iSp tljr BAinr 3tttbcir. A NEW YEAR S MASQUE, AND OTHBR POEMS. Limited Edition, printed from type. i6mo, gilt top, $1.50. THE ROUND YEAR. Prose Papers. i6mo,gilt top, $1.25. LYRICS AND SONNETS. i6mo, gilt top, $1.25. THE INVERTED TORCH. Poems. i6mo. |i.oo. HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO., BOSTON AND NEW YORK. THE INVERTED TORCH BY EDITH M. THOMAS BOSTON AND NEW YORK HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY Copyright, 1890, BY EDITU M. THOMAS. All rights reserved. The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U. S. A. Electrotyped and Printed by IL 0. Houghton & Company. To N. T. M. AND S. F. G. MY SISTER AND MY FRIEND. Faces wherein last shone the sinking 1 light Hearts that throbbed nearest mine in the new night Cherish these leaves by lonely memory traced While faint hope starred the wide surrounding- waste. 335968 / dreamed that in thy hollowed palm Thou heldst some measure of gray sand, And pouring it from hand to hand Still with a seer s inspection calm Thine eye the sliding atoms scanned. The greater part thou didst let pass And only here and there retain Some quick-discerned and precious grain These all were closed within a glass. And ran a wonder-lighted vein. Then with a vision s silent grace Thou gavest me the glass to mark All coming hours or bright or dark ; But ivith the gift dissolved thy face,. A fading light within its place. I wake not all from out that dream : Mine hours, if bright or dark they be, Seem noted ever, as they Jlee, By that smooth-gliding magic stream From the dull drift withdrawn by thee. CONTENTS I. TEMPLA QTTAM DILECTA. PAOB I. Ah, what so mightless as their state ... 7 II. Beholding how immutable, august .... 8 III. When in the first great hour of sleep supreme 9 IV. Then in that loneliest night of nights ... 10 Y. Still-charmed by that so-seeming deathless guise 11 VI. I sought thine empty chamber, closed the door 12 VII. Once from the crisping pain and constant throe 13 VIII. Thou hadst not slept an hour of that last sleep 14 IX. In that first hour ! Oh, poignant stroke . 16 X. I traveled far into the wilderness 17 XI. Tell me, is there sovereign cure 18 XII. Sometimes in musings that grow quick and keen 19 XIII. When from this distance I survey the past . 20 XIV. On the day of earth thy last 21 XV. They bid me think, who seek to close my wound 22 XVI. Time takes no toll of thee 23 XVII. How dost thou live in that Life out of thought, unencumbered and blest 25 XVIII. If I might have from thee what boon I would 27 XIX. Sleep soundly through the long light night . 28 II. CLARIOR B TENEBEIS. XX. Love for the lover the worn world renews . 31 XXI. Me, in the darkness lying faint and low . . 32 viii CONTENTS XXII. Now, more and more my heritage I learn 33 XXIII. Now I see, that careless went .... 34 XXIV. Day by day the soul of things .... 37 XXV. Last time I saw thy mortal resting-place 38 XXVI. Now is the waking time of earliest bloom 39 XXVII. In thine own garden (now a wild un- trimmed) 40 XXVIII. Last summer like a jewel lies .... 41 XXIX. I once besought thee that thou wouldst return 42 XXX. Sometimes long dwelling on thy blessed face 43 XXXI. All passions that have birth 44 XXXII. Not that henceforth no more they share . 4(3 XXXIII. How long ago, how long ago, Grief . . 47 III. OPTIMI CONSILIARII MOBTUI. XXXIV. How on the moment all changes ... 51 XXXV. Subtle-swift recognizance 52 XXXVI. I left the home whence thou before hadst passed 53 XXXVII. How often have I watched the winter moon 54 XXXVIII. Two powers the passive giant deep con trol 55 XXXIX. Withdrawing these crystalline drinkers of sunshine into the dark 5C XL. Some words of thine when words of thine were few 57 XLI. Dearest lips that Time hath stilled . . 58 XLJI. Hadst thou not prescience of my days to be GO XLIII. In little years, from dreams of evil guise 62 XLIV. I come to a certain realm in the Past . . 63 XLV. Two words, upon the lips grown obsolete 64 XLVI. In thy withdrawal from the near and known 65 XLVII. Thou wast a confidant, a refuge, still . . GO XLVIII. When fair days fall and fruiting hopes re pay G7 CONTENTS ix XLIX. It is the lover s vaunt that he transcends . 68 L. Or is that love, as once, still round me poured 69 LI. Whence this revelation wide 70 LII. Foregone to sight, to every sense denied . 71 IV. C<ELTJM NON ANIMAM MUTANT. LIII. If still they live, whom touch nor sight . . 75 LIV. Hath God new realms of lovely life for thee 76 LV. Thou hadst a joy in storms that sealike surge 77 LVI. In those last splendor - freighted autumn days 78 LVII. Once, looking on the grass in summer deep 79 LVIII. Though Life s tide ebbed or flowed beneath my eyes 80 LIX. Once I sat down beside a seaward stream . 81 LX. Oft will this thought my current day arrest 82 LXI. Some days there were whose dawns but lit . 83 LXII. Then speaking, this had been my cry . . .84 LXIII. How dare we say, who live by breath . . 85 LXIV. I speak what springeth in my soul to-day . 87 LXV. I could not bear thy name should have no part 88 LXVI. Oh, that thou hadst but crossed some ut- LXVII. I know not why henceforward I should fear 91 LXVIII. " Upon the earth my child ! " " My moth er, thou 92 LXIX. Oft have I wakened ere the spring of day . 92 LXX. Threading a darksome passage all alone . . 94 I. TEMPLA QUAM DILECTA THE INVERTED TORCH AH, what so mightless as their state, Enfolded in the all-night s sleep, Sleep without dream or date ! Ah, what so mightless as their state ? Yet strange regality they keep, As on the dim hours sweep* Ah, what so vacant as their state, Wherein nor wish nor thought inheres, Nor charge of small or great ! Ah, what so vacant as their state ? Yet seem they vision-guarding seers Of the unmeasured years. Most unappealable those brows, Those lips, those ears, that never failedL ; TRE fXVPrD TORCH To our warm prayers and vows ; Most unappealable those brows That kindred sovereignty have hailed, Yet from our knowledge veiled. They are no longer of our time, But to the eldest dead allied, In mien estranged, sublime. O God I they are not of our time ; So looked the first of those that died, So rapt, so glorified ! II. BEHOLDING how immutable, august, Looked that which was doomed downward to the dust, As though mortality itself had won Long immortality beneath the sun I could not understand ! For when some roof-tree built by human hand THE INVERTED TORCH 9 Loses its brood, all round dejection reigns, A wistful blindness dims the window-panes, And the whole mansionry goes down apace. But when the swift soul leaves her earthly place, Doth the poor body her great joy divine, And transiently with her exultance shine ? III. WHEN in the first great hour of sleep su preme I saw my Dearest fair and tranquil lie, Swift ran through all my soul this wonder- cry : " How hast thou met and vanquished hate extreme ! " For by thy faint white smiling thou didst seem, Sweet Magnanimity ! to half defy, Half pity, those ill things thou hadst put by, That are the haunters of our life s dim dream. 