Evening star., 1923-03-06
NEW BOOKS
AT RANDOM
THE BLACK PANTHERi BOOK OF

ding. These two, it seems. set out
about together-on that day Wnen
man lifted himself up. and stood,
looking across in dull wonder upon
the beauty and the terror of the
world The terror was close. IL
tr;liled him hour and day. The beau-
ty. a little blurred and distant, new
ertheless stirred new feelings within
him. Tumbling sounds to express
this lift of emotion must have come.
Gestures of appeal to the dread Nov
er of Things must have followed.
Poetry and religion, thus born,
moved forward together for ages. the
one the voice of the other. Then
learning overlook man. The mania
of words seized upon him. The pas
sion for ceremonial postures pos
seSsed him. And later. the world
opened wider and more wide, there
were invented signs. formulas, ciassi-
fications. to preserve order in
packed and crowded world of facts.
And these forms bore hard on both
poetry and religion, which by this
time had gone their separate ways.
Both rose to splendor through the
sence. Both sank TO impotency under
the burden of the forms imposed upon
them. To be sure, there were along
this way outbreakings of former fires,
but these, too. were smothered out by
the press OF the machinery above
them. Poetry. like religion. became
negligible. the pleasure of the few
with leisure. a little power to think.
"a little capacity to feel. The world
today is SO full of number of
ings and air talkings. money, no
money. and all the rest of the be-
deviling business of getting along
that only the driving things are con-
sidered And in this situation the
poet has pretty nearly gone under.
There is no atmosphere. no soil for
poetry. and IT. like other live things.
perishes without the support of soil
and air. If poet survives nova
days he does 1t from the inner urge
sturdy will to live. But now and then
one does survive, to the joy Of the
handful of folks standing round
about him.
And here is one of them-John Hall
Wheelock-offering poems of so high
quality In form and substance as to
identify him with earlier days of po-
etc inspiration. 1t is a little book
with but a single theme. This theme.
however. covers the supreme point of
HuiiidH interest ana concern. What
am /? What is life? What Is this
within me that drives me SO, that
bewilders me. that sometimes terri
f1es me? What is my soul? Where
did / get it? Where is 1t going? OF
what greater thing is it a part?
What am to the rest of life? Where
and what are my contacts with this
great unity of existence? What is
the drift and direction of the whole
Just the puzzle Of existence. Won
see, taken in and brooded upon by
the poet who turns the whole into
query, Importantly, demand. lust
a4other one trying to beguile or to
force the Sphinx into speech. The
author comes upon his single theme
from various ways of approach and
through a wide range of poetic
imagery. In one and another Of these
poems the imagery dwells upon Gagged
creatures. as the soul is Gagged:
There Is panther Gagged within
And in The Lion House.:
In vain. proud Force! might
Shrewder than yours did spin
Around your rage that bright
Prison of steel, wherein
You pace for my delight
And my heart, what doom.
What warier will has wrought
fhe cage within whose room
PAGES your burning thought
For the delight of whom
An outlook upon life. this, in Blind
Players:
Day breaks and the old drama
Repeats itself anew:
The hind wakes to be hunted,
The huntsman to pursue.
The soaring of a fish hawk becomes
here the ecstasy of motion, a vision
of power-slow, majestic, uplifted-
as this creature of the air takes pos
session Of its wide domain. sea
HOriZOnS.'
spreads the in3nity Of all space be-
fore one and, in effect, dissolves one
out of his own bodily self into a far
native kinship with this immensity OF
space. Strange power to be able to
fill space-just empty space-with the
whole Of life in it's real Significance.
The Divine Fantasy" Is the poets
conception of what-to the man on
thinking about when he created the
world and the life upon it. Or, was
He thinking?
A gloomy spirit back of this work?
No, not gloomy-not exactly. Despair
tiles merely tinge the whole. This is
a modern man. He sees and thinks
out of the drift and color of the
present. He, therefore, does not create
poetry on the basis of old. blithe ac-
does he sit in judgment on the work
of a good God. Rather. does he hold
himself, austerely, to his conception
Of the great plan as this is glimpsed
occasionally and distantly through
the medium of modern thought. Aus
terity-that's the word. That domi-
mates the whole-an austerity of
mood that controls both the thoughts
and the form. Yet, 1t is very beauti-
full For this is, in no sense, the
severe parsimony of the Puritan. 1t
is a rich thing that goes away back
as far as Hebrew source for some Of
its most searching and impassioned
words The thoughts here are so
impressive. the beauty of the verse
is so clear in it's rhythmic call, the
imagery is so fine, the touch with
the world of nature is SO close that
one cannot get out of calling this a
body of poetry that is bound to live
One does not wish to get out of it,
since the pleasure here is an abiding
one, an enjoyment that keeps one
company long after the mere reading
has been set aside.
John Hall Wheelock? A poet, as you
know-but this one judges a little
ing going on. 1t would be that way,
vet, certainly. Harvard, 1908. Travel
in Europe. Study all the time. Yes, he
has written other things. The HUI
man Fantasy'-a narrative Of city
life. but you may be sure this is no
enumeration of city facts. 1t is real
ism lifted from the mess of things.
"The Beloved Adventure Is a song of
the sea and of love. One does not see
this writer in any intimate personal
relations. His poetry does not At him
into that kind Of picture. However
here is certainly poet of whom 1t
is our good business to be proud.
/ G. NJ