^^^iv-=i> ^^7*7-^ PIPES OF PAN BY BLISS CARMAN Five volumes as follows : Each I vol., cloth, net, $i.oo " " flexible leather, net, j.jo now ready From the Book of Myths From the Green Book of the Bards Songs of the Sea Children Songs from a Northern Garden in pre pa ra tion From the Book of Pierrot L. C. PAGE & COMPANY New England Building Boston. Mass. Number Four ^ONGS FROM A NORTHERN GARDEN BY BLISS j:: ARM AN AUTHOR OF "PIPES OF PAN," "SAPPHO," "THE KINSHIP OF NATURE," "THE FRIENDSHIP OF ART," ETC. BOSTON L.C.PAGE 4 CO^ffifflW PUBLISHERS Copyright, iQOt By Bliss Carman Copyright, igoj Bv Perrv Mason Company Copyright, IQOS By Thk Outlook Company Copyright, igoj By Thk Scott- Thaw Company Copyright, /<)04 By L. C. Pace & Company (incorporated^ A a rights reserntd Published August, l<)04 Second Itnprtssivn, May, I<)i0 COLONIAL PRESS EUctrotyfid and Printed hy C. H . Sinionds 6* Co. Boston, Mass., U. S. A . CONTENTS Pace Our Lady of the Rain i In a Grand Pr£ Garden 12 The Keepers of Silence 27 At Home and Abroad 30 KiLLOOLEET 3 5 St, Bartholomew's on the Hill .... 39 The Church of the Leaves 41 The Deep Hollow Road 46 Malyn's Daisy 48 Above the Gaspereau 50 The Ballad of Father Hudson .... 79 The Word at St. Kavin's 87 Christmas Eve at St. Kavin's .... 102 OUR LADY OF THE RAIN. Across the purple valleys, Along the misty hills, By murmur-haunted rivers And silver-gurgling rills. By woodland, swamp and barren, By road and field and plain, Arrives the Green Enchantress, Our Lady of the Rain. Her pure and mystic planet Is lighted in the west; In ashy-rose and lilac Of meltins evenmg dressed. With golden threads ol sunset Inwoven in her gown, I OUR LADY OF THE RAIN With glamour of the springtime She has bewitched the town. Her look is soft with dreaming On old forgotten years; Her eyes are grave and tender With unpermitted tears; For she has known the sorrows Of all this weary earth, Yet ever brings it gladness, Retrieval and new birth. And when her splendid pageant, Sidereal and slow, With teeming stir and import Sweeps up from line to snow. There's not an eager mortal But would arise and make Some Drave unpromised venture For her immortal sake. 2 OUR LADY OF THE RAIN For no man knows what power Is sleeping in the seed, What destiny may slumber Within the smallest deed. In calm no fret can hurry, Nor any fear detain. She brings our own to meet us — Our Lady of the Rain. She saw the red clay moulded And quickened into man ; The sweetness of her spirit Within his pulses ran ; The ardour of her being Was in his veins like fire, The unreluctant passion, The unallayed desire. 'Twas she who brought rejoicing To Babylon and Ur. 3 OUR LADY OF THE RAIN To Carthage and to Sidon Men came to worship her. Her soft spring rites were honoured At Argolis and Troy, And dark Caldean women Gave thanks to her for joy. With cheer and exaltation With hope for all things born, To hearten the disheartened, To solace the forlorn. Too gentle and all-seeing For judgment or disdain, She comes with loving kindness — Our Lady of the Rain. With magical resurgence For all the sons of men She crosses winter's frontier, They know not whence nor when. 4 OUR LADY OF THE RAIN Yet silently as sunlight Along the forest floor Her step is on the threshold, Her shadow at the door. On many a lonely clearing Among the timbered hills She calls across the distance, Until the twilight fills With voice of loosened waters, And from the marshy ground Tlie frogs begin refilling Their flutes with joyous sound. Then note by note is lifted The chorus clear and shrill, And all who hear her summons Must answer to her will ; For she will not abandon The old Pandean strain 5 OUR LADV OF THE RAIN That called the world from chaos - Our Lady of the Rain. And still her wondrous music Comes up with early spring, And meadowland and woodland With silver wildness ring; The sparrow by the roadside, The wind among the reeds, Whoever hears that piping Must follow where it leads. Though no man knows the reason, Nor how the rumour spread, Through canyon-streeted cities Her message has been sped ; And some forgotten longing To hear a bluebird sing Bids folk from open windows Look forth — and It Is spring. 6 OUR LADY OF THE RAIN Come out into the sunshine, You dwellers of the town, Put by your anxious dolors. And cast your sorrows down. O, starved and pampered people, How futile is your gain ! Behold, there comes to heal you Our Lady of the Rain. Go where the buds are breaking Upon the cherry bough. And the strong sap is mounting In every tree-trunk now; Where orchards are in blossom On every spray and spire, Go hear the orioles whistle And pass like flecks of fire. Go find the first arbutus Within the piney wood, 7 OUR LADY OF THE RAIN And learn from that shy dweller How sweet is solitude; Go listen to the white-throat In some remote ravine Rehearse in tranquil patience His ecstasy serene. Go down along the beaches And borders of the sea, When golden morning kindles That blue immensity, And watch the white sails settle Below the curving rim Of this frail vast of colour, Diaphanous and dim. Go watch by brimming river Or reedy-marged lagoon The wild geese row their galley Across the rising moon, 8 OUR LADY OF THE RAIN That comes up like a bubble Out of the black fir-trees, And ask what mind invented Such miracles as these. Who came when we were sleeping And wrought this deathless lure, This vivid vernal wonder Improbable and sure ? Where Algol and Bootes Mark their enormous range, What seraph passed in power To touch the world with change? What love's unerring purpose Reveals itself anew In these mysterious transports Of tone and shape and hue? Doubt not the selfsame impulse Throbs in thy restless side, 9 OUR LADY OF THE RAIN Craves at the gates of being, And would not be denied. Be thou the west wind's brother, And kin to bird and tree, The soul of spring may utter Her oracles to thee; Her breath shall give thee courage, Her tan shall touch thy cheek, The words of sainted lovers Be given thee to speak. Fear not the mighty instinct. The great April Ian Creed ; The House of Spring Is open And furnished for thy need. But fear the little wisdom. The paltry doubt and vain. And trust without misgiving Our Lady of the Rain, lo OUR LADY OF THE RAIN What foot would fail to meet her, And who would stay indoor, When April in her glory Comes triumphing once more — When adder-tongue and tulip Put on their coats of gold, And all the world goes love-mad For beauty as of old ? At every year's returning The swallows will be here. The stalls be gay with jonquils, The dogwood reappear; And up from the southwestward Come back to us again With sorceries of gladness — Our Lady of the Rain. II IN A GRAND PRE GARDEN. In a garden over Grand Pre, dewy in the morning sun, Here in earliest September with the summer nearly done. Musing on the lovely world and all its beauties, one by one ! Bluets, marigolds, and asters, scarlet poppies, purple phlox, — Who knows where the key is hidden to those frail yet perfect locks In the tacit doors of being where the soul stands still and knocks? IN A GRAND PRE GARDEN There is Blomidon's blue sea-wall, set to guard the turbid straits Where the racing tides have entry; but who keeps for us the gates In the mighty range of silence where man's spirit calls and waits? Where is Glooscaap? There's a legend of that saviour of the West, The benign one, whose all-wisdom loved beasts well, though men the best, Whom the tribes of Minas leaned on, and their villages had rest. Once the lodges were defenceless, all the warriors being gone On a hunting or adventure. Like a panther on a fawn, On the helpless stole a war-band, ambushed to attack at dawn. 13 IN A GRAND PRE GARDEN But with night came Glooscaap. Sleeping he sur- prised them ; waved his bow ; Through the summer leaves descended a great frost, as white as snow; Sealed their slumber to eternal peace and stillness long ago. Then a miracle. Among them, while still death undid their thews, Slept a captive with her children. Such the magic he could use. She arose unharmed with morning, and depart- ing, told the news. He, too, when the mighty Beaver had the country for his pond. All the way from the Pereau here to Bass River and beyond. Stoned the rascal ; drained the Basin; routed out that vagabond. 