10 THE INVERTED TORCH Pain, error, grief, and fear poor shadows all, I, to thy triumph caught, saw fail and fade. Yet as some muser, when the embers fall, The low lamp flickers out, starts up dismayed, So I awoke, to find me still Time s thrall, Time s sport, nor by thy warm safe pre sence stayed. IV. THEN in that loneliest night of nights I looked unto those ancient lights, The myriad, the lidless eyes Whereunder earth all naked lies, The stars I sought, if still they lent To my appeal their dear consent, Immortal is man s soul ! But in that loneliest night of nights, All unintelligent, those lights THE INVERTED TORCH 11 (As gems that shone bright and aloof Within a vast world-cavern s roof) A hedge of lancing splendors wove, And back the old entreaty drove, Immortal is marts soul ? V. STILL-CHARMED by that so-seeming death less guise The Soul s late-left and silent Temple kept, It was as if a dateless cycle swept Past me and past that grace which held my eyes, As if all breathing life beneath the skies For sympathy death-sleep inviolate slept. But through the stillness gradually there crept Two sounds insistent, waking dull surprise : One sound the voice of children at their play, And one the ringing anvil. "Mirth and Toil, 12 THE INVERTED TORCH Of Grief unmindful, keep their beaten way." So first I thought; but then, "The Fate- wove coil Spares none of earth ; this is my bitter day, And later they must feel Time s wanton spoil." VI. I SOUGHT thine empty chamber, closed the door, And strove to know thine absence absolute. In vain! Not yet seemed Echo wholly mute To thy soft, slow, weak footfall on the floor ; And all I touched or looked upon still bore Thy touches vital, keen, beyond compute. Then did my ranging eye in dull pursuit Mark the clear sunlight through the window pour: Oh, then, upon that tide of airy gold (That oft had crowned thy silvering locks with light) THE INVERTED TORCH 13 Revealment suddenly upon me rolled : Eternal days, eternal days, all bright, All void, all waste, as this must I behold, Nor thou nor sign from thee make glad my sight ! VII. ONCE from the crisping pain and constant throe (As bath of fire around thee day and night), Thou criedst aloud, thy sweet lips tense and white, If t is some spirit power pursues me so, / shall myself be spirit soon and go To meet and question it with spirit might. Then sank st thou back to thine old patient plight And thoughts that only passing souls may know. Now evermore in me desire grows keen To learn of thy soul s speeding, if thou met 14 THE INVERTED TORCH Some blank All-Silent, or if thou dost lean On some All-Pitiful, not mindful yet, So wrapped in new-found ease and joy se rene, To search why life must pay such heavy debt. VIII. " Some lost Lady of old years With her beauteous vain endeavor, And goodness unrepaid as ever, The face accustomed to refusings. And so she glides as down a valley, Taking up with her contempt, Past our reach, and in, the flowers Shut her unregarded hours." THOU hadst not slept an hour of that last sleep When my soul woke to know what it had lost, And met the shining face of what thou wast, THE INVERTED TORCH 15 Whom time can touch no more, nor earth can keep. Thine eyes with love upfilled, unfathomed deep ! Thine eyes reproachless still ! ah, there fore most My soul did with reproach itself accost, And bid mine eyes to ache for grief, not weep. Thou, grateful-glad of every gladding thing, Love s least return, and each white truce to care ! For this my soul did lodge the sharpest sting, Because thou hadst of these such lenten share. But thou departedst, unremembering, A smiling vanisher in griefless light and air. It) THE INVERTED TORCH IX. IN that first hour ! Oh, poignant stroke Of all-invasive Light That searched my spirit out, and woke To clear discerning sight ! Thy life and mine before me swept : Mine, dry with selfish need ; Thine, beautiful, a fountain leapt, Blessing with selfless deed. Beneath me and around me gaped A chasm of torment fierce ; Where scourge and rack were dimly shaped, But no sweet light could pierce : No word to ply between us twain, No clasping of the knees, No heart-throe loosing tearful rain That brings a taste of ease ! THE INVERTED TORCH 17 At last, didst not thou intervene, And soft oblivion strow ? For since that hour I have not known Such gulfing deep of woe. X. I TRAVELED far into the wilderness, And found a spacious country choked with dust ; The cloven hillsides gaped all fountainless, The crisped forests showed as red as rust. In all the land no green plant reared its head ; A plain of dust the sultry sky did seem ; Along the river s void and silent bed The hot air rippled like a phantom stream. A Voice sprang up, than crackling flame more fine, And quivered through the waste, "What dost thou here, 18 THE INVERTED TORCH Within this realm o erswayed by powers malign, This Land where None hath ever shed a Tear? " What dost thou hope ? If any one might weep, Then would the rain descend in fostering showers, The stream along its crannied bed would leap, The land laugh out in sudden grass and flowers." XI. TELL me, is there sovereign cure For heart-ache, heart-ache, Cordial quick and potion sure, For heart-ache, heart-ache ? Fret thou not. If all else fail For heart-ache, heart-ache, THE INVERTED TORCH 19 One thing surely will avail, That s heart-break, heart-break ! XII. SOMETIMES in musings that grow quick and keen, The door I beat upon all wide is set, And thou thyself and I thy child are met, The barrier gone that late did intervene. And then, since thou hast dwelt removed, serene, Unknowing of this world s tumult and fret (Whose pulse and heat are in me mortal I seek to tell thee what my lot has seen. But on my lips the hurrying word falls null ; For thou dost seem, great marvel in thy gaze, To look on somewhat dread and beautiful. Its knowledge in thine eyes my babbling stays : 20 THE INVERTED TORCH What knowledge ! ah, forgive me, senseless dull ! For thou with Death hast walked through wondrous ways ! XIII. WHEN from this distance I survey the past, I marvel not at joys of bygone date. Nor chide I them that, trivial, they seemed great, And sped the restless golden hours too fast. Nay, dear as flowers that have brief time to last, My lost joys edge the roadway of that fate Through whose deep mournful vale I came but late, And gleam unblotted in the shadow vast. I chide not them ; but often as I turn My eyes, new-undeceived, on that closed way, THE INVERTED TORCH 21 Here, here, and there, I pageant things dis cern, That still at pantomime of Sorrow play, Once idly named My Griefs. These now I spurn ; Joy have I known, but Grief not till to-day. XIV. ON the day of earth thy last, Up my spirit rose aghast, For there came a legion throng All our days in summer long, All the days so gently paced, All the days with favor graced, All the beauteous days we passed, Mindless there should come The Last. All the days, from morn till noon, With the evening s sweeter boon, All for Love s full showing meant, Yet what part in silence spent ! 