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Title: Severn & Somme

Author: Ivor Gurney

Release date: November 27, 2020 [eBook #63895]

Language: English

Credits: Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team

at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images

available at The Internet Archive)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SEVERN & SOMME ***

SEVERN & SOMME

SEVERN & SOMME

BY

IVOR GURNEY

Private, of the Gloucesters

LONDON: SIDGWICK & JACKSON, LTD.

3 ADAM STREET, ADELPHI, W.C.2. 1917

First published in 1917

All rights reserved

TO

MARGARET HUNT

PREFACE

THIS book stands dedicated to one only of my friends, but there are many others to whom I would willingly dedicate singly and in state, if that did not mean the writing of forty books of verse and dedications—a terrible thing for all concerned.

So that, under the single name and sign of homage and affection, I would desire such readers as come to me to add also:

To my father and mother; F. W. Harvey (also a Gloucestershire lad); Miss Marion Scott, whose criticism has been so useful, and she so kind, in spite of my continued refusal to alter a word of anything; the Vicar of Twigworth; Herbert Howells (and this is not the last time you will hear of him); Mr. Hilaire Belloc, whose “Path to Rome” has been my trench companion, with “The Spirit of Man”; Mr. Wilfred Gibson, author of “Friends,” a great little book; many others also, including Shakespeare and Bach, both friends of mine; and, last but not least, my comrades of two platoons of the-/-[A] Gloucesters, who so often have wondered whether I were crazy or not. Let them draw their own conclusions now, for the writing of this book it was that so distracted me.... This is a long list, and even now does not include old Mrs. Poyner, who was so jolly and long-suffering, nor my boat Dorothy, now idle in the mud; though a poet sang of her full of glory at Framilode.

[A] The publication of Battalion Nos. being strictly forbidden by the Military Authorities, we have to leave the identification of the platoons referred to by Mr. Gurney to those whom it concerns.—S. & J., LTD.

Even as I write the list becomes fuller, farther extended, yet a soldier must face pain, and so it remains shorter by far than might be.

I fear that those who buy the book (or even borrow), to get information about the Gloucesters will be disappointed. Most of the book is concerned with a person named Myself, and the rest with my county, Gloucester, that whether I die or live stays always with me—being in itself so beautiful, so full of memories; whose people are so good to be friends with, so easy-going and so frank.

Some of the afore-mentioned people I have never had good fortune enough to meet in the flesh, but that was not my fault. I hope they will forgive my using their names without permission. Ah, would they only retaliate in kind! That is, however, not likely, as I never was famous, and a Common Private makes but little show.

All these verses were written in France, and in sound of the guns, save only two or three earlier pieces. This should be reason enough to excuse any roughness in the technique. If more reason is required, people of home, and most of all, people of Gloucester, may well be indulgent to one who thought of them so often, and whose images of beauty in the mind were always of Gloucester, county of Cotswold and Severn, and a plain rich, blossomy, and sweet of airs—as the wise Romans knew, who made their homes in exile by the brown river, watching the further bank for signs of war.

Ivor Gurney.

Spring, 1917.

CONTENTS

PAGE

TO CERTAIN COMRADES

13

THE FIRE KINDLED

15

TO THE POET BEFORE BATTLE

17

MAISEMORE

18

AFTERWARDS

20

CAROL

21

STRANGE SERVICE

23

SERENITY

25

THE SIGNALLER’S VISION

26

THE MOTHER

27

TO ENGLAND—A NOTE

28

BACH AND THE SENTRY

29

LETTERS

30

STRAFE

31

ACQUIESCENCE

32

THE STRONG THING

33

SCOTS

34

TO AN UNKNOWN LADY

35

SONG AND PAIN

36

PURPLE AND BLACK

37

WEST COUNTRY

38

FIRELIGHT

39

THE ESTAMINET

40

SONG

42

BALLAD OF THE THREE SPECTRES

43

COMMUNION

44

TIME AND THE SOLDIER

45

INFLUENCES

46

AFTER-GLOW

47

HAIL AND FAREWELL

48

PRAISE

49

WINTER BEAUTY

50

SONG OF PAIN AND BEAUTY

52

SPRING. ROUEN, MAY 1917

53

JUNE—TO—COME

57

“HARK, HARK, THE LARK”

59

SONG AT MORNING

60

TREES

61

REQUIEM

62

REQUIEM

63

REQUIEM

64

SONNETS 1917:

1. FOR ENGLAND

65

2. PAIN

66

3. SERVITUDE

67

4. HOME-SICKNESS

68

5. ENGLAND THE MOTHER

69

SEVERN AND SOMME

TO CERTAIN COMRADES

(E. S. AND J. H.)

