f I UC-NRLF *B lt3 30M FIFTY POEMS BY JOHN FREEMA 1911 Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2007 with funding from Microsoft Corporation http://www.archive.org/details/fiftypoemsOOfreerich t/UV. irpi<>*i^ T / y XfC^A** FIFTY POEMS ^ ^ImJ^-' p* i TWENTY POEMS By JOHN FREEMAN Gay & Hancock, Is. net Daily Chronicle. — He has his own way of looking at things, and a careful style. ... At times the felicity of his writing is almost startling. Bookman. — The reality and the sincerity of the best of these poems are perfectly evident. . . . No good, unusual work goes off with a loud report. Mr. Freeman, because of his aloof outlook and intro- spectiveness, because he is interested in and intent on what most people shun, or ignore, or cannot see, will win over his readers one by one. Star (on "A London Poet"). — In " Twenty Poems " there are some charm- ing impressions of London. ... A master of the sonnet form. Aberdeen Free Press. — There is about all the work of Mr. Freeman a note of dis- tinction. Manchester Courier. — He who reads " Twenty Poems " will wish the twenty had been forty. FIFTY POEMS BY JOHN FREEMAN LONDON HERBERT & DANIEL 21 MADDOX STREET, W 1911 PRINTED BY HAZELL, WATSON AND VINEY, LD., LONDON AND AYLESBURY. 9S1 it,, XLq ALICE MEYNELL L 488 Some of the verses in this book have already appeared in — The English Review, Fry's Magazine, The Pall Mall Gazette, The Tramp. The Author's acknowledgments are due to the respective Editors, for permission to reprint. CONTENTS I. THANKSGIVING II. PROMISE .... III. EVENING BEAUTY! BLACKFRIARS IV. " MY TRUE LOVE HATH MY HEART V. THE WEAVER OF MAGIC VI. SOLITUDE .... VII. STRIFE .... VIII. UNDER THE LINDEN BRANCHES IX. THE NIGHT WATCH X. THE NOBLE COMPANY . XI. THE DARKSOME NIGHTINGALE XII. FOREBODING XIII. FROM PICCADILLY IN AUGUST XIV. IN THE TRAIN XV. SILENCE AND ECHO PAGE II 13 14 16 17 18 20 21 22 24 26 27 28 29 30 CONTENTS XVI. XVII. XVIII. XIX. XX. XXI. XXII. XXIII. XXIV. XXV. XXVI. XXVII. XXVIII. XXIX. XXX. XXXI. XXXII. XXXIII. XXXIV. XXXV. XXXVI. HANDS ABSENCE . THE HAUNTED SHADOW ALONE AND COLD SLEEP THE FULL TIDE YOUR SHADOW MORNING PEACE INEVITABLE CHANGE LONELINESS FIRST LOVE, I. . DO., II. . DO., III. . " I HEARD A VOICE " THE CALL AGAINST DESIRE " O LOVE, WHAT SHALL THEE ? " THE PHYSICIAN WAITING . SLEEPING SEA . WALKING AT EVE PAGJS 31 CONTENTS XXXVII. SAVING DELIGHT XXXVIII. " YOU THAT WERE " XXXIX. " THE LIGHT THAT NEVER WAS ' XL. HOME AGAIN XLI. SAILING OF THE " GLORY ' XLII. ENGLAND'S ENEMY . XLIII. THE UNUTTERED XLIV* FAIR EVE XLV. EASTER . XLVI. THE SNARE XLVII. " O HIDE ME IN THY LOVE " XLVIII. BIRDS OF LONGING . XLIX. VISION AND ECHO L. PRAYER TO MY LORD 9 PAGE 53 55 57 59 6i 63 65 66 68 7i 73 74 75 77 Fifty Poems I THANKSGIVING To whom be thanks ? To them whose sorrow I Perforce did share, though their bright fortitude I could not share : To them chief thanks, whose half-suppress' d low sigh Taught me the bitterness of solitude I could not bear. And unto them be thanks, those poor who showed How cheerfully and plaintless men may live ; For whom to die Were but to lose an unsustainable load, Since barren lif e scarce even bread could give Them to live by. And unto you, poor lost ones evil-starr'd, Who taught me all your evil, and taught then Its impotence ; To you be thanks, by weak regret unmarr'd ; For how should I ever o'erprize again Your lures of sense ? But you, O poets of the living word, And you, magicians of rich melodies, How should I pay 12 FIFTY POEMS Thanks for the music heard, and that unheard Save in my heart ? for look, you touch the keys And on me play. Even as you will. . . . Enough ! I will praise Life For all things living, glad, sad, foul and fair. Since I have trod The brittle years, and all with splendour rife, I will praise life's abundance — for who dare Give praise to God ? FIFTY POEMS 13 II PROMISE The cold moon from the hilltop stares Over the leafless shaws and dark ; Fronting the moon the hillside bares Her bosom stark. Of all things else only cold age Might show thus desolate and chill. So looks the last month's pilgrimage, So the last hill, Down the moon-ghostened road there walks, Beneath dark shadow and white shine, A girl who to her own heart talks Of things so fine, So sure and fine, she breaks with song The stillness sealing everything : She nurses in her bosom the long Promise of Spring. 