22 THE INVERTED TORCH Lips to speak, yet most and best In the heart left unexpressed ! Lips to speak, such days in fee, - Now what stores should voiced be ! Still my spirit stood aghast, For the days, as they drew past, Strove each one its weight to cast On that frail and speechless Last ! XV. THEY bid me think, who seek to close my wound, How from life s storms thou hast escaped for aye. Their wonted words unobvious fire convey : For then I see thee, in my heart s profound, Stand as thou stood st upon life s open ground, A mettled tenderness and braced for fray ; I see thee whom no fortune could dismay, THE INVERTED TORCH 23 Or make thy soul aught less than sweet and sound. The storms of life what noble strength shall meet And grow not stronger for the sharp as sault ? But each hour s petty spoilure and defeat Wear out the heart in fruitless sick revolt ; So, not as freed from strife thy state I greet, But as above such piteous waste exalt. XVI. TIME takes no toll of thee, Age spares the soul of thee. They vex thee no more, Besieging thy door ; Nor without nor within Shall they vantage win. The long years are fled from thee, The winters are shed from thee, 24 THE INVERTED TORCH As the snows retire For Spring s hidden fire, And the gray of the fields To the young green yields. The long years descend on me, The winters bend on me Their gathering might, As when dwindles the light, And the gray of the fields To the white drift yields. Now, ill or well with me, Time and Age dwell with me ; When thou wast set free, They straightway sought me, Laying siege at my door, As at thine before. What dear things desert to thee, Youth doth revert to thee, While I, as Fate steers, Grow toward thy years, THE INVERTED TORCH 25 That, gone out of mind, Thou hast left behind ! XVII. How dost thou live in that Life out of thought, unencumbered and blest, How dost thou live, now immortal, of ulti mate being possessed, Nothing that turneth to rest, yet nothing that knoweth unrest ? Here, Life, to prolong her fond stay, with care is consumed evermore ; And calls a brief death-with-dreams, the spoil of each day to restore : How dost thou live in that Life without waste, at the spirit s core ? * Nothing the keen Hour wounds, and noth ing that seeketh recure ; 26 THE INVERTED TORCH Nothing of veiled response, that vexeth and maketh unsure ; Nothing that beckons the soul, to deceive with a vanishing lure. How dost thou live in that Life, oh, never the shadow of ours (Shadow itself, that Time with illusory heritage dowers), But constant, supreme of all real, endued with far pleasures and powers ! As tones transcending our sense, yet vibrat ing true in their height, As the element finer than air, that conveyeth the shaft of the light, So is that Life unbetokened by sound, and viewless to sight. THE INVERTED TORCH 27 XVIII. IF I might have from thee what boon I would, Or thou departing might to me resign Some safeguard virtue wherein thou didst shine (No more required by thee where Peace doth brood) ; If I might seek, and thou bestow, such good, What once possessed by thee should now be mine? Thy courage ! give me that bright proof of thine, Arms and defense of thy soft womanhood ! Thy courage grant me ! for I waver here As some late ill-fledged bird that, left behind Amid the wreckage of the sylvan year, Hath not sustaining power of flight to find Where its gone comrades make broad sum mer cheer, Nor is inured to cope with days unkind. 28 THE INVERTED TORCH XIX. (A VOICE IX A DREAM.) SLEEP soundly through the long light night. The day will come too soon, too soon. Across the halo-circled moon Ever some frailest cloud takes flight, Bathed in rare light. Oh, sleep! For this would seem that form to limn, For which, weeping, thine eyes grow dim Grow dim ! Sleep soundly through the long still night. The day will come too soon, too soon. Beneath thy casement falls aswoon The lonely wind that sways so light Yon pine s bleak height. Oh, sleep ! For this would seem that voice late stilled, For which thine ear hungers unfilled Unfilled ! II. CLARIOR E TENEBRIS. THE INVERTED TORCH 31 XX. LOVE for the lover the worn world renews : To his quick ear the harshest bird that sings Hath been in Heaven and learned delicious things ; To his quick eye the flower of dullest hues Reveals it late was bathed in beauty-dews That have been filtered from ethereal springs. He looks he listens all the air is wings, And full of sighed-out greetings and adieus ! Lovely the light through Love s all-colored prism, But sacred Grief can also wonders work, Laving the world from an o erflowing chrism : What stars, what stars shine through the wonted mirk 32 THE INVERTED TORCH Where night and dawn verge on the old abysm, And in dusk streams what trembling lustres lurk ! XXI. ME, in the darkness lying faint and low, Grief touched, and murmured, " I will give thee sight, "Whereto like some weak dream of yester night Thy former vision s casual gleams will show." Then to my eyes, that used with tears to flow, Came unreproving the slow winter light, Yet wrought them to behold anew, aright, The miracle of smooth night-fallen snow : The breath from morning fires the tree- tops haze The nest lone-swinging fair, how strangely fair! THE INVERTED TORCH 33 I saw it all in swift and soft amaze : The whiteness, lo ! the track that thou didst wear; The heavens musing loveliness, thy gaze ; Thy voice, the deepened silence of the air. XXII. Now, more and more my heritage I learn, Oh, more and more that full bequest grows mine, Which to my lone-left being fell from thine, The love of this fair earth ; sight to discern In nature s face, however pale or stern, A glory, and a grace, and touch benign, A western dawn spring from our day s decline, A fervor white within the hoar-frost burn. Dost thou not put me in possession sure Of thine own loving, liberal eye s estate ? 