Books: Poems of Optimism
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Ella Wheeler Wilcox >> Poems of Optimism
Transcribed from the 1919 (UK) edition by David Price,
email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk
POEMS OF OPTIMISM
Contents:
War
Greater Britain
Belgium
Knitting
Mobilisation
Neutral
A book for the King
The men-made gods
The Ghosts
The poet's theme
Europe
After
The peace angel
Peace should not come
Miscellaneous
The Winds of Fate
Beauty
The invisible helpers
To the women of Australia
Replies
Earth bound
A successful man
Unsatisfied
Separation
To the teachers of the young
Beauty making
On Avon's breast I saw a stately swan
The little go-cart
I am running forth to meet you
Martyrs of peace
Home
The eternal now
If I were a man, a young man
We must send them out to play
Protest
Reward
This is my task
The statue
Behold the earth
What they saw
His last letter
A dialogue
A wish
Justice
An old song
Oh, poor, sick world
Praise day
Interlude
The land of the gone-away-souls
The harp's song
The pendulum
An old-fashioned type
The sword
Love and the seasons
A naughty little comet
The last dance
A vagabond mind
My flower room
My faith
Arrow and bow
If we should meet him
Faith
The secret of prayer
The answer
A vision
The second coming
GREATER BRITAIN
Our hearts were not set on fighting,
We did not pant for the fray,
And whatever wrongs need righting,
We would not have met that way.
But the way that has opened before us
Leads on thro' a blood-red field;
And we swear by the great God o'er us,
We will die, but we will not yield.
The battle is not of our making,
And war was never our plan;
Yet, all that is sweet forsaking,
We march to it, man by man.
It is either to smite, or be smitten,
There's no other choice to-day;
And we live, as befits the Briton,
Or we die, as the Briton may.
We were not fashioned for cages,
Or to feed from a keeper's hand;
Our strength which has grown thro' ages
Is the strength of a slave-free land.
We cannot kneel down to a master,
To our God alone can we pray;
And we stand in this world disaster,
To fight, like a lion at bay.
BELGIUM
Ruined? destroyed? Ah, no; though blood in rivers ran
Down all her ancient streets; though treasures manifold
Love-wrought, Time-mellowed, and beyond the price of gold
Are lost, yet Belgium's star shines still in God's vast plan.
Rarely have Kings been great, since kingdoms first began;
Rarely have great kings been great men, when all was told.
But, by the lighted torch in mailed hands, behold,
Immortal Belgium's immortal king, and Man.
KNITTING
At the concert and the play
Everywhere you see them sitting,
Knitting, knitting.
Women who the other day
Thought of nothing but their frocks
Or their jewels or their locks,
Women who have lived for pleasure,
Who have known no work but leisure,
Now are knitting, knitting, knitting
For the soldiers over there.
On the trains and on the ships
With a diligence befitting,
They are knitting.
Some with smiles upon their lips,
Some with manners debonair,
Some with earnest look and air.
But each heart in its own fashion,
Weaves in pity and compassion
In their knitting, knitting, knitting
For the soldiers over there.
Hurried women to and fro
From their homes to labour flitting,
Knitting, knitting,
Busy handed come and go.
Broken bits of time they spare,
Just to feel they do their share,
Just to keep life's sense of beauty
In the doing of a duty,
They are knitting, knitting, knitting
For the soldiers over there.
MOBILISATION
Oh the Kings of earth have mobilised their men.
See them moving, valour proving,
To the fields of glory going,
Banners flowing, bugles blowing,
Every one a mother's son,
Brave with uniform and gun,
Keeping step with easy swing,
Yes, with easy step and light marching onward to the fight,
Just to please the warlike fancy of a King;
Who has mobilised his army for the strife.
Oh the King of Death has mobilised his men.
See the hearses huge and black
How they rumble down the track;
With their coffins filled with dead,
Filled with men who fought and bled;
Now from fields of glory coming
To the sound of muffled drumming
They are lying still and white,
But the Kings have had their fight;
Death has mobilised his army for the grave.
NEUTRAL
That pale word 'Neutral' sits becomingly
On lips of weaklings. But the men whose brains
Find fuel in their blood, the men whose minds
Hold sympathetic converse with their hearts,
Such men are never neutral. That word stands
Unsexed and impotent in Realms of Speech.
When mighty problems face a startled world
No virile man is neutral. Right or wrong
His thoughts go forth, assertive, unafraid
To stand by his convictions, and to do
Their part in shaping issues to an end.
Silence may guard the door of useless words,
At dictate of Discretion; but to stand
Without opinions in a world which needs
Constructive thinking, is a coward's part.
