BrD
Ani
BY
Son iKark Croum
Iroabmag
dampattg,
fork
Copyrighted, 1902,
Copyrighted, 1905,
DON" MARK LEMON.
All Rights Reserved.
As one who for a season has been confined
In some dense city, at whose brazen gate
Delight, and Love and Beauty rarely wait,
And song breathes never on the smoky wind,
At last, rejoicing, leaves those scenes behind
Of cheerless trade and commerce, and, elate,
Hies him toward the country's green estate
With willing heart and newly sweetened mind:
So leaves the Bard the dusty paths of prose
And hastes to his beloved Muse again ;
Leaves unmelodious writings to compose
Songs liquid sweet as springs Pierian;
And as he sings of summer and the rose
Joy holds the Poet's hand and guides his pen !
CONTENTS.
PAGE
A Little People 297
A Lying Press 245
A Memory 358
A Moral Tale 241
A New Pleasure 302
A Prayer 236
A Prelude 323
A Statistical Poem 340
Adeline 300
Alice 258
An Evil Book 321
Big Game 339
Call Him a Poet 213
Can This Be Home, Sweet Home? 355
Clara O'Dee 306
Columbia 335
Drifting 233
Duty 251
Enough! Strike Deep and Let Me Go 343
Eros Seeking 203
Fancy's Bark 356
Fate 267
Florence 138
Fortune Sick 379
Four Books . . 224
iv Contents.
PAGE
Gladness 367
Gone is a Strenuous Spirit 315
Gone, One More Faithful Friend 311
Hannah Moore 240
Hate 243
Her Beauty is a Climbing Rose 342
Her Fortune 271
Her Step is Music 227
Honor 200
How soon a Nation can Forget, O Lord 277
Hypocrisy 221
Dreamt the Stars are Characters 257
Know, I Know 281
Know Where the Sunbeams Go 361
Like to Think This Best of Worlds 247
Love My Country Not the Less 329
Loved You for Your Beauty First 285
Saw Her Lovely Face But Once 388
Think: I Know 330
Thought to Write My Name in Gold 249
I Would Not Hurt Her Little Hand 286
If 327
If Genius were but Catching 296
If Half the Riches Spent on War 351
If She Should Die To-Night 266
Ignorance 313
In These, Our Times 209
lone 4
Isabel 172
Keats 170
Kiss Me, Dear, and Let's Forget 290
Lake Tahoe 322
Laughology 204
Lenore 354
Liberty Lives : Her Soldier is Dead 368
Life's Failures 281
Lines 294
Live On, Old Tree 206
Love , . . . 369
Contents v
PAGE
Love's Pyrography 2;">6
Luther at Wartburg 248
Make Room for Youth 217
Mammon 346
Marriage 348
May Such Books Perish 243
Motley 201
My Heart is with My Bees To-Day 269
My Life was a Round of Golden Days 314
My Love a Constant Beauty is 223
My Love is Full of Pretty Ways 264
My Sweet Thoughts are My Daughters 307
My Queen 370
Not Always 287
Nothing Comes of It 279
Now Morn upon the Rosy Hills 288
O Darken the Window 220
O Don thy Kerchief 338
O For a Sparklins: Bowl of Laughter 246
O Ghost, I Have Thee Now 295
O God, if Ever We Had Cause for Fear 215
O Lass of the Land of the Listed Lance 229
O Poet, Build for Me a Splendid Home 202
O Poet, Open Wide the Gate of Dreams 318
O Set a Window 205
O She is a Poem 299
O She is Fair to Look Upon 387
O Sing Me a Song of My Native Land 331
O Take that Picture from the Wall 214
O That Good Ink 245
O Thou Who Art Divinely Gifted 234
O When Shall Dawn that Splendid Day?.. 237
Ode to Liberty Bell 238
Ode to the Airship 353
Of Many Fools, I Loathe the Most 289
Old Dan Miller 261
One of the Millions 381
Out of My Brain the Music Has Fled 304
Over the Hills to the Poorhouse 374
vi Contents.
PAGE
Palmistry 284
Phoebe 319
Pluck and Luck 231
Put Money in Your Purse 177
Rhyme 360
Rosabell 115
Rosa Lee 198
Scandal 360
Shall Lovers Dwell Apart? 270
She Has Her Faults Like Other Maids 312
She Wears a Starry Crown of Deeds 342
So Deep in Love Am 1 210
Somewhere 390
Take Back These Honeyed Songs 250
Take Down Those Gifts " 227
The Billionaire 251
The Book of Yosemite 211
The Column 218
The Divorcee Dinner 291
The Hours 278
The Human Tongue 230
The Land of Washington 363
The Loving Couple 332
The Moral Poet 255
The Old Folks Are Growing Old, Old 362
The Other Half 337
The Pen 295
The Poet 226
The Poet is a Deity 264
The Poets' Queen 392
The Present 268
The Prophet 272
The Rose That Bloomed in Eden 310
The Song That Lives for Aye 328
The Spirit of War 207
The Storm 283
The Two Voices 222
The Wheel of Child Labor 235
There Are More Ways of Pleasing God than One.. 305
They're Training Boys to Murder 197
Contents. vii
PAGE
Tired 298
'Tis Better Far 216
To Trade 309
Truth 359
Two Friends 276
Viola
War 324
War .375
What Dreams Unto the Rich Will Come 376
What Though the Garden of the Muses Yield? 317
When Beauty Builds Beneath the Stars 354
When I Consider 324
Where is My Little Girl To-Night? 389
Why? 378
Will He, Nill He 326
Woman 335
Your Beauty Left Me Marveling 306
OF THE
(' UNIVERSITY
OF
*Lir'
1ONE, AND OTHER POEMS.
THE POETS' QUEEN.
She sprung from Beauty's immemorial line,
And was herself the fairest of her race;
And ever to her stately dwelling place
The minstrels came, like palmers to a shrine.
Where Hesper is the evening star in June,
Westward she dwelt amid an island estate;
There Neptune's steed champed at her sea-girt
gate
And regal palms shook to the silver moon.
Beneath her latticed casement, sweet with balm,
The narcissus and the rose first heaved the sod,
And Love the poets sung awaked a God
Amid her garden of perpetual palm.
2 lone,
Her beauty was of earth as roses are
Mortal, but nothing that might lead astray :
The glory of her eyes held sovereign sway,
But blasted none, like some bright, evil star.
A splendid pride was softened in her mien-
She bended as the stately lily bends
When silver dew upon the field descends,
And bows that flower low, but not to stain.
Her eyes were bright as stars set for a sign
In heaven, and in her soft-clustering hair
The Spirit and the Love that made her fair
Had left the fragrance of its breath divine.
Forever open and forever bright,
Her sculptured gates looked out upon the sea;
Fit entrance to her halls where Poetry
Dwelt like a Presence all compact of light.
Queen of the Poets and Olympus' Nine,
Oft would she walk at twilight's pensive close
Where silver fountains like young palms uprose,
And hark unto bright ^Bolus in the pine.
Or with the morn, soft-op'ning as the rose,
And with the rose's vermeil flush and light,
She took her harp and bid adieu to night,
While chord by chord the stars sunk to repose.
And Other Poems.
But, lo ! long seasons she has been at rest,
And no more shall inspire the minstrel brood,
And given are her isles to solitude
Like a dead Orion within the west.
4 lone,
IONE.
PART I.
Through the red and three-forkt levin
Flaming o'er the troubled heaven,
Cold and pallid, like a spirit,
Looks the moon upon the deep.
There a merchant bark is riding
That the hand of Death is guiding,
And her timbers are colliding
With the jagged rocks that leap
Like Destruction from the waters,
Like a demon sent to reap
All the vessel hath in keep.
HarTc ! It is the sailors calling,
Calling down the winds appalling
Where the lightning points Disaster
Riding on the blast o'erhead!
Hark! The sheathed mast is riven,
Goring at the cruel heaven,
And the merchant bark is driven
And Other Poems.
Where Destruction lifts its head,
And her splitted timbers tremble
For that setting deep and dread
To the stormy ocean's bed !
Hark! The blow hath been delivered,
And the oaken bark is shivered;
Every ebb gives up a spirit,
Every flow a 'human core !
O'er the rocks the lightning burneih,
(Whence a corpse alone returneth!)
And each ruffian billow spurneth
Some dead body to the shore;
Heaps its dea_d- along the surf-line
And retreats amain for more,
Lashed into a maddened roar.
From the rocks a bell is tolling,
But the hour is past controlling,
Death has taken up the hour-glass
And each life he calls his own.
No, not all ! one soul is clinging
To that bell the winds are ringing,
And the distant shore is bringing
Help to him and him alone:
He hath met with Death and wrestled
And 'tis Death that's overthrown
On the bell's foundation stone.
lone,
He, among an hundred blasted,
Lives, whose life hath still forecasted
Sorrow for the gentle lone
Dreaming by the troubled deep.
Him the Destinies of sorrow
Bear from forth the tempest's horror
That upon the bitter morrow
He shall make fair lone weep,
Take the sunlight from her waking,
Take the love-light from her sleep,
And make way for Death to reap.
Him they bear unto the landing:
Bruised and faint, but still commanding,
He demands of those around him
Where the lady lone dwells :
"I have letters I must give her,
And a message to deliver
Be it o'er yon raging river
Like a gulf between two hells,
Be it where yon bell is ringing,
I will hasten where she dwells
While the love I bear impels."
"If ye seek the lady lone
Ye must pass the river Lion,
Ye must face a death by waters,
Face the Death within his home.
And Other Poems.
By the lightning that is streaming
Ye can see the castle gleaming
Where the lady now is dreaming,
Couched within the marble dome;
But ye better seek the Lorelei
With her golden hair and comb
Than seek lone o'er the foam."
But the stranger passes the Lion
For the love of gentle lone,
For the love he bears the maiden
As a father bears his child;
Passes o'er the river Lion
For the love of gentle lone,
Though the wave is not yet dry on
His gray hair and forehead mild :
Passes to the massive portals
Where sweet lone is exiled,
With a dream of hope beguiled.
"Lo, a face is at the portals
Be it ghost's or be it mortal's,
It shall never have admittance!"
Cries the Master of the grange.
"By the lightning that is leaning
From the skies, we know its meaning,
And the harvest it is gleaning,
8 lone,
And the love it would exchange!;
Know a fiend stands at the portals
And its presence nothing strange
In this night when Hell hath range.
"Back, ye foul and evil spirit,
To the doom that thou inherit ;
Back, ye fiend, unto thy torments
While the lightning points the way !
Back, ye fiend, for here is sleeping
One whom angels have in keeping,
And upon whose head are heaping
Blessings for which angels pray.
Ye have followed Fear too closely
And ye cannot now betray
Though thy head be old and gray."
"I am human, not a spirit/'
Thus the Stranger; "if ye fear it,
Bring the maiden from her chamber
Whom you love and I adore:
She will greet me at the portal
As a friend and as a mortal,
N"or her gentle spirit startle
Though the lightning plays me o'er.
I adore her as a kinsman,
Nor her father loves her more;
Open then thy heart and door.
And Other Poems.
l 'I am human., not a spirit:
Were I such I would inherit
But the blasts that breathe from Tophet,
Not the blasts of nature too.
By this coldness that congeals me,
By this faintness that o'ersteals me,
By each frailty that reveals me,
Judge me man and judge me true ;
One that nature touches wholly
And hath touched with loss anew
Of a noble ship and crew.
"Ye can see the lightning flashing,
Ye can hear the wild waves dashing,
But ye cannot know the sorrow
That it brings to other men!
Ye can hear the rolling thunder,
And the shock the deep leaps under,
But the heavens do not plunder
Thee in darkness stygian,
Tor the forked tongues of lightning
Leap into thy maddened ken
O'er the grave of ship and men !"
"Enter in, and speak my pardon;
I have been too harsh a warden."
Here the Master, hasting forward,
Takes the Stranger by the hand.
io lone,
"Enter in, now I recall thee;
By the hearth I will install thee,
And no evil shall befall thee
That my power can withstand.
Enter in : hast thou a message
From my Lady's native land,
From Hispania's far-off strand ?"
"I have letters for the maiden,
And a message that is laden
With the sighings of a father
Dying in a prison hole.
I, that fain would die to gladden
This sweet maiden, come to sadden
Her bright spirit yea, to madden
And convulse her gentle soul !
I, that hoped to bear Joy's message,
Come with Horror's fearful scroll,
Which myself I must unroll!"
"Christ, have mercy!" cries the Master:
"What unmerciful disaster
Hangs above this gentle spirit
Whom the angels all adore?
Hath all prayer been unavailing?
Is the love of heaven failing,
That the good are left bewailing
And Other Poems. n
For a light that is no more?
If this be the free-heart's portion,
What then is the guilty' s store ?
Christ, have mercy, I implore !"
"Judge not Heaven in the hour
Of the wrong, but when God's power
Hath brought light from out of darkness,
Out of evil hath brought good.
Judge it not at all were wiser,
Since we cannot be adviser
To our Lord and our Chastiser
Though we have all sin withstood."
Thus the Stranger softly answers
With the lips of ripe manhood,
And his words are understood.
"Yet inform me," thus the Master,
"Of this sorrow and disaster
What was it befell the father?
What must now befall his child?
Christ, her noble father dying
In the gaol where he is lying !
'Tis a time for work, not sighing,
To be cunning and not wild;
'Tis a time to turn to Heaven,
That its love be reconciled,
Not to doubt and be exiled."
12 lone,
"In Hispania thus 'tis stated
Lived a noble who was hated
By the father of sweet lone
For his evil life and heart:
He was foul past all detraction,
Cruel as death in his exaction,
False in faith and false in faction,
Schooled in evil as an art:
One who bore* a name of honor
But in honor bore no part
Formed without a blush or heart.
"Long he lived, but one dark morning,
Seemingly without forewarning,
He was murdered in a meadow
Eastward bounded by the sea.
There was gladness in each village,
For he nevermore would pillage
Labor of its honest tillage,
Of the fruits of husbandry:
And 'tis said that morn the oxen
Knelt upon the stormy lea
Dumbly thankful they were free.
"On that fearful Sabbath dawning
While the tyrant's grave was yawning
lone walked across the meadow
All alone in confidence.
And Other Poems. 13
Sudden at her feet upstarted
Him she loved, and wildly darted
From her presence with distorted
Pale and bloody countenance!
This she told unto her father
In a secret conference,
Sick at heart with love's suspense.
"Deeply was the father troubled,
But his fearfulness was doubled
When 'twas bruited that a murder
Was enacted with the dawn;
But his silence was unbroken,
And he gave his friends no token
Of the things his child had spoken
Or the face she looked upon.
Much he loved the youth suspected
Trusted him, to him was drawn
As a father to a son.
"Then the father rose in sorrow
And upon the bitter morrow
Gave his child into thy keeping
Till the ax of justice fell :
But the youth was unsuspected,
And the guilty undetected,
And the very crime neglected,
14 lone,
Till it reached the Cardinal ;
Then the sleeping law awakened
And all Eome stands sentinel
O'er an innocent man's cell!
"Lo, behold ! look where 'tis written
How the hand of Eome hath smitten
Tone's father for the murder
That sweet Zone's lover did!
Hasten then and waken lone
She must pass the river Lion
Though the tears be yet not dry on
Her warm cheek and drowsy lid:
She must hasten to her father
Witnessing what hath been hid,
As her father here hath bid.
"Better that her lover perish
Than the father she should cherish;
Better perish a false lover
Than an aged, guiltless sire.
Yet, in spite of Tone's admission,
And the father's deep suspicion,
And the youth's unkind position,
Were I Rome I would enquire
Deeper than these circumstances,
Though enough they seem and dire
To commit the youth to fire.
And Other Poems. 15
"For I think the youth is gentle
And this death was accidental,
Though no man's above suspicion
Till the Tempter hath been bound I"
Now the Stranger ceasing slowly
Kneels the Master meek and lowly
Like a pious man and holy
Kneels upon the flinty ground,
And to God commends his spirit
And of heaven's love profound
Asks that patience may abound.
Now, uprising, leads the Stranger,
Who hath faced a sea of danger,
To a high and spacious chamber
Ever ready for a guest.
"Rest ye here until the breaking
Of the dawn, and loner's waking,
Then, in this deep undertaking,
We will act as ye think best
Though there's one way, one way only,
Which is God's way manifest,
And that way ye did suggest."
Now a sleep falls on the Stranger,
Sleep too deep for dreams of danger,
And the Master seeks the chamber
Where sweet lone lies at rest.
1 6 lone,
At the threshold dim delays he,
And no call or speech essays he,
But in love and silence prays he
That the heavens guard his guest,
Guard the pure and gracious lady
In the name of Christ, the Best,
And all spirits pure and blest.
Deep she sleepeth though the lightning
O'er the moated grange is brightening,
Deep she sleepeth though the thunder
Rolls above her bosom bare.
From her dream she doth not borrow
Sadness for the dawning morrow
One she is that hath known sorrow
But hath never known despair;
One that hopeth ere the evil,
Hopeth after it doth snare;
Born to suffer, schooled to bear.
In the footsteps of bright Pleasure
Sorrow follows with full measure
Drinking deep the wine of gladness
We must drink the dregs at last;
So unto this maiden dreaming,
With the lightning o'er her gleaming,
And her virgin fancy teeming
And Other Poems. 17
With, the memories of the past,
Sorrow comes like some foul spirit
Borne before the midnight blast,
Treading Pleasure's steps full fast.
Sorrow comes to wake the Sleeper
And be made her silent keeper,
Like a guard placed o'er the guilty,
Like a watch placed o'er the doomed.
From her prison it shall be given
Her to still espy in heaven
Gladness from her presence driven,
But her spirit shall be entombed,
And the past can be remembered
But, ah nevermore resumed !
Like a vestment long consumed.
One she is that hath known sorrow
But from certain griefs we borrow
Kindly hope that leads and cheers us
Till our griefs no more annoy:
So with lone to her gladness
She has borrowed hope's sweet madness
And the present has lost its sadness
In the future's promised joy.
But, alas! the hour is coming
That forever will destroy
Hope, the dearest of employ.
i8 lone,
Tenderly, with maiden yearning,
Every thought of evil spurning
Still she loves the noble Bertrand
Who, indeed, is innocent;
And through all her separation
Still her heart with sweet elation
Beats her lover's vindication,
Deep and true and eloquent:
Still she trusteth in his honor
With a faith all confident,
And her faith is not misspent.
Now she dreams of when they parted,
She all faith, he broken-hearted ;
She, the weaker, raised by patience,
He, the stronger, bowed by woe:
And her gentle heart is beating
As it did at that last meeting,
When her lover brought his greeting
And she told him she must go
Go across the frowning mountains,
For what cause she must not know
Since her father willed it so.
"By that God that bends above thee,"
Low he answered, "I do love thee,
And my love shall teach me patience,
And my patience make thee mine.
And Other Poems. 19
Since it must be, I'll not grieve thee
With my sorrow, but will leave thee
Till that day when I receive thee
From thy father, to inshrine
Thee within my distant castle,
Where the climbing ivy vine
Roots itself in limpid Rhine."
Then he kist her hands and vestment,
And one moment in caressment
Touched her hair and added gently,
"Heart of heart, till then farewell !"
So these hapless lovers parted,
Trembling, if not broken hearted,
All their plans and gladness thwarted
By that vision that befell
lone walking through the meadows
Rapt in love's all-dreamy spell
That had seen, but seen not well.
Now she dreams of that sweet meeting
In the future and its greeting
When her lover, vindicated,
Shall again look on her face,
Kiss her hands and flowing vestment,
Touch her hair in sweet caressment,
And one moment in redressment
20 lone,
Hold her in his pure embrace,
Saying, "Love, the time was dreary,
Yet Timers footsteps I'd retrace
To live o'er this moment's grace."
And all love and faith she calleth
From her sleep "Whate'er befalleth,
I will never leave thee, Bertrand,
Surely, never leave thee more!
I believed thee, Bertrand, ever;
I will doubt thy honor never;
Nor my father now can sever
Thee from me, though him I adore !
I will follow where thou leadest,
Though the lightning hurtles o'er
And the deep beneath doth roar I"
At the threshold kneels the Master,
Like a form in alabaster,
Like a cold and marble figure
In the attitude of prayer;
But a living heart is beating
In his bosom, still repeating,
"Christ have mercy !" and entreating
Him to hearken and to spare
Spare the gentle lady lone,
In His mercy and His care,
Of a woe too great to bear.
And Other Poems. 21
But the silence being broken
By these words in deep sleep spoken,
To his feet the Master rises,
Troubled, like a father moved.
"She is with him in her dreaming,
With her Love ! her mind is scheming
Of a better day, and teeming
With his innocence approved !
All her being bends toward him,
All her thoughts are interwoved
With this Bertrand whom she loved !
"This is wormwood to the bitter !
Gall to wormwood ! 'twill unfit her
For all hope and consolation,
For all trust in heaven's grace!
With his love she is infected
Deeper than my mind suspected,
Deeper than her heart reflected,
Mirrored in her gentle face:
He is dearer than her father,
Dearer than her whole dear race,
Since she loves him in disgrace !
"Christ, prepare her for the morning
By prophetic dreams of warning,
In a dream prepare her spirit
For the bitter waking time!"
22 lone,
But all night she dreams of gladness,
Of sweet music charming sadness,
And of laughter without madness,
And of wedding hells that chime;
And she dreams not she is dreaming,
As she smells the dewy thyme
In her own warm native clime.
Now the Stranger hath uprisen,
And the castle seems a prison
To his eager restless spirit,
Still impatient to be gone.
"Haste," he whispers to the Master,
"Break to her this sad disaster,
Though thy story must o'ercast her
And make midnight of the dawn:
We have little time to linger,
But by noon must be withdrawn,
Though we've much to think upon. 3
"I will join you," thus the other,
"On this journey, as thy brother
In the cause of gentle lone,
As thy friend in every need.
Have ye patience, for 'tis better
That I school her ere the letter
Is surrendered that must fetter
And Other Poems. 23
Her to sorrow cruel indeed
I will school her gentle spirit,
Calm her heart that fain must bleed,
Then leave her alone to read.
"All alone, for it is better
That alone she read this letter
Which was written by her father
In an hour of deep distress:
And I'll also be attorney
To prepare her for this journey,
For this unexpected journey
To her fa-ther, comfortless.
Stay ye here, and pray the heavens
Smile upon my cause and bless
What we ask with all success/'
lone, at her casement standing,
Hears a footstep on the landing,
Hears the Master whom she honors
Hasting to her chamber door.
At the threshold now she meets him,
And with subdued welcome greets him
Humble welcome and entreats him
Enter in her greeting o'er.
To her window now she leads him,
Looking out upon the shore
She shall look on but twice more.
24 lone,
"Look," she saith, "a hope hath perished,
One, perhaps, that still is cherished."
Here she points unto a vessel
Wrecked upon the stormy reef.
"Yea, dear lady," thus the Master,
"Now ye look on stern disaster ;
But unkinder, deeper, vaster,
Than the sea is human grief !
Yet the tempest troubled ocean.
Is but as a whirling leaf
Unto Him who gives relief!
"Let it teach thy gentle spirit
That thyself must pain inherit,
Since these lives were not exempted
That the storm hath overthrown:
And, if thou hast ere known sorrow,
From this wreck the lesson borrow
Schooling thee through pain and horror
That thyself art not alone
In thy grief, but others suffer,
At their hearts a weight of stone,
Heavier with every groan."
"I perceive it," saith the maiden,
"And my heart is heavy laden;
Yea, that sorrow is most common,
This indeed I understood/'
And Other Poems. 25
"So the heavens have ordained it,"
Thus the Master, "Yet have strained it
Through God's mercy, and have rained it
On our spirits for our good,
For 'tis sorrow more than gladness
Teaches men a brotherhood
Closer than the ties of blood."
Now the Master, turning slowly
From the casement, utters lowly,
"lone, since thou hast known sorrow,
Thou may knowest how to bear;
To be patient, not contending
With thy soul, nor apprehending
That the evil is past mending,
Or is reason for despair;
To abide in faith and meeknesi,
As becoming in an heir
To yon Heaven's love and cart.
"Knowing those that lose not Heaven
Lose but that which hath been given
For a few brief fleeting seasons,
'And that Death eventually takes."
Here the Master meekly ceases,
But no hope his bosom eases,
And his fearfulness increases,
26 lone,
For a pallid dread awakes
In the face of gentle lone,
'And her startled bosom quakes
!As the blood her brow forsakes.
Pale she looks upon her teacher,
Whose gray lifted eyes beseech her
To have patience, hope and courage
'Gainst the sorrow that has come :
Pale she looks upon the ocean,
On the wreck in restless motion,
And a sad and stern prenotion
Leaves her fearful spirit dumb:
Pale as cold forsaken marble
Has fair lone now become
'Gainst a time of martyrdom.
"Courage, lone ; half our sorrow
From our fearful hearts we borrow;
Courage, lone, for the noble
Need fear nothing but their fear !
? Tis not death that now assails thee
In this hour when gladness fails thee,
And a bitter duty hails thee,
In which thou must persevere;
But that error is triumphant
Over him thou dost revere
With a daughter's heart sincere.*
And Other Poems. 27
Now the Master, meek and lowly,
Tells the Stranger's story wholly,
And to lone, pale and trembling,
Gives the letter he hath by;
And from fearful apprehension,
From a sad and stern presension,
lone passes cold with tension
To the truth without a cry ;
Learns her father's cruel position,
Which, to mend, her Love must die,
And in cold obstruction lie.
"I am ready ; thus bespeak me
To this friend that fain would seek me/'
Answers lone, and the Master
With these words his leave doth take.
Now pale lone reads the letter,
Reads the loving, pleading letter
From her father, which must fetter
Bands that angels cannot break,
Fetter bands about her spirit,
For her aged father's sake,
That love's angels cannot break.
Now upon her knees she bendetH,
Asking that her breathings endeth,
Craving that which every spirit
Hath once craved of heaven death!
28 lone,
That one prayer that ceasas never,
But forever and forever,
Though a thousand creeds dissever,
Rises upward without death;
Prayer of all and prayer for all time
While this mortal frame holds breath,
The eternal prayer for death !
Now she rises from her kneeling,
Shame's hot blush upon her stealing,
Saying, "Father, forgive me,
I must live to rescue thee !
Unto me alone is given,
By that mercy lodged in heaven,
Power to make these great odds even
And to work thy liberty ;
I alone can charm back honor
On thy gray hairs, and to me
Hath been given life's one key!
"But, Bertrand, my lover,
It is I that must discover
That wild vision of the meadow
Point thee out to death and shame !
Thou, that used to love and prize me,-
And thy love did still suffice me,
Now must evermore despise me
And Other Poems. 29
And adjudge me not the same;
Thou must think me false, inconstant,
When I publicly exclaim
'Gainst thy ever-gracious name !
" 'Twas not thee I saw that morning
But a vision of forewarning;
With thine own blood thou wast dabbled,
Blood that I myself must spill !
Not thee, Bertrand, but a vision,
And I merit all derision
That, in trembling indecision,
And in weakness of the will,
I made known unto another
That I saw thee near that hill
Where assassins had wrought ill !
"Yet, Love, in my unfitness,
I must be my father's witness,
Swear I saw thee, Love, that morning
Where the murdered man was found !
So it seemed yet 'twas but seeming,
But the folly of my dreaming
Of a dream past all redeeming,
Or a vision to confound !
I must swear to an appearance
And leave Heaven to expound
That 'twas such to all around !
30 lone,
"Would to God I then had perished,
Or thy love I ne'er had cherished !
Would thy hand had gathered flowers
For my grave, not for my breast !
Would that lilies sprang above me
That thou, Bertrand, still would love me.
With that early love still love me,
While I lie at perfect rest !
0, that I had died in summer
And thy gentle step had prest
To my grave among the blest !"
With these mournful words she ceases,
But no tear her sorrow eases ;
'Gainst the wall she leans her forhead,
Silent as a thing that's dead.
All her life before her rises,
All its joy and sweet surprises,
All its grief and sacrifices,
All, before her soul is spread:
All its shadow, all its beauty,
Pain that lingered, joys that fled,
Doubts that grieved, hope that misled.
Meantdme hath the Master carried
To that Stranger who hath tarried
In his chamber, Tone's message
And delivered it twice o'er.
And Other Poems. 31
"If ye've gold, prepare to spend it,"
Thus the Stranger, "or to lend it ;
Or, if ye cannot extend it,
Friends must stead thee from their store ;
For the sea. hath stol'n my fortune
On the reef beyond the shore,
And the sea doth not restore."
" 'Tis my time for exercising
Friendship's bounty, and devising
Means of travel/' thus the Master,
"And my fortune is not mean.
This much will I lend to heaven,
For to me much hath been given ;
More than I can e'er make even
Many times I have foreseen.
Be not fearful for this journey
We shall sail 'Hispania's Queeri.'
Ere the noonday sun is seen."
So 'tis wished, so prosecuted,
So the journey instituted;
Home sails lone to her father,
Leaving joy and youth behind !
Homeward journeys with the Master
And the Stranger; fast and faster
Sailing on toward disaster,
32 lone,
In the sails a mighty wind !
Home by Lisbon and Gibraltar,
lone sails with fearful mind,
Led by Fortune false and blind !
PAKT II.
In yon prison cell is lying,
Of dishonor slowly dying,
One whose name erewhile was noble
And thrice honored by the State.
Stone, beneath, above, around him,
Rears its columns to confound him
Where an evil time hath bound him,
Looking on with brow of hate.
All his honors have passed from him,
All his friends have proved ingrate
Save the few that strive and wait.
He is stript of Fortune's lending,
Naked with the blast contending ;
On his white hairs shame hath fallen,
Shame his neighbors' eyes have seen.
Age, that should have been a blessing,
Filled with honor's dear caressing,
Hath been cursed beyond redressing,
And Other Poems. 33
Made ignoble, harsh, and mean:
And he breathes the air of dungeons
Who should breathe the pure serene
Of the meadows lush and green.
This is lone's father, dying
In the cell where he is lying,
Calling on his God to witness
That his soul is innocent:
And his mighty heart is broken,
And his painful words are spoken
In such whispers as betoken
That his life is almost spent.
Him the law is sacrificing
As a guilty instrument
In what seemed a foul event.
Veiled corruption hath pursued him
For a season and subdued him
To the law's blind inquisition,
To dishonor, grief, and shame.
By a friend he still mistrusted
One that for his life hath lusted I-
Charge of murder hath been thrusted
Secretly upon his name,
And the law hath sate in judgment
And on him affixed the blame
Who is guiltless of the same.
34 lone,
Yet one hope there is remaining,
One dear hope his life sustaining,
And that hope is that his daughter
Will renew his liberty.
She was witness to a vision,
To a true, if damned vision,
Which must change the law's decision,
Change the law^s corrupt decree :
She will publish that young Bertrand
Slew the Noble by the sea,
And her father shall go free.
Now the old man falters lowly
To the stones, "The Lord is holy;
He will set me free in two worlds
In this one and in His own:
He will send my daughter to me
That those foemen who pursue me
And seek falsely to undo me
Shall be wholly overthrown:
In her hands He will lodge comfort
That shall presently atone
For this prison house of stone.
"Is there storm upon the water
That ye hear not of my daughter ?"
Now he whispers to his gaoler
Who hath brought him bitter food.
And Other Poems. 35
"Thou hast more need of devotion
Than of question, for the ocean
From its center is in motion !"
Thus the gaoler in wild mood :
"Trouble heaven with thy questions
And not feeling flesh and blood:
Die, and ask it of hell's brood !"
"0, my God," the old man falters,
"Prison walls all nature alters,
Till the stones rise up against me
That are laden with my tears !
And my daughter will forsake me
Hasten but to overtake me
Ere I pass away and make me
Cause for mockery and jeers!
All hath altered; e'en the heavens
Send a priest that doubts and sneers
And heaps curses on my ears!"
"Hush, ye fool !" the gaoler mutters,
" 'Tis thy madness now that utters
'Gainst the holy church such treason
As may some time cost thee dear.
See! the holy father's hasting
Unto thee the Lord is chast'ing,
And in treason thou art wasting
36 lone,
Breath thou needst to set thee clear.
Fear the Lord and shut thy mouth then !
Would that mouth were a third ear
That it could not speak, but hear !"
Now a cowled form enters slowly
Like a pious priest and holy,
But 'fore such a damned spirit
Cain had blushed and cried out "shame !"
'Tis no priest, but the betrayer
Of the pris'ner, and inveigher
'Gainst his honor; 'tis the slayer
Of the Noble: and his aim
Is to feed an ancient hatred
'Gainst the prisoner's fair name
Overtopping his in fame.
Once he sought a high position
Which might tempt a duke's ambition,
But the prisoner outplanned him
By his native strength of mind :
Crost in hope he sought to smother
All his hatred for the other,
Who had loved him as a brother,
Sought to make the victor blind
Till he found him in his power,
Then he purposed to be kind,
Kind as racks that rend and bind!
And Other Poems. 37
As he enters like a presence
Of some higher, purer essence,
From the dungeon hastes the gaoler
And his footsteps die away.
"Prisoner," he saith slowly,
"Thou art stained, the Church is holy,
She is proud and thou art lowly,
Wilt thou longer then delay?
Wilt thou keep confession waiting
Till the Church shall cease to pray
For thy soul in its dismay?
"Rome awaits but thy repentance
And confession, then her sentence
Shall be lifted from thy spirit
And thy soul need fear no ills.
But, fool ! beware Rome's turning,
Fear the hour of her spurning,
She is patient with all yearning,
Patient as her seven hills,
But her patience hath an ending
As the patience of the hills,
And this ending is what kills.
"Kills the soul that would find heaven,
As the crooked bolts of levin
Kill the body and consume it :
Such hath Rome the power to do!
38 lone,
Better thou wert not created
Than thy soul for aye be hated,
Cursed and excommunicated
By the mother Church and true !
Rome stands waiting; in her bosom
There is lightning and is dew !
Which, prisoner, choose you?"
"Cease thy counsel and chastising,"
Thus the prisoner, uprising;
"I am greater than thy orders,
A free soul is more than Rome!
By that God that watches o'er me
I am guiltless! then restore me
To that peace from whence they tore me,
To the quietness of my home:
Every stone knows I am guiltless
That upholds this prison dome!
Then restore me to my home.
"Yet, holy father, listen
And that Rome herself did christen
Me in youth is not more certain
Than these things whereof I'll speak:
Certain as my own baptism,
Certain as thy Catholicism,
Certain as the holy chrism,
And Other Poems. 39
Are these things whereof I'll speak.
But draw nearer, holy father,
For my voice is strangely weak ;
Draw ye nearer, cheek to cheek."
Nearer draws the false Corambis,
Nearer draws the cowled Corambis,
To the other saying sternly,
"Truth is coming ; let it come !
Blessed, if, ere my departure,
I can free thee from this torture,
From this almost hopeless torture
Which has made thy spirit dumb;
Blessed, if my lips can ease thee
Ere thy body shall succumb
To its fearful martyrdom."
"There is storm upon the water
And ye may not see my daughter,"
Thus true prisoner, "for lone
May be lost upon the sea:
Should this be, then I must borrow
From her death eternal sorrow,
For I fear upon the morrow
That my life shall cease to be,
And should lone die before me
Who will speak a word for me?
Who will set my good name free?
4O lone,
"Who? unless before I perish
I should publish what I cherish
As a secret of my daughter's,
Which her love forbid rne tell.
Who? unless thyself will hear me,
And, in living after, clear me
That the world shall still revere me
And not deem my soul in hell;
That my good name shall live after
And my spirit's passing bell
Be not honor's fearful knell."
"Speak," Corambis answers lowly,
"I will serve thee, serve thee wholly;
Pour into my ear thy secret,
From my lips shall comfort fall.
What is this thou hast kept hidden,
And thy daughter hath forbidden
By her voiceless love forbidden
Ye to tell in part or all ?
Dost thou know who slew the Noble
By that meadow's flinty wall,
While the devil stood in call?"
"Yea ! and I have kept it hidden
As my daughter's love hath bidden,
Thinking that the law would free me
And the guilty not be found;
And Other Poems. 41
But the hope hath passed probation
And hath failed: so Rome's legation
Shall undo my condemnation
And the guilty shall be bound.
I will suffer shame no longer,
Nor through idle hope compound
With an evil most profound.
"Draw ye nearer: I'll discover
In what manner lone's lover
On the morning of the murder
By my child herself was seen."
This he docs, moreover saying,
"Bertrand's guilty of the slaying,
Guilty of that Lord's betraying,
And, priest, my hands are clean;
He is guilty; let him answer;
I no longer choose to screen
Him from law, or come between."
"Ha!" Corambis cries, uprising,
"Thou deservest canonizing
For thy friendship and thy patience,
And I love thee for the same.
Come, rejoice ! for if thou perish
Both thy name and bones I'll cherish,
So thou needst not leave this garish
42 lone,
Day of life with fear of shame;
Thou shalt leave a voice behind thee
To cry honor on thy name
And give thee enduring fame."
But behind his cowl he mutters,
"This is truth the old man utters,
And I'll publish it for profit
Should he die with it unsaid,
For, by heaven ! but this morning
I received a hint of warning
From Montero curse his scorning!
Laying this murder on my head,
And, unless his eyes be hoodwinked
And his cunning thoughts misled,
I'll be numbered with the dead."
Now he adds, aloud and cheerful,
"Prisoner, be thou not fearful,
I release thee and absolve thee
From all past and future crime ;
And I'll do as ye have bidden
Publish what thou still hast hidden,
Which concealment should be chidden,-
Give thee whole unto the time :
I will live to shield thy honor,
Lift thy name from scandal's slime,
And make it again sublime."
And Other Poems. 43
With these mocking words he hurries
From the cell. The prisoner buries
His white hairs within his mantle
Moaning that his days are o'er;
And, upon the stones reclining,
Sees in thought the bright sun shining
On his home,, and sweet buds twining
'Round the lattice by the door;
Stands again upon the threshold,
In his ears the distant roar
Of the surf upon the shore.
Up the sunny path advances
lone with her tender glances,
Singing of the vales of Flora
Sweet in old Provengal lay :
After her, from field and bower
Washed at morn in golden shower,
Every April wakened flower
Bends the beauty of its spray,
And its fragrance wafts toward her
As if she were gentle May
Moving on her gracious way.
From this reverie awaking,
All his heart with sorrow aching,
Now the father in the darkness
Stretches out his yearning arms :
44 lone,
"0, my God, thou'll not bereave me
Of my child, nor she deceive me
And in this cold dungeon leave me
Where no sunlight shines or warms !
