3em">You Wrote

You wrote:
"The Abbey pillars are worn smooth.
Hundreds of shoulders leaned against their strength,
Age after age,
To set their smoothness, there .."

And they shall lean again
Because of lads like you,
Who wear their wings
And find these things as wonderful
As they had seemed
On printed pages head in nursery days!

For busts … and plaques … and effigies …
And figures carved in stone …
Tremendous tombs of Kings …
Are not cathedral furniture.

Here stand the dreams of men
Articulate in stone.
Honour made manifest;
The shadow of the Grail
Falls like a silver whisper in this place.

You wrote:
"The Abbey pillars are worn smooth …"
And I could see the valour in your face!

Blood Donor Clinic 10 a.m.

They file through the door,
They include men who look like ex-football players,
Big men, little men,
Men who have climbed down off coal trucks,
Bond salesmen, men in uniform,
Sailors on leave from minesweepers,
Whole men,
And men who have lost an arm or a leg in the last war,
Who cannot fight in this one,
Who remember what transfusions mean.
Blind men have come
Who make little jokes
About the "pretty nurse".
It takes a few minutes;
A few minutes stretched comfortably out on a cot
With your heart-beats measuring
Drop by drop the gift you give
To keep some soul alive.
It takes a few minutes out of a single day
To make you one of the vast army
Back of the fighting army.

It takes a few minutes
But because of that few minutes
Soldiers and sailors and flyers
Are going to come back after this war
Who couldn't come back
Without that "gift".

It means mothers and children,
Terribly hurt when bombs rained down,
Are going to live to forget those anxious days,
And laugh again, and breathe the air of quiet England.

It means that you have given something
Money couldn't buy.
The "quality of mercy", Shakespeare said.

It takes a few minutes
But it lets you in on a miracle!

Promise

We used to say
Oh, just in fun,
That when the time came
We would run
Away together just the two …

And live like all good Pixies do
Under a toadstool.

You laughed
And said we'd get quite tipsy
On rain cocktails;
And ipsy-dipsy
We'd wander here … and wander there,
And I, with flowers in my hair.

You promised,
When you went away
You'd come for me; and on that day
We'd seek the kindly, farthest star
Where all the other lovers are.

You said:
"Just Death … can keep me from… "
Darling … I know you meant to come!

Tasting the Earth

And the wind went over the top of the birch trees
Like a great hand,
Stirring their feathery leaves and weaving violet shadows
On their shining surface.

Lying flat on the young grass
Stretched out very tall
And feeling wonderfully magnificent,
I listened to my own heart beating.

"Darling … darling," said my heart,
Pressed against the warm earth,
"Love is beautiful, and love will die…"
But can it be so terrible a thing
For love to sleep in this velvet earth?
I pressed my face against the fallen leaves
And felt the sun tangled in my blowing hair,
And felt the sun burning down into my very bones,
And knew suddenly, with a terrible aching certainty
That it was so.

"Love is beautiful, and love will die …"
Said my heart, and even the dark earth
Was little comfort!

Spring Sunday … In a Small Town

To-day they're having Church Parade;
The Boy Scouts and the Girl Guides,
The Cubs and the Brownies,
Are all out, full force.
The uncertain, fumbling band begins a staggering march
And off they go, curling in a snaky line
Round the corner from the Market Square,
Under the old town clock.
All the people in town
Seem to have hurried down to one spot
To see their "young hopefuls" swinging past.
They don't march any too well, either,
But that isn't noticed.
There they go up the steps of the old gray church
And in at the door.

There isn't any need for tears pushing up to the surface
But they do!
The peace of it!
The ironic, terrible sense of security,
The threat under the dream!
Let the band play,
Let the children march,
Let the parents weep!

Ghost of New Year's Eve

A dear ghost, a young ghost
Walks this night,
Clad not in holy mail
Robed not in white.

Nothing like a halo
Round his brown head,
Laughter on his young lips,
Whimsical and red.

Wearing old flannel slacks, jacket sleeve torn,
"Sneakers" on his swift feet,
Scuffed and well-worn.

A dear ghost, a young ghost,
Sketch-book in hand,
Pockets full of charcoal …
Militant you stand,

Lip caught between teeth
Beautiful and white,
Eyes full of shining dreams
On this night.

A dear ghost, a young ghost
Walks this eve,
If he finds you paintable
He will touch your sleeve,

Saying, as the wind would,
"Please stand still…"
Sketching you and vanishing
Over some hill!

Quiet Has Come Down (Owen Sound)

Quiet has come down over this little village
As if a Nun, saying her beads
Had asked for peace
And it been granted.

A white sort of quiet,
Having to do with the snow
And the little necklace of lights on the Main Street,
And the white prows of the fleet in the harbour,
Silent, and folded in, like giant gulls.

Almost the whiteness of this quiet
Is too beautiful to be borne.
Were it not for the ebony of the branches,
And the dark arm of a church spire
And your black hair like a dark bird flying!

Hands

Hands have a way
Of betraying things.
I found this out
In a small, strange way;
You touched my face
The other day!

Rain … In the City

Rain…
Even in the city
It has the smell of the country.
Wet grasses … thorny hedges,
And chestnuts shaking down their polished brownness.
And ghosts of apple trees.
I swear they haunt the city streets
And fling their sweetness over formal lawns
And stiff, uncompromising dahlia beds!

Just let the drops come stinging down
Against your eyelids;
False tears that tangle in your lashes,
Making blurs of all the lamp-post lights
Until they swim like harbour lamps
Up through the larkspur evening.

Feel it against your shins,
The stinging slanting rain
That laces all the gutters
With its swathes of