Dana Burnet: The world’s awry and there are no more dreams!
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Anti-war essays, poems, short stories and literary excerpts
American writers on peace and against war
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Dana Burnet
The Plaint of Pan
Mars has my reed! My pipe of water rush,
Whereon I played the shepherds to their toil,
And whistled up the reaper in the dawn,
And whiled the plowman furrowing the soil.
My reed! My precious pipe! The trill in it
Was lighter than the laugh of water-brooks
‘Twas life itself, I tell you oft and oft
I’ve charmed a savant with it from his books.
And made a wise man of him, too! And then
When twilight hazed the pretty woodland streams,
I’ve led my lovers with a lilt of faith
Until their eyes were wonderful with dreams.
I’ve piped the winding caravans of peace,
And set a singing wind to blow the ships.
Now Mars, the braggart, thieves my pipe away,
And claps it to his rough and blowsy lips.
Jupiter, listen! Does he know the stops?
Can he awake those silver twining airs
By which I bound my world? Hark, as he pipes
Afar the angry strident trumpet blares!
My song is twisted out of all its sweet!
Souls cry in agony! The loosed sword gleams;
Oh, Jupiter, give Pan his pipes again!
The world’s awry and there are no more dreams!
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The Canal
The linked worlds stand in wonder at their bond,
The nations quicken and the two seas stir
The waiting spars make mist along the East.
It is the triumph of a Laborer!
The wonder is the wonder of a soul,
A heart that dreamed in terms of continents,
A hand that wrought with mountains and with seas,
A warrior with no murder in his tents.
Oh, there are poems in the clang of steel!
And mayhap there are songs to sing of steam.
Let others cry the glory of the deed,
I only see the Dreamer and the Dream.