34 THE INVERTED TORCH Ay, more, when some fresh scene makes overture With promise of revealment, strange, elate, Dost thou from fount of heavenly vision pure Endow mine eyes with more than sight in nate? XXIII. Now I see, that careless went In a dreamful rich content, Now I see how all life speeds Where its crafty Hermes leads, Into silence, into shade, Downward, downward, downward weighed By a stress that last or first Knows nor halt nor step reversed. Can it be that I alone Have ignored what all things own, Heeded not the common word Every listening creature heard, THE INVERTED TORCH 35 That a Forfeit still devours All increase of sunbright hours ? Now I know, twixt earth and sky Naught but breathes a conscious sigh, And a sentient look has caught, Answering unspoken thought ; Simplest flower by forest-edge, Hanging leaf and mirrored sedge, All in pensive musings lost ; And the wood-bird s note is crossed With a thrill of prescient pain ! Now I list, and not in vain, When their congener they greet With sad candor kind and sweet : " Hast thou but so late, alas ! Learned that thou and thine must pass ? Never was the truth concealed ; Quivering lights on distant field Often sought thine eye to gain, And the wind and gentle rain Strove to be articulate, So to teach impending Fate. 36 THE INVERTED TORCH Voice and sign, both failed alike Thy deep-slumbering sense to strike ; All monitions were despised Till near loss thy heart surprised. Thou and thine must pass, but we Comradely will go with thee, We and ours, with tears or laughter ! Every Vanished One draws after, As the lamp that rules the tides, As a hidden magnet guides, As a clew within a maze, Leading forth on unknown ways ! Latest Springtime, morning-faced, Springs outlived pursues in haste ; Reminiscent Summer hears Summer-calls of yester-years. Henceforth, oft as thou shalt see One of ours, though least it be, Trampled leaf or drooped flower, Yielding to its summoning Hour, Thou shalt stand fast in thy place Gaze and for a moment s space Feel the clew more tightly run Between thee and thy Vanished One ! " THE INVERTED TORCH 37 XXIV. DAY by day the soul of things Up its countless ladders springs, Fleeting back to whence it came, Inviolate, ethereal flame ! I have pierced its changing shapes, Coils and turnings, deft escapes ! Up yon swaying shaft it stole, Of the scarlet gladiole. First, the lowest bud it caught, And with fire its chalice fraught ; Then, with aspiration new, To the bloom above withdrew. Every flower, thus bereft, Like a quenched brand was left, Quickly into ashes fell When the Genius fled its cell ! On the morrow it will rest In the topmost blossom-crest ; Waving thence its light adieus, Some unseen way it pursues. 38 THE INVERTED TORCH Airy pyramid of grass At its motion yields a pass. Through the wind-loved wheat it flows, Up the tufted sedge-flower goes, Scales the foxglove s leaning spire, Fans the wild lobelia s fire, Where beside the pool it flashes ; And the slender vervain s lashes, By the climbing spirit swayed, All their purple length unbraid. Thus the soul of blooming things Up its countless ladders springs. XXV. LAST time I saw thy mortal resting-place, Twas covered all with a smooth weft of snow, Wherethrough some stems of yet sweet mint did show, Memorials of the vanished summer s grace. There, bending low, I marked a chary trace THE INVERTED TORCH 39 Of footprints delicate, that to and fro About thy quiet mansionry did go, Swift footprints of the least of Fauna s race. These were thy winter friendings, faint yet true, From Nature, whom thou lov dst so true and well. Spring came, and soft white blossoms round thee blew From that wild tree, thy shade and sentinel. Though far away, its flowering prime I knew, And ofttimes seemed to watch those blos soms as they fell. Now is the waking time of earliest bloom In greening meadow grounds that south ward slope, And woods that from the south sun gather hope 40 THE INVERTED TORCH To call their darlings from the nether gloom. Faint windflower hues the hasting clouds assume, And transient windows on the azure ope. Now softly gleam the stars from misty cope, And budded trees f oref eel their leafy doom. Oh seasonable, sweet awakening Oh restless joy of April day and night ! 1 to the earth iny griefful heart would fling; There, lying null to every sound and sight, I would forget, Gone Lover of the Spring, Thy birthday now returns, but not thy light ! XXVII. IN thine own garden (now a wild un- trimmed) White summer-hearted lilies, dashed with rain, THE INVERTED TORCH 41 Once bowed their regal height, still sweet though dimmed, A fallen, flower-fane, Not to be reared again ! I could not know what symbol they would form, Thou beaten down, so long by storm op pressed, Then wrapped in the lone calm that follows storm, Benignity and rest On brows, and lips, and breast. XXVIII. LAST summer like a jewel lies In the seal d casket of thine eyes, With all lost hours and rare. This summer greens thy footprint o er, And grows long sward about thy door, But yieldeth thee no share. 42 THE INVERTED TORCH Nor first-seen violet hast thou seen, Nor misty veil of earliest green Clothe the gray forest-wall ; Thou hast not probed the June s rose heart ; Ah, if in all thou hast no part, Be thou a part in all ! Speak sometimes by a flower s soft mouth, Or gather breath from the mild South Thy soothings to repeat. Let thy voice live with deepening leaves, And float to me, on quiet eves, From mystic fields of wheat. XXIX. I ONCE besought thee that thou wouldst return, And, spirit, clothe thyself in symboled speech That, though unheard, might still my spirit reach, And arm to vanquish Death s negation stern ; THE INVERTED TORCH 43 As, when spring s half-blown buds should seem to yearn For freedom and the fostering warmth beseech, Or when the stars, signalling each to each, With soft access of light should seem to burn, That I in these thy beckoning soul might see. Thine answer came, sad with prevision keen : Look not for this, but think, if it could be, How many myriads gone had comfort seen. From the all-binding law not one goes free ; It is for us as it for all has been. XXX. SOMETIMES long dwelling on thy blessed face Imaged within, my vision s force o ershot, There grows a void in which I see thee not, Nor eyes, nor brows, nor smoothed hair s silver grace : 44 THE INVERTED TORCH The way to thee I can no longer trace. So might some traveler bemoan his lot, When all at once thick grass and herbage blot The path that leads him through some vague waste place. Nor will nor strong desire my sight can clear, Yet even as I turn, it so may chance My eyes take in some trivial object near Enough, if it has known thy touch, thy glance, Enough! it. brings thee back, unstrange and dear, Thy shape, thy face, and light of coun tenance ! XXXI. ALL passions that have birth In clay-knit hearts do wear The imprint of the earth ; Time s touch thev ill can bear, THE INVERTED TORCH 45 But wavering and infirm They have their mortal term, Growth, vigor, and decline, And lapsed do not renew ; Kind Love, and Joy benign, And Grief is of them too. Perverse in unrestraint, The passion, wild at prime, The sooner worn and faint Draws to its folding-time. I said to Grief, " Kef rain, That thou mayst still remain, And, full of eyes to see, And voices touched with power, Mayst sit and speak with me In Life s far evening