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Garden of Dreams

<h1>THE GARDEN OF DREAMS</h1> <h3><big>MADISON CAWEIN</big> Author of "Intimations of the Beautiful," "Undertones," and several other books of verse</h3> <h3>LOUISVILLE JOHN P MORTON & COMPANY MDCCCXCVI</h3> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h4>Copyright, 1896, John P. Morton & Company.</h4> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h4>TO My Brothers.</h4> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Not while I live may I forget That garden which my spirit trod! Where dreams were flowers, wild and wet, And beautiful as God. </div> <div class="stanza"> Not while I breathe, awake adream, Shall live again for me those hours, When, in its mystery and gleam, I met her 'mid the flowers. </div> <div class="stanza"> Eyes, talismanic heliotrope, Beneath mesmeric lashes, where The sorceries of love and hope Had made a shining lair. </div> <div class="stanza"> And daydawn brows, whereover hung The twilight of dark locks; and lips, Whose beauty spoke the rose's tongue Of fragrance-voweled drips. </div> <div class="stanza"> I will not tell of cheeks and chin, That held me as sweet language holds; Nor of the eloquence within Her bosom's moony molds. </div> <div class="stanza"> Nor of her large limbs' languorous Wind-grace, that glanced like starlight through Her ardent robe's diaphanous Web of the mist and dew. </div> <div class="stanza"> There is no star so pure and high As was her look; no fragrance such At her soft presence; and no sigh Of music like her touch. </div> <div class="stanza"> Not while I live may I forget That garden of dim dreams! where I And Song within the spirit met, Sweet Song, who passed me by. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>CONTENTS.</h2> <table border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" summary="Table of Contents"> <tr> <td> </td> <td align="right">PAGE</td> </tr> <tr> <td>A Fallen Beech</td> <td align="right">1</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The Haunted Woodland</td> <td align="right">3</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Discovery</td> <td align="right">4</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Comradery</td> <td align="right">5</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Occult</td> <td align="right">6</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Wood-Words</td> <td align="right">7</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The Wind at Night</td> <td align="right">10</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Airy Tongues</td> <td align="right">11</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The Hills</td> <td align="right">13</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Imperfection</td> <td align="right">14</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Arcanna</td> <td align="right">15</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Spring</td> <td align="right">15</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Response</td> <td align="right">16</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Fulfillment</td> <td align="right">16</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Transformation</td> <td align="right">17</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Omens</td> <td align="right">17</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Abandoned</td> <td align="right">18</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The Creek Road</td> <td align="right">19</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The Covered Bridge</td> <td align="right">19</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The Hillside Grave</td> <td align="right">20</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Simulacra</td> <td align="right">20</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Before the End</td> <td align="right">21</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Winter</td> <td align="right">21</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Hoar Frost</td> <td align="right">22</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The Winter Moon</td> <td align="right">22</td> </tr> <tr> <td>In Summer</td> <td align="right">23</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Rain and Wind</td> <td align="right">24</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Under Arcturus</td> <td align="right">25</td> </tr> <tr> <td>October</td> <td align="right">27</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Bare Boughs</td> <td align="right">28</td> </tr> <tr> <td>A Threnody</td> <td align="right">30</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Snow</td> <td align="right">31</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Vagabonds</td> <td align="right">31</td> </tr> <tr> <td>An Old Song</td> <td align="right">32</td> </tr> <tr> <td>A Rose o' the Hills</td> <td align="right">33</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Dirge</td> <td align="right">34</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Rest</td> <td align="right">35</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Clairvoyance</td> <td align="right">36</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Indifference</td> <td align="right">37</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Pictured</td> <td align="right">37</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Serenade</td> <td align="right">38</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Kinship</td> <td align="right">39</td> </tr> <tr> <td>She is So Much</td> <td align="right">40</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Her Eyes</td> <td align="right">41</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Messengers</td> <td align="right">42</td> </tr> <tr> <td>At Twenty-One</td> <td align="right">43</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Baby Mary</td> <td align="right">44</td> </tr> <tr> <td>A Motive in Gold and Gray</td> <td align="right">45</td> </tr> <tr> <td>A Reed Shaken with the Wind</td> <td align="right">50</td> </tr> <tr> <td>A Flower of the Fields</td> <td align="right">71</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The White Vigil</td> <td align="right">73</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Too Late</td> <td align="right">74</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Intimations</td> <td align="right">74</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Two</td> <td align="right">80</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Tones</td> <td align="right">81</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Unfulfilled</td> <td align="right">83</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Home</td> <td align="right">86</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Ashly Mere</td> <td align="right">87</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Before the Tomb</td> <td align="right">88</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Revisited</td> <td align="right">89</td> </tr> <tr> <td>At Vespers</td> <td align="right">91</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The Creek</td> <td align="right">92</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Answered</td> <td align="right">93</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Woman's Portion</td> <td align="right">95</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Finale</td> <td align="right">97</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The Cross</td> <td align="right">98</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The Forest of Dreams</td> <td align="right">99</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Lynchers</td> <td align="right">101</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Ku Klux</td> <td align="right">102</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Rembrandts</td> <td align="right">103</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The Lady of The Hills</td> <td align="right">104</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Revealment</td> <td align="right">106</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Heart's Encouragement</td> <td align="right">107</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Nightfall</td> <td align="right">108</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Pause</td> <td align="right">108</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Above the Vales</td> <td align="right">109</td> </tr> <tr> <td>A Sunset Fancy</td> <td align="right">110</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The Fen-Fire</td> <td align="right">110</td> </tr> <tr> <td>To One Reading the Morte D'Arthure</td> <td align="right">111</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Strollers</td> <td align="right">112</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Haunted</td> <td align="right">114</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Præterita</td> <td align="right">115</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The Swashbuckler</td> <td align="right">115</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The Witch</td> <td align="right">116</td> </tr> <tr> <td>The Somnambulist</td> <td align="right">116</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Opium</td> <td align="right">117</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Music and Sleep</td> <td align="right">118</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Ambition</td> <td align="right">118</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Despondency</td> <td align="right">119</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Despair</td> <td align="right">119</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Sin</td> <td align="right">120</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Insomnia</td> <td align="right">120</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Encouragement</td> <td align="right">121</td> </tr> <tr> <td>Quatrains</td> <td align="right">122</td> </tr> <tr> <td>A Last Word</td> <td align="right">123</td> </tr> </table> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 1] <h1>THE GARDEN OF DREAMS</h1> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>A FALLEN BEECH</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Nevermore at doorways that are barken Shall the madcap wind knock and the noonlight; Nor the circle, which thou once didst darken, Shine with footsteps of the neighboring moonlight, Visitors for whom thou oft didst hearken. </div> <div class="stanza"> Nevermore, gallooned with cloudy laces, Shall the morning, like a fair freebooter, Make thy leaves his richest treasure-places; Nor the sunset, like a royal suitor, Clothe thy limbs with his imperial graces. </div> <div class="stanza"> And no more, between the savage wonder Of the sunset and the moon's up-coming, Shall the storm, with boisterous hoof-beats, under Thy dark roof dance, Faun-like, to the humming Of the Pan-pipes of the rain and thunder. </div> <div class="stanza"> Oft the satyr spirit, beauty-drunken, Of the Spring called; and the music-measure Of thy sap made answer; and thy sunken Veins grew vehement with youth, whose pressure Swelled thy gnarly muscles, winter-shrunken. </div> [Pg 2]<div class="stanza"> And the germs, deep down in darkness rooted, Bubbled green from all thy million oilets, Where the spirits, rain-and-sunbeam-suited, Of the April made their whispering toilets, Or within thy stately shadow footed. </div> <div class="stanza"> Oft the hours of blonde Summer tinkled At the windows of thy twigs, and found thee Bird-blithe; or, with shapely bodies, twinkled Lissom feet of naked flowers around thee, Where thy mats of moss lay sunbeam-sprinkled. </div> <div class="stanza"> And the Autumn with his gipsy-coated Troop of days beneath thy branches rested, Swarthy-faced and dark of eye; and throated Songs of hunting; or with red hand tested Every nut-bur that above him floated. </div> <div class="stanza"> Then the Winter, barren-browed, but rich in Shaggy followers of frost and freezing, Made the floor of thy broad boughs his kitchen, Trapper-like, to camp in; grimly easing Limbs snow-furred and moccasoned with lichen. </div> <div class="stanza"> Now, alas! no more do these invest thee With the dignity of whilom gladness! They—unto whose hearts thou once confessed thee Of thy dreams—now know thee not! and sadness Sits beside thee where forgot dost rest thee. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 3] <h2>THE HAUNTED WOODLAND</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Here in the golden darkness And green night of the woods, A flitting form I follow, A shadow that eludes— Or is it but the phantom Of former forest moods? </div> <div class="stanza"> The phantom of some fancy I knew when I was young, And in my dreaming boyhood, The wildwood flow'rs among, Young face to face with Faery Spoke in no unknown tongue. </div> <div class="stanza"> Blue were her eyes, and golden The nimbus of her hair; And crimson as a flower Her mouth that kissed me there; That kissed and bade me follow, And smiled away my care. </div> <div class="stanza"> A magic and a marvel Lived in her word and look, As down among the blossoms She sate me by the brook, And read me wonder-legends In Nature's Story Book. </div> [Pg 4]<div class="stanza"> Loved fairy-tales forgotten, She never reads again, Of beautiful enchantments That haunt the sun and rain, And, in the wind and water, Chant a mysterious strain. </div> <div class="stanza"> And so I search the forest, Wherein my spirit feels, In tree or stream or flower Herself she still conceals— But now she flies who followed, Whom Earth no more reveals. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>DISCOVERY</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> What is it now that I shall seek, Where woods dip downward, in the hills?— A mossy nook, a ferny creek, And May among the daffodils. </div> <div class="stanza"> Or in the valley's vistaed glow, Past rocks of terraced trumpet-vines, Shall I behold her coming slow, Sweet May, among the columbines? </div> <div class="stanza"> With redbud cheeks and bluet eyes, Big eyes, the homes of happiness, To meet me with the old surprise, Her hoiden hair all bonnetless. </div> [Pg 5]<div class="stanza"> Who waits for me, where, note for note, The birds make glad the forest-trees? A dogwood blossom at her throat, My May among the anemones. </div> <div class="stanza"> As sweetheart breezes kiss the blooms, And dewdrops drink the moonlight's gleams, My soul shall kiss her lips' perfumes, And drink the magic of her dreams. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>COMRADERY</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> With eyes hand-arched he looks into The morning's face, then turns away With schoolboy feet, all wet with dew, Out for a holiday. </div> <div class="stanza"> The hill brook sings, incessant stars, Foam-fashioned, on its restless breast; And where he wades its water-bars Its song is happiest. </div> <div class="stanza"> A comrade of the chinquapin, He looks into its knotted eyes And sees its heart; and, deep within, Its soul that makes him wise. </div> <div class="stanza"> The wood-thrush knows and follows him, Who whistles up the birds and bees; And 'round him all the perfumes swim Of woodland loam and trees. </div> [Pg 6]<div class="stanza"> Where'er he pass the supple springs' Foam-people sing the flowers awake; And sappy lips of bark-clad things Laugh ripe each fruited brake. </div> <div class="stanza"> His touch is a companionship; His word, an old authority: He comes, a lyric at his lip, Unstudied Poesy. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>OCCULT</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Unto the soul's companionship Of things that only seem to be, Earth points with magic fingertip And bids thee see How Fancy keeps thee company. </div> <div class="stanza"> For oft at dawn hast not beheld A spirit of prismatic hue Blow wide the buds, which night has swelled? And stain them through With heav'n's ethereal gold and blue? </div> <div class="stanza"> While at her side another went With gleams of enigmatic white? A spirit who distributes scent, To vale and height, In footsteps of the rosy light? </div> [Pg 7]<div class="stanza"> And oft at dusk hast thou not seen The star-fays bring their caravans Of dew, and glitter all the green, Night's shadow tans, From many starbeam sprinkling-cans? </div> <div class="stanza"> Nor watched with these the elfins go Who tune faint instruments? whose sound Is that moon-music insects blow When all the ground Sleeps, and the night is hushed around? </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>WOOD-WORDS</h2> <h4>I.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The spirits of the forest, That to the winds give voice— I lie the livelong April day And wonder what it is they say That makes the leaves rejoice. </div> <div class="stanza"> The spirits of the forest, That breathe in bud and bloom— I walk within the black-haw brake And wonder how it is they make The bubbles of perfume. </div> <div class="stanza"> The spirits of the forest, That live in every spring— I lean above the brook's bright blue And wonder what it is they do That makes the water sing. </div> [Pg 8]<div class="stanza"> The spirits of the forest. That haunt the sun's green glow— Down fungus ways of fern I steal And wonder what they can conceal, In dews, that twinkles so. </div> <div class="stanza"> The spirits of the forest, They hold me, heart and hand— And, oh! the bird they send by light, The jack-o'-lantern gleam by night, To guide to Fairyland! </div> </div> <h4>II.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The time when dog-tooth violets Hold up inverted horns of gold,— The elvish cups that Spring upsets With dripping feet, when April wets The sun-and-shadow-marbled wold,— </div> <div class="stanza"> Is come. And by each leafing way The sorrel drops pale blots of pink; And, like an angled star a fay Sets on her forehead's pallid day, The blossoms of the trillium wink. </div> <div class="stanza"> Within the vale, by rock and stream,— A fragile, fairy porcelain,— Blue as a baby's eyes a-dream, The bluets blow; and gleam in gleam The sun-shot dog-woods flash with rain. </div> [Pg 9]<div class="stanza"> It is the time to cast off care; To make glad intimates of these:— The frank-faced sunbeam laughing there; The great-heart wind, that bids us share The optimism of the trees. </div> </div> <h4>III.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The white ghosts of the flowers, The green ghosts of the trees: They haunt the blooming bowers, They haunt the wildwood hours, And whisper in the breeze. </div> <div class="stanza"> For in the wildrose places, And on the beechen knoll, My soul hath seen their faces, My soul hath met their races, And felt their dim control. </div> </div> <h4>IV.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Crab-apple buds, whose bells The mouth of April kissed; That hang,—like rosy shells Around a naiad's wrist,— Pink as dawn-tinted mist. </div> <div class="stanza"> And paw-paw buds, whose dark Deep auburn blossoms shake On boughs,—as 'neath the bark A dryad's eyes awake,— Brown as a midnight lake. </div> [Pg 10]<div class="stanza"> These, with symbolic blooms Of wind-flower and wild-phlox, I found among the glooms Of hill-lost woods and rocks, Lairs of the mink and fox. </div> <div class="stanza"> The beetle in the brush, The bird about the creek, The bee within the hush, And I, whose heart was meek, Stood still to hear these speak. </div> <div class="stanza"> The language, that records, In flower-syllables, The hieroglyphic words Of beauty, who enspells The world and aye compels. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>THE WIND AT NIGHT</h2> <h4>I.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Not till the wildman wind is shrill, Howling upon the hill In every wolfish tree, whose boisterous boughs, Like desperate arms, gesture and beat the night, And down huge clouds, in chasms of stormy white The frightened moon hurries above the house, Shall I lie down; and, deep,— Letting the mad wind keep Its shouting revel round me,—fall asleep. </div> </div> [Pg 11] <h4>II.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Not till its dark halloo is hushed, And where wild waters rushed,— Like some hoofed terror underneath its whip And spur of foam,—remains A ghostly glass, hill-framed; whereover stains Of moony mists and rains, And stealthy starbeams, like vague specters, slip; Shall I—with thoughts that take Unto themselves the ache Of silence as a sound—from sleep awake. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>AIRY TONGUES</h2> <h4>I.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> I hear a song the wet leaves lisp When Morn comes down the woodland way; And misty as a thistle-wisp Her gown gleams windy gray; A song, that seems to say, "Awake! 'tis day!" </div> <div class="stanza"> I hear a sigh, when Day sits down Beside the sunlight-lulled lagoon; While on her glistening hair and gown The rose of rest is strewn; A sigh, that seems to croon, "Come sleep! 'tis noon!" </div> [Pg 12]<div class="stanza"> I hear a whisper, when the stars, Upon some evening-purpled height, Crown the dead Day with nenuphars Of dreamy gold and white; A voice, that seems t' invite, "Come love! 'tis night!" </div> </div> <h4>II.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Before the rathe song-sparrow sings Among the hawtrees in the lane, And to the wind the locust flings Its early clusters fresh with rain; Beyond the morning-star, that swings Its rose of fire above the spire, Between the morning's watchet wings, A voice that rings o'er brooks and boughs— "Arouse! arouse!" </div> <div class="stanza"> Before the first brown owlet cries Among the grape-vines on the hill, And in the dam with half-shut eyes The lilies rock above the mill; Beyond the oblong moon, that flies Its pearly flower above the tower, Between the twilight's primrose skies, A voice that sighs from east to west— "To rest! to rest!" </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 13] <h2>THE HILLS</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> There is no joy of earth that thrills My bosom like the far-off hills! Th' unchanging hills, that, shadowy, Beckon our mutability To follow and to gaze upon Foundations of the dusk and dawn. Meseems the very heavens are massed Upon their shoulders, vague and vast With all the skyey burden of The winds and clouds and stars above. Lo, how they sit before us, seeing The laws that give all Beauty being! Behold! to them, when dawn is near, The nomads of the air appear, Unfolding crimson camps of day In brilliant bands; then march away; And under burning battlements Of twilight plant their tinted tents. The faith of olden myths, that brood By haunted stream and haunted wood, They see; and feel the happiness Of old at which we only guess: The dreams, the ancients loved and knew, Still as their rocks and trees are true: Not otherwise than presences The tempest and the calm to these: One shouting on them, all the night, Black-limbed and veined with lambent light: The other with the ministry Of all soft things that company [Pg 14]With music—an embodied form, Giving to solitude the charm Of leaves and waters and the peace Of bird-begotten melodies— And who at night doth still confer With the mild moon, who telleth her Pale tale of lonely love, until Wan images of passion fill The heights with shapes that glimmer by Clad on with sleep and memory. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>IMPERFECTION</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Not as the eye hath seen, shall we behold Romance and beauty, when we've passed away; That robed the dull facts of the intimate day In life's wild raiment of unusual gold: Not as the ear hath heard, shall we be told, Hereafter, myth and legend once that lay Warm at the heart of Nature, clothing clay In attribute of no material mold. These were imperfect of necessity, That wrought thro' imperfection for far ends Of perfectness—As calm philosophy, Teaching a child, from his high heav'n descends To Earth's familiar things; informingly Vesting his thoughts with that it comprehends. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 15] <h2>ARCANNA</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Earth hath her images of utterance, Her hieroglyphic meanings which elude; A symbol language of similitude, Into whose secrets science may not glance; In which the Mind-in-Nature doth romance In miracles that baffle if pursued— No guess shall search them and no thought intrude Beyond the limits of her sufferance. So doth the great Intelligence above Hide His own thought's creations; and attire Forms in the dream's ideal, which He dowers With immaterial loveliness and love— As essences of fragrance and of fire— Preaching th' evangels of the stars and flowers. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>SPRING</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> First came the rain, loud, with sonorous lips; A pursuivant who heralded a prince: And dawn put on a livery of tints, And dusk bound gold about her hair and hips: And, all in silver mail, then sunlight came, A knight, who bade the winter let him pass, And freed imprisoned beauty, naked as The Court of Love, in all her wildflower shame. And so she came, in breeze-borne loveliness, Across the hills; and heav'n bent down to bless: Before her face the birds were as a lyre; And at her feet, like some strong worshiper, The shouting water pæan'd praise of her, Who, with blue eyes, set the wild world on fire. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 16] <h2>RESPONSE</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> There is a music of immaculate love, That breathes within the virginal veins of Spring:— And trillium blossoms, like the stars that cling To fairies' wands; and, strung on sprays above, White-hearts and mandrake blooms, that look enough Like the elves' washing, white with laundering Of May-moon dews; and all pale-opening Wild-flowers of the woods, are born thereof. There is no sod Spring's white foot brushes but Must feel the music that vibrates within, And thrill to the communicated touch Responsive harmonies, that must unshut The heart of beauty for song's concrete kin, Emotions—that be flowers—born of such. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>FULFILLMENT</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Yes, there are some who may look on these Essential peoples of the earth and air— That have the stars and flowers in their care— And all their soul-suggestive secrecies: Heart-intimates and comrades of the trees, Who from them learn, what no known schools declare, God's knowledge; and from winds, that discourse there, [Pg 17]God's gospel of diviner mysteries: To whom the waters shall divulge a word Of fuller faith; the sunset and the dawn Preach sermons more inspired even than The tongues of Penticost; as, distant heard In forms of change, through Nature upward drawn, God doth address th' immortal soul of Man. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>TRANSFORMATION</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> It is the time when, by the forest falls, The touchmenots hang fairy folly-caps; When ferns and flowers fill the lichened laps Of rocks with color, rich as orient shawls: And in my heart I hear a voice that calls Me woodward, where the Hamadryad wraps Her limbs in bark, or, bubbling in the saps, Laughs the sweet Greek of Pan's old madrigals. There is a gleam that lures me up the stream— A Naiad swimming with wet limbs of light? Perfume, that leads me on from dream to dream— An Oread's footprints fragrant with her flight? And, lo! meseems I am a Faun again, Part of the myths that I pursue in vain. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>OMENS</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Sad o'er the hills the poppy sunset died. Slow as a fungus breaking through the crusts Of forest leaves, the waning half-moon thrusts, [Pg 18]Through gray-brown clouds, one milky silver side; In her vague light the dogwoods, vale-descried, Seem nervous torches flourished by the gusts; The apple-orchards seem the restless dusts Of wind-thinned mists upon the hills they hide. It is a night of omens whom late May Meets, like a wraith, among her train of hours; An apparition, with appealing eye And hesitant foot, that walks a willowed way, And, speaking through the fading moon and flowers, Bids her prepare her gentle soul to die. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>ABANDONED</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The hornets build in plaster-dropping rooms, And on its mossy porch the lizard lies; Around its chimneys slow the swallow flies, And on its roof the locusts snow their blooms. Like some sad thought that broods here, old perfumes Haunt its dim stairs; the cautious zephyr tries Each gusty door, like some dead hand, then sighs With ghostly lips among the attic glooms. And now a heron, now a kingfisher, Flits in the willows where the riffle seems At each faint fall to hesitate to leap, Fluttering the silence with a little stir. Here Summer seems a placid face asleep, And the near world a figment of her dreams. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 19] <h2>THE CREEK-ROAD</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Calling, the heron flies athwart the blue That sleeps above it; reach on rocky reach Of water sings by sycamore and beech, In whose warm shade bloom lilies not a few. It is a page whereon the sun and dew Scrawl sparkling words in dawn's delicious speech; A laboratory where the wood-winds teach, Dissect each scent and analyze each hue. Not otherwise than beautiful, doth it Record the happ'nings of each summer day; Where we may read, as in a catalogue, When passed a thresher; when a load of hay; Or when a rabbit; or a bird that lit; And now a bare-foot truant and his dog. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>THE COVERED BRIDGE</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> There, from its entrance, lost in matted vines,— Where in the valley foams a water-fall,—- Is glimpsed a ruined mill's remaining wall; Here, by the road, the oxeye daisy mines Hot brass and bronze; the trumpet-trailer shines Red as the plumage of the cardinal. Faint from the forest comes the rain-crow's call Where dusty Summer dreams among the pines. This is the spot where Spring writes wildflower verses In primrose pink, while, drowsing o'er his reins, [Pg 20]The ploughman, all unnoticing, plods along: And where the Autumn opens weedy purses Of sleepy silver, while the corn-heaped wains Rumble the bridge like some deep throat of song. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>THE HILLSIDE GRAVE</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Ten-hundred deep the drifted daisies break Here at the hill's foot; on its top, the wheat Hangs meagre-bearded; and, in vague retreat, The wisp-like blooms of the moth-mulleins shake. And where the wild-pink drops a crimson flake, And morning-glories, like young lips, make sweet The shaded hush, low in the honeyed heat, The wild-bees hum; as if afraid to wake One sleeping there; with no white stone to tell The story of existence; but the stem Of one wild-rose, towering o'er brier and weed, Where all the day the wild-birds requiem; Within whose shade the timid violets spell An epitaph, only the stars can read. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>SIMULACRA</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Dark in the west the sunset's somber wrack Unrolled vast walls the rams of war had split, Along whose battlements the battle lit Tempestuous beacons; and, with gates hurled back, A mighty city, red with ruin and sack, Through burning breaches, crumbling bit by bit, [Pg 21]Showed where the God of Slaughter seemed to sit With conflagration glaring at each crack. Who knows? perhaps as sleep unto us makes Our dreams as real as our waking seems With recollections time can not destroy, So in the mind of Nature now awakes Haply some wilder memory, and she dreams The stormy story of the fall of Troy. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>BEFORE THE END</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> How does the Autumn in her mind conclude The tragic masque her frosty pencil writes, Broad on the pages of the days and nights, In burning lines of orchard, wold, and wood? What lonelier forms—that at the year's door stood At spectral wait—with wildly wasted lights Shall enter? and with melancholy rites Inaugurate their sadder sisterhood?— Sorrow, who lifts a signal hand, and slow The green leaf fevers, falling ere it dies; Regret, whose pale lips summon, and gaunt Woe Wakes the wild-wind harps with sonorous sighs; And Sleep, who sits with poppied eyes and sees The earth and sky grow dream-accessories. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>WINTER</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The flute, whence Autumn's misty finger-tips Drew music—ripening the pinched kernels in The burly chestnut and the chinquapin, Red-rounding-out the oval haws and hips,— [Pg 22]Now Winter crushes to his stormy lips And surly songs whistle around his chin: Now the wild days and wilder nights begin When, at the eaves, the crooked icicle drips. Thy songs, O Autumn, are not lost so soon! Still dwells a memory in thy hollow flute, Which, unto Winter's masculine airs, doth give Thy own creative qualities of tune, By which we see each bough bend white with fruit, Each bush with bloom, in snow commemorative. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>HOAR-FROST</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The frail eidolons of all blossoms Spring, Year after year, about the forest tossed, The magic touch of the enchanter, Frost, Back from the Heaven of the Flow'rs doth bring; Each branch and bush in silence visiting With phantom beauty of its blooms long lost: Each dead weed bends, white-haunted of its ghost, Each dead flower stands ghostly with blossoming. This is the wonder-legend Nature tells To the gray moon and mist a winter's night; The fairy-tale, which her weird fancy 'spells With all the glamour of her soul's delight: Before the summoning sorcery of her eyes Making her spirit's dream materialize. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>THE WINTER MOON</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Deep in the dell I watched her as she rose, A face of icy fire, o'er the hills; With snow-sad eyes to freeze the forest rills, [Pg 23]And snow-sad feet to bleach the meadow snows: Pale as some young witch who, a-listening, goes To her first meeting with the Fiend; whose fears Fix demon eyes behind each bush she nears; Stops, yet must on, fearful of following foes. And so I chased her, startled in the wood, Like a discovered Oread, who flies The Faun who found her sleeping, each nude limb Glittering betrayal through the solitude; Till in a frosty cloud I saw her swim, Like a drowned face, a blur beneath the ice. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>IN SUMMER</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> When in dry hollows, hilled with hay, The vesper-sparrow sings afar; And, golden gray, dusk dies away Beneath the amber evening-star: There, where a warm and shadowy arm The woodland lays around the farm, To meet you where we kissed, dear heart, To kiss you at the tryst, dear heart, To kiss you at the tryst! </div> <div class="stanza"> When clover fields smell cool with dew, And crickets cry, and roads are still; And faint and few the fire-flies strew The dark where calls the whippoorwill; There, in the lane, where sweet again The petals of the wild-rose rain, To stroll with head to head, dear heart, And say the words oft said, dear heart, And say the words oft said! </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 24] <h2>RAIN AND WIND</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> I hear the hoofs of horses Galloping over the hill, Galloping on and galloping on, When all the night is shrill With wind and rain that beats the pane— And my soul with awe is still. </div> <div class="stanza"> For every dripping window Their headlong rush makes bound, Galloping up, and galloping by, Then back again and around, Till the gusty roofs ring with their hoofs, And the draughty cellars sound. </div> <div class="stanza"> And then I hear black horsemen Hallooing in the night; Hallooing and hallooing, They ride o'er vale and height, And the branches snap and the shutters clap With the fury of their flight. </div> <div class="stanza"> Then at each door a horseman,— With burly bearded lip Hallooing through the keyhole,— Pauses with cloak a-drip; And the door-knob shakes and the panel quakes 'Neath the anger of his whip. </div> [Pg 25]<div class="stanza"> All night I hear their gallop, And their wild halloo's alarm; The tree-tops sound and vanes go round In forest and on farm; But never a hair of a thing is there— Only the wind and storm. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>UNDER ARCTURUS</h2> <h4>I.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> "I belt the morn with ribboned mist; With baldricked blue I gird the noon, And dusk with purple, crimson-kissed, White-buckled with the hunter's moon. </div> <div class="stanza"> "These follow me," the season says: "Mine is the frost-pale hand that packs Their scrips, and speeds them on their ways, With gipsy gold that weighs their backs." </div> </div> <h4>II.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> A daybreak horn the Autumn blows, As with a sun-tanned band he parts Wet boughs whereon the berry glows; And at his feet the red-fox starts. </div> <div class="stanza"> The leafy leash that holds his hounds Is loosed; and all the noonday hush Is startled; and the hillside sounds Behind the fox's bounding brush. </div> [Pg 26]<div class="stanza"> When red dusk makes the western sky A fire-lit window through the firs, He stoops to see the red-fox die Among the chestnut's broken burs. </div> <div class="stanza"> Then fanfaree and fanfaree, Down vistas of the afterglow His bugle rings from tree to tree, While all the world grows hushed below. </div> </div> <h4>III.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Like some black host the shadows fall, And darkness camps among the trees; Each wildwood road, a Goblin Hall, Grows populous with mysteries. </div> <div class="stanza"> Night comes with brows of ragged storm, And limbs of writhen cloud and mist; The rain-wind hangs upon her arm Like some wild girl that will be kissed. </div> <div class="stanza"> By her gaunt hand the leaves are shed Like nightmares an enchantress herds; And, like a witch who calls the dead, The hill-stream whirls with foaming words. </div> <div class="stanza"> Then all is sudden silence and Dark fear—like his who can not see, Yet hears, aye in a haunted land, Death rattling on a gallow's tree. </div> </div> [Pg 27] <h4>IV.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The days approach again; the days, Whose mantles stream, whose sandals drag; When in the haze by puddled ways Each gnarled thorn seems a crookéd hag. </div> <div class="stanza"> When rotting orchards reek with rain; And woodlands crumble, leaf and log; And in the drizzling yard again The gourd is tagged with points of fog. </div> <div class="stanza"> Oh, let me seat my soul among Your melancholy moods! and touch Your thoughts' sweet sorrow without tongue, Whose silence says too much, too much! </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>OCTOBER</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Long hosts of sunlight, and the bright wind blows A tourney trumpet on the listed hill: Past is the splendor of the royal rose And duchess daffodil. </div> <div class="stanza"> Crowned queen of beauty, in the garden's space, Strong daughter of a bitter race and bold, A ragged beggar with a lovely face, Reigns the sad marigold. </div> [Pg 28]<div class="stanza"> And I have sought June's butterfly for days, To find it—like a coreopsis bloom— Amber and seal, rain-murdered 'neath the blaze Of this sunflower's plume. </div> <div class="stanza"> Here basks the bee; and there, sky-voyaging wings Dare God's blue gulfs of heaven; the last song, The red-bird flings me as adieu, still rings Upon yon pear-tree's prong. </div> <div class="stanza"> No angry sunset brims with rosier red The bowl of heaven than the days, indeed, Pour in each blossom of this salvia-bed, Where each leaf seems to bleed. </div> <div class="stanza"> And where the wood-gnats dance, a tiny mist, Above the efforts of the weedy stream, The girl, October, tired of the tryst, Dreams a diviner dream. </div> <div class="stanza"> One foot just dipping the caressing wave, One knee at languid angle; locks that drown Hands nut-stained; hazel-eyed, she lies, and grave, Watching the leaves drift down. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>BARE BOUGHS</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> O heart, that beat the bird's blithe blood, The blithe bird's message that pursued, Now song is dead as last year's bud, What dost thou in the wood? </div> [Pg 29]<div class="stanza"> O soul, that kept the brook's glad flow, The glad brook's word to sun and moon, What dost thou here where song lies low As all the dreams of June? </div> <div class="stanza"> Where once was heard a voice of song, The hautboys of the mad winds sing; Where once a music flowed along, The rain's wild bugles ring. </div> <div class="stanza"> The weedy water frets and ails, And moans in many a sunless fall; And, o'er the melancholy, trails The black crow's eldritch call. </div> <div class="stanza"> Unhappy brook! O withered wood! O days, whom death makes comrades of! Where are the birds that thrilled the blood When life struck hands with love? </div> <div class="stanza"> A song, one soared against the blue; A song, one bubbled in the leaves; A song, one threw where orchards grew All appled to the eaves. </div> <div class="stanza"> But now the birds are flown or dead; And sky and earth are bleak and gray; The wild winds sob i' the boughs instead, The wild leaves sigh i' the way. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 30] <h2>A THRENODY</h2> <h4>I.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The rainy smell of a ferny dell, Whose shadow no sunray flaws, When Autumn sits in the wayside weeds Telling her beads Of haws. </div> </div> <h4>II.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The phantom mist, that is moonbeam-kissed, On hills where the trees are thinned, When Autumn leans at the oak-root's scarp, Playing a harp Of wind. </div> </div> <h4>III.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The crickets' chirr 'neath brier and burr, By leaf-strewn pools and streams, When Autumn stands 'mid the dropping nuts, With the book, she shuts, Of dreams. </div> </div> <h4>IV.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The gray "alas" of the days that pass, And the hope that says "adieu," A parting sorrow, a shriveled flower, And one ghost's hour With you. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 31] <h2>SNOW</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The moon, like a round device On a shadowy shield of war, Hangs white in a heaven of ice With a solitary star. </div> <div class="stanza"> The wind is sunk to a sigh, And the waters are stern with frost; And gray, in the eastern sky, The last snow-cloud is lost. </div> <div class="stanza"> White fields, that are winter-starved, Black woods, that are winter-fraught, Cold, harsh as a face death-carved With the iron of some black thought. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>VAGABONDS</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Your heart's a-tune with April and mine a-tune with June, So let us go a-roving beneath the summer moon: Oh, was it in the sunlight, or was it in the rain, We met among the blossoms within the locust lane? All that I can remember's the bird that sang aboon, And with its music in our hearts we'll rove beneath the moon. </div> [Pg 32]<div class="stanza"> A love-word of the wind, dear, of which we'll read the rune, While we still go a-roving beneath the summer moon: A love-kiss of the water we'll often stop to hear— The echoed words and kisses of our own love, my dear: And all our path shall blossom with wild-rose sweets that swoon, And with their fragrance in our hearts we'll rove beneath the moon. </div> <div class="stanza"> It will not be forever, yet merry goes the tune While we still go a-roving beneath the summer moon: A cabin, in the clearing, of flickering firelight When old-time lanes we strolled in the winter snows make white: Where we can nod together above the logs and croon The songs we sang when roving beneath the summer moon. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>AN OLD SONG</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> It's Oh, for the hills, where the wind's some one With a vagabond foot that follows! And a cheer-up hand that he claps upon Your arm with the hearty words, "Come on! We'll soon be out of the hollows, My heart! We'll soon be out of the hollows!" </div> [Pg 33]<div class="stanza"> It's Oh, for the songs, where the hope's some one With a renegade foot that doubles! And a kindly look that he turns upon Your face with the friendly laugh, "Come on! We'll soon be out of the troubles, My heart! We'll soon be out of the troubles!" </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>A ROSE O' THE HILLS</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The hills look down on wood and stream, On orchard-land and farm; And o'er the hills the azure-gray Of heaven bends the livelong day With thoughts of calm and storm. </div> <div class="stanza"> On wood and stream the hills look down, On farm and orchard-land; And o'er the hills she came to me Through wildrose-brake and blackberry, The hill wind hand in hand. </div> <div class="stanza"> The hills look down on home and field, On wood and winding stream; And o'er the hills she came along, Upon her lips a woodland song, And in her eyes, a dream. </div> <div class="stanza"> On home and field the hills look down, On stream and vistaed wood; And breast-deep, with disordered hair, Fair in the wildrose tangle there, A sudden space she stood. </div> [Pg 34]<div class="stanza"> O hills, that look on rock and road, On grove and harvest-field, To whom God giveth rest and peace, And slumber, that is kin to these, And visions unrevealed! </div> <div class="stanza"> O hills, that look on road and rock, On field and fruited grove, What now is mine of peace and rest In you! since entered at my breast God's sweet unrest of love! </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>DIRGE</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> What shall her silence keep Under the sun? Here, where the willows weep And waters run; Here, where she lies asleep, And all is done. </div> <div class="stanza"> Lights, when the tree-top swings; Scents that are sown; Sounds of the wood-bird's wings; And the bee's drone: These be her comfortings Under the stone. </div> <div class="stanza"> What shall watch o'er her here When day is fled? Here, when the night is near [Pg 35]And skies are red; Here, where she lieth dear And young and dead. </div> <div class="stanza"> Shadows, and winds that spill Dew; and the tune Of the wild whippoorwill; And the white moon; These be the watchers still Over her stone. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>REST</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Under the brindled beech, Deep in the mottled shade, Where the rocks hang in reach Flower and ferny blade, Let him be laid. </div> <div class="stanza"> Here will the brooks, that rove Under the mossy trees, Grave with the music of Underworld melodies, Lap him in peace. </div> <div class="stanza"> Here will the winds, that blow Out of the haunted west, Gold with the dreams that glow There on the heaven's breast, Lull him to rest. </div> [Pg 36]<div class="stanza"> Here will the stars and moon, Silent and far and deep, Old with the mystic rune Of the slow years that creep, Charm him with sleep. </div> <div class="stanza"> Under the ancient beech, Deep in the mossy shade, Where the hill moods may reach, Where the hill dreams may aid, Let him be laid. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>CLAIRVOYANCE</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The sunlight that makes of the heaven A pathway for sylphids to throng; The wind that makes harps of the forests For spirits to smite into song, Are the image and voice of a vision That comforts my heart and makes strong. </div> <div class="stanza"> I look in one's face, and the shadows Are lifted: and, lo, I can see, Through windows of evident being, That open on eternity, The form of the essence of Beauty God clothes with His own mystery. </div> <div class="stanza"> I lean to one's voice, and the wrangle Of living hath pause: and I hear Through doors of invisible spirit, That open on light that is clear, The radiant raiment of Music In the hush of the heavens sweep near. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 37] <h2>INDIFFERENCE</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> She is so dear the wildflowers near Each path she passes by, Are over fain to kiss again Her feet and then to die. </div> <div class="stanza"> She is so fair the wild birds there That sing upon the bough, Have learned the staff of her sweet laugh, And sing no other now. </div> <div class="stanza"> Alas! that she should never see, Should never care to know, The wildflower's love, the bird's above, And his, who loves her so! </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>PICTURED</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> This is the face of her I've dreamed of long; Here in my heart's despair, This is the face of her Pictured in song. </div> <div class="stanza"> Look on the lily lids, The eyes of dawn, Deep as a Nereid's, Swimming with dewy lids In waters wan. </div> [Pg 38]<div class="stanza"> Look on the brows of snow, The locks brown-bright; Only young sleep can show Such brows of placid snow, Such locks of night. </div> <div class="stanza"> The cheeks, like rosy moons, The lips of fire; Love thinks no sweeter tunes Under enchanted moons Than their desire. </div> <div class="stanza"> Loved lips and eyes and hair, Lo, this is she! She, who sits smiling there Over my heart's despair, Never for me! </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>SERENADE</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The pink rose drops its petals on The moonlit lawn, the moonlit lawn; The moon, like some wide rose of white, Drops down the summer night. No rose there is As sweet as this— Thy mouth, that greets me with a kiss. </div> <div class="stanza"> The lattice of thy casement twines With jasmine vines, with jasmine vines; The stars, like jasmine blossoms, lie [Pg 39]About the glimmering sky. No jasmine tress Can so caress As thy white arms' soft loveliness. </div> <div class="stanza"> About thy door magnolia blooms Make sweet the glooms, make sweet the glooms; A moon-magnolia is the dusk Closed in a dewy husk. However much, No bloom gives such Soft fragrance as thy bosom's touch. </div> <div class="stanza"> The flowers, blooming now, shall pass, And strew the grass, and strew the grass; The night, like some frail flower, dawn Shall soon make gray and wan. Still, still above, The flower of True love shall live forever, love. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>KINSHIP</h2> <h4>I.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> There is no flower of wood or lea, No April flower, as fair as she: O white anemone, who hast The wind's wild grace, Know her a cousin of thy race, Into whose face A presence like the wind's hath passed. </div> </div> [Pg 40] <h4>II.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> There is no flower of wood or lea, No Maytime flower, as fair as she: O bluebell, tender with the blue Of limpid skies, Thy lineage hath kindred ties In her, whose eyes The heav'n's own qualities imbue. </div> </div> <h4>III.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> There is no flower of wood or lea, No Juneday flower, as fair as she: Rose,—odorous with beauty of Life's first and best,— Behold thy sister here confessed! Whose maiden breast Is fragrant with the dreams of love. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>SHE IS SO MUCH</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> She is so much to me, to me, And, oh! I love her so, I look into my soul and see How comfort keeps me company In hopes she, too, may know. I love her, I love her, I love her, This I know. </div> [Pg 41]<div class="stanza"> So dear she is to me, so dear, And, oh! I love her so, I listen in my heart and hear The voice of gladness singing near In thoughts she, too, may know. I love her, I love her, I love her, This I know. </div> <div class="stanza"> So much she is to me, so much, And, oh! I love her so, In heart and soul I feel the touch Of angel callers, that are such Dreams as she, too, may know. I love her, I love her, I love her, This I know. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>HER EYES</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> In her dark eyes dreams poetize; The soul sits lost in love: There is no thing in all the skies, To gladden all the world I prize, Like the deep love in her dark eyes, Or one sweet dream thereof. </div> <div class="stanza"> In her dark eyes, where thoughts arise, Her soul's soft moods I see: Of hope and faith, that make life wise; And charity, whose food is sighs— Not truer than her own true eyes Is truth's divinity. </div> [Pg 42]<div class="stanza"> In her dark eyes the knowledge lies Of an immortal sod, Her soul once trod in angel-guise, Nor can forget its heavenly ties, Since, there in Heaven, upon her eyes Once gazed the eyes of God. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>MESSENGERS</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The wind, that gives the rose a kiss With murmured music of the south, Hath kissed a sweeter thing than this,— The wind, that gives the rose a kiss— The perfume of her mouth. </div> <div class="stanza"> The brook, that mirrors skies and trees, And echoes in a grottoed place, Hath held a fairer thing than these,— The brook, that mirrors skies and trees,— The image of her face. </div> <div class="stanza"> O happy wind! O happy brook! So dear before, so free of cares! How dearer since her kiss and look,— O happy wind! O happy brook!— Have blessed you unawares! </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 43] <h2>AT TWENTY-ONE</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The rosy hills of her high breasts, Whereon, like misty morning, rests The breathing lace; her auburn hair, Wherein, a star point sparkling there, One jewel burns; her eyes, that keep Recorded dreams of song and sleep; Her mouth, with whose comparison The richest rose were poor and wan; Her throat, her form—what masterpiece Of man can picture half of these! She comes! a classic from the hand Of God! wherethrough I understand What Nature means and Art and Love, And all the lovely Myths thereof. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 44] <h2>BABY MARY</h2> <h3>TO LITTLE M. E. C. G.</h3> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Deep in baby Mary's eyes, Baby Mary's sweet blue eyes, Dwell the golden memories Of the music once her ears Heard in far-off Paradise; So she has no time for tears,— Baby Mary,— Listening to the songs she hears. </div> <div class="stanza"> Soft in baby Mary's face, Baby Mary's lovely face, If you watch, you, too, may trace Dreams her spirit-self hath seen In some far-off Eden-place, Whence her soul she can not wean,— Baby Mary,— Dreaming in a world between. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 45] <h2>A MOTIVE IN GOLD AND GRAY</h2> <h4>I.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> To-night he sees their star burn, dewy-bright, Deep in the pansy, eve hath made for it, Low in the west; a placid purple lit At its far edge with warm auroral light: Love's planet hangs above a cedared height; And there in shadow, like gold music writ Of dusk's dark fingers, scale-like fire-flies flit Now up, now down the balmy bars of night. How different from that eve a year ago! Which was a stormy flower in the hair Of dolorous day, whose sombre eyes looked, blurred, Into night's sibyl face, and saw the woe Of parting near, and imaged a despair, As now a hope caught from a homing word. </div> </div> <h4>II.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> She came unto him—as the springtime does Unto the land where all lies dead and cold, Until her rosary of days is told And beauty, prayer-like, blossoms where death was.— Nature divined her coming—yea, the dusk Seemed thinking of that happiness: behold, No cloud it had to blot its marigold Moon, great and golden, o'er the slopes of musk; Whereon earth's voice made music; leaf and stream Lilting the same low lullaby again, [Pg 46]To coax the wind, who romped among the hills All day, a tired child, to sleep and dream: When through the moonlight of the locust-lane She came, as spring comes through her daffodils. </div> </div> <h4>III.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> White as a lily molded of Earth's milk That eve the moon swam in a hyacinth sky; Soft in the gleaming glens the wind went by, Faint as a phantom clothed in unseen silk: Bright as a naiad's leap, from shine to shade, The runnel twinkled through the shaken brier; Above the hills one long cloud, pulsed with fire, Flashed like a great, enchantment-welded blade. And when the western sky seemed some weird land, And night a witching spell at whose command One sloping star fell green from heav'n; and deep The warm rose opened for the moth to sleep; Then she, consenting, laid her hands in his, And lifted up her lips for their first kiss. </div> </div> <h4>IV.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> There where they part, the porch's step is strewn With wind-tossed petals of the purple vine; Athwart the porch the shadow of a pine Cleaves the white moonlight; and, like some calm rune Heaven says to Earth, shines the majestic moon; And now a meteor draws a lilac line Across the welkin, as if God would sign The perfect poem of this night of June. [Pg 47]The wood-wind stirs the flowering chestnut-tree, Whose curving blossoms strew the glimmering grass Like crescents that wind-wrinkled waters glass; And, like a moonstone in a frill of flame, The dew-drop trembles on the peony, As in a lover's heart his sweetheart's name. </div> </div> <h4>V.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> In after years shall she stand here again, In heart regretful? and with lonely sighs Think on that night of love, and realize Whose was the fault whence grew the parting pain? And, in her soul, persuading still in vain, Shall doubt take shape, and all its old surmise Bid darker phantoms of remorse arise Trailing the raiment of a dead disdain? Masks, unto whom shall her avowal yearn, With looks clairvoyant seeing how each is A different form, with eyes and lips that burn Into her heart with love's last look and kiss?— And, ere they pass, shall she behold them turn To her a face which evermore is his? </div> </div> <h4>VI.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> In after years shall he remember how Dawn had no breeze soft as her murmured name? And day no sunlight that availed the same As her bright smile to cheer the world below? Nor had the conscious twilight's golds and grays Her soul's allurement, that was free of blame,— [Pg 48]Nor dusk's gold canvas, where one star's white flame Shone, more bewitchment than her own sweet ways.— Then as the night with moonlight and perfume, And dew and darkness, qualifies the whole Dim world with glamour, shall the past with dreams— That were the love-theme of their lives—illume The present with remembered hours, whose gleams, Unknown to him, shall face them soul to soul? </div> </div> <h4>VII.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> No! not for her and him that part;—-the Might- Have-Been's sad consolation;—where had bent, Haply, in prayer and patience penitent, Both, though apart, before no blown-out light. The otherwise of fate for them, when white The lilacs bloom again, and, innocent, Spring comes with beauty for her testament, Singing the praises of the day and night. When orchards blossom and the distant hill Is vague with haw-trees as a ridge with mist, The moon shall see him where a watch he keeps By her young form that lieth white and still, With lidded eyes and passive wrist on wrist, While by her side he bows himself and weeps. </div> </div> <h4>VIII.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> And, oh, what pain to see the blooms appear Of haw and dogwood in the spring again; [Pg 49]The primrose leaning with the dragging rain, And hill-locked orchards swarming far and near. To see the old fields, that her steps made dear, Grow green with deepening plenty of the grain, Yet feel how this excess of life is vain,— How vain to him!—since she no more is here. What though the woodland burgeon, water flow, Like a rejoicing harp, beneath the boughs! The cat-bird and the hermit-thrush arouse Day with the impulsive music of their love! Beneath the graveyard sod she will not know, Nor what his heart is all too conscious of! </div> </div> <h4>IX.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> How blessed is he who, gazing in the tomb, Can yet behold, beneath th' investing mask Of mockery,—whose horror seems to ask Sphinx-riddles of the soul within the gloom,— Upon dead lips no dust of Love's dead bloom; And in dead hands no shards of Faith's rent flask; But Hope, who still stands at her starry task, Weaving the web of comfort on her loom! Thrice blessed! who, 'though he hear the tomb proclaim, How all is Death's and Life Death's other name; Can yet reply: "O Grave, these things are yours! But that is left which life indeed assures— Love, through whose touch I shall arise the same! Love, of whose self was wrought the universe!" </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 50] <h2>A REED SHAKEN WITH THE WIND</h2> <h4>I.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Not for you and me the path Winding through the shadowless Fields of morning's dewiness! Where the brook, that hurries, hath Laughter lighter than a boy's; Where recurrent odors poise, Romp-like, with irreverent tresses, In the sun; and birds and boughs Build a music-haunted house For the winds to hang their dresses, Whisper-silken, rustling in. Ours a path that led unto Twilight regions gray with dew; Where moon-vapors gathered thin Over acres sisterless Of all healthy beauty; where Fungus growths made sad the air With a phantom-like caress: Under darkness and strange stars, To the sorrow-silenced bars Of a dubious forestland, Where the wood-scents seemed to stand, And the sounds, on either hand, Clad like sleep's own servitors In the shadowy livery Of the ancient house of dreams; That before us,—fitfully, With white intermittent gleams Of its pale-lamped windows,—shone; Echoing with the dim unknown. </div> </div> [Pg 51] <h4>II.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> To say to hope,—Take all from me, And grant me naught: The rose, the song, the melody, The word, the thought: Then all my life bid me be slave,— Is all I crave. </div> <div class="stanza"> To say to time,—Be true to me, Nor grant me less The dream, the sigh, the memory, The heart's distress; Then unto death set me a task, Is all I ask. </div> </div> <h4>III.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> I came to you when eve was young. And, where the park went downward to The river, and, among the dew, One vesper moment lit and sung A bird, your eyes said something dear. How sweet it was to walk with you! How, with our souls, we seemed to hear The darkness coming with its stars! How calm the moon sloped up her sphere Of fire-filled pearl through passive bars Of clouds that berged the tender east! While all the dark inanimate Of nature woke; initiate With th' moon's arrival, something ceased In nature's soul; she stood again Another self, that seemed t' have been [Pg 52]Dormant, suppressed and so unseen All day; a life, unknown and strange And dream-suggestive, that had lain,— Masked on with light,—within the range Of thought, but unrevealed till now. It was the hour of love. And you, With downward eyes and pensive brow, Among the moonlight and the dew,— Although no word of love was spoken,— Heard the sweet night's confession broken Of something here that spoke in me; A love, depth made inaudible, Save to your soul, that answered well, With eyes replying silently. </div> </div> <h4>IV.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Fair you are as a rose is fair, There where the shadows dew it; And the deeps of your brown, brown hair, Sweet as the cloud that lingers there With the sunset's auburn through it. Eyes of azure and throat of snow, Tell me what my heart would know! </div> <div class="stanza"> Every dream I dream of you Has a love-thought in it, And a hope, a kiss or two, Something dear and something true, Telling me each minute, With three words it whispers clear, What my heart from you would hear. </div> </div> [Pg 53] <h4>V.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Summer came; the days grew kind With increasing favors; deep Were the nights with rest and sleep: Fair, with poppies intertwined On their blonde locks, dreamy hours, Sunny-hearted as the rose, Went among the banded flowers, Teaching them, how no one knows, Fresher color and perfume.— In the window of your room Bloomed a rich azalea. Pink, As an egret's rosy plumes, Shone its tender-tufted blooms. From your care and love, I think, Love's rose-color it did drink, Growing rosier day by day Of your 'tending hand's caress; And your own dear naturalness Had imbued it in some way. Once you gave a blossom of it, Smiling, to me when I left: Need I tell you how I love it Faded though it is now!—Reft Of its fragrance and its color, Yet 'tis dearer now than then, As past happiness is when We regret. And dimmer, duller Though its beauty be, when I Look upon it, I recall Every part of that old wall; And the dingy window high, [Pg 54]Where you sat and read; and all The fond love that made your face A soft sunbeam in that place: And the plant, that grew this bloom Withered here, itself long dead, Makes a halo overhead There again—and through my room, Like faint whispers of perfume, Steal the words of love then said. </div> </div> <h4>VI.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> All of my love I send to you, I send to you, On thoughts, like paths, that wend to you, Here in my heart's glad garden, Wherein, its lovely warden, Your face, a lily seeming, Is dreaming. </div> <div class="stanza"> All of my life I bring to you, I bring to you, In deeds, like birds, that sing to you, Here, in my soul's sweet valley, Wherethrough, most musically, Your love, a fountain, glistens, And listens. </div> <div class="stanza"> My love, my life, how blessed in you! How blessed in you! Whose thoughts, whose deeds find rest in you, Here, on my self's dark ocean, Whereo'er, in heavenly motion, Your soul, a star, abideth, And guideth. </div> </div> [Pg 55] <h4>VII.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Where the old Kentucky wound Through the land,—its stream between Hills of primitive forest green,— Like a goodly belt around Giant breasts of grandeur; with Many an unknown Indian myth, On the boat we steamed. The land Like an hospitable hand Welcomed us. Alone we sat On the under-deck, and saw Farm-house and plantation draw Near and vanish. 'Neath your hat, Your young eyes laughed; and your hair, Blown about them by the air Of our passage, clung and curled. Music, and the summer moon; And the hills' great shadows hewn Out of silence; and the tune Of the whistle, when we whirled Round a moonlit bend in sight of Some lone landing heaped with hay Or tobacco; where the light of One dim solitary lamp Signaled through the evening's damp: Then a bell; and, dusky gray, Shuffling figures on the shore With the cable; rugged forms On the gang-plank; backs and arms With their cargo bending o'er; And the burly mate before. [Pg 56]Then an iron bell, and puff Of escaping steam; and out Where the stream is wheel-whipped rough; Music, and a parting shout From the shore; the pilot's bell Beating on the deck below; Then the steady, quivering, slow Smooth advance again. Until Twinkling lights beyond us tell There's a lock or little town, Clasped between a hill and hill, Where the blue-grass fields slope down.— So we went. That summer-time Lingers with me like a rhyme Learned for dreamy beauty of Its old-fashioned faith and love, In some musing moment; sith Heart-associated with Joy that moment's quiet bore, Thought repeated evermore. </div> </div> <h4>VIII.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Three sweet things love lives upon: Music, at whose fountain's brink Still he stoops his face to drink; Seeing, as the wave is drawn, His own image rise and sink. Three sweet things love lives upon. </div> [Pg 57]<div class="stanza"> Three sweet things love lives upon: Odor, whose red roses wreathe His bright brow that shines beneath; Hearing, as each bud is blown, His own spirit breathe and breathe. Three sweet things love lives upon. </div> <div class="stanza"> Three sweet things love lives upon: Color, to whose rainbow he Lifts his dark eyes burningly; Feeling, as the wild hues dawn, His own immortality. Three sweet things love lives upon. </div> </div> <h4>IX.