She was ever true and tender
And once more within these arms
I shall fold her, safe from storms!
"No, ah no; she's gone forever,
Gone forever and forever,
Lost upon the troubled waters
As these long delays attest!
And my arms shall ne'er enfold her,
Never, nevermore enfold her,
Nor my eyes again behold her;
She is gone where none molest!
I have outlived truth and honor,
And my child I loved the best
Is before me gone to rest!"
"No, my father, thou'rt mistaken
I'm not dead nor thou forsaken ;
I am living, I, thy daughter,
Living, and have brought thee peace!
So, dear father, be not daunted,
By no spirit art thou haunted,
Nor this dungeon is enchanted,
And Other Poems. 45
I am real and bring release:
Lo, I touch thy hand, my father!
Let thy doubts and. tremblings cease,
I, thy daughter, come with peace."
As the silence now is broken
By these tender words outspoken,
To his feet the father rises
With a startled, broken cry.
In his arms he clasps his daughter,
Clasps his faithful, gentle daughter,
Dearer than he ever thought her,
Bright as love may glorify;
Clasps her to his straining bosom,
Saying, "Lord, now let me die
While my daughter is still by!"
"Dear, my father, on the morrow
Thou shalt bid farewell to sorrow,
Yet not bid farewell, father,
Or to life or liberty.
Thou art talked of now in heaven
By good angels that are given
Power such as oft hath riven
Gates of brass and set men free:
Seraphs are this night impatient
For the gracious morn to be
When from hence they shall lea.4 ttiee,"
46 lone,
"0, my child, thou little knowest
How I'm numbered with the lowest,
How my works are all forgotten,
And my patience made my shame:
Little knowest how detraction
Hath set in with harsh exaction,
How the forked tongue of faction
Hath envenomed my good name;
Little knowest how I'm fallen,
Fallen without guilt or blame,
Fallen and who shall reclaim!"
"Yet, my father, I can reason
Of the cure, if not the treason
Of the remedy I've knowledge
Though not knowledge of the wrong.
Yet I partly am acquainted
With thy fall : my heart hath fainted
Many times since it hath painted
Thee so deeply grieved and long.
0, believe me, I have sounded
All the fearful depth of wrong
Since I came these stones among."
"0, sweet lone, kneel ye by me
And with comfort fortify me:
I will thank the stones beneath me
thou talk of being free.
And Other Poems. 47
Shall I see the sun in heaven
Once again ere I am given
Unto death? Shall shame be dr'vea
From my sight, rebuked by thee ?
Shall they clothe me with that honor,
With that former dignity
Which fell off with liberty?"
"Dear, my father, do not tremble
Thinkest thou I would dissemble?
Thou shalt see and seeing answer
'It is good good as can be '*
I have come upon this journey
As thy witness and attorney,
(Heaven be my own attorney!)
And I bring thee liberty:
Surely, father, they'll believe me,
Though, indeed, I'm kin to thee,
And, believing, set thee free."
Thus they whisper, one the other,
Never dreaming that another,
That Corambis at the threshold
Listens to their every word;
Never dreaming that their meeting,
That their happy, sacred greeting,
That their very pulses' beating,
48 lone,
By a foe is overheard:
Thinking that the heavens only
Know how deeply they are stirred,
Not a foe by hatred spurred.
Now, beside the pallet kneeling,
lone, with her soft hand stealing
Through her father's, whispers lowly
Words of love and comfort sweet.
Of her journey o'er the ocean,
Of her spirit's deep emotion,
Of her hopes and her devotion,
Whispers lowly at his feet;
But, as yet, speaks not of Bertrand,
In whose cause she shall entreat
With a woman's fervid heat.
To her words her father listens,
And each sunken eye now glistens
With the kindling light of gladness,
Hope, and waking ecstasy.
O'er her face he still is bending,
His cold breath and her warm blending,
Trusting still, still apprehending,
That her love shall set him free;
Hanging on her words intently
As if they were that decree
Giving him his liberty.
And Other Poems. 49
Thus conversing, lone slowly
Leads to that which claims her wholly
To the vision of the meadow
And her lover's part therein:
Saying, "Father, for that vision
Which must change the law's decision,
Why, indeed, 'twas but a vision,
To remembered dreams akin;
But a dream except in outcome,
Such as idle fancies spin
Or in fear have origin.
"Once before at early morning,
Suddenly, and without warning,
I perceived the noble Bertrand
Struggling in the very ground;
But when I had wildly hurried
To the spot where he seemed buried,
Upward to his shoulders buried,
'Twas an idle dream I found,
For it faded as a vision,
And I fell into a swound
With accustomed sights around."
To his feet her father staggers
As if she had spoken daggers;
To his feet he feebly rises
From his face a brightness fled,
50 lone,
Like when some rude spirit dashes
Waters on bright fire that Hashes
And one moment all is ashes,
Cold and still and dull and dead.
For a while he feebly swayeth,
Then, with one hand to his head,
Sinks upon his narrow bed.
lone, to her feet uprising,
Marks this change past all disguising,
Comprehends the fearful reason
And continues, wrung with pain:
"Father, dost thou fear this vision
Will make light the other vision,
That the law in its decision
Will receive me with disdain
Will adjudge that I am troubled
By some sickness of the brain
And my testimony vain?"
"Thou hast said : I'm ruined forever,"
Thus the prisoner, "and never
Shall I look upon the morrow
Or go forth to liberty !
There is naught but death remaining
Since my good name's past regaining,
And my freedom past attaining;
And Other Poems. 51
Naught but death as ye may see!
Thou'll be judged an idle dreamer
In the currents of decree,
And thou canst not set me free !"
"Yea, my father; and I tremble,
For my soul dare not dissemble
Hiding from the law this vision
That the other be not vain.
It were murder to conceal it,
For thou knowest not to reveal it,
But within my heart to seal it,
Would give credit to my brain,
And that vision of the meadow
Then would seem a flawless chain,
Not an idle dream profane."
Now the father knows temptation:
(Let his wrong be palliation!)
lone must conceal that vision
Of her lover in the ground.
"I have suffered for this other,"
Thinks the prisoner; "a brother
Not more freely nay, a mother
Not more freely had been bound:
Let him, then, in like repay me,
In like suffering compound
For this deep and grievous wound.
5* lone,
"lone," thus begins the father,
"There's a third way" "Yea, I rather
Choose the third way," answers lone,
"And perchance 'twill set thee free.
There's a third way and a better,
Not set down within thy letter,
And, for which, I am the debtor
To mine own anxiety;
And that third way is, my father,
That I take the guilt on me
Of that murder by the sea.
"Swear that I myself committed
This strange murder and outwitted
One that sought to wrong my honor
As I crost that meadow wide:
Swear that on that fatal morning,
Dastardly, and without warning,
This dead Lord all honor scorning
Sought to shame me and my pride,
And I plucked his weapon from him
Thrusting it into his side
So he sinned and so he died!"
At this plan so unexpected,
Deeply is the heart affected
Of that father whose intention
Was to wrong a guiltless man.
And Other Poems. 53
Shame comes o'er him and amazement,
Shame at his own heart's debasement,
And amazement, deep amazement,
At his daughter's daring plan.
With dim eyes he looks toward her,
But he scarcely now can scan
Her fair features, cold and wan.
"Yea," continues lone lowly,
"This is best and almost holy,
For that Lord has left no kindred
And we cannot harm his name.
Herein thou wilt be acquitted,
Nor shall Bert rand be committed,
While, for me, I but outwitted
One that sought to work my shame,
And what law will hold me guilty,
Or what tribunal will blame
That I struck what would defame?"
Down upon his pallet sinking,
Now the father takes to thinking,
With a mind subdued by sickness,
Of his daughter's daring plan.
It were possible in reason,
And, though false, it were not treason;
It might free him for a season,
54
To his life might add a span;
And the heavens would o'erlook it
Since 'twould lift a thrice-false ban
And set free a guiltless man.
Meanwhile lingers that foul traitor
Named Corambis: violater
Of a privacy that's sacred
And betrayer of his friends!
In the darkness he is slinking
And his evil mind is thinking
Of that daughter's plan, and linking
Thought to thought as serves his ends;
And he swears that Tone's purpose
Shall be crost, for it offends
And endangers his own. ends.
"Who/- 5 he schemes, "will think this maiden
Slew that mighty Lord of Vedin?
I, with all my strength and cunning,
Barely 'scaped Death's fellowship.
Should she then this plan discover
And be doubted, all is over,
For that vision of her lover
Will lose credit with one slip;
And, naught being sure, Montero
May in time my secret strip
Naked as confession's lip."
And Other Poems. 55
"Nay, my child, we must not borrow
Earthly joy to Heaven's sorrow;
Speak the truth as thou hast found it,
Leave the shaping to the Lord:
For although a plan bring gladness
It may yet be near to madness,
For hath God not willed that sadness
Shall be ours, though 'tis hard?
And in serving joy though pleasant
We may therein cross the Lord,
Should we aught of truth discard."
"0, my father, thou art nearer
Than the heavens, and art dearer,
And I know of heaven, nothing,
But much of this love within!
Do not fail me through thy reasons
Truth hath manifold, love, all seasons;
And a gentle spirit's treasons
Oft are higher laws 'gainst sin :
By this heart that feels there's heaven,
I do feel this deed's akin
To that heaven, and not sin!"
Thus these two resume communion,
But their minds are at disunion:
lone pleads the cause of feeling
And her father that of truth.
56 lone,
For a while they are divided,
And the question undecided
Which shall be the one that's guided
By the other age or youth;
Yet not long, for gentle lone
Wins her father o'er to ruth,
O'er to mercy if not truth.
Wins him o'er and wins his blessing
By her mild words and caressing,
Wins him to support her purpose
Half in reason, half without.
Smooths his forehead now and leaves him
As a dreamless sleep receives him,
Sleep wherein no sorrow grieves him,
Free as infancy from doubt:
Leaves him and retires slowly
Shadowed by a form devout
That doth darkly leer and flout!
PAET III.
By yon sea a youth is riding
And, with rein and knee, is guiding
'Gainst the tide his mettled stallion,
Fearful of the spumous wave.
And Other Poems. 57
In the rider's face is seated
Strength and courage undefeated
And a heart that ne'er retreated
From his eyes, warm, deep, and grave:
Gold-brown hair around his temple
Frames a forehead pure and brave,
Such as is not passion's slave.
This is Bertrand, Tone's lover,
O'er whom evil fate shall hover,
Though the airs be tempered for him
By the purple fires of love.
Of his lady love's returning
He hath heard, and now is yearning
All his heart within him burning
But to touch that lady's glove ;
But to touch the- flowing vestment
Of fair lone, far above
Every painting of a love.
But his lady love is hidden
From his sight, though he hath ridden
To her garden gate and lingered
Full an hour by his heart.
She is nowhere to be greeted,
And he feels that he is cheated,
Feels his love has been mistreated
lone,
By her keeping thus apart:
Yet he thinks upon her sorrows,
And her sorrows now exhort
Him to patience 'spite his smart.
Now a while he idly listens
To the surf that falls and glistens,
Lapping at his stallion's forefeet
Firmly planted in the sand:
Now he turns about and passes
From the sea the sunlight glasses
To the banks of waving grasses,
Thence to firm, dry, level land.
He will post unto his lady
And beside her wicket stand
With young flowers in his hand.
But, behold ! a hedge is parted
To his right, and tender hearted,
Trembling lone stands before him,
Seen too plainly to retire.
Instantly the hot blood rushes
Through the rider's heart and flushes
To has brow ; his right hand crushes
In its grasp the whip of briar.
Swift he wheels his mettled stallion
And with heart and brain on fire
Comes to her in sweet attire.
And Other Poems. 59
For a moment lone glances,
Trembling, backwards; then advances,
Giving one white hand to Bertrand,
Saying lowly, "Is it thou?"
To his lips the lover presses
That white hand he now possesses,
And with welcome words addresses
lone 'neath a branching bough;
And he marks that she who left him
But a maiden with sweet brow
Is a ripened woman now.
"Dearest lady, let my gladness,
Let my deep and new-found gladness
Be thy welcome not my speeches,
But the formal part of me.
Losing thee, I lost that even
One as dear as life and heaven,
Yet to me that hour was given
Thy most gracious memory:
This Fve cherished next thy presence
As the dearest thing to me
But how very far from thee !"
"Next to my dear father's greeting
Thine is dearest, and this meeting
I shall cherish/' answers lone;
"Unexpected, yet most dear.
60 lone,
But, Bertrand, I am grieving
For my father, deeply grieving !
For, although not past reprieving,
He's past much I greatly fear;
Past all joy though not past honor,
Past the old accustomed cheer,
Past all faith in friends sincere!
"True, he hath in thee and others
Friendship closer than a brother's,
But the faith is dark within him
That did once so brightly burn!
And I'm told he speaks unkindly
Of his dearest friends, and blindly
Judges all ; but ah not blindly
Should they judge him in return:
He hath suffered through misjudgment,
Suffered more than we can learn,
And his suffering makes him stern."
"0, dear lady, though unkindly
He hath judged his friends and blindly ,-
I amongst them, yet our pardon
Like a suitor seeks him out.
Thou hast said: He is mistaken
In our love and not forsaken,
Nor are the roots of friendship shaken,
And Other Poems. 61
And 'tis suffering makes him doubt;
But his suffering and his sorrow,
Not our action from without,
Nor his own heart, true, devout.
"Yet ye spoke of his reprieving
As a thing not past achieving
Has the guilty been discovered?
Have they found some certain clue?
Tell me, can ye loose this fetter
That hath made the law his debtor?
0, so be it; this were better
Than a blessed dream come true.
'Twere another bond 'twixt gladness
And my heart, if it be true,
And such bonds are very few !"
"It is true that I can free him,"
Answers lone: "Thou shalt see him
In his garden ere the Sabbath,
For I surely do not err.
On this very day I'm bidden
To make known what I've kept hidden
Let my silence be not chidden
And set free the prisoner.
What I'll publish shall find credence
And to me the law'll defer,
Which should greatly please thee, sir."
62 lone,
"Had I but one prayer with Heaven
I would pray that this be given,
Granted for thy sake, dear lady,
Since 'tis very dear to thee.
May I greet thee in that garden,
When thy father hath his pardon,
Or acquittal, and his warden
Shall his own kind daughter be;
May I greet thee there, sweet lone,
In that hour thy father's free
There to tell my love to thee?"
On the ground her sweet eyes bending,
Her full heart with love contending,
lone one fair hand surrenders
And surrenders it entire;
For a moment gives it wholly
Into Bertrand's hand, then slowly
Turns away, and sweet and lowly
Passes through the hedge of brier;
Sweet and pallid passes homeward,
While with heart and brain on fire
Bertrand watches her retire.
Ardently the youth regards her,
With the eyes of love regards her
Till she's lost beyond the meadow,
Then he dreams of her fair form.
And Other Poems. 63
But, alas! the air is broken
By such sounds as now betoken
Some near horseman, and a spoken
Harsh command breaks up the charm:
'Tis Corambis, who, dismounting
From his steed that took alarm,
Grasps the lover by the arm.
"Ha, good Bertrand, thou'rt a lover
And a dreamer, I discover,
For thy horse stands idly pawing
Whilst thou gaze on empty air.
Thou'rt a lover by thine action,
By this look of deep abstraction,
And the thin air hath attraction
But to those in Beauty's snare.
.Come, attend me; I have matter,
Matter worthy deepest care
As ye'll presently declare!"
"True, Corambis, I'm a lover,"
Answers Bertrand, "yet discover
What deep matter brings thee hither
Surely at thy leisure's cost.
Yet thou canst not bring me sadness,
For I've ventured faith and gladness,
Hope and peace, love deep as madness,
64 lone,
On one heart, and that's not lost;
And though earths four corners crumble
Nothing, I may say, is lost
Till this heart I love is lost!"
"Hast thou ventured on a maiden
All thy wealth ? As well have laden
Jewels on the backs of dolphins
Swimming in the open sea !
Yea, good Bertrand, thou'rt mistaken
In these hopes as yet unshaken,
And thou. shalt full soon awaken
To learn how it is with thee;
Learn thy judgment has been sleeping,
Not that sharp-toothed enemy
Woman's foul inconstancy!
"Yet to each man under heaven
Comes that hour when 'tis given
Either to forget some woman
Or to throw away his soul I"
Thus Corambis to the lover
Speaks as one who can discover
Treason black as clouds that hover
O'er the pit of sin and dole;
But the other is not fearful,
Standing near Love's perfect goal
With a faith divine and whole.
And Other Poems. 65
"No, Corarabis, thou'rt mistaken
And my love is still unshaken,"
Answers Bertrand ; "yet thou errest
Through thy brain, not through thy heart.
Wish me well, yet by some action
Other than to voice detraction
'Gainst this lady, whose infraction
Is a dream upon thy part.
As thou lovest me, speak no further,
For ye speak in such a sort
As will draw on rude retort!"
"Let it come," replies the other;
"Though I love thee as a brother
Better that I lose thy friendship
Than that thou become a fool !
For to lose thee through just reason
Is to lose thee but a season,
Since I'll win thee back when treason
Proves my words were just and cool ;
But thou'rt lost to me forever
When thou'rt made this woman's tool
For I cannot love a fool!
"Lend thine ear and I will shake thee
To the center, and awake thee
From this sleep wherein fair lone
Would betray thee with a kiss.
66 lone,
Mark me, and, when I've concluded,
Judge not me that have intruded
Here upon thy dreams secluded
But my message judge ye this;
Which, if doubted, go disprove me,
And not linger here to hiss
One who showed thee an abyss."
"Speak right on," jeplies the lover,
"And I'll mark all ye discover,
For, in friendship, I do lend thee
Both mine ears yet not my heart.
I reserve all but my hearing
In this cause, and nothing fearing,
In my faith still persevering,
I shall doubt all ye impart.
Speak right on, to ease thy conscience
Freely mayest thou exhort,
But thou canst not make me start."
"Where wast thou that fatal morning
When some foe all honor scorning
Slew the noble Lord of Vedin?
Tell me this, my steadfast friend."
Thus Corambis, drawing nearer,
Questions Bertrand, and austerer
Grow his features and severer
And Other Poems. 67
Flows his question to its end.
"Wast thou passing through that meadow
Where Lord Vedin did contend
With that foe we'd apprehend?"
"No, Corambis, I was riding
Southward where the sea is chiding,
Half a league beyond that meadow
Which Lord Vedin crost to die."
"Canst thou prove it to Eome's legation
To thine honor's vindication?"
Thus with seeming agitation
Asks Corambis in reply:
"Canst thou prove it by some witness
Meet within a judge's eye
Both to swear and testify?"
"No, Corambis, I've no witness;
But why question my unfitness
To make good mine own assertions
As if honor hung thereon?
If in secret thou dost reason
That I did this deed of treason,
Know thy words are out of season
And thy doubts are folly's spawn :
And thou must for why, Corambis,
Dost thou look so strangely on
As if faith in me were gone?"
68 lone,
"No, by heaven, let me perish !
When thy truth I cease to cherish!"
Cries Corambis: "Thou dost wrong me
With these very doubts of thine.
Judge me not so rude beseech thee
As to think I would impeach thee;
I am here, good friend, to teach thee
Of another's charge not mine,
Of that charge that tender lone
With some damnable design
Brings against thee : this, in fine !
"Learn, good Bertrand, that fair lone,
Ere thy kisses shall be dry on
Her white hand, will rise in judgment
And impeach thee with this deed.
Swear that as she walked in study
On that morn with face all bloody
And apparel cut and muddy,
Thou wast fleeing o'er that mead:
Swear enough to draw damnation
Down upon thee who must bleed
That her father may be freed !"
At these words the lover blanches,
Grasping hard the hanging branches
In whose shade fair lone granted
Sweet assurance of her truth.
And Other Poems. 69
But his heart is soon collected
Which so deeply was affected,
And each rising doubt rejected
As unworthy love and youth:
From his heart, with faith all glowing,
Now he plucks the serpent's tooth;
Yet ere long 'twill work him ruth !
"Take this dream back to thy chalice/'
Thus he speaks, "and, without malice,
Drown it in some cooler claret
Than begot it in thy brain.
Yet I thank thee for thy trouble;
And, since vain, my thanks are double;
Vain I say vain as a bubble
In that wine cup thou didst drain!
For this lady would not wrong me
Nor a moment cause me pain
Though it prove her father's gain."
"Go thy way, then," thus the other,
" 'From the smoke into the smother/
I have warned thee, but my warning
Is to thee a drunken dream.
Let the quicksands close above thee
Where this maiden's hand will shove thee,
While thy friend who'd save and love thee
70 lone,
Turns away in sad extreme:
Shut thine eyes and call it honor,
Stop thine ears and calPt esteem
Woman nerver yet did scheme !"
Deeply Bertrand is astonished
That his doubts are thus admonished,
That his friend remains so steadfast
Where all seems of folly born.
Can it be that lone imposes
Such a price for love's sweet roses ?
Doth she hope that for love's roses
He will wear this crown of thorn?
Must he suffer and be silent
Or expect his lady's scorn
Ere the breaking of the morn?
"Had her own sweet lips but tasked me
I had borne what she had asked me/'
Thus he thinks in pain and silence;
Then aloud unto his friend :
"How came ye to know what's hidden
That thon hast so harshly chidden?
Say, Corambis, wast thou bidden
Thus to speak, yet not offend?
Did my lady send thee hither
With thds message ye extend,
Or is't thine unto the end?"
And Other Poems. 71
"Wilt thou hear Death's raven croaking,"
Thus Corambis, "and, fast cloaking
Up thy head, swear 'tis the turtle
Bringing thee the olive bloom?
"Tis my message and each letter
Makes thee my eternal debtor,
And than scorn it thou hadst better
Go alive into thy tomb!
Hadst thou eyes r-ot shut and blinded
Thou wouldst hide thee with the gloom,
And not wait the whirlwind's doom !
"More than this I'll not reveal thee,
Yet I promise to conceal thee
There where thou may'st hear this maiden
Charging thee with that foul deed.
Then, indeed, thou shalt awaken
Knowing that thou art forsaken,
Yet, ere thou art overtaken,
May fly hence with instant speed;
I've a vessel in the harbor
Which I'll lend thee in thy need
If thou'll only turn and heed.
"0 that I could but persuade him
To fly hence ere they degrade him,"
Now in silence thinks Corambis,
"Then his guilt would seem confest.
72 lone,
Should he flee it would awaken
Suspicions not to be shaken,
And as soon as overtaken
He would suffer death at best:
So should I be safe in future,
For this crime, 'tis manifest,
Still upon his head would rest."
"Thanks, Corambis, for thy kindness
Shown me in my seeming blindness,"
Thus young Bertrand calmly answers,
"But thou canst not serve me, sir.
True it is thou'd not deceive me,
True this lady would not grieve me,
But not true, good friend, believe me,
That mistakes do not occur !
Therefore I'll continue steadfast
And believe though ye demur
That thou art mistaken, sir."
With these words this best of lovers
His accustomed calm recovers,
And, into his saddle springing,
Questions, "Whither goest to-day?*'
But Corambis, deeply sighing,
Looks aside without replying,
So the lover, gratifying
And Other Poems. 73
His own fancy, turns away.
Horse and rider soon are hidden
'Mong the trees that yet display
No green shoots or bloomy spray.
Meanwhile lone, with the Master
And that Captain whom disaster
Touched so deeply, stood conversing
Close beneath a sandy mound,
lone hath made known that vision
Which might mar the law's decision,
To these friends made known that vision
Of her lover in the ground;
But hath told her plan of action
Which will free her father bound
Nor her guiltless Love confound.
Modestly, without distraction,
She made known her plan of action
How she purposes to publish
That she slew the murdered lord.
For a while both friends objected
To this plan that lone selected,
Fearing it would be suspected
And all things made doubly hard ;
Then they bowed to her decision,
Taken from their better ward
By her pleas and their regard.
74 lone,
Thus essentially won over
Still to shield sweet Tone's lover,
Now the Master and the Captain
Take their leave and go their way.
lone marks their steps retreating
Mingling with her heart's loud beating,
And those footsteps seem repeating,
"All is well: fear no dismay!"
And her heart takes up the burden
When the footsteps die away
"All is well : fear no dismay !"
Now upon the gray sand kneeling,
O'er her brow a warm blush stealing,
lone thinks upon her lover
And upon the coining years.
No prophetic sorrow chills her,
But the golden sunlight fills her
With a gentle calm, now thrills her
Till she's flattered unto tears.
She is happy, very happy,
And she almost dreams she hears
That far music of the spheres!
But, alas! the charm is broken
By a greeting sternly spoken,
And Corambis bends o'er lone
And her features coldly scan.
And Other Poems. 75
Rising up the maiden faces
This rude traitor, and some paces
Draweth backwards, as she places
Little trust in voice or man.
She knows both, yet guesses neither,
For Corambis 'tis his plan
Seems disguised another man.
"My fair maiden, do not wonder
How that name thou goest under,"
Thus Corambis, "grew familiar
To these stranger lips of mine;
Marvel not that I'm acquainted
With thy thoughts so deeply tainted,
Nor be awed when I have painted
Every hope and fear of thine;
But put all such wonder from thee
And attend my every sign
For I come with warning fine !
"In this land thou hast a lover
And thou couldst a tale discover
Which might bring this lover sorrow
But would set thy father free.
This I know, and know, moreover,
That ye think to shield this lover,
Yet in that same hour recover
76 lone,
Thy good father's liberty :
Thou dost purpose through a falsehood-
Setting by thy modesty
To corrupt the law's decree!
"But beware, for if thou swearest
To this falsehood as thou darest,
I'll impeach thy testimony
And thou'll lose thy foolish pains!
Take not on thyself, false maiden,
That strange murder of Lord Vedin,
Or ere night thou shalt be laden
With a perjurer's close chains;
And, once swearing false, the judges
Still will doubt thee : so remains
Thy good father in his chains !
"But bear witness to that vision
Which shall change the law's decision,
To that vision of young Bertrand
On the morn when Vedin fell.
Swear thou saw him pale and bloody,
With his vestment cut and muddy,
As thou walked in early study
In the field where Vedin fell.
While, as for that other vision
Where this youth seemed in a well,
'Tis a dream ye must not tell.
And Other Poems. 77
"Thus I charge thee, and my power
Next the King's is chief this hour,
And herefrom thy only safety
And thy only hope shall spring!
Therefore scheme not to deny me
Or by silence to defy me,
Nor with riches seek to buy me
Or my heart attempt to wring;
Thou canst move a dead man sooner
Than this spirit which I bring,
Long since past all altering."
Like to one entranced or dreaming,
lone marks the gray eyes gleaming
In the brow of false Corambis,
Nor could speak though she should try.
So the dove amid the grasses
Marks the snake's eye as it glasses,
With a charm mesmeric glasses,
And can neither move nor cry ;
But with lone 'tis amazement
More than some mesmeric eye
That enchains her dumbly by.
Having done all in his power
To corrupt love's sweetest hour,
Now Corambis leaves the maiden
And triumphant goes his way.
78 lone,
Down upon the gray sands falling
Hapless lone still recalling
That strange warning and appalling
Hides her face from the bright day,
And her blanched lips are silent,
And her hands, though joined are they,
Are not joined to plead or pray.
Thus some moments she continues,
All the strength gone from her sinews,
Overcome in heart and body
Though her mind is active still.
But once more the sound comes stealing
O'er her ear of far bells pealing,
And she rises up, revealing
In her face the griefs that kill
Pale despair and tearless sorrow,
And a noble, tender will
Helpless in the hour of ill.
To the west she turns and passes
Through the tall and clinging grasses,
Staggering like one in sickness,
Falling thrice upon her knee.
Up the wind deep bells are swinging
And her call to court are ringing;
Deep-mouthed bells that now are bringing
And Other Poems. 79
Judge and clerk to hear her plea:
'Tis the hour for testimony
And pale lone holds the key
To her father's liberty !
"I am coming, father, coming;
Be thou patient; I am coming!"
Now she cries and onward hastens
To the tower of her trial.
At the gates of alabaster
Pale yet firm she greets the Master,
But speaks not of that disaster
Agonizing her the while.
This she locks within her bosom
And moves up the marble aisle
Deep into the prison pile.
To a chamber where tall torches
Dimly light the hanging arches
lone comes, but here the Master
Cannot enter so returns,
lone comes: a clerk perceives her
And with formal hand receives her;
To that spot he guides and leaves her
Where the brightest taper burns,
And each eye is on the maiden
And the dullest eye discerns
That her heart with sorrow yearns.
8o lone,
Pale she looks, and yet not daunted,
Though by evil spirits haunted,
Pale and sad; yet in her bearing
Strength there is and much of pride.
But that strength comes near to failing
And her pride seems unavailing
As into the judgment railing
Comes her father with his guide:
Pity melts her gentle bosom,
And she now can scarcely tide
Tears that down her cheeks would glide.
She would weep ! but ah for weeping
Time and place are out of keeping,
So her pride congeals the waters
That arise unto her eye.
She would weep ! but now the dial
Points the hour for the trial,
And she must not weep the while
But be calm and testify ;
She may weep when all is over
And no judge or jury by,
But till then her eyes be dry!
On her right a clerk now rising
His commission exercising
Swears her in to be a witness
And, so swearing, bids her speak':
And Other Poems. 81
Speak the truth unbiased by feeling,
Nothing adding, naught concealing,
Speak the truth of every dealing
For whose facts the law shall seek.
This he formally commands her,
And sweet lone grows faint and weak
With sick heart and blanched cheek !
Faint she grows and near to falling
With an agony appalling,
Thrice essaying and thrice failing
To find speech to testify:
But she thinks upon the morrow
And her father freed from sorrow,
And from such full thought doth borrow
Strength and courage to reply
To bear witness 'gainst young Bertrand,
And one moment gratify
Her wronged sire ere he die!
Word by word her lips discover
That last vision of her lover,
But no vision lone calls it
Nor casts doubt upon its truth.
Shade by shade, as she confesses
'Gainst her guiltless Love confesses!
In the chamber's far recesses
82 lone,
Grows the image of that youth,
Grows the image of young Bertrand,
In his features naught uncouth
Deep amazement mixed with ruth.
"Tis a vision to the maiden,
Fraught with shame, with horror laden;
Such an insubstantial vision
As she witnessed twice before.
Yet she gives the court no token,
Or by whispered word or spoken,
That its privacy is broken
And a wraith stands at the door;
But her pale, thin lips continue
In their charge as heretofore,
While a cold dew bathes her o'er.
On the wraith her fixed eyes bending,
Through a time that seems unending,
Still her lips beat out the story
Of that vision of the mead.
Still she speaks, and still that spirit
Standing in the door, or near it,
Listens to her speech, to hear it
With a heart that still can bleed.
With a human heart and breaking
Still the lover gives her heed
As her fatal words proceed !
And Other Poems. 83
But an end comes to the story
Of her Love all pale and gory
Fleeing on that fatal morning
From the mead where Vedin fell ;
Yet pale lone is not seated,
Though her tale is now completed ;
Still she stands, all power fleeted
'Gainst that vision to rebel,
For the countenance of Bertrand
Draws her like a mystic spell
Which she has no strength to quell.
Still into the shadows peering,
Nothing hoping, all things fearing,
lone stands, and while thus standing
Comes the judge's formal strain :
"That this honored court's decision
By no insubstantial vision,
By no idle, gross misprision,
Be corrupted and made vain,
Let the witness testifying
Answer and so we constrain
This one question, then refrain.
"Has this witness ere been haunted,
Like unto a soul enchanted,
By some insubstantial vision
Such as judgment puts to flight?
84 lone,
Has she seen in earth or heaven
With the morn or noon or even,
Or in waters under heaven,
Any visionary sight?
Has the presence of this Bertrand
Haunted her by day or night
While the youth was absent quite ?"
Deep into the shadows peering,
Nothing hoping, all things fearing,
lone stands, and slowly, lowly,
Comes her answer, fraught with pain
"No, my lord, I ne'er was haunted,
By no empty presence haunted ;
Nor, like some rapt soul enchanted.
Have I looked on visions vain.
Nay, my lord, so rest my spirit,
Never yet did vision chain
Mine eyesight, or vex my brain !"
Thus pale lone, falsely swearing,
Answers, while her eyes are staring
Hard against the face of Bertrand,
That a vision seems to be.
But yet Tone's not enchanted,
Nor the secret chamber haunted
It is Bertrand pale and daunted
And Other Poems. 85
Standing there so silently !
By an accident he entered
At the door, to hear and see
-What he vowed could never be!
Now, as lone ceases speaking
Still her eyes those shadows seeking,
On her right a clerk uprises
And calls on her father's name.
Twice the summons is repeated,
Twice the prisoner is greeted,
But the old man still is seated,
Deaf, it seems, or lost in shame ;
Still is seated, and no motion
Stirs his aged, weary frame,
Lighted up by fitful flame.
"Cease thy summons; he is stricken
Whom ye think by words to quicken !"
Thus a dark robed priest makes answer,
Standing in the fitful light.
"Lo, behold, his heart was broken
Ere the witness yet had spoken ;
Yea, he died ere yet one token
Eeached thine ears to set him right !
He is gone where is no error
And now walks in Honor's sight
With meek spirits and upright!"
86 lone,
"Dead!" the judge repeateth slowly,
"Dead!" the walls re-echo lowly;
"Dead!" and with one cry to heaven
lone sinks on dusty stone !
"Dead!" a hollow sigh replieth
Prom cold lips that none descrieth,
<f Dead!" and where the torchlight dieth
Fades a form that stood alone.
"Dead! my lord; but stay thy session
Till this Bertrand shall atone
For his guilt so clearly shown V
PART IV.
IB yon lonoly field and barren
Long ago a noble's warren,
But since blasted by the tempest
Stands a thatched and lowly cot:
From its door no light is streaming
Though 'tis dusk and few stars gleaming,
Dusk, and all the waste seems dreaming
Melancholy and forgot;
Dusk, and no sound save the complaining
Of the owl from secret grot
And the winds that sweep that spot.
And Other Poems. 87
To this shelter, dark and lowly,
Lo, a woman struggles slowly,
Through the waste of snow new-fallen,
Faint, exhausted, struggles on !
Now she sinks to earth, betraying
Wild despair, yet not delaying !
Now she kneels, and, dumbly praying,
Creeps the icy ground upon !
By no clasp her hair is gathered,
And her hood and cloak are gone,
Torn away by gusts of dawn.
Still the bitter winds pursue her,
And it seems they will subdue her,
But at last she gains the threshold
Of that shelter dark and lone.
Thrice in vain she knocks then, kneeling,
Her faint brain with horror reeling !
Calls aloud in voice appealing
That some charity be shown;
But the silence is unbroken
Save by icy winds that moan
O'er that shelter of rude stone.
Eising now, she looks behind her
At the snows that daze and blind her;
Now she turns and, lo, kind mercy
Hath the door wide open thrown !
88 lone,
In she enters, saying lowly,
"God reward thee; thou art holy!"
But no answer comes, and slowly
She perceives that she's alone,
That the door wherethrough she entered
By the wind was open blown,
And no other welcome shown.
Though no thanks to man he given,
Deepest thanks are due to heaven,
And most humbly they are rendered
With meek heart and bended knee :
"For this strength I have remaining,
God, I thank thee, uncomplaining;
I have asked, and all-sustaining
Thou hast shown much grace to me :
Let it grow till I have finished
That which brought me o'er the sea
And that drew me near to Thee."
Ceasing now, she looks around her,
Trembling,, for the cold winds wound her.
And the darkness makes her fearful
Hiding what she does not know;
But full soon the shadows lighten
And her thoughts no more affrighten,
For the hearth begins to brighten,
And Other Poems. 89
Fanned by winds that inward blow;
And, behold, the room is lighted,
As the bright flames come and go,
By a warm and ruddy glow !
Closing now the door, and kneeling,
With the firelight o'er her stealing,
She gives way to dreams and slumber
At worn nature's heavy call :
But not long, for something haunts her,
Something left unfinished haunts her,
Some great work that grieves and daunts her,
Yet which she cannot recall;
And she wakens from that slumber,
Resting on her like a pall,
With her pulse in fever's thrall.
Suddenly she looks with wonder
At a sword the mantle under,
And a passionate cry escapes her
As the firelight plays it o'er.
Pale she grows with deep emotion,
Pallid with a strange prenotion,
And she kneels as in devotion
Down upon the rush-strewn floor.
Something in the sight hath stirred her
As perhaps no sight before
Ever stirred her bosom's core.
90 lone,
"Bertrand, Bertrand, have I found thee ?
Though despairing, have I found thee?
Dost thou dwell in this far valley?
Do I kneel where thou abide?
'Tis thy sword ! to thee 'twas given
By my father now in heaven,
And, although our love be riven,
Thou hast cast it not aside !
'Tis thy sword ! and here I'll linger,
Though thy love hath long since died,
Till I ,hear thy step outside !
" 'Tis thy sword ! I'm not mistaken,
Nor I dream, and shall awaken :
See, ah see, thy name is graven
Here upon the fretted guard !
Ay ? 'tis thine, and soon returning
Thou wilt find a bright fire burning,
And I'll kneel, that not with spurning
Thou wilt hear me false, abhorr'd!
And I'll tell thee how Corambis
Hath confessed he slew that lord,
And is gone to his reward !
"Surely, surely thou wilt hear me,
Though I've wronged thee thou wilt hear me,
For I've searched the wide world over,
But to publish this to thee!
And Other Poems. 91
Much I've suffered, still abjuring
Every joy; all things enduring;
Through all seasons still assuring
My sick soul that thou'd hear me;
And thou wilt not spurn me, Bertrand,
Till I speak and set thee free
From that haunting infamy!"
Thus pale lone, lowly kneeling,
With the fire light o'er her stealing,
Touched with hope and stirred by passion,
Lays her fraughted bosom bare.
But her heart now shakes with terror,
With a fell and sudden terror:
All, she fears, may be an error
And her heart must needs despair;
Bertrand may be dead or distant,
And a stranger fallen heir
To his weapon hanging there.
Yet not long is she affrighted
By these doubts her fears excited,
For she finds upon the table
Bertrand' s ring that bears his seal.
Near it open to her glances
Lies a volume of romances
Prose and verse that time enhances,
92 lone,
And to sorrow most appeal :
Bertrand's name is on the margin
By the verse that cannot heal
His sad heart, yet may reveal.
"He will come again/' she whispers,-
To the volume lowly whispers;
" 'Tis his writing on thy margin,,
Next his voice and face most dear!
