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A MEN AGE A TROIS -^ 
 ACROSS THE STYX 
 
 cAND OTHERo 
 
 ADVENTURES IN VERSE 
 
 -by 
 
 Lt. Col. sir frank POPHAM YOUNG 
 
 K. B. B., C. I. E. 
 
 A. M. ROBERTSON 
 
 SAN FRANCISCO 
 
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 ^\ 
 
 
 Copyright, 1922 
 By Lt. Col. Sir Frank Popham Young 
 
 M IS 1923 
 
 ©C1A697001 
 
 Made by Sunset Press 
 
 ^^ I 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 1. Kismet 
 
 2. In the Mist. 
 
 3. California or Cathay 
 
 4. Vox Feminae Vox Dei 
 
 5. Kl and K2 
 
 6. Intercessional. 
 
 7. A Cup of Cold Water 
 
 8. Noblesse Oblige 
 
 9. Creeds, Constellations, and Creeping Things 
 10. A Menage a Trois Across the Styx 
 
TO THE LADY 
 
 WHO HAS PLACED HER HAND IN MINE 
 COME WEAL OR WOE 
 THIS LITTLE VOLUME IS DEDICATE 
 F. P. Y. * 
 
"KISMET' 
 
 
 HAT which is built by mortal hands 
 
 Time lays to waste, 
 But 'tis not so with those mysterious 
 commands, 
 Which on man's forehead traced, 
 Link life with life by interwoven strands 
 Of Destiny. These cannot be effaced. 
 
 [1] 
 
"IN THE MIST" 
 
 a 
 
 OVE has thundered, Venus beckoned, 
 Thor and Odin held their sway; 
 
 (See the light upon the mountain 
 And the ripple on the sea!) 
 
 Brahma counselled, Shiva threatened; 
 Christ has died. 
 
 (Hear the rustle on the mountain 
 And the murmur of the sea!) 
 
 Sternly preached Mahommed; 
 
 Gently smiling, practised Buddha. Yet alway 
 Human steps have wandered. 
 
 Human hearts have cried 
 "What is Truth? But lift the curtain, 
 Making Love more pure, and Faith more certain." 
 (The light has died upon the mountain — 
 
 Mists enshroud the sea). 
 
 2] 
 
CALIFORNIA OR CATHAY 
 
 X 
 
 RESTED in the Shalimar where, tier on tier, 
 The jewelled garden nestles 'neath th' eternal 
 
 hills, 
 And broods above the sleeping surface of the 
 lake. 
 
 The great "chenar" trees whispered "It was here 
 Jehangir held his court," and all the little rills 
 Told of a storied Past. I pondered only half awake; 
 
 Pictured the smooth and scheming courtiers, silken 
 
 clad. 
 When Islam with a fierce, intense, and vivid sweep 
 Led, dominated, ruled, and then declined. 
 By sloth and luxury beguiled, and power-mad, 
 Akbar's great Empire-fortress tottered till its keep, 
 Sapped by fanatic hate, was slowly undermined. 
 
 And then the jangled music of soft camel bells 
 Announced a "Kafila" beyond the carven gate. 
 Austere and supercilious, gaunt, reluctant, slow, 
 From Samarkand, Bokhara — weaving magic spells — 
 These central Asian genii discharged their freight, 
 Into the living present, stark Romance of long ago. 
 
 I watched the bearded, hawk-nosed trader from afar. 
 Engirt with pistols, hung about with keen edged 
 
 knives. 
 And judged his treasure to be something worth. 
 Perchance 
 
 He carried priceless jewels — some great, shining star 
 Of Asia ! Or perchance this care betokened wives 
 Suspect of light and loose — and dangerous — dalliance. 
 
 NOTE: Kafila — a train of camels. 
 
 [3] 
 
He made ablutions. Then with fervent, supple grace 
 Salaamed to Allah, faced the setting sun in prayer. 
 A half raised "burka," which had draped the form 
 Of one who, patient, sat behind, revealed a face 
 Which well might turn an Emperor from the fretting 
 
 care 
 Of march and countermarch, of combat, siege, and 
 
 storm. 
 
 Long curving lashes swept the olive tinted cheek 
 Stained with a tea-rose flush. Then slowly 
 
 dropped the veil. 
 The little figure softly lit upon the ground. 
 To outward seeming humble, acquiescent, meek, 
 Followed the age old path of servitude behind the 
 
 male, 
 Rebel at heart — her eyes had told it — gagged and 
 
 bound. 
 
 Long years have passed, and more than half the 
 
 circled world 
 Divides me from that terraced garden of delight. 
 Softened by night the rough Pacific hills enfold. 
 On the calm bosom of the bay the sails are furled. 
 The water plashes and low voices of the night 
 Bring back to me that scene, the tale that half was 
 
 told. 
 
 The wizardry of art has wrought with loving skill, 
 Has caught the spirit of the Orient ; and here 
 Curved arches, cunning lines of building, terraced 
 
 slopes, 
 The sense of quiet water, and the brooding hill, 
 The richly perfumed air — all waft me to Kashmir, 
 And tell a thousand tales of bygone fears and hopes. 
 
 [41 
 
Once more I see that stealing glance with eyes abrim, 
 The little henna-tinted feet, the blush, the blanch 
 
 of fear, 
 As gleaming in the folds of his silk "kamarband" 
 Sharp steel forbade all speech with any man but him, 
 (Owner of lips unsmiling. Lord of a tremulous tear) 
 Who brought his wares to India from distant 
 
 Samarkand. 
 
 Written in the garden of the Samarkand Hotel, 
 Santa Barbara, Calif., February 28, 1921. 
 
 [5] 
 
vox FEMINAE VOX DEI 
 
 INSCRIBED TO . 
 
 G 
 
 ARELESSLY I trod and recked not that 
 my feet 
 
 Oft injured little peeping things of life. 
 
