The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Death of the Scharnhorst, and Other Poems

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Title: The Death of the Scharnhorst, and Other Poems

Author: Arch Alfred McKillen

Release date: February 19, 2021 [eBook #64594]
Most recently updated: October 18, 2024

Language: English

Credits: Curt Troutwine, Mary Glenn Krause, Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEATH OF THE SCHARNHORST, AND OTHER POEMS ***

 

THE DEATH OF
THE
SCHARNHORST
AND OTHER POEMS

by ARCH ALFRED McKILLEN





VANTAGE PRESS, Inc. NEW YORK

 

Copyright, 1952, by Arch Alfred McKillen
Manufactured in the United States of America

 

To
L.R.D., EM 1/c, U. S. Navy
Killed in action, Pearl Harbor, T. H.
December 7, 1941

Smile a little, lad,
 For when you smile
 There is no sleep.
 How can there then be Death?

The Chicago Sun has kindly granted permission to
reprint the poem “The Litany of Pearl Harbor,”
which it published on December 7, 1942, in
June Provines’ column

CONTENTS

 Page
The Bird, the Lad and Me1
The War in Spain1
It Rains Tonight2
While Drums Are Rolling2
Apollo3
Fountain of Loveliness4
Highway Number 665
Dirge for the Squalus6
Echo Canyon7
Fragment8
We Hang upon a Scaffold8
I Looked into Your Eyes9
Of This Great Voiceless Love9
I Would Have Brought You Fire10
Too Much of Life10
Lone Cello11
Apocalypse11
The Old Sea Wall12
The Midnight Horseman13
Lonely Heart14
Dreams15
The Bugles Called15
Morning Guard16
When Kilmer Wrote of Trees17
Wild Geese17
I Write to You in Red18
’Tis Winter Now18
Sonnet19
The Tropic Dawn20
Twilight21
Echo21
Star Course22
Memorandum23
The Litany of Pearl Harbor23
We Were Waiting That Morning for Colors26
The Motor Launch Crew27
To the Garrison at Wake28
Corregidor and Calvary31
When he and I had met33
To the Marines34
The Lads Who Go Below35
The Road to High Wood36
Night Watch37
The Soldier and the Samovar38
Nocturne38
The Swing39
Somewhere on Leave40
The Sentry41
I Watched Him in the Tournament41
South Pacific42
Deck-Ape43
Sailor Boy43
Avenge44
The Crossing of the Rhine45
The Ballad of the Dead Sailor45
The Death of the Scharnhorst47
Little Boys and Little Dogs53
U.S.S. Oklahoma Returns to Her Crew54
Night56
For All Heroes57
Foxhole58
Bury Him61

THE BIRD, THE LAD AND ME

The sky was touched with tints of morn,
 A wind was in the trees,
 I lay in bed awakened
 By the murmur of the leaves.
I listened to the chirping
 Of the first-awakened bird,
 And, his leather heels a-clicking,
 Some lad off to work I heard.
Then my thoughts to sleep returning
 Wondered briefly, of us three,
 What brave paths the fates have destined
 For the bird, the lad and me.

THE WAR IN SPAIN

The war in Spain is over
 Yet victory does not smile
 For all the lads are murdered
 Who might have laughed awhile.
And those who march triumphant
 Are sadder than the dead
 Because their hearts are shadowed,
 Because their hands are red.
The war in Spain is over,
 Yet other trumpets sound
 And call the world’s young manhood
 To another battleground.

IT RAINS TONIGHT

It rains tonight and wolf-winds howl.
 His grave is not so deep,
 But that the mournful Heavens
 Upon his body weep;
 They wet the mound of spaded earth
 And through his coffin seep.
It rains tonight and wolf-winds howl,
 And beaten hangs the tree,
 And comfortless in Death he lies
 Who comforted should be,
 The guy who lost
 And killed himself,
 And never spoke to me!

WHILE DRUMS ARE ROLLING

Then you’ll go while drums are rolling,
 And you’ll charge and make the bluff
 That your heart is full of courage,
 And you’ll curse the vilest stuff.
And you’ll see a lot of fellows
 That you’ve never seen before,
 And they may all be twenty
 Or one or two years more.
And you’ll briefly talk together,
 But of what you will not know.
 There is so much that lads can say
 When off to war they go.
And you’ll see a lot of fellows
 When the battle roar is done,
 Though all are dead upon the field
 And will not know it’s won.
And the drums will roll on, rolling
 Till some bullet finds your heart,
 Then you’ll join the lads before you
 And you’ll never have to part.

