I
I
walk
through
the
long
schoolroom
questioning;
A
kind
old
nun
in
a
white
hood
replies;
The
children
learn
to
cipher
and
to
sing,
To
study
reading-books
and
history,
To
cut
and
sew,
be
neat
in
everything
In
the
best
modern
way—the
children's
eyes
In
momentary
wonder
stare
upon
A
sixty-year-old
smiling
public
man.
II
I
dream
of
a
Ledaean
body,
bent
Above
a
sinking
fire,
a
tale
that
she
Told
of
a
harsh
reproof,
or
trivial
event
That
changed
some
childish
day
to
tragedy—
Told,
and
it
seemed
that
our
two
natures
blent
Into
a
sphere
from
youthful
sympathy,
Or
else,
to
alter
Plato's
parable,
Into
the
yolk
and
white
of
the
one
shell.
III
And
thinking
of
that
fit
of
grief
or
rage
I
look
upon
one
child
or
t'other
there
And
wonder
if
she
stood
so
at
that
age—
For
even
daughters
of
the
swan
can
share
Something
of
every
paddler's
heritage—
And
had
that
colour
upon
cheek
or
hair,
And
thereupon
my
heart
is
driven
wild:
She
stands
before
me
as
a
living
child.
IV
Her
present
image
floats
into
the
mind—
Did
Quattrocento
finger
fashion
it
Hollow
of
cheek
as
though
it
drank
the
wind
And
took
a
mess
of
shadows
for
its
meat?
And
I
though
never
of
Ledaean
kind
Had
pretty
plumage
once—enough
of
that,
Better
to
smile
on
all
that
smile,
and
show
There
is
a
comfortable
kind
of
old
scarecrow.
V
What
youthful
mother,
a
shape
upon
her
lap
Honey
of
generation
had
betrayed,
And
that
must
sleep,
shriek,
struggle
to
escape
As
recollection
or
the
drug
decide,
Would
think
her
son,
did
she
but
see
that
shape
With
sixty
or
more
winters
on
its
head,
A
compensation
for
the
pang
of
his
birth,
Or
the
uncertainty
of
his
setting
forth?
VI
Plato
thought
nature
but
a
spume
that
plays
Upon
a
ghostly
paradigm
of
things;
Solider
Aristotle
played
the
taws
Upon
the
bottom
of
a
king
of
kings;
World-famous
golden-thighed
Pythagoras
Fingered
upon
a
fiddle-stick
or
strings
What
a
star
sang
and
careless
Muses
heard:
Old
clothes
upon
old
sticks
to
scare
a
bird.
VII
Both
nuns
and
mothers
worship
images,
But
those
the
candles
light
are
not
as
those
That
animate
a
mother's
reveries,
But
keep
a
marble
or
a
bronze
repose.
And
yet
they
too
break
hearts—O
Presences
That
passion,
piety
or
affection
knows,
And
that
all
heavenly
glory
symbolise—
O
self-born
mockers
of
man's
enterprise;
VIII
Labour
is
blossoming
or
dancing
where
The
body
is
not
bruised
to
pleasure
soul,
Nor
beauty
born
out
of
its
own
despair,
Nor
blear-eyed
wisdom
out
of
midnight
oil.
O
chestnut
tree,
great
rooted
blossomer,
Are
you
the
leaf,
the
blossom
or
the
bole?
O
body
swayed
to
music,
O
brightening
glance,
How
can
we
know
the
dancer
from
the
dance?
