Poems of the Past and the Present

MISCELLANEOUS POEMS

THE MOTHER MOURNS

When mid-autumn’s moan shook the night-time,   And sedges were horny,And summer’s green wonderwork faltered   On leaze and in lane,I fared Yell’ham-Firs way, where dimly   Came wheeling around meThose phantoms obscure and insistent   That shadows unchain.Till airs from the needle-thicks brought me   A low lamentation,As ’twere of a tree-god disheartened,   Perplexed, or in pain.And, heeding, it awed me to gather   That Nature herself thereWas breathing in aërie accents,   With dirgeful refrain,Weary plaint that Mankind, in these late days,   Had grieved her by holdingHer ancient high fame of perfection   In doubt and disdain.– “I had not proposed me a Creature   (She soughed) so excellingAll else of my kingdom in compass   And brightness of brain“As to read my defects with a god-glance,   Uncover each vestigeOf old inadvertence, annunciate   Each flaw and each stain!“My purpose went not to develop   Such insight in Earthland;Such potent appraisements affront me,   And sadden my reign!“Why loosened I olden control here   To mechanize skywards,Undeeming great scope could outshape in   A globe of such grain?

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1

The “Race” is the turbulent sea-area off the Bill of Portland, where contrary tides meet.

2

Pronounce “Loddy.”