Walter De La Mare

He squats by the fire
    On his three-legged stool,
When all in the house
    With slumber are full.

And he warms his great hands,
    Hanging loose from each knee.
And he whistles as soft
    As the night wind at sea.

For his work now is done;
    All the water is sweet;
He has turned each brown loaf,
    And breathed magic on it.

The milk in the pan,
    And the bacon on beam
He has "spelled" with his thumb,
    And bewitched has the dream.

Not a mouse, not a moth,
    Not a spider but sat,
And quaked as it wondered
    What next he'd be at.

But his heart, O, his heart -
    It belies his great nose;
And at gleam of his eye
    Not a soul would suppose

He had stooped with great thum...

Longlegs - he yelled 'Coo-ee!'
    And all across the combe
Shrill and shrill it rang - rang through
    The clear green gloom.
Fairies there were a-spinning,
    And a white tree-maid
Lifted her eyes, and listened
    In her rain-sweet glade.
Bunnie to bunnie stamped; old Wat
    Chin-deep in bracken sate;
A throstle piped, 'I'm by, I'm by!'
    Clear to his timid mate.
And there was Longlegs, straddling,
    And hearkening was he,
To distant Echo thrilling back
    A thin 'Coo-ee!'

Longlegs - he yelled "Coo-ee!"
    And all across the combe
Shrill and shrill it rang - rang through
    The clear green gloom.
Fairies there were a-spinning,
    And a white tree-maid
Lifted her eyes, and listened
    In her rain-sweet glade.
Bunnie to bunnie stamped; old Wat
    Chin-deep in bracken sate;
A throstle piped, "I'm by, I'm by!"
    Clear to his timid mate.
And there was Longlegs straddling,
    And hearkening was he,
To distant Echo thrilling back
    A thin "Coo-ee!"

I watched the Lady Caroline
Bind up her dark and beauteous hair;
Her face was rosy in the glass,
And 'twixt the coils her hands would pass,
    White in the candleshine.

Her bottles on the table lay,
Stoppered yet sweet of violet;
Her image in the mirror stooped
To view those locks as lightly looped
    As cherry-boughs in May.

The snowy night lay dim without,
I heard the Waits their sweet song sing;
The window smouldered keen with frost;
Yet still she twisted, sleeked and tossed
    Her beauteous hair about.

Sleep, sleep, lovely white soul!
The singing mouse sings plaintively,
The sweet night-bird in the chesnut-tree -
They sing together, bird and mouse,
In starlight, in darkness, lonely, sweet,
The wild notes and the faint notes meet -
    Sleep, sleep, lovely white soul!

Sleep, sleep, lovely white soul!
Amid the lilies floats the moth,
The mole along his galleries goeth
In the dark earth; the summer moon
Looks like a shepherd through the pane
Seeking his feeble lamb again -
    Sleep, sleep, lovely white soul!

Sleep, sleep, lovely white soul!
Time comes to keep night-watch with thee
Nodding with roses; and the sea
Saith 'Peace! Peace!' amid his foam
White as thy night-clothes; 'O be still!'
The wind cries up the whisp'ring hill -
...

Rose, like dim battlements, the hills and reared
Steep crags into the fading primrose sky;
But in the desolate valleys fell small rain,
Mingled with drifting cloud. I saw one come,
Like the fierce passion of that vacant place,
His face turned glittering to the evening sky;
His eyes, like grey despair, fixed satelessly
On the still, rainy turrets of the storm;
And all his armour in a haze of blue.
He held no sword, bare was his hand and clenched,
As if to hide the inextinguishable blood
Murder had painted there. And his wild mouth
Seemed spouting echoes of deluded thoughts.
Around his head, like vipers all distort,
His locks shook, heavy-laden, at each stride.
If fire may burn invisible to the eye;
O, if despair strive everlastingly;
Then haunted here the ...

A little sound - -
Only a little, a little - -
The breath in a reed,
A trembling fiddle;
A trumpet's ring,
The shuddering drum;
So all the glory, bravery, hush
Of music come.

A little sound - -
Only a stir and a sigh
Of each green leaf
Its fluttering neighbor by;
Oak on to oak,
The wide dark forest through - -
So o'er the watery wheeling world
The night winds go.

A little sound,
Only a little, a little - -
The thin high drone
Of the simmering kettle,
The gathering frost,
The click of needle and thread;
Mother, the fading wall, the dream,
The drowsy bed.

'Once ... once upon a time ...'
Over and over again,
Martha would tell us her stories,
In the hazel glen.

Hers were those clear grey eyes
You watch, and the story seems
Told by their beautifulness
Tranquil as dreams.

She'd sit with her two slim hands
Clasped round her bended knees;
While we on our elbows lolled,
And stared at ease.

Her voice and her narrow chin,
Her grave small lovely head,
Seemed half the meaning
Of the words she said.

'Once ... once upon a time ...'
Like a dream you dream in the night,
Fairies and gnomes stole out
In the leaf-green light.

And her beauty far away
Would fade, as her voice ran on,
Till hazel and summer sun
And all were gone: -

All fordone and forgot;

Three and thirty birds there stood
In an elder in a wood;
Called Melmillo - flew off three,
Leaving thirty in a tree;
Called Melmillo - nine now gone,
And the boughs held twenty-one;
Called Melmillo - eighteen
Left but three to nod and preen;
Called Melmillo - three - two - one -
Now of birds were feathers none.

