Poems

by Katherine Mansfield (1888~1923)

Transcriber’s Note:
Cover created by Transcriber and placed in the Public Domain.

POEMS

By the same author:

THE GARDEN PARTY
THE DOVES’ NEST
BLISS

POEMS

BY KATHERINE MANSFIELD

LONDON: CONSTABLE & CO. LTD.

First published 1923

PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY ROBERT MACLEHOSE AND CO. LTD.
THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, GLASGOW

TO ELIZABETH OF THE GERMAN GARDEN
WHO LOVED CERTAIN OF THESE POEMS
AND THEIR AUTHOR

vii

CONTENTS

  PAGE
Introductory Note xi
POEMS: 1909–1910
In the Rangitaki Valley 3
Spring Wind in London 4
Butterfly Laughter 6
The Candle 7
Little Brother’s Secret 8
Little Brother’s Story 9
The Man with the Wooden Leg 10
When I was a Bird 11
The Arabian Shawl 12
Sleeping Together 13
The Quarrel 14
POEMS: 1911–1913
Loneliness 17
The Meeting 18
The Gulf 19
The Storm 20
Across the Red Sky 21
Very Early Spring 22
The Awakening River 23
The Sea-Child 24
The Earth-Child in the Grass 25
To God the Father 26
The Opal Dream Cave 27
Sea 28
Jangling Memory 29
There was a Child once 30viii
The Secret 31
Sea Song 32
Countrywomen 34
Stars 35
Deaf House Agent 36
POEMS AT THE VILLA PAULINE: 1916
Villa Pauline 39
Camomile Tea 40
Waves 41
The Town between the Hills 43
Voices of the Air 45
Sanary 46
To L. H. B. (1894–1915) 47
POEMS: 1917–1919
Night-Scented Stock 51
Now I am a Plant, a Weed.... 53
There is a Solemn Wind To-night 54
Out in the Garden 55
Fairy Tale 56
Covering Wings 57
Firelight 59
Sorrowing Love 60
A Little Girl’s Prayer 61
The Wounded Bird 62
CHILD VERSES: 1907
A Fairy Tale 65
Opposites 67
Song of Karen, the Dancing Child 69ix
A Joyful Song of Five 70
The Candle Fairy 71
Song by the Window before Bed 72
A Little Boy’s Dream 73
Winter Song 74
On a Young Lady’s Sixth Anniversary 75
Song of the Little White Girl 76
A Few Rules for Beginners 77
A Day in Bed 78
The Lonesome Child 79
A Fine Day 80
Evening Song of the Thoughtful Child 81
A New Hymn 83
Autumn Song 84
The Black Monkey 85
The Pillar Box 86
The Quarrel 87
Grown-up Talk 88
The Family 89

xi

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

In her Journal, on January 22, 1916, Katherine Mansfield told her plans as her writer to her dead brother. She wanted to pay “a sacred debt” to her country, New Zealand, because “my brother and I were born there.” “Then,” she continued, “I want to write poetry.”

“I feel always trembling on the brink of poetry,” she whispers to her brother. “The almond tree, the birds, the little wood where you are, the flowers you do not see, the open window out of which I lean and dream that you are against my shoulder, and the times that your photograph ‘looks sad.’ But especially I want to write a kind of long elegy to you ... perhaps not in poetry. No, perhaps in prose. Almost certainly in a kind of special prose.”

This “special prose” was the peculiar achievement of her genius. It seems to me that nothing like Prelude or At the Bay or The Voyage or The Doves’ Nest had ever been written in English before. English prose was turned to a new and magical use, made crystal-clear, and filled with rainbow-beauties that are utterly indefinable. What might, in another writer of genius, have become poetry, Katherine Mansfield put into her stories.

Nevertheless, she had written and, at long intervals, continued to write poetry. Perhaps her poetry is not quite poetry, just as her prose is not quite prose. Certainly, whatever they are, they belong to the same order; they have the same simple and mysterious beauty, and they are, above all, the expression of the same exquisite spirit. To my sense they are unique.

Comparatively few of these poems have been published; and of these few hardly one, except those which have appeared after her death in The Adelphi, over her own name. All those which were published in her lifetime, with two exceptions, appeared in papers which we edited together—in Rhythm, when we were young; in The Athenaeum, when we were older. The reason of this restriction was that she had tried in vain to get them published in other places. I remember her telling me when first we met that the beautiful pieces now gathered together as “Poems, 1911–1913” had been refused, because they were unrhymed, by the only editor who used to accept her work. He wanted her to write nothing but satirical prose. This treatment made her very reserved about her verses. Those she published in Rhythm appeared as translations from an imaginary Russian called Boris Petrovsky; those she published in The Athenaeum appeared over the pseudonym of Elizabeth Stanley. Her cousin, to whom this book is dedicated, was the only person to penetrate this latter disguise.

The poems have been roughly grouped in periods. Katherine Mansfield’s practice was suddenly to spend several days in writing poetry, and then to abandon poetry wholly for months and years together. “Poems at the Villa Pauline,” with the exception of the sonnet to L. H. B., were written in curious circumstances. Villa Pauline was a four-roomed cottage on the shore of the Mediterranean where we lived in 1916. For the whole of one week we made a practice of sitting together after supper at a very small table in the kitchen and writing verses on a single theme which we had chosen. It seems to me now almost miraculous that so exquisite a poem as, for instance, “Voices of the Air,” should have been thus composed.

The Child Verses at the end of the volume were written when Katherine Mansfield was still at Queen’s College. They were saved from destruction by one of her friends.

3

POEMS 1909–1910

IN THE RANGITAKI VALLEY

O valley of waving broom,
 O lovely, lovely light,
 O heart of the world, red-gold!
 Breast high in the blossom I stand;
 It beats about me like waves
 Of a magical, golden sea.
The barren heart of the world
 Alive at the kiss of the sun,
 The yellow mantle of Summer
 Flung over a laughing land,
 Warm with the warmth of her body,
 Sweet with the kiss of her breath.
O valley of waving broom,
 O lovely, lovely light,
 O mystical marriage of Earth
 With the passionate Summer sun!
 To her lover she holds a cup
 And the yellow wine o’erflows.
 He has lighted a little torch
 And the whole of the world is ablaze.
 Prodigal wealth of love!
 Breast high in the blossom I stand.
1909.

4

SPRING WIND IN LONDON

5

I blow across the stagnant world,
 I blow across the sea,
 For me, the sailor’s flag unfurled,
 For me, the uprooted tree.
 My challenge to the world is hurled;
 The world must bow to me.
I drive the clouds across the sky,
 I huddle them like sheep;
 Merciless shepherd-dog am I
 And shepherd-watch I keep.
 If in the quiet vales they lie
 I blow them up the steep.
Lo! In the tree-tops do I hide,
 In every living thing;
 On the moon’s yellow wings I glide,
 On the wild rose I swing;
 On the sea-horse’s back I ride,
 And what then do I bring?
And when a little child is ill
 I pause, and with my hand
 I wave the window curtain’s frill
 That he may understand
 Outside the wind is blowing still.
 ... It is a pleasant land.
O stranger in a foreign place,
 See what I bring to you.
 This rain—is tears upon your face;
 I tell you—tell you true
 I came from that forgotten place
 Where once the wattle grew.
All the wild sweetness of the flower
 Tangled against the wall.
 It was that magic, silent hour....
 The branches grew so tall
 They twined themselves into a bower.
 The sun shone ... and the fall
Of yellow blossom on the grass!
 You feel that golden rain?
 Both of you could not hold, alas,
 (Both of you tried—in vain)
 A memory, stranger. So I pass....
 It will not come again.
1909.

6

BUTTERFLY LAUGHTER

In the middle of our porridge plates
 There was a blue butterfly painted
 And each morning we tried who should reach the butterfly first.
 Then the Grandmother said: “Do not eat the poor butterfly.”
 That made us laugh.
 Always she said it and always it started us laughing.
 It seemed such a sweet little joke.
 I was certain that one fine morning
 The butterfly would fly out of the plates,
 Laughing the teeniest laugh in the world,
 And perch on the Grandmother’s lap.

7

THE CANDLE

By my bed, on a little round table
 The Grandmother placed a candle.
 She gave me three kisses telling me they were three dreams
 And tucked me in just where I loved being tucked.
 Then she went out of the room and the door was shut.
 I lay still, waiting for my three dreams to talk;
 But they were silent.
 Suddenly I remembered giving her three kisses back.
 Perhaps, by mistake, I had given my three little dreams.
 I sat up in bed.
 The room grew big, oh, bigger far than a church.
 The wardrobe, quite by itself, as big as a house.
 And the jug on the washstand smiled at me:
 It was not a friendly smile.
 I looked at the basket-chair where my clothes lay folded:
 The chair gave a creak as though it were listening for something.
 Perhaps it was coming alive and going to dress in my clothes.
 But the awful thing was the window:
 I could not think what was outside.
 No tree to be seen, I was sure,
 No nice little plant or friendly pebbly path.
 Why did she pull the blind down every night?
 It was better to know.
 I crunched my teeth and crept out of bed,
 I peeped through a slit of the blind.
 There was nothing at all to be seen.
 But hundreds of friendly candles all over the sky
 In remembrance of frightened children.
 I went back to bed ...
 The three dreams started singing a little song.

8

LITTLE BROTHER’S SECRET

When my birthday was coming
 Little Brother had a secret:
 He kept it for days and days
 And just hummed a little tune when I asked him.
 But one night it rained
 And I woke up and heard him crying:
 Then he told me.
 “I planted two lumps of sugar in your garden
 Because you love it so frightfully
 I thought there would be a whole sugar tree for your birthday,
 And now it will all be melted.”
 O the darling!

9

LITTLE BROTHER’S STORY

We sat in front of the fire;
 Grandmother was in the rocking chair doing her knitting
 And Little Brother and I were lying down flat.
 “Please tell us a story, Grandmother,” we said.
 But she put her head on one side and began counting the stitches,
 “Suppose you tell me one instead.”
 I made up one about a spotted tiger
 That had a knot in his tail;
 But though I liked this about the knot,
 I did not know why it was put there.
 So I said: “Little Brother’s turn.”
 “I know a perfect story,” he cried, waving his hands.
 Grandmother laid down her knitting.
 “Do tell us, dear.”
 “Once upon a time there was a bad little girl
 And her Mummy gave her the slipper, and that’s all.”
 It was not a very special story.
 But we pretended to be very pleased
 And Grandmother gave him jumps on her lap.

10

THE MAN WITH THE WOODEN LEG

There was a man lived quite near us;
 He had a wooden leg and a goldfinch in a green cage.
 His name was Farkey Anderson,
 And he’d been in a war to get his leg.
 We were very sad about him,
 Because he had such a beautiful smile
 And was such a big man to live in a very small house.
 When he walked on the road his leg did not matter so much;
 But when he walked in his little house
 It made an ugly noise.
 Little Brother said his goldfinch sang the loudest of all birds,
 So that he should not hear his poor leg
 And feel too sorry about it.

11

WHEN I WAS A BIRD

I climbed up the karaka tree
 Into a nest all made of leaves
 But soft as feathers.
 I made up a song that went on singing all by itself
 And hadn’t any words, but got sad at the end.
 There were daisies in the grass under the tree.
 I said just to try them:
 “I’ll bite off your heads and give them to my little children to eat.”
 But they didn’t believe I was a bird;
 They stayed quite open.
 The sky was like a blue nest with white feathers
 And the sun was the mother bird keeping it warm.
 That’s what my song said: though it hadn’t any words.
 Little Brother came up the patch, wheeling his barrow.
 I made my dress into wings and kept very quiet.
 Then when he was quite near I said: “Sweet, sweet!”
 For a moment he looked quite startled;
 Then he said: “Pooh, you’re not a bird; I can see your legs.”
 But the daisies didn’t really matter,
 And Little Brother didn’t really matter;
 I felt just like a bird.

12

THE ARABIAN SHAWL

“It is cold outside, you will need a coat—
 What! this old Arabian shawl!
 Bind it about your head and throat,
 These steps ... it is dark ... my hand ... you might fall.”
What has happened? What strange, sweet charm
 Lingers about the Arabian shawl ...
 Do not tremble so! There can be no harm
 In just remembering—that is all.
“I love you so—I will be your wife,”
 Here, in the dark of the Terrace wall,
 Say it again. Let that other life
 Fold us like the Arabian shawl.
“Do you remember?” ... “I quite forget,
 Some childish foolishness, that is all,
 To-night is the first time we have met ...
 Let me take off my Arabian shawl!”

13

SLEEPING TOGETHER

Sleeping together ... how tired you were ...
 How warm our room ... how the firelight spread
 On walls and ceiling and great white bed!
 We spoke in whispers as children do,
 And now it was I—and then it was you
 Slept a moment, to wake—“My dear,
 I’m not at all sleepy,” one of us said...
Was it a thousand years ago?
 I woke in your arms—you were sound asleep—
 And heard the pattering sound of sheep.
 Softly I slipped to the floor and crept
 To the curtained window, then, while you slept,
 I watched the sheep pass by in the snow.
O flock of thoughts with their shepherd Fear
 Shivering, desolate, out in the cold,
 That entered into my heart to fold!
 A thousand years ... was it yesterday
 When we, two children of far away,
 Clinging close in the darkness, lay
 Sleeping together?... How tired you were...

14

THE QUARREL

Our quarrel seemed a giant thing,
 It made the room feel mean and small,
 The books, the lamp, the furniture,
 The very pictures on the wall—
Crowded upon us as we sat
 Pale and terrified, face to face.
 “Why do you stay?” she said, “my room
 Can never be your resting place.”
“Katinka, ere we part for life,
 I pray you walk once more with me.”
 So down the dark, familiar road
 We paced together, silently.
The sky—it seemed on fire with stars!
 I said:—“Katinka dear, look up!”
 Like thirsty children, both of us
 Drank from that giant loving cup.
“Who were those dolls?” Katinka said.
 “What were their stupid, vague alarms?”
 And suddenly we turned and laughed
 And rushed into each other’s arms.

15

17

POEMS 1911–1913

LONELINESS

Now it is Loneliness who comes at night
 Instead of Sleep, to sit beside my bed.
 Like a tired child I lie and wait her tread,
 I watch her softly blowing out the light.
 Motionless sitting, neither left nor right
 She turns, and weary, weary droops her head.
 She, too, is old; she, too, has fought the fight.
 So, with the laurel she is garlanded.
Through the sad dark the slowly ebbing tide
 Breaks on a barren shore, unsatisfied.
 A strange wind flows ... then silence. I am fain
 To turn to Loneliness, to take her hand,
 Cling to her, waiting, till the barren land
 Fills with the dreadful monotone of rain.
1911.