14 IN A GRAND PRE GARDEN You can see yourself Five Islands Glooscaap flung at him that day, When from Blomidon to Sharp he tore the Bea- ver's dam away, — Cleared the channel, and the waters thundered out into the bay. (Do we idle, little children? Ah, well, there is hope, maybe. In mere beauty which enraptures just such ne'er- do-wells as we! I must go and pick my apples. Malyn will be calling me!) Here he left us — see the orchards, red and gold in every tree ! — All the land from Gaspereau to Portapique and Cheverie, All the garden lands of Minas and a passage out to sea. 15 IN A GRAND PRE GARDEN You can watch the white-sailed vessels through the meadows wind and creep. All day long the pleasant sunshine, and at night the starry sleep, While the labouring tides that rest not have their business with the deep! So I get my myth and legend of a breaker-down of bars, Putting gateways in the mountains with their thousand-year-old scars, That the daring and the dauntless might steer outward by the stars. So my demiurgic hero lays a frost on all our fears. Dead the grisly superstition, dead the bigotry of years, Dead the tales that frighten children, when the pure white light appears. i6 IN A GRAND PRE GARDEN Thus did Glooscaap of the mountains. What doth Balder of the flowers, Balder, the white lord of April, who comes back amid the showers And the sunshine to the Northland to revive this earth of ours? First, how came my garden, where untimely not a leaf may wilt? For a thousand years the currents trenched the rock and wheeled the silt, Dredged and filled and smoothed and levelled, toiling that it might be built. For the moon pulled and the sun pushed on the derrick of the tide; And a great wind heaved and blustered, — swung the weight round with a stride. Mining tons of red detritus out of the old moun- tain side, — 17 IN A GRAND PRE GARDEN Bore them down and laid them even by the mouth of stream and rill For the quiet lowly doorstep, for cemented joist and sill Of our Grand Pre, where the cattle lead their shadows or lie still. So my garden floor was founded by the labour- ing frugal sea, Deep and virginal as Eden, for the flowers that were to be, All for my great drowsy poppies and my mari- golds and me. Who had guessed the unsubstantial end and out- come of such toil, — These, the children of a summer, whom a breath of frost would foil, I, almost as faint and fleeting as my brothers of the soil? i8 IN A GRAND PRE GARDEN Did those vague and drafty sea-tides, as they journeyed, feel the surge Of the prisoned life that filled them seven times full from verge to verge, Mounting to some far achievement where its ardour might emerge? Are they blinder of a purpose in their courses fixed and sure, Those sea arteries whose heavings throb through Nature's vestiture, Than my heart's frail valves and hinges which so perilously endure? Do I say to it, " Give over! " — Can I will, and it will cease? Nay, it stops but with destruction ; knows no res- pite nor release. I, who did not start its pulses, cannot bid them be at peace. 19 IN A GRAND PRE GARDEN Thus the great deep, framed and fashioned to a thought beyond its own, Rocked by tides that race or sleep without its will from zone to zone, Setting door-stones for a people in a century un- known, Sifted for me and my poppies the red earth we love so well. Gently there, my fine logician, brooding in your lone grey cell! Was it all for our contentment such a miracle befell? No; because my drowsy poppies and my marl- golds and I Have this human need in common, nodding as the wind goes by ; There is that supreme within us no one life can satisfy. 20 IN A GRAND PRE GARDEN With their innocent grave faces lifted up to meet my own, They are but the stranger people, swarthy chil- dren of the sun, Gypsies tenting at our door to vanish ere the year is done. (How we idle J little children! Still our best of tasks may be. From distraction and from discord without base- ness to get free. I must go and pick my apples. Malyn will be calling me!) Humbly, then, most humbly ever, little brothers of the grass. With Aloha at your doorways I salute you as you pass, I who wear the mortal vesture, as our custom ever was. 21 IN A GRAND PRE GARDEN Known for kindred by the habit, by the tanned and crimson stain, Earthlings in the garb ensanguined just so long as we remain, You for days and I for seasons mystics by the common strain, Till we tread the virgin threshold of a great moon red and low, Clean and joyous while we tarry, and uncraven when we go From the rooftree of the rain-wind and the broad eaves of the snow. And this thing called life, which frets us like a fever without name, Soul of man and seed of poppy no mortality can tame, Smouldering at the core of beauty till it breaks in perfect flame, — 22 IN A GRAND PRE GARDEN What it is I know not; only I know they and I are one, By the lure that bids us linger in the great House of the Sun, By the fervour that sustains us at the door we can- not shun. From a little wider prospect, I survey their bright domain ; On a rounder dim horizon, I behold the plough- man rain; All I have and hold so lightly, they will perish to attain. Waking at the word of April with the South Wind at her heels, We await the revelation locked beneath the four great seals, Ice and snow and dark and silence, where the Northern search-light wheels. 23 IN A GRAND PRE GARDEN Waiting till our Brother Balder walks the lovely earth once more, With the robin in the fir-top, with the rain-wind at the door, With the old unwearied gladness to revive us and restore, We abide the raptured moment, with the patience of a stone, Like ephemera our kindred, transmigrant from zone to zone. To that last fine state of being where they live on joy alone. O great Glooscaap and kind Balder, born of human heart's desire, When earth's need took shape and substance, and the impulse to aspire Passed among the new-made peoples, touching the red clay with fire, 24 . IN A GRAND PRE GARDEN By the myth and might of beauty, lead us and allure us still, Past the open door of wonder and oblivion's granite sill, Past the curtain of the sunset in the portals of the hill, To new provinces of wisdom, sailless latitudes of soul. I for one must keep the splendid faith in good your lives extol, Well assured the love you lived by is my being's source and goal. Fearless when the will bids " Venture," or the sleepless mind bids " Know," Here among my lowly neighbours blameless let me come and go. Till I, too, receive the summons to the silent Tents of Snow. 25 IN A GRAND PRE GARDEN In a garden over Grand Pre, bathed in the seren- ity Of the early autumn sunlight, came these quiet thoughts to me. While the wind went down the orchard to the dikes and out to sea. (Idling yet? My flowery children, only far too well I see How this day will glow forever in my life that is to be! I must go and pick my apples. There is Malyn calling me!) 26 THE KEEPERS OF SILENCE My hillside garden half-way up The mountains from the purple sea, Beholds the pomp of days go by In summer's gorgeous pageantry. I watch the shadows of the clouds Stream over Grand Pre in the sun, And the white fog seethe up and spill Over the rim of Blomidon. For past the mountains to the North, Like a great caldron of the tides, Is Fundy, boiling round their base. And ever fuming up their sides. 27 THE KEEPERS OF SILENCE Yet here within my valley world No breath of all that tumult stirs; The little orchards sleep in peace; Forever dream the dark blue firs. And while far up the gorges sweep The silver legions of the showers, I have communion with the grass And conversation with the flowers. More wonderful than human speech Their dialect of silence is, The simple Dorian of the fields, So full of homely subtleties. When the dark pansies nod to say Good morning to the marigolds. Their velvet taciturnity Reveals as much as it withholds. 28 THE KEEPERS OF SILENCE I always half expect to hear Some hint of what they mean to do ; But never is their fine reserve Betrayed beyond a smile or two. Yet very well at times I seem To understand their reticence, And so, long since, I came to love My little brothers by the fence. Perhaps some August afternoon, When earth is only half-aware, They will unlock their heart for once, How sad if I should not be there! 