FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
FIRST POEMS & FRAGMENTS 
 
 BY 
 
 PHILIP HENRY SAVAGE 
 
 BOSTON 
 
 COPELAND AND DAY 
 I8 95 
 
COPYRIGHT BY COPELAND AND DAY MDCCCXCV 
 
TO GERTRUDE SAVAGE 
 
 A WINDING WATER ONWARD FLOWS, 
 AND WHITHER, ONLY OCEAN KNOWS j 
 HAPPY THE CRYSTAL SOURCE THAT LIES 
 REFLECTING IN ITS HEART THE SKIES. 
 
 305586 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 DEDICATION 
 
 APOLOGY 
 
 SHORTER POEMS. I -XXVIII Page 3 
 
 LONGER POEMS. I -VII 31 
 
 SONNETS. I -XVI 59 
 
 FRAGMENTS. I-V 81 
 
APOLOGY 
 
 BE more concrete, immediate to man ! 
 So did he counsel me, the sage; and I, 
 Taking for naught the gentle guidances 
 Of nature, who in all my life before 
 Had lived unconscious, leaving much to her, 
 I cast her out; so I forgot the sky 
 And turned my eyes into the heart of man. 
 But poetry is a swift, unconscious growth, 
 Springs native where it may, and ever lives 
 The child of impulse unaware and wild; 
 And passion many times must rise and fall 
 And much of life be lived before the word 
 Spring up to utterance and demand a birth. 
 So was I barren many days and so 
 I doubted him, the sage and moralist ; 
 Therefore at last I claimed again the days 
 When I was not so much and nature more, 
 When beauty rose, if beauty it were, and clothed 
 A happy impulse or a strong desire 
 In forms and colors native to the time. 
 
SHORTER POEMS 
 I -XXVIII 
 
^T^ IS grace to sing to nature, and to pray 
 JL The God of nature, out of His large heart, 
 
 To grant us knowledge of His human way; 
 This is the whole of nature and of art. 
 
 II 
 
 EVEN in the city, I 
 Am ever conscious of the sky ; 
 A portion of its frame no less 
 Than in the open wilderness. 
 The stars are in my heart by night; 
 I sing beneath the opening light, 
 As envious of the bird ; I live 
 Upon the pavement, yet I give 
 My soul to every growing tree 
 That in the narrow ways I see. 
 My heart is in the blade of grass 
 Within the courtyard where I pass ; 
 And the small, half-discovered cloud 
 Compels me till I cry aloud. 
 I am the wind that beats the walls 
 And wanders trembling till it falls ; 
 The snow, the summer rain am I, 
 In close communion with the sky. 
 
FIRST POEMS . & FRAGMENTS 
 
 III 
 
 WHEN I look on Ossipee 
 Not the hill alone I see ; 
 Not the hill I see to-day 
 Fair and large and distant gray, 
 But a mountain richly bright, 
 Shining with eternal light. 
 Fashioned in a fearful past, 
 Born to be while life shall last, 
 Yet I fear thee not, but know 
 Thou shalt ever with me go. 
 I shall see thee, I shall find 
 The vision ever in the mind, 
 Given to me one happy hour 
 And received by me in power; 
 I shall never know the day 
 When thy touch has passed away; 
 For thy spirit, Ossipee, 
 Has become a part of me. 
 
 IV 
 
 UPON a pasture hill a pine-tree stands 
 And in the air holds up its slender hands; 
 A double sheep-track turns beneath the tree, 
 Dips to the firs, and seeks the meadow lands. 
 
 4 
 
SHORTER POEMS 
 
 The sun is setting ; slowly, one by one, 
 Faint breaths of wind along the branches run; 
 
 The quiet of the hills is on the air 
 And on the earth beneath a quiet sun. 
 
 
 
 In contrast with the sky a gray stone wall 
 Is black beneath the orange light j and all 
 
 The earth is black ; never so black the earth 
 As underneath a sunset sky in fall. 
 
 The pine-tree s plumy branches make a net 
 And hold the light of heaven ; and nearer yet, 
 
 Cold in the unfeatured blackness of the ground, 
 Up-springs a ray from some hid rivulet, 
 
 Deep in the pasture hummocks at my feet ; 
 I hear its icy ripple, low and sweet; 
 
 No other sound ; but in the air, unheard, 
 I hear the pulse of winter coldly beat. 
 
 WHAT know I of the fields of fall, 
 The autumn days beyond the town? 
 I do not hear the harvest-call, 
 I do not see the pastures brown ; 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 The upland sloping to the down, 
 With corn-shocks leaning on the wall ; 
 And golden ground-fruit shining through it all, 
 
 They tell me of the violet 
 
 Upon the hill, bare at the crest; 
 Of the autumnal primrose set 
 
 Deep where the banks protect it best ; 
 
 Of summer fallow fields now drest 
 In green ; of meadows deep and wet ; 
 Ah ! I have seen and I shall not forget ! 
 
 Where stubble-fields give way to fern 
 In meadows where the water lies, 
 
 I ve seen the sharp-flamed sumac burn 
 And flash its fires before my eyes. 
 Faint pictures of the river rise 
 
 With blowing mist beyond the turn ; 
 
 Of lean November forests bare and stern. 
 
 I once have seen; and all the kind 
 Stood round me in that happy year ; 
 
 In one bright impulse of the mind 
 I was the centre of the sphere; 
 The spring and summer centred here 
 
 On autumn; winter stood behind 
 
 And beckoned, whispering in the smoky wind. 
 
 6 
 
SHORTER POEMS 
 
 VI 
 
 THE sea is silent round this rocky shore ; 
 The forest wind 
 
 From the loud level beach behind 
 Brings rolling up the distant water s roar. 
 
 Silent the wheeling sea-gull in the air, 
 
 Without a cry ; 
 
 Far off beneath the bending sky 
 A silent ship goes down the ocean stair. 
 
 The sea is blue, the sky is white with cloud, 
 
 The land is white ; 
 
 The seaward rocks are shining bright, 
 Enwrapped in a white, salt, and icy shroud. 
 
 The weeds and bushes bare above the snow, 
 
 Against the sun 
 
 Hold up brave stems, and many a one 
 Has February bits of bud to show. 
 
 Where roses grew in one wild garden-close 
 
 I pulled away 
 
 A pair of rose-hips for to-day ; 
 Memorial to the mistress of the rose. 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 VII 
 
 WHEN February sun shines cold 
 There comes a day when in the air 
 The wings of winter slow unfold 
 And show the golden summer there. 
 
 Dead ivy on the winter wall 
 Is glowing with an April light ; 
 
 And all the wreckage of the fall 
 Above the snow comes into sight. 
 
 By a green rock beneath the pines 
 Are shadows blue along the snow. 
 
 Above the silent sun the lines 
 Of cloud in white procession go. 
 
 A bloom is on the forest tops 
 
 Of red light bursting through the brown. 
 The ice awakes, and silver drops 
 
 Come through the meadow stealing down. 
 
 The sky is hushed ; beneath the trees 
 Where silentness and night have birth, 
 
 I heard the sunset whisper, Peace ! 
 
 Peace, Peace ! the gods are on the earth. 
 
 8 
 
SHORTER POEMS 
 
 VIII 
 
 STILL, in the meadow by the brook I lay 
 And felt the April creep along my streams, 
 Subdue my currents to herself and play 
 
 At hide-and-seek with winter in my dreams. 
 
 Rich in the summer day the time is rife 
 With all an eager fancy will contrive ; 
 
 But April welcomes each new shock of life 
 The sluggard winter from the heart to drive. 
 
 Thus did I tremble at the passing bird, 
 
 Leaped in the sun and with the breezes ran, 
 
 My heart a brook, and all my life a word 
 To tell how near to nature is a man. 
 
 IX 
 
 IN the first pale flush of even 
 When the sun is hardly down, 
 Ere the stars are in the heaven, 
 Ere the shadows turn to brown ; 
 
 When the eastern sky is darkened 
 And the zenith still is blue, 
 
FIRST POEMS & FRAGMENTS 
 
 I have stood and dimly hearkened 
 To the falling of the dew. 
 
 I have stood within the hollow 
 By low, rolling hummocks made, 
 
 Close beside a sloping fallow 
 In the bottom of a glade, 
 
 While the west was slowly dying ; 
 
 And the dark east followed fast, 
 Swarming over, swiftly flying 
 
 Till the world was overcast, 
 
 Downward, past the dim horizon 
 Till the valley filled with night, 
 
 And the cool earth-whisper rising, 
 Filled me with a wild delight! 
 
 Let the day go by to even. 
 
 Hark ! the distant vespers toll. 
 When the sun is set in heaven 
 
 It is sunrise in the soul. 
 
 X 
 
 WHEN evening comes and shadows gray 
 Steal out across the glimmering bay 
 And tremble in the air between; 
 
 10 
 
SHORTER POEMS 
 
 When evening comes and shadows green 
 Are shaken down across the moor 
 From willow-trees along the shore ; 
 
 When evening stoops across the hill 
 Towards the sunset glowing still 
 And fills the hollow glens with shade; 
 
 When evening gathers in the glade ; 
 And all the little beasts now run 
 That erst were hidden from the sun ; 
 
 Then do I hear the footsteps fall 
 That bitter day hears not at all ; 
 Then is the sunset like a door 
 That leads me on to more and more, 
 Till in the quietness of night 
 I find a freedom and a light 
 Eternal such as nowhere glows 
 From any sun that ever rose. 
 