14 FIFTY POEMS III EVENING BEAUTY : BLACKFRIARS Nought is but beauty weareth, near and far, Under the pale, blue sky and lonely star. This is that quick hour when the city turns Her troubled harsh distortion and blind care Into brief loveliness seen everywhere, While in the fuming west the low sun smouldering burns. Not brick nor marble the rich beauty owns, Not this is held in starward-pointing stones. Sun, wind and smoke the threefold magic stir, Kissing each favourless poor ruin with kiss Like that when lovers lovers lure to bliss, And earth than heaven awhile is heavenlier. Tall shafts that show the sky how far away ! The thousand- window' d house gilded with day That fades to night ; the arches low, the streamer Everywhere of the rudd3^d smoke. ... Is aught Of loveliness so rich e'er sold and bought ? Look visions fairer in the eyes of any dreamer ? Needs must so rare a beauty be so brief ! Night comes, of this delight the subtle thief. Thou canst not, Night, this same rich thievery keep ; Seize it and look ! 'tis gone, ere seized is gone — Only in our warm bosoms lingering on, A nest of precious dreams when droop our eyes in sleep. FIFTY POEMS 15 So in her darkening loveliness is she seen Like an autumnal passion-haunted queen, Who hears, " A captain-king is nigh the gate " — " 'Tis Antony, Antony ! " Then hastens she, Beauty to beauty adding yet, till — see, A queen within the queen perilous with love and fate ! 16 FIFTY POEMS IV 'MY TRUE LOVE HATH MY HEART" She is more bright than are those flowers April hands on to May. Sweeter with her are spent my hours, Than else the day. Hers is the beauty women own By love transfigured ; Beauty of swallows early flown, Or Spring half fled. Yea, 'tis a thing almost for tears, Being for joy too great, Yet subject not to fret of years, Nor to swift Fate. Eyes mild as those the peaceful herds Turn towards the lessening sun : She hath the voice of gathering birds When the day's done. Thou canst not, subtle Sorrow, reach Thy finger to her breast ; Nor thou, Delight, canst Envy teach To break her rest. To love her how could I but choose, Though nought to Love will bind her. . » , No matter, for I cannot lose, Since I ne'er find her. FIFTY POEMS 17 v THE WEAVER OF MAGIC Weave cunningly the web Of Twilight, O thou subtle-fingered Eve ! And at the slow day's ebb With small blue stars the purple curtain weave. If any wind there be, Bid it but breathe lightly as woodland violets o'er the sea ; If any moon, be it no more than a white fluttering feather. Call the last birds together. O Eve, and let no wisp Of day's distraction thine enchantment mar ; Thy soft spell lisp And lure the sweetness down of each blue star. Then let that low moan be A while more easeful, trembling remote and strange, far oversea ! So shall the easeless heart of love rest then, or only sigh, Hearing the swallows cry ! 18 FIFTY POEMS VI SOLITUDE By the broad mere he sitteth musingly Watching the slow shadow of the hours Wheel by, until the cold moon silver all, Laving the water with her watery light. He heareth the dusk-wingers' distant call, And in the lucid stars reads the great peace of night. Not of chill death their token, but of life ! What passion of calm purpose moveth there. What secret pulse of immortality Is beating ! All the multitude of day, The soul-bewildering beauty, quietly Dieth away, and the soul's languors die away. Then when no voice is, and is nothing seen But of the narrow moon the chilly beam And of the ancient stars their faithfulness ; Then sitting by the wan face of the mere He feels the wind of strange wings numberless, And spirits to his lowly spirit drawing near. Empty of self awhile, and the sharp pang Of foiled ambition and of common lust, Empty of grief ev'n, and of mean regret, Starlike in loneliness he watcheth pass In one hour all the hours, and seeth the set Of tile chill moon and fade the stars that were as grass. FIFTY POEMS 19 Or in the hour before the hour of dawn Waking, he stands beside the stirless mere Feeding upon the silence of the hour. . . . O silent hour, than wine more vital far Poured into veins of age, thine is the power The faithful soul to enlarge, scattering small joys afar. He