The poetical works of George MacDonald in two volumes — Volume 2

DECEMBER 23, 1879

I

 
A thousand houses of poesy stand around me everywhere;
They fill the earth and they fill my thought, they are in and above the air;
But to-night they have shut their doors, they have shut their shining windows fair,
And I am left in a desert world, with an aching as if of care.
 

II

 
Cannot I break some little nut and get at the poetry in it?
Cannot I break the shining egg of some all but hatched heavenly linnet?
Cannot I find some beauty-worm, and its moony cocoon-silk spin it?
Cannot I find my all but lost day in the rich content of a minute?
 

III

 
I will sit me down, all aching and tired, in the midst of this never-unclosing
Of door or window that makes it look as if truth herself were dozing;
I will sit me down and make me a tent, call it poetizing or prosing,
Of what may be lying within my reach, things at my poor disposing!
 

IV

 
Now what is nearest?—My conscious self. Here I sit quiet and say:
"Lo, I myself am already a house of poetry solemn and gay!
But, alas, the windows are shut, all shut: 'tis a cold and foggy day,
And I have not now the light to see what is in me the same alway!"
 

V

 
Nay, rather I'll say: "I am a nut in the hard and frozen ground;
Above is the damp and frozen air, the cold blue sky all round;
And the power of a leafy and branchy tree is in me crushed and bound
Till the summer come and set it free from the grave-clothes in which it is wound!"
 

VI

 
But I bethink me of something better!—something better, yea best!
"I am lying a voiceless, featherless thing in God's own perfect nest;
And the voice and the song are growing within me, slowly lifting my breast;
And his wide night-wings are closed about me, for his sun is down in the west!"
 

VII

 
Doors and windows, tents and grave-clothes, winters and eggs and seeds,
Ye shall all be opened and broken and torn; ye are but to serve my needs!
On the will of the Father all lovely things are strung like a string of beads
For his heart to give the obedient child that the will of the father heeds.
 

SONG-PRAYER: AFTER KING DAVID

 
I shall be satisfied
With the seeing of thy face.
When I awake, wide-eyed,
I shall be satisfied
With what this life did hide,
The one supernal grace!
I shall be satisfied
With the seeing of thy face.
 

DECEMBER 27, 1879

 
Every time would have its song
  If the heart were right,
Seeing Love all tender-strong
  Fills the day and night.
 
 
Weary drop the hands of Prayer
  Calling out for peace;
Love always and everywhere
  Sings and does not cease.
 
 
Fear, the caitiff, through the night
  Silent peers about;
Love comes singing with a light
  And doth cast him out.
 
 
Hate and Guile and Wrath and Doubt
  Never try to sing;
If they did, oh, what a rout
  Anguished ears would sting!
 
 
Pride indeed will sometimes aim
  At the finer speech,
But the best that he can frame
  Is a peacock-screech.
 
 
Greed will also sometimes try:
  Happiness he hunts!
But his dwelling is a sty,
  And his tones are grunts.
 
 
Faith will sometimes raise a song
  Soaring up to heaven,
Then she will be silent long,
  And will weep at even.
 
 
Hope has many a gladsome note
  Now and then to pipe;
But, alas, he has the throat
  Of a bird unripe.
 
 
Often Joy a stave will start
  Which the welkin rends,
But it always breaks athwart,
  And untimely ends.
 
 
Grief, who still for death doth long,
  Always self-abhorred,
Has but one low, troubled song,
I am sorry, Lord.
 
 
But Love singeth in the vault.
  Singeth on the stair;
Even for Sorrow will not halt,
  Singeth everywhere.
 
 
For the great Love everywhere
  Over all doth glow;
Draws his birds up trough the air,
  Tends his birds below.
 
 
And with songs ascending sheer
  Love-born Love replies,
Singing Father in his ear
  Where she bleeding lies.
 
 
Therefore, if my heart were right
  I should sing out clear,
Sing aloud both day and night
  Every month in the year!
 

SUNDAY,

DECEMBER 28, 1879

 
A dim, vague shrinking haunts my soul,
  My spirit bodeth ill—
As some far-off restraining bank
Had burst, and waters, many a rank,
  Were marching on my hill;
 
 
As if I had no fire within
  For thoughts to sit about;
As if I had no flax to spin,
No lamp to lure the good things in
  And keep the bad things out.
 
 
The wind, south-west, raves in the pines
  That guard my cottage round;
The sea-waves fall in stormy lines
Below the sandy cliffs and chines,
  And swell the roaring sound.
 
 
The misty air, the bellowing wind
  Not often trouble me;
The storm that's outside of the mind
Doth oftener wake my heart to find
  More peace and liberty.
 
 
Why is not such my fate to-night?
  Chance is not lord of things!
Man were indeed a hapless wight
Things, thoughts occurring as they might—
  Chaotic wallowings!
 
