The Project Gutenberg eBook of The flying Parliament and other poems, by Edwina Stanton Babcock.

The Bersagliere looks up; the cut on his forehead bleeds less freely but he holds his ragged handkerchief to it. As he speaks, he motions toward the unfinished Christ lying on the table—his voice a gutteral whisper.

Never the hungry world,
The desperate childish world,
The feeble stupid world,
Caught in its horrible webs,
Of stupid desires and needs,
Of pamperings and sloth,
Of pride and avarice,
Of class and snobbery;
Never the world can be saved
Until we look on this.

He reaches over, seizes the cross and embraces it, passionately continuing between moans:

In the trenches they say it,
In the hospitals know it.
Men have talked to each other,
Lying sobbing with pain
Under the misery
Of stabbing knives of cold.
Out under the stars,
Where the broken bodies lie
Of young men scattered stiff
In terrible postures of death;
Or sweet boys broken up
In ghastly pieces of death.
The broken whispers sob:
The body and blood of Christ.
“The body and blood of Christ,”
It has been broken again,
By all the simple people
The patient humble people;
A long communion table,
Stretching out through all lands.
The body and blood of Christ,
Given to us again
By these his ignorant men,
Who when they crashed to death
On mountain or on plain
Resigned their souls to Him.

Nevermore will I take
The holy sacrament
But that my lips will say,
The bodies and blood of men,
Never will I receive
The wafer on my lips
But after Christ’s sweet name,
“Bodies and blood of men!”
Bitter will be the wine
Unless I murmur soft
“The bodies and blood of men
Who die, that He might live.”

The American bites his lips and clenches his hand. Finally he turns to where the cross lies on the table, takes it up reverently and curiously, and looks at it as at some new thing.

It means, a new-raised cross;
The simple things Christ knew,
And a Christ that has not died.
It means a new found self,
And a Soul that trusts itself.
It means a Mind that sees
Beyond race boundaries,
Beyond all Separates
Of race or land or kin;
One People that shall rise
Throughout the nationed globe,
And speak one solemn word
With all their various tongues,
There shall be no more War!
One People shall demand,
For the children still to be,
That Self shall be consumed
In the Passion No more War.
One Science dedicate
To a solemn World-emprise,
Spreading immortal health
Over the whole of life;
That engines be dedicate
To the good and help of the world;
That crops be dedicate
To the strength and life of the world;
That gold be dedicate
To the power and might of the world;
That Mind be dedicate
To the reverent Law of the World.

And what of race-pride?

And what of commerce?

And what of home and hearth?

I KNOW not.
I know only,
All else is lost and fails.
I know new forces shape
Illimitable life
Out of infinite Mind.

He looks at the Bersagliere, touching him gently on the shoulder, saying softly:

’Tis a long communion table;
We all kneel at that table.
It stretches through many lands,
It is spread in many minds.
How do we go from that table?
The bodies and blood of men
Must not be given in vain.

The American, turning to the Woodcarver, looks at him wistfully. He gestures to the winged figures all about, and says gravely and reverently:

Go on making angels!

The American, turning to the child, puts his arm around him, and together they stand at the door looking up at the whirling doves.

Know’st thou, little one,
They be pigeons,
Who bear all tidings
Under their wings?
Over the borders
Listen, One day,
Winged men shall cross
All the borders
With messages under their wings,
And the Parliaments shall meet
To try their mighty wings
Of fresh and buoyant thought,
And the minds of men shall rise
To the cleanness of the skies,
And the way shall be made clear,
And your world be safe once more.
You shall see clouds of planes,
Soaring over your home
Bringing tidings of hope,
Dropping flowers on the graves
Of the everlasting Young,
Who died to further it.
Flocks of singing planes,
Voyaging over the air,
With singing men and women,
Chanting a paeon of peace.
So that your children’s sons,
Their noble heritage,
Shall register and say
“The warless days came in
With the winged flying men,
And the flying Parliaments
Brought to us lasting Peace.”

The American turns to the Woodcarver. He looks long and fixedly at him. At last he smiles wistfully, and points to the winged figures all about, saying soberly:

Go on making angels!