 The frond unfolding, and the shyly sweet 
 Florescence of green leaf and yellow bud. 
 Born in a world of strife, 
 Small things essayed their wings. 
 Or crept, across my path. 
 Those little animate things 
 
 I crushed unheeding. Careless hands destroyed them. 
 Careless footsteps spilled their innocent blood. 
 The righteous wrath 
 Of God made me more blind. 
 The timid questionings of some untutored mind, 
 The gropings of a human soul, 
 
 The silent plea for sympathy — all these sacred claims 
 I passed unheeding. Like the sightless mole 
 I burrowed, thinking all the while that selfish aims 
 Carried me upwards. I had hurt and bruised 
 Frail things and tender, newly born. 
 For worse than open scorn 
 Is chill indifference. I had thus abused 
 The trust imposed in me, but gaily went 
 Along the open road, blind to the narrow trails 
 Which lead through brambles to the dazzling height. 
 I had been sent 
 
 To do God's work. The man who fails 
 Not in his weakness, but because the light 
 Is turned from in a selfish pride 
 Had better died 
 Before, with calloused soul, he learns 
 
 [6] 
 
To hold that he is justified 
 
 When he has failed to glimpse the Love, 
 
 All else above, 
 
 For which the whole of Nature aching ever yearns. 
 
 And so, in truth, with eyes I thought uplifted, 
 My steps were leading to a dark and ice-cold Hell. 
 I had believed I marched and conquered. I had 
 
 merely drifted. 
 Then Grod compassioned with me ; and I met, 
 And meeting loved — Estelle ! 
 
 7] 
 
G 
 
 K 1. AND K 2. 
 
 The fourth highest mountain peak in the world has been named bj cartiv 
 gTaphers"K. 2." 
 
 HALLENGING the giant Everest 
 
 For world supremacy, it soars 
 
 Lifting its snow clad crest 
 
 Near thirty thousand feet into the azure 
 of an Eastern sky, 
 Stands sentinel above the rugged tableland of far 
 
 Thibet, 
 Whilst from its molten sides it pours 
 Great streams of water into the teeming plains 
 Where myriad voices ever raise the ceaseless cry 
 "Assuage our thirst, enrich our fields, so we forget 
 The pangs of hunger and the pains 
 Of drought." Through the long years 
 This mighty monarch of the Himalayan range 
 Skyward rears 
 
 The glittering lancepoint of its ice bound peak. 
 Its snow draped sides untrod, 
 Nor chance, nor change 
 
 Affect its solemn, silent intercourse with God. 
 Remote, mist -shrouded. Science had, perforce, 
 
 to seek 
 Amidst the tumbled mass of chasm and cliff, 
 
 ravine and towering mountain top 
 Its jealous guarded secret. Located after many years. 
 Measured and charted, there appears 
 The stately record of this vast outcrop 
 Of rock primaeval. No grandiloquence 
 Of nomenclature marks its consequence. 
 
 (8] 
 
K. 2 is all the name 
 
 By which it stands identified 
 
 This far off mountain, which so long defied 
 
 The curious interest of men. Its fame 
 
 E'en now denied. 
 
 ****** 
 
 July the twenty-second. Here I sit 
 
 Thinking of just a little bit 
 
 Of femininity. A woman child 
 
 By whose kind eyes beguiled 
 
 The rusting decades slip away, 
 
 And Youth sings sweetly "Life is work and play." 
 
 Vision slips backwards, inwards; and I muse — 
 
 If between dominating forces one could choose 
 
 That which should lead and guide 
 
 Would one abide 
 
 By all that mountain seems to tjrpify — 
 
 (Quest, domination, struggle; add and multiply) — 
 
 In the harsh battle of ambitious aims 
 
 Which made one long to climb and conquer? 
 
 What's the use 
 Of scaling heights if, left behind, 
 In the cold effort to improve one's mind 
 The tender claims 
 Of laughing lips 
 
 Of little, rosy, clinging finger tips 
 Are passed and there remains, 
 For all one's pains, 
 A husk without a core, a sapless rind? 
 
 9] 
 
This other K 
 
 Holds a more potent sceptre, has a wider sway. 
 
 And so I lay 
 
 These verses at her feet 
 
 On this her natal day. 
 
 K. 2, Go too! 
 
 I have no wreath for you. 
 
 This is K. 1. Smile with those bright eyes, Sweet! 
 
 Will you not kiss me, K? 
 
 To Kathleen (Kay) 
 On her sixteenth birthday. 
 
 [10] 
 
INTERCESSIONAL 
 
TO BESSIE McJ. BARRET 
 
 A LADY FROM 'OLE KAINTUCK', IN WHOM THE 
 
 WRITER HAS BEEN PRIVILEGED TO DISCERN 
 
 THOSE CHIVALROUS QUALITIES WITH WHICH 
 
 HE HAS ENDOWED MOSES HIGGINS. 
 
 THESE VERSES ARE INSCRIBED 
 
 F. P. Y 
 
INTERCESSIONAL 
 
 X 
 
 N the little room, above the bam, in ole 
 
 Kaintuck 
 One Moses Higgins breathed his last. He'd 
 followed 'osses 
 Most 'is life." These new machines had made things 
 
 hard. 
 But that stout heart had never lost its pluck. 
 If old Mo' played a card 
 
 And lost, you'ld never hear a whine about his losses. 
 I'ld have you know that this old Mo', 
 Above whose lonely grave wild grasses blow, 
 Deserved as much that greatest epitaph, 
 "A gentil, parfait knight," 
 
 As any doughty, mediaeval champion of the fight. 
 His sword a reaping hook. 
 His spear a staff, 
 Nature his Book, 
 He played the game, ploughed a straight furrow, 
 
 never lied, 
 Lived cleanly, loved devoutly, laid him down — and 
 died. 
 
 The blue eyes glazed, and Moses Higgins looked 
 
 upon a screen. 
 "The Moses Higgins record!" called a voice. 
 A shining figure — Mo' saw him fold his wings — 
 Announced the choice. 
 I guess it's me they mean, 
 Thought Moses. ''That's the Arch-Director, 
 
 Gabriel. 'Hello, Gabe'," he said. 
 
 15] 
 
"You've got me goin' round in rings." 
 
 "Hold on!" said Gabriel. "We've got to size you 
 
 up a bit 
 To see if you pass fit. 
 You know you're dead." 
 