 XI 
 
 WITH all the soul within me and suppressed 
 Before the sunset, heard I, and confessed, 
 A breath of God from out the whispered hand 
 Held o er the lips of the great speaking west. 
 
 n 
 
FIRST POEMS & FRAGMENTS 
 
 Heard it, and all the soul within me burned ! 
 Heard it, and wondered at the secret learned ; 
 
 And all the busy accidents of life 
 O erwhelmed it then ; it never has returned. 
 
 Thus once the doors of heaven wide open stand ; 
 The voice is heard, of promise or command ; 
 
 Is seen the gleam ; and then the portals close 
 And nature grows again upon the land. 
 
 XII 
 
 I LOVE to walk against the yellow light, 
 The lemon-yellow of the first daylight, 
 When cold and clear above the frozen earth 
 The white sun rises far down to the right. 
 
 And then to think of life is very sweet ; 
 The shackles fall and drop about one s feet ; 
 
 Till in the clear forgetfulness of morn 
 It seems the world and life are all complete. 
 
 12 
 
SHORTER POEMS 
 
 T is good to be forgotten and forget ; 
 To look upon the sun and so beget 
 
 A golden present, and a past that s free, 
 A little time, of memory and regret. 
 
 And when one strikes and stumbles on a stone, 
 And turns to find the winged fancies flown 
 
 Yet through the passages of life that day 
 Will run a radiance other than its own. 
 
 XIII 
 
 THE flash of sunlight from a bit of glass 
 Has often power to stop me as I pass ; 
 And when I turn into the burning west 
 I fling me down upon the sunny grass, 
 
 Silent. I tell not all the little things 
 That fly to me and give my spirit wings ; 
 
 The black-eyed bird, the cloud, the silver leaf, 
 The valley wind that passes as it sings. 
 
 And when the sun descending from the height, 
 Seeks in the sunken west the bath of night, 
 
 Wrapped in the darkling mantle of the sky 
 I wander forth and seek a new delight. 
 
FIRST POEMS & FRAGMENTS 
 
 XIV 
 
 THE influences of air and sky 
 Are side lights from the eternal throne 
 That fall upon the watchful eye 
 Of him who silent waits, alone, 
 And crown him master of his own. 
 He knows the beauty of the rose; 
 The central sun, the farthest star he knows. 
 
 The balance of a blade of grass, 
 
 The winds that in the meadows run, 
 
 Gathering incense as they pass 
 To offer to the throned sun; 
 The trembling secret to be won 
 
 From every running stream ; all these 
 
 Are his, yet force him, silent, to his knees. 
 
 The watcher shall possess the earth 
 In silence, leaping to control 
 
 In moments mighty with the birth 
 Of passion, when the eternal soul 
 Shall wholly bind him to the whole. 
 
 The air, the sky, the winds, the rose, 
 
 Are his; the earth, and God Himself he knows, 
 
 To H. F. L. 
 
SHORTER POEMS 
 
 XV 
 
 A LARK flew by upon the air 
 And struck a red leaf from the tree, 
 There where he lighted; and a pair 
 Of robins bore him company. 
 And I, I looked across the lea, 
 Across the autumn uplands bare, 
 Then turned again and saw him sitting there. 
 
 Thy life is mine, thou meadow-lark ; 
 
 Within thy golden breast I feel 
 My own heart beating, and I hark 
 
 And hear thy voice upon me steal, 
 
 Winning my own; and past repeal 
 I give myself to thee and mark 
 These few words here upon this maple s bark ; 
 
 That " I am Thou and Thou art I; " 
 Cutting it deep that it may show 
 
 To future years ; and, by and by, 
 When, as the tree shall lofty grow, 
 The woodman comes to lay it low, 
 
 This word shall stand before his eye, 
 
 That " I am Thou," writ clear, " and Thou art V 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 XVI 
 
 THIS is thy brother, this poor silver fish, 
 Close to the surface, dying in his dish ; 
 Thy flesh, thy beating heart, thy very life ; 
 All this, I say, art thou, against thy wish. 
 
 Thou mayst not turn away, thou shalt allow 
 The truth, nor shalt thou dare to question how : 
 There is but one great heart in nature beating, 
 And this is thy heart, this, I say, art thou. 
 
 In all thy power and all thy pettiness, 
 With this and that poor selfish purpose, this 
 And that high-climbing fancy, and a heart 
 Caught into heaven or cast in the abyss, 
 
 Thou art the same with all the little earth, 
 A little part ; and sympathy of birth 
 
 Shall tell thee, and thine openness of soul, 
 What fear is death and what a life is worth. 
 
 16 
 
SHORTER POEMS 
 
 XVII 
 
 FAR in the south the redwings hear and speed 
 To answer nature s far-heard northern cry ; 
 Swift from the fields they gather and take on 
 The burden of a journey ; young and old 
 Swing upward to the sun as if the need 
 Of earth and of her comfort were gone by. 
 And guided by the star of memory run 
 Upon the trembling air ; if, losing hold, 
 With weary wing one settle to the land ; 
 If, sideways glancing from the flight, one see 
 A fairer light than hope, or faltering 
 Another answer to the white command 
 Hurled upward from the gun : yet joyfully 
 The happy flight speeds onward with the spring. 
 
 XVIII 
 
 THOU little god within the brook 
 That dwellest, friend of man, 
 I oft have heard the simple prayer 
 Thou tellest unto Pan : 
 
 That he who comes with rod and line 
 
 And robs thy life to-day, 
 May yet by the great god be taught 
 
 To come some other way. 
 
 17 
 
FIRST POEMS & FRAGMENTS 
 
 XIX 
 
 WHERE man has conquered nature dies; 
 We shift some slender-growing pine 
 From out her own familiar skies 
 
 Where-under forests fall and rise, 
 
 To pots and gardens, then repine 
 That where man conquers nature dies. 
 
 The atmosphere that round her lies 
 
 Bears not the light that used to shine 
 From out her own familiar skies, 
 
 She is a stranger. So our eyes 
 
 Run o er the world and seek a sign ! 
 If where man conquers nature dies 
 
 What is our earthly paradise ? 
 
 Will nature there withhold the wine 
 That from her own familiar skies 
 
 She used to pour ? Do we devise 
 
 A garden earth and say, in fine, 
 Where man has conquered nature dies 
 From out her own familiar skies ? 
 
 18 
 
SHORTER POEMS 
 
 XX 
 
 THE breath of slowly-moving spring 
 Stirs the light leaf, the doubtful wing, 
 And tempers each created thing. 
 
 The tumult of the summer s life 
 Surrounds the earth and, rich and rife, 
 Finds outlet in a world of strife. 
 
 The autumn season stills the plain, 
 Quiets the river, sifts the grain, 
 And looks to rest and sleep again. 
 
 In winter does great nature rest 
 
 Or die, dismissing every guest 
 
 And closing up the broad earth s breast. 
 
 XXI 
 
 OMETHING in the sense of morning 
 Lifts the heart up to the sun." 
 In our youth we may be pagan, 
 God is many, and the One 
 Great Supreme will wait till evening 
 When our little day is done : 
 Something in the sense of morning 
 Lifts the heart up to the sun ! 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 XXII 
 
 THE road ran sloping through the trees 
 Below the dusty hill ; 
 The sun, swept inward by the breeze, 
 Lightened the running rill. 
 
 Maples and chestnuts stood along 
 
 And autumn, at the prime, 
 Strewed nuts and leafage that belong 
 
 To this September time. 
 
 One tree was green beside the way, 
 A small white pine, I thought ; 
 
 And there a broken branch and gray 
 Within a fork had caught. 
 
 It showed unlovely on the tree 
 
 As dark and dead it lay; 
 " And in my spleen I smiled " to see 
 
 That symbol of decay. 
 
 But my companion did not show 
 
 Such sympathy as mine ! 
 He mounted up the tree, to throw 
 
 Its burden from the pine. 
 
 20 
 
SHORTER POEMS 
 
 I cried, "Why will you not believe 
 
 That nature s ways suffice 
 To nature s purposes and leave 
 
 Her to her own device ? 
 
 " She knows her purpose for the pine 
 
 And does not need the aid 
 Of wisdom such as yours and mine 
 
 In plans which she has made." 
 
 He cast it down and answered, "Why, 
 
 Ev n as I am a man, 
 In doing this, believe me, I 
 
 Am part of nature s plan ! " 
 
 I smiled again but not in joy, 
 
 In fear ; for where it lay, 
 The branches covered, to destroy, 
 
 A purple aster spray ! 
 
 My friend was pleased ; not he divined 
 That though he was a man, 
 
 To be content we must be blind ; 
 For such is nature s plan. 
 
 21 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 XXIII 
 
 I STOOD at the hedge as a hearse went by 
 And passed me along the way; 
 The sun broke in through a silver sky 
 And scattered a golden ray. 
 
