9 I ;-NRLF ALVMNVS BOOK FVND THE LIFTED CUP THE LIFTED CUP BY JESSIE 13. HI 1TEN HOUSE AUTHOR OF u THE DOOR OF DREAMS "5 EDITOR OF "THE LITTLE BOOK OF MODERN VERSE." ETC. BOSTON AND NEW YORK HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY (Cfcz ftifccrsidc press Cambridge 1921 COPYRIGHT, 1921, BY JESSIE B. KITTENHOUSE ALL RIGHTS RESERVED / lift it up again to you, This cup you poured for me, As one before (in altar lifts r Die cup of sanctity. 77/7,9 deep, full cup, tliis holy cup, Your lips have touched and mine, Is mystical, for you have turned Die water into ivine. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS THANKS are due to the editors of Harper s Mag azine, McClures Magazine, Good Housekeeping, Ainslefs Magazine, and The Kmart 8et for permis sion to reprint poems which originally appeared in their pages. CONTENTS I THE SECRET 3 u WE WHO GIVE OUR HEARTS IN SPRING " 4 .THE HOURS 5 CONFESSION 6 THE CAPTIVE 7 IN SOME TO-MORROW 8 THE PASSING JUNE 9 TRANSFORMATION 10 UNSUNG 1 1 II THE STAR 15 UNREST 16 THE DREAM 17 PROTEST 1 8 THE ALTAR 19 Two THAT PASS 2O "FAME AND THE MUSE" 21 SEVEN SONGS 22 THE MIRACLE 23 ix CONTENTS THE WALL 24 THE HAUNTED HEART 25 THE VEIL 26 III THE WATERFALL 29 MARSH-GRASS 3O APPLE-TREES 3 1 IN THE GREEN MOUNTAINS 32 UNVEILED 33 VISION 34 ONE STAR 35 THE GREEN TREE IN THE FALL 36 IN WHATSOEVER STATE 37 THE SNARE 38 THE DRAGON-FLY 39 IV PRESENCE 43 THE AVENUE 45 THE QUEST 46 THE DOOR 49 PRESCIENCE 5O REVISITED 5 1 CONTENTS TRANSIENCE 52 THE FESTAL HEART 53 TO-DAY 54 MY SONGS 55 THE RADIANT Loss 56 POSSESSION 57 THE LIFTED CUP I THE LIFTED CUP i THE SECRET I GO in vesture spun by hands Upon no loom of earth, I dwell within a shining house That has no walls nor hearth; I live on food more exquisite Than honey of the bee, More delicate than manna It falls to nourish me; But none may see my shining house, Nor taste my food so rare, And none may see my moon-spun robe Nor my star-powdered hair. WE WHO GIVE OUR HEARTS IN SPRING" WE who give our hearts in Spring, Putting all the old life by, We shall start with everything Keen and glad beneath the sky. We shall know the urge of grass Parting each detaining clod, Know the one sweet day they pass Flowers, the spirit of the sod. We are caught into the flame Where the golden fire runs, All its ardor is the same, In the flesh and in the suns. THE HOURS You can enchant the hours for me So that they go I know not where, Save only they are fleet as birds That flash through sunlit air. And all the hours that lie between Oh, you have put on them a ban, So that they creep through parching wastes Like any caravan ! CONFESSION HEAR the words that I would speak, Take the kiss that I would give, If Life, the long-withholding, Should one day bid us live, But I bear a coward s heart, Thinking only of the pain When hands that clasp so closely Shall be unclasped again. THE CAPTIVE ONLY a day ago, it seems, The world was a wide, wide place, And all my thoughts could wander far On the four winds of space. But now my thoughts are captive birds That have no will for flight, You shut them fast within your heart All on an April night. IN SOME TO-MORROW ROMAN ways shall know our feet Sometime in a golden Spring When these hours sweet and fleet Shall be but remembering. Resting in the ilex shade Of some path that Shelley knew, I shall no more be afraid To be true, as Life is true. And at evening when we stand In the flower-scented air Rising always from that land Like an incense fine and rare, Lifted from the world apart, Hushed so deep from frets and harms, Beauty purging all my heart, I shall turn unto your arms. THE PASSING JUNE I AM shut in as June goes by. And can but see one little tree Tossing its new leaves to the sky With the old ecstasy. And of the sky itself I see Only a curving arc of blue, That brings the larkspur dawn to me And holds the evening true. I am shut in as June goes by, But every day you come to me, And I am glad to lose the sky And every dancing tree. TRANSFORMATION I SHALL be beautiful when you come back, With beauty that is not of lips nor eyes, And you will look at me with swift surprise Seeing in me that loveliness I lack. And you will wonder how this beauty grew, In all the restless clamor of the days, Not knowing that I walk in cloistered ways Bearing within one rapt, still thought of you. 10 UNSUNG THE songs I have not sung to you Will wake me in the night And hover in the dark like birds Whose wings are tipped with light. Like birds with restless, eager wings That quiver for their flight, The songs I have not sung to you Will wake me in the night. 