**, sdi' ;
:
SWORD BLADES AND
POPPY SEED
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY NEW YORK
BOSTON CHICAGO DALLAS ATLANTA - SAN FRANCISCO
MACMILLAN & LONDON
CO., LIMITED
BOMBAY CALCUTTA MELBOURNE
THE MACMILLAN
CO. OF TORONTO
CANADA,
LTD.
SWORD BLADES AND
POPPY SEED
-
BY
AMY LOWELL AUTHOR OF 'A
DOME
OF MANY-COLOURED GLASS
Nefo gorft
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 1914 All rights reserved
Copyright, 1913, by Harriet Monroe.
The
Atlantic
Monthly Company and by
Copyright, 1914, by The Atlantic Monthly Company, by Charles Scribner s Sons, by The Century Company, by Harriet
Monroe, by The International Monthly, and by Albert and Charles Boni.
COPYRIGHT, 1914,
BY Set
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.
up and electrotyped.
Published October, 1914.
Norfooott Berwick J. S. Gushing Co.
& Smith Co. Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.
'Face
invisible! je fai gravee en medailles
D argent doux comme Vaube pale, D or ardent comme le
/tOSte*
soleil,
D airain sombre comme la nuit; 11
y en a de
Qui
comme
Comme V amour, comme
Seche
'
les
*
//
la joie,
Qui sonnent lourd comme
Et fai fait
x3
t
MAtA
tout metal,
tintent clair
*^&
C*/V&D5
la gloire,
la mort;
plus belles de
belle argile
et fragile.
Une a
une, vous les comptiez en souriant,
Et vous
disiez :
II est habile;
Et vous passiez en souriant. '
Aucun de
vous
mains tremblaient de
Que
tries
Que
tout le
Vivait en
Que je
Mes
n a done vu
grand songe
moi pour
gravais
tendresse,
terrestre
vivre
en eux
aux metaux pieux,
Dieux.'
Henri de Regnier,
'
LES MEDAILLES D
330393
ARGILE.'
PREFACE No one expects a man to make a chair without learning how, but there
first
sion that the poet
is
is
a popular impres
born, not made,
and that
verses burst from his overflowing heart of selves.
As a matter
his trade in the
of fact, the poet
his
them
must
learn
same manner, and with the same
painstaking care, as the cabinet-maker. His heart
may
overflow with high thoughts and sparkling
fancies,
but if he cannot convey them to his reader
by means
of the written
be considered a poet.
word he has no claim
A workman may
to
be par
doned, therefore, for spending a few moments to explain
A
and describe the technique
work
of
beauty which cannot stand an
mate examination In the lief
of his trade.
is
inti
a poor and jerry-built thing.
first place, I
wish to state
my
firm be
that poetry should not try to teach, that
it
should exist simply because it is a created beauty,
PREFACE
Vlii
even
if
sometimes the beauty of a gothic gro
tesque.
We
do not ask the trees to teach us
moral lessons, and only the Salvation
Army feels
necessary to pin texts upon them.
We know
it
that these texts are ridiculous, but
of us
many
do not yet see that to write an obvious moral all is
over a work of
art, picture, statue, or
poem,
not only ridiculous, but timid and vulgar.
We
we only
and
distrust a beauty
half understand,
How
rush in with our impertinent suggestions. far
we are from
'admitting
Universe, which flings seas,
as
down
Universe'
its
!
The
continents and
and leaves them without comment. Art
much
is
a function of the Universe as an Equi
noctial gale, or the insist
the
Law
upon considering
of Gravitation it
merely a
work, of no great importance unless
;
and we
little scroll
it
be studded
with nails from which pretty and uplifting senti
ments may be hung
!
For the purely technical side
I
must
state
my
immense debt to the French, and perhaps above
PREFACE all
IX
to the, so-called, Parnassian School, although
some
of the writers
do not belong to
who have influenced me most
it.
High-minded and untiring
workmen, they have spared no pains to produce a poetry
finer
than that of any other country
our time. Poetry so that the study of
full of
it is
and a despair to the
beauty and
at once
artist.
in
feeling,
an inspiration
The Anglo-Saxon
of
our day has a tendency to think that a fine idea excuses slovenly workmanship. These clear-eyed
Frenchmen are a reproof laziness.
to our self-satisfied
Before the works of Parnassians like
Le Conte de
Lisle,
and Jose-Maria de Heredia,
or those of Henri de Regnier, Albert Samain,
Francis Jammes, Fort, of the
It
de Gourmont, and Paul
more modern
buked. Indeed ter in
Remy
'They
school,
we stand
re
order this matter bet
France.'
is
because in France, to-day, poetry
ing and vigorous a thing, that so
many
is
so liv
metrical
experiments come from there. Only a vigorous
X
PREFACE
tree has the vitality .to put forth
The poet with
new
and power
originality
branches. is
always
seeking to give his readers the same poignant
which he has himself. To do
feeling
must constantly delightful
great,
new and
it
a remarkable
must once have conjured up like the
egg, breaking through
that
striking images,
What
for instance.
round sun,
But we have
clouds.
he
and unexpected forms. Take the word
'daybreak,'
picture
find
this
we do not
The
!
yolk of some mighty
cracked and splintered
said
so often
'daybreak'
see the picture
become only another word
for
any more,
it
has
dawn. The poet
must be constantly seeking new pictures to make his readers feel the vitality of his thought.
Many in
of the
poems
what the French
clature
call
volume are written
'Vers Libre,'
a
nomen
more suited to French use and to French
versification
poems
in this
than to ours. I prefer to
in 'unrhymed
their exact
cadence,'
call
them
for that conveys
meaning to an English
ear.
They
are
PREFACE
XI
'
built
upon
organic
rhythm,'
the speaking voice with
its
or the
rhythm
of
necessity for breath
ing, rather
than upon a
They
from ordinary prose rhythms by be
differ
strict metrical
system.
ing
more curved, and containing more
The
stress,
and exceedingly marked curve,
regular metre built
is
easily
subtle,
less fixed.
prose lines into lengths does dence,
it is
not produce ca
ize,'
rhyme.'
to head-up
hot, seems to be
The
in
which
its
I
of
had
'those
tried to
one scarce can
desire to 'quintessential
an emotion
until
it
burns white-
an integral part of the modern
temper, and certainly
unique in
In the pref
Henley speaks
'Poems,'
quintessentialize, as (I believe) in
but the laws
constructed upon mathematical and
unrhyming rhythms
do
any
Merely chopping
absolute laws of balance and time.
ace to his
of
perceived. These poems,
upon cadence, are more
they follow are not
stress.
power
'unrhymed cadence' is
of expressing this.
Three of these poems are written in a form

PREFACE
Xll
which, so far as I know, has never before been
attempted in English. M. Paul Fort ventor,
and the
him
results it has yielded to
most beautiful and
its in
is
Perhaps
satisfactory.
are
it
is
more suited to the French language than to Eng lish.
But
I
found
these particular fluid
it
medium
the only
in
poems could be written.
and changing form, now
and permitting a great variety
But the reader will abandoned the more
see that I classic
prose,
which It
now
is
a
verse,
of treatment.
have not entirely
English metres. I
cannot see why, because certain manners suit certain emotions
and
subjects,
it
should be con
sidered imperative for an author to others.
Schools are for those
themselves within them. ness in
me
employ no
who can
Perhaps
it is
confine
a weak
that I cannot.
In conclusion, I would say that these remarks are in answer to
many
questions asked
people
who have happened
poems
in periodicals.
to read
They
some
me by of these
are not for the pur-
PREFACE
Xiii
pose of forestalling criticism, nor of courting
and they
it
;
deal, as I said in the beginning, solely
with the question of technique. For the more im portant part of the book, the poems must speak for themselves.
AMY LOWELL. MAY
19, 1914.
CONTENTS SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
S
SWORD BLADES THE CAPTURED GODDESS
31
THE
PRECINCT. ROCHESTER
34
THE
CYCLISTS
39
SUNSHINE THROUGH A COB WEBBED WINDOW
A LONDON THOROUGHFARE ASTIGMATISM
.
.
.41 43
.45
THE COAL PICKER
50
STORM-RACKED
53
CONVALESCENCE
54
PATIENCE
55
APOLOGY
57
A
59
PETITION
CONTENTS
XVI
A BLOCKHEAD STUPIDITY
IRONY .^HAPPINESS
THE LAST QUARTER OF THE MOON
A TALE
OF STARVATION
THE FOREIGNER
.
.
.
.
.....
ABSENCE
A
GIFT
THE BUNGLER FOOL S MONEY BAGS MISCAST
I
.
.
.... ....
MISCAST II
..... ......
ANTICIPATION
--VINTAGE
THE TREE OF SCARLET BERRIES OBLIGATION
THE TAXI THE GIVER OF STARS
.
CONTENTS
XV11
THE TEMPLE
98
EPITAPH OF A YOUNG POET
99
IN ANSWER TO A REQUEST
100
POPPY SEED -THE GREAT ADVENTURE OF
MAX BREUCK
SANCTA MARIA, SUCCURRE MISERIS
.
.103
....
148
AFTER HEARING A WALTZ BY BARTOK
.
.
.
155
CLEAR, WITH LIGHT, VARIABLE WINDS
.
.
.
160
>
THE BASKET
164
IN A CASTLE
172
THE BOOK OF HOURS OF
SISTER CLOTILDE
.
.179
THE EXETER ROAD
200
THE SHADOW
204
THE FORSAKEN
227
LATE SEPTEMBER
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
232
THE PIKE
234
THE BLUE SCARF
236
WHITE AND GREEN
238

CONTENTS
XV111
f
AUBADE
239
Music
240
A LADY
242
IN A GARDEN
244
A
TULIP GARDEN
Thanks Scribner
London,
are
s,
,
246
due to the editors of The Atlantic Monthly, The Century,
Poetry, The International, The Glebe, and The Egoist,
for their courteous permission to reprint certain of these
which have been copyrighted by them.
poems
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED /
<
A DRIFTING,
April, twilight sky,
A wind which blew And
the puddles dry,
slapped the river into waves
That ran and hid among the staves Of an old wharf.
A watery light
Touched bleak the granite Without the
The All
bridge,
slightest tinge of gold,
city shivered in the cold.
day
thoughts had lain as dead,
my
Unborn and bursting
From time Which
in
my
to time I wrote a
head.
lines
and
word
circles overscored.
My table seemed a graveyard, full Of
and white
coffins waiting burial.
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
4
I seized these vile abortions, tore
Them
into jagged bits,
To be
the dupe of hope no more.
and swore
Into the evening straight I went,
Starved of a day
s
accomplishment.
Unnoticing, I wandered where
The
city
And on
gave a space for
air,
the bridge s parapet
I leant, while pallidly there set
A dim,
discouraged, worn-out sun.
Behind me, where the tramways run, Blossomed bright
When someone 'Your
Most
A
pardon,
plucked
Sir,
voice
have
was
I turned and
turned to leave,
me by
you lend
lost
my
met the
to
me
purse.'
clear, concise,
Of strange eyes
the sleeve.
but I should be
grateful could
carfare, I
The
lights, I
and
terse.
quiet gaze
flashing through the haze.
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
The man was Under
his cloak
Disarranged
He
old
its
and
slightly bent,
some instrument stately line,
rested on his cane a fine
And nervous
hand, an almandine
Smouldered with dull-red flames, sanguine It
burned in twisted gold, upon
His
Like some Spanish don,
finger.
Conferring favours even
when
Asking an alms, he bowed again
And
Empty,
No
in vain I
my
pockets proved
poked and shoved,
hidden penny lurking there
Greeted I
But
waited.
my
search.
'Sir,
have no money, pray
I declare
forgive,
But
let
me
And
so
we plodded through
Where
take you where you
street
*
live.
the mire
lamps cast a wavering
fire.
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
6
I took no note of where
we went,
His talk became the element
Wherein
my
being swam, content.
It flashed like rapiers in the night
Lit by uncertain candle-light,
When on some
moon-forsaken sward
A
quarrel dies
It
hacked and carved
upon a sword. like
a cutlass blade,
And
the noise in the air the broad words
Was
the cry of the wind at a window-pane
On an Autumn Then
it
made
night of sobbing rain.
would run
like
a steady stream
Under pinnacled bridges where minarets gleam, Or
lap the air like the lapping tide
Where a marble
staircase lifts its
wide
Green-spotted steps to a garden gate,
And a waning moon
Down
to a black
is
sinking straight
and ominous
sea,
While a nightingale sings in a lemon
tree.
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
I walked as though
Had
some opiate
stung and dulled
my
brain, a state
Acute and slumbrous. It grew
We
late.
stopped, a house stood silent, dark.
The
old
man
scratched a match, the spark of a door,
Lit
up the keyhole
We
entered straight upon a floor
White with
finest
powdered sand
Carefully sifted, one might stand
Muddy and Would
From
And a
dripping,
and yet no trace
stain the boards of this kitchen-place.
the chimney, red eyes sparked the gloom, cricket s chirp filled all the room.
My host threw pine-cones on And crimson and Wrapped
scarlet
the
fire
glowed the pyre
in the golden flame s desire.
The chamber opened
like
As a half-melted cloud
an eye,
in a
Summer sky
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
8
The
soul of the house stood guessed,
and shy
It peered at the stranger warily.
A little
shop with
its
various ware
Spread on shelves with nicest care. Pitchers,
Pipkins,
and
jars,
and
jugs,
and
and mugs, and many
Of lacquered
canisters, black
lots
and
Like those in which Chinese tea Chests, and puncheons, kegs,
pots,
gold,
is
and
sold. flasks,
Goblets, chalices, firkins, and casks.
In a corner three ancient amphorae leaned Against the wall, like ships careened.
There was dusky blue of Wedgewood ware,
The
carved, white figures fluttering there
Like leaves adrift upon the
air.
Classic in touch, but emasculate,
The Greek The
soul
grown effeminate.
factory of Sevres had lent
Elegant boxes with ornament
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED Culled from gardens where fountains splashed
And
golden carp in the shadows flashed,
Nuzzling for crumbs under lily-pads,
Which
threw as the
ladies
last of fads.
Eggshell trays where gay beaux knelt,
Hand on
heart,
and
daintily spelt
Their love in flowers, brittle and bright, Artificial
and
The vows
of
The cruder
fragile,
which told aright
an eighteenth-century knight.
tones of old
Glared from one
shelf,
Dutch jugs
where Toby mugs
Endlessly drank the foaming ale, Its froth
The
grown dusty, awaiting
glancing light of the burning
Played over a group of
On
a distant
Had To
sale.
shelf, it
jars
wood
which stood
seemed the sky
lent the half-tones of his blazonry
paint these porcelains with
unknown hues
Of reds dyed purple and greens turned
blues,
9
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
10
Of
lustres with so evanescent a sheen
Their colours are
felt,
but never seen.
Strange winged dragons writhe about
These vases, poisoned venoms spout, Impregnate with old Chinese charms
;
Sealed urns containing mortal harms,
They
the
fill
mind with thoughts impure,
Pestilent drippings from the ure
Of vicious thinkings. Said
I,
The
old
Shook
'you
man
his
deal in
I
As he
head gently.
'No,'
his cloak
so carefully
laid it
A Toledo
see,'
pottery.'
had wondered to
Guarded
I
turned and looked at me.
Then from under Which
'Ah,
down
it
from
said he.
he took the thing
see
him bring
sight.
flashed in the light,
blade, with basket hilt,
Damascened with arabesques
of gilt,
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED Or rather
gold,
11
and tempered so
It could cut a floating thread at a blow.
The
man
old
Twas a
little
My cloak,
So I brought 'An
careless to
fine, it
amateur of
'Bringing
has no sheath,
have
my arm
home
I could not wait,
with
me
arms,'
despite
state.'
a prize which he has bought.
care for this sort of thing,
'Not
in the
way which you
them
its
I thought,
'You
I need
beneath
it
resulted in serious harm.
was so
it
'It
for a jostle to
Would have But
smiled,
Dear
Sir
infer.
in business, that
is
all.'
And he
pointed his finger at the wall.
Then
saw what I had not noticed
The
I
walls were
hung with at
Of swords and daggers
Which nations
?'
before.
least five score
of every size
of militant
men
could devise.
Poisoned spears from tropic seas,
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
12
That
natives, under
Smear with the
banana
juice of
trees,
some deadly snake.
Blood-dipped arrows, which savages make
And
tip
with feathers, orange and green,
A quivering
death, in harlequin sheen.
High up, a fan
Was formed
of glancing steel
of claymores in a wheel.
Jewelled swords worn at kings levees
Were suspended next midshipmen
s dirks,
and
these
Elbowed
stilettos
come from Spain,
Chased with some splendid Hidalgo
s
name.
There were Samurai swords from old Japan,
And
scimitars from Hindoostan,
While the blade of a Turkish yataghan
Made
a waving streak of vitreous white
Upon
the wall, in the
firelight.
Foils with buttons broken or lost
Lay heaped on a
chair,
among them
tossed
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED The boarding-pike
of a privateer.
Against the chimney leaned a queer
Two-handed weapon, with edges
As though from hacking on a
The
rusted blood corroded
My host From
And At
took up a paper
dull
skull.
it still.
spill
a heap which lay in an earthen bowl,
lighted
it
at a burning coal.
either end of the table, tall
Wax
candles were placed, each in a small,
And
slim,
and burnished candlestick
Of pewter. The old man
And
the
room
the flickering
Above the chimney Shoulder high,
Was
each wick,
more obviously
leapt
Upon my mind, and
What
lit
I could see
fire
s
had hid from me.
yawning throat,
like the
dark wainscote,
a mantelshelf of polished oak
Blackened with the pungent smoke
13
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
14
Of
firelit
nights
;
a Cromwell clock
Of tarnished brass stood
like
a rock
In the midst of a heaving, turbulent sea
Of every
sort of cutlery.
There lay knives sharpened to any
The keenest
And Of
and the obtuse
lancet,
blunted pruning bill-hook blades ;
razors, scalpels, shears
;
Of penknives, with handles
And
use,
scythes,
and
sickles,
cascades of mother-of-pearl,
and
scissors
;
a whirl
Of points and edges, and underneath Shot the gleam of a saw with
My head grew dizzy, A
battle-cry
bristling teeth.
I seemed to hear
from somewhere near,
The
clash of arms,
And
the echoless thud
A smoky cloud
and the squeal
had
of balls,
when a dead man
falls.
veiled the room,
Shot through with lurid glares the gloom ;
Pounded with shouts and dying
groans,
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED With the drip
on
of blood
15
hard stones.
cold,
Sabres and lances in streaks of light
Gleamed through the smoke, and
A creese,
like
a licking serpent
Glittered an instant, while
it
s
my
right
tongue,
stung.
Streams, and points, and lines of
man
at
fire
!
The
livid steel,
Had
forged and welded, burned white and cold.
which
s desire
Every blade which man could mould,
Which could
cut, or slash, or cleave, or rip,
Or
pierce, or thrust, or carve, or strip,
Or
gash, or chop, or puncture, or tear,
Or
slice,
or hack, they
all
were there.
Nerveless and shaking, round and round, I stared at the walls Till the
And I
sell
room spun
like
a stern voice in
no
and at the ground, a whipping top,
my
ear said,
'Stop
tools for murderers here.
Of what are you thinking
!
Please clear
!
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
16
Your mind Sit
of such imaginings.
down. I
will tell
He pushed me Of
of these
poked a
flare
flame, with the old long sword,
the chimney
;
but said no word.
Slowly he walked to a distant
And brought back a
He
rested a
Upon
things.'
into a great chair
russet leather,
Of tumbling
Up
you
moment
shelf,
crock of finest
delf.
a blue-veined hand
the cover, then cut a band
Of paper, pasted neatly round,
Opened and poured.
