Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, HERE IS MUSIC: SECOND-LIEUTENANT E.T.; IN MEMORRIAM, by AUSTIN PHILIPS


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

HERE IS MUSIC: SECOND-LIEUTENANT E.T.; IN MEMORRIAM, by                    
First Line: Sunlight and shimmering haze
Last Line: Whose bouquet works like wine.
Subject(s): Courage; Death; Fights; Honor; Patriotism; World War I; Valor; Bravery; Dead, The; First World War


SUNLIGHT and shimmering haze,
High over Zennor. Sea
Stretching unbrokenly
Westward. The moors ablaze
With yellow gorses, glorious to the gaze.
The lilt of larks above,
The hum of bees about,
In blest officious rout.
The squawk of gulls that rove
Inland. Wood-smoke that comes
Thin, blue, from granite homes.
Belovèd airs, which flow
From land and water, blow
Beauteous and bland, bring scent
Of purple heather, blent
With exquisite odours, offspring of the brine,
Whose bouquet works like wine.

These things—sense, sight and sound—
Wake one-time joys. Around,
A world re-peopled, throbs and goes vibrating:
Not present hours, but past,
Command my thoughts, and cast
Sweet sunshine o'er my soul, thus re-creating
Days when, in direful need,
Of friends, I found friends indeed:
Friends generous, friends kind,
Friends of the heart, brain, mind,
Friends swift to enlarge my life,
Narrowed by long, vain strife
To find my proper peers amid the cold
And foul Philistian, minor-Civil Service fold.

Thought of each homestead, hearth
Field, farm brings fair re-birth
And fresh awareness of great days of gladness,
Shine of the sun, the Sea,
Restores, renews in me
Hour after hour of mirth and happy madness:
Cream among women and men
Walk these wild cliffs again:
Ghosts, gallant, goodly, brave,
Gather in gay conclave,
Prompt with their praise, yet wise,
Just, stern to criticise:
Peerless procession, proud prerogatives
Of that Valhalla which was once St. Ives.

But less, this day, the light
Of those strong souls shines bright
Within my heart, warms memory, goes awaking
Lost splendours, comes to cast
Up flotsam from the Past,
Bids doors, these decades sealed, swing wide, be breaking:
Less—since my torn heart turns
To slenderer star, and yearns
Towards one who, impelled and urged
By inner strengths, emerged
A trivial space, thus knew
The friendship of the few,
The élite ... then found the beacon that he bore
Sudden eclipsed: foredoomed, alas! to shine no more.

Lo! from that lost, lone cot—
Hallow'd of memory, spot
Sacred to human suffering, softly hiding
'Twixt twin Tors deep in dale—
Tall, down that stone-slabbed trail
Which fronts self-chosen home of sad abiding,
Once more I see our Ernest deftly guiding
The ass which draws his creaking cart, or striding,
Honey-filled haversack
Braced on his broad, lean back,

Cross the long, one-time rough and granite road,
(Last lap which linked Land's End
With London), next ascend
The village slope, scarce conscious of his load,
Come to Miss Hoskyn's shop
Enter, give greetings, drop
His burden, talk awhile:
Ere he stride forth ... to make friends with fortunate me,
Stay on, as one who starves for sympathy,
Bid her farewell with gentle, gracious smile,
Take his small tale of silver—thankfully.

Crystal-clear comes that day.
I stood, by chance, at play
With village lads, but then let loose from schooling,
Who vainly flung their ball
At wicket, marked on wall,
While I, the batsman, flogged their tyro-bowling,
Coaching their crude incompetence, condoling,
Or flinging casual coin for their consoling.
Sudden, I made a stroke,
And leftwards glanced, to look
After the ball I guessed was soaring seaward,
Saw a tall figure stand,
With outstretched arm, clasped hand,
Knapsack on shoulder, gently smiling me-ward.
Happy to meet such match,
I stood and praised the catch,
Strode towards the stranger, talked
Cricket a space; liked him intuitively,
Came, in three minutes' slender space, to see
His rich, rare spirit: next, invited, walked
Up to that lone, lost cottage, gladly, eagerly.

There, in that Spartan cell,
Slowly, the story fell
From lips long silent, heart held-in, soul chastened
By hours of loneliness,
Long, almost measureless,
Born of brave spirit's best, offspring of straitened
Means, of high courage, fate of one who, fastened
Firm in Philistia's fold, fought free and hastened—
Bursting each bond, each band—
Forth to find Promised Land,
Brewer's brat, rising high past thought of pelf,
Flinging aside false fears,
Seeking real friends, true peers,
But seeking, most, the best things in himself. ...
Thus, hanging on each word,
Enthralled, enrapt, I heard
How, humble, manly, generous and meek,
When the fierce father cried, in cruelty,
"How much, then, does this nidering need from me?"
The answer came, "Give me a pound a week!"—
Came from the rich man's son, reared up in luxury.

