A Novelty
Why should I care for the Ages
Because they are old and grey?
To me, like sudden laughter,
The stars are fresh and gay;
The world is a daring fancy,
And finished yesterday.
Why should I bow to the Ages
Because they were drear and dry?
Slow trees and ripening meadows
For me go roaring by,
A living charge, a struggle
To escalade the sky.
The eternal suns and systems,
Solid and silent all,
To me are stars of an instant,
Only the fires that fall
From God's good rocket, rising
On this night of carnival.
poem by G.K. Chesterton from The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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At Night
How many million stars there be,
That only God hath numberéd;
But this one only chosen for me
In time before her face was fled.
Shall not one mortal man alive
Hold up his head?
poem by G.K. Chesterton from The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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The Skeleton
Chattering finch and water-fly
Are not merrier than I;
Here among the flowers I lie
Laughing everlastingly.
No: I may not tell the best;
Surely, friends, I might have guessed
Death was but the good King's jest,
It was hid so carefully.
poem by G.K. Chesterton from The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Ultimate
The vision of a haloed host
That weep around an empty throne;
And, aureoles dark and angels dead,
Man with his own life stands alone.
'I am,' he says his bankrupt creed:
'I am,' and is again a clod:
The sparrow starts, the grasses stir,
For he has said the name of God.
poem by G.K. Chesterton from The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Ecclesiastes
There is one sin: to call a green leaf grey,
Whereat the sun in heaven shuddereth.
There is one blasphemy: for death to pray,
For God alone knoweth the praise of death.
There is one creed: 'neath no world-terror's wing
Apples forget to grow on apple-trees.
There is one thing is needful - everything -
The rest is vanity of vanities.
poem by G.K. Chesterton from The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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The Happy Man
To teach the grey earth like a child,
To bid the heavens repent,
I only ask from Fate the gift
Of one man well content.
Him will I find: though when in vain
I search the feast and mart,
The fading flowers of liberty,
The painted masks of art.
I only find him at the last,
On one old hill where nod
Golgotha's ghastly trinity-
Three persons and one god.
poem by G.K. Chesterton from The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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The Two Women
Lo! very fair is she who knows the ways
Of joy: in pleasure's mocking wisdom old,
The eyes that might be cold to flattery, kind;
The hair that might be grey with knowledge, gold.
But thou art more than these things, O my queen,
For thou art clad in ancient wars and tears.
And looking forth, framed in the crown of thorns,
I saw the youngest face in all the spheres.
poem by G.K. Chesterton from The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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The Beatific Vision
Through what fierce incarnations, furled
In fire and darkness, did I go,
Ere I was worthy in the world
To see a dandelion grow?
Well, if in any woes or wars
I bought my naked right to be,
Grew worthy of the grass, nor gave
The wren, my brother, shame for me.
But what shall God not ask of him
In the last time when all is told,
Who saw her stand beside the hearth,
The firelight garbing her in gold?
poem by G.K. Chesterton from The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Art Colours
On must we go: we search dead leaves,
We chase the sunset's saddest flames,
The nameless hues that o'er and o'er
In lawless wedding lost their names.
God of the daybreak! Better be
Black savages; and grin to gird
Our limbs in gaudy rags of red,
The laughing-stock of brute and bird;
And feel again the fierce old feast,
Blue for seven heavens that had sufficed,
A gold like shining hoards, a red
Like roses from the blood of Christ.
poem by G.K. Chesterton from The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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The Last Masquerade
A wan new garment of young green
Touched, as you turned your soft brown hair
And in me surged the strangest prayer
Ever in lover's heart hath been.
That I who saw your youth's bright page,
A rainbow change from robe to robe,
Might see you on this earthly globe,
Crowned with the silver crown of age.
Your dear hair powdered in strange guise,
Your dear face touched with colours pale:
And gazing through the mask and veil
The mirth of your immortal eyes.
poem by G.K. Chesterton from The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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