Came from And
little
heap of sands,
Black and smooth. Pepper,'
'What
I thought.
you
sound
beneath his old white hands,
I saw a
'
A sliding
see
is
What
He
poppy
could they be
looked at me.
seed.
Lethean dreams for those
in
need.'
:
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
He
17
took up the grains with a gentle hand
And
On
sifted
his old
Shot out 'Visions
them slowly
like hour-glass sand.
white finger the almandine incarnadine.
its rays,
for those too tired to sleep.
These seeds cast a film over eyes which weep.
No
single soul in the world could dwell,
Without these poppy-seeds I
sell.'
For a moment he played with the shining Passing
it
At
he poured
last,
The china Which he
through
jar of
his fingers. it
Enough
back into
Holland blue,
carefully carried to its place.
Then, with a smile on
He drew up
his
aged
Young man,
face,
a chair to the open space
Twixt table and chimney. I will say that
Is not the puzzle 'But
stuff,
you take
surely, Sir, there
is
'Without
preface,
what you
see
it
to
be.'
something strange
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
18
In a shop with goods at so wide a range
Each from the
other, as swords
Your neighbours must have he
'My neighbours,'
'Live
are wrong,
but one thing in
He
seeds.
greatly differing
and he stroked
my
sort of goods
all its moods.'
took a shagreen letter case
From
and with charming grace
his pocket,
Offered
me
a printed card.
I read the legend,
Dealer in
'Ephraim
Words.'
And
Bard.
that was
all.
I stared at the letters, whimsical
Indeed, or was
He 'All
answered
it
my
merely a
jest.
unasked request
:
books are either dreams or swords,
You can
cut, or
My firm is The
entries
you can drug, with words.
a very ancient house,
on
my
books would rouse
needs.'
his chin,
everywhere from here to Pekin.
But you Is
said,
and
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED Your wonder, perhaps
incredulity.
I inherited from an ancestry
Stretching remotely back and far,
This business, and
As were those
of
my clients
my
are
grandfather
s
days,
Writers of books, and poems, and plays.
My swords are tempered for every speech, For fencing
wit, or to carve a
breach
Through old abuses the world condones. In another room are
my
grindstones and hones,
For whetting razors and putting a point
On
daggers, sometimes I even anoint
The
blades with a subtle poison, so
A twofold
result
may
follow the blow.
These are purchased by men who
The need
of stabbing society s heel,
Which egotism has brought them Is set
An
feel
on their necks. I have
foils
adversary to quaint reply,
to think
to pink
19
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
20
And
have customers who buy
I
Scalpels with which to dissect the brains
And
hearts of men.
Ultramundanes
Even demand some
To open
their
But the other With
visions
own
finer kinds
souls
half of
and
my
fancies.
and minds. business deals
Under
seals,
Sorted, and placed in vessels here, I keep the seeds of an atmosphere.
Each
jar contains
Of poppy
Come
seed.
a different kind
From
farthest Ind
the purple flowers, opium
From which
filled,
the weirdest myths are distilled
My orient porcelains contain them all. Those Lowestoft pitchers against the wall
Hold a
And
On
lighter kind of bright conceit
;
those old Saxe vases, out of the heat
that lowest shelf beside the door,
Have
a sort of Ideal,
'couleur
d
or.'
;
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED Every
castle of the air
and there
Sleeps in the fine black grains,
Are seeds
for every
romance, or light
Whiff of a dream for a summer I supply to every
Twas
to
Dumfounded
He
want and
iiight,
taste.'
slowly said, in no great haste
He seemed
A log
21
on the
push
listened. fire
but I
his wares,
By and by
broke in two.
looked up quickly,
'Sir,
and you
?'
I groped for something I should say ;
Amazement
held
You sweated
He
at a fruitless
spoke for me,
How
me numb.
'What
can I serve you
My penniless I have no
state
?'
'To-day
task.'
do you ask 'My
kind host,
was not a boast
money with
Not
for that
You
here; you paid
money
me.'
He
;
smiled.
I beguiled
me
in
?
advance.'
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED Again I
though a trance
felt as
Had dimmed my
He
faculties.
Again
spoke, and this time to explain.
'The
money
I
demand
Your nervous
force,
What infamous
Was made me
is
Life,
your joy, your
now
proposal
with so calm a brow
Bursting through
my
I
am no
Is
what
I call
my !
Revolts me. Let
And
:
I
infernal wine ?
Faust, and what
Devil or Ghost
'I
am
this a nightmare, or
Drunk with some
soul
Your
me
!
is
mine
Old
Man
go.'
'My child,'
the old tones were very mild,
have no wish to barter souls;
am no
devil
;
is
!
hellish plan
My traffic does not ask such tolls. I
?
lethargy,
Indignantly I hurled the cry 'Is
strife
there one
?
!'
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED Surely the age of fear
We live within Lit
a daylight world
Sweep clouds to
I
scatter pattering rain,
then blow back the sun again.
my
sell
To
gone.
sun, where winds unfurled
by the
And
is
23
those
Ideas, of
fancies, or
who
swords,
more
care far
which they are the
Than any
Who buy
my
for words, sign,
other life-design. of
me must
simply pay
Their whole existence quite away
:
Their strength, their manhood, and their prime, Their hours from morning
When And
To
life,
think
it
miss what other
feet,
complete
men count
gain the gift of deeper seeing
Must spurn All
the time
evening comes on tiptoe
losing
Must
till
all ease, all
;
being,
;
hindering love,
which could hold or bind must prove ;
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
24
The
farthest boundaries of thought,
And shun no end which Then
these have brought
die in satisfaction,
knowing
That what was sown was worth the sowing. I claim for
That they
all
the goods I
will serve their
And though you
sell
purpose well,
perish, they will live.
Full measure for your
pay I
give. in vain.
To-day you worked, you thought,
What Your
since has
happened
is
the train
I spoke to you
toiling brought.
For
my
share of the bargain,
'My
life
!
In pay
?
And
is
that
What even
all
due.'
you crave
childhood gave
I have been dedicate from youth.
Before
my God
I speak the truth
!'
Fatigue, excitement of the past
Few All
hours broke
me down
day I had forgot to
at last.
eat,
!
;
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
My nerves betrayed I
bowed
my
me, lacking meat.
head and
the storm
felt
Plough shattering through
The
25
tearless sobs tore at
my
my
prostrate form.
heart.
My host withdrew himself apart
;
Busied among his crockery, i
He
paid no farther heed to me.
Exhausted, spent, I huddled there,
Within the arms of the old carved chair.
A long half-hour dragged And 'The
away,
then I heard a kind voice say,
day
will
You must
soon be dawning, when
begin to work again.
Here are the things which you
By
the fading light of the dying
And by I
require.'
the guttering candle s
saw the old man standing
He handed me
fire,
flare,
there.
a packet, tied
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED
26
With crimson Are seeds
of
and
tape,
many
sealed.
'Inside
differing flowers,
To occupy your utmost powers Of
storied vision,
Are the
finest
Go home and
and these swords
which use
my
them
Yourself ; let that be
;
all
shop affords.
do not spare your care.
Whatever you have means
Be very
He
sure I can
buy
supply.'
slowly walked to the window, flung
It open,
and
The sound I took
An
to
my
ancient
in the grey air
of distant parcels.
matin
rung bells.
Then, as
mumbling monk
tells
his beads,
I tried to thank for his courteous deeds
My strange old friend. He
urged me,
'you
'Nay,
do not
have a long walk
Before you. Good-by and Good-day
And
talk,
gently sped upon
my way
!'
SWORD BLADES AND POPPY SEED I stumbled out in the morning hush,
As down the empty
Ran
level
from the
street a flush rising sun.
Another day was just begun.
7
SWORD BLADES
THE CAPTURED GODDESS OVER
the housetops,
Above the
rotating chimney-pots,
I have seen a shiver of amethyst,
And
blue and cinnamon have flickered
A moment, At the
far
end of a dusty
Through sheeted
Has come a
And
rain
lustre of crimson,
I have watched
Hushed by a
It
street.
moonbeams
film of palest green.
was her wings,
Goddess
Who
!
stepped over the clouds,
SWORD BLADES
32
And
laid her
rainbow feathers
Aslant on the currents of the
air.
I followed her for long,
With gazing eyes and stumbling
feet.
I cared not where she led me,
My eyes were full of colours
:
Saffrons, rubies, the yellows of beryls,
And
the indigo-blue of quartz
;
Flights of rose, layers of chrysoprase,
Points of orange, spirals of vermilion,
The
spotted gold of tiger-lily petals,
The loud pink
of bursting hydrangeas.
I followed,
And watched
for the flashing of her wings.
In the city I found her,
The
narrow-streeted city.
In the market-place I came upon her,
SWORD BLADES Bound and
33
trembling.
Her fluted wings were fastened
to her sides with
cords,
She was naked and
cold,
For that day the wind blew
Without sunshine.
Men
chaffered for her,
They bargained
in silver
and
gold,
In copper, in wheat,
And
called their bids across the market-place.
The Goddess wept.
Hiding
And
my
face I fled,
the grey wind hissed behind me,
Along the narrow
streets.
SWORD BLADES
34
THE PRECINCT. ROCHESTER THE
tall
yellow hollyhocks stand,
Still
and
straight,
With
their
round blossoms spread open,
In the quiet sunshine.
And
still is
Roman
the old
Rough with jagged
And
wall,
bits of flint,
jutting stones,
Old and cragged, Quite
still
in its antiquity.
The
pear-trees press their branches against
And
feeling it
The
little
warm and
pears ripen to yellow and red.
They hang heavy, Against the wall.
So
kindly,
old, so still
!
bursting with juice,
it,
SWORD BLADES
The sky The
is still.
clouds
As they
make no sound
slide
away
Beyond the Cathedral Tower,
To
the river,
And
the sea.
It
very quiet,
is
Very sunny.
The myrtle
flowers stretch themselves in the
sunshine,
But make no sound.
The
roses push their
And
climb higher and higher.
little
tendrils up,
In spots they have climbed over the wall.
But they
are very
They do not seem
And
still,
to move.
the old wall carries
them
35
SWORD BLADES
36
Without
and quietly
effort,
Ripens and shields the vines and blossoms.
A bird in
a plane-tree
Sings a few notes,
Cadenced and perfect
They weave
into the silence.
The Cathedral
bell
knocks,
One, two, three, and again,
And
then again.
It
a quiet sound,
is
Calling to prayer,
Hardly scattering the
Only making
stillness,
close in
it
more densely.
The gardener
picks ripe gooseberries
For the Dean
s
It
is
supper to-night.
very quiet,
Very regulated and mellow.
But the wall
is
old,
SWORD BLADES known many
It has It
is
Roman
a
37
days.
wall,
Left-over and forgotten.
Beyond the Cathedral Close Yelp and mutter the discontents of people not mellow,
Not
well-regulated.
People
who
Who would And give To
care
more
for
bread than for beauty,
break the tombs of
saints,
the painted windows of churches
their children for toys.
People
They
who say
are dead,
:
we
live
!
The world
is
for the
Fools
is
always the dead
!
It
Crush the ripe
Yet
And
its
fruit,
living.'
and cast
who it
breed.
aside,
seeds shall fructify,
trees rise
where your huts were standing.
SWORD BLADES
38
But the
They
little
chaffer,
They gnaw
And
people are ignorant,
and swarm.
like rats,
the foundations of the Cathedral are honey
combed.
The Dean
He
is
is
in the
Chapter House
reading the architect s
;
bill
For the completed restoration
of the Cathedral.
He
for supper,
will
And
By
have ripe gooseberries
then he will walk up and down the path
the wall,
And admire
the snapdragons and dahlias,
Thinking how quiet and peaceful
The garden The
is.
old wall will watch him,
Very quietly and patiently For the wall It
is
a
is
Roman
old,
wall.
it
will
watch.
SWORD BLADES
THE CYCLISTS SPREAD on the roadway,
With open-blown
jackets,
Like black, soaring pinions,
They swoop down the
The
hillside,
Cyclists.
Seeming dark-plumaged Birds, after carrion,
Careening and
Over the dying
Of England.
circling,
SWORD BLADES
40
She
lies
with her bosom
Beneath them, no longer
The Dominant Mother, The
Virile
but rotting
Before time.
The
smell of her, tainted,
Has
bitten their nostrils.
Exultant they hover,
And shadow
the sun with
Foreboding.
SWORD BLADES
41
SUNSHINE THROUGH A COBWEBBED
WINDOW /
WHAT charm Of outworn,
is
^
yours,
you faded old-world
tapestries,
childish mysteries,
Vague pageants woven on a web
And
./
/
/
of
dream
!
we, pushing and fighting in the turbid stream
Of modern
life,
find solace in
your tarnished broideries.
.
Old lichened
The
halls,
sun-shaded by huge cedar-trees,
layered branches horizontal stretched, like .
Japanese
Dark-banded Of
prints.
faintest colour,
And sway
Carven cathedrals, on a sky
where the gothic
like masts, against
spires fly
a shifting breeze.
SWORD BLADES
42
Worm-eaten pages, clasped
in old
brown vellum,
shrunk
From
over-handling,
Or Virgin With
s
by some anxious monk.
Hours, bright with gold and graven
flowers,
and rare
birds,
and
all
the Saints of
Heaven,
And Noah s
ark stuck on Ararat, when
all
the world
had sunk.
They soothe
By
us like a song, heard in a garden, sung
youthful minstrels, on the moonlight flung
In cadences and
Widowed and
falls,
to ease a queen,
childless,
Of myrtles, whose unstrung.
life
cowering in a screen
hangs with
all its
threads
SWORD BLADES
A LONDON THOROUGHFARE. THEY have watered
43
2
the street,
It shines in the glare of lamps,
Cold, white lamps,
And
lies
Like a slow-moving river,
Barred with
silver
Cabs go down
and black.
it,
One,
And then
another.
Between them I hear the
shuffling of feet.
Tramps doze on the window-ledges, Night-walkers pass along the sidewalks.
The
city
With the
is
squalid and sinister,
silver-barred street in the midst,
Slow-moving,
A river leading
nowhere.
A.M.
SWORD BLADES
44
Opposite
my
The moon
window,
cuts,
Clear and round,
Through the plum-coloured She cannot It
is
light the city
night.
;
too bright.
It has white lamps,
And
glitters coldly.
I stand in the
window and watch the moon.
and
She
is
But
I love her.
I
thin
lustreless,
%
know the moon,
And
this is
an
alien city.
SWORD BLADES
45
ASTIGMATISM To EZRA POUND WITH MUCH FRIENDSHIP AND ADMIRATION AND
SOME DIFFERENCES OF OPINION
THE Poet Of
fine
took his walking-stick
and polished ebony.
Set in the close-grained
Were quaint
devices
wood
;
Patterns in ambers,
And
in the clouded green of jades.
The top was
And
of smooth, yellojfr ivory,
a tassel of tarnished gold
Hung by
a faded cord from a hole
Pierced in the hard wood, Circled with silver.
For years the Poet had wrought upon His wealth had gone to enrich
it,
this cane.
SWORD BLADES
46
His experiences to pattern
it,
His labour to fashion and burnish
To him
it
A work of
was
perfect,
art
and a weapon,
A delight and
a defence.
The Poet took
And walked
it.
his walking-stick
abroad.
Peace be with you, Brother.
The Poet came
to a
meadow.
Sifted through the grass were daisies,
Open-mouthed, wondering, they gazed at the sun.
The Poet struck them with
The
little
heads flew
off,
his cane.
and they lay
Dying, open-mouthed and wondering,
On
the hard ground.
'They
are useless.
They are not
roses,'
said the Poet.
SWORD BLADES Peace be with you, Brother.
The Poet came
47
Go your
ways.
to a stream.
Purple and blue flags waded in the water ;
In among them hopped the speckled frogs ;
The wind
slid
The Poet
lifted his cane,
And
the
They
iris
heads
fell
into the water.
floated away, torn
'Wretched
'They
through them, rustling.
flowers,'
are not
and drowning.
said the Poet,
roses.'
Peace be with you, Brother. It
The Poet came
is
your
affair.
to a garden.
Dahlias ripened against a wall, Gillyflowers stood stature,
up bravely
for all their short
SWORD BLADES
48
And
a trumpet- vine covered an arbour
With the red and gold
Red and
gold like the brass notes of trumpets.
The Poet knocked
And
his
of its blossoms.
off
the
stiff
heads of the dahlias,
cane lopped the gillyflowers at the ground.
Then he severed the trumpet-blossoms from
their
stems.
Red and
gold they lay scattered,
Red and
gold, as
Red and
gold, prone
'They
were not
on a battle
field
;
and dying.
roses,'
said the Poet.
Peace be with you, Brother.
But behind you
is
destruction,
The Poet came home
And
and waste
places.
at evening,
in the candle-light
He wiped and The orange
polished his cane.
candle flame leaped in the yellow ambers,
SWORD BLADES
And made
49
the jades undulate like green pools.
It played along the bright ebony,
And glowed But these
in the top of cream-coloured ivory.
things were dead,
Only the candle-light made them seem to move. 'It
is
a pity there were no
roses,'
Peace be with you, Brother. part.
said the Poet.
You have
chosen your
SWORD BLADES
50
THE COAL PICKER HE
perches in the slime, inert,
Bedaubed with
iridescent dirt.
r
The
To
oil
upon the puddles dries
colours like a peacock s eyes,
And
half -submerged tomato-cans
Shine scaly, as leviathans Oozily crawling through the mud.
The ground
is
With lumps
of only part-burned coal.
His duty
To
is
here and there bestud
to glean the whole,
pick them from the
To hoard them
for the
filth,
hidden sun
Which glows within each
And
waits to be
made
each one,
fiery core
free
once more.
Their sharp and glistening edges cut
His stiffened
fingers.
Through the smut
SWORD BLADES Gleam red the wounds which
digs the slippery coals
They
He
A
will
not shut.
shivering he kneels
Wet through and And
51
slide about.
like eels
;
His force
all
spent,
counts his small accomplishment.
half-a-dozen clinker-coals
Which Fire
!
still
And
The topaz
He
sees
And
have in his fire
it fling
still
fire in then* souls.
thought there burns
of votive urns.
from
consumed,
hill
is
to
hill,
burning
still.
Higher and higher leaps the flame,
The smoke an
He
ever-shifting frame.
sees a Spanish Castle old,
With
silver steps
and paths
From myrtle bowers comes
of gold.
the plash
Of fountains, and the emerald
Of parrots
flash
in the orange trees,
Whose blossoms pasture humming
bees.
SWORD BLADES
52
He knows
he feeds the urns whose smoke
Bears visions, that his master-stroke Is out of dirt
and misery
To
light the fire of poesy.
He
sees the glory, yet he
knows
That others cannot
see his shows.
To them
is
his
smoke
sightless, black,
His votive vessels but a pack
Of old discarded shards,
A peddler s Is incensed,
He
sighs
;
still
to
his fire
him the pyre
an enduring goal
and grubs another
!
coal.
SWORD BLADES
53
STORM-RACKED How
should I sing
And
when
buffeting salt
waves
stung with bitter surges, in whose might
I toss, a cockleshell ?
Marshals
its
The
dreadful night
undefeated dark and raves
In brutal madness, reeling over graves
Of vanquished men, long-sunken out
of sight,
Sent wailing down to glut the ghoulish sprite
Who No
haunts foul seaweed forests and their caves. parting cloud reveals a watery star,
My cries are washed away upon the wind, My cramped and blistering hands can find no spar, My eyes with
hope o erstrained, are growing
But painted on the sky great
My voice,
visions burn,
oblation from a shattered urn
!
blind.