hour." Grief to my gentle prayer A yielding mind did lend, To dwell with me, and share Whatever Time should send. Grief is no foe to Joy Good part of Grief s employ, 46 THE INVERTED TORCH My spirit to beguile, And show how passing mirth Would win my Lost One s smile, Were she yet here on earth. XXXII. NOT that henceforth no more they share Our once divided load of care, And wake because we cannot sleep, Not that with us no more they weep, Strains on the longing heart so much As when, at first, some chariest touch From Life s kind angel, Humor, brings Faint tremble to the unused strings. Oh then, might we but see arise The dawn of mirth in their sweet eyes, While their full laughter s heavenly sound Were in our hungering ears unbound ! THE INVERTED TORCH 47 XXXIII. How long ago, how long ago, Grief ! Twice have I felt spring winds arise and blow, And vernal suns with quickening fervor glow ; Twice have I seen the broad noon-silent leaf, And twice have marked its fall, and whiten ing sheaf On many a gusty hillside bowed low. How long ago, O Grief, how long ago ! How brief the severing space, O Love, how brief ! Saith Grief to me, " Thou canst not well recall Dear looks, dear tones, for the great time between, That like a crowding mist confuseth all." 48 THE INVERTED TORCH Love saith, " Be these as present, heard and seen ! " Love chides because Grief s eyelids droop and fall ; Then Grief grows more because Love s vis ion is so ke?n. III. OPTIMI CONSILIARII MORTUI. XXXIV. How on the moment all changes ! Quietude midmost the throng, Peace amid tumult, and dissonance Charmed into vespertine song ! Dew on the dust of the noontime, Spring at the dead of the year, Freedom discerned out of bondage, Grace in condition austere ! Praise to attemper world s censure, Monition allaying world s praise, Shield interposed to the arrow, Instant clear path through the maze ! How on the moment all changes, Life shaking off its dull trance ! 52 THE INVERTED TORCH (Thou overwatching, Beloved One ? Thou overruling, perchance ?) XXXV. SUBTLE-SWIFT recognizance Of the soul s inheritance ! Even now the word that sped From these lips thou mightst have said ; Turn of phrase and voiced tone Were as they had been thine own ; Oft these eyes thy glance repeat "When some moving scene they meet ; Yet more deeply is inwrought The similitude of thought. So of thee I still shall learn, So as with thy sight discern. Then, if on my further way Thou dost keep an oversway, Though the earth thy shape forego, Yet from thee shall influence flow ; And if from my life proceed Loving-kindness, generous deed, THE INVERTED TORCH 53 Here I own that, in so much, Still the world shall feel thy touch ! XXXVI. I LEFT the home whence thou before hadst One moment in the gliding landscape shone The mornward hill-verge, winter-pale and lone, Where thou for dreamless sleep thy cham ber hast. Oh, then, I saw thee as I saw thee last (All fair, desiring nought, and envying none), Save now above thee winter s fleeces strown, And round thee calm, oblivious earth up cast. I left the home whence thou hadst passed before. The swift train on through day and dark ness hurled : 54 THE INVERTED TORCH But yet thy hill its mournful summit bore Mong woods and heights and clouds con fused whirled, Thy little dome of earth f orevermore Magnetic centre of my shattered world ! XXXVII. How often have I watched the winter moon Glide on through cloudy legions chased by flaw, Glide on, or seem to glide, in lonely awe, As fain to vanish from earth s ken full soon! But, watching still, behold, swift lucent boon Far-flashing through the vapory clefts I Since but the wind-borne clouds did fast withdraw, Unchanged that tender face of plenilune. And so, when first thyself from me wast reft, I seemed to see thee far, and yet more far, THE INVERTED TORCH 55 Remove, rare-glimpsed through Time s wild- woven weft Of days and deeds that make our life or mar. These, cloud-like, have their passing ; thou art left, In my night-heaven, a constant beacon star. XXXVIII. Two powers the passive giant deep control. The one, great foe to mass and unity, Breaks up into ten thousand seas the sea, And wanton drives it onward to no goal. The other, as with bell of sphery toll (Whether the wind be loosed or chaine d be), To tidal orisons draws holily The mighty water with its yearning soul. To the wide world my spirit open lies, As lies the mobile sea beneath the wind, 56 THE INVERTED TORCH That evermore its veering force applies. But thou, beyond all and through all, canst bind And hold me still in fealty to the skies, Swaying with heavenly influence undi- vined. XXXIX. " Hearts that yet (Like gems in darkness issuing rays They ve treasured from the sun that s set) Beam all the light of long-lost days." WITHDRAWING these crystalline drinkers of sunshine into the dark, Lo, quenched is the flame of rubies, dead is the amethyst s spark ! The diamond alone exulteth when suddenly seized by the night, The diamond alone conserveth its hoard of scintillant light. THE INVERTED TORCH 57 Now, O my Soul, thou art tried ; and how dost thou choose to be known ? Ingrate, lost, and undone ? or peer of the kingliest stone, Lucid by day, and braving the dark with its luminous freight ? Hold thou the glow of thy Past, and shine in the glooming of Fate. XL. SOME words of thine when words of thine were few And priceless dear, upwafted with a sigh, Do ever greaten to my mind s fixed eye, As legend on a magic door wherethrough Wide-wandering pilgrims pass, and gain the clue. Thou saidst : God set my heart no creed, but I In goodwill towards His world have lived and die. Then thy far thought in silence didst pursue. 58 THE INVERTED TORCH That hour thy visioned word laid stress on me To let all watchwords pass save only one (Howe er confused and vexed these world- cries be) : Goodwill, Goodwill, Goodwill shall hence forth run Through thought and deed. It were unfaith to thee To stoop with malison for malison. XLI. Begin the morning by saying to thyself, I shall meet with the busybody, the ungrateful, arrogant, deceitful, envious, unsocial. All these things happen to them by reason of their ignorance of what is good and evil. But I, who have seen the nature of the good that it is beautiful, and of the bad that it is ugly, and the nature of him who does wrong, that it is akin to me, ... I can neither be injured by any of them, for no one can fix on me what is ugly, nor can I be angry with my kinsman nor hate him. Antoninus. DEAREST lips that Time hath stilled, In all gracious wisdom skilled, THE INVERTED TORCH 59 Once those clement words brought home From the purple of old Rome. Though tho morning give thee joy, Thou shalt meet with much annoy Ere the evening mild and gray Comes to shrive the erring day. Thou shalt meet with those who wear Face, not heart, of Friendship fair. Thou shalt meet with those whose praise Tasteless burden on thee lays. Thou shalt suffer wanton blame, All unweeting whence it came : Some shall envy thee, the while Some thy well-content revile ; Some shall hate, for this alone, That thy bounty they have known ! Random judgments thrown abroad, Justice scorned, and Faith outlawed, Heartless laughter of no mirth, Lack of love, and Pity s dearth, Thou shalt meet, or thou, or thine Dear by human bond divine. 