11 II II THE STAR You were aloof as a star in space That holds alone its charted way, You felt the cold and stellar air Where winds of heaven play. But now I know the lonely God Who made all things from His desire, Gave to the star the whitest flame Because its heart is fire. 15 UNREST Now I shall know unrest again, And all my heart that was so still Will beat in me like troubled tides And urge me to its will. Now joy, like an ecstatic flame, Will light the dark about my bed But with the morning I shall know That it was pain instead. 16 THE DREAM BEFORE I knew that you would come, Before I knew that you would go, I dreamed it all with the prescience That one in dreams may know. You gave to me one wild sweet kiss That pierced me with a joy above The joy of any other kiss, For, oh, I dreamed it love! PROTEST ONCE to you a woman sang, Craving love a human thing, " Throne me not so high, my King ! In my heart her message rang. But lest love should sink and tire With his wings caught in a mesh, I would cry, against the ftesh, " Throne me higher, higher ! " 18 THE ALTAR BETWEEN our lips a ghostly thing Escapes and flies on noiseless wing, It is my soul that would not mate With your soul at the outer gate, But sought the still and hidden shrine Where pale lights bum to the divine, My soul that could not worship there Because it found the altar bare. 19 TWO THAT PASS WE were but as two that pass With a lingering word, Yet for long its echoing In my heart I heard. Now you come and speak a word Passionate and dear, Then to-morrow you will go And leave me wondering here. 20 "FAME AND THE MUSE" FAME and the muse you would not yield, For love was but a transient thing, And so love waits above your door With outspread wing. For he must seek another one Who will not his high gift refuse, Since love alone can touch to fire Fame and the muse. SEVEN SONGS SEVEN songs I made for you In the briefest days; Seven songs I made for you, Longing for your praise. Not of joy these fragile songs; Oftener of pain ; But the pain is joy, since you Give me song again ! 22 THE MIRACLE THEY told me miracles had gone The way of childish tales, And that to call them back again Not any dream avails. It may be so to duller folk Who do not know like me How cold gray skies may break to rose And thrill with prophecy. 23 THE WALL Now we two are heart to heart, O most dear of all, Who were held so long apart By the sundering wall. But so suddenly it fell, At the final touch, We are dazed and cannot tell If we hope too much. We would wait to know the sum Of our joy and pain But what if shadowy hands should come And build the wall again ? 24 THE HAUNTED HEART I AM not wholly yours, for I can face A world without you in the years to be, And think of love that has been given me By other men, and wear it as a grace; Yes, even in your arms there is a space That yet might widen to infinity, And deep within your eyes I still can see Old memories that I cannot erase. But let these ghostly tenants of the heart Stay on unchallenged through the changing days And keep their shadowy leaseholds without fear, Then if the hour should come when we must part, We know that we shall go on haunted ways, Each to the end inalienably dear. THE VEIL LET the last veil remain between us two, That we may keep love still a strange fair thing Which comes each day with a new marvelling And goes each night to dreams as fair and new. Leave still unsaid the dearest word of all, That I may wait more eagerly to hear, But each day speak a word more deep and dear That shall foretell the dearest word of all. 26 Ill Ill THE WATERFALL I WENT to see a waterfall When days were dull of song, And to its jubilant wild voice I listened deep and long. I thought that it would loose my dreams, But, ah, it could not free My bound heart, for it sang so loud It drowned the song in me. 29 MARSH. GRASS I SAW the marsh-grass blowing ; It took me far away ; For I was bom where marsh-grass Was endlessly at play. Its ripples were the gladdest things That one could ever see, So who would think that marsh-grass Would bring the tears to me ? 