Alfred Noyes

(It is supposed that Shadow-of-a-Leaf uses the word "clear" in a more ancient sense of "beautiful.") As along a dark pine-bough, in slender white mystery The moon lay to listen, above the thick fern,

O what is that whimpering there in the darkness? "Let him lie in my arms. He is breathing, I know. Look. I'll wrap all my hair round his neck."--"The sea's rising,

(After a glimpse of a certain monument in New York, during the Victory Celebration) The thousand-windowed towers were all alight. Throngs of all nations filled that glittering way;

They are buffeting out in the bitter grey weather, Blow the man down, bullies, blow the man down! Sea-lark singing to Golden Feather,

Not with a flash that rends the blue Shall fall the avenging sword. Gently as the evening dew

The neighbours gossiped idly at the door. Copernicus lay dying overhead. His little throng of friends, with startled eyes,

Shun the brush and shun the pen, Shun the ways of clever men, When they prove that black is white,

There came a crowder to the Mermaid Inn, One dark May night, Fiddling a tune that quelled our motley din,

I. Steadfast as any soldier of the line He served his England, with the imminent death

Fashion on fashion on fashion, (With only the truth growing old!) And here's the new purple of passion,

Long, long ago He said, He who could wake the dead, And walk upon the sea--

I. (On many recent novels by the conventional unconventionalists.) Old Pantaloon, lean-witted, dour and rich,

(On a certain goddess, acclaimed as "new" but known in Babylon.) I saw the assembled artists of our day Waiting for light, for music and for song.

(On Certain of the Bolsheviki "Idealists.") With half the force and thought you waste in rage Over your neighbor's house, or heart of stone,

(On Certain Realists.) You with the quick sardonic eye For all the mockeries of life,

(An Answer) [After reading an article in a leading London journal by an "intellectual" who attacked one of the noblest poets and greatest artists of a former century (or any century) on the ground that his high ethical standards were incompatible with the new lawlessness. This vicious lawlessness the writer described definitely, and he paid his tribute to dishonour as openly and brutally as any of the Bolsheviki could have done. I had always known that this was the real ground of the latter-day onslaught on some of the noblest literature of the past; but I had never seen it openly confessed before. The time has now surely come when, if our civilization is to make any fight at all against the new "red ruin and breaking up of laws," we must cease to belaud our slack-minded, latter-day "literature of rebellion" for its cleverness in making scraps of paper out of the plain laws of right and wrong. It has been doing this for more than twenty-five years, and the same has become fashionable among those who are too busy to read carefully or understand fully what pitfalls are being prepared for their own feet and the feet of their children.] I

I (Celeste, in the Convent at Arcetri, writes to her old lover at Rome.) My friend, my dearest friend, my own dear love,

"There are no ghosts in America." There are no ghosts, you say, To haunt her blaze of light;

Now, in a breath, we'll burst those gates of gold, And ransack heaven before our moment fails. Now, in a breath, before we, too, grow old,

John Kepler, from the chimney corner, watched His wife Susannah, with her sleeves rolled back Making a salad in a big blue bowl.

Dark, dark lay the drifters against the red West, As they shot their long meshes of steel overside; And the oily green waters were rocking to rest

With shadowy pen I write, Till time be done, Good news of some strange light,

I know a land, I, too, Where warm keen incense on the sea-wind blows, And all the winter long the skies are blue,

Under an arch of glorious leaves I passed Out of the wood and saw the sickle moon Floating in daylight o'er the pale green sea.

But where's the brown drifter that went out alone? --Roll and go, and fare you well-- Was her name Peggy Nutten? That name is my own.

I If I saw farther, 'twas because I stood On giant shoulders," wrote the king of thought,

Last night, I dreamed of Nippon.... I saw a cloud of white Drifting before the sunset

On this high altar, fringed with ferns That darken against the sky, The dawn in lonely beauty burns

(1916) I. I found a dreadful acre of the dead,

Give me the pulse of the tide again And the slow lapse of the leaves, The rustling gold of a field of grain

"You were weeping in the night," said the Emperor, "Weeping in your sleep, I am told." "It was nothing but a dream," said the Empress;

(1917) The first four lines of this poem were written for inscription on the first joint memorial to the American and British soldiers who fell in the Revolutionary War. This memorial was recently dedicated at Princeton. I.

