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THE VILLAGE WIFE'S LAMENT

POETICAL WORKS OF MAURICE HEWLETT

     A Masque of Dead Florentines
     Pan and the Young Shepherd: a pastoral
     Artemision
     The Agonists: a trilogy
     Helen Redeemed and other Poems
     Gai Saber: Tales and Songs
     The Song of the Plow
     Peridore and Paravail
     The Village Wife's Lament




THE VILLAGE WIFE'S LAMENT

BY

MAURICE HEWLETT



LONDON

MARTIN SECKER
LONDON: MARTIN SECKER (LTD) 1918




                       I


                       i

    O what is this you've done to me,
      Or what have I done,
    That bare should be our fair roof-tree,
      And I all alone?
    'Tis worse than widow I become
      More than desolate,
    To face a worse than empty home
      Without child or mate.

    'Twas not my strife askt him his life
      When it was but begun,
    Nor mine, I was a new-made wife
      And now I am none;
    Nor mine that many a sapless ghost
      Wails in sorrow-fare--
    But this does cost my pride the most,
      That bloodshedding to share.

    Image of streaming eyes, tear-gleaming,
      Of women foiled and defeat,
    I am like Christ shockt out of dreaming,
      Showing His hands and feet;
    Showing His feet and hands to God,
      Saying, "Are these in vain?
    For men I have trod the sorrowful road,
      And by them I am slain."

    Seeing I have a breast in common,
      I must share in that shame,
    Since from the womb of some poor woman
      Each evil one came--
    Every hot and blundering thought,
      Every hag-rid will,
    And every haut king pride-distraught
      That drove men out to kill.

    A woman's womb did fashion him,
      Her bosom was his nurse,
    And many women's eyes are dim
      To see their sons a curse.
    Had I the wit some women have
      To one such I would say,
    "Think you this love the good Lord gave
      Is yours to take away?"

    O Hand divine that for a sign
      Didst bend the rose-red bow,
    Betokening wrath was no more Thine
      With man's Cain-branded brow--
    What now, O Lord, shouldst Thou accord
      To such a shameful brood?
    A bow as crimson as the sword
      Which men have soakt in blood.


                       ii

    I cannot see the grass
      Or feel the wind blowing,
    But I think of brother and brother
      And hot blood flowing.

    The whole world akin,
      And I, an alien,
    Walk branded with the sin
      And the blood-guilt of men.

    And often I cry
      In my sharp distress,
    It were better to die
      Than know such bitterness.


                       iii

    The Lord of Life He did ordain
      How this world should run,
    That Love should call thro' joy and pain
      Two natures to be one;
    Now jags across the high God's plan
      Division like a scar,
    For this is true, that He made man,
      But man made war.

    Had men the dower of teeth and claws
      And not a grace beside them?
    Were they given wit to know the laws
      And hard hearts to outride them?
    What drove them turn the sweet green earth
      Into a puddle of blood?
    What drove them drown our simple mirth
      In salt tear-flood?

    Has man been lifted up erect,
      A lord of life and death,
    His world's elect, and his brow deckt
      With murder for a wreath?
    What shall be done with such an one,
      And whither he be hurl'd?
    The Lord let crucify His Son--
      Who gibbetted His world?


                       iv

    Be it Pole Star or Southern Cross
      That shelters me or you,
    The same things are gain and loss,
      And the same things true:
    The home-love, the mother-love,
      The old, old things;
    The lad's love of maiden's love
      That gives a man wings,

    And makes a maid stand still, afraid
      Lest it were all a dream
    That he do think himself apaid
      If she be all to him.
    The arching earth has no more worth
      Than this, to love, to wed,
    To serve the hearth, to bring to birth,
      To win your children's bread.


                       v

    The bee pills nothing for himself,
      Loading with gold his thigh,
    The martin twittering, at his shelf,
      Glancing from the sky
   Not greedy ease make slaves of these;
      Nor yet endures the cow,
    Her failing knees and agonies
      For price of joy I vow.

    A call above the spell of love,
      A crying and a need
    To make two one, the fruit whereof
      To nurture and to feed;
    To brood, to hoard, to spend as rain
      Virtue and tears and blood;
    To get that you may give amain--
      Of such is parenthood.


                       vi

    I chose a heart out of a hundred
      To nest my own heart in;
    To have that plunder'd, and two hearts sunder'd--
      Who had heart for the sin?
    What woman's son that saw but one
      Such sanctuary waste
    Could set his lips like ironstone
      And raven broadcast?

    What harm did we to any man
      That now I must moan?
    We did but follow Nature's plan
      And cleave to our own;
    For Life it teaches you but this:
      Seek you each other;
    Rise up from your clasp and kiss,
      A father and a mother.

    O piety of hand and knee,
      Of lips and bow'd head!
    O ye who see a soul set free--
      Free, when the heart is dead!
    There is no rest but in the grave;
      Thither my wasted eyes
    Turn for the only home they have,
      Where my true love lies.

    There alongside his clay-cold corse
      I pray that mine may rest;
    I'll warm him with my lover's force
      And feed him at my breast:
    I'll nurse him as I nurst his child,
      The child he never saw,
    The stricken child that never smil'd.
      And scarce my milk could draw.

    Poor girls, whose argument's the same
      For seeking or denying,
    Who kiss to shield yourselves from blame,
      And kiss for justifying;
    How am I better now or worse,
      Beguiler or beguiled,
    Who crave to nurse a clay-cold corse,
      And kiss a dead child?


                       vii

    O I was shap't in comeliness,
      My face was fashion'd fair,
    My breath was sweet, I used to bless
      The treasure of my hair;
    A many prais'd my body's grace,
      And follow'd with the eye
    My faring in the village ways,
      And I knew why.

    Love came my way, fire-flusht and gay,
      Where I did stand:
    "This is the day your pride to lay
      Under a true man's hand."
    I bow'd my head to hear it said
      In words of long ago;
    For ever since the world was made
      Our lot was order'd so.