 "I guess," said Moses, "they're aint much to show. 
 Jus' me behind the 'osses. It's a pretty team. 
 The grey mare's savin' her off fore. 
 There's Lizzie at the gate. She oughter know 
 That I'm out lookin' for her. It do seem 
 As if she reckerlected I was kinder sore 
 The time she beat it off to town 
 With that young drummer chap who called me 
 
 clown. 
 But, bless yer, Liz, I've gotten over that this long 
 
 ago. 
 You creep in here, and lie all cuddled like yer 
 
 useter — so." 
 
 "What's this yer showin', Gabe? Why that aint 
 
 me! 
 I guess that's Romeyo, or that Hamlick guy. 
 Who stuck that fat chap, hid behind the curtain, 
 
 with his sword. 
 Gosh! How that made me larf! I'm blessed if I 
 
 can't see 
 Doug Fairbanks doin' stunts — and that blue eye 
 I 'Id know a mile off — Mary Pick — My word! 
 You don't say that them is me and Liz 
 Cuttin' around, and doin' all that funny biz!" 
 
 [16 
 
"Why, yes, I'll say that when those actor chaps 
 Was showin' how you'ld gotta play the game, 
 And keep yer pecker up, and peg away, and tell 
 
 the truth 
 And trust yer girl, 
 I useter feel 
 
 That I'd no cause to squeal 
 Because I didn't seem to make no headway. I 
 
 thought p'raps 
 It weren't no shame, 
 
 Me bein' what that drummer called uncouth 
 (Yokel was right enough, but when he named me 
 
 churl 
 That riz me, and I knocked his silly tooth 
 Into his windpipe) — I thought it weren't no shame 
 To make pretence that I was jus' the same 
 As them bright fellers. I useter step along 
 (Me, ole Mo' — some Romeyo!) 
 Behind the 'osses with a kind o' song 
 Singin' inside me. What's that Gabe? 
 You've passed me? Reckon you're some babe. 
 I go behind the curtain 'long o' Liz? 
 And take the grey mare too? I'll say that is 
 Worth waitin' for. I'll tell ole Pete 
 That he must keep them actor chaps a seat. 
 For sure they helped a lot, and kep things clean 
 
 and sweet. 
 When life was kind o' dull and work a grind 
 In that ole Kaintuck shanty that I've left behind." 
 
 Written in connection with Actor's 
 Benefit Fund Pete at Los Angeles 
 
 [17 
 
"A CUP OF COLD WATER" 
 
 c 
 
 HE Haberdasher's Assistant saluted the 
 clear dawn, 
 
 Scratching the while with unclean 
 finger nail 
 A festering surface on his thigh, 
 With a yellow fanged and offending yawn, 
 A bleary eye, and a dismal sigh. 
 Half snore, half wail. 
 
 Through the green avenue of trees. 
 Along the shining beach, 
 They gave their willing horses rein. 
 And the look i^ his pleasant tired eyes was like thai of 
 a war worn Moor who sees 
 In the desert a haven of rest, and a harvest af grain. 
 At last within his reach. 
 
 The Haberdasher's Assistant coughed, lay still, 
 Caressed a pimple on his chin. 
 And slowly counted the coins he had pinched 
 By sly manoeuverings with ledger and with till. 
 Made play with rusty razor, essayed cold water, 
 shivered thereat and flinched. 
 And so with dragging steps set forth his 
 daily bread to win. 
 
 18 
 
The little tor inkles round his tired eyes 
 
 Creased into kindliness and mirth. 
 Hillside and moor, flood, field and tropic suns. 
 The silken salon, music, laughter, azure skies. 
 Tempest, harsh conflict, belching guns. 
 
 Had marred and made this man for such as 
 he was worth. 
 
 Through door ajar the Haberdasher's Assistant spied 
 A bowed and broken figure; (Mary, pity 
 women!) Youth astray, 
 Hunger and misery enthroned where Love should 
 reign ! 
 And floundering in the squaHd mire of his Hfe, he 
 lied, 
 Denied himself, regretted, cursed, denied himself 
 again. 
 Found strength, gave comfort, shewed a 
 better way. 
 
 A Veritable Knight he seemed. 
 
 '*No doubt he'd lived his life." 
 (Those little bowed and broken figures by the way!) 
 The road stretched fair in front. They talked and 
 dreamed. 
 ( Thus is the balance. Some spend and others pay.) 
 Peace after battle. After Experience a wife. 
 
 [19] 
 
The sun, slow westering, lit the hills across the bay. 
 
 Made glorious the glittering tracery of the trees. 
 And cast a halo round her golden hair. 
 Aslant, down murky streets the dying day 
 Groped for an entry up a narrow stair, 
 
 But, fading, failed to find a form on bended 
 knees. 
 
 Is this the balance? In the cosmic veins 
 
 A red corpuscle found a tardy birth. 
 And aeons after with a surge as of rising tide, and 
 
 of pent up flood, 
 The vivifying Force which rules by yielding, and 
 
 by service reigns. 
 Multiplied and martialled the red corpuscles, 
 
 attacked and routed, swept and cleansed the blood. 
 
 And thus did the Haberdasher's Assistant play a 
 part in creating a new Heaven long after 
 his rickety and calcareous bones had re- 
 turned to the good Earth. 
 
 20 
 
'NOBLESSE OBLIGE' 
 
"NOBLESSE OBLIGE" 
 
 © 
 
 HE sceptre passes. In the "good old days" 
 When Gurth the swineherd waited at the postern 
 
 gate 
 And hugged the chains which bound him, 
 munched the proffered crust, 
 Nor questioned Fate, 
 A single golden phrase — 
 
 "Noblesse Oblige" — born in the cut and thrust 
 Of those fierce conflicts which ennobled and enslaved 
 Men with an equal birthright, helped to compensate 
 For all the hideous inequity which ruled — and rules 
 
 — the world. 
 '*Dieu et mon droit*' the buccaneering Baron raved, 
 With pennons flying, banner of silk unfurled. 
 And robbed, and raped, and murdered with his 
 
 chosen partner — God. 
 Some fed their appetites. Others hewed the wood 
 And drew the water, tilled the kindly soil, 
 Broken in spirit kissed the chastising rod, 
 Nor understood 
 
 That the keen blade and pointed lance 
 Were edged and sharpened by their honest toil. 
 The gallant bearing and the gay romance 
 Of those who reaped what these poor hinds had sown 
 Obscured the issue, and the circumstance 
 Of puling infants, cradled in mangers or in palaces, 
 Determined who should perish in the fetid hovel, 
 
 who should occupy the gilded throne. 
 Thus human fallacies 
 Forged chains which link by link 
 Priests tempered, monarchs strengthened, lackeys 
 
 and peasants embraced. 
 
 23 
 
But one thought graced 
 
 Those darkened ages. One lone star shone clear 
 
 And helped the tossed and weather beaten craft to 
 
 steer 
 — Though blindly — to a haven where men should 
 
 rest awhile. 
 "Noblesse Oblige!" The Golden Rule applied 
 To those who held the rank and wealth men almost 
 
 deified. 
 "Noblesse Oblige!" Surrender; sacrifice; 
 Excuse for ignorance; 
 The courteous smile 
 
 When weakness hurled the angry insult; tolerance 
 Of human frailties; pity for poverty. In this device 
 Emblazoned on the banners of the chosen few 
 A world distraught with hates and fears 
 Found hope, held faith, gained solace for bitter tears, 
 Courage in sorrow, measure of comfort, some 
 
 small ruth for rue. 
 
 The sceptre passes. Rank lingers on the stage 
 
 Superfluous. "Captains and Kings depart." 
 
 Science, not privilege, marks the accepted sage. 
 
 The brains of men, their industry, their art 
 
 Fashion the crowns worth wearing. Fearless eyes 
 
 Look into eyes as fearless. Throughout a continent 
 
 Stretching three thousand miles from sea to sea 
 
 No man so daft 
 
 As to deny his heritage 
 
 Of all the earth. Not one who deifies 
 
 Those ancient fetishes which have meant 
 
 24 
 
So much to men who had not known the joy of 
 
 being free. 
 The crown of freedom presses on the brow 
 Of every citizen of America, 
 And here in the fair state of CaHfornia 
 Where even now, 
 
 When half the world is hungered and athirst, 
 The horn is filled with plenty, and the presses burst 
 With all the lavish products of a golden soil, 
 That crown is studded with a thousand costly gems. 
 Enthroned and sceptred by their enterprise and toil 
 Winged are their feet to lead men forward. 
 Myrrh and frankincense 
 
 Are proffered by proud sovereigns of distant realms, 
 Piteous, entreating hands would touch the hems 
 Of garments worn by those whose eyes have seen 
 
 the light 
 Denied to them ; of men who can dispense 
 Their favours regally; whose hands are on the helms 
 Of all the little barques which set their timid sails 
 To catch the winds of Freedom; of men who've 
 
 fought and won — in part — the fight. 
 
 But what of all that Privilege entails? 
 "Noblesse Oblige." How far does that sweet phrase 
 Govern men's conduct in these later days 
 Of clash and clanguor and of storm and stress? 
 These modern monarchs go their several ways 
 And ask, no favours, plead for no largesse. 
 They've learned to take what's theirs, to hold 
 their own. 
 
 25] 
 
But what of giving? On the bare Caucasian slopes, 
 Where the blue Danube rolls, on barren Russian 
 
 plains. 
 On Don, on Dneiper, Vistula; on Rhine and Rhone, 
 Amidst the tumbled Balkans — everywhere the hopes 
 Of famished men, of lonely women, helpless 
 
 orphans, rest upon the generosity of those 
 
 whose gains 
 Have not been wasted in the cruel furnace of the war. 
 And not in vain the quest! 
 America has proved herself as great in giving as in 
 
 garnering wealth. 
 But money does not heal the scar 
 Which sears the soul of men. What of the kindly 
 
 thought, 
 The knightly courtesy, humility in pride — 
 Gifts of the spirit which can not be bought? 
 There is no health 
 
 In arrogance, or in the strength which boasts. 
 And would deride 
 
 The claims of those who cannot martial hosts 
 To force them. "Noblesse Oblige." From that 
 
 old world 
 In which men groped towards the light. 
 And, groping, bound themselves with iron chains 
 Of Privilege, and Prejudice, and Fantasies, and 
 
 Forms, 
 Has passed the sceptre. No longer, scented, curled, 
 Pampered, misled by intrigue, flattered by parasite, 
 Does Royalty dictate the issue. Thews and brains 
 Bred in the crowded cities, nurtured in the fertile 
 
 plains 
 Of free America can alone decide 
 
 [26 
 
Whether that civilization shall abide 
 
 Which trembles in the balance. It is your pride 
 
 That 'neath the stars and stripes, no crest, no 
 
 coat of arms, no old device 
 Of mud-stained chivalry- 
 Can link your purpose with a tortured past. 
 The stripes for union, and the stars for liberty! 
 Let that suffice ! 
 
 That "he alone must travel who would travel fast" 
 Voices that other thought your stripes deny. 
 The stripes for union ! Would you then confine 
 That sense of union? Give the lie 
 To half your emblem? Do the stars reflect 
 God's light upon a single continent 
 Of this small globe, which, swinging in the firma- 
 ment. 
 Carries the destiny of man. 
 Do you reject 
 The wider plan. 
 Which tells you that the call. 
 Resounding on your platforms, echoed in your press, 
 
 applauded even in your Council Hall, 
 "First comes America," can never satisfy 
 The souls of those who wield the sceptre? Is it not 
 
 better than that golden phrase 
 Which helped the weaker, made more strong the 
 
 stronger, in those "good old — bad old — days" 
 — "Noblesse Oblige" — be written on the flag which 
 
 leads the van? 
 So shall America not permit to die 
 Her own ideal — The Real Brotherhood of Man. 
 