You took poor pittance, wove
Fresh warp, fresh woof, then drove
Westwards, to seek in Cornwall re-creation,
Dreaming, forthwith, to find
Friendship, intend your mind,
Wholly, impassioned, towards self-education.
Instead, you found appalling isolation,
Felt each hour bring its fresh humiliation:
Since, in harsh poverty,
Prisoner you lived. Not free
To mix with men whom you had dreamed of meeting,
With aching, hungry heart,
Walking as one apart,
Depressed in health, nay, starved beyond our weeting:
Losing your youth, your looks,
Your pittance spent on books,
Your winter's firing hewn from household chair:
E'en when we beaglers roamed pursuingly
'Cross moor, cross cliff, stood baffled by the Sea,
You watched aloof, kept distant, did not dare
To join us, lest some 'Whip' extend peaked cap, ask fee.

I did my slender best,
Brother, to help, invest
Your lonely life with human understanding,
Strove to make some amends
For all you had suffered. Friends,
With fuller purses, came, at my demanding,
To show you generous sympathy, expanding
Your yet young life, beneficently banding,
Made you, henceforward, free
Of hospitality,
And, showing this, showed more than things material,
Guided your untrained mind,
Helped your sad soul to find
Fresh outlook, stable, steadfast, high, imperial:
So that, before I fled
To further pastures, sped,
Faithful to inner urge, and made more wide
My own life, lo! I saw you royally
Restored in spirit, come again to be
Uppingham athlete, take stout gates in stride,
Fight, work, create ... nay, sell your toil successfully.

Sunlight and shimmering haze,
High over Zennor. Sea,
Stretching unbrokenly
Westward. The moors ablaze
With yellow gorses, glorious to the gaze.
The lilt of larks above,
The hum of bees about,
In blest officious rout.
The squawk of gulls that rove
Inland. Wood-smoke that comes,
Thin, blue, from granite homes.
Belovèd airs, that flow
From land and water, blow
Beauteous and bland, bring scent
Of purple heather, blent
With exquisite odours, offspring of the brine,
Whose bouquet works like wine.

Then came the first World-War,
Swift to dissever, jar
The whole world's smoothness, send foul discord speeding
Through each man's works and days,
And yet, perverse, emblaze
His soul, and fan some strange, fierce force, exceeding
Man's common strength: which made him, blest by breeding,
Embrace the cause of all, and come, unheeding
Of self, to serve and stand
Amid most blessèd Band
Of Brothers, as though vowed 'neath sweet, celestial
Star. You, at once, possest
With passion, as the rest
Of British Youth, to bring to naught the bestial
Hopes of the Hun-like foe,
Hastened to fight, to throw
Aside the things you loved, the aims that held
Your inmost heart: in high fidelity,
(As to those earlier dreams when you fought free
From foul Philistia), gloriously impelled
By Youth's supreme insignia—Chivalry.

You sent me news from France,
Said that your sufferance
Throughout lone nights, dark days, though fierce, stayed slender
Besides those griefs, those woes,
Sorrows, and wild heart-throes
Your Zennor years had known to nurse, engender:
Told me how frost-filled fields saw you defender
Of danger-point on railway, talked with tender
And gentle, smiling pen,
As in those old times when
You sat and smiled and gently told that story
Which rang so just, so true,
Which we who heard it knew
Your father's shame, his son's unquestioned glory...
Such, then, those letters, filled
With essential self, which thrilled
Their reader's dolorous days, what time he stood,
Slave, at a desk in heat-baked factory,
(If not Hell's image, place of Purgatory!)
Brought him dear dreams of Cornwall, bade him brood
On hours to be, fair fruit of Britain's victory.

Then silence came. Your news
Ceased sudden. Fear arose.
Within my heart stalked cruel care and goading:
Ere long I learned the truth,
Fallen in Flower of Youth,
Your fate in Picard field fulfilled foreboding:
Grief gripped and held me. Sorrow overloading
My sense and spirit, stayed, still stays, corroding
Something of that delight
I felt, yet feel, in bright
And unforgotten hours of ancient union.
Though I love Zennor, still,
Not again Zennor will
Give me sweet, one-time sense of whole communion:
Always my innermost
Eye sees you, gallant ghost—
Even as I batted, back to church-town wall—
Tall, your quick fingers instantaneously
Closed, and within them, grasped so dexterously,
The swiftly-caught, fierce-driven, full-flogged ball...
Sees you stand smiling gently—almost tenderly.