29 AT HOME AND ABROAD. My modest Northern garden Is full of yellow flowers, And quaking leaves and sunlight And long noon hours. It hangs upon the hillside Above the little town; And there in pleasant weather You can look far down, To the broad dikes of Grand Pre Roamed over by the herds. And the purple Minas water Where fish the white sea-birds. 30 AT HOME AND ABROAD I watch the little vessels, Where the slow rivers glide Between the grassy orchards.. Come in upon the tide. For daily there accomplished Is the sea's legerdemain. To fill the land with rivers And empty it again. Before you lies North Mountain, Built like a long sea-wall — A wonder in blue summer And in the crimson fall. The sea-fogs cloud and mantle Along its fir-dark crest, While under it the fruit-lands Have shelter and have rest. 31 AT HOME AND ABROAD And when the goblin moonlight Loiters upon her round Of valley, marsh and mountain To bless my garden-ground, — (The harvest moon that lingers Until her task is done, And all the grain is ripened For her great lord, the sun,) I know that there due northward, Under the polar star. Sir Blomidon is fronting Whatever storms there are. I cannot see those features I love so well by day. Calmed by a thousand summers, Scarred by the winter's play; 32 AT HOME AND ABROAD Yet there above the battle Of the relentless tides, Under the solemn starlight He muses and abides. And in the magic stillness, The moonlight's ghostly gleam Makes me its sylvan brother. To rove the world a-dream. That wayward and oblivious Mortal I seem to be Shall habit not forever This garden by the sea. Not Blomidon nor Grand Pre Shall be his lasting home, Nor all the Ardise country Give room enough to roam. i^ AT HOME AND ABROAD Even to-night a little He strays, and will not bide The gossip of the flowers, The rumour of the tide. He must be forth and seeking, Beyond this garden-ground, The arm-in-arm companion For whom the sun goes round. And in the soft May weather I walk with you again, Where the terraces of Aleudon Look down upon the Seine. 44 KILLOOLEET. There's a wonderful woodland singer In the North, called Killooleet, — That is to say Little Sweetvoice In the tongue of the Milicete, The tribe of the upper Wolaastook, Who range that waterway From the blue fir hills of its sources To the fogs and tides of the bay. All day long in the sunshine, All night long through the rains, On the grey wet cedar barrens And the lonely blueberry plains, 35 KILLOOLEET You may hear Killooleet singing, Hear his O sweet (Then a grace-note, then the full cadence), Killooleet, Killooleet, Killooleet! Whenever you dip a paddle, Or set a pole in the stream, Killooleet marks the ripple, Killooleet knows the gleam; Killooleet gives you welcome, Killooleet makes you free With the great sweet wilderness freedom That holds over land and sea. You may slide your birch through the alders, Or camp where the rapids brawl, The first glad forest greeting Will still be Killooleet's call. 36 KILLOOLEET Wherever you drive a tent-pin, Or kindle a fire at night, Killooleet comes to the ridge-pole, Killooleet answers the light. The dark may silence the warblers; The heavy and thunderous hush That comes before storm may stifle The pure cool notes of the thrush; The waning season may sober Bobolink, bluebird, and quail ; But Killooleet's stainless transport Will not diminish nor fail. Henceforth you shall love and fear not. Remembering Killooleet's song Haunting the wild waste places. Deliberate, tranquil, and strong; 37 KILLOOLEET And so you shall come without cunning, But wise in the simpler lore, To the House of the Little Brothers, And God will open the door. 38 ST. BARTHOLOMEW'S ON THE HILL. " Bartholomew with his cold dew." Bartholomew, my brother, I like your roomy church ; I like your way of leaving No sinners in the lurch. I wish the world were wealthy In ministers like you. When at the lovely August You give the blessed dew. I love your rambling Abbey, So long ago begun. Whose choirs are in the tree-tops, Whose censer is the sun. 39 ST. BARTHOLOMEW S ON THE HILL Its windows are the morning ; Its rafters are the stars; The fog-banks float like incense Up from its purple floors. And where the ruddy apples Make lamps in the green gloom, The flowers in congregation Are never pressed for room ; But in your hillside chapel, Gay with its gorgeous paints. They bow before the Presence, — Sweet merry little saints! 40 THE CHURCH OF THE LEAVES. In French Canadian legendry, A rising from the dead recurs Each Christmastide. The old cure. With his parishioners Around him, in the night returns; And while his voice renews its bond In the beloved offices, The ghostly flock respond. Just so, we keep the forms of faith That wrought and moved us long ago; We mark the height man's soul attained, Forgetting it must grow. 41 THE CHURCH OF THE LEAVES Those venerable outgrown shells Wherefrom the radiant life is fled, — We wrong with our idolatry The dogmas of the dead. But He who walked with the world-soul At twilight in Gethsemane, Breathing among the listening boughs Sweet prayers of charity, Must daily with the wind return About the dim world, to renew The trembling litanies of the leaves, The blessings of the dew. He must revive with wind-sweet voice The gospel hardly known to flesh, Till the same spirit speaks again. Interpreting afresh; 42 THE CHURCH OF THE LEAVES Till the vast house of trees and air Reverberates from roof to floor With meanings of mysterious things We need to ask no more. For still He w^alks these shadowy aisles, Dreaming of beauties still to be, More manly than our manliest, Whose thought and love were free. The pines are all His organ pipes, And the great rivers are His choir; And creatures of the field and tide That reck not, yet aspire, Our brothers of the tardy hope, Put forth their strength in senses dim, Threading the vast, they know not why, Through eons up to Him. 43 THE CHURCH OF THE LEAVES I see Him in the orchard glooms, Watching the russet apples tan, With the serene regard of one Who is more God than man. And where the silent valley leads The small white water through the hills, And the black spruces stand unmoved, And quiet sunlight fills The world and time with large slow peace, It is His patience waiting there Response from lives whose breath is but The echo of His prayer. Brother of Nazareth, behold, We, too, perceive this life expand Beyond the daily need, for use Thy thought must understand. 44 THE CHURCH OF THE LEAVES Not for ourselves alone we strive, Since Thy perfection manifest Bids self resign what self desired, Postponing good for best. And in the far unfretted years, The generations we uphold Shall reach the measure of Thy heart, The stature of Thy mould. 45 THE DEEP HOLLOW ROAD. Cool in the summer mountain's heart, It lies in dim mysterious shade, Left of the highway turning in With grassy rut and easy grade. The marshes and the sea behind, The solemn fir-blue hills before; Here is the inn for Heavy-heart And this is weary Free-foot's door. O fellows, I have known it long; For joy of life turn in with me ; We bivouac with peace to-night, And good-bye to the brawling sea. 46 THE DEEP HOLLOW ROAD You hear? That's master thrush. He knows The voluntaries fit for June, And when to falter on the flute In the satiety of noon. A mile or two we follow in This rosy streak through forest gloom, Then for the ample orchard slopes And all the earth one snowy bloom! 47 MALYN'S DAISY. You know it. Rays of ashy blue Around a centre small and golden, An autumn face of cheery hue And fashion olden. When the year rests at Michaelmas Before the leaves must vanish faster, The country people see it pass And call it aster. It does not come with joy and June; It knows God's time is sometimes tardy ; And waits until we need the boon Of spirit hardy. 48 MALYNS DAISY So unobtrusive, yet so fair, About a world it makes so human, Its touch of grace is everywhere — Just like a woman. Along the road and up the dike It wanders when the noons are hazy, To tell us what content is like; That's Malyn's daisy. 