We have now won two world-wars, neither of which concerned us, we were

Whether of earth or sky. Their gnarled roots clingLike wasted fingers of a clutching handIn the grim rock. A silent spectral bandThey watch the old sky, but hold no communingWith aught. Only, when some lone eagle’s wingFlaps past above their grey and desolate land,Or when the wind pants up a rough-hewn glen,Bending them down as…

with banners,The beaters whoop the grouse to the butts.Three gentlemen fling up their guns and the frightened covey isa few wings fewer;Then grooms approach with the panniered horses.The gray old moorland silence has closed like water and coveredthe gunshots.Wave on wave goes the moor to the greatCircle of the sky; the cairn on the slope…

How beautiful when we first beheld it,Unbroken field of poppy and lupin walled with clean cliffs;No intrusion but two or three horses pasturing,Or a few milch cows rubbing their flanks on the outcrop rockheads-Now the spoiler has come: does it care?Not faintly. It has all time. It knows the people are a tideThat swells and…

Not for joy the stars burn, not for joy the vultureSpreads her gray sails on the airOver the mountain; not for joy the worn mountainStands, while years like waterTrench his long sides. ‘I am neither mountain nor birdNor star; and I seek joy.’The weakness of your breed: yet at length quietnessWill cover those wistful eyes.

I thought of the smaller lives that were caught.Beauty is not always lovely; the fire was beautiful, the terrorOf the deer was beautiful; and when I returnedDown the back slopes after the fire had gone by, an eagleWas perched on the jag of a burnt pine,Insolent and gorged, cloaked in the folded storms of his…

Have charm for children but lack nobility; it is bitter earnestnessThat makes beauty; the mindKnows, grown adult.A sudden fog-drift muffled the ocean,A throbbing of engines moved in it,At length, a stone’s throw out, between the rocks and the vapor,One by one moved shadowsOut of the mystery, shadows, fishing-boats, trailing each otherFollowing the cliff for guidance,Holding…