SWORD BLADES
54
CONVALESCENCE FROM
out the dragging vastness of the sea,
Wave-fettered, bound in sinuous, seaweed strands,
He
toils
toward the rounding beach, and stands
One moment, white and Cut
a cameo in
like
Then
falls,
dripping, silently,
lazuli,
betrayed by shifting
Prone in the jeering water, and
shells,
his
and lands
hands
Clutch for support where no support can be.
So up, and down, and forward, inch by
He
gains
And
upon the
sandflies
shore,
dance their
The sucking waves
where poppies glow little lives
retard,
The weeds about him, but
And
in the
inch,
and
away.
tighter clinch
the land-winds blow,
sky there blooms the sun of May.
55
SWORD BLADES
PATIENCE
BE
patient with you
When
?
the stooping sky
Leans down upon the
And
tenderly, as one
An
who
soothing
anguish, gathers earth to
Embraced and
girdled.
Feel patience then
Be
hills
patient with you
When
Do
stills
lie
the sun-filled
?
?
the snow-girt earth
Cracks to
let
through a spurt
Of sudden green, and from the muddy
A snowdrop leaps, To
men
how mark
its
worth
eyes frost-hardened, and do weary
Feel patience then
?
dirt
men
SWORD BLADES
56
Be
patient with you
When
pain
s
?
iron bars
Their rivets tighten, stern
To bend and break
their victims
;
as they turn,
Hopeless, there stand the purple jars
Of night to
spill oblivion.
Feel patience then
Be
patient with you
You
!

Do
these
men
?
?
My sun and moon
My basketful of flowers
!
!
My money-bag of shining dreams My hours, !
Windless and
You
are
my
still,
of afternoon
world and I your
What meaning can have
!
citizen.
patience then
?
SWORD BLADES
57
APOLOGY BE
not angry with
Your
me
that I bear
colours everywhere,
All through each
crowded
street,
And meet The
wonder-light in every eye,
As
I go by.
Each plodding wayfarer
looks
up to
gaze,
Blinded by rainbow haze,
The
stuff of happiness,
No
less,
Which wraps me Of peacock
Before
my
in its glad-hued folds
golds.
feet the dusty,
Flushes beneath
its
rough-paved way
gray.
SWORD BLADES
58
My steps fall ringed with So
light,
bright,
It seems a
myriad suns are strown
About the town.
Around me
And
rich
Hang
is
the sound of steepled
bells,
perfumed smells
like
a wind-forgotten cloud,
And shroud
Me from close contact with
the world.
I dwell impearled.
You
blazon
me
with jewelled insignia.
A flaming nebula Rims
in
You
my
life.
And
yet
set
The word upon me, unconfessed
To
go unguessed.
SWORD BLADES
59
A PETITION
I
PRAY to be the
which to your hand
tool
Long use has shaped and moulded Apt
You
for
take
To be
till it
be
your need, and, unconsideringly, it
for its service.
forgotten in the
I
demand
woven strand
Which grows the multi-coloured tapestry Of your bright
A hidden,
life,
and through
its tissues lie
strong, sustaining, grey-toned band.
I wish to dwell around your daylight dreams,
The
railing to the stairway of the clouds,
To
guard your steps securely up, where streams
A faery
moonshine washing pale the crowds
Of pointed
stars.
You mount,
Remember not whereby
protected, to the far-flung sky.
SWORD BLADES
60
A BLOCKHEAD BEFORE me
lies
a mass of shapeless days,
Unseparated atoms, and I must Sort them apart and live them. Sifted dust
Covers the formless heap. Reprieves, delays,
There are non, ever. As a monk who prays
The
sliding
Each
beads asunder, so I thrust
tasteless particle aside,
and
just
Begin again the task which never stays.
And
When
I have
known a
days flashed by, pulsing with joy and
Drunk bubbled wine
And Spilt
glory of great suns,
is
felt
Threw down the
!
in goblets of desire,
the whipped blood laughing as
that liquor,
fire
my
it
runs
too hasty hand
cup, and did not understand.
!
SWORD BLADES
61
STUPIDITY
DEAREST, forgive that with I broke
and bruised your
my
clumsy touch
rose.
I hardly could suppose It were a thing so fragile that
Could
kill it,
It stood so proudly
I
Fell,
clutch
thus.
up upon
knew no thought
And coming
my
its
stem,
of fear,
very near
overbalanced, to your garment
Tearing
Now,
it
by one,
petals, all
Outspread about
They hold
hem,
down.
stooping, I upgather, one
The crimson
s
my
fall.
their fragrance
Of memory.
still,
a blood-red cone
SWORD BLADES
62
And
with
my
To keep
words I carve a
little jar
their scented dust,
Which, opening, you must Breathe to your
More
soul, and, breathing,
grieved than you.
know me
far
SWORD BLADES
63
IRONY AN
arid daylight shines along the beach
Dried to a grey monotony of tone,
And
stranded
The sun-baked
jelly-fish
melt soft upon
pebbles, far
beyond
their reach
Sparkles a wet, reviving sea. Here bleach
The
skeletons of fishes, every bone
Polished and stark, like traceries of stone,
The
and knuckles hardened each to each.
joints
And they
are dead while waiting for the sea,
The moon-pursuing
sea, to
come
again.
Their hearts are blown away on the hot breeze.
Only the
Washed
May
shells
bright.
not endure
and stones can wait to be For
till
living things,
who
suffer pain,
time can bring them ease.
SWORD BLADES
64
HAPPINESS
HAPPINESS, to some, elation Is,
to others,
Days At
mere stagnation.
of passive somnolence,
its wildest,
Hours
No
;
of
indolence.
empty
delight,
quietness,
and no
Happiness to
me
is
distress.
wine,
Effervescent, superfine.
Full of tang and fiery pleasure,
Far too hot to leave
For a
single
me
leisure
thought beyond
it.
Drunk! Forgetful! This the bond
Means
to give one s soul to gain
Life s quintessence.
Even pain
Pricks to livelier living, then
:
it
SWORD BLADES Wakes
65
the nerves to laugh again,
Rapture
s self is
three parts sorrow.
Although we must die to-morrow, Losing every thought but this
Torn, triumphant, drowned in
Happiness I would
:
We rarely feel
buy
it,
beg
it,
;
bliss.
it.
steal
it,
Pay
in coins of dripping blood
For
this
one transcendent good.
SWORD BLADES
66
THE LAST QUARTER OF THE MOON How
long shall I tarnish the mirror of
A spatter of rust on The
its
polished steel
life,
!
seasons reel
Like a goaded wheel.
Half-numb, half-maddened,
The
night
is
hills
days are
strife.
towards the dawn,
sliding
And upturned
my
crouch at autumn
s knees.
A torn moon flees Through the hemlock
The hours have gnawed
trees, it
to feed their spawn.
Pursuing and jeering the misshapen thing
A rabble
of clouds flares out of the east.
Like dogs unleashed After a beast,
They stream on
the sky, an outflung string.
SWORD BLADES
A
67
desolate wind, through the unpeopled dark,
Shakes the bushes and whistles through empty nests,
And
the fierce unrests
I keep as guests
Crowd my
Leave me
brain with corpses, pallid and stark.
in peace,
O
My labouring mind,
Spectres,
I
who haunt
have fought and
I have not quailed, I
was
all
And naked
unmailed I strove, tis
The moon drops As waking out I hear the
my
only vaunt.
into the silver
of her
day
swoon she comes.
drums
Of millenniums Beating the mornings I
still
must
stay.
failed.
SWORD BLADES
68
The
years I must watch go in and out,
While I build with water, and dig in
And
air,
the trumpets blare
Hollow despair,
The shuddering trumpets
An atom
of utter rout.
tossed in a chaos
made
Of yeasting worlds, which bubble and foam.
Whence have
What would
I
come
be home
I hear no answer. I
am
?
?
afraid
!
j
I crave to be lost like a wind-blown flame.
Pushed into nothingness by a breath,
And quench
in
a wreath
Of engulfing death This fight for a God, or this devil
s
game.
SWORD BLADES
69
A TALE OF STARVATION /o
THERE
And
He
once was a
man whom
a disagreeable
man was
the gods didn t love, he.
loathed his neighbours, and his neighbours hated
him,
And he
cursed eternally.
He damned And he
He
the sun, and he
damned
the stars,
blasted the winds in the sky.
sent to Hell every green, growing thing,
And he raved
at the birds as they
fly.
His oaths were many, and his range was wide,
He But
swore in fancy ways
his
Was
;
meaning was plain that no created thing :
other than a hurt to his gaze.
7)
SWORD BLADES
70
He
dwelt
all alone,
underneath a leaning
And windows toward And on
hill
there were none,
the other side they were white-washed thick,
To keep
When
the
hill,
out every spark of the sun.
he went to market he walked
all
the
way
Blaspheming at the path he trod.
He
cursed at those he bought
he sold
By
For
all
And
his
and swore at those
to,
the names he
his heart
of,
knew
was soured
of
in his
God.
weary old
hide,
hopes had curdled in his breast.
His friend had been untrue, and his love had thrown
him over For the chinking money-bags she liked
best.
SWORD BLADES The
rats
The
had devoured the contents
his
In the
summer drought,
sheep had died unshorn.
His hens wouldn
And
of his grain-bin,
deer had trampled on his corn,
His brook had shrivelled in a
And
71
t lay,
and
his
cow broke
his old horse perished of a colic. loft his
wheat-bags were nibbled into
holes
By
little,
glutton mice on a
So he slowly
And
lost all
frolic.
he ever had,
the blood in his body dried.
Shrunken and mean he
And
loose,
still
lived on,
cursed that future which had
lied.
SWORD BLADES
72
One day he was As
his aching
When
digging, a spade or two,
back could
lift,
he saw something glisten at the bottom of the trench,
And
to get
it
out he
made
great shift.
So he dug, and he delved, with care and pain,
And
the veins in his forehead stood taut.
At the end
He
A
of
an hour, when every bone cracked,
gathered up what he had sought.
dim
old vase of crusted glass,
Prismed while Shifting reds
At
and
it
lay buried deep.
greens, like a pigeon s neck,
the touch of the sun began to leap.
SWORD BLADES was
It
dull in the tree-shade,
73
but glowing in the light ;
Flashing like an opal-stone,
Carved into a flagon and the colours glanced and ;
ran,
Where
at
first
there had seemed to be none.
had handles on each
It
And a Its
side to bear it up,
belly for the gurgling wine.
neck was slender, and
And
The
its lip
old
And
was curled and
man saw
it
in the
the colours started
And he who had Held the
its
mouth was
wide,
fine.
sun
s bright stare
up through the
crust,
cursed at the yellow sun
flask to it
and wiped away the
dust.
SWORD BLADES
74
And he
bore the flask to the brightest spot,
Where the shadow
And he And
turned the
flask,
it
carried
it
and he looked at the
home, and put
was only grey
So he fetched a
And he went
And he washed
flask,
pail,
And when
and a
it
Watching
man its
Dancing
shelf,
outside with a broom.
his
windows
just to let the sun ;
moved
it
down
on a table near the place
Where a candle old
on a
bit of cloth,
evening came, he
And put
it
in the gloom.
Lie upon his new-found vase
The
;
the sun shone without his sneer.
Then he But
of the hill fell clear
fluttered in a draught
from the door.
forgot to swear,
shadow grown a mammoth
in the kitchen there.
size,
SWORD BLADES
He
forgot to revile the sun next morning
When And he
he found his vase
carried
And kept
And
so
The
On
75
it
it
it
afire in its light.
out of the house that day,
close beside
him
happened from day to day.
old
man
fed his
life
the beauty of his vase, on
And
And
And
his soul forgot its
the village-folk
The
until night.
flagon which
the old
man
jf
its
former
perfect shape. strife.
came and begged
to see
was dug from the ground.
never thought of an oath, in his joy
At showing what he had found.
One day the master
of the village school
Passed him as he stooped at
Hoeing
Was
for
a bean-row, and at
toil,
his side
the vase, on the turned-up
soil.
SWORD BLADES
76 'My friend,'
'That
But
it
s
a valuable thing you have there,
might get broken out
It should
What
are
'Why,
'I
said the schoolmaster, pompous and kind,
meet with the utmost
you doing with
Sir,'
it
To be
with
it all
smash
it,'
I
care.
out here
'
?
man,
about, do you see
have
will
it
said the poor old
like to
'You
of doors,
?
can.'
said the schoolmaster, sternly
right, 'Mark
my
words and see
And he walked away, At
!'
while the old
his treasure despondingly.
man
looked
SWORD BLADES Then he smiled
He had
toiled for
Yes loved !
Which
As
it
Then
it,
it
!
swift hues,
its subtle,
own hard work had
it
his
and now he cared.
shape, and
carry
was
bared.
round with him everywhere,
gave him joy to do.
A fragile Who
its
his
He would
to himself, for
77
vase should not stand in a bean-row
would dare to say so
his heart
was
rested,
?
and
Who ?
his fears
gave
way,
And he bent
A
to his hoe again.
clod rolled down,
And he
and
.
.
.
his foot slipped back,
lurched with a cry of pain.
!
SWORD BLADES
78
For the blade
And The
He
the vase
old
He
of the
to iridescent sherds.
fell
man s body heaved
were cut and torn.
his fingers
Whence
hole in the very place
the beautiful vase had been borne.
covered the hole, and he patted
Then he hobbled tore
up
his coat
That no beam
He
with slow, dry sobs.
gathered the fragments, one by one,
Then he made a
He
glass,
did not curse, he had no words.
And
He
hoe crashed into
sat
down
And he
to his house
and nailed
it
down,
and shut the door.
it
at the
windows
of light should cross the floor.
in front of the
empty hearth,
neither eat nor drank.
In three days they found him, dead and cold,
And
they said
:
'What
a queer old crank
!'
SWORD BLADES
79
THE FOREIGNER HAVE
at you,
My
back
For you
s
you Devils
!
to this tree,
re nothing so nice
That the hind-side
of
me
Would escape your
assault.
Come on now,
three
Here
s
all
!
a dandified gentleman,
Rapier at point,
And
a wrist which whirls round
Like a circular
A spatter That
of blood,
s just to
And make
joint.
man
!
anoint
supple your limbs.
Tis a pity the silk
SWORD BLADES
80
Of your waistcoat
Why And I
Your heart
!
so
full, it spills
s full of milk,
over
!
m not of your ilk.
You At
and laughed
said so,
my
old-fashioned hose,
At the cut
of
my
At the length
To
stained.
is
carve
it
I think
hair,
of
my
to pattern
you propose.
Your pardon, young But
my
nose.
nose and
Sir,
my
sword
Are proving themselves In quite perfect accord. I grieve to have spotted
Your
shirt.
On my word
!
SWORD BLADES
And
You
hullo!
That blade
To
And my To be
cleft
and
skull
left,
too thick
is
with such cuffs
Now
Of a sword.
Down
Bully!
not a stick
s
slash right
81
a lick
the side of your face.
What
a pretty, red line
!
Tell the taverns that scar
Was an
Don t whine
honour.
That a stranger has marked you. *
*
The
tree s there,
Did you think
You Swine
a
little
In front
?
!
to get in
At the back, while your
Made
*
*
diversion
So
it
ends,
,
friends
SWORD BLADES
82
With your sword
On
I
clattering
down
the ground. Tis amends
make
for
your courteous
Reception of me,
A foreigner, From
landed
over the sea.
Your welcome was I think you
ll
fervent
agree.
My shoes are not buckled With
gold, nor
my
Oiled and scented,
Not
satin, I
hair
my
wear
Corded breeches, wide
And
I
make
So I do, but
jacket s
hats,
people stare
my
heart
Is the heart of a
man,
!
SWORD BLADES
And my
83
thoughts cannot twirl
In the limited span
Twixt
my
head and
my
As some other men
I have business
Than
From Of
you
live in,
half-rotted shoots
s at
You Apes
tree
You
!
jeer at
But you
!
you, once more. Jack-fools
You can show me And
boots,
the sky, to the roots
Of a mouldering Here
my
interests range
this dung-hill
You
s can.
more strange
the shape of
And my
heels,
my
re
!
the door,
ways,
pinked to the core.
SWORD BLADES
84
And
before I have done,
I will prick
With the
my name
front of
And your
my
in
steel,
lily-white skin
Shall be printed with me.
For I ve come here to win
!
SWORD BLADES
85
ABSENCE MY
empty
to-night,
Cold and dry are
its sides,
cup
is
by the wind from the open window.
Chilled
Empty and The room
void,
is filled
it
sparkles white in the moonlight.
with the strange scent
Of wistaria blossoms.
They sway
And
in the
radiance
s
tap against the wall.
But the cup
And
moon
cold,
When you
of
my
heart
is still,
and empty.
come,
it
brims
Red and trembling with
blood,
Heart
s
To
your mouth with love
fill
And
blood for your drinking
;
the bitter-sweet taste of a soul.
SWORD BLADES
86
A GIFT SEE
I give myself to you, Beloved
!
!
My words are little jars For you to take and put upon a
shelf.
Their shapes are quaint and beautiful,
And
they have
many
To recommend
them.
pleasant colours and lustres
Also the scent from them
With sweetness
When
of flowers
I shall have given
You
will
But
I shall be dead.
have the whole
,J
fills
the
room
and crushed
you the of
me,
grasses.
last one,
SWORD BLADES
87
THE BUNGLER You
glow in
my
heart
Like the flames of uncounted candles.
warm my
But when I go
to
My clumsiness
overturns the light,
And
hands,
then I stumble
Against the tables and chairs.
SWORD BLADES
88
FOOL S MONEY BAGS
OUTSIDE the long window,
With
his
The dog
head on the stone is
Gazing at
sill,
lying, his Beloved.
His eyes are wet and urgent,
And
his
It
cold on the terrace
is
body
A pale wind
is
taut and shaking. ;
licks along the stone slabs,
But the dog gazes through the
And
is
glass
content.
The Beloved
is
writing a letter.
Occasionally she speaks to the dog,
But she Does
is
thinking of her writing.
she, too, give her devotion to
Not worthy ?
one
SWORD BLADES
89
MISCAST I I
HAVE whetted
my
brain until
it is
like
a Damascus
blade,
So keen that
it
nicks off the floating fringes of passers-
by,
So sharp that the
Were
it
air
would turn
its
edge
to be twisted in flight. i
Licking passions have bitten their arabesques into
it, I
And
the
mark
of
them
lies,
in
and
out,
Worm-like,
With the beauty
of corroded copper patterning white
steel.
My And
brain
is
curved
like
a scimitar,
sighs at its cutting
Like a sickle mowing
grass.
SWORD BLADES
90
But I,
of
what use
who am
is all
this to
set to crack stones
In a country lane
!
me
!
SWORD BLADES
91
MISCAST II
My heart is like a cleft pomegranate Bleeding crimson seeds
And
dripping them on the ground.
My heart gapes because it is ripe and over-full, And
its
seeds are bursting from
But how I,
is
who am
this other
it.
than a torment to
me
shut up, with broken crockery,
In a dark closet
!
!
SWORD BLADES
92
ANTICIPATION
I
HAVE been temperate
But
I
am
always,
be very drunk
like to
With your coming. There have been times
down
I feared to walk
the street
Lest I should reel with the wine of you,
And
jerk against
my
neighbours
As they go by. I
am
parched now, and
my
tongue
is
horrible in
mouth,
But
my
brain
With the
is
clash
noisy
and gurgle
of filling wine-cups.
my
SWORD BLADES
93
VINTAGE
I
WILL mix me a drink
of stars,
Large stars with polychrome needles, Small stars jetting maroon and crimson, Cool, quiet, green stars. I will tear
them out
of the sky,
And
squeeze them over an old silver cup,
And
I will
So that
my
It will lap
As
pour the cold scorn of
ice.
and scratch
I shall feel
down it
;
as a serpent of
Coiling and twisting in
His snortings
And
Beloved into
drink shall be bubbled with
I swallow it
And
my
my
will rise to
I shall be hot,
fire,
belly.
my
head,
and laugh,
Forgetting that I have ever
known a woman.
it,
SWORD BLADES
94
THE TREE OF SCARLET BERRIES THE
rain gullies the garden paths
And
tinkles
A
tree, at
Even
A
so, I
on the broad
the end of
my
can see that
sides of grass blades.
arm,
it
is
hazy with mist.
has red berries,
scarlet fruit,
Filmed over with moisture. It
seems as though the
Dripping from
rain,
it,
Should be tinged with colour. I desire the berries,
But, in the mist, I only scratch thorns.