He makes a slight gesture of farewell, steps out of the door and into the piazza San Marco. Standing there he looks at the Italian flag, then at the small tricolor in his own button-hole. Smiling reverently and tenderly upon them, he stretches out his arms toward the sky, and with a gesture of passionate hope and appeal, salutes the Air.

“GONE WEST”

West Wind blowing from the far clime,
What seeds are you sowing for the New Time?
“Pollen of souls that died
In a young smiling pride,
Scattered of chivalry and world-dream sublime.”

West Wind filling all the green trees,
What hope did they leave for us on our knees?
“Their happy, high Belief
To you they now bequeath—
Their vast, unconquered Sky bannered with breeze.”

Bright Wind surging from the clean West,
What were they urging on their gay young quest?
“High Urge and keen,
That Life shall mean
Bold truths, faced with a bold broad breast.”

West Wind blowing from their dim coasts,
Do they see weakness of all human boasts?
“Yes, but they know
That men still go
Forward and Forward in strong steady hosts.”

West Wind, West Wind, what will they do
If we should fail them—should prove us untrue?
Fail them? That cannot be.
For all Eternity
Faith in World-Liberty
Joins them to You!

OTHER POEMS

THE HAPPY PEOPLE

DOWN the spring slope sweep the Happy People
In a stream;
Pressing naked feet in rosy clover,
Flitting through the glades where songbirds hover,
Following brooks that run the meadows over;
(In my dream.)

Down the green lawns throng the Happy People,
Joy supreme
In their poised hands garlanded with flowers,
Joy of soft limbs fresh from sun and showers,
Joy of sweet lips tasting dewy hours;
(In my dream.)

Toward the mountains fare the Happy People,
And they seem
Waving me a promise bright and splendid,
Calling me to take the way they wended.
(But that way began—so has it ended
In my dream.)

FROM TREE CLOISTER

OUT of the city I came,
Heart aflame,
Thoughts oblique, confused, amazed;
My yester dreamings hurt and dazed
With the stifling buildings sweeping high
And the towers choking the dingy sky.
But I left it all to cross the dune,
Hand in hand with the crescent moon.

Out of the city I came,
Dreams of Fame
Dogged me up to my cottage walls,
Human passions and powers and thralls
Challenged the way I took
By the frozen meadow brook;
But the hill-top pasture bars
Chapelled the winter stars,
And their votive candles burned
At the gate wherein I turned.

Out of the city I came.
Father of endless name,
Who burn there burn on thy sacred pyre—
Burn with the flame of the heart’s desire
Toward flame of worthier things,
Toward lifting of broader wings;
And their purple gift and their scarlet boon
I hang on my altars of winter noon.
I speak to the brook in its icy shrine,
Confess to the tall dark palmer pine,
And soft on the country air,
I breathe the cities’ prayer.

FROM A WINDOW

THE ever-greens that line the road
Bow snowy heads upon the sight;
The netted horses draw the load
As it were light.

The living grief I would not see,
The hands in helpless quiet wrung;
But the white trappings say that she
Was fair and young.

The coaches blot the wintry scene
Passing where snow-blue shadows lurk....
Youth, Life, Love, Death—what do they mean?
Back to my work!

BIRTHRIGHT

HOW have I lost them, the old powers of dream?
I used to float through life, as on expanse
Quivering with light, slow-moving in a trance
That bore me like a petal on its stream.

Now, mouth and eyes are filled with dust of life.
I, once a Seer, with my crystal globe,
Know now no sphere, no irridescent robe;
But bear me like a thief, with hand on knife.

How have I lost them, the old powers of dream?
I, who was so content with simple things—
With one bright Autumn leaf, wood murmurings,
The near-spun grass, or one star’s far off gleam?

Now, I bear burdens with an ashen face.
I count my gains, I clamor at my loss;
I too have joined the tawdry pitch and toss,
Who once walked trancéd, with illusioned pace.

Since they are dead to me, dear dreaming powers—
Dead, with their grail and magic, visions, wings—
I shall distil the attar sorrow brings,
And lave them in the sweet of their own hours.

