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Poems by Katherine Mansfield

Poems at the Villa Pauline : 1916

Poems at the Villa Pauline : 1916

page break page 45

Villa Pauline

But, ah ! before he came
You were only a name :
Four little rooms and a cupboard
Without a bone,
And I was alone !
Now with your windows wide
Everything from outside
Of sun and flower and loveliness
Comes in to hide,
To play, to laugh on the stairs,
To catch unawares
Our childish happiness,
And to glide
Through the four little rooms on tip-toe
With lifted finger,
Pretending we shall not know
When the shutters are shut
That they still linger
Long, long after.
Lying close in the dark
He says to me : “Hark,
Isn't that laughter ?”

1916.

page 46

Camomile Tea

Outside the sky is light with stars;
There's a hollow roaring from the sea.
And, alas ! for the little almond flowers,
The wind is shaking the almond tree.

How little I thought, a year ago,
In that horrible cottage upon the Lee
That he and I should be sitting so
And sipping a cup of camomile tea !

Light as feathers the witches fly,
The horn of the moon is plain to see;
By a firefly under a jonquil flower
A goblin toasts a bumble-bee.

We might be fifty, we might be five,
So snug, so compact, so wise are we !
Under the kitchen-table leg
My knee is pressing against his knee.

Our shutters are shut, the fire is low,
The tap is dripping peacefully;
The saucepan shadows on the wall
Are black and round and plain to see.

1916.

page 47

Waves

I saw a tiny God
Sitting
Under a bright blue Umbrella
That had white tassels
And forked ribs of gold.
Below him His little world
Lay open to the sun.
The shadow of His hat
Lay upon a city.
When he stretched forth His hand
A lake became a dark tremble.
When he kicked up His foot
It became night in the mountain passes.

But thou art small!
There are gods far greater than thou;
They rise and fall,
The tumbling gods of the sea.
Can thy heart heave such sighs,
Such hollow savage cries,
Such windy breath,
Such groaning death ?
And can thy arm enfold
The old,
The cold,
The changeless dreadful place
page 48 Where the herds
Of horned sea-monsters
And the screaming birds
Gather together.
From those silent men
That lie in the pen
Of our pearly prisons,
Canst thou hunt thy prey ?
Like us canst thou stay
Awaiting thine hour,
And then rise like a tower
And crash and shatter ?

There are neither trees nor bushes
In my country,
Said the tiny God.
But there are streams
And waterfalls
And mountain-peaks
Covered with lovely weed.
There are little shores and safe harbours,
Caves for cool and plains for sun and wind.
Lovely is the sound of the rivers,
Lovely the flashing brightness
Of the lovely peaks.
I am content.

page 49

Waves

But Thy kingdom is small,
Said the God of the Sea.
Thy kingdom shall fall;
I shall not let thee be.
Thou art proud !
With a loud
Pealing of laughter,
He rose and covered
The tiny God's land
With the tip of his hand,
With the curl of his fingers :
And after—

The tiny God
Began to cry.

1916.

page 50

The Town Between the Hills

The farther the little girl leaped and ran,
The farther she longed to be;
The white, white fields of jonquil flowers
Danced up as high as her knee
And flashed and sparkled before her eyes
Until she could hardly see.
So into the wood went she.

It was quiet in the wood,
It was solemn and grave;
A sound like a wave
Sighed in the tree-tops
And then sighed no more.
But she was brave,
And the sky showed through
A bird's-egg blue,
And she saw
A tiny path that was running away
Over the hills to-who can say ?
She ran, too.
But then the path broke,
Then the path ended
And wouldn't be mended.

A little old man
Sat on the edge,
Hugging the hedge.
page 51 He had a fire
And two eggs in a pan
And a paper poke
Of pepper and salt;
So she came to a halt
To watch and admire :
Cunning and nimble was he !
“May I help, if I can, little old man ?”
“Bravo ! “he said,
“You may dine with me.
I've two old eggs
From two white hens
And a loaf from a kind ladie :
Some fresh nutmegs,
Some cutlet ends
In pink and white paper frills :
And-I've-got
A little hot-pot
From the town between the hills.”

He nodded his head
And made her a sign
To sit under the spray
Of a trailing vine.

But when the little girl joined her hands
And said the grace she had learned to say,
page 52 The little old man gave two dreadful squeals
And she just saw the flash of his smoking heels
As he tumbled, tumbled
With his two old eggs
From two white hens,
His loaf from a kind ladie,
The fresh nutmegs,
The cutlet-ends
In the pink and white paper frills.
And away rumbled
The little hot-pot,
So much too hot,
From the town between the hills.

1916.

page 53

Voices of the Air

But then there comes that moment rare
When, for no cause that I can find,
The little voices of the air
Sound above all the sea and wind.

The sea and wind do then obey
And sighing, sighing double notes
Of double basses, content to play
A droning chord for the little throats—

The little throats that sing and rise
Up into the light with lovely ease
And a kind of magical, sweet surprise
To hear and know themselves for these—

For these little voices: the bee, the fly,
The leaf that taps, the pod that breaks,
The breeze on the grass-tops bending by,
The shrill quick sound that the insect makes.

1916.

page 54

Sanary

Her little hot room looked over the bay
Through a stiff palisade of glinting palms,
And there she would lie in the heat of the day,
Her dark head resting upon her arms,
So quiet, so still, she did not seem
To think, to feel, or even to dream.

The shimmering, blinding web of sea
Hung from the sky, and the spider sun
With busy frightening cruelty
Crawled over the sky and spun and spun.
She could see it still when she shut her eyes,
And the little boats caught in the web like flies.

Down below at this idle hour
Nobody walked in the dusty street
A scent of dying mimosa flower
Lay on the air, but sweet—too sweet.

1916.

page 55

To L. H. B. (1894–1915)

Last night for the first time since you were dead
I walked with you, my brother, in a dream.
We were at home again beside the stream
Fringed with tall berry bushes, white and red.
“Don't touch them : they are poisonous,” I said.
But your hand hovered, and I saw a beam
Of strange, bright laughter flying round your head
And as you stooped I saw the berries gleam.
“Don't you remember ? We called them Dead Man's Bread !”
I woke and heard the wind moan and the roar
Of the dark water tumbling on the shore.
Where-where is the path of my dream for my eager feet ?
By the remembered stream my brother stands
Waiting for me with berries in his hands …
“These are my body. Sister, take and eat.”

1916.