Probably, too, they are bitter.
my
hand on the
SWORD BLADES
95
OBLIGATION f
HOLD your apron wide That
I
may pour my
So that scarcely
From
I
shall
falling to the
gifts into
your two arms hinder them
ground.
would pour them upon you
And
cover you,
For greatly do I
feel this
Of giving you something,
Even
these poor things.
Dearest of
my
Heart
it,
!
need
SWORD BLADES
96
THE TAXI WHEN
I go
The world
away from you
beats dead
Like a slackened drum. I call out for
And
stars
shout into the ridges of the wind.
Streets
One
you against the jutted
coming
fast,
after the other,
Wedge you away from me,
And
the lamps of the city prick
So that I can no longer see your
Why
my
eyes
face.
should I leave you,
To wound
myself upon the sharp edges of the night
?
SWORD BLADES
97
THE GIVER OF STARS HOLD your
soul open for
Let the quiet of your
With
its clear
my
spirit
and rippled
welcoming.
bathe
me
coolness,
That, loose-limbed and weary, I find
rest,
Outstretched upon your peace, as on a bed of ivory.
Let the flickering flame of your soul play
That
The
into
life
my
limbs
and joy
may come
all
about me,
the keenness of
of tongues of flame,
And, going out from you, tightly strung and I
may
fire,
in tune,
rouse the bleaV-eyed world,
And pour
into
it
the beauty which you have begotten
.
SWORD BLADES
98
THE TEMPLE BETWEEN
us leapt a gold and scarlet flame.
Into the hollow of the cupped, arched blue
Of Heaven
And
We
it rose.
Its flickering tongues
vanished in the sunshine.
How
it
came
guessed not, nor what thing could be
From each
to each
up-drew
its
name.
had sprung those sparks which
flew
Together into
fire.
The winds would
And To
so
it,
roofed
it in
their
game.
fashioned marble blocks
and placed them round about.
pillared porticos
And
and quench
we graved and
treasure
With
slap
But we knew
it
we wreathed
the whole,
with bright bronze. Behind carved
locks
Flowered the
The
baffled
tall
and sheltered flame. Without,
winds thrust at a column
s bole.
SWORD BLADES
EPITAPH OF A YOUNG POET
WHO DIED BEFORE HAVING ACHIEVED SUCCESS BENEATH
this
sod
Of one who died
lie
the remains
of growing pains.
SWORD BLADES
100
ANSWER TO A REQUEST
IN
You
ask
Can
me
for a sonnet.
my
Dear,
clocks tick back to yesterday at noon
Can cracked and
And
Ah,
leap
June
fallen leaves recall last
up on the boughs, now
stiff
and
?
sere
?
For your sake, I would go and seek the year,
Faded beyond the purple ranks
Blown sands
of drifted hours,
of dune,
which the moon
Streaks with a ghostly finger, and her sneer Pulls at
my
lengthening shadow. Yes,
My shadow stretches forward, Is
dark in front because the light It
is
tis
and the ground s
behind.
grotesque, with such a funny hat,
In watching
it
and walking I have found
More than enough
to occupy
I cannot turn, the light
my
that!
mind.
would make
me
blind.
POPPY SEED
THE GREAT ADVENTURE OF MAX BREUCK I
A YELLOW band
of light
upon the
street
Pours from an open door, and makes a wide
Pathway
of bright gold across a sheet
Of calm and
Come
liquid moonshine.
From
inside
shouts and streams of laughter, and a
snatch
Of song, soon drowned and
lost again in mirth,
The
clip of
tankards on a table top,
And
stir of
booted
heels.
Of candle-light a shadow
Against the patch falls, its
girth
Proclaims the host himself, and master of his shop.
POPPY SEED
104
II
This
is
the tavern of one Hilverdink,
Jan Hilverdink, whose wines are much esteemed. Within
The
his cellar
men can have
rarest cordials old
To coax from pulpy Improve and
to drink
monks ever schemed
grapes,
and with nice art
spice their virgin juiciness.
Here froths the amber beer
of
many
a brew,
Crowning each pewter tankard with as smart
A
cap as ever in his wantonness
Winter
set glittering
on top
of
an old yew.
Ill
Tall candles stand upon the table, where
Are twisted
glasses,
Clarets and ports.
Drained from Rhine.
ruby-sparked with wine,
Those topaz bumpers were
slim, long-necked bottles of the
POPPY SEED
The
centre of the board
Slender and clean, the
Awaits
its
burning
Stretches from
piled with pipes,
is
still
unbaptized clay
Behind, the vault
fate.
dim
105
to dark, a groping
way
Bordered by casks and puncheons, whose brass stripes
And bands gleam dully
still,
beyond the gay tumult.
IV good old Master Hilverdink, a toast
'For
Clamoured a youth with 'Bring
From
!
on
his boots.
out your oldest brandy for a boast, that small barrel in the very roots
Of your deep
Ho
tassels
!'
cellar,
man.
Welcome, Max, you
We want to
Why
here
is
Max
!
re scarcely here in time.
drink to old Jan
s luck,
and smoke
His best tobacco for a grand climax. Here, Jan, a paper, fragrant as crushed thyme,
We
ll
have the best to wish you luck, or choke!'
may we
POPPY SEED
106
V
Max
Breuck unclasped
his broadcloth cloak,
and
sat. '
Well thought Jan.
The host
of,
Franz here ;
luck to
Mynheer
*
set
down a
jar
;
then to a vat
Lost in the distance of his
Max
s
cellar, ran.
took a pipe as graceful as the stem
Of some long
tulip,
crammed
The pungent smoke deep
it full,
and drew
to his grateful lung.
and flew
It curled all blue throughout the cave
Into the silver night. At once there flung Into the crowded shop a boy,
who
cried to
VI 'Oh,
sirs, is
Some
there
some learned lawyer
advocate, or
all- wise
counselor
My master sent me to inquire ttiere
here, ?
them
:
POPPY SEED
Such men do mostly
Was
but every door
shut and barred, for late has grown the hour.
I pray
you
One versed 'I
be,
107
am
tell
me where
in law, the
a lawyer,
boy,'
Is not locked to
my
I
may now
matter
said
Max,
business,
I shall be glad to serve
will
find
not
'my
mind
though
what way
is
wait.'
in
tis late.
my
power.
VII
Then once more, cloaked and
ready, he set out,
Tripping the footsteps of the eager boy
Along the dappled cobbles, while the rout Within the tavern jeered at his employ.
Through new-burst elm leaves
filtered the
white
moon,
Who
peered and splashed between the twinkling
boughs,
Flooded the open spaces, and took Before
tall,
flight
serried houses in platoon,
POPPY SEED
108
Guarded by shadows. Past the Custom House
They took their hurried way in the Spring-scented night.
VIII
Before a door which fronted a canal
The boy
halted.
A
The water lapped
And rhythmic
dim tree-shaded
spot.
the stones in musical
tappings, and a galliot
Slumbered at anchor with no
The boy knocked
twice,
light aboard.
and steps approached.
A
flame
Winked through the
And through
keyhole, then a key was turned,
the open door
Max
went toward
Another door, whence sound of voices came.
He
entered a large
room where candelabra burned.
IX
An aged man
in quilted dressing
Rose up to greet him.
'Sir,'
gown
said
Max,
'y
u sent
POPPY SEED
Your messenger
A
to seek throughout the
town
lawyer. I have small accomplishment,
But Is
am
I
Max
at your service,
Am I, am
and
my name
Breuck, Counsellor, at your
'Mynheer,'
I
109
replied the aged
man,
and count myself much
Cornelius Kurler, and
Is better
known on
command.'
'obliged
privileged.
my
fame
distant oceans than on land.
X
My ship has And She
bartered goods at s oft
And
tasted water in strange seas,
sheered
'Enough of
old
uncharted
off
hurricanes with jaunty
poetry,
draw the deed and
man seemed
'No
good
smiles.'
here broke in the other man, sign.'
to wizen at the voice, '
'My
isles.
coquetted with a tropic breeze,
'Tush, Kurler,'
The
still
friend, Grootver,
introductions, let us have
he at once began.
some wine,
POPPY SEED
110
And
business,
now
that you at last have
made your
choice.'
XI
A
man
harsh and disagreeable
he proved to be,
This Grootver, with no single kindly thought. Kurler explained, his old hands nervously
Twisting his beard. His vessel he had bought
From
Grootver.
He had
thought to soon repay
The ducats borrowed, but an adverse wind
Had But
so delayed
him that
his cargo
half its proper price, the very
He came
brought
day
to port he stepped ashore to find
The market
glutted
and
his
counted profits naught.
XII Little
by
little
Max made
out the
way
That Grootver pressed that poor harassed His money he must have, too long delay
old
man.
POPPY SEED
Had
turned the usurer to a ruffian. let
'But
111
me
Of cotton
take
stuffs
my
ship,
with
Open
for
That
all
bales
dyed crimson, green, and blue,
Cunningly patterned, made to
Of mandarin
many
s ladies
;
suit the taste
when my battered
home, such stores
will I bring
sails
you
your former ventures will be counted waste.
XIII
Such
light
And
indigo
and foamy
crinkled cream,
silks, like
more blue than sun-whipped
beam
Spices and fragrant trees, a massive
Of sandalwood, and pungent China Tobacco, coffee
Max
heard
The deed
He
it all,
old
teas,
Grootver only laughed.
and worse than
all
he heard
to which the sailor gave his word.
shivered, twas as
The
He
!'
seas,
man
if
the villain gaffed
with a boat-hook
begged for
life
nor knew at
;
bleeding, spent,
all
the road he went.
POPPY SEED
11
XIV For Kurler had a daughter, young and gay, Carefully reared and shielded, rarely seen.
But on one black and most
unfriendly day
Grootver had caught her as she passed between
The kitchen and
the garden.
In fear of him, his
And when he came
She had run
evil leering eye,
she, bolted in her
room,
Refused to show, though gave no reason why.
The spinning
On
of her future
had begun,
quiet nights she heard the whirring of her doom.
XV Max mended
an old goosequill by the
fire,
Loathing his work, but seeing no thing to do.
He
felt his
hands were building up the pyre
To burn two
He
souls,
and
seized with vertigo
staggered to his chair. Before
him lay
POPPY SEED
White paper 'Now,
113
unspotted by a crime.
still
young man,
write,'
said Grootver in his
ear. If in
two years
my
From Amsterdam,
A
friend,
my
vessel should yet stay
I give Grootver, sometime
Now
daughter for his lawful wife.
swear.'
XVI
And Kurler And
swore, a palsied, tottering sound,
traced his name, a shaking, wandering line.
Then dazed he
sat there, speechless
Grootver got up
He
shuffled
:
'Fair
from
last the
from the room, and
aged
man began
left
daughter,
Mynheer Breuck,
Will you watch over her
?
!'
the house. street.
to rouse.
With help he once more gained 'My
wound.
voyage, the brigantine
His footsteps wore to silence down the
At
his
his trembling feet. is
friendless
I ask a solemn
now.
vow.'
POPPY SEED
114
XVII
Max
hand upon the old man
laid his
'Before
God,
sir,
I vow,
when you
So to protect your daughter from
As one man
The
He
may.'
situation to
Thus
Max
s
arm,
are gone, all
harm
sorrowful, forlorn,
Breuck appeared,
gave his promise almost without thought,
Nor looked
to see a difficulty.
Gently to watch a mother
Bound by a dying
The world
s
left
'Bred
alone ;
father s wish,
who
feared
accustomed harshness when he should
be dead ;
XVIII
Such was
my
case from youth,
Last Winter she died
Are passed
And undo
also,
and
Mynheer
my
Kurler.
days
in work, lest I should grieve for her,
habits used to earn her praise.
POPPY SEED
My leisure I
115
will gladly give to see
Your household and your daughter
The
He So
sailor said his thanks,
prosperous.'
but turned away.
could not brook that his humility, little
Should
wonted, and so tremulous,
first
before a stranger
make such
great dis
play.
XIX 'Come
here to-morrow as the bells ring noon,
I sail at the full sea, I will
make known
If after I
my
daughter then
to you.
Twill be a boon
have bid good-by, and when
Her
eyeballs scorch with watching
You
bring her
home
again.
She
me
lives
depart,
with one
Old serving- woman, who has brought her up.
But that
No
is
no friend for so
free a heart.
head to match her questions. It
And
I
must
sail
away
to
is
done.
come and brim her cup.
POPPY SEED
116
XX
My ship s the fastest that owns Amsterdam As home,
so not a letter can
you send.
I shall be back, before to where I
Another ship could reach.
Now
Quickly Breuck interposed.
am '
your stipend
'When
Tread on the stones which pave our night
To-morrow
At the
you once more streets.
Good
!
I will be, at stroke of noon,
great
wharf.'
Then
hurrying, in spite
Of cake and wine the old man pressed upon
Him ere he went, he took
his leave
and shut the door.
XXI Twas noon
And
in
Amsterdam, the day was
clear,
sunshine tipped the pointed roofs with gold.
The brown
canals ran liquid bronze, for here
The sun sank deep
into the waters cold.
POPPY SEED
And
117
every clock and belfry in the town
Hammered, and
struck,
and rang. Such peals of
bells,
To
shake the sunny morning into
And Of
to proclaim the middle,
this
life,
and the crown,
most sparkling daytime
The crowd
!
Laughing and pushing toward the quays
swells,
in friendly
strife.
XXII
The
'
Horn
At highest
And
of
The
away
to-day.
Saucy popinjay
!
to her boats to let her start.
the ocean, with a flashing breeze.
shining waves are quick to take her part.
They push and Her
sails
in freshest paint she curtseys low,
And beckons is
'
tide she lets her anchor go,
starts for China.
Giddy
Blue
Fortune
spatter her.
tackles hanging, waiting
Her
sails are loose,
men
to seize
118
POPPY SEED
And
haul them taut, with chanty-singing, as they choose.
XXIII
At the great wharf
And by
Max
s
edge Mynheer Kurler stands,
his side, his daughter,
Breuck
young Christine.
there, his hat held in his hands,
is
Bowing before them both. The brigantine Bounces impatient at the long delay, Curvets and jumps, a cable
A heavy
galliot
Round, yellow
s
length from shore.
unloads on the walls
cheeses, like gold
cannon
balls
Stacked on the stones in pyramids. Once more Kurler has kissed Christine, and
now he
is
XXIV Christine stood rigid like a frozen stone,
Her hands wrung
pale in effort at control.
Max moved
and
aside
let
her be alone,
away.
POPPY SEED
119
For
grief exacts each penny of
The dancing boat
A
tossed on the glinting sea.
sun-path swallowed
in flaming light,
it
Then, shrunk a cockleshell,
Upon
the other side.
It took the
Could see
it
its toll.
'Horn
of
Now
it
came again
on the
Fortune.'
hauled aboard,
men
lee
Straining sight pulling on the crane.
XXV Then up above the eager
brigantine,
Along her slender masts, the
sails
took
flight,
Were sheeted home, and ropes were coiled. The shine Of the wet anchor, when
its
heavy weight
Rose splashing to the deck. These things they saw, Christine
and Max, upon the crowded quay.
They saw the The
ship
sails
grow white, then blue
had turned, caught
in a
in shade,
windy flaw
She glided imperceptibly away,
Drew
farther off
and
in the bright
sky seemed to fade.
POPPY SEED
120
XXVI Home, through
the emptying streets,
Max
took
Christine,
Who
would have hid her sorrow from
his gaze.
Before the iron gateway, clasped between
Each garden Asked,
'Do
he stopped. She, in amaze,
wall,
you enter not then, Mynheer Breuck
My father told me Since I
am now
To show
your courtesy. tis
your charge,
meet
for
me
such hospitality as maiden may,
Without disdaining Katrina
of
will
have
rules
coffee,
must not be broke. and she bakes
today.'
XXVII She straight unhasped the
tall,
beflowered gate.
Curled into tendrils, twisted into cones
Of leaves and It
roses, iron infoliate,
guards the pleasance, and
its stiffened
bones
?
POPPY SEED
121
Are budded with much peering at the rows,
And
beds,
Max
started at the beauty, at the glare
Of
tints.
and arbours, which
At
either
Path strewn with Of
end was
fine,
it
keeps inside.
wide
set a
red gravel, and such shows
tulips in their splendour flaunted
From
side to side,
midway each
everywhere
!
path, there
ran
A
longer one which cut the space in two.
And,
like
a tunnel some magician
Has wrought
in twinkling green,
an
alley grew,
Pleached thick and walled with apple trees
;
their
flowers
Incensed the garden, and when
The plump and heavy
And tapped
Autumn came
apples crowding stood
against the arbour.
Then the dame
Katrina shook them down, in pelting showers
POPPY SEED
122
They plunged
to earth,
and died transformed to
sugared food.
XXIX* Against the high, encircling walls were grapes,
Nailed close to
From glowing
feel
the baking of the sun
bricks.
Their microscopic shapes
Half hidden by serrated leaves.
Old cherry tossed
its
And one
branches near the door.
Bordered along the wall, in beds between, Flickering, streaming, nodding in the air,
The
pride of
Tulips than
They
all
the garden, there were more
Max had
jostled,
ever dreamed or seen.
mobbed, and danced.
Max
stood at
helpless stare.
XXX 'Within
the arbour,
Mynheer Breuck,
Coffee and cakes, a pipe, and Father
I s
ll
bring
best
POPPY SEED
123
Tobacco, brought from countries harbouring
Dawn s
earliest footstep.
Wait.'
With
girlish
zest
To
A moment
please her guest she flew.
more
She came again, with her old nurse behind. Then,
sitting
on the bench and knitting
fast,
She talked as someone with a noble store
Of hidden Eager to
fancies,
blown upon the wind,
flutter forth
and leave
their silent past.
XXXI The Let
little
fall
apple leaves above their heads
a quivering sunshine. Quiet, cool,
In blossomed boughs they
Of
sat.
^Beyond, the beds
tulips blazed, a proper vestibule
And antechamber
to the rainbow.
Dyes
Of prismed richness Carmine. Madder. Blues :
Tinging dark browns to purple. Silvers flushed
To amethyst and
tinct with gold.
Round
eyes
POPPY SEED
124
Of
scarlet, spotting tender saffron hues.
Violets
sunk to blacks, and reds
in orange crushed
XXXII Of every pattern and
in every shade.
Nacreous, iridescent, mottled, checked.
Some
An
purest sulphur-yellow, others
made
ivory-white with disks of copper flecked.
Sprinkled and striped, tasselled, or keenest edged. Striated, powdered, freckled, long or short.
They bloomed, and seemed strange wonder-moths new-fledged,
[Born
wedded
of the spectrum
to a
flame/J
The shade within the arbour made a port
To
o ertaxed eyes,
its still,
green twilight rest became.
XXXIII Her knitting-needles
clicked
This child matured to
and Christine talked,
woman
unaware,
POPPY SEED
The
first
Found
time
left alone.
utterance.
Max
Now
125
dreams once balked
thought her very
fair.
Beneath her cap her ornaments shone gold,
And
purest gold they were.
And
heedful.
Whose
Her
old
Kurler was rich
maiden aunt had died
darling care she was.
Now, growing
Max
Dropped a
She asked, had
a
sister ?
bold,
stitch
At her own candour. Then she paused and
softly
sighed.