18

THE MEETING

We started speaking,
 Looked at each other, then turned away.
 The tears kept rising to my eyes
 But I could not weep.
 I wanted to take your hand
 But my hand trembled.
 You kept counting the days
 Before we should meet again.
 But both of us felt in our hearts
 That we parted for ever and ever.
 The ticking of the little clock filled the quiet room.
 “Listen,” I said. “It is so loud,
 Like a horse galloping on a lonely road,
 As loud as that—a horse galloping past in the night.”
 You shut me up in your arms.
 But the sound of the clock stifled our hearts’ beating.
 You said, “I cannot go: all that is living of me
 Is here for ever and ever.”
 Then you went.
 The world changed. The sound of the clock grew fainter,
 Dwindled away, became a minute thing.
 I whispered in the darkness, “If it stops, I shall die.”
1911.

19

THE GULF

A gulf of silence separates us from each other.
 I stand at one side of the gulf, you at the other.
 I cannot see you or hear you, yet know that you are there.
 Often I call you by your childish name
 And pretend that the echo to my crying is your voice.
 How can we bridge the gulf? Never by speech or touch.
 Once I thought we might fill it quite up with tears.
 Now I want to shatter it with our laughter.
1911.

20

THE STORM

I ran to the forest for shelter,
 Breathless, half sobbing;
 I put my arms round a tree,
 Pillowed my head against the rough bark.
 “Protect me,” I said. “I am a lost child.”
 But the tree showered silver drops on my face and hair.
 A wind sprang up from the ends of the earth;
 It lashed the forest together.
 A huge green wave thundered and burst over my head.
 I prayed, implored, “Please take care of me!”
 But the wind pulled at my cloak and the rain beat upon me.
 Little rivers tore up the ground and swamped the bushes.
 A frenzy possessed the earth: I felt that the earth was drowning
 In a bubbling cavern of space. I alone—
 Smaller than the smallest fly—was alive and terrified.
 Then, for what reason I know not, I became triumphant.
 “Well, kill me!” I cried and ran out into the open.
 But the storm ceased: the sun spread his wings
 And floated serene in the silver pool of the sky.
 I put my hands over my face: I was blushing.
 And the trees swung together and delicately laughed.
1911.

21

ACROSS THE RED SKY

Across the red sky two birds flying,
 Flying with drooping wings.
 Silent and solitary their ominous flight.
 All day the triumphant sun with yellow banners
 Warred and warred with the earth, and when she yielded
 Stabbed her heart, gathered her blood in a chalice,
 Spilling it over the evening sky.
 When the dark plumaged birds go flying, flying,
 Quiet lies the earth wrapt in her mournful shadow,
 Her sightless eyes turned to the red sky
 And the restlessly seeking birds.
1911.

22

VERY EARLY SPRING

The fields are snowbound no longer;
 There are little blue lakes and flags of tenderest green.
 The snow has been caught up into the sky—
 So many white clouds—and the blue of the sky is cold.
 Now the sun walks in the forest,
 He touches the boughs and stems with his golden fingers;
 They shiver, and wake from slumber.
 Over the barren branches he shakes his yellow curls.
 ... Yet is the forest full of the sound of tears....
 A wind dances over the fields.
 Shrill and clear the sound of her waking laughter,
 Yet the little blue lakes tremble
 And the flags of tenderest green bend and quiver.
1911.

23

THE AWAKENING RIVER

The gulls are mad-in-love with the river,
 And the river unveils her face and smiles.
 In her sleep-brooding eyes they mirror their shining wings.
 She lies on silver pillows: the sun leans over her.
 He warms and warms her, he kisses and kisses her.
 There are sparks in her hair and she stirs in laughter.
 Be careful, my beautiful waking one! you will catch on fire.
 Wheeling and flying with the foam of the sea on their breasts,
 The ineffable mists of the sea clinging to their wild wings,
 Crying the rapture of the boundless ocean,
 The gulls are mad-in-love with the river.
 Wake! we are the dream thoughts flying from your heart.
 Wake! we are the songs of desire flowing from your bosom.
 O, I think the sun will lend her his great wings
 And the river will fly away to the sea with the mad-in-love birds.
1911.

24

THE SEA CHILD

Into the world you sent her, mother,
 Fashioned her body of coral and foam,
 Combed a wave in her hair’s warm smother,
 And drove her away from home.
In the dark of the night she crept to the town
 And under a doorway she laid her down,
 The little blue child in the foam-fringed gown.
And never a sister and never a brother
 To hear her call, to answer her cry.
 Her face shone out from her hair’s warm smother
 Like a moonkin up in the sky.
She sold her corals; she sold her foam;
 Her rainbow heart like a singing shell
 Broke in her body: she crept back home.
Peace, go back to the world, my daughter,
 Daughter, go back to the darkling land;
 There is nothing here but sad sea water,
 And a handful of sifting sand.
1911.

25

THE EARTH-CHILD IN THE GRASS

In the very early morning
 Long before Dawn time
 I lay down in the paddock
 And listened to the cold song of the grass.
 Between my fingers the green blades,
 And the green blades pressed against my body.
 “Who is she leaning so heavily upon me?”
 Sang the grass.
 “Why does she weep on my bosom,
 Mingling her tears with the tears of my mystic lover?
 Foolish little earth child!
 It is not yet time.
 One day I shall open my bosom
 And you shall slip in—but not weeping.
 Then in the early morning
 Long before Dawn time
 Your lover will lie in the paddock.
 Between his fingers the green blades
 And the green blades pressed against his body ...
 My song shall not sound cold to him
 In my deep wave he will find the wave of your hair
 In my strong sweet perfume, the perfume of your kisses.
 Long and long he will lie there ...
 Laughing—not weeping.”
1911.

26

TO GOD THE FATHER

To the little, pitiful God I make my prayer,
 The God with the long grey beard
 And flowing robe fastened with a hempen girdle
 Who sits nodding and muttering on the all-too-big throne of Heaven.
 What a long, long time, dear God, since you set the stars in their places,
 Girded the earth with the sea, and invented the day and night.
 And longer the time since you looked through the blue window of Heaven
 To see your children at play in a garden....
 Now we are all stronger than you and wiser and more arrogant,
 In swift procession we pass you by.
 “Who is that marionette nodding and muttering
 On the all-too-big throne of Heaven?
 Come down from your place, Grey Beard,
 We have had enough of your play-acting!”
 It is centuries since I believed in you,
 But to-day my need of you has come back.
 I want no rose-coloured future,
 No books of learning, no protestations and denials—
 I am sick of this ugly scramble,
 I am tired of being pulled about—
 O God, I want to sit on your knees
 On the all-too-big throne of Heaven,
 And fall asleep with my hands tangled in your grey beard.
1911.

27

THE OPAL DREAM CAVE

In an opal dream cave I found a fairy:
 Her wings were frailer than flower petals,
 Frailer far than snowflakes.
 She was not frightened, but poised on my finger,
 Then delicately walked into my hand.
 I shut the two palms of my hands together
 And held her prisoner.
 I carried her out of the opal cave,
 Then opened my hands.
 First she became thistledown,
 Then a mote in a sunbeam,
 Then—nothing at all.
 Empty now is my opal dream cave.
1911.

28

SEA

The Sea called—I lay on the rocks and said:
 “I am come.”
 She mocked and showed her teeth,
 Stretching out her long green arms.
 “Go away!” she thundered.
 “Then tell me what I am to do,” I begged.
 “If I leave you, you will not be silent,
 But cry my name in the cities
 And wistfully entreat me in the plains and forests;
 All else I forsake to come to you—what must I do?”
 “Never have I uttered your name,” snarled the Sea.
 “There is no more of me in your body
 Than the little salt tears you are frightened of shedding.
 What can you know of my love on your brown rock pillow....
 Come closer.”
1911.