watches, and is 'ware of other breath, Of other eyes is 'ware and neighbourhood Of presence great and strange. He feeleth then A hand upon his own, a voice doth hear : No voice, hand, eyes nor breath that's known to men ; — A Spirit to his lowly spirit draweth near. And when out of the East a creeping light Stirreth upon the waters, and the sense Is strong of that pure tongueless ecstasy Ere fading in the gathering glow of day ; A voice he hears quiet as memory, That echoeth unendingly nor dieth away. 20 FIFTY POEMS VII STRIFE The wind fought with the angry trees » ■ . All morning in immense unease They wrestled, and ruin strowed the ground, And the north sky frowned. The oak and aspen arms were held Defiant, but the death was knelled Of slender saplings, snappy boughs, Twigs brittle as men's vows. How moaned the trees the struggle through ! Anger almost to madness grew. The aspen screamed, and came a roar Of the great wind locked in anguish sore. Desolate with defeat . . . and then, Quiet fell again : The trees slept quiet as great cows That He at noon 'neath broad green boughs. How pure, how strange the calm ; but hist I , Was it the trees by the wind kist ? Or from afar, where the wind's hid, A throb, a sob ? . , . FIFTY POEMS 21 VIII UNDER THE LINDEN BRANCHES Under the linden branches They sit and whisper ; Hardly a quiver Of leaves, hardly a lisp or Sigh in the air. Under the linden branches They sit, and shiver At the slow air's ringers Drawn through the linden branches Where the year's sweet lingers ; And sudden avalanches Of memories, fears, Shake from the linden branches Upon them sitting With hardly a sigh or a whisper Or quiver of tears. 22 FIFTY POEMS IX THE NIGHT WATCH Beneath the trees with heedful step and slow At night I go, Fearful upon their whispering to break Lest they awake Out of those dreams of heavenly light that fill Their branches still With a soft murmur of memoried ecstasy. There 'neath each tree Nightlong a spirit watches, and I feel His breath unseal The fast-shut thoughts and longings of tired day, That flutter away Mothlike on luminous soft wings and frail And moonlike pale. There in the flowering chestnuts' bowering gloom And limes' perfume (Wandering wavelike through the moondrawn night That heaves toward light), There hang I my dark thoughts and deeper prayers ; And as the airs Of star-kissed dawn come stirring and o'er-creep The ford of sleep, Thy shape, great Love, grows shadowy in the East, Thine accents least Of all those jarring voices of false morn : And oh, forlorn Thy hope, thy courage vanishing, thine eyes Sad with surprise. FIFTY POEMS 23 Oh, with the dawn I know, I know how vain Is love that's fain To beat and beat against Her obstinate door. For as once more It opes, she passes out nor heedeth me (Nay, will not see) ; — As when a man, rich and of high estate, Sees at his gate (Or will not see) a famishing poor wretch, Whose longings fetch A sob up from his pain-imprisoning breast. Till sad despair his anger puts to rest. 24 FIFTY POEMS THE NOBLE COMPANY When thou art safely entered, call for wine, Nor wonder if at a brief word of thine A thin ghost come, and between thee and day Stand, like a bat's wing, frail and shadow-gray And wavering. Speak to him boldly then : Ask him for news of rare women and dead men Once-famed ; of ancient beauty and the bold Bravery of sword-captains, sung of old By poets everliving. Speak, and he, As out of ghostly store lingeringly Taking, shall of those great ones tell thee all Thy heart may wish. Press him until he call Even their shades to thine — those lovers which On earth made love with lovelier tribute rich Past mere love's self. Call for Catullus, and Catullus verily by thee will stand, Ghost by ghost, lover lover questioning, New passion perished passion answering. For Antony call, and Antony shall stir The dark, nodding a challenge proudlier Than men unloving. Or thou for Helen plead, And ev'n shall Helen answer thee and lead Thine eyes astray, thine heart astray. Or speak Hector's great name, and Hector then shall seek Thee with calm look. Yes wondrously shall each Answer in their high manner of old speech, Thrilling thee as the wind a ship's bent mast. FIFTY POEMS 25 But if thou reverently fear to cast Thy shadow athwart theirs, then mix with