 27] 
 
CREEDS, CONSTELLATIONS, AND CREEPING 
 THINGS 
 
 B 
 
 HE sense of Oneness! If that only were 
 
 achieved, 
 And human brains conceived 
 That greater thought which hnks 
 Mankind, the sap which thrills with life 
 The larkspur, poisonous red berry, and the little 
 
 peeping frond. 
 Born with a tender breath of spring into a world 
 
 of strife, 
 The fleeting moment and the Great Beyond, 
 The furtive weasel as it homeward slinks 
 Obscene with cruel bloodstains and yet sanctified 
 In that she lives, as she had gladly died. 
 To feed two cheeping, chattering little balls of fur, 
 Pressing with soft, pink, clawless pads her swollen 
 
 teats, 
 Which constitute the Universe to her! 
 Rapine, surrender, sacrifice, low greed, and lofty feats 
 Of knightly chivalry, all inextricably bound and tied 
 Into the very fabric of the lives 
 Of men and mice and metals, hunter and hunted, 
 
 prelates and butchers, doves, cormorants, 
 
 cretaceans, prostitutes, and wives! 
 If man but understood ! 
 The plains of France bear witness. Seamed and 
 
 scarred 
 The barren fields are sown with skulls and bones 
 To ripen into hate twixt humans yet unborn: 
 The erstwhile fruitful orchard and the peaceful wood 
 All charred: 
 
 28 
 
Sweet homesteads ravished, women dishonoured, 
 
 little ones forlorn. 
 Is there no gain to balance? Nothing which atones? 
 "A greater love no man can have than this." 
 Through the long ages how those words resound! 
 Stirred by a wave of generous, patriotic thought, 
 (Come death! Come sickness, or the crippling 
 
 wound !) 
 They held themselves as naught, 
 Embraced the steel, welcomed the shattering roar 
 
 of cannon, and the bullet's hiss. 
 If England lived — If France escaped her doom — 
 If the lost provinces of Italy could be redeemed — 
 If young America could show the world 
 That the free banner which she had unfurled 
 Could not be stained by lust of conquest. Ebb 
 
 and flow 
 Mark all the processes of Nature. Dying embers 
 
 nurse the glow 
 From which again shall leap the sacred flame. 
 
 It has even seemed 
 That the filth-crusted, dust-encumbered room 
 Of human habitation 
 Has been garnished, cleansed and swept. 
 Whilst strong men writhed in agony and women wept, 
 For the greater delectation 
 
 Of seven times seven devils who have entered in. 
 Revise your phrases! Recognize that sin 
 Is clear insanity: 
 
 That egotistic faith to which you pin 
 Your hopes of gaining something which you've 
 
 missed 
 
 [29 
 
A sheer inanity ! 
 
 *'Sic vos non vobis." When the stern crusader kissed 
 
 The cross which made a handle to the blade 
 
 He fain would crimson with the blood of men 
 
 Born in a distant land, 
 
 He failed to understand 
 
 That he blasphemed his own ideal. 
 
 The tide creeps higher, despite the frequent retro- 
 cession, 
 
 Now as then. 
 
 For not less real 
 
 Has been the blundering ineptitude which has led 
 
 Teuton and Gaul, Celt, Slav, and many a mingled 
 breed 
 
 Welded in selfless loyalty to a mere geographical 
 expression 
 
 To suffer jubilantly without heed 
 
 To personal advantage. Yet the red blood they shed 
 
 On Moloch's altar is accepted as a sacrifice 
 
 In that it marks a dawning sense 
 
 Of the extension of the sphere of influence 
 
 Of that great Concept which shall one day kill 
 
 The creeds which help to float the swimmer and 
 then with strangling hold 
 
 Engulf him in a sea of self. To heal the essential ill 
 
 It shall not suffice 
 
 That Mongol and Aryan would as lief 
 
 Hamper or hurt each other as a thief 
 
 Would steal the wage that he himself has earned. 
 
 Far more bold 
 
 Must be man's grasp of that Infinity, 
 
 So faint discerned — 
 
 30] 
 
The infinitely small and infinitely great, 
 
 The mite, the microbe, men, Martians, and the 
 
 Milky Way, 
 Larva of dead volcanoes, laughing children, wondrous 
 
 webs of spiders, stinging nettles, fragrant 
 
 flowers in May, 
 Love-linked, though seemingly distraught with hate, 
 Inseparate, Inviolate — 
 The One in All, and All in one, which is Divinity ! 
 
 [31] 
 
A MENAGE A TROIS ACROSS THE STYX 
 
A MENAGE A TROIS ACROSS THE STYX 
 
 XT'S a dashed nuisance that we've lost our 
 grips. 
 That weird old fellow at the helm's to 
 blame. 
 I'm bio wed 
 
 If I'll bestow upon these grinning boatmen any tips. 
 I like this place. We'll breakfast here. The air 
 
 was chill 
 Crossing that river. Strange I cannot recollect 
 
 the name. 
 I wish I'd rowed 
 To keep me warm. 
 
 Why do you kiddies sit so glum and still? 
 What does it matter where we've landed? It's 
 
 the same 
 So long as we're together. Sweetheart, lend your 
 
 lips! 
 Encircle me with your soft arm! 
 That's better. Feel myself again. 
 And now to breakfast. I vote we go and sit 
 In the vine-trellised arbour yonder. P'raps 
 
 we'll get a drink. 
 It doesn't look as if this place 
 Was ruled by that damned prohibition. Shine or 
 
 rain 
 We've stuck together since Claire made a hit 
 With me, and I began to think 
 In terms of real soul freedom, and this little 
 
 Grace, 
 Wife of my springtime, recognized the truth 
 That man is polygamic — kept her hand in mine — 
 
 35 
 
Never reproached because we found that on a 
 
 certain plane 
 We met no longer; whether it was Youth 
 That sprouted fresh within me — or the brute. 
 I'm not abusing any part of God's creation. 
 They are just as fine 
 
 As we are — these frank, healthy, sane, 
 Erotic, questing, hunting, fighting, lusting beasts. 
 Well, anyway, Grace understood and played the 
 
 game, 
 And here we are — the three of us! Doesn't 
 
 she look cute 
 In that frilled nighty? Give me your lips, Claire! 
 
 It's blamed queer 
 That after all our feasts 
 Of Love and Reason, when we talked, and danced, 
 
 and sang, 
 Touched life at every point. 
 And never gave a hang 
 
 For damned conventions, we should be sitting here 
 In this rum joint. 
 
