APOLLO AND 
 
 THE SEAMAN 
 
 A3 
 
 = 
 
 3 m 
 
 ;3 g 
 
 3 m 
 
 6 H 
 
 7 = 
 
 8 ^ 
 
 BY 
 
 HERBERT TRENCH
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 By the Same Author 
 DEIRDRE WEDDED 
 
 AND NINETEEN OTHER POEMS 
 
 INCLUDING 
 
 A Silver Birch 
 
 Song for the Funeral of a Boy 
 
 Shakespeare 
 
 A Charge 
 
 In the Roman Amphitheatre, Verona 
 
 NEW POEMS 
 
 INCLUDING 
 
 Apollo and the Seaman 
 
 An Ode to Beauty 
 
 Stanzas to Tolstoy 
 
 The \'oice from the Column 
 
 Lindisfarne 
 
 The Questioners 
 
 Jean Richepin's Song 
 
 Old Anchor Chanty 
 
 AND twenty- four OTHERS 
 METHUEN AND CO.
 
 APOLLO AND 
 
 THE SEAMAN 
 
 BY 
 
 HERBERT TRENCH 
 
 LONDON . METHUEN AND CO. 
 ESSEX STREET, STRAND ^k:» 1908
 
 5"^ 7/ 
 
 / 6 6L- 
 
 APOLLO AND THE SEAMAN 
 
 APOLLO through the woods came down Apoiio's 
 Furred like a merchant fine, "°'^"^- 
 
 And sate with a Sailor at an Inn 
 Sharing a jug of wine. 
 
 Had sun-rays, spilled out of a storm, 
 Thither the God conveyed ? 
 Or some green and floating cloudlet caught 
 On the fringes of a glade ? 
 
 For none had known him by his gait 
 Descending from the hills. 
 Though far and wide before him blew 
 The friendly daffodils; 
 
 No shepherd had discovered him 
 On upland pasture bare 
 By dew-pond or green Roman camp ; 
 No voice aloft in air 
 
 A I 
 
 941300
 
 Along lone barrows of great downs 
 With kine in rolling coombes, 
 Where bells blow up from all the plain 
 To headlands spring perfumes, 
 
 Proclaimed him to those coombes and folds 
 
 Of little lambs unyeaned, 
 
 Or sung him to the billowy woods 
 
 With spray of buds begreened, 
 
 Where spreads in haze the snowy maze 
 
 Of orchards deep-ravined — 
 
 Telling the dingles of the thrush 
 To overflow with sound, 
 Warning the grassy commons all 
 In vales for miles around : 
 
 " Wake ! shady forest-coverts wide ! 
 Wake ! skylit river-sward ! 
 Chases and meres and misty shires 
 Be ready for your lord ! " 
 
 But he would not stay nor tarry there 
 On the blithe edge of the down, 
 To the sea-coast his errand was 
 And the smoke-hanging town. 
 
 Far off he saw its harbours shine 
 And black sea-bastions thronged 
 With masts of the sea-traffickers 
 For whom his spirit longed. 
 
 2
 
 Far off he heard the windlass heaved 
 And the creaking of the cranes, 
 Gay barges hailed and poled along, 
 And the rattling fall of chains, 
 
 Till by the windows of that Inn 
 
 He sate and took his ease 
 
 Where the bowsprits of the swarthy ships 
 
 Came thrusting to the quays. 
 
 II 
 
 " And why are you cast down, sailor ? The rumour. 
 
 And why are you cast down ? 
 With lapfuls of the guineas light 
 Come you not back to town ? 
 
 Your feet that must have run in air 
 Aloft the slippy mast 
 Are they not glad to land, my lad. 
 On steady ground at last ? " 
 
 Up from his brown and branded hands 
 A heavy chin he raised. 
 And sidelong through the harbour bluffs 
 Looked out like man amazed. 
 
 " If you had cruised as I have cruised 
 The world for many a year, 
 Your blood like mine it would have struck 
 At the strange news I hear. 
 
 3
 
 the Moon went riding high last night 
 And the dance along the quays. 
 
