Clive Hamilton > Quotes

“That music could have crumbled proud belief
With doubt, or in the bosom of the sage
Madden the heart that had outmastered grief,
And flood with tears the eyes of frozen age
And turn the young man's feet to pilgrimage -
So sharp it was, so sure a path it found,
Soulward with stabbing wounds of bitter sound.
- Dymer, Canto I, v. 24”
― Clive Hamilton / CS Lewis

“Thank God that there are solid folk
Who water flowers and roll the lawn,
And sit an sew and talk and smoke,
And snore all through the summer dawn.
Who pass untroubled nights and days
Full-fed and sleepily content,
Rejoicing in each other's praise,
Respectable and innocent.”
― Clive Hamilton, Spirits in Bondage: A Cycle of Lyrics

“Last night I dreamed that I was come again
Unto the house where my beloved dwells
After long years of wandering and pain.
And I stood out beneath the drenching rain
And all the street was bare, and black with night,
But in my true love's house was warmth and light.
Yet I could not draw near nor enter in,
And long I wondered if some secret sin
Or old, unhappy anger held me fast;
Till suddenly it came into my head
That I was killed long since and lying dead—
Only a homeless wraith that way had passed.”
― Clive Hamilton, Spirits in Bondage: A Cycle of Lyrics

“God!...Once the lying spirit of a cause
With maddening words dethrones the mind of men,
They're past the reach of prayer. The eternal laws
Hate them. Their eyes will not come clean again,
But doom and strong delusion drive them then
Without ruth, without rest…the iron laughter
Of the immortal mouths goes hooting after.
- Dymer, Canto IV, v. 29”
― Clive Hamilton / CS Lewis

“It was no nightmare now with fiery stream
Too horrible to last, able to blend
Itself and all things in one hurrying dream;
It was the waking world that will not end
Because hearts break, that is not foe nor friend,
Where sane and settled knowledge first appears
Of work-day desolation, with no tears.
- Dymer, Canto IV, v. 10”
― Clive Hamilton / CS Lewis

“And O, my poor Despoina, do you think he ever hears
The wail of hearts he has broken, the sound of human ill?
He cares not for our virtues, our little hopes and fears,
And how could it all go on, love, if he knew of laughter and tears?
Ah, sweet, if a man could cheat him! If you could flee away
Into some other country beyond the rosy West,
To hide in the deep forests and be for ever at rest
From the rankling hate of God and the outworn world's decay!”
― Clive Hamilton, Spirits in Bondage: A Cycle of Lyrics