The Nuns And The Lilies
The lilies in the garden walk
Are out today.
The nuns all came to look at them,
To look and say
They wouldn't last to deck the crib
On Christmas day.
They had outstripped the Holy Child.
And yet at least
They should have been for Ursula,
Lucy, Joan, Perpetua,
Have glittered on the altar through some virgin feast.
The lilies in the convent walk
Are fair to see.
They have forgotten baby Christs,
It seems to me.
They laugh and toss their royal heads
In ecstasy.
And still they say I must believe
Like princely churls
For all your lovely purity,
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poem by Lesbia Harford
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When my lover put the sea between us
When my lover put the sea between us
And went wandering in Italy
My poor silly heart miscalled his journey—
'Leaving me'.
Towns of Spain and Italy he stayed in,
Each and all of them to me unknown;
How could he find pleasure being a lover,
Being alone!
Truly I was not as fair as Venice,
Noble as Siena, strange as Rome.
Certainly he loved Milan and Florence
More than home.
I believed his absence had estranged us
And across the heart-dividing sea
Sent him word that I no longer loved him.
Foolish me!
Came his answer after months of waiting
Echoing my letter, lie for lie.
Truth or lies I know not. Which unfaithful,
He or I.
poem by Lesbia Harford
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And is love very strong where honour rules?
And is love very strong where honour rules?
Would the world ever speak of Lancelot's love
Or Tristram's love had they put honour first?
What would you think if Guinevere had knelt
And begged for kisses and had begged in vain?
Should she be constant had she been refused
Or would she laugh and turn to love elsewhere?
But Joseph is a hero nowadays
And young Paolo, the Italian blood,
Rather too rash and uncontrollable.
Lovers who are not free should sigh and part—
Lovers, you call them—and not free to love:
They may be wives or husbands, businessmen,
Saints even: they're not lovers. After all
I'd rather be a lover than a saint.
poem by Lesbia Harford
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The Two Swans
There's a big park just close to where we live —
Trees in a row
And shaggy grass whereon the dead leaves blow.
And in the middle round a great lagoon
The fair yachts sail
In loveliness that makes the water pale.
Last night I went to walk along the road
Beside the park
And feel the kisses of the wintry dark.
It's the best place to watch the evening come
For mists are there
And lights and shadows and the lake is fair
And last night looking up I saw two swans
Fly overhead
With long black necks and their white wings outspread.
Above the houses citywards they went,
An arrowy pair
In secret — white and black and dark and fair.
poem by Lesbia Harford
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He has picked grapes in the sun.
He has picked grapes in the sun. Oh it seems
Like a fairy tale,
Like a tale of dreams.
'He in his slender youth, with vines, with sun,
Under a blazing sky'—
The tale might run.
There's beauty for eye and mind, for sight and thought,
Here on the surface.
Plunge. This beauty's nought.
Vision succeeds to dream. Deep in his heart
Fierier beauty lives
Than this surface art.
He has no song to sing of fragrant soil
Who in his heart revolts
At unlovely toil.
He has known the real, the truth of it. It seems
Misery eats the heart
Out of fairest dreams.
He in his slender youth, at strife, in vain
Offers his life to set
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poem by Lesbia Harford
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I must be dreaming through the days
I must be dreaming through the days
And see the world with childish eyes
If I'd go singing all my life
And my songs be wise
And in the kitchen or the house
Must wonder at the sights I see.
And I must hear the throb and hum
That moves to song in factory.
So much in life remains unsung,
And so much more than love is sweet.
I'd like a song of kitchenmaids
With steady fingers and swift feet.
And I could sing about the rest
That breaks upon a woman's day
When dinner's over and she lies
Upon her bed to dream and pray
Until the children come from school
And all her evening work begins.
There's more in life than tragic love
And all the storied, splendid sins.
poem by Lesbia Harford
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I dare not leave the splendid town
I dare not leave the splendid town
To go where morning meadows are,
For somewhere here the Future's hid
In factory, shop, or liquor bar.
And when the picture shows are closed
She goes to roam about the docks.
Oh, she has wisdom on her mouth
And blood with honey in her locks.
I dare not read of Rosamund
Or such sweet ladyhood in books,
Lest dreaming on their excellence
I should forget the Future's looks.
And I'll walk lonely all my days
Down city pavements without end,
For with young love on flowery paths
I'd have small need of her to friend.
Yea, I would fain forget to sing,
Like larks in city prison bound,
In case I should not hear her voice
Above that clatter of sweet sound.
poem by Lesbia Harford
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A Blouse Machinist
Miss Murphy has blue eyes and blue-black hair,
Her machine's opposite mine
So I can stare
At her pale face and shining blue-black hair.
I'm sure that other people think her plain
But I could look at her
And look again
Although I see why people think her plain.
She's nice to watch when her machine-belt breaks.
She has such delicate hands
And arms, it takes
Ages for her to mend it when it breaks.
Oh, beauty's still elusive and she's fine.
Though all the moulding
Of her face, the line
Of nose, mouth, chin is Mongol, yet she's fine.
Of course things would be different in Japan.
They'd see her beauty.
On a silken fan
They'd paint her for a princess in Japan.
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poem by Lesbia Harford
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The Psychological Craze
I in the library,
Looking for books to read,
Pulled one out twice to see
If it fulfilled my need.
Butler had written this
Autobiography.
Which of the Butlers, then?
I opened it to see.
He's an old general
Mounted upon a horse.
Thinkers don't write their lives,
But soldiers can, of course.
They write: 'The regiment
Was sent to Omdurman,
Where Gordon died. To catch
The Mahdi was our plan.'
Later—'The bride wore white
And she had golden hair.
Four bridesmaids bore her train
Up to the altar where
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poem by Lesbia Harford
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I'm like all lovers, wanting love to be
I'm like all lovers, wanting love to be
A very mighty thing for you and me.
In certain moods your love should be a fire
That burnt your very life up in desire.
The only kind of love then to my mind
Would make you kiss my shadow on the blind
And walk seven miles each night to see it there,
Myself within, serene and unaware.
But you're as bad. You'd have me watch the clock
And count your coming while I mend your sock.
You'd have my mind devoted day and night
To you and care for you and your delight.
Poor fools, who each would have the other give
What spirit must withhold if it would live.
You're not my slave, I wish you not to be.
I love yourself and not your love for me,
The self that goes ten thousand miles away
And loses thought of me for many a day.
And you loved me for loving much beside
But now you want a woman for your bride.
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poem by Lesbia Harford
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