Poems (Chesterton, 1915)/Bay Combe
BAY COMBE
WITH leaves below and leaves above,
And groping under tree and tree,
I found the home of my true love,
Who is a wandering home for me.
Who, lost in ruined worlds aloof,
Bore the dread dove wings like a roof:
Who, past the last lost stars of space
Carried the fire-light on her face.
Who, passing as in idle hours,
Tamed the wild weeds to garden flowers;
Stroked the strange whirlwind's whirring wings,
And made the comets homely things.
Where she went by upon her way
The dark was dearer than the day;
Where she paused in heaven or hell,
The whole world's tale had ended well.
With leaves below and leaves above,
And groping under tree and tree,
I found the home of my true love,
Who is a wandering home for me.
Where she was flung, above, beneath,
By the rude dance of life and death,
Grow she at Gotham—die at Rome,
Between the pine trees is her home.
In some strange town, some silver morn,
She may have wandered to be born;
Stopped at some motley crowd impressed,
And called them kinsfolk for a jest.
If we again in goodness thrive,
And the dead saints become alive,
Then pedants bald and parchments brown
May claim her blood for London town.
But leaves below and leaves above,
And groping under tree and tree,
I found the home of my true love,
Who is a wandering home for me.
The great gravestone she may pass by,
And without noticing, may die;
The streets of silver Heaven may tread,
With her grey awful eyes unfed.
The city of great peace in pain
May pass, until she find again
This little house of holm and fir
God built before the stars for her.
Here in the fallen leaves is furled
Her secret centre of the world.
We sit and feel in dusk and dun
The stars swing round us like a sun.
For leaves below and leaves above,
And groping under tree and tree,
I found the home of my true love,
Who is a wandering home for me.