heavy sky, and a drizzling rain
And the lamps in rigid rows;
Long smears of light all down the street
Where a lean cat stalking goes;

Blank, save a glimmer here and there
The gaunt dark houses stand—
And a man and a girl against the gate
Whispering, hand in hand.

There is a little dripping sound
Of rain from off the roof;
And gleaming like black armour goes
The policeman's waterproof.

He crosses the road to give them room
As he takes his evening beat;
He also knows that heaven may look
Like a rainy London street.

A LONDON IDYLL

II

Just to all of us once there comes
    This splendour and wonder of love,
When the earth is transmuted to silver and gold,
    And heaven opens above;

When all we have ever seen with our eyes,
    Daily, under the sun,
Seems like a miracle, happening again
    To us two, instead of to one.

When there is nothing so ugly or mean,
    But somehow shimmers and glows
In that light, whose spring is within our hearts
    And whose stream o'er the wide earth flows.

When the spirit of us that is prisoned within
    Seems at last to have wings,
And, soaring, looks with no common eyes
    On no other than common things;

When we may freely enter and share
    Heaven's splendour and mirth—
Just for a moment to all of us comes
    This glory of love upon earth.

FINIS

S.C.K.S.

A book's end is the end of many hopes;
Much good endeavour; certain hours of stress
When brain and spirit fail, and laziness
Thralls the poor body—yet the purpose gropes
Athwart it all, and as the horseman cheers
His tired beast with chirrup, spur, and goad
Towards his home along the heavy road,
So drives us purpose till the end appears.
Read it who may! Find more or less of good
Within its covers, but at least find this:
Glad service to a great and noble aim
That may be striven for, and understood,
And fallen short of—so not quite we miss
In our small lamp of clay Truth's very flame.

OTHER VERSES

IN EARLY SPRING

There's a secret, have you guessed it, you with human eyes and hearing—
Which the birds know, which the trees know, and by which the earth is stirred,
Stirred through all her deep foundations, where the water-springs are fastened,
Where the seed is, and the growth is, and the still blind life is heard?

There's a miracle, a miracle—oh mortal, have you seen it?
When the springs rise, and the saps rise, and the gallant cut-and-thrust
Of the spear-head bright battalions of the little green things growing
(Crocus-blade or grass-blade) pierce the brown earth's sullen crust?

Oh, wonder beyond speaking in the daily common happening;
But the little birds have known it, and the evening-singing thrush,
In the cold and pearly twilights that are February's token
Speaks of revelation through the falling day-time's hush.

A BALLAD OF THE FALL OF KNOSSOS

(Circa 1400 B.C.)

Is it a whisper that runs through the galleries?
Is it a rustle that stirs in the halls?
Is it of mortals, or things that are otherwise
This sound that so haltingly, dreadfully falls,
Pauses, and hurries, and falls?

No moon, and no torches; not even a glimmer
To pin-prick the darkness that weighs like a sin,
And nothing is breathing, and nothing is stirring,
And hushed are the small owls without, and within
The mice to their holes have run in.

It is not the step of a foot on the pavement;
It is not the brush of a wing through the air;
It is not a passing, it is not a presence,
But the ghost of the fate that this palace must bear,
Of the ruin of Knossos goes there.

*****

For on such a night, when the moon is dark,
And all of the stars are dumb,
With a sudden flare by the sea-ward gate
Shall the doom of Knossos come;
For a cry will shatter the brooding hush,
And the crickets and mice shall wake
To clatter and clash and shout and cry,
And the stumble of frenzied feet going by
Death's stride will overtake.

For into the glare of a new-lit torch
That shakes in a shaking grasp,
Sweat-streaked, wild-eyed, and dark with blood
Shall a runner break, and gasp
Of a burning harbour, of silent ships,
Of men sprung out of the night—
Is it men or devils?—He moans, and reels
Shoulder to wall, and a red stain steals
Down the frescoes gay and bright.

And hard on the word they hear approach
The surge of the battle near,
And to whistle of arrows, and clang of bronze
The palace awakes in fear.
Light! Light! and torches, like waking eyes
Leap from each darkened door;
And the guard at the sea-ward gate go down
In the vast black sea of men, and drown,
While sweeps the torrent o'er.

What door shall hold, or what walls withstand
The roll of a full spring-tide,
With an on-shore wind? And the gates of bronze
Ring, rock, and are flung aside;
And a myriad unknown raiders burst
Into the hall of the King,
Where Minos on his carved, stone seat
Beheld the nations at his feet,
Watched each its tribute bring.

Minos is slain; his guards are slain;
Which of his sons shall live
In this pillared Hall of the Double Axe
The word of the Kings to give?
Which of his sons? Shall they know his sons
In this sudden terror sprung
On sleeping men? Half-armed they stand,
Foot pressed to foot, hand tense to hand,
And muscles iron-strung.

The flame of the torches in the wind
Of their struggle blackens the wall,
And the floor is sticky with blood, and heaped
With the bodies of those that fall.
What if a son of Minos live?
In that horror of blood and gloom,
What of the noble, what of the brave?
Better to die, than endure as a slave
The days after Knossos' doom.

But above the scuffle of sandalled feet,
And the breath of men hard-pressed,
And the clash of bronze, and the gasp and thud
As the point goes through the breast,
And above the startled hoot of owls,
And the rattle of shield and spear,
The wailing voices of women rise
As their men are stricken before their eyes
And they huddle together in fear.

Slow comes the dawning in the East;
Pale light on the earth is shed,
And cool and dewy blows the wind
Over the writhen dead;
Pale light, which fades in the growing glare
Of the flames that swirl and leap
Through corridor, and bower, and hall,
On carven pillar and painted wall;
The flames that like sickles reap

A barren harvest of kingly things,
To be bound in ashy sheaves,
While driven forth by the work of his hands,
Stumbles the last of the thieves.
Behind him is fire, ruin, and death,
Before him the kine-sweet morn,
But vases of silver and cups of gold