I shall their delicate bright figures lay
Embalmed in gold, in so profound a rock,
That no sharp-featured pain shall find a way
To touch, and no smug knowledge come to mock.

TO A LONELY STAR

ONCE more we keep our tryst—I on the beach,
Brooding in milky tides of Autumn moon,
Watching the gold black water softly reach
And fill the hollows of grass silvered dune;
Till, far beyond the rim of a lagoon
I see Thee in thy calm ascension tread
A darkened way to thy cloud-cloistered rest;
Hanging thy maiden lantern in the West,
Where planet torches lie extinguishéd.

The world will never miss me when I go.
These gossip ripples in the sedges there
Will still be whispering of that Thing they know;
The moon’s new milk will bathe the young and fair,
Nourishing Youth and Passion with such care.
But Thou, O Abbess Star! keep trimmed thy light,
Taking thy warder-way across the moor.
Yea, many a woman by her cottage door
Will need thy comfort all the lonely night.

THE OLD ORDER CHANGETH

THERE comes the time when he who gathers grapes
Must find his vineyard in the city street,
Must press what wine he may from lobate shapes
And globules clustered at his head and feet.
The press he treads will be the city night—
Bubble and bloom and burst of heady wine;
No fairer fresher grapes will meet his sight
Than pallid fruit of the electric vine!

There comes the time when he who longs for song
Must turn to monsters dreaming in the dark,
That Science-incubated aeons long;
Will give to music new heresiarch!
But Harmonies of pride and lust and doubt
Will greet the ear, that for some human hymn
Longs bitterly, hearing the brassy shout
Of engine songs, massive, superb and grim.

In those stark days new Lancelots shall pass
Accoutered black, with the bi-colored plume.
New Siegfrieds, armored in their steel and brass,
Shall flash subseas in tunnelled ocean gloom.
Woman and Science, gaunt with bold new brow,
Shall say what shall be born, what thing shall cry
Pioneer on its lurching, airdashed prow,
Air-immigrant to harbors of the sky.

There comes the day when on the sea of stars
Unspoken ships shall lay unsounded course,
And looming shapes, outside uncharted bars,
Shall dumbly signal with some speechless force.
New worlds shall stare on other worlds that be,
Sailing close by them on that starry sea,
And know that all the Main that round them rolls
Swells to new moons, new seas, new tides, new poles.

There comes the time, O patient Human heart,
O Brave Pathetic—time when thou must see
The old, the dear, the simple things depart,
Who canst not love the strange new things to be.
Yet by this New, shall not thy vision grow
To some estate, some altitude of range,
Where it is given thee that thou shalt know
What Changeless ’tis, that underlies all change?

THE TRAMP

THE ragged sun, the wind-filled sky,
The wet track and the empty car;
The night-hung woods, and, raised on high,
The lighted candle of a star.

So reads his heraldry, who prowls
On listless following of chance;
Who, sullenly appraising, scowls
On the rich dwelling’s circumstance.

The cloud of smoke upon the hill,
The rag left on the highway’s beat,
The light o’er a deserted sill—
These mark the passing of his feet.

No strenuous call of noontime bells
Vibrates through ether of his dreams;
For him no clock the hour tells;
For him no church’s spire gleams.

Though from his thoughts undisciplined
To warehouse and to street averse,
He, in exchanges of his mind,
Diverts him with a lavish purse —

Diverts him with his social schemes,
His plan against the existing plot;
And what he, of his justice, deems
Would—justice practised—be his lot.

Of whence he comes, of where he goes—
These things no human record keeps.
What black unwritten deed he does,
What pure fair hope within him sleeps.

What strange mysterious power he wields,
What undeveloped force to sway,
None guess who see him cross the fields,
Or plodding on his stealthy way.

Only dead fires attest his life,
Only dumb trees his brothers stand;
He knows not home nor child, nor wife,
Nor friendly grasp of any hand,

Yet lays his scheme for daily food,
Yet keeps him keen for filching pence
For this ... o’er pipe and fire to brood—
Spending imagined affluence!