29

JANGLING MEMORY

Heavens above! here’s an old tie of yours—
 Sea-green dragons stamped on a golden ground.
 Ha! Ha! Ha! What children we were in those days.
Do you love me enough to wear it now?
 Have you the courage of your pristine glories?
 Ha! Ha! Ha! You laugh and shrug your shoulders.
Those were the days when a new tie spelt a fortune:
 We wore it in turn—I flaunted it as a waist-belt.
 Ha! Ha! Ha! What easily satisfied babies.
“I think I’ll turn it into a piano duster.”
 “Give it to me, I’ll polish my slippers on it!”
 Ha! Ha! Ha! The rag’s not worth the dustbin.
“Throw the shabby old thing right out of the window;
 Fling it into the faces of other children!”
 Ha! Ha! Ha! We laughed and laughed till the tears came!
1911.

30

THERE WAS A CHILD ONCE

There was a child once.
 He came to play in my garden;
 He was quite pale and silent.
 Only when he smiled I knew everything about him,
 I knew what he had in his pockets,
 And I knew the feel of his hands in my hands
 And the most intimate tones of his voice.
 I led him down each secret path,
 Showing him the hiding-place of all my treasures.
 I let him play with them, every one,
 I put my singing thoughts in a little silver cage
 And gave them to him to keep ...
 It was very dark in the garden
 But never dark enough for us. On tiptoe we walked among the deepest shades;
 We bathed in the shadow pools beneath the trees,
 Pretending we were under the sea.
 Once—near the boundary of the garden—
 We heard steps passing along the World-road;
 O how frightened we were!
 I whispered: “Have you ever walked along that road?”
 He nodded, and we shook the tears from our eyes....
 There was a child once.
 He came—quite alone—to play in my garden;
 He was pale and silent.
 When we met we kissed each other,
 But when he went away, we did not even wave.
1912.

31

THE SECRET

In the profoundest ocean
 There is a rainbow shell,
 It is always there, shining most stilly
 Under the greatest storm waves
 And under the happy little waves
 That the old Greek called ‘ripples of laughter.’
 And you listen, the rainbow shell
 Sings—in the profoundest ocean.
 It is always there, singing most silently!
1912.

32

SEA SONG

33

I will think no more of the sea!
 Of the big green waves
 And the hollowed shore,
 Of the brown rock caves
 No more, no more
 Of the swell and the weed
 And the bubbling foam.
Memory dwells in my far away home,
 She has nothing to do with me.
She is old and bent
 With a pack
 On her back.
 Her tears all spent,
 Her voice, just a crack.
 With an old thorn stick
 She hobbles along,
 And a crazy song
 Now slow, now quick
 Wheeks in her throat.
And every day
 While there’s light on the shore
 She searches for something,
 Her withered claw
 Tumbles the seaweed;
 She pokes in each shell
 Groping and mumbling
 Until the night
 Deepens and darkens,
 And covers her quite,
 And bids her be silent,
 And bids her be still.
The ghostly feet
 Of the whispery waves
 Tiptoe beside her.
 They follow, follow
 To the rocky caves
 In the white beach hollow ...
 She hugs her hands,
 She sobs, she shrills,
 And the echoes shriek
 In the rocky hills.
 She moans: “It is lost!
 Let it be! Let it be!
 I am old. I’m too cold.
 I am frightened ... the sea
 Is too loud ... it is lost,
 It is gone...” Memory
 Wails in my far away home.
1913.

34

COUNTRYWOMEN

These be two
 Country women.
 What a size!
 Grand big arms
 And round red faces;
 Big substantial
 Sit down places;
 Great big bosoms firm as cheese
 Bursting through their country jackets;
 Wide big laps
 And sturdy knees;
 Hands outspread,
 Round and rosy,
 Hands to hold
 A country posy
 Or a baby or a lamb—
 And such eyes!
 Stupid, shifty, small and sly
 Peeping through a slit of sty,
 Squinting through their neighbours’ plackets.
1914.

35

STARS

Most merciful God
 Look kindly upon
 An impudent child
 Who wants sitting on.
 This evening late
 I went to the door
 And then to the gate
 There were more stars—more
 Than I could have expected,
 Even I!
 I was simply amazed
 Almighty, August!
 I was utterly dazed,
 Omnipotent! Just
 In a word I was floored,
 Good God of Hosts—Lord!
 That at this time of day
 They should still blaze away,
 That thou hadst not rejected
 Or at least circumspected
 Their white silver beauty—
 Was it spite ... Was it duty..?
1914.

36

DEAF HOUSE AGENT

That deaf old man
 With his hand to his ear—
 His hand to his head stood out like a shell,
 Horny and hollow. He said, “I can’t hear,”
 He muttered, “Don’t shout,
 I can hear very well!”
 He mumbled, “I can’t catch a word;
 I can’t follow.”
 Then Jack with a voice like a Protestant bell
 Roared—“Particulars! Farmhouse! At 10 quid a year!”
 “I dunno wot place you are talking about,”
 Said the deaf old man.
 Said Jack, “What the Hell!”

But the deaf old man took a pin from his desk, picked a piece of wool the size of a hen’s egg from his ear, had a good look at it, decided in its favour and replaced it in the aforementioned organ.

1914.

37

POEMS AT THE VILLA PAULINE 1916

39

VILLA PAULINE

But, ah! before he came
 You were only a name:
 Four little rooms and a cupboard
 Without a bone,
 And I was alone!
 Now with your windows wide
 Everything from outside
 Of sun and flower and loveliness
 Comes in to hide,
 To play, to laugh on the stairs,
 To catch unawares
 Our childish happiness,
 And to glide
 Through the four little rooms on tip-toe
 With lifted finger,
 Pretending we shall not know
 When the shutters are shut
 That they still linger
 Long, long after.
 Lying close in the dark
 He says to me: “Hark,
 Isn’t that laughter?”
1916.

40

CAMOMILE TEA

Outside the sky is light with stars;
 There’s a hollow roaring from the sea.
 And, alas! for the little almond flowers,
 The wind is shaking the almond tree.
How little I thought, a year ago,
 In that horrible cottage upon the Lee
 That he and I should be sitting so
 And sipping a cup of camomile tea.
Light as feathers the witches fly,
 The horn of the moon is plain to see;
 By a firefly under a jonquil flower
 A goblin toasts a bumble-bee.
We might be fifty, we might be five,
 So snug, so compact, so wise are we!
 Under the kitchen-table leg
 My knee is pressing against his knee.
Our shutters are shut, the fire is low,
 The tap is dripping peacefully;
 The saucepan shadows on the wall
 Are black and round and plain to see.
1916.