    And I was bred in pious bed,
      Brought up to be good:
    Respect yourself, my mother said,
      And rule your own mood.
    Fend for yourself while you're a may,
      And keep your own counsel,
    And pick at what the neighbours say
      As a bird picks at groundsel.

    But Love said Nay to Watch and Pray
      When the birds were singing,
    And taught my heart a roundelay
      Like the bells a-ringing;
    And so blindfast I ran and cast
      My treasure on the gale--
    Would the storm-blast had snapt the mast
      Before I fared to sail!




                       II


                       i

    Now that the Lord has open'd me
      The evil with the good,
    I am as one wise suddenly
      Who never understood.
    I see the shaping of my days
      From the beginning,
    When, a young child, I walkt the ways
      And knew nought of sinning.

    I see how Nature ripen'd me
      Under sun and shower,
    As she ripens herb and tree
      To bud and to flower.
    As she ripens herb and tree
      Unto flowering shoot,
    So it was she ripen'd me
      That I might fruit.

    I see--alas, how should I not,
      With all joy behind?--
    How that in love I was begot
      And for love design'd.
    Consentient, my mother lent,
      Blessing, who had been blest,
    That fount unspent, my nourishment,
      Which after swell'd my breast.


                       ii

    I learned at home the laws of Earth:
      The nest-law that says,
    Stray not too far beyond the hearth,
      Keep truth always;
    And then the law of sip and bite:
      Work, that there may be some
    For you who crowd the board this night,
      And the one that is to come.

    The laws are so for bird and beast,
      And so we must live:
    They give the most who have the least,
      And gain of what they give.
    For working women 'tis the luck,
      A child on the lap;
    And when a crust he learn to suck,
      Another's for the pap.


                       iii

    I know 'tis true, the laws of Life
      Are holy to the poor:
    Cleave you to her who is your wife,
      Trust you in her store;
    Eat you with sweat your self-won meat,
      Labour the stubborn sod,
    And that your heat may quicken it,
      Wait still upon God.

    Hallow with praise the wheeling days
      Until the cord goes slack,
    Until the very heartstring frays,
      Until the stiffening back
    Can ply no more; keep then the door,
      And, thankful in the sun,
    Watch you the same unending war
      Ontaken by your son.


                       iv

    Who is to know how she does grow
      Or how shapes her mind?
    The seasons flow, not fast or slow,
      We cannot lag behind.
    The long winds blow, a tree lies low
      That was an old friend:
    The winter snow, the summer's glow--
      Shall these things have an end?

    When I was young I used to think
      I should not taste of death;
    And now I faint to reach the brink,
      And grudge my every breath
    That streameth to the utter air
      Leaving me to my tears
    And outlook bare, with eyes astare
      Upon the creeping years.


                       v

    That little old house that seems to stoop
      Yellow under thatch,
    Like a three-sided chicken-coop,
      Where, if you watch,
    You'll see the starlings go and come
      All a spring morn--
    Half of that is my old home
      Where I was born.

    One half a little old cottage
      The five of us had,
    Five tall sisters in a cage
      With our Mother and Dad.
    Alice she was the eldest one,
      Then Mary, and then me,
    And then Fanny, and little Joan,
      The last-born was she.

    Never a boy that liv'd to grow
      Did our mother carry;
    She us'd to wonder how she'd do
      With five great girls to marry.
    But once I heard her say to Dad,
      A chain of pretty girls
    Made out her neck the comelier clad
      Than diamonds or pearls.


                       vi

    How we did do on Father's money
      Is more than I can tell:
    There was the money from the honey,
      And Mother's work as well;
    For she did work with no more rest
      Than the buzzing bees,
    And the sight I knew and lov'd the best
      Was Mother on her knees.

    When we were fed and clean for school,
      Out Mother goes,
    Rinsing, rubbing, her hands full
      Of other people's clothes.
    If there's one thought above another
      Sets my heart singing,
    It's thinking of my little sweet Mother,
      Her arms full of linen.

    And yet she rul'd her house and all
      Us girls within it;
    There was no meal but we could fall
      To it at the minute;
    Thing there was none, said, thought or done,
      But she must know it,
    Nor any errand to be run
      But she made us go it.

    She with her anxious, watchful glance,
      Blue under her glasses,
    Was meat and drink and providence
      To us five lasses.
    Out she fetcht from hidden stores
      White frocks for Sundays,
    And always nice clean pinafores
      Against school, Mondays.

    She and Dad were little people,
      But most of us were tall,
    And I shot up like Chichester steeple;
      Fan, she was small.
    You never saw a kinder face
      Or met with bluer eyes:
    If ever there was a kissing-case
      On her mouth it lies.


                       vii

    When I was old enough for skipping
      My school days began;
    By Mary's side you'd see me tripping--
      I was baby then.
    A B C and One-two-three
      Were just so much Greek;
    But I could read, it seems to me,
      As soon as I could speak.

    Before I knew how fast I grew
      I was the tallest there;
    Before my time was two-thirds thro'
      I must plait my hair;
    Before our Alice took a place
      And walkt beside her fancy,
    I had on my first pair of stays
      And saw myself Miss Nancy.

    And then goodbye to form and desk
      And sudden floods of noise
    When fifteen minutes' fun and frisk
      Make happy girls and boys.
    As shrill as swifts in upper air
      Was our young shrillness:
    'Twas joy of life, 'twas strength to fare
      Broke the morning stillness.

    I see us flit, as here I sit
      With wet-fring'd eyes,
    And never rime or reason to it--
      Like a maze of flies!
    The boys would jump and catch your shoulder
      Just for the fun of it--
    They tease you worse as you grow older
      Because you want none of it.

