Henry Kendall

Prefatory Sonnets

I.

I purposed once to take my pen and write,
 Not songs, like some, tormented and awry
 With passion, but a cunning harmony
Of words and music caught from glen and height,
And lucid colours born of woodland light
 And shining places where the sea-streams lie.
But this was when the heat of youth glowed white,
 And since I've put the faded purpose by.
I have no faultless fruits to offer you
 Who read this book; but certain syllables
 Herein are borrowed from unfooted dells
And secret hollows dear to noontide dew;
And these at least, though far between and few,
 May catch the sense like subtle forest spells.

II.

So take these kindly, even though there be
 Some notes that unto other lyres belong,
 Stray echoes from the elder sons of song;
And think how from its neighbouring native sea
The pensive shell doth borrow melody.
 I would not do the lordly masters wrong
 By filching fair words from the shining throng
Whose music haunts me as the wind a tree!
 Lo, when a stranger in soft Syrian glooms
Shot through with sunset treads the cedar dells,
And hears the breezy ring of elfin bells
 Far down by where the white-haired cataract booms,
He, faint with sweetness caught from forest smells,
 Bears thence, unwitting, plunder of perfumes.

September in Australia

Grey Winter hath gone, like a wearisome guest,
   And, behold, for repayment,
September comes in with the wind of the West
   And the Spring in her raiment!
The ways of the frost have been filled of the flowers,
   While the forest discovers
Wild wings, with the halo of hyaline hours,
   And the music of lovers.

September, the maid with the swift, silver feet!
   She glides, and she graces
The valleys of coolness, the slopes of the heat,
   With her blossomy traces;
Sweet month, with a mouth that is made of a rose,
   She lightens and lingers
In spots where the harp of the evening glows,
   Attuned by her fingers.

The stream from its home in the hollow hill slips
   In a darling old fashion;
And the day goeth down with a song on its lips
   Whose key-note is passion;
Far out in the fierce, bitter front of the sea
   I stand, and remember
Dead things that were brothers and sisters of thee,
   Resplendent September.

The West, when it blows at the fall of the noon
   And beats on the beaches,
Is filled with a tender and tremulous tune
   That touches and teaches;
The stories of Youth, of the burden of Time,
   And the death of Devotion,
Come back with the wind, and are themes of the rhyme
   In the waves of the ocean.

We, having a secret to others unknown,
   In the cool mountain-mosses,
May whisper together, September, alone
   Of our loves and our losses.
One word for her beauty, and one for the grace
   She gave to the hours;
And then we may kiss her, and suffer her face
   To sleep with the flowers.

. . . . .

Oh, season of changes — of shadow and shine —
   September the splendid!
My song hath no music to mingle with thine,
   And its burden is ended;
But thou, being born of the winds and the sun,
   By mountain, by river,
Mayst lighten and listen, and loiter and run,
   With thy voices for ever.

Rose Lorraine

Sweet water-moons, blown into lights
 Of flying gold on pool and creek,
And many sounds and many sights
 Of younger days are back this week.
I cannot say I sought to face
 Or greatly cared to cross again
The subtle spirit of the place
 Whose life is mixed with Rose Lorraine.

What though her voice rings clearly through
 A nightly dream I gladly keep,
No wish have I to start anew
 Heart fountains that have ceased to leap.
Here, face to face with different days,
 And later things that plead for love,
It would be worse than wrong to raise
 A phantom far too vain to move.

But, Rose Lorraine — ah! Rose Lorraine,
 I'll whisper now, where no one hears —
If you should chance to meet again
 The man you kissed in soft, dead years,
Just say for once "He suffered much,"
 And add to this "His fate was worst
Because of me, my voice, my touch" —
 There is no passion like the first!

If I that breathe your slow sweet name,
 As one breathes low notes on a flute,
Have vext your peace with word of blame,
 The phrase is dead — the lips are mute.
Yet when I turn towards the wall,
 In stormy nights, in times of rain,
I often wish you could recall
 Your tender speeches, Rose Lorraine.

