hem like stars set in a lonely sky,
Whisper my heart out, yearning for reply;
Summon your lips from far across the sea
Bidding them live a twilight hour with me.

Then, when the match was shrivelled into gloom,
Lo--you were with me in the darkened room.

THE LAST SONNET

Suppose one knew that never more might one
Put pen to sonnet, well loved task; that now
These fourteen lines were all he could allow
To say his message, be forever done;
How he would scan the word, the line, the rhyme,
Intent to sum in dearly chosen phrase
The windy trees, the beauty of his days,
Life's pride and pathos in one verse sublime.
How bitter then would be regret and pang
For former rhymes he dallied to refine,
For every verse that was not crystalline....
And if belike this last one feebly rang,
Honour and pride would cast it to the floor
Facing the judge with what was done before.

THE WAR

IRONY

Anton Lang, the _Christus_ of Oberammergau, has not been called upon
to fight in the German army.
NEWS ITEM.

So War hath still some ruth? some sense of shame?
The Crown of Thorns hath reverence even now?
For when the summons to that village came,
They spared the Christ of Oberammergau.

Enlist the actors of that sacred mime--
Paul, Peter, Pilate--Judas too, I trow;
Spurn Christ of Galilee, but (O sublime!)
Revere the Christ of Oberammergau.

TO A FRENCH BABY

Marcel Gaillard, Baby number 6 in _Life's_ fund for French war-orphans

What unsaid messages arise
Behind your clear and wondering eyes,
O grave and tiny citizen?
And who, of wise and valiant men,
Can answer those mute questionings?
I think the captains and the kings
Might well kneel in humility
Before you on your mother's knee,
As knelt, beside a stable door,
Other great men, long before.

In you, poor little lad, one sees
All children and all mothers' knees:
All voices inarticulate
That cry against the hymns of hate;
All homes, by Thames or Rhine or Seine,
Where cradles will not rock again.

AFTER HEARING GERMAN MUSIC

What pang of beauty is in all these songs,
Flooding the heart with painful bliss within--
Was this the folk to which Von Kluck belongs,
The land of poison ga