LIVING we loved you, yet withheld our praises

Before your faces;

And though we had your spirits high in honour,

After the English manner

We said no word. Yet, as such comrades would,

You understood.

Such friendship is not touched by Death’s disaster,

But stands the faster;

And all the shocks and trials of time cannot

Shake it one jot.

Beside the fire at night some far December,

We shall remember

And tell men, unbegotten as yet, the story

Of your sad glory—

Of your plain strength, your truth of heart, your splendid

Coolness, all ended!

All ended, ... yet the aching hearts of lovers

Joy overcovers,

Glad in their sorrow; hoping that if they must

Come to the dust,

An ending such as yours may be their portion,

And great good fortune—

That if we may not live to serve in peace

England, watching increase—

Then death with you, honoured, and swift, and high;

And so—not die.

IN TRENCHES, July 1916.

THE FIRE KINDLED

GOD, that I might see

Framilode once again!

Redmarley, all renewed,

Clear shining after rain.

And Cranham, Cranham trees,

And blaze of Autumn hues.

Portway under the moon,

Silvered with freezing dews.

May Hill that Gloster dwellers

’Gainst every sunset see;

And the wide Severn river

Homing again to the sea.

The star of afterglow,

Venus, on western hills;

Dymock in spring: O spring

Of home! O daffodils!

And Malvern’s matchless huge

Bastions of ancient fires—

These will not let me rest,

So hot my heart desires....

Here we go sore of shoulder,

Sore of foot, by quiet streams;

But these are not my rivers....

And these are useless dreams.

TO THE POET BEFORE BATTLE

NOW, youth, the hour of thy dread passion comes:

Thy lovely things must all be laid away;

And thou, as others, must face the riven day

Unstirred by rattle of the rolling drums,

Or bugles’ strident cry. When mere noise numbs

The sense of being, the fear-sick soul doth sway,

Remember thy great craft’s honour, that they may say

Nothing in shame of poets. Then the crumbs

Of praise the little versemen joyed to take

Shall be forgotten: then they must know we are,

For all our skill in words, equal in might

And strong of mettle as those we honoured; make

The name of poet terrible in just war,

And like a crown of honour upon the fight.

MAISEMORE

O WHEN we swung through Maisemore,

The Maisemore people cheered,

And women ran from farmyards,

And men from ricks, afeared

To lose the sight of soldiers

Who would, ’fore Christmas Day,

Blow Kaiser William’s Army

Like mist of breath away!

The war it was but young then!

And we were young, unknowing

The path we were to tread,

The way the path was going.

And not a man of all of us,

Marching across the bridge,

Had thought how Home would linger

In our hearts, as Maisemore Ridge.

When the darkness downward hovers

Making trees like German shadows,

How our souls fly homing, homing

Times and times to Maisemore meadows,

By Aubers ridge that Maisemore men

Have died in vain to hold....

The burning thought but once desires

Maisemore in morning gold!

O when we marched through Maisemore

Past many a creaking cart,

We little thought we had in us

Love so hot at heart.

AFTERWARDS

THOSE dreadful evidences of Man’s ill-doing

The kindly Mother of all shall soon hide deep,

Covering with tender fingers her children asleep,

Till Time’s slow cycle turns them to renewing

In other forms their beauty—no grief, no rueing

Irrevocable woe. They’ll lie, they’ll steep

Their hearts in peace unfathomed, till they leap

Quick to the light of the sun, as flowers strewing,

Maybe, their own friends’ paths. And that’s not all.

When men who knew them walk old ways alone,

The paths they loved together, at even-fall,

The troubled heart shall know a presence near,

Friendly, familiar, and the old grief gone,

The new keen joy shall make all darkness clear.

CAROL

WINTER now has bared the trees,

Killed with tiny swords the jolly

Leafage that mid-summer sees,

But left the ivy and the holly.

Hold them high

And make delight

For Christë’s joy that’s born to-night.

All green things but these have hid

Their heads, or died in melancholy,

Winter’s spite them all has rid

Save only ivy and brave holly.

Give them place

In all men’s sight

For Christë’s grace that’s born to-night.

Baby eyes are pleased to see

Bright red berries and children jolly,

So shout and dance and sing with glee,

And honour ivy and prickly holly.