A BOOK FOR THE KING
A book has been made for the King,
A book of beauty and art;
To the good king's eyes
A smile shall rise
Hiding the ache in his heart -
Hiding the hurt and the grief
As he turns it, leaf by leaf.
A book has been made for the King,
A book of blood and of blight;
To the Great King's eyes
A look shall rise
That will blast and wither and smite -
Yes, smite with a just God's rage,
As He turns it, page by page.
THE MEN-MADE GODS
Said the Kaiser's god to the god of the Czar:
'Hark, hark, how my people pray.
Their faith, methinks, is greater by far
Than all the faiths of the others are;
They know I will help them slay.'
Said the god of the Czar: 'My people call
In a medley of tongues; they know
I will lend my strength to them one and all.
Wherever they fight their foes shall fall
Like grass where the mowers go.'
Then the god of the Gauls spoke out of a cloud
To the god of the King nearby:
'Our people pray, tho' they pray not loud;
They ask for courage to slaughter a crowd,
And to laugh, tho' themselves may die.'
And far out into the heart of Space
Where a lonely pathway crept,
Up over the stars, to a secret place,
Where no light shone but the light of His face,
Christ covered His eyes and wept.
THE GHOSTS
There was no wind, and yet the air
Seemed suddenly astir;
There were no forms, and yet all space
Seemed thronged with growing hosts.
They came from Where, and from Nowhere,
Like phantoms as they were;
They came from many a land and place -
The ghosts, the ghosts, the ghosts.
And some were white, and some were grey,
And some were red as blood -
Those ghosts of men who met their death
Upon the field of war.
Against the skies of fading day,
Like banks of cloud they stood;
And each wraith asked another wraith,
'What were we fighting for?'
One said, 'I was my mother's all;
And she was old and blind.'
Another, 'Back on earth, my wife
And week-old baby lie.'
Another, 'At the bugle's call,
I left my bride behind;
Love made so beautiful my life
I could not bear to die.'
In voices like the winds that moan
Among pine trees at night,
They whispered long, the newly dead,
While listening stars came out.
'We wonder if the cause is known,
And if the war was right,
That killed us in our prime,' they said,
'And what it was about.'
They came in throngs that filled all space -
Those whispering phantom hosts;
They came from many a land and place,
The ghosts, the ghosts, the ghosts.
THE POET'S THEME
Why should the poet of these pregnant times
Be asked to sing of war's unholy crimes?
To laud and eulogise the trade which thrives
On horrid holocausts of human lives?
Man was a fighting beast when earth was young,
And war the only theme when Homer sung.
'Twixt might and might the equal contest lay:
Not so the battles of our modern day.
Too often now the conquering hero struts,
A Gulliver among the Lilliputs.
Success no longer rests on skill or fate,
But on the movements of a syndicate.
Of old, men fought and deemed it right and just,
To-day the warrior fights because he must;
And in his secret soul feels shame because
He desecrates the higher manhood's laws.
Oh, there are worthier themes for poet's pen
In this great hour than bloody deeds of men:
The rights of many--not the worth of one -
The coming issues, not the battle done;
The awful opulence and awful need -
The rise of brotherhood--the fall of greed;
The soul of man replete with God's own force,
The call 'to heights,' and not the cry 'to horse.'
Are there not better themes in this great age
For pen of poet, or for voice of sage,
Than those old tales of killing? Song is dumb
Only that greater song in time may come.
When comes the bard, he whom the world waits for,
He will not sing of War.
EUROPE
Little lads and grandsires,
Women old with care;
But all the men are dying men
Or dead men over there.
No one stops to dig graves;
Who has time to spare?
The dead men, the dead men
How the dead men stare.
Kings are out a-hunting -
Oh, the sport is rare;
With dying men and dead men
Falling everywhere.
Life for lads and grandsires;
Spoils for kings to share;
And dead men, dead men,
Dead men everywhere.
AFTER
Over the din of battle,
Over the cannons' rattle,
Over the strident voices of men and their dying groans,
I hear the falling of thrones.
Out of the wild disorder
That spreads from border to border,
I see a new world rising from ashes of ancient towns;
And the Rulers wear no crowns.
Over the blood-charged water,
Over the fields of slaughter,
Down to the hidden vaults of Time, where lie the worn-out things
I see the passing of Kings.
THE PEACE ANGEL
Angel of Peace, the hounds of war,
Unleashed, are all abroad,
And war's foul trade again is made
Man's leading aim in life.
Blood dyes the billow and the sod;
The very winds are rife
With tales of slaughter. Angel, pray,
What can we do or think or say
In times like these?
'Child, think of God!'
