i{But wind comes up from the shore:}

i{They shake when the winds roar,}
i{Old bones upon the mountain shake.}

BROKEN DREAMS
THERE is grey in your hair.

Young men no longer suddenly catch their breath
When you are passing;

But maybe some old gaffer mutters a blessing
Because it was your prayer

Recovered him upon the bed of death.
For your sole sake -- that all heart's ache have known,

And given to others all heart's ache,
From meagre girlhood's putting on

Burdensome beauty -- for your sole sake
Heaven has put away the stroke of her doom,

So great her portion in that peace you make
By merely walking in a room.

Your beauty can but leave among us
Vague memories, nothing but memories.

A young man when the old men are done talking
Will say to an old man, "Tell me of that lady

The poet stubborn with his passion sang us
When age might well have chilled his blood.'

Vague memories, nothing but memories,
But in the grave all, all, shall be renewed.

The certainty that I shall see that lady
Leaning or standing or walking

In the first loveliness of womanhood,
And with the fervour of my youthful eyes,

Has set me muttering like a fool.
You are more beautiful than any one,

And yet your body had a flaw:
Your small hands were not beautiful,

And I am afraid that you will run
And paddle to the wrist

In that mysterious, always brimming lake
Where those What have obeyed the holy law

paddle and are perfect. Leave unchanged
The hands that I have kissed,

For old sake's sake.
The last stroke of midnight dies.

All day in the one chair
From dream to dream and rhyme to rhyme I have

ranged
In rambling talk with an image of air:

Vague memories, nothing but memories.
BROWN PENNY

I WHISPERED, "I am too young,"
And then, "I am old enough";

Wherefore I threw a penny
To find out if I might love.

"Go and love, go and love, young man,
If the lady be young and fair."

Ah, penny, brown penny, brown penny,
I am looped in the loops of her hair.

O love is the crooked thing,
There is nobody wise enough

To find out all that is in it,
For he would be thinking of love

Till the stars had run away
And the shadows eaten the moon.

Ah, penny, brown penny, brown penny,
One cannot begin it too soon.

TO SOME I HAVE TALKED WITH BY THE FIRE
WHILE I wrought out these fitful Danaan rhymes,

My heart would brim with dreams about the times
When we bent down above the fading coals

And talked of the dark folk who live in souls
Of passionate men, like bats in the dead trees;

And of the waywardtwilight companies
Who sigh with mingled sorrow and content,

Because their blossoming dreams have never bent
Under the fruit of evil and of good:

And of the embattled flaming multitude
Who rise, wing above wing, flame above flame,

And, like a storm, cry the Ineffable Name,
And with the clashing of their sword-blades make

A rapturous music, till the morning break
And the white hush end all but the loud beat

Of their long wings, the flash of their white feet.
CHURCH AND STATE

HERE is fresh matter, poet,
Matter for old age meet;

Might of the Church and the State,
Their mobs put under their feet.

O but heart's wine shall run pure,
Mind's bread grow sweet.

That were a cowardly song,
Wander in dreams no more;

What if the Church and the State
Are the mob that howls at the door!

Wine shall run thick to the end,
Bread taste sour.

MEDITATIONS IN TIME OF CIVIL WAR
I

i{Ancestral Houses}
SURELY among a rich man s flowering lawns,

Amid the rustle of his planted hills,
Life overflows without ambitious pains;

And rains down life until the basin spills,
And mounts more dizzy high the more it rains

As though to choose whatever shape it wills
And never stoop to a mechanical

Or servile shape, at others' beck and call.
Mere dreams, mere dreams! Yet Homer had not Sung

Had he not found it certain beyond dreams
That out of life's own self-delight had sprung

The abounding glittering jet; though now it seems
As if some marvellous empty sea-shell flung

Out of the obscure dark of the rich streams,
And not a fountain, were the symbol which

Shadows the inherited glory of the rich.
Some violent bitter man, some powerful man

Called architect and artist in, that they,
Bitter and violent men, might rear in stone

The sweetness that all longed for night and day,
The gentleness none there had ever known;

But when the master's buried mice can play.
And maybe the great-grandson of that house,

For all its bronze and marble, 's but a mouse.
O what if gardens where the peacock strays

With delicate feet upon old terraces,
Or else all Juno from an urn displays

Before the indifferent garden deities;
O what if levelled lawns and gravelled ways

Where slippered Contemplation finds his ease
And Childhood a delight for every sense,

But take our greatness with our violence?
What if the glory of escutcheoned doors,

And buildings that a haughtier age designed,
The pacing to and fro on polished floors

Amid great chambers and long galleries, lined
With famous portraits of our ancestors;

What if those things the greatest of mankind
Consider most to magnify, or to bless,

But take our greatness with our bitterness?
II

i{My House}
An ancient bridge, and a more ancient tower,

A farmhouse that is sheltered by its wall,
An acre of stony ground,

Where the symbolic rose can break in flower,
Old ragged elms, old thorns innumerable,

The sound of the rain or sound
Of every wind that blows;

The stilted water-hen
Crossing Stream again

Scared by the splashing of a dozen cows;
A winding stair, a chamberarched with stone,

A grey stone fireplace with an open hearth,
A candle and written page.

i{Il Penseroso's} Platonist toiled on
In some like chamber, shadowing forth

How the daemonic rage
Imagined everything.

Benighted travellers
From markets and from fairs

Have seen his midnight candle glimmering.
Two men have founded here. A man-at-arms

Gathered a score of horse and spent his days
In this tumultuous spot,

Where through long wars and sudden night alarms
His dwinding score and he seemed castaways

Forgetting and forgot;
And I, that after me

My bodily heirs may find,
To exalt a lonely mind,

Befitting emblems of adversity.
III

i{My Table}
Two heavy trestles, and a board

Where Sato's gift, a changeless sword,
By pen and paper lies,

That it may moralise
My days out of their aimlessness.

A bit of an embroidered dress
Covers its wooden sheath.

Chaucer had not drawn breath
When it was forged. In Sato's house,

Curved like new moon, moon-luminous
It lay five hundred years.

Yet if no change appears
No moon; only an aching heart

Conceives a changeless work of art.
Our learned men have urged

That when and where 'twas forged
A marvellous accomplishment,

In painting or in pottery, went
From father unto son

And through the centuries ran
And seemed unchanging like the sword.

Soul's beauty being most adored,
Men and their business took

Me soul's unchanging look;
For the most rich inheritor,

Knowing that none could pass Heaven's door,
That loved inferior art,

Had such an aching heart
That he, although a country's talk

For silken clothes and stately walk.
Had waking wits; it seemed

• portion [´pɔ:ʃən] n.嫁妆；命运 vt.分配 (初中英语单词)
• passion [´pæʃən] n.激情；激怒；恋爱 (初中英语单词)
• standing [´stændiŋ] n.持续 a.直立的 (初中英语单词)
• youthful [´ju:θfəl] a.年轻的；青年的 (初中英语单词)
• mysterious [mi´stiəriəs] a.神秘的；难以理解的 (初中英语单词)
• midnight [´midnait] n.午夜；漆黑 (初中英语单词)
• wrought [rɔ:t] work 的过去式(分词) (初中英语单词)
• twilight [´twailait] n.黎明；黄昏 (初中英语单词)
• rustle [´rʌsl] v.&n.(使)沙沙作响 (初中英语单词)
• ambitious [æm´biʃəs] a.有雄心的；热望的 (初中英语单词)
• whatever [wɔt´evə] pron.&a.无论什么 (初中英语单词)
• fountain [´fauntin] n.泉水；源泉；根源 (初中英语单词)
• violent [´vaiələnt] a.强暴的；猛烈的 (初中英语单词)
• marble [´mɑ:bəl] n.大理石 a.大理石的 (初中英语单词)
• delicate [´delikət] a.精美的；微妙的 (初中英语单词)
• childhood [´tʃaildhud] n.幼年(时代)；早期 (初中英语单词)
• stream [stri:m] n.河 vi.流出；飘扬 (初中英语单词)
• lonely [´ləunli] a.孤独的；无人烟的 (初中英语单词)
• wooden [´wudn] a.木制的；呆板的 (初中英语单词)
• painting [´peintiŋ] n.绘画；(油)画；着色 (初中英语单词)
• stubborn [´stʌbən] a.顽固的；坚持的 (高中英语单词)
• certainty [´sə:tənti] n.确实(性)；确信 (高中英语单词)
• paddle [´pædl] n.踏板 v.用浆划；划船 (高中英语单词)
• crooked [´krukid] a.弯曲的；畸形的 (高中英语单词)
• passionate [´pæʃənit] a.易动情的；易怒的 (高中英语单词)
• symbol [´simbəl] n.符号；象征 (高中英语单词)
• architect [´ɑ:kitekt] n.建筑师 (高中英语单词)
• sweetness [´swi:tnis] n.甜蜜；芳香；亲切 (高中英语单词)
• bronze [brɔnz] n.青铜(器) (高中英语单词)
• peacock [´pi:kɔk] n.(雄)孔雀 vi.炫耀 (高中英语单词)
• indifferent [in´difrənt] a.不关心的；中立的 (高中英语单词)
• greatness [´greitnis] n.巨大；高尚；卓越 (高中英语单词)
• farmhouse [´fɑ:mhaus] n.农场住房，农舍 (高中英语单词)
• ragged [´rægid] a.衣服破烂的 (高中英语单词)
• chamber [´tʃeimbə] n.房间；议院；会议室 (高中英语单词)
• fireplace [´faiəpleis] n.壁炉，炉灶 (高中英语单词)
• learned [´lə:nid] a.有学问的，博学的 (高中英语单词)
• inferior [in´fiəriə] n.下级的 n.下级；晚辈 (高中英语单词)
• silken [´silkən] a.丝制的；柔软光滑的 (高中英语单词)
• stately [´steitli] a.庄严的，雄伟的 (高中英语单词)
• loveliness [´lʌvlinis] n.美丽，可爱 (英语四级单词)
• flaming [´fleimiŋ] a.熊熊燃烧的；热情的 (英语四级单词)
• cowardly [´kauədli] a.&ad.胆小的(地) (英语四级单词)
• gentleness [´dʒentlnis] n.温和，温柔 (英语四级单词)
• contemplation [,kɔntem´pleiʃən] n.注视；冥想；打算 (英语四级单词)
• magnify [´mægnifai] vt.放大；推崇；夸张 (英语四级单词)
• bridge [bridʒ] n.桥(梁)；鼻梁；桥牌 (英语四级单词)
• bodily [´bɔdili] a.身体的 ad.亲自 (英语四级单词)
• wayward [´weiwəd] a.任性的；不易控制的 (英语六级单词)
• arched [´ɑ:tʃid] a.弓形(结构)的 (英语六级单词)
• pottery [´pɔtəri] n.陶器；陶器制造厂 (英语六级单词)