Honour courage

And make delight

For Christë’s sake that’s born to-night.

Christus natus hodie!

Drink deep of joy on Christmas Day,

Join hands and sing a roundelay,

For this is Christ’s and children’s day,

Christus natus hodie!

Hodie!

STRANGE SERVICE

LITTLE did I dream, England, that you bore me

Under the Cotswold hills beside the water meadows,

To do you dreadful service, here, beyond your borders

And your enfolding seas.

I was a dreamer ever, and bound to your dear service,

Meditating deep, I thought on your secret beauty,

As through a child’s face one may see the clear spirit

Miraculously shining.

Your hills not only hills, but friends of mine and kindly,

Your tiny knolls and orchards hidden beside the river

Muddy and strongly-flowing, with shy and tiny streamlets

Safe in its bosom.

Now these are memories only, and your skies and rushy sky-pools

Fragile mirrors easily broken by moving airs....

In my deep heart for ever goes on your daily being,

And uses consecrate.

Think on me too, O Mother, who wrest my soul to serve you

In strange and fearful ways beyond your encircling waters;

None but you can know my heart, its tears and sacrifice;

None, but you, repay.

SERENITY

NOR steel nor flame has any power on me,

Save that its malice work the Almighty Will,

Nor steel nor flame has any power on me;

Through tempests of hell-fire I must go free

And unafraid; so I remember still

Nor steel nor flame has any power on me,

Save that its malice work the Almighty Will.

THE SIGNALLER’S VISION

ONE rainy winter dusk

Mending a parted cable,

Sudden I saw so clear

Home and the tea-table.

So clear it was, so sweet,

I did not start, but drew

The breath of deep content

Some minutes ere I knew

My Mother’s face that’s soother

Than autumn half-lights kind,

My softly smiling sisters

Who keep me still in mind,

Were but a dream, a vision—

That faded. And I knew

The smell of trench, trench-feeling—

And turned to work anew.

THE MOTHER

WE scar the earth with dreadful engin’ry;

She takes us to her bosom at the last;

Hiding our hate with love, who cannot see

Of any child the faults; and holds us fast.

We’ll wait in quiet till our passion’s past.

TO ENGLAND—A NOTE

I WATCHED the boys of England where they went

Through mud and water to do appointed things.

See one a stake, and one wire-netting brings,

And one comes slowly under a burden bent

Of ammunition. Though the strength be spent

They “carry on” under the shadowing wings

Of Death the ever-present. And hark, one sings

Although no joy from the grey skies be lent.

Are these the heroes—these? have kept from you

The power of primal savagery so long?

Shall break the devil’s legions? These they are

Who do in silence what they might boast to do;

In the height of battle tell the world in song

How they do hate and fear the face of War.

BACH AND THE SENTRY

WATCHING the dark my spirit rose in flood

On that most dearest Prelude of my delight.

The low-lying mist lifted its hood,

The October stars showed nobly in clear night.

When I return, and to real music-making,

And play that Prelude, how will it happen then?

Shall I feel as I felt, a sentry hardly waking,

With a dull sense of No Man’s Land again?

LETTERS

“MAIL’S UP!” The vast of night is over,

And love of friends fills all one’s mind.

(His wife, his sister, or his lover.)

Mail’s up, the vast of night is over,

The grey-faced heaven joy does cover

With love, and God once more seems kind.

“Mail’s up!” the vast of night is over,

And love of friends fills all one’s mind.

STRAFE

THE “crumps” are falling twenty to the minute.

We crouch, and wait the end of it—or us.

Just behind the trench, before, and in it,

The “crumps” are falling twenty to the minute;

(O Framilode! O Maisemore’s laughing linnet!)

Here comes a monster like a motor-bus.

The “crumps” are falling twenty to the minute:

We crouch and wait the end of it—or us.

ACQUIESCENCE

SINCE I can neither alter my destiny

By one hair’s breadth from its appointed course;

Since bribes nor prayers nor any earthly force

May from its pathway move a life not free—

I must gather together the whole strength of me.

My senses make my willing servitors;

Cherish and feed the better, starve the worse;

Turn all my pride to proud humility.

Meeting the daily shocks and frozen, stony,

Cynical face of doubt with smiles and joy—

As a battle with autumn winds delights a boy,

Before the smut of the world and the lust of money,

Power, and fame, can yet his youth destroy;

Ere he has scorned his Father’s patrimony.