 And dressed like this, as if we three had had a call 
 At midnight which we could not shirk or stay. 
 
 "So that's it, is it? You two knew that Life 
 
 Held us no longer — that the Moving Picture Play 
 
 Is over for the three of us? Well, after all 
 
 It had to come some day. 
 
 Styx or Spoon River! Loose me for a moment, 
 
 Claire. 
 I want that little Grace, 
 My wife, 
 
 [36 
 
Back in my arms. Guess we've got to face 
 This thing together. You, too, Claire! I 
 
 didn't mean 
 To hurt you, sweetheart. You and I 
 Have got to try 
 
 To straighten this thing out — be fair and square 
 To this dear child on whose calm strength 
 
 we've learned to lean. 
 How did we die? 
 
 ****** 
 
 "I remember now, Claire. You had sung 
 And thrilled me with the passion of your 
 
 splendid voice. 
 It seemed that liquid fire coursed my veins. I 
 
 had no choice. 
 A star, low hung. 
 Lit that sweet path which led 
 To rapture. Grace had slipped away, 
 To sleep or pray. 
 You had shed 
 Upon me all the generous, poignant beauty of 
 
 your love, 
 Showered upon me all the glorious wealth 
 Of that wild, wayward heart, which made your eyes 
 Rubies for me, your breasts great chalices of wine. 
 Gave to your voice the soft caressing murmur of 
 
 of the mating dove, 
 And made your hair a mesh which held me by a 
 
 thousand strands of gold. 
 And then with stealth 
 Came footsteps to surprise, 
 Came Greed and Violence to snatch poor gauds 
 
 of mine. 
 
 [37 
 
And when I started to resist I felt the clinging 
 
 hold 
 Of your soft arms. One shot in panic killed us both. 
 Terror had made that poor, stealing coward bold. 
 And Grace here — she could not have been far 
 
 off, Claire — 
 
 Nothing loth 
 
 (Not far off! By God! That mak.es one thinly. 
 
 Oh, yes! She'd acquiesced. But was it fair?) 
 
 Took that to drink 
 
 Which brought her little body to the brink 
 
 Of the dark river which we've crossed. 
 
 So it's all over! All is won or lost. 
 
 We three have got to face the music — count 
 
 the cost ! 
 The harvest ripens. Well, t'was I that sowed 
 
 the seed ! 
 Hi! Waiter! Where's that queer old Ganymede?" 
 
 "Gen'man with two ladies, Sir! Wants to pay the 
 
 bill. 
 Seems that 'e's 'ad 'is fill 
 
 And doesn't know the rules of this establishment. 
 'Can't pay for wot I've 'ad?' 'e says. 
 ' 'Oo runs this show? Is this a bloomin' maze? 
 I've 'eard,' 'e says, 'of 'umans being' sent 
 Along the broad and easy path plumb down to Hell, 
 Or up the straight and narrer — ^jus' two ways. 
 But this would craze 
 A bleedin' Archimandrite to be told' 
 (You'll pardon me, Sir, if I'm overbold. 
 I'm usin' jus' the langwidge w'ich 'e used) 
 
'That wot a fella's bought 'as not bin sold, 
 
 And that the one 'oo pays 
 
 Is not the chap wot's fed the biggest appetite. 
 
 I'd rather be excused 
 
 From entering any of the many mansions in this 
 
 'ouse' 
 (His actual words, Sir, were that 'e'd be damned) 
 *If I can't settle this account. 
 I'll do wot's right. 
 
 I've never subterfuged, or lied, or shammed, 
 And I'll pay up, wotever the amount.' 
 In fact 'e claimed to be the one and only mouse 
 As ate the cheese. 
 Judg'n, 'owever, that Yer Honor's ruling in this 
 
 case 
 Seems to be likely to affect the 'uman race 
 Considerable, since they've chucked the good old 
 
 wheeze 
 'Bout marriage bein' made in 'Eaven, 
 I've brought the crowd along. 
 I guess the little 'un supplies the leaven 
 To sweeten the 'ole lump, 
 Altho' she aint carollin' no sweet song. 
 There's suthin' about 'er seems to brighten 
 
 this old dump. 
 Well! That's your job, Sir. 'Scuse me now! 
 
 So long!" 
 
 "I see you misconstrue the purpose of this Court. 
 I'll not enter now 
 
 Into those super-subtleties to which your minds 
 are not attuned. 
 
 39 
 
This is no anteroom to a kind of psychic health 
 
 resort, 
 Such as your quacks who flourish down below 
 Construct to fit their predilections. You have 
 
 mooned 
 About your souls, and sought to justify 
 A living lie 
 By reference to Truths you've really failed to 
 
 grasp, 
 Altho' you've glimpsed them. Now you three 
 Before me, in brief respite, stand at the last gasp 
 Of those detached, encircling, envelopes of flesh 
 (Drops, rivulets, then rivers, then the open sea!) 
 Which for a space have circumscribed 
 Those fragments of the essential. Universal stuff" 
 Short loaned to you. Each held within, and peering 
 
 through, a mesh 
 Has given to each, and has from each imbibed, 
 And yet in futile, human arrogance has maintained 
 The personal, egoistic standpoint. You believe 
 That it is not enough 
 That the whole Universe of circling orbs 
 Should swing in ordered, rhythmic unison; that each 
 
 scrap 
 Of interlocking, interchanging, interacting dust, 
 Each particle a Cosmos which has waxed and waned, 
 (Grass, fibre, shuttle, warp and woof, and, lo! 
 
 the Final Weave!) 
 Should form a part of that Infinity of Mind 
 Which grasps, reflects, ordains, reacts, absorbs 
 All processes — is Life, is Love, is Hope, 
 
 the very Sap 
 And Substance — Hunger, Thirst, Soft Pity, Rabid 
 
 Lust 
 
 [40] 
 
