Matin Bells and Scarlet and Gold By "F. Harald Williams"[i.e. F. W. O. Ward]. First Edition |
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THE COSMOS. |
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 | Matin Bells and Scarlet and Gold |  |
THE COSMOS.
Why has God clothed with terrible sweet joy
And awful beauty
This earth of ours, that is the children's toy
Yet does its duty?
For while the cosmic wheels go rolling on
Machine-wise, mighty,
They give a Bable or a Babylon
Or the white wonder of the Parthenon
And Aphrodite;
Yea, though they are for ever grinding, grinding
As grist the planets
With Johns and Janets,
Through orbs and individuals winding, winding
Their systemed cycles, and the centuries pass
And grow as lightly as the summer grass
Civilisations
And populations,
With newer cults and fears and nobler creeds,
Which answer to the pulse of broader needs;
Yet do they touch the springs of inmost being
Where blessed knowledge is the same as seeing
Beyond all stricture,
And on a common ground of one agreeing
They make a picture.
And awful beauty
This earth of ours, that is the children's toy
Yet does its duty?
For while the cosmic wheels go rolling on
Machine-wise, mighty,
They give a Bable or a Babylon
Or the white wonder of the Parthenon
And Aphrodite;
Yea, though they are for ever grinding, grinding
As grist the planets
With Johns and Janets,
Through orbs and individuals winding, winding
Their systemed cycles, and the centuries pass
And grow as lightly as the summer grass
Civilisations
And populations,
290
Which answer to the pulse of broader needs;
Yet do they touch the springs of inmost being
Where blessed knowledge is the same as seeing
Beyond all stricture,
And on a common ground of one agreeing
They make a picture.
He was not bound to mete a building fair
And glad with glory,
As He hath richly garmented in air
Of blue clerestory
This world and all the universes' eaves
And starry hanging,
That with the æons form and fade as leaves
And fruit and then are gathered up as sheaves
Through shadowed panging;
He was not forced with kindly tending, tending,
To paint us yellow
Gold and its fellow
The buttercup, and in soft blending, blending,
To mix with subtlest graces, hopes and hues—
A freewill offering and with heavenly clues—
And pour a fragrance
On wild weeds' vagrance,
Or lavish wealth of curves and cunning forms
And fashion comely the rude strife and storms.
They do not help the pistons' measured beating,
Or add a morsel to His furnace heating
By pretty dresses;
And yet God scatters far, not once repeating,
His lovelinesses.
And glad with glory,
As He hath richly garmented in air
Of blue clerestory
This world and all the universes' eaves
And starry hanging,
That with the æons form and fade as leaves
And fruit and then are gathered up as sheaves
Through shadowed panging;
He was not forced with kindly tending, tending,
To paint us yellow
Gold and its fellow
The buttercup, and in soft blending, blending,
To mix with subtlest graces, hopes and hues—
A freewill offering and with heavenly clues—
And pour a fragrance
On wild weeds' vagrance,
Or lavish wealth of curves and cunning forms
And fashion comely the rude strife and storms.
They do not help the pistons' measured beating,
Or add a morsel to His furnace heating
By pretty dresses;
And yet God scatters far, not once repeating,
His lovelinesses.
He might have cast an ugly evil shape
Of clay and granite,
And not have finished even one purple grape
Though He began it;
He might have framed us just a monstrous mill
With iron forges,
Which manufactured blindly good and ill
Impartially, and left no room for will
In sunless gorges.
He might have thrown His engines' panting, panting,
Down with no sweetness
On our unmeetness,
Without a throb of pleasure's chanting, chanting;
And scribbled not a bird upon the sky
Nor scattered flower and wing of butterfly
And cushioned mosses
Among our crosses,
That lift us by their charms most gently up
And turn each bud a sacramental cup.
But out of all the many gifts and choices
He in His bounty dealt us singing voices
Beyond small stricture,
And moulded earth that laughs and still rejoices
A perfect picture.
Of clay and granite,
And not have finished even one purple grape
Though He began it;
He might have framed us just a monstrous mill
With iron forges,
Which manufactured blindly good and ill
291
In sunless gorges.
He might have thrown His engines' panting, panting,
Down with no sweetness
On our unmeetness,
Without a throb of pleasure's chanting, chanting;
And scribbled not a bird upon the sky
Nor scattered flower and wing of butterfly
And cushioned mosses
Among our crosses,
That lift us by their charms most gently up
And turn each bud a sacramental cup.
But out of all the many gifts and choices
He in His bounty dealt us singing voices
Beyond small stricture,
And moulded earth that laughs and still rejoices
A perfect picture.
| Matin Bells and Scarlet and Gold | |