41

WAVES

42

I saw a tiny God
 Sitting
 Under a bright blue Umbrella
 That had white tassels
 And forkèd ribs of gold.
 Below him His little world
 Lay open to the sun.
 The shadow of His hat
 Lay upon a city.
 When he stretched forth His hand
 A lake became a dark tremble.
 When he kicked up His foot
 It became night in the mountain passes.
But thou art small!
 There are gods far greater than thou;
 They rise and fall,
 The tumbling gods of the sea.
 Can thy heart heave such sighs,
 Such hollow savage cries,
 Such windy breath,
 Such groaning death?
 And can thy arm enfold
 The old,
 The cold,
 The changeless dreadful places
 Where the herds
 Of horned sea-monsters
 And the screaming birds
 Gather together?
 From those silent men
 That lie in the pen
 Of our pearly prisons,
 Canst thou hunt thy prey?
 Like us canst thou stay
 Awaiting thine hour,
 And then rise like a tower
 And crash and shatter?
There are neither trees nor bushes
 In my country,
 Said the tiny God.
 But there are streams
 And waterfalls
 And mountain-peaks
 Covered with lovely weed.
 There are little shores and safe harbours,
 Caves for cool and plains for sun and wind.
 Lovely is the sound of the rivers,
 Lovely the flashing brightness
 Of the lovely peaks.
 I am content.
But Thy kingdom is small,
 Said the God of the Sea.
 Thy kingdom shall fall;
 I shall not let thee be.
 Thou art proud!
 With a loud
 Pealing of laughter,
 He rose and covered
 The tiny God’s land
 With the tip of his hand,
 With the curl of his fingers:
 And after—
The tiny God
 Began to cry.
1916.

43

THE TOWN BETWEEN THE HILLS

44

The further the little girl leaped and ran,
 The further she longed to be;
 The white, white fields of jonquil flowers
 Danced up as high as her knee
 And flashed and sparkled before her eyes
 Until she could hardly see.
 So into the wood went she.
It was quiet in the wood,
 It was solemn and grave;
 A sound like a wave
 Sighed in the tree-tops
 And then sighed no more.
 But she was brave,
 And the sky showed through
 A bird’s-egg blue,
 And she saw
 A tiny path that was running away
 Over the hills to—who can say?
 She ran, too.
 But then the path broke,
 Then the path ended
 And wouldn’t be mended.
A little old man
 Sat on the edge,
 Hugging the hedge.
 He had a fire
 And two eggs in a pan
 And a paper poke
 Of pepper and salt;
 So she came to a halt
 To watch and admire:
 Cunning and nimble was he!
 “May I help, if I can, little old man?”
 “Bravo!” he said,
 “You may dine with me.
 I’ve two old eggs
 From two white hens
 And a loaf from a kind ladie:
 Some fresh nutmegs,
 Some cutlet ends
 In pink and white paper frills:
 And—I’ve—got
 A little hot-pot
 From the town between the hills.”
He nodded his head
 And made her a sign
 To sit under the spray
 Of a trailing vine.
But when the little girl joined her hands
 And said the grace she had learned to say,
 The little old man gave two dreadful squeals
 And she just saw the flash of his smoking heels
 As he tumbled, tumbled
 With his two old eggs
 From two white hens,
 His loaf from a kind ladie,
 The fresh nutmegs,
 The cutlet-ends
 In the pink and white paper frills.
 And away rumbled
 The little hot-pot,
 So much too hot,
 From the town between the hills.
1916.

45

VOICES OF THE AIR

But then there comes that moment rare
 When, for no cause that I can find,
 The little voices of the air
 Sound above all the sea and wind.
The sea and wind do then obey
 And sighing, sighing double notes
 Of double basses, content to play
 A droning chord for the little throats—
The little throats that sing and rise
 Up into the light with lovely ease
 And a kind of magical, sweet surprise
 To hear and know themselves for these—
For these little voices: the bee, the fly,
 The leaf that taps, the pod that breaks,
 The breeze on the grass-tops bending by,
 The shrill quick sound that the insect makes.
1916.

46

SANARY

Her little hot room looked over the bay
 Through a stiff palisade of glinting palms,
 And there she would lie in the heat of the day,
 Her dark head resting upon her arms,
 So quiet, so still, she did not seem
 To think, to feel, or even to dream.
The shimmering, blinding web of sea
 Hung from the sky, and the spider sun
 With busy frightening cruelty
 Crawled over the sky and spun and spun.
 She could see it still when she shut her eyes,
 And the little boats caught in the web like flies.
Down below at this idle hour
 Nobody walked in the dusty street
 A scent of dying mimosa flower
 Lay on the air, but sweet—too sweet.
1916.

47

TO L. H. B. (1894–1915)

Last night for the first time since you were dead
 I walked with you, my brother, in a dream.
 We were at home again beside the stream
 Fringed with tall berry bushes, white and red.
 “Don’t touch them: they are poisonous,” I said.
 But your hand hovered, and I saw a beam
 Of strange, bright laughter flying round your head
 And as you stooped I saw the berries gleam.
 “Don’t you remember? We called them Dead Man’s Bread!”
 I woke and heard the wind moan and the roar
 Of the dark water tumbling on the shore.
 Where—where is the path of my dream for my eager feet?
 By the remembered stream my brother stands
 Waiting for me with berries in his hands ...
 “These are my body. Sister, take and eat.”
1916.

49

51

POEMS 1917–1919

NIGHT-SCENTED STOCK

52

White, white in the milky night
 The moon danced over a tree.
 “Wouldn’t it be lovely to swim in the lake!”
 Someone whispered to me.
“Oh, do—do—do!” cooed someone else,
 And clasped her hands to her chin.
 “I should so love to see the white bodies—
 All the white bodies jump in!”
The big dark house hid secretly
 Behind the magnolia and the spreading pear-tree,
 But there was a sound of music—music rippled and ran
 Like a lady laughing behind her fan,
 Laughing and mocking and running away ...
 “Come into the garden—it’s as light as day!”
“I can’t dance to that Hungarian stuff,
 The rhythm in it is not passionate enough,”
 Said somebody. “I absolutely refuse...”
 But he took off his socks and his shoes
 And round her spun. “It’s like Hungarian fruit dishes
 Hard and bright—a mechanical blue!”
 His white feet flicked in the grass like fishes ...
 Someone cried: “I want to dance, too!”
But one with a queer Russian ballet head
 Curled up on a blue wooden bench instead.
 And another, shadowy—shadowy and tall—
 Walked in the shadow of the dark house wall,
 Someone beside her. It shone in the gloom,
 His round grey hat, like a wet mushroom.
“Don’t you think perhaps ...” piped someone’s flute ...
 “How sweet the flowers smell!” I heard the other say—
 Somebody picked a wet, wet pink
 Smelled it and threw it away.
 “Is the moon a virgin or is she a harlot?”
 Asked somebody. Nobody would tell.
 The faces and the hands moved in a pattern
 As the music rose and fell,
 In a dancing, mysterious, moon-bright pattern
 Like flowers nodding under the sea ...
The music stopped and there was nothing left of them
 But the moon dancing over the tree.
1917.

53

NOW I AM A PLANT, A WEED ...

Now I am a plant, a weed,
 Bending and swinging
 On a rocky ledge;
 And now I am a long brown grass
 Fluttering like flame;
 I am a reed;
 An old shell singing
 For ever the same;
 A drift of sedge;
 A white, white stone;
 A bone;
 Until I pass
 Into sand again,
 And spin and blow
 To and fro, to and fro,
 On the edge of the sea
 In the fading light—
 For the light fades.
But if you were to come you would not say:
 “She is not waiting here for me;
 She has forgotten.” Have we not in play
 Disguised ourselves as weed and stones and grass
 While the strange ships did pass
 Gently, gravely, leaving a curl of foam
 That uncurled softly about our island home ...
 Bubbles of foam that glittered on the stone
 Like rainbows? Look, darling! No, they are gone.
 And the white sails have melted into the sailing sky ...
1917.

54

THERE IS A SOLEMN WIND TO-NIGHT

There is a solemn wind to-night
 That sings of solemn rain;
 The trees that have been quiet so long
 Flutter and start again.
The slender trees, the heavy trees,
 The fruit trees laden and proud,
 Lift up their branches to the wind
 That cries to them so loud.
The little bushes and the plants
 Bow to the solemn sound,
 And every tiniest blade of grass
 Shakes on the quiet ground.
1917.