THE STRONG THING

I HAVE seen Death and the faces of men in fear

Of Death, and shattered, terribly ruined flesh,

Appalled; but through the horror, coloured and clear

The love of my county, Gloster, rises afresh.

And on the Day of Days, the Judgment Day,

The Word of Doom awaiting breathless and still,

I’ll marvel how sweet’s the air down Framilode way,

And take my sentence on sheer-down Crickley Hill.

SCOTS

THE boys who laughed and jested with me but yesterday,

So fit for kings to speak to, so blithe and proud and gay ...

Are now but thoughts of blind pain, and best hid away....

(Over the top this morning at the dawn’s first grey.)

O, if we catch the Kaiser his dirty hide to flay,

We’ll hang him on a tall tree his pride to allay.

That will not bring the boys again to mountain and brae....

(Over the top this morning at the dawn’s first grey.)

To think—earth’s best and dearest turned to red broken clay

By one devil’s second! What words can we say?

Or what gift has God their mothers’ anguish to repay?...

(Over the top this morning at the first flush of day.)

TO AN UNKNOWN LADY

YOU that were once so sweet, are sweeter now

That an even leaden greyness clouds my days;

A pain it is to think on your sweet ways,

Your careless-tender speaking, tender and low.

When the hills enclosed us, hid in happy valleys,

Greeting a thousand times the things most dear,

We wasted thoughts of love in laughter clear,

And told our passion out in mirthful sallies.

But in me now a burning impulse rages

To praise our love in words like flaming gold,

Molten and live for ever; not fit for cold

And coward like-to-passions Time assuages.

Nor do I fear you are lovely only in dreams,

Being as the sky reflected in clear streams.

SONG AND PAIN

OUT of my sorrow have I made these songs,

Out of my sorrow;

Though somewhat of the making’s eager pain

From Joy did borrow.

Some day, I trust, God’s purpose of Pain for me

Shall be complete,

And then—to enter in the House of Joy....

Prepare, my feet.

PURPLE AND BLACK

THE death of princes is

Honoured most greatly,

Proud kings put purple on

In manner stately.

Though they have lived such life

As God offends,

Gone fearful down to death,

Sick, without friends.

And in the temple dim,

Trumpets of gold

Proclaim their glory; so

Their story is told.

In sentimental hymns

Weeping her dolour,

The mother of heroes wears

Vile black—Death’s colour,

Who should walk proudly with

The noblest one

Of all that purple throng—

“This was my son.”

WEST COUNTRY

SPRING comes soon to Maisemore

And spring comes sweet,

With bird-songs and blue skies,

On gay dancing feet;

But she is such a shy lady

I fear we’ll never meet.

Yet some day round a corner

Where the hedge foams white,

I’ll find Spring sleeping

In the young-crescent night,

And seize her and make her

Yield all her delight.

But yon’s a glad story

That’s yet to be told.

Here’s grey winter’s bareness

And no-shadowed cold.

O Spring, with your music,

Your blue, green, and gold,

Come shame his hard wisdom

With laughter and gold!

FIRELIGHT

SILENT, bathed in firelight, in dusky light and gloom

The boys squeeze together in the smoky dirty room,

Crowded round the fireplace, a thing of bricks and tin,

They watch the shifting embers till the good dreams enter in,

That fill the low hovel with blossoms fresh with dew,

And blue sky and white clouds that sail the clear air through.

They talk of daffodillies and the bluebells’ skiey bed,

Till silence thrills and murmurs at the things they have said.

And yet, they have no skill of words, whose eyes glow so deep,

They wait for night and silence and the strange power of sleep,

To lift them and drift them like sea-birds over the sea

Where some day I shall walk again, and they walk with me.

THE ESTAMINET

THE crowd of us were drinking

One night at Riez Bailleul,

The glasses were a-clinking,

The estaminet was full;

And loud with song and story

And blue with tales and smoke,—

We spoke no word of glory,

Nor mentioned “foreign yoke.”

But yarns of girls in Blighty;

Vain, jolly, ugly, fair,

Standoffish, foolish, flighty—

And O! that we were there!

Where never thuds a “Minnie,”

But Minnie smiles at you

A-meeting in the spinney,

With kisses not a few.

And of an inn that Johnson

Does keep; the “Rising Sun.”

His friends him call Jack Johnson,

He’s Gloster’s only one.

And talk of poachers’ habits

(But girls ever and again)

Of killing weasels, rabbits,

Stoats, pheasants, never men,

Although we knew to-morrow

Must take us to the line,

In beer hid thought and sorrow,

In ruddy and white wine.

