OLDER than the hills, older than the sea,

Older than the heart of the Spring,

O, what is this that breaks

From the blind shell, wakes,

Wakes, and is gone like a wing?

Older than the sea, older than the moon,

Older than the heart of the May,

What is this blind refrain

Of a song that shall remain

When the singer is long gone away?

Older than the moon, older than the stars,

Older than the wind in the night,—

Though the young dews are sweet

On the heather at our feet

And the blue hills laughing back the light,—

Till the stars grow young, till the hills grow young,

O, Love, we shall walk through Time,

Till we round the world at last,

And the future be the past,

And the winds of Eden greet us from the prime.

IS it your watch-fire, elves, where the down with its darkening shoulder

Lifts on the death of the sun, out of the valley of thyme?

Dropt on the broad chalk path and, cresting the ridge of it, smoulder

Crimson as blood on the white, halting my feet as they climb,

Clusters of clover-bloom, spilled from what negligent arms in the tender

Dusk of the great grey world, last of the tints of the day;

Beautiful, sorrowful, strange last stain of that perishing splendour.

Elves, from what torn white feet trickled that red on the way?

No—from the sun-burnt hands of what lovers that fade in the distance?

Here, was it here that they paused, here that the legend was told?

Even a kiss would be heard in this hush; but, with mocking insistence,

Now thro’ the valley resound—only the bells of the fold.

Dropt—from the hands of what beautiful throng? Did they cry “follow after”?

Dancing into the west, leaving this token for me,

Memory dead on the path, and the sunset to bury their laughter?

Youth—is it youth that has flown? Darkness covers the sea.

Darkness covers the earth; but the path is here! I assay it.

Let the bloom fall like a flake—dropt from the torch of a friend!

Beautiful revellers, happy companions, I see and obey it;

Follow your torch in the night, follow your path to the end.

DEEP in the greenwood of my heart

My wild hounds race.

I cloak my soul at feast and mart,

I mask my face;

Outlawed, but not alone, for Truth

Is outlawed, too.

Proud world, you cannot banish us.

We banish you.

Go by, go by, with all your din,

Your dust, your greed, your guile,

Your gold, your thrones can never win—

From Her—one smile.

She sings to me in a lonely place,

She takes my hand.

I look into her lovely face

And understand....

Outlawed, but not alone, for Love

Is outlawed, too.

You cannot banish us, proud world.

We banish you.

Now which is outlawed, which alone?

Around us fall and rise

Murmurs of leaf and fern, the moan

Of Paradise.

Outlawed? Then hills and woods and streams

Are outlawed, too!

Proud world, from our immortal dreams,

We banish you.

WHEN leaves broke out on the wild briar,

And bells for matins rung,

Sorrow came to the old friar

—Hundreds of years ago it was!—

And May came to the young.

The old was ripening for the sky,

The young was twenty-four.

The Franklin’s daughter passed him by,

Reading a painted missal-book,

Beside the chapel door.

With brown cassock and sandalled feet,

And red Spring wine for blood;

The very next noon he chanced to meet

The Franklin’s daughter, in a green May twilight,

Walking through the wood.

Pax vobiscum—to a maid

The crosiered ferns among!

But hers was only the Saxon,

And his the Norman tongue;

And the Latin taught by the old friar

Made music for the young.

And never a better deed was done

By Mother Church below

Than when she made old England one,

—Hundreds of years ago it was!—

Hundreds of years ago.

Rich was the painted page they read

Before that sunset died;

Nut-brown hood by golden head,

Murmuring Rosa Mystica,

While nesting thrushes cried.

A Saxon maid with flaxen hair,

And eyes of Sussex grey;

A young monk out of Normandy:—

“May is our Lady’s month,” he said,

“And O, my love, my May!”

Then over the fallen missal-book

The missel-thrushes sung

Till—Domus Aurea—rose the moon

And bells for vespers rung.

It was gold and blue for the old friar,

But hawthorn for the young.

For gown of green and brown hood,

Before that curfew tolled,

Had flown for ever through the wood

—Hundreds of years ago it was!—

But twenty summers old.

And empty stood his chapel stall,

Empty his thin grey cell,

Empty her seat in the Franklin’s hall;

And there were swords that searched for them

Before the matin bell.