 But I could not find it in my heart 
 To care for shows like these ; 
 
 For while still I felt the rollers' lift 
 Bear on through the dark land 
 And the little houses here still rock 
 And sway — they would not stand — 
 
 1 heard them calling in the streets 
 That the ship I serve upon — 
 The great ship Immortality — 
 
 Was gone down, like the sun. . . ." 
 
 Ill 
 
 Apollo. " And whence did that craft hail, sailor, The Ship. 
 
 Of which you seem so fond ? " 
 Seaman. " It was some harbour of the East, 
 
 Back o' beyond, back o' beyond ! " 
 
 Apollo. '' What shipwrights' hammers rang on her. 
 The stout ship and the leal .? 
 In what green forest inlet lay 
 Her cradle and her keel ? " 
 
 Seaman. " I think some arm of the sea-gods 
 Framed us her stormy frame, 
 And ribbed and beamed and stanchioned her. 
 And gave her strength a name. 
 
 4
 
 Never, Sir Traveller, have you seen 
 A sight the half as fine 
 As v^^hen she hove up from the East 
 On our horizon-line ! " 
 
 Apollo. " I have seen a dead god on the Nile, 
 Paddled by tribes of bronze. 
 Under mud-built villages of palms 
 Glide, statelier than swans. 
 And Isis' frail moon-golden skiff 
 Restore him to that barque of life 
 Whose years are millions. 
 
 I have seen Jason and his men 
 
 Into bows of Argo piece 
 
 Oak of Dodona, ere she slid 
 
 To find the golden fleece; 
 
 Ay, and triremes of the marble isles 
 
 Pursue from Salamis. 
 
 I have seen master-galleys rise 
 Dipping in mass the oar. 
 And centaur-carven caravels. 
 And galleons big with ore. 
 Dromonds, and mountain'd argosies 
 That sack the globe no more : 
 
 Great sails, like yellow weeping clouds, 
 Heap'd thunder, roaring squall — 
 And their fadings, like the fleet of stars 
 That floateth over all."
 
 Seaman. " Well — ask all navies such as these — 
 Was she not more divine 
 Who, challenged by Death's muffled drums, 
 Gave Death the countersign ? 
 
 Ah, to serve on her in time of war ! 
 Why it set aflame your blood 
 To feel her in the slack of peace 
 Come booming up the flood, 
 
 Thousands of wings about her bows 
 As she cast away the deep. 
 The morning star swung from a spar 
 And every sail asleep. 
 
 And her masts ! Land-locked and shut away 
 
 From the sea-winds' scud and psalm. 
 
 Her masts, they trembled in a leash — 
 
 You laid on them your palm. 
 
 And they quivered over with great life 
 
 That never could be calm. 
 
 No frothings in your purple wake 
 On the lone path to the pole 
 White as the spread of sail on her 
 That lent wings to your soul — " 
 
 Apollo. " What was her build, that boat of yours 
 So proud upon the sea ? 
 What was her make of hull and deck, 
 What suit of sails had she ? " 
 6
 
 Seaman. " O her Stretch of sail so white, so white, 
 
 By no man's hand unfurled, 
 
 Was Heaven ! " 
 Apollo. " And the decks you kept so bright ? " 
 
 Seaman. " Were like this bustling World." 
 Apollo. " And the hold and cockpit out of sight, 
 
 Pitch dark and ill to smell, 
 
 Full of the friends of your delight ? " 
 Seaman. " That was the pit of Hell ! " 
 
 Seaman. 
 
 IV 
 
 " How think of her, gone down, gone down ! The tidings. 
 How think of her decayed ! 
 Or that the maker of that ship 
 Could let his creature fade ! 
 More unbridled — unforgettable — was never 
 creature made. 
 
 Gone by the board, those swinging spars 
 That seemed through storm to climb ! 
 Sent down, like any cockle-shell, 
 To the tangle and the slime ! 
 
 Did he that takes the narrow sounds 
 His monstrous hands between 
 Whirl her among his crazy locks 
 Into an eddy green ? 
 
 Was it fog-bound, on a foul coast, 
 With not enough sea-room. 
 Or clear of land that she was lost. 
 Where the hard gale can blow home ?
 
