The long struggle with the city began. Miss Davies wrote short stories, two serials, reams of sentimental verses—anything to keep alive. She turned finally to verse, chiefly because “when the rent is due there’s no time to write a story, only verse can save one in time.”
Her work divides itself into two distinct classes: the hackwork which she does for a living and the genuine poetry which she creates for its own sake. Her first volume _The Drums in Our Street_ (1918) was a mixture of loud bombast and quiet beauty, of blatant war-verse and unaffected lyrics. _Youth Riding_ (1919), although as uneven as its predecessor, is simpler and surer. The poems in _vers libre_ are clearly musical, and her eight-line lyrics are particularly wistful and delicate.
The day before April, Alone, alone, I walked in the woods And I sat on a stone.
I sat on a broad stone And sang to the birds. The tune was God’s making But I made the words.
My apples are heavy upon me. It was the Spring; And proud was I of my petals, Nor dreamed this thing:
That joy could grow to a burden, Or beauty could be Changed from snow-light to heavy To humble me.
Winifred Welles was born at Norwich Town, Connecticut, January 26, 1893, and educated in the vicinity of her home.
Her frail and delicately fashioned lyrics are the distinguishing feature of _The Hesitant Heart_ (1920). This first volume, so appropriately named, has a frank tenderness that never grows maudlin, a wistful introspection that never forgets to sing.
Roaming the lonely garden, he and I Pursue each other to the fountain’s brim, And there grow quiet—woman and butterfly— The frail clouds beckon me, the flowers tempt him.
My thoughts are rose-like, beautiful and bright, Folded precise as petals are, and wings Uplift my dreaming suddenly in flight, And fill my soul with jagged colorings.
The waters tangle like a woman’s hair Above the dim reflection of a face— He thinks those are his own lips laughing there, His own breasts curving under silk and lace.
How shall we know our real selves, he and I, Which is the woman, which the butterfly?
How nakedly an animal Lies down on earth to die, Unmindful of the shining air, And unashamed of sky.
But men and women under roofs Draw shades and hush the floor, And furtively they lay their dead Behind a darkened door.