No More Learning

Dwellers above, beneath the ground,
Shall live contented in that time;
No subtle growths shall e'er confound
Their natural joy and instinct prime.

Not such as those who planned to nought
And groped (wise fools! ) beyond their ken
Scarce knowing what they loved or sought--
Those subtle growths, those weary men--
Shall dwell earth's inexperienced brood
In natural joy and instinct prime;
But without evil, without good,
Be each new moment, not all time.

Jungles shall grow where cities stood,
The mighty rivers roar unbridged
The hungry tiger seek his food,
Save for thy bidding, privileged,
Where (weary subtle growths) we bore
Our burden of humanity;
For conscious mind shall work no more
And man himself have ceased to be.




SONGS.




The Palmer's Song.


I will fling ambition away
Like a vain and glittering toy;
With tristful weeping will I pray
And wash my sin's alloy.
I will wear the palmer's weed
And walk in the sandal shoon.
I will walk in the sun by day
And sleep beneath the moon.
I will set forth as the bells toll
And travel to the East,
Because of a sin upon my soul
And the chiding of a priest.




The Song of the Old Men.


We are the old, old men,
Once fierce and high-hearted in frolics,
But now we are three score and ten
Or upwards--mere relics
Of the fine strong pageant of youth,
Which time in his spite and unruth
Has taken.
We are dim and palsied and shaken,
Ah! me--forsaken.

Where are the fair white maids
With flower faces and carriage
Straight as new-smithied blades,
Ripe, ready for marriage?
Now all are withered and grey,
Their beauty has passed away,
Ah! madness--
They are bent like hoops with sadness
And the world's badness.

Our voices are hoarse and drear,
As we sit and mumble together,
We have no good tidings to hear
We had sooner have never
(So we grumble together) been born,
That are so sick and forlorn;
Just shadows--
But once bright fishers of shallows,
Swift hunters of meadows.

We are the old, old men,
We have seen and endured much trouble;
It has turned us children again,
And bent us double.
Now we sit like a circle of stones,
And hear in each others' moans
Ill token.
For our sweetest thoughts were broken
Or else unspoken.




The Song of Snorro.


"Oh! who can drink at the world's brink,
Or reach the twilight star?
It's a long sail where the winds wail,
And the great waters are.

"Or who can say at the parting day
That he will see once more
His children's faces in happy places,
His true wife at the door? "

Snorro the Viking, his thigh striking,
Laughed in his big red beard.
"Some are bound by sight and sound.
While some have wished and feared.

"Their days dream as a droning stream
Or moonlight in a wood.
Now who can sate his love or hate,
And the tumult of his blood?