And, crowders tell, a sword that night

Wrought them an evil turn,

And that the may was not more white

Than those white bones the robin found

Among the roots of fern.

But others tell of stranger things

Half-heard on Whitsun eves,

Of sweet and ghostly whisperings—

Though hundreds of years ago it was—

Among the ghostly leaves:—

Sero te amavi—

Grey eyes of sun-lit dew!—

Tam antiqua, Tam nova—

Augustine heard it, too.

Late have I loved that May, Lady,

So ancient, and so new!

And no man knows where they were flown,

For the wind takes the may:

But white and fresh the may was blown

—Though hundreds of years ago it was—

As this that blooms to-day.

And the leaves break out on the wild briar,

And bells must still be rung;

But sorrow comes to the old friar,

For he remembers a May, a May,

When his old heart was young.

WHO would be a king

That can sit in the sun and sing?

Nay, I have a kingdom of mine own.

A fallen oak-tree is my throne.

Then, pluck the strings, and tell me true

If Cæsar in his glory knew

The worlds he lost in sun and dew.

Who would be a queen

That sees what my love hath seen?—

The blood of little children shed

To make one royal ruby red!

Then, tell me, music, why the great

For quarrelling trumpets abdicate

This quick, this absolute estate.

Nay, who would sing in heaven,

Among the choral Seven

That hears—as Love and I have heard,

The whole sky listening to one bird?

And where’s the ruby, tell me where,

Whose crimsons for one breath compare

With this wild rose that all may share?

MUSIC is dead. An age, an age is dying.

Shreds of Uranian song, wild symphonies

Tortured with moans of butchered innocents,

Blow past us on the wind. Chaos resumes

His kingdom. All the visions of the world,

The visions that were music, being shaped

By law, moving in measure, treading the road

That suns and systems tread, O who can hear

Their music now? Urania bows her head.

Only the feet that move in order dance.

Only the mind attuned to that dread pulse

Of law throughout the universe can sing.

Only the soul that plays its rhythmic part

In that great measure of the tides and suns

Terrestrial and celestial, till it soar

Into the supreme melodies of heaven,

Only that soul, climbing the splendid road

Of law from height to height, may walk with God,

Shape its own sphere from chaos, conquer death,

Lay hold on life and liberty, and sing.

Yet, since, at least, the fleshly heart must beat

In measure, and no new rebellion breaks

That old restriction, murmurs reach it still,

Rumours of that vast music which resolves

Our discords, and to this, to this attuned,

Though blindly, it responds, in notes like these:

There was a song in heaven of old,

A song the choral seven began,

When God with all his chariots rolled

The tides of chaos back for man;

When suns revolved and planets wheeled,

And the great oceans ebbed and flowed,

There is one way of life, it pealed,

The road of law, the unchanging road.

The trumpet of the law resounds,

And we behold, from depth to height,

What glittering sentries walk their rounds,

What ordered hosts patrol the night,

While wheeling worlds proclaim to us,

Captained by Thee thro’ nights unknown,—

Glory that would be glorious

Must keep Thy law to find its own.

Beyond rebellion, past caprice,

From heavens that comprehend all change,

All space, all time, till time shall cease,

The trumpet rings to souls that range,

To souls that in wild dreams annul

Thy word, confessed by wood and stone,—

Beauty that would be beautiful

Must keep Thy law to find its own.

He that can shake it, will he thrust

His careless hands into the fire?

He that would break it, shall we trust

The sun to rise at his desire?

Constant above our discontent,

The trumpet peals in sterner tone,—

Might that would be omnipotent

Must keep Thy law to find its own.

Ah, though beneath unpitying spheres

Unreckoned seems our human cry,

In Thy deep law, beyond the years,

Abides the Eternal memory.

Thy law is light, to eyes grown dull

Dreaming of worlds like bubbles blown;

And Mercy that is merciful

Shall keep Thy law and find its own.

Unchanging God, by that one Light

Through which we grope to Truth and Thee,

Confound not yet our day with night,

Break not the measures of Thy sea.

Hear not, though grief for chaos cry

Or rail at Thine unanswering throne.