 Should I offer a prayer for the passing dead, 
 
 For the hearts going burdened by; 
 With a human pity, a catholic dread 
 
 Of the tear, the sorrow, and sigh ? 
 
 I too knew grief and the burdened heart, 
 Some knowledge of pain was mine ; 
 
 Should I bow my head for another s smart, 
 Should I make this simple sign ? 
 
 So I wondered and thought as the hearse went by 
 
 With its poor dead corpse within ; 
 But I turned aside to the opening sky 
 
 " Such a feeling may once have been, 
 
 " But now" for the impulse was gone, you see, 
 
 And death was no longer new ; 
 " Like a fallen leaf from an autumn tree 
 
 He is dead ; what is else to do ? " 
 
 22 
 
SHORTER POEMS 
 
 And there on the path as I turned around, 
 
 By the side of a thorn-tree root 
 An earthworm lay, crushed into the ground 
 
 By the heel of a passing boot. 
 
 Well, death and death ; t is an equal term 
 For the worm and the man to-day ; 
 
 But I turned and buried the angle-worm 
 In a neighboring lump of clay. 
 
 XXIV 
 
 THE scream of the tern in the roar of the 
 waters 
 
 Will sound when the tumult of nature is o er ; 
 When the garden of earth is a home for the 
 
 daughters 
 Of Eve, and when Pan is remembered no more. 
 
 White-winged, he appears ! Dark, erratic, uneven, 
 A figure on earth of the stars in the sky ; 
 
 Of high disarray and disorder in heaven, 
 
 Where the Galaxy strikes with dismay on the 
 eye! 
 
 2 3 
 
FIRST POEMS & FRAGMENTS 
 
 Where freak and caprice build a wild conflagration, 
 Where Chaos is king over torrents of stars ; 
 
 Who scatters the earth in a blind indignation, 
 And systems are sped in interminate wars. 
 
 Then the children of Pan in that day will come 
 singing, 
 
 In fierceness, of him who has set in the spheres 
 Dismay ; and along the salt sea-limits ringing, 
 
 The scream of the tern striking wild on their ears. 
 
 XXV 
 
 LIKE a dead leaf that rolls along the ground, 
 Driven by a wind that wanders round and round, 
 I see my heart, with edges cut and curled, 
 Like a dead leaf that s driven without a sound. 
 
 Green faded into red, and red to brown ; 
 Life to decay, and death the latest crown ! 
 
 So is my life, and lacks the heart of power 
 Here to lift up the god that s fallen down. 
 
 Alas ! why, in the days of mighty Jah, 
 Did I pull down thy pillars, Asherah ? 
 
 Baal, where art thou ? Egypt, even thou 
 Hadst faith for me beneath the wings of Ptah ! 
 
 24 
 
SHORTER POEMS 
 
 XXVI 
 
 ADAM arose at the word of God, 
 Up-borne on the bosom of all the earth ; 
 Brother of trees and the black, prone sod ; 
 The same in death and the same in birth. 
 
 Is it divine, the mystery ? 
 
 Is the whisper true of the hidden word 
 That sounds for some in hill and sea, 
 
 In the lapse of life when the deeps are heard ? 
 
 The sunlight lifts in the soul of man 
 The white-light torch of another dawn ; 
 
 And love will finger a mystic span, 
 When the chords are drawn. 
 
 XXVII 
 
 IN long, slow silences of soul 
 Beneath the sunset on the sea 
 I think I hear the numbers roll 
 That tell my conquest over thee ; 
 
 When thou art gentle and serene, 
 Thyself, forgotten all thy pride ; 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 And I, myself as I have been, 
 A hero with his sword untried, 
 
 Able for mastery ; and the game 
 Is offered and the action up ; 
 
 And to my purpose true I claim 
 
 A hot draught from the stirrup-cup, 
 
 Then entertain thee. All my soul 
 Awakes upon the sunset sea 
 
 When high and clear the numbers roll 
 That tell my conquest over thee. 
 
 XXVIII 
 
 IF ever I have thought or said 
 In all the seasons of the past 
 One word at which thy heart has bled 
 Believe me, it will be the last. 
 
 The tides of life are deep and wide, 
 The currents swift to bear apart 
 
 E en kindred ships ; but from thy side 
 I pray my sail may never start. 
 
 If, in the turning day and night 
 
 Of this our earth, our little year, 
 26 
 
SHORTER POEMS 
 
 Thou shalt have lost me from thy sight 
 Across the checkered spaces drear, 
 
 Thy words are uttered ; and the mind 
 Accustomed, cannot all forget ; 
 
 While written in my heart I find 
 An impulse that is deeper yet. 
 
 We love but never know the things, 
 To value them, that nearest stand. 
 
 The heart that travels seaward brings 
 The dearest treasure home to land. 
 To M. J. S. 
 
LONGER POEMS 
 I -VII 
 
A NEW ENGLAND MOUNTAIN 
 
 ESTMORELAND and the hills of Cum- 
 
 berland, 
 
 Though Alps may overpeer them, have a name 
 Unperishing while the earth still bears in man 
 The blossom of a high-aspiring mind ; 
 For Wordsworth loved them. And the sacred 
 
 poet 
 
 Helvetia lacks not, nor old-age Japan, 
 A poet whose song above the fields of tea, 
 Above the temples to the figured god 
 Ancient in beauty set against the ascent, 
 Rises supreme to where above them all 
 Uplifts a hollow summit white with snow 
 Pale Fuji-san, and there in music builds 
 A temple sheer in beauty to the sky ! 
 No outland peaks I know ; but were I born 
 Among the lakes, or in the fields of Kai 
 No other were the song s essential heart 
 Upon the mountains that I then should sing ; 
 For once I saw a summit not so bright 
 As these are fabled, mounting to the sky 
 In scar and ice-cliff loftily supreme, 
 But such a mountain as New England knows j 
 And never since in moments when the press 
 
FIRST POEMS Sr FRAGMENTS 
 
 Of life has lifted has the mountain s touch 
 Joy, merely joy and beauty, that is all, 
 And passionate love and depth and mystery 
 Left me ! and thus I sing a native song, 
 Content to be a brother to Japan, 
 Cousin to Switzerland, believing true 
 That ere he wanders by Castalian springs 
 The poet first must drink the wells of home. 
 
 II 
 
 NEAR THE WHITE LEDGE, 
 SANDWICH, N. H. 
 
 I FOLLOWED up a little burn, 
 Led onward by the smell of fern ; 
 And standing at the opening day 
 Where yellow blossoms line the way 
 I catch, blown faintly on the air, 
 The whispered perfume of the rare, 
 Pale morning-primrose, wet and fair ! 
 The bobolink stands on the grass 
 Now ere the deep July shall pass 
 And greets me from the bennets tall j 
 I hear a distant thrush s call 
 Rise full and deep, then silent fall. 
 
LONGER POEMS 
 
 Spirit of Wordsworth, with me still 
 
 Upon the plain, upon the hill, 
 
 I find my purpose wholly bent 
 
 To be to-day thine instrument ; 
 
 Led upward to the thought of thee 
 
 By all the spreading world I see. 
 
 The broad lake country at my feet 
 
 Bids Asquam with Wynander greet, 
 
 Rydal with Ossipee ; and shows 
 
 The Bearcamp water where it flows 
 
 Another Rotha, stream and break, 
 
 From covert pond to glittering lake ; 
 
 While Grasmere lies serene and still 
 
 By yonder tarn beneath Red Hill. 
 
 Thy mountains, Wordsworth, too, are by 
 
 And paint their shadows on the sky. 
 
 Chocorua stands, but not alone, 
 
 For out across the scene is thrown 
 
 The memory of Helvellyn ; hid 
 
 Within thy folds, Tripyramid, 
 
 Are thoughts of Kirkstone, Fairfield, all 
 
 That heard Joanna s laughing call ! 
 
 Whiteface is vanished in the shade 
 
 By Scawfell and Blencathra made ; 
 
 While Sandwich Mountain at the west, 
 
 In Glaramara s shadow dressed, 
 
 Leads the high path toward Campton ways 
 
 33 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 Across a steeper Dunmail Raise ! 
 Lake, hill, and mountain, all are bright 
 With the first gift of morning light ; 
 The sun is on them and the dew, 
 Shining far down and glittering through 
 The wide, white fields of mountain air 
 High o er the valleys everywhere. 
 And Wordsworth, in the auxiliar flame 
 That trembles on them from thy name 
 They bear in all their company 
 Aloft, the living thought of thee. 
 
 The Quaker poet sang his song 
 
 And loved the world these scenes among ; 
 
 A sober man, a song, I think 
 
 Not like the wanton bobolink ! 
 
 It was an utterance sweet like those 
 
 Light raptures of the song-sparrows ; 
 
 It ne er attained the impetuous rush 
 
 And music of the full-voiced thrush ; 
 
 Whose song, O Wordsworth, like to thine 
 
 In joy long-thought and measured fine, 
 
 Is priestly in the praise of Pan Divine. 
 