 Was it ice-floe in the sheeted foam 
 Ambushed her ? or some ledge 
 Of false lights — or uncharted reef — 
 Broke her back upon its edge ? 
 
 Perhaps even she was seized at last 
 Off some island precipice 
 With weariness, like man's weariness. 
 Of everything that is. 
 
 And stranded so till the fresh flood 
 That through the channel swings 
 Crumbled that side like a sea-cliff 
 As one crumbles little things." 
 
 Apollo. " Her end was none, my lad, of these ; 
 But first, if you must know. 
 Mutiny of those friends of yours 
 In irons down below." 
 
 Seaman. " And how got you. Sir Merchantman, 
 This news — or bitter jest ? " "z" ' \ 
 
 Apollo. " Sir, my trade is bringing light to all 
 From the East unto the West. 
 
 Nay, he that built your famous boat 
 From the old coasts to fly 
 And bear you ever out and on 
 Was I, and none but I ! " 
 8
 
 (musing). 
 
 With that the sailor clutch'd the board 
 Wine spilt out of his glass 
 Dripp'd to the floor, but not a sound 
 From his parch'd mouth would pass. 
 
 V 
 
 The tale of 
 
 Apollo tt There was no whisper out of space, ApoUo. 
 
 Scarcely a ripple ran 
 From thine incommensurable side 
 O dim leviathan, 
 
 When from afar I came in flight, 
 Rumours 'gainst thee to probe. 
 Leaving far off, engraved in shade, 
 Many a dreaming silver globe 
 And approaching thee on the middle sea 
 Wrapt in my darkling robe. 
 
 From that Ship becalm'd, that triple-tier'd 
 Of Heaven and Earth and Hell, 
 Spread strange commotion as I near'd 
 Over the starred sea-swell. 
 
 Arcturus, I remember, shone — 
 That rebel ! mirror'd bright. 
 And Saturn in his moat of moons 
 Glass'd in unsounded night ; 
 All the million-litten vault below 
 Breathed, in a slumber light. 
 
 B
 
 As in some mountain forest glade 
 When frosts ere dawn are brisk 
 And early spring boughs knitted close 
 Across the red moon's disk. 
 
 And the rimy turf rings hard to hoof 
 Of the light branch-feeding deer, 
 One sees upflushing some glen's brow 
 Camp-fire of mountaineer 
 
 Bivouack'd below ; shag-bearded pines, 
 All gnarled, loom down estranged 
 At the wanton fire about their knees 
 With the moon-fire interchanged — 
 
 So strange her gaunt dishevelled spars 
 Loomed down out of the sky ; 
 Sails that had drunk Earth's soul immense 
 Hung pierced and slung awry. 
 
 My inwoven eternal blazonries 
 An idle tattered shame. 
 Was this the keen fire-spirited prow 
 Ark of the heaving flame 
 
 That sun-stampt and illumined ship. 
 That keel of mystery. 
 Loosed, after toilings beyond count, 
 To plunge from the Daedalian mount 
 And to stem futurity ? 
 
 10
 
 Now, because mine own insignia badged 
 
 Each white celestial vail, 
 
 Rage seized me, like your emperor 
 
 Trajan — how goes the tale ? — 
 
 Who on Tigris, twice defeated, tore 
 
 His gold wolves from the sail. . . . 
 
 And as from forge doors in her decks 
 Escaped, lulled, rose again. 
 Confused blasts — insolent uproar 
 From torch'd and naked men. 
 As it were some wind from Africa's 
 Tropic and demon'd fen. 
 
 And beast-like shadows ran and flashed ; 
 Knotted at grips they swayed 
 And writhed. Unkennelled Hell was loose 
 And swarmed in escalade. 
 
 Hard-pressed my righteous stood at bay ; 
 But when Hell's desperate brood 
 Saw me, they shouted, * Lord of lights 
 Release ! ' And ruinous strew'd. 
 Fell on their faces on the decks 
 In breathless multitude. 
 
 But their leader, with inverted torch, 
 Stepp'd through them. Stern he comes, 
 Stirring their night-bound forest hearts 
 Like distant savage drums, 
 
 * 1 1
 
 And cries aloud, ' In this^ in this — 
 Shaking his torch — is peace ! 
 Not thou, tardy deliverer. 
 But /, confer release ! 
 
