I struck the board, and cried, "No more!
I will abroad.
What! shall I ever sigh and pine?
My lines and life are free; free as the road,
Loose as the wind, as large as store.
Shall I be still in suit?
Have I no harvest but a thorn
To let me blood, and not restore
What I have lost with cordial fruit?
Sure there was wine
Before my sighs did dry it; there was corn
Before my tears did drown it.
Is the year only lost to me?
Have I no bays to crown it?
No flowers, no garlands gay? all blasted?
All wasted?

The morning comes, and thickening clouds prevail,
Hanging like curtains all the horizon round,
Or overhead in heavy stillness sail;
So still is day, it seems like night profound;
Scarce by the city's din the air is stirred,
And dull and deadened comes its every sound;
The cock's shrill, piercing voice subdued is heard,
By the thick folds of muffling vapors drowned.
Dissolved in mists the hills and trees appear,
Their outlines lost and blended with the sky;
And well-known objects, that to all are near,

XXXVI
The swift approach and unexpected speed
The king had made upon this new-rais'd force,
In the unconfirmed troops, much fear did breed,
Untimely hind'ring their intended course.
The joining with the Welsh they had decreed
Was hereby dash'd; which made their cause the worse.
Northumberland, with forces from the north,
Expected to be there, was not set forth.

XXXVII
And yet undaunted Hotspur, seeing the king
So near arriv'd, leaving the work in hand,
With forward speed his forces marshalling,

for Sydney Pettit

The lines are keen against today's bad sky
about to rain. We're white and understand
why Indians sold butter for the funds
to build this church. Four hens and a rooster
huddle on the porch. We are dark
and know why no one climbed to pray. The priest
who did his best to imitate a bell
watched the river, full of spirits, coil
below the hill, relentless for the bay.

A church abandoned to the wind is portent.
In high wind, ruins make harsh music.
The priest is tending bar. His dreams have paid

Ye gods that have a home beyond the world,
Ye that have eyes for all man’s agony,
Ye that have seen this woe that we have seen,—
Look with a just regard,
And with an even grace,
Here on the shattered corpse of a shattered king,
Here on a suffering world where men grow old
And wander like sad shadows till, at last,
Out of the flare of life,
Out of the whirl of years,
Into the mist they go,
Into the mist of death.

O shades of you that loved him long before
The cruel threads of that black sail were spun,

For those that never know the light,
The darkness is a sullen thing;
And they, the Children of the Night,
Seem lost in Fortune's winnowing.

But some are strong and some are weak, --
And there's the story. House and home
Are shut from countless hearts that seek
World-refuge that will never come.

And if there be no other life,
And if there be no other chance
To weigh their sorrow and their strife
Than in the scales of circumstance,

'T were better, ere the sun go down
Upon the first day we embark,

954

The Chemical conviction
That Nought be lost
Enable in Disaster
My fractured Trust—

The Faces of the Atoms
If I shall see
How more the Finished Creatures
Departed me!

Would you hear a Wild tale of adventure
Of a hero who tackled the sea,
A super-man swimming the ocean,
Then hark to the tale of Joe Lee.

Our Channel, our own Straits of Dover
Had heen swum by an alien lot:
Our British-born swimmers had tried it,
But that was as far as they'd got.

So great was the outcry in England,
Darts Players neglected their beer,
And the Chanc'Ior proclaimed from the Woolsack
As Joe Lee were the chap for this 'ere.

For in swimming baths all round the country

POOR River, now thou'rt almost dry,
What Nymph, or Swain, will near thee lie?
Since brought, alas! to sad Decay,
What Flocks, or Herds, will near thee stay?
The Swans, that sought thee in thy Pride,
Now on new Streams forgetful ride:
And Fish, that in thy Bosom lay,
Chuse in more prosp'rous Floods to play.
All leave thee, now thy Ebb appears,
To waste thy sad Remains in Tears;
Nor will thy mournful Murmurs heed.
Fly, wretched Stream, with all thy speed,
Amongst those solid Rocks thy Griefs bestow;

Up the dusk-enfolded prairie,
Foot-falls, soft and sly,
Velvet cushioned, wild and wary,
Then--the coyote's cry.

Rush of hoofs, and roar and rattle,
Beasts of blood and breed,
Twenty thousand frightened cattle,
Then--the wild stampede.

Pliant lasso circling wider
In the frenzied flight--
Loping horse and cursing rider,
Plunging through the night.

Rim of dawn the darkness losing
Trail of blackened soil;
Perfume of the sage brush oozing
On the air like oil.