 34 
 
LONGER POEMS 
 
 III 
 "I LEFT THE CITY" 
 
 TLEFT the city to the north and walked 
 A Against a southwest wind ; the hurtling rain 
 Showered the empty streets in noisy gusts, 
 Swept little footsteps down across the walls, 
 And on the wind came tossing through the trees. 
 The gusty city was not long to leave, 
 And underneath the open heaven I found 
 Breath and a beating wind, a hurrying sky 
 Of gray cloud under white, a world of rain, 
 And one long roadway southward under it, 
 A causey on the marsh, where on the left 
 A broad reach of the tide lay full, with salt 
 Red grasses bounded. Swinging to the west 
 The long, dark wind came streaming, while the rain 
 Sloped with the wind and swept into my face ; 
 And I rejoiced, exulted in my heart, 
 Taking a grim delight as I suppressed 
 Each motion that betrayed me to the rain, 
 And drew my mantle closer. Rank on rank 
 The rain came on ; the landscape, wetted o er, 
 Lay passive, bay and bogland, to the sky ; 
 The wind beat hard, and I through a long hour 
 Had stood rejoicing in the unwonted storm, 
 
 35 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 When two small figures hurrying through the rain 
 Came down the pathway from the town ; they 
 
 laughed, 
 
 Two rascal boys set free from school and mother, 
 And laid small schemes for catching smaller fish, 
 Clambered across the roadway fence and followed 
 Through the salt grasses to the reedy shore ; 
 I saw them standing, careful of their lines 
 And peering o er the bankside, plotting deep 
 With one desire in earnest in their minds 
 And filling them ; while I, the idler there, 
 Leaned on the rail to watch them and the bay, 
 Gave up the hope I harbored of the west 
 And sunset, for the hour was drawing near, 
 Content to take my pleasure in the rain. 
 The sky had darkened in the hour and drew 
 A cloak of gray cloud closer to the earth ; 
 Sudden as half aware I watched the scene 
 A sense of saffron in the western sky 
 Grew over me ; the heavens were lifted high 
 And broke before my eyes ; along the west 
 Great masses of the storm swept to the north, 
 Went swarming eastward in the southern sky ; 
 The evening earth grew black beneath the light 
 That broke through western clouds, that caught 
 
 the rain 
 In brightness as it lay in shining pools, 
 
 36 
 
LONGER POEMS 
 
 And sprang from wet walls and from dripping roofs. 
 There midst the white light and the golden edges 
 Of happy clouds just opening to the earth, 
 Bluer than painted blue was ever painted, 
 I saw the sky and prayed prayed ? prayed to 
 
 whom ? 
 
 God, God ! I cried, but what I meant I knew not. 
 This was the perfect beauty, this was joy 
 Supreme, redundant ; ah ! no longer men 
 Seek heaven in Beatrice ; this was heaven displayed 
 To the broad, fertile earth and yet I prayed not. 
 T was like a gray thought broken by the wind 
 Of promise and the sun s fulfilment ; scattered 
 To north and south, with routed columns flying, 
 Majestic rain in grand procession moved 
 Across the saffron fading western sky, 
 Cloud upon massive cloud-shape trailing low 
 Over the sunset earth ; while in my eyes 
 I caught the cool, white, crystal light of heaven 
 That glistens after rain, and that one grace 
 Supreme that God has granted pagan man, 
 The bright blue sky. 
 
 37 
 
FIRST POEMS Sr FRAGMENTS 
 
 IV 
 THE SONG-SPARROW 
 
 AT rest upon some quiet limb 
 And singing to his pretty " marrow," 
 Sweet-breasted friend of child and man, 
 I love the bright eyes and the tan, 
 Gray-mottled coat that suits the trim 
 And winsome singing-sparrow. 
 
 He seeks no dear and lofty ground ; 
 His home is every ridge and furrow ; 
 In the low alder bushes he s 
 At home, and in the wayside trees ; 
 Wherever man lives I have found 
 The nest of the song-sparrow, 
 
 Except among the chimney-tops 
 
 A-smoking where the streets are narrow ; 
 Where man has banished living green 
 And scarce a blade of grass is seen 
 He rarely comes, he never stops, 
 The little rustic sparrow. 
 
 Where twigs are small and branches low 
 And scarce the name of woods can borrow, 
 
 38 
 
LONGER POEMS 
 
 He flits and sings the whole day long 
 And " Rivers run," is still his song, 
 u And flowers blossom, breezes blow, 
 And all for the song-sparrow ! " 
 
 I meet him in the tufted field 
 
 Among the clover-tops and yarrow ; 
 I hear him by the quiet brook, 
 And always with the open look 
 Of one who would not be concealed ; 
 And then I meet the sparrow 
 
 When golden lights at evening run 
 
 Among the trees the copses thorough ; 
 And there I catch his joyous song, 
 Stealing the moments that belong 
 To songsters of the setting sun 
 And not to the song-sparrow. 
 
 When touches of the coming night 
 Set free the bands of hidden sorrow 
 
 The night-bird sounds his ringing note, 
 And from his melancholy throat 
 The hermit pours a sad delight, 
 And no one hears the sparrow. 
 
 His song is tuned for his to-day, 
 
 With hope and promise for the morrow ; 
 
 39 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 More lofty notes are upward sent, 
 But none more simple and content, 
 None cheerfuller in work and play 
 Than that of the song-sparrow. 
 
 V 
 IN CHERRY LANE 
 
 A LITTLE maiden, in her hand 
 A pitcher, on her head a band 
 Of yellow cloth ; her neck was bare, 
 The kerchief fluttered in the air ; 
 The loose-stuff gown all straitly hung 
 And as she went about her clung ; 
 Her bosom showed beneath the dress 
 Young and unconscious, and a tress 
 Now here, now there, crept out beneath 
 The band, as from the opening sheath 
 The tasselled spring ; a slender maid, 
 She walked in childhood unafraid. 
 
 That such a slip of womanhood 
 Should blossom in a lane so rude, 
 That one in that low, sodden place 
 Should smile with such a winning grace 
 
 40 
 
LONGER POEMS 
 
 A marvel is unto the last ! 
 I seemed to see, even as she passed 
 The summer following on the spring ; 
 Hot, fetid days that ever bring 
 The noisome vapors up about 
 The meadow blossom in a rout ; 
 Till in the passing of the days 
 The stem was bent, the shining face 
 Stooped down and met the marshy soil 
 And soon was gone. But in my heart 
 Even at the fancy I recoil ; 
 I will not give her such a part. 
 Her eye was bright, her step was free, 
 And as I looked I seemed to see 
 The quick blood flow, the softer skin 
 Below the throat, beneath the chin, 
 The quick, young beating of the heart, 
 And on her face the blushes start ! 
 Even as she came so let her go, 
 Whither or whence I cannot know. 
 I only know if in that lane 
 I ever chance to pass again, 
 The memory of that maiden fair 
 Will lend a fragrance to the air 
 And make the place, not over sweet, 
 Not wholly evil to my feet. 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 VI 
 WOODSTOCK 
 
 THIS, Woodstock, is my gift; and if I give 
 So much as this of all thou gavest me, 
 Call me not selfish if I have forgot 
 Thy daily life. 
 
 THE STREAMS 
 
 OFT have my footsteps in the past been turned, 
 Woodstock, to seek in solitude the life 
 That flows within thy brotherhood of streams ; 
 In Moosilauke the slender, in the blue 
 Pemigewasset, and the silver East. 
 Now once again and in what other scenes ! 
 Thy voices come to me, thy life, across 
 The silver indistinctness of a year ; 
 And first, O Moosilauke, I turn to thee, 
 Born of the mighty mountain and its caves 
 Dark, and its forests and its long ravines. 
 A multitude of slender waters run 
 From off the sloping hills, from beds of moss 
 Beneath a hundred oaks, from little stones 
 Tumbled along before thy April strength, 
 
 42 
 
LONGER POEMS 
 
 Now lying quiet, making thee a bed ; 
 
 From sandy sources in the tufted fields 
 
 Where cattle browse, and from a thousand springs 
 
 Where I was never led thy waters come, 
 
 Thy blue and silver slender stream. The sky 
 
 Bends over thee more closely, and there falls 
 
 A richer gift of azure through the trees 
 
 Upon thy waters, making thee a brook 
 
 Of blue and silver, Moosilauke ; and thou, 
 
 Fulfilled of beauty in thyself and round 
 
 Encompassed all about with loveliness, 
 
 Art richer than thy brothers in the gift 
 
 Of quietness and tender solitude ; 
 
 Friend of the green upon thy banks, thou rt loved 
 
 More dearly by the white and purple flowers, 
 
 More dearly loved if loving be the act 
 
 Of neighborhood and presence ; and as I 
 
 Do love the neighborhood of green and blue, 
 
 The forest and the sky ; the silver love 
 
 That glistens in the stream, and that low light 
 
 That passes from the faces of the flowers ; 
 
 So by this promise and confession I 
 
 Do love thee, Moosilauke. 
 