55

OUT IN THE GARDEN

Out in the garden,
 Out in the windy, swinging dark,
 Under the trees and over the flower-beds,
 Over the grass and under the hedge border,
 Someone is sweeping, sweeping,
 Some old gardener.
 Out in the windy, swinging dark,
 Someone is secretly putting in order,
 Someone is creeping, creeping.
1917.

56

FAIRY TALE

Now folds the Tree of Day its perfect flowers,
 And every bloom becomes a bud again,
 Shut and sealed up against the golden showers
 Of bees that hover in the velvet hours....
 Now a strain
 Wild and mournful blown from shadow towers,
 Echoed from shadow ships upon the foam,
 Proclaims the Queen of Night.
 From their bowers
 The dark Princesses fluttering, wing their flight
 To their old Mother, in her huge old home.
1919.

57

COVERING WINGS

58

Love! Love! Your tenderness,
 Your beautiful, watchful ways
 Grasp me, fold me, cover me;
 I lie in a kind of daze,
 Neither asleep nor yet awake,
 Neither a bud nor flower.
 Brings to-morrow
 Joy or sorrow,
 The black or the golden hour?
Love! Love! You pity me so!
 Chide me, scold me—cry,
 “Submit—submit! You must not fight!”
 What may I do, then? Die?
 But, oh, my horror of quiet beds!
 How can I longer stay!
 “One to be ready,
 Two to be steady,
 Three to be off and away!”
Darling heart—your gravity!
 Your sorrowful, mournful gaze—
 “Two bleached roads lie under the moon,
 At the parting of the ways.”
 But the tiny, tree-thatched, narrow lane,
 Isn’t it yours and mine?
 The blue-bells ring
 Hey, ding-a-ding, ding!
 And buds are thick on the vine.
Love! Love! grief of my heart!
 As a tree droops over a stream
 You hush me, lull me, darken me,
 The shadow hiding the gleam.
 Your drooping and tragical boughs of grace
 Are heavy as though with rain.
 Run! Run!
 Into the sun!
 Let us be children again.
1919.

59

FIRELIGHT

Playing in the fire and twilight together,
 My little son and I,
 Suddenly—woefully—I stoop to catch him.
 “Try, mother, try!”
Old Nurse Silence lifts a silent finger:
 “Hush! cease your play!”
 What happened? What in that tiny moment
 Flew away?
1919.

60

SORROWING LOVE

And again the flowers are come
 And the light shakes,
 And no tiny voice is dumb,
 And a bud breaks
 On the humble bush and the proud restless tree.
 Come with me!
Look, this little flower is pink,
 And this one white.
 Here’s a pearl cup for your drink,
 Here’s for your delight
 A yellow one, sweet with honey,
 Here’s fairy money
 Silver bright
 Scattered over the grass
 As we pass.
Here’s moss. How the smell of it lingers
 On my cold fingers!
 You shall have no moss. Here’s a frail
 Hyacinth, deathly pale.
 Not for you, not for you!
 And the place where they grew
 You must promise me not to discover,
 My sorrowful lover!
 Shall we never be happy again?
 Never again play?
 In vain—in vain!
 Come away!
1919.

61

A LITTLE GIRL’S PRAYER

Grant me the moment, the lovely moment
 That I may lean forth to see
 The other buds, the other blooms,
 The other leaves on the tree:
That I may take into my bosom
 The breeze that is like his brother,
 But stiller, lighter, whose faint laughter
 Echoes the joy of the other.
Above on the blue and white cloud-spaces
 There are small clouds at play.
 I watch their remote, mysterious play-time
 In the other far-away.
Grant I may hear the small birds singing
 The song that the silence knows ...
 (The Light and the Shadow whisper together,
 The lovely moment grows,
Ripples into the air like water
 Away and away without sound,
 And the little girl gets up from her praying
 On the cold ground.)
1919.

62

THE WOUNDED BIRD

In the wide bed
 Under the green embroidered quilt
 With flowers and leaves always in soft motion
 She is like a wounded bird resting on a pool.
The hunter threw his dart
 And hit her breast,—
 Hit her but did not kill.
 “O my wings, lift me—lift me!
 I am not dreadfully hurt!”
 Down she dropped and was still.
Kind people come to the edge of the pool with baskets.
 “Of course what the poor bird wants is plenty of food!”
 Their bags and pockets are crammed almost to bursting
 With dinner scrapings and scraps from the servants’ lunch.
 Oh! how pleased they are to be really giving!
 “In the past, you know you know, you were always so fly-away.
 So seldom came to the window-sill, so rarely
 Shared the delicious crumbs thrown into the yard.
 Here is a delicate fragment and here a tit-bit
 As good as new. And here’s a morsel of relish
 And cake and bread and bread and bread and bread.”
At night, in the wide bed
 With the leaves and flowers
 Gently weaving in the darkness,
 She is like a wounded bird at rest on a pool.
 Timidly, timidly she lifts her head from her wing
 In the sky there are two stars
 Floating, shining ...
 O waters—do not cover me!
 I would look long and long at those beautiful stars!
 O my wings—lift me—lift me!
 I am not so dreadfully hurt ...
1919.

63

65

CHILD VERSES 1907

A FAIRY TALE

Now this is the story of Olaf
 Who ages and ages ago
 Lived right on the top of a mountain,
 A mountain all covered with snow.
And he was quite pretty and tiny
 With beautiful curling fair hair
 And small hands like delicate flowers—
 Cheeks kissed by the cold mountain air.
He lived in a hut made of pinewood
 Just one little room and a door
 A table, a chair, and a bedstead
 And animal skins on the floor.
Now Olaf was partly a fairy
 And so never wanted to eat
 He thought dewdrops and raindrops were plenty
 And snowflakes and all perfumes sweet.
In the daytime when sweeping and dusting
 And cleaning were quite at an end,
 He would sit very still on the doorstep
 And dream—Oh, that he had a friend!
Somebody to come when he called them,
 Somebody to catch by the hand,
 Somebody to sleep with at night time,
 Somebody who’d quite understand.
One night in the middle of Winter
 He lay wide awake on his bed,
 Outside there was fury of tempest
 And calling of wolves to be fed—
Thin wolves, grey and silent as shadows;
 And Olaf was frightened to death.
 He had peeped through a crack in the doorpost,
 He had seen the white smoke of their breath.

66

But suddenly over the storm wind
 He heard a small voice pleadingly
 Cry, “I am a snow fairy, Olaf,
 Unfasten the window for me.”
So he did, and there flew through the opening
 The daintiest, prettiest sprite;
 Her face and her dress and her stockings,
 Her hands and her curls were all white.
And she said, “O you poor little stranger
 Before I am melted, you know,
 I have brought you a valuable present,
 A little brown fiddle and bow.
So now you can never be lonely,
 With a fiddle, you see, for a friend,
 But all through the Summer and Winter
 Play beautiful songs without end.”
And then,—O she melted like water,
 But Olaf was happy at last;
 The fiddle he tucked in his shoulder,
 He held his small bow very fast.
So perhaps on the quietest of evenings
 If you listen, you may hear him soon,
 The child who is playing the fiddle
 Away up in the cold, lonely moon.