those That throng the meads where that dark river flows, The obscure, nameless, noteless ghosts that keep Such busyness as long vexes mortal sleep ; And thou shalt hear all, all that happened long And long ago : of the singers whose rich song Reverberates ever, ever. Dante shall grow Less stern, less bitter for thee ; yes, thou'lt know Caesar's great brow ; and learn that, lonely yet, Miltonic pride Milton's dark ghost doth fret. . . . And maybe (for such grace hath been for shades), Quaffing that thin wine when the faint day fades, One with broad forehead, sweet lips, eyes that still With old love and wild laughter wake and fill : One such (there's none but one) will drink with thee, And following him that excellent company At heel — Falstaff and Romeo and Rosalind And Bottom, and the rest. 26 FIFTY POEMS XI THE DARKSOME NIGHTINGALE Why dost thou, darksome Nightingale, Sing so distractingly — and here ? Dawn's preludings prick my ear, Faint light is creeping up the vale ; While on these dead thy rarer Song yet falls, dark night-farer. Were it not better thou shouldst sing Where the drenched lilac droops her plume. Spreading frail banners of perfume ? Or where the easeless pines enring The river-lulled village Whose lads the lilac pillage ? Oh, if aught songful these hid bones Might reach, as doth the subtle rain, Surely the dead had risen again And listened, white by the white stones ; Back to rich life song-charmed, By ghostly joys alarmed. This may not be. And yet, oh still Pour like night dew thy richer speech Some late-lost youth perchance to reach, Or love-robbed girl ; and stir and fill Their passionless cold bosoms Under red wallflower blossoms ! FIFTY POEMS 27 XII FOREBODING O linger late, poor yellow lisping leaves ! As yet the eves Are golden and the simple moon looks through The clouds and you. O linger yet although the night be blind, And in the wind You wake and lisp and shiver at the stir And sigh of her Whose rimy fingers chill you each and all : And so you fall As dead as hopes or dreams or whispered vows. . O then the boughs That bore your busy multitude shall feel The cold light steal Between them, and the timorous child shall start. Hearing his heart Drubbing affrighted at the frail gates, for lo, The ghostly glow Of the wild moon, caught in the barren arms Of leafless branches loud with night's alarms 1 28 FIFTY POEMS XIII FROM PICCADILLY IN AUGUST Now the trees rest : the moon hath taught them sleep. Like drowsy wings of bats are all their leaves, Clinging together. Girls at ease who fold Fair hands upon white necks and thro' dusk fields Walk all content, — of them the trees have taken Their way of evening rest ; the yellow moon With her pale gold hath lit their dreams that lisp On the wind's murmurous lips. And low beyond Burn those bright lamps beneath the moon more bright, Lamps that but flash and sparkle and light not The inward eye and musing thought, nor reach Where, poplar-like, that tall-built campanile Lifts to the neighbouring moon her head and feels The pale gold like an ocean laving her. FIFTY POEMS 29 XIV IN THE TRAIN She was more wonderful than prized pearls ! She bore her beauty as an April flower That hangs as sweet unknown as known. Her cheeks The pallor of pale moony water had Under the shadow of dark heavy hair. Spearlike for straightness was her nose, with firm Curve of soft nostrils : lips and chin firm too ; A broad white brow, and eyes set wide beneath — Clear steady eyes — and lids whose quivering was Than speech more cunning and than song more sweet She lived in the moment ; and the moment felt Eternity's long kiss when her lips kissed In speech. H . • She went like sunset out, and I Saw her no more. But O, she left in me Memory of a moment made Eternity ; Unsealed a fountain of true joy, that sang How beauty is the only breath of Heaven, And fives in women as Spring lives in woods. 