30 APPLE-TREES MY childhood held a fairy sight A thousand apple-trees, All pink and white for my delight And humming with the bees. They grew upon a green hillside, They sweetened all the air, They spread a tent of blossoms wide For my pavilion there. I broke the branches at my will, There was so vast a store; From out my arms the sprays would spill, But there were always more. Now I go out from city ways To see the apple-tree, For if I miss her flowering days The year goes ill with me. 31 IN THE GREEN MOUNTAINS I DARE not look away From beauty such as this, Lest, while my glance should stray, Some loveliness I miss. The trees might choose to print Their shadow on the lake; The windless air might glint With aspen leaves that shake. Over the mountains there A thin blue veil might drift ; Then in a moment rare This thin blue veil might lift. Ah, I must pay good heed To beauty such as this, Lest, in some hour of need, Its loveliness I miss. 32 UNVEILED TO-DAY the hills put off their haze And stand so green and clear That every peak remote and strange Is intimate and near. I can make out the very trees That mass upon their sides, And look deep into the white cloud That swift above them rides. But, oh, I would not have them stand Unveiled by blowing air; Give me the blue, blue mists again That make them far and fair ! 33 VISION I CAME to the mountains for beauty, And I find here the toiling folk, On sparse little farms in the valleys, Wearing their days like a yoke. White clouds fill the valleys at morning ; They are round like great billows at sea, And roll themselves up to the hill-tops, Still round as great billows can be. The mists fill the valleys at evening ; They are blue as the smoke in the fall, And spread all the hills with a tenuous scarf That touches the hills not at all. These lone folk have looked on them daily, Yet I see in their faces no light; Oh, how can I show them the mountains That are round them by day and by night ! 34 ONE STAR ONE star over the mountains Comes earlier than all, And waits alone in the solemn sky Until the darkness fall. It parts the mist before it, It sheds a golden light, It watches while the evening melts Into the purple night. One star over the mountains, Eternal and yet new, One star over the mountains My thought of you. 35 THE GREEN TREE IN THE FALL DID you forget to bud in Spring, O Green Tree in the Fall, That now you wear these fresh young leaves As for a coronal ? All of your mates within the wood Are in the crimson leaf, They had their swift, enamored spring, Their summertime too brief. But you what chance befell that you Were cheated of the Spring, That now you cling so fast to leaves Wherein no bird will sing ? My heart is with you, little tree, For I was cheated too, And now I grasp at what I missed And cling as fast as you. 36 IN WHATSOEVER STATE I AM rebuked, O Beauty, That I have murmured so, When I see the stony places Where yellow daisies grow. Or when I see the milkweed, In a tangled country lane, Unfold her sea-shell blossoms To call the bee again, I know I need not trouble To seek another place, If I have aught of beauty To offer up as grace. 37 THE SNARE MANY birds will fly away From the cages that I build., Yet if one shall sing and stay, I have all the joy I willed. Many songs are in the air, Flitting like evasive birds, Ah, if I but one may snare In the cage of words. 38 THE DRAGON-FLY THE day was set to a beautiful theme By the blue of a dragon-fly That poised with his air) 7 wings agleam On a flower, as I passed by. So frail and so lovely a touch would destroy ; He seemed but a fancy, a whim ; Yet this gossamer thing is a breath of God s joy, And Life is made perfect in him ! 