'Before this little speck in space
Called Earth with light was shod,
Great chains and tiers of splendid spheres
Were fashioned by His hand.
Be thine the part to love and laud,
Nor seek to understand.
Go lift thine eyes from death-charged guns
To one who made a billion suns;
And trust and wait.
Child, dwell on God!'
PEACE SHOULD NOT COME
Peace should not come along this foul, earth way.
Peace should not come, until we cleanse the path.
God waited for us; now in awful wrath
He pours the blood of men out day by day
To purify the highroad for her feet.
Why, what would Peace do, in a world where hearts
Are filled with thoughts like poison-pointed darts?
It were not meet, surely it were not meet
For Peace to come, and with her white robes hide
These industries of death--these guns and swords, -
These uniformed, hate-filled, destructive hordes, -
These hideous things, that are each nation's pride.
So long as men believe in armed might
Let arms be brandished. Let not Peace be sought
Until the race-heart empties out all thought
Of blows and blood, as arguments for Right.
The world has never had enough of war,
Else war were not. Now let the monster stand,
Until he slays himself with his own hand;
Though no man knows what he is fighting for.
Then in the place where wicked cannons stood
Let Peace erect her shrine of Brotherhood.
THE WINDS OF FATE
One ship drives east and another drives west,
With the self-same winds that blow,
'Tis the set of the sails
And not the gales
That tell them the way to go.
Like the winds of the sea are the winds of fate,
As we voyage along through life,
'Tis the set of the soul
That decides its goal
And not the calm or the strife.
BEAUTY
The search for beauty is the search for God
Who is All Beauty. He who seeks shall find.
And all along the paths my feet have trod,
I have sought hungrily with heart and mind,
And open eyes for beauty, everywhere.
Lo! I have found the world is very fair.
The search for beauty is the search for God.
Beauty was first revealed to me by stars,
Before I saw it in my mother's eyes,
Or, seeing, sensed it beauty, I was stirred
To awe and wonder by those orbs of light
All palpitant against empurpled skies.
They spoke a language to my childish heart
Of mystery and splendour, and of space,
Friendly with gracious, unseen presences.
Beauty was first revealed to me by stars.
Sunsets enlarged the meaning of the word.
There was a window looking to the west;
Beyond it, wide Wisconsin fields of grain,
And then a hill, whereon white flocks of clouds
Would gather in the afternoon to rest.
And when the sun went down behind that hill
What scenes of glory spread before my sight;
What beauty--beauty, absolute, supreme!
Sunsets enlarged the meaning of that word.
Clover in blossom, red and honey-sweet,
In summer billowed like a crimson sea
Across the meadow lands. One day, I stood
Breast-high amidst its waves, and heard the hum
Of myriad bees, that had gone mad like me
With fragrance and with beauty. Over us,
A loving sun smiled from a cloudless sky,
While a bold breeze kissed lightly as it passed,
Clover in blossom, red and honey-sweet.
Autumn spoke loudly of the beautiful.
And in the gallery of Nature hung
Colossal pictures hard against the sky,
Set forests gorgeous with a hundred hues;
And with each morning, some new wonder flung
Before the startled world; some daring shade,
Some strange, new scheme of colour and of form.
Autumn spoke loudly of the beautiful.
Winter, though rude, is delicate in art -
More delicate than Summer or than fall
(Even as rugged man is more refined
In vital things than woman). Winter's touch
On Nature seemed most beautiful of all -
That evanescent beauty of the frost
On window panes; of clean, fresh, fallen snow;
Of white, white sunlight on the ice-draped trees.
Winter, though rude, is delicate in art.
Morning! The word itself is beautiful,
And the young hours have many gifts to give
That feed the soul with beauty. He who keeps
His days for labour and his nights for sleep
Wakes conscious of the joy it is to live,
And brings from that mysterious Land of Dreams
A sense of beauty that illumines earth.
Morning! The word itself is beautiful.
The search for beauty is the search for God.
THE INVISIBLE HELPERS
There are, there are
Invisible Great Helpers of the race.
Across unatlased continents of space,
From star to star.
In answer to some soul's imperious need,
They speed, they speed.
When the earth-loving young are forced to stand
Upon the border of the Unknown Land,
They come, they come--those angels who have trod
The altitudes of God,
And to the trembling heart
Their strength impart.
Have you not seen the delicate young maid,
Filled with the joy of life in her fair dawn,
Look in the face of death, all unafraid,
And smilingly pass on?
This is not human strength; not even faith
Has such large confidence in such an hour.
It is a power
Supplied by beings who have conquered death.
Floating from sphere to sphere
They hover near
The souls that need the courage they can give.
This is no vision of a dreamer's mind.
Though we are blind
They live, they live,
Filling all space -
Invisible Great Helpers of the race.
TO THE WOMEN OF AUSTRALIA
A toast to the splendid daughters
Of the New World over the waters,
A world that is great as new;
Daughters of brave old races,
Daughters of heights and spaces,
Broad seas and broad earth places -
Hail to your land and you!
The sun and the winds have fed you;
The width of your world has led you
Out into the larger view;
Strong with a strength that is tender,
Bright with a primal splendour,
Homage and praise we render -
Hail to your land and you!
Sisters and daughters and mothers,
Standing abreast with your brothers,
Working for things that are true;
Thinking and doing and daring,
Giving, receiving, and sharing,
Earning the crowns you are wearing -
Hail to your land and you!
REPLIES
You have lived long and learned the secret of life, O Seer!
Tell me what are the best three things to seek -
The best three things for a man to seek on earth?
The best three things for a man to seek, O Son! are these:
Reverence for that great Source from whence he came;
Work for the world wherein he finds himself;
And knowledge of the Realm toward which he goes.
What are the best three things to love on earth, O Seer!
What are the best three things for a man to love?
The best three things for a man to love, O Son! are these:
Labour which keeps his forces all in action;
A home wherein no evil thing may enter;
And a loving woman with God in her heart.
What are the three great sins to shun, O Seer! -
What are the three great sins for a man to shun?
The three great sins for a man to shun, O Son! are these:
A thought which soils the heart from whence it goes;
An action that can harm a living thing;
And undeveloped energies of mind.
What are the worst three things to fear, O Seer! -
What are the worst three things for a man to fear?
The worst three things for man to fear, O Son! are these:
Doubt and suspicion in a young child's eyes;
Accusing shame upon a woman's face;
And in himself no consciousness of God.
EARTH BOUND
New paradise, and groom and bride;
The world was all their own;
Her heart swelled full of love and pride;
Yet were they quite alone?
'Now how is it, oh how is it, and why is it' (in fear
All silent to herself she spake) 'that something strange seems here?'
Along the garden paths they walked -
The moon was at its height -
And lover-wise they strolled and talked,
But something was not right.
And 'Who is that, now who is that, oh who is that,' quoth she,
(All silent in her heart she spake) 'that seems to follow me?'
He drew her closer to his side;
She felt his lingering kiss;
And yet a shadow seemed to glide
Between her heart and his.
And 'What is that, now what is that, oh what is that,' she said,
(All silent to herself she spake) 'that minds me of the dead?'
They wandered back by beds of bloom;
They climbed a winding stair;
They crossed the threshold of their room,
But something waited there.
'Now who is this, and what is this, and where is this,' she cried,
(All silent was the cry she made) 'that comes to haunt and hide?'
Wide-eyed she lay, the while he slept;
She could not name her fear.
But something from her bedside crept
Just as the dawn drew near,
(She did not know, she could not know--how could she know?--who came
To haunt the home of one whose hand had dug her grave of shame).
A SUCCESSFUL MAN
There was a man who killed a loving maid
In some mad mood of passion; and he paid
The price, upon a scaffold. Now his name
Stands only as a synonym for shame.
There was another man, who took to wife
A loving woman. She was full of life,
Of hope, and aspirations; and her pride
Clothed her like some rich mantle.
First, the wide
Glad stream of life that through her veins had sway
He dammed by rocks, cast in it, day by day.
Her flag of hope, flung gaily to the world,
He placed half mast, and then hauled down, and furled.
The aspirations, breathing in each word,
By subtle ridicule, were made absurd:
The delicate fine mantle of her pride,
With rude unfeeling hands, was wrenched aside:
And by mean avarice, or vulgar show,
Her quivering woman's heart was made to know
That she was but a chattel, bought to fill
Whatever niche might please the buyer's will.
So she was murdered, while the slow years went.
And her assassin, honoured, opulent,
Lived with no punishment, or social ban!
'A good provider, a successful man.'
UNSATISFIED
The bird flies home to its young;
The flower folds its leaves about an opening bud;
And in my neighbour's house there is the cry of a child.
I close my window that I need not hear.
She is mine, and she is very beautiful:
And in her heart there is no evil thought.
There is even love in her heart -
Love of life, love of joy, love of this fair world,
And love of me (or love of my love for her);
Yet she will never consent to bear me a child.
And when I speak of it she weeps,
Always she weeps, saying:
'Do I not bring joy enough into your life?
Are you not satisfied with me and my love,
As I am satisfied with you?
Never would I urge you to some great peril
To please my whim; yet ever so you urge me,
Urge me to risk my happiness--yea, life itself -
So lightly do you hold me.' And then she weeps,
Always she weeps, until I kiss away her tears
And soothe her with sweet lies, saying I am content.
Then she goes singing through the house like some bright bird
Preening her wings, making herself all beautiful,
Perching upon my knee, and pecking at my lips
With little kisses. So again love's ship
Goes sailing forth upon a portless sea,
From nowhere unto nowhere; and it takes
Or brings no cargoes to enrich the world.
The years
Are passing by us. We will yet be old
Who now are young. And all the man in me
Cries for the reproduction of myself
Through her I love. Why, love and youth like ours
Could populate with gods and goddesses
This great, green earth, and give the race new types
Were it made fruitful! Often I can see,
As in a vision, desolate old age
And loneliness descending on us two,
And nowhere in the world, nowhere beyond the earth,
Fruit of my loins and of her womb to feed
Our hungry hearts. To me it seems
More sorrowful than sitting by small graves
And wetting sad-eyed pansies with our tears.
The bird flies home to its young;
The flower folds its leaves about an opening bud;
And in my neighbour's house there is the cry of a child.
I close my window that I need not hear.
SEPARATION
HE
One decade and a half since first we came
With hearts aflame
Into Love's Paradise, as man and mate;
And now we separate.
Soon, all too soon,
Waned the white splendour of our honeymoon.
We saw it fading; but we did not know
How bleak the path would be when once its glow
Was wholly gone.
And yet we two were forced to follow on -
Leagues, leagues apart while ever side by side.
Darker and darker grew the loveless weather,
Darker the way,
Until we could not stay
Longer together.
Now that all anger from our hearts has died,
And love has flown far from its ruined nest,
To find sweet shelter in another breast,
Let us talk calmly of our past mistakes,
And of our faults; if only for the sakes
Of those with whom our futures will be cast.
You shall speak first.
SHE
A woman would speak last -
Tell me my first grave error as a wife.
HE
Inertia. My young veins were rife
With manhood's ardent blood; and love was fire
Within me. But you met my strong desire
With lips like frozen rose leaves--chaste, so chaste
That all your splendid beauty seemed but waste
Of love's materials. Then of that beauty
Which had so pleased my sight
You seemed to take no care; you felt no duty
To keep yourself an object of delight
For lover's-eyes; and appetite
And indolence soon wrought
Their devastating changes. You were not
The woman I had sworn to love and cherish.
If love is starved, what can love do but perish?
Now will you speak of my first fatal sin
And all that followed, even as I have done?
SHE
I must begin
With the young quarter of our honeymoon.
You are but one
Of countless men who take the priceless boon
Of woman's love and kill it at the start,
Not wantonly but blindly. Woman's passion
Is such a subtle thing--woof of her heart,
Web of her spirit; and the body's part
Is to play ever but the lesser role
To her white soul.
Seized in brute fashion,
It fades like down on wings of butterflies;
Then dies.
So my love died.
Next, on base Mammon's cross you nailed my pride,
Making me ask for what was mine by right:
Until, in my own sight,
I seemed a helpless slave
To whom the master gave
A grudging dole. Oh, yes, at times gifts showered
Upon your chattel; but I was not dowered
By generous love. Hate never framed a curse
Or placed a cruel ban
That so crushed woman, as the law of man
That makes her pensioner upon his purse.
That necessary stuff called gold is such
A cold, rude thing it needs the nicest touch
Of thought and speech when it approaches love,
Or it will prove the certain death thereof.
HE
Your words cut deep; 'tis time we separate.
SHE
Well, each goes wiser to a newer mate.
TO THE TEACHERS OF THE YOUNG
How large thy task, O teacher of the young,
To take the ravelled threads by parents flung
With careless hands, and through consummate care
To weave a fabric, fine and firm and fair.
God's uncompleted work is thine to do -
Be brave and true!
BEAUTY MAKING
Methinks there is no greater work in life
Than making beauty. Can the mind conceive
One little corner in celestial realms
Unbeautiful, or dull or commonplace?
Or picture ugly angels, illy clad?
Beauty and splendour, opulence and joy,
Are attributes of God and His domain,
And so are worth and virtue. But why preach
Of virtue only to the sons of men,
Ignoring beauty, till they think it sin?
Why, if each dweller on this little globe
Could know the sacred meaning of that word
And understand its deep significance,
Men's thoughts would form in beauty, till their dreams
Of heaven would find expression in their lives,
However humble; they themselves would grow
Godlike, befitting such a fair estate.
Let us be done with what is only good,
Demanding here and now the beautiful;
Lest, with the mind and eye on earth untrained,
We shall be ill at ease when heaven is gained.