49 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU. TO H. E. C. There are sunflowers too in my garden on top of the hill, Where now in early September the sun has his will, — The slow autumn sun that goes leisurely, taking his fill Of life in the orchards and fir woods so moveless and still; As if, should they stir, they might break some illu- sion and spill The store of their long summer musing on top of the hill. .10 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU The crowds of black spruces in tiers from the val- ley below, Ranged round their sky-roofed coliseum, mount row after row. Kow often there, rank above rank, they have watched for the slow Silver-lanterned processions of twilight, — the moon's come and go! How often as if they expected some bugle to blow, Announcing a bringer of news they were breath- less to know. They have hushed every leaf, — to hear only the murmurous flow Of the small mountain river sent up from the valley below! How still through the sweet summer sun, through the soft summer rain. SI ABOVE THE GASPEREAU They have stood there awaiting the summons should bid them attain The freedom of knowledge, the last touch of truth to explain The great golden gist of their brooding, the mar- vellous train Of thought they have followed so far, been so strong to sustain, — The bright gospel of sun and the pure revelations of rain! Then the orchards that dot, all in order, the green valley floor. Every tree with its boughs weighed to earth, like a tent from whose door Not a lodger looks forth, — yet the signs are there gay and galore, The great ropes of red fruitage and russet, crisp snow to the core. 52 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU Can the dark-eyed Romany here have deserted of yore Their camp at the coming of frost? Will they seek it no more? Who dwells in St. Eulalie's village? Who knows the fine lore Of the tribes of the apple-trees there on the green valley floor? Who, indeed? From the blue mountain gorge to the dikes by the sea, Goes that stilly wanderer, small Gaspereau ; who but he Should give the last hint of perfection, the touch that sets free From the taut string of silence the whisper of beauties to be! The very sun seems to have tarried, turned back a degree, 53 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU To lengthen out noon for the apple-folk here by the sea. What is it ? WTio comes ? What's abroad on the blue mountainside? A hush has been laid on the leaves and will not be defied. Is the great Scarlet Hunter at last setting out on his ride From the North with deliverance now? Were the lights we descried Last night in the heavens his camp-fires seen far and wide, The white signal of peace for whose coming the ages have cried ? " Expectancy lingers; fulfilment postponed," I replied, When soul said uneasily, " Who is it haunts your hillside?" 54 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU All the while not a word from my sunflowers here on the hill. And to-night when the stars over Blomidon flower and fill The blue Northern garden of heaven, so pale and so still, From the lordly king-aster Aldebaran there by the sill Of the East, where the moonlight will enter, not one will fulfil A lordlier lot than my sunflowers here on the hill. So much for mere fact, mere impression. So much I portray Of the atmosphere, colour, illusion of one autumn day, In the little Acadian village above the Grand Pre; 55 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU Just the quiet of orchards and firs, where the sun had full sway, And the river went trolling his soft wander-song to the bay, While roseberry, aster, and sagaban tangled his way. Be you their interpreter, reasoner ; tell what they say, These children of silence whose patient regard I portray. You Londoner, walking in Bishopsgate, stroll- ing the Strand, Some morning in autumn afford, at a fruit- dealer's stand. The leisure to look at his apples there ruddy and tanned. Then ask, when he's smiling to serve j'^ou, if choice can command S6 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU A Gravenstein grown oversea on Canadian land. (And just for the whim's sake, for once, you'll have no other brand!) How teach you to tell them? Pick one, and with that in your hand, Bethink you awhile as you turn again into the Strand. " What if," you will say, — so smooth in your hand it will lie, So round and so firm, of so rich a red to the eye. Like a dash of Fortuny, a tinge of some Indian dye, While you turn it and toss, mark the bloom, ere you taste it and try, — " Now what if this grew where the same bright pavilion of sky Is stretched o'er the valley and hillside he bids me descry. 57 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU The windless valley of peace, where the seasons go by, And the river goes down through the orchards where long shadows lie! " There's the fruit in your hand, in your ears is the roar of the street, The pulse of an empire keeping its volume and beat, Its sure come and go day and night, while we sleep or we eat. Taste the apple, bite in to the juice; how abun- dant and sweet ! As sound as your own English heart, and whole- some as wheat. There grow no such apples as that in your Bishopsgate street. Or perhaps In St. Helen's Place, when your business is done 58 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU And the ledgers put by, you will think of the hundred and one Commissions and errands to do ; but what under the sun Was that, so important? Ah, yes! the nev/ books overrun The old shelves. It is high time to order a new set begun. Then off to the joiner's. You enter to see his plane run With a long high shriek through the lumber he's working upon. Then he turns from his shavings to query what you would have done. But homeward 'tis you who make question. That song of the blade! And the sharp sweet cry of the wood, what an answer it made! 59 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU What stories the joiner must hear, as he plies his clean trade, Of all the wild life of the forest where long shadows wade The untrodden moss, and the firs send a journey- ing shade So slow through the valley so far from the song of his blade. Come back to my orchards a moment. They're waiting for you. How still are the little grey leaves where the pippins peep through! The boughs where the ribstons hang red are half-breaking in two. Above them September in magical soft Northern blue Has woven the spell of her silence, like frost or like dew, 60 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU Yet warm as a poppy's red dream. When All Saints shall renew The beauty of summer awhile, will their dream- ing come true? Ah, not of my Grand Pre they dream, nor your London and you ! Their life is their own, and the surge of it. All through the spring They pushed forth their buds, and the rainbirds at twilight would sing. They put forth their bloom, and the world was as fairy a thing As a Japanese garden. Then midsummer came with a zing And the clack of the locust; then fruit-time and coolness, to bring This aftermath deep underfoot with its velvety spring. 6i ABOVE THE GASPEREAU And they all the while with the fatherly, motherly care, Taking sap from the strength of the ground, taking sun from the air, Taking chance of the frost and the worm, taking courage to dare. Have given their life that the life might be goodly and fair In their kind for the seasons to come, with good witness to bear How the sturdy old race of the apples could give and not spare. To-morrow the harvest begins. We shall rifle them there Of the beautiful fruit of their bodies, the crown of their care. How lovingly then shall the picker set hand to the bough ! — 62 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU Bid it yield, ere the seed come to earth or the graft to the plough, Not only sweet life for its kind, as the instincts allow, That savour and shape may survive generations from now. But life to its kin who can say, " I am stronger than thou," — Fulfilling a lordlier law than the law of the bough. I heard before dawn, with planets beginning to quail, — " Whoso hath life, let him give, that my purpose prevail : Whoso hath none, let him take, that his strength may be hale. Behold, I have reckoned the tally, I keep the full tale. 63 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU Whoso hath love, let him give, lest his spirit grovi^ stale; Whoso hath none, let him die; he shall wither and fail. Behold I will plenish the loss at the turn of the scale. He hath law to himself, who hath love ; ye shall hope and not quail." Then the sun arose, and my sunflowers here on the hill, In free ceremonial turned to the East