When all had finished drinking,

Though still was clear each head,

We said no word—went slinking

Straight homeward (?), into bed (?).

O never lads were merrier

Nor straighter nor more fine,

Though we were only “Terrier”

And only, “Second Line.”

O I may get to Blighty,

Or hell, without a sign

Of all the love that filled me,

Leave dumb the love that filled me,

The flood of love that filled me

For these dear comrades of mine.

SONG

ONLY the wanderer

Knows England’s graces,

Or can anew see clear

Familiar faces.

And who loves joy as he

That dwells in shadows?

Do not forget me quite,

O Severn meadows.

BALLAD OF THE THREE SPECTRES

AS I went up by Ovillers

In mud and water cold to the knee,

There went three jeering, fleering spectres,

That walked abreast and talked of me.

The first said, “Here’s a right brave soldier

That walks the dark unfearingly;

Soon he’ll come back on a fine stretcher,

And laughing for a nice Blighty.”

The second, “Read his face, old comrade,

No kind of lucky chance I see;

One day he’ll freeze in mud to the marrow,

Then look his last on Picardie.”

Though bitter the word of these first twain

Curses the third spat venomously;

“He’ll stay untouched till the war’s last dawning

Then live one hour of agony.”

Liars the first two were. Behold me

At sloping arms by one—two—three;

Waiting the time I shall discover

Whether the third spake verity.

COMMUNION

BEAUTY lies so deep

On all the fields,

Nothing for the eyes

But blessing yields.

Tall elms, greedy of light,

Stand tip-toe. See

The last light linger in

Their tracery.

The guns are dumb, are still

All evil noises.

The singing heart in peace

Softly rejoices,

Only unsatisfied

With Beauty’s hunger

And sacramental thirst—

Nothing of anger.

Mist wraiths haunt the path

As daylight lessens,

The stars grow clearer, and

My dead friend’s presence.

TIME AND THE SOLDIER

HOW slow you move, old Time;

Walk a bit faster!

Old fool, I’m not your slave....

Beauty’s my master!

You hold me for a space....

What are you, Time?

A ghost, a thing of thought,

An easy rhyme.

Some day I shall again,

For all your scheming,

See Severn valley clouds

Like banners streaming.

And walk in Cranham lanes,

By Maisemore go....

But, fool, decrepit Fool,

You are SO SLOW!!!

INFLUENCES

WHEN woods of home grow dark,

I grow dark too.

Images of strange power

Fill me and thrill me that hour,

Sombre of hue.

The woods of Dunsinane

I walk, and know

What storms did shake Macbeth,

That brought on Duncan’s death,

And his own woe.

Strange whispers chill the blood

Of evil breath;

Such rumours as did stir

Witch and foul sorcerer

On the lone heath.

No power have these on me;

I know too well

Their weakness to condemn.

Spring will exorcise them

With one bluebell.

AFTER-GLOW

[TO F. W. HARVEY]

OUT of the smoke and dust of the little room

With tea-talk loud and laughter of happy boys,

I passed into the dusk. Suddenly the noise

Ceased with a shock, left me alone in the gloom,

To wonder at the miracle hanging high

Tangled in twigs, the silver crescent clear.—

Time passed from mind. Time died; and then we were

Once more at home together, you and I.

The elms with arms of love wrapped us in shade

Who watched the ecstatic West with one desire,

One soul uprapt; and still another fire

Consumed us, and our joy yet greater made:

That Bach should sing for us, mix us in one

The joy of firelight and the sunken sun.

HAIL AND FAREWELL

THE destined bullet wounded him,

They brought him down to die,

Far-off a bugle sounded him

“Retreat,” Good-bye.

Strange, that from ways so hated,

And tyranny so hard

Should come this strangely fated

And farewell word.

He thought, “Some Old Sweat might

Have thrilled at heart to hear,

Gone down into the night

Too proud to fear!

But I—the fool at arms,

Musician, poet to boot,

Who hail release; what charms

In this salute?”

He smiled—“The latest jest

That time on me shall play.”

And watched the dying west,

Went out with the day.

PRAISE

O friends of mine, if men mock at my name,

Say “Children loved him.”

Since by that word you will have far removed him

From any bitter shame.

WINTER BEAUTY

I CANNOT live with Beauty out of mind;

I seek her and desire her all the day,

Being the chiefest treasure man may find,

And word most sweet his eager lips can say.