 Mighty shall be the high sea-flame ! 
 
 Superb the funeral pyre 
 
 Of Heaven and Earth ! . . . Kindle it. Hell ! 
 
 To glut this God's desire I ' 
 
 He paused, with black distorted arms 
 Rear'd, long before the crash — 
 Like some hollow oak that long outliveth 
 Coil of the lightning's lash ; 
 
 Then fell. Majestic enemy, 
 Time with thy falling rang ! 
 He, first of all the ship, was free 
 And fled without a pang. 
 
 Out of the throng'd expanse, skull-bare 
 
 Heads rose and dropped again. 
 
 They quailed, they flinched before my gaze. 
 
 My light to them was pain. 
 
 Shadows of wreckage on the masts 
 
 Went streaming down the main. 
 
 Stooping above one cowering shape, 
 
 I raised it by the chin. 
 
 Upturned the pallid chronicle 
 
 And read the tale therein ; 
 
 Read the thing purposed, by the bone. 
 
 And the thing done, by the skin. 
 
 12
 
 The lecherous, wan, with eyehd Hned, 
 Heavy-soul'd, torn with vice, 
 The murderous with the flitting smile. 
 The drunkard blue as ice ; 
 Incomplete and colourable things 
 Whose breathings must be lies. 
 
 All the sweet neighbours that men take 
 
 Within their breasts to thrive 
 
 Had blown like glass the body's case 
 
 Or stamped its clay alive. 
 
 So I mused — (All hung upon a hair !) 
 
 Why need the dead survive ? 
 
 In one face, stony, white and bleak. 
 Had passions scooped their bed ; 
 Old lavas down the rigid cheek, 
 Meseemed, were still unshed ; 
 
 And I read the eyes of him that thirsted 
 
 Only for things beyond ; 
 
 Whose strata, tossed in molten dreams. 
 
 Would never correspond 
 
 With things about him, for he willed 
 
 To die unparagoned. 
 
 Unseen above them so bowed down 
 Like bent and sodden corn, 
 Should I cast them with derision back, 
 That throng of the forlorn, 
 
 '3
 
 Herding them with derision cold 
 
 As with a hand of steel, 
 
 Condemn them to endurance back 
 
 And still to think and feel, 
 
 While the tears that might not fall for them 
 
 Did on my cheek congeal ? 
 
 And in that pause their mournful hope 
 Swelling like the undertone 
 That dins within the wildest gale 
 Utter'd aloud mine own. 
 
 Blindly they stretched their scarry hands. 
 
 Their piteous hands, to me : 
 
 ' Since bonds we cannot bear, nor sight 
 
 Be thou our sanctuary ! 
 
 Open again the narrow gate — 
 
 het us no longer be ! ' 
 
 Then lo ! my righteous, whose wounds still 
 
 With bitter conflict bled, 
 
 Veer'd in their wrath, hoarsely unjust. 
 
 Arraigned me for these dead — 
 
 Spat on their own high bliss, and craved 
 
 To stand in Hades' stead. 
 
 Had all white-priested Egypt, then, 
 
 Not taught thee to perdure. 
 
 My Boat of Years ? Lo, in man's dust 
 
 So mixed — so long impure — 
 
 Came light ! Then I summoned up each soul 
 
 H
 
 And round its neck secure 
 
 Fastened this token : ' Judge thyself^ 
 
 That justice might be sure. 
 
 Aloft, long since, I saw, had fled 
 
 That viewless sanhedrim 
 
 Of presences starry-cresseted 
 
 Who erst through waters dim 
 
 Had breathed the towering sails along, 
 
 My faithful seraphim. 
 
 And I turned about in mournfulness 
 Steadfastly to behold 
 
 Bulwarks charred, ay, and drunken masts 
 And slow deep-labouring hold. 
 
 And the heeling of age-crumbled beams 
 
 And helmless spars divine — 
 
 Beheld the horror of those decks 
 
 Bloodied with mystic wine ; 
 
 Even the little fluttering genius reft 
 
 From the wrecked and flameless shrine. 
 