67

OPPOSITES

The Half-Soled-Boots-With-Toecaps-Child
 Walked out into the street
 And splashed in all the puddles till
 She had such shocking feet.
The Patent-Leather-Slipper-Child
 Stayed quietly in the house
 And sat upon the fender stool
 As still as any mouse.
The Half-Soled-Boots-With-Toecaps-Child,
 Her hands were black as ink;
 She would come running through the house
 And begging for a drink.
The Patent-Leather-Slipper-Child,
 Her hands were white as snow;
 She did not like to play around,
 She only liked to sew.
The Half-Soled-Boots-With-Toecaps-Child
 Lost hair ribbons galore;
 She dropped them on the garden walks,
 She dropped them on the floor.
The Patent-Leather-Slipper-Child,
 O thoughtful little girl!
 She liked to walk quite soberly,
 It kept her hair in curl.
The Half-Soled-Boots-With-Toecaps-Child
 When she was glad or proud
 Just flung her arms round Mother’s neck
 And kissed her very loud.
The Patent-Leather-Slipper-Child
 Was shocked at such a sight,
 She only offered you her cheek
 At morning and at night.
O Half-Soled-Boots-With-Toecaps-Child,
68 Your happy laughing face
 Does like a scented Summer rose
 Make sweet the dullest place.
O Patent-Leather-Slipper-Child,
 My dear, I’m well content,
 To have my daughter in my arms,
 And not an ornament.

69

SONG OF KAREN, THE DANCING CHILD

(O little white feet of mine)
 Out in the storm and the rain you fly;
 (Red, red shoes the colour of wine)
 Can the children hear my cry?
(O little white feet of mine)
 Never a child in the whole great town;
 (Red, red shoes the colour of wine)
 Lights out and the blinds pulled down.
(O little white feet of mine)
 Never a light on a window pane,
 (Red, red shoes the colour of wine)
 And the wild wet cry of the rain.
(O little white feet of mine)
 Shall I never again be still?
 (Red, red shoes the colour of wine)
 And away over valley and hill.
(O little white feet of mine)
 Children, children, open the door!
 (Red, red shoes the colour of wine)
 And the wind shrieks Nevermore.

70

A JOYFUL SONG OF FIVE

Come, let us all sing very high
 And all sing very loud
 And keep on singing in the street
 Until there’s quite a crowd;
And keep on singing in the house
 And up and down the stairs;
 Then underneath the furniture
 Let’s all play Polar bears;
And crawl about with doormats on,
 And growl and howl and squeak,
 Then in the garden let us fly
 And play at hide and seek;
And “Here we gather Nuts and May,”
 “I wrote a Letter” too,
 “Here we go round the Mulberry Bush,”
 “The Child who lost its shoe”;
And every game we ever played.
 And then—to stay alive—
 Let’s end with lots of Birthday Cake
 Because to-day you’re five.

71

THE CANDLE FAIRY

The candle is a fairy house
 That’s smooth and round and white,
 And Mother carries it about
 Whenever it is night.
Right at the top a fairy lives,
 A lovely yellow one,
 And if you blow a little bit
 It has all sorts of fun.
It bows and dances by itself
 In such a clever way,
 And then it stretches very tall;
 “Well, it grows fast,” you say.
The little chimney of the house
 Is black and really sweet,
 And there the candle fairy stands
 Though you can’t see its feet.
And when the dark is very big
 And you’ve been having dreams,
 Then Mother brings the candle in;
 How friendly like it seems!
It’s only just for Mothers that
 The candle Fairy comes;
 And if you play with it, it bites
 Your fingers and your thumbs.
But still you love it very much
 This candle Fairy, dear,
 Because, at night, it always means
 That Mother’s very near.

72

SONG BY THE WINDOW BEFORE BED

Little Star, little Star,
 Come down quick.
 The Moon is a bogey-man;
 He’ll eat you certain if he can.
 Little Star, little Star,
 Come down quick!
Little Star, little Star,
 Whisper “Yes.”
 The trees are just niggers all,
 They look so black, they are so tall.
 Little Star, little Star,
 Whisper “Yes.”
Little Star, little Star,
 Gone—all gone.
 The bogey-man swallowed you,
 The nigger trees are laughing too.
 Little Star, little Star,
 Gone—all gone.

73

A LITTLE BOY’S DREAM

To and fro, to and fro
 In my little boat I go
 Sailing far across the sea
 All alone, just little me.
 And the sea is big and strong
 And the journey very long.
 To and fro, to and fro
 In my little boat I go.
Sea and sky, sea and sky,
 Quietly on the deck I lie,
 Having just a little rest.
 I have really done my best
 In an awful pirate fight,
 But we captured them all right.
 Sea and sky, sea and sky,
 Quietly on the deck I lie
Far away, far away
 From my home and from my play,
 On a journey without end
 Only with the sea for friend
 And the fishes in the sea.
 But they swim away from me
 Far away, far away
 From my home and from my play.
Then he cried “O Mother dear.”
 And he woke and sat upright,
 They were in the rocking chair,
 Mother’s arms around him—tight.

74

WINTER SONG

Rain and wind, and wind and rain.
 Will the Summer come again?
 Rain on houses, on the street,
 Wetting all the people’s feet.
 Though they run with might and main.
 Rain and wind, and wind and rain.
Snow and sleet, and sleet and snow.
 Will the Winter never go?
 What do beggar children do
 With no fire to cuddle to,
 P’raps with nowhere warm to go?
 Snow and sleet, and sleet and snow.
Hail and ice, and ice and hail,
 Water frozen in the pail.
 See the robins, brown and red,
 They are waiting to be fed.
 Poor dears; battling in the gale!
 Hail and ice, and ice and hail.

75

ON A YOUNG LADY’S SIXTH ANNIVERSARY

Baby Babbles—only one,
 Now to sit up has begun.
Little Babbles quite turned two
 Walks as well as I and you.
And Miss Babbles one, two, three
 Has a teaspoon at her tea.
But her Highness at four
 Learns to open the front door.
And her Majesty—now six,
 Can her shoestring neatly fix.
Babbles, Babbles, have a care,
 You will soon put up your hair!

76

SONG OF THE LITTLE WHITE GIRL

Cabbage tree, cabbage tree, what is the matter?
 Why are you shaking so? Why do you chatter?
 Because it is just a white baby you see,
 And it’s the black ones you like, cabbage tree?
Cabbage tree, cabbage tree, you’re a strange fellow
 With your green hair and your legs browny-yellow.
 Wouldn’t you like to have curls, dear, like me?
 What! No one to make them? O poor cabbage tree!
Never mind, cabbage tree, when I am taller,
 And if you grow, please, a little bit smaller,
 I shall be able by that time, may be,
 To make you the loveliest curls, cabbage tree.

77

A FEW RULES FOR BEGINNERS

Babies must not eat the coal
 And they must not make grimaces,
 Nor in party dresses roll
 And must never black their faces.
They must learn that pointing’s rude,
 They must sit quite still at table,
 And must always eat the food
 Put before them—if they’re able.
If they fall, they must not cry,
 Though it’s known how painful this is;
 No—there’s always Mother by
 Who will comfort them with kisses.

78

A DAY IN BED

I wish I had not got a cold,
 The wind is big and wild,
 I wish that I was very old,
 Not just a little child.
Somehow the day is very long
 Just keeping here, alone;
 I do not like the big wind’s song,
 He’s growling for a bone.
He’s like an awful dog we had
 Who used to creep around
 And snatch at things—he was so bad,
 With just that horrid sound.
I’m sitting up and nurse has made
 Me wear a woolly shawl;
 I wish I was not so afraid;
 It’s horrid to be small.
It really feels quite like a day
 Since I have had my tea;
 P’raps everybody’s gone away
 And just forgotten me.
And oh! I cannot go to sleep
 Although I am in bed.
 The wind keeps going creepy-creep
 And waiting to be fed.

