Part 2 (1/2)

On windless nights, in the lonely places, There, where the winter water races, O, Porton river, are we forgotten?

Through Porton village, under the bridge, The clear bourne floweth with gra.s.ses trailing, Wherein are shadows of light cloud sailing, And elms that shelter under the ridge.

The pale moon she comes and looks; Over the lonely spire she climbs; For there she is lovelier many times Than in the little broken brooks.

AN OLD HOUSE

No one lives in the old house; long ago The voices of men and women left it lonely.

They shuttered the sightless windows in a row, Imprisoning empty darkness--darkness only.

Beyond the garden-closes, with sudden thunder The lumbering troop-train pa.s.sing clanks and jangles; And I, a stranger, peer with careless wonder Into the thickets of the garden tangles.

Yet, as I pa.s.s, a transient vision dawns Ghostly upon my pondering spirit's gloom, Of grey lavender bushes and weedy lawns And a solitary cherry-tree in bloom....

No one lives in the old house: year by year The plaster crumbles on the lonely walls: The apple falls in the lush gra.s.s; the pear, Pulpy with ripeness, on the pathway falls.

Yet this the garden was, where, on spring nights Under the cherry-blossom, lovers plighted Have wondered at the moony billows white, Dreaming uncountable springs by love delighted;

Whose ears have heard the blackbird's jolly whistle, The shadowy cries of bats in twilight flitting Zigzag beneath the eaves; or, on the thistle, The twitter of autumn birds swinging and sitting;

Whose eyes, on winter evenings, slow returning Saw on the frosted paths pale lamplight fall Streaming, or, on the hearth, red embers burning, And shadows of children playing in the hall.

Where have they gone, lovers of another day?

(No one lives in the old house; long ago They shuttered the sightless windows....) Where are they, Whose eyes delighted in this moony snow?

I cannot tell ... and little enough they care, Though April spray the cherry-boughs with light, And autumn pile her harvest unaware Under the walls that echoed their delight.

I cannot tell ... yet I am as those lovers; For me, who pa.s.s on my predestinate way, The prodigal blossom billows and recovers In ghostly gardens a hundred miles away.

Yet, in my heart, a melancholy rapture Tells me that eyes, which now an iron haste Hurries to iron days, may here recapture A vision of ancient loveliness gone to waste.

THE DHOWS

South of Guardafui with a dark tide flowing We hailed two s.h.i.+ps with tattered canvas bent to the monsoon, Hung betwixt the outer sea and pale surf showing Where dead cities of Libya lay bleaching in the moon.

'Oh whither be ye sailing with torn sails broken?'

'We sail, we sail for Sheba, at Suliman's behest, With carven silver phalli for the ebony maids of Ophir From brown-skinned baharias of Arabia the Blest.'

'Oh whither be ye sailing, with your dark flag flying?'