Poems by Sir John Collings Squire Volume I Part 7

See these men in a world of men.

Material bodies?--yes, what then?

These coa.r.s.e trunks that here you see Judge them not, lest judged you be, Bow not to the moment's curse, Nor make four walls a universe.

Think of these bodies here a.s.sembled, Whence they have come, where they have trembled With the strange force that fills us all.

Men and beasts both great and small.

Here within this fleeting home Two hundred men have this day come; Here collected for one day, Each shall go his separate way.

Self, you can imagine nought Of all the battles they have fought, All the labours they have done, All the journeys they have run.

O, they have come from all the world, Borne by invisible currents, swirled Like leaves into this vortex here Flying, or like the spirits drear Windborne and frail, whom Dante saw, Who yet obeyed some hidden law.

Is it not miraculous That they should here be gathered thus, All to be spread before your view, Who are strange to them as they to you?

Soul, how can you sustain without a sob, The lightest thought of this t.i.tanic throb Of earthly life, that swells and breaks Into leaping scattering waves of fire, Into tameless tempests of effort and storms of desire That eternally makes The confused glittering armies of humankind, To their own heroism blind, Swarm over the earth to build, to dig, and to till, To mould and compel land and sea to their will...

Whence we are here eating...

Standing here as on a high hill, Strain, my imagination, strain forth to embrace The energies that labour for this place, This place, this instant. Beyond your island's verge, Listen, and hear the roaring impulsive surge, The clamour of voices, the blasting of powder, the clanging of steel, The thunder of hammers, the rattle of oars...

For this one meal Ten thousand Indian hamlets stored their yields, Manchurian peasants sweltered in their fields, And Greeks drove carts to Patras, and lone men Saw burning summer come and go again And huddled from the winds of winter on The fertile deserts of Saskatchewan.

To fabricate these things have been marchings and slaughters, The sun has toiled and the moon has moved the waters, Cities have laboured, and crowded plains, and deep in the earth Men have plunged unafraid with ardour to wrench the worth Of sweating dim-lit caverns, and paths have been hewn Through forests where for uncounted years nor sun nor moon Have penetrated, men have driven straight s.h.i.+ning rails Through the dense bowels of mountains, and climbed their frozen tops, and wrinkled sailors have shouted at shouting gales In the huge Pacific, and battled around the Horn And gasping, coasted to Rio, and turning towards the morn, Fought over the wastes to Spain, and battered and worn, Sailed up the Channel, and on into the Nore To the city of masts and the smoky familiar sh.o.r.e.

So, so of every substance you see around Might a tale be unwound Of perils pa.s.sed, of adventurous journeys made In man's undying and stupendous crusade.

This flower of man's energies Trade Brought hither to hand and lip By waggon, train or s.h.i.+p, Each atom that we eat....

Stare at the wine, stare at the meat.

The mutton which these platters fills Grazed upon a thousand hills; This bread so square and white and dry Once was corn that sang to the sky; And all these spruce, obedient wines Flowed from the vatted fruit of vines That trailed, a bright maternal host, The warm Mediterranean coast, Or spread their Bacchic mantle on That Iberian Helicon Where the slopes of Portugal Crown the Atlantic's eastern wall.

O mighty energy, never-failing flame!

O patient toils and journeys in the name Of Trade! No journey ever was the same As another, nor ever came again one task; And each man's face is an ever-changing mask.

From the minutest cell to the lordliest star All things are unique, though all of their kindred are.

And though all things exist for ever, all life is change, And the oldest pa.s.sions come to each heart in a garment strange.

Though life be as brief as a flower and the body but dust, Man walks the earth holding both body and spirit in trust; And the various glories of sense are spread for his delight, New pageants glow in the sunset, new stars are born in the night, And clouds come every day, and never a shape recurs, And the gra.s.s grows every year, yet never the same blade stirs Another spring, and no delving man breaks again the self-same clod As he did last year though he stand once more where last year he trod.

O wonderful procession fore-ordained by G.o.d!