 
The man of moods might merely say
  As by the fire he sat,
"I am low spirited to-day;
I must do something, work or play,
  Lest care should kill the cat!"
 
 
Not such my saw: I was not meant
  To be the sport of things!
The mood has meaning and intent,
And my dull heart is humbly bent
  To have the truth it brings.
 
 
This sense of needed shelter round,
  This frequent mental start
Show what a poor life mine were found,
To what a dead self I were bound,
  How feeble were my heart,
 
 
If I who think did stand alone
  Centre to what I thought,
A brain within a box of bone,
A king on a deserted throne,
  A something that was nought!
 
 
A being without power to be,
  Or any power to cease;
Whom objects but compelled to see,
Whose trouble was a windblown sea,
  A windless sea his peace!
 
 
This very sadness makes me think
  How readily I might
Be driven to reason's farthest brink,
Then over it, and sudden sink
  In ghastly waves of night.
 
 
It makes me know when I am glad
  'Tis thy strength makes me strong;
But for thy bliss I should be sad,
But for thy reason should be mad,
  But for thy right be wrong.
 
 
Around me spreads no empty waste,
  No lordless host of things;
My restlessness but seeks thy rest;
My little good doth seek thy best,
  My needs thy ministerings.
 
 
'Tis this, this only makes me safe—
  I am, immediate,
Of one that lives; I am no waif
That haggard waters toss and chafe,
  But of a royal fate,
 
 
The born-child of a Power that lives
  Because it will and can,
A Love whose slightest motion gives,
A Freedom that forever strives
  To liberate his Man.
 
 
I live not on the circling air,
  Live not by daily food;
I live not even by thinkings fair,
I hold my very being there
  Where God is pondering good.
 
 
Because God lives I live; because
  He thinks, I also think;
I am dependent on no laws
But on himself, and without pause;
  Between us hangs no link.
 
 
The man that lives he knows not how
  May well fear any mouse!
I should be trembling this same now
If I did think, my Father, thou
  Wast nowhere in the house!
 
 
O Father, lift me on thine arm,
  And hold me close to thee;
Lift me into thy breathing warm,
Then cast me, and I fear no harm,
  Into creation's sea!
 

SONG-SERMON

 
In his arms thy silly lamb,
Lo, he gathers to his breast!
See, thou sadly bleating dam,
See him lift thy silly lamb!
Hear it cry, "How blest I am!
Here is love, and love is rest!"
In his arms thy silly lamb
See him gather to his breast!
 

THE DONKEY IN THE CART TO THE HORSE IN THE CARRIAGE

I

 
I say! hey! cousin there! I mustn't call you brother!
Yet you have a tail behind, and I have another!
You pull, and I pull, though we don't pull together:
You have less hardship, and I have more weather!
 

II

 
Your legs are long, mine are short; I am lean, you are fatter;
Your step is bold and free, mine goes pitter-patter;
Your head is in the air, and mine hangs down like lead—
But then my two great ears are so heavy on my head!
 

III

 
You need not whisk your stump, nor turn away your nose;
Poor donkeys ain't so stupid as rich horses may suppose!
I could feed in any manger just as well as you,
Though I don't despise a thistle—with sauce of dust and dew!
 

IV

 
T'other day a bishop's cob stopped before me in a lane,
With a tail as broad as oil-cake, and a close-clipped hoggy mane;
I stood sideways to the hedge, but he did not want to pass,
And he was so full of corn he didn't care about the grass.
 

V

 
Quoth the cob, "You are a donkey of a most peculiar breed!
You've just eaten up a thistle that was going fast to seed!
If you had but let it be, you might have raised a crop!
To many a coming dinner you have put a sad stop!"
 

VI

 
I told him I was hungry, and to leave one of ten
Would have spoiled my best dinner, the one I wanted then.
Said the cob, "I ought to know the truth about dinners,
I don't eat on roadsides like poor tramping sinners!"
 

VII

 
"Why don't you take it easy? You are working much too hard!
In the shafts you'll die one day, if you're not upon your guard!
Have pity on your friends: work seems to you delectable,
But believe me such a cart—excuse me—'s not respectable!"
 

VIII

 
I told him I must trot in the shafts where I was put,
Nor look round at the cart, but set foremost my best foot;
It was rather rickety, and the axle wanted oil,
But I always slept at night with the deep sleep of toil!
 

IX

 
"All very fine," he said, "to wag your ears and parley,
And pretend you quite despise my bellyfuls of barley!
But with blows and with starving, and with labour over-hard,
By spurs! a week will see you in the knacker's yard."
 

X

 
I thanked him for his counsel, and said I thought I'd take it, really,
If he'd spare me half a feed out of four feeds daily.
He tossed his head at that: "Now don't be cheeky!" said he;
"When I find I'm getting fat, I'll think of you: keep steady."
 

XI

 
"Good-bye!" I said—and say, for you are such another!
Why, now I look at you, I see you are his brother!
Yes, thank you for your kick: 'twas all that you could spare,
For, sure, they clip and singe you very, very bare!
 