79

THE LONESOME CHILD

The baby in the looking-glass
 Is smiling through at me;
 She has her teaspoon in her hand,
 Her feeder on for tea.
And if I look behind her I
 Can see the table spread;
 I wonder if she has to eat
 The nasty crusts of bread.
Her doll, like mine, is sitting close
 Beside her special chair,
 She has a pussy on her lap;
 It must be my cup there.
Her picture-book is on the floor,
 The cover’s just the same;
 And tidily upon the shelf
 I see my Ninepin game.
O baby in the looking glass,
 Come through and play with me,
 And if you will, I promise, dear,
 To eat your crusts at tea.

80

A FINE DAY

After all the rain, the sun
 Shines on hill and grassy mead;
 Fly into the garden, child,
 You are very glad indeed.
For the days have been so dull,
 Oh, so special dark and drear,
 That you told me, “Mr. Sun
 Has forgotten we live here.”
Dew upon the lily lawn,
 Dew upon the garden beds;
 Daintily from all the leaves
 Pop the little primrose heads.
And the violets in the copse
 With their parasols of green
 Take a little peek at you;
 They’re the bluest you have seen.
On the lilac tree a bird
 Singing first a little note,
 Then a burst of happy song
 Bubbles in his lifted throat.
O the sun, the comfy sun!
 This the song that you must sing,
 “Thank you for the birds, the flowers,
 Thank you, sun, for everything.”

81

EVENING SONG OF THE THOUGHTFUL CHILD

Shadow children, thin and small,
 Now the day is left behind,
 You are dancing on the wall,
 On the curtains, on the blind.
On the ceiling, children, too,
 Peeping round the nursery door,
 Let me come and play with you,
 As we always played before.
Let’s pretend that we have wings
 And can really truly fly
 Over every sort of things
 Up and up into the sky,
Where the sweet star children play—
 It does seem a dreadful rule,
 They must stay inside all day.
 I suppose they go to school.
And to-night, dears, do you see,
 They are having such a race
 With their father moon—the tree
 Almost hides his funny face.
Shadow children, once at night,
 I was all tucked up in bed,
 Father moon came—such a fright—
 Through the window poked his head;
I could see his staring eyes,
 O, my dears, I was afraid,
 That was not a nice surprise,
 And the dreadful noise I made!
Let us make a fairy ring,
82 Shadow children, hand in hand,
 And our songs quite softly sing
 That we learned in fairyland.
Shadow children, thin and small,
 See, the day is far behind;
 And I kiss you—on the wall
 On the curtains—on the blind.

83

A NEW HYMN

Sing a song of men’s pyjamas,
 Half-past-six has got a pair,
 And he’s wearing them this evening,
 And he’s looking such a dear.
Sing a song of frocks with pockets
 I have got one, it is so’s
 I can use my ’nitial hankies
 Every time I blow my nose.

84

AUTUMN SONG

Now’s the time when children’s noses
 All become as red as roses
 And the colour of their faces
 Makes me think of orchard places
 Where the juicy apples grow
 And tomatoes in a row.
And to-day the hardened sinner
 Never could be late for dinner,
 But will jump up to the table
 Just as soon as he is able,
 Ask for three times hot roast mutton—
 Oh! the shocking little glutton.
Come then, find your ball and racket,
 Pop into your winter jacket,
 With the lovely bear-skin lining.
 While the sun is brightly shining,
 Let us run and play together
 And just love the autumn weather.

85

THE BLACK MONKEY

My Babbles has a nasty knack
 Of keeping monkeys on her back.
 A great big black one comes and swings
 Right on her sash or pinny strings.
 It is a horrid thing and wild
 And makes her such a naughty child.
She comes and stands beside my chair
 With almost an offended air
 And says:—“Oh, Father, why can’t I?”
 And stamps her foot and starts to cry—
 I look at Mother in dismay ...
 What little girl is this, to-day?
She throws about her nicest toys
 And makes a truly dreadful noise
 Till Mother rises from her place
 With quite a Sunday churchy face
 And Babbles silently is led
 Into the dark and her own bed.
Never a kiss or one Goodnight,
 Never a glimpse of candle light.
 Oh, how the monkey simply flies!
 Oh, how poor Babbles calls and cries,
 Runs from the room with might and main,
 “Father dear, I am good again.”
When she is sitting on my knee
 Snuggled quite close and kissing me,
 Babbles and I, we think the same—
 Why, that the monkey never came
 Only a terrible dream maybe ...
 What did she have for evening tea?

86

THE PILLAR BOX

The pillar box is fat and red,
 The pillar box is high;
 It has the flattest sort of head
 And not a nose or eye,
 But just one open nigger mouth
 That grins when I go by.
The pillar box is very round
 But hungry all the day;
 Although it doesn’t make a sound,
 Folks know it wants to say,
 “Give me some letter sandwiches
 To pass the time away.”
“A postage stamp I like to eat
 Or gummy letterette.”
 I see the people on the street,
 If it is fine or wet,
 Give something to the greedy thing;
 They never quite forget.
The pillar box is quite a friend
 When Father goes away,
 My Mother has such lots to send,
 Fat letters every day,
 And so I drop them in its mouth
 When I go out to play.

87

THE QUARREL

We stood in the vegetable garden
 As angry and cross as could be
 ’Cause you said you wouldn’t beg pardon
 For eating my radish at tea.
I said, “I shall go an’ tell Mummy.
 I hope it is makin’ you ill.
 I hope you’ve a pain in your tummy,
 And then she will give you a pill.”
But you cried out, “Good-bye then—for ever.
 Go and play with your silly old toys!
 If you think you’re so grown up and clever,
 I’ll run off and play with the Boys.”

88

GROWN-UP TALK

Half-Past-Six and I were talking
 In a very grown-up way;
 We had got so tired with running
 That we did not want to play.
“How do babies come, I wonder,”
 He said, looking at the sky,
 “Does God mix the things together
 An’ just make it—like a pie?”
I was really not quite certain,
 But it sounded very nice;
 It was all that we could think of,
 Besides a book said ‘sugar and spice.’
Half-Past-Six said—he’s so clever—
 Cleverer than me, I mean ...
 “I suppose God makes the black ones
 When the saucepan isn’t clean.”

89

THE FAMILY

Hinemoa, Tui, Maina,
 Ail of them were born together;
 They are quite an extra special
 Set of babies—wax and leather.
Every day they took an airing;
 Mummy made them each a bonnet;
 Two were cherry, one was yellow
 With a bow of ribbon on it.
Really, sometimes we would slap them,
 For if ever we were talking,
 They would giggle and be silly,
 Saying, “Mamma, take us walking.”
But we never really loved them
 Till one day we left them lying
 In the garden—through a hail-storm,
 And we heard the poor dears crying.
Half-Past-Six said—“You’re a mother!
 What if Mummy did forget you?”
 So I said, “Well, you’re their Father.
 Get them!” but I wouldn’t let you.

Transcriber’s Notes

Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling inconsistences within poems were not changed, as they may be intentional.

Simple typographical errors were corrected.

Ellipses were retained as printed in the original book, whether mid-sentence, at the end of a line, or at the end of a sentence. The ellipsis in the title of the poem on page 53 is shown here with three dots, as that matches its appearance in the Table of Contents and is consistent with other ellipses in this book.