"Oh! Love," they said, "is King of Kings, And Triumph is his crown. Earth fades in flame before his wings, And Sun and Moon bow down." — But that, I knew, would never do; And Heaven is all too high. So whenever I meet a Queen, I said, I will not catch her eye.
"Oh! Love," they said, and "Love," they said,
"The gift of Love is this; A crown of thorns about thy head, And vinegar to thy kiss!" — But Tragedy is not for me; And I'm content to be gay. So whenever I spied a Tragic Lady, I went another way.
And so I never feared to see You wander down the street, Or come across the fields to me On ordinary feet. For what they'd never told me of, And what I never knew, It was that all the time, my love, Love would be merely you.
Kindliness
When love has changed to kindliness — Oh, love, our hungry lips, that press So tight that Time's an old god's dream Nodding in heaven, and whisper stuff Seven million years were not enough To think on after, make it seem Less than the breath of children playing, A blasphemy scarce worth the saying, A sorry jest, "When love has grown To kindliness – to kindliness!" … And yet – the best that either's known Will change, and wither, and be less, At last, than comfort, or its own Remembrance. And when some caress Tendered in habit (once a flame All heaven sang out to) wakes the shame Unworded, in the steady eyes We'll have, —that day, what shall we do? Being so noble, kill the two Who've reached their second-best? Being wise, Break cleanly off, and get away, Follow down other windier skies New lures, alone? Or shall we stay, Since this is all we've known, content In the lean twilight of such day, And not remember, not lament? That time when all is over, and Hand never flinches, brushing hand; And blood lies quiet, for all you're near; And it's but spoken words we hear, Where trumpets sang; when the mere skies Are stranger and nobler than your eyes; And flesh is flesh, was flame before; And infinite hungers leap no more In the chance swaying of your dress; And love has changed to kindliness.
The Voice
Safe in the magic of my woods I lay, and watched the dying light. Faint in the pale high solitudes, And washed with rain and veiled by night,
Silver and blue and green were showing. And the dark woods grew darker still; And birds were hushed; and peace was growing; And quietness crept up the hill;
And no wind was blowing …
And I knew That this was the hour of knowing, And the night and the woods and you Were one together, and I should find Soon in the silence the hidden key Of all that had hurt and puzzled me — Why you were you, and the night was kind, And the woods were part of the heart of me.
And there I waited breathlessly, Alone; and slowly the holy three, The three that I loved, together grew One, in the hour of knowing, Night, and the woods, and you —
And suddenly There was an uproar in my woods, The noise of a fool in mock distress, Crashing and laughing and blindly going, Of ignorant feet and a swishing dress, And a Voice profaning the solitudes.
The spell was broken, the key denied me. And at length your flat clear voice beside me Mouthed cheerful clear flat platitudes.
You came and quacked beside me in the wood. You said, "The view from here is very good!" You said, "It's nice to be alone a bit!" And, "How the days are drawing out!" you said. You said, "The sunset's pretty, isn't it?"
* * * * *
By God! I wish – I wish that you were dead!
Menelaus and Helen
I
Hot through Troy's ruin Menelaus broke To Priam's palace, sword in hand, to sate On that adulterous whore a ten years' hate And a king's honour. Through red death, and smoke, And cries, and then by quieter ways he strode, Till the still innermost chamber fronted him. He swung his sword, and crashed into the dim Luxurious bower, flaming like a god.
High sat white Helen, lonely and serene. He had not remembered that she was so fair, And that her neck curved down in such a way; And he felt tired. He flung the sword away, And kissed her feet, and knelt before her there, The perfect Knight before the perfect Queen.
II
So far the poet. How should he behold That journey home, the long connubial years? He does not tell you how white Helen bears Child on legitimate child, becomes a scold, Haggard with virtue. Menelaus bold Waxed garrulous, and sacked a hundred Troys 'Twixt noon and supper. And her golden voice Got shrill as he grew deafer. And both were old.
Often he wonders why on earth he went Troyward, or why poor Paris ever came. Oft she weeps, gummy-eyed and impotent; Her dry shanks twitch at Paris' mumbled name. So Menelaus nagged; and Helen cried; And Paris slept on by Scamander side.
The Jolly Company
The stars, a jolly company, I envied, straying late and lonely; And cried upon their revelry: "O white companionship! You only In love, in faith unbroken dwell, Friends radiant and inseparable!"
Light-heart and glad they seemed to me And merry comrades (even so God out of Heaven may laugh to see The happy crowds; and never know That in his lone obscure distress Each walketh in a wilderness).
But I, remembering, pitied well And loved them, who, with lonely light, In empty infinite spaces dwell, Disconsolate. For, all the night, I heard the thin gnat-voices cry, Star to faint star, across the sky.
Thoughts on the Shape of the Human Body
How can we find? how can we rest? how can We, being gods, win joy, or peace, being man? We, the gaunt zanies of a witless Fate, Who love the unloving, and the lover hate, Forget the moment ere the moment slips, Kiss with blind lips that seek beyond the lips, Who want, and know not what we want, and cry With crooked mouths for Heaven, and throw it by. Love's for completeness! No perfection grows 'Twixt leg, and arm, elbow, and ear, and nose, And joint, and socket; but unsatisfied Sprawling desires, shapeless, perverse, denied. Finger with finger wreathes; we love, and gape, Fantastic shape to mazed fantastic shape, Straggling, irregular, perplexed, embossed, Grotesquely twined, extravagantly lost By crescive paths and strange protuberant ways From sanity and from wholeness and from grace. How can love triumph, how can solace be, Where fever turns toward fever, knee toward knee? Could we but fill to harmony, and dwell Simple as our thought and as perfectible, Rise disentangled from humanity Strange whole and new into simplicity, Grow to a radiant round love, and bear Unfluctuant passion for some perfect sphere, Love moon to moon unquestioning, and be Like the star Lunisequa, steadfastly Following the round clear orb of her delight, Patiently ever, through the eternal night!