He will come again, and, kneeling,
Nothing in that hour concealing,
I will bring his spirit healing,
Though he loathe my presence here:
I will tell him of Corambis,
And he shall no longer fear
For his life or freedom dear.
"He will hate me, loathe, revile me,
And for evermore exile me,
Yet 'twere better, ah far better,
That he hate me than forget!
He will loathe my name forever,
Yea, forever and forever!
Or, perchance, the years will sever
Memory's bonds that bind him yet,
And in some brief fleeting seasons,
Though I wronged him, he'll forget
That we parted, or e'er met !"
And Other Poems. 93
Thus laments pale lone, believing
Bertrand's scorn is past retrieving,
Thus laments above the volume
That shall shed a different light
O'er that volume of romances,
At which she but merely glances,
Till through better fate it chances
That some verses meet her sight,
Verses where the book lies open,
And which Bertrand ere the night
Read with sad heart and contrite.
"Here he read the page is holy !"
She continues, rapt and lowly;
"Here his eyes have lately rested,
And I'll dare to read it o'er.
Since I charged him with the slaying
Of that lord, all love betraying!
And he fled, no hour staying
Wherein I had told him more,
I have nothing read, and haply
It may blunt my pain to pore
O'er these verses of 'Elnore.' "
94 lone,
ELNOKE.
Deep I loved with love all holy, ere the demon
Melancholy
O'er my soul had cast its shadow to be lifted
nevermore !
For I loved as loves a spirit, such as without grief
inherit
Aidenn or the regions near it, where no cloud ere
brooded o'er
Loved as spirits love in Aidenn, where no cloud
ere brooded o'er
Loved the radiant Elnore.
Ah, she walked in light from heaven, ere our an-
cient love was riven,
Ere my spirit rushed into eclipse upon a foreign
shore,
Eadiant as the star of morning that the angels
are adorning;
Star of love and sad forewarning that my spirit
doth adore,
Eadiant as the star of morning that my spirit
must adore,
With its memories of Elnore.
And Other Poems. 95
Then my days were all of gladness, and my nights
were without madness ;
Music followed close behind me and her image
went before:
Every rose that blew to heaven, when we met at
golden even,
Blew again in sweet dreams given, to a Presence
brooding o'er
Blew in blessed dreams of midnight to a Presence
brooding o'er
The bright Presence of Elnore.
But a change came o'er her brightness, and her
heart took on a lightness
Such as told her spirit wearied of the passionate
love I bore;
Such as whispered of another, dearer than a friend
or brother,
One whose lightest word could smother all my love
that went before
One whose lightest word was dearer than my love
that went before,
One beloved by lost Elnore.
And I cast away all gladness to believe it in my
madness,
And the roses withered in my dreams to blossom
nevermore :
96 lone,
All the light went out of heaven, when our an-
cient love was riven,
Save the bolts of fitful levin naming o'er the
troubled shore
Save the red and maddened levin naming o'er
the troubled shore,
And the form of lost Elnore.
Spurning love and love's last prophet, far I fled
into a Tophet
Where the shadow of the cypress hung fantas-
tically o'er:
Spurning her that love had painted as beyond all
women sainted,
With the demon Hate acquainted, soon I fled my
native shore
With a demon in my bosom soon I fled my native
shore,
And the love of lost Elnore.
Under some fantastic heaven whence the wraith
of hope was driven,
Long I searched for Lethe dim to feel that death
is not its shore.
There one crescent moon of sorrow awakes mor-
row unto morrow,
And the pools a silence borrow from that planet
hanging o'er
And Other Poems. 97
Silence deep as death they borrow from that
planet hanging o'er,
Pale and wan as lost Elnore.
By a dim titanic alley, leading to an ultimate
valley,
Whence the Dead alone return return to haunt
whom they adore,
By dim sheeted figures haunted, such as might
have madness daunted,
Long I dwelt as one enchanted by that planet
hanging o'er,
By that changeless, silent, wan and ghastly planet
hanging o'er,
With its dreams of lost Elnore.
Dwelt until a spirit lonely whispered that my star
was only
As a planet in eclipse, to dawn upon a fairer
shore, .
Dwelt until with sweet insistence, haunting me
without resistance,
From the ultimate dim distance flowed the voice
that I adore,
Flowed the sweet, the sorrowful, the tender voice
that I adore
The spirit voice of lost Elnore 1 .
98 lone,
Sweeter than a voice from Aidenn was her sing-
ing, sorrow laden,
And I cast my heart beneath the spirit feet that
pasi me o'er!
Fearful was my soul and shaken that her love I
had mistaken
That in scorn I had forsaken One that angels
might adore,
One that angels, happier for an earthly love,
might well adore,
And that One the lost Elnore.
Yet I gave the night no token that my spirit had
been broken,
Though all Tophet had no tongue to tell the
agony I bore;
ISTeither lingered I till breaking of that moon that
fiends were waking,
But, the instant way betaking, came unto my
native shore,
Like a spirit from enchantment came unto my
native shore,
And the feet of lost Elnore.
As the angels change in Aidenn, she had changed
with sorrow laden ;
Yea, she had become a spirit for whom death could
do no more :
And Other Poems. 99
All of earth that clung around her were the roses
pale that bound her,
And the roses' scent that wound her in a fragrance
evermore
In a fragrance that shall cling around the mem-
ory evermore
Of the meek and lost Elnore.
She was sleeping by a fountain where the red
earth meets the mountain,
And the moonlight lay upon her eyes, and on the
wreath she wore:
She was sleeping was she dreaming? dreaming
of the fountain gleaming?
Dreaming of the moonlight streaming? dreaming
One was bending o'er,
One who loved her dearer than the dead are loved
was bending o'er
Bending o'er his lost Elnore?
She was sleeping was she sleeping? all my
pulses in me leaping,
Down beside her form I knelt, and from her heart
the flowers tore:
Surely I was not mistaken,, surely she would soon
awaken !
She had swooned with sorrow shaken, but the
night was passing o'er,
ioo lone,
All the bitter, bitter night of sorrow then was
passing o'er,
Giving back my lost Elnore.
So I kissed those eyes that borrow a fixed light
from fleeting sorrow,
Softly breathing Night was far behind and Morn-
ing just before;
And my heart drank deep of madness from the
spirit's cup of gladness,
While my pulse o'erran the sadness that its ruddy
current bore
While each pulse o'erran the sadness that its ruddy
current bore,
As it set to lost Elnore.
Then a darkness fell around me, and a coil of
horror boimd me,
And a growing light went out of heaven to re-
turn no more!
For God she did not waken ! All the angels
had forsaken
Me, the madman, and had taken that bright spirit
I adore;
Heaven, with my coming, stooped and took that
spirit I adore
Took the meek and lost Elnore.
And Other Poems. 101
Ah, the coldness of her ashes, whence no light of
spirit flashes!
Ah ? the silence of her allies that shall stir
nevermore !
Ah, the paleness of the roses that her sopulcher
incloses !
Ah, the tears upon the roses springing from her
marble door,
Springing from her vaulted sepulcher, and from
its marble door,
And the dust of lost Elnore !
Like the lightning sudden flashing,
Startling, daunting, and abashing,
Are these verses unto lone
Laying bare her lover's heart.
And unto her bosom pressing
That sweet volume and redressing,
Much divining, still more guessing,
She looks up with pallid start ;
And her lips with passion tremble,
And a moment lose all art
To cry out or aught impart.
"Can it be God in heaven!
That the wrong is all forgiven,
And this verse is as a message,
Though not sent me, yet received?
IO2 lone,
Is his pardon in these verses,
And my sin no more accurses?
May I hope this book disperses
All the shadow that so grieved,
And that he was drawing nearer
In the dark, while I believed
He had left me, tmreprieved ?
"Was I blind, or is it blindness
To believe in so great kindness
To belierve in perfect pardon
By that heart that should reprove?
That the old love which abounded
Has been blessedly refounded,
And the evil all redounded
To my pity and my love;
All the wrong and scorn inverted
Till my sins perhaps now move
More than once my guiltless love?
"Ah, no, no; it were but madness
To look forward to such gladness,
For he surely will not pardon
One that struck so harsh a blow !
Or perhaps he hath forgiven
Since he deems my soul in heaven,
For the dead are soon forgiven
And Other Poems. 103
But the living hardly so,
And he will retract that pardon
When in time he comes to know
That I have not been laid low !"
Thus sweet lone 'twixt joy and sorrow
Trembles, while her features borrow
Now the grayness of the ashes,
Now the scarlet of the flame.
But again she reads the verses
And their mystery rehearses,
While their tenderness immerses
Her bowed face in tears of shame
And the verses seem to lone
Her forgiveness, though the same
Bear another maiden's name.
"Ye reflect his present feeling
More than spoken words revealing,"
Now she whispers to the verses,
And her heart with faith leaps high.
"But ah wherefore still delays he?
In the darkness whereat strays he?
Does he wait the moon, or stays he
Till the bitter wind shall die?
Has he gone toward the ocean,
Or toward the hills that lie
Northward, with their weight of sky?
104 lone,
"Yet, Bertram!," she continues,
"Though it crack my heart's tense sinews,
I'll have patience till thy coming,
Be it one hour hence or four."
But wild fears arise to grieve her,
Deepened by her pulses' fever,
And in some brief moments leave her
Eestless as she was before:
Horrid fears that shake her bosom
And that drive her to the door
Where the cold wind chills her o'er.
In the snow are footsteps leading
From the threshold, but proceeding
Where she knows not, though she guesses
On toward the beating tide.
Seeing which her heart is shaken
With the dread that she's forsaken
Bertrand may perhaps have taken
Farewell of that warren wide,
With the day his farewell taken
And gone elsewhere to abide,
Lost to her without a guide !
Or a cruel death may threat him,
And with fearful odds beset him
On the snow he may lie helpless
By the bitter cold subdued !
And Other Poems. 105
Yea, while she was lowly kneeling
By the firelight warm and healing,
Death's deep sleep may have been stealing
O'er his eyes with mists bedewed,
And his spirit may have yielded
To Death's angel that pursued
Him down that white solitude!
Yet, in following some distance,
She may be of true assistance,
And she dares to seek her lover
For her heart is filled with doubt.
Though the evening has grown colder
She is warmer now and bolder,
And she throws across her shoulder
Bertrand's cloak and ventures out;
Out into the snow she ventures
On her mission most devout
And the night wraps her about.
Frozen waters lie before her
And a frozen sky is o'er her,
In the east the moon is leaning
Hard against the frozen hills.
All seems frozen save the ocean
With its never-ceasing motion ;
All ! and now a cold prenotion
io6 lone,
Seizes lone's heart and chills,
Chills its deep and warm pulsations
Like an icy hand that stills
What it touches, and then kills!
Strange forebodings of a danger
Unto which she seems no stranger,
For she feels that she has suffered
All its threatened pains before!
Where, she knows not, yet she guesses
Searching memory's recesses
In some dream, and fear oppresses
Her cold bosom more and more;
More and more her heart is troubled
As she hears the increasing roar
Of the surf upon the shore.
She hath trod in dreams that warren,
Dim, forsaken, cold and barren,
She hath heard in dreams the beating
Of yon surf upon the strand!
She hath felt this night around her,
Felt in dreams the winds that wound her,-
Heard those cries that now confound her
Coming o'er the waste of land!
And God hath she not witnessed
Him that struggles in quicksand,
With one vain, uplifted hand !
And Other Poems. 107
Like to one whose heart is daunted
In a dream by horror haunted,
And can neither cry nor struggle,
loner's rooted to the ground.
There before her some few paces
Whence no foot its path retraces
In the quicksand's fell embraces,
Is her Lover lost, though found!
And his eyes are turned toward her,
And there comes a bubbling sound
From his lips by waters bound.
For some hideous moments seeming
As an age pale lone stands dreaming,
Then she shrieks the name of "Bertrand !"
"Bertrand, Bertrand, speak to me!"
But no answer from her Lover,
For the rising waters hover
At his bubbling lips, and cover
All his mouth as she may see;
But as yet his lifted forehead,
And his eyes and nose are free
Of the quicksands and the sea.
In the presence of this vision,
Helpless in her indecision,
lone reels some fearful moments-
Now leaps forward with wild cry;
lone,
Now leaps forward, vainly thinking
She can save her Love from sinking,
But she feels the quicksands linking
Her own feet, and she will die,
Die a death too quick and fearful
Should she further madly try
To free him imprisoned by.
So she pauses and looks 'round her,
But the level snows confound her
Nowhere is there bough or cordage,
She may cast to Bertrand's hand;
And she cannot bring assistance
From the cot far in the distance
There is naught to make resistance
'Gainst the treacherous quicksand:
She must watch the salty waters
Rise along the fatal strand,
With no power to command.
Yea, upon the loose sands kneeling,
With white face to God appealing,
She must watch the consummation
Hidden by no kindly cloud!
Watch the waters unretreating
'Gainst her Lover's lips still beating,
'Gainst those lips shut from repeating
And Other Poems. 109
Prayers beneath their wat'ry shroud !
Watch the tide as it comes creeping
To his forehead, once so proud,
Now to dark oblivion bowed!
No! her love than fear is stronger,
And she hesitates no longer
Starting up she flings her body
O'er the deadly stretch of strand,
And a moment more is bending
O'er her Love with death contending,
While her woman's arms are lending
All the strength at their command!
Strength that drags her Lover upwards
Some few inches in the sand,
And sets free his lips and hand.
"Bertrand, Bertrand, let me save thee,
Since I wronged thee let me save thee;
Drag me down and tread upon me,
And escape unto the shore!
Look, the tide is rising o'er thee,
But the shore is just before thee
Drag me down, oh I implore thee,
And escape ere all is o'er!
I have wronged thee past all pardon,
Shamed that honored name ye bore,
And am fit to love no more J"
i ro lone,
"lone !" Bertrand cries in horror
In his face not hate but sorrow,
"0, my God, thou canst not save me,
And thyself must perish too!
Quick ! I'll cast thee to the ocean,
And perhaps the sea in motion
Will sustain thee, and that motion
Bear thee from this awful slew:
Thou art to thy knees in quicksand
Yet I have the strength of two
And will save thee. Thou wast true !"
But he cannot, though he borrow
Strength from every pulse of horror,
For pale lone clings about him,
And his labors are in vain:
Vain, too, is the passionate pleading
Of his heart with sorrow bleeding,
Vain, quite vain, for still, unheeding,
lone chooses to remain ;
Neither prayers nor force can move her
To forsake her Love in pain,
And the living shore regain.
"Cease, cease thy vain endeavor,
For Fll never leave thee never!
Here lies death, but there lies madness,
And I rather choose to die.
And Other Poems. in
Let me be: since thou must perish,
Here I also choose to perish;
Thou art all I love and cherish,
And I care not Death is by.
No, no, no, thou shalt not free me !
If thou dost I'll come and lie
Here when thou canst not defy."
" 'Tis too late for prayer or endeavor ;
Too, too late: thou'rt lost forever!"
Bertrand moans in fearful answer
Straining lone to his face.
"0, my God, I have no power
To defend thee in this hour ;
I am down and now must cower
Till Death strike me from my place!
Ah, I feel like some false coward,
Or a low born slave and base,
And would hide me from disgrace!"
"Hush!" pale lone answers lowly,
"I am now encompassed wholly
And 'tis no dishonor to thee
That thou canst not set me free.
0, but say that I'm forgiven,
And thou hast done more than striven,
Thou hast answered a prayer for heaven,
112 lone,
And what more can chivalry?
Say I'm pardoned though 'tis selfish
That I ask so much of thee
In this hour of agony."
"Ah, sweet lone, if 'twere given
I should be accurst of heaven,
For 'tis I that needs be pardoned,
Pardoned both by God and thee.
I have wronged thee, for that vision
Which so changed the law's decision
Was a strange, prophetic vision
On thy part of times to be;
'Twas no falsehood as I deemed it,
But indeed ye spoke of me
As one speaks in prophecy.
"On yon warren I was halted
By a robber and assaulted;
So I slew him there receiving
Wounds thou hadst described before!
All my face was pale and bloody,
And my clothing cut and muddy,
Even as thou saw in study
On Hispania's far-off shore;
And God I knew thee guiltless
When I saw the form I bore
In a pool I bended o'er !"
And Other Poems. 113
"Bertrand, Bertrand, then thou knowest,
And I'm lifted from the lowest !"
lone cries, and, softly weeping,
Touches Bertrand on the brow.
"Then thou knowest 'twas not all treason
Which I spoke in that sad season !
Yet I wronged thee, but my reason
Was subdued by frenzied woe;
0, I swore it was no vision,
Yet 'twas sorrow and a foe
That made me to stoop so low !"
"Hush!'' her lover whispers lowly,
"I will trust thee, trust thee wholly;
Through my doubt ings of thy honor
I have suffered, not through thee.
Had I trusted thee erewhile
I had never fled my trial,
Nor become a weak exile,
Nor had perished by this sea.
I am weighed and am found wanting
In the truth of constancy,
And the Lord hath punished me !"
lone bends her lips to answer,
Words of humbleness to answer,
But the waters dash against them
And forever they are sealed.
H4 lone,
Now her eyes with startled motion
Turn toward the beating ocean,
And her hands as in devotion
Are uplifted and revealed :
Now she lays her face to Bertrand's,
And her pallor is concealed
In his face all cold and steeled.
Night, and no sound ! save the beating
Of the sea its dirge repeating,
Save the voice of winds that wander
Down the lonely, barren strand:
Night, and no stars ! save one gleaming-
Like a frozen taper gleaming
O'er the waste that now lies dreaming
Dreams that none may understand:
Night! and these are joined forever
In the quietness of the sand,
Face 'gainst face, and hand in hand !
And Other Poems. 115
ROSABELL.
PART I.
O dales of Arcady, adieu !
I've looked upon a fairer land:
An air comes to me from its strand,
An echo from its mountains blue.
May brings her roses here and dreams;
June comes upon the laden air,
Unclasps the jewels in her hair
And revels by the limpid streams.
The undulating meads of gold
Are newly washed in freshest dew,
And milder winds than ever blew
In Tempe warm the leafy mold.
u6 lone,
Far off the deep-starred western sea,
Dyed by unnumbered sunsets bright,
Sends back a silver shaft of light
To Phoebe o'er the greenwood tree.
The gates of morning in the east
Are founded by a crystal lake,
Wherein a second morn doth break,
And light and beauty are increast.
The gates of evening sweep the sea
And open outward on the deep:
Here Day goes forth and balmy Sleep
Comes in with spirit company.
Sweet land, thy light is on my page;
Thy name is like a woman's name
Beloved! And he that dare defame
A wrestling spirit shall engage.
But 'tis of Rosabell I sing,
Chiefly of her, bright land and free ;
So breathe her name again to me,
And I will touch a sweeter string.
Of Eosabell and Theodore!
Ah, Muse, forget not his dear name,
And with the gold of summer frame
Phis constant pair forevermore.
And Other Poems. 117
Ere yonder budded tulip sprung,
Where sucks the summer-nourished bee
A bark lay dancing on the sea,
The blue and sunny waves among.
The gentle winds that kist its side
And bore it to yon silver strand
Brought Summer also in the land,
And clothed the valleys as a bride.
At twilight from this white-winged bark
A little maiden stepped ashore
And danced along the pebbled floor
Of ocean, with eyes all dewy dark.
Then upward passed from those moist sands,
Her soft eyes closed in balmy rest,
The sweetest dreamer at the breast
Of Sleep, long waiting with stretched hands.
Where is the mother there is home.
And quietly through the night she slept,
Nor opened her dewy eyes, nor wept
That she had crossed the ocean's foam,
And breathed no more her native air;
Nor smelt the fragrant heliotrope
That used to climb her casement ope
And turn to her its petals fair.
n8 lone,
Then morning came with rosy hand
And waked her to the Southern change,
And all was novel, all was strange :
Ah, so unlike her native land !
But shade hy shade it passed away
The wonder and the novelty,
And dancing by the sunny sea
Or with her gentle mates at play,
Her distant home became a dream
And was forgotten with the year,
Forgotten with the childhood tear
That fell at parting in extreme
Of tender sorrow. So the rose,
Transplanted to a warmer bed,
Wooes but the zephyrs overhead,
Nor of its native bower knows.
Then gentle Spring led Summer on,
And each led Beauty by the hand,
And there was fragrance in the land
From thyme and lind and new-mown lawn.
Then golden Autumn flushed the west,
And faded like the setting sun;
But Winter scarcely had begun
Ere Spring returned with flowered vest.
And Other Poems. 1 1
Twice seven times the golden spring
Rekindled then the firmament,
Twice seven Summers came and went,
Such as the skies of Cashmere bring:
And Rosabell walked through the vale
And gathered flowers for her hair,
And knew that she was very fair
With scarlet lips and forehead pale.
And gracious pride was in her heart;
A lovely thing seen through the sphere
And depth of woman's eyes, when clear
And large, and lustrous to impart.
And love she knew, and wreathed her hair,
By bright reflection in the brook,
With starry buds and bells that shook
Their dews upon her shoulders fair.
A lover's footprint in the vale,
A lover's footprint on the hill !
Ah, was it not enough to fill
Her life with romance, and prevail
While Summer still was in the bloom
Against her heart, though fortified
By virgin modesty and pride,
And every foreign thought entomb !
120 lone,
From Love s bright casement she had ta'en
Her first sweet glimpses of the world,
While 'round her lustrous forehead curled
The passion flower, unprofane.
And dear those glimpses to her heart,
And trebly dear young Theodore,
Who made her then and evermore
The Eros of his life and art.
"Ah, it is kindness to be fair,
'Tis kindness passing dear," she said,
As o'er the running stream was spread
The beauty of her loosened hair.
Dark hair, dark-clustering and fine,
The hair of Miranda in her youth,
Half veiling eyes of liquid truth
Dark, deep, and sacred to the Nine.
"But to be loved is more than kind,
Is more than beauty !" Here she looks
To heaven, glancing from the brooks,
And heaven seems of equal mind.
"Why tarriest thou, my Theodore?
O what excuse mak'st thou thy heart?
And dost thou play the laggard's part
Who split the moments heretofore
And Other Poems. 121
"And vowed each half eternity
When thou wast absent from my side?
The laggard's part! woe betide,
'Twere better that thou ill shouldst be !
"0 sweet to nurse a lover ill,
But death to nurse a sickened faith!
Ah, better to look on thy wraith
Than on thy love, dead, cold, and still !
"The roses dream at twilight' s gate
pluck them, Love, and come to me:
The sun broods o'er the sunset sea
share its beauty ere too late.
"Blue hills have kissed the bluer sky
And bid 'Good night!' The silver bow,
New bent in heaven, 'gins to glow,
And, Love, the hour of rest draws nigh.
"The mocking-bird is in the thorn
Ah, let him mock thy sweet 'Good night !'
Until the morning's golden light,
Then all day long mock thy 'Good morn !' "
She paused, and footsteps filled the space,
The footsteps of young Theodore.
"Sweet Love/' he smiled, "they should adore
Who cometh late with warmer grace."
122 lone,
"Ay me!" she said, with eyes withdrawn
And fixed upon the senseless ground,
"Time lost in love is never found;
'Tis lost 'tis lost, 'tis mourned; quite gone!
"Hast thou another love than me
That thou didst linger in the vale?
Or was it hut the nightingale
That held thee spellbound o'er the leaP
"Xay, Love, no other love is mine,
Or if another love there be
I love that other love for thee,
Which is Olympus' sacred Nine.
"As winds a brook through garden ways
Reflecting heaven's image fair,
Thou knowest that this love I bear
r A linked light winds through my lays."
"Thou lovest numbers more than me,"
Fond Rosabell made low reply:
" 'Twere better that thy Muse should die
Than steal thy love away from thee.
"Bright summer and the fragrant spring,
The morning and the evening star,
Thou lovest not for what they are
But that of them thou mayest sing.
And Other Poems. 123
"And losing me thou wouldst not faint
That thou hadst lost a living love,
But something worshipped far above
A subject for thy Muse to paint !"
"Honor the verse which honors thee,"
Thus Theodore with tender mien,
"And where thou glean'st delight glean
Forbearance for some frailty."
"Alas!" fond Kosabell replied,
As heaved her breast with stifled moan,
"How shall thy honeyed lines atone
For bitter absence from my side ?
"Than linked verse or stately prose
Thy voice more pleasant is and bland,
And one sweet primrose from thy hand
Were more than Fancy's scentless rose.
"Then cease to sound Parnassus' spring
And sound a loving woman's heart !
The lover's not the poet's part
Be thine, ere all's past altering."
"0, Love/' thus Theodore in pain,
"What though I tarry from thy side
And make the wind or beating tide
An hollow ear to mark my strain?
124 lone,
"Thou art my song and what inspires,
Thou art the music of my lines ;
And thou the Heart my verse enshrines,
The spring of all my best desires.
"Thou art the white light of my soul,
The pole-star of my spirit's bark !
Ah, Eosabell, thou dost not mark,
Nor judge me fair, nor judge me whole !"
And so these gentle lovers met,
And, meeting, quarreled without cause,
And drew apart, and there was pause,
A pause, it seemed, without regret.
But lovers' quarrels beneath the moon
Are neither madness nor are sin ;
They're something, nothing; all akin
To idle dreams when no hearts swoon.
So music fled back to their lips,
And love and gladness shared their speech,
And either softly did beseech
Forgiveness for his love's eclipse.
And it was twilight ! O'er the sea
The march of golden stars began,
And gentle winds arose to fan
The new-blown musk by vale and lea.
And Other Poems. 125
'Twas twilight, and bright Phoebe moved
Toward her throne with gentle pace :
The deep looked in her lustrous face
And kindled like a thing that loved !
'Twas twilight, and the distance seemed
To empty into visions wide
Of mystic mountains swilled by the tide,
Such as in childhood we have dreamed.
0, Nature, from my halting hand
Take thou the pencil, for I feel
My inability to reveal
The beauty of this twilight land.
Take thou the pencil and paint on!
But chiefly paint this loving pair,
In colors that thou only dare
To mix and mingle, and anon
Thy poet shall resume his part,
And follow thee as one who knew,
And, knowing, wrought e'en to the dew
Dim hidden in the rose's heart.
Paint thou. the parting low and sweet
Of Eosabell and Theodore ;
Paint thou bright Phoebe bending o'er,
And waters shining at their feet.
126 lone,
Great Artist, paint thy tender face
Soft listening to their sweet "Good night !"
And mingle with thy warmth the light
Both thine to radiate and trace.
Paint thou these lovers gone to rest,
And close the first part of my dream ;
One touch by thee will half redeem
The verse, and give it interest.
PART II.
Wake not the dreaming Hours, Morn,
Upon their heads is Sorrow's crown,
While wreathed about their foreheads' frown
The wormwood twines the nettle thorn !
Withhold thy flame, ye golden sun;
Thou light' st but Sorrow to her thorns,
For Hope's sweet wreath no more adorns
Fair Rosabell, the lovely One!
At midnight, by the silver sea,
Where poets love to walk and dream,
Young Theodore, in love's extreme,
Addressed bright Phoebe, ardently.
And Other Poems. 127
Bright Phoebe, Queen of love and night,
That was with Beauty from the first !
And all his spirit was athirst
And hungered, e'en in love's despite.
Hungered for that which many name
But only Spirits comprehend,
So far its fineness doth transcend
Man, to his sorrow and his shame.
They call it "Ideality,"
Who call it wisely, "Ideal love !"
Which lifts the spirit far above
The passions of humanity.
At midnight, by the silver sea,
Young Theodore, communing, walked,
When from the deeper shadows stalked
Three strangers, speaking sullenly.
With straining thongs they bound his hands,
With bitter goad they prest him on,
And ere the breaking of the dawn
Bore him away for foreign lands.
In Cyprus he remained a slave!
They counted o'er their gains as gain
These evil Three, nor felt they pain,
And crost again the ocean's wave.
128 lone,
Weep, weep, ye starry buds and bells,
Turn all your silver dew to tears;
And pour from out your hollow spheres
The light of dawn, ye asphodels !
And, awake, ye mocking-bird,
Awake, awake, for Sorrow wakes !
And mourn with Kosabell, who aches
With horrid fear, and dreads each word
As tidings of a stricken Love,
Since, living, he would not delay
Upon his promised bridal day,
But hasten swift as homing dove.
"He cometh not I" she softly said :
"He cometh not !" her maidens sighed.
"He is delayed ; let us not chide I"
"Absent, but coming : lift thy head I"
But Night and not the Bridegroom comes,
And Sorrow leads the Bride apart :
Alone, and with a broken heart,
Almost her gentle life succumbs.
But hope dies not within a night,
And when the golden morning broke
She smiled, as though her lover spoke,
And passed into the growing light.
And Other Poems. 129
She looked upon the albatross,
The albatross looked on the sail
That bore young Theodore, all pale,
Down love's horizon and across.
'Mid hyacinth and geraniums
She walked, and wreathed her tresses dear :
"It would delight him were he here,
It will delight him when he comes,"
She said, and kist the flowers hard
That fell about her shoulders fair :
And afterwards she spread her hair
Above the brook with sunlight barred.
Her image from the waters smiled,
And softly she began to sing
A roundelay of love and spring,
And thus the morning hours beguiled.
Then twilight came, and o'er her face
A shadow not of evening fell ;
A shadow morn would not dispel,
Nor noon-day soften, nor spring efface.
"0 God, how near is life to death !"
She moaned "For I must think him dead ;
The glory from his eyes quite fled,
And from his lips the loving breath.
130 lone,
"A step in darkness and he sank
Into the river's risen tide ;
Xo hand to aid, no light to guide,
It bore him swiftly from the bank !
"The seaweed clings about his breast
In cold embraces, while my arms
Are empty. Given to rude storms,
I may not mourn above his rest.
"Nor look again upon his face,
Nor touch his gentle brow though dead
Nor teach the cypress how to spread
Its shade above his resting place.
"I have nowhere to greet him dead
Love is denied me and love's grave !
The Hand hath taken that once gave,
And taken all with life's shorn thread!
"0 God, I knew that I must bear
And I am willing to submit,
But ah, not this! I am unfit
And cannot live through such despair.
"Give me to blindness and disgrace
But let me touch his hand again ;
Bring me into the viper's den
But let me look upon his face.
And Other Poems. 131
"Uncrown me of all human trust
But give him quick into my arms ;
Let Death awake his rude alarms
But give his spirit back or dust.
"Ah, any anything but this ;
All evil that is felt or feared
Be mine to bear, uneased, uncheered,
But give back the face I miss!"
She ceased, and loving friends drew near
Who sought to comfort and sustain,
But idle was their love and vain,
Nor wiped away one cadent tear.
Hope had no healing for her heart
And sweet religion had no balm,
Yet meek she was and strangely calm,
But sought to be alone, apart.
The second evening came and went
But without tidings of her Love,
Though twenty searched the hills above
And twenty to the vales were sent.
Day followed day, but brought no hope,
Night followed 'night without surcease,
And Kosabell pra}^ed for release,
And darkling for Death's hand did grope.
132 lone,
She peered into the crystal stream
To mark her beauty, ah, no more !
She searched for her dead Theodore,
With upturned face as in a dream!
She hastened to the summer vale
To gather flowers, ah, no more!
She searched for her dead Theodore,
With glazed eye and forehead pale !
One handful of his dust in vain
She craved, to plant the rose above,
Who late asked Heaven for her Love,
Warm, living, without hurt or stain.
But growing humble with the year
She asked but knowledge of his grave
Whether 'twas on the land or wave,
Though she might never draw more near.
Neither her Love nor yet his dust
She asked of Heaven, but to know
Where her Love's body was laid low,
And Heaven's silence seemed unjust.
Then from the heavens passed a light
As from a casement some loved face,
And Winter shut the skies a space
Shut as a casement for a night.
And Other Poems. 133
Then Spring once more with glowing hand
Baptized the rose in dew and flame,
And to that sweet baptism came
Hope, with the almond in her hand.
She took the aloe from Love's brow
And set a crown of roses there,
And in Love's gentle hand, all bare,
She placed her budded almond bough.
"It cannot be that he is dead/'
Thus Rosabell amid the field,
"Or else my searching had revealed
Where death prepared my true Love's bed.
"It cannot be that he is dead,
Or else his spirit would return
From where the newly dead sojourn,
And hover o'er the bridal bed.
"Immortal Spring her roses gave
For him to paint, not for his bier,
And Summer stoopt but to endear
His sunny verse, not deck his grave.
"He was an instrument apart,
For Beauty's touch and Beauty's hand
Kept sacred; and death could not command
Nor crack the lute strings of his heart.
134 Ion >
"'The stately lilies spring and glow
Like tapers on the twilight lea,
Tall tapers lighting Faith to me,
Within her hand the hawthorn bough.
"Hope, like the winter bird, returns,
That buildeth at. my open door,
And all the day doth sing and soar,
Nor ceases till bright sunset burns.
"Xo, no, I cannot think him dead
Though weakness trusts 'tis madness doubts;
And ere in sweet and purple routs
The violets come, his gentle tread
"Shall press the lawn beside my door,
His eager hand be on the latch,
And from that moment I shall snatch
A light to guide me evermore !"
"He comes !" she whispers to the rose ;
The rose looks upward in her face
Thanking bright June with tender grace
Is bending o'er, and warmer glows.
"He comes, ye stream ; comes as of old :
Prepare to see his face again:
Leave thou the lowlands and the fen
And make thy bed on sands of gold!
And Other Poems. 135
"He comes, ye stars of summer night !
Kiss ye dark places with the new&
And make them glow. He comes, ye dews;
His path is o'er ye as the light !
"Ye hills that see my Love afar,
Whisper his coming to the vale
In twilight waits the nightingale
And trembles like a quiring star
"To hymn his return. And thou sweet lark
That drink'st the dew at heaven's gate,
Unto two worlds with song elate
Publish the coming of his bark !"
Informed by hope as some sweet wine
Fair Rosabell gave way to joy
That knew nor surcease nor alloy,
But deeper grew and more divine.
The current of her thoughts had turned
And into brighter channels passed ;
No more her spirit was o'ercast
But glowed with every light that burned,
So turns aside a stream that flows
Through channels of a darkened fen,
And glides o'er fields Elysian
With light upon it from the rose.
136 lone,
Once more she wreathed her loosened hair
With flowers of the middle Spring,
And taught sweet Echo how to sing
And wake soft laughter in the air.
Once more above the running stream
Her beauty flushed with gentle pride?
She hung enamoured, as if she spied
Reflected there her dearest dream.
But, ah, no visionary light
Transfixed her. but her own face,
Her own sweet eyes and forehead's grace,
And sloping shoulders smooth and white.
And why she gazed thus earnestly
Was partly that her face was dear
To Theodore, and partly fear
That grief had wrought deformity.
And partly that the human face,
Divine, is dearer to the heart
That hath known sorrow ; and in part
'Twas naught but play and maiden grace.
Thus Spring returned and with her Hope,
And Summer met them in the dell,
And bid the gentle Spring farewell
But parted not with gracious Hope.
And Other Poems. 137
And flowers sprung at Summer's feet
And little children played in the beam,
And all the land became a dream
Of color and of childhood sweet.
So leave the gentle "Rosabell,
With childhood laughter in her ear,
Bright waters at her feet and clear,
And in her hand the asphodel.
A hark is dnnoing on the sea
And leads through golden floods her Love,
Her Theodore; while far above
T!r.> lark pours forth its melody!
138 lone.
FLORENCE,
PAET I.
I.
By the Tiber dwelt a maiden, nobly born
Ah, fair she was as a rose by Fancy's spring !
Dwelt in a garden where the golden morn
Winged music from the palace of the king;
Sweet prelude to the huntsman's silver horn
Shaking the drowsy dew from falcon's wing;
Sweet prelude that the Prince aloft did wake,
Touching the morning harp for Music's blessed
sake.
II.
She wore the purple in her lovely eyes,
Twin stars of vesper 'neath her morning hair,
And ruled with song, with laughter, and with
sighs
A little kingdom wonderfully fair,
And Other Poems. 139
A pleasant garden seat 'neath perfect skies,
High walled about and open to the air,
Where sweet birds sang and fragrant flowers grew,
And love came early, and sorrows not at all, or few.
III.
Florence, they named her in this garden seat,
And sweeter to the mother faint and wan
Than "roses" spelt in roses at her feet
That name became; but ere the summer's dawn
The mother faded with the drowsy heat
Of Phoebus brooding o'er the sloping lawn,
And left sweet Florence to the loving care
Of hands that smoothed back that dying mother's
hair.
IV.
Twilight in heaven, morn within her hair,
Morning in heaven, dusk within her eye,
Sweet Florence grew ah, dear above compare !
And moved amid the flowers of splendid dye
Bright as a Naiad of the fountain there,
Or looked at morning from her lattice high
Like a high-born maiden looking o'er the sea
From casement set in the gold of olden poesy.
140 lone,
V.
Within the garden, like a spirit bright,
A fountain clomb to heaven with its dew,
Ever to fall to earth inweaved with light
And star the flowers that around it grew.
In twilight's front the Bird of love and night
Thrilled the dim foliage of the avenue;
And here the morning lark rose up elate,
And found the earthly love it sung at heaven's
gate !
VI.
Twilight in heaven, morn within her heart,
Sweet Florence prest the dewy leaves among:
A tender kinship was her utmost art
Who trained the flowers as on threads of song
To climb above the fountain and impart
A fragrance such as hanging walls prolong,
A fragrance and a light that led the Prince
Unto that garden the dews of song have watered
since.
VII.
Back from the chase at break of golden ere
The Prince with revelry and consort came:
A favorite falcon clung unto his sleeve,
Veiling its drowsy eye 'gainst sunset flame;
And Other Poems. 141
Before him went two heralds to receive
With gates wide thrown and sovereign acclaim
The Nobles coming from the morning chase,
And Heir to Italy's throne and Heaven's tender
grace.
VIII.
Past tower, moat, and grange the Prince rode on:
Afar the bright imperial palace shone
Like adamant hewn from the golden sun
Throned on a starry eminence, alone !
But soon, upon the upland's verdant lawn,
The Prince and consort came unto the stone,
The sculptured stone and column of the gate
That led unto the gardens where sweet Florence
sate.
IX.
She sate within the dusk of hanging walls
Singing a ditty of delicious glee:
Melodious as the blind Philomel calls
Unto the Rose he nevermore shall see,
It came o'er the Prince's ear, whose marble halls
Flushed never with such dulcet harmony;
And hushed was the revel of his train,
So sweet the roundelay, so tender the refrain.
