THE FILES And above them, sere and swift, Made their boasts and spake according in the files(Hear the ghosts that wake applauding in the files!) Trace each all-forgot career From long primer through brevier Unto Death, a para minion in the files (Para minion-solid-bottom of the files). Some successful Kings and Queens adorn the files, And their deaths were triple-headed, So they catch the eye in running through the files (Show as blazes in the mazes of the files); For their 'paramours and priests,' And their gross, jack-booted feasts, And their epoch-marking actions see the files. Was it Saffi, a professor Once of Oxford, brought redress or Garibaldi? Who remembers Forty-odd-year old Septembers?— Only sextons paid to dig among the files Ere you know for sure who was it Came to burial with such honour in the files (Only seven seasons back beneath the files). 'Very great our loss and grievous So our best and brightest leave us, (The open-minded, opportunist files- It is good to read a little in the files; Yea, and philosophic doubt when Life beguiles. When you marvel at your lateness In apprehending facts so plain to Smiles Bids you set the Thames afire, You'll remember men have done so-in the files. Of the reboantic Norns Usher gentlemen and ladies With new lights on Heaven and Hades, Guaranteeing to Eternity All yesterday's modernity; When Brocken-spectres made by Light your pipe and take a look along the files! THE FILES You've a better chance to guess (Which is Greatness-vide press) When you've seen it in perspective in the files. N° THE REFORMERS (1901) OT in the camp his victory lies To turn the judgment from his race. Happy is he who, bred and taught Sees, on the threshold of his days, And to unheralded dismays Submits his body and his soul; The fatted shows wherein he stood That he may prove with his own blood Ultimate issues, primal springs, Demands, abasements, penalties— The imperishable plinth of things Seen and unseen, that touch our peace. THE REFORMERS For, though ensnaring ritual dim With great things charged he shall not hold But serve, full-harnessed, as of old, He shall forswear and put away Unflinching tribute of his vows. He shall not plead another's act, The yoke he bore shall press him still, To find, to fashion, and fulfil The cleaner life, the sterner code. Not in the camp his victory lies- Shall see it in his children's eyes And from his grandson's lips shall learn! |