Ban and Arriere Ban: A Rally of Fugitive Rhymes

THE PROMISE OF HELEN

 
Whom hast thou longed for most,
   True love of mine?
Whom hast thou loved and lost?
   Lo, she is thine!
 
 
She that another wed
   Breaks from her vow;
She that hath long been dead
   Wakes for thee now.
 
 
Dreams haunt the hapless bed,
   Ghosts haunt the night,
Life crowns her living head,
   Love and Delight.
 
 
Nay, not a dream nor ghost,
   Nay, but Divine,
She that was loved and lost
   Waits to be thine!
 

THE RESTORATION OF ROMANCE

TO H. R. H., R. L. S., A. C. D., AND S. W

 
King Romance was wounded deep,
   All his knights were dead and gone,
All his court was fallen on sleep,
   In a vale of Avalon!
Nay, men said, he will not come,
   Any night or any morn.
Nay, his puissant voice is dumb,
   Silent his enchanted horn!
 
 
King Romance was forfeited,
   Banished from his Royal home,
With a price upon his head,
   Driven with sylvan folk to roam.
King Romance is fallen, banned,
   Cried his foemen overbold,
Broken is the wizard wand,
   All the stories have been told!
 
 
Then you came from South and North,
   From Tugela, from the Tweed,
Blazoned his achievements forth,
   King Romance is come indeed!
All his foes are overthrown,
   All their wares cast out in scorn,
King Romance hath won his own,
   And the lands where he was born!
 
 
Marsac at adventure rides,
   Felon men meet felon scathe,
Micah Clarke is taking sides
   For King Monmouth and the Faith;
For a Cause or for a lass
   Men are willing to be slain,
And the dungeons of the Bass
   Hold a prisoner again.
 
 
King Romance with wand of gold
   Sways the realms he ruled of yore.
Hills Dalgetty roamed of old,
   Valleys of enchanted Kôr:
Waves his sceptre o’er the isles,
   Claims the pirates’ treasuries,
Through innumerable miles
   Of the siren-haunted seas!
 
 
Elfin folk of coast and cave,
   Laud him in the woven dance,
All the tribes of wold and wave
   Bow the knee to King Romance!
Wand’ring voices Chaucer knew
   On the mountain and the main,
Cry the haunted forest through,
   King Romance has come again!
 

CENTRAL AMERICAN ANTIQUITIES

IN SOUTH KENSINGTON MUSEUM

 
‘Youth and crabbed age
      Cannot live together;’
               So they say.
 
 
On this little page
      See you when and whether
               That they may.
 
 
Age was very old —
      Stones from Chichimec
               Hardly wrung;
 
 
Youth had hair of gold
      Knotted on her neck —
               Fair and young!
 
 
Age was carved with odd
      Slaves, and priests that slew them —
               God and Beast;
 
 
Man and Beast and God —
      There she sat and drew them,
               King and Priest!
 
 
There she sat and drew
      Many a monstrous head
               And antique;
 
 
Horrors from Peru,
      Huacas doubly dead,
               Dead cacique!
 
 
Ere Pizarro came
      These were lords of men
               Long ago;
 
 
Gods without a name,
      Born or how or when,
               None may know!
 
 
Now from Yucatan
      These doth Science bear
               Over seas;
 
 
And methinks a man
      Finds youth doubly fair,
               Sketching these!
 

ON CALAIS SANDS

 
On Calais Sands the grey began,
   Then rosy red above the grey,
The morn with many a scarlet van
   Leap’d, and the world was glad with May!
The little waves along the bay
   Broke white upon the shelving strands;
The sea-mews flitted white as they
            On Calais Sands!
 
 
On Calais Sands must man with man
   Wash honour clean in blood to-day;
On spaces wet from waters wan
   How white the flashing rapiers play,
Parry, riposte! and lunge!  The fray
   Shifts for a while, then mournful stands
The Victor: life ebbs fast away
            On Calais Sands!
 
 
On Calais Sands a little space
   Of silence, then the plash and spray,
The sound of eager waves that ran
   To kiss the perfumed locks astray,
To touch these lips that ne’er said ‘Nay,’
   To dally with the helpless hands;
Till the deep sea in silence lay
            On Calais Sands!
 
 
Between the lilac and the may
   She waits her love from alien lands;
Her love is colder than the clay
            On Calais Sands!
 