142 I6ne,
X.
The lark hath not one feather tipped with gold,
Philomel, midst the dew,, no silver wing;
The lyre-bird doth the April bow enfold,
Yet in despite its beauty cannot sing
But the painting of a song which we behold
Limned on the bloomy spray of azure Spring :
Only in maidens doth the kinship dwell
Both wondrous beauty and the voice of Philo-
mel.
XL
So thought the list'ning Prince, and deemed her
fair
Who sate in twilight and sung up the dusk,
The dewy dusk, when on the blinded air,
As fleeting as the trodden violet's musk,
All splendid dyes dissolve which flowers wear,
Leaving bright buds as dull as winter's husk;
But woman's beauty, glowing through the night,
Fades not at shut of eve when fade the flowers of
light.
XII.
Within the dusk of hanging walls she sate
Singing a ditty of delicious glee,
But soon the silver moon at twilight's gate
Shot lustre through its cloudy canopy
And Other Poems. 143
As though a star should suddenly dilate
Into bright Phoebe o'er a silver sea,
Sweet Florence glowed upon the Prince's soul,
And Love, like Aidefm's rose, sprung into perfect
whole !
XIII.
The silver moon looked in her happy eyes
Back to her lustrous hair a glory came
Like morn of Italy when perfect skies
With amber burn, and rose and golden flame;
Imbued with rose-bloom and hyacinthine dyes
The virgin snows returned to her fair frame:
The silver moon looked in her happy eyes
Kindling her face and breast with light from Par-
adise.
XIV.
"She is a spirit, and the night is charmed;
Look not upon this Dian, or ye die I"
"She is a spirit, yet be not alarmed
Whom Dian slays hath life by her fair eye!' 7
But 'gainst their argument the Prince was armed
And answered on the burthen of a sigh:
"Ah, she is human with her length of hair!
Ah, she is human with her virgin bosom bare !"
144 lone,
XV.
"She is a spirit and a woman too-
A nymph to sing, a maiden fond to glow !
But haste, sweet Prince, and bid the night adieu
From off thy starry battlements, for lo !
The sun is brighter on Atlanta blue
Than on yon Mediterranean's lulled flow:
And look, my gentle Prince, the silver moon
Hath veiled its glimpses sweet in dim and cloudy
swoon."
XVI.
"Thou counsel'st well, my Lord; lead on to rest:
'Twere rude to linger here with laggard feet."
And, turning from the gate, the Prince addrest
Himself and consort to the castle seat.
Sweet Florence lingered like a parting guest
In the dim twilight of her hushed retreat,
Then smiled a virgin at her garden gate
But blushed a Princess in the secret glass of Fate !
XVII.
"Love, like the rose, may blossom by the throne
And princes wear it on coronation day:
Love, like the rose, by cottage gates hatli blonrn.
And like the fragrant rose on bloomy spray
And Other Poems. 145
Hath been transplanted to the sculptured stone
Where kings have sate and ruled with gentle
sway:
To love, alike as to the summer rose,
Enough is morning dew and light that comes and
goes.
XVIII.
"Upon the forelock of the warrior's steed
Love rides invisible and guides the rein:
Within the hollow of the minstrel's reed
Love shapes to ecstaey the tender strain:
Upon Love's honey dew the poets feed,
Till life is but an echo and refrain
Of silver rnusic to the west-wind sung,
Of song and verse composed the pleasant hills
among."
XIX.
Thus eloquently, touched by lyric fire,
The Prince soliloquized in pleasant grove;
And in the stilly night he waked the lyre*
Of passion, while bright Venus shone above,
Xor left one string un jar red. The golden wire
Shook with the full diapason of a new love !
Tie seemed compact of music and sweet fire.
With lids that did not weary, hands that did not
tire.
146 lone,
XX.
"Come o'er Rome's seven pleasant hills, Miorn,
And look upon the waters lulled in sleep !
Come through the silver moon's inverted horn
And hang thy herald in the azure deep !
Come with thy forehead bright and locks unshorn
And light the temples dim upon the steep !
Come thou, golden Morn, and plant the throne
Where Day shall sit in beauty when sable Night
hath flown !
XXI.
"Come up the pleasant vales, rosy Morn,
Thy sure foot planted in the silver dew,
And from the eglantine and white hawthorn
Loose thy caged larks to sing in heaven blue !
Come to the stately lilies that adorn
The hills of twilight, bidding Night adieu !
Come thou, rosy Morn, and ope the gate
That leadeth to those gardens where my Soul doth
wait!
XXII.
"Come from the champak to the rose, Morn,
From India's plain to vales of Italy!
Come from the silver palm to white hawthorn.
From banks of poppy to banks ol narcissi !
And Other Poems. 147
Come with thy dewy fingers and adorn
The gardens of Tiber, and thou shalt be to me
A brighter morn than ever yet hath sprung
In Tempe, or the purple peaks of song among 1
XXIII.
"Lo, like a cherub standing in the sun
In the full splendor of his wings unshorn,
Love shines upon me to Love's rituals won!
And welcome, ah thrice welcome, thou bright
Morn
Whose light shall lead me, ere thy sands are run,
Down all the pleasant fields to that sweet
bourn
Where sate the maiden, bright above compare,
With Hero's length of tress and Hero's bosom
bare!"
XXIV.
Thus passioned from his starry battlement
The enamoured Prince, and eyes of lovers still
Best herald the dawn .... With morn sweet
Florence bent
Her happy footsteps through that gate at will
148 lone,
Which downward led to gardens sweet with scent
And splendid with bright buds as Fancy's hill,
Where Florence spent, shut from all envious view,
A youth untroubled, sweet, and born each morn
anew.
XXY.
A little wliile she lingered by the fount
That tempted thrice the new-fledged laik to
soar,
As nigher and still higher it did mount,
And wetted flowers bowed them to acjore:
A little while she lingered by the fount
That tempted thrice the new-fledged lark to
soar,
Then 'gan she to tremble like a rose awaked
By Zephyr, and her heart with sudden passion
ached.
XXVI.
Some say the lily trembles 'gainst that hour
A lover's hand shall ravish it away:
Some say the roses feel the coming shower
Though heaven still is blue and no clouds stray
And Other Poems. 149
Perhaps 'twas so with .Florence as with the flower
Of purity, or rose? on leafy spray,
Perhaps like these she felt a sweet approach
And shook like asphodels when lover's hands en-
croach.
XXVII.
Perhaps a Presence went before the youth
That Love was leading to the garden gate
And shook the Rose of Tiber. Ay, in sooth,
'Tis sweet to fable that love did agitate
Her maiden bosom, and not passing ruth:
Nor shall I question this, nor make debate 1 ,-
No poet questions beauty but to find
A greater beauty, and no greater is behind.
XXVIII.
Then, as a gust of summer faints and dies
And troubled waters take their native calm,
The passion passed from Florence, and her eyes
As dark as twilight 'neath a budded palm
Resumed their converse with the morning skies,
That newly to her heart brought peace and balm,
Her lips grew tender, and she 'gan to sing
A ditty light as air, wed to one silver string.
150 lone,
XXIX.
Stol'n to the sculptured gate the garden's seal
'Neath shade of purple flowers, such as twine
The pulses of the wandering winds and feel
The heart of Summer through them heat divine,
The Prince, unseen, a little while did kneel
Like palmer at the foot of holy shrine,
Then, rising up, looked full on Florence there
And craved a cup of water as her utmost care.
XXX.
By noble and ingenuous youth the dew
Of courtesy is never strained, and with a cup
Of water asked youth gives its friendship too,
So deemed the ardent Nobleman, and up
The garden path came Florence and withdrew
The single severing holt that he might sup
The waters of the fountain, as he sued:
A youth right noble, sooth, and with all grace
imbued !
XXXI.
He entered in! No bright imperial crown
Shot golden lustre through the crown of youth
Encircling his fair forehead. One whom Renown
Had touched but lightly yet had touched for
truth,
And Other Poems. 151
For truth and chivalry, he seemed; and down
The garden path, right courteously in sooth,
Fair Florence led him onward, undismayed,
To where the fountain rose and cast a pleasant
shade.
XXXII.
Deep drank the Prince. "Does Tiber taste so
sweet ?
Is Tiber, then, so delicate at's head?
Ah, blessed Tiber !" " 7 Tis thy journey's heat
Hath made it delicate," fair Florence said.
"A charmed fountain and a charmed retreat!"
The Prince responded then : "And may I tread
This pleasant path, and rest a wanderer's eye
Upon the rose that springs a home and haven by ?"
xxxm.
Ah, wherefore did fair Florence turn away?
Ah, wherefore did she tremble like a star?
Was it with anger that he chose to stay
And with rude presence on her spirit jar?
Ah, no, not anger, for from bloomy spray
She plucked the fragrant rose he praised afar,
152 Ions,
And begged him keep it till the Tiber drew
Him unto greener fields where sweeter flowers
blew.
XXXIV.
"Sweet to the wanderer is the rose," he said,
"That springs with light upon it from the home ;
Upon its leaves a brighter dew is shed
Than falleth ever on fields wherethrough we
roam!
Yet not with wandering spirit am I led
To journey o'er the fields and spumy foam,
I seek a blessed shrine but newly found
Where once a Seraph stood, and now 'tis holy
ground."
XXXV.
"Farewell!" sweet Florence said, and then it
seemed
She had waked a chord she did not mean to
wake,
r An impassioned chord of which she had not
dreamed
That shook her heart and made her being ache.
"Adieu !" the Prince replied : "I had not deemed
The morn so high in heaven ; yet ere I take
And Other Poems. 153
My leave of Tiber thrice this way I ride
Though not to rest again by this cool fountain's
side/'
XXXVI.
A question 'twas within whose answer sweet
A wiser maid had crowded all her heart,
But Florence guessed not that he did entreat
A triple audience ere they should part;
Yet ignorance in her worked no defeat
Nor made the Prince with trepidation start,
For courteously she welcomed him to rest
Though from the east he came or from the dewy
west.
XXXVII.
Ah, brief their meeting, swift their parting fond,
As transitory as a morning dream,
Yet Love found time to knit the subtle bond
That bound their spirits to a single scheme!
Home from the fountain starred like diamond
Keturned the gentle Prince in sweet extreme,
Communing with his spirit as he went,
For love, though no ear listens, waketh eloquent.
154 lone,
XXXVIII.
While for sweet Florence by the gate apart
A dawning in her tender eye and glad
She first knew love, and to her happy heart
The morning rose another meaning had !
Immortal love she knew and love's best art,
Which virtue is in sweet simplicity clad :
Then 'gan she to sing and through her singing
ached
A chord untouched before, a string but newly
waked.
PAKT II.
I.
Now on their love, alike as on the rose,
Another morn hath risen. At the gate
The Prince again did crave the sweet repose
And waters o' the garden, cool and delicate ;
Again fair Florence by the fount uprose
And loost the bolt and welcomed him elate :
Again they bade adieu and turned away
He to his harp addrest, she to the rose of May.
And Other Poems. 155
II.
Then twice the golden sun rose on their love
To set upon their parting dim and sweet,
Ah, twice the fading sun brought home the dove,
And either stayed though neither did entreat;
Then twice the tender gloaming from above
Came down and trembled 'round their happy
feet
A book by sunlight and a harp by dusk
Held them together till the glow-worm breathed
the musk.
III.
Then came the seventh day, the perfect day,
Such as in June the poets search and sing;
It came unto the rose on bloomy spray,
Then to the risen lark with dewy wing ;
Then to fair Florence came with golden ray
And lingered in her hair. It was in Spring,
One echo slept upon an hundred hills
The song of Philomel among the morning rills.
IV.
It came, and found the lovers with a book,
A book of verse beneath the lilac tree,
Rare verse of May, of dale and sunny nook,
Of hedges sweet with lind, where sucked the
bee;
156 lone,
Of thyme -linked glimpses of the running
Of purple bloom and dews of Arcady :
And love was there, and grew from bud to leaf,
From bud to leaf it grew into the perfect sheaf.
V.
"0, Florence, Florence, by his cunning art
This bard hath stolen so rarely doth he sing
Light from thine eyes and sweetness from thy
heart
And builded up a dream of love and Spring !
Ah, Florence, Florence, these shall never part,
Linked by the golden rhyme the bard dotH
bring,
And thou and I forevermore shall be
Like these two lovers joined for aye in poetry !"
VI.
"This be my story then," the answer came:
"Into thy keeping here I give my heart:
Thou taught me love ere others taught its name
Farewell, sweet garden, thou and I must part!"
"0 may confusion seize me and hot shame
If ever, Love, my love should wing this dart !
Look up, bright Florence, here thou still may'st
dwell,
These hanging walls thou lovest shall echo not
'farewell !'
And Other Poems. 157
VII.
"My state is noble, noble is my race,
And here beside these pleasant walls, sweet one,
I'll build thee a palace home." But in the face
Of Florence was a light not in the sun,
But something that is born of human grace,
Of finer substance than the day is spun :
"Ah, no," she softly said, "that must not be;
This garden were a love to steal my love from
thee."
VIII.
"Nay, gentle heart, the bird of sweetest lay,
The leafiest tree, tho brightest flower that blows
Within these gardens, decked by darling May,
Shall be transplanted where thy sweet self goes,
And thou shalt parted be ah scarce a day;
Then come, dear heart, and bid the fragrant
rose
Beside thy father's door a long farewell,
I have a distant home where thou and I shall
dwell."
IX.
"0 may I dream the early dream to-night
Which knows no sad ( i arewell !' Abide till morn,
Then, questionless, I'll act this heavy rite
And bid farewell to flower and to thorn.
158 lone,
But, lo ! when morning comes with golden light
And far away I hear the huntsman's horn,
Ah, tell me, Love, where wilt thou lead my feet
Hast thou a home for me, a pleasant garden seat?"
X.
"0, Love, I ne'er had stol'n away thy heart
Without some haven for thy weary feet !
Believe my passion is the better part
Integrity and honor; and I entreat
Thee not to question me in any sort
To make the rare more rare, the sweet more
sweet,
I've 4 veiled from thee thy pardon set me right
From whence I come at morn and whither go at
night.
XI.
"Yet know, and let it be thy surety,
Within my father's halls there is no stone
But once hath echoed without disloyalty
Thy father's name; and now it shall be shown
How dear he was, whose name shall ever be
A silver echo given by the throne
Back to the lips of Honor without blame,
Of Rome, for Rome, and unto Rome, an immortal
name!
And Other Poems. 159
XII.
"0, then, leave not my grace at question, Dear,
But think that where thy father's name hath
been
And lingers as great music on the ear
His daughter happily may enter in,
Without the shadow of a doubt or fear,
And dwell in honor as befits his kin.
trust me, I've a home within the North,
The rose is at its gate and myrrh upon its hearth."
XIII.
"There is a tomb beside the sounding sea
They taught me to call 'f ather/ " Florence said :
"Alas, he never lived to christen me!
The painting of a mother by my bed.
They taught me to call 'mother/ and to be
A daughter to, the gentlest of the dead.
Yet I am happy, Love, for thou art near,
And when thou goest hence thou leadest me from
here."
XIV.
And then the twilight came with gentle hand
And parted these two lovers side by side:
Home went the Prince with tender heart and
bland,
And Florence to her rest with maiden pride.
160 lone,
After, the moon came down upon that land
Of gardens, wherethrough crystal waters glide,
And Philomel saw that the night was fine
And sung across the dews a hymn of love divine.
XV.
Then paled the stars hefore the bridal morn
That rose from seas ^Egean without stain,
And from lush covert of untrodden thorn
The lark uprose, and sweeter was his strain
Than that of fabled birds such as adorn
Apollo's tree, and poets love to feign.
But, ah, it was not day, not perfect day,
Until the Bride arose and stood mid dewy spray!
XVI.
Mid dewy spray she stood at sweet repose,
Adorned by nature with so much of fair
That poetry shall only add a rose
And with a sapphire pin it in her hair.
Mid spray of hyacinth at sweet repose
Fair Florence stood, and charmed the list'ning
air
With those sweet bursts that rather seem to be
The language of a heart than scheme of harmony.
And Other Poems. 161
XVII.
But soon her singing ceased, for at the gate
A stranger stood, and in the Prince's name
Craved gently that he need no longer wait
But enter in and speak wherefore he came.
He bore the countenance of royal state,
A throne's reflected light and golden flame;
And courteously he crost the garden's marge
And knelt at Florence's feet and spoke his honored
charge.
XVIII.
"Fair lady, from thy sovereign Prince I come
The Throne in one mind with its royal Heir
To publish in this garden that thy sum
Of grace and beauty, and a name most rare,
Have moved the bravest Prince in Christendom
To choose thee Consort to his state and share
His present honors and prophetic reign,
The grandeur of his throne and grace that doth
sustain.
XIX.
"Thou art a Princess, chosen from beyond
The royal line but not the royal grace:
And art thrice blest in cherishing this bond
Blessing ,thyself, the Prince, and populace !
162 lone,
But, lo ! with pageantries that correspond
With his great intent, to this pleasant place
The Prince with all his train is now addrest:
Throw wide thy heart and entertain the royal
guest !"
XX.
Was it with woman's longings for royalty
That Florence^ brow grew pale and cold as
death?
Was it the thin air of high sovereignty
Oppressed her heart and stole away her breath?
Ah, no, not these though these it well might be
Paled her fair brow and stole away her breath :
'Twas that she never dreamed the Prince her
Love,
And now had come divorce she could not rise
above.
XXL
Or so it seemed; for should the Prince decree
Her as the Consort of his royal state
Her marriage with another could not be,
And knowing this she thought she knew her
fate.
"Alas!" she said, "Fm chosen for misery;
Waiting for gentle love I do but wait
For rude divorce : and in Love's name they post
Who steal away my Love and widow me almost !
And Other Poems. 163
XXII.
"0, thou sweet garden, unto thee I turn,
Then comfort me in sorrow, or I faint.
Ah, thou wast ever gentle, nor wilt spurn
Me in the heaviness of rude complaint:
My hopes are ashes, never more to burn
With colors warmer than the poets paint !
0, teach me, is it thus in human fate
That lovers' hearts must break in Spring when
sweet birds mate?
XXIII.
"A Princess and prophetic Queen to be!
then shall grief and wrong be lifted high,
And, hooped by golden bands of royalty,
This heart must break while Grandeur stand-
eth by !
0, Love, hear my complaint and haste to me,
And thou and I from Italy shall fly
In the sweet-bitter steps of frightened Love
To where our hearts are whole though skies be
rent above!"
XXIV.
Then Florence wept ! But in this lyric song
There are no tears but that are wiped away :
All swift affliction and all seeming wrong
Which she shall ever know is but a way
164 lone,
To make the sweet more sweet, as shadows throng
The forehead of the morning and the day
Seems brighter and more welcome after shade,
More golden on the hill, more tender in the glade.
XXV.
Then on her ear sweet music rose and fell
And down she knelt as for a sacrifice ;
But nature in the gentlest dare rebel
'Gainst power that would blind Love's tender
eyes
And him into the thongs of bondage sell,
Barred from the golden warmth of freedom's
skies :
So Florence rose, unconquered it would seem,
Save but her vesper eyes down bent as in a dream.
XXVI.
Meanwhile the eager Prince had stayed his train
Hard by the garden walls, and through the
gate
Alone he came. Fair Florence with sharp pain
Felt that approach which needs must agitate
Her tender bosom,, and a moment drain
Heaven of balm and youth of joy innate.
That golden light that shines from Providence
Has passed into eclipse and all is now suspense !
And Other Poems. 165
XXVII.
"Fair lady," thus the Prince, "a courtier
Hath been before and herald' my approach:
His chosen words no doubt did minister
To honor more than love, yet my reproach
Shall nothing injure, for what reverend sir,
In Love's uneasy livery set abroach,
Can put to fitting words a young man's heart,
Paint what he feels not, what he doth not dream,
impart ?
XXVIII.
"I am thy Prince, and thou shalt be my bride :
'Tis so decreed and that decree shall stand.
Thy spirit hath been ever by my side
And now, indeed, I take thy corporal hand.
This kiss be at my judgment to betide
Me weal or woe as to its faith I stand-
Thy royal husband and thy loyal love,
As constant to thine eyes as fate to stars above !"
XXIX.
Then down fair Florence knelt, and at his feet
Poured out in supplication her sad heart.
The Prince, confounded, heard his Love entreat,
And saw the actor, yet guessed not the part,
i66 lone,
But soon her pleading ceased, so bitter-sweet,
So far from forethought yet so near to art,
And looking down upon her sunny hair
The Prince in sorrow found the source of her de-
spair.
XXX.
"0 good, my Lord, thou hast not seen behind
This high decree, or else thy lips had stayed
To bless it with approval. Thou dost bind
An innocent love in constancy arrayed
And set a sorrow free ! 0, most unkind
That, guiltless, I am guiltlessly betrayed.
sad, my Lord, the sun hath stooped to bless,
But, blessing, hath consumed me in my lowliness !
XXXI.
"My love is to my fortune as a vine
That climbs no higher than that cottage eave
Whereneath 'tis planted, for this love of mine
Hath climbed no higher than my state gives
leave.
1 looked unto that kingly throne of thine
But to obey, my Lord, not to receive ;
Elsewhere I looked for love, elsewhere 'twas found,
Nor sprung so high as thine yet sprung from holy
ground.
And Other Poems. 167
XXXII.
"I love a youth, a noble youth, my Lord,
Who, with the morning, greets me at the gate,
And here upon this green and pleasant sward
We linger till the twilight doth abate
Light on the pages of that gentle bard
Who found love sweet and found it adequate ;
And good, my Lord, thou canst not surely mean
To blast that love which flowered ere thy love was
green !"
XXXIII.
"0, Florence, Florence, hast thou been deceived
So far beyond the period of intent?
Hath expectation failed, and art thou grieved
By circumstances in all kindness meant?
Dear heart, hast thou some threatening gloom per-
ceived
In heaven, where Love's golden bow was bent?
then kneel not amid the weeping dew,
1 am thy royal Prince and, sweet, thy lover too !"
XXXIV.
Drawn up by these strange accents to her feet,
She opened wide her veiled, affrayed eye:
The wonder of it all was near complete,
And ignorance was taking wings to fly
lone,
Then sudden to her neck and forehead sweet
The warm blood mantled like a painful dye,
And darkling for the well of speech she groped,
Saying, "Art thou a prince indeed past what
I hoped!
XXXV.
"0, pardon me, my Lord, I knew it not,
And in my ignorance I was not bold ;
But now I see my love is overshot
Beyond my fortune and the tale is told !"
"Sweet Love/' the Prince replied, "there is no
blot
But love may better wear than lust for gold;
Thy veins are noble and thy heart is great,
And thou shalt be the Consort of my royal state.
XXXVI.
"Nay, lead thy doubts aside to perish, sweet,
And follow faith unto its perfect goal:
I saw this hour coming, nor defeat
Was in its train, but victory and whole.
entertain me, now our love's complete,
Both with a lifted eye and perfect soul:
Or say, bright Florence, wilt thou bid farewell
To these sweet flowers that blow where thou no
more shalt dwell?"
And Other Poems. 169
XXXVII.
"It is my wish/' she said, "my dearest bent;
And as a Princess I command at will !"
Then through the garden hand in hand they went,
While music rose and fell to soothe or thrill.
The flowers throng their steps with fragrant scent,
And as these lovers by the gate stand still
And bid the rose 1 farewell on leafy spray,
Bid them adieu and let the music die away.
Ion,
KEATS.
He was the darling of blue Olympus,
The loveliest of them all;
And the way of his youth was Beauty's way
And never shall weary or pall.
He hung a silver moon in the heavens,
And that moon shall never fade;
But lovers shall look on its face forever,
As bright as when Madeleine prayed
He fled with Philomel into the wood
Where numberless shadows throng,
And into that wood half the world hath stolen
And listened to Philomel's song.
He bathed the ieasoni in myitic light
I can fee that light on th* hill!
An hundred years his eyes are closed
But the world looks through them still.
And Other Poems. 171
Death shall lie down with the fairest of earth
But not with the fairest of his,
For the lovely daughters of his mind
Each one immortal is.
Greece is dearer for his dear "Urn/'
And Italy bluer for him;
And Arcady is nearer to us
Because of his lovely hymn.
The only nightingale thousands have heard
He loosed from his tranced heart,
In sweet embalmed darkness to sing
To sing, and never depart.
His music hath passed into Beauty's face,
Her smile is one with his hymn :
And if there's a thought in the heart of the rose
'Tis a thought of him.
1 72 lone,
ISABEL
'Tis midnight, and a spirit in my feet,
Past many an upland lawn by Eros prest,
Eastward hath led me to where the violets sweet
Yet bear the impress of her twilight rest.
Here, where through flowers dim and fragrant-
eyed
The wandering airs of heaven breathe and die,
On pleasant sward, at shut of golden eve,
She knelt within my arms, a promised bride ;
The twilight lingering in her azure eye,
The night upon the curls that 'round her
forehead cleave.
II.
The wild bee sleeps in star light with the rose,
The dews are blown abroad, the silver moon,
Making night beautiful, conies down and glows
Upon the waters from her queenly noon.
And Other Poems. 173
The mocking-bird hath caught a lyric note
That fell from heaven with the twilight dim,
And all the night hath stayed awake with
song-
Like some rapt poet wandering remote,
And shaping with his lips a golden hymn
From voices that around his haunted spirit
throng.
III.
Where broods bright Hesper o'er yon silver steep
And Summer lays her flowered mantle by,
My Lady sleeps a golden-visioned sleep,
Soft-fanned by airs that climb the azure sky.
Exhaling fragrance from each pearled brim
Beneath her casement sweet buds faintly gleam,
Such as in Arcady first sprung and blew;
The rose looks upward to her lattice dim
Upon the sloping lawn the tranced night
through,
And lends a perfume to the rose within her
dream.
IV.
Her youth lies open to the golden light
And moves through beauty like a mountain
brook ;
Her heart is tender as a summer night,
And twilight meets the morning in her look.
174 lone,
The mocking-bird is singing up the dawn,
And sweeter birds shall sing the morning in,
But not the risen lark sings sweet as she
Climbing the steep blue o'er a poet's lawn,
Nor Philomel, to songs unsung akin,
Singing from dewy thyme in olden poesy.
V.
As shakes a new-blown rose in Summer's front
Before the winds that breathe from meadows
wide,
Here where the air is cool with swaying fount
My Isabel became my promised bride.
With something of that early proud repose
And something of that late and sweet unrest,
She knelt within my arms with meek embrace ;
Her blush down-mantling to the fragrant rose
{That shook its conscious dews upon her breast,
Her eyes, half veiled with love, upturned unto
my face.
VI.
for the wand of Morpheus to fill
Her dreams with visions that arise in me, -
To visit her in balmy sleep at will
And shake her heart with this deep ecfctaty !
And Other Poems. 175
for an hour to be old Somnus' heir
And guide athwart yon azure fields of light
The winged and viewless chariot of dreams I
So should I hang the dim and spacious air
Wherein she moves in dreams of summer night
Even with yon bright star that on my fore-
head streams.
VII.
Yea, seat her on this pleasant hill in dreams
And cool her hands in flowers dim and sweet,
Within her ears the sound of falling streams,
The wandering airs of heaven 'round her feet.
Nor should my voice be hushed until the dawn,
But sometimes, falling through the verdurous
gloom,
Come o'er her listening ear as sweet and far
As spirit calling unto spirit; anon
Risa at her feet from dewy hawthorn bloom :
Yet I should not be found beneath the even-
ing star.
VIII.
Aye troubled in her dreams she would awake,
Awake, arise, and come into the night ;
Come out into the night for love's sweet sake
And seek me by yon heaven's tender light.
1 76 lone,
Like some bright flower borne unto my feet
Upon the waters of a running stream,
Troubled, but not o'ercome, past brook and
fall,
Past pools where Phoebe dreams, through mead-
ows sweet,
O'er dewy lawn, in shade and blended beam,
My Bride would come to me, and love be all
in all!
IX.
Ay me ! some sweetness is too sweet for dreams,
Some buds too bright to ope on fancy's air,
Some stars too golden for the night which streams
Around the dreamer bright above compare !
Ye stars of summer night, this may not be !
Enough to touch her hand at break of dawn,
Enough our lips shall meet at dewy dusk;
Too sweet, too rare, too wrought with ecstasy,
To calm my Love at midnight, all forlorn,
And take her to my heart, soft-fanned by the
blown musk.
X.
The lake has lit the mocking-bird to rest,
Midst purple spray and ever-flowering green,
The bright, soft-pacing moon hath newly drest
The falls bevond the wood in silver sheen !
And Other Poems. 177
One star hath lit me to this pleasant seat,
Streaming upon my path with rosy light,
One star shall light me down unto my rest ;
One light is on my dreams, one 'round her feet,
Yon star of Love hung pendulous in night,
Shaking its golden splendors from the stead-
fast West!
PUT MONEY IN YOUR PURSE.
MONEY, however got, is money still,
The greatest thing that serves the human will;
Earned, found or stolen, borrowed, begged as well,
'T will move all spirits and all men compel.
Get money, then, and get it as you may,
For everything is his who has the means to pay.
Go to, I say; put money in your purse;
In health ? t will feed you and in sickness nurse:
Affection wearies; love grows weak and cold,
Not so that blessed angel yellow gold !
Fame! Glory! all the bright, immortal host
Cannot attempt what gold does lightly boast;
Lo ! Genius cannot ease one labored breath
But money oft can stay the hand of death:
The tongue of Burke shall parch with fever's
heat
While Midas cools his throat with vintage rare
and sweet!
178 lone,
Go to, I say; put money in your purse;
'T will ease, if not subdue, the primal curse;
For death itself is easier for gold
Which keeps out summer's heat and winter's cold.
Get money, then, and get it as you may,
For everything is his who has the means to pay.
The poor may neither choose nor have their
fill,
The rich choose freely, freely where they will;
The poor are food for famine and for wars,
For cold and pestilence; they bear the scars
Of yesterday, and fear to-morrow's wound,
And, dead, are oft interred in potter's ground:
The rich are guarded like a sacrament
Up from the cradle till their breath is spent,
Then, borne in splendor from their castle walls,
E'en as they lived they sleep in marble halls.
Go to, I say; put money in your purse;
This is the wisdom of all prose and verse,
The wisest maxim that was ever told,
The truth that grows in youth while other truths
grow old.
Whoever has a dollar has a part
Of what is nearest to his neighbor's heart,
And, having that, his neighbor is his friend,
Or, if his enemy, himself he can defend.
Whoever have a dollar more than you
Holds in their hands your liberty, to do
And Other Poems. 179
According with it freely as they please
Or lift you to a throne or bring you to your
knees.
You have a daughter: look unto your purse,
Its emptiness shall prove that daughter's curse;
She shall be tempted for her daily bread
And set her honor 'gainst starvation's dread.
You have a son with genius in his brain;
The rich shall prostitute it for their gain;
His spirit shall put on a livery
And lackey to the golden powers that be.
Play fast and loose with every law of love
But guard your purse like treasures from above:
Who worship now the gods that Caesar had?
But Caesar's gold will keep you warmly clad.
Thus pass the great divinities of old
And teach us there is nothing true but gold.
Go to, get gold ; behold ! on Sinai's mount
Was never given truth of such account!
Suppose you do not, then another will,
Treading you down when you are poor and
ill:
What then shall honor* love and beauty be,
And all religion, all philosophy?
What then, when there is nothing in your purse
And those dependent on you share that curse?
Get money, and more money, and still more,
As did the crafty who have gone before,
180 lone,
And now their issue rule this ancient earth
And live in wealth, in leisure and in mirth.
They neither steal nor beg from door to door,
And, having much, give something to the poor;
Their bodies are not warped with toil and sin,
An insult to the spirit hedged within;
And the}' alone are free to come and go,
With opportunity to see, leisure to know.
Go to, I say; put money in your purse;
Wealth has no stings but poverty has worse.
Wine ! Women ! Song ! Would you partake of these ?
Who have the money choose where'er they please.
Travels and leisure! Do these suit your mind?
Then money is your friend and more than kind.
A palace with attendants at each door !
How often fall such wonders to the poor?
A yacht in summer and blue skies in winter time !
Your gold will get them though itself be got by
crime!
Go to, I say; put money in your purse;
No man does better, thousands daily worse:
Though money may not bring you happiness
Its lack will ever bring you dire distress.
You have religion! Will it keep you warm,
Or thrust aside necessity's stern arm ?
What use or value is your little creed
At which ten thousand mock, for which scarce one
will bleed?
And Other Poems. 181
Think you that your religion is the truth?
Nay, so the Roman thought as much, forsooth;
He was as certain that his faith v;as right
As you are certain of your creed to-night:
He worshipped Jove, another god have you;
To still a third, perchance, your son will sue.
Then be not eager to deceive yourself
And for an uncertain god lose certain pelf.
Perchance you labor for a deathless fame,
The glory of a bright, immortal name!
All wealth that Cscsar in his life possest
Bright gold will purchase, making you as blest;
And, Cassar dead, what comfort can he find
In that immortal name he left behind?
The dead in their own glory have no part ;
Fame cannot stir a clod though once a human
heart!
Nay, when indeed you have paid nature's claim
Though honor crown your grave you shall not
know 't from shame!
Get money; nor in getting be too nice,
For yellow gold is cheap at any price:
? T will buy you friendship and 7 t will find you
love,
And serve you freer than the gods above.
7 T were better that your children wish you
killed
That they possess your money-bags, well-filled,
182 lone,
Than that your children wish you dead and gone
Since you have nothing left to live upon.
'T is money that 's respected, not the man ;
'T is money that ? s the soul of every plan!
All under heaven, be it what it may,
Love, virtue, honor, meets bright gold half-
way :
Whenever virtue does refuse to yield
And honor will not cast aside his shield,
? T is not they are impenetrable stuff
But only that your price is not enough:
Hold forth a little more, and each will come
And yield his crown up for that larger sum !
Get money, then; all hell cannot delay
The march of money, nor all heaven stay!
Go to, I say; put money in your purse;
'T will heighten every pleasure, lighten every
curse.
Wealth's counterfeit is more than virtue's self,
An angel's presence less than shadows cast by
pelf.
Who steals your purse has stolen all your wealth,
Your liberty, your comfort, and your health;
Your honor, too, for how shall that remain
When hunger fills your body with sharp pain?
Who steals your money steals your daughter too,
To do with her as money choose to do,
Leaving you bound and helpless to pursue.
And Other Poems. 183
Cease reading this and go abroad and see
How sterner than its story is want's reality:
Rhyme softens still the tale and meter part re-
fines
But poverty itself has no such pleasing lines;
'T is hell, stern hell, unchastened, unrelieved;
No art has smoothed it and no poet sieved.
Like beasts pursued, and crowding each on each,
The poor are huddled close in Mammon's reach :
If you have money go amidst them there
And choose a mistress from the young and fair,
Or choose the hardiest to be your slave,
Make smooth your path in life, in death make
smooth your grave.
Go to, I say; put money in your purse,
Or your own self shall bartered be, or worse.
Bright gold a kingdom is, and he is chief
Who has possession, though an arrant thief:
The tongue of genius he can loose or bind
And stay the thinker's pen and starve the
thinker's mind.
Where money ends there slavery begins,
And hunger, and with hunger half our sins:
And where your money ends leave off all hope
Those gates are shut upon you that gold alone
can ope!
Prate not of heaven's help or virtue's arms
The poor dwell in a city of alarms,
184 lone,
And, waiting for death to set their spirit free,
They suffer all things, all injustice see:
Their very virtues eke their patience out
And patience longer bears the scourge and knout.
Go to, I say; put money in your purse;
No matter how; for poverty is worse,
Yes, poverty is worse a thousand fold
Than the losing of your soul by the getting of
your gold!
Get money; money suffers no delays,
And where there's gold there are a thousand ways.
So many creeds, and nothing sure but gold;
So many visions, and, when all are told,
We find ourselves with nature as before
Well fed, if rich, but hungry if we're poor !
Eeligions rise and fall; great poets sing;
Philosophies, like hidden waters, spring;
New customs die, the old are born again;
Sometimes the sword shall rule, sometimes the
pen;
Greece yesterday, America to-day,
To-morrow, what ? Ah ! who can surely say ?
But whether Shakespeare sings or CaBsar reigns,
Or Nero binds the slave or Lincoln rends his
chains,
Gold ever is the same life-shaping tool
And, changing oft its name, has never changed
its rule.
And Other Poems. 185
Go to, I say; put money in your purse;
There are no losses but 'i will reimburse,
Or, if there are ten thousand ten times o'er,
Will they be less in number if you're poor?
Nay, poverty will make the bad still worse,
To every evil add a greater curse;
There 's naught so sad but it will sadder make,
Nor broken but that once again 't will break:
It kills the little comfort that remains
And hope, already thin, still thinner strains:
The body sick, it sickens then the heart,
And leaves the faint and hunted no resort:
It adds a toil unto the widow's grief
And of the merely hungry makes the damned
thief:
O'er simple failure throws a complex spell
And digs a deeper pit in deepest hell!
Get money, then, and, having much, get more;
'T is not enough alone not to be poor,
Be also richer than your neighbor is
Or what is yours right shortly shall be his.
Get money ; having got the smallest store
You'll never need persuasion to get more:
Faith, truth and beauty need the wisest laws,
An angePs tongue to win us to their cause,
But money, which none question, none deny,
Speaks for itself and wins both heart and
eye.
1 86 lone,
Your wants perhaps are simple and are few
Plain food to feed your body and renew,
Three suits a year and every month a book,
One day in seven by a running brook,
A little leisure and a little song,
A loving friend who does the heart no wrong,
And naught, save thought, intense, and naught,
save labor, long:
But though your wants are simple and are few
With other men this finding holds not true;
Their wants are legion who can comprehend
Their multiplicity, or find their end?
They tax all nature and exhaust all art,
And in their satisfaction you must play a
part.
You shall be forced to labor 'gainst your will
With ax or loom, with shovel or with quill:
'T is gold will set the task and hour, too,
Wherein that labor must be done and through,
And, being poor, you shall do certain things
Nor 'scape that task though heaven lend you
wings.
'T is gold decides the labor and the man,
Appoints the hour and designs the plan,
Sets on its forces as it best agrees,
Then stands hard by and sternly oversees.
Get money, then, or else the rich will make
A vassal of you for their passions' sake:
And Other Poems. 187
Though homely fare contents you and invites,
The rich have more capricious appetites:
When your own toil has earned a simple dish
Of lentil, fruit, or wheaten bread, or fish,
And you are satisfied, then will the rich
Stir you abroad to delve in sand and ditch,
Scour all the plain and drag the viewless air,
To load their tables with a richer fare.