XII

 
My cart it is upsets you! but in that cart behind
There's no dirt or rubbish, no bags of gold or wind!
There's potatoes there, and wine, and corn, and mustard-seed,
And a good can of milk, and some honey too, indeed!
 

XIII

 
Few blows I get, some hay, and of water many a draught:
I tell you he's no coster that sits upon my shaft!
And for the knacker's yard—that's not my destined bed:
No donkey ever yet saw himself there lying dead.
 

ROOM TO ROAM

 
Strait is the path? He means we must not roam?
Yes; but the strait path leads into a boundless home.
 

COTTAGE SONGS

I.—BY THE CRADLE

 
Close her eyes: she must not peep!
Let her little puds go slack;
Slide away far into sleep:
Sis will watch till she comes back!
 
 
Mother's knitting at the door,
Waiting till the kettle sings;
When the kettle's song is o'er
She will set the bright tea-things.
 
 
Father's busy making hay
In the meadow by the brook,
Not so very far away—
Close its peeps, it needn't look!
 
 
God is round us everywhere—
Sees the scythe glitter and rip;
Watches baby gone somewhere;
Sees how mother's fingers skip!
 
 
Sleep, dear baby; sleep outright:
  Mother's sitting just behind:
Father's only out of sight;
  God is round us like the wind.
 

II.—SWEEPING THE FLOOR

 
Sweep and sweep and sweep the floor,
  Sweep the dust, pick up the pin;
Make it clean from fire to door,
  Clean for father to come in!
 
 
Mother said that God goes sweeping,
  Looking, sweeping with a broom,
All the time that we are sleeping,
  For a shilling in the room:
 
 
Did he drop it out of glory,
  Walking far above the birds?
Or did parson make the story
  For the thinking afterwards?
 
 
If I were the swept-for shilling
  I would hearken through the gloom;
Roll out fast, and fall down willing
  Right before the sweeping broom!
 

III.—WASHING THE CLOTHES

 
This is the way we wash the clo'es
  Free from dirt and smoke and clay!
Through and through the water flows,
  Carries Ugly right away!
 
 
This is the way we bleach the clo'es:
  Lay them out upon the green;
Through and through the sunshine goes,
  Makes them white as well as clean!
 
 
This is the way we dry the clo'es:
  Hang them on the bushes about;
Through and through the soft wind blows,
  Draws and drives the wetness out!
 
 
Water, sun, and windy air
  Make the clothes clean, white, and sweet
Lay them now in lavender
  For the Sunday, folded neat!
 

IV.—DRAWING WATER

 
Dark, as if it would not tell,
  Lies the water, still and cool:
Dip the bucket in the well,
  Lift it from the precious pool!
 
 
Up it comes all brown and dim,
  Telling of the twilight sweet:
As it rises to the brim
  See the sun and water meet!
 
 
See the friends each other hail!
  "Here you are!" cries Master Sun;
Mistress Water from the pail
  Flashes back, alive with fun!
 
 
Have you not a tale to tell,
  Water, as I take you home?
Tell me of the hidden well
  Whence you, first of all, did come.
 
 
Of it you have kept some flavour
  Through long paths of darkling strife:
Water all has still a savour
  Of the primal well of life!
 
 
Could you show the lovely way
  Back and up through sea and sky
To that well? Oh, happy day,
  I would drink, and never die!
 
 
Jesus sits there on its brink
  All the world's great thirst to slake,
Offering every one to drink
  Who will only come and take!
 
 
Lord of wells and waters all,
  Lord of rains and dewy beads,
Unto thee my thirst doth call
  For the thing thou know'st it needs!
 
 
Come home, water sweet and cool,
  Gift of God thou always art!
Spring up, Well more beautiful,
  Rise in mine straight from his heart.
 

V.—CLEANING THE WINDOWS

 
Wash the window; rub it dry;
  Make the ray-door clean and bright:
He who lords it in the sky
  Loves on cottage floors to light!
 
 
Looking over sea and beck,
  Mountain-forest, orchard-bloom,
He can spy the smallest speck
  Anywhere about the room!
 
 
See how bright his torch is blazing
  In the heart of mother's store!
Strange! I never saw him gazing
  So into that press before!
 
 
Ah, I see!—the wooden pane
  In the window, dull and dead,
Father called its loss a gain,
  And a glass one put instead!
 
 
What a difference it makes!
  How it melts the filmy gloom!
What a little more it takes
  Much to brighten up a room!
 
 
There I spy a dusty streak!
  There a corner not quite clean!
There a cobweb! There the sneak
  Of a spider, watching keen!
 
 
Lord of suns, and eyes that see,
  Shine into me, see and show;
Leave no darksome spot in me
  Where thou dost not shining go.
 
 
Fill my spirit full of eyes,
  Doors of light in every part;
Open windows to the skies
  That no moth corrupt my heart.