In Error

Friend, thou beholdest the lightning? Who has the charge of it,
To decree which rock-ridge shall receive, shall be chosen for targe of it?
Which crown among palms shall go down, by the thunderbolt broken;
While the floods drown the sere wadis where no bud is token?

First for my eyes, above all, he made show of his treasure.
First in his ear, before all, I made sure of my measure.
If it were good, what acclaim! None other so moved me.
If it were faulty, what shame? While he mocked me he loved me.

Friend, thou hast seen in Rida’ar, the low moon descending,
One silent, swart, swift-striding camel, oceanward wending?
Browbound and jawbound the rider, his shadow in front of him,
Ceaselessly eating the distances? That was the wont of him.

Whether the cliff-walled defi...

There was a strife ’twixt man and maid
Oh that was at the birth of time!
But what befall ’twixt man and maid,,
Oh that’s beyond the grip of rhyme.
’Twas, “Sweet, I must not bide with you,”
And “Love, I cannot bide alone”;
For both were young and both were true,
And both were hard as the nether stone.



Beware the man who’s crossed in love;
For pent-up steam must find its vent.
Stand back when he is on the move,
And lend him all the Continent.



Your patience, Sirs. The Devil took me up
To the burned mountain over Sicily
(Fit place for me) and thence I saw my Earth,
(Not all Earth’s splendour, ’twas beyond my need, )
And that one spot I love, all Earth to me,
And her I love, my Heaven. What said I?
My love was safe from...

There was a strife 'twixt man and maid,
Oh, that was at the birth of time!
But what befell 'twixt man and maid,
Oh, that's beyond the grip of rhyme.
'Twas "Sweet, I must not bide with you,"
And, "Love, I cannot bide alone";
For both were young and both were true.
And both were hard as the nether stone.

Beware the man who's crossed in love;
For pent-up steam must find its vent.
Stand back when he is on the move,
And lend him all the Continent.

Your patience, Sirs. The Devil took me up
To the burned mountain over Sicily
(Fit place for me) and thence I saw my Earth,
(Not all Earth's splendour, 'twas beyond my need,)
And that one spot I love, all Earth to me,
And her I love, my Heaven. What said I?
My love was safe from all the powers of Hell...

I was the staunchest of our fleet
Till the sea rose beneath my feet
Unheralded, in hatred past all measure.
Into his pits he stamped my crew,
Buffeted, blinded, bound and threw,
Bidding me eyeless wait upon his pleasure.

Man made me, and my will
Is to my maker still,
Whom now the currents con, the rollers steer,
Lifting forlorn to spy
Trailed smoke along the sky,
Falling afraid lest any keel come near!

Wrenched as the lips of thirst,
Wried, dried, and split and burst,
Bone-bleached my decks, wind-scoured to the graining;
And, jarred at every roll
The gear that was my soul
Answers the anguish of my beams' complaining.

For life that crammed me full,
Gangs of the prying gull
That shriek and scrabble on the riven hatches.

I sent a message to my dear,
A thousand leagues and more to Her,
The dumb sea-levels thrilled to hear,
And Lost Atlantis bore to Her.

Behind my message hard I came,
And nigh had found a grave for me;
But that I launched of steel and flame
Did war against the wave for me.

Uprose the deep, by gale on gale,
To bid me change my mind again,
He broke his teeth along my rail,
And, roaring, swung behind again.

I stayed the sun at noon to tell
My way across the waste of it;
I read the storm before it fell
And made the better haste of it.

Afar, I hailed the land at night,
The towers I built had heard of me,
And, ere my rocket reached its height,
Had flashed my Love the word of me.

Earth sold her chosen men of strength

So we settled it all when the storm was done
As comfy as comfy could be;
And I was to wait in the barn, my dears,
Because I was only three;
And Teddy would run to the rainbow’s foot
Because he was five and a man;
And that’s how it all began, my dears,
And that’s how it all began!



Then we brought the lances down, then the trumpets blew
When we went to Kandahar, ridin’ two an’ two.
Ridin’, ridin’, ridin’, two an’ two!
Ta-ra-ra-ra-ra-ra-a!
All the way to Kandahar,
Ridin’ two an’ two.



The, wolf-cub at even lay hid in the corn,
When the smoke of the cooking hung grey.
He knew where the doe made a couch for her fawn,
And he looked to his strength for his prey.
But the moon swept the smoke-wreaths away,
And he turned...