A cry of the long pain In the reeds of a steel lagoon In a land that no man knows. _Selections from_ _POMPEY THE GREAT_ CHORUS Man is a sacred city, built of marvellous earth. Life was lived nobly here to give this body birth. Something was in this brain and in this eager hand. Death is so dumb and blind, Death cannot understand. Death drifts the brain with dust and soils the young limbs’ glory. Death makes women a dream and men a traveller’s story, Death drives the lovely soul to wander under the sky, Death opens unknown doors. It is most grand to die. CHORUS Kneel to the beautiful women who bear us this strange brave fruit. Man with his soul so noble: man half god and half brute. Women bear him in pain that he may bring them tears. He is a king on earth, he rules for a term of years. And the conqueror’s prize is dust and lost endeavour. And the beaten man becomes a story for ever. For the gods employ strange means to bring their will to be. We are in the wise gods’ hands and more we cannot see. EPILOGUE And all their passionate hearts are dust, And dust the great idea that burned In various flames of love and lust Till the world’s brain was turned. God, moving darkly in men’s brains, Using their passions as his tool, Brings freedom with a tyrant’s chains And wisdom with the fool. Blindly and bloodily we drift, Our interests clog our hearts with dreams, God make my brooding soul a rift Through which a meaning gleams. _Selections from_ _THE EVERLASTING MERCY_ THE SCALLENGE The moonlight shone on Cabbage Walk, It made the limestone look like chalk. It was too late for any people, Twelve struck as we went by the steeple. A dog barked, and an owl was calling, The squire’s brook was still a-falling, The carved heads on the church looked down On “Russell, Blacksmith of this Town,” And all the graves of all the ghosts Who rise on Christmas Eve in hosts To dance and carol in festivity For joy of Jesus Christ’s Nativity (Bell-ringer Dawe and his two sons Beheld ’em from the bell-tower once), Two and two about about Singing the end of Advent out.