39 IV IV PRESENCE I WILL go back to Italy, For well I know that there Your feet will still come climbing A worn, accustomed stair; And we will stand at evening On a little terrace hung High up above the Arno, While all the bridges flung Across the wide, dark river Are strung with golden light, And straight before us rises Miniato s jewelled height. Then in late summer afternoons, Just cooling from the heat, We ll go again exploring Each little narrow street, And rest in dim old churches And watch the pictured walls, 43 THE LIFTED CUP While through the ancient, hallowed glass The colored sunlight falls. But I will not go near the North Nor see the mountain snows, Nor look upon that valley Where the dread Piave flows, Lest they should dare to tell me That you are lying there You who pervade the very day Like warm, sun-lighted air! THE AVENUE IT was but two weeks since you died, Yet you were strange and far As one who had a lifetime dwelt Upon an alien star, When sudden in Manhattan streets Your presence smote me through, You had so loved the zest of life Upon Fifth Avenue! 45 THE QUEST I WOULD go soon, for if I stay You will have gone so far I cannot find you in that place Where the most radiant are. And all eternity will be But seeking after you, But coming to some gate to find That you have just passed through, 46 V THE DOOR THERE was a door stood long ajar That one had left for me, While I went trying other doors To which I had no key. And when at last I turned to seek The refuge and the light, A gust of wind had shut the door And left me in the night. 49 PRESCIENCE AH, there were those who twined their wreaths From buds that I let fall, So rich was I in blossoming time That I had gifts for all; But what if, when the day is chill And flowers forget to blow, I should go begging back the gifts I gave them long ago ? 50 REVISITED You and I came down here once In our happiest days, It was May and birds were singing On the budding sprays. Youth was high within us then, We could laugh at time, He could never touch us two With his icy rime. Now the boughs are black and bare, Snows without a stain I could never come in May When life was quick again. 51 TRANSIENCE DID you come to me, indeed, And will you come again ? I know it but as leaves may know The fresh, keen breath of rain Then in a moment in the sky The sun is shining plain. I know it but as boughs may know, When wild birds stop in flight, If they will come that way again Before the fall of night ; I know it but as travellers know Some swift and lovely sight. 52 THE FESTAL HEART BY all the tests of human will I should be weary now ; Yet I am glad as any bird That sings upon a bough. For how shall weariness prevail, Or hold me in its thrall, When daily for your sake I keep An inner festival ? 53 TO-DAY WHAT will it matter when I am dead If they remember or forget Those unborn, whom I shall not know, Those who may live and love me yet ? What will it matter if they praise Or if they treasure some word I say ? But, oh, it matters so very much That you should think of me to-day ! 54 MY SONGS I SANG my songs for you alone, But all the others heard, And thought that I had sung for them Each half-revealing word ; And on the four winds, back to me, Like freight of winged seed, Came song for song from all the rest You only did not heed. 55 THE RADIANT LOSS OH, I have lived to be so glad You failed me long ago, So glad you cast away the love That I had lavished so, So glad that you were dull and blind, So glad you did not know ! For in a way I had not dreamed I built my life anew, And all the structure of my days Into a wonder grew; And, oh, you left me free to love A greater one than you ! 56 POSSESSION TiiFA r all may go, for I have known the one Who will forever stay, Though each day tells me until time is done That he has gone away, He is the light that breaks in dawns at sea, The dream in mountain haze; He is the soul of wistful things to me In all the still procession of my days. 57 tgfce XUbcnsfoe Jhrss CAMBRIDGE MASSACHUSETTS U S A THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE STAMPED BELOW AN INITIAL FINE OF 25 CENTS WILL BE ASSESSED FOR FAILURE TO RETURN THIS BOOK ON THE DATE DUE. THE PENALTY WILL INCREASE TO SO CENTS ON THE FOURTH DAY AND TO $I.OO ON THE SEVENTH DAY OVERDUE. 27 1933 JUL 25*940 LD 21-50m-l, 3 48876-i UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY