Confessional
I could explain
The complicated lore that drags the soul
From what shall profit him
To gild damnation with his choicest gold.
But you
Are poring over precious books and do not hear
Our plaintive, frivolous songs;
[ . . . ]
Iris Tree's poem "Confessional" was published in 1917 in the third "cycle" of the Wheels anthology. To read this poem in full in a digitized version of this publication, follow the links below:
French Peacock
In "taking charge of your possessions when you saw
them," you became a golden jay.
Whatever you admired you charmed away —
The color, habit, ornament or attitude.
Of chiseled setting and black-opalescent dye,
You were the jewelry of sense.
[ . . . ]
Marianne Moore's poem "French Peacock" was published in the 1917 Others anthology. To read this poem in full in a digitized version of this publication, follow the links below:
Rupert Brooke
Your face was lifted to the golden sky
Ablaze beyond the black roofs of the square,
As flame on flame leapt, flourishing in air
Its tumult of red stars exultantly,
To the cold constellations dim and high;
[ . . . ]
Wilfrid Wilson Gibson's poem "Rupert Brooke" was published in Georgian Poetry, 1916-1917. To read this poem in full in a digitized version of this publication, follow the links below:
Erinnyes
There has been so much noise,
Bleeding and shouting and dying,
Clamour of death.
There are so many dead,
Many have died unconsenting,
Their ghosts are angry, unappeased.
So many ghosts among us,
Invisible, yet strong,
Between me and thee, so many ghosts of the slain.
They come back, over the white sea, in the mist,
Invisible, trooping home, the unassuaged ghosts
Endlessly returning on the uneasy sea.
They set foot on this land to which they have the right,
They return relentlessly, in the silence one knows their tread,
Multitudinous, endless, the ghosts coming home again.
They watch us, they press on us,
They press their claim upon us,
They are angry with us.
What do they want ?
We are driven mad,
Madly we rush hither and thither:
Shouting, "Revenge, Revenge,"
Crying, "Pour out the blood of the foe,"
Seeking to appease with blood the insistent ghosts.
Out of blood rise up new ghosts,
Grey, stern, angry, unsatisfied,
The more we slay and are slain, the more we raise up new
ghosts against us.
Till we are mad with terror, seeing the slain
Victorious, grey, grisly ghosts in our streets,
Grey, unappeased ghosts seated in the music-halls.
The dead triumphant, and the quick cast down,
The dead, unassuaged and angry, silencing us,
Making us pale and bloodless, without resistance.
What do they want, the ghosts, what is it
They demand as they stand in menace over against us?
How shall we now appease whom we have raised up?
Since from blood poured out rise only ghosts again,
What shall we do, what shall we give to them ?
What do they want, forever there on our threshold ?
Must we open the doors, and admit them, receive them home,
And in the silence, reverently, welcome them,
And give them place and honour and service meet ?
For one year's space, attend on our angry dead,
Soothe them with service and honour, and silence meet,
Strengthen, prepare them for the journey hence,
Then lead them to the gates of the unknown,
And bid farewell, oh stately travellers,
And wait till they are lost upon our sight.
Then we shall turn us home again to life
Knowing our dead are fitly housed in death,
Not roaming here disconsolate, angrily.
And we shall have new peace in this our life,
New joy to give more life, new bliss to live,
Sure of our dead in the proud halls of death.
D.H. Lawrence's poem "Erinnyes" was published in the 1916 Some Imagist Poets anthology. To read the poem in a digitized version of this publication, follow the links below: