Sympathy with Stone
Blood-red the lily, and the questing horn
Shrivelling in silence;
Crumbling the archway, tumbled stone
Trembling at violence
Of rain and frosty ruin and the crushing heel;
No tenderness,
No knowledge of that soul
Which cries in every stone, how hewn, how shaped.
We quarried you and gave you for a name
His title whom you shielded from the wolf,
Who left you standing naked, when his shame
Gave him grave's armour, left him safe
With you to take the punishment, sad stone.
How living among men, how dead alone.
You suffer, I could find my part to weep . . .
But hush, I think this dying stone's asleep.
poem by Henry Treece
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The Haunted Garden
In this sad place
Memory hangs on the air
Fragile as Spring snail's tiny shell,
Coming to the sympathetic ear
Gentle as bud's green pulsing in the sun,
Suave as sin in a black velvet glove;
The old faces gaze
Wistfully as birds, among the nodding leaves,
They watch the pleasures they may never share;
And through the twilight hours
Old voices call along the river banks,
And out of the high-walled garden.
Why do they sigh,
The gentle ones in the flowering musk;
And what are the words of the song
The pale stranger sings as he walks
The garden's still, deserted paths,
Like a boy searching for his dog?
poem by Henry Treece
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Revenente
The bells of memory sound this summer day
Down the long alleys of the blue-skied years;
Shy cowslip, thyme, the haunting scent of hay,
Pleached gardens nourished by a lover's tears,
And honeysuckle, shy maid in the hedge,
Are all Her handmaids; blessed is the sight
The mirror-pool caught of Her. So the stage
Is set for entrance, and a girl in white
Walks in my heart again, out of pale death,
Kingdom of shrivelled mouth and powdering bone,
Touching my cheek with flower-laden breath,
And whispering, 'Poor love, and still alone?'
Was any man so lucky, dear God?
It will be dawn before She takes the road.
poem by Henry Treece
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The Waiting Watchers
They shall come in the black weathers
From the heart of the dead embers,
Walking one and two over the hill.
And they shall be with you, never farther
Than your bedside.
At their will
The smell of putrefaction lingers
And floor is carpetted with rotting hair;
Or sheets are torn to shreds
By the beaks of dead dry birds
And the red blood clots in your cup.
Put up your swords!
What steel can cut the throat of next year's dream,
What tongue is tunes to speak last night's quick scream?
Go alone by darkness;
Burn the clippings of your nail;
Donate a thousand candles.
But do as you will,
When sun is blind and lamps are lit once more,
Two and one, they shall be standing
[...] Read more
poem by Henry Treece
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The Barriers
Between the muscle and the hammer-head,
The liquor and the veinous leaf it feeds;
Between the vision and the throne of God,
The promise and the stillborn shrouded words;
Between the hope that flies, the fear that dives,
The beak of hawk, the pretty breast of wren;
Between the husk that dries, the seed that thrives,
The line that flames, and that which leaves the pen,
Stand blood, its channel and the broken cross,
The bed unslept-in and the worn-down shoe,
The fruit of pity and the breast of Christ,
And all the bones kissed clean beneath the sea.
And would you say it even if you could,
Smash cage and let the weary words fly free?
Might that not let the tiger from the wood,
And madness ride across the morning sky?
poem by Henry Treece
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Poem - I
In the dark caverns of the night,
Loveless and alone,
Friendless as wind that wails across the plains,
I sit, the last man left on earth,
Putting my fear on paper,
Praying that love will flow from my dry pen
And watching the tears make havoc on my page.
And I remember then,
Under the night's still mask,
The gallant geese
Making their way through storms,
The fieldmouse scattering to my door
Away from the black cloud,
And the gay snail
Garnishing the twig before leaves came.
The old ones told me,
'When you grow grey you think on little things ;'
Now these dreams kiss the bruises from my mind
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poem by Henry Treece
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Martyr
He lay, wrapped in a world of mutilated hands,
Of trees that walked by night and grinning clouds;
To bellowing of bulls, his dream's black cloth
Ripped and let dropp a heart stuck full of swords.
He walked, and by his side there strode a shade
Whose tattered hood half-hid a ram's dry skull:
'There is a place set for me at God's side.'
Said Ram, 'A door swings open outside Hell!'
He rose, upon hysteric wreaths of love,
Soared, nailed to an unrelenting beam;
Through airs that tingled with a child's low cries
He glided, gentle as a girl's soft dream
Of hyacinth and marjoram, in bowers
Of vernal holiness, where at a sigh
The leaves bend back like gracious hostesses
To introduce a lover, golden in glee.
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poem by Henry Treece
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