IN THE STRANGE COUNTRY

I SPEAK your language very glibly now,
Have all the countersigns and know the range
Of all your boundaries; the streets I know....
And yet, your land is strange.

You ask me whence I came? I cannot tell.
My Race? Ah! God forbid that you should see
Others like me,—in this land where you dwell—
Not such as we.

“Do you have news?” you ask. My heart contracts.
Do I have news?... Yea, messages do come,
As if I had made wistful, faithful pacts
With those ... back home....

This butterfly brought one, that errant vine
Conveys a Word; the Sea, it would seem, knows....
Sweet tidings that I cannot quite divine
The flowers disclose.

But since you ask me idly, let me say,
I know not whence I am, nor why I come;
Yet I sit with you in your inn today
Devising speech—though dumb.

RAIN PICTURES

THE soft rain falls; the willow trees
Throw silver tangle on the breeze,
While Robin tunes his pipe and blows
His joyance down the orchard-close.
Amid the spraying crystal notes
One irridescent bubble floats—
Bubble of music, that careens
Adown the pasture’s mottled greens.
How tell the rapture that he sings
To beatings of his happy wings?
Why praise the story that he tells,
The message that his bosom swells ...?
Ah! he is Robin, and he goes,
Singing the only song he knows.

The sweet saps rise; the maple trees
Drink deep and scatter crimson lees.
I wander up and down the stream,
Singing the music of my dream;
Its cadence vague, its plaintive strain
Attunes it to the Harp of Rain;

The muted branches softly play
An obligato to my lay;
The drooping willows pluck the stream
With pensive touch that marks the theme,
And all the trilling water-tune
Accompanies my simple rune.

No heart have I to wake the green
With joyous lilting loud and keen.
I tune no pipe for jaunty snatch
Like Robin’s loud ecstatic catch.
I sing the song of wistful things,
Dumb longings, blind imaginings....
And yet, why blame me that I stray,
Crooning so poor a rondelay?
Ah! I am Human, and I go
Singing the only song I know.

My tree-calf books; my seven branched candle-stick;
The pine-knot’s bursting heart, flame-plethoric;
My jug from old Fiesole; the rain,
And the witch-vine that darkly taps the pane.

The witch-vine signals, and the rainy night
Enters my heart; puts out its wan rush light,
Like a chill blast of fore-writ doom and tears,
Extinguishing the meaning of my years.

Then come the spectral tapping on the pane,
Counting the unmarked graves of things as vain
As that bright-bound, dumb company of books
And worthless treasure of my chamber nooks.

Let be, O witch-vine fingers! I have grown
So kindly used to living all alone.
Let be, O furtive night! And I would fain
Be unremarked of thee, O brooding rain!

Be unreminded, when the tendril taps
Keep count of years—of the remorseless lapse
Of time ... for I must tend my fire yet,
And hear the storm, and see the window wet,

Thinking of some strange hour of frozen peace,
When the reproach of wind and rain shall cease
Thinking what Guest sits by ... when fires wane,
And the witch-vine lies withered on the pane.

Down the black mountain
The fairies come, I ween;
Tarrying hither,
Hurrying thither,
Grey-bright,
Phantom flight,
Winging by the glass.
Lo! spreads a green,
Leaf-lattice screen.

In the stark valley
The fairies riches feign;
They fling, they sprinkle
Tiny gems a-twinkle;
Water gems,
Flower gems
Sparkle in the grass.
Lo! in the lane,
Blood-root again.

On the dull houses
The fairies come to dance;
They masque, they chatter,
Elfin goblets shatter,
“Health to Spring,”
So they sing,
Laughing in the eaves.
Lo! like a lance,
See sunlight glance!

From a poor spirit
The fairies take the fears;
They soothe, they flatter,
They sing, “What matter?”
“Oh! Life is good to try!”
Lo! through my tears,
All the sky clears.

WAR POEMS

“WE MUST MAKE THE WORLD SAFE FOR DEMOCRACY.” 1917.

OUT on the prairies;
Where rivers flow;
On crests of mountains
The stern words glow.
“War,” say the rocks.
The rails ring, “War.”
From smoking chimneys
The solemn clouds pour.