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Memories of other days, With the whilom happiness, Rise before my musing gaze In the twilight ... And your dress Seems beside me, like a haze Shimmering white; as when we went 'Neath the star-strewn firmament, Love-led, with impatient feet Down the night that, summer-sweet, Sparkled o'er the lamp-lit street. Every look love gave us then Comes before my eyes again, Making music for my heart On that path, that grew for us Roses, red and amorous, On that path, from which oft start, [Pg 58]Out of recollected places, With remembered forms and faces, Dreams, love's ardent hands have woven In my life's dark tapestry, Beckoning, soft and shadowy, To the soul. And o'er the cloven Gulf of time, I seem to hear Words, once whispered in the ear, Calling—as might friends long dead, With familiar voices, deep, Speak to those who lie asleep, Comforting—So I was led Backward to forgotten things, Contiguities that spread Sudden unremembered wings; And across my mind's still blue From the nest they fledged in, flew Dazzling shapes affection knew. </div> </div> <h4>X.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Ah! over full my heart is Of sadness and of pain; As a rose-flower in the garden The dull dusk fills with rain; As a blown red rose that shivers And bends to the wind and rain. </div> <div class="stanza"> So give me thy hands and speak me As once in the days of yore, When love spoke sweetly to us, The love that speaks no more; The sound of thy voice may help him To speak in our hearts once more. </div> [Pg 59]<div class="stanza"> Ah! over grieved my soul is, And tired and sick for sleep, As a poppy-bloom that withers, Forgotten, where reapers reap; As a harvested poppy-flower That dies where reapers reap. </div> <div class="stanza"> So bend to my face and kiss me As once in the days of yore, When the touch of thy lips was magic That restored to life once more; The thought of thy kiss, which awakens To life that love once more. </div> </div> <h4>XI.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Sitting often I have, oh! Often have desired you so— Yearned to kiss you as I did When your love to me you gave, In the moonlight, by the wave, And a long impetuous kiss Pressed upon your mouth that chid, And upon each dewy lid— That, all passion-shaken, I With love language will address Each dear thing I know you by, Picture, needle-work or frame: Each suggestive in the same Perfume of past happiness: Till, meseems, the ways we knew Now again I tread with you [Pg 60]From the oldtime tryst: and there Feel the pressure of your hair Cool and easy on my cheek, And your breath's aroma: bare Hand upon my arm, as weak As a lily on a stream: And your eyes, that gaze at me With the sometime witchery, To my inmost spirit speak. And remembered ecstacy Sweeps my soul again ... I seem Dreaming, yet I do not dream. </div> </div> <h4>XII.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> When day dies, lone, forsaken, And joy is kissed asleep; When doubt's gray eyes awaken, And love, with music taken From hearts with sighings shaken, Sits in the dusk to weep: </div> <div class="stanza"> With ghostly lifted finger What memory then shall rise?— Of dark regret the bringer— To tell the sorrowing singer Of days whose echoes linger, Till dawn unstars the skies. </div> [Pg 61]<div class="stanza"> When night is gone and, beaming, Faith journeys forth to toil; When hope's blue eyes wake gleaming, And life is done with dreaming The dreams that seem but seeming, Within the world's turmoil: </div> <div class="stanza"> Can we forget the presence Of death who walks unseen? Whose scythe casts shadowy crescents Around life's glittering essence, As lessens, slowly lessens, The space that lies between. </div> </div> <h4>XIII.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Bland was that October day, Calm and balmy as the spring, When we went a forest-way, 'Neath paternal beeches gray, To a valleyed opening: Where the purple aster flowered, And, like torches shadow-held, Red the fiery sumach towered; And, where gum-trees sentineled Vistas, robed in gold and garnet, Ripe the thorny chestnut shelled Its brown plumpness. Bee and hornet Droned around us; quick the cricket, Tireless in the wood-rose thicket, [Pg 62]Tremoloed; and, to the wind All its moon-spun silver casting, Swung the milk-weed pod unthinned; And, its clean flame on the sod By the fading golden-rod, Burned the white life-everlasting. It was not so much the time, Nor the place, nor way we went, That made all our moods to rhyme, Nor the season's sentiment, As it was the innocent Carefree childhood of our hearts, Reading each expression of Death and care as life and love: That impression joy imparts Unto others and retorts On itself, which then made glad All the sorrow of decay, As the memory of that day Makes this day of spring, now, sad. </div> </div> <h4>XIV.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The balsam-breathed petunias Hang riven of the rain; And where the tiger-lily was Now droops a tawny stain; While in the twilight's purple pause Earth dreams of Heaven again. </div> [Pg 63]<div class="stanza"> When one shall sit and sigh, And one lie all alone Beneath the unseen sky— Whose love shall then deny? Whose love atone? </div> <div class="stanza"> With ragged petals round its pod The rain-wrecked poppy dies; And where the hectic rose did nod A crumbled crimson lies; While distant as the dreams of God The stars slip in the skies. </div> <div class="stanza"> When one shall lie asleep, And one be dead and gone— Within the unknown deep, Shall we the trysts then keep That now are done? </div> </div> <h4>XV.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Holding both your hands in mine, Often have we sat together, While, outside, the boisterous weather Hung the wild wind on the pine Like a black marauder, and With a sudden warning hand At the casement rapped. The night Read no sentiment of light, Starbeam-syllabled, within Her romance of death and sin, [Pg 64]Shadow-chaptered tragicly.— Looking in your eyes, ah me! Though I heard, I did not heed What the night read unto us, Threatening and ominous: For love helped my heart to read Forward through unopened pages To a coming day, that held More for us than all the ages Past, that it epitomized In its sentence; where we spelled What our present realized Only—all the love that was Past and yet to be for us. </div> </div> <h4>XVI.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> 'Though in the garden, gray with dew, All life lies withering, And there's no more to say or do, No more to sigh or sing, Yet go we back the ways we knew, When buds were opening. </div> <div class="stanza"> Perhaps we shall not search in vain Within its wreck and gloom; 'Mid roses ruined of the rain There still may live one bloom; One flower, whose heart may still retain The long-lost soul-perfume. </div> [Pg 65]<div class="stanza"> And then, perhaps, will come to us The dreams we dreamed before; And song, who spoke so beauteous, Will speak to us once more; And love, with eyes all amorous, Will ope again his door. </div> <div class="stanza"> So 'though the garden's gray with dew, And flowers are withering, And there's no more to say or do, No more to sigh or sing, Yet go we back the ways we knew When buds were opening. </div> </div> <h4>XVII.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Looking on the desolate street, Where the March snow drifts and drives, Trodden black of hurrying feet, Where the athlete storm-wind strives With each tree and dangling light,— Centers, sphered with glittering white,— Hissing in the dancing snow ... Backward in my soul I go To that tempest-haunted night Of two autumns past, when we, Hastening homeward, were o'ertaken Of the storm; and 'neath a tree, With its wild leaves whisper-shaken, Sheltered us in that forsaken, Sad and ancient cemetery,— Where folk came no more to bury.— [Pg 66]Haggard grave-stones, mossed and crumbled, Tottered 'round us, or o'ertumbled In their sunken graves; and some, Urned and obelisked above Iron-fenced in tombs, stood dumb Records of forgotten love. And again I see the west Yawning inward to its core Of electric-spasmed ore, Swiftly, without pause or rest. And a great wind sweeps the dust Up abandoned sidewalks; and, In the rotting trees, the gust Shouts again—a voice that would Make its gaunt self understood Moaning over death's lean land. And we sat there, hand in hand; On the granite; where we read, By the leaping skies o'erhead, Something of one young and dead. Yet the words begot no fear In our souls: you leaned your cheek Smiling on mine: very near Were our lips: we did not speak. </div> </div> <h4>XVIII.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> And suddenly alone I stood With scared eyes gazing through the wood. For some still sign of ill or good, To lead me from the solitude. </div> [Pg 67]<div class="stanza"> The day was at its twilighting; One cloud o'erhead spread a vast wing Of rosy thunder; vanishing Above the far hills' mystic ring. </div> <div class="stanza"> Some stars shone timidly o'erhead; And toward the west's cadaverous red— Like some wild dream that haunts the dead In limbo—the lean moon was led. </div> <div class="stanza"> Upon the sad, debatable Vague lands of twilight slowly fell A silence that I knew too well, A sorrow that I can not tell. </div> <div class="stanza"> What way to take, what path to go, Whether into the east's gray glow, Or where the west burnt red and low— What road to choose, I did not know. </div> <div class="stanza"> So, hesitating, there I stood Lost in my soul's uncertain wood: One sign I craved of ill or good, To lead me from its solitude. </div> </div> <h4>XIX.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> It was autumn: and a night, Full of whispers and of mist, With a gray moon, wanly whist, Hanging like a phantom light O'er the hills. We stood among Windy fields of weed and flower, [Pg 68]Where the withered seed pod hung, And the chill leaf-crickets sung. Melancholy was the hour With the mystery and loneness Of the year, that seemed to look On its own departed face; As our love then, in its oneness, All its dead past did retrace, And from that sad moment took Presage of approaching parting.— Sorrowful the hour and dark: Low among the trees, now starting, Now concealed, a star's pale spark— Like a fen-fire—winked and lured On to shuddering shadows; where All was doubtful, unassured, Immaterial; and the bare Facts of unideal day Changed to substance such as dreams. And meseemed then, far away— Farther than remotest gleams Of the stars—lost, separated, And estranged, and out of reach, Grew our lives away from each, Loving lives, that long had waited. </div> </div> <h4>XX.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> There is no gladness in the day Now you're away; Dull is the morn, the noon is dull, Once beautiful; [Pg 69]And when the evening fills the skies With dusky dyes, With tired eyes and tired heart I sit alone, I sigh apart, And wish for you. </div> <div class="stanza"> Ah! darker now the night comes on Since you are gone; Sad are the stars, the moon is sad, Once wholly glad; And when the stars and moon are set, And earth lies wet, With heart's regret and soul's hard ache, I dream alone, I lie awake, And wish for you. </div> <div class="stanza"> These who once spake me, speak no more, Now all is o'er; Day hath forgot the language of Its hopes of love; Night, whose sweet lips were burdensome With dreams, is dumb; Far different from what used to be, With silence and despondency They speak to me. </div> </div> <h4>XXI.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> So it ends—the path that crept Through a land all slumber-kissed; Where the sickly moonlight slept Like a pale antagonist. Now the star, that led us onward,— Reassuring with its light,— [Pg 70]Fails and falters; dipping downward Leaves us wandering in night, With old doubts we once disdained ... So it ends. The woods attained— Where our heart's desire builded A fair temple, fire-gilded, With hope's marble shrine within, Where the lineaments of our love Shone, with lilies clad and crowned, 'Neath white columns reared above Sorrow and her sister sin, Columns, rose and ribbon-wound,— In the forest we have found But a ruin! All around Lie the shattered capitals, And vast fragments of the walls ... Like a climbing cloud,—that plies, Wind-wrecked, o'er the moon that lies 'Neath its blackness,—taking on Gradual certainties of wan, Soft assaults of easy white, Pale-approaching; till the skies' Emptiness and hungry night Claim its bulk again, while she Rides in lonely purity: So we found our temple, broken, And a musing moment's space Love, whose latest word was spoken, Seemed to meet us face to face, Making bright that ruined place With a strange effulgence; then Passed, and left all black again. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 71] <h2>A FLOWER OF THE FIELDS.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Bee-bitten in the orchard hung The peach; or, fallen in the weeds, Lay rotting: where still sucked and sung The gray bee, boring to its seed's Pink pulp and honey blackly stung. </div> <div class="stanza"> The orchard path, which led around The garden,—with its heat one twinge Of dinning locusts,—picket-bound, And ragged, brought me where one hinge Held up the gate that scraped the ground. </div> <div class="stanza"> All seemed the same: the martin-box— Sun-warped with pigmy balconies— Still stood with all its twittering flocks, Perched on its pole above the peas And silvery-seeded onion-stocks. </div> <div class="stanza"> The clove-pink and the rose; the clump Of coppery sunflowers, with the heat Sick to the heart: the garden stump, Red with geranium-pots and sweet With moss and ferns, this side the pump. </div> <div class="stanza"> I rested, with one hesitant hand Upon the gate. The lonesome day, Droning with insects, made the land One dry stagnation; soaked with hay And scents of weeds, the hot wind fanned. </div> [Pg 72]<div class="stanza"> I breathed the sultry scents, my eyes Parched as my lips. And yet I felt My limbs were ice. As one who flies To some strange woe. How sleepy smelt The hay-sweet heat that soaked the skies! </div> <div class="stanza"> Noon nodded; dreamier, lonesomer, For one long, plaintive, forestside Bird-quaver.—And I knew me near Some heartbreak anguish ... She had died. I felt it, and no need to hear! </div> <div class="stanza"> I passed the quince and peartree; where All up the porch a grape-vine trails— How strange that fruit, whatever air Or earth it grows in, never fails To find its native flavor there! </div> <div class="stanza"> And she was as a flower, too, That grows its proper bloom and scent No matter what the soil: she, who, Born better than her place, still lent Grace to the lowliness she knew.... </div> <div class="stanza"> They met me at the porch, and were Sad-eyed with weeping. Then the room Shut out the country's heat and purr, And left light stricken into gloom— So love and I might look on her. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 73] <h2>THE WHITE VIGIL.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Last night I dreamed I saw you lying dead, And by your sheeted form stood all alone: Frail as a flow'r you lay upon your bed, And on your still face, through the casement, shone The moon, as lingering to kiss you there Fall'n asleep, white violets in your hair. </div> <div class="stanza"> Oh, sick to weeping was my soul, and sad To breaking was my heart that would not break; And for my soul's great grief no tear I had, No lamentation for my heart's deep ache; Yet all I bore seemed more than I could bear Beside you dead, white violets in your hair. </div> <div class="stanza"> A white rose, blooming at your window-bar, And glimmering in it, like a fire-fly caught Upon the thorns, the light of one white star, Looked on with me; as if they felt and thought As did my heart,—"How beautiful and fair And young she lies, white violets in her hair!" </div> <div class="stanza"> And so we watched beside you, sad and still, The star, the rose, and I. The moon had past, Like a pale traveler, behind the hill With all her echoed radiance. At last The darkness came to hide my tears and share My watch by you, white violets in your hair. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 74] <h2>TOO LATE.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> I looked upon a dead girl's face and heard What seemed the voice of Love call unto me Out of her heart; whereon the charactery Of her lost dreams I read there word for word:— How on her soul no soul had touched, or stirred Her Life's sad depths to rippling melody, Or made the imaged longing, there, to be The realization of a hope deferred. So in her life had Love behaved to her. Between the lonely chapters of her years And her young eyes making no golden blur With god-bright face and hair; who led me to Her side at last, and bade me, through my tears, With Death's dumb face, too late, to see and know. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>INTIMATIONS.</h2> <h4>I.