FROM A WESTERN SHOREWAY
I
THE SHADOW ON THE SHORE
A spot there is on this far-reaching bay
Where sleeps a shadow heavier than night,
A shadow of unmitigated gloom,
The undying presence of a bygone doom,
Streaked with no ray of light.
The place is fair; its white-capped wavelets gay;
Across its sand-bars the pied shadows play,
And thorn-trees, bent beneath their harvests fair,
Scatter tart fragrance to the brine-filled air.
Yet over all there hangs a sense of doom,
A shadow of impenetrable gloom,
Some leaden taint, which haunts it like a tomb.
Vanish ill-haunted spot! Which brings to birth
Visions so baneful; dreams which only come
After too many lonely hours where
The thick-strewn shadows, aliens from the sun,
Leave cold and bare
The untended bones of Mother Earth;
Where Joy runs leaping never, nor young Mirth
Nor Love, nor aught that is heart-whole and fair;
Only old Desolation and sick Care
Sit sorrowing. Where the brine-crusted shore
Slopes to a wrinkled sea-line, scattered o’er
With thin grey flakes of pale and orphaned foam,
Flicked by the jealous gusts from their own wave-filled Home.
Kind hearth you call; I come! The night is rough,
The skies inhospitable; morose this strand;
I will not, nay I dare not longer be
Where Peace, hard-pressed, strains at a nerveless hand.
And peace, fierce ghosts, to thee!
Are there not on these lone hills graves enough?
Is there not space in yonder dark-hued sea?
In yon grey mist-swept shore even for ye?
Behold the dusk brings comfort. On yon height
One silvery hovering gleam of watery light.
Sea, shore, and all these naked uplands wear
That wild wan look, that mute appealing air,
That smile—born of young Hope and old Despair—
Which Eiré’s world-wide lovers find so fair.
Oh, woman-country, weak, yet strangely strong,
What witchery doth to thy cold skies belong,
What spells are thine, all other lands apart,
Which cling so closely, madly to the heart?
Is it such wandering ghosts as hover here,
Or thine own tireless dreams that keep thee young and dear?
II
A BOG-FILLED VALLEY
Sick little valley, meted out for sadness,
Bent thorn-trees sparsely above your brown floods rise,
Brimming full your streams are, brimming full, yet holding
Little joyous commerce with the sun and skies.
Sadly in the night-time the moon, besieged by shadows,
Over your dark hollows holds her pallid court;
Scarce an evening flower lighting for her pleasure,
Scarce a silvery ripple dancing for her sport.
Yet, oh little valley, little bog-filled valley,
I, who linger near you, grieving turn to part,
In your bareness finding, in your sadness seeing,
Something very tender, very near my heart.
Turning with reluctance, often I look backwards,
Seeing, feeling, counting what hath been before,
Finding in your bareness, seeing in your sadness,
That which, going elsewhere, I shall find no more.
III
A MIDNIGHT VISION
A grey peak, naked as some sharp-edged cloud,
Splintering the smooth breast of a placid sky,
Rough to the hand, it charms the tired eye;
Small tufts of sea-pink round its basement crowd,
A tide beneath, that mounts and tumbles by
In monstrous wrinkles, each ten cubits high.
Around a ship-less, sail-less wilderness,
On high, with arms outstretched as in distress,
Cutting the lone grey sky, one broken cross—
—Say, long since seen, long-vanished sign of grace,
Man’s needs, man’s sorrows, why from thy dim height
Thy most austere, remote, abiding place,
Steal’st thou, grey ghost, to visit me to-night?
IV
VAGRANTS
Magician of the labouring brain,
Shepherd who herds a wandering train,
The flocks which bring us joy or pain;
Whose tramplings fill this mortal span—
—Wild vagrant thoughts that bless or ban
The little wayward mind of man—
What hand doth their wild march control?
Heed’st Thou, contriver of the Whole,
Such idle tenants of the soul?
Wild birds which flutter to and fro,
Misled, misguided barques which go
’Cross currents streaked with weal and woe?
Propelled by gusts from shore to shore.
With senseless runes bedabbled o’er,
Known for a while, then seen no more.
Can such light things deserve one tear?
Be harbingers of Hope or Fear?
We know not. This alone we hear,
In waves, in dreams across yon sea,
Some faint voice sighs—“Infinity.”