30 FIFTY POEMS XV SILENCE AND ECHO Though birds be songless and the bare Branches of winter strain and creak, There wants not music anywhere And you but speak. But when birds sing and green leaves brush Green leaves awake, and dawn to dark Sedge-warbler, linnet, swallow, thrush, Heav'n-loving lark, Stir all the air to music ; yet That plenteous music peals unheard : As well might leaves their noise forget, As well each bird, If you but speak, if you but sing, Or echo of your singing creep Into my mind, or whispering Call me from sleep. And yet your eyes I never see, Memories of you like shadows pass : O'er you the trees wave sighingly, And waves the grass. FIFTY POEMS 31 XVI HANDS Your hands, your hands, Fall upon mine as waves upon the sands. O, soft as moonlight on that evening rose, That but to moonlight doth its sweet unclose, Your hands, your hands, Fall upon mine, and my hands open as That evening primrose opens when the hot hours pass. Your hands, your hands, They are like towers that in far southern lands Look at pale dawn over gloom- valley' d miles, White temple towers that gleam through mist at whiles. Your hands, your hands, Like the south wind fall kissing on my brow, And all past joy and future is summed in this great " Now ! M 32 FIFTY POEMS XVII ABSENCE Distance no grace can lend you, but for me Distance doth magnify your mystery. With you, and soon content, I ask how should In your two eyes be hid my heaven of good ? How should your own mere voice the strange words speak That tease me with the sense of what's to seek In all the world beside ? How your brown hair, That simply and neglectfully you wear, Bind my wild thoughts in its abundant snare ? With you, I wonder how you're stranger than Another woman to another man ; But parted — and you're as a ship unknown That to poor castaways at dawn is shown As strange as dawn, so strange they fear a trick Of eyes long- vexed and hope with falseness sick. Parted, and like the riddle of a dream, Dark with rich promise, does your beauty seem. I wonder at your patience, stirless peace, Your subtle pride, mute pity's quick release. Then are you strange to me and sweet as light Or dew ; as strange and dark as starless night. Then let this parting, Dear, be now forgiven : I go from you to find in you strange heaven. FIFTY POEMS 33 XVIII THE HAUNTED SHADOW Fair Trees, O keep from chattering so When I with my more Fair do go Beneath your branches ; For if I laugh with her your sigh Her rare and sudden mirth puts by, Or your too noisy glee will take Persuasion from my lips and make Her deaf as winter. O be not as the pines — that keep The shadow-charmed light asleep — Perverse and sombre ! For when we in the pinewood walked And of young love and far age talked, Their solemn haunted shadow broke Her peace — ah, how the sharp sob shook Her shadowed bosom 1 '34 FIFTY POEMS XIX ALONE AND COLD Do not, O do not use me As you have used others. Better you did refuse me : You have refused others. Better, far better Hope to banish A small child than, grown old, Hope should decay, his vigour vanish, And I be left alone and Cold, cold. Ah, use no guile nor cunning If you should ev'n yet love me. ftark, Time with Love is running, Death cloud-like floats above me. Love me with such simplicity As children, frankly bold, Do love with ; else 'twere best (ah me !> That I be left alone and Cold, cold. FIFTY POEMS 35 XX SLEEP Not a dream brush your sleep, Not a thought wake and creep Jn upon your spirit's slumber ; Not a memory encumber, Nor a thievish care unbar Sleep's portcullis that no star Nor sentry hath. I'll not speak With my soul even : no, nor seek Other happiness for you When you this happy sleep sleep through. Let no least desire waver Between us, nor impatience quaver ; No sudden nearness of me flush Your veins with welcome. , • , Hush, hush I Be still, my thoughts, lest you creep Unawares into her sleep* 36 FIFTY POEMS XXI THE FULL TIDE Now speaks the wave, whispering me of you ; In all his murmur your music murmurs too; O 'tis your voice, my love, whispering in The wave's voice, ev'n your voice so far and thin ; And mine to yours answering clear is heard In the high lonely voice of the last bird. And when, my love, the full tide runneth again, Shall yet the seabird call, call, call in vain ? Will not the tide wake in my heart and stir The old rich happiness that's sunken there ? Thou moon of love, bid the retreated tide Return, for which the wandering bird hath cried. FIFTY POEMS 37 XXII YOUR SHADOW From Swindon out to White Horse Hill I walked, in morning rain, And saw your shadow lying there. As clear and plain As lies the White Horse on the Hill I saw your shadow lying there. Over the wide green downs and bleak, Unthinking, free I walked, And saw your shadow fluttering by. Almost it talked, Answering what I dared not speak While thoughts of you ran fluttering by. . So on to Baydon sauntered, teased With that pure native air. Sometimes the sweetness of wild thyme The strings of care Did pluck ; sometimes my soul was eased With more than sweetness of wild thyme. Sometimes within a pool I caught Your face, upturned to mine. And where sits Chilton by the waters Your look did shine Wildly in the mill foam that sought To hide you in those angry waters. 