XXXIV Two But
years was long fears she
had
!
not.
Just sailed or sailing.
On
She loved her father
He had And
always been
she must not dwell
sad thoughts, he had told her
Her smile
Two
at parting.
years was long
;
well,
so,
and seen
But she sighed once more. twas not one hour yet
Mynheer Grootver she would not
see at
all.
Yes, yes, she knew, but ere the date so set,
!
POPPY SEED
126
The
'Horn
of
would be at the
Fortune'
When Max had
bid farewell, she watched
wall.
him from
the door.
XXXV The next day, and the
The health
next,
Max
of Juf vrouw Kurler,
went to ask
and the news
:
Another tulip blown, or the great task
Of gathering petals which the high wind strews
The
;
polishing of floors, the pictured tiles
Well scrubbed, and oaken chairs most deftly
Such things were Christine Winter drew near,
his
s
oiled.
world, and his was she.
sun was in her smiles.
Another Spring, and at
his
law he
Unspoken hope counselled a wise
toiled,
efficiency.
XXXVI Max
Breuck was honour
The guardian
of this girl
s soul,
;
he knew himself
no more, no
less.
POPPY SEED
As one
in charge of guineas
Loose in a china teapot, His need, but
Comes back
No word He
on a
may
to give.
So Max,
of love or marriage
;
!
The second
Lagged slowly by
till
till
his friend
in honour, said
but the days
clipped off on his almanac.
Must come
shelf
confess
not borrow
may
127
The end
year, with feet of lead,
Spring had plumped the willow
sprays.
XXXVII
Two
years had
made
Christine a
With dignity and gently
But
all
Max was
in lovely
certain pride.
dreamings seemed to
her trusted friend, did she confess
closer happiness
Two
grown,
her childhood fancies had not flown,
Her thoughts
A
woman
?
Max
could not
years were over and his
Sphered and complete. In
life
tell.
he found
restless eagerness
glide.
POPPY SEED
128
He
waited for the
Had
'Horn
of
Fortune.'
Well
he his promise kept, abating not one pound.
XXXVIII Spring slipped away to Summer. Sighted the brigantine.
Demanding Jufvrouw
Was
justified, for
Still
no
glass
Then Grootver came His trespass
Kurler.
he had won the game.
Christine begged time,
more time
!
Midsummer
went,
And Grootver waxed Tarried.
impatient.
Christine, betrayed
Still
the ship
and weary, sank
i
To
dreadful terrors.
For Max.
One day,
'Come quickly,'
crazed, she sent
said her note,
The worst distress until we meet. The world
'I
is
XXXIX Through the long sunshine
Max
went to
her.
of late afternoon
In the pleached
alley, lost
skip
blank.
POPPY SEED
129
In bitter reverie, he found her soon.
And Of
sitting
down
all his secret,
beside her, at the cost
'Dear,'
said he,
So suddenly has happened
?'
'what
Then,
thing
in tears,
She told that Grootver, on the following morn.
Would come E
to
marry
her,
and shuddering
I will die rather, death has lesser
Max
felt
:
fears.'
the shackles drop from the oath which he
had sworn.
XL E
My Dearest One, I love you,
oh
!
the hid joy of
my
all this
!
you must indeed have known.
In strictest honour I have played
But
heart
my
part
;
misery has overthrown
My scruples.
If
you love me, marry me
Before the sun has dipped behind those trees.
You cannot be wed
twice,
Can
My care it shall be
eat his anger.
and Grootver,
foiled,
POPPY SEED
130
To pay your As
father s debt,
I can compass,
and
by such degrees
for years I ve greatly toiled.
XLI This
is
not haste, Christine, for long I ve known
My love,
and
I worship
you with
In keeping
He
silence forced
upon
touched her arm.
lips.
the strength I ve shown
all
With pleading
faith.'
my
'Christine!
finger tips
Beloved!
Think.
Let us not tempt the future. Dearest, speak, I love you.
Do my
They ve been She sat quite
Then
into
words
fall
too swift
in leash so long
upon the
still,
now
?
brink.'
her body loose and weak.
him she melted,
all
her soul at flow.
XLII
And they were married
Had
ere the westering sun
disappeared behind the garden trees.
POPPY SEED
JThe And
evening poured on them
its
131 C
benison,
flower-scents, that only night-time frees,
J
Rose up around them from the beamy ground, Silvered
and shadowed by a tranquil moon.
Within the arbour, long they lay embraced, In such enraptured sweetness as they found Close-partnered each to each, and thinking soon
To be enwoven,
long ere night to morning faced,
XLIII
At
last
Max
spoke,
'Dear
Heart, this night
is
ours,
To watch
it
pale, together, into
dawn,
Pressing our souls apart like opening flowers Until our lives, through quivering bodies drawn,
Are mingled and confounded. Then,
Our eyes
will close to
undisturbed
far spent,
rest.
For that desired thing I leave you now.
To
pinnacle this day s accomplishment,
POPPY SEED
132
By
telling
Is his,
k
Grootver that a bootless quest
and that
his
schemes have met a knock-down
blow.'
XLIV But Christine clung Pleading for love
And wound
s
to
him with sobbing
cries,
sake that he leave her not.
her arms about his knees and thighs
As he stood over Of Grootver
s
her.
With dread, begot
name, and
silence,
She shook and trembled. Words
Wooed him
to stay.
Yet greatly
feared.
and the in
night,
moaning
plaint
She feared, she knew not why, She seemed some anguished
saint
Martyred by
visions.
Max
Breuck soothed her
fright
With wisdom, then stepped out under the
cooling sky.
POPPY SEED
133
XLV But
at the gate once
And quenched
her heart again upon his
Sweetheart,
'My
But
why
this terror
to be gone one hour
Away,
this errand
First goes
my
father,
Softly he laughed,
moonlight
!
if
slips
you now
in panic lest she
'One
That
s
lips.
'Max
done.'
I lose
close
I propose
?
Evening
!
must be
She grasped him as
By
more she held him
!
Max
!
!'
drown.
hour through the town
no place
for foul attacks.
Dearest, be comforted, and clear that troubled brow.
XLVI One
We
hour, Dear, and then, no front another
more
day as man and
I shall be back almost before I
And midnight
shall anoint
Then through the gate he
m
alone.
wife.
gone,
and crown our passed.
life.'
Along the street
POPPY SEED
134
She watched
He
his buttons
gleaming in the moon.
stopped to wave and turned the garden wall.
Straight she sank
Her
down upon a mossy
senses, mist-encircled
Swayed
seat.
by a swoon,
to unconsciousness beneath
its
wreathing
pall.
XLVII Briskly
Max
walked beside the
still
canal.
His step was firm with purpose. Not a jot
He
feared this meeting, nor the rancorous gall
Grootver would spit on him who marred
He
his plot.
dreaded no man, since he could protect
Christine. His wife
His starved It strained
Even
this
'Damn
life
him
!
He stopped and laughed
had not
fitted
him
aloud.
for joy.
to the utmost to reject
hour with her. His heart beat loud.
Grootver,
employ
!'
who can
force
my
time to this
POPPY SEED
135
XLVIII
He
What
laughed again.
To be
Then
so racked.
boyish uncontrol
felt his ticking
watch.
In half an hour Grootver would know the whole.
And he would be Of
his
And
He
own
returned, lifting the latch
gate, eager to take Christine
crush her to his
lips.
How
bear delay
broke into a run. In front, a
line
Of candle-light banded the cobbled Hilverdink
Had
s
tavern
!
Not
for
?
street.
many
a day
he been there to take his old, accustomed seat.
XLIX 'Why,
Max!
Max!'
Stop,
And
out they came
pell-mell,
His old companions.
Not
drink with us
How many
?
months
'Max,
where have you been
Indeed you serve us well is it
since
we have seen
!
?
POPPY SEED
136
You
here
Here Stir
s
Jan, Jan, you slow, old doddering goat
?
Mynheer Breuck come back again
at last,
your old bones to welcome him. Fie, Max.
Business
Here
s
And
!
after hours
!
Now,
beer or brandy.
Fill
your throat
whacks
him
boys, hold
Put down your cane, dear man. What
;
fast.
really vicious
'
!
L They
forced
him
to a seat,
and held him
there,
Despite his anger, while the hideous joke
Was
tossed from
hand to hand. Franz poured with
care
A brimming glass
of whiskey.
'Here,
Into a virgin barrel for you, drink
Tut
!
!
Tut
Just hear
!
when
him
!
we ve broke
!
Married
!
Who, and
?
Married, and out on business. Clever Spark
Which
lie s
the likeliest
?
Come, Max, do
!
think.'
POPPY SEED
137
Swollen with fury, struggling with these men,
Max
cursed hilarity which must needs have a mark.
|
LI
Forcing himself to steadiness, he tried
To
quell the uproar, told
Of
his
own
matters, time could
mood
In jesting
And
and circumstance. Implied
life
Most urgent
scoffed at
He
it.
And
He
'
at duty
forced a pipe
shivered
it
be spared.
ill
comrades heard
his
Goaded and bursting
To mock
them what he dared
;
felt his
his tale,
anger more
'Cowards
Here they
!
Is
no one loth
called for ale,
upon him. With an oath
to fragments on the earthen floor.
LII
Sobered a
And by Nor
little
by
the host
his violence,
who begged them
injure his good
name,
'Max,
to be
no
still,
offence,'
POPPY SEED
138
They 'One
blurted,
moment,
'you
may
Max,'
leave
now
said Franz.
if
you
'We
will.'
ve gone too
far.
I ask your pardon for our foolish joke.
wager ere you came.
It started in a
The
talk
somehow had
I brought
fall
n on drugs, a
jar
from China, herbs the natives smoke,
Was with me, and
I thought merely to play a game.
LIII Its properties are to induce a sleep
Fraught with adventure, and the Is inconceivable in swiftness.
Sunken
flight of
time
Deep
in slumber, imageries sublime
Flatter the senses, or
some
fearful
dream
Holds them enmeshed. Years pass which on the clock
Are but so many seconds.
We
agreed
That the next man who came should prove the scheme
;
POPPY SEED
And you were
Two
whiffs
were
Jan handed you the crock.
he.
And
!
139
then the pipe was broke, and you
freed.'
LIV a
is
'It
Max
lie,
a damned, infernal
!'
Breuck was maddened now.
Of your befuddled I
lie
am
wits.
You
to be your butt. ll
choose
I
At
'Another jest
know not why
my
request
among you one who
ll
answer for
Your most unseasonable mirth. Good-night
And
gentlemen.
good-by,
You
ll
hear from
But Franz had caught him at the very 'It
I
is
am
no
lie,
Max
to blame.
door,
Breuck, and for your plight
Come
back, and
we
ll
talk quietly.
LV You have no
me.'
business, that
is
why we
laughed,
Since you had none a few minutes ago.
POPPY SEED
140
As
Knowing the length
A
chaffed,
of time it takes to
do
simple thing like that in this slow world.
Indeed, I
we
to your wedding, naturally
ll
Max, twas a dream. Forgive me
burn the drug
if
you
Muttered and stared,
ll
And
lie.'
Distraught, this word at Franz It s proven, I
But Breuck
prefer.'
'A
'
:
then he hurled,
Prove it. And when
That thing
believe.
then.
shall
be your
work.
LVI I
ll
give
you
On August
cried,
The year April,
A
!
and
chair,
Or you,
You
proof.'
week
'A
re
make your
case.
I,
are
With wondering
to August,
mad,
tis
eighteen-twelve.'
'April
or
to
thirty-first, eighteen-fourteen,
I shall require your
Franz
week
just one
I
and fourteen
April now.
Max
two years ago
mad.
face
!
staggered, caught
Indeed,
know not how
POPPY SEED Either could blunder
Amsterdam
'The
so.'
Gazette,'
141
Hilverdink brought
and
Max
was forced to
read. I
LVII '
Eighteen hundred and
twelve,'
And
next to
the
The
letters
it, 'April
in largest print;
twenty-first.'
smeared and jumbled, but by dint
Of straining every nerve to meet the worst,
He
read
it,
Tumbled a
and into horror.
his
pounding brain
Like a roaring sea
Foreboding shipwreck, came the message plain 'This
He
is
fled
two years ago
!
What
of Christine
:
?'
the cellar, in his agony
Running
to outstrip Fate,
and save
his
holy shrine.
LVIII
The darkened
buildings echoed to his feet
Clap-clapping on the pavement as he ran.
POPPY SEED
142
Across moon-misted squares clamoured his
And
fleet
terror-winged steps. His heart began
To
labour at the speed.
No
flutter of
And
no
sign,
a leaf against the sky.
be the garden wall, and round
And
this should
The
corner, the old gate.
Was
this
!
still
No
Shattered the
wall
!
No
And
stillness.
even
line
then a fearful cry
Two
stiff
houses
filled
the
ground.
LIX Shoulder to shoulder, like dragoons in
They
To
stood,
right
and
and
Max knew them
left of
Kurler
Rigid next frozen spine.
Of ancient gilded
Expanding
in
s
No
line,
to be the ones
garden. Spine
mellow tones j
iron, undulate,
wide
circles
and broad curves,
The
twisted iron of the garden gate,
Was
there.
The houses touched and
left
no space
POPPY SEED
143
Between. With glassy eyes and shaking nerves
Max
gazed.
Then mad with
fear, fled still,
and
left
that place.
LX Stumbling and panting, on he ran, and on. His slobbering
lips
could only cry,
My Dearest Love My Wife !
What
future
Sardonic devil
Two It
our past
is
?
Me
What
years together in a puff of
still
it
imprisoned in Time
love.
I feel
it.
Where
!
are you gone
saturnine,
has bid us live
s jest
was no dream, I swear
Or
!
'Christine
!
smoke ?
In some
s egg,
star,
you give
Dearest Dear, this stroke
Shall never part us, I will reach to where
you
are.'
S
LXI His burning eyeballs stared into the dark.
The moon had long been
set.
And
still
he cried
:
?
POPPY SEED
144 'Christine!
My Love
!
Christine
A
f'
sudden
spark Pricked through the gloom, and shortly
Max
espied
With
his uncertain vision, so within
Distracted he could scarcely trust
A
latticed
its
truth,
window where a crimson gleam
Spangled the blackness, and hung from a pin,
An
iron crane, were three gilt balls.
Had
taught their meaning, his
His youth
now they
closed
upon
dream.
LXII Softly he knocked against the casement, wide It flew,
and a cracked voice
his business there
Demanded. The door opened, and
Max
stepped.
He saw
Above the head 'Simeon
Isaacs,
inside
a candle held in air
of a gray -bearded Jew.
Mynheer, can
I serve
POPPY SEED
You I
?'
'Yes,
want a
Livid.
'
I think
Mynheer, a
You from your
Do you
you can.
Quick the old
pistol.'
pistol
!
145
keep arms
?
man grew
Let
me
swerve
purpose. Life brings often false
alarms
'
LXIII 'Peace,
good old Isaacs, why should you suppose
My purpose deadly. Blest above others.
Of
pistols it
In good truth I ve been
You have many rows
would seem. Here,
this shagreen
Case holds one that I fancy. Silvered mounts
Are to Its
my
These
taste.
former owner
Twill serve
my
?
letters
C. D. L.
Dead, you say. Poor Ghost
!
Hastily he
turn though
counts
The
florins
down upon
Good-night, and wish toast.'
the table.
me luck
for
'Well,
your to-morrow
s
POPPY SEED
146
LXIV Into the night again he hurried, Pale and in haste
He
;
and
And
set his goal.
far
beyond the town
then he wondered
Poor C. D. L. had come to
Handy
And
in killing,
will
Upon
work
maybe,
die.
this I
'It
s
how
grown
ve bought,
His sorrow
punctually.'
fell
his senses, shutting out all else.
Again he wept, and
The heavy I
now
called,
miles away.
and blindly fought
'Christine.
m coming. My Own Wife
!'
He
I
m well.
lurched with
failing pulse.
LXV Along the dyke the keen
And
grasses bent
The Zuider Long
air
blew in gusts,
and wailed before the wind.
Zee, which croons
stealthy fingers
all
mght and thrusts
up some way to
find
POPPY SEED
And crumble down
the stones,
moaned
The wide-armed windmills looked
No
lights
Max
baffled.
Here
like gallows-trees.
were burning in the distant thorps.
laid aside his coat.
Babbled
147
'
Christine
'
!
His mind, half-clear,
A shot split
through the
breeze.
The
cold stars winked corpse.
and
glittered at his chilling
POPPY SEED
148
SANCTA MARIA, SUCCURRE MISERIS DEAR
Virgin Mary, far away,
Look down from Heaven while
Open your golden casement
And I
am
lean so
A task
way out beyond
little, it
for
high,
the sky.
be
you to harken me.
Lady Mary,
A candle,
may
I have bought
as the good priest taught.
1 only had one penny, so
Old Goody Jenkins It
is
a
I pray.
little
But Oh, be
bent,
let it go.
you
see.
merciful to
me
!
I have not anything to give,
Yet I so long
for
him
to live.
POPPY SEED
A
year ago he sailed
And
149
away
not a word unto today.
I ve strained
my
eyes from the sea-wall
But never does he come at
all.
Other ships have entered port Their voyages finished, long or short,
And
other sailors have received
Their welcomes, while I sat and grieved.
My heart is bursting for his hail, O
Virgin, let
me
spy his
sail.
Hull down on the edge of a sun-soaked sea Sparkle the bellying sails for me.
Taut
to the
Shaking
push of a rousing wind
the sea
till it
The tightened rigging '
We
are back again
foams bchind is shrill
t
with the song :
who were gone
so
long.'
POPPY SEED
150
One afternoon I sat on a post
I
bumped my
and wished
head.
I were
dead
Like father and mother, for no one cared
Whither I went or how I
fared.
A man s
little lad,
Here
s
voice said,
'My
a bit of a toy to make you
Then
I opened
With
his sleeves rolled up,
eyes and saw
my
glad.'
him
plain,
and the dark blue
stain
Of tattooed Flew up to
skin,
where a
his shoulder
Of a dragon
and met the
curled, all pink
Which sprawled on
He
flock of quail
and green,
his back,
when
held out his hand and gave to
The most marvellous top which It
had ivory
And a
eyes,
and
tail
it
was
me
could ever be.
jet-black rings,
red stone carved into
seen.
little
wings,
POPPY SEED All joined
And
by a twisted golden
set in the
151
line,
brown wood, even and
fine.
Forgive me, Lady, I have not brought
My
treasure to
But he
said to keep
And comfort Joy
you as I ought, for his sake
myself with
in its spinning,
mean
It couldn t
it
it,
and so
quite the
and take
I do.
same to you.
Every day I met him
there,
Where the
dry in the sunny
He
told
fisher-nets
me
stories of courts
Of storms at
The top he
and
air.
kings,
sea, of lots of things.
said
That something
was a
sort of sign
in the big
world was mine.
Blue and white on a sun-shot ocean. Against the horizon a glint in motion.
POPPY SEED
152
Futt in the grasp of a shoving wind,
Trailing her bubbles of foam behind,
Singing and shouting
A flying
Queen 1
am
He
of
to
port she races,
harp, with her sheets and braces.
Heaven, give
me
heed,
utmost need.
in very
loved me, he was
And when he came
all
it
I had,
made
the sad
Thoughts disappear. This very day Send
his ship
I
ll
be a
I
ll
work
priest, till
And study
On
home
if
to
me
I pray.
you want
it so,
I have enough to go
Latin to say the prayers
the rosary our old priest wears.
I wished to be a sailor too, %
But
I will give myself to you.
POPPY SEED I
ll
my
never even spin
But put
it
away
153
top,
in a box.
I
ll
stop
Whistling the sailor-songs he taught. I
A
ll
save
my
silver heart in the
I ve seen
I
pennies
ll
give
some
up
all
till
I
have bought
market square,
beautiful, white ones there.