 And I cried to the white shape on the prow 
 
 Ascendant by my skill, 
 
 ' O winged ardour, headless now, 
 
 To sound what wild sea-victory 
 
 Swing'st there, triumphant still ? 
 
 Why spared they wholly to shatter thee ? 
 
 Thy rippling veils from feet to breasts 
 
 Winds from the future fill 
 
 15
 
 But I know my handiwork outworn, 
 
 And this bolted fabric vast 
 
 That disciplined through many wars 
 
 Man's courage in the past, — 
 
 And well, well, hath she served her Lord — 
 
 Unseaworthy at last ! ' 
 
 Then from ocean's frothy hazardous 
 Dream-element I caught 
 Her crew — every half-foundered soul 
 Wherewith her hold was fraught ; 
 
 And I sang them back to steady Earth 
 After their wanderings long. 
 Both quick and dead. Hangs on thy breast 
 The token of my song ? " 
 
 (He fumbled in his hairy breast 
 
 Yes — the ' 'Judge thyself hung there) 
 
 " And remembering then their mad outburst 
 
 Of quaint hope and despair 
 
 Who deemed each puny life should last 
 When nothing else escapes. 
 And the nations and the planets melt 
 Like breakers on the capes. 
 
 From laughter, from tears unquenchable. 
 
 Scarce able to forbear, 
 
 I smote the great hull to a ghost 
 
 And the mighty masts to air. 
 
 i6
 
 Seaman. " What ! is there not even left enough 
 Of that so noble craft, 
 A gang-board or a plank or two, 
 To lash into a raft ? " 
 
 Apollo. " No, lad ; you shall not ride in her ; 
 But then you shall not weep ; 
 Nor hear aloft her pipes of cheer 
 Nor the wail under the deep. 
 
 Yet sometimes like the Northern Lights 
 Hull-down — a radiance dim — 
 Loftier than air of Earth, up-sprung 
 To planes beyond its rim, 
 
 At hours when you are fever-struck 
 A phantom you may see. 
 Derelict — drifting out of hail — 
 Lost Immortality ! " 
 
 VI 
 
 When the man knew the ship he loved The rebuke. 
 
 Had melted to a lie 
 
 He fronted him upon his feet 
 
 As who should Gods defy — 
 
 Syllables choked not in his throat, 
 
 He met him eye to eye. 
 
 Refreshed was he through long forborne 
 Anger. His spirit swelled 
 Manful — the stronger in his grief 
 By all that he had quelled. 
 
 c 17
 
 Seaman. " This is your world-discovery ! 
 This is the great landfall ! 
 This coil of warehouses and quays 
 And taverns — this is all ! 
 
 Well was it that we trusted you ! 
 Else — how had we achieved 
 Good luck ? But then we had a friend 
 Wholly to be believed. 
 
 This is the country we have gained, 
 This land of milk and balm ! 
 For this our innocent took wounds 
 And died without a qualm, 
 Drawn on as by a ghost, that ends 
 Like a catspaw in a calm ! 
 
 Stay ! I have heard, how in action's heat 
 
 A captain in his tent 
 
 Sealed a despatch ; and the rider died 
 
 That with the letter went ; 
 
 But the letter — saved — was found a blank. 
 
 You, who the message sent. 
 
 Say, how will you now make amends 
 
 For what was vainly spent ! " 
 
 Fell off, fell off the enshrouding furs — 
 
 The beamwork of the room 
 
 To its last crevices was lit ; 
 
 So terribly illume 
 
 The God's eyes — all his presence seemed 
 
 Outwardly to consume 
 
 i8
 
 As though all burning sovranties 
 And throbbings of the mind, 
 Condensed into a single flame, 
 Across that board confined 
 Shot the human shade, a skeleton. 
 Clean on the wall behind 
 The man. 
 
 ApoUo. " Ah, fragment of my soul. 
 
 When I invented thee 
 To utter Mind, as guest and mate 
 Of a voiceless family. 
 