Later, came written word,
And we, your lovers, heard
The spacious story of your life's high leaving:
How (so your Colonel wrote)
You died a death of note,
Gallant—though not beyond the glad conceiving
Of us, who long since guessed ... nay, went believing
You finest fine, in whom Pride lessens grieving.
The Hun attacked with gas,
(Which, poison'd, pungent, crass,
Blew o'er the trenches, bestial, swift and sickening),
Followed foul feat with wave
Of Infantry. Blest, brave,
You scorned the hordes on-coming, ever-thickening:
Leapt, light, on parapet
Of trench, saw machine-gun set
Full on the foemen, stood in charge of Section,
Faced sure annihilation scornfully,
Daring in deed, as daring spiritually,
Gave your men orders, shouted them direction,
Proud, in your great abiding, perished gloriously.

Such, then, your days, your death,
The way you drew last breath,
Such was the grief your lovers felt congealing
Their very heart's blood, fill
Their souls with anguish, still
All zest for living, until Time's annealing,
Helped by the common round and daily dealing,
Came, in Time's time-worn hand, to bring them healing
Such was the meed you won
From men who had striven, and done,
Themselves, some self-set task of worth and daring. ...
Did your relations learn,
At long last, to discern
The metal which rang true, their rue go wearing?
In after days they came
To Zennor. Not praise, blame
They gave you, in their haste to justify
Their deeds ... nor knew their kinsman's life and death,
Gallant and Grecian, gloriously enwreath
Him whom their father sought to crucify,
Bring them vicarious patent of nobility,
Hurl harsh detraction back in base, barbarian teeth.

Such, then, their urge to blame,
To denigrate, defame
Him whose brave life, high death, integrity
Of spirit shed strong light
On, stung and shamed the night
Of, jealous, bourgeois mediocrity,
Which, out of envy, loathes all rarity...
Yet shall some pardon come and charity,
In that this dead man's soul
Aspired to such great goal
As led to lesser men's misunderstanding,
And even faithful friends
Scarce glimpsed the God-like ends
He had in view, and, blind at times, went branding
In wrong, yet well-meant, wrath
His patient path as sloth,
Sometimes scarce sensing all his faith and force—
Misled, mayhap, by some impetuosity
Of soul, themselves but half-divined his quality,
How he had, steadfast, struck and steered a course. ...
Nor dreamed what heights, what visions held him devotee.

I—even I, no less—
Ful-filled with shame, confess
How, in your awful hours of teen and testing,
Dolt-like, I dared to doubt
At times; flashed forth some flout,
Fool in my folly, fatuously investing
With false interpretations your fair questing,
Your passionate search, un-hasting and unresting:
Sought, needlessly, to spur
You to some premature
Task, bring to birth, untimely, calm creation,
Held that perchance your kin
Had no small cause wherein
To scorn your self-determined segregation
As sheer excuse, escape
From Life, fit food for jape,
Weakness, not strength. I—even I—stood blind
At moments to your grandeur, might not see
Innate, yet nascent, rare nobility,
Nor knew such preparation held, enshrined,
Long pondered, loftiest purpose, real sublimity.

Since you were always strong,
I, oft impetuous, wrong,
A load lies on my bosom, bids me, sorrowing,
Seek your forgiveness, tell
Sad truth, in words that well,
Remorseful, from my heart which, overflowing,
Aches, and is fain for full and free avowing
Of ancient fault, which begs for the bestowing
Of present pardon, prays
Your love, as in first days
Of Friendship, thirsts for gentle, smiling word:
Yet, since your ears be deaf
For all time, such relief
Doomed down Eternity to stay unheard,
Lo! to our sacred Tor,
That vale, this lonely moor,
Whereon, wherein you suffered—where still live
Your essential soul and self—my voice goes flinging
Sorrowful syllables, athirst to shrive
The heart it speaks for ... but no answer bringing.
Echo alone replies. Her tones come ringing,
Afflicted, fierce; cry, "Brother, oh, forgive, forgive!"

Sunlight and shimmering haze,
High over Zennor. Sea,
Stretching unbrokenly
Westward. The moors ablaze
With yellow gorses, glorious to the gaze.
The lilt of larks above,
The hum of bees about,
In blest, officious rout.
The squawk of gulls that rove
Inland. Wood-smoke that comes,
Thin, blue, from granite homes.
Belovèd airs, that flow,
From land and water, blow
Beauteous and bland, bring scent
Of purple heather, blent
With exquisite odours, offspring of the brine,
Whose bouquet works like wine.





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