Because, you see, I thought them true,
 And did not count you self-deceived,
And gave myself in all to you,
 And looked on Love as Life achieved.
Then came the bitter, sudden change,
 The fastened lips, the dumb despair:
The first few weeks were very strange,
 And long, and sad, and hard to bear.

No woman lives with power to burst
 My passion's bonds, and set me free;
For Rose is last where Rose was first,
 And only Rose is fair to me.
The faintest memory of her face,
 The wilful face that hurt me so,
Is followed by a fiery trace
 That Rose Lorraine must never know.

I keep a faded ribbon string
 You used to wear about your throat;
And of this pale, this perished thing,
 I think I know the threads by rote.
God help such love! To touch your hand,
 To loiter where your feet might fall,
You marvellous girl, my soul would stand
 The worst of hell — its fires and all!

To a Mountain

To thee, O father of the stately peaks,
Above me in the loftier light — to thee,
Imperial brother of those awful hills
Whose feet are set in splendid spheres of flame,
Whose heads are where the gods are, and whose sides
Of strength are belted round with all the zones
Of all the world, I dedicate these songs.
And if, within the compass of this book,
There lives and glows ONE verse in which there beats
The pulse of wind and torrent — if ONE line
Is here that like a running water sounds,
And seems an echo from the lands of leaf,
Be sure that line is thine. Here, in this home,
Away from men and books and all the schools,
I take thee for my Teacher. In thy voice
Of deathless majesty, I, kneeling, hear
God's grand authentic Gospel! Year by year,
The great sublime cantata of thy storm
Strikes through my spirit — fills it with a life
Of startling beauty! Thou my Bible art
With holy leaves of rock, and flower, and tree,
And moss, and shining runnel. From each page
That helps to make thy awful volume, I
Have learned a noble lesson. In the psalm
Of thy grave winds, and in the liturgy
Of singing waters, lo! my soul has heard
The higher worship; and from thee, indeed,
The broad foundations of a finer hope
Were gathered in; and thou hast lifted up
The blind horizon for a larger faith!
Moreover, walking in exalted woods
Of naked glory, in the green and gold
Of forest sunshine, I have paused like one
With all the life transfigured: and a flood
Of light ineffable has made me feel
As felt the grand old prophets caught away
By flames of inspiration; but the words
Sufficient for the story of my Dream
Are far too splendid for poor human lips!
But thou, to whom I turn with reverent eyes —
O stately Father, whose majestic face
Shines far above the zone of wind and cloud,
Where high dominion of the morning is —
Thou hast the Song complete of which my songs
Are pallid adumbrations! Certain sounds
Of strong authentic sorrow in this book
May have the sob of upland torrents — these,
And only these, may touch the great World's heart;
For, lo! they are the issues of that grief
Which makes a man more human, and his life
More like that frank exalted life of thine.
But in these pages there are other tones
In which thy large, superior voice is not —
Through which no beauty that resembles thine
Has ever shone. THESE are the broken words
Of blind occasions, when the World has come
Between me and my Dream. No song is here
Of mighty compass; for my singing robes
I've worn in stolen moments. All my days
Have been the days of a laborious life,
And ever on my struggling soul has burned
The fierce heat of this hurried sphere. But thou,
To whose fair majesty I dedicate
My book of rhymes — thou hast the perfect rest
Which makes the heaven of the highest gods!
To thee the noises of this violent time
Are far, faint whispers; and, from age to age,
Within the world and yet apart from it,
Thou standest! Round thy lordly capes the sea
Rolls on with a superb indifference
For ever; in thy deep, green, gracious glens
The silver fountains sing for ever. Far
Above dim ghosts of waters in the caves,
The royal robe of morning on thy head
Abides for ever! Evermore the wind
Is thy august companion; and thy peers
Are cloud, and thunder, and the face sublime
Of blue mid-heaven! On thy awful brow
Is Deity; and in that voice of thine
There is the great imperial utterance
Of God for ever; and thy feet are set
Where evermore, through all the days and years,
There rolls the grand hymn of the deathless wave.

