I
THERE is no wrath in the stars, | |
| They do not rage in the sky; | |
| I look from the evil wood | |
| And find myself wondering why. | |
| |
| Why do they not scream out | 5 |
| And grapple star against star, | |
| Seeking for blood in the wood | |
| As all things round me are? | |
| |
| They do not glare like the sky | |
| Or flash like the deeps of the wood; | 10 |
| But they shine softly on | |
| In their sacred solitude. | |
| |
| To their high, happy haunts | |
| Silence from us has flown, | |
| She whom we loved of old | 15 |
| And know it now she is gone. | |
| |
| When will she come again, | |
| Though for one second only? | |
| She whom we loved is gone | |
| And the whole world is lonely. | 20 |
| |
| And the elder giants come | |
| Sometimes, tramping from far | |
| Through the weird and flickering light | |
| Made by an earthly star. | |
| |
| And the giant with his club, | 25 |
| And the dwarf with rage in his breath, | |
| And the elder giants from far, | |
| They are all the children of Death. | |
| |
| They are all abroad to-night | |
| And are breaking the hills with their brood,— | 30 |
| And the birds are all asleep | |
| Even in Plug Street Wood! | |
| |
II
Somewhere lost in the haze | |
| The sun goes down in the cold, | |
| And birds in this evil wood | 35 |
| Chirrup home as of old; | |
| |
| Chirrup, stir and are still, | |
| On the high twigs frozen and thin. | |
| There is no more noise of them now, | |
| And the long night sets in. | 40 |
| |
| Of all the wonderful things | |
| That I have seen in the wood | |
| I marvel most at the birds | |
| And their wonderful quietude. | |
| |
| For a giant smites with his club | 45 |
| All day the tops of the hill, | |
| Sometimes he rests at night, | |
| Oftener he beats them still. | |
| |
| And a dwarf with a grim black mane | |
| Raps with repeated rage | 50 |
| All night in the valley below | |
| On the wooden walls of his cage. | |
| |
III
I met with Death in his country, | |
| With his scythe and his hollow eye, | |
| Walking the roads of Belgium. | 55 |
| I looked and he passed me by. | |
| |
| Since he passed me by in Plug Street, | |
| In the wood of the evil name, | |
| I shall not now lie with the heroes, | |
| I shall not share their fame; | 60 |
| |
| I shall never be as they are, | |
| A name in the lands of the Free, | |
| Since I looked on Death in Flanders | |
| And he did not look at me. | |