 And thee I love, 
 
 Pure in thy beauty, perfect in thy strength, 
 Pemigewasset, lying in thy source 
 Beneath the brow of the great Profile ! Far 
 
 43 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 Above thee is the stern, sad Mountain King, 
 Him with the mighty message that no man 
 Can wholly hear : the sternness and the sadness 
 Of nature conscious of herself, or man 
 Conscious of nature, ignorant of God. 
 This is the burden of that noble brow ; 
 And thou to me didst give along thy way 
 Suggestions of this message till below, 
 Surrounded by the world, thou dost forget 
 Thy birth and I with thee forgot. One day 
 I wandered from thy course beside a run 
 Of darker waters ; turning from the track 
 Of wheels and from the multitude of men 
 Along thy fertile way, to seek thy stream, 
 Thou dark-veined Began, tributary brook. 
 Thy waters run and bear a deeper song 
 Soft on the moss, and in my heart I love 
 The memory of that hour wherein I stayed 
 My life a little while with thee ; my heart 
 Was opened to thee in a deep unrest, 
 And to the motion of thy currents all 
 My thoughts ran freely ; t was a joy to hear, 
 T was rest and satisfaction to behold 
 Thy voice and colors and thy forms ; I took 
 A comfort in thy presence, tuned to hear 
 A voice in thee repeated from my own 
 And yet not wholly mine ; but more, to live 
 
 44 
 
LONGER POEMS 
 
 And run harmonious with my hand in thine, 
 
 And in the gentle beating of thy life 
 
 Find my own poise and balance j wrapt about 
 
 As in a mist of music and led on 
 
 To live and feel as prodigal as thou, 
 
 Careless of all degrees. 
 
 And now with strength and joy I turn to thee 
 Thundering in thy caverns, noble East, 
 Born of the midmost of the mountains, child 
 More truly than the Saco of the heart 
 And spirit of the hills. The powers prevail 
 Through all the mountains that shall give thee life ; 
 Thy birth is now upon a thousand peaks 
 And has been and shall be ; thou art a giant, 
 Impatient of the earth that holds thee, wild ! 
 And thus thy voice is stranger to me, thus 
 It sounds a note I cannot always hear, 
 Not in all moods ; but sometimes, low at first, 
 Above the unsensed tumult of the world 
 I hear the rushing of thy waters, catch 
 The silver flash of sunlight from thy rocks, 
 Then in my heart feel thy great spirit moving. 
 Thou art the friend, not of the earth the rocks 
 Surround thee and control thy dreadful course 
 But of the mountain winds; the winds pass o er thee 
 And catch thy motion and thy eager voice ; 
 
 45 
 
FIRST POEMS Sr FRAGMENTS 
 
 Thus tempered they pass onward and below 
 They whisper to the listening ear of man. 
 Or in thy solitudes perchance he hears 
 A choral voice, thy music and the wind, 
 Joined always, breathing to the same intent, 
 A brother voice, an echo of his own. 
 There if he listen, down below the sound 
 He hears the voice articulate of life 
 Made manifest his own ; he hears his voice 
 Dim-speaking to him through the gulf of change 
 Another form, a myriad others, but 
 Ever his own beseeching to be heard 
 In sympathy. Wise in my purpose I, 
 Nor I alone give, noble East, to thee 
 My hand ; for thou art brother to the wind, 
 And savage as thou art, child of the peaks, 
 Clad white in rocks and thine own silver form, 
 Thou dost not find thy rest upon the earth 
 But goest dissatisfied unto the sea 
 Where thou again art wild. 
 To J. T. S. 
 
LONGER POEMS 
 
 THE HEDGEROW 
 
 THE sun is up, Great God, the sun is up, 
 High o er the eastern hill among white clouds 
 Insufferable ! I thank Thee for the call. 
 Deep in the Woodstock meadows on a morn 
 Pleasant it is to wander ere the sun 
 Has burned the dewdrops off the bending grass ; 
 When each small area seems a world complete, 
 When every forest stem beneath the sun 
 Shoots out a light, and every meadow span 
 Is dowered with moving radiance ; and the hills ! 
 I had not known their power till I had seen, 
 Limned by the early morn, their mystic heads 
 White in the eastern circuit. From the town 
 The path led out across the dew-wet lands, 
 Crossed the cold river in the river-mist, 
 And turned aside before the columned elms, 
 Heavy with morning light ; three things remain 
 In joy, of all the pleasant things I saw 
 Along this early path : the glowing elms, 
 Far off, the line of hills, and suddenly 
 (That rose abrupt and claimed its character) 
 A straight and tangled row of heavy green, 
 A hedge, till then unguessed, where loftier trees 
 Stood up amid a world of clustering things, 
 Brambles and slender vines and, stiffly held, 
 
 47 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 The heads of little, sturdy, hopeful trees. 
 
 Along one maple branch some colder wisp 
 
 Of passing wind had struck an early blow 
 
 And pressed the green life back ; the kindlier airs 
 
 Had after gathered round and now caressed 
 
 The broken hope into a golden death. 
 
 This was a passing fancy, but the elms 
 
 Are living elms and must forever live, 
 
 Rich in the willing burden of that morn ; 
 
 I never see beneath the golden mist 
 
 Of peaceful afternoon, or in the time 
 
 Of open daylight such an upland slope 
 
 Without the gentle coming of this one, 
 
 This morning picture and the further thought 
 
 Of all the hidden chambers whence are drawn 
 
 The veils, lights, shadows, colors of the world 
 
 That spread across the poorest piece of ground 
 
 To form and to transform ; then at the last 
 
 I saw the tangled hedgerow by the wall, 
 
 My mind woke to a fancy and at once 
 
 I found it wandering over English fields 
 
 And lodging with the primrose and the lark ; 
 
 For here there was a hedge ! The pioneer 
 
 Had built his roadside wall of labored stone, 
 
 And through his fields had led this simple line 
 
 Rough-set of rounded rock, to part his herd 
 
 Of cattle and his flock (perhaps) of sheep, 
 
LONGER POEMS 
 
 What time they browsed in Woodstock. Early 
 
 grass 
 
 Had pushed a carpet in among the stones 
 And here the scythe had stopped ; chance-drifted 
 
 dust, 
 
 Holding the promise and the hope of life, 
 Seeds, the small looms of nature s garment, here 
 Found an untroubled resting-place and ran 
 Through all their changes. Years passed by and 
 
 here 
 
 The squirrel found a harbor and a home j 
 For overhead the angled beechnut hung, 
 And hazels stood at hand. Here in the spring 
 The gold of summer s sunrise dandelions 
 And daisies, starry oxeyes, clustered near j 
 The earlier violets were not absent nor 
 In later days the modest, showy bell, 
 Blue, slender-hanging. So the summers passed, 
 Rising and falling ; as his homestead grew 
 The farmer mowed more widely, nor his flocks 
 Demanded less his care in fold and field 
 To bound ; and so as ever each day more 
 He saw the need for labor, this one wall, 
 Now old and overgrown, he eyed with pleasure j 
 The stones might fall away, the flooding rains 
 That drove the stream up on the meadow-lands 
 Might roll and still displace them, and the vines, 
 
 49 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 The wild grape and the bramble, force their way 
 Disintegrating, still no care was his ; 
 For over all the green was gathered close 
 And densely massed, so that no glimpse beyond 
 Greeted the searching eye ; and here I found 
 The hedgerow standing as the sun had shaped it, 
 Richly confused and prodigal and wild, 
 And yet a straight, well-guided hedge and serving 
 Its master better than he served himself, 
 Adding to service beauty and a soul. 
 
 SOLITUDE 
 
 I KNOW a little patch of mountain ground 
 Low-settled by itself; and Moosilauke 
 Stands boldly in the west but never sees 
 Its little group of buildings and the elm 
 Close by the door. And farther in the north, 
 Bearing his sun-scarred summit proudly forth, 
 Stands noble Lafayette; he looks abroad 
 Across the sunny hamlet where the meadows 
 Shine with a softer green, yet scarcely knows 
 This low gray dwelling and beside the door 
 Its ancient elm-tree ; yet do Lafayette 
 And Moosilauke the mountain and the deep, 
 Aspiring hills feel through their silent hearts 
 
 50 
 
LONGER POEMS 
 
 The birth and progress, Woodstock, of thy streams, 
 Born of the mossy mountains and the rocks 
 And running through the hills ; and they in turn 
 Do visit and confirm the house in joy. 
 Gray with the touch of nature, friend familiar 
 Of forests and their mosses, with its roofs 
 Long-sloping to the west, I see it stand, 
 With gables not uncopied from the hills, 
 The mountain house, the home of quietness. 
 The village knew it not ; beyond the hill 
 It was itself a hamlet ; here there stood 
 Its tributary fields and pastures, here 
 A crystal source of water and a world 
 Of timber, and its flocks were on the hills. 
 There lay the little graveyard in the pines, 
 And these with larches and small maples made 
 A decent graveyard shadow ; and I see 
 One queer, untutored apple that has placed 
 His foot beyond the pale, dropping his fruit 
 On the most ancient grave ; all round about 
 Are golden meadows quiet in the sun, 
 With ombrel elm-trees dotting out the green. 
 
 This is the gate to Solitude ; one day 
 I crossed the yard to where an old man sat 
 And questioned him, although I knew him not, 
 Brought here among the sources of the hills 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 Close to the thought of small simplicity. 
 