 And gave thee selfhood, barred with sleeps. 
 On yon ship's heaving shelves. 
 Selfhood that never can contrive — 
 However lightning-like it strive — 
 To escape, in its inmost, deepest dive 
 My ^^i beneath your selves, 
 
 I built through demiurgic powers, 
 Myriad human hopes and fears. 
 And laboured at this shipwright's task 
 A hundred thousand years. 
 
 Think'st thou I framed a vessel vain 
 As earthly ships of wood ? 
 Or that thy voyage never was. 
 And wasted all your blood ? 
 What ! Hast not felt the invisible 
 Nor faintly understood ? 
 
 19
 
 Thou hast seen armies serve a name, 
 A rag, a tomb forlorn ; 
 And the tides of men obey a ghost, 
 The ghost of the unborn. 
 
 Thou hast felt the Passions' blindest roots 
 Quake up man's silly crust. 
 And rock thy reason from its state 
 And crack its towers to dust. 
 
 Thou hast seen the Gods figure forth races, 
 Surging out of the vast 
 On the crest of wave after wave, for aye 
 To sweep till time be past : — 
 
 Feel'st thou no wind behind those waves 
 
 All washing on one way ? 
 
 Organs of the invisible 
 
 Yes, thou hast felt their sway ! 
 
 Deem'st those old faceless images, 
 ' Truth,' 'Justice,' ' Liberty,' 
 Heralding symbols thou employ 'st ? 
 They are employing thee ! 
 Organs of the invisible 
 Yes, thou hast felt their sway. 
 All the buried city of thy heart 
 Knows thou art less than they. 
 
 But now get back upon high seas 
 Unknown and drear indeed. 
 Thou, the adventure of my cloud 
 And sailing of my seed ! " 
 20
 
 Seaman. " Lord, I confess the things unseen 
 Closer the fountain-head 
 Than the wooden table in my grasp 
 Or yonder loaf of bread ; 
 But must we, ever-living one. 
 Go out when we are dead ? 
 When the arms that held us close and dear, 
 When the love that we are used 
 To mingle with, are wrenched away 
 And the body's kiss is loosed ? " 
 
 The God smiled, and with 'haviour soft 
 Leaning across the wine 
 Heavily took those shoulders young 
 Into his grasp divine. 
 
 Apollo, " Hearken ! I put you to the touch 
 My son, my prodigal — 
 Since every brave song hath its close 
 Your own life, end it shall ; 
 Yes, utterly shall meet an end. 
 Be it heroical ! 
 
 And, born aboard, my rover stark, 
 Dread you to die aboard ? 
 To lay you down beside your love 
 With the sunset on your sword ? . . . 
 
 21
 
 Apollo 
 (con- 
 tinuing). 
 
 VII 
 
 " Voyage after voyage, how else, how else 
 Should I man's soul prepare 
 For the new venture, bolder yet, 
 On which he now must dare ? — 
 
 The New 
 Ship 
 
 See ! from the voyage whence you come now 
 You come not back the same ; 
 Behind the door of your dull brow 
 Hath sprung up doubt and blame — 
 
 Defiance of me. That I praise. 
 
 This once low-cabined pate 
 
 Hollows deep-chambered — is become 
 
 Tribunal — hall of state 
 
 For the assembled thrones of angels — root 
 
 For an assize of fate ! 
 
 Thou hast forgotten, whom I took 
 
 From lap of things inform 
 
 And flung to embraces of the sea 
 
 And caresses of the storm ! 
 
 Now electrified, subtler-energied, 
 
 Starker-willed, battle-warm 
 
 Thou comest, thou comest again to me ! . 
 
 Son of tumult, gloom enorm, 
 
 I have new jeopardy for thee 
 
 And new eyes yet to form ! 
 
 22
 
 O wrestler into consciousness 
 
 Stand upon Earth ! Away ! 
 
 Long hath the journey been by night, 
 
 But roseate breaks the day ; 
 
 Like a scroll I unfold the mountain-tops 
 
 And the windings of the bay. 
 
 Awake ! thou'rt already on the cruise 
 And shalt not see its end. 
 Earth is the ship ! Thou shalt have time 
 To find the Earth thy friend ! " 
 
 Seaman. " Is there a hand upon her helm ? " 
 Apollo. " Weigh thou thine own heart-fires, 
 
 And her wash of overwhelming dawns, 
 
 And her tide that never tires — 
 
 Her tranquil heave of seasons — flowers — 
 
 All that in thee aspires ! 
 