Then stole slim Melmillo in
To that wood all dusk and green,
And with lean long palms outspread
Softly a strange dance did tread;
Not a note of music she
Had for echoing company;
All the birds were flown to rest
In the hollow of her breast;
In the wood thorn, elder, willow -
Danced alone - lone danced Melmillo.

Along an avenue of almond-trees
Came three girls chattering of their sweethearts three.
And lo! Mercutio, with Byronic ease,
Out of his philosophic eye cast all
A mere flowered twig of thought, whereat -
Three hearts fell still as when an air dies out
And Venus falters lonely o'er the sea.
But when within the further mist of bloom
His step and form were hid, the smooth child Ann
Said, "La, and what eyes he had!" and Lucy said,
"How sad a gentleman!" and Katherine,
"I wonder, now, what mischief he was at."
And these three also April hid away,
Leaving the Spring faint with Mercutio.

Jemima is my name,
    But oh, I have another;
My father always calls me Meg,
    And so do Bob and mother;
Only my sister, jealous of
    The strands of my bright hair,
'Jemima - Mima - Mima!'
    Calls, mocking, up the stair.

When thin-strewn memory I look through,
I see most clearly poor Miss Loo,
Her tabby cat, her cage of birds,
Her nose, her hair - her muffled words,
And how she'd open her green eyes,
As if in some immense surprise,
Whenever as we sat at tea
She made some small remark to me.

It's always drowsy summer when
From out the past she comes again;
The westering sunshine in a pool
Floats in her parlour still and cool;
While the slim bird its lean wires shakes,
As into piercing song it breaks;
Till Peter's pale-green eyes ajar
Dream, wake; wake, dream, in one brief bar.

And I am sitting, dull and shy,
And she with gaze of vacancy,
And large hands folded on the tray,
Musing the afternoon away;
Her satin bosom heaving slow
With sighs th...

It's a very odd thing - - -
    As odd as can be - -
That whatever Miss T. eats
    Turns into Miss T.;
Porridge and apples,
    Mince, muffins and mutton,
Jam, junket, jumbles - -
    Not a rap, not a button
It matters; the moment
    They're out of her plate,
Though shared by Miss Butcher
    And sour Mr. Bate;
Tiny and cheerful,
    And neat as can be,
Whatever Miss T. eats
    Turns into Miss T.

Sitting under the mistletoe
(Pale-green, fairy mistletoe),
One last candle burning low,
All the sleepy dancers gone,
Just one candle burning on,
Shadows lurking everywhere:
Some one came, and kissed me there.

Tired I was; my head would go
Nodding under the mistletoe
(Pale-green, fairy mistletoe),
No footsteps came, no voice, but only,
Just as I sat there, sleepy, lonely,
Stooped in the still and shadowy air
Lips unseen - and kissed me there.

Sitting under the mistletoe
(Pale-green, fairy mistletoe),
One last candle burning low,
All the sleepy dancers gone,
Just one candle burning on,
Shadows lurking everywhere:
Some one came, and kissed me there.

Tired I was; my head would go
Nodding under the mistletoe
(Pale-green, fairy mistletoe),
No footsteps came, no voice, but only,
Just as I sat there, sleepy, lonely,
Stooped in the still and shadowy air
Lips unseen - and kissed me there.

"Whom seek you here, sweet Mistress Fell?"
"One who loved me passing well.
Dark his eye, wild his face -
Stranger, if in this lonely place
Bide such an one, then, prythee, say
I am come here to-day."

"Many his like, Mistress Fell?"
"I did not look, so cannot tell.
Only this I surely know,
When his voice called me, I must go;
Touched me his fingers, and my heart
Leapt at the sweet pain's smart."

"Why did he leave you, Mistress Fell?"
"Magic laid its dreary spell. -
Stranger, he was fast asleep;
Into his dream I tried to creep;
Called his name, soft was my cry;
He answered - not one sigh.

"The flower and the thorn are here;
Falleth the night-dew, cold and clear;
Out of her bower the bird replies,
Mocking the dark with e...

The far moon maketh lovers wise
In her pale beauty trembling down,
Lending curved cheeks, dark lips, dark eyes,
A strangeness not her own.
And, though they shut their lids to kiss,
In starless darkness peace to win,
Even on that secret world from this
Her twilight enters in.

Come, Death, I'd have a word with thee;
And thou, poor Innocency;
And love - a Lad with broken wing;
And Pity, too:
The Fool shall sing to you,
As Fools will sing.

Ay, music hath small sense,
And a tune's soon told,
And Earth is old,
And my poor wits are dense;
Yet have I secrets, - dark, my dear,
To breathe you all: Come near.
And lest some hideous listener tells,
I'll ring my bells.

They are all at war! -
Yes, yes, their bodies go
'Neath burning sun and icy star
To chaunted songs of woe,
Dragging cold cannon through a mire
Of rain and blood and spouting fire,
The new moon glinting hard on eyes
Wide with insanities!

Hush!... I use words
I hardly know the meaning of;
And the mute birds
Are glancing...