lifted there seemed to go
Some life of the moon, like breath that moves
Or parting glances that flutter and strain —
A ghost with hands the colour of doves
And feet the colour of rain.

XIII

Dawn

A THRUSH is tapping a stone
With a snail-shell in its beak;
A small bird hangs from a cherry
Until the stem shall break.
No waking song has begun,
And yet birds chatter and hurry
And throng in the elm's gloom
Because an owl goes home.

XIV

Ring-Dove Song

S OFTLY I sing you, sweet,
Songs of the swaying tops,
Darkly green of the fir-trees,
Airily light of the beeches.
Here in the twittering frondage
Sweetly the scent of larch-bloom
Over me sweeps in a tide,
Breaks on this emerald shore.
Softly the branches wave,
Soft as I sing to you,
Sweet.