to fulfil Their daily observance, receiving his peace and his will, — The lord of their light who alone bids the dark- ness be nil, The lord of their love who alone bids the life in them thrill; Undismayed and serene, they awaited him here on the hill. 64 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU Ah, the patience of earth! Look down at the dark pointed firs; They are carved out of blackness; one pattern recurs and recurs. They crowd all the gullies and hillsides, the gashes and spurs. As silent as death. What an image! How nature avers The goodness of calm with that taciturn beauty of hers! As silent as sleep. Yet the life in them climbs and upstirs. They too have received the great law, know that haste but defers The perfection of time, — the initiate gospeller firs. So year after year, slow ring upon ring, they have grown, 65 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU Putting infinite long-loving care into leafage and cone, By the old ancient craft of the earth they have pondered and known In the dead of the hot summer noons, as still as a stone. Not for them the gay fruit of the thorn, nor the high scarlet roan, Nor the plots of the deep orchard-land where the apples are grown. In winter the wind, all huddled and shuddering, came To warm his old bones by the fires of sunset aflame Behind the black house of the firs. When the moose-birds grew tame In the lumberer's camps In the woods, what marvellous fame 66 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU His talk and the ice of his touch would spread and proclaim, Of the berg and the floe of the lands without nation or name, Where the earth and the sky, night and noon, north and south are the same. The white and awful Nirvana of cold whence he came! Then April, some twilight picked out with a great yellow star, Returning, like Hylas long lost and come back with his jar Of sweet living water at last, having wandered so far, Leads the heart out-of-doors, and the eye to the point of a spar, At whose base in the half-melted snow the first Mayflowers are, — 67 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU And there the first robin is pealing below the great star. So soon, oversoon, the full summer. Within those dark boughs, Deliberate and far, a faltering reed-note will rouse The shy transports of earth, till the wood-crea- tures hear where they house. And grow bold as the tremble-eared rabbits that nibble and mouse. While up through the pasture-lot, startling the sheep as they browse, Where kingbirds and warblers are piercing the heat's golden drowse, Some girl, whom the sun has made tawny, the wind had to blowse. Will come there to gentle her lover beneath those dark boughs. 68 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU Then out of the hush, when the grasses are frosty and old, Will the chickadee's tiny alarm against winter be rolled ; And soon, when the ledges and ponds are bitten with cold, The honk of the geese, that wander-cry stirring and bold, Will sound through the night, where those hardy mariners hold The uncharted course through the dark, as it is from of old. Ah, the life of the woods, how they share and partake of it all. These evergreens, silent as Indians, solemn and tall! From the goldenwing's first far-heard awaken- ing call, 69 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU The serene flute of the thrush in his high beech hall, And the pipe of the frog, to the bannered ap- proach of the fall. And the sullen wind, when snow arrives on a squall. Trooping in all night from the North with news would appal Any outposts but these; with a zest they partake of it all. Lo, out of the hush they seem to mount and aspire ! From basement to tip they have builded, with heed to go higher, One circlet of branches a j^ear with their lift of green spire. Nay, rather they seem to repose, having done with desire, 70 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU Awaiting the frost, with the fruit scarlet-bright on the briar, Each purpose fulfilled, each ardour that bade them aspire. Then hate be afar from the bite of the axe that shall fell These keepers of solitude, makers of quiet, who dwell On the slopes of the North. And clean be the hand that shall quell The tread of the sap that was wont to go mount- ing so well, Round on round with the sun in a spiral, slow cell after cell, As a bell-ringer climbs in a turret. That resinous smell From the eighth angel's hand might have risen with the incense to swell 7« ABOVE THE GASPEREAU His offering in heaven, when the half-hour's si- lence befell. Behold, as the prayers of the saints that w^ent up to God's knees In John's Revelation, the silence and patience of these Our brothers of orchard and hill, the unhurry- ing trees, To better the burden of earth till the dark suns freeze. Shall go out to the stars with the sound of Acadian seas. And the scent of the wood-flowers blowing about their great knees. To-night when Altair and Alshain are ruling the West, Whence Bootes is driving his dogs to long hunt- ing addressed; 72 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU With Alioth plumb over Blomidon standing at rest; When Algol is leading the Pleiades over the crest Of the magical East, and the South puts Al- pherat to test With Menkar just risen ; will come, like a sigh from Earth's breast. The first sob of the tide turning home, — one distraught in his quest Forever, and calling forever the wind in the west. And to-night there will answer the ghost of a sigh on the hill, So small you would say. Is it wind, or the frost with a will Walking down through the woods, who to- morrow shall show us his skill 73 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU In yellows and reds? So noiseless, it hardly will thrill The timorous aspens, which tremble when all else is still; Yet the orchards will know, and the firs aware on the hill. " O Night, I am old, I endure. Since my be- ing began, When out of the dark the aurora spread up like a fan, I have founded the lands and the islands; the hills are my plan. I have covered the pits of the earth with my bridge of one span. From the Horn to Dunedin unbroken my long rollers ran, From Pentland and Fastnet and Foyle to Bras d'Or and Manan, 74 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU To dredge and upbuild for the creatures of tribe and of clan. Lo, now who shall end the contriving my fingers began ? " Then the little wind that blows from the great star-drift Will answer, " Thou tide in the least of the planets I lift, Considers the journeys of light. Are thy journey- ings swift? Thy sands are as smoke to the star-banks I huddle and shift. Peace! I have seeds of the grasses to scatter and sift. I have freighting to do for the weed and the frail thistle drift. " O ye apples and firs, great and small ar^ as one in the end. 75 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU Because ye had life to the full, and spared not to spend; Because ye had love of your kind, to cherish and fend; Held hard the good instinct to thrive, cleaving close to life's trend; Nor questioned w^here impulse had origin, — pur- pose might tend ; Now, beauty is yours, and the freedom whose promptings transcend Attainment forever, through death with new being to blend. O ye orchards and woods, death is naught, love is all in the end." Ah, friend of mine over the sea, shall we not discern. In the life of our brother the beech and our sister the fern, 76 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU As St. Francis would call them (his Minorites, too, would we learn!), In death but a door to new being no creature may spurn, But must enter for beauty's completion, — pass up in his turn To the last round of joy, yours and mine, whence to think and discern? Who shall say " the last round ? " Have I passed by the exit of soul ? From behind the tall door that swings outward, replies no patrol To our restless Qui vivef when is paid each implacable toll. Not a fin of the tribes shall return, having cleared the great shoal ; Not a wing of the migrants come back from below the dark knoll; 77 ABOVE THE GASPEREAU Yet the zest of the flight and the swimming who fails to extol? Saith the Riddle, " The parts are all plain ; ye may guess at the whole." I guess, " Immortality, knowledge, survival of Soul." To-night, with the orchards below