Reality
|
|
AT
the Inn by the flowing road,
Where the shadow merges with sun,
There is lodging for everyone,
And plenty of food in store,—
Bread with a flavour of mould,
|
5 |
Wine
that is cloudy and rough.
No one asks for gold;
But the service is brisk enough
For the folk that frequent the Inn.
The courtyard rings and rattles
|
10 |
With
the chaffering and the din;
For all the guests are merchants
Who all have dreams to sell;
Nothing but dreams they proffer,—
"Dreams,—fine dreams!" they cry.
|
15 |
But
you have your dreams to offer,
So why should you buy
Inferior dreams. Your own
Are lovely beyond compare;
You unfold their tremulous tissues |
20 |
And
free them to float in the air,
But nobody seems to care.
And as Time grows slow,
Like the ivy along the wall
Of the Inn, you fancy you know
|
25 |
That
the only things that are real
In all the moving show
Are the wine and the bread.
So the taste comes to be loathly,
And you loathe the streams |
30 |
Of
simple, importunate merchants
Hawking the dreams
That no one will buy.
Hope goes out with a sigh,
For nobody heeds the beauty |
35 |
You
spread in the sun;
And you fold the dream-tissues
When the day is done.
Then though you make no sign,
They bring you the bread and the wine. |
40 |
Yea,
the service is quick to please;
You may sit at your ease,
Even beyond the even,
Watching the small gray stars
Drift in the shallow heaven; |
45 |
You
may linger till Time is dead,
With those delicate dreams of thine,
Eating the bitter bread,
And drinking the harsh wine!
But when night deepens in flood
|
50 |
Floating
the greater stars,
When silence falls, and the blood
Slows in the aching heart,
All sudden you are aware
Of a mystical light in the air; |
55 |
For
the unsold dreams, transfigured,
Have peopled the void
With a flutter of angels;
Over each wondering merchant
Glimmers an angel guest; |
60 |
You
have your angel of angels,
Whose radiance surpasses the rest;
Your hands are your angel's hands,
His soul is your soul, and you know
That the only things that were real |
65 |
In
all that moving show
Were the dreams.
Then
though you make no sign,
They bring you viands divine;—
You may linger till Time is dead |
70 |
With
those realized dreams of thine,
Eating the honeyed bread,
And drinking the rich wine. |
|
The
Fields of Earth
|
|
| DELIGHT
is the fruit of the Tree of Joy |
|
|
On
the fields of Earth, |
|
| Youth
plunders the loaded lower branches |
|
|
With
shouts of mirth. |
|
Their hands are stained with the blood-red juice |
5 |
|
From
the golden rind; |
|
| They
scatter the seed with prodigal gestures |
|
|
To
the careless wind. |
|
The trees spring up with a fountain-rush |
|
|
In
the fragrant night; |
10 |
| There
in the first rose-flush of the morning |
|
. |
Are
the globes of Delight |
|
Youth sets tooth in the peerless flesh
|
|
|
Untroubled
by thought, |
|
| "It
is naught", says Youth, the glorious spendthrift, |
15 |
|
"Delight!—it
is naught!" |
|
| They
weary and wander away before noon, |
|
|
None
left at last: |
|
| Silence
flows in a tide of old tenderness |
|
|
Out
of the past. |
|
| Then
the Others come as daylight fails; |
20 |
|
With
trembling fingers |
|
| They
gather Delight from the highest branches |
|
|
While
the light lingers. |
|
| The
finest fruit from the branches of dusk |
|
|
Neglected
by Youth,— |
25 |
| Delight
with the honey-core of Beauty |
|
|
And
the seed of Truth. |
|
| They
eat of the sovereign core that stills |
|
|
The
yearning of years, |
|
| They
bury the seed in fullness of knowledge |
30 |
|
And
with secret fears. |
|
| For
naught ever grows from the seed they plant |
|
|
On
the upland cold; |
|
| But
Delight is alive in the morning valley |
|
|
With
the globes of gold. |
35 |
They see the revelers with careless mirth |
|
|
Plundering
the trees, |
|
| They
hark to the mingled music and laughter |
|
|
Till
the sounds cease. |
|
| Then
they venture down to the Trees of Joy, |
40 |
|
Deserted
by Youth, |
|
| To
gather Delight with the core of Beauty |
|
|
And
the seed of Truth. |
|
A
Blackbird Rhapsody
|
|
ON
the heights of Oberhofen
Where the woods are interwoven
With the gardens and the orchards,
First I heard the blackbird singing
Through a shower of rain at dawn, |
5 |
Ringing,
ringing, ringing,
Till the rain was gone.