 How like an eagle on the abyss 
 With outspread wing serene 
 She circles ! — thought rolls under her 
 And the flash from the unseen. 
 Here's to her mission, winged rock. 
 Bluff-bowed and heavy keel'd 
 Through the night-watches swinging on 
 Still under orders sealed ! 
 
 No crystal gives a peep, my son. 
 Of her errand far and surgy ; 
 No witch's magic brew of sleep 
 Nor smoke of thaumaturgy ; 
 Nor, for the future, shall you reap 
 Much benefit of clergy. 
 
 23
 
 But If thy former priestly ship 
 Failed of the port assigned, 
 The overwhelming globe takes on 
 Her altar-flame of mind. 
 See that the oils that feed the lamp 
 Fail not ! " 
 
 Seaman. " What are those oils ? " 
 
 Apollo. " Heroic, warm, abounding souls ! 
 These are the sacred oils 
 On the fragrant thin-flamed thymele 
 Lost on the deep like melody — 
 They who, as I My Self disperse 
 In them through the tragic universe, 
 Scatter themselves in toils. 
 
 And I shall stream into their life 
 
 Waking — sense after sense — 
 
 New understandings — endless, no, 
 
 But more and more intense. 
 
 Till joy in the will that wafts the world 
 
 Buoyant as swimmers be 
 
 Makes thee divine, perhaps at last 
 
 Wholly delivers thee." 
 
 Seaman, And the man exclaimed, " Delivers me ! • 
 How, if this death descends ? 
 I am a man and not a race. 
 What matters, if self ends ? 
 Speak ! quick, my brain is worn and cold, 
 Little it comprehends." 
 24
 
 Apollo. « I shall tell thee, but as music tells. 
 I too, like thee, have striven. 
 I too am launched from the profound 
 And past ; I too am driven 
 In- turn upon the stream of storms 
 From fountains beyond heaven ; 
 And to me, too, light is mystery 
 And the greater light half-given. 
 
 How can I make plain the goal obscure 
 
 Of thy journey but begun ? " 
 
 And again the God smiled on the man 
 
 And asked, " Hast thou a son ? " 
 
 He nodded. " And never yet hast guessed 
 
 That thou and he are one ! 
 
 Yet leaf shall of leaf become aware 
 
 On the selfsame bough and stem, 
 
 Whose branches are murmuring everywhere 
 
 And the heaven floods all of them ! 
 
 Between you — between all that love — 
 Runs no gulf wide nor deep. 
 But a sheen'd veil, thinner than any veil, 
 Thin as the veil of sleep. 
 
 Through the death-veil — looming silverly — 
 Through the self-veil's subtle strand, 
 Dawns it not ? For that dawn thy heart 
 Hath eye — shall understand 
 Before its seeing rock-walls melt 
 And cracks the mortal band. 
 
 D 25
 
 cation 
 
 For when once the whole consummate strength 
 
 Of thy slow-kindling mind 
 
 Can see in the heart's light at length 
 
 All the strange sons of mankind, 
 
 Then the Earth — that else were but a strait 
 
 Rock-sepulchre — is new : 
 
 Of what account to it is death ? 
 
 It is glowing, through and through, 
 
 It moveth, alive with a God's breath. 
 
 Translucent as the dew ! " 
 
 VIII 
 
 The last words in the rafters rang The embar- 
 
 And the bright haze sounded on ; 
 Walls, air and shadows vibrant still, 
 But the God himself was gone. 
 
 Was the thing dreamed ? The Tavern 
 
 wall 
 Solid ? Still it rang. 
 Feverish he threw the lattice back 
 Outside fluttered and sang 
 Trees of a tract of narrow yards 
 Behind dark tenements, 
 The nearest garden vacant — rope 
 Eked out its broken fence. 
 Naked it lay — brown mould bestrewn 
 With refuse crockery — yet 
 A pear-tree in its darkest nook 
 Bowered it in delicate 
 Whiteness. Beyond its further pale 
 26
 
 Above a wall-flower bed, 
 
 Women were hanging linen out : 
 
 One stoop'd a kerchief'd head. 
 