APOLLO

Beautiful pagan, possess me!
 Over thy body my fingers I race.
 Hot on thy cheeks are my kisses,
 Naked with thee in a lovers’ embrace.
Passionate night,
 And the scents from the orchard
 Heavily here
 In thy temple retreat.
Moonlight and marble,
 Where pillars and shadows
 Cast thee in twilight,
Beautiful statue,
 Warm with the warmth
 Of my body
 Against thee,
I quiver,
 I clasp thee
 And fall at thy feet!

FOUNTAIN OF LOVELINESS

Fountain of loveliness, flowing
 Deep in a wildwood of aspen and pine,
 Swanlike forever upon thy calm surface
 I drift in my nakedness, white in the sun.
O plunge me beneath,
 Where thy depths are the greenest,
 Cover my heart,
 And the secret it keeps!

HIGHWAY NUMBER 66

We drove down the road
 Like two bats out of Hell,
 And before us the gates
 At the rail crossing fell.
But we crashed through the splinters
 And over the tracks,
 And the train whistled madly
 And screamed at our backs.
And we rode on in silence
 With never a word,
 And only the wind
 And the motor were heard.
For a lad lay a-dying
 That both of us knew,
 And over the hills
 To his bedside we flew.
He was dead when we got there,
 And somehow I know
 At that curve on the hill
 With the valley below,
Where the crossing is laid,
 And that monster of steel,
 Not my hand, but his
 Was guiding the wheel.

DIRGE FOR THE SQUALUS

We did not raise a submarine
 From the ocean’s fathomed bed,
 But twenty-six brave sailor lads
 And all of them were dead.
 We left them not beneath the sea;
 We brought them sadly home,
 To dedicate anew to Death,
 Who nevermore shall roam.
Then, trumpeter, be firm your lip,
 What though the tears may fall,
 For muffled drums in velvet beat
 Beneath your trumpet’s call.
 And there are hearts in other lads
 That swell with sorrow, too.
 It need not matter that those hearts
 Are not in navy blue.
And they who have escaped that tomb
 Beneath the restless wave,
 How deeply reverent they hold
 The gift the dead men gave.
 For twenty-six on them bestowed
 The utmost they could give,
 When twenty-six accepted death
 That thirty-three might live.
The passage doorway dogged and tight,
 On either side two groups of men.
 In one compartment, mad with fright,
 The thirty-three who’ll live again.
And on the other, maddened, too,
 The water rising swiftly, high,
 The twenty-six who looked and knew
 They were the ones who had to die.
Then let some fitting tribute stand
 When we from here are fled,
 The living consecrated
 By the consecrated dead!

ECHO CANYON

We ride to Echo Canyon,
 He rides with me tonight,
 No moon above to guide us,
 The stars alone are bright.
The wind is in the sagebrush;
 Somewhere a coyote calls;
 The studded sky is briefly lit
 As a flaming starlet falls.
We draw the rein together,
 He trembles as I pass
 To turn the horses free to graze
 In the wild September grass.
And now I stretch beside him
 Where he lies upon the ground,
 And in all this lovely wilderness
 We two alone are found.

FRAGMENT

He wandered through the darkened streets of night,
 His massive cape a-blown with every wind.
 He passed the strumpets flirting near the lamps,
 And bowed to one—the one most infamous.
 Then down familiar avenues he strolled,
 And met, as he was sure to meet them there,
 The lads who knew these lanes where men were bold.
How many a British soldier went to death
 Beneath an Afric sun with some small gift,
 A pocketknife inlaid with precious stones,
 A case for cigarettes, or watch and chain,
 Which had been given him by Oscar Wilde.

WE HANG UPON A SCAFFOLD

We hang upon a scaffold, lad,
 The skeleton within
 Is all the horror of the world,
 Of virtue and of sin.
For he who knows no word of love,
 Nor has his heart’s desire,
 Must hang the same and die the same
 As he who walks in fire.
Then hang upon your scaffold, lad
 The mob will pierce your side,
 Yet cry your triumph and your pain,
 For man is crucified.

I LOOKED INTO YOUR EYES

I looked into your eyes and saw,
 Or thought I saw, your love.
 I tried to hide my own from you;
 Not ever spoken of.
Yet, there was something I could feel
 Electrify the air
 When both of us were quite alone
 And no one else was there.
And when at last I spoke my love,
 And wanting yours for me,
 I looked into your eyes and knew
 Such love was not to be.

OF THIS GREAT VOICELESS LOVE

Of this great voiceless love of mine for you
 There is no word to your heart out of mine
 That may go winging through the whispering night.
Look only then for laughter in my letters
 As I from day to day The Fool rehearse.
 And if one blushing phrase too boldly written
 Inscribes too fervently that I am yours,
 Believe it only penmanship and style,
 Or the careless informality of friends.