60 THE INVERTED TORCH Thou shalt see the boastful gain What meek Worth shall seek in vain. Thriftless running to and fro Shall for zeal and service show. Foolish ones shall sit in state While the wise unplaced shall wait. These are so, as thou shalt see, Not too much perturbed be, Nay, for this were harm s increase, In thy bosom nestle Peace ! These are so from blinded sight ; If thine eye have more of light, Thankful, keep within the ray Thrown upon thy fairer way, Thankful that no God commands Thou go forth with scourging hands. XLII. HADST thou not prescience of my days to be When thine own day should sink below Life s west, THE INVERTED TORCH 61 That now I seem to fare on bidden quest, Whose road and every chance were known to thee ? Did not thy loving forecast circle me ? A look of thine caught back arms strong my breast, Thy word, Memory s inner-templed guest, Springs up, from slackening doubt and fear to free. Thus one in midst of deedful times may turn The leaves of some old sacred book, and start, Finding foreshadowed there the thought that burns, The act that burning thought coins from the heart. Thus one a phosphor - writing may dis cern But not till daylight utterly depart. 62 THE INVERTED TORCH XUII. IN little years, from dreams of evil guise That trouble childhood s sleep, I oft would wake Calling on one dear name whose might could break The charm that heavy lay upon my eyes. Then, quickly won by thy soft-breathed re plies, Came Peace, as stilly as the falling flake, And Sleep within his blissful arms would take And bear me to the kiss of morning skies. Still, still, awaking from some pained dream, I call thy name but with what other cheer ! Now beats my heart beneath this touch ex treme As slow with grief as once how fast with fear! THE INVERTED TORCH 63 Yet oft it seems (ah, might it more than seem !) Thou and thy shielding comfort still are near. XLIV. I COME to a certain realm in the Past Lovely and lonely, and overcast, Sunlight and shadow, barren and bloom, All overcast with a wondrous clear gloom ! There is the morning blossom half blind With dew that the sun has yet to find ; There is the magical flower once seen, Once and no more, by the wood-aisle green ; And there is the bird, unnamed, tliat sings With a melody caught from bubbling springs. There are the Maytime orchard trees That palace a myriad murmuring bees ; There are the beechen vistas deep That forever the gold of Autumn keep ; 64 THE INVERTED TORCH While the journeying river, slim and bright, Is merged afar in the hazy light. There, in the hour that wakens the moth, Up from the new-fallen harvest swath, Languid sweetnesses wander, and die ; In the thrilling calm of the deepened sky, There is the star that seems to hear The song on the threshold, to childhood dear. Rarely I come to this realm in the past All with a clear gloom overcast, For I too sorrowful-rich am grown, So sweet an estate possessing alone. Lovely and lonely, unshared, it lies, Save Memory dwells with thee, too, in the skies. XLV. Two words, upon the lips grown obsolete, Are folded in the heart ; one stands for thee, THE INVERTED TORCH 65 And one, close-linked with thine in music sweet, For sheltering love long-lost to thee and me. Tell all that I would tell if thou hast found That spirit lit with hope and touched with mirth. Oh hearken, both (where er in Heaven s round) To those dear guardian names I miss on earth ! XLVI. IN thy withdrawal from the near and known, Past any touch of hands, past sight, past call, Thrice have I lost thee, once my child hood s all, When thou and I it seemed did wait alone On the green curve of earth close to God s throne, And hearken well what secrets He let fall 66 THE INVERTED TORCH About this lower kingdom s great and small, In whisper and by sign now fainter grown. Again I lose thee, Voice of Courage clear, Thou Soul of Youth that didst my youth up- stay ! And yet again I lose thee, loss most dear ! For now, when I before thee hoped to lay Some fruitage of the slow responsive year, Thou, tarrying not, art gone the Lonely Way. XL VII. THOU wast a confidant, a refuge, still, As when thy kisses balmed a childish hurt ; A heartener of baffled lone desert, Of strength too far essayed, of faltering will; But see, I can forego thy tender skill, All-comforting, all-healing, as thou wert ; I can forego the shield that did avert The ceaseless wear, the thrusts that sudden kill; THE INVERTED TORCH 67 I can forego thee in such bitter harms As may along my journey ambushed, lie, By thought that thou art freed from sharp alarms And taste of troublous days. But how shall I Not speak, not cast myself into thine arms, Should ever some quick joy my cup fill high ? XLVIII. WHEN fair days fall and fruiting hopes re- pay My care (not thee, who first and most gave cheer), Unfilled by all, my heart desires thee near Nay, dreams that thou the prosperous hour dost sway ! But when there comes a season gaunt and gray, Winds pierce, and the mask d heaven looks austere, I pray that thou art very far from here, Ay, in safe Paradise rapt far away. 68 THE INVERTED TORCH Yet sometimes a new light unblinds my eyes: Even if thou my joys and sorrows knew, Perchance to thee they would show other wise, Or unregarded sink beneath thy view. Could I to thine imagined height once rise, What earthly pain or pleasure could subdue ? XLIX. IT is the lover s vaunt that he transcends All who have loved, or who in love excel ; And if his tongue be rich-endowed, to tell His love s esteem, a world of words he spends. My broken song for no such meed contends. Nor dares my love to claim its parallel In thine ; but on thy love for me I dwell, Thine peerless, met no more until life ends. THE INVERTED TORCH 69 Oh, mother-love, from childhood unexplored, Oh, mother-love, all boundless in pure height ! (So to the bird a sun-filled heaven un soared, Tenderly overlies its daily flight.) Lost Plenitude! Be thou not lost, but stored Where I shall find thee after one strange night. OR is that love, as once, still round me poured, Unknown because this dense mortality With doubt or stern denial houses me ? As though the ambient daylight were ig nored By one whose way of vision had been scored, As bird, that cannot past its cage-eaves see, Might well forget that unto pinions free Vast shining tracts the morning skies afford. 