 In lime-trees idle rooks were cawing ; 
 
 Even to his upper room 
 
 Came wafted from some distant plot 
 
 Fragrance like thyme's perfume ; 
 
 And, adrift from zigzag chimney-stacks 
 
 And ancient courtyards, soft 
 
 Blue smoke was breathed amongst the trees ; 
 
 Dazzling clouds moved aloft ; 
 
 Even to the window where he stood 
 
 A cherry stretched its limb, 
 
 Half the diaphanous clusters clear 
 
 Enlumined, and half dim. 
 
 Green swift immortal Spring was here — 
 
 Spring in her lovely trim — 
 
 And whether it were ship or no. 
 
 The Earth seemed good to him. 
 
 Had he been Greek, or nurtured well 
 
 In lore of sages gone. 
 
 He would have felt her like that ship 
 
 Ascribed to Hieron 
 
 Which, beside its deck-house luxuries 
 
 Of baths and bronzes fine, 
 
 Carried a pergola's green walk, 
 
 Shade-galleries of vine, 
 
 And for awnings fruit-espaliers 
 
 From buried urns in line. 
 
 Quitting the Inn he made for home. 
 And by many a cobbled wynd 
 
 27
 
 Behung with mariners' wares, uphill 
 
 He strode with seething mind. 
 
 Above in the shady market-place 
 
 Unwonted silence reigned. 
 
 Under their patched umbrella stalls 
 
 Few flower-sellers remained ; 
 
 But one, with old face like a map 
 
 Wrinkled by good and evil hap, 
 
 Stretched forth her palm. It rained. 
 
 Ah, yes, it rained — sudden acold 
 
 The sky loured overcast. 
 
 Soon the pavements leapt with plashing drops ; 
 
 And as he hasty passed 
 
 He heard a burst of chanted sound, 
 
 And glanced up at the vast 
 
 Shadow that over huddled roofs 
 
 Loomed, pinnacled and grey. . . . 
 
 The spired cathedral thundrously 
 
 And widely seemed to sway ; 
 
 Like Earth upon her pilgrimage 
 
 Buffetting on from age to age. 
 
 It still was under way. 
 
 And on he trudged with peace at heart, 
 Rain pelting on his cheek. 
 But the shower half-ceased before he found 
 The bourne he seemed to seek. 
 
 A small house in a by-way dark 
 
 Beneath that April cloud, 
 
 And nigh the doorway he looked up 
 
 Keen-eyed. He could have vowed 
 
 28
 
 It was his wife stood shining there, 
 Yon, where the lintel dripped. 
 With soft, profound, familiar look 
 Low-laughing forth she slipped ; 
 
 Her mute nod warned him (while her hair 
 Released bright drops that fell) 
 And bade him watch, but not disturb, 
 A happy spectacle. 
 
 Now vapour'd were the cobble-stones, 
 And the runnel where they stood 
 Fleeted adown the middle street, 
 Rays gleaming on its mud, 
 When lo ! he saw a boy, their son. 
 Squatted beside the flood. 
 
 Like the city's sole inhabitant 
 And lost to aught beside. 
 Wholly absorbed, aloof, intent. 
 Upon that ruffling tide 
 
 The boy embarked a faery ship 
 
 Of paper, white and gay. 
 
 And watched, with grave ecstatic smile, 
 
 Its glories whirled away. 
 
 THE END.
 
 PRINTED BY EALLANTYNE AND COMPANY 
 
 LIMITED, AT THE BALLANTYNE 
 
 PRESS, TAVISTOCK STREET 
 
 COVENT GARDEN 
 
 LONDON, W.C.
 
 i
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 
 Los Angeles 
 This book is DUE on the last date stamped below. 
 
 Form L9-40m-7,'56(C790s4)444
 
 PR Trench - 
 "P^Tl Apollo ana the 
 T6a seaman 
 
 HI 
 
 5671 
 T6a 
 
 UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY f A 
 
 iMiiiinliillllllllllllllllllllH IHIPP' 
 
 AA 000 383 678