I WOULD HAVE BROUGHT YOU FIRE

I would have brought you fire for those nights
 When you were cold and lonely and in doubt.
 I would have brought you laughter for your tears
 And given you new dreams to dream about.
But look away, your eyes are much too bright,
 And sorrow has lent beauty to your face,
 And should I cast aside this cloak of years
 And live forever after in disgrace—
 It is an old temptation sprung anew,
 Yet must not be.
 Ah, look at me and you shall see
 I am, my love, as miserable as you!

TOO MUCH OF LIFE

Too much of life we spend alone,
 Too many thoughts are ours to share,
 Too little love we call our own
 Though multitudes of men are there.
We’re strangers undetermined of
 Where madness rules the lives of men,
 Where he who dares design of love
 Lives not to dare the deed again.
Beware of love! Be lonely, lad.
 There is no death that can compare
 Where loving hearts are crucified,
 And multitudes of men are there.

LONE CELLO

Too much is incomplete. Let’s make an end
 Of all the fond impossible dreams we’ve dreamed,
 And when we part,
 We were not meant to be
 Too closely here companioned where the thorn
 Of our red love transfixes joy’s brief crown.
 The roses wither, time itself decays,
 And log-lit embers fall to ashes when
 The memory of the flame no longer glows.
We rode to Echo Canyon and your smile
 Ran naked through the chambers of my heart.
 Now lonely cellos must out parting sing
 As when some cool green afternoon lets fall
 From one high branch a few wind-weary leaves.
 We grow too old too suddenly. Farewell!

APOCALYPSE

These are the seeds of the future,
 The weary, the wretched, the slain.
 These are the ghosts we shall harvest
 In wars that shall come again.
These are the fields we have furrowed,
 The dreams that have fallen apart,
 And this is the plow of our madness,
 The fear that has entered the heart.
Oh, how shall we welcome the reaper
 When autumn shall fill the air,
 When all the hope of the springtime
 Is cut with the edge of despair?

THE OLD SEA WALL

Oh, you who go hurrying, worrying by
 With never a cry or a call,
 Saw you a lad who was standing here
 On the crest of the old sea wall?
I saw him last night in the twilight
 As the long low breakers rolled,
 And across the bay in the chapel
 An evening bell was tolled.
And we looked at each other a moment
 And then from each other we turned,
 But I read in his eyes of a longing
 That a merciless world had spurned.
Oh, have you no answer to make me,
 All you who go hastening past,
 And though I am late will none tell me
 Where he was standing last?
Like a whisper I hear from the sea wall,
 Where the waters are troubled below,
 A murmur of wavelets complaining,
 And the fate of the lad I know.
Spin onward, old world, to your ending.
 The hearts that you break and condemn
 Will someday rise madly against you,
 Reversing your judgment of them.

THE MIDNIGHT HORSEMAN

Ten thousand trees in the forest stood
 And watched me as I passed,
 Ten thousand trees that did not breathe
 The wind that rode as fast,
 Ten thousand leaves on every tree
 Immovably aghast!
The road in the light of the moon was white,
 The sky overhead was gray,
 With a kind of a washed, half-tone effect
 That took the night away,
 Yet to right and left like the cloak of death
 The deepest darkness lay.
The steed’s quick breath his hooves beat out
 And silvered all the air,
 On, on we sped like a thing of dread;
 We were a ghostly pair.
 We passed the somber stricken wood;
 We found no shelter there.
I might have stayed and made pretense
 That I was like the rest,
And laughed and drunk and sung their songs
 As loudly as the best,
 And never have given an answer to,
 Not recognized my quest.
Farewell, and onward! Piteous flight
 That leaves all friends behind,
 That hastes from old familiar scenes
 Where love was young and kind.
 Oh, petrified Sylvania,
 Where shall I others find?

LONELY HEART

Where do you wander far and afield,
 Lonely heart? Lonely heart, where is your shield?
Where are your rings and where is your purse?
 Love is expensive. It’s cheaper to curse.
Where are your garments? Look at your shoes.
 Laughter or sorrow, which did you choose?
Walking the streets, nights that are cold,
 Men who are wretched, men who are bold.
Rooms in the shadows, Love me tonight,
 Love me and leave me before it grows bright.
Don’t heed the sob of a heartbreak within.
 Hold me, and kiss me and teach me to sin!
Into the quicksand, hungry and dark,
 Into the grotto, into the park,
 Into the depths of the tomb, it is said,
 Lovers have cast themselves, living and dead.
Lonely heart, lonely heart, walking alone,
 Friendless and frantic, and turning to stone!

DREAMS