Paul Bewsher

When Death has crossed my name from out the roll
Of dreaming children serving in this War;
And with these earthly eyes I gaze no more
Upon sweet England's grace - perhaps my soul
Will visit streets down which I used to stroll
At sunset-charmèd dusks, when London's roar
Like ebbing surf on some Atlantic shore
Would trance the ear. Then may I hear no toll

Of heavy bells to burden all the air
With tuneless grief: for happy will I be! -
What place on earth could ever be more fair
Than God's own presence? - Mourn not then for me,
Nor write, I pray, "He gave" - upon my clod -
"His life to England," but "his soul to God."

Isle of Sheppey, 1917.

That I were Keats! And with a golden pen
Could for all time preserve these golden days
In rich and glowing verse, for poorer men,
Who felt their wonder, but could only gaze
With silent joy upon sweet Autumn's face,
And not record in any wise its grace!
Alas! But I am even dumb as they -
I cannot bid the fleeting hours stay,
Nor chain one moment on a page's space.

That I were Grieg! Then, with a haunting air
Of murmurs soft, and swelling, grand refrains
Would I express my love of Autumn fair
With all its wealth of harvest, and warm rains:
And with fantastic melodies inspire
A memory of each mad sunset's fire
In which the day goes slowly to its death
As through the fragrant woods dim Evening's breath
Doth soothe to sleep the drowsy songbirds' choir.

How many of those youths who consecrate
Their lives to art, and worship at her shrine,
And sacrifice their early hours and late
In serving her exacting whims divine
Have gathered in old Chelsea's shaded peace,
Whose faint, elusive charm, and gentle airs,
Bring inspiration fresh, and sweet release
From Trouble's haunting shapes and goblin cares?

O! tree-embowered hamlet, whose demesne
Sleeps in the arms of London quietly,
Whose sparrow-haunted roads, and squares serene,
From all the stress of life seem ever free -
O! are you more than just a passing dream
Beside the city's slim and lovely stream?

Luxeuil-les-Bains, 1917.

'Tis strange to leave this world of woods and hills,
This world of little farms, and shady mills, -
Of fields, and water-meadows fair,
Upon some sad and shadowy day
When all the skies are overcast and grey,
And climb up through the gloomy air,
And ever hurry higher still, and higher,
Till underneath you lies a far-flung shire
All sober-hued beneath the ceiling pale
Of crawling clouds, whose barrier soon you reach,
And through their clammy vapours swiftly sail,
Their chill defences hoping soon to breach -
To see no skies above, no ground below,
And in that nothingness toss to and fro
Is no sweet moment - will it never cease? -
Climbing and diving, thrown from side to side, -
All suddenly there comes a sense of peace
And o'er a wondrous scenery we glide.

Above the clouds I sail, above the clouds,
    And wish my mind
Above its clouds could climb as well,
    And leave behind
The world and all its crowds,
    And ever dwell
In such a calm and limpid solitude
With ne'er a breath unkind or harsh or rude
    To break the spell -
With ne'er a thought to drive away
The golden splendour of the day.
Alone and lost beneath the tranquil blue,
    My God! With you!

Written in an Aeroplane.

How bright is Earth's rich gown
None but an Airman knows
Yellow, and green, and brown -
How bright is Earth's rich gown!
I see, as I gaze down,
Its purple, cream, and rose.
How bright is Earth's rich gown
None but an Airman knows!

The long and tedious months move slowly by
And February's chill has fled away
Before the gales of March, and now e'en they
Have died upon the peaceful April sky:
And still I sadly wander, still I sigh,
And all the splendour of each Springtime day
Is dyed, for me, one melancholy grey,
And all its beauty can but make me cry.

For thou art silent, Oh! far distant friend,
And not one word has come to cheer my heart
Through these sad months, which seem to have no end,
So distant seems the day which bade us part!
Oh speak! dear fair-haired angel! Spring has smiled,
And I despair - a broken-hearted child.

FRANCE, 1917.

You mortals see the sky -
I only see the ground,
As through the air I fly.
You mortals see the sky,
And yet with envy sigh
Because to earth you're bound!
You mortals see the sky -
I only see the ground!

When through the heat of some long afternoon
In blazing August, on the grass I lie,
And watch the white clouds move across the sky,
On whose azure is faintly etched the moon,
That, when the evening deepens, will be soon
The brightest figure of those hosts on high,
My heart is discontented, and I sigh,
For Autumn and its vapours; till I swoon

Upon the vision of October days
In dreaming London, when each mighty tree
Sheds daily more brown showers through the haze,
Which lends each street Romance and Mystery -
When pallid silver Sunshine only gleams
On that grey Lovers' City of Sweet Dreams.

Isle of Grain, 1916.

Here slow decay with creeping finger peels
The yellow plaster from the grimy walls,
Like leprous lichen, day by day which falls,
And, day by day, more rotting stone reveals!
Here are old mournful squares through which there steals
No cheerful music, or the heedless calls
Of laughing children; and the smoke, which crawls
Across the sky, the heavy silence seals!

Lean, blackened trees stretch up their withered boughs
Behind the rusty railings, prison-bound,
In vain they seek the summer sunlight's gold
In which their long-dead fathers used to drowse:
For pallid terraces lie far around,
In gloomy sadness ever growing old.