38 FIFTY POEMS And yet, O Sweet, you never knew Those downs, the thymy air That with your spirit haunted is — Yes, everywhere ! Ah, but my heart is full of you., And with your shadow haunted is. FIFTY POEMS 39 XXIII MORNING PEACE Not jealousy a sharper torment has Than this self-torturing and easeless mind : As though one, seeing, smote his eyeballs blind Then wandered wilful on a mountain pass. Not love by beauty scorned more anguish knows. Nor shadowed by love's loss more desolate grows. For then, when love perverse doth love abuse. When hope is stabbed with arrows of despair, When fair things are grown hateful, being fair. When memory old memory doth accuse ; Then is the dark hour when the wanton mind Would rage to think the world not all unkind. What healing, then, for the distempered brain. What poison's antidote, though wildly sought ? Sick of self-love against myself I fought, With wounded hands striving against my pain. Dark, dark, dark shadows dragged before my sight ; I hugged foul anger with a foul delight. I . . No grief like that ! I waked at dawn, and there A hundred spider-webs dew-bright were hung, A myriad dew-drops on the morning flung ; The marigold and sunflower were how fair And rich in peace ! and that peace drank I up As of the fresh dew drinks the buttercup. 40 FIFTY POEMS XXIV INEVITABLE CHANGE Young as the Spring seemed life when she Came from her silent East to me ; Unquiet as Autumn was my breast When she declined into her West. Such tender, such untroubling things She taught me, daughter of all Springs ; Such dusty deathly lore I learned When her last embers redly burned. How should it hap (Love, canst thou say ?) Such end should be to so pure day ? Such shining chastity give place To this annulling grave's disgrace ? Such hopes be quenched in this despair, Grace chilled to granite everywhere ? How should — in vain I cry — how should That be, alas, which only could ! FIFTY POEMS 41 xxv LONELINESS How green and strange the light is, Creeping through the window. Lying alone in bed, How strange the night is ! How still and chill the air is. It seems no sound could live Here in my room That now so bare is. Ah, bright and still the room is, But easeless here am I. Deep in my heart Cold lonely gloom is ! 42 FIFTY POEMS XXVI FIRST LOVE I " No, no ! Leave me not in this dark hour," She cried. And I, " Thou foolish dear, but call not dark this hour ; What night doth lour ? " And nought did she reply, But in her eye The clamorous trouble spake, and then was still. O that I heard her once more speak, Or even with troubled eye Teach me her fear, that I might seek Poppies for misery. The hour was dark, although I knew it not, But when the livid dawn brake then I knew, How while I slept the dense night through Treachery's worm her fainting fealty slew. O that I heard her once more speak As then — so weak — " No, no ! Leave me not in this dark hour." That I might answer her, " Love, be at rest, for nothing now shall stir Thy heart, but my heart beating there." FIFTY POEMS 43 XXVII Come back, come back — ah, never more to leave me ! Come back, ev'n though your constant longing grieve me, w Longing for other kisses, hands, than mine. By all that's most divine In your frank human beauty, come and cover With that deceiving smile the love your lover Hath taught you, and the light that in your eyes Tells of the painful joys that make your ruinous Paradise. Come back, that so, upon the shining meadow When the sun draws the magic of your shadow ; Or when the red fire's gradual sinking light Yields up the room to night ; Seeing you thus or thus I may recapture The very sharpness of remembered rapture : — So it may seem, by exquisite deceit, You are yet mine, I yours, and life yet rare and sweet. Come back — nay, come not back now, come back never ; That day you went I knew it was for ever. I know you, how the spectra of cold shame Would chill you if you came. Lo, here first love's first memory abideth ; Here in my heart the image of you yet hideth. But though you should come back and hope thrilled me anew, First love would yet be dead — oh, it would not be you 1 44 FIFTY POEMS XXVIII O but what grace if I could but forget you ! You have made league with all familiar things — The thrush that still, evening and morning, sings, The aspen leaves that sigh M My dear ! " with your true voice when I pass by. . O, and that painful 'lated flush of tender sky That minds me, and with sense too grave for tears, Of those forever dead too-blissful years. Yet 'twere a miracle could I forget you, Since ev'n dead things, once sensible of you, Yield up your ghost ; as all the garden through Murmurs the rose, " 'Twas she Shook in her palm the dew that shone in me M ; And on the stairs your recent footstep echoingly Sounds yet again, and each dark doorway speaks Of you toward whom my sharpened longing seeks. O that I could forget or not regret you ! Could I but see you as one sees a fair Child under apple-burdened boughs that bear Morn's autumn beauty, and Seeing her seeth Heaven at his hand, And all day sees that happy child before him stand. . Not thus I see you, but as one drowning sees Home, friends — and loves his very enemies ! FIFTY POEMS 45 XXIX I HEARD A VOICE UPON THE WINDOW BEAT " I heard a voice upon the window beat And then grow dim, grow still. Opening I saw the snowy sill Marked with the robin's feet. Chill was the air and chill The thoughts that in my bosom beat. I thought of all that wide and hopeless snow Crusting the frozen lands. Of small birds that in famished bands A-chill and silent grow. And how Earth's myriad hands Clutched only hills of frosted snow. And then I thought of Love that beat and cried Famishing at my breast ; How I, by chilling care distrest, Denied him, and Love died. . , , O, with what sore unrest Love's ghost woke with the bird that cried ! 46 FIFTY POEMS XXX THE CALL Is it the wind that stirs the trees, Is it the trees that scratch the wall, Is it the wall that shakes and mutters, Is it a dumb ghost's call ? The wind steals in and twirls the candle, The branches heave and brush the wall, But more than tree or wild wind mutters This night, this night of all* " Open ! " a cry sounds, and I gasp. " Open ! " and hands beat door and wall. " Open ! M and each dark echo mutters. I rise, a shape and shadow tall. " Open ! " Across the room I falter, And near the door crouch by the wall ; Thrice bolt the door as the voice mutters " Open ! " and frail strokes fall. " Open ! " The light's out, and I shrink Quaking and blind against the wall ; " Open ! " no sound is, yet it mutters Within me now, this night of all. Was it the wind that stirred the trees, Was it the trees that scratched the wall, Was it the wall that shook and muttered. Was it Love's Ghost's last call ? FIFTY POEMS 47 XXXI AGAINST DESIRE Unsatisfied and all unblissful heart, What is it keeps thee from thy timely peace ? Lo here, a tree whispers to Care, " Depart ! " And hark, yon blackbird bidding Sorrow cease Her tedious tale. High overhead the sharp-edged white clouds sail Bird-like upon the blue : what hindereth The cloud that glooms thy courage (oft too frail) From passing on this west wind's valorous breath ? It is Desire that maketh thee a slave, The insatiable tyrant of man's life. Up cloudy treacherous stairs Desire doth wave His purple banner, and with pain and strife And teasing fear Thou climbest, and gay fancies flutter near. . . « Sudden as Death thy fall is, yet again I His soft deceitful notes when thou dost hear Once more dost climb and once more climb'st in vain. i Foolish, unblissful and unsatisfied ! I will lie down amid the seeding grass And hear the wild bee humming at my side, And watch the high clouds as they slowly pass. Heart, be at rest, ! Nor knock so wildly now within my breast ! Let that proud subtle tyrant called Desire ! Be no more than a casual timid guest Who creeps to warm him at a great Lord's fire. 48 FIFTY POEMS XXXII " O LOVE, WHAT SHALL BE SAID OF THEE ? M O i