Stop the World

My world is cold,
When you are cold.
And my eyes, they tear,
When you can’t stop the tears.
My world would stop,
If you ever did;
And my heart would bleed,
If you didn’t want it.
My breath turns cold,
When you exhale;
And the world around us stops,
Because nothing else matters.
So stop the world,
And stop the tears.
Stop my heart,
And stop my breath.
Because the world rotates around us,
And would stop, if we did so.


Still Heart

When I give up the helm
I know that the time has come for thee to take it.
What there is to do will be instantly done.
Vain is this struggle.

Then take away your hands
and silently put up with your defeat, my heart,
and think it your good fortune to sit perfectly still
where you are placed.

These my lamps are blown out at every little puff of wind,
and trying to light them I forget all else again and again.

But I shall be wise this time and wait in the dark,
spreading my mat on the floor;


Still Falls the Rain

Still falls the Rain---
Dark as the world of man, black as our loss---
Blind as the nineteen hundred and forty nails
Upon the Cross.

Still falls the Rain
With a sound like the pulse of the heart that is changed to the hammer-beat
In the Potter's Field, and the sound of the impious feet

On the Tomb:
Still falls the Rain

In the Field of Blood where the small hopes breed and the human brain
Nurtures its greed, that worm with the brow of Cain.

Still falls the Rain


Stay

Now the journey is ending,
the wind is losing heart.
Into your hands it's falling,
a rickety house of cards.

The cards are backed with pictures
displaying all the world.
You've stacked up all the images
and shuffled them with words.

And how profound the playing
that once again begins!
Stay, the card you're drawing
is the only world you'll win.


Spring in War Time

I feel the Spring far off, far off,
The faint far scent of bud and leaf--
Oh how can Spring take heart to come
To a world in grief,
Deep grief?

The sun turns north, the days grow long,
Later the evening star grows bright--
How can the daylight linger on
For men to fight,
Still fight?

The grass is waking in the ground,
Soon it will rise and blow in waves--
How can it have the heart to sway
Over the graves,
New graves?

Under the boughs where lovers walked


St. Martin's Summer

AS swallows turning backward
When half-way o'er the sea,
At one word's trumpet summons
They came again to me -
The hopes I had forgotten
Came back again to me.

I know not which to credit,
O lady of my heart!
Your eyes that bade me linger,
Your words that bade us part -
I know not which to credit,
My reason or my heart.

But be my hopes rewarded,
Or be they but in vain,
I have dreamed a golden vision,
I have gathered in the grain -
I have dreamed a golden vision,


St. Senanus and the Lady

St. Senanus

"On! haste, and leave this sacred isle,
Unholy bark, ere morning smile;
For on thy deck, though dark it be,
A female form I see;
And I have sworn this sainted sod
Shall ne'er by woman's feet by trod!"


The Lady

"Oh! Father, send not hence my bark
Through wintry winds and billows dark,
I come, with humble heart, to share
Thy morn and evening prayer;
Nor mine the feet, oh! holy Saint,
The brightness of thy sod to taint."



Stars

Wild eyes—and faces ashen grey
That strain through lofty prison bars
To see the everlasting stars,
Then turn—to slumber as we may:

Even as we are, so are they,
And here is peace for all who know
The stars still follow where we go,
When heaven and earth have passed away.

Obedient to the Unknown Power,
From out the ruin of a world
A clustered galaxy is hurled
To glimmer through its steadfast hour:

The blazing sun of Shakespeare’s soul


Star of My Heart

Star of my heart, I follow from afar.
Sweet Love on high, lead on where shepherds are,
Where Time is not, and only dreamers are.
Star from of old, the Magi-Kings are dead
And a foolish Saxon seeks the manger-bed.
O lead me to Jehovah's child
Across this dreamland lone and wild,
Then will I speak this prayer unsaid,
And kiss his little haloed head —
"My star and I, we love thee, little child."

Except the Christ be born again to-night
In dreams of all men, saints and sons of shame,


Stanzas to the Rose

SWEET PICTURE of Life's chequer'd hour!
Ah, wherefore droop thy blushing head?
Tell me, oh tell me, hap'less flow'r,
Is it because thy charms are fled?
Come, gentle ROSE, and learn from me
A lesson of Philosophy.

Thy scented buds, LIFE'S joys disclose;
They strew our paths with magic sweets;
Where many a thorn like thine, fair ROSE,
Full oft the weary wand'rer meets;
And when he sees thy charms depart,
He feels thy thorn within his heart.

When Morn's bright torch illum'd the sky,


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