Nay, being poor, you shall be poorer still
And serve the wealthy ere you have your fill;
Right fortunate if after they shall sup
Enough remains to fill your plate and cup.
Before the rich have risen from their bed
You shall have sweated for your daily bread,
And hours after they have gone to rest
The burning sweat of toil shall fall upon your
breast !
Go to, I say; put money in your purse;
No matter how; the lack 's the greater curse:
He has indeed no friend who has no pelf
And, having naught, he shall despise himself:
The heart of him who can possess no gold
Is like some wretched weed that we behold
Bitter while young and poisonous when old.
Get money, then; possess it as you may;
No matter how 't is gotten it will pay.
The rich man's profit is the poor man's war,
And, being poor, you cannot fly so far
1 88 lone,
But gold, that yellow loadstone none escape,
Will draw you back again and all your actions
shape.
You shall be listed in the ranks of war
To fix the bayonet, or guide the car,
To meet the advancing, charge the retreating foe,
Here ride upon, iron-shod, there overthrow;
O'errun the greatest length of bloody ground,
Slay where you can, and where you cannot, wound ;
Eetreat a cripple, or perish in a ditch,
And all for Home for Country and the Rich !
Get money, then; with money you can buy
A substitute to strike for you and die!
Get money, and more money, and still more,
And take your leisure 'long a pleasant shore,
Nor die a soldier in a foreign bog,
Nor sweat your face away to keep another's dog.
Put by your music and your brush and pen
And follow in the steps of moneyed men:
You are just so much poorer for your verse,
And, painting beauty, you but paint a hearse!
Go to, I say ; put by these little tools ;
They're but the playthings of we easy fools,
They serve nor devil, angel, God, nor man,
And though of nature not in nature's plan.
Get out; get gold: write verses on a bill,
Those verses shall be scanned on Zion's highest
hill.
And Other Poems. 189
Go to, I say ; put money in your purse,
And, having more than others, fear no curse,
Not guiltless, murdered blood can cry so loud
From haunted sepulcher or damned shroud
But money's music can subdue that cry
And buy out justice though it fall from yonder
sky!
Get money, then ; and money can be had
Ten thousand ways, and not one way is bad:
Earned, found, or stolen from your neighbor's till,
Possessed by rapine or by labor's skill,
Robbed from the needy, from the wealthy tricked,
By usury got, or from a gutter picked,
An almighty dollar is a dollar still,
The greatest thing that serves the human will.
Some people say, and moralists acquiesce,
That riches cannot bring us happiness
While all about us thousands suffer dire distress;
The sight of others mourning, so they say,
Will take our appetite for joy away.
But we know better, we who look around
And are not cheated by an empty sound:
Do we not daily in this world of ours
Behold the wealthy look from hall and towers,
Laughing and feasting, on the poor below,
Nor feel remorse nor shudder at their woe?
Nay, as sweet music oft is sweeter found
By frequent contrast with discordant sound,
190 lone,
So wealth seems sweeter for the poverty around.
Trust not the pen, nor what it testifies,
The pen is mighty often but in lies;
Trust your own natural passions and your eyes:
Look not into a book upon the shelf
But, if you'd truly know, look to the thing itself.
The bards know naught of money save its lack
And that being painful straight they damn it
black ;
Believe them never; gold is more than kind,
Ay, gold is golden even to the blind.
Go to, I say; put money in your purse;
Nor trust in rhyme nor reason, prose nor verse:
Yon gilded fool can stutter genius down
And damn his inspiration with a frown;
Yon puppet, be he worked by golden strings,
Shall sit with princes and consort with kings
And cherubim shall fan him with their wings.
The dirty work must needs be done by some,
Therefore get gold, or numbered with the scum,
You'll pack the offal, swill and tend the hogs,
Or fetch and carry for a rich man's dogs :
Your very sons shall loathe you for your grime
And wish your squalid toil were gilded crime.
Each act of poverty is questioned still,
But riches, without question, does its will;
The pauper's hour of prayer is not his own,
The rich man's orgies still are left alone.
And Other Poems. 191
Go to, I say; put money in your purse,
And earth's denunciation and heaven's curse,
The church's clamor and the state's reproof,
Shall turn like warded lightning from your
- roof :
Your hands can juggle with that holy fire
That plays 'twixt heaven and the church's spire,
The laws shall lackey to you, and the pen
Drip incense sweet as gums Arabian.
Therefore get gold, nor for your soul delay;
Riches knock once, then hasten on their way,
But Christ's salvation may be had on any day!
Look here upon this honest man, then here
Upon his neighbor! One has naught a year,
The other, thousands nay, a million has;
One treads in Truth's, the other Mammon's
paths ;
The first is honest, but the other not :
So far the first is happier: then^what?
Why, soon the honest man has lost his health
Or that position that was all his wealth,
And falling lower and still lower yet,
Betrayed by evil times and growing debt,
Himself and all his family are compelled
To get by squalid toil what Mammon has with-
held:
His daughters on an evil world are thrown
To slave for that which heaven made their own.
192 lone,
To face temptation, oft to be subdued
By hunger stronger than their fortitude,
To marry far beneath them and beget
Degraded young, whose young is lower yet.
His sons, uneducated, leave their home
To labor dully, or in squalor roam,
To bear the heavy burdens and to freeze,
The heirs of accident and foul disease,
Or, lower still, be driven into crime
And toil in villainies like toads in slime
His wife a weary household drudge becomes
Without a thought beyond the kitchen crumbs!
Not so the rich man nor his family;
In city home, or cottage by the sea,
His happy sons and daughters gather 'round
And make of mirth one sweet, continual sound;
And, Fortune's favorite, his wife is there,
Still wiser than her sons and than her daughters
fair!
Get money, then, or there may come a time
When poverty will drag you in its slime,
And all your honesty shall end in pain or crime.
Go to, I say ; put money in your purse ;
Toil, beg or borrow, swindle, steal, or worse:
Were it not better to defile your hands
By robbing others' tills and others' lands
Than that, for lack of nourishment, your wife
Should bear you children sickly all their life,,
And Other Poems. 193
Anemic, imbecile, and ricket brood
Whose only sin a mother's lack of food?
Dishonesty may make your name reviled
But poverty can damn your helpless child!
Get out; get gold: who cheats his neighbor
first,
His children shall not hunger nor shall thirst !
The land is sweet with orchard and with vine,
The press is overflowing with its wine,
The cattle low across the grassy lea,
You sink in fragrant clover to the knee,
The bees are droning in the warm sunshine
And o'er the walls the morning-glories twine,
But, without money, you shall starve and pine:
Peace, beauty, plenty, shelter, everywhere,
But, if your purse is empty, only toil and care!
Get money; nature will not question you
As whether it was gotten false or true,
By honest toil or shameful villainy,
And, having millions, neither will society.
Get gold; dismiss your conscience from your
breast.
So many men and every one possest
With something called a conscience for its name,
But never yet two consciences the same!
Go to, I say; put money in your purse;
'T will ease each greater, overcome each lighter
curse :
194
Never too young to get it nor too old;
Turn everything you touch to yellow gold;
'T is better that you blush for treasons done
Than hunger, thirst and slave from sun to sun.
Stolen glimpses of the great through stately
doors,
Kich hanging tapestries, long, level floors,
Broad oaken stairways leading up and on
To splendid halls and gilden suites withdrawn,
These cannot comfort you when you are cold,
Forsaken, poor, and miserable and old;
But, having money, all of these are yours,
With pleasure knocking at an hundred doors.
The poor have poor and miserable ways
Beset by strife and trouble all their days:
Their lives are like some wretched ship a-leak
Whose wretched crew dare scarcely pause or speak,
But labors in the hatchway or the hold
Bereft of hope; its food and water doled,
All comforts thrown into the vasty deep,
All pleasures sacrificed, with scarcely time for
sleep.
They battle daily 'gainst a thousand odds,
All men against them, often all the gods,
Nor for some splendid prize or trophy strive
But merely that they still may keep alive!
Look there upon that poor abandoned wretch
Between yourself and him, ah, what a stretch;
And Other Poems. 195
So poor, besotted, miserable and foul
The very devil would not buy his soul !
He shuffles on and leaves the spirit sick,
His supper with abandoned dogs to pick.
To such a being and to all his sort
Kind hearts than mile posts further are apart.
Yet there no broader line or chasm is
Dividing off your destiny from his
Than money and the cursed line it draws
'Twixt man and man and man's unequal laws:
Lose but your fortune, then your health can
fail
And you may struggle on without avail
To sink into the like and damnable detail.
Get money, then ; though riches may have wings
Black poverty has her ten thousand stings.
Eiches can purchase, poverty is bought;
Riches are courted, poverty unsought;
Riches have leisure, poverty must sweat;
Riches can spend, but poverty must get;
One dwells in palaces with golden ease,
The other in a hovel with Disease!
Riches are noble, poverty depraved;
Riches go free, but poverty's enslaved;
Riches can laugh, while poverty must plan;
Riches mock God, but poverty fears man:
Get riches and your daring can go far
All things save poverty forgiven are!
196 lone,
Eiches can bathe the calendar in blood
And be forgiven, but not Jordan's flood
Can cleanse the pauper of a little stain,
For with his poverty so shall his fault remain.
Whoso has money has the only good,
A truth oft spoken, ever understood:
Get money, then ; get it by rack and screw
Nor fear that bugbear end of Shakespeare's Jew
Your Shylocks never fall in actual life
But only in the play and its inverted strife.
Get money, and more money, and, then, more,
Ingot and nugget, bullion, coin and ore,
Deed, bond and mortgage, warrant, note and
bill,
For money is the engine of the will;
It shakes all heaven and it moves all earth,
Draws down the angel Death and shapes our very
birth!
Get money, and more money, and still more,
For damned be he who shall continue poor !
Remember, whatsoever you shall get
Get money, and more money ; still more yet :
When you have millions you have not enough,
You only have begun to get the precious stuff;
Get on and on; amass ten millions more,
Then bury that beneath a greater store.
Like Alexander you shall never mourn,
For money's conquest has no end or bourn;
And Other Poems. 197
This ancient earth can conquered be, but gold
The more its conquests are the more it shall be-
hold.
Go to, I say ; put money in your purse ;
The lack of money is life's greatest curse ;
Nor think this satire, for you'll find it truth,
And gold will rule your age though beauty sway
your youth!
THEY'RE TRAINING BOYS TO MURDER
DOWN ON ARMY STREET.
They're training boys to murder down on Army
Street !
Throw up your window wide and hear their tramp-
ing feet.
They're training boys to murder in the name of
God;
They're breaking them for soldiers with an iron
rod.
Each bears a deadly rifle in his boyish hands,
And now the captain calls aloud his stern com-
mands ;
They kneel they load take aim you hear the
triggers click
And they have learned to slay! and oh, the heart
grows sick.
198 lone,
The little children follow, mimicking it all,
Held by the awful scene as by some magic thrall;
Then back unto their mother hasten from the drill
And beg for sword and rifle that they, too, may
kill.
They're training boys to murder down on Army
Street!
Throw up your window wide and hear their tramp-
ing feet.
They're training boys to murder in God's name,
who are?
Why, you and I, and all apologists of war !
ROSA LEE.
Rosa Lee was sweet of face
As one of heaven's angel race,
Blue-eyed as Fancy's youngest heir
As blithesome and as debonair;
With golden curls around her brow
And lips as sweet as swaying almond bough.
As rose-buds wear their beauty, she
Her beauty wore unconsciously;
Nor dreampt how fair and full of grace
Her. maiden form and lovely face,
And Other Poems. 199
Her look, her smile, her lightest glance,
Her sweet refusals, sweeter complaisance.
She dwelt beside an inland sea,
This gracious child of liberty:
The very flowers she walked between
Took on a lovelier scent and sheen,
And brighter ran the babbling brook
That caught the beauty of her darling look.
For her, I think, the dews were made,
And golden light and spangled shade;
And well I ween the poets came
Into the world to praise her name:
And hearts were made to throb and beat
And cast themselves beneath her gentle feet.
A mighty lord came from the east,
Whose riches daily were increast,
And courted her, as rich men do,
With jewels clear as morning dew,
With gold and silk and linen fine,
And castles numerous as whisp'ring pine.
An humble youth came out the west
Who loved her only and loved best;
Whose riches were a simple cot
Where honor was, though glory not,
2OO lone,
An upright heart and constant mind,
Bright hopes before him and bright deeds behind.
Rosa Lee was true as truth
She's wedded to that humble youth,
And this forever be her praise,
Lengthening and sweet'ning through the days
She might have ruled from south to north
But chose, instead, to rule one true man's hearth !
HONOR.
life is much, and love is much,
And beauty all adore;
And sweet a maiden's gracious touch,
But honor, friend, is more.
glory leads unto the height
Where but the great have trod,
And riches lead to power and might.
But honor leads to God.
diamonds and pearls are brave,
And rubies never rust,
But honor shines within our grave
And dazzles from our dust.
And Other Poems. 201
genius makes the kingly bard
Whose fame the ages span,
And linkage makes the mighty
But honor makes the man.
MOTLEY.
We make too much of farce in this, our time,
Too much of jest ; a dearth of serious things.
We stoop too often, and instead of wings
Wherewith to soar to solemn heights sublime
We wear the jester's cloak, and play the mime
On all occasions. Ay, our very kings
Are clothed in motley, and when the poet
sings
His verse is nothing if not. jesting rhyme.
Is heaven won, or sorrow's tears aye stilled
That there is nothing sober to attempt?
Are all the myriad mouths of hunger filled
That half our time for humor is exempt?
Is there no later news from heaven or hell
For poets' ears to catch and poets' lips to tell?
2O2 lone,
POET, BUILD FOR ME A SPLENDID
POEM.
Poet, build for me a splendid poem
Wherein my soul may dwell,
And, in the sure supremacy of truth,
All doubts of God repel.
Build me a high, unconquerable hope
That atheists cannot shake:
Build me a moated castle of true faith
That doubt shall never take.
clothe me in the golden mail of faith
'Gainst engines of despair,
And furnish me against the siege of doubt
With living waters there.
worker in the spirit stuff of thought,
Build me this citadel,
Build me this moated, heaven-kissing seat,
And there my soul will dwell,
And living faiths shall like tall sentinels
Cry down, Who goeth there?
And naught shall enter that abode of light
Save who is heaven's heir.
And Other Poems. 203
EROS SEEKING.
The golden sunshine broods o'er fairyland,
The crystal waters meet, and kiss, and part;
The purple mountains rise on either hand
Far-distant like some magic dream of art;
The heavens with odorous airs are fan'd,
But Love goes searching on with anxious heart,
Goes searching through the tender, livelong day,
Aye putting by the flowers from his onward way.
All night among the fairy hills he sought,
Nor rested when the morning star grew dim;
And often was his trailing mantle caught
On thorn and brier and overbranching limb.
All night, and all the eve before he sought
Aye by the pale light of the moon's cold rim;
And still he hastens on with anxious heart,
And still his troubled breast his weary wings ex-
hort.
Ah ! where is Psyche, his immortal Queen ?
He cannot find her anywhere no more:
Not in all fairyland hath she been seen
Since last the golden tide set from the shore:
Gone as a bright star from the blue serene
Leaving an empty space to tremble o'er;
Gone as splendor out of fairyland,
Evanishing in heaven like a mist thrice fan'd.
204 lone,
Poets, searching in a land of dreams
For Beauty with the red rose in her hair,
Have ye seen Psyche by Olympus' streams
Eesting her wings upon the haunted air,
Or in the white light of the moon's bright beams
Sleeping forgetful of her love's despair?
if ye have, then hasten with the news
Back where young Eros weeps amid the silver
dews.
LAUGHOLOGY.
There's palmistry, phrenology,
And old astrology,
And other "sciences" manifold
To tell your fate and get your gold.
There 're many who can "see
Your fate in leaves of tea,"
Or in crystal spheres
Foretell the coming years.
But, ah, my friend, were I
The least inclined to spy
Through keyhole small or great
In Time's three-barred gate,
I'd do it otherwise
Than by reading of the skies,
And Other Poems. 205
Or human hand or head,
Or leaves of tea outspread,,
Or gazing in a sphere
Of crystal, smooth and clear.
The human laugh would be
My chart of destiny,
And they who laughed the
Would lead the rest
In everything that ? s good
For woman- or man-hood;
While they who never laugh at all
A merry ha! ha! ha!
Ho! ho! ho!
For them I'd prophesy a fall,
And failure and despair,
And wretchedness and care,
An empty bosom and a fortune bare,
SET A WINDOW.
O set a window in thy soul
And let it face the True,
And plant the rose of Beauty there
And water it with dew.
206 lone,
cut a door within thy heart
And give to Love the key,
That only Love may come and go,
Aye debonair and free.
build a highway to thy brain
Wide as Eternal Truth,
That angels, four-abreast, may come
To thee in age and youth.
clear the waste-lands of thy life
And plant great thoughts and true,
Which, like tall cedars, will draw down
Sweet heaven's rain and dew.
LIVE ON, OLD TREE !
Live on, old tree,
And cast thy pleasant shadow o'er the ground!
Be thou a shelter to the dove's white wing,
A living choir where sweetest birds shall sing:
Let all thy branches be one sober green
Till autumn comes; then hap'ly will be seen
A veil of saffron, aureate and warm,
Cast over thee, as by some magic charm
And Other Poems. 207
Of air or heaven : then come winter down
And robe thee in warm ermine snow, and crown
Thee king of maples.
0, thou faithful tree,
If brutes inherit immortality,
Shalt thou not also ? Surely thou shalt be
Among the risen, and forever stand
A tall, green angel in the Holy Land.
THE SPIRIT OF WAR.
I am the Spirit of War, and inherit
One-third of this earth for my own;
And millions unborn in my name shall mourn
And bleed at the foot of my throne.
I ride on the blast, and my wings overcast
Temple and church and home;
And I sweep to their doom tall cities that bloom
With a splendor never on Rome.
I fill the earth with a ghastly mirth,
With the revels of drunken men,
With the mob's wild shout and the licensed rout
Of the pillager broke from his den.
208 lone,
I kill the bride at the bridegroom's side;
I slay the babe at the breast;
I glut the grave with the fair and the brave;
I torture and burn the best.
As under an arch, the nations march
Under my wings outspread;
And Death, with the Fates, in my shadow awaits,
And Horror uprears her head.
Oh, I am the same as the Fiend but in name,
Yet the preachers call me sublime,
And the poets bring unto me as a king
Their tribute of stately rhyme.
I sicken the moon with corpses strewn
By glade and by field and by flood :
I fatten all hell with powder and shell,
And gorge all her furies with blood.
To my lips I hold up as a chalice or cup
The skull of the innocent child;
And ravish the maid that I have betrayed,.
And flay her when she is defiled.
I have come and gone, with bloody sword drawn,
Wherever the blue sky domes,
And have dragged an iron net with heart's blood
wet
Through every bright land of homes.
Kn'd Other Poems. 209
With cannon and shell and the banners of hell
I lead my myriads on,
And where at dusk was a land of musk
Is the vale of Hinnom ere dawn.
Oh, I am the sorrow of earth, and I borrow
The pangs and the torments of hell,
And I rack not alone the flesh and the bone
But I torture the soul as well.
Oh, I am that Shape that few shall escape,
And Death has built me a throne,
And I shake the earth like an earthquake's birth,
And bind it with bloody zone.
And whenever men make an excuse for my sake
The devil then laughs aloud,
And for every plea in favor of me
Death weaves another shroud.
IN THESE, OUR TIMES.
In these, our times, when time is everything,
There 's time for all things either new or old :
Time without end for gaming and for gold,
For fashion, nettle-like of bloom and sting,
2io lone,
For news and gossip of the throne and king;
For novels, plays, and players manifold;
For sports unnumbered: time, when all is told,
To harp a thousand tunes on folly's string:
Time for all things, save poetry alone,
Save rhyme and rhythm and their melodious
scheme :
Save Beauty girded round with jewels of tone
Soft-pacing by the bright Aonian stream:
Save distant glimpses of the dim Unknown
Through poetry's casement opening on the
Dream !
SO DEEP IN LOVE AM I.
could I sing but one more song,
One song before I die,
I'd sing of love to thee, my Love,
So deep in love am I.
had I but one other dream,
One dream before I die,
I'd dream thy face was shining, Love,
My open casement by.
And Other Poems. 211
had I but one other wish,
One wish before I die,
I'd wish thy path through roses, Love,
Though I beneath them lie.
could I take one treasure hence,
One treasure when I die,
Fd take a kiss of thine, my Love,
So deep in love am I.
THE BOOK OF THE YOSEMITE.
Have you read from that Book that was written
of old,
When the heavens were young, and the planets
new hung
On hinges of diamond and gold ?
Have you read from that volume, that wonderful
tome,
With the light of the ages a-glow on its pages,
That Book with the West for its home?
Have you read its great metre, its marvelous lines,
With a wonder of thought that puts Shakespeare
at naught
As brambles are dwarfed by tall pines ?
212 lone,
It is bound in the purple of heaven convex,
And its characters are each fresh as a star,
And God has illumined the text.
',T is a lyric by morn, and an epic by night,
A bright drama by noon, and beneath the soft
moon
An anthem to beauty and light.
thou Book of Yosemite, Heaven writ thee,
And thy verses are sung in bright Heaven's own
tongue,
And run through all harmony.
In the glory of noon I have read thy great lines,
And re-read thee at night by the silver moonlight,
O'ershadowed by whispering pines.
1 have read thee by twilight, and read thee by
dawn;
And re-read thee at dusk, when the earth was all
musk,
And all the sweet night have read on.
thou Book of the Soul, oh, thou Volume su-
pernal,
You run into song that our pulses prolong,
And glow with a freshness eternal.
And Other Poems. 213
And millions unborn shall be charmed by thy
And when Homer is not, and great Milton forgot,
Thou still shalt be read of the ages.
CALL HIM A POET.
Horny his hands and uncouth is his speech,
And the pen unfamiliar to him;
Born to the soil as an ox to the plow,
With the strength of an ox and the limb.
Ah, but his soul is a true poet's soul,
And the work of his brain and his heart
Heaven has weighed and the angels have praised
As the bright consummation of art.
Not as a closeted singer he sings
Till the heat of his frenzy grows cold,
Nor as a poet who writes and writes on
For the guerdon of honor or gold;
But as a human who loves and is loved,
Who has taken a fatherless child,
Nurtured it kindly and made it a home
And has kept its young life undefiled.
214 lone,
Taught it to honor the good and the great,
And forever beware of deceit:
Shaped its young soul as a poet his dream,
Immortal and rounded and sweet.
Call him a poet who labors like this,
Though he never has written a line;
Not a mere maker of idle-sweet lays,
But a builder of beauty divine.
TAKE THAT PICTURE FROM THE
WALL.
take that picture from the
And cut a window there,
And let the golden sunlight in
Upon the scholar's chair.
take that battle scene away,
That work of blood and death,
And let the blue of heaven in
And summer's gentle breath.
Take down that painting, take it down,
Unfix that bloody scene,
And let in visions of the sky
And meadows sweet and green.
And Other Poems. 215
Make way for heaven's fragrant air,
For glimpse of lambs at play,
For scent of ro^e and song of bird,
And waters far away.
O God, we've had enough of war,
Of blood and death and fear;
Of manhood bleeding at the front
And dying at the rear.
Then take, oh take, that painting down
Upon the schoolroom wall,
That cruel, bloody scene of war
With death-dew over all.
For Christ's sweet sake, oh take it down
And cut a window there,
And let the golden sunlight in
Upon the scholar's chair !
GOD, IF EVER WE HAD CAUSE FOR
FEAR.
God, if ever we had cause for fear,
For deep solicitude and anxious care,
If ever we had need of wakeful prayer,
This is the season, this the solemn year !
216 lone,
The fatted Time has turned away its ear
Deaf to Thy chiding whispers on the air,
To dance lasciviously to the snare
Of luxury, and lust, her foul compeer!
A storm is sweeping up to-morrow's shore,
Already are the heavens overcast;
The true, far-seeing prophet shakes before
The future like a reed before the blast !
What can we hope for when these times are o'er,
These times that, conscience whispers, cannot
last?
'T IS BETTER FAR.
'T is better far to be unknown
Than 't is to be forgot:
To never have achieved a name
Than know oblivion's blot.
'T is better to have gone one's way
Unnoticed and unsung,
Than after splendid days to be
Forgot of old and young.
From out the book of glory struck.
From memory's tablet razed,
A looker-on where once you shone,
Forgot, unsought, unpraised!
And Other Poems. 217
MAKE ROOM FOR YOUTH.
Make room for Youth, ye gray-haired sires,
Make room for Youth and daring;
Make room about your council fires
For Youth with kingly bearing.
He comes with knowledge on his tongue
And courage in his heart,
And courage never is too young
To play a god-like part.
Make room beside your eldest chief
And by your wisest too
Who banish Youth must welcome Grief
And all her retinue.
Make room for Youth, for kingly Youth,
Make room, I say, for him
Afar he shall discern the truth
When your old eyes are dim.
He comes through time's star-blazoned door
With eager strength and laughter,
With Promise pressing on before,
Fulfillment hasting after-
218 lone,
THE COLUMN.
Those stones itand longest whereon truths ar
writ!
Let Justice then be graven in the base
Of yon bright column, which we have seen fit
To rear to heaven in this time of grace
When good comes to all men and comes apace:
Justice, not "Liberty"; Justice and Law!
That cycle which the sure and coming Race
Shall run without illusion, and shall draw
All kingdoms to its sphere, as Christ of old fore-
saw.
We live for sterner and for deeper truth
Than that for which our fathers bled and died,
And not to "Liberty" yet without ruth
We rear this column by the beating tide.
And when its corner-stone has fallen aside
Its sentiment shall still be sweet and strong!
Yea, Justice shall endure and be our guide
When "Liberty" shall have become a song,
A closet-passion that the bards alone prolong.
To Justice and not "Liberty" we build
This stately column by the sounding sea.
Another, brighter morn than ours shall gild
Its crowning arch and fretted masonry,
But from yon blue, eternal canopy
And Other Poems. 219
The sun shall never shine on monument
Reared to a nobler cause and destiny
Than this we dedicate, without dissent,
To Justice and to Law the voice and instrument.
We know that "Liberty" is not the whole
Of that high destiny whereto we're led,
Nor yet the noblest part, though poets enroll
"Freedom" and "Liberty" the fountain-head
Of grace unto the living and the dead.
Our chief concernment it has ceased to be,
And has become a name less heard than read,
More often met with in past history
Than where men dare and suffer or on land or sea.
Ah ! not that "Freedom's" stars less brightly shine
Do we to Justice dedicate this stone,
But that in heaven has been seen divine
A brighter star than o'er our fathers shone.
Ah ! not that "Liberty" has been outgrown
And no more can delight us or invite,
But that "Liberty" is not enough alone
To lead us onward. We need another light
Than that which was our fathers though pleasant
in their sight.
The spirit of our fathers is put by
Ah! not because our kindnesses transcend
Our fathers' kindnesses, but that we descry
A glory that they could not comprehend:
22O lone,
We work not nobler, but to a broader end,
We are not sterner, but the truth is more;
We're not the braver but we apprehend
A deeper meaning than has been before;
We look beyond the stars and see a further shore.
Our fathers flashed a sun to light the world
And lo ! it shows us fairer worlds beyond
Whereto we move with "Freedom's" flag unfurled,
But Justice now the spirit and the bond
Of man's best feelings which shall not de-
spond !
Our fathers made us fine with liberty
And we are finer for the truth; more fond
Of justice since they fought to make men free:
Raised by their works we grasp a broader phi-
losophy.
DARKEN THE WINDOW AND DARKEN
THE DOOR.
darken the window and darken the door
And take this red rose from my hair:
go from my presence and vex me no more;
leave me alone with despair.
And Other Poems. 221
let me forget that the heavens are blue,
let me forget it is June:
let me forget that you vowed to be true,
let me forget or I swoon!
this is the morning when we were to wed,
this is the day of all days !
And now you avow that your passion is dead,
And we must go opposite ways.
well for your soul that you find this is so
Before 't is forever too late!
well for your soul ! Fare you well now, and go,
To her whom you love and not hate.
go to the woman that stole you from me,
go to her side and rejoice !
She casteth the spell of the wanton o'er thee,
And shame lures you on through her voice!
HYPOCRISY.
A poet writing with a stolen pen,
Imparting honesty to youth;
A harper harping on a pilfered harp,
Singing of truth;
222 lone,
A robber giving alms of stolen wealth;
A parricide toasting his murdered sire's health !
Can foul hypocrisies
Strike deeper root than these?
Ay, when a public trust
Is used to glut a private lust:
When war is forced upon a land
In Liberty's bright name,
That some official's bloody hand
The proper moment and the hour
May grasp the mane of power
And mount to wealth and fame
And cheat an injured people of a patriot's acclaim !
THE TWO VOICES.
FIRST VOICE.
The sun of Liberty has sunk to rest,
Gone down in depths abysmal, dark, and vast,
As sinks Hyperion into the west,
Its last hour loveliest but ah, its last,
And Tyranny comes forth like stormy night
When wild beasts stalk abroad and howl from erery
height!
And Other Poems. 223
No glow of Freedom's golden sun remains
Save that reflected by the poet's line;
Gone is its glory from the level plains,
From wood and mountain, home, and fount, and
shrine ;
And we who watched the setting of that sun
Shall never, never see its dawning! No, not one!
SECOND VOICE.
Who can call back the morning, or bind fast
The golden sun that sinks into the sea?
Nor man nor angel ! But from forth the vast
Shall dawn another morn right gloriously:
So shall the sun of Freedom once again
Flame in the zenith, and burn from Ind to Darien !
MY LOVE A CONSTANT BEAUTY IS.
My love a constant beauty is
A constant joy and wonder;
Nor artful plot nor evil league
Can part us 'twain asunder.
She dwells along a flowery way
Where sorrow visits never:
I've loved her since the roses came
And I shall love her ever.
224 lone,
She wears one jewel on her breast,
But in her heart an hundred.
Ah ! how I lived ere yet we loved
I've often vainly wondered.
FOUR BOOKS.
I.
This book is like a little sun
As warm and bright and golden
And gildeth all it treats upon
Of modern times or olden.
Dear God ! it shineth in my face
Whene'er I turn its pages,
All warmth, all cheerfulness, all grace.
So may it shine for ages.
II.
This book is like an hermitage,
Where I may pass at even
A quiet hour with poet and sage
And spirits kin to heaven.
And Other Poems. 225
Where there is much to speak about
And more to love and rev'rence;
Where never cometh darker doubt
Nor life and God are at severance.
III.
This book is like a good old man
With frosty heart yet kindly;
The leader of a little clan ;
Decided, but not blindly.
One who has traveled and seen much,
Yet holds the world discreetly;
And though with but a few in touch
In touch with those completely.
IV.
This book is like a mighty world
In the firmament suspended,
From forth the hand of genius hurled,
With its own sun attended.
A world eternal and sublime,
With life and matter teeming;
With its own mountains, seas and clime,
And gods above them dreaming.
226 lone,
THE POET.
Nobly he writes of what was nobly done,
Building great verses on from sun to sun :
Now paints a god, now limns the hand of Fate,
And makes his verses like his subject, great:
Now hears the thunder rolling far along
And echoes back its voice from peaks of song:
Now clashes mighty verses till they rock
Like war's confusion, or an earthquake's shock!
He looks upon the sunrise, then in rhyme
Reflects its chastened glory for all time:
He sees the gates of evening open wide
And the silver moon come forth like heaven's
bride,
Then makes it evening once again in song,
And from his verses, bright and clear and strong.
As from another east there doth arise
A poet's moon that climbs the azure skies.
He adds great verse to verse like star to star
And with his hands the gates of truth unbar.
He looks on lovely summer like the stream
Reflecting all the glory and the dream.
Like some charmed, silent household Nature ileepi
Until the poet comes and laughs and weeps,
Then Nature through her myriad halls awakes
A living thing, that breathes and joys and aches !
And Other Poems. 227
When all the gods are dumb he bravely speaks
And Beauty's end and not his own he seeks!
In crystal verse he sets a crystal thought,
Or tools a sonnet like a gem inwrought.
His lovely verses cluster 'round their theme
Like roses 'round their stem. He wakes the Dream
That sleeps with Silence and sends it forth to be
A glory and a light eternally !
HER STEP IS MUSIC AT MY DOOR.
Her step is music at my door,
Her knock is sweetest song;
And when she speaks a gladness leaps
Somewhere my heart along.
Her face awakes the man in me,
Her touch awakes the god:
I am no longer since she came
A dull and selfish clod.
TAKE DOWN THOSE GIFTS.
Take down those gifts you've brought for me
Those costly gifts, I pray,
And hang a dream upon the tree
This holy Christmas day.
228 lone,
Take down those gifts so rich and rare
Which you in love bestow,
And hang upon the branches there
One dream of long ago.
Hang me a dream of darling youth
Upon the Christmas tree,
A dream of glory, hope and truth
Such dreams as used to be!
little need have I this day
Of gifts of pearl and gold;
My hair, you see, is turning gray
And I am growing old.
But, oh, for one bright dream of youth,
One dream of boyhood pride,
When life seemed honor linked with truth
And love walked at my side.
Then take those costly gifts away,
And on the Christmas tree
Hang me one dream of boyhood's day
Such dreams as used to be !
And Other Poems. 229
LASS OF THE LAND OF THE LISTED
LANCE.
lass of the land of the listed lance,
maid of the tilt and the tourney,
Send me a glance
From old romance
And my heart will go on a journey,
Back to the days of amour and armor,
Of herald and knight and esquire;
The days of chivalry,
Love and revelry ;
Days of the lute and the lyre.
Days of the joust ere armor in rust
Hung on the wall unregarded:
To times romantic
By shores Atlantic,
When bards like kings were rewarded.
There, there to kneel at thy feet and feel
The power of love and its magic;
Of love unacquainted
With days that are tainted,
With days that are tainted and tragic!
230 lone,
THE HUMAN TONGUE.
The tongue has parted more friends than death,
Has blasted more hopes than war;
The tongue is sharper than the adder's fang
And it leaves a crueler scar.
The tongue can heal when medicines fail,
And under the human tongue
Is the balm of Gilead which bringeth peace
Whenever the heart is wrung.
The tongue is a flaming sword of truth,
Or a serpent coiled to sting :
The human tongue is a poisoned well
Or an angel-haunted spring.
The tongue is a fiend forever at home,
A scorpion hid in its nest;
A foul tarantula shut in its hole
And woe unto they who molest !
The tongue is love's baptismal font;
The wing of eternal truth :
The surest, keenest weapon of God;
The armor of age and youth.
And Other Poems. 231
The tongue is a trumpet that 's keyed in hell
To summon the fiends from below :
The tongue is a harp from heaven's bright choir
And its music makes heaven to glow.
never a witch's broth is brewed
In the foulest depths of hell
But a human tongue is cast therein
To treble the damnable spell.
never a drama of love is played
But the chief and the crowning part
Is enacted by the human tongue
Whose cue is a loving heart.
the human tongue is an angel bright,
Or a devil a-smoke with hell;
And over all life has power to cast
Its blessed or evil spell!
PLUCK AND LUCK.
Now gold is where you find it, lad,
But friends are where you make them ;
While opportunities are had
Wherever you awake them.
232 lone,
Sometimes our dearest friend is gained
Within the f oeman's castle ;
And Fortune, bravely entertained,
Can oft be made our vassal.
Then never talk of "luck" and "chance";
They have no sure existence.
Away with "happy circumstance"
Naught's certain but persistence !
Mere luck is like the flowers that grow
Upon an untilled heather
A little while they bloom and blow,
Then die in frosty weather.
While pluck is like the apple tree
That bears in cold November,
Whose fruit you pluck right merrily
And roast in golden ember.
And true pluck has a luck its own
That luck alone has never;
And you will leave all luck alone
Save pluck-luck, if you're clever.
And Other Poems. 233
DRIFTING.
I'm further away from the old home-light
And away from my father's door,
And further away from heaven to-night
Than I was ever before.
I'm further away from Honor's side,
And further away from God,
And further away from my mother who died
And the paths she blessed and trod.
I'm further away from mercy to-night,
Yet nearer unto my grave:
I'm drifting away from the kindly light,
Drifting on sin's dark wave.
I'm nearer than ever before to shame,
And nearer to evil resort ;
And nearer to staining my father's name
And breaking my sister's heart.
Fm further away from heaven to-night
Than I was ever before ;
And further away from the old home-light,
And a mother who comes no more.
234 lone,
THOU WHO ART DIVINELY GIFTED.
thou who art divinely gifted
With the bright genius of song,
Yet who never, oh never, have lifted
Thy voice against wrong:
singer of a thousand sweet lays,
builder of beautiful verse,
Yet who never, oh never, once flays
Sin, or its curse.
turn from the paths of beauty,
wake from thy dreams of delight ;
Gome into the arena of duty
And smite for the right.
Come forth with thy magical numbers,
Come forth with thy star-pointed pen:
Shake off the dream that encumbers
And mingle with men.
the lily needs not thy adorning,
And the rose is lovely enough;
But the vicious need thy warning
And the proud thy rebuff.
And Other Poems. 235
Let the little poets and the narrow
Sing sweetly of beauty and youth ;
Be thou a swift-flaming arrow
In the quiver of Truth.
THE WHEEL OF CHILD LABOR.
the wheel of labor, the wheel of child labor,
It turneth 'round night and day,
And oh brother, oh sister, oh friend, and oh neigh-
bor,
'T is wearing young lives away.
For ever and ever it whirleth around;
No pause, no cease, no rest :
It crushes our little ones unto the ground,
It dashes the babe from the breast.
Oh a wheel of fire is the wheel of child labor,
And it burns to the very brain;
? T is crueler than either the sword or saber;
'T is dark with a bloody stain.
It smokes with sacrifice through the long years,
It smokes with the blood it has spilled :
'T is a wheel turned 'round by a river of tears.
God, the young lives it has stilled !
236 lone,
Around and around for ever and ever,
And Death goeth 'round with it;
Around and around and the toiler, oh never,
Can pause till the worn heart split.
Around and around and, oh night and day!
How the faces of the toilers change;
How they change, how they fade, how they waste
away,
How awful they grow and how strange !
the pity of it ! the sorrow of it !
the shame ! the brutality !
the crime of it ! the horror of it !
the black inhumanity !
