What the Old Church Said

I MOVED a little where the church-tower rose
Above a close-grown belt of beech and firs,
And the tall pointed windows of the tower,
With slant flat bars of wood that broke the light
Through -shining from the facing windows, looked
Like the old church's melancholy eyes.
But as I mused, with slow deep-booming tone
The clock tolled one, and the sound died away.
It seemed as though the old church gave utterance
In that slow melancholy dying toll
To some oppression smothering the soul.
I weary of the years (it seemed to say),
The long slow years ; I would that they might cease,
Or that I might withdraw me from their eyes !
Am I not wearied with so many suns
That rise to set, and with their lavish light.
Crimson and orange ; with so many moons.
Crescent and full and waning, haunting pale
My lichened mullions where the ivy stirs
And rustles in the night-breeze, and the owl
With feather}' face and large white open eyes
Sits hooting — with the clear-obscure of nights
Wherein the stars mount over me and go ?
Beautiful ! but the beauty palls upon me,
Ever the same, and I am very old :
I care not though the swallows dart and wheel
About my steeple, feeding on the wing
Their young exultant youth-wise in the air,
Which age, and fly thwart seas and rear their brood
Next summer, and forget their nurturing sires ;
I care not though the flowers about my feet,
Over my graves, bud, open unaware,
Then loosening yield their petals to the grass,
And other youngling blossoms blush and blow
In the rich mould of parent-flowers' decay
Summer on summer ; while the silent clouds
Grow in the blue, change fleetly and are gone:
I care not for their change and vanishing ;
For these, all these fulfil themselves and die :
But for the glorious human things I care.
For all the faces through the centuries
I have seen lighted with a light beyond
The light of youth and health, a spirit-light
Of aspiration for eternity !
For all such faces waning one by one ;
Many for disappointment and for doubt
Before the last, but all extinguished now,
First one and then another through the years
Darkened, befouled, effaced in damps of death ;
Of this I wear)-, and for this make moan.
For all they came as little infants here
Opening dazed eyes upon the wonder-world,
Brought of their parents to the christening font
And dedicated to the Father in Christ ;
Came as blithe children chafing at long prayers ;
Came as paired lovers, with unutterable
Love in their eyes, and vowing faithfulness
Till death before the crowd, but in their hearts
Vowing strong love for ever and for ever !
And I was glad and pealed a merry peal
Of laughter from my bells triumphantly
Up the blue sky, and the blue answered me
With sunshine and with bird-song, and young maids
Strewed flowers before the bride who wept for joy.
Some came again cold, alienated, dull.
With all the glory-flush died out of them
And a fool's jeering at their nobler selves ;
A few were faithful to their solemn vow
Before the crowd, and till death parted them
Loved on — and then they came again to me,
One carried on the shoulders of six men,
Dull, cold as clay, not to be looked upon ;
The other with despair in poor vague eyes,
Swathed in black crape, to leave her in the vault
With generations of illustrious dead,
Under my feet here. I was sorrowful
And tolled my melancholy toll for grief.
After a few sad years he swore the same
To another bride all buoyant like the first
With hope and trust and joy, until he sank,
He of the scant grey hairs and dimming eyes
And failing spirit — and she buried him.
So they lie side by side, his wives and he ;
With all the generations I have seen
Born, married, buried, over whom fair tombs
Are carven in marble down my solemn aisles.
So they lie side by side, his wives and he,
With no heart-burnings : never lip seeks lip
There in the darkness, never hand seeks hand.
There are no smiles — nor any weeping there.
Yet where, ah where, the sweet vows they have vowed ?
Unheeding in the coffin lies the corpse.
Where that ebullient love that brooked no bounds,
Mighty unconquerable like the dawn.
Chariot of fire that lifts a man to heaven !
Where is it now ? Alas ! I only hear
The ghostwind rushing moaning round my tower.
Strewing my worn stone winding-stairs with sticks
And straws from jackdaw nests high up my spire.
There the great clock, my heart, beats awfully
With throb monotonous : anon it seems
The solemn heart of Fate ; or measured tread
Of Time, the cold relentless skeleton,
Awfully blind, informed with ne'er a soul,
Nay, with no dawning hope of any soul ;
Soul that, how stony pitiless soe'er.
Knowing the deeds would falter and repent,
Nor might endure for ever to behold
Unmoved his own monotonous dull stamp
Moment by moment crushing out some bloom
Of life fresh wistful nestling to his feet ! . . .

I only know the solemn chaunted prayer,
.A.nd psalm of praise men come to sing below,
Wanders in snatches faintly up my tower,
There to be pounced upon of maniac winds.
Caught and devoured, and scattered all abroad !
Unheeding in the coffin lies the corpse.
'Tis all I know ; and yet the children play.
The merry human children o'er the graves,
About their parents' headstones mouldering,
Like fairy boats upon green-mounded waves :
I hear their laughter on the sunny air.
For they know not, and woe is me, I know !
And so I weary of the slow sad years —
Would they might cease, or I withdraw from them.
Sink to a ruinous heap and be no more !