English

I. Speak N OW FOR P EACE

Lady of Light, and our best woman, and queen,
Stand now for peace (though anger breaks your heart),
Though naught but smoke and flame and drowning is seen.
Lady of Light, speak, though you speak alone,
Though your voice may seem as a dove's in this howling flood,
It is heard tonight by every senate and throne.

Though the widening battle of millions and millions of men
Threatens tonight to sweep the whole of the earth,
Back of the smoke is the promise of kindness again.

II. Written IN A Y EAR W HEN M ANY OF M Y P EOPLE D IED

I have begun to count my dead.
They wave green branches
Around my head,
Put their hands upon my shoulders,
Stand behind me,
Fly above me —
Presences that love me.
They watch me daily,
Murmuring, gravely, gaily,
Praising, reproving, readily.
And every year that company
Grows the greater steadily.
And every day I count my dead
In robes of sunrise, blue and red.

II. The R HYMER'S R EPLY : I NCENSE AND S PLENDOR

Incense and Splendor haunt me as I go.
Though my good works have been, alas, too few,
Though I do naught, High Heaven comes down to me,
And future ages pass in tall review.
I see the years to come as armies vast,
Stalking tremendous through the fields of time.
M AN is unborn. Tomorrow he is born,
Flame-like to hover o'er the moil and grime,
Striving, aspiring till the shame is gone,
Sowing a million flowers where now we mourn —

I. The V OICE OF THE M AN I MPATIENT WITH V ISIONS AND U TOPIAS

We find your soft Utopias as white
As new-cut bread, and dull as life in cells,
O scribes who dare forget how wild we are,
How human breasts adore alarum bells.
You house us in a hive of prigs and saints
Communal, frugal, clean and chaste by law.
I'd rather brood in bloody Elsinore
Or be Lear's fool, straw-crowned amid the straw.
Promise us all our share in Agincourt
Say that our clerks shall venture scorns and death,

III. T O B UDDHA

Awake again in Asia, Lord of Peace,
Awake and preach, for her far swordsmen rise.
And would they sheathe the sword before you, friend,
Or scorn your way, while looking in your eyes?

Good comrade and philosopher and prince,
Thoughtful and thoroughbred and strong and kind,
Dare they to move against your pride benign,
Lord of the Law, high chieftain of the mind?

*****

But what can Europe say, when in your name

II. The F IREMEN'S B ALL

Section One

" Give the engines room,
Give the engines room. "
Louder, faster
The little band-master
Whips up the fluting,
Hurries up the tooting.
He thinks thaThe stands,
The reins in his hands,
In the fire-chief's place
In the night alarm chase.
The cymbals whang,
The kettledrums bang: —
" Clear the street,
Clear the street,
Clear the street — Boom, boom.
In the evening gloom,
In the evening gloom,

I. With A B OUQUET OF T WELVE R OSES

I saw Lord Buddha towering by my gate
Saying: " Once more, good youth, I stand and wait. "
Saying: " I bring you my fair Law of Peace
And from your withering passion full release;
Release from that white hand that stabbed you so.
The road is calling. With the wind you go,
Forgetting her imperious disdain —
Quenching all memory in the sun and rain. "

" Excellent Lord, I come. But first, " I said,
" Grant that I bring her these twelve roses red.

But what is the earthquake's cry at last
Making St. Francis yet aghast: —

" Oh the flashing cornucopia of haughty California
Is gold, gold, gold .
Their brittle speech and their clutching reach
Is gold, gold, gold .
What is the fire-engine's ding dong bell?
The burden of the burble of the bullfrog in the well?
Gold, gold, gold.
What is the color of the cup and plate
And knife and fork of the chief of state?
Gold, gold, gold.
What is the flavor of the Bartlett pear?
What is the savor of the salt sea air?

III. S T. F RANCIS OF San F RANCISCO

But the surf is white, down the long strange coast
With breasts that shake with sighs,
And the ocean of all oceans
Holds salt from weary eyes.

St. Francis comes to his city at night
And stands in the brilliant electric light
And his swans that prophesy night and day
Would soothe his heart that wastes away:
The giant swans of California
That nest on the Golden Gate
And beat through the clouds serenely
And on St. Francis wait.

II. The C HANTING OF THE W HALES

North to the Pole, south to the Pole
The whales of California wallow and roll.
They dive and breed and snort and play
And the sun-struck feed them every day
Boatloads of citrons, quinces, cherries,
Of bloody strawberries, plums and beets,
Hogsheads of pomegranates, vats of sweets,
And the he-whales' chant like a cyclone blares,
Proclaiming the California noons
So gloriously hot some days
The snake is fried in the desert
And the flea no longer plays.