Thy law, Thy law, is liberty,

And in Thy law we find our own.

So, to Uranian music, rose our world.

The boughs put forth, the young leaves groped for light.

The wild flower spread its petals as in prayer.

Then, for terrestrial ears, vast discords rose,

The struggle in the jungle, clashing themes

That strove for mastery; but above them all,

Ever the mightier measure of the suns

Resolved them into broader harmonies,

That fought again for mastery. The night

Buried the mastodon. The warring tribes

Of men were merged in nations. Wider laws

Embraced them. Man no longer fought with man,

Though nation warred with nation. Hatred fell

Before the gaze of love. For in an hour

When, by the law of might, mankind could rise

No higher, into the deepening music stole

A loftier theme, a law that gathered all

The laws of earth into its broadening breast

And moved like one full river to the sea,

The law of Love.

The sun stood dark at noon;

Dark as the moon before this mightier Power,

And a Voice rang across the blood-stained earth:

I am the Way, the Truth, the Life, the Light.

We heard it, and we did not hear. In dreams

We caught a thousand fragments of the strain,

But never wholly heard it. We moved on

Obeying it a little, till our world

Became so vast, that we could only hear

Stray notes, a golden phrase, a sorrowful cry,

Never the rounded glory of the whole.

So one would sing of death, one of despair,

And some, knowing that God was more than man,

Knowing that the Eternal Power behind

Our universe was more than man, would shrink

From crowning Him with human attributes,

Though these remained the highest that we knew;

And therefore, falling back on lower signs,

Bereft of love, thought, personality,

They made Him less than man; made Him a blind

Unweeting force, less than the best in man,

Less than the best that He Himself had made.

Yet, though from earth we could no longer hear

As from a central throne, the harmonies

Of the revolving whole; yet though from earth,

And from earth’s Calvary, the central scene

Withdrew to dreadful depths beyond our ken;

Withdrew to some deep Calvary at the heart

Of all creation; yet, O yet, we heard,

Echoes that murmured from Eternity,

I am the Way, the Truth, the Life, the Light.

And still the eternal passion undiscerned

Moved like a purple shadow through our world,

While we, in intellectual chaos, raised

The ancient cry, Not this man, but Barabbas.

Then Might grew Right once more, for who could hold

The Right, when the rebellious hearts of men

Finding the Law too hard in life, thought, art,

Proclaimed that Right itself was born of chance,

Born out of nothingness and doomed, at last,

To nothingness; while all that men have held

Better than dust—love, honour, justice, truth—

Was less than dust, for the blind dust endures?

But love, they said, and the proud soul of man,

Die with the breath, before the flesh decays.

And still, amidst the chaos, Love was born,

Suffered and died; and in a myriad forms

A myriad parables of the Eternal Christ

Unfolded their deep message to mankind.

So, on this last wild winter of his birth,

Though cannon rocked his cradle, heaven might hear,

Once more, the Mother and her infant Child.

Will the Five Clock-Towers chime tonight?

—Child, the red earth would shake with scorn.—

But will the Emperors laugh outright

If Roland rings that Christ is born?

No belfries pealed for that pure birth.

There were no high-stalled choirs to sing.

The blood of children smoked on earth;

For Herod, in those days, was king.—

O, then the Mother and her Son

Were refugees that Christmas, too?—

Through all the ages, little one,

That strange old story still comes true.—

Was there no peace in Bethlehem?—

Yes. There was Love in one poor Inn;

And, while His wings were over them,

They heard those deeper songs begin.—

What songs were they? What songs were they?

Did stars of shrapnel shed their light?—

O, little child, I have lost the way.

I cannot find that Inn tonight.—

Is there no peace, then, anywhere?—

Perhaps, where some poor soldier lies

With all his wounds in front, out there.—

You weep?—He had your innocent eyes.—

Then is it true that Christ’s a slave,

Whom all these wrongs can never rouse?—

They said it. But His anger drave

The money-changers from His House.—

Yet He forgave and turned away.—

Yes, unto seventy times and seven.

But they forget. He comes one day

In power, among the clouds of heaven.—

Then Roland rings?—Yes, little son!

With iron hammers they dare not scorn,

Roland is breaking them, gun by gun,

Roland is ringing. Christ is born.