and the firs on the hill Asleep in the long solemn moonlight and taking no ill, A hand will open the sluice of the great sea- mill, — Start the gear and the belts of the tide. Then a murmur will fill The hollows of midnight with sound, when all else is still, A promise to hearten my sunflowers here on the hill. 78 THE BALLAD OF FATHER HUDSON. You may doubt, but I heard the story Just as I tell it to you; And whatever you think of the setting, I believe the substance true. The great North Seaboard Province, From Fundy to Chaleurs, Is a country of many waters And sombre hills of fir, Where the moose still treads his snow-yard, Breaking his paths to browse, Where the caribou rove the barrens. And the bear and the beaver house; 79 THE BALLAD OF FATHER HUDSON Where Killooleet sings from the ridge-pole All through the night and the rain, When the great blue Northern Summer Comes back to the wilds again. In that land of many rivers, Began and lake and stream, You may follow the trail in the water With the paddle's bend and gleam. Where the canoe, like a shadow Among the shadows, slips Under the quiet alders And over the babbling rips; You may go for a w^eek together, Reading footmark and trace Of the wild shy woodland creatures, Ere you meet a human face. 80 THE BALLAD OF FATHER HUDSON There where the Loyalists came And the houses of men were few, Little was all their wealth And great were the hardships they knew; But greater the hardy faith They kept unflinching and fine, And chose to be naught in the world For the pride of a loyal line. And there came Father Hudson, As I've heard my father tell, To serve the wilderness missions, With sound of a Sunday bell. Sober he was and a toiler, Cared not for ease nor place; They speak of his humour, too, And the long droll shaven face. 8i THE BALLAD OF FATHER HUDSON Labour he did, and spared not, In that vineyard wild and rough, And often was sore with travel. And often hungry enough. Doubt not, as he carried the word By portage and stream and trail, That still in the mind of his people The fire of truth should prevail. And once was a church to build, Little, lonely, apart. Hardly more than a token In the forest's great green heart. With his own hands he reared it. And often was wet to the hide. And often slept on the shavings Till the birds sang outside ; 82 THE BALLAD OF FATHER HUDSON Then up in the fragrant morning, And back to hammer and saw, Building into the timbers Love and devotion and awe. So the fair summer went by, And the church was finished at last; But Father Hudson was called To a country still more vast. In the land of the creaking snowshoe And the single track in the snow, There's many a thing of wonder No man will ever know. It happened about the feast Of the blessed Nativity, When the snow lay heavy and silent On every bending tree, 83 THE BALLAD OF FATHER HUDSON When the great north lights were stalking Through the purple solitude, Father Hudson's successor Passed by the church in the wood. And it came to his mind to ponder What the requital may be Of toil that is done in the body, When the soul is at last set free ; And whether the flame of fervour That is quenched in service here, Survives through self-surrender To illumine another sphere. Then he saw the place all lighted, Though it was not the hour of prayer. And the strains of a triumphing organ Came to him on the air. 84 THE BALLAD OF FATHER HUDSON In amazement he turned aside. Who could the player be? And who had lighted the lights? The door still fast, the key On its nail in the little porch! He turned, put one foot on the sill, Unlocked, opened, and entered. The church was dark and still! The white-robed spruces around it Stood still with never a word ; The sifting snow at the window Was all the good man heard. Verily, Father Hudson, Strong was thy sturdy creed. But stronger and more enduring The humble and holy deed, 85 THE BALLAD OF FATHER HUDSON Which SO could enthral the senses And lend the spirit sight To behold the glory of labour And love's availing might. O brave are the single-hearted Who deal with this life, and dare To live by the inward vision, — In the soul's native air. 86 THE WORD AT ST. KAVIN'S. Once at St. Kavin's door I rested. No sign more Of discontent escaped me from that day. For there I overheard A Brother of the Word Expound the grace of poverty, and say: Thank God for poverty That makes and keeps us free, That lets us go our unobtrusive way, Glad of the sun and rain, Upright, serene, humane. Contented with the fortune of a day. 87 THE WORD AT ST. KAVIN S Light-hearted as a bird, I will obey the word That bade the earth take form, the sea subside, — • That bids the wild wings go Each year from line to snow. When Spring unfurls her old green flag for guide, — That bids the fleeting hosts Along the shelving coasts Once more adventure far by sound and stream, — Bids everything alive Awaken and revive, — Resume the unperished glory and the dream. I too, with fear put by, Confront my destiny. With not a wish but to arise and go. Where beauty still may lead From creed to larger creed. Thanking my Maker that he made me so. 88 THEWORDATST. KAVIN S For I would shun no task That kindliness may ask, Nor flinch at any duty to my kind; Praying but to be freed From ignorance and greed, Grey fear and dull despondency of mind. So I would readjust The logic of the dust, The servile hope that puts its trust in things. Ephemera of earth, Of more than fleeting worth. Are we, endowed with rapture as with wings. (Type of the soul of man. The slight yet stable plan! Those creatures perishable as the dew. How buoyantly they ride The vast and perilous tide, Free as the air their courses to pursue!) 89 THEWORDATST. KAVIN S And I would keep my soul Joyous and sane and whole, Unshamed by falsehood and unvexed by strife, Unalien in that clear And radiant atmosphere That still surrounds us with a larger life, When we have laid aside Our truculence and pride, Craven self-seeking, turbulent self-will, Resolved this very day No longer to obey The tyrant Mammon who begods us still. All selfish gain at best Brings but profound unrest And inward loss, despite our loud professions. Think therefore what it is, What surety of bliss. To be absolved from burdensome possessions! 90 THEWORDATST. KAVIN S Shall God, who doth provide The majesty and pride And beauty of this earth so lavishly, Deny them to the poor And lowly and obscure? Nay, they are given to all justly and free. And if I share my crust, As common manhood must, With one whose need is greater than my own. Shall I not also give His soul, that it may live, Of the abundant pleasures I have known? And so, if I have wrought, Amassed or conceived aught Of beauty or Intelligence or power. It is not mine to hoard; It stands there to afford Its generous service simply as a flower. 91 THE WORD AT ST. KAVIN S How soon, my friends, how soon We should obtain the boon Of shining peace for which the toiler delves, If only we would give Our spirit room to live, — Be, here and now, our brave untarnished selves; If only we would dare Espouse the good and fair Our soul, unbound by custom, still perceives; And without compromise Or favour in men's eyes Live by the truth each one of us believes! Bow not to vested wrong That we have served too long, Pawning our birthright for a tinsel star! Shall the soul take upon her Time-service and mouth-honour? Behold the fir-trees, how unswerved they are! 92 THEWORDATST. KAVIN S Native to sun and storm, They cringe not nor conform, Save to the gentle law their sound heart knows; Each day enough for them To rise, cone, branch, and stem, A leaf-breadth higher in their tall repose. Ah, what a travesty Of man's ascent, were I To bear myself less royally than they, After the ages spent In spirit's betterment, Through rounds of aspiration and decay ! For surely I have grown Within a cleft of stone, With spray of mountain torrents in my face. Slow soaring ring by ring On moveless tiled wing, I have seen earth below me sink through space. 93 THEWORDATST. KAVIN S I too in polar night Have hungered, gaunt and white, Alone amid the awful silences; And fled on gaudy fin. When the blue tides came in, Through coral gardens under tropic seas. And wheresoe'er I strove, The greater law was love, A faith too fine to falter or mistrust; There was no wanton greed, Depravity of breed, Malice nor cant nor enmity unjust. Nay, not till I was man, Learned I to scheme and plan The blackest depredation on my kind. Converting to my gain My fellow's need and pain, In chartered pillage ruthless and refined. 