Yog Sothothery - The Definitive H.P. Lovecraft Anthology

by H. P. Lovecraft

And leave with lessen’d weight upon his back!

  To Laurie A. Sawyer

  As Christmas snows (as yet a poet’s trope)

  Call back one’s bygone days of youth and hope,

  Four metrick lines I send—they’re quite enough—

  Tho’ once I fancy’d I could write the stuff!

  To Sonia H. Greene

  Once more the ancient feast returns,

  And the bright hearth domestic burns

  With Yuletide’s added blaze;

  So, too, may all your joys increase

  Midst floods of mem’ry, love, and peace,

  And dreams of Halcyon days.

  To Rheinhart Kleiner

  St. John, whose art sublimely shines

  In liquid odes and melting lines,

  Let Theobald his regard express

  In verse of lesser loveliness.

  As now in regal state appear

  The festive hours of Yuletide cheer,

  My strongest wish is that you may

  Feel ev’ry blessing of the day!

  To Felis (Frank Belknap Long’s cat)

  Little Tiger, burning bright

  With a subtle Blakeish light,

  Tell what visions have their home

  In those eyes of flame and chrome!

  Children vex thee—thoughtless, gay—

  Holding when thou wouldst away:

  What dark lore is that which thou,

  Spitting, mixest with thy meow?

  To Annie E. P. Gamwell

  As when a pigeon, loos’d in realms remote,

  Takes instant wing, and seeks his native cote,

  So speed my blessings from a barb’rous clime

  To thee and Providence at Christmas time!

  To Felis (Frank Belknap Long’s cat)

  Haughty Sphinx, whose amber eyes

  Hold the secrets of the skies,

  As thou ripplest in thy grace,

  Round the chairs and chimney-place,

  Scorn on thy patrician face:

  Hiss not harsh, nor use thy claws

  On the hand that gives applause—

  Good-will only doth abide

  In these lines at Christmastide!

  An American to Mother England

  Written: January 1916

  First Published: Poesy,

  Vol. 1, No. 7 (January 1916), Page 62

  England! My England! Can the surging sea

  That lies between us tear my heart from thee?

  Can distant birth and distant dwelling drain

  Th’ ancestral blood that warms the loyal vein?

  Isle of my Fathers! hear the filial song

  Of him whose sources but to thee belong!

  World-conquering Mother! by thy mighty hand

  Was carv’d from savage wilds my native land:

  Thy matchless sons the firm foundation laid;

  Thy matchless arts the nascent nation made:

  By thy just laws the young republic grew,

  And thro’ thy greatness, kindred greatness knew:

  What man that springs from thy untainted line

  But sees Columbia’s virtues all as thine?

  Whilst nameless multitudes upon our shore

  From the dim corners of creation pour,

  Whilst mongrel slaves crawl hither to partake

  Of Saxon liberty they could not make,

  From such an alien crew in grief I turn,

  And for the mother’s voice of Britain burn.

  England! Can aught remove the cherish’d chain

  That binds my spirit to thy blest domain?

  Can Revolution’s bitter precepts sway

  The soul that must the ties of race obey?

  Create a new Columbia if ye will;

  The flesh that forms me is Britannic still!

  Hail! oaken shades, and meads of dewy green,

  So oft in sleep, yet ne’er in waking seen.

  Peal out, ye ancient chimes, from vine-clad tow’r

  Where pray’d my fathers in a vanish’d hour:

  What countless years of rev’rence can ye claim

  From bygone worshippers that bore my name!

  Their forms are crumbling in the vaults around,

  Whilst I, across the sea, but dream the sound.

  Return, Sweet Vision! Let me glimpse again

  The stone-built abbey, rising o’er the plain;

  The neighb’ring village with its sun-show’r’d square;

  The shaded mill-stream, and the forest fair,

  The hedge-lin’d lane, that leads to rustic cot

  Where sweet contentment is the peasant’s lot;

  The mystic grove, by Druid wraiths possess’d,

  The flow’ring fields, with fairy-castles blest:

  And the old manor-house, sedate and dark,

  Set in the shadows of the wooded park.

  Can this be dreaming? Must my eyelids close

  That I may catch the fragrance of the rose?

  Is it in fancy that the midnight vale

  Thrills with the warblings of the nightingale?

  A golden moon bewitching radiance yields,

  And England’s fairies trip o’er England’s fields.

  England! Old England! in my love for thee

  No dream is mine, but blessed memory;

  Such haunting images and hidden fires

  Course with the bounding blood of British sires:

  From British bodies, minds, and souls I come,

  And from them draw the vision of their home.

  Awake, Columbia! scorn the vulgar age

  That bids thee slight thy lordly heritage.

  Let not the wide Atlantic’s wildest wave

  Burst the blest bonds that fav’ring Nature gave:

  Connecting surges ’twixt the nations run,

  Our Saxon souls dissolving into one!