I
want
And do whatever you
to do tell
me
to.
Heavenly Lady, take away All the
Take
games I
my
life
to
like to play, fill
the score,
Only bring him back once more
!
The poplars shiver and turn
And
the
wind through
their leaves.
the belfry
moans and
grieves.
The gray dust whirls in
And
the market square,
the silver hearts are covered with care
POPPY SEED
154
By
thick tarpaulins.
The bay
The Queen
A
little
of
is black
Once again
under heavy rain.
Heaven has shut her
door.
boy weeps and prays no more.
POPPY SEED
155
AFTER HEARING A WALTZ BY BARTOK BUT why
did I
kill
him
?
Why? Why?
In the small, gilded room, near the
My
ears rack
And As
fingers sink into the fair
White skin
I killed
of his throat.
him!
I shook
him
It
was I
!
My God Don t you hear ? !
until his red
tongue
flapping out through the black, queer,
Swollen lines of his
With
The
his cry,
under his hair,
his eyes goggle
my
Hung
and throb with
stair ?
my
loose,
nails
lips.
And
I clung
drawing blood, while I flung
heavy body
in fear.
POPPY SEED
156
Fear
lest
he should
still
not be dead.
I was drunk with the lust of his
The blood-drops oozed slow from
And dabbled
a chair.
And
our
life.
his
head
strife
Lasted one reeling second, his knife
Lay and winked
And
the waltz from the ballroom I heard,
When And
I called
Of
him a
low, sneaking cur.
the wail of the violins stirred
My brute As
in the lights overhead.
anger with visions of her.
I throttled his windpipe, the purr
his breath
with the waltz became blurred.
I have ridden ten miles through the dark,
With that music, an Pounding rhythmic
One
!
Two

infernal din,
inside me.
Three
!
And my
Just
Hark
!
fingers sink in
POPPY SEED
To And
One
his flesh
when the
violins, thin
straining with passion,
!
Two
Three
!
157
grow
stark.
Oh, the horror of sound
!
While she danced I was crushing
He had
On One
!
her body, and I heard him gloat
the favour.
Two
!
is
That instant
Three
round
He
his throat.
wound
tasted the joy of her,
Round
!
How
!
I smote.
the dancers swirl
!
here in the room, in
my
arm,
His limp body hangs on the spin
Of the waltz we are dancing, a swarm
Of blood-drops
hemming
is
Round and round
!
One
!
us in
Two
!
his sin ,
Is red like his
tongue
lolling
warm.
!
Three
!
And
POPPY SEED
158
One
Two
!
He As
is
!
Three
And
!
the drums are his knell.
heavy, his feet beat the floor
him about
I drag
in the swell
Of the waltz. With a menacing
The trumpets
roar,
crash in through the door.
One
!
Two
!
Three
!
clangs his funeral bell.
One
!
Two
!
Three
!
In the chaos of space
Rolls the earth to the hideous glee
Of death I
stifle
!
And
so
cramped
has covered
And
!
God
my mouth
!
Tis he throttles
with his face
Three
!
me
!
my
heart
heart beats and labours.
One
his blood has dripped into
And my
Of
this place,
and pant. One! Two! Three!
Round and round
He
is
!
!
Two
His dead limbs have coiled every part
my
body
in tentacles.
Through
!
!
POPPY SEED
My ears the waltz jangles. His dead body holds
One
Two
!
One One
!
!
Three
!
Two
Two
!
me
One
Two
Air
!
Give
Three
Three
Beats !
!
!
!
me
I
!
me
Three air
!
!
Air
!
me
am
And
into a jelly
air
Oh
!
drowning
!
My
God
in slime
his corpse, like
!
!
a clod,
The chime,
And !
Like glue
athwart.
Give !
159
his
dead
My God
!
legs
keep time.
POPPY SEED
160
CLEAR, WITH LIGHT VARIABLE WINDS
THE
fountain bent and straightened
In the night wind,
Blowing
like
It gleamed
A
tall
a flower.
and
white
lily,
Under the eye
From a
glittered,
of the golden
stone seat,
Beneath a blossoming
The man watched
And
On
lime,
it.
the spray pattered
the dim grass at his feet.
The
Up
moon.
fountain tossed
and up,
Is that
its
water,
like silver marbles.
an arm he sees
?
itself
POPPY SEED
And
for
161
one moment
Does he catch the moving curve Of a thigh
?
The fountain gurgled and
And
the
man
s
face
A
was wet.
he hears
Is it singing that
splashed,
song of playing at ball
?
?
The moonlight shines on the straight column of water,
And through
it
he sees a woman,
Tossing the water-balls.
Her
breasts point outwards,
And
the nipples are like buds of peonies.
Her
flanks ripple as she plays,
And
the water
Than
is
not more undulating
the lines of her body.
'Come,'
she sings,
'Poet
!
Am I not more worth than your day ladies,
POPPY SEED
162
Covered with awkward Unreal, unbeautiful
What do you
stuffs,
?
fear in taking
Is not the night for poets
I
am
me ?
?
your dream,
Recurrent as water,
Gemmed
with the
moon
'
!
She steps to the edge of the pool
And
the water runs, rustling,
down her
sides.
She stretches out her arms,
And
the fountain streams behind her
Like an opened
veil.
In the morning the gardeners came to their work.
There
is
something in the
They shuddered
fountain,'
said one.
as they laid their dead master
POPPY SEED
On 'I
the grass.
will close his
'It
is
eyes,'
said the head gardener,
uncanny to see a dead man staring at the
163
POPPY SEED
164
THE BASKET I
THE inkstand and unspotted, candle.
is full
of ink,
in the
and the paper
round
lies
white
thrown by a
of light
Puffs of darkness sweep into the corners,
and
keep rolling through the room behind his chair. The air is silver
and
pearl, for the night is liquid
with
moonlight.
See .
how
Over
blue,
the roof
and beside
!
She
bright hair.
is
is
it
laughs,
stand two geraniums, purple be
silver-blue, to-night,
coming, the young
i
woman
with the
She swings a basket as she walks, which
she places on the
He
!
there, a slice of yellow cuts into the silver-
cause the light
See
glitters, like ice
sill,
between the geranium
and crumples
his
stalks.
paper as he leans forward
POPPY SEED to look.
a
Basket Filled with
'The
title for
165
a book
what
Moonlight,'
!
The
bellying clouds swing over the housetops.
He
woman
has forgotten the
He
geraniums.
drums hammers
beating his brain, and in his ear
his
And tap
cracks a nut.
shells ricochet
pulse.
She
!
Another.
upon the
sits
And
Tap
roof,
on the win
!
tap
Tap
!
!
She
Tap
!
and get into the
and bounce over the edge and disappear.
gutters, 'It
heavy
with the basket in her lap.
dow-sill,
The
is
room with the
in the
is
empty, I
very
m
queer,'
sure.
thinks Peter,
How
'the
basket was
could nuts appear from the
'
atmosphere
The purple,
?
silver-blue
moonlight makes the geraniums
and the roof
glitters like ice.
POPPY SEED
166
II
Five o clock. The geraniums are very gay in their crimson array. The bellying clouds swing over the housetops, and over the roofs goes Peter to pay his
morning
s
work with a
holiday.
Have you finished ? Can I come ?
'Annette, it is I.
'
Peter jumps through the window. 'Dear,
are
'Look,
Peter, the
you alone
This gold thread ing,
is
?'
dome
of the tabernacle is done.
so very high, I
am
a starry sky would have seen
down, now
tell
me,
The golden dome ting sun.
On
is
glad
me
it is
morn
bankrupt. Sit
your story going well
'
?
glittered in the orange of the set
the walls, at intervals, hung altar-cloths
and chasubles, and copes, and
stoles,
All stiff with rich embroidery,
and
coffin palls.
and stitched with so
much artistry, they seemed like spun and woven gems, or flower-buds new-opened
on
their stems.
POPPY SEED
167
Annette looked at the geraniums, very red against the blue sky. 'No
matter
how
I try, I cannot find
of such a red.
My
in comparison.
Heigh-ho
I
m
in love with
I
don
t
be so rough promise. sit
My
know. ;
it is
You
bleeding hearts drip stuff
s
See
muddy
my little pecking dove ?
temple. Only that halo
s
too strong, or not strong enough.
eyes are tired. Oh, Peter, don t valuable.
won
I
t
do any more. I
tyrannise, Dear, that s enough.
down and amuse me
The shadows
!
my own
wrong. The colour
any thread
of the
while I
rest.'
geraniums creep over the
and begin to climb the opposite
Now
floor,
wall.
Peter watches her, fluid with fatigue, floating, and drifting,
and undulant
in the orange glow.
flow towards her, where she
Seeming drowned
lies
His senses
supine and dreaming.
in a golden halo.
POPPY SEED
168
The pungent
smell of the geraniums
hard to
is
bear.
He
pushes against her knees, and brushes his
His
across her languid hands. less.
He woos
lips
her, quivering,
with shadows, for the sun has
are hot and speech
and the room set.
is filled
But she only un
derstands the ways of a needle through delicate
and the shock
of
see that this
the same, and querulously
is
lips
stuffs,
one colour on another. She does not
murmurs his
name. 'Peter,
And
I
don
t
want
it.
he, the undesired,
There
is
a crescent
I
am
tired.'
burns and
moon on
is
consumed.
the rim of the sky.
HI 'Go
home, now, Peter. To-night
must be 'How
is full
moon. I
alone.'
soon the
moon
is full
again
!
Annette,
let
POPPY SEED
me
stay.
My
Indeed, Dear Love, I shall not go away.
God, but you keep
Entrance Here, over
my
me
You
!
the doors. Is
all
Would marriage
hating bonds as you do, rights of loving
if
give
me
it
not strange,
me
you
entrance blind, or,
You want
the
to rest you, but
you
free
my brains
my loving, and
you
you know
please, poor Peter,
It will crush
He
No
should I be denied the
you
on being a poet. Let
life
strike
write
?
not one heart-beat. Oh, forgive me, Sweet
I suffer in
'As
why
I leave
whole of me, you pick
do.
starved
Dear, that loving, yet you deny
everywhere.
my
169
answered
me
it.
I cannot feed
stay.'
but it will hurt me
your heart and squeeze the love gruffly,
'I
!
know what
I
m
if
you
out.'
about.'
My work MUST
Only remember one thing from to-night. is
taxing and I
The
clear
must have
moon
sight
!
I
!'
looks in between the geraniums.
On the wall, the shadow of the man is divided from the shadow
of the
woman by
a silver thread.
POPPY SEED
170
They are eyes, hundreds
of eyes,
Unwinking, for there are no
and
hazel,
they is
and the
glitter
irises
round like marbles
lids.
Blue, black, gray,
are cased in the whites,
off
the whites
and throws them away. They ricochet upon the and get into the
gutters,
But she
window-sill, eating
The purple,
and
and spark under the moon. The basket
heaped with human eyes. She cracks
disappear.
!
silver-blue
roof,
and bounce over the edge and
is
here, quietly sitting
human
on the
eyes.
moonlight makes the geraniums
and the roof shines
like ice.
IV
How hot the sheets are pricks,
and over him
!
His skin
sticks,
It lights the sky with blood,
drops
sizzle
on
his bare skin,
is
tormented with
and never moves, an
eye.
and drips blood. And the and he smells them burn
ing in, and branding his body with the name
'Annette.'
POPPY SEED
The blood-red sky it
blood or
fire ?
is
The
outside his
Merciful
wrenches and pounds lead of the roof
God
!
'Annette
is
to the edge, bounces over
The
171
window now.
Fire
!
And his
Is
heart
!'
scorching, he ricochets, gets
and disappears.
bellying clouds are red as they swing over the
housetops.
V The
air is of silver
with moonlight. of ice
the
!
and
How
pearl, for the night
liquid
the ruin glistens, like a palace
Only two black holes swallow the
brilliance of
moon Deflowered windows, sockets without sight. .
A man stands before the house. He blue moonlight, and set in
and
is
flickering, eyes of
Annette
!
it,
sees the silver-
over his head, staring
geranium red.
POPPY SEED
172
IN A CASTLE
I
OVER hiss
log
the yawning chimney hangs the fog. Drip hiss
drip
the raindrops on the oaken
fall
which burns, and steams, and smokes the
beams. Drip
The wide, let.
the rain never stops.
hiss
state
ceiling
bed shivers beneath
its
velvet cover
Above, dim, in the smoke, a tarnished coronet
gleams dully. Overhead hammers and chinks the Fearfully wails the wind
down
rain.
distant corridors, and
there comes the swish and sigh of rushes lifted off the
The
floors.
and then
It
is
arras blows sidewise out
falls
my
from the
wall,
much
nice
back again.
lady
s
key, confided with
cunning, whisperingly.
He
enters on a sob of wind,
POPPY SEED
173
which gutters the candles almost to swaling. The flutters
He
and drops. Drip
shuts the door.
along the
the rain never stops.
hiss
rushes
fall
Outside, the wind goes wailing.
Above, in the
tarnished gold.
and holds out
firelight,
The knight
his
How
head
smooth and
shivers in his coat of fur,
hands to the withering flame. She
the log hisses and drips
satisfying will be her lips
is
is
winks the coronet of
always the same, a sweet coquette.
It
again to stillness
velvet coverlet of the wide bed
The cold.
floor.
The
fire
is
He will wait for her. !
How warm
and
!
wide and cold, the state bed; but when her
lies
wet with
under the coronet, and her eyes are love,
full
and
and when she holds out her arms, and
the velvet counterpane half slips from her, and alarms her trembling modesty,
how
eagerly he will leap to
cover her, and blot himself beneath the quilt, making
POPPY SEED
174
her laugh and tremble. Is it guilt to free a lady
from her palsied
sent and fighting, terribly abhorred
He
stirs
lord,
ab
?
a booted heel and kicks a rolling coal.
His spur clinks on the hearth. Overhead, the rain
hammers and
chinks.
She
is
so pure
and whole. Only
because he has her soul will she resign herself to him, for
where the soul has gone, the body must be given
as a sign.
He takes her by the divine right
lover.
He
after.
Should he be overborne, she
of the only
has sworn to fight her lord, and will die
wed her adoring
him, forlorn, shriven by her great love.
Above, the coronet winks in the darkness. Drip hiss
fall
the raindrops.
The
arras blows out from
the wall, and a door bangs in a far-off hall.
The
candles swale. In the gale the
plunges and spatters.
moat below
Will the lady lose courage and
POPPY SEED not come
The
?
rain claps on a loosened rafter.
Is that laughter
The room
?
is filled
thing mutters.
with
far
state
little
is
!
s
Death
!
It
is
is
is
is it
which chatters
very cold and he
chuckling sounds.
Jesus, it
one
bed
entries
from the wall the arras
Christ
and whispers. Some
which pads and patters,
wind through the winding
The
lisps
One candle drowns and the other gut
Is that the rain
ters.
175
blown
is
alone.
the
?
How
!
no storm which makes these
By the Great Wounds of Holy
his dear lady, kissing
and clasping some
Through the sobbing storm he hears her love
take form and flutter out in words. his ears
and stun
hard and dead, never stops.
his desire,
which
like frozen fire.
They lies
And
prick into
within him,
the
little
noise
POPPY SEED
176
He tears down ber
s
the rain drops.
hiss
Drip
the arras from before an inner
cham
bolted door.
II
The hiss
On
state fall
bed shivers
in the
the raindrops. For the storm never stops.
the velvet coverlet
fair in
watery dawn. Drip
the cold, grey
lie
two
bodies, stripped hiss
fall
drops, for the bleeding never stops.
The
air.
Drip
the blood-
quietly.
At each side of the bed, on the floor,
A man s
on
this side,
a
woman
s
and
bodies is
lie
a head.
on that, and the red
blood oozes along the rush mat.
A wisp of paper is twisted carefully into the strands man
of the
dead
wife s
paramour has paid with
s
hair.
It says,
'My
Lord: Your
his life for the high
favour.'
Through the lady
s silver fillet is
wound another
POPPY SEED paper. It reads,
'Most
177
noble Lord
Your wife
:
s
mis
deeds are as a double-stranded necklace of beads.
But
I have engaged that, on your return, she shall
welcome you before,
was
here.
you have
red, her
She
still
will
not spurn your love as
the best part of her.
body white, they
will
Her blood
both be here for
your delight. The soul inside was a lump of dirt, I
have
rid
you
Good luck plaisant,
of that with a spurt of
She
to your pleasure.
my
will
sword point.
be quite
com
my friend, I wager.' The end was a splashed
flourish of ink.
Hark
!
In the passage
heard the clink of armour,
is
The door
the tread of a heavy man.
bursts open
and
standing there, his thin hair wavering in the glare of steely daylight,
is
my
Lord
of Clair.
Over the yawning chimney hangs the hiss
drip
hiss
fall
hammers and chinks the
the
rain
fog.
raindrops.
Drip
Overhead
which never stops.
POPPY SEED
178
The
velvet coverlet
beams are its
tight.
sodden and wet, yet the roof
is
Overhead, the coronet gleams with
blackened gold, winking and blinking.
Among
the
rushes three corpses are growing cold.
m In the castle church you
Two sumptuous tombs Of the
my
choir,
In sculptured
Lord
filigrees.
may
see
them
stand,
on either hand
and
s
my Lady s,
And where
grand
the transepts of
the church expand,
A
crusader,
come from the Holy Land,
Lies with crossed legs
The page
s
For shame.
and embroidered band.
name became a brand
He was
buried in crawling sand,
After having been burnt
by royal command.
POPPY SEED
179
THE BOOK OF HOURS OF SISTER CLOTILDE
THE
Bell in the convent tower swung.
High overhead the great sun hung,
A navel for the The
air
curving sky.
was a blue Swallows
And
The
/x
clarity.
flew,
a cock crew.
iron clanging sank through the light air,
Rustled over with blowing branches.
A flare
Of spotted green, and a snake had gone Into the bed where the snowdrops shone
In green new-started, Their white bells parted.
POPPY SEED
180
Two by
two, in a long brown
The nuns were walking Bright April
And work
air.
to breathe the fine
They must go
this
time
They walk
is
theirs
!
in pairs.
comes the Abbess, preoccupied
First
slow, as a
woman
With her temper
often tried,
Then the
in bond.
Then younger and younger,
Has a laugh on her
And
all
oldest nun.
until the last
lips,
fairly skips.
They wind about the
And
in soon
at their tasks all the afternoon.
But
And
line,
gravel walks
the long line buzzes and talks.
They
step in time to the ringing bell,
With
scarcely a shadow.
The sun
is
well
one
POPPY SEED
181
In the core of a sky
Domed
silverly.
Sister Marguerite said
:
'The
Sister Angelique said she
And
free the earth
Sister
s
:
'Oh,
roots.
look at those shoots
a crocus up,
With a purple
But
bud.'
must get her spud
round the jasmine
Veronique said
There
pears will soon
cup.'
Sister Clotilde said nothing at
all,
She looked up and down the old grey wall
To
see
if
a lizard were basking there.
She looked across the garden to where
A sycamore Flanked the garden door.
She
And

as restless, although her
quite unsatisfied, for
it
little feet
chanced
danced,
!
POPPY SEED
182
Her morning
And would
s
work had hung
not take form. She could not find
The
beautifulness
For the Virgin
Should
it
it
s dress.
be of pink, or damasked blue
Or perhaps Should
mind
in her
lilac
with gold shotted through
be banded with yellow and white
Roses, or sparked like a frosty night
?
Or a crimson sheen Over some sort of green
But In
Clotilde s eyes
all
?
saw nothing new
the garden, no single hue
So lovely or so marvellous
That
its
?
use would not seem impious.
So on she walked,
And
the others talked.
?