A PRAYER.
Lord, give me for my fortieth year
A heart for any fate;
A spirit firm, yet not severe;
A body temperate.
A conscience free of guilty
A hand for charity ;
And Other Poems. 237
A mind above the little creeds ;
A soul that dares be free.
My feet upon the solid ground
My head the stars among;
A depth that gold can never sound ;
A nature ever young.
Good health, good friends, good books, pure
thought ;
A mission worth the while;
A lin'age to be loved and taught;
A woman's wifely smile.
WHEN SHALL DAWN THAT SPLENDID
DAY?
when shall dawn that splendid day
When we of mortal race
Shall gravitation's anchor weigh
And sail the seas of space?
Leave earth, like some low coast, behind
And cleave towards the moon:
On! on! as bounding as the mind,
With all the man in tune.
238 lone,
Beyond the winds, beyond the clouds,
Through meteoric storms,
To where eternal darkness shrouds
World-without-end alarms.
Past golden planets of the blest,
And dance of married spheres,
And moons all pallid with the rest
Of a thousand million years.
Past worlds that are but matter's ghost
And ancient track of suns;
Around that ultimate, dim coast
Where hoary Chaos stuns.
On waves of star-dust sailing fast
Beyond Orion's seas,
To make an anchorage at last
Among the Pleiades!
ODE TO LIBERTY BELL. .
Ring out, thou blessed Bell!
Ring out the King, ring in the State!
Ring out, and let thy music swell
To heaven's starry gate!
And Other Poems. 239
Seraphs have thy tongue unbound,
Seraph faces throng thee 'round,
While in thy pauses sweet Heaven's deep organs
sound !
Proclaim sweet Freedom's name!
Proclaim that blessed hour has come
To which the martyrs looked through flame
In holy martyrdom !
Ring thou out o'er field and town,
And all other voices drown
Long hath Freedom been crushed down,
Weaving her tears like stars into the martyr's
crown!
Cease not that blessed note!
Cease not that holy harmony
Pouring from out thy brazen throat
Till kings shall bend the knee !
Till each perished hope shall rise
From the tomb wherein it lies,
And clothe itself in living light
To lead a People through a revolution's night !
Ring out, thou blessed Bell!
Ring out a glory hath been born !
Ring out, and let thy music swell
Above the rising morn!
240 lone,
All the air thou solemnize
And this hour immortalize
As o'er the sun of Europe a brighter sun doth
rise!
HANNAH MOORE.
I had a sweetheart, but we parted
At one sad evening's close;
Alas! we quarreled and broken-hearted
I left my sweet Irish rose.
She lives at cottage number ten,
Where drooping willows stand.
might I see her face again,
might I touch her hand!
I'm waiting, waiting, Love,
Until you smile again,
Until you welcome me
At cottage number ten;
The little cottage home
With roses o'er the door
But the sweetest rose within
My bonny Hannah Moore!
And Other Poems. 241
I loved my Hannah ere we parted
Since then I've loved her more;
And night and day I'm broken-hearted
And wish our parting o'er.
I could not miss the sun from heaven
Like I miss Hannah Moore:
I could not miss the stars at even
Like her face gone from the door.
A MORAL TALE.
Now listen, friends, and I will tell
And tell you plainly how 't hefell
I got this grievous crack:
And sure, sweet friends, you cannot fail
To find a moral in my tale
If you but have the knack.
Look where my head is broke across:
A bitter wound! and, oh, the loss
Of good, red honest blood!
This morning, at the break of day,
As I was jogging on my way
I came to Silo's flood.
242 lone,
The river it was wide and dank
I sat me down upon the bank,
And as I sat I thought,
Then came a robber after me
And fell upon me grievously;
And thus I him besought:
"Good friend, or if not friend, 'Good sir/
Prithee, put up thy stick of fir,
Nor crack my pate across:
Why should'st thou break an old man's head,
As gray a one as e'er touched bed,
Or bowed to king or cross ?"
That villain answered: "God defend,
If I don't crack thy noddle, friend,
Some other robber will;
And I've a wife and family
Who need thy gold right grievously;
So, friend, I do no ill."
And then he broke my head across;
A bitter wound ! and, oh, the loss,
Of good, red honest blood!
And then he robbed me of my purse
left me there for dead or worse,
And ferried Silo's flood.
And Other Poems. 243
HATE.
The quarryman, quarrying, sometimes findi
Deep in the heart of a stone,
A hideous, horrible, shriveled toad,
Aghast, agape, and alone.
So in quarrying into thy bosom to-day,
I found that thy heart is a stone,
And Hate, like a toad, is squatted within,
Agape, aghast, and alone.
MAY SUCH BOOKS PERISH.
may such books perish
Once and for all;
May no man cherish
Print them or scrawl!
They 're a delusion
Honest men know,
False in conclusion
Breeding confusion,.
Distraction and woe !
Put them behind you,
Don't let them blind you;
244 lone,
Hysterical, empirical,
Vain and chimerical,
Bare of amenity,
Truth and serenity;
Stript of humanity,
Lacking all sanity,
Honor, urbanity;
Heavy with vanity
And fulsome inanity!
the world's trouble
Forever's made double
By books like these;
They corrupt half our youth.
Demoralize truth,
And blight like disease!
They 're all for detriment,
Nothing for betterment,
Tools from the workshop
Of Satan and Sin,
Evil without and corrupt within!
Shame on their publication,
Stern be their reprobation,
Swift be their condemnation,
And damned be their preservation !
And Other Poems. 245
THAT GOOD INK.
that good ink
Which might make men think
Should curdle and blink
And thicken and stink
And be another link
'Twixt man and the devil
And all that is evil!
A LYING PRESS.
Hell has no torment like a lying Press,
Nor devils can devise a sharper rack:
No torture does it overlook or lack;
Cold, brutal, agonizing, pitiless!
It has no mercy, knows no sacredness;
An Inquisition of the soul, as black
As sunless hell ; a shape demoniac ;
A torture without hope, without redress!
Its type are scorpions and its ink, hell-fire,
Its staff are devils, and its editor
Another Legion ! 'T is a Beast of Hire,
Kept for the coward and conspirator,
246 lone,
The tneak, the scoundrel, felon, caitiff, liar,
Th bribed judge and the faithless senator!
FOR A SPARKLING BOWL OF
LAUGHTER.
for a sparkling bowl of laughter
That bright, authentic brew
That leaves no sting or flatness after
Such as my boyhood knew !
With gladness welling like bright bubbles
From out its depths of gold,
Cleansing the heart of all its troubles,
And loos'ning sorrow's hold.
for a goblet overflowing
With the bright, authentic stuff,
To lift to spirit lips all glowing
And drink till I cry Enough !
once again to drown my sorrow
In a mead too sweet to last,
Drink, and forget the bitter morrow,
Drink, and forget the past!
And Other Poems. 247
I LIKE TO THINK THIS BEST OF
WORLDS.
I like to think this best of worlds
Is going right ahead ;
That some new work is done each da)'
And some new thought is said.
"o 1
1 like to see old ways forgot,
Not sneered at but put by,
And everything brought up-to-date,
Beneath the dear blue sky.
I like to know machinery
Is doing half the work,
And men and women need no more
To slave like beast or Turk.
I like to smell the factory smoke
And hear the ring of steel;
In loom and forge as in the rose
God does himself reveal.
I like to know that thought is free,
Nor churches prisons are;
And men no longer cast their kind
'Neath bigotry's iron car.
248 lone,
I like this pleasant time of ours,
This twentieth century,
When there 's enough to go around,
And most are fat and free.
Let others prate of other days
And sing their doleful rhymes,
It is their souls that are poor, I think,
And not these kindly times.
LUTHER AT WARTBURG.
Though pardon veils her face in brass
My soul shall suffer no affright:
Upon my forehead is a light
That falls through neither stone nor glass;
This marble where I come and pass
Smells sweet, and glows the livelong night
With angels' feet. This faith upright
Man cannot break, though he harass.
Thy prisoner, oh, Roman See?
Nay, I am free to follow Him
Not followed by dull feet of clay,
But by the spirit. And, ye see,
Although these castle walls be dim
There 's light enough to kneel and pray !
And Other Poems. 249
I THOUGHT TO WRITE MY NAME IN
GOLD.
I thought to write my name in gold,
Where all would see and praise,
Where neither time, nor heat, nor cold
Could blemish, blot, or raze.
I thought to seize the poet's pen
And never put it down
Till on from Ind to Darien
Had traveled my renown.
I thought to achieve a work of art
A poet's burning lay,
That would outlive the human heart
And be as young alway.
But ah! the master bards are few,
And art is fearful hard;
And I have failed and bade adieu
To art and its reward.
And now I turn but not in scorn-
To Duty's lowly cot
To die unknown as I was born ;
Content to be forgot
250 lone,
Right glad at last that kindly deeds.
And love, and simple tasks,
Are all that manhood really needs,
And all that heaven askg.
TAKE BACK THESE HONEYED SONGS.
Take back these honeyed songs of love and youth
And give, oh give me youth and love again ;
Give me the workings of a boyish heart
And take the music of the poet's pen.
A primrose gathered in the May of youth
Smells sweeter than the queenliest rose of song;
Hope drinks its dew, while 'round its fragrant
brim,
Like painted butterflies, bright fancies throng.
Then take these honeyed song* of youth and love,
Take all their music and their garnered joy,
And give, oh give me love and youth again!
Ay, take the poet and give back the boy!
And Other Poems. 251
DUTY.
Like some steep path that leadeth
Unto a verdant lawn,
The path that leads to duty
Still leads to beauty on.
Yet upward and yet onward
Until you gain the crest,
Then all around shall dazzle;
The footprints of the blest.
THE BILLIONAIRE.
"How did the billionaire
Amass his mighty hoard ?"
The People asked the Poet,
The Poet asked the Lord.
The Lord leaned out of heaven
And took the rich man's heart
And bared it to the Poet.
(Well might that Poet start!)
And this is how the billionaire
Amassed his piles of gold:
As sad a tale as ever yet
The saddest poet told!
2$2 lone,
By cheat and deceit,
By guile and by wile,
By hook and by crook ;
By such deeds as would shame
The devil to name !
By robbing and jobbing,
And gambling and scrambling,
And fining and combining,
And squeezing and freezing,
And flaying and slaying!
By hoaxing and coaxing,
And duping and stooping,
Eailroading and goading;
Now cheating a tenant,
Now bribing a senate!
By backing and sacking,
Impeaching, overreaching,
Contending, offending,
And sweating and betting,
And altering and paltering!
By checking and wrecking,
And luring and sluring,
And juggling and smuggling,
And driving and conniving,
And beguiling and defiling!
And Other Poems. 253
By deluding, intruding,
Befooling, false-ruling,
Entangling and strangling;
Now watering stock,
Now "shearing the flock!"
By jewing and sueing,
And plotting and boycotting;
By hocus and pocus,
And ways insidious,
Deeds perfidious!
By hiding and dividing,
And shuffling and scuffling,
And shamming and damning,
And abusing and confusing,
And scarring and warring!
By pledging, then hedging,
And leasing and fleecing;
By the sweat of another
A friend or a brother,
A sister or mother !
By bribing and proscribing,
And loading and toad'ing;
By bickering and dickering;
By every transgression and evil concession
And act unbecoming a Turk pr a Hessian !
254 lone,
By exchanging, arranging, estranging,
By winking and slinking and stinking,
And lending and amending and pretending;
By gambling in meat and in wheat and in flour,
False-voting, promoting; devoting to money each
hour!
By hurting, diverting, perverting,
Debasing, disgracing, out-facing;
By buying and lying, the law still defying;
By crushing and hushing never once blushing ;
And steering and queering, the small voice of
conscience ne'er hearing!
By corrupting the nation with bribed 'ministra-
tion,
Ward-heeling and stealing, concealing and squeal-
ing;
By great sins and little for tithe and for tittle ;
Time-serving, still nerving the heart to worse
crime,
Valuing nothing that 's sweet or sublime!
By annoying and decoying and alloying and de-
stroying,
And supplanting and granting and recanting and
covenanting,
And fighting and back-biting and enditing and
slighting,
And Other Poems. 255
And feigning and paining and straining and stain-
ing,
And deceiving and grieving and thieving and be-
reaving !
By taking and breaking and raking and forsak-
ing,
And waylaying and betraying and dismaying and
delaying,
And shaving and slaving and depraving and basely
behaving,
And trading and evading and persuading and
masquerading and ambuscading,
And hating and adulterating and baiting and slat-
ing and inflating and falsely legislating!
O this is how the billionaire amassed his piles of
gold,
The saddest tale that ever yet the saddest poet
told!
THE MORAL POET.
His poetry is a shaft shot at a mark,
A flaming arrow hurtled through the dark
To pierce the heart of Wrong and lay it cold and
stark.
256 lone,
It is an engine terrible and bright,
Forever standing on the side of Right
To lay the evil flat and let in heaven's light.
Or is a deep, prophetic organ voice
That gives the listening soul of man no choice
But upright ways and pure. And conscience doth
rejoice.
He is an archer of the shafts of song,
Not for the dream or glory, but that Wrong
Shall die in all her towers the wide land along.
LOVE'S PYROGRAPHY.
She 's a picture on my heart,
Burned by Cupid's fiery dart,
Drawn by Love's pyrography,
And, behold, right gloriously !
Golden curls to twine and kiss;
Eyes like stars where souls in bliss
Dwell forever; creamy brow;
Cheeks like peaches on the bough;
Lips like rose in dewy mist;
Veins like running amethyst;
Oval chin and swelling breast:
Lovely, lovely, I protest !
And Other Poems. 257
Though I may forget the sun
And the worlds that 'round him run,
Moon and star and lesser light,
Morn and noon and dewy night,
Summer, winter, autumn, spring,
Home and country, church and king,
I shall not forget her name,
Free as heaven of all blame,
Nor her picture on my heart,
Burned by Cupid's fiery dart,
Drawn by Love's pyrography,
And, behold, right gloriously !
I DREAMT THE STARS ARE CHARACTERS.
I dreamt the stars are characters,
(0 heart, perhaps they are!)
And Wisdom taught me how to read
Them from afar.
Methought I read from Orion
Toward the Pleiades,
Read from the mighty scroll of God
His mysteries,
258 lone,
Those hieroglyphics of the skies,
The countless stars of night,
I read their eternal argument
By their own light.
And waking from that dream, I said
heart, perhaps ? t is true;
Perhaps the stars are letters writ
In the steadfast blue.
And we shall some day ages hence
Make all their truths our own,
As learning once interpreted
The Rosetta stone.
ALICE.
I.
O'er yon grave the stone is broken
And the flowers withered all:
There no loving words are spoken
And no tears of sorrow fall.
There a stranger in God's acre
Sleeps beneath the withered grass,
Where no gentle mourner lingers
Though an hundred come and pass.
And Other Poems. 259
O'er the grave a broken chalice
For no wreath collects the dew,
But beneath the sweet name Alice
Stand unfilled the long year through.
Alice! 't is a name for heaven,
For a soul among the blest;
'T is the sweetest name e'er spoken
Where young angels whisper "Rest !"
Alice! } i is a hope I've cherished
Through the long sweet-bitter years
Hopes have sprung and hopes have perished,
But this hope lies close as tears.
II.
She was fair and true and tender,
With a more than earthly grace,
And I think upon the lilies
When I think upon her face.
For we parted just at even
In a garden dim and sweet,
And the last bright beam of heaven
Crowned the lilies at her feet.
260 lone,
Many times returning summer
Since that day hath waked the rose,
Many times the purple aster
Hath been gathered to the snows.
But though season follows season
Alice comes not, nor is led,
And I ask my heart the reason
And it whispers, "She is dead!"
Yet I hope that she is living,
Though I fear that she is gone;
And that fear is like the midnight,
But that hope is like the dawn.
III.
Can it be my Love is sleeping
Dust to dust beneath yon stone,
Where a graven form is keeping
Watch in silence and alone?
Have I found my long-lost Alice
Where Death's ivy ever drips?
Have I found her in God's acre
With life's welcome on my lips?
And Other Poems. 261
? T is the same sweet name of Alice
And the grave is just her length I
my God ! did Death's rude malice
Touch her in her youth and strength?
'T is that same far-distant country
To whose shore she turned her face
Here she journeyed and ere winter
I had lost her and all trace.
Lo! within yon broken chalice
I will plant a young rose tree
And beneath the sweet name Alice
Write, Beloved, is it thee?
OLD DAN MILLER.
Old Dan Miller was a rare old soul,
Rotund of paunch and heavy of jowl,
Fond of his pipe and fond of his bowl,
His laugh contagion and his walk a roll.
Old Dan Miller never went out
To mend the world or turn it about;
Stayed in his inn and swore that the gout
Is trouble enough for a heart that is stout.
262 lone,
Smoked in his inn and vowed to his wife
That a quiet life is the only life,
That trouble and losses and sorrow and strife
Are the portion of travelers; and ate with his
knife.
Old Dan Miller was the king of hosts,
His signboard clattered between two posts;
He had his tales and he had his boasts,
Had been at nine weddings and seen three ghosts.
Old Dan Miller was merry of heart;
He held that to laugh is never an art,
Never a trick or a thing apart
But unto a man as the wheels to a cart.
He fattened his cattle and fattened his frau,
Fattened himself and his pot-boy Joe,
Fattened his mare till she hardly would go
Swore that good fat is salvation below.
Old Dan Miller was true as his word,
Slow to be moved and hard to be stirred;
Wanted the facts as the facts occurred,
And called it a lie when the truth was slurred.
Rare old fellow, in faith, was Dan,
Built on a rare if peculiar plan;
Pinched the children when their cheeks were tan,
Sighed when the children were peaked and wan.
And Other Poems. 263
Held that a prayer will do its work,
But a prayer can't finish what the hands shall
shirk :
Smoked his pipe like an ancient Turk,
And directed his pot-boy with nod and jerk.
Old Dan Miller was known to dream,
Singular thing though it may seem;
Dream and nod and nod and dream
Over the kettle's singing steam.
Dream of a better land than this,
Somewhere over the dark abyss,
Where the little babe would never miss
Its mother's face or her evening kiss.
Where death would be but a memory,
And his own little boy would laugh on his knee :
Where Tartar and Turk would at last agree,
And all men be fat and all be free.
Old Dan Miller is dead and gone;
Green is his grave as a bowling lawn:
Lord, may I meet his spirit anon
Keeping an inn in the new white dawn !
264 lone,
MY LOVE IS FULL OF PRETTY WAYS.
My Love is full of pretty ways
As May is full of mallow.
(Her eyes are blue as mountain pools,
Her hair a golden halo!)
My Love is full of kindnesses
As June is full of clover.
(No sweeter lass has ever tripped
This golden, wide world over!)
My Love is full of constancies
As March is full of myrtle.
(She brings me sunbeams in her eyes
And pansies in her kirtle!)
My Love is full of every good
As Spring is full of grasses.
(The meanest flower knows her step
And sweetens as she passes!)
THE POET IS A DEITY.
The Poet is a deity
And shapes a world his own,
And rules it from his steadfast mind
As from a throne.
And Other Poems. 265
He pours around it lucent floods
Bends o'er 't an azure sky,
And doeth all things lovingly,
Both low and high.
He makes the gentle rain to fall,
And sets the golden bow,
And builds the purple hills and crowna
Their heads with snow.
He brings the seasons in their turn
Mild autumn and bright spring;
And tilts the rose with morning dew
While sweet birds sing.
He dances forth the mountain brook
And weaves the fern-leaf there,
While piney odors rise and fall
Upon the air.
He hangs the heavens with new stars
Down all the zodiac,
And with his hand upbuilds the weit
With sunset rack.
He calls the forked lightning down
And hurls the thunderbolt,
And makes his heavens now to smile,
Now to revolt.
266 lone,
He shapes a thousand human souls
Of high and low degree,
And puts them down upon his world
To dwell and be;
And gives them human hearts and minds
And human love and longing,
And sets the shapes of Destiny
Amidst them thronging.
IF SHE SHOULD DIE TO-NIGHT.
If she should die to-night,
I'd call to mem'ry then,
With soul contrite,
All sad occasions when
I wronged that gentle heart of hers,
Which now God! so faintly, weakly stirs.
If she should die to-night,
How every wrong of mine
And petty spite
Shown her who gave no sign,
Would grow and wax upon my soul
And sting me with remorse past all control.
And Other Poems. 267
If she should die to-night,
The few, few faults she had
Would seem how slight!
And I should deem me mad
To ever once have spoken ill
To her whose place not all this world can fill!
If she should die to-night,
then I would recall,
With heart contrite,
Those many seasons all
Wherein were means to testify
My love for her, but which I let pass by.
If she should die to-night,
How stained my soul would seem,
But hers how white!
How like a selfish dream
My past would then appear to me;
While hers how rich, how filled with charity!
FATE.
Thou stern, inscrutable, eternal Fate,
Like he who scourged the ocean in his hate
Thinking to punish, even so are we
Who in our weakness lift a voice 'gainst thee !
268 lone,
How futile, then, must all arraignment seem
Hurled 'gainst thy godhead ! Futile as a dream,
Or engine hurtled 'gainst the morning mist
Which, ere 't is troubled, ceases to exist.
Yet, agonized, tormented, full of pain,
Still shall humanity thy ways arraign ;
Still storm thy ear as some high citadel,
To take it never : nor shalt thou repel
Its vain advance. The desert sphinx art thou,
Humanity the wandering airs that blow
Forever 'round thee: still thou lookest down,
Unmoved, unriddled, without smile or frown!
THE PRESENT.
The Past is dead, the Future yet unborn ;
The Present Lo ! 't is with me this new morn,
An all-familiar spirit by my side
From which I gladly would yet cannot hide.
It follows me; by God, it mocks me now!
I'll speak; perhaps 't will fade away:
"0 thou
Familiar Spirit, wherefore vex me so ?
Thou wast a stranger but an hour ago ;
I neither knew thee nor didst thou know me ;
Then wherefore shouldst thou be mine enemy ?"
And Other Poems. 269
"Thou never knew me ! Hast thou then forgot
Thou spurned me yesterday, thou foolish sot?
Hast thou forgotten and so soon forgot!"
"By Christ, I never spurned thee ! Nay, what 's
more,
I never looked upon thy form before.
Thou art a lying Present! Hence, Ingrate,
I hear the Future knocking at Time's gate.
She comes make way she comes, my queen, my
bride
Already I feel her presence at my side!"
"0 unprophetic, unrecollecting fool,
Thou novice in experience's school,
I am that Future knocking at Time's gate,
I am the spirit of the Past you hate,
And I'm the Present, too the awful Now
To whom the angels of the Lord do bow !
Go cleanse thy heart, and come and honor me,
Then shall the Future be as a bride to thee,
And all the past a blessed memory."
MY HEAET IS WITH MY BEES TO-DAY.
My heart is with my bees to-day,
Across the summer lea,
For there the clover is in spray
And Nellie waits for me,
270 lone,
Her hair a bank of sunshine is
And fragrant as the south:
I'd rather kiss its slightest curl
Than another maiden's mouth!
Her lovely voice is sweeter far
Than music in a dream ;
Her eyes are liquid as a star
That shineth in a stream.
I'd not exchange an hour with her
For heaven's longest June,
For Paradise without my Nell
Were a song all out of tune.
SHALL LOVERS DWELL APAET?
My happy heart goes on before,
My feet they hasten after :
Within my bosom is a store
Of undefiled, warm laughter.
I hear the blackbird's whistle clearly,
I hear the mock-bird's call:
I take the path I love so dearly
And skirt the garden wall.
And Other Poems. 271
Beneath her roses she is waiting,
The Musk-rose of my heart!
say, while all the birds are mating
Shall lovers dwell apart?
HER FORTUNE.
"'Your face is your fortune/ my pretty maid;
'Your face is your fortune/ dear," he said:
"Your golden hair and your eyes of blue,
Your cheeks like 'roses new washed in dew/
Your creamy brow and your dimpled chin,
Your Cupid's mouth and the pearls within:
'Your face is your fortune'; then come with me
To my castles three
Over the bright blue sea:
And tarry not, dear, for the nuptial troth,
For love is the wine and marriage the froth ;
And tarry not, dear, for the bright wedding ring,
But be you my queen and I'll be your king,
And over the dew,
All under the blue,
We'll hasten away to those castles three
Where Rapture is calling to you and to me!"
2jz lone,
"Oh no, oh no !" cried the pretty maid,
"My honor's my fortune, ?ny ' she said :
"A stainless name and a plighted troth
These are the wine and beauty the froth:
And your castles three
Over the bright blue sea
Shall ne'er be the tomb of Honor and me."
THE PROPHET.
"Alas !" they said,
"Our hands are red
With blood of prophet slain !
But ah, dear God,
Spare Thou the rod
And send Thy seer again.
"We did not know
W T ho struck him low
That he was seer of Thine;
We did not guess
He came to bless ;
We could not read Thy sign.
"The truth? he taught,
The deeds he wrought,
And Other Poems. 273
To us, ah, what were they!
We called him fool
Both church and school,
And stoned him ! Woe the day !
"But ah, dear God,
Put back the sod
That 's green above his grave:
Give him again
Into our ken
We know his lips can save.
"Give back the dead,
The seer that 's fled,
And we will homage do;
Low at his feet
We'll take our seat,
And learn of him we slew."
The good God heard
The people's word,
And did their prayer fulfill:
But lo! He gave
That seer from the grave
A broader wisdom still.
He raised that seer,
Dead many a year,
2 74 lone,
And gave him back to men;
But gave his brain
A richer vein,
His hand a wiser pen.
From field and waste
The people haste
To catch this prophet's fire.
He speaks and lo!
With shock and blow
They tread him in the mire.
Then God in pain
"Why hast thou slain
This prophet of my soul?
Dost thou not know
Thou hast struck low
Thy seer again made whole ?"
"0 hear, dear God,
And spare the rod!"
The fearful people groan:
"Lo ! o'er that seer
Dead many a year
We reared a church of stone.
"The truths he taught,
The deeds he wrought,
And Other Poems. 275
We made religion of,
And knelt we down,
Both king and clown,
And honored it in love.
"And he we stoned
To-day disowned
That holy church and law:
He said that we
In darkness be ;
Our best is only flaw.
"And this to us
Was blasphemous;
We stoned him ! Woe the day !
But hear, dear God,
Spare Thou the rod,
And give him back, we pray.
"Give back the dead,
The seer that 'B fled,
And we will homage do;
Low at his feet
We'll take our seat,
And learn of him we slew/'
276 lone,
TWO FRIENDS.
Two friends I had: Both went away;
I heard of them but yesterday.
One journeyed east, the other, west;
Both loved a song, both loved a jest,
And both were quick to understand,
Of open heart and warm of hand.
In height about the same, in face
Alike as brothers of one race
Though not one common parentage,
And equal, so I think, in age:
Their fortunes were about the same,
Ambitions much alike, and aim:
And so they went away, these two,
As friends have done and daily do,
One journeyed west, the other, east;
And which was greater, which was least,
In honor, manhood, heart, and head,
Not for my soul could I have said.
But now why now I hear it told
That one has bartered truth for gold,
Uncrowned himself of honor's crown,
Pawned all its jewels, and dashed it down,
And without turning, where he stands
Can touch a prison with his guilty hands !
And Other Poems. 277
While he, that other friend I had,
Has gone up higher: made the mother glad
That bore him, and a nation proud
To touch his hand and name his name aloud!
HOW SOON A NATION CAN FORGET,
LORD!
How soon a nation can forget, Lord,
How soon forget its troubled past, and sleep
In easy negligence, nor longer keep
At every door and gate stern watch and ward!
How soon a land is taken from its guard
When plenty smiles again and bread is cheap ;
How soon forgets it late had cause to weep,
When spoilsmen ruled and times were bitter hard !
let us then remember ere too late,
That only yesterday grim hunger's ghost
Walked in the land and troubled all the state,
While knaves and spoilsmen ruled from coast to
coast.
And shall we sleep forgetful of such fate?
Call up the sentries ! Send them to their post !
278 lone,
THE HOURS.
We lightly speak of killing Time,
't is not Time we kill;
It is an angel in disguise
That serves God's will.
The Hours they are living things
Not marks upon a dial,
Tall cherubim that come and go
In single file.
And some are clad in sombre black,
And some in faded gray,
While others come in living gold
And bright array.
Some bear the hawthorn in their hands,
Some bring the bitter rue;
While others hold a red, red rose
All bright with dew.
They come ! No king can stay their march,
No hand turn them aside;
They move like stately angels, or
Like spirits glide.
And Other Poems. 279
Not one is missing from his place,
Not one but passes on ;
A little while they are with us
And then they 're gone.
From whence they come or whither go
No mortal man can say,
But by their shining brows we guess
They 've passed His way.
Christ ! it were an awful thing
To harm the least of these,
For they are servitors of Him
Whom we would please.
They are His angels in disguise,
Bright shapes solicitous,
And as we measure unto them
So He to us!
NOTHING COMES OF IT.
I've tried and tried and tried again,
But nothing comes of it.
I've hoped and labored as few men,
But nothing comes of it.
280 lone,
I've done the very best I could,
But nothing comes of it.
I have been faithful, as I should,
But nothing comes of it.
I've toiled on water and on land,
But nothing comes of it.
I've labored with both brain and hand,
But nothing comes of it.
Fve risen early, late retired,
But nothing comes of it.
I've often done more than required,
But nothing comes of it.
I've studied to improve my work,
But nothing comes of it.
And rarely, rarely do I shirk,
But nothing comes of it.
All told, I've done the work of three,
But nothing comes of it.
I've sweated blood, it seems to me,
But nothing comes of it.
And Other Poems. 281
LIFE'S FAILURES.
Be not so rudely harsh with us
Though we are failures all,
Though we have fallen in the strife
And lower still may fall.
What though we wear no laurel wreath
And grasp no victor's prize,
We still have hearts that wrong can break,
Still tears can dim our eyes.
Still we are feeling flesh and blood,
Though humbled in the dust;
Still pray we to one kindly Judge
And labor still, and trust.
And Fate cannot so bar success
But God will leave a way,
That none may have so wholly failed
But shall succeed some day!
I KNOW. I KNOW.
I know, I know why the rose is so red,
Why the dews like a carpet of pearl are spread,
282 lone,
Why the nightingale sings from the wood all
night,
And the moon is enthroned on a mountain of
light!
I know, I know why the poet is awake,
Why the mocking-bird calls from the hawthorn
brake,
Why Beauty is walking abroad to-night,
And the east is clothed in a mystic light !
I know, I know why the silvery fall
Doth murmur and sigh and whisper and call,
Why the youngest flowers are awake to-night,
And Love's brightest arrow has sped on its flight !
I know, I know why the stars are all gold,
Why the sweetest story is yet untold,
Why the mountain pool is astir to-night,
And heaven will not let the earth from its
sight !
For Lydia, bright Lydia is coming at morn
Back unto the castle where she was born,
And nature is welcoming her all night
With beauty and fragrance and music and light !
And Other Poems. 283
THE STORM.
A storm is sweeping through my heart
With lightning and with hail,
And I am beaten to the earth
Beneath its jagged flail.
My soul is shaken like a tree
And stript of all its bloom;
Borne down before the hurricane,
Aghast beneath the gloom.
Wild thoughts are surging through my brain
Like panic-stricken things ;
Like beast and reptiles, tempest-lashed,
And birds with blasted wings.
I hear the nearing thunders now
Of conscience and of fear;
They split my 'guilty soul in twain
And blast my wild career.
The storm of God is on my head,
His awful hurricane,
And crushes me unto the earth
In body, soul and brain!
284 lone,
PALMISTRY.
What ! do I understand
My fortune 's in my hand
That here is writ
In the palm of it,
In lines that meet and cross,
All I shall he
Or do or see
My every gain and loss:
Life's history,
Death's mystery;
Each pleasure rare,
Each deep despair,
And all things whatsoe'er the future holds for me ?
It is a lie,
And but for coward souls would die!
I hold my fortune in my hand,
But hold it there at my command :
It rests with me
What I shall he.
And do and see,
And take and leave,
Adventure and achieve!
I am the master of my brain and brawn
And not necessity's ignoble spawn:
And Other Poems. 285
I hold my fortune in my hand indeed
But not in fleshy lines that human art can read !
Let knaves teach fools
The folly of the palmist schools,
And stoop their souls to shallow rules,
No fate embalms
My fortune in my palms
And turns a reverseless key
'Twixt what I am and what I'd be!
The future of a man is nowhere writ,
Nor yet in whole nor part,
And angels can but guess at it,
To miss or hit
By chance, not art.
The soul is free,
And ever was, and ever it shall be,
And can achieve the fortune that it dare,
And dare achieve all fortunes whatsoe'er!
I LOVED YOU FOR YOUR BEAUTY FIRST,
I loved you for your beauty first,
Then loved you for your mind,
Your gracious wealth of character,
Your spirit pure and kind.
286 lone,
You have a manner all your own
I cannot well express,
And sweeter than the viol is
The music of your dress.
You wear your learning like the rose
That trembles in your hair,
Where half concealed amidst your curls
It makes you doubly fair.
could I seal my love to-night
Beneath the fragrant flowers,
Then how much sweeter were my rest
And all my waking hours!
I WOULD NOT HURT HER LITTLE HAND.
I would not hurt her little hand,
But my poor heart breaks she;
I'd die for her on sea or land
Yet she '11 not smile for me.
She dwells my father's fields above
Beside the old mill-stone,
This blue-eyed lass that I may- love
But never call my own.
And Other Poems. 287
Yet though she loves another youth
I love the maiden still,
For love like mine, all trust and truth,
May not be changed at will.
NOT ALWAYS.
't is not always the golden pen
That writes the golden thought:
? t is not always the richest men
Whose favors most widely are sought.
't is not always the fairest in face
We love the longest and best:
't is not always the first in the race
We ask to be our guest.
Not always our chiefest thanks are his
Who plays the chiefest part:
And the first in rank not always is
The first within our heart.
O 't is not always the king that rules;
Not always the mighty overcome:
Not always from forth the greatest schools
The greatest scholars come.
288 lone,
't is not always the prince or the lord
Who plays the kingliest part:
And 't is not always the grandest bard
Who sings right into our heart.
't is not always the forwardest youth
That makes the foremost man:
And the plan that seems all virtue and truth
Is not always heaven's plan.
Then let the lowly take courage from this,
And let the exalted take care;
Let the faint look up and their fears dismiss,
Let the proud look round and beware.
NOW MORN UPON THE ROSY HILLS.
Now morn upon the rosy hills
Is looking o'er the valley
Unto that cot and pleasant spot
Where dwells my blithesome Sally.
Her lilies are the first to wake
And catch the sunrise-glory,
And now unfold such hearts of gold
As never were in story.
And Other Poems.
Her apple wakes her cheery tree,
Her cherry wakes the clover,
And now is heard the note of bird
And earth knows night is over.
To be alive and be in love
In such a morn and season
Is as near to heaven as shall be given
To we of mortal reason.
OF MANY FOOLS, I LOATHE THE MOST.
Of many fools, I loathe the most
That muddled, puddled oaf
Who holds that life's realities
Are bed and drink and loaf.
That clod who has no place for dreams
Among the list of needs,
Who holds as real those things alone
On which his belly feeds.
To whom immortal verse is naught,
And fine, enlightened taste;
And beauty but an empty mist,
And fancy's field a waste.
290 lone,
To whom all things are dreams save those
That he can eat or pawn,
Naught worthy second glance or thought
Save what he fattens on.
That earthly and besotted dolt
Who takes his narrow stand,
And blots from life's realities
What god-like souls demand.
Like one in total blindness born
Who bats his sightless eye,
And values far above yon sun
The stick he hobbles by.
Souls cannot live by bread alone
Hunger has deeper springs;
And beauty is a stubborn fact
And dreams substantial things.
KISS ME, DEAR, AND LET 'S FORGET.
Kiss nie, dear, and let 's forget
That our eyes were ever wet;
That our hearts were ever sad
With a world that 9 s mostly bad;
That our dreams come seldom true,
And are nothing when they do!
And Other Poems. 291
Kiss me, dear, and let 's forget
Memory is all regret;
All our days are empty urns
Where the ash of promise burns:
All our actions end in thought,
And all thinking comes to naught!
Kiss me, dear, and let 's forget
All things save that we have met;
Save the skies are blue above
And we have an hour for love;
Save our lips may meet to-day
Come to-morrow come what may!
THE DIVORCEE DINNER: THE LATEST
FAD.
Have you heard of that dinner, that wonderful
dinner ?
(Yet surely you have, though a saint or a sinner !)
'T was given of late
In a middle-west State
By a lady in society of perfect propriety,
Whose fads are philanthropy, church-work and
piety.
292 lone,
The fair hostess herself with her own hand indited
The prized invitations. The mansion was lighted,
The banquet was spread,
The wine glistened red,
The guests were thrice seven, the servants eleven:
The hostess was Madam Dean-Morgan-Hill-Nevin.
A three times divorcee, new wed in Dakota;
(Divorced in Ohio, New York, Minnesota!)
The guests at her board
Were her new-wedded lord,
Her three faithful lawyers Burke, Wilson and
Sawyers
Who won her divorces; forensic old warriors.
While seated between were the honorable judges
Who granted her freedom (which no man be-
grudges!)
And gave her respite
From marital delight,
And made her lords pony up good alimony.
(Ah, judges have hearts though their office is
stony!)
Still further along at the banquet were seated
Her three divorced husbands ; now royally feted :
While sleek and serene
Eight plain to be seen
And Other Poems. 293
Were the four reverend pastors (though pious, not
f asters ! )
Who wedded their hostess to marital disasters.
On the left, with their morals loose-fitting as
blouses,
Were the three divorced wives of her three divorced
spouses ;
While down at the foot
Of the table were put
Two sons and a daughter that marriage had
brought her:
Too youthful to sip of the wine without water.
And last, but not least t'other end of the table
Was seated her lover (a fact and no fable!)
The man she would wed
Ere the old year was dead
And divorce in the summer to wed a new-comer
A coachman or bishop, a lawyer or plumber.
And this is the dinner, the dinner-divorcee,
With a touch aristocratic and a touch that is
horsey,
Which the newspapers print
For all that is in 't;
The dinner select and the dinner correct,
The dinner which every good wife should affect.
294 lone,
LINES.