  Lines on Gen. Robert Edward Lee

  Written: 18th May 1916

  First Published: The Coyote,

  Vol. 3, No. 1 (January 1917), Pages 1-2

  “Si veris magna paratur

  Fama bonis, et si successu nuda remoto

  Inspicitur virtus, quicquid laudamus in ullo

  Majorum, fortuna fuit.”

  —Lucan.

  Whilst martial echoes o’er the wave resound,

  And Europe’s gore incarnadines the ground;

  Today no foreign hero we bemoan,

  But count the glowing virtues of our own!

  Illustrious LEE! around whose honour’d name

  Entwines a patriot’s and a Christian’s fame;

  With whose just praise admiring nations ring,

  And whom repenting foes contritely sing!

  When first our land fraternal fury bore,

  And Sumter’s guns alarm’d the anxious shore;

  When Faction’s reign ancestral rights o’erthrew,

  And sunder’d States a mutual hatred knew;

  Then clash’d contending chiefs of kindred line,

  In flesh to suffer and in fame to shine.

  But o’er them all, majestic in his might,

  Rose LEE, unrivall’d, to sublimest height:

  With torturing choice defy’d opposing Fate,

  And shunn’d Temptation for his native State!

  Thus Washington his monarch’s rule o’erturn’d

  When young Columbia with rebellion burn’d.

  And what in Washington the world reveres,

  In LEE with equal magnitude appears.

  Our nation’s Father, crown’d with vict’ry’s bays,

  Enjoys a loving land’s eternal praise:

  Let, then, our hearts with equal rev’rence greet

  His proud successor, rising o’er defeat!

  Around his greatness pour disheartening woes,

  But still he tow’rs above his conqu’ring foes.

  Silence! ye jackal herd that vainly blame

  Th’ unspotted leader by a traitor’s name:

  If
such was LEE, let blushing Justice mourn,

  And trait’rous Liberty endure our scorn!

  As Philopoemen once sublimely strove,

  And earn’d declining Hellas’ thankful love;

  So follow’d LEE the purest patriot’s part,

  And wak’d the worship of the grateful heart:

  The South her soul in body’d form discerns;

  The North from LEE a nobler freedom learns!

  Attend! ye sons of Albion’s ancient race,

  Whate’er your country, and whate’er your place:

  LEE’S valiant deeds, tho’ dear to Southern song,

  To all our Saxon strain as well belong.

  Courage like his the parent Island won,

  And led an Empire past the setting sun;

  To realms unknown our laws and language bore;

  Rais’d England’s banner on the desert shore;

  Crush’d the proud rival, and subdu’d the sea

  For ages past, and aeons yet to be!

  From Scotia’s hilly bounds the paean rolls,

  And Afric’s distant Cape great LEE extols;

  The sainted soul and manly mien combine

  To grace Britannia’s and Virginia's line!

  As dullards now in thoughtless fervour prate

  Of shameful peace, and sing th’ unmanly State;

  As churls their piping reprobations shriek,

  And damn the heroes that protect the weak;

  Let LEE’S brave shade the timid throng accost,

  And give them back the manhood they have lost!

  What kindlier spirit, breathing from on high,

  Can teach us how to live and how to die?

  The Rose of England

  Written: October 1916

  First Published: The Scot,

  No. 14 (October 1916), Page 7

  At morn the rosebud greets the sun

  And sheds the evening dew,

  Expanding ere the day is done,

  In bloom of radiant hue;

  And when the sun his rest hath found,

  Rose-petals strow the garden round!

  Thus that blest Isle that owns the Rose

  From mist and darkness came,

  A million glories to disclose,

  And spread BRITANNIA’S name;

  And ere Life’s Sun shall leave the blue,

  ENGLAND shall reign the whole world thro’!

  The Peace Advocate

  Written: May 1917

  First Published: The Tryout,

  Vol. 3, No. 6 (May 1917), Pages 12-14

  (Supposed to be a “pome”, but cast strictly in modern metre.)

  The vicar sat in the firelight’s glow,

  A volume in his hand;

  And a tear he shed for the widespread woe,

  And the anguish brought by the vicious foe

  That overran the land.

  But ne’er a hand for his King rais’d he,

  For he was a man of peace;

  And he car’d not a whit for the victory

  That must come to preserve his nation free,

  And the world from fear release.

  His son had buckled on his sword,

  The first at the front was he;

  But the vicar his valiant child ignor’d,

  And his noble deeds in the field deplor’d,

  For he knew not bravery.

  On his flock he strove to fix his will,

  And lead them to scorn the fray.

  He told them that conquest brings but ill;

  That meek submission would serve them still

  To keep the foe away.

  In vain did he hear the bugle’s sound

  That strove to avert the fall.

  The land, quoth he, is all men’s ground,

  What matter if friend or foe be found

  As master of us all?

  One day from the village green hard by

  The vicar heard a roar

  Of cannon that rivall’d the anguish’d cry

  Of the hundreds that liv’d, but wish’d to die

  As the enemy rode them o’er.

