d ecstasy we pass;
Wind, sun, and earth remain, the birds sing still,
When we are old, are old...." "And when we die
All's over that is ours; and life burns on
Through other lovers, other lips," said I,
--"Heart of my heart, our heaven is now, is won!"

"We are Earth's best, that learnt her lesson here.
Life is our cry. We have kept the faith!" we said:
"We shall go down with unreluctant tread
Rose-crowned into the darkness!" ... Proud we were
And laughed, that had such brave true things to say.
--And then you suddenly cried, and turned away.

The true lover of poetry, it seems to me, cannot but wish that the
"1914" sonnets and the most perfect of the later poems had been
separately issued. The best of Brooke forms a thin sheaf of consummate
beauty, and I imagine that the little edition of "1914 and Other Poems,"
containing the thirty-two later poems, which was published in England
and issued in Garden City by Doubleday, Page & Company in July, 1915, to
save the American copy right, will always be more precious than the
complete edition. As there were only twenty-five copies of this first
American edition, it is extremely rare and will undoubtedly be sought
after by collectors. But for one who is interested to trace the growth
of Brooke's power, the steadying of his poetic orbit and the mounting
flame of his joy in life, the poems of 1908-11 are an instructive study.
From the perfected brutality of _Jealousy_ or _Menelaus and Helen_ or
_A Channel Passage_ (these bite like Meredith) we see him passing to
sonnets that taste of Shakespeare and foretell his utter mastery of the
form. What could better the wit and beauty of this song:

"Oh! Love," they said, "is King of Kings,
And Triumph is his crown.
Earth fades in flame before his wings,
And Sun and Moon bow down."
But that, I knew, would never do;
And Heaven is all too high.
So whenever I meet a Queen, I said,
I will not catch her eye.

"Oh! Love," they said, and "Love," they said,
"The Gift of Love is this;
A crown of thorns about thy head,
And vinegar to thy kiss!"--
But Tragedy is not for me;
And I'm content to be gay.
So whenever I spied a Tragic Lady,
I went another way.

And so I never feared to see
You wander down the street,
Or come across the fields to me
On ordinary feet.
For what they'd never