Born and re-born; for though the Christ we knew

On earth be dead for ever, who shall kill

The Eternal Christ whose law is in our hearts,

Christ, who in this dark hour descends to hell,

And ascends into heaven, and sits beside

The right hand of the Father. If for men

This law be dead, it lives for children still.

Children that men have butchered see His face,

Rest in His arms, and strike our mockery dumb.

So shall the trumpet of the law resound

Through all the ages, telling of that child

Whose outstretched arms in Belgium speak for God.

They crucified a Man of old,

The thorns are shrivelled on His brow.

Prophet or fool or God, behold,

They crucify Thy children now.

They doubted evil, doubted good,

And the eternal heavens as well,

Behold, the iron and the blood,

The visible handiwork of Hell.

Fast to the cross they found it there,

They found it in the village street,

A naked child, with sunkissed hair.

The nails were through its hands and feet.

For Christ was dead, yes, Christ was dead!

O Lamb of God, O little one,

I kneel before your cross instead

And the same shadow veils the sun....

And the same shadow veils the sun....

But you, O land, O beautiful land of Freedom,

Hold fast the faith which made and keeps you great.

With you, with you abide the faith and hope,

In this dark hour, of agonised mankind.

Hold to that law whereby the warring tribes

Were merged in nations, hold to that wide law

Which bids you merge the nations, here and now,

Into one people. Hold to that deep law

Whereby we reach the peace which is not death

But the triumphant harmony of Life,

Eternal Life, immortal Love, the Peace

Of worlds that sing around the throne of God.

THUS only should it come, if come it must—

Not with a riot of flags and a mob-born cry,

But with a noble faith, a conscience high

That, if we fail, we failed not in our trust.

We fought for peace. We dared the bitter thrust

Of calumny for peace, and watched her die,

Her scutcheons rent from sky to outraged sky

By felon hands and trampled into the dust.

We proffered justice, and we saw the law

Cancelled by stroke on stroke of those deft hands

Which still retain the imperial forger’s pen.

They must have blood—Then, at this last, we draw

The sword, not with a riot of flags and bands,

But silence, and a mustering of men.

They challenge Truth. A people makes reply,

East, West, North, South, one honour and one might,

From sea to sea, from height to war-worn height,

The old word rings out—to conquer or to die.

And we shall conquer! Though their eagles fly

Through heaven, around this ancient isle unite

Powers that were never vanquished in the fight,

The unconquerable Powers that cannot lie.

Though fire destroy her flesh, and many a year

This land forgot the faith that made her great,

Now, as her fleets cast off the North Sea foam,

Casting aside all faction and all fear,

Thrice-armed in all the majesty of her fate,

Britain remembers, and her sword strikes home.

GROW, my song, like a tree,

As thou hast ever grown,

Since first, a wondering child,

Long since, I cherished thee.

It was at break of day,

Well I remember it,—

The first note that I heard,

A magical undertone,

Sweeter than any bird

—Or so it seemed to me—

And my tears ran wild.

This tale, this tale is true.

The light was growing gray;

And the rhymes ran so sweet

(For I was only a child)

That I knelt down to pray.

Grow, my song, like a tree.

Since then I have forgot

A thousand friends, but not

The song that set me free,

So that to thee I gave

My hopes and my despairs,

My boyhood’s ecstasy,

My manhood’s prayers.

In dreams I have watched thee grow,

A ladder of sweet boughs,

Where angels come and go,

And birds keep house.

In dreams, I have seen thee wave

Over a distant land,

And watched thy roots expand,

And given my life to thee,

As I would give my grave.

Grow, my song, like a tree,

And when I am grown old,

Let me die under thee,

Die to enrich thy mould;

Die at thy roots, and so

Help thee to grow.

Make of this body and blood

Thy sempiternal food.

Then let some little child,

Some friend I shall not see,

When the great dawn is gray,

Some lover I have not known,

In summers far away,

Sit listening under thee.

And in thy rustling hear

That mystical undertone,

Which made my tears run wild,

And made thee, O, how dear.

In the great years to be?

I am proud then? Ah, not so.

I have lived and died for thee.

Be patient Grow.

Grow, my song, like a tree.