Ochey-les-Bains, 1917.

DIED OF WOUNDS RECEIVED AT THE DARDANELLES.


Where stern grey busts of gods and heroes old
Frown down upon the corridors' chill stone,
On which the sunbeam's amber pale is thrown
From leaf-fringed windows, one of quiet mould
Gazed long at those white chronicles which told
Of honours that the stately School had known.
He read the names: and wondered if his own
Would ever grace the walls in letters bold.

He knew not that he for the School would gain
A greater honour with a greater price -
That, no long years of work, but bitter pain
And his rich life, he was to sacrifice -
Not in a University's grey peace,
But on the hilly sun-baked Chersonese.

H.M.S. "Manica,"
    Dardanelles, 1915.

Two long, full years have passed since I have smelt
Sweet London in this happy month of May!
Last year relentless War bore me away
To Imbros Isle, where six sad months I dwelt
Beneath a burning sun - nor ever felt
One breath of gentle Spring blow o'er the bay
Between whose sun-dried hills so long I lay
A restless captive. Now has Fortune dealt

More kindly with me: once again I know
The drowsy languor of the afternoons:
The soft white clouds: the may-tree's whiter snow:
The star-bound evenings, and the ivory moons.
My heart, dear God! leaps up till it is pain
With thanks to Thee that I am here again.

London.

I love the little daisies on the lawn
Which contemplate with wide and placid eyes
The blue and white enamel of the skies -
The larks which sing their mattin-song at dawn,
High o'er the earth, and see the new Day born,
All stained with amethyst and amber dyes.
I love the shadowy woodland's hidden prize
Of fragrant violets, which the dewy morn

Doth open gently underneath the trees
To cast elusive perfume on each hour -
The waving clover, full of drowsy bees,
That take their murmurous way from flower to flower.
Who could but think - deep in some sun-flecked glade -
How God must love these things that He has made?

Eastchurch, 1916.

    The rich, red blood
Doth stain the fair, green grass, and daisies white
    In generous flood ...
This sun-drowsed day for me is darkest night.
O! wreck of splintered wood and twisted wire,
What blind, unmeasured hatred you inspire
Because yours was the power that life to end ...
    Of him, who was my friend!

This morn we lay upon the grass,
And watched the languid hours pass;
A lark, deep in the sky's blue sea,
Sang ecstasies to him and me.

And with the daisies did he play,
As on the waving grass we lay,
And made a little daisy chain
To bring his childhood back again.

And while he watched the clouds above
He drifted into thoughts of love.
He said, "I know why skylarks sing -
Because they love, and it is Spring.

Sometimes I fly at dawn above the sea,
Where, underneath, the restless waters flow -
Silver, and cold, and slow.
Dim in the East there burns a new-born sun,
Whose rosy gleams along the ripples run,
Save where the mist droops low,
Hiding the level loneliness from me.

And now appears beneath the milk-white haze
A little fleet of anchored ships, which lie
In clustered company,
And seem as they are yet fast bound by sleep,
Although the day has long begun to peep,
With red-inflamèd eye,
Along the still, deserted ocean ways.

The fresh, cold wind of dawn blows on my face
As in the sun's raw heart I swiftly fly,
And watch the seas glide by.
Scarce human seem I, moving through the skies,
And far removed from warlike enterprise -
Like some gre...

Now have I left the world and all its tears,
And high above the sunny cloud-banks fly,
Alone in all this vast and lonely sky -
This limpid space in which the myriad spheres
Go thundering on, whose song God only hears
High in his heavens. Ah! how small seem I,
And yet I know he hears my little cry
Down there among Mankind's cruel jest and sneers.

And I forget the grief which I have known,
And I forgive the mockers and their jest,
And in this mightly solitude alone,
I taste the joys of everlasting rest,
Which I shall know when I have passed away
To live in Heaven's never-fading day.

Written in the Air.

The day is cold; the wind is strong;
And through the sky great cloud-banks throng,
While swathes of snow lie on the ground
O'er which I walk without a sound,
But I have vowed to fly to-day
Though winds are fierce, and clouds are grey.
My aeroplane is on the field;
So I must fly - my fate is sealed,
And no excuses can I make;
Within its back my place I take.
I strap myself inside the seat
And press the rudder with my feet,
And hold the wheel with nervous grip
And gaze around my little ship -
For on its wire-rigging taut
Depends my life - which will be short
If it should fail me in the air;
Swift then my fall, and short my prayer,
And these my wings would be my pyre -
So well I scrutinise each wire!
Then out across the field I go
In shak...

When heavy on my tired mind
The world, and worldly things, do weigh,
And some sweet solace I would find,
Into the sky I love to stray,
And, all alone, to wander round
In lone seclusion from the ground.

Ah! Then what solitude is mine -
From grovelling mankind aloof!
Their road is but a thin-drawn line:
Their busy house a scarce-seen roof.
That little stain of red and brown
They boast about! - It is their town!

How small their petty quarrels seem!
Poor, crawling multitudes below;
Which, like the ants, in feverish stream
From place to place move to and fro!
Like ants they work: like ants they fight,
Assuming blindly they are right.

Soon their existence I forget,
In joy that on these flashing wings
I cleave the skies - O! let ...