(1912) (Written after entering New York Harbor at Daybreak) Up the vast harbor with the morning sun

As I was walking Alone by the sea, "What is that whisper?"

True type of all, from his own father's hand He caught the fire; and, though he carried it far Into new regions; and, from southern fields

"Our cavalry have rescued Nazareth from the enemy whose supermen described Christianity as a creed for slaves." The Emperor mocked at Nazareth In his almighty hour.

Give me the sunlight and the sea And who shall take my heaven from me? Light of the Sun, Life of the Sun,

This is the song of the wind as it came Tossing the flags of the nations to flame: I am the breath of God. I am His laughter.

The Temple Bell was out of tune, That once out-melodied sun and moon. Instead of calling folk to prayer

The very best ship that ever I knew, --Ah-way O, to me O-- Was a big black trawler with a deep-sea crew--

When hawthorn buds are creaming white, And the red foolscap all stuck with may, Then lasses walk with eyes alight,

How few are they that voyage through the night On that eternal quest, For that strange light beyond our light,

Green wing and ruby throat, What shining spell, what exquisite sorcery, Lured you to float

The great roads are all grown over That seemed so firm and white. The deep black forests have covered them.

It is not over yet-the fight Where those immortal dreamers failed. They stormed the citadels of night

The man who discovered the use of a chair, Odds--bobs-- What a wonderful man!

I. If souls could sing to heaven's high King As blackbirds pipe on earth,

"I want to be new," said the duckling. "O, ho!" said the wise old owl, While the guinea-hen cluttered off chuckling

"And that a reply be received before midnight." British Ultimatum. Their Day was at twelve of the night,

At noon, upon the mountain's purple height, Above the pine-woods and the clouds it shone No larger than the small white dome of shell

"If I could whisper you all I know," Said the Old Fool in the Wood, "You'd never say that green leaves grow.

The old gentleman, tapping his amber snuff-box (A heart-shaped snuff-box with a golden clasp) Stared at the dying fire. "I'd like them all

(New Jersey, 1918) Its quiet graves were made for peace till Gabriel blows his horn. Those wise old elms could hear no cry

O Mystery of life, That, after all our strife, Defeats, mistakes,

Out of her darkened fishing-ports they go, A fleet of little ships, whose every name-- Daffodil, Sea-lark, Rose and Surf and Snow,

(1904) The sunset lingered in the pale green West: In rosy wastes the low soft evening star

(Written after hearing a line of Keats repeated by a passing stranger under the palms of Southern California.) Under the palms of San Diego Where gold-skinned Mexicans loll at ease,

Why do we make our music? Oh, blind dark strings reply: Because we dwell in a strange land

I. There is one road, one only, to the Light: A narrow way, but Freedom walks therein;

Wonder in happy eyes Fades, fades away: And the angel-coloured skies

(1917) You that have gathered together the sons of all races, And welded them into one,

How should we praise those lads of the old Vindictive Who looked Death straight in the eyes, Till his gaze fell,

I. Black-veiled, black-gowned, she rides in bus and train, With eyes that fill too listlessly for tears.

(What the Ghosts Said) And after all the labour and the pains, After the heaping up of gold on gold,

Last night I rode with Touchstone on a bus From Ludgate Hill to World's End. It was he! Despite the broadcloth and the bowler hat,

I They thought him a magician, Tycho Brahe, Who lived on that strange island in the Sound,

(Written after the British Service at Trinity Church, New York) I. Before those golden altar-lights we stood,

PROLOGUE The Observatory At noon, upon the mountain's purple height,

(An epistle from a narrow-minded old gentleman to a young artist of superior intellect and intense realism.) Your thoughts are for the poor and weak? Ah, no, the picturesque's your passion!

Was it a dream?--that crowded concert-room In Bath; that sea of ruffles and laced coats; And William Herschel, in his powdered wig,

Now to those who search the deep, Gleam of Hope and Kindly Light, Once, before you turn to sleep,