THE PACIFIC, 1914
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One Day* Today I have been happy. All the dayI held the memory of you, and woveIts laughter with the dancing light o' the spray,And sowed the sky with tiny clouds of love,And sent you following the white waves of sea,And crowned your head with fancies, nothing worth,Stray buds from that old dust of misery,Being glad with a new foolish quiet mirth. So lightly I played with those dark memories,Just as a child, beneath the summer skies,Plays hour by hour with a strange shining stone,For which (he knows not) towns were fire of old,And love has been betrayed, and murder done,And great kings turned to a little bitter mould. THE PACIFIC, _October_ 1913 *Sonnet* (_Suggested by some of the Proceedings of the__Society for Psychical Research_) Not with vain tears, when we're beyond the sun,We'll beat on the substantial doors, nor treadThose dusty high-roads of the aimless deadPlaintive for Earth; but rather turn and runDown some close-covered by-way of the air,Some low sweet alley between wind and wind,Stoop under faint gleams, thread the shadows, findSome whispering ghost-forgotten nook, and there Spend in pure converse our eternal day;Think each in each, immediately wise;Learn all we lacked before; hear, know, and sayWhat this tumultuous body now denies;And feel, who have laid our groping hands away;And see, no longer blinded by our eyes. *Clouds* Down the blue night the unending columns pressIn noiseless tumult, break and wave and flow,Now tread the far South, or lift rounds of snowUp to the white moon's hidden loveliness.Some pause in their grave wandering comradeless,And turn with profound gesture vague and slow,As who would pray good for the world, but knowTheir benediction empty as they bless. They say that the Dead die not, but remainNear to the rich heirs of their grief and mirth.I think they ride the calm mid-heaven, as these,In wise majestic melancholy train,And watch the moon, and the still-raging seas,And men, coming and going on the earth. THE PACIFIC, _October_ 1913 *Mutability* They say there's a high windless world and strange,Out of the wash of days and temporal tide,Where Faith and Good, Wisdom and Truth abide,_AEterna corpora_, subject to no change.There the sure suns of these pale shadows move;There stand the immortal ensigns of our war;Our melting flesh fixed Beauty there, a star,And perishing hearts, imperishable Love.... Dear, we know only that we sigh, kiss, smile;Each kiss lasts but the kissing; and grief goes over;Love has no habitation but the heart.Poor straws! on the dark flood we catch awhile,Cling, and are borne into the night apart.The laugh dies with the lips, "Love" with the lover.
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