[Illustration]
Now is the evening dipped knee-deep in blood
And the dun hills stand fearful in their places.
Cunning in sin, we shuffle down the streets
With burdens of vainglory on our backs,
Spinning with spider-hands the miser's web
Or sitting placid, gay and fat with ease.
But out beyond, the armies of the world
March doomwards to the rhythm of the drum
Under the thirsting sun. Death holds his state:
His skeleton hands are filled with scarlet spoil:
He stands on flaming ramparts, waving high
The ensign of decay. All his bones are dressed
With livid roses; all his pillars black
Are girt in ashen poppies, and on dust
He raises up his awful golden throne.
Oh! your fierce shrieks have fainted on deaf ears;
Your tears have flowed on feet of carven stone;
Your blood is spilt for the boiling-pot of God
Where good and evil mix; and all your rage
Is but a thin smoke wafted in His face.
1914
Blow upon blow they bruise the daylight wan,
Scar upon scar they rend the quiet shore;
They ride on furious, leaving every man
Crushed like a maggot by the hoofs of war:
Gods that grow tired of paradisial water
And fill their cups with steaming wine of slaughter.
I fear a thing more terrible than death:
The glamour of the battle grips us yet--
As crowds before a fire that hold their breath
Watching the burning houses, and forget
All they will lose, but marvel to behold
Its dazzling strength, the glamour of its gold.
I fear the time when slow the flame expires,
When this kaleidoscope of roaring color
Fades, and rage faints; and of the funeral-fires
That shone with battle, nothing left of valour
Save chill ignoble ashes for despair
To strew with widowed hands upon her hair.
Livid and damp unfolds the winding-sheet,
Hiding the mangled body of the Earth:
The slow grey aftermath, the limping feet
Of days that shall not know the sound of mirth,
But pass in dry-eyed patience, with no trust
Save to end living and be heaped with dust.
That stillness that must follow where Death trod,
The sullen street, the empty drinking-hall,
The tuneless voices cringing praise to God,
Deaf gods, that did not heed the anguished call,
Now to be soothed with humbleness and praise,
With fawning kisses for the hand that slays.
Across the world from out the fevered ground
Decay from every pore exhales its breath;
A cloak of penance winding close around
The bright desire of spring. And unto Death,
As to a conquering king, we yield the keys
Of Beauty's gates upon our bended knees.
The maiden loverless shall go her ways,
And child unfathered feed on crust and husk;
The sun that was the glory of our days
Shining as tinsel till the moody dusk
Into our starving outstretched arms shall lay
Her silent sleep, the only boon we pray.
1914
A ragged drummer rides along the street,
And at his coming
The silence fills with tunes and rustling feet
And voices humming.
He rode a year ago from far away,
On charger prancing,
With bright new buttons and with ribbons gay,
And banners dancing.
Oh, he was fatter than the bursting drum
He bore so proudly,
His roaring music woke the silence dumb
To thunder loudly.
And by his side the old men and the young
Had followed cheering
Into the sunset smiling as they sung,
Nor thought of fearing.
They left their lovers and their mothers' lap,
Their homes demolish,
"For, look, I have a ribbon for my cap,
A sword to polish!"
And so the town was silent once again,
Though tunes of battle
Beat fearful in the wind, or in the rain
Ghost drums would rattle.
But at the chuckling dice or careful loom,
Or candled churches
A few forgot or prayed or followed doom
With drunken lurches....
Now loom and bar and church disgorge the throng,
In huddled masses
They stand aghast to hear the drummer's song
As back he passes--
Palsied and drear and bent he turns alone
In rags and tatters,
And on a soundless barrel with a bone
He beats and batters.
"Where march your feet so gaily, careless crowd,
That we may kiss them?
Where sound your little songs that rang so loud
To us that miss them?"
There are no songs, no happy marching feet,
No favours flying:
The drummer passes ... on the quiet street
The sun is dying.
Sun that must bleed to death so red and brave!...
Have done with weeping,
But put your ribbons on a soldier's grave
As he lies sleeping.
1914