She is as strong on me as though I wandered

In Severn meadows some blue riotous day.

But since the trees have long since lost their green,

And I, an exile, can but dream of things

Grown magic in the mind, I watch the sheen

Of frost and hear the song Orion sings,

And hear the star-born passion of Beethoven;

Man’s consolations sung on the quivering strings.

Beauty of song remembered, sunset glories,

Mix in my mind, till I not care nor know

Whether the stars do move me, golden stories,

Or ruddy Cotswold in the sunset glow.

I am uprapt, and not my own, immortal, ...

In winds of Beauty swinging to and fro.

Beauty immortal, not to be hid, desire

Of all men, each in his fashion, give me the strong

Thirst past satisfaction for thee, and fire

Not to be quenched.... O lift me, bear me along,

Touch me, make me worthy that men may seek me

For Beauty, Mistress Immortal, Healer of Wrong.

SONG OF PAIN AND BEAUTY

[To M. M. S.]

O MAY these days of pain,

These wasted-seeming days,

Somewhere reflower again

With scent and savour of praise.

Draw out of memory all bitterness

Of night with Thy sun’s rays.

And strengthen Thou in me

The love of men here found,

And eager charity,

That, out of difficult ground,

Spring like flowers in barren deserts, or

Like light, or a lovely sound.

A simpler heart than mine

Might have seen beauty clear

Where I could see no sign

Of Thee, but only fear.

Strengthen me, make me to see Thy beauty always

In every happening here.

IN TRENCHES, March 1917.

SPRING. ROUEN, MAY 1917

I AM dumb, I am dumb!

And here’s a Norman orchard and here’s Spring

Goading the sullen words that will not come.

Romance, beating his distant magical drum,

Calls to a soldier bearing alien arms,

“Throw off your yoke and hear my darlings sing,

Blackbirds” (by red-roofed farms)

“More drunk than any poet with May’s delight,

Green alive to the eye, and pink and white.”

Joy’s there, but not for me;

And song, but shall I sing

That live as in a dream of some bad night,

Whose memories are of such ecstasy

And height of passionate joy, that pain alone

Is born of beauty in cloud and flower and tree;

Yes, and the great Cathedral’s towering stone.

To me these are but shadows

Of orchards and old meadows

Trodden before the dawn,

Trodden after the dusk....

All loveliness of France is as a husk,

The inner living spirit of beauty gone,

To that familiar beauty now withdrawn

From exiles hungering ever for the sight

Of her day-face;

England’s;

Or in some orchard space

Breathless to drink peace from her calm night.

How shall I sing, since she sings not to me

Songs any more?

High rule she holds for ever on the sea

That’s hers, but dreams too might guard the shore

Of France, that’s French and set apart for ever.

A Spirit of Love our link of song does sever.

Had it been hate

(The weakest of all sworn enemies of Love)

We should have broken through or passed above

Its foolish barriers;

Here we must bow as to established Fate,

And reverently; for, comrades and high peers,

Sisters in blood,

Our mothers brook no rival in their state

Of motherhood.

But not for ever shall our travail last,

And not for ever we

Be held by iron Duty over sea.

The image of evil shall be overcast,

And all his willing slaves and priests of evil

Scattered like dust, shall lie upon the plain;

That image, ground to dust utterly level

With unregarded weeds and all as vain.

The oppressed shall lift their hearts up once again,

And we return....

Not to scarred lands and homes laid in the dust,

Not with hard hearts to sights that sear and burn,

But with assured longing and certain trust,

To England’s royal grace and dignity,

To England’s changing skies, rich greenery,

High strength controlled, queenly serenity,

Inviolate kept by her confederate sea

And hearts resolved to every sacrifice.

We shall come home,

We shall come home again,

Living and dead, one huge victorious host—

The dead that would not leave their comrades till

The last steep were topped of the difficult hill,

The last farthing paid of the Great Cost,

The last thrill suffered of the Great Pain.

Living and dead, we shall come home at last

To her sweet breast,

England’s; by one touch be paid in full

For all things grey and long and terrible

Of that dread night which seemed eternity.

O Mother, shall thy kisses not restore

Body and life-sick soul? Yes, and set free

Songs and great floods of lovelier melody

Than thou didst give

When we those days of half-awake did live.

And joy must surely flower again more fair

To us, who dwelt in shadows and foul air.

We’ll breathe and drink in song.