POPPY SEED Sister Elisabeth
From what For
Sister
183
edged away
her companion had to say,
Marthe saw the world
in little,
She weighed every grain and recorded each
tittle.
She did plain stitching
And worked
'Sister
in the kitchen.
Radegonde knows the apples won
t last,
I told her so this Friday past. I
must speak
to her before
Her words were
The
like dust
other
nun
Compline.'
motes
sighed,
With her pleasure quite
Suddenly 'The
Sister
little
And
in
dried.
Berthe cried out
snowdrops are blooming
The
in slanting sunshine.
!'
:
They turned
white cups bent over the ground,
among
the light stems
wound
about.
POPPY SEED
184
A
crested snake,
With
his eyes
awake.
His body was green with a metal brightness Like an emerald set in a kind of whiteness,
And
all
down
his curling length
were disks,
Evil vermilion asterisks,
They paled and As wounds
flooded
fresh-blooded.J
His crest was amber glittered with blue,
And opaque It
so the sun
came
seemed a crown with
When
he quivered
From The
all
shining through.
fiery points.
down
his scaly joints,
every slot
sparkles shot.
The nuns huddled
tightly together, fear
Catching their senses. But Clotilde must peer
POPPY SEED
More
185
closely at the beautiful snake,
She seemed entranced and eased. Could she make Colours so rare,
The
dress were there.
The Abbess shook 'Sisters,
Sidling
The
we
will
off
walk
her lethargy.
on,'
said she.
away from the snowdrop bed,
line
curved forwards, the Abbess ahead.
Only Clotilde
Was
When
the last to yield.
the recreation hour was done
Each went
in to her task.
In the library, with Clotilde
its
Alone
great north light,
wrought at an exquisite /
Wreath
of flowers
For her Book of Hours.
POPPY SEED
186
She twined the
little
With snowdrops and Of
laurel leaves
With
crocus blooms daffodils, the
glooms
were interwoven
Stars-of -Bethlehem,
and cloven
Fritillaries,
Whose
colour varies.
They framed the
picture she
had made,
Half-delighted and half-afraid.
In a courtyard with a lozenged
The
floor
Virgin watched, and through the arched door
The
angel
came
Like a springing flame.
His wings were dipped in violet His limbs were strung to holy
He
fire,
desire.
lowered his head and passed under the arch,
And
the air seemed beating a solemn march.
POPPY SEED
The
187
Virgin waited
With eyes
dilated.
Her
face
And
beautiful with her strange assent.
A
silver
was quiet and innocent,
thread about her head
Her halo was
poised.
But
in the stead
Of her gown, there remained
The
vellum, unstained.
Clotilde painted the flowers patiently,
Lingering over each tint and dye.
She could spend great pains, now she had seen
That
curious,
A
colour so strange
It
had seemed to change.
She thought
At
unimagined green.
first it
it
had altered while she gazed.
had been simple green
;
then glazed
POPPY SEED
188
All over with twisting flames, each spot
A molten
colour, trembling
And
and
every eye
Seemed
to liquefy.
She had made a plan, and her After
all,
hot,
spirits
danced.
she had only glanced
At that wonderful Just what hues
snake, and she must
made
know
the creature throw
Those splashes and sprays Of prismed
When
rays.
evening prayers were sung and said,
The nuns
lit
And soon
in the
their tapers
and went to bed.
convent there was no
For the moon did not
rise until late
Only the shine
Of the lamp at the
shrine.
light,
that night,
POPPY SEED Clotilde lay
189
in her trembling sheets.
still
Her heart shook her body with She could not see
the
till
moon
its
beats.
should
rise,
So she whispered prayers and kept her eyes
On
the window-square
Till light
The
faintest
Fell
on the
should be there.
shadow
floor.
of a
Clotilde,
With solemn purpose,
And
fluttered
branch
grown staunch
softly rose
down between
the rows
Of sleeping nuns. She almost runs.
She must go out through the Lest the nuns
The
Virgin
little
side door
who were always praying
s altar
She pushed the
before
should hear her pass.
bolts,
and over the grass
POPPY SEED
190
The
red
moon
Mounted
its
s
brim
rim.
Her shadow crept up the convent As she
swiftly left
The garden
it,
over
wall
all
lay the level glow
Of a moon coming up, very big and
The
gravel glistened.
She stopped and
It
was
still,
Was
listened.
and the moonlight was getting
She laughed a
Than
little,
ever before.
but she
felt
clearer.
queerer
The snowdrop bed
reached and she bent
On
slow.
down her head.
the striped ground
The snake was wound.
For a moment Clotilde paused
in alarm,
Then she rolled up her sleeve and stretched out her arm.
POPPY SEED She thought she heard
steps, she
191
must be quick.
She darted her hand out, and seized the thick Wriggling slime,
Only
just in time.
The
old gardener
And
his
And
covered Clotilde and the angry snake.
He
shadow
bit her,
came muttering down the path,
fell like
a broad, black swath,
but what difference did that make
The
Virgin should dress
In his loveliness.
The gardener was covering
his new-set plants
For the night was, chilly, and nothing daunts
Your
lover of growing things.
Something to do and turned
And
On
He
spied
aside,
the moonlight streamed
Clotilde,
and gleamed.
!
POPPY SEED
192
His business finished the gardener
He
A
rose.
shook and swore, for the moonlight shows
girl
with a fire-tongued serpent, she
Grasping him, laughing, while quietly
Her eyes
he sleeping
Is
He
are weeping.
thinks
it is
?
some holy
vision,
Brushes that aside and with decision
Jumps
and
hits the
snake with his
stick,
Crushes his spine, and then with quick,
Urgent command
Takes her hand.
The gardener sucks the poison and
spits,
Cursing and praying as befits
A poor
old
'Whatever
man
half out of his wits.
possessed you, Sister,
it s
POPPY SEED
Hatched
And
It s one of
You His
life
of a devil
very
evil.
them horrid
read about. to touch
193
basilisks
They say a man it,
but I guess I ve sucked
Out by now. Lucky I chucked
Away from
you.
I guess
ll
you
risks
it
do.'
no, FranQois, this beautiful beast
'Oh,
Was
sent to me, to
the least
in all our convent, so I
Worthy Could
me
finish
my
picture of the
Most High
And Holy Queen, In her dress of green.
He
is
At
once,
dead now, but
his colours
and by noon I
shall
won
t
fade
have made
it
POPPY SEED
194
The
How
Virgin s robe. Oh, Frangois, see
kindly the
moon
shines
down on me
!
I can t die yet,
For the task was
'You
won
now, for I ve sucked
t die
Grumbled old Frangois, If the Virgin is set 'Frangois,
don
set.'
t
'so
on snake
it away,'
have your play. s
colours so strong,
say things like that,
it is wrong.'
So Clotilde vented
Her
'He
can
'Paint
He
t
as
creed.
He
repented.
do no more harm,
much
as
you
like.'
Sister,'
And
picked up the snake with his
said he.
gingerly
stick.
Clotilde
Thanked him, and begged that he would Her
To
secret,
though itching
talk in the kitchen.
shield
'
POPPY SEED
The gardener promised, not very
And
195 pleased,
Clotilde, with the strain of adventure eased,
Walked quickly home, while the
Made
half-high
moon
her beautiful snake-skin sparkle, and soon
In her bed she lay
And
At dawn Clotilde
waited for day.
s first
saffron-spired warning
was up. And
all
that morning,
Except when she went to the chapel to pray,
She painted, and when the April day
Was
hot with sun,
Clotilde
Done
!
had done.
She drooped, though her heart beat loud
At the beauty before
To
A
her,
and her
spirit
bowed
the Virgin her finely-touched thought had made.
lady, in excellence arrayed,
POPPY SEED
196
And
wonder-souled.
Christ
From
s
Mould
Blessed
long fasting Clotilde
But her eyes were
Enmeshed
in
!
weary and
felt
faint,
starred like those of a saint
Heaven
s
beatitude.
A sudden clamour hurled its
rude
Force to break
Her
The door
By
vision awake.
nearly leapt from
the multitude of nuns.
When
hinges, pushed
They hushed
they saw Clotilde, in perfect quiet,
Smiling, a
little
And
all
Buzzed
perplexed at the
riot.
the hive 'She
Old Frangois had
Of
its
s
told.
silence too great,
alive!'
He had
found the strain
and preferred the pain
POPPY SEED
197
Of a conscience outraged. The news had spread,
And
all
were convinced Clotilde must be dead.
For Francois, to
spite them,
Had
to right them.
not seen
fit
The Abbess, unwontedly trembling and Put her arms round Clotilde and wept,
Has the Holy Mother showed you
To
could
we have guessed
Our convent
A
miracle
!
But Oh
To have you
die
!
!
so blessed
!
My Lamb
And
I,
hollow, living shell, the grave
Is
empty
of
!
who am
A
me. Holy Mary, I crave
To be
taken,
Dear Mother,
Instead of this
other.'
'My
this grace,
spare you while you imaged her face
How
mild,
?
child,
POPPY SEED
198
She dropped on her knees and
With anguished hands and
silently prayed,
tears delayed
To
a painful slowness. The minutes drew
To
fractions.
Then
The sound
On
It
of a bell, swell.
came skipping over the
And To
a gusty
the west wind blew
slates of the roof,
the bright bell-notes seemed a reproof
grief, in
the eye of so fair a day.
The Abbess, comforted,
And
the sun
In Clotilde
s
lit
ceased to pray. the flowers
Book
of Hours.
It glistened the green of the Virgin s dress
And made
the red spots, in a flushed excess,
Pulse and start
;
and the
violet
wings
Of the angel were colour which shines and
sings.
POPPY SEED
The book seemed a Of rainbow
The Abbess
199
choir
fire.
crossed herself, and each
nun
Did the same, then one by one,
They
filed to
Might plead
the chapel, that incensed prayers for the life of this sister of theirs.
Clotilde, the Inspired
She only
The
!
felt tired.
old chronicles say she did not die
Until heavy with years.
There hangs
Of osiered
in the
silver,
And
And
is
why
convent church a basket
a holy casket,
treasured therein
A dried
that
snake-skin.
POPPY SEED
200
THE EXETER ROAD PANELS
Under the moon
A coronet And
and blue which shine
of claret
done
like lees of wine.
in a golden scroll,
wheels which blunder and creak as they
Through the muddy
They daren
t
moorland track.
ruts of a
look back
roll
!
J They
are whipping
What
brutes
Behind,
my
men
and cursing the
are
That coach,
For
Lord
and
to see
gold,
and
blue,
slue.
are scared half out of their wits, poor souls.
my
lord has a casket full of rolls
!
re scored.
gallops with me,
it is fine
all claret,
Hop about and
They
when they think they
bay gelding
In a steaming sweat,
horses.
POPPY SEED
Of minted
sovereigns,
I laugh to think
and
how he
ll
silver bars.
show
He
In London to-morrow.
201
his scars
whines with rage
In his varnished cage.
My lady has shoved
her rings over her toes.
*Tis
an ancient trick every night-rider knows.
But
I shall relieve her of
When I
And
s
nothing to hurry -about, the plain
gelding
s
and the
mud s
a strain.
uncommonly strong
in half an hour I 'Tis
this night,
the green moonlight.
Is hours long,
My
yet,
I see she limps in the minuet
must beg to celebrate
There
them
ll
bag the
in the loins,
coins.
a clear, sweet night on the turn of Spring.
The chase
is
the thing
!
POPPY SEED
202
How
the coach flashes and wobbles, the
Dripping down so quietly on Is beating out of the curses
And
the cracking
Steady, old horse,
all
And
s
tune
and screams,
through the painted seams.
we
ll
keep
Tis a rare fine night
There
A
it.
moon
in sight.
it
!
a clump of trees on the dip of the down,
the sky shimmers where
It seems a
shame to break the
In two with this
Of drudgery
pistol,
?
Hold up, you
Amen
beast,
this
moor
hangs over the town.
air
but I ve
my
share
men.
like other
His hat
Confound
it
!
now what
the devil
!
for a pockholed, evil,
My right leg s snapped. Tis a mercy he s rolled, but I m nicely capped.
Rotten marsh.
POPPY SEED
A broken-legged man They
ll
A
they
all
will
come
lion to handcuff
What I
ll
ll
s
that
give
it
?
Wind
Way His
to
out, every loafer
man
a
a head to
They handcuffed they
reach the town
!
fit it
No
the
s bulleted
pat.
cravat.
body just for
hung him in chains for
scour
grown
that s down.
Oh, the coachman
Thank you
And
and a broken-legged horse
get me, of course.
The cursed coach
And
203
him flesh from
style,
the volatile
bones.
out on the moor you can hear the groans
gibbet
makes when
Tis a
common
it
tale.
blows a gale.
hat
!
!
POPPY SEED
204
THE SHADOW PAUL JANNES was working very For
this
watch must be done by eight
To-morrow
Would
late,
or the Cardinal
certainly be vexed.
Of
all
His customers the old prelate
Was
the most important, for his state
Descended to
And he gave
his
his mistresses
To make them
When
watches and
he paid
many
forget his age visits,
rings,
things
and smile
and they could while
The time away with a diamond
locket
Exceedingly well. So they picked his pocket,
And he
paid in jewels for his slobbering kisses.
This watch was made to buy him
From an
Austrian countess on her
Home, and
blisses
way
she meant to start next day.
POPPY SEED
205
Paul worked by the pointed, tulip-flame
Of a tallow candle, and became So absorbed, that
his old clock
Striking the hour a Its echo, only half
moment
little
since.
apprehended,
Lingered about the room.
Screwing the
made him wince
He ended
rubies in,
Setting the wheels to lock
and
spin,
Curling the infinitesimal springs, Fixing the
filigree
hands. Chippings
Of precious stones lay strewn about.
The
table before
him was a rout
Of splashes and sparks
of coloured light.
There was yellow gold
in sheets,
A
heap
of emeralds,
and
and quite
steel.
Here was a gem, there was a wheel.
And
glasses lay like limpid lakes
Shining and
still,
and there were
flakes
POPPY SEED
206
Of
silver,
And
and shavings wires
little
With the
awhirl
took the watch
hands about to match
its
time, then glanced
From
He
light of the candle.
And wound The
all
of pearl,
up
to take the hour
the hanging clock.
Good, Merciful Power
How came
that shadow on the wall,
No woman
was
in the
room
!
His
tall
Chiffonier stood gaunt behind
His chair. His old cloak, rabbit-lined,
The door was
closed.
moment he must have
dozed.
Hung from a Just for a
He
looked again, and saw
The
On
peg.
silhouette
made a
it
plain.
blue-black stain
the opposite wall, and
it
never wavered
Even when the candle quavered Under That
his panting breath.
What made
beautiful, dreadful thing, that shade
!
POPPY SEED
Of something so
207
lovely, so exquisite,
Cast from a substance which the sight
Had
not been tutored to perceive
?
Paul brushed his eyes across his sleeve.
Clear-cut, the
Gleamed
Paul
s
Shadow on the
and never moved at
black,
watches were
Wrought
wall
like amulets,
into patterns
and
rosettes
The
cases were all set with stones,
And
wreathing
He knew And
the
With
its
lines,
all.
;
and shining zones.
the beauty in a curve,
Shadow tortured every nerve perfect
rhythm
of outline
Cutting the whitewashed wall. So fine
Was It
the neck he
knew he could have spanned
about with the fingers of one hand.
The
chin rose to a
mouth he
guessed,
POPPY SEED
208
But could not
see,
the lips were pressed
Loosely together, the edges close,
And
the proud and delicate line of the nose
Melted into a brow, and there
Broke into undulant waves
The lady was edged with
of hair.
the stamp of race.
A singular
vision in such a place.
He moved
the candle to the
Chiffonier; the
He
still
the lady
From every
s
face
was
corner of the
wall.
there.
room
saw, in the patch of light, the gloom
That was the
Was
lady.
Her
violet
bloom
almost brighter than that which came
From
He
Shadow stayed on the
threw his cloak upon a chair,
And
He
tall
his candle s tulip-flame.
set the filigree
hands he ;
laid
POPPY SEED
The watch
in the case
He put on
his rabbit cloak,
209
which he had made
;
and snuffed
His candle out. The room seemed stuffed
With darkness.
And
let
himself out through the door.
The sun was
And
Softly he crossed the floor.
wheel,
flashing
from every pin
when Paul
The whitewashed
The room was the
let
himself
walls were hot with light.
core of a chrysolite,
Burning and shimmering with
The sun was
From
in.
so bright that
fiery might.
no shadow could
the furniture upon the wall.
Paul sighed as he looked at the empty space
Where a
He
glare usurped the lady s place.
settled himself to his work,
but his mind
Wandered, and he would wake to find His hand suspended, his eyes grown dim,
fall
POPPY SEED
210
And Of
nothing advanced beyond the rim
The Cardinal
sent to
pay
which had purchased so
fine
his dreaming.
For
his watch,
But Paul could hardly touch the It
seemed the price
With the
first
And watched
of his
gold,
Shadow,
twilight he struck a
the
little
a day.
sold.
match
blue stars hatch
Into an egg of perfect flame.
He At
lit
his candle,
and almost
in
shame
his eagerness, lifted his eyes.
The Shadow was
there,
and
its
precise
Outline etched the cold, white wall.
The young man There
s
swore,
'By
God
!
You, Paul,
something the matter with your brain.
Go home now and
sleep off the
The next day was a
strain.'
storm, the rain
Whispered and scratched at the window-pane.
POPPY SEED
A
211
grey and shadowless morning
The
little
Were dead and
The gems
The watches,
shop.
filled
chilled,
sparkless as burnt-out coals.
lay on the table like shoals
Of stranded
shells, their colours faded,
Mere heaps
of stone, dull
Paul
No
s
head was heavy,
and degraded.
his
hands obeyed
orders, for his fancy strayed.
His work became a simple round
Of watches repaired and watches wound.
The
slanting ribbons of the rain
Broke themselves on the window-pane,
But Paul saw the
silver lines in vain.
Only when the candle was
And on
the wall just opposite
He watched
again the coming of
Could he trace a
And
lit
IT,
line for the joy of his soul
over his hands regain control.
POPPY SEED
Paul lingered late in his shop that night
And
the designs which his delight
Sketched on paper seemed to be
A tribute To
offered wistfully
the beautiful shadow of her
And hovered
who came
over his candle flame.
In the morning he selected
all
His perfect jacinths. One large opal
Hung
like
a milky, rainbow
moon
In the centre, and blown in loose festoon
The
To
red stones quivered on silver threads
the outer edge, where a single, fine
Band
of mother-of-pearl the line
Completed.
On
The creamy
porcelain of the face
the other side,
Bore diamond hours, and no lace
Of cotton or
silk
could ever be
POPPY SEED Tossed into being more
Than
213
airily
the filmy golden hands
the time
;
/
Seemed
When,
Upon
to tick
in
away
at dusk, the
the wall, Paul
rhyme.
Shadow grew s
work was through.
Holding the watch, he spoke to her 'Lady,
:
Beautiful Shadow, stir
Into one brief sign of being.
Turn your eyes
this
way, and seeing
This watch, made from those sweet curves
Where your
hair from your forehead swerves,
which I have wrought
Accept the
gift
With your
fairness in
Grant
me
Honoured
this,
thought.
shall
be
overwhelmingly.'
The Shadow
And
and I
my
rested black
and
still,
the wind sighed over the window-sill.
214
POPPY SEED
Paul put the despised watch away
And
laid out before
him
his array
Of stones and metals, and when the morning Struck the stones to their best adorning,
He
chose the brightest, and this
Was
so light
The
sunlight s nothingness,
and thin
it
new watch
seemed to catch
and
its
gleam.