Araluen

Take this rose, and very gently place it on the tender, deep
Mosses where our little darling, Araluen, lies asleep.
Put the blossom close to baby — kneel with me, my love, and pray;
We must leave the bird we've buried — say good-bye to her to-day;
In the shadow of our trouble we must go to other lands,
And the flowers we have fostered will be left to other hands.
Other eyes will watch them growing — other feet will softly tread
Where two hearts are nearly breaking, where so many tears are shed.
Bitter is the world we live in: life and love are mixed with pain;
We will never see these daisies — never water them again.
     . . . . .
Here the blue-eyed Spring will linger, here the shining month will stay,
Like a friend, by Araluen, when we two are far away;
But, beyond the wild, wide waters, we will tread another shore —
We will never watch this blossom, never see it any more.

Girl, whose hand at God's high altar in the dear, dead year I pressed,
Lean your stricken head upon me — this is still your lover's breast!
She who sleeps was first and sweetest — none we have to take her place!
Empty is the little cradle — absent is the little face.
Other children may be given; but this rose beyond recall,
But this garland of your girlhood, will be dearest of them all.
None will ever, Araluen, nestle where you used to be,
In my heart of hearts, you darling, when the world was new to me;
We were young when you were with us, life and love were happy things
To your father and your mother ere the angels gave you wings.

You that sit and sob beside me — you, upon whose golden head
Many rains of many sorrows have from day to day been shed;
Who, because your love was noble, faced with me the lot austere
Ever pressing with its hardship on the man of letters here —
Let me feel that you are near me, lay your hand within mine own;
You are all I have to live for, now that we are left alone.
Three there were, but one has vanished. Sins of mine have made you weep;
But forgive your baby's father now that baby is asleep.
Let us go, for night is falling, leave the darling with her flowers;
Other hands will come and tend them — other friends in other hours.

After Many Years

The song that once I dreamed about,
 The tender, touching thing,
As radiant as the rose without,
 The love of wind and wing:
The perfect verses, to the tune
 Of woodland music set,
As beautiful as afternoon,
 Remain unwritten yet.

It is too late to write them now —
 The ancient fire is cold;
No ardent lights illume the brow,
 As in the days of old.
I cannot dream the dream again;
 But, when the happy birds
Are singing in the sunny rain,
 I think I hear its words.

I think I hear the echo still
 Of long-forgotten tones,
When evening winds are on the hill
 And sunset fires the cones;
But only in the hours supreme,
 With songs of land and sea,
The lyrics of the leaf and stream,
 This echo comes to me.

No longer doth the earth reveal
 Her gracious green and gold;
I sit where youth was once, and feel
 That I am growing old.
The lustre from the face of things
 Is wearing all away;
Like one who halts with tired wings,
 I rest and muse to-day.

There is a river in the range
 I love to think about;
Perhaps the searching feet of change
 Have never found it out.
Ah! oftentimes I used to look
 Upon its banks, and long
To steal the beauty of that brook
 And put it in a song.

I wonder if the slopes of moss,
 In dreams so dear to me —
The falls of flower, and flower-like floss —
 Are as they used to be!
I wonder if the waterfalls,
 The singers far and fair,
That gleamed between the wet, green walls,
 Are still the marvels there!

Ah! let me hope that in that place
 Those old familiar things
To which I turn a wistful face
 Have never taken wings.
Let me retain the fancy still
 That, past the lordly range,
There always shines, in folds of hill,
 One spot secure from change!

I trust that yet the tender screen
 That shades a certain nook
Remains, with all its gold and green,
 The glory of the brook.
It hides a secret to the birds
 And waters only known:
The letters of two lovely words —
 A poem on a stone.