Spring shall blot out all traces of old care;

Her clouds of green and waves of gold among

We shall grow free of heart, and great, and young—

Be made anew in that Great Resurrection,

Perfect as is the violet’s perfection.

Perfect as she

Who sanctifies our memory with sorrow,

Hugs, as a mother hugs, the thoughts that harrow,

Watching for dawn, hungering for the morrow

Lone oversea....

I am dumb now, dumb,

But in that time what music shall not come?

Mother of Beauty, Mistress of the Sea.

JUNE—TO—COME

WHEN the sun’s fire and gold

Sets the bee humming,

I will not write to tell

Him that I’m coming,

But ride out unawares

On that old road,

Of Minsterworth, of Peace,

Of Framilode,

And walk, not looked for, in

That cool, dark passage.

Never a single word;

Myself my message.

And then; well ... O we’ll drift

And stand and gaze,

And wonder how we could

In those Bad Days

Live without Minsterworth;

Or western air

Fanning the hot cheek,

Stirring the hair;

In land where hate of men

God’s love did cover;

This land.... And here’s my dream

Irrevocably over.

“HARK, HARK, THE LARK”

HARK, hark, the lark to heaven’s gate uprisen,

Pours out his joy ...

I think of you, shut in some distant prison,

O Boy, poor Boy;

Your heart grown sick with hope deferred and shadows

Of prison ways;

Not daring to snatch a thought of Severn meadows,

Or old blue-days.

SONG AT MORNING

PRAISE for the day’s magnificent uprising!

Praise for the cool

Air and the blue new-old ever-surprising

Face of the sky, and mirrored blue of the pool.

Only the fool, bat-witted, owl-eyed fool

Can hold a deaf ear while life begins

The actual opening of a myriad stories....

Blindness, ingratitude, the foolishest sins!

Now if this day blot out my chief desires,

And leave me maimed and blind and full of hot

Surges of insurrection, evil fires,

Memories of joys that seem better forgot;

Quiet me then.

Thy Will is binding on the nearest flower

As on the farthest star; and what shall put me

Out of Thy power, or from Thy guidance far,

Though I in hell of my self-will would shut me?

But if Thy Will be joy for me to-day,

Give me clear eyes, a heart open to feel

Thy influence, Thy kindness: O unseal

The shut, the hidden places in me, reveal

Those things most precious secretly hidden away

From all save children and the simply wise.

Give me clear eyes!

And strength to know, whatever may befall,

The eternal presence of great mysteries,

Glorifying Thee for all.

TREES

(“You cannot think how ghastly these battle-fields look under a grey sky. Torn trees are the most terrible things I have ever seen. Absolute blight and curse is on the face of everything.”)

THE dead land oppressed me;

I turned my thoughts away,

And went where hill and meadow

Are shadowless and gay.

Where Coopers stands by Cranham,

Where the hill-gashes white

Show golden in the sunshine,

Our sunshine—God’s delight.

Beauty my feet stayed at last

Where green was most cool,

Trees worthy of all worship

I worshipped ... then, O fool,

Let my thoughts slide unwitting

To other, dreadful trees, ...

And found me standing, staring

Sick of heart—at these!

REQUIEM

POUR out your light, O stars, and do not hold

Your loveliest shining from earth’s outworn shell—

Pure and cold your radiance, pure and cold

My dead friend’s face as well.

REQUIEM

NOR grief nor tears should wrong the silent dead

Save England’s, for her children fallen so far

From her eager care; though by God’s justice led

And fallen in such a war.

REQUIEM

POUR out your bounty, moon of radiant shining

On all this shattered flesh, these quiet forms;

For these were slain, so strangely still reclining,

In the noblest cause was ever waged with arms.

SONNETS 1917

[TO THE MEMORY OF RUPERT BROOKE]

1. FOR ENGLAND

THOUGH heaven be packed with joy-bewildering

Pleasures of soul and heart and mind, yet who

Would willingly let slip, freely let go

Earth’s mortal loveliness; go wandering

Where never the late bird is heard to sing,

Nor full-sailed cloud-galleons wander slow;

No pathways in the woods; no afterglow,

When the air’s fire and magic with sense of spring?

So the dark horror clouds us, and the dread

Of the unknown.... But if it must be, then

What better passing than to go out like men

For England, giving all in one white glow?