70 THE INVERTED TORCH Yet moments there have been (too rare they fall !) When I, though blind and captive here, have spurned The darkness, and have shaken off the thrall. And then, where er my quickened spirit turned, The light would seem as love diffused tlirough all, The love seemed thou about to be dis cerned. LI. WHENCE this revelation wide, Lucid as the morning tide, Whereby thou art seen more clear Than in mortal habit here ? Now thy looks grow permanent, As a star s glance earthward bent, Ever there, though late descried, Ever there, and patient-eyed. THE INVERTED TORCH 71 Words of thine, unhearkened long, Come as strains of Orphic song, Or, as Corybantic flute Deep-pervading, never mute, Wake to courage and to trust, Bid be just were all unjust. Ah, that thou art so revealed When between us speech is sealed ! LII. FOREGONE to sight, to every sense de nied, Voiceless, and vanished, nevermore to fill Thy lacking place, art thou not human still, With only human sorrow cast aside ? Or now, that round me draws a novel tide Of urgent days that sway me as they will, Must I to thee grow strange, and stranger, till From all thou knewest I seem disallied ? 72 THE INVERTED TORCH Look down with thine old tender, large re gard, When my soul wavers from its clear de sign. As once thou wouldst reprove, and afterward Smile on thy child, half-humorous, benign, Now even so (although in heaven starred), Chide smilingly each human lapse of mine. IV. CCELUM NON ANIMUM MUTANT. LHL IF still they live, whom touch nor sight Nor any subtlest sense can prove, Though dwelling past our day and night, At farthest star s remove, Oh, not because these skies they change For upper deeps of sky unknown, Shall that which made them ours grow strange, For spirit holds its own ; Whether it pace this earth around, Or cross, with printless, buoyant feet, The unreverberant Profound That hath no name nor mete ! 76 THE INVERTED TORCH LIV. " God must be glad one loves his world so much. I can give news of earth to all the dead Who ask me." HATH God new realms of lovely life for thee In some white star, the soul of eve or morn, Whose full and throbbing lustre makes for lorn Us who not yet across the void shall flee ? But why remote should now thy pleasures be, When yet thy joy in nature was unworn, W r hether forth shot the blade of tender corn, Or the wild tempest scourged the winter tree? Seeker and seer of beauty in each phase Of day or year through which the dear earth runs, Far be the Heaven of change-desiring ones, Be thine not so ; but love thou still to gaze On morning dews that wed with golden suns, And happy deaths of stainless summer days. THE INVERTED TORCH 77 LV. THOU hadst a joy in storms that sealike surge, A joy in tumult-stirring winds that fare Through hollow heaven and through forests bare, A joy in the red lightning s lustral scourge. Hence, to my ear comes no vague mournful dirge In the sweet tremblings of this wind-harp rare Like thine, this dauntless gentle voice of air Bids follow, follow to thought s farthest verge ! Now God hath made thy spirit faint and strange, If thou thy choice of heavenly seats dost find Where never a brave storm the plains may range, And in its course wild minstrelsy unbind ; 78 THE INVERTED TORCH But if thine olden pleasure knows not change, How friendly breathes on me this wintry wind! LVI. IN those last splendor - freighted autumn days Thou murmuredst, leaning at the open door, The world, how beautiful! but mine no more. Veiled, then, thy dark eyes long-foregoing gaze. But when the year s night had shut down their rays, Thy words deep in my heart a pathway wore The world, thy world, that brought thee so rich store, Thy lost world ! then not mine to love, to praise ! THE INVERTED TORCH 79 Long time its voices nothing said to me, Its wheeling lights across blank reaches shone, Because I deemed thou couldst not hear nor see. At last a slender flame of hope was blown, That God takes not his much-loved world from thee, But still thou lov st it, though in ways un known. LVIL ONCE, looking on the grass in summer deep, That, myriad waving at the wind s light will, Vouchsafes no murmur, but is voiceless still, Thou saidst, A secret the sly grass-blades keep ! And thou wouldst marvel how a flower doth sleep, Folding its dainties from the evening chill, 80 THE INVERTED TORCH And how a tendriled summer vine has skill Sunward by one same spiral path to creep. Now if the petals of a flower I part, Or gaze into the green depths of a tree, A trembling sense will glide into my heart, To tell me, though I am too dull to see, In all these gentler subtleties thou art, And all that nature is, is known to thee. LVIII. THOUGH Life s tide ebbed or flowed beneath my eyes, Its ebb had but a legend s force for me Until the refluent wave made prize of thee. Now thoughts of Death forever in me rise, But in no strange, in no forbidding guise ; So might some stream have prescience of the sea, So forecast of fruition thrill some tree Rolling white-billowed bloom on Maytime skies. THE INVERTED TORCH 81 As foldwise the great sea awaits the stream, As autumn is the green tree s toiled-f or goal, So is it peace to me, not strife, to deem Death grows with all my days past all con trol, And nearer brings oblivion or dream Or boon awakening of the lifted soul ! LIX. ONCE I sat down beside a seaward stream ; Beneath the summer light s enchanted wand The home -bound water, the green marge beyond, The long-descending pastured hills, did seem As some far bourne within Elysian dream, Where souls, new-loosed from their most grievous bond, Between desireful hope and tarriance fond Might wait till beckoned on to joy su preme. 82 THE INVERTED TORCH "With this came thoughts of thee in Paradise. No more the bright home-drawing flood se rene, No more the lapsing hills, the happy skies As dome of light, and stream, and hill were seen, But as if thou, wide-browed, with blessing eyes Subliming, softening all, didst through them lean. LX. OFT will this thought my current day ar rest : If from the round of being thou art shed, Already am I too among the dead, And but in semblant life, not real, drest, Semblant, the heart s strange knocking at the breast, This sight with crowding images o erfed, This breath outgoing, and the vain word sped, This brain with fictile labor still oppressed. THE INVERTED TORCH 83 Swift then another thought this thought pur sues : But I yet live I live and thou livest ! Of sovereign being nothing shall I lose, Nor hast thou lost, Life s close eternal guest, Who after wandering gatherest up the clues, While I grope many ways in obscure quest. LXI. SOME days there were whose dawns but lit The voidness of an Infinite That draws all life, yet life knew not, When quest I made. Some days there were whose nights forgot, Or scorned, the ignorant stars above, Pleaders inane for life and love Since these