Perhaps the lady of the past
 Upon these lines may light,
The purest verses, and the last,
 That I may ever write:
She need not fear a word of blame:
 Her tale the flowers keep —
The wind that heard me breathe her name
 Has been for years asleep.

But in the night, and when the rain
 The troubled torrent fills,
I often think I see again
 The river in the hills;
And when the day is very near,
 And birds are on the wing,
My spirit fancies it can hear
 The song I cannot sing.

Hy-Brasil

"Daughter," said the ancient father, pausing by the evening sea,
"Turn thy face towards the sunset — turn thy face and kneel with me!
Prayer and praise and holy fasting, lips of love and life of light,
These and these have made thee perfect — shining saint with seraph's sight!
Look towards that flaming crescent — look beyond that glowing space —
Tell me, sister of the angels, what is beaming in thy face?"
And the daughter, who had fasted, who had spent her days in prayer,
Till the glory of the Saviour touched her head and rested there,
Turned her eyes towards the sea-line — saw beyond the fiery crest,
Floating over waves of jasper, far Hy-Brasil in the West.

All the calmness and the colour — all the splendour and repose,
Flowing where the sunset flowered, like a silver-hearted rose!
There indeed was singing Eden, where the great gold river runs
Past the porch and gates of crystal, ringed by strong and shining ones!
There indeed was God's own garden, sailing down the sapphire sea —
Lawny dells and slopes of summer, dazzling stream and radiant tree!
Out against the hushed horizon — out beneath the reverent day,
Flamed the Wonder on the waters — flamed, and flashed, and passed away.
And the maiden who had seen it felt a hand within her own,
And an angel that we know not led her to the lands unknown.

Never since hath eye beheld it — never since hath mortal, dazed
By its strange, unearthly splendour, on the floating Eden gazed!
Only once since Eve went weeping through a throng of glittering wings,
Hath the holy seen Hy-Brasil where the great gold river sings!
Only once by quiet waters, under still, resplendent skies,
Did the sister of the seraphs kneel in sight of Paradise!
She, the pure, the perfect woman, sanctified by patient prayer,
Had the eyes of saints of Heaven, all their glory in her hair:
Therefore God the Father whispered to a radiant spirit near —
"Show Our daughter fair Hy-Brasil — show her this, and lead her here."

But beyond the halls of sunset, but within the wondrous West,
On the rose-red seas of evening, sails the Garden of the Blest.
Still the gates of glassy beauty, still the walls of glowing light,
Shine on waves that no man knows of, out of sound and out of sight.
Yet the slopes and lawns of lustre, yet the dells of sparkling streams,
Dip to tranquil shores of jasper, where the watching angel beams.
But, behold! our eyes are human, and our way is paved with pain,
We can never find Hy-Brasil, never see its hills again!
Never look on bays of crystal, never bend the reverent knee
In the sight of Eden floating — floating on the sapphire sea!

Outre Mer

I see, as one in dreaming,
 A broad, bright, quiet sea;
Beyond it lies a haven —
 The only home for me.
Some men grow strong with trouble,
 But all my strength is past,
And tired and full of sorrow,
 I long to sleep at last.
By force of chance and changes
 Man's life is hard at best;
And, seeing rest is voiceless,
 The dearest thing is rest.

Beyond the sea — behold it,
 The home I wish to seek,
The refuge of the weary,
 The solace of the weak!
Sweet angel fingers beckon,
 Sweet angel voices ask
My soul to cross the waters;
 And yet I dread the task.
God help the man whose trials
 Are tares that he must reap!
He cannot face the future —
 His only hope is sleep.

Across the main a vision
 Of sunset coasts, and skies,
And widths of waters gleaming,
 Enchant my human eyes.
I, who have sinned and suffered,
 Have sought — with tears have sought —
To rule my life with goodness,
 And shape it to my thought.
And yet there is no refuge
 To shield me from distress,
Except the realm of slumber
 And great forgetfulness.