Hovers ‘twixt vague pleasureAnd tremulous confidence.Arms to have and to use themAnd a soul to be madeWorthy, if not worthy;If afraid, unafraid.To endure for a little,To endure and have done:Men I love about me,Over me the sun!And should at last suddenlyFly the speeding death,The four great quarters of heavenReceive this littlle breath.
The whole bay bared its blaze to me;Loud sang the wind, the wild sun shoneThe tumbled clouds fled scattering on,Light shattered on wave and winking stone,And in the glassy midst stood oneBrighter than sun or cloud or sea.She with flame-vehement hair untied,Virginal in her fluttering dress,Watched, deafened and all dazzle-eyed,Each opulent breaker’s crash and glideAnd…
Day like a tragic actor plays his roleTo the last whispered word and falls gold-clad.I, too, take leave of all I ever had.They shall not say I went with heavy heart:Heavy I am, but soon I shall be free,I love them all, but oh I now departA little sadly, strangely, fearfully,As one who goes to…
For our kisses lightlier runThan the traceries of the sunBy the lolling water castUp grey precipices vast,Lifting smooth and waem and steepOut of the palely shimmering deep.Come, ye sorrowul, and takeKisses that are but half awake:For here are eyes O softer farThan the blossom of the starUpon the mothy twilit waters,And here are mouths whose…
My heart burns whiter, fearfuller, prouder;Hurricanes growAs guns redouble their fire.Through the shaken periscope peepingI glimpse their wire:Black earth, fountains of earth rise, leaping,Spouting like shocks of meeting waves.Death’s fountains are playing,Shells like shrieking birds rush over;Crash and din rises higher.A stream of lead ravesOver us from the left… (we safe under cover!)Crash. Reverberation. Crash!Acrid…
On a more unhappy head,On tears lonelier than mine,Vainer prayers and deepest sighs,Take, sweet spirit, thou that artComforter of our despairsAll the prayers perforce unsaid,All the sighs I cannot sigh,All the tears I cannot shed;Fill his eyes and flood his heart,Who, my everlasting kin,Broods, afar, unknown, apart.Bring, ah bring him that surceaseFrom unsolaceable pain,Which nor…
It is midday; the deep trench glares….A buzz and blaze of flies….The hot wind puffs the giddy airs….The great sun rakes the skies.No sound in all the stagnant trenchWhere forty standing menEndure the sweat and grit and stench,Like cattle in a pen.Sometimes a sniper’s bullet whirsOr twangs the whining wire,Sometimes a soldier sighs and stirsAs…
Flame sleeps beneath the crust;O whence had he those eyesLit with celestial surprise?From what world blew that gust?Are we near to Paradise?Gather a chaplet of five starsAnd the opalescent hueOf the aureole brightness cast —Red, hardly red, and blue, scarce blue, —Round th’ immaculate frosty moon,Splintering light in glacial spars,When November’s loudening blastSweeps heaven’s floor…
Other loves I have, men rough, but men who stirMore grief, more joy, than love of thee and thine.Faces cheerful, full of whimsical mirth,Lined by the wind, burned by the sun;Bodies enraptured by the abounding earth,As whose children we are brethern: one.And any moment may descend hot deathTo shatter limbs! Pulp, tear, blastBelovèd soldiers who…
Of complete silence, darkness absolute,To feel the world, tilted on axle-tree,In slow gyration, with no sensible sound,Unless to ears of unimagined beings,Resident incorporeal or stretchedIn vigilance of ecstasy amongEthereal paths and the celestial maze.The rumour of our onward course now bringsA steady rustle, as of some strange shipDarkling with soundless sail all set and amply…