Dante called you Merlo,
Chaucer called you Merle,
In Surrey lands and Umbrian valleys
|
10 |
They
overheard your witty sallies;
Now you whistle in the swirled
Current of our modern world,
Blackbird by the Lake of Thun
In the Bernese Oberland. |
15 |
All
day long I hear you giving
Comments on the joy of living;
You, a mote of bright black feathers
With a sparkling dot of yellow,
Seem to sum up and pervade |
20 |
All
the sunshine, all the shade,
Greeting with a blithe, "Hail fellow!"
Everything beneath the sun,—
From the enamelled garden-beds
Set around the painted chalets, |
25 |
From
the lake's pellucid lights,
Up the torrents in the valleys
To the frigid Alpine heights;
Calling to the rooted mountains
"Why are you at rest so long, |
30 |
Shake
your snowy pinions,
Why not fly and sing a song?"
When a wind-wing on the lake
Leaves a track upon the water
Like a quick grey snake; |
35 |
When
the ripples on the pebbles
Running in like silver rebels
From the level leaden surface
Make him mad with joy;—
"Come, you cold and heavy water |
40 |
Rise
in mist and be a cloud,
Float aloft and sing aloud!"
The clear gem-tints of the flowers
Caught up from the pansy-beds
And the drooping dahlia heads, |
45 |
Topaz
light and ruby shimmer,
Emeralds of a leafy glimmer,
Sapphire-flame and turquoise mould
In a setting of green-gold,—
Flicker in your spangled notes |
50 |
As
if your voice was in their throats.
Did Wagner build the wild Valkyrie
War-cry on that valiant phrase?
Did Bach tangle in the maze
Of a fugue those six notes, bold
|
55 |
As
six bells of beaten gold?
Then I hear from out the clustered
Thicket of a sycamore
A few unctuous notes satirical,
In the manner rapt and lyrical, |
60 |
Of
the famous nightingale;
Followed by a cheery hail
In your native idiom;—
Contrast sly between the noise
Of premeditated passion |
65 |
And
legendary strife,
And the wild impromptu voice
Of the simple love of life.
Through the lingering gradual light,
I seem to hear a dauntless sprite |
70 |
Who
lives without the need of rest,
Without a mate, without a nest.
Yet, for just an instant
As the light begins to minish
Do you take to dreaming, |
75 |
With
your parted golden bill,
Half-spread wings, rapt and still,
Poising like an ebon finish
To the apex of a fir-tree?
After all this whirl of winging |
80 |
Is
your vision a vale of rest;
Is your dream a dream of silence
Of a day too rich for singing
By a brooding shadow-nest,
Far beyond the mountains of the west? |
85 |
Silence
for an instant long;—
Then you charge upon the gardens
With a rush of song;
Fluting the last light away
From the embers of the day. |
90 |
Earth turns into night and quiet;
After such a day-long riot
Silence also cometh to the Merle.
An ethereal film of rose
Sudden flushes the pale snows |
95 |
Of
the Jungfrau range,
And as soon begins to change
To a cloud of ghostly light,
Strewing all the breathless height
With ashes of dead silver. |
100 |
Through
the lustrous Alpine twilight
Rises up from Italy
The Immortal Pearl, (so Dante called her,)
The Immortal Pearl, The Moon,
Drifts along the Lake of Thun, |
105 |
Driven
ever with the cosmic urge,
Striving to escape beyond the verge
To the veiled mountains of the imagined West
Where She and all Immortal Spirits hope for rest. |
|
Como
|
|
| LAKE
Como, rippled with light airs |
|
|
Or
crossed with silver showers, |
|
| Lay
trembling in her opulence |
|
|
Of
olives and of flowers. |
|
| Below
the clustered villages |
5 |
|
And
villas on the height |
|
| We
saw the shadowed water turn |
|
|
To
turquoise in the light. |
|
| The
lindens murmured, full of bees; |
|
|
Around
the cypress spires |
10 |
| Wandered
wreaths of oakwood smoke |
|
|
Drawn
from the peasant fires. |
|
| Where
the gardens and the hayfields |
|
|
Hung
in terraced lines |
|
| Girls
were singing in the vineyards |
15 |
|
As
they sprayed the vines. |
|
| When
early night infused the air |
|
|
With
a warm flush of gray |
|
| It
seemed as if the veil of light |
|
|
Would
never wear away. |
20 |
Yet colour in the diaphanous air |
|
|
Deepened
from change to change, |
|
| Till
the familiar shore-line grew |
|
|
Far,
far off and strange. |
|
| Across
the transfigured scene a barge, |
25 |
|
With
ochre sail half-furled, |
|
| Drifted
like a shrivelled ghost |
|
|
From
the ancient world; |
|
| With
freight intangible as sleep,— |
|
|
The
passion of old wars, |
30 |
| Early
dreams on Love and Death, |
|
|
The
Ocean and the Stars. |
|
| It
drifted past the enchanted shore |
|
|
Like
a withered husk, |
|
| Drifted
and disappeared beyond |
35 |
|
Bellano
in the dusk. |
|
Evening
at Ravello
|
|
FROM
the gray shadow of the olive hill
The mellow Angelus bell lends to the sea
Its silver tone; the sea that lies so far
Below, entranced with its own fathomless beauty,
Has no voice; the still crystal surge |
5 |
Clings
like a fringe of snow along the shore
Silent;—no movement, only change from deep
To deeper sapphire; and a wayward air
Carries away the cadence of a song.
The fisher draws his boat upon the beach; |
10 |
The
vine-dresser who tied the vine to the trellis
A long day, climbs the last terrace and the lights
Find the lost houses in the deepest gorge.
If there is music now it is not heard
Only imagined, even the mellow bell |
15 |
Is
mute. If there are stars in heaven
They give no sign. In the silence the worn heart
Takes a deep draught of peace. How far away
Seems all the malice of this turbulent world.
A vain desire flows from the tranquil beauty |
20 |
To
share the sorrow and delight of life
With simple men who take their meat
From the vine the olive and the sea. |
|
Chiostro
Verde
|
|
HERE
in the old Green Cloister
At Santa Maria Novella
The grey well in the centre
Is dry to the granite curb;
No splashing will ever disturb |
5 |
The
cool depth of the shaft.
In the stone-bordered quadrangle
Daisies, in galaxy, spangle
The vivid cloud of grass.
Four young cypresses fold |
10 |
Themselves
in their mantles of shadow
Away from the sun's hot gold;
And roses revel in the light,
Hundreds of roses; if one could gather
The flush that fades over the Arno |
15 |
Under
Venus at sundown
And dye a snow-rose with the colour,
The ghost of the flame on the snow
Might give to a painter the glow
Of these roses. |
20 |
Above
the roof of the cloister
Rises the rough church wall
Worn with the tides of Time.
The burnished pigeons climb
And slide in the shadowed air, |
25 |
Wing-whispering
everywhere,
Coo and murmur and call
From their nooks in the crannied wall.
Then on the rustling space,
Falling with delicate grace,
|
30 |
Boys'
voices from the far off choir,
The full close of a phrase,
A cadence of Palestrina
Or something of even older days,
No words—only
the tune.
|
35 |
It
dies now—too soon.
Will music forever die,
The soul bereft of its cry,
And no young throats
Vibrate to clear new notes?
|
40 |
While
the cadence was hovering in air
The pigeons were flying
In front of the seasoned stone,
Visiting here and there,
Cooing from the cool shade |
45 |
Of
their nooks in the wall;
Who taught the pigeons their call
Their murmurous music?
Under the roof of the cloister
A few frescoes are clinging |
50 |
Made
by Paolo Uccello,
Once they were clear and mellow
Now they have fallen away
To a dull green-gray,
What has not fallen will fall; |
55 |
Of
all colour bereft
Will nothing at last be left
But a waste wall?
Will painting forever perish,
Will no one be left to cherish |
60 |
The
beauty of life and the world,
Will the soul go blind of the vision?
Who painted those silver lights in the daisies
That sheen in the grass-cloud
That hides their stars or discloses, |
65 |
Who
stained the bronze-green shroud
Wrapping the cypress
Who painted the roses? |
|
Kensington
Gardens
|
|
| WHEN
sun is over the Gardens |
|
|
The
gulls are bright as snow, |
|
| They
move like arctic lightning |
|
|
And
rush in a tangled glow; |
|
| The
Pond flashes beneath them, |
5 |
|
And
the roar of the troubled town |
|
| Sounds
with the force of a freshet |
|
|
When
the ice is crashing down. |
|
When night is over the Gardens |
|
|
The
gulls have flown to rest; |
10 |
| He
knows where who has the sway |
|
|
Of
the sea within his breast; |
|
| The
Pond is dead in the darkness, |
|
|
And
the city's muted roar |
|
| Sounds
like a secret water |
15 |
|
By
an unknown shore. |
|
On
Ragleth Hill
|
|
A
BROKEN line of trees on the hill-crest
Stands clear against the luminous sky. It seems
A caravan of traders come to rest,
Their camels weary, laden down with dreams;
For when the first stars in the twilight shine |
5 |
The
leaders of the march begin to sway,
Then all the others tremble into line
And tread the sands of sleep and fade away.