94 THE WORD AT ST. KAVIN S Therefore, my friends, I say, Back to the fair sweet way Our mother Nature taught us long ago, — The large primeval mood, Leisure and amplitude, The dignity of patience strong and slow. Let us go in once more. By some blue mountain door, And hold communion with the forest leaves, Where long ago we trod The Ghost House of the God, Through orange dawns and amethystine eves. There bright-robed choristers Make music in the firs. Rejoicing in their service all day long; And there the whole night through. Along the dark still blue. What glorying hosts with starry tapers throng! 95 THEWORDATST. KAVIN S There in some deep ravine Whose walls are living green, A sanctuary spacious, cool, and dim, At earth-refreshing morn, The pure white clouds are born, — The incense of the ground sent up to Him. No slighted task is there, But equal craft and care And love in irresistible accord, The test and sign of art, Bestowed through every part; No thought of recognition or reward. In that diviner air We shall grow wise and fair, Not frayed by hurry nor distraught by noise, - Learn once again to be Noble, courageous, free, — Regain our primal ecstasy and poise. 96 THE WORD AT ST. KAVIN S Calm in the deep control Of firmamental soul, Let us abide unfretful and secure, Knowledge and reason bent To further soul's intent, — Her veiled dim purposes remote yet sure. For soul has led us now. Science unravels how, Through cell and tissue up from dust to man And will lead by and by. No logic tells us why, To fill her purport in the ampler plan. Ah, trust the soul, my friends, To seek her own great ends Revealed not in the fashion of the hour! For she outlives intact The insufficient act, Herself the source and channel of all power. 97 THE WORD AT ST. KAVIN S The soul survives, unmarred, The mind care-vi^orn and scarred, That still is anxious over little things. To come unto her own, Through benefits unknown And the green beauty of a thousand springs. From infinite resource She holds her gleaming course Through toil, distraction, hindrance, and dismay. Till some high destiny, Accomplished by and by. Reveals the splendid hope that was her stay. Therefore should every hour Replenish her with power Of joy and love and freedom and fresh truth, That we even In age May share her heritage Of ancient wisdom with the heart of youth. 98 THE WORD AT ST. KAVIN S Lore of the worldly wise Is folly in her eyes. All-energy, all-knowledge, and all-love, Aware of deeps below This pageant that we know, Hers is the very faith accounted of By Him who rose and bade His friends be not afraid, When peril rocked their fishing-boat at sea, — Who bade the sick not fear, The sad be of good cheer. And in the hour they were made whole and free. The sceptic sees but part Of Nature's mighty heart. A wide berth would I give that dangerous shoal — Steer for the open sea, No sight of land, but free. Trusting my senses, shall I doubt my soul ? 99 THEWORDATST. KAVIN S Let me each day anew My outward voyage pursue For the Far Islands and the Apple Lands. Till through the breaking gloom Some evening they shall loom, With one pale star above the lilac sands. Ah, that day I shall know How the shy wood-flowers grow In the deep forest, turning to the light; Untrammelled impulse still With glad obedient will The only guide out of ancestral night. Oh, I shall comprehend Truth at my journey's end, — What being is, and what I strive to be, — ■ What soul in beauty's guise Eludes our wistful eyes, Yet surely Is akin to you and me. I GO THEWORDATST. KAVIN S Therefore, towards that supreme Knowledge, that unveiled dream, That promise of our life from day to day, The grace of joyousness Abide with us to bless And help us forth along the Perfect Way ! The voice of the good priest In benediction ceased ; The congregation like a murmur rose; And when I set my pack Once more upon my back, 'Twas light as any thistle-down that blows. lOI CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN'S. To the assembled folk At great St. Kavin's spoke Young Brother Amiel on Christmas eve; I give you joy, my friends, That as the round year ends, We meet once more for gladness by God's leave. On other festal days For penitence or praise Or prayer we meet, or fulness of thanksgiving; To-night we calendar The rising of that star Which lit the old world with new joy of living. 1 02 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S 'Ah, we disparage still The Tidings of Good Will, Discrediting Love's gospel now as then! And with the verbal creed That God is love indeed, Who dares make Love his god before all men? Shall we not, therefore, friends, Resolve to make amends To that glad inspiration of the heart; To grudge not, to cast out Selfishness, malice, doubt. Anger and fear ; and for the better part, To love so much, so well. The spirit cannot tell The range and sweep of her own boundary! There is no period Between the soul and God ; Love is the tide, God the eternal sea. 103 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S Of old, men walked by fear; And if their God seemed near, It was the Avenger unto whom they bowed, - - A wraith of their own woes. Vain, cruel, and morose, With anger and vindictiveness endowed. Of old, men walked by hate ; The ruthless were the great; Their crumbling kingdoms stayed by might alone. Men saw vast empires die, Nor guessed the reason why, — The simple law of life as yet unknown As love. Then came our Lord, Proclaiming the accord Of soul and nature in love's rule and sway, The lantern that he set To light us, shining yet Along the Perfect Path wherein we stray. 104 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S To-day we walk by love; To strive is not enough, Save against greed and ignorance and might. We apprehend peace comes Not with the roll of drums, But in the still processions of the night. And we perceive, not awe But love is the great law That binds the world together safe and whole. The splendid planets run Their courses in the sun; Love is the gravitation of the soul. In the profound unknown, Illumined, fair, and lone, Each star is set to shimmer in its place. In the profound divine Each soul is set to shine. And its unique appointed orbit trace, 105 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S There is no near nor far, Where glorious Algebar Swings round his mighty circuit through the night, Yet where without a sound The winged seed comes to ground. And the red leaf seems hardly to alight. One force, one lore, one need For satellite and seed. In the serene benignity for all. Letting her time-glass run With star-dust, sun by sun, In Nature's thought there is no great nor small. There is no far nor near Within the spirit's sphere. The summer sunset's scarlet-yellow wings Are tinged with the same dye That paints the tulip's ply. And what is colour but the soul of things? 1 06 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S (The earth was without form; God moulded it with storm, Ice, flood, and tempest, gleaming tint and hue; Lest it should come to ill For lack of spirit still, He gave it colour, — let the love shine through.) My joy of yesterday Is just as far away As the first rapture of my man's estate. A lifetime or an hour Has all there is of power. In Nature's love there is no small nor great. Of old, men said, "Sin not; By every line and jot Ye shall abide; man's heart is false and vile." Christ said, " By Love alone In man's heart is God known; Obey the word no falsehood can defile." 