BALLADE OF YULE

 
This life’s most jolly, Amiens said,
   Heigh-ho, the Holly!  So sang he.
As the good Duke was comforted
   In forest exile, so may we!
The years may darken as they flee,
   And Christmas bring his melancholy:
But round the old mahogany tree
   We drink, we sing Heigh-ho, the Holly!
 
 
Though some are dead and some are fled
   To lands of summer over sea,
The holly berry keeps his red,
   The merry children keep their glee;
They hoard with artless secresy
   This gift for Maude, and that for Molly,
And Santa Claus he turns the key
   On Christmas Eve, Heigh-ho, the Holly!
 
 
Amid the snow the birds are fed,
   The snow lies deep on lawn and lea,
The skies are shining overhead,
   The robin’s tame that was so free.
Far North, at home, the ‘barley bree’
   They brew; they give the hour to folly,
How ‘Rab and Allan cam to pree,’
   They sing, we sing Heigh-ho, the Holly!
 

ENVOI

 
Friend, let us pay the wonted fee,
   The yearly tithe of mirth: be jolly!
It is a duty so to be,
   Though half we sigh, Heigh-ho, the Holly!
 

POSCIMUR

FROM HORACE

 
Hush, for they call!  If in the shade,
My lute, we twain have idly strayed,
And song for many a season made,
         Once more reply;
Once more we’ll play as we have played,
         My lute and I!
 
 
Roman the song: the strain you know,
The Lesbian wrought it long ago.
Now singing as he charged the foe,
         Now in the bay,
Where safe in the shore-water’s flow
         His galleys lay.
 
 
So sang he Bacchus and the Nine,
And Venus and her boy divine,
And Lycus of the dusky eyne,
         The dusky hair;
So shalt thou sing, ah, Lute of mine,
         Of all things fair;
 
 
Apollo’s glory!  Sounding shell,
Thou lute, to Jove desirable,
When soft thine accents sigh and swell
         At festival —
Delight more dear than words can tell,
         Attend my call!
 

ON HIS DEAD SEA-MEW

FROM THE GREEK

I

 
Bird of the graces, dear sea-mew, whose note
      Was like the halcyon’s song,
In death thy wings and thy sweet spirit float
      Still paths of the night along!
 

II
THE SAILOR’S GRAVE

 
Tomb of a shipwrecked seafarer am I,
      But thou, sail on!
For homeward safe did other vessels fly,
      Though we were gone.
 

FROM MELEAGER

 
I love not the wine-cup, but if thou art fain
   I should drink, do thou taste it, and bring it to me;
If it touch but thy lips it were hard to refrain,
   It were hard from the sweet maid who bears it to flee;
For the cup ferries over the kisses, and plain
   Does it speak of the grace that was given it by thee.
 

ON THE GARLAND SENT TO RHODOCLEIA

RUFINUS

GOLDEN EYES

 
‘Ah, Golden Eyes, to win you yet,
I bring mine April coronet,
The lovely blossoms of the spring,
For you I weave, to you I bring
These roses with the lilies set,
The dewy dark-eyed violet,
Narcissus, and the wind-flower wet:
Wilt thou disdain mine offering?
            Ah, Golden Eyes!
 
 
Crowned with thy lover’s flowers, forget
The pride wherein thy heart is set,
For thou, like these or anything,
Has but a moment of thy spring,
Thy spring, and then – the long regret!
            Ah, Golden Eyes!’
 

A GALLOWAY GARLAND

 
We know not, on these hills of ours,
   The fabled asphodel of Greece,
That filleth with immortal flowers
   Fields where the heroes are at peace!
   Not ours are myrtle buds like these
That breathe o’er isles where memories dwell
   Of Sappho, in enchanted seas!
 
 
We meet not, on our upland moor,
   The singing Maid of Helicon,
You may not hear her music pure
   Float on the mountain meres withdrawn;
   The Muse of Greece, the Muse is gone!
But we have songs that please us well
   And flowers we love to look upon.
 
 
More sweet than Southern myrtles far
   The bruised Marsh-myrtle breatheth keen;
Parnassus names the flower, the star,
   That shines among the well-heads green
   The bright Marsh-asphodels between —
Marsh-myrtle and Marsh-asphodel
   May crown the Northern Muse a queen