Whose bodies shall lie in earth as on a bed,

And as the Will directs our spirits may go

2. PAIN

PAIN, pain continual; pain unending;

Hard even to the roughest, but to those

Hungry for beauty.... Not the wisest knows,

Nor most pitiful-hearted, what the wending

Of one hour’s way meant. Grey monotony lending

Weight to the grey skies, grey mud where goes

An army of grey bedrenched scarecrows in rows

Careless at last of cruellest Fate-sending.

Seeing the pitiful eyes of men foredone,

Or horses shot, too tired merely to stir,

Dying in shell-holes both, slain by the mud.

Men broken, shrieking even to hear a gun.—

Till pain grinds down, or lethargy numbs her,

The amazed heart cries angrily out on God.

3. SERVITUDE

IF it were not for England, who would bear

This heavy servitude one moment more?

To keep a brothel, sweep and wash the floor

Of filthiest hovels were noble to compare

With this brass-cleaning life. Now here, now there

Harried in foolishness, scanned curiously o’er

By fools made brazen by conceit, and store

Of antique witticisms thin and bare.

Only the love of comrades sweetens all,

Whose laughing spirit will not be outdone.

As night-watching men wait for the sun

To hearten them, so wait I on such boys

As neither brass nor Hell-fire may appal,

Nor guns, nor sergeant-major’s bluster and noise.

4. HOME-SICKNESS

WHEN we go wandering the wide air’s blue spaces,

Bare, unhappy, exiled souls of men;

How will our thoughts over and over again

Return to Earth’s familiar lovely places,

Where light with shadow ever interlaces—

No blanks of blue, nor ways beyond man’s ken—

Where birds are, and flowers, as violet, and wren,

Blackbird, bluebell, hedge-sparrow, tiny daisies.

O tiny things, but very stuff of soul

To us ... so frail.... Remember what we are;

Set us not on some strange outlandish star,

But one caring for Love. Give us a Home.

There we may wait while the long ages roll

Content, unfrightened by vast Time-to-come.

5. ENGLAND THE MOTHER

WE have done our utmost, England, terrible

And dear taskmistress, darling Mother and stern.

The unnoticed nations praise us, but we turn

Firstly, only to thee—“Have we done well?

Say, are you pleased?”—and watch your eyes that tell

To us all secrets, eyes sea-deep that burn

With love so long denied; with tears discern

The scars and haggard look of all that hell.

Thy love, thy love shall cherish, make us whole,

Whereto the power of Death’s destruction is weak.

Death impotent, by boys bemocked at, who

Will leave unblotted in the soldier-soul

Gold of the daffodil, the sunset streak,

The innocence and joy of England’s blue.

THE END

PRINTED BY

HAZELL, WATSON AND VINEY, LD.,

LONDON AND AYLESBURY.

From Sidgwick & Jackson’s List of Poetry

ASQUITH, HERBERT. The Volunteer and other Poems. Second Edition, with new Poems added. 2s. net.

BROOKE, RUPERT. Poems. (First issued 1911.) Nineteenth Impression. 2s. 6d. net.

—— 1914 and other Poems. With a Portrait. Twenty-first Impression. 2s. 6d. net.

—— Selected Poems. With a new Portrait. Second Impression. Cloth, 3s. 6d. net; lambskin, 5s. net.

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Table of Contents

SEVERN & SOMME

PREFACE

CONTENTS

SEVERN AND SOMME

TO CERTAIN COMRADES (E. S. AND J. H.)

THE FIRE KINDLED

TO THE POET BEFORE BATTLE

MAISEMORE

AFTERWARDS

CAROL

STRANGE SERVICE

SERENITY

THE SIGNALLER’S VISION

THE MOTHER

TO ENGLAND—A NOTE

BACH AND THE SENTRY

LETTERS

STRAFE

ACQUIESCENCE

THE STRONG THING

SCOTS

TO AN UNKNOWN LADY

SONG AND PAIN

PURPLE AND BLACK

WEST COUNTRY

FIRELIGHT

THE ESTAMINET

SONG

BALLAD OF THE THREE SPECTRES

COMMUNION

TIME AND THE SOLDIER

INFLUENCES

AFTER-GLOW

HAIL AND FAREWELL

PRAISE

WINTER BEAUTY

SONG OF PAIN AND BEAUTY

SPRING. ROUEN, MAY 1917

JUNE—TO—COME

“HARK, HARK, THE LARK”

SONG AT MORNING

TREES

REQUIEM

REQUIEM

REQUIEM

SONNETS 1917

1. FOR ENGLAND

2. PAIN

3. SERVITUDE

4. HOME-SICKNESS

5. ENGLAND THE MOTHER

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