For to make plain that man's disdain Is but new Beauty's birth

For to possess in merriness

The joy of all the earth.

As Thou didst teach all lovers speech And Life all mystery,

So shalt Thou rule by every school Till life and longing die,

Who wast or yet the Lights were set,

A whisper in the Void,

Who shalt be sung through planets young When this is clean destroyed.

Beyond the bounds our staring rounds, Across the pressing dark,

The children wise of outer skies

Look hitherward and mark

A light that shifts, a glare that drifts, Rekindling thus and thus,

Not all forlorn, for Thou hast borne Strange tales to them of us.

Time hath no tide but must abide

The servant of Thy will;

Tide hath no time, for to Thy rhyme

The ranging stars stand still

Regent of spheres that lock our fears

Our hopes invisible,

Oh 't was certes at Thy decrees

We fashioned Heaven and Hell!

Pure Wisdom hath no certain path

That lacks thy morning-eyne,

And captains bold by Thee controlled Most like to Gods design.

Thou art the Voice to kingly boys To lift them through the fight,

And Comfortress of Unsuccess, To give the Dead good-night.

A veil to draw 'twixt God His Law And Man's infirmity,

A shadow kind to dumb and blind The shambles where we die;

A rule to trick th' arithmetic,

Too base, of leaguing odds

The spur of trust, the curb of lust, Thou handmaid of the Gods!

O Charity, all patiently Abiding wrack and scaith!

O Faith, that meets ten thousand cheats Yet drops no jot of faith!

Devil and brute Thou dost transmute

To higher, lordlier show,

Who art in sooth that lovely Truth

The careless angels know!

Thy face is far from this our war, Our call and counter-cry,

I may not find Thee quick and kind, Nor know Thee till I die.

Yet may I look with heart unshook On blow brought home or missedYet may I hear with equal ear

The clarions down the List;

Yet set my lance above mischance

And ride the barriere

Oh, hit or miss, how little 't is, My Lady is not there!

SESTINA OF THE TRAMP-ROYAL

1896

SPEAKIN' in general, I 'ave tried 'em all —

The 'appy roads that take you o'er the world.
Speakin' in general, I 'ave found them good
For such as cannot use one bed too long,
But must get 'ence, the same as I 'ave done,
An' go observin' matters till they die.

What do it matter where or 'ow we die,
So long as we 've our 'ealth to watch it all
The different ways that different things are done,
An' men an' women lovin' in this world;
Takin' our chances as they come along,
An' when they ain't, pretendin' they are good?

In cash or credit- no, it aren't no good;
You 'ave to 'ave the 'abit or you'd die,
Unless you lived your life but one day long,
Nor did n't prophesy nor fret at all,

But drew your tucker some'ow from the world,
An' never bothered what you might ha' done.

But, Gawd, what things are they I 'ave n't done!
I've turned my 'and to most, an' turned it good,
In various situations round the world-
For 'im that doth not work must surely die;
But that's no reason man should labour all
'Is life on one same shift; life's none so long.

Therefore, from job to job I've moved along.
Pay could n't 'old me when my time was done,
For something in my 'ead upset me all,
Till I 'ad dropped whatever 't was for good,
An', out at sea, be'eld the dock-lights die,

An' met my mate the wind that tramps the world!

It's like a book, I think, this bloomin' world,
Which you can read and care for just so long,
But presently you feel that you will die
Unless you get the page you 're readin' done,
An' turn another likely not so good;
But what you're after is to turn 'em all.

Gawd bless this world! Whatever she 'ath done Excep' when awful long — I've found it good. So write, before I die, "'E liked it all!"

66

I

THE MIRACLES

1894

SENT a message to my dear

A thousand leagues and more to Her — The dumb sea-levels thrilled to hear,

And Lost Atlantis bore to Her!

Behind my message hard I came,

And nigh had found a grave for me; But that I launched of steel and flame Did war against the wave for me.

Uprose the deep, in gale on gale,

To bid me change my mind again He broke his teeth along my rail, And, roaring, swung behind again.

I stayed the sun at noon to tell
My way across the waste of it;
I read the storm before it fell
And made the better haste of it.

Afar, I hailed the land at night

The towers I built had heard of me
And, ere my rocket reached its height,
Had flashed my Love the word of me.

Earth sold her chosen men of strength
(They lived and strove and died for me)
To drive my road a nation's length,
And toss the miles aside for me.

I snatched their toil to serve my needs
Too slow their fleetest flew for me.
I tired twenty smoking steeds,

And bade them bait a new for me.

I sent the Lightnings forth to see
Where hour by hour She waited me.
Among ten million one was She,

And surely all men hated me!

Dawn ran to meet me at my goal

Ah, day no tongue shall tell again!..
And little folk of little soul

Rose up to buy and sell again!

SONG OF THE WISE CHILDREN

1902

WHEN the darkened Fifties dip to the North,

And frost and the fog divide the air, And the day is dead at his breaking-forth, Sirs, it is bitter beneath the Bear!