 I asked him," Where is Solitude ? " He rose, 
 
 And pointing with his cane across the ridge 
 
 Described a course that drew my heart in joy ; 
 
 " Beyond the sheepfold follow the small lane 
 
 Across the first low ridge ; the cattle there 
 
 Are mine and mine the pasture to the wood ; 
 
 The lane will enter through the trees and lead 
 
 A mile or more over and up the slope, 
 
 There where you see the pines; let down the bars 
 
 At the upper end and that is Solitude." 
 
 I never started out on any course 
 
 With half the joy I felt for Solitude ! 
 
 Rocks in the pasture lay, oases bare 
 
 In deserts of green grass ! I moved among 
 
 The beasts and stood beside them where they drank 
 
 The stony pasture stream, where little grass 
 
 Crept thickly down the bank beside the shallows. 
 
 I wet my lips ; t is like a sacrament 
 
 To touch wild water where the cattle drink ; 
 
 And more, I guessed it came from Solitude. 
 
 Then at the entrance of the trees I stood, 
 
 Ground the hard earth beneath my foot, and sent 
 
 A proud glance northward ; he who thus can stand 
 
 On Moosilauke and look on Lafayette 
 
 Is master of the western hills ; below, 
 
 Beyond the trees and pasture lay the valley 
 
 52 
 
LONGER POEMS 
 
 Voiceless and crowded by the mountains round 
 In multitude so great I turned and fled 
 Up the long, turning footway of the lane. 
 Ah, silence in the forest ! I have learned 
 More from the hush of forests than from speech 
 Of many teachers, more of joy at least, 
 And that quick sympathy where joy has birth ; 
 A thousand times called outward from myself 
 By life at every point, ten thousand things 
 Speaking at once in tones so sharp and sweet 
 Their voice was pain, but pain as life is pain 
 Beneath the over-chorus of the sky ; 
 In silence finding joy to know myself 
 Deep in the heart of nature and the world. 
 As one advances up the slow ascent 
 Along the pathway in the woods the trees 
 Change aspect, nor alone in this but change 
 In stature and in power till Solitude 
 Seems cut out of the ancient forest. Here 
 Was Solitude ! where man had lived of old, 
 Loved, serving God, and built himself a home. 
 Man smooths an acre on the rolling earth, 
 Turns up the mould and reaps the gifts of God ; 
 Plucks down the apple from the tree, the tree 
 From empire in the forest, builds a home ; 
 Turns for a bout among his brothers, wins 
 A sister to his wife and gets an heir ; 
 
 53 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 And then as here in Solitude departs 
 
 And leaves small mark behind. The place is rare 
 
 In this high epic of the human life. 
 
 Where wildness has been wilderness shall be, 
 
 But give God time ; and life is but a span, 
 
 Nine inches, while before it and behind 
 
 Stretches the garden of the cosmic gods ; 
 
 For after London, England shall be wild 
 
 And none can thaw the iceberg at the pole. 
 
 In Solitude one sees the winding trace 
 
 Of what has been a road, a block of stone 
 
 Footworn, that lies along the dim pathway 
 
 Before one old foundation ; and the rest 
 
 Is freaks of grass among the rising growth 
 
 Of birch and maple that another year 
 
 Shall see almost a forest. 
 
 VII 
 PUTATIS LUCUM LIGNA 
 
 YE seem intent to stand alone 
 Monarchs, ye men, of stock and stone; 
 The forest dead and everywhere 
 Untenanted the fields of air. 
 To view a wood unwilling, ye 
 
 54 
 
LONGER POEMS 
 
 Who for the timber hate the tree ! 
 Will ye cast nature from her throne 
 And waste the earth you call your own ? 
 Descending from the Lincoln hills 
 I came where join the Woodstock rills ; 
 Across the east a smoky veil 
 Lets not, or day or night, to trail 
 Words dire in meaning, seen before 
 By Dante on the infernal door ! 
 For pant of engines on the air 
 Shatters the mountain silence where 
 Five-throated, bound with iron bands, 
 The havoc of the forest stands ! 
 
 Where man has conquered nature dies 
 From out her own familiar skies, 
 
 And nature loves her child ; 
 T is nature loves the running brooks, 
 Not man but nature guards the nooks 
 
 From which they are beguiled. 
 Infinite labor gives them birth, 
 The rocks, the deeps below the earth, 
 And dusky shadows bring them forth 
 
 As weak as they are wild. 
 The earth will, all in little room 
 Become a garden, then a tomb ; 
 
 Then keep it while ye may 
 
 55 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 A little wild, where we may see 
 The unthreatened glory of a tree, 
 
 And feel the fountain s spray. 
 Reserve one spot where we may find 
 An untamed accent in the wind ; 
 And beds of moss unbroken, where 
 To mark the footprint of the bear ; 
 One stream of water mountain-pure 
 Wherein the wild trout may endure 
 And the wild deer may drink and bathe secure ! 
 
SONNETS 
 I -XVI 
 
THE flood of life that turned away 
 In search of rarer things, the rose, 
 The fragile flower that bursting blows, 
 And as it blows turns to decay, 
 Once more seeks rest along the way 
 Of earlier days and finds repose 
 In love of each green thing that grows, 
 A bunch of grass, an alder spray. 
 You common things I hold you dear 
 And beg the comfort you can give ; 
 The faith that bears you through the year, 
 The courage both to die and live ; 
 Believing that I too shall hear 
 The mountains fall, and shall not grieve. 
 
FIRST POEMS & FRAGMENTS 
 
 II 
 
 TEN thousand fancies flitting through the mind, 
 An impulse here, a half-created thought 
 Are, in the stress of fancied duty, taught 
 To bow and pass and leave no trace behind. 
 Or carelessness, destructive as the wind, 
 More prodigal than nature, valuing not 
 The store of life that pain and joy have wrought 
 Laughs and forgets, blind leader of the blind ! 
 We are but open caskets whence are fled 
 The choicest gifts God-given ; while we retain 
 Indifference with a blustering hardihead, 
 And querulousness before a righteous pain ; 
 Pale pietism, when virtue s self is dead, 
 With smug conceit impregnable and vain. 
 
 60 
 
SONNETS 
 
 III 
 
 MERCY ! Justice ! Ah, no ! Heaven s gate ! 
 Heaven s gate ! " 
 
 Panic above the crash of trampling horse 
 And rush of wings upright against the course, 
 A cry of gods confounded under fate ! 
 In tumult deep and inarticulate 
 The angelic press burst outward, of the Source 
 Of bulk Omnipotence compelled by force 
 Save Lucifer, omnipotent in hate. 
 Bright as the dying day, with one black cloud 
 Up-marshalled from the south and crossing o er 
 The glory and blotting out the evening star, 
 So for a space he stood ; then silent bowed, 
 And from the battlements outspringing far 
 Deep into darkness all his anguish bore. 
 
 61 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 IV 
 
 I LOVE the hills but she the open shore, 
 The shore because it lies along the sea. 
 I would be lofty, solitary, free, 
 Selfish at times ; at times, hearing the roar 
 Of the ocean where beneath the bending oar 
 It does the planet service, I would be 
 As rich in blessing, yea, as rich as she 
 Is rich in blessing ; I could not be more. 
 I walk apart, my heart is in the sky, 
 Yet ever yearning downward to the land ; 
 She walks where all the world is crowding by 
 And holds a little child in either hand j 
 I bless her service with a troubled cry 
 Of one who would but cannot understand. 
 
 62 
 
SONNETS 
 
 I CANNOT face the utterance of a prayer 
 In innocence j I know not by what gate 
 Egress it finds beyond the fields of air ; 
 In what vain corridor my words may wait. 
 A mystic once, I did communicate 
 With my own self and thought with God to share 
 My hope and aspiration ; but of late 
 My words, like Noah s dove, returning bare, 
 I feel the confines of my spirit s heaven. 
 Against the limits of myself in vain 
 They strike and bruise their wings and downward 
 
 fall. 
 
 Then to myself, Peace ! do I cry, and call 
 That sufferance peace which yet is perfect pain : 
 In courage, Peace ! when there is no peace given. 
 
FIRST POEMS & FRAGMENTS 
 
 VI 
 
 TO catch at that which never can be caught, 
 To yearn for what thou never shalt attain 
 (Nature s own motions moving in the brain) 
 This is thy life and thou by her art taught. 
 This is her gift ; to thee if welcome not 
 With all its store of passion and of pain, 
 Thou hast the power to give it back again 
 And break the bow before thou triest the shot. 
 Nay rather let me live to fight the fight 
 And die the death, when driven against the wall, 
 That many a man has fairly fought and died. 
 Then shall I keep the spark she gave me bright 
 (Gigantic mirth, that gave it to deride ! ) 
 And cast it at the heavens even as I fall. 
 
 64 
 
SONNETS 
 
 VII 
 
 A MONTH ago the cloud alone was fair. 
 None watched the leafless tree-tops, thin and 
 
 Hold up their slender fans against the sky 
 Save here a poet and a dreamer there. 
 But now the sun through the soft, golden air 
 Requires an incense from the flowers that lie 
 Within a thousand vales ; and low and high 
 The broad earth doth a pale green mantle wear. 
 Now voices are where all was still before ; 
 By each green leaf there trembles a brown wing ; 
 A thousand small lives wake beside my door 
 And ea^h one turns to labor and to sing. 
 At last* man feels the tumult of the spring 
 And looks upon the universe once more. 
 