Wonderful in unity, wonderful in diversity.

Contemplate it, soul, and see How the material universe moves and strives with anguish and glee!

I was born for that reason, With muscles, heart and eyes, To watch each following season, To work and to be wise; Not body and mind to tether To unseen things alone, But to traverse together The known and the unknown.

My muscles were not welded To waste away in sleep, My bones were never builded To throw upon a heap.

"Man wors.h.i.+ps G.o.d in action,"

Senses and reason call, "And thought is putrefaction, If thought is all in all!"

Most of the guests are gone; look over there, Against a pillar leans with absent air A tall, dark, pallid waiter. There he stands Limply, with vacant eyes and listless hands.

He dreams of some small Tyrolean town, A church, a bridge, a stream that rushes down.

A frustrate, hankering man, this one short time Unconscious he into my gaze did climb; He sinks again, again he is but one Of many myriads underneath the sun, Now faint, now vivid.... How puzzling is it all!

For now again, in spite of all, The lights, the chairs, the diners, and the hall Lose their opacity.

Fool! exert your will, Finish your whisky up, and pay your bill.

FAITH

When I see truth, do I seek truth Only that I may things denote, And, rich by striving, deck my youth As with a vain unusual coat?

Or seek I truth for other ends: That she in other hearts may stir, That even my most familiar friends May turn from me to look on her?

So I this day myself was asking; Out of the window skies were blue And Thames was in the sunlight basking; My thoughts coiled inwards like a screw.

I watched them anxious for a while; Then quietly, as I did watch, Spread in my soul a sudden smile: I knew that no firm thing they'd catch.

And I remembered if I leapt Upon the bosom of the wind It would sustain me; question slept; I felt that I had almost sinned.

A FRESH MORNING

Now am I a tin whistle Through which G.o.d blows, And I wish to G.o.d I were a trumpet --But why, G.o.d only knows.

INTERIOR

I and myself swore enmity. Alack, Myself has tied my hands behind my back.

Yielding, I know there's no excuse in them-- I was accomplice to the stratagem.

ON A FRIEND RECENTLY DEAD

I

The stream goes fast.

When this that is the present is the past, 'Twill be as all the other pasts have been, A failing hill, a daily dimming scene, A far strange port with foreign life astir The s.h.i.+p has left behind, the voyager Will never return to; no, nor see again, Though with a heart full of longing he may strain Back to project himself, and once more count The boats, the whitened walls that climbed the mount, Mark the cathedral's roof, the gathered spires, The vanes, the windows red with sunset's fires, The gap of the market-place, and watch again The coloured groups of women, and the men Lounging at ease along the low stone wall That fringed the harbour; and there beyond it all High pastures morning and evening scattered with small Specks that were grazing sheep.... It is all gone, It is all blurred that once so brightly shone; He cannot now with the old clearness see The rust upon one ringbolt of the quay.

II

And yesterday is dead, and you are dead.

Your duplicate that hovered in my head Thins like blown wreathing smoke, your features grow To interrupted outlines, and all will go Unless I fight dispersal with my will...

So I shall do it ... but too conscious still That, when we walked together, had I known How soon your journey was to end alone, I should not, now that you have gone from view, Be gathering derelict odds and ends of you; But in the intense lucidity of pain Your likeness would have burnt into my brain.

I did not know; lovable and unique, As volatile as a bubble and as weak, You sat with me, and my eyes registered This thing and that, and sluggishly I heard Your voice, remembering here and there a word.

III

So in my mind there's not much left of you, And that disintegrates; but while a few Patches of memory's mirror still are bright Nor your reflected image there has quite Faded and slipped away, it will be well To search for each surviving syllable Of voice and body and soul. And some I'll find Right to my hand, and some tangled and blind Among the obscure weeds that fill the mind.

A pause....

I plunge my thought's hooked resolute claws Deep in the turbid past. Like drowned things in the jaws Of grappling-irons, your features to the verge Of conscious knowledge one by one emerge.

Can I not make these scattered things unite? ...