A cat lay dying in the gutter, and
A little child was staring at it there:
The child drew nearer and with stick in hand
Poked at the creature, ruffling its dank hair;
Then, drawing nearer still, with baby feet
Trod on the moaning beast, and laughed to hear
The thing complaining, like a toy that
squeaks
When pressed in the middle. A butcher's boy,
with meat
And basket, loitering on his way, drew near
And watched the baby with the rosy cheeks,
Moist yet with mother kisses, take a stick
And poke the creature's eyes out one was
blind;
Laughing with baby glee. Then with a brick,
The largest and the roughest he could find
After some moments' search, the butcher's boy
Drove at the creature, shouting as with joy:
Then, taking up the brick, hurled it again,
And once again the cat not yet quite dead;
Then, whistling shrilly, went upon his way
The little child looked after him and then
Plucked off his bonnet from his curly head
And singing to himself returned to play.
And Other Poems. 295
O GHOST, I HAVE THEE NOW.
say, thou foolish, fond and bow-legged ghost,
Since thou hast shuffled off the "mortal coil,"
Why dost thou daily haunt this distant coast
Called Earth this scene of former strife and
toil,
And fright we mortals with thy spectral shape,
Thy chuckling laugh, and legs that seem to
yawn
As if aweary? 'Ncath thine ancient cape
What loves contend ? What passions still live on ?
Oft have I met thee in our cellar-room
Hard by the cider keg. With pensive brow
Thou seemed but a deeper shadow in the gloom.
And She was there ! 0, ghost, I have thee
now
Thou lovest that freckled red-haired lass of suds
Who weekly washes for us, and then scuds !
THE PEN.
You may talk of the power of electricity,
That great science yet in its great youth;
But the PEN" is the lever that moves this old
earth
And the fulcrum it rests on is truth.
296 lone,
And good steam is a puissance not to be scorned,
And bright fire is the father of force;
But the PEN in the hand of a scholar or bard
Can move this old world from its course.
You may talk of the power of powder and shell,
And of rifle and mortar and gun;
But the battles achieved by the might of the PEN"
Are the only battles that are won.
For who conquer by powder, by steel, or by fire
Must conquer again and again,
But they conquer forever who conquer but once
By the might of the almighty PEN.
IF GENIUS WERE BUT CATCHING.
If genius were but catching, sweet,
I'd catch the poet's malady,
And wake some splendid burst of song
And dedicate it unto thee.
If riches were contagious, dear,
I'd take the rich man by the hand,
Then thou couldst dwell in crystal halls
And be a lady of the land.
And Other Poems. 297
If glory were infectious, love,
I'd go where glory brightest be,
Then millions would applaud my name,
And I I'd give that name to thee.
A LITTLE PEOPLE.
A little People o'er the sea
Have known themselves a year,
Have known themselves and will be free
To shape their own career.
The flower of liberty has sprung
On plain and hill and slope;
The dome of heaven has been hung
With a new star of hope.
The iron within their poets' blood
Has met war's two-edged flint:
The forehead of their young manhood
Has ta'en a new imprint.
They've cast their lead in sterner mold
That similitudes of kings:
They've found that commerce for their gold
From which a Nation springs.
298 lone,
They battle for their living faith
What land has fought for more?
They snatch a glory from stern death,
They sink, but not implore.
They bind the tyrant's hands abhor'd
And his fierce spirit awe;
They go forth with a two-edged sword,
Returning with the law !
TIRED !
I'm tired, tired, tired,
Too tired to creep:
I'm tired, dead tired,
Too tired to sleep.
I'm tired, tired, tired,
Tired unto death:
Too tired almost
To draw my breath.
I'm, tired, sick-tired,
Tired of it all:
Too tired to stand,
Too tired to crawl.
And Other Poems. 299
I'm tired, tired, tired,
Dead tired; fagged out:
Too tired to know
What it 's all about.
My heart is tired,
And my poor head:
And I'm too tired
To creep in bed.
I'm tired, tired, tired,
Too tired to sigh;
Too tired to live,
Too tired to die.
Tired, tired, dead tired;
Old, tired, and gray:
Too tired to rest,
Too tired to pray!
SHE IS A POEM!
she is a poem that angels have pen'd,
A poem of love without surfeit or end;
A poem forever delightful and new,
Eternal, supernal, and rounded and true!
300 lone,
she is a verse from the song of the spheres,
A rhyme from the joy of the ultimate years;
A madrigal sung in bright paradise,
A pulse of the paeans that balance the skies !
she is a song and awakeneth song;
A lyric that echoing poets prolong:
In music's anthology sweetest of all,
Awaking and taking each heart in her thrall!
maid with the large and luminous eyes,
You answer the Sphinx's immemorial whys,
You answer the riddle of life with your smile
And, lo, I have come to your palm-fronded isle!
ADELINE.
The miracle 01 flowers is undone,
The bobolink hath sought a brighter clime,
Dim clouds are driven o'er the darkened sun
And gusty winds bring in the winter time :
Big drops of rain are falling in the land
Drowning the meadows, where no fold is seen;
Leafless and cold against the barren moor
A single ash hath ta'en its blasted stand:
Hath faded from the lake a day serene,
A glory gone from heaven, a light passed
from the shore !
And Other Poems. 301
Beneath yon yew tree's shade, where no birds sing,
In linen scarf and faded mantle wound,
My Love hath slept since autumn's golden spring,
The earth high-piled above her dreamless swound ;
My Adeline hath slept a dreamless sleep
Nor knows the golden rod hath come and gone,
Nor knows the orchis lingered for her sake,
To perish only on the winter's steep;
My Adeline hath slept in death alone,
The bride hath slept the sleep the bridegroom
cannot break!
Above her head the morning rose shall blow,
The stately asphodel shall spring and wave,
The flower of winter star the sheeted snow
Tender and passionless upon her grave;
But in their beauty she shall not delight
Nor turn aside to gather them at morn;
She sleepeth now beneath the drooping yew
And hath no smiles sweet buds make doubly bright^
No youth the stately lily may adorn,
No golden hair to bind with roses wet with
dew.
She came with summer like this morning rose
I plucked upon my casement, sweet and lone;
She passed with summer, at one twilight's close,
Like petals that around my feet are strown.
302 lone,
Her death was as a golden fountain stopt
Upon a sudden in a morn of May
When birds sing sweetest 'round its crystal
well,
Or as a fragrant rose whose stem is lopt
Holding an hour of bloom e'en in decay,
The dew upon its leaves but death within each
cell.
While summer still was in the dream and gold,
And winged odors stirred the citron glen
My Love drew nearer, while I softly told
A story older than the poet's pen,
The story primal of the primal pair,
Forever new and oh forever dear!
When lo ! we heard a spirit footstep fall,
A fearful summons from the viewless air,
And Azrael rose in the twilight clear
And led my Love away toward Death's cham-
ber hall !
A NEW PLEASURE.
""0 for a new pleasure," the weary king sighed,
"A pleasure untasted before!"
And he turned from the revelers reveling wide
And passed through the golden-hung door.
And Other Poems. 303
"0 for a new pleasure; a novel delight;
A joy and a gladness unstaled !
Whoso shall discover it him I will knight,
For the pleasures of life have all failed."
The master of revels was there at the feast,
And heard the desire of his lord.
A greater magician ne'er came out the East,
And he thought of that master's award.
Up rose the magician and followed the king,
On hastened the king to the sea,
Where he envied the curlew his swift-flying wing
And sighed for the fisherboy's glee.
And envying and sighing sate down on the shore
And looked on the bird and the boy,
And, looking, he marvelled the more and the more
Whence came their pure spirit of joy.
Then a voice at his side and a presence recalled
The wandering thoughts of the king,
And spoke the magician "Since pleasure has
palled,
And shattered is joy's sweetest string,
"Learn you of the curlew who wingeth the shore,
And learn of yon fisherman's boy
This truth that has power to make the world o'er
A new heart is the only new joy.
304 lone,
"You who seek a new pleasure, go find a new heart
That labors in meekness and love,
Then pleasures as many and perfect will start
As stars from the heavens above!"
OUT OF MY BRAIN" THE MUSIC HAS FLED.
Out of my brain the music has fled
And out of my life the dream;
The poet in me is cold and dead,
And beauty no longer supreme.
Gone is the heart that leapt up in me
At the magical name of song;
Gone is the charm of melody,
Ay, gone these seasons long.
Like a spirit I moved in a spirit land
And nothing was common to me
The sound of a voice or touch of a hand
Could shake me with ecstasy.
But the wonder has passed like a dream of night,
never to come again,
And the world grows stale, and common, and trite,
And I the dullest of men.
And Other Poems. 305
The fame of a poet was nothing to me
But to feel as a poet was all;
I asked not the guerdon of melody
But to live in the poet's high thrall.
THERE ARE MORE WAYS OF PLEASING
GOD THAN ONE !
There are more ways of pleasing God than one !
More ways than building up His church for
Him,
And kneeling there beneath stained windows
dim
And praying to the Father through the Son.
The world is His, and all that 's kindly done,
Or nobly undertaken, is to Him
As dear as labor of those hands that trim
His altar candles at the set of sun.
He loves the merchant not less than the priest,
He loves the maiden dearly as the nun;
Blesses alike the home and church's feast,
And hath indeed in love no favorite one;
Oft prospering most what serves His church the
least,
For all that 's kindly done is godly done.
306 lone,
YOUR BEAUTY LEFT ME MARVELING.
Your beauty left me marveling,
Your coldness left me grieved:
That one so fair could be so distant
I would not have believed.
Perhaps they warned you I am poor,
The poorest of brave men;
But Fortune's wheel has turned before
And it may turn again!
True love like mine has lifted some
Unto a kingly throne,
And the doors to-night they turn me from
To-morrow may be my own!
CLARA O'DEE.
One rose in your hair
Makes summer for me,
rare, sweet Clare,
Clara O'Dee!
And Other Poems. 307
One smile from your lips
Brings back the lost June
With the tuberose scent
And the oriole's tune!
I pass the wine cup
And touch but your glove,
And my soul is caught up
In the white arms of Love!
Ah! the paths that lead
To paradise sweet,
Fd leave for the lane
That runs to your feet !
MY SWEET THOUGHTS ARE MY
DAUGHTERS.
My sweet thoughts are my daughters,
My brave thoughts are my sons:
Such are the poet's children
And oft his only ones.
I love them for their mother,
Their mother who is Song:
She 's all the bride I've taken
And ah, I've loved her long.
308 lone,
Her hair is more than golden,
And never shall be gray:
She came to me in beauty
And shall be young alway.
We dwell within a palace,
A palace of high faith,
Where sweet pipes play forever,
And charms the passion wraith.
Yet sometimes I am haunted
By a mortal maiden's face,
A countenance all beauty
A look all youth and grace.
And though to Song I'm wedded
And love her very much,
I hunger for the human,
I crave the human touch.
I feel the icy coldness
Of her, my spirit bride,
And long to clasp the maiden
That laugheth at my side.
And Other Poems. 309
TO TKADE.
To trade: for a little baby's smile
And the touch of a baby's hand,
A lady's diamond pointed pen
And stock with golden band.
To trade: a silver inkwell, chased,
And a gold-bound blotting-pad,
For the uncertain sound of two little feet
In softest moccasins clad.
To trade: a lady's writing desk
And paper seven reams,
For the joy that comes to a mother
When her babe first smiles in its dreams.
To trade: a dictionary of rhymes
And Roget's Thesaurus,
For a baby's mouth at my breast
And a love idolatrous.
To trade: the thousand thoughts and fancies
That haunt a poetess' brain,
For the one pure thought of a mother
For her little babe in pain.
310 lone,
To trade: a name in the magazines,
And a name in a book or two,
For my face caught up and reflected
In a baby's eyes of blue.
THE ROSE THAT BLOOMED IN EDEN
BLOOMS TO-DAY.
The rose that bloomed in Eden blooms to-day,
The nightingale that shut the primal eyes
To slumber and to dreams in Paradise
Still sings at even mid the bloomy spray:
The sun shines down with as elysian ray
As ever in that golden time ; the skies
Are not less purple; and yon heaven lies
No jot or league more distantly away.
It is our heart and not the world that ? s changed,
It is the heart the world is Eden still:
It is the spirit from its God estranged,
No change of wood or brook, or vale or hill.
Still are we living in bright Paradise,
Still, still in Eden 'neath edenic skies.
And Other Poems. 311
GONE, ONE MOKE FAITHFUL FRIEND.
Our old clock died this morning,
Our beautiful old friend:
Death came without a warning
And no one saw the end.
We woke to miss his greeting;
We looked to find him dead;
His heart no longer beating,
Death's angel at his head.
At first we thought him sleeping
With tired hands folded o'er,
But ah! his heart was keeping
The sleep that wakes no more.
He took the silent hours
And rung them like sweet chimes,
And come sunshine or showers,
His ways were true all-times.
When our little son lay dying
And we thought o' the cold, cold sod,
His faithful hands were trying
To point right up to God.
Gone one my verse shall hallow;
Gone one more faithful friend:
Gone and when I shall follow
As peaceful be my end.
312 lone,
SHE HAS HER FAULTS LIKE OTHER
MAIDS.
She has her faults like other maids,
Her foibles and her failings;
Her beauty has its little aids,
Her temper has its ailings.
She is not perfect, as I grant,
And, as I guess, quite mortal;
And neither learned nor ignorant
To that extent to startle.
Not always wrong, not always right;
A loved and loving human
Whom poets call an angel bright,
Philosophy, a woman.
Somewhere may be another maid
That artist might call fairer,
Whose hair is of a brighter shade,
Whose eyes and lips are rarer.
But nowhere is another lass
Whose love is all her dowry,
Can bring my heart to such a pass
As lovely Laura Lourie.
And Other Poems. 313
IGNORANCE.
There's bigger game than bison,
Than moose, or wolf, or bear,
And though not seen by vision
'T is met with everywhere.
'T is fiercer than the tiger,
Or than the crocodile,
Than beasts that stalk the Niger,
Or shapes that haunt the Nile.
It preys upon no dumb thing,
Nor hind, nor hart, nor foal;
It is a fearful Something
That stalks the human soul.
The scholar and the teacher,
The scientist and the bard,
They hunt this hellish creature
And hunt him fast and hard.
They drive him far and farther
From human residence,
For lo! he is no other
Than bestial Ignorance.
3 X 4 lone,
And greater than great Nimrod
That hunter-king of old,
Or those that after him trod
In emulation bold,
Is he, that dauntless spirit
Who hunts this brutish thing-
May he such fame inherit
As only brave deeds bring.
MY LIFE WAS A ROUND OF GOLDEN
DAYS.
My life was a round of golden days
When thou wast near me, Lucy;
But now I walk i i darkened ways
With naught to cheer me, Lucy.
My laugh is not the laugh of youth;
Its sound doth pain me, Lucy:
For distance is a serpent's tooth
And it hath slain me, Lucy.
My heart was a nest of singing birds
When I first kissed thee, Lucy ;
But now alas! I have no words
To tell how I've missed thee, Lucy.
And Other Poems. 315
My dreams are not the dreams that were
When thou wast near me, Lucy;
Dark shapes about me move and stir,
And shadows jeer me, Lucy.
My days were sweet as summer flowers
That strew the heather, Lucy;
In those old times, those happy hours
When we dwelt together, Lucy.
But now I scarce dare think of then:
And the thought should start us, Lucy,
That ere our lips shall meet again
Death's hand may part us, Lucy!
GONE IS A STRENUOUS SPIRIT.
Out of the shadow of nature
Unto the glory of death,
Gone is a strenuous spirit,
Resigning a worker's breath
Not as a reaper but sower
Into the body he came
Harvests there were to be planted
To reap ere he sowed was shame.
316 lone,
Loved less the harvest than furrow,
Loved less the rose than the seed;
His was the hand of a planter
Let others still reap the meed.
Knew that our doings abideth
States cannot live by a name;
Gave all his days to great action
And not one brief hour to fame.
Never, in fear of an error,
Did he step over the truth
Heard the full summons of spirit
And wrought with the faith of youth.
Held that chief truth of our finding
That the wide world is as deep
As we shall judge it in spirit,
And as we so judge we reap.
Left his pure footsteps to guide us
In the high places of truth;
Left his great faith to the weary
And unto the old his youth.
And Other Poems. 317
WHAT THOUGH THE GARDEN OF THE
MUSES YIELD?
What though the garden of the Muses yield
But one sweet flower to my hand each day ?
Contented, come I from the bloomy field
And at thy feet that single flower lay.
Kich in the treasure of that only bloom,
But richer in the thought that 't is for thee;
For not, indeed, the flower but for whom
The flower is gathered most enriches me.
Then take this single blossom of my rhyme,
This everlasting of a poet's mind,
And make it doubly precious for all time,
Thrice precious by acceptance more than kind.
Take these, the single flowers of my song,
And day to day my toil shall add to them
Until they grow to be 't will not be long
A wreath, a garland and a diadem.
A chaplet sweet to crown thee queen of love,
Thou lovely spirit with thy human mouth,
Thou blue-eyed maiden precious far above
All sister-spirits of thy shining south.
318 lone,
POET, OPEN WIDE THE GATE OF
DREAMS.
Poet, open wide the gate of dreams
And let our care-worn spirits in to rest;
Throw wide the hinges of the gates of Song
And none so poor but will be Beauty's guest.
Our hearts are cankered with the canker gold,
The World beats on us like a tropic sun;
Almost we have forgotten Beauty's name,
So fierce we slave, so fast the race is run.
Throw wide the everlasting gates of Song,
(So heaven's gates by seraphs are thrown
wide!)
And like young angeis we shall enter in
And with great truths, as with the gods, abide.
flush our hearts with the Pierian spring,
bathe us in the bright Aonian flood;
reach from out the dream and draw us back
That music heal this fever in our blood.
Builder of the Dream that is no dream
Worker in the spirit stuff of thought,
0Poet, open wide the gates of Song
We flee from Mammon, and would not be
caught !
And Other Poems. 319
give us shelter from the world's alarms;
Show us again in heaven Beauty's bow;
Lead us into the silences of God,
And crown us with a faith lost long ago.
PHOEBE.
Thou pleasant land of brooks and leaf-fringed
streams,
Thou Arcady of citron and of vine,
Untroubled vale, where aye bright Summer
dreams
Lulled in the coil of dewy eglantine,
What conscious spirit, by winged airs entranced,
Her breast soft-heaving with its burdened
musk,
Enamoured sleeps midst yonder depth of
thorn
Where never mortal nor yet spirit chanced,
Saving perhaps with golden rain or dusk
Some faery hasting by with silent horn?
She sleeps a spirit's sleep on rose-bloom prest,
Her hair half-loosened from a fragrant wreath ;
One white, soft-tapering hand upon her breast,
The other hid her crooked curls beneath.
320 lone,
Upon her body is a splendid light,
A glory like around the summer moon
That sleeps upon the lakes of Thessaly;
Her watchers are the golden stars of night,
And, hanging with the lily o'er her swoon,
The nightingale pours forth its melody.
She sleeps a spirit's sleep, rose-bloom above,
O'erwoofed with oxlip and musk roses dear,
And dreams a spirit's dream, soft breathing love
Which only the rapt nightingale may hear.
Immortal bird ! Sweet-throated interpreter !
Thy music is the cadence of her dream,
A dream prophetic of the golden morn
Bright vision that the hours will not blur
Into forgetfulness, nor orient beam
Dissolve away and leave her all forlorn!
She dreams of him long-seeking her through pain,
Only to meet in dreams of summer night,
Meet and embrace, embrace and part again
Like guilty things in the hierarchy's sight.
Of young Endymion she dreams of him!
For she is Phoebe, his immortal love !
'T is evening ; they have met in Thessaly,
And in her dream she plucks the lily dim
That hangs her shut and sleeping eyes above
And lays it on her breast where he will see.
And Other Poems. 321
Love's dreams are sweet, but sweeter is love's
waking.
Aye clasped in embrace to the other's heart!
then awake thy waking hath no sting !
Awake, bright Spirit nor thy dreams depart!
Not o'er the threshold of thy dreams alone
Endymion comes, but o'er the threshold too
Of thy lush bower thatched with tender
shoot ;
Not only in thy dreams the Fates atone
But in thy waking also! O'er the dew
Endymion comes, and Philomel is mute!
AN EVIL BOOK.
There is no evil like an evil book,
And no infection half so quickly spread,
Since such has power to strike the conscience
dead
And rot the spirit, ere the flesh is shook.
Such evil tomes are each a golden hook
That, shining, snares and, snaring, lets not go
Until the devil has the soul in tow,
Jerked like a grayling from its native brook!
u
or THE
{ UNIVERSITY
OF
Va
322 lone,
In writing then write holily or quit;
And every page for honor's sake left blank
Will shine in heaven with a splendid wit,
And angels and not men shall give you rank;
But whensoever an evil line is writ
Hell has another scribbling fool to thank!
LAKE TAHOE.
Beauty walks by Lake Tahoe
Her path is through the pine;
And Grandeur from eternal snow
Aye looketh down divine.
Here Solitude and Silence meet
In their unbroken love;
And day completes the earth beneath
And night the skies above.
Tall golden splendors bloom and shake
Where limpid waters lie,
And heaven's face glows in the lake
As in a conscious eye.
While from the hanging walls above
The stately pine looks down,
Aye carpeting the dewy earth
With needles smooth and brown.
And Other Poems. 323
A PRELUDE.
I sing of Romance and the South,
Of meads that lovers' feet have prest;
A river flowing to the west
With sunset islands at its mouth.
I sing of beauty and of light,
Of truth and honor not in vain
The love that lifts me shall sustain,
The grace that wins me shall invite.
Of love amid a pleasant seat,
And of that pleasant seat I sing;
Though nothing new to song I bring
Save this new heart with love complete.
The golden Springtime needs be here
Ere I've attained my middle flight:
may the Spring's propitious light
Be ripened with my full career,
That from my labors I arise
And with the Springtime bid adieu,
To feel that I have flowered too,
And left a sweetness in the skies.
324 lone,
WHEN I CONSIDER.
When I consider how the smallest thing
Can make or mar our human life divine:
How nothing is so trifling, frail, or fine,
But has the power, like a tyrant king,
To lift our feet to honor, or to bring
Our life to nothing and to hell consign
Our fondest hopes how trifles still combine
Mere trifles to overmaster every spring
Of human action ! When I think of this,
And look about and stern example see
On heaven's summit or in hell's abyss
Of the power of trifles, then to Destiny,
To fixed Fate I turn, and hold as flaw
Free Will which leaves our fate to hang upon a
straw.
WAR!
War! War! War!
Bring forth the iron car,
The cimeter and blade,
The cannon and grenade,
Mortar, rifle, sword and dirk,
Christian armament, or Turk;
And Other Poems. 325
Powder, shot and shell,
Shrapnel as well:
Bring forth the bayonet
And let the blade be set;
Cartridge, bomb, and ball,
Ordnance great and small,
Then light the brand that lies at hand
And with War's bloody carnage sweep the troubled
land!
War! War! War!
War and blood! blood and war!
War anear and war afar!
Death in every form and shape,
Eack and ruin, murder, rape !
Days of sorrow,
Nights of horror,
Bloody fields with corpses strewn
Smoking 'neath the torrid noon
Glist'ning ghastly in the pale light of the moon !
War! War! War!
Foreign war ! internal war !
War at home and war abroad,
War for lucre, war for fraud!
Ambition's war,
Sedition's war,
War in the name of Almighty God !
326 lone,
War and carnage, war and massacre,
War, the bloody-handed murderer,
War for every day on the calendar!
War! War! Christian war!
War! War! War!
Headlong, raging war,
Red-handed, rav'ning war,
Shuddering, revolting war,
Horrid wounds and ghastly accidents;
Brutish force and devilish intents!
Spitted babes and gutted sires,
Matrons roasted in circumfluent fires!
War and conflagration,
War and desolation!
War on land and war on sea,
War where'er two brothers be
War! War! Christian war!
WILL-HE NILL-HE.
I've cast my heart beneath her feet,
I've cast my fortune after:
No other lass has lips so sweet,
No other lass such laughter.
And Other Poems. 327
Her eyes are heaven's baby stars,
Her lips are love's fresh fountains;
For her I'd tilt a lance on Mars
Or scale the moon's cold mountains.
I grant my love may foolish seem,
My actions well nigh silly;
But my poor heart has found his dream
And loves her, will he nill he.
IF!
If love were but a home, dear,
And kisses wine and cake,
Then we would never roam, dear,
Nor fear sharp hunger's ache.
If simple faith were gold, dear,
And true hearts silver were,
Then we would laugh at cold, dear,
And dress in silks and fur.
If father love were a tree, dear,
And mother love a toy,
Then Christmas would bring glee, dear,
Unto our little boy.
328 lone,
But love is only love, dear,
And kisses but love's way;
And though we've a home above, dear,
We 're shelterless to-day.
And simple faith is much, dear,
And faithful hearts are more,
But they are graces such, dear,
As cannot clothe the poor.
And father love will cleave, dear,
And mother love be true,
But oh this Christmas eve, dear,
To fill Tim's little shoe!
THE SOXG THAT LIVES FOR AYE.
'T is not the polished phrase that makes
The song that lives for aye;
Nor perfect rhymes a poem are,
NOT measured beat a lay.
Though every rune should have its rhythm
And formal, studied scheme,
Each rounded, living poem must have
Its consecrated dream.
And Other Poems. 329
The stately lines of poetry
Are broad, bright avenues
Down whose far vistas, like a god,
The poet's spirit moves.
And though these stately lines be set
With all the gems of art,
Unless the spirit moveth there
They have of life no part.
I LOVE MY COUNTRY NOT THE LESS,
DEAR FRIENDS.
I love my country not the less, dear friends,
But ah! I love humanity the more:
I would not see my country gain her ends
By means which leave the other nations poor.
"My country, right or wrong/' is not my creed:
Where honor ends there ends my country too:
Truth's cause is dearer than my country's need,
Love's banner higher than the Red-white-blue.
Too much I love my country and her call
To fight her battles when she lists with hell:
And he who to his soul is false at all
Is false unto his fatherland as well.
33 lone,
Thrice dear my country or in peace or war;
Thrice dear yon starry banner waving o'er,
But let this truth be blazoned on each bar
I owe my country much, but owe God more !
I THINK: I KNOW.
I think the hills were made for her,
And half the vales between :
I know the trees cast shade for her,
And all the land is green.
I think the rose is red for her,
New washed in morning dew:
I know the fields are spread for her
With buds of lovely hue.
I think that song was born for her,
The hills of joy among:
I know that naught has scorn for her,
Or heart, or eye, or tongue.
I think the heavens glow for her,
And set their golden bow;
I know the rivers flow for her,
And sparkle as they flow.
And Other Poems. 331
Ah, yes! the blossoms burst for her
On hedge and vine and tree;
And every joy was first for her
And then, oh then for me.
I think the stars look down for her
And shed their golden light;
And summer wears a crown for her,
And winter takes its flight.
I know the days are long for her,
The skies are blue above;
The birds were given song for her,
And youth was given love.
I think the sun doth shine for her,
For her sweet sake alone;
And life was made divine for her,
My Marian! my own!
SING ME A SONG OF MY NATIVE LAND.
sing me a song of my native land,
In the dear old American tongue;
sing me a song of Columbia,
The sweetest song ever sung.
332 lone,
sing me a song of the Stars and Stripes,
sing me a song of the West,
And take me back in my dreams again
To the land I love the best.
for an hour of the life I lived
In God's own beautiful land;
The home of the true, the home of the brave,
Where Freedom forever shall stand!
Ten thousand miles from America,
Ten thousand miles from home !
And were I back in my own country
1 never more would roam.
THE .LOVIXG COUPLE.
Look here upon* this husband,
And here upon this wife,
Where they, in rhyme and reason,
Are painted to the life.
He married for that jewel
Respectability,
(Sure marriage is a blessing
And the height of policy!)
And Other Poems. 333
And happily he got it,
As any friend can tell,
For marriage with the lady
Made her respectable.
In winning her in marriage
He lost his only friend,
For soon as she was wedded
Her friendship reached its end.
In wedding with her husband
She found a lover dear;
But 't was not in her husband
Let it be stated here.
He acts a shameful evil,
And she she points it out:
He has, indeed, no honor,
And this she does not doubt.
He is not wholly happy
Until he plays the fool,
Nor she is e'er contented
Until at scandal's school.
He swears she 's vain and foolish,
Tricked out in silk for show;
She swears before her children
Her husband made her so.
334 lone,
There 're two sides to each question,
And why ? 't is plain as life
One side is for the husband,
The other for the wife.
Were he to swear the noonday
Was luminous or bright,
She'd have the heavens darkened
To prove he was not right.
To prove her wrong in judgment
He'd prove himself a fool;
Eat fire for disagreement
And swear that it was cool.
Yet both, indeed, are happy
As ever day was long
And each can prove the other
Has lately been in the wrong.
And, sure, they have religion
But still to breed dispute
Learned in their creeds and doctrines
To be in quarrels acute.
They '11 never move together
An hour in one course
Until they move together
For divorce.
And Other Poems. 335
WOMAN.
a man am a human,
But a woman am a woman;
An' dat am certainly true.
An' when de debil made sin,
He chucked a woman in,
So what am a feller gwine to do?
COLUMBIA.
As a river floweth downward
From the mountains to the sea,
O my Country, so each nation
Floweth ever unto thee.
As the ocean melts in vapor
That descends in gentle rain,
my Country, so thy bounty
Nourishes the furtherest plain.
Like the ocean thou receivest,
Like the ocean render back
Troubled waters flowing to thee
Changed to golden, sun-kist rack.
336 lone,
Much receiving, more returning;
Like the ocean, world-begot:
Changing all that empties in thee,
But thine own self changing not.
All the stars are in thy bosom
And all lands lead down to thee:
Turns the bondman to thy shore
As turns the sailor to the sea.
Like the ocean, swayed by heaven;
Like the ocean, pure and deep;
With the ocean's .stored thunders
And the ocean's splendid sweep.
Golden years shall beat upon thee
As the stars beat on the sea,
Kindling it with golden splendors
Streaming from infinity.
In the beauty of thy presence
Like the beauty of the sea,
Stately thoughts and noble passions
Ever keep us company.
Columbia ! my Country !
Fair art thou and beautiful
As yon evening sea, blue-heaving,
Glory-kist, star-sown, illimitable!
And Other Poems. 337
THE OTHER HALF.
In wretchedness of body and of mind
Live half the wretched sum of humankind;
In ghastly poverty of blood and soul,
Oblivion their hope and death their goal !
Their birthright stolen in their mother's womb,
Their hopes betrayed and damned this side the
tomb ;
The smile of God aye turned away from them
As if He, too, their spirits did condemn:
Puppets of Mammon, slaves of blackest chance,
Disease and crime their sure inheritance!
They live (0 God in heaven, how they live!)
Like souls foredoomed to hell, yet fugitive
A little season here upon this earth
To swell Gehenna's lists with other birth
Wretched as they, as lost to heaven's light,
As sunken in bestiality and night!
Like brutes they toil, like brutes rewarded are
With chain and lash, and galling yoke, and
scar;
While at each furrow's end a grave doth gape
Which, if they could, they scarcely would
escape !
From sea to sea, from spanning zone to zone
The poor grow poorer still: ah! not alone
338 lone,
In fortune, but in faith and hope as well;
Hope for that blessed time when each shall dwell
Beneath his own vine in some goodly land'
With Peace above and Joy on either hand!
The rich grow richer, not alone in gold
But pride and power ! All that they behold
They covet ; laying hands upon the dream
Of poets hands whose touches base blaspheme:
Placing their seals upon the seeds of time;
Possessing all things of all growth and clime!
Richer they grow, still adding more to more,
And more to more 2 till God himself seems poor !
DOX THY KERCHIEF.
don thy kerchief, sweetheart mine,
And don thy hood of lace,
And come to me 'neath the lemon tree,
Our lovely trysting-place.
mark how swiftly time doth fly
And haste without delay:
Sweet looks like thine and a heart like mine
May not be young alway.
And Other Poems. 339
BIG GAME.
Don't talk to me of panther,
Or moose, or grizzly bear;
There 's bigger game than either
And plenty everywhere.
I hunted it last season
And bagged it every day
I know what I am saying,
And, h 1, I '11 have my say!
It isn't tiger, either,
Nor elephant, nor whale;
While, as for alligators,
They 're only so much quail.
'T is bigger game than ever
Old Nimrod's shade will stalk:
This game of which I'm talking,
Why, h 1, it too can talk!
It sort of rhymes with trigger
You '11 surely guess by that
This game why, it is nigger,
And wears a shirt and hat!
340 lone,
Don't talk of killing tigers
Nor brag about the same;
If you've never bagged a nigger
You don't know what 's big game.
I like to pot 'em settin'
A-high upon a roof,
And watch 'em come a-tumblin'
To earth head-over hoof.
They squeal to beat a rabbit;
But when the nigger 's dead
You feel you've potted something
And not been wasting lead!
A STATISTICAL POEM.
Suppose there be (just for argument's sake)
A billion of people on earth
A probable thing, and a reasonable thing,
And neither redundance nor dearth.
And suppose each body should live thirty years,
Each woman, each child, and each man
The average of life as statistics will tell
As well as statistics well can.
And Other Poems. 341
And suppose each body should once in his life,
Just once, and no more and no less,
Do something that 's wicked say perjure or steal,
Or drink of the cup to excess.
Now figure that out: you will find it will come
To ninety-nine thousand per day,
To ninety-nine thousand offences per diem
'T is more than enough, you will say.
And ninety-nine thousand offences per diem
Makes sixty-nine every minute:
A crime for each second ticked off by the clock
Good Lord, but the devil is in it!
But now to my moral as quick as a trice,
Or quick as my meter will let me;
And should I not prove what I set out to prove
May the devil statistical get me.
And what I intended to prove from the first
Is listen and you shall all hear
This planet called earth is still peopled with
saints
Though millions do sin every year.
For a sin every second, when counted all up,
Is only one sin to each soul,
One sin in a life-time of thirty long years!
So Earth ? s not so bad on the whole.
342 lone,
SHE WEAES A STARRY CROWN OF
DEEDS.
She wears a starry crown of deeds
Upon her angel brow:
She rules a world of lovely thoughts
The Lady of the Vow.
She moves as beauteous as a star
From good to higher good:
She is the bright consummate flower
Of Catholic sisterhood.
HER BEAUTY IS A CLIMBING ROSE.
Her beauty is a climbing rose
A-clambering o'er my heart,
A-swooning it in fragrances
Of every precious sort.
Her beauty is a golden dew
That falls upon my brain,
Till lovely buds of thought upspring
Like roses after rain.
And Other Poems. 343
Her beauty is the evening star,
My soul the mountain stream
A-dream, a-rapture with that star,
A-tremble with its beam.
Her beauty is a new-blown rose
My heart a vase of light,
And should you take the rose away
That vase were empty quite!
ENOUGH! STRIKE DEEP AND LET ME
GO.
Enough ! strike deep and let me go :
My friends all, all are gone,
Only the foe
Live on.
What, man ! fear not ! strike sure and deep ;
My soul will take its flight,
Nor haunt thy sleep
To-night.
I have outlived my time below,
And now the law says, die!
And even so
Say I.
344 Ione >
Strike deep, and part the cord of life!
I am aweary, friend,
Of hate and strife.
Let >s end !
My place is in death's chamber hall:
And may I be forgot
As my friends are all
Forgot.
Why dost thou pause and strangely stare
Nor whet thy cruel knife?
What ! would thou spare
My life?
Too late! they killed me long ago
When some unkindest one
In death laid low
My son.
time and time again he bled,
Yet labored bravely on:
But now he ? s dead
And gone.
He was the noblest of us all :
The last we had put by,
Yet first to fall
And die.
And Other Poems. 345
I know not where his body lies;
And when I think of him
These old worn eyes
Grown dim.
Well, well, we all must sometime go,
Each race must needs be run;
And swift or slow,
Strike here, strike deep, and many thanks!
I see that life '& a game,
And we drew blanks.
Take aim!
What 's that you say ? Sit still, my heart !
Our noble cause hath won,
And thou thou art
My son!
No, no ! it were a bitter jest
To fool an old man so.
Ah, it were best
I go.
How now, you seem to pity me!
. And you would still my fears
And set me free
With tears !
346 lone,
Gracious God, this is my son!
And these He makes amends
Friends, friends, each, one,
Dear friends!
MAMMON.
Mammon I am! with the power to damn
The born and the unborn too!
Supreme I rule over church and school,
Over Christian and pagan and Jew.
I am the king of the times, and can bring
Caesars to kiss my rod;
And the nations bend while I shape their end
Even as I were a god.
No power dare say my authority nay
Nor Republic, nor Kingdom, nor State;
And what I command I have forces at hand
To accomplish as surely as Fate.
The young and the old are alike in my hold
The infant, the youth, and the sire;
The tramp in the ditch, and the arrogant rich
In silken and purple attire.
And Other Poems. 347
Under my heel I have ground the seal
Dividing the right from the wrong,
And corrupted the gauge of reward and wage,
And given the earth to the strong.
I come between the king and his queen
And the beggar and his drab;
And I set at strife the husband and wife,
And teach them to poison or stab.
I hold in my hand the laws of the land
And amend and interpret at will;
And I am the court of last resort,
And he who offends me, I kill.
I stand like Fate on the ship of State
And its wheel is in my hand.
And calm and wrack are at my back,
Minions of my command.
The poets obey whatever I say
Though angels are hymning near;
And I dictate their love and their hate,
And' force their laughter or tear.
I tower above the spirit of love
As the hawk above his prey;
I loosen and bind the thinker's mind,
And shape his thoughts like clay.
348 lone,
'Twixt the wornb and the -grave each woman 's
a slave
Bartered and bought by me;
I appoint her place of shame or of grace,
Of honor or infamy.
With gloves of gold I knead and mold
The living hearts of men ;
And I direct what all project
Labor of loom or pen.
the preachers preach and the scholars teach
And book is added to book,
And philosophy weaves her gathered sheaves
And wears her momentous look.
But I am behind each book and each mind
As the cause is behind the effect;
And though fabrics rise till they kiss the skies
I am their architect.
MARRIAGE.
She passed for twenty, he was twenty-two;
His hair was slightly red, her eyes were blue;
They met, and, meeting, saw the world in each,
And, meeting once again, found means of speech;
And Other Poems. 349
From speech to kisses was a single stride
And, first he knew, the lady was his bride:
Indeed, he'd just begun to feel love's thrills
When he awoke to pay the lady's bills.
(Lord! marriage is a sudden thing at best
And all is lost before we can protest ! )
But they were young, and though they won-
dered some,
Each at the other, yet they did not come
To words of anger till some months had passed,
When love gave place to apathy at last,
And, growing cold, they each grew critical
And questioned why they came to wed at all.