War in the khaki,
War in the lace;
On youthful forehead
And stern old face.
“War!” smiles the lips,
Though the heart sobs “War.”
A Nation’s eyes flash
Like keen scimitar.

On all the houses
The flags are like fires.
East, West, arouses,
West, East inspires.
Light fills the banners
Light tips the poles,
The thrilled Stars and Stripes
Slowly unrolls.

Doom of the nations,
Doom of the brave.
Now it breaks o’er us,
War’s bitter wave;
But we shall hold us
Face toward the light....
We have enrolled us
Now for the fight!

THE MEANING

PEACE is not small white flowers
Shining on a lawn.
Peace is not youths and maidens wedded in their beauty.
Peace is not silver sandals of a stainless dawn.
Peace is the calm acceptance of heroic duty.

War is not bloody standards hung with crape.
War is not murdered men and women’s sorrow.
War, for our hearts and hands, is but a Shape,
That once destroyed, leaves ghost-less the tomorrow.

THE MARCHING FAITH

I HAVE seen the men go marching,
Marching away from life;
Away from love and children
Into a bitter strife.
I have seen the men go marching
With strange high courage shod—
The old, old way of Crusaders
Men who believe in God.

Brown eyes, blue eyes, grey eyes,
Swing of the Highland kilt,
Shoulders of English lordling,
Slight form Eastern built,
Chin of a New York lawyer,
Head of a happy Greek.
I have seen the men go marching,
And I know the thing they seek.

I have seen the men go marching,
And I have no word to say;
They have read their hearts more truly
Than I in my wistful way.
They sprang to an instinct Action,
Though they scorned the path they trod.
Gold help us! we must follow—
Men who go forth for God.

Brown eyes, blue eyes, grey eyes,
Eyes that have laughed with love,
Eyes that have glowed with music,
Indian eyes that rove,
Jaw of a tall Italian,
Teeth of the French Touraine,
Faces full of the tide of life,
That will not come back again.

I have seen the men go marching,
And I know what I must do:—
Never to play them weak or false
Though the news be false or true;
Whatever the Great Endeavor
For body or brain or pen,
I must be true forever
To the faith of the Marching Men!

HOME COMING

[A]"They will fight until the stolen and lost and scattered children return home.”

T’ will be a great day for the Children,
The lost and scattered Children,
When they come home!
I can see now the little faces smiling,
Hear broken words, see baby hands beguiling,
And watch the dear processions straggled filing,
When the Children come.

In all the crushed, insulted, stricken households,
In all the bare and desecrated households
There will be joy.
Mothers will rouse them from their haunted sorrow,
Because their love has given the Tomorrow
A pledge, on which posterity may borrow
From girl and boy.

Mothers will rouse them from their stricken anguish,
Daring to face the future in their anguish,
Because the Children say,
“We have no part in all the hopeless killing;
We are your sacrament, your holy willing;
We are your cups for the glad, new wine-filling
Of a new Day.”

T’will be a great day for the Future,
The dim and broken Future,
When the Children come!
They will bring back some clean, unlooted treasure;
New hope in life, of love a higher measure;
Unselfish aim, and purer, keener, pleasure
When they come home.

I see them dazed, the little bare feet stumbling;
I see them hasten, stunned, confused, and stumbling—
Yet unafraid.
For one great People comes to bring them gladness;
To take away the pitiful child-sadness;
To heal the infant pain and baby madness—
Another People made.

On one side wait the agonizing mothers,
The tearless, outraged, consecrated mothers,
To see them come;
The other side is lined with silent fathers,
Dead, mutilated, tortured, murdered fathers,
Sacred, elect, regenerated fathers,
Who died for Home.

And with them march the gay and ready Strangers,
The sunny, stern Americans, the Strangers,
Who bid them come.
Yea, though my eyes be blind with bitter crying,
Yet do I count worth while the fearful dying;
When dead men on a hundred red fields lying
Send the children—Home!

HOME COMING [A]"They will fight until the stolen and lost and scattered children return home.”

HOME COMING

[A]"They will fight until the stolen and lost and scattered children return home.”