There will be nothing left But the clean earth and some children— Our child, Love, and a child for it to mate with. The air they breathe will be pure For the lies will be all dead. Mlle. Poetry Meets Me at the Church ROSCOE WILLIAM BRINK To a New York poetry society one night with a friend of a friend.... I had always wanted to see that society. Long have I listened in awe to the unutterable rhythms of the city itself: the daily ictus of the workward crowds in the morning, the beat again in the homeward evening, lyric activity of the weeks rising to a crest like an Elizabethan sonnet to end in a Saturday-Sunday couplet of application to the heart of man, involved quatrains of the seasons, free verse epochs and tensions, years and decades. As I listened to these bigger canticles of New York City I have wanted to see its poetry society, fancying it some homely cricket on its communal hearth—my pleasant heart-warming dream. You see, also, besides listening in on this great, loud city voice, I once wanted to write poetry myself—but that was long ago before, under penalty of death by starvation, they took me and put me to work and rediscovered vers libre. As I sat beside the friend of a friend, gazing in glad surmise at an elegant assembly of ladies and gentlemen, the poetry society meeting came to order. Not since I was fourteen-fifteen, and went to prayer-meeting because the girl I adored would be there, have I experienced such emotions as I experienced then. I don’t suppose you know my particular old white church prayer-meeting. I used to go, rain or shine, every Friday night, and sit where I could watch the door admit the pretty upward toss of curls of my affections’ desire. Sometimes she didn’t come and didn’t come. The opening hymn would be sung and I would hear it not, for my eyes were upon the door. Another hymn and the preacher would begin to speak with a gentle, gushing, splashing sound at the mouth, but the door would remain closed; and knotted, stifling disappointment be clutching at my throat. Another hymn, and the discussion would be thrown open to the congregation. Well, the door was stolid; I would slide back from the edge of my chair and breathe thickly of the resisting air. So late, she would not come now. To be sure, the congregation was some comfort: there were the frisky young lady and the frisky middle-aged lady who would pop to their feet with a squeal of enthusiasm, the deacons and the elders, the sincere girls, the succinct young men with a duty to perform, the conservatives and the infirm—all of them to speak. There came one night when there was rejoicing in heaven’s hour. Somebody had sent a check to pay for a new coat of white paint for the church. The treasurer arose from his chair and lifted up the check for all to see. Then were hymns and glad talks with God and with woman and man. The banks next day refused to honor the check.