Sex, Music, Dissolution, Reconstruction, Sun and 
 
 Wind, 
 Heat, Vapour, Waves, Vibrations, Impulse, Act, 
 Art, Mechanism, Ether, Poetry, Concept, Fact, 
 Ape, Vegetable, Man, Sloth, Flea, and Cataract. 
 All this is not enough, but you must hold 
 Since we've endowed a certain fragment of our whole 
 With cerebration — matter in motion whirled around 
 So that the things you call volition, thought. 
 Follow on certain groupings — your mentalities 
 
 enfold 
 A separate entity; that the human Soul 
 Amounts to something which, as though in honour 
 
 bound. 
 We must perpetuate. It matters naught 
 That all the rotting refuse of the endless forms 
 In which you see life spring and life decay 
 Gainsay 
 
 Your theories. You cling 
 To that which is in truth a very little thing. 
 The lesson of the bees, of gin, depression, 
 
 exaltation, calms and storms. 
 Of ions, coral, crawfish, Mamelukes and Kings, 
 Seed, sceptres, sickness, health, volcanoes, 
 
 wedding rings. 
 Laws, revolutions, motherhood, receding tides, 
 
 dead stars. 
 Unions of labour, churches, comradeship, fierce 
 
 wars — 
 All these escape you, since you magnify 
 That little spark which animates 
 The brief association of dead leaf, dead fly, 
 Mist of the mountain, and the ocean slime, 
 
 [41] 
 
(Which, conscious of itself. 
 
 Desires and copulates, breeds, barters, boasts, and 
 
 hates) 
 Into a rounded whole. But neither Space 
 
 nor Time 
 Limit the vision of that conscious Universe 
 In which you claim 
 
 That each fortuitous concatenation of our element, 
 Which is to Nature as the sound of insects' 
 
 hum or as the scent 
 Of flowers, shall rest forever on its little shelf 
 (Marcus Aurelius, Robert Browning, Caliban, 
 
 Wong Sin, Yourself) 
 Beatified, or blighted by some cruel, vengeful, 
 
 undiscerning curse. 
 You miss our aim. 
 Soft dalliance with houris, blissful adoration, 
 
 human intercourse 
 With the few atoms you've contacted with before, 
 Thrills without satiety, 
 A chain of transmigration with each link, 
 Detached in individual knowledge from the one 
 
 behind — 
 A weird variety 
 
 Of futile aspirations centred round the core 
 Of finite consciousness which you choose to think 
 To be the very Source 
 
 Of Something sempiternal. You must clear the mind 
 Of all such aberrations. Hate, Love, Fear, Remorse 
 Abide. No sparrow falls and leaves the Universe 
 
 unchanged. 
 Your acts have helped or hurt 
 To all time. 
 
 [42 
 
I have ranged 
 
 Beyond your comprehension. Hold to this. 
 
 Clean dirt, 
 
 {The sweat of agonized, effete endeavour 
 
 Or fierce, forbidden, lusting, generous, sympathetic 
 
 kiss). 
 Noisome slime, 
 
 {Deliberate and hypocritical denial of the truth) 
 May clog and jam our mechanism, both alike. 
 The one is swept away. 
 Dust dancing in the sun's clear ray. 
 The other, in that it retards th' appointed end, 
 Endures forever. 
 
 Confounds confusion, wrecks a myriad lives, 
 Is cancerous in the heart of that which men call God. 
 There is no ruth 
 
 For meanness, self deception, Pharisaic lies. 
 The man who strives 
 
 And fails, has helped to clear the issue. Made 
 The anti-toxin. The green sod 
 Which lightly rests where he was laid 
 Can deal with all that emanates. The little cries 
 Of peewits marks the passing of that soul, 
 Merged in the Infinite ; enwrapt ; oblivious ; fragment 
 
 of the Conscious Whole. 
 
 "I see friend Richard yawns portentously. Perhaps 
 
 he thinks 
 That all the troubles which afflict the tortured world 
 — It always has been tortured; ever on the brinks 
 Of endless crises — these are due 
 
 43 
 
To the loquacity he has observed in Me, 
 Indicative of that dread thing, senile decay. 
 Instead of those harsh thunderbolts we hurled 
 To drive our blithering sheep back into the fold, 
 A stream of endless talk! Dick, I think that you 
 Are justified. I said I would not deal in super- 
 subtleties. 
 
 But I see 
 I've got you all balled up when I have only told 
 The half of half of the tenth part of all that I 
 
 might say. 
 So to get back to earth! It has dawned on you 
 That if my teaching holds, it matters naught 
 To that dead self of yours if you have wrought 
 Evil or good. Rewards, damnation, rapture, rue. 
 All meaningless! A truce to metaphysics! I will 
 
 merely hint 
 At that which some day will be understood 
 Even by humans. What if you are sick? 
 You long for health. Thought conquers. You 
 
 are well. 
 Mind is the mint. 
 Your little cosmos — revolving atoms; Sleep and 
 
 Awaking ; 
 
 Procreation; Brain Work; Food; 
 Co-operation; Energy; Despair; Hope; Habit; 
 
 Flame and Wick — 
 Restores proportions, reckons values, skirts the 
 
 brink of Hell, 
 Emerges sane, and dances gladly down the path 
 
 of Time. 
 But when mind fails? Does not this mean 
 That all the myriad component parts lack unison, 
 
 have not the sense of rhyme, 
 
 [441 
 
Fail to react, to comprehend direction, are self- 
 willed? 
 
 Now grant this comprehension ! Does the new-born 
 child 
 
 Yearn to destroy the gentle breasts which wean? 
 
 Does the lute strive to make a rasping discord? 
 Yet it happens so, 
 
 For lack of comprehension — which is Conscience. 
 Dick! 
 
 Those fabled tortures, burnings, keeping dead 
 things quick 
 
 That they may suffer anguish, are as melting snow 
 
 To lips all cracked and parched, compared with 
 that distress 
 
 Which shatters, rends, and tears each fibre of the 
 Inner Consciousness 
 
 Of those who k^ow. 
 
 Who've hurt, who've hindered, made insane, un- 
 clean. 
 
 The very thing they are — the All-Pervading, 
 All-Embracing, Great Unseen. 
 
 "It comes to this. 
 The lightest kiss. 
 
