WOMEN WAR POETS

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 2934, 21 November 1916, Page 3

WOMEN WAR POETS

A TRIBUTE

(By tho Editor of the "I'ootry Review.")

]fc has been-my lot and privilege tc note two remarkable features of' tht poetry evoked by the war—one, tli< I fine spirit displayed by numerous soldier poets, and—what has beeu over- | looked by tho man critics who have dealt moro or less superficially and contemptuously with the poetry of the war—-the rare quality and. beauty oi the war verse produced by women. When I drew attention to this lattei feature at a women's club in tho coursc of a short address on the literature ol tho war, I mav have been considered more complimentary than, sincere, bui I am certain that the best war poetry has been the incidental verse, characterised very often by a fine singularity and exquisite tenderness, and that the finest woik in this class has been done by women, who in a thousand ways have felt the tragedy and pathos inseparable from this horrible business ol insensate, cruel war. The imagination that is appalled by the world tragedy and stricken into futility has been responsive to the individual and collective cry of misery and terror, and particularly to tho little human incidents and personalia of war. Where the big poets have left us cold tho women writers of verse have stirred the feelings. The great guns may have hit the mark, but they have left no impression. We have had admirable expositions of our cause and lofty demands on the national spirit in short poems—whole leading articles, nay, ponderous Blue Books compressed into a. sonnet—excellent examples of the art of condensation in poetiy. What more can you expect? Patriotism may be, but war as we know it, war in the concrete, _ war at close quarters, is not a fit subject for poetry. Homer himim- 11 deal with it in another Iliad,' much less a modern poet in a short lyric—all the. public has the patience_ to_ read ; From other points of view it is quite natural, quite to be expected, that we have not had greater poetry than we have hadi from the men with big reputations. While tho heavv Jatter.cs were firing at tho Kaiser and the lighter artillery was roaring at the Prussianising of Germany, a womanpoet- like Miss Moberly was feeling the pathos and pitifulriess of tho little incidental things that make up the great horror of war. Seeing tho horses commandeered by the Army coming in from tho country down the Pinchey Road in tile far-off early days, she wrote: Last year he drew the harvest home Along the winding upland lane; » Mr-ea twisted marigolds And ..clover flowers to dock his inane. Last year—he drew the harvest home. T TO- f n~ witU P U2zle<J > Patient face, Uitii ears adroop and weary feet He marches to the sound of drums, _ And draws the guri along the street, -Lo-day—be draws the guns of war. One might cito numerous examples not only of detached poems but of volumes such as Mrs ; Grantham's sonnets on her son killed in the war—verse too tender and personal to quote. Much less personally poignant, but finely expressed, has come under my personal notice: , one suc k is "a poem by a Shefneld girl, concerning which a very learned lady asked if it had not been actually written by a blinded soldier: There's a misty sea-girt island in the . sunset-haunted west; (. I can see it in my wounded dreams of ; home. . I-jcan see the dwindling hedgerows where the sparrow builds her nest, And the grass-land with • it's throw of daisied foam. ■ ■; , Oh! there's Spring upon tho island, and the greening lures me baek To mysterious meres and woodways in -the .-west, , . . ~ They have stripped inv manhood . from me, they have stretched mo on the rack"... Tako mo home, a blinded, broken thing, to Test! I can never see the island with its fields of sheeted gold, And the wisps of sunset drifting in the west; Darkness drowns tho dim green valleys and tho silent hills of old, And the hedges where tiie sparrow builds , her ne6t. Lot mo put my blind eyes down among the bluebells and the grass, Let mo feel the' brimming coolness on my brow ; Let mo touch the dewy bracken where - tho dreamful Bhadows pass; I have bled for England; let hot heal ma now! ~ And it will be appreciated, too, bow in these days when, as "Tho Times" recently finely pointed out, poetry resumes its ancient place as an inspiration and consolation, tho message of soul to soul, instead of being an exorcise in banality, such feminine poems as Mrs. Katharine Tynan's beautiful ''Flower of Youth" have been a solace to, many burdened hearts and drawn tearß from wrinkled lawyers and bearded farmers when read aloud: Lest Heaven be thronged with greybeards hoary God, who made boys for His delight, Stoops, in a -day of griei Bnd glory, And calls thein in, in from the night. When they come trooping' from the war Our skies havo many a new gold star. Heaven's thronged with gay and careless faces. New-waked from dreams of dreadful .things. They ™lk in green and pleasant places And by the crystal water-springs Who dreamt of dying and the slain, And the fierce thirst and the stron" pain. ° Dear boys! They shall bo young for ever. The Son of God was once a boy. They run and leap by a clear river, And of their youth they have great -joy. God, wlio made boys so . clean and good Smiles with, the eyes of fatherhood. P°? Ten i s hy the young invaded; Their laughter's in the House of God. Stainless and simple as He made it God keeps the heart o' the boy unflawed. ' The old wise Saints look on and smile, They are so young and without guile. Ok, if the sonless mothers weeping And widowed girls, could see inside The glory that hath them in keepin" Who went to the Great War and died. Ihey would use and put their mourning And say: "Thank God, he has enough!" This is fino work for tho poet, and many women arc responding nobly to the inspiration.