Part 8

None live who need fear anything From her, whose losses are their pleasure; The plover with a wounded wing Stays not the flight that others measure; So there she waits, and while she lives, And death forgets, and faith forgives, Her memories go foraging For bits of childhood song they treasure.

And like a giant harp that hums On always, and is always blending The coming of what never comes With what has past and had an ending, The City trembles, throbs, and pounds Outside, and through a thousand sounds The small intolerable drums Of Time are like slow drops descending.

Bereft enough to shame a sage And given little to long sighing, With no illusion to assuage The lonely changelessness of dying,-- Unsought, unthought-of, and unheard, She sings and watches like a bird, Safe in a comfortable cage From which there will be no more flying.

The Burning Book

Or the Contented Metaphysician

To the lore of no manner of men Would his vision have yielded When he found what will never again From his vision be shielded,-- Though he paid with as much of his life As a nun could have given, And to-night would have been as a knife, Devil-drawn, devil-driven.

For to-night, with his flame-weary eyes On the work he is doing, He considers the tinder that flies And the quick flame pursuing. In the leaves that are crinkled and curled Are his ashes of glory, And what once were an end of the world Is an end of a story.

But he smiles, for no more shall his days Be a toil and a calling For a way to make others to gaze On God's face without falling. He has come to the end of his words, And alone he rejoices In the choiring that silence affords Of ineffable voices.

To a realm that his words may not reach He may lead none to find him; An adept, and with nothing to teach, He leaves nothing behind him. For the rest, he will have his release, And his embers, attended By the large and unclamoring peace Of a dream that is ended.

Fragment

Faint white pillars that seem to fade As you look from here are the first one sees Of his house where it hides and dies in a shade Of beeches and oaks and hickory trees. Now many a man, given woods like these, And a house like that, and the Briony gold, Would have said, "There are still some gods to please, And houses are built without hands, we're told."

There are the pillars, and all gone gray. Briony's hair went white. You may see Where the garden was if you come this way. That sun-dial scared him, he said to me; "Sooner or later they strike," said he, And he never got that from the books he read. Others are flourishing, worse than he, But he knew too much for the life he led.

And who knows all knows everything That a patient ghost at last retrieves; There's more to be known of his harvesting When Time the thresher unbinds the sheaves; And there's more to be heard than a wind that grieves For Briony now in this ageless oak, Driving the first of its withered leaves Over the stones where the fountain broke.

Lisette and Eileen

"When he was here alive, Eileen, There was a word you might have said; So never mind what I have been, Or anything,--for you are dead.

"And after this when I am there Where he is, you'll be dying still. Your eyes are dead, and your black hair,-- The rest of you be what it will.

"'Twas all to save him? Never mind, Eileen. You saved him. You are strong. I'd hardly wonder if your kind Paid everything, for you live long.

"You last, I mean. That's what I mean. I mean you last as long as lies. You might have said that word, Eileen,-- And you might have your hair and eyes.

"And what you see might be Lisette, Instead of this that has no name. Your silence--I can feel it yet, Alive and in me, like a flame.

"Where might I be with him to-day, Could he have known before he heard? But no--your silence had its way, Without a weapon or a word.

"Because a word was never told, I'm going as a worn toy goes. And you are dead; and you'll be old; And I forgive you, I suppose.

"I'll soon be changing as all do, To something we have always been; And you'll be old... He liked you, too. I might have killed you then, Eileen.

"I think he liked as much of you As had a reason to be seen,-- As much as God made black and blue. He liked your hair and eyes, Eileen."

Llewellyn and the Tree

Could he have made Priscilla share The paradise that he had planned, Llewellyn would have loved his wife As well as any in the land.

Could he have made Priscilla cease To goad him for what God left out, Llewellyn would have been as mild As any we have read about.

Could all have been as all was not, Llewellyn would have had no story; He would have stayed a quiet man And gone his quiet way to glory.

But howsoever mild he was Priscilla was implacable; And whatsoever timid hopes He built--she found them, and they fell.