Topazes ran in a foamy stream
Over the cover, the hands were studded
With
The
garnets,
face
Upon With
it
was
and seemed red of crystal,
roses,
and engraved
the figures flashed and waved
zircons,
It took a
and
week
beryls,
to make,
and amethysts.
and
his trysts
At night with the Shadow were Paul swore not to speak
The
budded.
till
his alone.
his task
was done.
night that the jewel was worthy to give.
POPPY SEED
215
Paul watched the long hours of daylight live
To
the faintest streak
;
then
And
sharp against the wall
The
outline of the
Shadow
s
lit
his light,
pure white
started
Into form. His burning-hearted
Words
so long imprisoned swelled
To tumbling
He
speech.
Like one compelled,
told the lady all his love,
And
holding out the watch above
His head, he knelt, imploring some Littlest sign.
The Shadow was dumb.
Weeks
And
passed, Paul worked in fevered haste,
everything he
Before his lady.
made he placed
The Shadow kept
Its perfect passiveness.
He wooed
Paul wept.
her with the work of his hands,
POPPY SEED
216
He
waited for those dear commands
No
She never gave.
Eased the ache
word, no motion,
of his devotion.
His days passed
in a strain of toil,
His nights burnt up
in a seething coil.
Seasons shot by, uncognisant
He
worked. The Shadow came to haunt
Even
his days.
He saw on Of
Sometimes quite plain
the wall the blackberry stain
his lady s picture.
Enough
No
sun was bright
to dazzle that from his sight.
There were moments when he groaned to His
life spilled
Begging
His
The
for
finest
out so uselessly,
boons the Shade refused,
workmanship abused,
iridescent bubbles he blew
Into lovely existence, poor and few
POPPY SEED
217
In the shadowed eyes. Then he would curse
Himself and her
!
The Universe
!
And
more, the beauty he could not make,
And
give her, for her comfort s sake
He would Upon Of
!
beat his weary, empty hands
the table, would hold up strands
silver
and
gold, arid ask her
why
She scorned the best which he could buy.
He would
pray as to some high-niched
That she would cure him Of
failure.
With
He
He would
of the taint
clutch the wall
his bleeding fingers,
if
she should
With sobs he would ask her to
fall
make
could catch, and hold her, and
All he
saint,
her live
!
forgive
had done. And broken, spent,
He would
call himself
Presumptuous
;
To madness by
impertinent
a tradesman
;
;
a nothing
the sight of Heaven.
At other times he would take the things
;
driven
POPPY SEED
218
He had made, and Hang
winding them on
strings,
garlands before her, and burn perfumes,
Chanting strangely, while the fumes
Wreathed and blotted the shadow
As with a cloudy, nacreous
face,
lace.
There were days when he wooed as a
lover, sighed
In tenderness, spoke to his bride,
Urged her to patience, said Should break the
Could compass
By
spell.
life,
Christ s Blood
The edge The
of the
lips of
He would And pat
the
!
his skill
A man s
sworn
will
even that, he knew.
He would
Shadow never
Shadow never
prove
it
true
blurred.
stirred.
climb on chairs to reach her
lips,
her hair with his finger-tips.
But instead
of young,
warm
flesh returning
!
POPPY SEED
219
His warmth, the wall was cold and burning Like stinging
Lay
ice,
and
in his heart like
At the moment
He would
lie
his passion, chilled,
some dead thing
Then, deadly
of birth.
in a
swoon
his
The
crisis
body shrieked
And
Why
in the clutch of pain.
quite confused, not being certain
he was suffering a curtain ;
His sorrow. Like a
He would
little
mind beguiled child
play with his watches and gems, with glee
Calling the
Shadow
to look
and
see
the spots on the ceiling danced prettily
When Has
wake and smile
joy, half -imbecile
Fallen over the tortured
How
his brain,
passed, he would
With a vacant
sick,
for hours, while thick
Phantasmagoria crowded
And
killed
he flashed his stones.
slid so
'Mother,
cunningly in between
the green
POPPY SEED
220
The
blue and the yellow. Oh, please look
Then, with a
He would
pitiful,
get
From
puzzled frown,
up slowly from
And walk round
down
his play
the room, feeling his
way
table to chair, from chair to door,
Stepping over the cracks in the
floor,
Till reaching the table again, her face
Would
bring recollection, and no solace
Could balm Stifled
his hurt
him and
till
his great distress.
One morning he threw
On coming Made
in,
unconsciousness
and
the street door wide
his vigorous stride
the tools on his table rattle and jump.
In his hands he carried a new-burst clump
Of
laurel blossoms,
Were
To
whose smooth -barked stalks
pliant with sap.
the wife he
left
As a husband
an hour ago,
talks
:
!
POPPY SEED Paul spoke to the Shadow.
To-day the calendar
And
I
woke
this
Asphodels, in
2 'Dear,
you know
calls it Spring,
morning gathering
my
dreams, for you.
So I rushed out to
see
what
flowers blew
Their pink-and-purple-scented souls Across the town-wind
And made
A
s
dusty
scrolls,
the approach to the
Market Square
garden with smells and sunny
I feel so well
air.
and happy to-day,
I think I shall take a Holiday.
And I
am
He It
to-night
we
will
have a
little treat.
going to bring you something to eat
looked at the Shadow anxiously.
was quite grave and
silent.
He
Shut the outer door and came
And
leant against the window-frame.
Dearest,'
he said,
'we
Although I bear you
in
live
apart
my
heart.
!'
POPPY SEED
222
We
look out each from a different world.
At any moment we may be hurled Asunder. They follow their
Obey
Now
orbits,
their laws entirely.
you must come, or
Unless
we
I go there,
are willing to live the flare
Of a lighted instant and have
'
we
it
gone.'
A
bee in the laurels began to drone.
A
loosened petal fluttered prone.
Man You
grows by eating, will
be
filled
if
you eat
with our
life,
sweet
Will be our planet in your mouth. If not, I
must parch
in death s
wide drouth
Until I gain to where you are,
And
May
give
you myself
happen.
O You
in
whatever star
Beloved
Is it not ordered cleverly
?'
of
Me
!
POPPY SEED
The Shadow, bloomed
Hung
in the sunlight.
like
223
a plum, and clear,
It did not hear.
Paul slipped away as the dusk began
To dim
To
the
little
shop.
He
ran
the nearest inn, and cho.se with care
As much
as his thin purse could bear.
As rapt-souled monks watch over the baking Of the sacred wafer, and through the making
Of the holy wine whisper
That God So Paul,
will bless this
secret prayers
labour of theirs
in a sober ecstasy,
Purchased the best which he could buy. Returning, he brushed his tools aside,
And
laid across the table
Napkin.
On
He put
a wide
a glass and plate
either side, in duplicate.
Over the lady
s,
excellent
;
POPPY SEED
224
With
loveliness, the laurels bent.
In the centre the white-flaked pastry stood,
Red
And
beside
Was
the wine which should bring the lustihood
Of human
When
all
the wine flask.
it
life
as blood
to his lady s veins.
was ready,
all
which pertains
To
a simple meal was there, with eyes
Lit
by the joy
He
reverently bade her come,
And
He
forsake for
him her
distant home.
put meat on her plate and
And
filled
From
lay quietly on the wall.
the street outside
came a watchman
cloudy night. Rain beginning to
And
her glass,
waited what should come to pass.
The Shadow
'A
of his great emprise,
still
he waited. The clock
Knocked on the
silence.
s
fall.'
slow tick
Paul turned
sick.
s call
:
POPPY SEED
He
filled his
From
Was
his
own
glass full of
his
He knew
jumbled
He
holding
drank
It
is
!
it.
little string.
it
shook powder into the wine,
up so the candle
'Dear,
You have
done, and I
Paul Jannes
And
let
down
Unstained
!
at
its
said
it
shine
heart,
was mine to do.
am come
the
s
never apart
empty
held out his arms.
Stared
of life
that he must do the thing
feared.
Again
The cord
tools.
Sparked a ruby through
He
;
pocket he took a paper. The twine
Snapped as he cut the
And
wine
knotted, and he searched a knife
From
He
225
to
!
wine-glass
The
him with
'
you
fall,
insentient wall
its cold,
The Shadow was not
white glare there
!
Paul clutched and tore at his tightening throat.
POPPY SEED
6
He
felt
And
the veins in his body bloat,
the hot blood run like
Along the
fire
and stones
sides of his cracking bones.
But he laughed
as he staggered towards the door,
And he laughed
aloud as he sank on the
The Coroner took
And
floor.
the body away,
the watches were sold that Saturday.
The Auctioneer
said one could seldom
Such watches, and the
buy
prices were high.
POPPY SEED
227
THE FORSAKEN HOLY Mother of God, Merciful Mary. Hear me
am very weary. all
I
I
have come from a village miles away,
day I have been coming, and I ache for stieh far roam
ing.
I cannot walk as light as I used,
grow confused.
Let this fear be only seeming, .
Mary Mother,
!
Beautiful Holy Lady, take
ing
and my thoughts
I am heavier than I was.
you know the cause
I
!
my shame away from me let it
!
be that I am dream
For months I h ave hoped it was so, now I am afraid
know. Lady, why should
I haven t got his name.
and he couldn did he die
t
be shame, just because
this
He loved me, yes, Lady, he did,
keep it hid.
We meant to marry. Why
?
That day when they
told
me
he had gone down in
POPPY SEED
228
the avalanche, and could not be found until the snow
melted in Spring, I did nothing. I could not cry. should he die
His
little
God, for
?
Why should
he die and his child
child alive in me, for
my misery
Why
my comfort.
live ?
No, Good
I cannot face the shame, to be a
!
mother, and not married, and the poor child to be reviled for having
Virgin, take
no
I have told call
off of
me
Mother, Holy
Let the baby not be.
sin I did.
away this
Only take the stigma
would
father. Merciful
!
no one but you, Holy Mary.
me
'whore,'
and
spit
My mother
upon me; the
priest
would have me repent, and have the rest of my life spent in a convent.
I
am no whore, no bad woman,
he loved
me, and we were to be married. I carried him always in
my heart, what did it matter if
part of
I gave
him the least
me too ? You were a virgin, Holy
Mother, but
you had a son, you know there are times when a woman
must give all. There
is
some call
to give
and hold back
POPPY SEED nothing.
I swear I
who lives
in
dead,
obeyed God then, and
me
This
again.
is
Oh, Holy Virgin, protect
baby
this child
me is the sign. What am I saying ? He is
my beautiful, strong man
caress
229
I shall never feel
!
him
the only baby I shall have.
my baby
!
My little, helpless
!
He will
look like his father, and he will be as fast a
runner and as good a shot. Not that he shall be no scholar neither. learn to read
He
and
shall
write,
go to school in winter, and
and
to carve, so that he can
my father will
make
the
little
horses,
cows, and chamois, out of white wood. Oh,
No
teach him
No
and
No
!
!
How can I think such things, I am not good. My
!
father will have nothing to do with
my boy, I
shall
be
an outcast thing. Oh, Mother of our Lord God, be mer ciful,
take away
before he came.
neath
my shame No
little
!
Let
baby
my body be
for
as
it
was
me to keep under
my heart for those long months. To live for and
POPPY SEED
230
I cannot go
to get comfort from.
home and
tell
my
mother. She is so hard and righteous. She never loved
my father, and we were cannot face
it.
Take away
my
bear
it
And
born for duty, not for love. I
Holy Mother, take baby! I don
little
t
my
baby away
want
it,
!
I can t
!
I shall have nothing, nothing
as a good
Have
girl.
other
!
men want
Just be to
known
marry me,
whom I could not touch, after having known my man. Known
the length and breadth of his beautiful white
body, and the depth of his love, on the high Alp, with the
moon
shiny in the light of
never hear him or
above, and the pine-needles it.
feel
So
in
my
I shall live
arms
He
is
gone,
him again, but
another. I would rather
own man
Summer
lie
my
man,
all
*-~~^ I shall
I could not touch
under the snow with
my
!
on and on. Just a good woman. With
POPPY SEED nothing to
231
warm my heart where he
me
for
left his
baby
human,
I think.
will respect me.
to care for.
I shall not be quite
Merely a stone-dead creature. They
What do I care for respect You didn !
care for people s tongues
our Lord Jesus.
and where he
lay,
t
when you were carrying
God had my man
give
me my
baby,
when He knew that He was going to take him away. His lips will
I will
comfort me, his hands will soothe me. All day
my lace-making, and all night I will keep
work at
him warm by
my
side
and pray the blessed Angels to
cover him with their wings. Dear Mother, what that sings
?
I hear voices singing,
trumpets through side of the wall.
it all.
Let
They seem
just
silver
on the other
me keep my baby, Holy Mother.
He is only a poor lace-maker him, but give
and lovely
is it
s
baby, with a stain upon
me strength to bring him up to be a man.
POPPY SEED
LATE SEPTEMBER TANG
of fruitage in the air
;
Red boughs
bursting everywhere
Shimmering
of seeded grass
Hooded
Warmth Tearing
gentians
all
of earth, off
;
a mass.
and cloudless wind
the husky rind,
Blowing feathered seeds to
By
;
fall
the sun-baked, sheltering wall.
Beech
trees in a golden haze
Hardy sumachs
all
ablaze,
Glowing through the
How
;
silver birches.
that pine tree shouts and lurches
!
POPPY SEED
From
the sunny door- jamb high,
Swings the
shell of
a butterfly.
Scrape of insect violins
Through the stubble
Every blade
s
shrilly dins.
a minaret
Where a small muezzin Loudly
calling us to
At the miracle
Then
s set,
pray
of day.
the purple-lidded night
Westering comes, her footsteps light
Guided by the radiant boon Of a sickle-shaped new moon.
233
POPPY SEED
234
THE PIKE IN the brown water, Thick and silver-sheened
in the sunshine,
Liquid and cool in the shade of the reeds,
A pike
dozed.
Lost among the shadows of stems
He
lay unnoticed.
Suddenly he
And a
flicked his tail,
green-and-copper brightness
Ran under
the water.
Out from under the
Came And
reeds
the olive-green light,
orange flashed up
Through the sun-thickened water. So the
fish
passed across the pool,
Green and copper,
POPPY SEED
A darkness And
235
and a gleam,
the blurred reflections of the willows on the opposite
Received
it.
bank
POPPY SEED
236
THE BLUE SCARF PALE, with the blue of high zeniths, shimmered over with
silver,
brocaded
In smooth, running patterns, a soft
knotted fringes,
Warm
from a close
Where
is
woman
on
it,
she, the
it lies
s soft
with dark
there,
shoulders,
and
my
fingers
caressing.
woman who wore
me
her lingers and drugs
A
stuff,
it ?
The
scent of
!
languor, fire-shotted, runs through me, and I crush
the scarf
down on my
And gulp in the warmth and swim
face,
the blueness, and
my eyes
in cool- tin ted heavens.
Around me are columns flickered
of marble,
and a diapered, sun-
pavement.
Rose-leaves blow and patter against stone -steps a lute tinkles.
it.
Below the
POPPY SEED
A
jar of green jade floor.
throws
its
237
shadow
half over the
A big-bellied
Frog hops through the sunlight and plops in the goldbubbled water of a basin,
Sunk
in the black
has
On
and white marble. The west wind
a scarf
lifted
the seat close beside me, the blue of
it is
a violent
outrage of colour.
She draws
more
it
closely
beneath her slight
Her
kisses are sharp
about her, and
it
ripples
stirring.
buds of
fire;
and I burn back
against her, a jewel
Hard and white a ;
stalked, flaming flower
;
till
I break
to a handful of cinders,
And open my
eyes to the scarf, shining blue in the
afternoon sunshine.
How
loud clocks can tick
one
is
alone
!
when a room
is
empty, and
POPPY SEED
238
WHITE AND GREEN HEY
!
My daffodil-crowned,
Slim and without sandals
As the sudden spurt So
my
!
of flame
upon darkness
eyeballs are startled with you,
Supple-limbed youth among the
fruit-trees,
Light runner through tasselled orchards.
You
are an
almond flower unsheathed
Leaping and
flickering
between the budded branches.
POPPY SEED
239
AUBADE As
I
would
free the white
almond from the green
husk
So would
I strip
your trappings
off,
Beloved.
And
fingering the
smooth and polished kernel
I should see that in
counting.
my hands
glittered a
gem beyond
POPPY SEED
240
MUSIC THE neighbour From my bed
sits in his
window and plays the
flute.
I can hear him,
And
the round notes flutter and tap about the room,
And
hit against
each other,
Blurring to unexpected chords. It
is
very beautiful,
With the
little
flute-notes all
about me,
In the darkness.
,
In the daytime,
The neighbour
And
He
eats bread
and onions with one hand
copies music with the other.
is
fat
and has a bald head,
So I do not look at him,
But run quickly past
his
window.
POPPY SEED There
is
241
always the sky to look
Or the water
in the well
at,
!
But when night comes and he plays I think of
him
With gold
seals
as a
young man,
hanging from his watch,
And
a blue coat with silver buttons.
As
lie
I
in
my
his flute,
bed
The
flute-notes
And
I go to sleep, dreaming.
push against
my
ears
and
lips,
POPPY SEED
242
A LADY You
are beautiful
and faded
Like an old opera tune
Played upon a harpsichord ;
Or
like the sun-flooded silks
Of an eighteenth-century boudoir. In your eyes
Smoulder the
And Is
fallen roses of out-lived minutes,
the perfume of your soul
vague and suffusing,
With the pungence
Your
And
of sealed spice-jars.
half-tones delight me,
I
grow mad with gazing
At your blent
colours.
My vigour is a new-minted penny, Which
I cast at your feet.
POPPY SEED Gather
That
it
its
up from the dust,
sparkle
may amuse
you.
243
POPPY SEED
244
IN A
GARDEN
GUSHING from the mouths
To
of stone
men
spread at ease under the sky
In granite-lipped basins,
Where
And
iris
dabble their feet
rustle to a passing wind,
The water
fills
the garden with
its
rushing,
In the midst of the quiet of close-clipped lawns.
Damp
smell the ferns in tunnels of stone,
Where
trickle
and plash the fountains,
Marble fountains, yellowed with much water.
Splashing It
falls,
And
down moss-tarnished
the water
the air
is
steps
;
throbbing with
it.
POPPY SEED
With
its
gurgling
and running.
With
its
leaping,
and deep, cool murmur.
And I
I wished for night
wanted to
see
you
White and shining
245
and you.
in the
swimming-pool,
in the silver-flecked water.
While the moon rode over the garden,
High
And
in the arch of night,
the scent of the lilacs was heavy with stillness.
Night, and the water, and you in your whiteness,
bathing
!
POPPY SEED
246
A TULIP GARDEN GUARDED
within the old red wall s embrace,
Marshalled
The
like soldiers in
tulips stand arrayed.
gay company,
Here infantry
Wheels out into the sunlight. What bold grace Sets off their tunics, white with crimson lace
Here are platoons
With
!
of gold-frocked cavalry,
scarlet sabres tossing in the eye
Of purple
batteries, every
gun
in place.
Forward they come, with flaunting colours spread,
With torches burning, stepping out
in
time
To some quick, unheard march. Our
We cannot
ears are dead,
catch the tune. In pantomime
Parades that army. With our utmost powers
We hear the
wind stream through a bed
of flowers.
Lf*
I-
14 DAY USE RETURN TO DESK FROM WHICH BORROWED
LOAN o
^jjjj$jj&
DEPT.
due on the last date stamped below, or on the date to which renewed. Renewed books are subject to immediate recall.
This b_,ok
is
AI1R
7
i381
k
^039 5
8
I INTER-LI BRAIW B 3
JUN 13 1967
rR.-7
RtTR
MAR
4 1982
1969 KEC.C1R. DEC
MAY 17
06 82
1993
JUL13 U
LD
21A-60m-7, 66 (G4427slO)476B
General Library University of California Berkeley
3305^
UNIVERSITY
X>F
CALIFORNIA LIBRARY