No less, no more, naught else know we.
Only for ever through the brain
Flit on and ever on that train,
The thoughts which bring it peace—or pain.
V
A SPHINX
What are your thoughts, wild Dreamer from of old?
Who shall foreknow thy dark and devious way?
What hand dare limn in colours grey or gold
The close-furled puzzle of thine unborn day?
As in its first chill early glimmering morn
Some simple prophet cons the coming year,
Tells all its warm days, measures tear by tear
Its rainfall—and is laughed by it to scorn!—
So we by you, oh green and sea-worn sphinx,
Loved so profoundly, named of many names,
Heart-breaking goal of he that loves, that thinks,
Founded on treasons, sorrows, glories, shames!
VI
A PARALLEL
Deep in this gorge the sullen waters roll,
Over my head the clouds in black array,
Sweep their long skirts round the converging whole
While hostile eve succeeds to hostile day;
Yet here in sight
One dauntless wavelet of this gloom-struck lake
Catches the light,
Resists the night,
And the whole scene grows living for its sake.
From early dawn through ever-darkening years
Clouds black as night have thickened in men’s sight,
Yet undismayed by caitiff doubts and fears,
Some still hope on, some still for honour fight.
Oh gallant toilers in a desperate cause,
Fain would I see
The shadows flee,
Light grow round ye
Who, great of heart! labour without applause.
VII
MEMORIES
Painter of Painters,
Artist of Artists,
Loving the earliest,
Holding it tenderly
Nearest thy breast.
Giver of colour,
Form and perception,
Shapes without number,
God of the child-world!
How shall I thank thee,
Life’s benefactor,
Earliest and dearest?
When shall thy joys fail?
Cease to enchant me?
Cease to soothe sorrow?
Only in Death!
Tenderly, daintily,
Vividly, cloudily,
Gleam through the darkness
These, thy first pictures;
Odours and tones too,
Scents of wet seaweed,
Wings of wild sea-birds,
Flashes of sunlight,
Winds from the westward,
Red streams of sunset,
Bog-scents and sea-scents,
Huge domes of cloudland,
Clattering of rain-drops,
Rushing and splashing,
Beating to leeward.
Wild wastes of moorland;
Deep pools of colour;
Grey tarns and tussocks,
Starry blue blossoms;
Sheets of bog-myrtle;
Odorous with crushing;
Grey moths uprising,
Ghosts of the heather,
Others at eventide,
Larger, more splendid,
Peering mysteriously;
Bats flitting swiftly,
Wild storms at midnight;
Grey morning wakings;
Rushes to seaward;
Rides through the wet grass;
Laughter and greetings.
Up on the heights too,
Ancient grey ruins,
—Hoary, so hoary—
Toppling and perilous,
From whose high ramparts
Spreads like a deluge,
Endless as Chaos,
Spreads to the uttermost,
Wastes of grey water;
Wakening the child-brain,
Rousing its visions—
—Dreams of the measureless
Hints of the boundless,
Breaths of the Infinite,
Soul of God’s world!
Oh, mighty artist!
Life’s benefactor,
Earliest and dearest,
When shall thy joys fail?
Cease to enchant me?
Cease to soothe sorrow?
Only in Death.
VIII
EMIGRANTS
Like sea-pools on some restless, rock-strewn shore
These bog-pools flutter ere they sink to rest,
And o’er this surface, level as a floor,
Yon blue reek trails its idle way to west.
It comes from thee, brown shieling, late bereft
Of thy last fledgelings; tenement outworn,
Long marked for desolation, and now left
To two old hearts, submissive, but forlorn.
How like some wintry nest it shows to-night;
While over its bent thatch a young curved moon
Peers through thin clouds scarce greyer than her light
Peers wistfully, as if arrived too soon,
Or doubtful of her welcome. While I stand
A string of wild duck speeds across her horn,
Six, seven, eleven—Oh adventurous band!
Westward you stream, due west, and now are gone.
Gone! Gone! They leave us! Yet the brown pools there
Still dance and flutter in this crisping wind,
And still the blue reek gaily mounts to where
That new-born moon, so timid, yet so kind,
Peers earthward, as if curious to mark
A scene less often honoured of the sun.
Slowly the shadows lengthen, while the dark
Grows deeper; and another day is done.