 The flicker of a half -born thought. 
 Repression, Inclination — all these count. 
 Each a microscopic fount 
 
 Flowing eternal. Crushed insects fertilize a tiny seed ; 
 The desert blossoms. From that little weed 
 Follow the chain of consequence ! A flower plucked ; 
 A darting rattlesnake; Human ambitions shattered, 
 brought to naught; 
 
 45] 
 
Hearts broken; children wailing — a whole world 
 awry. 
 
 "And now, my friends, I've chucked 
 
 This highfalutin' talk. I'll have a try 
 
 To size the situation up with which we've got to deal. 
 
 In language suited to those mortal brains 
 
 Which shortly must be used again for making grass 
 
 or glow worms. 
 We've got to balance losses, count the gains, 
 Now that you three are dead. 
 In spite of all I've said 
 We go through all the forms 
 Of judgment. What is your appeal? 
 I'll do the pleading. There is nothing sacrosanct 
 About an institution planned by men and ratified 
 
 by priests. 
 Who incidentally may be thanked 
 For half the troubles Flesh is heir to. Marriage 
 
 feasts 
 Occasion frequent indigestion. We continually shift 
 Our standards. Many a dead Turk, 
 By honest work. 
 
 Has helped to give your little world a lift. 
 Whose amorous proclivities might have justified 
 — If we did things that way — 
 A course in higher mathematics for that cheerful 
 
 myth 
 The Recording Angel. Your point is Richard, 
 
 that you haven't lied 
 To your most intimate associate in the game of life, 
 Your wife. 
 
 46 
 
All those intensely complex forces which must play 
 Upon the question — heredity, environment, 
 
 attributes 
 Of mind and body — you had better leave to me. 
 I'll extract the pith. 
 Men are brutes. 
 Mists of the mountain top are part and parcel 
 
 of the sea. 
 The sum and substance of it all is this. 
 — Clasp; handshake; soft caress; sweet, clinging, 
 
 biting kiss — 
 Who has been taking, who been giving, most? 
 Just when you are, just where you are, just who 
 
 you are. 
 You've got to play the game, in peace or war, 
 To help and not to hinder. The kindly crutch today 
 Will atrophy sound limbs unless it's thrown away 
 When all the host 
 
 Of tiny filaments of nerve and tissue tingle at the call 
 Of health restored. 
 
 Just who you are, just where you are, just when. 
 The world of men 
 
 Must gain or lose by you. The supremest test 
 Is giving and taking. One loved, and one abhorred 
 By the Great Purpose. That's the all in all! 
 Let go the rest! 
 
 "One of you is rotten. That means a doom 
 I've only vaguely adumbrated. Grace's 
 
 pleading eyes 
 Tell the old tale. Vicarious sacrifice 
 Means nothing really. We have no room 
 For purely human sentiment. And yet 
 
 [47] 
 
You'll miss the balance, finer than the thread 
 
 Of finest gossamer split in a billion strands, 
 
 If you fail to get 
 
 The inner meaning of the thing called Love. 
 
 We put that above 
 
 Aught else — The love which understands, 
 
 Surrenders, suffers, and endures when passion's 
 
 cold and dead. 
 And if this wins no solace, no respite 
 For the one loved, what use has been the fight? 
 Your question, Grace! It all depends, my child, 
 On the reaction of the man you've loved — 
 
 the thing you've made. 
 Depend upon it you've created something which 
 
 will aid. 
 — ^A spark! A seedling! — Pass, my daughter, 
 
 unafraid. 
 
 "Claire, you are trembling. Rash, wayward, wild, 
 You've grasped as well as given. 
 Perchance, not striven 
 Too hard to conquer appetite. 
 Dust dancing in the sunbeam, Claire! 
 You recollect my simile. Well, well! Our air 
 Cannot be all pure ether. You're all right! 
 ****** 
 
 "Oh, Yes! We know the women ministered for 
 
 their own delight. 
 Each in her separate way. 
 There's much to say 
 On your side, Richard. It's a fearful coil 
 This old sex problem. Brain and brain; 
 Body and body; that flashing keen insight 
 
 [48] 
 
Into a world of art and beauty which is all the soul 
 You humans are endowed with. Wit, laughter, 
 
 share of toil — 
 How these unite ! 
 Give sense of rounded whole ! 
 Pulses beat higher, comradeship ensues, 
 A splendid gain, 
 
 But clean outside that marriage contract. I will use 
 A simple illustration — then have done. 
 If something has been lost it often happens 
 
 something has been won. 
 
 ****** 
 
 "Here is a type. Rigid, affectionate, honest, clean, 
 
 upright. 
 He passes to the home where that embrace 
 Which Law has sanctified, 
 
 Shall still the throb of Nature on this day of spring. 
 A familiar face. 
 Lips which have never lied. 
 Quiescent, acquiescent, dutiful — the wife. 
 And then the sting — 
 We'll skip the details; how it came about; 
 The chance acquaintance ; skirt uplifted, eyes that 
 
 brimmed. 
 Then flushed with the soft dew of passion — 
 
 Aye the sting. 
 The bruise — dear bruise — the hurt — sweet hurt — 
 
 the bite 
 Of vivid, vital, pulsing, energizing Life, 
 By poets hymned. 
 
 There's something lost. Inevitable deceit, 
 A hidden background. (That has been left out 
 In your case, Richard.) If in that retreat 
 
 [49] 
 
^ 
 
 From rectitude and boredom there has sprung 
 Real tenderness, real pity, longing for solace, 
 
 that heartache 
 Which makes men generous, something has been 
 
 gained. 
 Forces which mar are forces which can make. 
 Fire can cleanse that which the smoke of fire has 
 
 stained. 
 All must be reckoned. When the urge was spent, 
 The soft arms flung 
 
 Beneath those flowing tresses, wrapt in sleep 
 She lay. The glimmer of a tear 
 Upon her cheek. Men prey and women weep! 
 Into her shell like ear 
 He murmured 'Oh! My dear! My dear! 
 The pity of it !' We count that. 
 
 "Have we arrived now, Richard? Do you sense 
 The final judgment? — What I am driving at? 
 We leave it in the very last event 
 — You'll suffer, Richard! — to your Conscience." 
 
 50 
 
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