To see your taps’yls scuddin’ dune the west,
Nae muckle love bear we for a’ your breed—
Bluid willna dry like water—yet ’tis meet
We gi’ ye due, that curious unrest
Wha’ gars ye seek the deed beyant the deed.
TRANSLATION:
Rane of the Sword, whom men miscall the fool,
Has turned his galley to the unknown lands;
Now in the dragon-girded prow he stands.
Billows above the token of his rule,
Great fold on fold, the rover’s banner spread.
The hard hands thrust the oars against the tide
The war shields thrum their might along the side,
The red moon hammers down a sea of red.
Rane of the Sword, we sorely weep with fright
To see your topsails scudding down the west,
No great love do we bear for all your breed—
Blood will not dry like water—yet, ’tis right
We give you due, that curious unrest
That goads you seek the deed beyond the deed.
Deeps
Table of Contents
There is a cavern in the deep
Beyond the sea-winds brawl;
Where the hills of the sea slope high and steep,
And dragons sleep
And serpents creep
There is a cavern in the deep
Where strange sea-creatures crawl.
Dreamer
Table of Contents
I live in a world apart
A world that has no link with this drab earth.
A vague, melodious world, where breezes start
Soft joys and gay-hued mirth.
Dreaming
Table of Contents
The Dreamer dreamed in the shade of the vine,
The Seeker rode in the sun;
They are parted by winds and lands and brine,
But their lives cling and their souls twine
Till the last of the day is done.
For the Seeker dreams when the cold stars shine,
And the Dreamer seeks for his soul in wine
And dream and seeking must meet and twine
Or ever the day is done.
Dreaming on Downs
Table of Contents
I marched with Alfred when he thundered forth
To break the crimson standards of the Dane;
I saw the galleys looming in the north
And heard the oar-locks and the sword's refrain.
And far across the pleasant Wessex downs
The chanting of the spearmen broke the lyre,
Till where the black thorn forest grimly frowns
We sang a song of doom and steel and fire.
Death rode his pale horse through the dreaming sky
All through that long red summer afternoon,
And night and silence fell, when silently
The dead men lay beneath a cold white moon.
Now Alfred sleeps with all the swords of yore,
(But o'er the downs a brooding shadow glides)
Untrampled flowers dream along the shore,
And Guthrum's galleys rust beneath the tides.
Now underneath this drowsy tree I lie
And turn old dreams upon my lazy knees,
Till ghostly giants fill the sumer sky
And phantom oars awake the sleeping seas.
Dreams of Nineveh
Table of Contents
Silver bridge in a broken sky,
Golden fruit on a withered bough,
Red-lipped slaves that the ancients buy—
What are the dreams of Nineveh now?
Ghostly hoofs in the brooding night
Beat the bowl of the velvet stars.
Shadows of spears when the moon is white
Cross the sands with ebony bars.
But not the shadows that brood her fall
May check the sweep of the desert fire,
Nor a dead man lift up a crumbling wall,
Nor a spectre steady a falling spire.
Death fires rise in the desert sky
Where the armies of Sargon reeled;
And though her people still sell and buy,
Nineveh's doom is set and sealed.
Silver mast with a silken sail,
Sapphire seas 'neath a purple prow,
Hawk-eyed tribes on the desert trail—
What are the dreams of Nineveh now?
Drummings on an Empty Skull
Table of Contents
This is the word that Jacob
Meeting his death in Egypt
Laid on the brow of Judah,
Lion of all the earth:
“Nations shall bow before thee,
“All of thy brothers shall praise thee,
“Fruit on thy boughs shall blossom,
“Tribes from thy loins have birth.”
Sing-song chants from the ghettoes,
Tell of a thin limbed people,
Crowded into their hovels,
Rats who blink at the sun—
Where is thy heritage, Judah?
Lost in the mists of ages.
These are a bastard motley,
Ghosts of a race long run.
Easter Island
Table of Contents
How many weary centuries have flown
Since strange-eyed beings walked this ancient shore,
Hearing, as we, the green Pacific's roar,
Hewing fantastic gods from sullen stone!
The sands are bare; the idols stand alone.
Impotent 'gainst the years was all their lore:
They are forgot in ages dim and hoar;
Yet still, as then, the long tide-surges drone.
What dreams had they that shaped these uncouth things?
Before these gods what victims bled and died?
What purple galleys swept along the strand
That bore the tribute of what dim sea-kings?
But now, they reign o'er a forgotten land,
Gazing forever out beyond the tide.
Empire’s Destiny
Table of Contents
Bab-ilu's women gazed upon our spears,
And roses flung, and sang to see us ride.
We built a glory for the marching years
And starred our throne with silver nails of pride.
Our horses' hoofs were shod with brazen fears:
We laved our hands in blood and iron tears,
And laughed to hear how shackled kings had died.
Our chariots awoke the sleeping world;
The thunder of our hoofs the mountains broke;
Before our spears were empires' banners furled
Amd death and doom and iron winds were hurled,