  Now he sees his own cathedral shake

  At the foeman’s wanton aim.

  The ancient tow’rs with the bullets quake;

  The steeples fall, the foundations break,

  And the whole is lost in flame.

  Up the vicarage lane file the cavalcade,

  And the vicar, and daughter, and wife

  Scream out in vain for the needed aid

  That only a regiment might have made

  Ere they lose what is more than life.

  Then quick to his brain came manhood’s thought,

  As he saw his erring course;

  And the vicar his dusty rifle brought

  That the foe might at least by one be fought,

  And force repaid with force.

  One shot—the enemy’s blasting fire

  A breach in the wall cuts thro’,

  But the vicar replies with his waken’d ire;

  Fells one arm’d brute for each fallen spire,

  And in blood is born anew.

  Two shots—the wife and daughter sink,

  Each with a mortal wound;

  And the vicar, too madden’d by far to think,

  Rushes boldly on to death’s vague brink,

  With the manhood he has found.

  Three shots—but shots of another kind

  The smoky regions rend;

  And upon the foeman with rage gone blind,

  Like a ceaseless, resistless, avenging wind,

  The rescuing troops descend.

  The smoke-pall clears, and the vicar’s son

  His father’s life has sav’d;

  And the vicar looks o’er the ruin done,

  Ere the vict’ry by his child was won,

  His face with care engrav’d.

  The vicar sat in the firelight’s glow,

  The volume in his hand,

  That brought to his hearth the bitter woe

  Which only a husband and father can know,

  And truly understand.

  With a chasten’d mien he flung the book

  To the leaping flames before;

  And a breath of sad relief he took

  As the pages blacken’d beneath his look—

  The fool of Peace no more!

  Epilogue

  The rev’rend parson, wak’d to man’s estate,

  Laments his wife’s and daughter’s common fate.

  His martial son in warm embrace enfolds,

  And clings the tighter to the child he holds.

  His peaceful notions, banish’d in an hour,

  Will nevermore his wit or sense devour;

  But steep’d in truth, ’tis now his nobler plan

  To cure, yet recognise, the faults of man.

  Ode for July Fourth, 1917

  Written: July 1917

  First Published:The United Amateur,

  Vol. 16, No. 9 (July 1917), Page 121

  As Columbia’s brave scions, in anger array’d,

  Once defy’d a proud monarch and built a new nation;

  ’Gainst their brothers of Britain unsheath’d the sharp blade

  That hath ne’er met defeat nor endur’d desecration;

  So must we in this hour

  Show our valour and pow’r,

  And dispel the black perils that over us low’r:

  Whilst the sons of Britannia, no longer our foes,

  Will rejoice in our triumphs and strengthen our blows!

  See the banners of Liberty float in the breeze

  That plays light o’er the regions our fathers defended;

  Hear the voice of the million resound o’er the leas,

  As the deeds of the past are proclaim’d and commended;

  And in splendour on high

  Where our flags proudly fly,

  See the folds we tore down flung again to the sky:

  For the Emblem of England,
in kinship unfurl’d,

  Shall divide with Old Glory the praise of the world!

  Bury’d now are the hatreds of subject and King,

  And the strife that once sunder’d an Empire hath vanish’d.

  With the fame of the Saxon the heavens shall ring

  As the vultures of darkness are baffled and banish’d;

  And the broad British sea,

  Of her enemies free,

  Shall in tribute bow gladly, Columbia to thee:

  For the friends of the Right, in the field side by side,

  Form a fabric of Freedom no hand can divide!

  The Conscript

  Written: 1918?

  First Published:A Winter Wish.

  By H. P. Lovecraft, Edited by Tom Collins.

  Chapel Hill, NC: Whispers Press (1977), Pages 117-118

  I am a peaceful working man—

  I am not wise or strong—

  But I can follow Nature’s plan

  In labour, rest, and song.

  One day the men that rule us all

  Decided we must die,

  Else pride and freedom surely fall

  In the dim bye and bye.

  They told me I must write my name

  Upon a scroll of death;

  That some day I should rise to fame

  By giving up my breath.

  I do not know what I have done

  That I should thus be bound

  To wait for tortures one by one,

  And then an unmark’d mound.

  I hate no man, and yet they say

  That I must fight and kill;

  That I must suffer day by day

  To please a master’s will.

  I used to have a conscience free,

  But now they bid it rest;

  They’ve made a number out of me,

  And I must ne’er protest.

  They tell of trenches, long and deep,

  Fill’d with the mangled slain;

  They talk till I can scarcely sleep,

  So reeling is my brain.

  They tell of filth, and blood, and woe;

  Of things beyond belief;

  Of things that make me tremble so

  With mingled fright and grief.

  I do not know what I shall do—

  Is not the law unjust?

  I can’t do what they want me to,

  And yet they say I must!

  Each day my doom doth nearer bring;

  Each day the State prepares;

  Sometimes I feel a watching thing

  That stares, and stares, and stares.

  I never seem to sleep—my head