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Is it uneasy moonlight, On the restless field, that stirs? Or wild white meadow-blossoms The night-wind bends and blurs? </div> <div class="stanza"> Is it the dolorous water, That sobs in the wood and sighs? Or heart of an ancient oak-tree, That breaks and, sighing, dies? </div> [Pg 75]<div class="stanza"> The wind is vague with the shadows That wander in No-Man's Land; The water is dark with the voices That weep on the Unknown's strand. </div> <div class="stanza"> O ghosts of the winds who call me! O ghosts of the whispering waves! As sad as forgotten flowers, That die upon nameless graves! </div> <div class="stanza"> What is this thing you tell me In tongues of a twilight race, Of death, with the vanished features, Mantled, of my own face? </div> </div> <h4>II.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The old enigmas of the deathless dawns, And riddles of the all immortal eves,— That still o'er Delphic lawns Speak as the gods spoke through oracular leaves— I read with new-born eyes, Remembering how, a slave, I lay with breast bared for the sacrifice, Once on a temple's pave. </div> <div class="stanza"> Or, crowned with hyacinth and helichrys, How, towards the altar in the marble gloom,— Hearing the magadis Dirge through the pale amaracine perfume,— 'Mid chanting priests I trod, With never a sigh or pause, To give my life to pacify a god, And save my country's cause. </div> [Pg 76]<div class="stanza"> Again: Cyrenian roses on wild hair, And oil and purple smeared on breasts and cheeks, How with mad torches there— Reddening the cedars of Cithæron's peaks— With gesture and fierce glance, Lascivious Mænad bands Once drew and slew me in the Pyrrhic dance, With Bacchanalian hands. </div> </div> <h4>III.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The music now that lays Dim lips against my ears, Some wild sad thing it says, Unto my soul, of years Long passed into the haze Of tears. </div> <div class="stanza"> Meseems, before me are The dark eyes of a queen, A queen of Istakhar: I seem to see her lean More lovely than a star Of mien. </div> <div class="stanza"> A slave, I stand before Her jeweled throne; I kneel, And, in a song, once more My love for her reveal; How once I did adore I feel. </div> [Pg 77]<div class="stanza"> Again her dark eyes gleam; Again her red lips smile; And in her face the beam Of love that knows no guile; And so she seems to dream A while. </div> <div class="stanza"> Out of her deep hair then A rose she takes—and I Am made a god o'er men! Her rose, that here did lie When I, in th' wild-beasts' den, Did die. </div> </div> <h4>IV.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Old paintings on its wainscots, And, in its oaken hall, Old arras; and the twilight Of slumber over all. </div> <div class="stanza"> Old grandeur on its stairways; And, in its haunted rooms, Old souvenirs of greatness, And ghosts of dead perfumes. </div> <div class="stanza"> The winds are phantom voices Around its carven doors; The moonbeams, specter footsteps Upon its polished floors. </div> [Pg 78]<div class="stanza"> Old cedars build around it A solitude of sighs; And the old hours pass through it With immemorial eyes. </div> <div class="stanza"> But more than this I know not; Nor where the house may be; Nor what its ancient secret And ancient grief to me. </div> <div class="stanza"> All that my soul remembers Is that,—forgot almost,— Once, in a former lifetime, 'Twas here I loved and lost. </div> </div> <h4>V.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> In eöns of the senses, My spirit knew of yore, I found the Isle of Circe, And felt her magic lore; And still the soul remembers What flesh would be once more. </div> <div class="stanza"> She gave me flowers to smell of That wizard branches bore, Of weird and sorcerous beauty, Whose stems dripped human gore— Their scent when I remember I know that world once more. </div> [Pg 79]<div class="stanza"> She gave me fruits to eat of That grew beside the shore, Of necromantic ripeness, With human flesh at core— Their taste when I remember I know that life once more. </div> <div class="stanza"> And then, behold! a serpent, That glides my face before, With eyes of tears and fire That glare me o'er and o'er— I look into its eyeballs, And know myself once more. </div> </div> <h4>VI.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> I have looked in the eyes of poesy, And sat in song's high place; And the beautiful spirits of music Have spoken me face to face; Yet here in my soul there is sorrow They never can name nor trace. </div> <div class="stanza"> I have walked with the glamour gladness, And dreamed with the shadow sleep; And the presences, love and knowledge, Have smiled in my heart's red keep; Yet here in my soul there is sorrow For the depth of their gaze too deep. </div> [Pg 80]<div class="stanza"> The love and the hope God grants me, The beauty that lures me on, And the dreams of folly and wisdom That thoughts of the spirit don, Are but masks of an ancient sorrow Of a life long dead and gone. </div> <div class="stanza"> Was it sin? or a crime forgotten? Of a love that loved too well? That sat on a throne of fire A thousand years in hell? That the soul with its nameless sorrow Remembers but can not tell? </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>TWO.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> With her soft face half turned to me, Like an arrested moonbeam, she Stood in the cirque of that deep tree. </div> <div class="stanza"> I took her by the hands; she raised Her face to mine; and, half amazed, Remembered; and we stood and gazed. </div> <div class="stanza"> How good to kiss her throat and hair, And say no word!—Her throat was bare; As some moon-fungus white and fair. </div> <div class="stanza"> Had God not giv'n us life for this? The world-old, amorous happiness Of arms that clasp, and lips that kiss! </div> [Pg 81]<div class="stanza"> The eloquence of limbs and arms! The rhetoric of breasts, whose charms Say to the sluggish blood what warms! </div> <div class="stanza"> Had God or Fiend assigned this hour That bloomed,—where love had all of power,— The senses' aphrodisiac flower? </div> <div class="stanza"> The dawn was far away. Nude night Hung savage stars of sultry white Around her bosom's Ethiop light. </div> <div class="stanza"> Night! night, who gave us each to each, Where heart with heart could hold sweet speech, With life's best gift within our reach. </div> <div class="stanza"> And here it was—between the goals Of flesh and spirit, sex controls— Took place the marriage of our souls. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>TONES.</h2> <h4>I.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> A woman, fair to look upon, Where waters whiten with the moon; While down the glimmer of the lawn The white moths swoon. </div> <div class="stanza"> A mouth of music; eyes of love; And hands of blended snow and scent, That touch the pearl-pale shadow of An instrument. </div> [Pg 82]<div class="stanza"> And low and sweet that song of sleep After the song of love is hushed; While all the longing, here, to weep, Is held and crushed. </div> <div class="stanza"> Then leafy silence, that is musk With breath of the magnolia-tree, While dwindles, moon-white, through the dusk Her drapery. </div> <div class="stanza"> Let me remember how a heart, Romantic, wrote upon that night! My soul still helps me read each part Of it aright. </div> <div class="stanza"> And like a dead leaf shut between A book's dull chapters, stained and dark, That page, with immemorial green, Of life I mark. </div> </div> <h4>II.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> It is not well for me to hear That song's appealing melody: The pain of loss comes all too near, Through it, to me. </div> <div class="stanza"> The loss of her whose love looks through The mist death's hand hath hung between: Within the shadow of the yew Her grave is green. </div> [Pg 83]<div class="stanza"> Ah, dream that vanished long ago! Oh, anguish of remembered tears! And shadow of unlifted woe Athwart the years! </div> <div class="stanza"> That haunt the sad rooms of my days, As keepsakes of unperished love, Where pale the memory of her face Is framed above. </div> <div class="stanza"> This olden song, she used to sing, Of love and sleep, is now a charm To open mystic doors and bring Her spirit form. </div> <div class="stanza"> In music making visible One soul-assertive memory, That steals unto my side to tell My loss to me. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>UNFULFILLED.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> In my dream last night it seemed I stood With a boy's glad heart in my boyhood's wood. </div> <div class="stanza"> The beryl green and the cairngorm brown Of the day through the deep leaves sifted down. </div> <div class="stanza"> The rippling drip of a passing shower Rinsed wild aroma from herb and flower. </div> [Pg 84]<div class="stanza"> The splash and urge of a waterfall Spread stairwayed rocks with a crystal caul. </div> <div class="stanza"> And I waded the pool where the gravel gray, And the last year's leaf, like a topaz lay. </div> <div class="stanza"> And searched the strip of the creek's dry bed For the colored keel and the arrow-head. </div> <div class="stanza"> And I found the cohosh coigne the same, Tossing with torches of pearly flame. </div> <div class="stanza"> The owlet dingle of vine and brier, That the butterfly-weed flecked fierce with fire. </div> <div class="stanza"> The elder edge with its warm perfume, And the sapphire stars of the bluet bloom; </div> <div class="stanza"> The moss, the fern, and the touch-me-not I breathed, and the mint-smell keen and hot. </div> <div class="stanza"> And I saw the bird, that sang its best, In the moted sunlight building its nest. </div> <div class="stanza"> And I saw the chipmunk's stealthy face, And the rabbit crouched in a grassy place. </div> <div class="stanza"> And I watched the crows, that cawed and cried, Hunting the hawk at the forest-side; </div> <div class="stanza"> The bees that sucked in the blossoms slim, And the wasps that built on the lichened limb. </div> [Pg 85]<div class="stanza"> And felt the silence, the dusk, the dread Of the spot where they buried the unknown dead. </div> <div class="stanza"> The water murmur, the insect hum, And a far bird calling, Come, oh, come!— </div> <div class="stanza"> What sweeter music can mortals make To ease the heart of its human ache!— </div> <div class="stanza"> And it seemed in my dream, that was all too true, That I met in the woods again with you. </div> <div class="stanza"> A sun-tanned face and brown bare knees, And a hand stained red with dewberries. </div> <div class="stanza"> And we stood a moment some thing to tell, And then in the woods we said farewell. </div> <div class="stanza"> But once I met you; yet, lo! it seems Again and again we meet in dreams. </div> <div class="stanza"> And I ask my soul what it all may mean; If this is the love that should have been. </div> <div class="stanza"> And oft and again I wonder, Can What God intends be changed by man? </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 86] <h2>HOME.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Among the fields the camomile Seems blown steam in the lightning's glare. Unusual odors drench the air. Night speaks above; the angry smile Of storm within her stare. </div> <div class="stanza"> The way for me to-night?—To-night, Is through the wood whose branches fill The road with dripping rain-drops. Till, Between the boughs, a star-like light— Our home upon the hill. </div> <div class="stanza"> The path for me to take?—It goes Around a trailer-tangled rock, 'Mid puckered pink and hollyhock, Unto a latch-gate's unkempt rose, And door whereat I knock. </div> <div class="stanza"> Bright on the old-time flower-place The lamp streams through the foggy pane. The door is opened to the rain; And in the door—her happy face, And eager hands again. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 87] <h2>ASHLY MERE.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Come! look in the shadowy water here, The stagnant water of Ashly Mere: Where the stirless depths are dark but clear, What is the thing that lies there?— A lily-pod half sunk from sight? Or spawn of the toad all water-white? Or ashen blur of the moon's wan light? Or a woman's face and eyes there? </div> <div class="stanza"> Now lean to the water a listening ear, The haunted water of Ashly Mere: What is the sound that you seem to hear In the ghostly hush of the deeps there?— A withered reed that the ripple lips? Or a night-bird's wing that the surface whips? Or the rain in a leaf that drips and drips? Or a woman's voice that weeps there? </div> <div class="stanza"> Now look and listen! but draw not near The lonely water of Ashly Mere!— For so it happens this time each year As you lean by the mere and listen: And the moaning voice I understand,— For oft I have watched it draw to land, And lift from the water a ghastly hand And a face whose eyeballs glisten. </div> <div class="stanza"> And this is the reason why every year To the hideous water of Ashly Mere I come when the woodland leaves are sear, And the autumn moon hangs hoary: [Pg 88]For here by the mere was wrought a wrong ... But the old, old story is over long— And woman is weak and man is strong ... And the mere's and mine is the story. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>BEFORE THE TOMB.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The way went under cedared gloom To moonlight, like a cactus bloom, Before the entrance of her tomb. </div> <div class="stanza"> I had an hour of night and thin Sad starlight; and I set my chin Against the grating and looked in. </div> <div class="stanza"> A gleam, like moonlight, through a square Of opening—I knew not where— Shone on her coffin resting there. </div> <div class="stanza"> And on its oval silver-plate I read her name and age and date, And smiled, soft-thinking on my hate. </div> <div class="stanza"> There was no insect sound to chirr; No wind to make a little stir. I stood and looked and thought on her. </div> <div class="stanza"> The gleam stole downward from her head, Till at her feet it rested red On Gothic gold, that sadly said:— </div> [Pg 89]<div class="stanza"> "God to her love lent a weak reed Of strength: and gave no light to lead: Pray for her soul; for it hath need." </div> <div class="stanza"> There was no night-bird's twitter near, No low vague water I might hear To make a small sound in the ear. </div> <div class="stanza"> The gleam, that made a burning mark Of each dim word, died to a spark; Then left the tomb and coffin dark. </div> <div class="stanza"> I had a little while to wait; And prayed with hands against the grate, And heart that yearned and knew too late. </div> <div class="stanza"> There was no light below, above, To point my soul the way thereof,— The way of hate that led to love. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>REVISITED.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> It was beneath a waning moon when all the woods were sear, And winds made eddies of the leaves that whispered far and near, I met her on the old mill-bridge we parted at last year. </div> [Pg 90]<div class="stanza"> At first I deemed it but a mist that faltered in that place, An autumn mist beneath the trees that sentineled the race; Until I neared and in the moon beheld her face to face. </div> <div class="stanza"> The waver of the summer-heat upon the drouth-dry leas; The shimmer of the thistle-drift a down the silences; The gliding of the fairy-fire between the swamp and trees; </div> <div class="stanza"> They qualified her presence as a sorrow may a dream— The vague suggestion of a self; the glimmer of a gleam; The actual unreal of the things that only seem. </div> <div class="stanza"> Where once she came with welcome and glad eyes all loving-wise, She passed and gave no greeting that my heart might recognize, With far-set face unseeing and sad unremembering eyes. </div> <div class="stanza"> It was beneath a waning moon when woods were bleak and sear, And winds made whispers of the leaves that eddied far and near, I met her ghost upon the bridge we parted at last year. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 91] <h2>AT VESPERS.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> High up in the organ-story A girl stands slim and fair; And touched with the casement's glory Gleams out her radiant hair. </div> <div class="stanza"> The young priest kneels at the altar, Then lifts the Host above; And the psalm intoned from the psalter Is pure with patient love. </div> <div class="stanza"> A sweet bell chimes; and a censer Swings gleaming in the gloom; The candles glimmer and denser Rolls up the pale perfume. </div> <div class="stanza"> Then high in the organ choir A voice of crystal soars, Of patience and soul's desire, That suffers and adores. </div> <div class="stanza"> And out of the altar's dimness An answering voice doth swell, Of passion that cries from the grimness And anguish of its own hell. </div> <div class="stanza"> High up in the organ-story One kneels with a girlish grace; And, touched with the vesper glory, Lifts her madonna face. </div> [Pg 92]<div class="stanza"> One stands at the cloudy altar, A form bowed down and thin; The text of the psalm in the psalter He reads, is sorrow and sin. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>THE CREEK.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> O cheerly, cheerly by the road And merrily down the billet; And where the acre-field is sowed With bristle-bearded millet. </div> <div class="stanza"> Then o'er a pebbled path that goes, Through vista and through dingle, Unto a farmstead's windowed rose, And roof of moss and shingle. </div> <div class="stanza"> O darkly, darkly through the bush, And dimly by the bowlder, Where cane and water-cress grow lush, And woodland wilds are older. </div> <div class="stanza"> Then o'er the cedared way that leads, Through burr and bramble-thickets, Unto a burial-ground of weeds Fenced in with broken pickets. </div> <div class="stanza"> Then sadly, sadly down the vale, And wearily through the rushes, Where sunlight of the noon is pale, And e'en the zephyr hushes. </div> [Pg 93]<div class="stanza"> For oft her young face smiled upon My deeps here, willow-shaded; And oft with bare feet in the sun My shallows there she waded. </div> <div class="stanza"> No more beneath the twinkling leaves Shall stand the farmer's daughter!— Sing softly past the cottage eaves, O memory-haunted water! </div> <div class="stanza"> No more shall bend her laughing face Above me where the rose is!— Sigh softly past the burial-place, Where all her youth reposes! </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>ANSWERED.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Do you remember how that night drew on? That night of sorrow, when the stars looked wan As eyes that gaze reproachful in a dream, Loved eyes, long lost, and sadder than the grave? How through the heaven stole the moon's gray gleam, Like a nun's ghost down a cathedral nave?— Do you remember how that night drew on? </div> <div class="stanza"> Do you remember the hard words then said? Said to the living,—now denied the dead,— That left me dead,—long, long before I died,— [Pg 94]In heart and spirit?—me, your words had slain, Telling how love to my poor life had lied, Armed with the dagger of a pale disdain.— Do you remember the hard words then said? </div> <div class="stanza"> Do you remember, now this night draws down The threatening heavens, that the lightnings crown With wrecks of thunder? when no moon doth give The clouds wild witchery?—as in a room, Behind the sorrowful arras, still may live The pallid secret of the haunted gloom.— Do you remember, now this night draws down? </div> <div class="stanza"> Do you remember, now it comes to pass Your form is bowed as is the wind-swept grass? And death hath won from you that confidence Denied to life? now your sick soul rebels Against your pride with tragic eloquence, That self-crowned demon of the heart's fierce hells.— Do you remember, now it comes to pass? </div> <div class="stanza"> Do you remember?—Bid your soul be still. Here passion hath surrendered unto will, And flesh to spirit. Quiet your wild tongue And wilder heart. Your kiss is naught to me. The instrument love gave you lies unstrung, Silent, forsaken of all melody. Do you remember?—Bid your soul be still. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 95] <h2>WOMAN'S PORTION.</h2> <h4>I.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The leaves are shivering on the thorn, Drearily; And sighing wakes the lean-eyed morn, Wearily. </div> <div class="stanza"> I press my thin face to the pane, Drearily; But never will he come again. (Wearily.) </div> <div class="stanza"> The rain hath sicklied day with haze, Drearily; My tears run downward as I gaze, Wearily. </div> <div class="stanza"> The mist and morn spake unto me, Drearily: "What is this thing God gives to thee?" (Wearily.) </div> <div class="stanza"> I said unto the morn and mist, Drearily: "The babe unborn whom sin hath kissed." (Wearily.) </div> <div class="stanza"> The morn and mist spake unto me, Drearily: "What is this thing which thou dost see?" (Wearily.) </div> [Pg 96]<div class="stanza"> I said unto the mist and morn, Drearily: "The shame of man and woman's scorn." (Wearily.) </div> <div class="stanza"> "He loved thee not," they made reply. Drearily. I said, "Would God had let me die!" (Wearily.) </div> </div> <h4>II.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> My dreams are as a closed up book, (Drearily.) Upon whose clasp of love I look, Wearily. </div> <div class="stanza"> All night the rain raved overhead, Drearily; All night I wept awake in bed, Wearily. </div> <div class="stanza"> I heard the wind sweep wild and wide, Drearily; I turned upon my face and sighed, Wearily. </div> <div class="stanza"> The wind and rain spake unto me, Drearily: "What is this thing God takes from thee?" (Wearily.) </div> [Pg 97]<div class="stanza"> I said unto the rain and wind, Drearily: "The love, for which my soul hath sinned." (Wearily.) </div> <div class="stanza"> The rain and wind spake unto me, Drearily: "What are these things thou still dost see?" (Wearily.) </div> <div class="stanza"> I said unto the wind and rain, Drearily: "Regret, and hope despair hath slain." (Wearily.) </div> <div class="stanza"> "Thou lov'st him still," they made reply, Drearily. I said, "That God would let me die!" (Wearily.) </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>FINALE.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> So let it be. Thou wilt not say 't was I! Here in life's temple, where thy soul may see, Look how the beauty of our love doth lie, Shattered in shards, a dead divinity! Approach: kneel down: yea, render up one sigh! This is the end. What need to tell it thee! So let it be. </div> [Pg 98]<div class="stanza"> So let it be. Care, who hath stood with him, And sorrow, who sat by him deified, For whom his face made comfort, lo! how dim They heap his altar which they can not hide, While memory's lamp swings o'er it, burning slim. This is the end. What shall be said beside? So let it be. </div> <div class="stanza"> So let it be. Did we not drain the wine, Red, of love's sacramental chalice, when He laid sweet sanction on thy lips and mine? Dash it aside! Lo, who will fill again Now it is empty of the god divine! This is the end. Yea, let us say Amen. So let it be. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>THE CROSS.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The cross I bear no man shall know— No man can ease the cross I bear!— Alas! the thorny path of woe Up the steep hill of care! </div> <div class="stanza"> There is no word to comfort me; No sign to help my bended head; Deep night lies over land and sea, And silence dark and dread. </div> <div class="stanza"> To strive, it seems, that I was born, For that which others shall obtain; The disappointment and the scorn Alone for me remain. </div> [Pg 99]<div class="stanza"> One half my life is overpast; The other half I contemplate— Meseems the past doth but forecast A darker future state. </div> <div class="stanza"> Sick to the heart of that which makes Me hope and struggle and desire, The aspiration here that aches With ineffectual fire; </div> <div class="stanza"> While inwardly I know the lack, The insufficiency of power, Each past day's retrospect makes black Each morrow's coming hour. </div> <div class="stanza"> Now in my youth would I could die!— As others love to live,—go down Into the grave without a sigh, Oblivious of renown! </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>THE FOREST OF DREAMS.</h2> <h4>I.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Where was I last Friday night?— Within the forest of dark dreams Following the blur of a goblin-light, That led me over ugly streams, Whereon the scum of the spawn was spread, And the blistered slime, in stagnant seams; [Pg 100]Where the weed and the moss swam black and dead, Like a drowned girl's hair in the ropy ooze: And the jack-o'-lantern light that led, Flickered the fox-fire trees o'erhead, And the owl-like things at airy cruise. </div> </div> <h4>II.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Where was I last Friday night?— Within the forest of dark dreams Following a form of shadowy white With my own wild face it seems. Did a raven's wing just flap my hair? Or a web-winged bat brush by my face? Or the hand of—something I did not dare Look round to see in that obscene place? Where the boughs, with leaves a-devil's-dance, And the thorn-tree bush, where the wind made moan, Had more than a strange significance Of life and of evil not their own. </div> </div> <h4>III.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Where was I last Friday night?— Within the forest of dark dreams Seeing the mists rise left and right, Like the leathery fog that heaves and steams From the rolling horror of Hell's red streams. While the wind, that tossed in the tattered tree, And danced alone with the last mad leaf ... Or was it the wind?... kept whispering me— "Now bury it here with its own black grief, And its eyes of fire you can not brave!"— And in the darkness I seemed to see My own self digging my soul a grave. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 101] <h2>LYNCHERS.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> At the moon's down-going, let it be On the quarry bill with its one gnarled tree.... </div> <div class="stanza"> The red-rock road of the underbrush, Where the woman came through the summer hush. </div> <div class="stanza"> The sumach high, and the elder thick, Where we found the stone and the ragged stick. </div> <div class="stanza"> The trampled road of the thicket, full Of foot-prints down to the quarry pool. </div> <div class="stanza"> The rocks that ooze with the hue of lead, Where we found her lying stark and dead. </div> <div class="stanza"> The scraggy wood; the negro hut, With its doors and windows locked and shut. </div> <div class="stanza"> A secret signal; a foot's rough tramp; A knock at the door; a lifted lamp. </div> <div class="stanza"> An oath; a scuffle; a ring of masks; A voice that answers a voice that asks. </div> <div class="stanza"> A group of shadows; the moon's red fleck; A running noose and a man's bared neck. </div> <div class="stanza"> A word, a curse, and a shape that swings; The lonely night and a bat's black wings.... </div> <div class="stanza"> At the moon's down-going, let it be On the quarry hill with its one gnarled tree. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 102] <h2>KU KLUX.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> We have sent him seeds of the melon's core, And nailed a warning upon his door; By the Ku Klux laws we can do no more. </div> <div class="stanza"> Down in the hollow, 'mid crib and stack, The roof of his low-porched house looms black; Not a line of light at the doorsill's crack. </div> <div class="stanza"> Yet arm and mount! and mask and ride! The hounds can sense though the fox may hide! And for a word too much men oft have died. </div> <div class="stanza"> The clouds blow heavy towards the moon. The edge of the storm will reach it soon. The killdee cries and the lonesome loon. </div> <div class="stanza"> The clouds shall flush with a wilder glare Than the lightning makes with its angled flare, When the Ku Klux verdict is given there. </div> <div class="stanza"> In the pause of the thunder rolling low, A rifle's answer—who shall know From the wind's fierce burl and the rain's blackblow? </div> <div class="stanza"> Only the signature written grim At the end of the message brought to him— A hempen rope and a twisted limb. </div> <div class="stanza"> So arm and mount! and mask and ride! The hounds can sense though the fox may hide! And for a word too much men oft have died. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 103] <h2>REMBRANDTS.</h2> <h4>I.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> I shall not soon forget her and her eyes, The haunts of hate, where suffering seemed to write Its own dark name, whose syllables are sighs, In strange and starless night. </div> <div class="stanza"> I shall not soon forget her and her face, So quiet, yet uneasy as a dream, That stands on tip-toe in a haunted place And listens for a scream. </div> <div class="stanza"> She made me feel as one, alone, may feel In some grand ghostly house of olden time, The presence of a treasure, walls conceal, The secret of a crime. </div> </div> <h4>II.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> With lambent faces, mimicking the moon, The water lilies lie; Dotting the darkness of the long lagoon Like some black sky. </div> <div class="stanza"> A face, the whiteness of a water-flower, And pollen-golden hair, In shadow half, half in the moonbeams' glower, Lifts slowly there. </div> [Pg 104]<div class="stanza"> A young girl's face, death makes cold marble of, Turned to the moon and me, Sad with the pathos of unspeakable love, Floating to sea. </div> </div> <h4>III.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> One listening bent, in dread of something coming, He can not see nor balk— A phantom footstep, in the ghostly gloaming, That haunts a terraced walk. </div> <div class="stanza"> Long has he given his whole heart's hard endeavor Unto the work begun, Still hoping love would watch it grow and ever Turn kindly eyes thereon. </div> <div class="stanza"> Now in his life he feels there nears an hour, Inevitable, alas! When in the darkness he shall cringe and cower, And see his dead self pass. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>THE LADY OF THE HILLS.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Though red my blood hath left its trail For five far miles, I shall not fail, As God in Heaven wills!— The way was long through that black land. With sword on hip and horn in hand, At last before thy walls I stand, O Lady of the Hills! </div> [Pg 105]<div class="stanza"> No seneschal shall put to scorn The summons of my bugle-horn! No man-at-arms shall stay!— Yea! God hath helped my strength too far By bandit-caverned wood and scar To give it pause now, or to bar My all-avenging way. </div> <div class="stanza"> This hope still gives my body strength— To kiss her eyes and lips at length Where all her kin can see; Then 'mid her towers of crime and gloom, Sin-haunted like the Halls of Doom, To smite her dead in that wild room Red-lit with revelry. </div> <div class="stanza"> Madly I rode; nor once did slack. Before my face the world rolled, black With nightmare wind and rain. Witch-lights mocked at me on the fen; And through the forest followed then Gaunt eyes of wolves; and ghosts of men Moaned by me on the plain. </div> <div class="stanza"> Still on I rode. My way was clear From that wild time when, spear to spear, Deep in the wind-torn wood, I met him!... Dead he lies beneath Their trysting oak. I clenched my teeth And rode. My wound scarce let me breathe, That filled my eyes with blood. </div> [Pg 106]<div class="stanza"> And here I am. The blood may blind My eyesight now ... yet I shall find Her by some inner eye! For God—He hath this deed in care!— Yea! I shall kiss again her hair, And tell her of her leman there, Then smite her dead—and die. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>REVEALMENT.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> At moonset when ghost speaks with ghost, And spirits meet where once they sinned, Between the bournes of found and lost, My soul met her soul on the wind, My late-lost Evalind. </div> <div class="stanza"> I kissed her mouth. Her face was wild. Two burning shadows were her eyes, Wherefrom the maiden love, that smiled A heartbreak smile of severed ties, Gazed with a wan surprise. </div> <div class="stanza"> Then suddenly I seemed to see No more her shape where beauty bloomed ... My own sad self gazed up at me— My sorrow, that had so assumed The form of her entombed. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 107] <h2>HEART'S ENCOURAGEMENT.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Nor time nor all his minions Of sorrow or of pain, Shall dash with vulture pinions The cup she fills again Within the dream-dominions Of life where she doth reign. </div> <div class="stanza"> Clothed on with bright desire And hope that makes her strong, With limbs of frost and fire, She sits above all wrong, Her heart, a living lyre, Her love, its only song. </div> <div class="stanza"> And in the waking pauses Of weariness and care, And when the dark hour draws his Black weapon of despair, Above effects and causes We hear its music there. </div> <div class="stanza"> The longings life hath near it Of love we yearn to see; The dreams it doth inherit Of immortality; Are callings of her spirit To something yet to be. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 108] <h2>NIGHTFALL.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> O day, so sicklied o'er with night! O dreadful fruit of fallen dusk!— A Circe orange, golden-bright, With horror 'neath its husk. </div> <div class="stanza"> And I, who gave the promise heed That made life's tempting surface fair, Have I not eaten to the seed Its ashes of despair! </div> <div class="stanza"> O silence of the drifted grass! And immemorial eloquence Of stars and winds and waves that pass! And God's indifference! </div> <div class="stanza"> Leave me alone with sleep that knows Not any thing that life may keep— Not e'en the pulse that comes and goes In germs that climb and creep. </div> <div class="stanza"> Or if an aspiration pale Must quicken there—oh, let the spot Grow weeds! that dost may so prevail, Where spirit once could not! </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>PAUSE.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> So sick of dreams! the dreams, that stain The aisle, along which life must pass, With hues of mystic colored glass, That fills the windows of the brain. </div> [Pg 109]<div class="stanza"> So sick of thoughts! the thoughts, that carve The house of days with arabesques And gargoyles, where the mind grotesques In masks of hope and faith who starve. </div> <div class="stanza"> Here lay thy over weary head Upon my bosom! Do not weep!— "He giveth His beloved sleep."— Heart of my heart, be comforted. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>ABOVE THE VALES.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> We went by ways of bygone days, Up mountain heights of story, Where lost in vague, historic haze, Tradition, crowned with battle-bays, Sat 'mid her ruins hoary. </div> <div class="stanza"> Where wing to wing the eagles cling And torrents have their sources, War rose with bugle voice to sing Of wild spear thrust, and broadsword swing, And rush of men and horses. </div> <div class="stanza"> Then deep below, where orchards show A home here, here a steeple, We heard a simple shepherd go, Singing, beneath the afterglow, A love-song of the people. </div> [Pg 110]<div class="stanza"> As in the trees the song did cease, With matron eyes and holy Peace, from the cornlands of increase. And rose-beds of love's victories, Spake, smiling, of the lowly. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>A SUNSET FANCY.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Wide in the west, a lake Of flame that seems to shake As if the Midgard snake Deep down did breathe: An isle of purple glow, Where rosy rivers flow Down peaks of cloudy snow With fire beneath. </div> <div class="stanza"> And there the Tower-of-Night, With windows all a-light, Frowns on a burning height; Wherein she sleeps,— Young through the years of doom,— Veiled with her hair's gold gloom, The pale Valkyrie whom Enchantment keeps. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>THE FEN-FIRE.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The misty rain makes dim my face, The night's black cloak is o'er me; I tread the dripping cypress-place, A flickering light before me. </div> [Pg 111]<div class="stanza"> Out of the death of leaves that rot And ooze and weedy water, My form was breathed to haunt this spot, Death's immaterial daughter. </div> <div class="stanza"> The owl that whoops upon the yew, The snake that lairs within it, Have seen my wild face flashing blue For one fantastic minute. </div> <div class="stanza"> But should you follow where my eyes Like some pale lamp decoy you, Beware! lest suddenly I rise With love that shall destroy you. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>TO ONE READING THE MORTE D'ARTHURE.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> O daughter of our Southern sun, Sweet sister of each flower, Dost dream in terraced Avalon A shadow-haunted hour? Or stand with Guinevere upon Some ivied Camelot tower? </div> <div class="stanza"> Or in the wind dost breathe the musk That blows Tintagel's sea on? Or 'mid the lists by castled Usk Hear some wild tourney's pæon? Or 'neath the Merlin moons of dusk Dost muse in old Cærleon? </div> [Pg 112]<div class="stanza"> Or now of Launcelot, and then Of Arthur, 'mid the roses, Dost speak with wily Vivien? Or where the shade reposes, Dost walk with stately armored men In marble-fountained closes? </div> <div class="stanza"> So speak the dreams within thy gaze. The dreams thy spirit cages, Would that Romance—which on thee lays The spell of bygone ages— Held me! a memory of those days, A portion of its pages! </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>STROLLERS.</h2> <h4>I.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> We have no castles, We have no vassals, We have no riches, no gems and no gold; Nothing to ponder, Nothing to squander— Let us go wander As minstrels of old. </div> </div> <h4>II.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> You with your lute, love, I with my flute, love, Let us make music by mountain and sea; [Pg 113]You with your glances, I with my dances, Singing romances Of old chivalry. </div> </div> <h4>III.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> "Derry down derry! Good folk, be merry! Hither, and hearken where happiness is!— Never go borrow Care of to-morrow, Never go sorrow While life hath a kiss." </div> </div> <h4>IV.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Let the day gladden Or the night sadden, We will be merry in sunshine or snow; You with your rhyme, love, I with my chime, love, We will make time, love, Dance as we go. </div> </div> <h4>V.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Nothing is ours, Only the flowers, Meadows, and stars, and the heavens above; [Pg 114]Nothing to lie for, Nothing to sigh for, Nothing to die for While still we have love. </div> </div> <h4>VI.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> "Derry down derry! Good folk, be merry! Hither, and hearken a word that is sooth:— Care ye not any, If ye have many Or not a penny, If still ye have youth!" </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>HAUNTED.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> When grave the twilight settles o'er my roof, And from the haggard oaks unto my door The rain comes, wild as one who rides before His enemies that follow, hoof to hoof; And in each window's gusty curtain-woof The rain-wind sighs, like one who mutters o'er Some tale of love and crime; and, on the floor, The sunset spreads red stains as bloody proof; From hall to hall and stealthy stair to stair, Through all the house, a dread that drags me toward The ancient dusk of that avoided room, Wherein she sits with ghostly golden hair, And eyes that gaze beyond her soul's sad doom, Bending above an unreal harpsichord. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 115] <h2>PRÆTERITA.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Low belts of rushes ragged with the blast; Lagoons of marish reddening with the west; And o'er the marsh the water-fowl's unrest While daylight dwindles and the dusk falls fast. Set in sad walls, all mossy with the past, An old stone gateway with a crumbling crest; A garden where death drowses manifest; And in gaunt yews the shadowy house at last. Here, like some unseen spirit, silence talks With echo and the wind in each gray room Where melancholy slumbers with the rain: Or, like some gentle ghost, the moonlight walks In the dim garden, which her smile makes bloom With all the old-time loveliness again. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>THE SWASHBUCKLER.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Squat-nosed and broad, of big and pompous port; A tavern visage, apoplexy haunts, All pimple-puffed; the Falstaff-like resort Of fat debauchery, whose veined cheek flaunts A flabby purple: rusty-spurred he stands In rakehell boots and belt, and hanger that Claps when, with greasy gauntlets on his hands, He swaggers past in cloak and slouch-plumed hat. Aggression marches armies in his words; And in his oaths great deeds ride cap-a-pie; [Pg 116]His looks, his gestures breathe the breath of swords; And in his carriage camp all wars to be: With him of battles there shall be no lack While buxom wenches are and stoops of sack. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>THE WITCH.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> She gropes and hobbies, where the dropsied rocks Are hairy with the lichens and the twist Of knotted wolf's-bane, mumbling in the mist, Hawk-nosed and wrinkle-eyed with scrawny locks. At her bent back the sick-faced moonlight mocks, Like some lewd evil whom the Fiend hath kissed; Thrice at her feet the slipping serpent hissed, And thrice the owl called to the forest fox.— What sabboth brew dost now intend? What root Dost seek for, seal for what satanic spell Of incantations and demoniac fire? From thy rude hut, hill-huddled in the brier, What dark familiar points thy sure pursuit, With burning eyes, gaunt with the glow of Hell? </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>THE SOMNAMBULIST.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Oaks and a water. By the water—eyes, Ice-green and steadfast as cold stars; and hair Yellow as eyes deep in a she-wolf's lair; [Pg 117]And limbs, like darkness that the lightning dyes. The humped oaks stand black under iron skies; The dry wind whirls the dead leaves everywhere; Wild on the water falls a vulture glare Of moon, and wild the circling raven flies. Again the power of this thing hath laid Illusion on him: and he seems to hear A sweet voice calling him beyond his gates To longed-for love; he comes; each forest glade Seems reaching out white arms to draw him near— Nearer and nearer to the death that waits. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>OPIUM.</h2> <h3>On reading De Quincey's "Confessions of an Opium Eater."</h3> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> I seemed to stand before a temple walled From shadows and night's unrealities; Filled with dark music of dead memories, And voices, lost in darkness, aye that called. I entered. And, beneath the dome's high-halled Immensity, one forced me to my knees Before a blackness—throned 'mid semblances And spectres—crowned with flames of emerald. Then, lo! two shapes that thundered at mine ears The names of Horror and Oblivion, Priests of this god,—and bade me die and dream. Then, in the heart of hell, a thousand years Meseemed I lay—dead; while the iron stream Of Time beat out the seconds, one by one. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 118] <h2>MUSIC AND SLEEP.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> These have a life that hath no part in death; These circumscribe the soul and make it strong; Between the breathing of a dream and song, Building a world of beauty in a breath. Unto the heart the voice of this one saith Ideals, its emotions live among; Unto the mind the other speaks a tongue Of visions, where the guess, we christen faith, May face the fact of immortality— As may a rose its unembodied scent, Or star its own reflected radiance. We do not know these save unconsciously. To whose mysterious shadows God hath lent No certain shape, no certain countenance. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>AMBITION.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Now to my lips lift then some opiate Of black forgetfulness! while in thy gaze Still lures the loveless beauty that betrays, And in thy mouth the music that is hate. No promise more hast thou to make me wait; No smile to cozen my sick heart with praise! Far, far behind thee stretch laborious days, And far before thee, labors soon and late. Thine is the fen-fire that we deem a star, Flying before us, ever fugitive, Thy mocking policy still holds afar: And thine the voice, to which our longings give Hope's siren face, that speaks us sweet and fair, Only to lead us captives to Despair. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 119] <h2>DESPONDENCY.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Not all the bravery that day puts on Of gold and azure, ardent or austere, Shall ease my soul of sorrow; grown more dear Than all the joy that heavenly hope may don. Far up the skies the rumor of the dawn May run, and eve like some wild torch appear; These shall not change the darkness, gathered here, Of thought, that rusts like an old sword undrawn. Oh, for a place deep-sunken from the sun! A wildwood cave of primitive rocks and moss! Where Sleep and Silence—breast to married breast— Lie with their child, night-eyed Oblivion; Where, freed from all the trouble of my cross, I might forget, I might forget, and rest! </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>DESPAIR.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Shut in with phantoms of life's hollow hopes, And shadows of old sins satiety slew, And the young ghosts of the dead dreams love knew, Out of the day into the night she gropes. Behind her, high the silvered summit slopes Of strength and faith, she will not turn to view; But towards the cave of weakness, harsh of hue, She goes, where all the dropsied horror ropes. There is a voice of waters in her ears, And on her brow a wind that never dies: [Pg 120]One is the anguish of desired tears; One is the sorrow of unuttered sighs; And, burdened with the immemorial years, Downward she goes with never lifted eyes. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>SIN.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> There is a legend of an old Hartz tower That tells of one, a noble, who had sold His soul unto the Fiend; who grew not old On this condition: That the demon's power Cease every midnight for a single hour, And in that hour his body should be cold, His limbs grow shriveled, and his face, behold! Become a death's-head in the taper's glower.— So unto Sin Life gives his best. Her arts Make all his outward seeming beautiful Before the world; but in his heart of hearts Abides an hour when her strength is null; When he shall feel the death through all his parts Strike, and his countenance become a skull. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>INSOMNIA.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> It seems that dawn will never climb The eastern hills; And, clad in mist and flame and rime, Make flashing highways of the rills. </div> <div class="stanza"> The night is as an ancient way Through some dead land, Whereon the ghosts of Memory And Sorrow wander hand in hand. </div> [Pg 121]<div class="stanza"> By which man's works ignoble seem, Unbeautiful; And grandeur, but the ruined dream Of some proud queen, crowned with a skull. </div> <div class="stanza"> A way past-peopled, dark and old, That stretches far— Its only real thing, the cold Vague light of sleep's one fitful star. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>ENCOURAGEMENT.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> To help our tired hope to toil, Lo! have we not the council here Of trees, that to all hope appear As sermons of the soil? </div> <div class="stanza"> To help our flagging faith to rise, Lo! have we not the high advice Of stars, that for all faith suffice As gospels of the skies? </div> <div class="stanza"> Sustain us, Lord! and help us climb, With hope and faith made strong and great, The rock-rough pathway of our fate, The care-dark way of time! </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> [Pg 122] <h2>QUATRAINS.</h2> <h4>PENURY.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Above his misered embers, gnarled and gray, With toil-twitched limbs he bends; around his hut, Want, like a hobbling hag, goes night and day, Scolding at windows and at doors tight-shut. </div> </div> <h4>STRATEGY.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Craft's silent sister and the daughter deep Of Contemplation, she, who spreads below A hostile tent soft comfort for her foe, With eyes of Jael watching till he sleep. </div> </div> <h4>TEMPEST.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> With helms of lightning, glittering in the skies, On steeds of thunder, cloudy form on form, Terrific beauty in their hair and eyes, Behold the wild Valkyries of the storm. </div> </div> <h4>THE LOCUST BLOSSOM.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> The spirit Spring, in rainy raiment, met The spirit Summer for a moonlit hour: Sweet from their greeting kisses, warm and wet, Earth shaped the fragrant purity of this flower. </div> </div> <h4>MELANCHOLY.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> With shadowy immortelles of memory About her brow, she sits with eyes that look Upon the stream of Lethe wearily, In hesitant hands Death's partly-opened book. </div> </div> [Pg 123] <h4>CONTENT.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Among the meadows of Life's sad unease— In labor still renewing her soul's youth— With trust, for patience, and with love, for peace, Singing she goes with the calm face of Ruth. </div> </div> <h4>LIFE AND DEATH.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Of our own selves God makes a glass, wherein Two shadows image them as might a breath: And one is Life, whose other name is Sin; And one is Love, whose other name is Death. </div> </div> <h4>SORROW.</h4> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Death takes her hand and leads her through the waste Of her own soul, wherein she hears the voice Of lost Love's tears, and, famishing, can but taste The dead-sea fruit of Life's remembered joys. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <h2>A LAST WORD.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> Not for thyself, but for the sake of Song, Strive to succeed as others have, who gave Their lives unto her; shaping sure and strong Her lovely limbs that made them god and slave. </div> <div class="stanza"> Not for thyself, but for the sake of Art, Strive to advance beyond the others' best; Winning a deeper secret from her heart To hang it moonlike 'mid the starry rest. </div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> For permission to reprint a number of the poems included in this volume, thanks are due to The Chap-Book, Cosmopolitan, Lippincott's, Century, New England, Atlantic, and Harper's. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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