FIRST POEMS & FRAGMENTS 
 
 VIII 
 
 A THOUSAND flowerets of a thousand hues 
 -t\Born of the sunset and the early dawn, 
 Burn in the darker forest and suffuse 
 An unimagined brightness o er the lawn. 
 These are the days I give my heart in pawn 
 To thee, O nature, and the world refuse ; 
 These are the days I feel my footsteps drawn 
 To seek the wayward motions of the muse ! 
 I have not long enough on earth to stay 
 To lose the joy of one bright summer day ; 
 One quiet day of peace, ah many a one ! 
 Full of the song of birds and tremulous 
 With sunshine ; let the world seek after us : 
 The muse and I are wandering with the sun. 
 
 66 
 
SONNETS 
 
 IX 
 
 I STOOD long time and listened to the wind 
 That tossed the fallen foliage o er and o er ; 
 Long time I stood ; then turned within to bind 
 An evergreen upon the open door. 
 When winter comes to sweep across the floor 
 And freeze the panes perforce the huswife mind 
 Shuts-to the autumnal door and there reclined 
 Battens on books till summer comes once more. 
 I cannot stop her ; turning to the shelves 
 Her idleness she feeds on other men ; 
 Takes what she finds, complaining not and delves 
 In mines deep-sunken with the golden pen ; 
 Then weary grows and longs to see again 
 The spirits of the sky, the woodland elves. 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 MOOSILAUKE IN DECEMBER 
 
 THE wet, brown leaves of winter on the ground 
 Unkempt they looked or evil, one by one 
 Called back to vision by a careless sun ; 
 He should by this have reached his southern bound 
 Leaving December earth all straitly gowned 
 In decent white ; but here we trod upon 
 Her bosom black, uncovered and undone, 
 And shrank from many a wet and naked wound. 
 The Parthian sun his arrows to the head 
 Drew, and within the field a little rill 
 Beneath an edge of morning ice awoke ; 
 A line down through the mat-brown grass it led 
 White, threaded with the blue the heavens spill, 
 And tinkled coldly past a frozen oak. 
 
 68 
 
SONNETS 
 
 Light veils of snow the west wind bore along, 
 White shadows, drifted through the upper air 
 Above the valley ; they were very fair 
 And passed in music like a summer song. 
 I stood upon a mountain ; here the strong 
 Wild-Ammonoosuc rolled in forests bare, 
 A tumult in his hollow pathway ; there 
 Whispered through Wildwood with an icy tongue. 
 The sunlight shone on Kinsman through the cloud 
 And turned the little falling snow to gold 
 Which never reached the earth, but it went back 
 Into the chambers of the air ; the loud, 
 White shepherd west wind drove into the fold 
 And forests waving showed his vanished track. 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 Standing above the Tunnel gorge, the brook 
 Unseen, unheard below I knew laid out 
 And trimmed its tenements for April s trout, 
 Rested and ran from hidden nook to nook. 
 The wintry forests in the wind had shook 
 December from their branches ; round about, 
 The sun had aided in the season s rout 
 To Moosilauke ; and when to him I look, 
 White snow and winter build in me a sense, 
 Structured on beauty awful and serene, 
 Of majesty, a pressing sense of fear. 
 I never saw a vision more intense 
 In awfulness than that tremendous scene 
 Black Moosilauke, uprising dark and near ! 
 
 70 
 
SONNETS 
 
 So very near ! Far down, the Tunnel run 
 Crept out beneath the mountain s heavy base ; 
 Buttress and bastion mounting I could trace 
 In upright courses to the supreme One, 
 High, distant dome where-over bits of sun 
 Ran with the rolling clouds a windy race. 
 But all beneath was blackness, and my face 
 A breath as of the mountain fell upon. 
 A whisper from the mountain came across, 
 So dark, so strong ! a breath in blackness drawn, 
 Long drawn and deep, so near we were and high ! 
 And then it seemed a simple child might toss 
 Against the opposed wall a pebble-stone, 
 Deep in the Tunnel gorge to roll and lie. 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 XI 
 
 THE poet stoops and plucks a little flower 
 To tell his greatness in a simple song ; 
 He does not need through seasons to prolong 
 A mighty work to manifest his power ; 
 Which still is simple, still the common dower 
 If unexpressed, of many in the throng 
 Unconscious who, with poetry along, 
 In life s sojourn spend many a happy hour. 
 So Burns delights us with a lowly lay, 
 The warm expression of a simple joy ; 
 So Wordsworth, moving through each quiet day, 
 Forgets not the quick impulse of the boy ; 
 And midst thy passion, Shelley, to destroy, 
 Thou st found the truth along the lyric way. 
 
SONNETS 
 
 XII 
 
 I HATE the vast array of " modern " things, 
 Gilt and pale purple, yellow, pink, and white ; 
 Dull imitations and a thousand light 
 And weightless books of verse and copyings. 
 There are so many ! Every season brings 
 A thousand fashions new and with delight 
 Proclaims them beautiful ; till I take flight 
 And turn me to the masters and the kings. 
 And yet they will not let the masters be ; 
 I find my Walton in a showy dress ; 
 Find all the bright, old-age simplicity 
 Bedecked and botched ; the years of good Queen 
 
 Bess 
 
 Are made the dull philistine s property ; 
 And Burns is " popularly " sent to press. 
 
 73 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 XIII 
 
 HIGH on a sunward-mounting precipice 
 Edged with a cloud that all before me ran, 
 I backward gazed and pictured, span by span, 
 How I had mounted upward from the abyss ; 
 By what a confused pathway come to this, 
 The end of earth ; and saw the future s plan 
 Grow, " minimize the universe to man," 
 And build a daring, nobler edifice. 
 Ah, struggle to assume this new control 
 And seek thy higher reaches, O my soul ! 
 Thou rt sure of this, thy feet are on the earth ; 
 Forget it, it remains ; but let thine eyes 
 Lead on thy heart, and find beyond the skies 
 At least the promise of an upward birth. 
 
 74 
 
SONNETS 
 
 XIV 
 
 HONEY of woodland wild and of the hill, 
 The juices of the maple and the cane 
 And all the fulness of the fallen grain ; 
 The pauses in the running of the rill, 
 Silence of distant meadows, voices far 
 Of unseen swallows in the upper air ; 
 The beauty of the bending bough j the rare, 
 Soft rose, the sunbeam and the melting star 
 What are they all but shadows in the night 
 To thee, where beauty burns a perfect light ! 
 I see thee standing gracefuller than grass, 
 Nakea, with one foot in the lingering stream, 
 The sun upon thee, perfect ! or alas, 
 Is it not thee, my dryad, but a dream ! 
 
 75 
 
FIRST POEMS & FRAGMENTS 
 
 XV 
 
 THE warm, moist kiss of April on the grass ; 
 The stooping sun, the wet and fragrant plain j 
 The voice of life, low-whispered as I pass ; 
 The vision of the summer through the rain ; 
 A thousand thoughts borne outward from the mind 
 Laughing at nature, caught and held again 
 Close to the stirring heart, till like the grain 
 In autumn they are scattered by the wind ! 
 And some may range along the open sky, 
 And some may fall and live and some may die. 
 I care not now whether the wanton air 
 Rid me of flying chaff or sift the seed 
 Of future promise ; or if this, indeed, 
 My present fancy lead me anywhere ! 
 
SONNETS 
 
 XVI 
 
 TLAYED upon a rock beside the sea 
 
 J- A spray of eglantine where all about 
 
 The water rushed in torrents in and out 
 
 Among the wet, black rocks tempestuously. 
 
 To eastward high, a little promont ry 
 
 Up-bore the billows on his iron breast 5 
 
 And thence they rolled beyond him to the west 
 
 Surging about my eglantine and me. 
 
 And of the mightiest waves their spray that cast 
 
 White and imperious far into the air, 
 
 Not one but passed the sweet-briar safely by. 
 
 Till, midst the churning foam and surges there 
 
 That reached but could not clutch it, rising high 
 
 The tide itself did take it at the last. 
 
 77 
 
FRAGMENTS 
 I-V 
 
 
 
I 
 
 IN the low-lying April afternoon 
 The earth was hushed within a mellow mist 
 Across the new brown meadows j the white sun 
 Was gathered in a knot of clouds and gave 
 No thought of an infinity beyond. 
 Each blade of grass was conscious of its shadow ; 
 The sounds of birds and waters and the air 
 Were stilled within the silence where I sat 
 Beside, and as I sat I felt the least 
 Of nature s children that around me played, 
 And all was like a dream. I gathered up 
 A handful of the grass and then forgot it ; 
 I felt a gentle rising of the wind 
 And heard a sparrow whisper close at hand, 
 With other little life beside me ; but 
 The distance faded and the nearness grew 
 Confused to a fancy in the gray, 
 The desolate gray shadow of the earth, 
 Unreal and dimly dying from my thought 
 Till all was nothing save the sun and me. 
 
