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THE MAN in the MOON

From the Ncwâ'tgate Prize Poem, 1937.

And they have said there is a man in the moon, Watching eternally, sleepless and undying, Condemned for sin to hold his icy realm, To see no spring, inherit no fresh green,

Nor feel the lusty sun nor the blown rain.

They have peopled that unwavering deceit

Of ivory light, the borrower, the moon, , Being fearful of the empty shaft of space; **

They strut upon their petty earth, . > And ice themselves upon the stars e Who sullenly ignore this earth, and stare In polished insolence ihrough night.

For man, though in his mind the king of space,

Shrinks lonely, terror in the compass of his shadow, Birds fly before him, mice, prick-oyed with fear,

Peer from the boles of trees. No feel by his shall tread, The light-foot hooves of deer have fled,

And though he lame the stallion's burning crest,

And hood the hawk, they fear him, and keep close

Their knowledge and their love. So, in his loneliness, Man multiplies himself; the silent trees

At night step dryads, the unwavering brooks Become the silver-haiied, the crystal nymph«,

I Birds hide a ravished girl, a god treads golden

In the brief sunlight of an April day.

MARGARET STANLEY-WRENCH I j

(quoted in the "Listener")

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