Too late they one another's faults espied;
Too late ! the bans were read, the knot was tied,
And now (0 not the last nor yet the first!)
They needs must make the best of still the
worst!
She looked before her wedding to those days
When, bondage-free, she went her maiden ways,
And wished to heaven she were back once more
And had her marriage business to do o'er,
Or, in her mind went o'er the wedding form
But 't was another man who held her arm!
While he since he had time to think it o'er
'T was strange he'd never thought of it before
He now remembered she had been as hot
To marry him as if it were a plot,
350 lone,
As free of favors as a wishing ring,
As light to snare as bird without a wing.
And had she been as free with other men,
As liberal of favors had she then?
By heaven ! she was cheaper for the thought,
And if 't were so indeed, then she was naught.
Another month and they had quarreled out-
right,
He stirred by jealousy and she by spite;
Some things they told each other that 't were
best
That they had whispered in a serpent's nest.
Then 'gan the daily feud and hourly jar,
The open rupture and admitted war,
The cat-and-dog-life of the wedded state
When passion dies and love is turned to hate.
Their home became a place to keep their clothes,
To part as strangers or to meet as foes,
To leave the baby (when the baby came),
And had no other use, it seemed, or claim.
Then infidelity rose up unclean,
That scarlet shape long felt ere yet *t is seen
Her lover found her husband false as dice,
Whereat she sought a lawyer for advice.
A suit was then begun and truth let loose
To play the very devil without truce.
The wonder grew that things had gone so far
Before they brought their troubles to the bar;
And Other Poems. 351
She charged, he charged; complaint and cross-
complaint
Till scandal held its nostrils and grew faint.
Then on a certain day the case was tried,
The knot that bound them legally untied,
She got the child, he paid her counsel fee,
And each, according to the law, was free.
He paid her alimony once or twice
Then, being shrewd, he took his own advice
And left his troubles and his state behind
For parts unknown and more unto his mind.
She found another father for her child,
An easy-going fellow, weak and mild:
They lived together twenty years or so
Then died or parted, which, I do not know.
IF HALF THE EICHES SPENT ON WAR.
If half the riches spent on war
Were spent upon the mind,
Then Heaven would not seem so far,
Nor Fate would be so blind.
If half the forethought given wealth
Were given to the soul,
Our brows would press the crown of health,
And millions sick be whole.
352 lone,
If half the labor spent in dress
Were spent to banish grime,
Then Beauty would rise up and bless
The spirit of the time.
If half the money spent on drink
Were spent on cultured taste,
More men would be like men, I think,
More women would be chaste.
If half the watch from barracks kept
Were kept from Christian shrine,
The angels, though they sometimes wept,
Would weep from joy divine.
If half the prisons built for men
Were built for training youth,
Men would be nearer Honor, then,
And Law be nearer Truth.
If half that ? s spent on things that pass
Were spent upon the soil,
Then women need not slave like brass
Nor little children moil.
If half that 's wasted on the sword
Were spent upon the pen,
What living truths we should record,
What poets would be then.
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ODE TO THE AIRSHIP.
Thou rare soft-soaring car, wherein we feel
The waking-dream of wings v at last come true ;
Thou marriage-graceful of bright silk and steel
Climbing the highways of the steadfast blue;
Not rosy Bacchus nor his merry bards,
In Tempe or in Thessaly divine,
E'er urged pleasure-wards
Chariot one-half so luxurious as thine!
Rare is a mount upon a mettled steed,
Rare is a canter through the dewy morn,
Rare are all joys equestrian indeed;
Ah, rare the throne behind the saddle-horn!
Rare are the motions of a white-winged yacht
Parting the spindrift of the purple tide,
When days are sultry-hot
Save where the bright sea opens cool and wide !
But thou, oh latest birth of speed and flight,
Intelligence of woven silk, and fire,
Thy spell is rarer still: thou dost invite
Entirely, and, inviting, never tire !
The hand that grasps thy lever hath sure hold
Of Pleasure's silken girdle; and who ride
Thee up the morning gold
Sweep through bright gates elysian open wide!
354 Ione >
WHEN BEAUTY BUILDS BENEATH THE
STAES.
When Beauty builds beneath the stars
A temple all divine,
The Poet is the architect
Who shapes the high design.
Before the doing is the dream,
Before the work, the plan;
Without the Poet what were then
The proudest artisan?
His pencil drew entempled Greece
Upon the hearts of men
A thousand years ere Pericles
Was Athen's citizen.
LENORE.
Lenore, was her name!
From worlds above she came:
She brought me Eden in her face
And heaven in her eyes,
And for a little blessed space
We dwelt in paradise:
And Other Poems. 355
then the white-rose bloom,
Aslant her marble tomb,
Bar'd out the precious sight of her
And shut my heaven up in the voiceless sepulchre !
CAN THIS BE HOME, SWEET HOME?
The hands that rocked me in the cradle
I have crossed for evermore;
The face that watched my homeward coming
Watches no more at the door:
She is dead, my darling mother,
And I wander through our home;
But the face I seek is sleeping
Underneath the grassy loam !
Can this be home, sweet home,
With mother dead and gone?
Can this be that dear haven
That yesterday she called Sweet Home,
Where yesterday she sang Sweet Home?
Her touch could charm away all sadness,
Her hair was soft as sleep;
She brought a smile to crown my gladness,
She left me not alone to weep.
356 lone,
I've had companions, but my mother
Was a friend before them all;
And I thought her most secure
When she heard the angels call!
Can this be home, sweet home,
With mother dead and gone?
Can this be that dear haven
That yesterday she called Sweet Home,
Where yesterday she sang Sweet Home ?
FANCY'S BARK.
bright Fancy, come to me
O'er the deep blue western sea,
Come upon the salt airs sweet
While the spray drifts 'round my feet;
Come, bright Fancy, be my guide
O'er the golden sunset tide!
Love was born beside the sea
Where I stand and call to thee,
But I seek not Love to-day,
Mocking me through driven spray
What is wanton Love to me
While my bark is on the sea,
While each chaliced wave shall hold
A star of trembling gold;
And Other Poems. 357
While the sun shall sink to rest
On the sea's dark-heaving breast,
While the bright, soft-pacing moon
Shall attain her queenly noon
Right above a stately mast
Piercing to the starry vast?
bright Fancy, hasten then
From the shores of Darien
Must I sail the sea no more,
Ever chained to this bleak shore,
Who am drunk on driven foam
From my dark-heaving home?
Now you fade again, bleak shore,
Now I sail the sea once more!
Blow, ye airs, straight to my heart,
Fill, ye sails, and do your part;
O'er the mountains of the sea,
Down its valleys, blue and free,
I and Fancy, on and on,
Sail toward the gates of dawn.
Lo ! I hear the sea-bird's call
Like a voice from heaven fall,
Sweeter, sweeter, near to pain
Like a dead voice heard again:
While upon my lisfning ear
Fall those sounds I love so dear
358 lone,
Sound of wind and sound of tide,
Of the waters flowing wide
'Bound the brow of Fancy's bark;
Sounds that but old sailors hark;
Sounds but to the sailor dear;
Sounds that sailors love and fear!
Oh, I hear and I rejoice,
And each sound is as a voice
Calling to its sister sound
That the sailor has been found,
That he hath come home again
Sailing on past Darien,
Sailing o'er the drifting foam
Of his dark-heaving home.
A MEMORY.
He puts aside his playthings all
His soldiers, blocks, and drum,
And holding out his baby hands
He begs his mother come.
I feel his arms about my neck,
His cheek against my cheek
So drowsy are his rosy lips
They murmur and not speak.
And Other Poems. 359
I press him closer to my heart,
And smooth his curly hair,
Then lay him in his little cot
And leave him sleeping there.
He wakes and calls me back again
And begs some promised toy;
And I I grant him anything
My sweet, dead little boy!
TRUTH.
The naked Truth was in the cold
The Poet took it in
And clothed it in bright mail of gold
As J t were his dearest kin.
And fed its lips on honey-dew
Distilled of freshest song;
Then led it forth where Error drew
Her python length along.
The youngest scholar knows the rest
How Truth smote Error cold!
But honor unto him who drest
The Truth in mail of gold.
360 lone,
SCANDAL.
Scandal has quitted her perch as the falcon,
And flaps her cruel pinions above,
And hunteth the Dove of my passion that soareth
A-high in the heavens of love.
And Gladness is frightened away as the turtle
Is frightened away by the hawk,
And all the bright brood of sweet Pleasure is
silent
As linnets when hooting owls stalk.
RHYME.
What strange philosophies rhyme leads us to
Only the poets know the minstrel crew.
? T was Samuel Butler once upon a ime
Said that the rudder of all verse is rhyme,
But nowhere has old Butler set it down,
(Perhaps he knew, but feared the church and
crown ! )
How that in this wide world of yours and mine
Somewhere may be religions called divine,
And schools and systems and philosophies
And faiths that move the heart and bend the
knees,
And Other Poems. 361
Born of a poet's thought, which thought sublime
\\as forced upon the poet by his rhyme,
And by him accepted for the rhyme at stake,
And not for truth's or inspiration's sake.
I KNOW, I KNOW WHERE THE SUNBEAMS
GO.
I know, I know where the sunbeams go
Whenever the day-star dies;
Into the face of my love they go,
To sparkle again in her eyes.
I know where the violets all have gone
When winter is in the grove;
Into the veins of my love they go
To pulse in purple and mauve.
I know, I know where the melody goes
When the harper doth cease to rejoice;
Into the throat of my love it goes,
To awaken again in her voice.
I know where the musk of the rose is gone
When the rose is withered in death;
Into the lips of my love ? t is gone,
And rises again in her breath.
362 lone,
I know, I know where all kind thoughts go
When the thinker has given them o'er;
Into the heart of my love they go,
To dwell in that heart evermore.
THE OLD FOLKS ARE GROWING OLD,
OLD!
The old folks are talking of buying two graves,
Two graves on the hillside so cold;
Two graves side-by-side far out under the stars!
the old folks are growing old, old!
The old folks are talking of buying a stone,
A stone to be placed o'er their mold;
A stone that will mark where they sleep the long
sleep !
the old folks are growing old, old!
The old folks were out in the graveyard to-day,
The sun was just setting in gold;
They walked hand-in-hand and they chose out two
graves!
the old folks are growing old, old!
And Other Poems. 363
"Dear Mary," said Robert, "we'll sleep side by
side
Here under the dew and the mold,
And awaken together in the smile of the Lord!"
the old folks are growing old, old!
THE LAND OF WASHINGTON.
say where is the land of Washington,
The land of Franklin and of Jefferson;
That pleasant land along a pleasant sea
Where Freedom sprung, where laughed bright
Liberty,
Where honor shone more splendidly than gold
And manhood was not bought nor statehood sold?
1 cannot find it on the world's wide map
That lies outspread before me on my lap !
"T is not in Europe! No; though Thessaly
The Beautiful is there; and Arcady,
Bright Arcady with all her lakes and rills,
Her verdant valleys and her wooded hills !
But, stay, perhaps it northward lies by chance
Amidst the pleasant vales of sunny France,
Or southward in the land of Italy
Which dips an hundred cities in an azure sea!
Ah, no! the kindly land of Washington
Keposes not beneath Italian sun,
364 lone,
Nor can I find it in bright Thessaly,
Nor yet in France nor sunny Arcady.
Then does it lie on the Castilian shore
By Biscay's Bay or by Gibraltar's door?
Ah, no, not here ! Nor northward on the isles
Where Briton rules o'er her enkingdomed miles.
'T is not in Europe ! Nay ; nor in Araby,
Nor Persia, nor along the Indian sea,
Nor in that Empire wintry as the moon
And one half hidden like the distant moon,
Russia the vast; nor yet in Egypt's land
Where Cheops looks forever o'er a world of sand !
No, not in Africa can it be found
This land of Washington, this holy ground;
Nor in Australia ; nor the islands that surround
That larger Isle ; nor where the Great Wall runs
Sheer by the Tartar Empire with her myriad sons !
So look I elsewhere on the world's wide map
Which lies outspread before me on my lap,
And search out every land aye, every one
To find the kindly land of Washington;
But nowhere can I find it, though I seek
From hot Brazil to Greenland cold and bleak!
Yet, stay, here is a country broad and vast,
The mightiest, the richest, and the last;
America! we call it on the map
America! a name for gods to clap!
And Other Poems. 365
The States United and the States supreme,
Time's chief est work and history's noblest theme!
say, is this the land of Washington,
The land of Franklin and of Jefferson?
Can this, our Country, be that holy seat
Where darkness sank reproved and tyrants met
defeat?
That young Republic, lit with Freedom's star,
That loosed Religion's chain and broke the feudal
bar?
Ah, no ! it seems, but yet it cannot be
Too great, too wide, is the diversity !
The land of Washington, though thousands fell,
Was not Oppression's seat, nor Mammon's hell;
It was not eaten with the golden-rot;
The hungry were but few those few were not for-
got:
It sweetened fifty years of history
And smells sweet yet ! So then it cannot be
That this, our Country, is that kindly land
Where Washington once stood and now his works
should stand.
Ah, no! though fondly we would have them one
This land is not the land of Washington!
Here Mammon rules ; Oppression has her hold ;
And woe to him who is both poor and old!
Here men, like vultures, in high places sit,
And, having gorged, gorge on and will not quit!
366 lone,
Here Opportunity has closed her gate
And barred out thousands that on merit wait !
Here nothing greater is than minted gold
Saving more gold ! Here honor 's bought and
sold
And rogues and caitiffs feast while Virtue shakes
with cold!
The very rich here fear the greater rich,
The poor fear all ! Here principle 's a ditch
Wherein to stumble and be trod upon,
But damned hypocrisy 's a level lawn
Where millions move secure though hell itself
should yawn !
The land of Washington ! It is not here
In this, our Country; nor this country near!
In this, our Counhr, this, our native land,
With blue skies o'er, blue seas on either hand,
Eternal springs in her bosom and gold in all her
sand,
We rob the toiler in his mother's womb,
We rob him in his sickness, in his tomb,
We steal his widow's labor, and his orphans' doom !
then, this cannot be the land I seek,
The land we often hear of, often speak,
The dear, the kindly land of Washington,
The land of Franklin and of Jefferson!
So putting from my hands the world's wide map
Which lay outspread before me on my lap,
And Other Poems. 367
I write it down in sorrow yet in truth
The land of Washington, beloved of youth,
Of age thrice honored and thrice dear in song,
Has vanished from the earth these ages long:
Perhaps ere Plato's time, or Ptolemy's,
It sunk with bright Atlantis into the purple seas,
Or else, removed by centuries of time,
Long leagues of space, beneath some other clime
Far distant, say in yonder golden star,
It had its radiant seat and dazzled from afar!
GLADNESS.
Gladness has come as the robin returns,
And sings in my garden again!
The robin whose breast with her happy heart burns,
Eare lover of children and men.
Right under my window she turneth her note,
Her note which is sweetest of all,
And floods the bright heaven from one spirit
throat,
And comes to my hand at my call.
368 lone,
And my heart like a mocking-bird mocks her all
day
And wakes through the night with her glee
For love is the measure and rhythm of her lay,
The burden, the chord, and the key!
LIBERTY LIVES: HER SOLDIER IS DEAD.
Rose of the Valley,
Rose of the Vale,
1 found thee all blushing
But left thee all pale.
I brought thee the story
Of war o'er the sea,
Of death on the waters
And death on the lea.
I brought thee Love's message
From over the wave,
A curl from his forehead
A flower from his grave.
He faced the baptism
Of fire and of lead
And liberty lives
But her soldier is dead !
And Other Poems. 3619
LOVE.
Love makes the world over,
Love keeps the world young;
And love is the sweetest song
Sung or unsung.
Love is a sorrow,
And Love is a cheat:
Love makes us to hunger,
Then takes 'way the meat.
Love is a higher life
Lived in this one;
The only Elysium
Under the sun.
Love 's a contradiction
And Love is a fraud:
For Love we cast heaven by
And worship a gaud.
Love takes the man pris'ner,
Then sets his soul free
To soar in a higher world
With angel company.
Love wakes the thick dullard
And puts him to school;
Love sits the philosopher
On the dunce-stool.
37 lone,
Love, oh what art thou
Angel or devil?
Brightest of bright things
Or blackest of evil ?
MY QUEEN.
Queen of the Isles of Perfume and Smiles,
Queen of those Isles and of me,
The air that blows from the sweet tuberose
Was never as sweet as thee,
Nor the dulcet note from the oriole's throat
Can match thy harmony.
Queen of the Isles of Perfume and Smiles,
With the airs of Heaven thou art fanned,
And the flowers they press the hem of thy dress
Whenever you walk in the land,
And like a flame of fire the rose climbs higher
Striving to touch thy hand.
Queen of the Isles of Perfume and Smiles
And arbiter of my fate,
Thou hast shaken all care from thy sun-bright
hair
And put off the girdle of state,
And I follow after the voice of thy laughter
And come to thy garden gate.
And Other Poems. 371
We meet on the green, my Love and my Queen,
And the rose is between us two;
A red, red rose that swings and glows
Like a censer of perfume and dew;
While unbeholden from the distance golden
The oriole sings his adieu.
A moment you stand with outstreiched hand
And welcome me debonair,
Then all proud and pale thou drawest thy veil
Concealing thy brow so fair;
But ah the soft lace you draw o'er thy face
Leaves thy warm bosom all bare.
rose look away! heart look away!
oriole cease thy strain
Till my Queen shall veil her bosom all pale
With its purple warmth of vein;
Till the sweet unrest of my young Queen's breast
Is hid in her silken train !
Quickly you turn and your sweet cheeks burn
With virgin modesty through;
Quickly you veil thy bosom now pale
Through all its veins of blue
Fate made thee a queen with stately mien
But made thee a woman too.
37 2 lone,
my sweet girl Queen, what eye hath seen
The path that leads to thy heart ?
Not the eagle above nor the homing dove
Aught of that path can impart;
Nor the fleeting hind that path can find
With all her cunning and art.
For there :'s a path that the eagle hath
Seen never from the clouds above,
Nor the lark in its flight nor the bird of night,
Nor hind, nor hart, nor dove
The secret path, the wonderful path
That leads to a woman's love.
That path is known to brave men alone
Who do their honor no wrong,
And though I were blind that path I shall find
That leads to thy heart along;
Nor the gods shall say my spirit nay
As I take that path with song.
Ah, well I ween that thou art a queen,
gracious lady of mine,
Queen of the Isles of Perfume and Smiles,
And queen by a right divine;
As high and proud as yon golden cloud
Trailing its robes of sunshine!
And Other Poems. 373
But the poet springs of a line of kings,
Born in the purple of song,
And I shall not wait for robes of state
Nor fear that 1 do thee wrong,
For this name of mine is as high as thine
And my kingly line is as long.
I have followed after the voice of thy laughter
And come to thy wicket gate;-
I have bribed the warden of this sun-bright garden
With a bribe that was passionate;
And now I wist to my love thou wilt list,
arbiter of my fate.
Often you hark to the sweet meadowlark
Singing from heaven blue,
And thine ear it hath heard the whistling black-
bird,
And the note of the oriole too:
Then need I to fear you ? 11 not lend an ear
Unto a love that is true?
the love of a man is more precious than
An anthem at heaven's gate;
Than whistling blackbird, or the music that ? s stir'd
In the oriole's heart by its mate:
J T is no fleeting note from a dumb creature's
throat
But a human cry passionate.
374 lone,
Queen of the Isles of Perfume and Smiles,
Queen of those Isles and of me,
The grass lies sweet under our feet
And sweet is the lilac tree,
The red rose swings and the oriole sings
And my heart goeth out to thee.
Then lift the warm lace from thy queenly face
And soften this silence with a glance;
For my heart must ache and my heart must break
While you keep me in ignorance:
Say thou wilt be more than queen to me,
And swift be thy utterance.
Then this love I have nurst like the white rose
shall burst
And fill all thy path with light;
And my heart shall be a new kingdom for thee
To rule over day and night;
And the strength of my arm shall shield thee
from harm
Till heaven burst on thy sight.
OVER THE HILLS TO THE POORHOUSE.
Over the hills to the poorhouse
Love is going to-day,
And all the flowers are weeping
That bloom along his way.
And Other Poems. 375
Over the hills to the poorhouse,
Over the hills of June,
And all the birds are silent,
And the brooks are out of tune.
Over the hills to the poorhouse,
Over the western hills,
Through the sweet forget-me-nots
And the yellow daffodils.
Over the hills to the poorhouse
Love is going to-day,
And Mammon is going before him
Showing him on his way!
WAR.
Of War, I sing; of bloody war and long;
War 'gainst the weak and war amongst the strong :
Red war, that runs the rivers thick with blood,
Wasting the nations like another Flood !
War crimson, lurid, deep and damned as hell;
War, certain war where'er two brothers dwell.
Of war, that great prophetic war, I sing,
Whose vultures even now are on the wing;
The last, the worst, the blackest of all wars,
Whose smoke, ascending, shall blot out the stars!
376 lone,
The hour was written and the hour has ooine
The world's four winds bring beating of the drum,
The blare of trumpet, and the sound of fife,
Foregathering all nations to the strife !
Not Europe now alone, but all the earth
Comes forth to battle ! Like some monster birth
Of coil in coil and scale overlapping scale,
Blinding high heaven with its glist'ning mail
It issues forth ! God, but to behold
Would make the blood of Lucifer run cold!
WHAT DREAMS UNTO THE RICH WILL
COME !
What dreams unto the rich will come!
I dreamt I dwelt within a slum
Where loathsome things in human guise
Slunk loathsomely 'neath loathsome skies;
A nefarious, accursed spot
That on hell itself would cast a darker blot !
Hard by a city (thickly sown
With golden steeples) overgrown
With hovels as with blasted brake
It lay, and heaven seemed to ache
Above it, and the moon's dim flood
Changed in its thick and murky air to blood.
And Other Poems. 377
Methought I came (nor came alone!)
From palace wrought in precious stone,
Down, down, (as one descends to hell!)
Into this slum where horrors dwell:
This noisome, dark, and damned place
With human horror for a populace.
Nor came alone ! My wife and child
Clung to me: bright their eyes and wild,
All pale their lips, and ah, they shook
Like slaves with cold; and in their look
Despair I saw in its extreme,
And, writhing, cursed God in my sleep and dream.
Shame first we met ! Shame face to face,
And shame's familiar, foul disgrace;
Then misery, then wretched want,
Then hunger hunger stern and gaunt!
Then came one tempting, tempting me
To traffic with my daughter's chastity!
God, how I wrestled in my dream
With that which was not, yet did seem:
How sternly did I struggle then,
All men against me, 'gainst all men:
liet in that hour of sleep learned more
Than e'er in all my waking hours before.
378 lone,
I learned how millions daily dwell
In torment out-tormenting hell:
I learned what living costs the poor
When gold is to be had no more:
I learned the price that thousands pay
To keep themselves in bread day unto day.
Then, waking, bowed my fevered head
Ashamed of mine own wealth, and said:
God, this very dream has left
Me sickened and of peace bereft,
What then to feeling souls must be
The stern, the black, the damned reality!
WHY?
Why is her face so fair to me?
Why is her mouth so sweet?
Why is her smile so rare to me,
Her beauty so complete?
Why is she all divine to me,
A red, red rose, new blown?
Why is her kiss like wine to me?
Her voice like music's own?
And Other Poems. 379
Why is she like the sun to me,
Or like the golden dawn?
Why is it darkness unto me
Whenever she is gone?
Why are her wants supreme to me,
My constant, one employ?
Why is she all a dream to me,
A wonder and a joy?
Why is her hair so bright to me,
All curls, all silk, all gold?
Why are her eyes a light to me
To guide me and uphold?
Why is her laugh so much to me
It sets me all astir?
Why are her glances such to me
That I would die for her?
FORTUNE-SICK.
I would open my heart as I open a door
And welcome the Angel of Death,
For I'm weary of being unhappy and poor,
Of drawing life's pain-laden breath.
380 lone,
I am weary of toiling that others may rest,
Of starving that others may feast:
I am sick of a Fortune that makes me its jest,
Its gold-burdened, thistle-fed beast.
I am cut to the heart with the cheat of it all,
The shame, the unkindness and wrong:
With the height and the depth and the breadth of
that wall
Dividing the weak from the strong.
I am mad with a madness that y s not of the brain,
And surgery never can heal,
And I chafe at my thoughts as a man at a chain
That bindeth him unto the wheel.
I am sick of the mouthings and empty advice
Of those who have never known want
As they counsel the poor, o'er their wine and their
spice,
Their words are a blow and a taunt.
my God for a century, oh for a land
Where men in the sunlight might grow
Like the trees that touch heaven, and evermore
stand
Untroubled by shock or by blow.
And Othej Poems. 381
ONE OF THE MILLIONS.
The stunted infant of a stunted pair,
In squalor bred, in sickness and despair,
His eyes first op'ning on a factory's red glare.
Untimely issued from his mother's womb,
Who e'en in childbirth labored at the loom
To earn the daily crust that kept her from the
tomb.
One limb was twisted, and an iron wheel
Glared on his bosom like an angry seal
The birthmark of this child crushed under Mam-
mon's heel.
A beast of burden born the self-same night
Had scarce so early quit its mother's sight
To bear the yoke of labor as this stunted wight.
With speech unformed and limbs unschooled in
play*
He quit the hovel of loose drift and clay
Which he called "home" because it kept the rain
away,
382 lone,
And like a brute made in our human form
Went down to labor with that motley swarm
Which digs and delves the coal that keeps the
gentle warm.
(0 Poverty, thou art an hellish thing.
You widow every hope ; each bosom wring ;
Thy dullest barb is sharper than the adder's sting.
Betwixt the black earth and its nadir fire
Men slave like beasts to gain a meager hire,
And all because of thee, thou wolf who dost not
tire!)
He labored in the darkness of the mine,
This being born with human face divine
And in his heart the tracings of a high design,
Until his speech grew brutish and he spoke
Like brute to brute, and through the damp and
smoke
His face glared forth like some strange animal in
yoke.
(Nor call him "slave" the very word is shame;
Call him "a toiler, poor and without blame":
Yet slavery f s as bitter by any other name!)
And Other Poems. 383
And he was numbered like a branded brute
By those who ruled his body absolute
Nor recognized his soul, a shriveled thing and
mute.
But wherefore should he rave? What boots a
name
To one whose only record is of shame,
A poor untutored beast but fit for gas and flame?
The sun in heaven seemed not made for him,
And Beauty mocked him as with twisted limb
He dragged himself from sleep to labors cold and
grim.
'T is labor that 's the father of the man
And damning that you damn the artisan
3 T was labor that had warped him from the nobler
plan.
A labor bestial-like ; toil terrible
That bodes for neither slave nor master well;
A daily hell of toil where wheels of brass rebel.
And so he sweated for his daily hire,
For that strained little which the poor require
To keep them at their toil and feed the living
fire.
384 lone,
One of the millions, the countless multitude
Whom fortune shuns, whom all the joys elude,
Whose numbers daily failing, daily are renewed.
Nor Beauty's self, nor Beauty's name he knew
Ah, what to him were flowers midst the dew,
Who was denied the fruit that midst those flowers
grew !
The starved flesh dies, but starve the human mind
And it grows rankly like some monster kind
And ranges wide as hell, corrupt and cruel and
blind.
And daily he was starved of every truth,
To grow in evil as he grew from youth,
His ignorance rankling in him like the rabid's
tooth.
From curses first he learned the name of God,
This wretched human, and he daily trod
All goodness underfoot as if it were a clod.
Some thought him damned ere his nativity,
As weeds are weeds and cannot other be
Though angels water them with tears of sanctity.
But he who slaves unceasing save when crime
Breaks through his labors for a little time
Rears all its serpent-aspect and aspires to climb,
And Other Poems. 385
What can he know of sweetness or of light,
Of beauty's largess or of manhood's height;
What good can move him or what tenderness in-
vite?
The son of Caesar, by a she-wolf bred,
Upon all fours will go with wolfish tread,
His vision narrowed to prey, the godhood in him
dead.
And so perhaps less sorely but as sure
Did wolfish, bestial-like environ lure
The godhead from this man and every good ob-
scure.
His youth was scarcely over ere he slew
The overseer of his motley crew
And deep into a shaft the bloody body threw.
The deed was bitter, but the wages sweet
The dead man's hoarded gold lay at his feet
And blood is only blood, but gold is drink and
meat!
With eager hands he seized upon the gold
And left the murdered man all stark and cold,
With face upturned to God and frightful to be-
hold,
386 lone,
Then westward fled before the rising sun,
The deed of murder pondered, plotted, done,
His own damnation sure, society's begun.
Now he, who for a season without toil
Has lived on stolen gold, no more will moil,
And sweat and slave, but like the tiger will de-
spoil.
So when this murderer's purse had emptied been
Of all the profits of his deadly sin,
He thrust still deeper in crime his hand already
in,
And if by chance there yet remained as guest
One spark divine within his brutish breast,
His second murder damned it blacker than the
rest.
(0 Muse, shall you record that awful crime
And make an instrument of verse and rhyme
To blazon down our shame into our children's
time?
May song forbid ! It was too damnable,
Too black for those black records such as tell
Of deeds delighting fiends and carried out in hell.
And Other Poems. 387
Leave it to silence and the wiser wrath
Of Him who both an hour and angel hath
To flame the sword of heaven o'er the guilty's
path.)
Thus he, the wretched human of our song,
From brutish labor turned to brutish wrong,
And ever swifter, further, he was borne along.
Criminality he made his trade and jest,
And grew to love the darker life and quest,
His heart-latch ever out for crime to gain his
breast.
Nor damned himself alone, but turned to teach
Evil to all who came within the reach
Of that most filthy thing, his brutish human
speech.
SHE IS FAIK TO LOOK UPON.
she is fair to look upon
But fairer when you know her,
And though your knowledge may increase
You never shall outgrow her.
388 lone,
Her beauty grows upon one's eyes,
Her goodness on one's feeling:
Her very step has that in it
Which brings the spirit healing.
Fll not compare her to a saint,
For she ? s too sweetly human;
Nor to an angel, tall and bright,
For she is all a woman.
I'll not compare this maid at all;
Suffice she 's fair and saintly,
And brightest words are dusty glass
And mirror her but faintly.
I SAW HER LOVELY FACE BUT ONCE.
I saw her lovely face but once,
Yet shall forget it never;
The curls that clustered 'round her brow
Shall haunt my heart forever.
I scarcely knew how fair she was
Nor how her beauty moved me,
Till she was lost amid the throng
Then all my heart reproved me.
And Other Poems. 389
I stretch out yearning arms for her
But cannot draw her near me:
I breathe a message on the air,
But ah, she cannot hear me.
did I know her dwelling place
How soon Fd come unto her;
did I know her lovely name
I'd seek her out and woo her.
WHERE IS MY LITTLE GIRL TO-NIGHT?
God ! where is my little girl to-night,
The daughter of my home
Far, far beyond a father's aching sight
whither does she roam ?
My love for her was all idolatrous,
She was her mother's pride,
Until she fell and went away from us!
God, that she had died!
We hoped to marry her to some good man
To be his lovely wife,
And dear unto her mother was our plan,
And dear to me as life.
390 lone,
But devils (0 that I had understood!)
In saintly raiment came
And she is fallen from her womanhood
And bears a nameless name!
God, where is she wandering to-night-
Down what great city's street?
What open doors, aglare with hell, invite
Her weary, wayward feet?
SOMEWHERE.
Though we are worn with wearinesa
And sick at heart and sad,
And life seems only dreariness,
Somewhere the world is glad.
Somewhere the clouds are lifting
And the winds have ceased to blow.
And the golden light is drifting
Upon the world below.
Though we have lost the feeling
And faith in God divine,
Somewhere there 's always kneeling
A soul at Christian shrine.
And Other Poems. 391
Though the knell is tolling, tolling,
Over a love our own,
Somewhere are sweethearts strolling
And the rose is newly blown.
Somewhere a babe is waking
Within his little cot,
Though our own heart is breaking
For a lamb who waketh not.
Though all our nights are appalling
And our days are filled with care,
The smile of God is falling
Somewhere, always somewhere!
THE POETS' QUEEN.
She sprung from Beauty's immemorial line,
And was herself the fairest of her race ;
And ever to her stately dwelling place
The minstrels came, like palmers to a shrine.
Where Hesper is the evening star in June,
Westward she dwelt amid an island estate;
There Neptune's steed champed at her sea-girt
gate
And regal palms shook to the silver moon.
392 lone,
Beneath her latticed easement, sweet with balm,
The narcissus and the rose first heaved the sod,
And Love the poets sung awaked a God
Amid her garden of perpetual palm.
Her beauty was of earth as roses are
Mortal, but nothing that might lead astray:
The glory of her eyes held sovereign sway,
But blasted none, like some bright, evil star.
A splendid pride was softened in her mien
She bended as the stately lily bends
When silver dew upon the field descends,
And bows that flower low, but not to stain.
Her eyes were bright as stars set for a sign
In heaven, and in her soft-clustering hair
The Spirit and the Love that made her fair
Had left the fragrance of its breath divine.
Forever open and forever bright,
Her sculptured gates looked out upon the sea;
Fit entrance to her halls where Poetry
Dwelt like presence all compact of light.
Queen of the Poets and Olympus' Xine,
Oft would she walk at twilight's pensive close
Where silver fountains like young palms uprose,
And hark unto bright J3olus in the pine.
And Other Poems. 393
Or with the morn, soft-op'ning as the rose,
And with the rose's vermeil flush and light,
She took her harp and bid adieu to night,
While chord by chord the stars sunk to repose.
But, lo ! long seasons she has been at rest,
And no more shall inspire the minstrel brood,
And given are her isles to solitude
Like a dead Orion within the west.
VIOLA;
rare is the maiden, Viola,
And healing is her touch ;
And I feel the words I utter
But when I sing of such.
How gracious is her presence,
How fair her lovely frame,
My heart can never utter,
And poetry hath no name.
To the stars of bright midsummer,
With orient pearl anew,
The rose is linked, and its sweetness
Is blown abroad with the dew.
394 Ione >
But there is a breath more fragrant
Than on the midsummer air
The breath of the Loves that linger
In the dusk of Viola's hair.
And were I not always a poet
I were a poet this once,
To sing of the maiden, Viola,
And the light of her countenance.
THE END.
BOOKS YOU NVST READ
SOONER. OR LATER
Book b y the Author of
A Girl and the Devil !
We beg to announce for autumn a new novel from
the pen of JEANNETTE LLEWELLYN EDWARDS, entitled
LOVE IN THE TROPICS
The scene of Miss Edwards' new work is laid in
strange lands, and a treat may be confidently prom-
ised the wide reading public whose interest in her first
book has caused it to run through over a dozen editions.
LOVE IN THE TROPICS
tuill be ready about ffo'Vcmber 1. and
particular* tuill be duly announced.
The New Womanhood
BY WlNNIFRED H. COOLEY.
$1.25.
No more original, striking and brilliant treatise on
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BOOKS YOU MUST READ
SOONER OH LATER
Marcelle
A Tale of the Revolution
BY WlLLJBERT DAVIS AND CLAUDIA BRANNON.
I2mo, cloth. Illustrated.
$1.00.
A fascinating story of the Revolutionary period, in
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The loves of Andre and Marcelle (herself a spy) lend a)
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The Burton Manor
A NOVEL
BY REV. M. V. BROWW.
I2mo, cloth. $1.50.
A most thoughtful, able and authoritative work in
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BOOKS YOV MVST READ
SOONER OR LATER
Told eU Twilight
BY EVA BROWNE.
A delightful collection of stories and poems.
(Author's photo.)
$1.00.
Job Trotter
BY SYLVESTER FIELD.
5oc.
A unique work, proving that the "earthly paradise"
of the colored race is Africa. This book is decidedly
the best work that has yet appeared on the subject.
The Sin of Ignorance
BY HENRIETTA SIEGEL,
$1.00.
An exceedingly clever story, by a New York girl, who
pictures with a fearless hand the domestic misery result-
ing from drink and dissipation.
(4 special drawings.)
BOOKS YOU MUST HEAD
SOONER. OR. LATER.
Llewellyn
A NOVEL
BY HADLEY S. KIMBERLING.
Cloth. $1.50.
5 Illustrations by S. Klarr.
Here is a story whose artistic realism will appeal to
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of the Modern World
By E. G. DOYEN.
I2mo, cloth, handsomely produced.
$1.50.
The title of this book will arouse curiosity, and its
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A Missouriark's Honor
BY W. W. ARNOLD.
Goth, i2mo. $1.00.
3 Illustrations.
BOOKS YOU MUST READ
SOONER. OR LATER
Why JVot Order
Evelyn
A Story of the West and the Far East
BY MRS. ANSEL OPPSFUEIM.
4 Illus. $1.50.
Limited edition in leather, $2.00.
Tb* PKM b spoken of ttls book with unqualified term*
The Lfest of the CaveJiers
BY N. J. FLOYD.
9 Drawings and Author's Photo.
$1.50.
/ "No wiser or more brilliant pen has told the story of
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BOOKS YOU MUST READ
SOONER OR LATER
Ltewdy Century
BY MRS. A. G. KINTZEL.
4 Drawings by Hartman. v
Decorated cover in black, red and gold.
$1.50.
Critics who have seen the book declare 'it superior to
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"Sparkling from cover to cover."
NAN & SUE
Stenographers
BY HARRIET C. CULLATOM.S
$1.00.
You've no doubt heard of this book! It stands all
alone in the originality of its title and subject, and every-
one knows how charming a subject "Nan & Sue, Ste-
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who have the most amusing adventures. The book's ap-
pearance is as original and charming as Nan and Sue
themselves.
Order now and join the procession on the autumn
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BOOKS YOU MVST READ
SOONER OR LATER
The Instrument Tuned
BY ROSA B. Hirr.
Attractive Binding", 75 cents.
Limited Edition in White and Gold, $t.oo,
(Author's photo.)
An able and interesting work on a comparatively new
subject Psycho-physical culture of whose methods the
author has made successful application. The book is full
of common-sense suggestions and is admirably adapted
to the needs of humanity in general.
The chapter-captions will give an excellent idea of the,
comprehensive and practical character of the work:,
Various Therapeutic Agents.,
Influence of Mind.
Extravagant Emotions^
Insomnia.
Relaxation.
Harmony the La* of Nature^
Order
All of the books named in this magazine to be had
from any newsdealer, or
YB I200T
.