FIRST POEMS Sr FRAGMENTS 
 
 II 
 
 WESTWARD I walked; the sun was low; 
 the plain, 
 
 Seeming to rise before me, with the earth 
 Revolving, rolling backward to the east, 
 Shut out the dropping sun. I hastened on, 
 But still the day grew darker as the west 
 Drew in its last, white, fading fan of light, 
 And all the world was cold ; and when the land 
 Ceased to reflect the sky, and heavy lay, 
 And dully, by itself, I came where spread 
 A darkling mirror, whitened half, and blue, 
 Still cherishing a faint thought of the sky. 
 The hour was calm, forgetful of the day, 
 Where toward the noon the pattering rain did 
 
 beat 
 
 The fragrant earth; a soft green mist arose 
 And lay across the opening fields ; and then, 
 Sweeping the huddled air around the world 
 The silver storm scowled black; o er all the sky 
 It tore itself in fury and ran low 
 Across the shuddering earth ; it seized the trees, 
 It seized the mountains in its gloomy hands 
 And shook them ; while the terror stricken streams 
 Leaped madly on to aid the warring sea. 
 Then in the thronging blackness of the storm 
 82 
 
FRAGMENTS 
 
 I had rejoiced, as now I smiled to see 
 
 The fair, white, gentle surface of the lake 
 
 And feel the air fall softly ; at my feet 
 
 The waters rose like coming thoughts that fall 
 
 Forgotten, and my mind rose till it ran 
 
 As smoothly as the yet unbroken wave. 
 
 Ill 
 
 THE wild-eyed, savage gull, with bow*d wing, 
 tips 
 
 The white, flat surface of the misty sea ; 
 Or, stooping in the wind-trod, hollow wave, 
 Reels upward straight, hangs quivering, his whole 
 
 self 
 
 Intent, and breaks the surface like a bolt ! 
 This spirit of the mystery of the sea 
 Sweeps by in silence on the noisy scud, 
 Or bursts across the borders of the storm, 
 A flash of horrid white ; with beating wing 
 Struggles in futile, royal wrath against 
 The armed battalions of a mighty wind, 
 And beaten, leaps aloft upon the storm 
 To ride in fury down the conquering gale. 
 Away, thou symbol of my own gray thoughts ! 
 Whenever from the heaven of weary hopes 
 
 83 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 The clouds run low in the palely flowing sky ; 
 Whenever from the world of the unachieved 
 The mists mount up to meet the drooping cloud, 
 And I between them fail, t is thou I see, 
 Thou dreadful emblem of my darker life ! 
 Thou art no child of sunlight, for indeed, 
 Whether beneath some purple summer eve 
 Thou weariest thy way into the west, 
 Or in the winter on the frozen bay 
 Standest erect, a white, mad, ravened king, 
 Life-banished by the ice, thou art the same, 
 Grim, busy with thyself, hard, gloomy, wild. 
 
 IV 
 
 AT sunset in the college close the light 
 Falls like a benediction softly down ; 
 Here is a moving stillness in the air, 
 Quiet, as though the now deserted east 
 Had laid its empty hand upon the lawns 
 And hushed the world ; from out the glowing west 
 The sunlight settles on each tender leaf, 
 And entering in the gentle, empty cells 
 Calls through the hollow tubes ; down to the earth 
 Trembles the peaceful summons ; and the grass 
 Drinks in the sunset light, except where lie 
 
FRAGMENTS 
 
 Dark traceries of black upon the green, 
 Left mourning for the sun the while the tree 
 Laughs with its selfish seizure of the light ! 
 This is the life of peace ; but on the sky 
 The city in the distance casts a light 
 Brilliant and false, electric, publishing 
 Confusion and false day, nature betrayed, 
 And all the dark disguises of the town ; 
 The frantic strivings after more, that choke 
 The holy fact of life, which single here 
 Sits at the heart and bids the rest be still. 
 
 WHEN the low sun descends on Hamlet hill 
 And this my maple throws a longer line 
 Of lengthening shadow down across the slope, 
 Then has a day departed, casting yet 
 A lingering light from sidelong slopes and hills 
 That run into the west. Much would I love 
 One passing day to live beneath my tree, 
 And there within its shadow on the earth 
 Move with the moving sun a mutual course. 
 First in the dawning is the crystal light 
 Scarce sprinkled o er the hill, while all the heaven 
 Sheds seeming equal brightness on the world ; 
 
 85 
 
FIRST POEMS & FRAGMENTS 
 
 But after comes the round, revealing sun, 
 To mark his influence and define the earth, 
 Giving my tree its shadow on the ground. 
 And therein would I rest and through the day 
 Follow it lengthening downward past the noon ; 
 See the light grasses and the browsed tufts 
 Of pasture herbage tremble in the sun, 
 Pale upland asters, dusty goldenrod, 
 And all the autumn flowering of the fields ; 
 Then feel them sink to quietness within 
 The slow advancing shadow. I should find 
 A joy in the light liftings of the leaves, 
 Breeze-shifted shadows trembling, little rays 
 Of unexpected light along the ground. 
 Then as the day advanced to its fall 
 And this my maple s shadow crept along 
 Downward, I should forget the lesser life 
 Of grass blade and of sunny pebble-stone, 
 Feeling the great fact of the day s decline, 
 The coming of the hour when all the hill 
 Would cast its shadow ; of the later night, 
 The shadow of the earth. Thus would I live, 
 And one day thus bid welcome and depart. 
 
 86 
 
TABLE OF FIRST LINES 
 
TABLE OF FIRST LINES 
 
 Adam arose at the word of God Page 25 
 
 A lark flew by upon the air 15 
 
 A little maiden, in her hand 40 
 
 A month ago the cloud alone was fair 65 
 
 A thousand flowerets of a thousand hues 66 
 
 At rest upon some quiet limb 38 
 
 At sunset in the college close the light 84 
 
 A winding water onward flows v 
 
 Be more concrete, immediate to man vm 
 
 Even in the city, I 3 
 
 Far in the south the redwings hear and speed 17 
 
 High on a sunward-mounting precipice 74 
 
 Honey of woodland wild and of the hill 75 
 
 I cannot face the utterance of a prayer 63 
 
 If ever I have thought or said 26 
 
 I followed up a little burn 32 
 
 I hate the vast array of " modern " things 73 
 
 I know a little patch of mountain ground 50 
 
 I layed upon a rock beside the sea 77 
 
 I left the city to the north and walked 35 
 
FIRST POEMS r FRAGMENTS 
 
 I love the hills but she the open shore Page 62 
 
 I love to walk against the yellow light 12 
 
 In long slow silences of soul 25 
 
 In the first pale flush of even 9 
 
 In the low-lying April afternoon 81 
 
 I stood at the hedge as a hearse went by 22 
 
 I stood long time and listened to the wind 67 
 
 Light veils of snow the west wind bore along 69 
 
 Like a dead leaf that rolls along the ground 24 
 
 "Mercy! Justice! Ah, no! Heaven s gate! 
 
 Heaven s gate ! " 61 
 
 Oft have my footsteps in the past been turned 42 
 
 "Something in the sense of morning" 19 
 
 So very near ! Far down, the Tunnel run 7 1 
 
 Standing above the Tunnel gorge, the brook 70 
 
 Still, in the meadow by the brook I lay 9 
 
 Ten thousand fancies flitting through the mind 60 
 
 The breath of slowly-moving spring 19 
 
 The flash of sunlight from a bit of glass 13 
 
 The flood of life that turned away 59 
 
 The influences of air and sky 14 
 
 The poet stoops and plucks a little flower 72 
 
TABLE OF FIRST LINES 
 
 The road ran sloping through the trees Page 20 
 
 The scream of the tern in the roar of the waters 23 
 
 The sea is silent round this rocky shore 7 
 
 The sun is up, Great God, the sun is up 47 
 
 The warm, moist kiss of April on the grass 76 
 
 The wet, brown leaves of winter on the ground 68 
 
 The wild-eyed, savage gull, with bow d wing, tips 83 
 
 This is thy brother, this poor silver fish 16 
 
 This, Woodstock, is my gift; and if I give 42 
 
 Thou little god within the brook 17 
 
 T is grace to sing to nature, and to pray 3 
 
 To catch at that which never can be caught 64 
 
 Upon a pasture hill a pine-tree stands 4 
 
 Westmoreland and the hills of Cumberland 31 
 
 Westward I walked ; the sun was low ; the plain 82 
 
 What know I of the fields of fall 5 
 
 When evening comes and shadows gray 10 
 
 When February sun shines cold 8 
 
 When I look on Ossipee 4 
 
 When the low sun descends on Hamlet Hill 85 
 
 Where man has conquered nature dies 18 
 
 With all the soul within me and suppressed 1 1 
 
 Ye seem intent to stand alone 54 
 
OF THIS EDITION OF FIRST POEMS AND FRAGMENTS FIVE HUNDRED COPIES 
 HAVE BEEN PRINTED WITH FIFTY COPIES ADDITIONAL ON ENGLISH HAND 
 MADE PAPER AND FIVE COPIES ON JAPAN PAPER BY THE EVERETT PRESS 
 BOSTON MAY 1895 
 

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