    I hear them call their saucy names--
      Mine was Maypole Nance;
    I see our windy bickering games,
      Half like a dance;
    The opening and closing ring
      Of pinafored girls,
    And the wind that makes the cheek to sting
      Blowing back their curls!

    There in the midst is Sally Waters,
      As it might be I,
    With the idle song of Sons and Daughters
      Drifting out and by
   Sons and daughters! Break, break,
      Heart, if you can--
    How have they taught us treat sons and daughters
      Since I began?


                       viii

    There is a bank that always gets
      The noon sun full;
    There we'd hunt for violets
      After morning school.
    White and blue we hunted them
      In the moss, and gave them,
    Dropping-tir'd and short in stem,
      To Mother. She must have them.

    Primrose-mornings in the copse,
      Autumn berrying
    Where the dew for ever stops,
      And the serrying,
    Clinging shrouds of gossamers
      Glue your eyes together;
    Gleaning after harvesters
      In the mild blue weather--

    Life so full of bud and blossom,
      Fallen like a tree!
    Who gave me a woman's bosom--
      And who has robb'd me?




                       III


                       i

    When from the folds the shepherd comes
      At the shut of day,
    The fires are lit in valley homes,
      The smoke blue and grey--
    So still, so still!--hangs o'er the thatch;
      So still the night falls,
    My love might know me at the latch
      By my heart-calls.

    And hear you me, my love, this night
      Where Grief and I are set?
    And look you for the beacon light,
      And can you see it yet?
    Or is the sod too deep, my love,
      Which they piled over you?
    Or are you bound in sleep, my love,
      Lying in the dew?


                       ii

    When I was done with schooling days,
      Turn'd sixteen,
    My mother found me in a place
      My own bread to win.
    I had not been a month in place,
      A month from the start,
    When there show'd grace upon my face
      That smote a man's heart.

    Tho' I was young and full of play,
      As full as a kitten,
    I knew to reckon to a day
      When his heart was smitten.
    You'll pick my logic all to holes,
      But here's my wonder:
    It is that God should knit two souls,
      And men tear them asunder.

    For we were knit, no doubt of it,
      I as well as he;
    I peered in glass, my eyes were lit
      After he'd lookt at me.
    I knew not why my heart was glad,
      Or why it leapt, but so 'tis,
    The sharpest, sweetest pang I've had
      Was when he took notice.

    And 'tis not favour makes a lad
      To a girl's mind,
    But 'tis himself makes good of bad,
      Or her stone-blind.
    And men may cheer at tales of wars,
      But every girl knows
    What makes her eyes to shine like stars
      And her face a rose.


                       iii

    No word he said, but turned his head
      After he'd lookt at me;
    I coloured up a burning red,
      Setting the cloth for tea.
    The board was spread with cakes and bread
      For farmer in his sleeves,
    For mistress and the shepherd Ted;
      They talkt of hogs and theaves--

    But nothing ate I where I sat,
      So bashful as I was,
    But kept my eyes upon my plate
      And pray'd the minutes pass.
    Tic-toc, tic-toc from great old clock,
      The long hand did creep;
    And every stroke in my heart woke
      Nature out of her sleep.

    So once, they tell, did Gabriel
      Name a young Maid
    For honour and a miracle,
      And few words she said;
    But things have changed a wondrous deal
      Since she was nam'd,
    If to her room she did not steal
      As if she were asham'd;

    And there upon her bed to sit
      Astare, as I guess,
    Watching her fingers weave and knit,
      Bedded in her dress,
    A-thinking thoughts in her young mind
      Too wild for tears to gain,
    As when the roaring North-West wind
      Gives no time to the rain.


                       iv

    Give thanks, you maids, that there's your work
      To keep your heart and head
    From thoughts that lurk in them who shirk
      Their daily round to tread.
    But she goes bold who feels the hold
      And colour of her love
    Laid on her task like water-gold
      From the lit sky above.


                       v

    I rose with early morning light,
      The meadows grey with rime,
    To set the kitchen fire, and dight
      The room for breakfast-time;
    Or make the beds, or rinse and scour,
      And all the while
    A singing heart, a face aflower,
      And secret smile.

    So 'twas with me week in, week out,
      And no more to be said;
    A moment's look, a hint of doubt,
      A half-turn of the head.
    I had my hands as full as full,
      And full of work was he--
    But I learn'd in another school
      After he'd lookt at me.


                       vi

    In summer time of flowers and bees
      And flies on the pane,
    Before the sun could gild the trees
      Or set afire the vane,
    Down I must go upon my knees,
      Or ply the showering mop;
    Then feed the chicken, ducks and geese,
      And milk the last drop.

    On winter mornings dark and hard,
      White from aching bed,
    There were the huddled fowls in yard
      All to be fed.
    My frozen breath stream'd from my lips,
      The cows were hid in steam;
    I lost sense of my finger-tips
      And milkt in a dream.

    My drowsy cheek fast to her side,
      The pail below my arm,
    My thought leapt what might me betide,
      And soon I was warm.
    For that gave me a beating heart
      And made me hot thro',
    As when you reckon, with a start,
      Someone speaks of you.


                       vii

    And all my years of farm-service
      There was no dismay,
    But men and maids knew nought amiss
      With their work or play;
    But grew amain like tree or beast,
      Labouring out their lives
    Till sap and milk fill'd spine and breast,
      And ripen'd men and wives.

    What call had we to think of war,
      We growing things?
    What need had we to reckon o'er
      Misdoubts or threatenings?
    A soldier-lad in his red coat
      Show'd up then as he past
    Like a lamplighted fishing-boat
      Lonely in the vast.

    An aeroplane in middle sky
      Might bring us to our doors,
    To see her like a dragon-fly
      Droning as she soars.
    Long before you see her come
      You can hear her throbbing,
    Far, far away like a distant drum,
      Near, like a thresher sobbing.

    Ah, in those days of wonderment,
      Wonder and delight,
    No thought we spent what murder meant,
      Horror in the night;
    Or how a hidden dreadful plan
      Like a fingering weed
    Was growing up in the mind of man
      From a fungus-seed!




                       IV


                       i

    Out of the clear how shrewdly blows
      The North-West wind!
    Free as he goes, how brave he shows,
      The sun seems blind!
    The shadows fleet upon the grass
      Where the kestrels hover--
    What leagues of sorrow they must pass
      Before they shroud my lover!

    Half-naked now, confronting cold,
      The tall trees shiver,
    Each with its pool of pallid gold
      Draining down to the river.
    'Tis now when fret of winter wet
      Warns the year she is old,
    And she casts robe and coronet,
    That I would loosen hold.


                       ii

    Our lives creep on to change at last,
      And change is sudden coming;
    Rooted you see yourself and fast,
      And then be sent roaming.
    When I was come to twenty years,
      Home for a spell,
    Mother she brought a flush of tears
      With what she had to tell.

    There was a fine new place for me
      Forty miles away--
    And where my dream of what might be
      One fine day?
    The farmer's wife she kiss'd me kindly
      When I was paid;
    But Ted and I said Goodbye blindly,
      And no more said.

    No word between us of the thought
      That fill'd four years,
    No fond look caught by eyes well taught,
      Tho' thick with tears!
    'Twas Goodbye, Nance, and Goodbye, Ted,
      And just a clasp of the hand:
    Maybe I'll write, he might have said
      For me to understand.

    But poor people have need to work
      Whether merry or sad,
    Whatever groping thought do lurk,
      Whatever dreams they've had!
    I went my way and he kept his,
      I to the county town,
    He in a row of cottages
      Below the hump-backt down.


                       iii

    A town-bred girl, her hair in curl
      And apron edged with lace,
    She took me in, my head awhirl,
      To my new place.
    And there the five of us must hive
      In that warm shutter'd house,
    And keep our honesty alive
      With none to counsel us.

    The master and the mistresses,
      What were they but strangers?
    'Twas no part of their businesses
      To think of servants' dangers.
    They sneer at us, and we at them,
      Life sunders where the stairs are:
    But are the things that they condemn
      In us much worse than theirs are?


                       iv

    'Twas busy now I had to be,
      And keep myself neat,
    Dress in my new black gown by tea,
      And streamer'd cap to it.
    The brisk young men were plenty enough,
      And talk about them plenty
    Among us maids! No other stuff
      Contents the tongue at twenty.

    But Mother's words came back to me,
      Told when I was little:
    Mind you, the tongue's your only key,
      And what it guards is brittle.
    Love is the best; let go the rest,
      But hold him by the wing
    Until he's plumaged for the test--
      Then let him soar and sing.

    I took no harm of all their talk--
      All talkt the same--
    Tho' more than one askt me to walk
      When my Sunday came;
    But I held fast the dream I'd had
      In the old farm,
    And saw myself beside my lad,
      My hand on his arm.


                       v

    A year went on, and twenty-one
      Saw me discarded.
    They laught at me for constancy
      Ne'er to be rewarded.
    Then came a warm, still day of May
      And brought me a letter.
    I blusht so red, the cook she said,
      Lucky man to get her!

    At half-past three he came for me;
      I dared not speak;
    But there was all he need to see
      Flaming in my cheek.
    What better has the best of us
      If kind Heaven grant her
    A glowing hearth, a little house,
      And a good man to want her?

    In the soft shrouding clinging mist
      His strong arms held me.
    Our lips kept tryst, and long we kiss'd;
      His great love fill'd me.
    Sweet is the warmth of summer weather,
      But the best fire I know
    Is of two pair of lips together,
      Two hearts in one glow.

    His love he told, that made me bold
      To look at him fairly,
    And see the burning blush take hold
      And colour him up rarely.
    Within his ply though caught was I,
      I backt a saucy head:
    "Oh, I was shy a year gone by--
      Your turn now," I said.


                       vi

    Now would you prove the man I love
      As I saw him then?
    He was of them who're slow to move,
      One of your still men;
    One of your men self-communing
      Who see sheep on a hill,
    Ships out at sea or birds a-wing
      Where you see _nil_.

    And what they see they seldom say,
      Holding speech to be vain;
    And yet so kin to earth are they
      They smell the coming rain.
    The earth can teach them without speech,
      They know as they are known--
    Why should they preach to the out-of-reach,
      Or counsel Nature's own?

    He never was a man to talk,
      He was too wise;
    But things he'd see out on his walk
      Would blind another's eyes.
    But when it came to speak about them
      'Twas another thing.
    He'd say, "What use is it to shout them?
      I want to sing!"

    A smallish head, with jet-black hair
      And eyes grey-blue,
    You felt when'er he lookt you fair
      That he must be true;
    And when he smil'd his dear and shy way
      Sidelong his mouth,
    I always thought the sun fell my way
      And the wind South.

    So I possest the knowledge blest
      That Love had held him fast
    Since the day our eyes confest,
      The first time and the last.
    "Since then," he said, "I never durst
      Look at you at all,
    For fear you'd see the hunger and thirst
      That kept me like a thrall.


                       vii

    "'Twas when you went away and left
      Me and pain alone,
    By fortune's theft I stood bereft
      Of all I'd counted on--
    And this also, I ne'er could go
      On my shepherd life,
    Without I had the grace to woo
      You my loving wife.

    "There was a fate, I do believe,
      Call'd us together;
    God visit me when'er you grieve
      Taking on my tether!
    But if we share with every creature
      That is quick and dead
    The call of nature unto nature,
      Then we two should wed.

    "You are a beauty bred and born,
      As any one can see;
    You walk the world as if in scorn
      Of riches or degree.
    Your eyes call home the soft green tone
      Of the fainting sky
    When the eve-star keeps watch alone,
      And the summer is nigh.

    "But 'tis your grave and constant mind
      Beckon'd me to you,
    Too good, too sweet, too fond, too kind,
      For me to be untrue.
    So trust me, lass, I'll not be false
      While I do live,
    For we two go where Nature calls,
      As I believe."


                       viii

    Trust! Oh, I could have sunk to ground
      And lain under his feet!
    To have his praise was like a wound,
      Throbbing and deadly sweet;
    A wound that lets the welling blood
      Ebb from the vein,
    Merging the hurt in drowsihood,
      And hushing down the pain.

    High destiny of Nature's calling,
      Foil'd and frustrate!
    Just then the evil tide was crawling
      To drown love in hate.




                       V


                       i

    The meadows wear a cloth of gold,
      The trees wear green;
    Upon the down in dimpled fold
      The white lambs glean;
    Deep blue the skyey canopy,
      Soft the wind's fan:
    Behold the earth as it might be
      If man lov'd man!

    Summer is soon; the next new moon
      Will see the yellowing wheat;
    Then will be harvest, Earth's high boon
      To them that work for it.
    The reapers swink, the heat-waves blink
      Across the drowsy fen--
    Now let hearts shrink from scythes that drink
      The blood of young men!


                       ii

    As I stood at my open door
      I caught a flying word:
    Two strangers past, "Then that means war----"
      That was what I heard.
    'Twas ten o'clock, a summer's day,
      My love on the hill.
    "Then that means war," I heard them say,
      And my heart stood still.

    Life had been fair as I stood there,
      Eight weeks a bride;
    All of me laid warm and bare
      To my true love's side!
    Oh, who should dream of dark to-morrows
      And lonely weeping
    Whose steadfast joys and passing sorrows
      Lay in such a keeping?

    There blew a chill wind from the hill
      Like a sea-breath;
    I shiver'd and a taint of ill
      Brought news of death.
    I blinkt my eyes as who should try
      To see what is to fear;
    The sun still shone high in the sky,
      But no warmth there.

    Then far away I saw the sea
      A rippling golden sheet,
    And courage flowed again in me--
      What foe could break thro' it?
    And all about the fields and hedges,
      There when I was born,
    The river slipping through the sedges,
      And the growing corn--

    A land of quiet tilth and cote,
      Of little woods and streams,
    Of gentle skies and clouds afloat,
      And swift sun-gleams!
    A land where knee-deep cattle keep,
      Chewing as they stand;
    Of hillsides murmurous with sheep--
      That is my native land!

    They say you never love so dear
      As when you are to part;
    I know, to see my land so clear
      Cut me to the heart.
    What vain regrets to have lov'd so ill
      What was our all!
    What idle vows to love her still
      Though she should fall!

    At stroke of noon my love came in
      Sharpset for his food;
    To see him was right sense to win,
      And feel safe and good.
    I was asham'd my fears to tell
      Lest he should think,
    "I thought I knew this woman well--
      But what makes her shrink?"


                       iii

    The summer went her gracious way
      Of sun and lingering eves;
    I did my share to win the hay,
      The corn stood in sheaves
    Ere August month was fairly come;
      And when it was here
    I knew I carried in my womb
      The harvest of my dear.


                       iv

    When I was sure I sat down quiet
      In the deep shade,
    And if my heart was all in riot
      I was not afraid.
    I did not think, nor say a pray'r,
      But lookt straight before me,
    And felt that Someone else stood there
      With hands held o'er me.

    I thought His peace blest my increase;
      But then, as it seem'd,
    A shadow made my joy to cease,
      And the day was dimm'd.
    I shiver'd as if one a knife
      Should pull forth of the sheath.
    I think just then the Lord of Life
      Gave way to Him of Death.

    As one bestead with gossamer-thread
      I pluckt at my eyes
    To catch again the glory shed,
      The hope, the load, the prize;
    But no more hands invisible
      Held like a shade o'er me,
    And there seem'd little enough to tell
      My husband momently.

    The long forenoon my thought I held,
      And yet all thro' it
    The wires all England over shrill'd,
      And I never knew it!
    In a high muse I nurst my news
      All the forenoon,
    While England braced her limbs and thews
      To a marching tune.


                       v

    I serv'd my love, when he came home,
      His meal; then on his knee
    I told him what I might become,
      And he kiss'd me;
    Then said, "Indeed, there may be need
      Of this little one,
    For many a woman's heart must bleed
      For wanting of a son.

    "Since we awoke, the word is spoke,
      And if 'tis still right
    That English folk keep faith unbroke,
      Then must England fight."
    I could not look, nor think, nor ask
      What himself would do,
    But call'd to task my pride, to bask
      In what had warm'd me thro'.

    Oh, he was grave and self-possest
      Under love's new crown!
    He took me in his arms to rest,
      And lay my head down
    A moment on his shoulder; then
      Went steady to his work.
    I knew what fate soe'er call'd men
      He was none to shirk.

    Now I must play the helpful wife,
      And my new pride
    Be little worth to ease the strife
      That vext me in the side;
    For like a green and aching wound,
      Like a throbbing vein
    I felt this terror on the ground
      Of young men slain.

    The swooning summer sun sank low,
      And all the dusty air
    Held breathlessly beneath his glow,
      So tir'd, so quiet and fair,
    I would not think that men could live
      In such glory a minute,
    To hate and grudge, to slay and reive
      Poor souls within it.


                       vi

    I heard fond crying in my ears,
      Fond and vain regret
    For life as it had been ere tears
      Made women's eyes wet;
    I saw arise the host of stars
      And listen'd to their song;
    "O we have seen a thousand wars
      And woe agelong!

    "What are you men, what are you women
      But a shifting sand?
    The tide of life is overbrimming--
      God holds not His hand;
    But all the evil with the good
      To His mill is grist;
    He serves his mood now with man's blood
      Who serv'd it once with beast."

    So sang the stars. That night our love
      Burn'd at its holiest;
    For aught we knew the same might prove
      Our last in the nest.
    But from the bed my passion pled,
      O God, let us be!
    If woman's anguish her bestead,
      Then forsake not me!


                       vii

    I dare not trace that watching space
      Of days, too short, too long--
    Too long to wear a patient face,
      Too short to wear a strong.
    I us'd to think I'd have him choose
      His duty and begone;
    And then, No, no, I dare not lose
      Him ere he take his son!

    Too long, too short the days to wait,
      To plan and think and dread;
    And happy we whose poor estate
      Claims our work for our bread.
    Each day I went to scour and scrub
      As my mother us'd,
    Or stood before the washing-tub
      Where the linen sluiced.

    And so my love with careful hand
      And careful eye
    Led his white flock about the land;
      And I must sigh,
    "There's no rebelling in a poor man's dwelling,
      The roof stoops to the blast;
    And no heart-swelling meets God's compelling,
      And what is cast is cast!"


                       viii

    But as the tide crawls to his full
      Without your knowing,
    Invading rock and filling pool,
      Endlessly flowing;
    Lo, while you sit and look at it,
      Idle, little thinking,
    The flood is brimming at your feet,
      Lipping there and winking--

    The very same the Great War grew;
      Like a flowing tide
    It spread its channels thro' and thro'
      The quiet countryside.
    One day you'd stop: a poster up,
      And Lord, how it glared!
    The next there'd be a very crop,
      And not a body stared.

    And then the lorries flung along
      By ones and twos, and then
    In snaky line some twenty strong,
      Full of shouting men.
    They made me blench with noise and stench,
      But more, I do believe,
    To know them gaining inch by inch
      The earth whereby we live.

    So faded fast the painted past
      Beneath the mist of war;
    One could not think life had been cast
      In sweet lines before.
    There was no list in that red mist
      For love or wholesome breath,
    But making rage our staple grist
      We ground the dust of death.

    Our men held talk among themselves,
      But said little to we;
    And soon they went by tens and twelves
      Soldiers to be.
    I knew how 'twould be from the first,
      I think my heart could tell;
    I loved a man who never durst
      Not do well.


                       ix

    How young, how gay they marcht away,
      All our village boys!
    Leaving us women here to pray,
      Drowning with their noise
    Misdoubt and eager mother-love,
      Hungry on the watch,
    As if they went to race and shove
      In a football match.

    But my love chose in soberness
      Another way, his own;
    And God I bless that my distress
      Came suddenly down.
    A swift November night was falling
      In a windless air;
    I heard him indoors, heard him calling,
      And went, and he was there.


                       x

    He stood still, and his gaze
      Was far off, and slow
    And quiet the words he says:
      "Nancy, I must go."

    In my still heart's deep
      I gloried in the trust
    He handed me to keep,
      In his quiet "I must."

    No more we said that night,
      But sat in the gloom;
    We sat without candle-light
      In our little room.

    Handfast, like girl and boy,
      There we sat on,
    Hoarding our store of joy
      Against he were gone.

    Handfast, like boy and girl,
      And my eyes they did fill;
    But my heart was in a whirl
      To have him there still.

    'Twas when we were abed,
      And I against his heart,
    That I knew the great dread
      It would be to part.

    Old sayings, that sounded new,
      Sweet, every broken word--
    "My Nancy, sweet and true,
      My pretty wild bird!"

    I let him kiss me, but I
      Lay quite still in his arm:
    If I had started to cry
      God only knew the harm!

    And if he thought me cool
      'Twould make an easier going;
    But _if_ he thought me cool
      'Twas not for want of knowing.

    Towards the twilight gray
      When my love was sleeping,
    I sat upright to pray,
      And heard the sparrows cheeping.

    It was their fond love-twitter
      That broke my prayer down,
    Turn'd all my faith bitter,
      To set it by their own.

    Their love-life to begin,
      And mine now--where?
    Their nest to win,
      Mine soon to be bare!

    I lookt forth from my bed
      To the cold square of the light--
    Unto God I said,
      "Show me why men must fight,

    "You, Who to each one say,
      Love you one another;
    You, Who bid women obey
      Husbands, and sons their mother;

    "You, Who of me require
      To love what I cannot see,
    Milk and a heart of fire
      To nourish what may not be!

    "Shall my milk be churn'd into gall,
      Or my blood freeze at the fount,
    And You make light of it all,
      And my love of little account?"

    Then as I held my throat,
      God answer'd me by a bird,
    One long flourishing note,
      The bravest I ever heard;

    And I turn'd where my love lay fast
      In his wholesome sleep;
    About him my arms I cast
      And found grace to weep.

    He would do what was right,
      As I knew very well--
    Yes, but who made them fight,
      And turn'd our heaven to hell?

    The more I listen the sighs,
      The mourning and the dearth,
    The deeper my heart cries
      Over this wounded earth.




                       VI


                       i

    May the good King
      That guards like sheep
    Kings and shepherds all
      Send us quiet sleep!

    Shepherds great and small
      Has He in hold;
    There need no danger
      Threaten field or fold.

    Lowly in a manger
      That King was born
    Of maid undefiled
      On a winter's morn.

    He lay a little child
      On His mother's knee;
    Three kings out of the East
      Came Him to see.

    On a mother's breast
      Still did He lie:
    Said one king to the other,
      "Such once was I!"

    Then said his brother,
      "Even thus, I trow,
    Once lay thy simplicity,
      _But where is that now_?"


                       ii

    How many a woman's eyes are worn,
      Weeping a murder'd son!
    How many wish none they had borne
      To do as theirs have done!
    Who dares to see a mask of hate
      And snarling on the face
    Which she had pray'd to consecrate
      To honour for a space?

    This high-flusht lad whom she has known
      Since as a new-born child
    He lay as soft as thistle-down,
      Or like an angel smil'd;
    Whom she has seen, a sturdy imp
      Tumble bare-breecht at play,
    Or nurst to health when, quiet and limp,
      Short-breath'd and flusht he lay;

    Or shockhead boy, aburst with joy,
      Or gawky, ill-at-ease,
    All hot and coy, a hobbledehoy
      With laces round his knees--
    But hers, her own, with eyes that trust
      Hers for his better part--
    Ah, tiger-lust of War that thrust
      A hand to snatch that heart!

    She hides her woe, and helps him go,
      She sits at home to pray;
    He tells her when he met the foe,
      But nothing of the way.
    She never knows the way, and who
      Would know it if she could,
    What in his fever-heat he do
      Of rage and dust and blood?

    The lads go by, the colours fly,
      Drums rattle, bugles bray;
    We only cry, Let mine not die--
      No thought for whom he slay.
    But woman bares a martyr breast,
      And herself points the flame:
    Her son, a hero or a beast,
      Will never be the same.


                       iii

    When forth my love to duty went
      I sought my old home,
    My few months' joy over and spent,
      And lean years to come.
    My mother blinkt her patient eyes;
      She said, It was to be.
    Was I less temperate or more wise
      To question her decree?

    Was it for this, our clasp and kiss?
      For this end and no other
    That I was shapt to have increase,
      And call'd to be mother?
    Did God make o'er the power to soar
      On men, that they should sink?
    Did He outpour a flood of war
      And leave us on the brink?

    Was't so He wove the robe of Love,
      To mock the lovely earth?
    Sees He, above, creation move
      To death, not birth?
    Go, thou dear head, for God is dead,
      And Death is our Lord:
    Between us, red, lies in the bed
      War, like a naked sword.


                       iv

    O failing heart, accept your part,
      And thank the Lord, Who bound
    Your labour daily to the mart,
      Your service to the ground!
    Take to the mart your stricken heart,
      Tho' the chaffer graze it;
    Shrink not altho' the quick flesh smart--
      But meet pain and praise it!


                       v

    He came to see me once again,
      Stiffen'd in his new buff:
    A few short hours compact of strain,
      Too hasty for love;
    For Love can never be confin'd,
      But asks eternity.
    To nurse the lov'd one in the mind
      The bond must first be free.

    And he, he now serv'd otherwhere
      And could not be the same;
    To all the world my love was there
      And answer'd to his name;
    But not to me, oh, not to me
      The kisses of his lips
    Were as of old, but guardedly,
      Like sunlight in eclipse.

    The moment came, I held him close,
      But had no word to say--
    Good-bye, sweetheart, Good-bye, Blush Rose:
      'Twas his old way.
    Then in a hush which seem'd to rock
      Me like a leaf about,
    I heard the pulsing of the clock,
      Counting my dear life out.

    And I am here, and you are, where?
      While the long hours go by,
    And on my eyes the glaze of care,
      And in my heart a cry.
    Bury my heart deep in the grave
      Where all its grace is hid:
    What other service should I have
      Than tend my lovely dead?


                       vi

    Then waiting, watching, judging news,
      Then terror in the night--
    I used to start up with the dews
      All over me of fright.
    I dream'd of him on stormy seas;
      Then, in a woodland bare,
    I saw my love on hands and knees,
      With blood upon his hair.

    Along the limits of the wood,
      A green bank full of holes,
    With lichen'd stumps which lean'd or stood
      Like crazy channel-poles:
    'Twas there I saw my love's drawn face,
      A face of paper-white,
    Wherein just for a choking space
      His eyes shone burning bright;

    Then faded, and an eyeless man
      He crawled along the wood,
    And from his hair a black line ran
      And broaden'd into blood.
    It was not horror of him wrong'd,
      It was not pity mov'd me;
    It was, those tortur'd eyes belong'd
      To one who'd never lov'd me.

    That was my love in face and shape,
      That was my love in pain;
    But something told me past escape
      That not by him I'd lain.
    I sat and star'd into the night,
      And still most dreadfully
    I saw those two eyes burning white
      That never had seen me!


                       vii

    Upon a wild March morn
      My husband went to France;
    The day my child was born
      His word came to advance.

    'Twas on that very day
      When my life should be crown'd,
    As I lay in, he lay
      Broken upon the ground.

    For my loss there was gain,
      But his precious blood
    Was shed to earth like rain
      Within the shatter'd wood.

    Missing, the paper said,
      But my heart said, Nay.
    Missing! My man had been dead
      Before he went away!


                       viii

    It never throve from the first,
      Mother, she seem'd to fear it;
    But her words were the worst:
      "Nancy, you'll never rear it."

    Yet he took to the breast
      And I knew the great end
    Of women, to give their best,
      To spend and to spend.

    But his great eyes stared
      Till he seemed all eyes,
    And more than I dared
      Meet looks so wise.

    Wondering and darkly blue,
      Pondering and slow,
    They would look you thro' and thro',
      Then tire and let you go,

    And fall back to vacancy,
      As if the poor thing plain'd,
    "Why was I not let be,
      And what have I gain'd?"

    'Twas more than I could bear,
      I pray'd that he might die;
    And God must have heard my prayer,
      For he went with a little sigh:

    A flutter, a murmur, a sigh
      Lighter than dawn wind--
    It was his soft Good-bye;
      And all my life lay behind.

    I wonder if they were wise,
      Those three kings of the East
    Who offer'd gifts of price
      To the Child on a Girl's breast.

    But if they were wise, their sons
      Have other counsel than they:
    The gifts they offer are guns,
      And the children's parents they slay.


                       ix

    He went before my load was quicken'd,
      And I lay in alone.
    He was not there when baby sicken'd,
      Nor when it was gone.
    I walkt with Mother to the church,
      With Mother and Fan,
    My hard eyes ever on the search--
      Pity me who can!

    The grief was bad enough to bear,
      So dreadfully to wean it;
    But to go home and leave it there,
      And he had never seen it--!
    It was a thing to thank God for
      That home for me was none;
    I knew before we reacht the door
      That my home life was done.


                       x

    Now limpt or dragg'd about our street
      The wounded men in blue,
    Trailing the feet which had been fleet,
      Or crutching one for two;
    Like ghosts of men past out of ken,
      Pale and uncertain-eyed,
    Whose gaze would flicker out, and then
      Come back with hasty pride.

    What they had seen they never told,
      Nor what they had done:
    I saw young lads turn'd suddenly old;
      I saw the blind in the sun
    Look up to pray, as if the blue
      Was shapt like a cross:
    There came back one my husband knew,
      Spoke kindly of my loss.

    He told me how my love was dead;
      He was not the first!
    Broadcast our land the word of dread
      Told women the worst.
    They say, let love and light be given
      So we keep Liberty;
    But I say there is no more Heaven
      If men must so be free.


                       xi

    Can it be own'd that kings were crown'd,
      Consecrate to such evil?
    God-appointed, by God anointed
      Only to play the devil!
    Their men to bind of the tiger kind,
      To bind and then to goad,
    Blundering, slavering, hot and blind,
      On murder's hollow road?

    If kings are so, then let all go--
      Let my dear love cast down
    His lovely life, so we lay low
      The last to wear a crown.
    I'll look upon the steadfast stars,
      Patient and true and wise,
    And read in them the end of wars,
      As in my dead love's eyes.

    O Lord of Life, for whom this earth
      Should image back Thy thought,
    Wherein the mystery of birth
      In Love like Thine be wrought,
    If pity stands with Thy commands,
      Grant a short breathing-space
    Ere men hold up their bloody hands
      Before Thy awful face.




Note

This poem is dramatic, and I am not to be supposed answerable for all
that it expresses; nevertheless I think that my own convictions about
aggressive war are very much those of my Village Wife. Of defensive war,
of war to save the lives of our children, of war to save humanity
itself, there cannot be two sane opinions: that is a pious duty forced
upon us; but it becomes every day more inconceivable to me how men can
engage in the other kind of war, and how, in particular, a people so
provident as the German people could have hoodwinked themselves into
believing that they could be better off by such a monstrous means as
warfare has now become. They had behind them the experience of the
Russians and Japanese; they had all about them the evidences of their
forty years' commercial activity; they must have known, or at least
their governors must have known, what kind of results might be looked
for from modern armament--and yet they dared risk the dereliction of
human morality, the cutting off of a generation of men, and their own
national bankruptcy. Whether it was the madness of lust, or of pride, or
of fear, it was a madness which has procured the greatest disaster of
recorded time, and revealed a criminal folly in themselves which it will
take more than two generations to efface. Indeed, German blood-lust will
become one of the standing legends of History.

The Village Wife knows nothing of the Germans, however, and her
reproaches strike at the heart of Mankind. So long as Mankind looks
upon aggressive war as a reasonable, if ultimate, appeal, her reproaches
will have force, and be deserved. They, or something like them (with the
sanction of inspiration upon them) will, I believe, be the means of our
redemption. As human nature still actually is, no League of Nations
conceivable to us will be able to save us from war. Rend your hearts and
not your armaments. Let us learn to look War in the face, and while the
blood is cold, so that we may know what we are meaning to do. Let us put
a moral taboo upon it, such as we have put upon parricide, or incest, or
cannibalism. For certain, in those matters, the reason has put a
sanction on the conscience. So will it in the matter of aggressive war.
Side by side with that, as we now see, we must change the governance of
nations. If those who do a nation's work are given their due share of
that nation's government, war I firmly believe, will become a dark
memory, a blotted cloud upon a past age. "Hundreds of years ago," it
will one day be said to some wondering child, "men hired men to murder
each other for the sake of their religion or their commerce. This they
had done for thousands of years until at last, in the most dreadful of
their wars, they killed or maimed a whole generation in the space of
about four years. Then it was that men saw what they had been doing, and
for a while the world was shamed, silent. That time of silence was long
enough to turn the hearts of men."

I have put into the mouth of my Village Wife thoughts which she may
never have formulated, but which, I am very sure, lie in her heart, too
deep for any utterance but that of tears. If I know anything of village
people I know this, that they shape their lives according to Nature, and
are outraged to the root of their being by the frustration of Nature's
laws and the stultification of man's function in the scheme of things.
What the function of man is, what the power, what the dignity have been
well paraphrased in these words:

"'Neither a fixed abode, nor a form in thine own likeness, nor any gift
peculiar to thyself alone, have we given thee, O Adam, in order that
what abode, what likeness, what gifts thou shalt choose may be thine to
have and to possess. The nature allotted to all other creatures, within
laws appointed by ourselves, restrains them. Thou, restrained by no
narrow bounds, according to thy own free will, in whose power we have
placed thee, shalt define thy nature for thyself. We have set thee
midmost the world, that thence thou mightest more conveniently survey
whatsoever is in the world. Nor have we made thee either heavenly or
earthly, mortal or immortal, to the end that thou, being, as it were,
thy own free maker and moulder, shouldst fashion thyself in what form
may like thee best. Thou shalt have power to decline unto the lower or
brute creatures. Thou shalt have power to be reborn unto the higher or
divine, according to the sentence of thy intellect.' Thus to Man, at his
birth, the Father gave seeds of all variety and germs of every form of
life."

That is near enough to the Nature of Man for present purposes.

    "Teach us man's worth, that we may know it,
      Who, being alone in power to lift
    Above his nature, sinks below it!"


  BROADCHALKE, _7th July_, 1918.

  PRINTED IN ENGLAND
  BY THE WESTMINSTER PRESS
  411a, HARROW ROAD, LONDON, W.9.





End of Project Gutenberg's The Village Wife's Lament, by Maurice Hewlett