could fade ! From out that Void how hollow rung What seers have breathed and bards have sung, 84 THE INVERTED TORCH Attesting Immortality. My own heart s cheer In mocking strain returned to me ; So lonely need might send a call, And, echo from the mountain wall, Sole answer hear. LXH. THEN speaking, this had been my cry : " I have deceived been ! Now I Nor currency nor credit give The heart s brave tale. Not anywhere they longer live, When once the earth has claimed its kin, And from the haunts where they have been Their faces fail." But, after-days, this voice arose : 44 Since the Event no mortal knows, But Yea or Nay may still advance, Nor pierce veiled fate. THE INVERTED TORCH 85 To give the lie, thou liest perchance ! Foster not fear but hope the while, And, closed in human life s defile, Solution wait." LXIII. How dare we say, who live by breath, They are no more, who have closed with Death, Faced that great total Dread of man, Like some brave, mist-surrounded van Their victory in the formless blank Unsighted by the hereward rank ! They are no more ? That word is ours, Whose hunted being shrinks and cowers, Who turn our toil, and wind with craft, To parry still the eventual shaft. We whom death-perils each way hem Perchance we are no more to them ! 86 THE INVERTED TORCH Though it may be some guard they keep Above this dream-beleagured sleep That they once deemed, and we still deem, Life, not its faint-divining dream, We are no more, our now and here Naught to those wakened spirits clear. Sometimes wherever I may go, Unto my heart thou livest so, I marvel if the forms I meet, The speech I hear, be Time s deceit If viewlessness and silence screen More life than can be heard and seen ! Thou against all this shadow-world ! Thou between whom and me were hurled Figments that mourning Fancy rears Thou against all that thus appears Thou, and the Life to be, gainst all I dream and fear, and Life miscall! THE INVERTED TORCH 87 LXIV. I SPEAK what springeth in my soul to-day : Thanks be that man believes his life hath root (However perish mortal flower and fruit) So deep that thither nothing ill makes way. Thanks for belief-in-life, Life s one great stay, Though wandering voices still faith s sub stance moot, And even though should end the dear pur suit Where, ending all, none heareth the dread Nay. I utter this, remembering a dead space In which Death, Death, and Death alone forth stood, A legend written on the whole world s face, In characters of monstrous certitude 88 THE INVERTED TORCH It seemed no time nor power could erase ; Yet something in my soul some faith re newed. LXV. I COULD not bear thy name should have no part In speech that human thought and impulse frame ; And so I still would press its fading claim, With more of zeal than of strategic art. Then on my lips would come with passioned start Its syllables that once so native came, And passed, undwelt on. Now thy precious name I can contain in quiet in my heart. I seek not now so much, with instant pain, To make thee loved by those who knew not thee. THE INVERTED TORCH 89 By stranger s love and praise what couldst thou gain? It shall suffice that there remains for me Thy light, as in some forested deep fane Filled with sweet breath and sound from many a tree. LXVI. OH, that thou hadst but crossed some ut most seas Round strange shores beating, in unmapped degrees ! Then might I trust to speeding sails, and cleave The deep ways of the sea through day and eve, And all the circling year, till I should stand Some morning at the prow, and greet Thy Land. 90 THE INVERTED TORCH Oh, that thou hadst thy dwelling, though most far, Within some one all - conscious - glowing star. Then might I waste towards thee, as on lone height, When all are gone, goes out the camp-fire s light Or as gray Hesper from the hills was borne, After ten thousand vigil-nights forlorn ! Oh, that most surely thou wert Here or There, - Some certain goal whither my thought might fare! Oh, that from out the vague, formless Im mense Came but one signal palpable to sense, Foreshowing by what path my soul shall start, When it goes forth to find thee where thou art! THE INVERTED TORCH. 91 LXVII. I KNOW not why henceforward I should fear, Once having felt the master-stroke of fate. The waif upon some low reef desolate Dreads not to quit his tide-lapped rock and steer His rude-framed raft over the waters drear, Where yet unseen the mainland may await, Or passing bark shall succor his estate. So move I on, and with this certain cheer : That thou no more art torn whate er my lot,- Though round this life, once thy solicitude, Were tightening now the clues of Time s last plot. Ay, thou mightst smile though near to death I stood, Thou knowing what death is, I knowing not, A wanderer forth from shores with wreckage strewed. 92 THE INVERTED TORCH LXVIII. " UPON the earth my child ! " " My mother, thou ! " Such greetings when shall be and where, and how ? In these known accents or in some new tongue More sweet than any notes our wood-birds sung? Or, when in haven glides my bark distressed, Wilt hush all words of mine with one word " Rest ! " So at the first my soul shall merely sleep, Full weary with the troubles of the Deep ? LXIX. OFT have I wakened ere the spring of day, And from my window looking forth have found THE INVERTED TORCH 93 All dim and strange the long - familiar ground. But soon I saw the mist glide slow away, And leave the hills in wonted green array, While from the stream-sides and the fields around Rose many a pensive day-entreating sound, And the deep-breasted woodlands seemed to pray. Will it be even so when first we wake Beyond the Night in which are merged all nights, The soul sleep-heavy and forlorn will ache, Deeming herself midst alien sounds and sights ? Then will the gradual Day with comfort break Along the old deeps of being, the old heights ? 94 THE INVERTED TORCH LXX. THREADING a darksome passage all alone, The taper s flame, by envious current blown, Crouched low, and eddied round, as in af fright. So challenged by the vast and hostile night, Then down I held the taper ; swift and fain Up climbed the lovely flower of light again ! Thou Kindler of the spark of life divine, Be henceforth the Inverted Torch a sign That, though the flame beloved thou dost depress, Thou wilt not speed it into nothingness ; But out of nether gloom wilt reinspire, And homeward lift the keen empyreal fire ! 14 DAY USE RETURN TO DESK FROM WHICH BORROWED LOAN DEPT. This book is due on the last date stamped below, or on the date to which renewed. Renewed books are subject to immediate recall. ftPRUBBo rt A 7\ ^- .< . i alter - B1 . % 1 5 7i * i ( CT 1 a W71 2 2 Qrfn i n DEC 3 7 1 -2 PM 9 KLU U LU **" LD21A-60r (F7763slO)47CB General Library University of Californii Berkeley UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY