A Father of Women, and Other Poems

								


Transcribed from the 1917 Burns & Oates Ltd edition by David Price, email
ccx074@pglaf.org

                            A FATHER OF WOMEN

                             AND OTHER POEMS

                                    by

                              Alice Meynell



                                * * * * *



                            BURNS & OATES Ltd

                            28 Orchard Street

                                 London W

                                   1917



                                   To

                                 V. L.



                       THE CONTENTS
A Father of Women                                    Page 7
Length of Days: To the Early Dead in Battle               9
Nurse Edith Cavell                                       11
Summer in England, 1914                                  12
To Tintoretto in Venice                                  14
A Thrush Before Dawn                                     16
The Two Shakespeare Tercentenaries                       18
To O--, of her Dark Eyes                                 19
The Treasure                                             20
A Wind of Clear Weather in England                       22
In Sleep                                                 23
The Divine Privilege                                     24
Free Will                                                26
The Two Questions                                        27
The Lord's Prayer                                        29
Easter Night                                             30
A FATHER OF WOMEN

                             AD SOROREM E. B.



    "Thy father was transfused into thy blood."



                                   Dryden: Ode to Mrs. Anne Killigrew.



         Our father works in us,

   The daughters of his manhood.  Not undone

   Is he, not wasted, though transmuted thus,

         And though he left no son.



         Therefore on him I cry

   To arm me: "For my delicate mind a casque,

   A breastplate for my heart, courage to die,

         Of thee, captain, I ask.



         "Nor strengthen only; press

   A finger on this violent blood and pale,

   Over this rash will let thy tenderness

         A while pause, and prevail.



         "And shepherd-father, thou

   Whose staff folded my thoughts before my birth,

   Control them now I am of earth, and now

         Thou art no more of earth.



         "O liberal, constant, dear!

   Crush in my nature the ungenerous art

   Of the inferior; set me high, and here,

         Here garner up thy heart."



         Like to him now are they,

   The million living fathers of the War--

   Mourning the crippled world, the bitter day--

         Whose striplings are no more.



         The crippled world!  Come then,

   Fathers of women with your honour in trust;

   Approve, accept, know them daughters of men,

         Now that your sons are dust.