107 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S The wise physician there Of our distress had care, And laid his finger on the pulse of time. And there to eyes unsealed Earth's secret lay revealed, The truth that knows not any age nor clime. The heart of the ancient wood Was a grim solitude. The sanction of a worship no less grim ; Man's ignorance and fear Peopled the natural year With forces evil and malign to him. He saw the wild, rough way Of cosmic powers at play; He did not see the love that lay below. Jehovah, Mars, and Thor, These were the gods of war He made in his own likeness long ago. 1 08 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S Then came the Word, and said, " See how the world is made, — With how much loving kindness, ceaseless care. Not Wrath, but Love, call then The Lord of beasts and men, Whose hand sustains the sparrows in the air." And since that day we prove Only how great is love, Nor to this hour its greatness half believe. For to what other power Will life give equal dower. Or chaos grant one moment of reprieve! Look down the ages' line, Where slowly the divine Evinces energy, puts forth control; See mighty love alone Transmuting stock and stone, Infusing being, helping sense and soul. 109 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S And what is energy, In-working, which bids be The starry pageant and the life of earth? What is the genesis Of every joy and bliss, Each action dared, each beauty brought to birth? What hangs the sun on high ? What swells the growing rye ? What bids the loons cry on the Northern lake? What stirs in swamp and swale, When April winds prevail. And all the dwellers of the ground awake? What lurks in the dry seed, But waiting to be freed. Asleep and patient for a hundred j^ears? Till of earth, rain, and sun, A miracle is done, Some magic calls the sleeper and he hears, — no CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN s Arouses, puts forth blade And leaf and bud, arrayed Some morning in that garb of rosy snow, The same fair matchless flower As shed its petal-shower Through old Iberean gardens long ago. What is it that endures, Survives, persists, immures Life's very self, preserving type and plan?—- Yet learns the scope of change. As the long cycles range, — Looks through the eyes of bluebird, wolf, and man? What lurks in the deep gaze Of the old wolf? Amaze, Hope, recognition, gladness, anger, fear. But deeper than all these Love muses, yearns, and sees, And is the self that does not change nor veer. Ill CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S Not love of self alone, Struggle for lair and bone, But sell-denying love of mate and young, Love that is kind and wise, Knows trust and sacrifice, And croons the old dark universal tongue. In Nature you behold But strivings manifold. Battle and conflict, tribe warring against tribe? Look deeper, and see all That death cannot appal. Failure intimidate, nor fortune bribe. Our brothers of the air Who come with June must dare, Be bold and strong, have knowledge, lust, and choice ; Yet think, when glad hosts throng The summer woods with song, Love gave them beauty and love lends them voice. 112 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S Love surely in some form Bade them brave night and storm, — Was the dark binnacle that held them true, Those tiny mariners No unknown voyage deters, When the old migrant longing stirs anew. And who has understood Our brothers of the wood, Save he who put off guile and every guise Of violence, — made truce With panther, bear, and moose, As beings like ourselves whom love makes wise? For they, too, do love's will, Our lesser clansmen still ; The House of Many Mansions holds us all ; Courageous, glad, and hale. They go forth on the trail. Hearing the message, hearkening to the call. 113 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S Oh, not fortuitous chance Alone, nor circumstance, Begot the creatures after their own kind ; But always loving will Was present to fulfil The primal purpose groping up to mind. Adversity but bade New puissance spring to aid, New powers develop, new aptness come in play; Yet never function wrought Capacity from nought, — Gave skill and mastery to the shapes of clay; For always while new need Evoked new thought through deed. Old self was there to ponder, choose, and strive. Fortune might mould, evolve, But impulse must resolve, Equipped at length to know, rejoice, and thrive. 114 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S And evermore must Love Hearten, foresee, approve, And look upon the work and find it good ; Else would all effort fail, — The very stars avail Less than a swarm of fireflies in a wood. Take love out of the world One day, and we are hurled Back into night, to perish in the void. Love is the very girth And cincture of this earth, No stitch to be unloosed, no link destroyed. However wild and long The battle of the strong. Stronger and longer are the hours of peace. When gladness has its way Under the fair blue day. And life aspires, takes thought, bids good increase. 115 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S So dawns the awaited hour When the great cosmic power Of love was first declared by Christ ; so too To-day we keep in mind His name who taught mankind That open secret old, yet ever new, — Commemorate his birth Who loved the kindly earth, Was gentle, strong, compassionate, humane, And tolerant and wise And glad, — the very guise And height of manhood not to lose again. Shall we not then forego Lavish perfunctory show. The burdensome display, the empty gift, That we may have to give To every soul alive Of love's illumination, cheer, and lift? ii6 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S See rich and poor be fed ! Break up thy soul for bread, Be loaves and fishes to the hungry heart, That a great multitude, Receiving of thy good, May bless the God within thee and depart! You workman, love your work Or leave it. Let no irk Unsteady the laborious hand, that still Must give the spirit play To follow her own way To beauty, through devotion, care, and skill. How otherwise find vent For soul's imperious bent. Than thro' these hands for wonder-working made, When Love the sure and bold Guides to the unforetold? Blessed the craftsman who is unafraid! 117 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S Give Beauty her sweet will, Make love your mistress still, You lovers, nor delay! God's time be yours. Make low-born jealousy And doubt ashamed to be, And cast old envious gossip out-of-doors. Believe the truth of love, Enact the beauty of love, Praise and adore the goodliness of love. For we are wise by love, And strong and fair through love, No less than sainted and inspired with love: Remember the new word The Syrian twilight heard, That marvellous discourse which John records, The one last great command The Master left his band, " Love one another! " And our time afFords ii8 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S What greater scope than just To execute that trust? Love greatly; love; love is life's best employ. Neighbour, sweetheart, or friend, Love wholly, to love's end; So is the round world richer for your joy. Love only, one or all! Measure no great and small! Love is a seed, life-bearing, undecayed ; And that immortal germ Past bounds of zone and term Will grow and cover the whole world with shade. Sow love, it cannot fail; Adversity's sharp hail May cut all else to ground ; fair love survives. The black frost of despair And slander's bitter air, — Love will outlast them by a thousand lives. 119 CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. K.AVIN S Be body, mind and soul, Subject to love's control, Each loving to the limit of love's power; And all as one, not three. So is man's trinity Enhanced and freed and gladdened hour by hour. Beauty from youth to age, The body's heritage, Love will not forfeit by neglect nor shame; And knowledge, dearly bought, Love will account as nought. Unless it serve soul's need and body's claim. Let soul desire, mind ask, And body crave; our task Be to fulfil each want in love's own way. So shall the good and true Partake of beauty too, And life be helped and greatened day by day. CHRISTMAS EVE AT ST. KAVIN S Spend love, and save it not; In act, in wish, in thought, Spend love upon this lifetime without stint. Let not the heart grow dry, As the good hours go by; Love now, see earth take on the glory tint. Open the door to-night Within your heart, and light The lantern of love there to shine afar. On a tumultuous sea Some straining craft, maybe. With bearings lost, shall sight love's silver star. THE END. >^.^; >^7 THE LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Santa Barbara THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE STAMPED BELOW. Ties 9482 ^•i ,4-* ^ ^iJ£2£5?042 225^' ."/C SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARv'pACILmr A A 001 433 398