Where is the market for the fragile stuff
Enfolded in the gossamer bales they bear;
|
10 |
Where
are the ghostly merchants frail enough
To come and barter in the phantom fair?
For in their tents with sighs the dreams are bought,
And beauty is sold for shadows of lovely thought. |
|
At
Lodore
|
|
FALLING
from a leafy heaven,
With no tumult and no roar,
Came the water at Lodore;
Slipping down from level to level,
Shining down in burnished lustres, |
5 |
Hanging
almost still in clusters,
Quartz-like on the rocks;
Sliding out between the boulders
With fern forests on their shoulders
Always moving to the rhythm |
10 |
Of
a measured, dulcet drumming,
Underneath the melody coming
From the slender strings of water
Fretted by the stones.
The little pools of beryl |
15 |
| Flecked
with bells of broken bubbles
Hold their breath and bear away
To tease
the golden gravel
With a moil of tiny troubles
To ravel and unravel |
20 |
As
in play.
When the wind in wilfull rushes
Carries away the liquid flushes
To the homes of the thrushes
In the sycamore, |
25 |
The
water-murmurs dwindle
To the whisper of a spindle
When the wheel turns slow
And slower.
Then the almost silence seeming |
30 |
Moves
the spirit into dreaming
If the water were not there,
If the gorge of rock uprisen
Were alone a shadowy prison
For the air; |
35 |
Yet
would moonlight fall in clusters,
Crystal forms of water-lustres
Moving on the stones,
And the sycamore would shiver
Murmur ripples like the river |
40 |
| Undertones. |
|
At
Palma
|
|
| SHELTERED
under the cliffside |
|
|
There
lies in this sunny land |
|
| A
miniature Mediterranean |
|
|
Harbour
of rock and sand. |
|
Over the wall of a garden |
5 |
|
The
mimosa holds on high |
|
| A
flame of sulphur-yellow |
|
|
Against
the sapphire sky. |
|
Air-tremors flow or idle |
|
|
Under
the ilex shade |
10 |
| Bearing
the rustle of sheep-bells |
|
|
From
the far olive glade. |
|
The rock cove holds in its setting |
|
|
A
jewel of mystery— |
|
| The
light in the heart of an emerald— |
15 |
|
A
secret of the sea. |
|
Sudden the water rises |
|
|
As
if it must share |
|
| This
secret of the ocean |
|
|
Alone
too great to bear. |
20 |
And heaving a tiny wavelet
|
|
|
Comes
with a mimic shock |
|
| To
lose its emerald lustre |
|
|
In
ripple round the rock, |
|
Runs on with an ebbing burden |
25 |
|
And
reaches the waiting shore, |
|
| With
only the strength to whisper |
|
|
"I
will return once more." |
|
But no one can tell to the moment |
|
|
How
long the sun shall burn, |
30 |
| Who
will go forth with a message |
|
|
Or
who will return. |
|
At
East Gloucester
|
|
MIST
has thickened the air
And darkened the morning hour,
Nowhere
Is a tree or a house or a tower;
Even the near things seem |
5 |
Unreal,
the sea and the shore,
The margin of earth and the edge of the deep,
Ruins of dream
In a land of sleep.
Sounds are astray in the mist, |
10 |
The
bells of Gloucester town,
The bell on the sunken reef,
Thridding their way in the gray
Gloom of the day.
Two strokes from the bell on the reef |
15 |
Confirm
the ancient belief
Of the bells in the towers of the town,
The town-bells tell the truth
To the lonely bell on the reef;
Silvern spirits and pure |
20 |
In
knowledge made perfect and sure
Repeating their mastered lessons
In beautiful acquiesence.
"Let them say as they say
We know better than they, |
25 |
To
the hearts that hover between
But nearer to Heaven than Earth,
Sounds that were heard are dearer
Than scenes that were seen." |
|
In
the Rocky Mountains
|
|
|
I
|
|
O
LOVELY light endure the growing splendour,
Until the noon endure,
Endure when shades invade the lofty valleys,
Gradual and sure;
O light that trembled first upon the mountains, |
5 |
Radiant
and pure,
Even when all the peaks are dark with midnight,
Tremble but still endure.
|
|
|
|
Rooted
with death in darkness,
Crowned with death in snow, |
10 |
Height
beyond height, the mountains,
Stand in the frigid glow
Of desolate moonlight.
The folds of the dense forest
Cling to the granite slopes, |
15 |
Like
the pall of a sombre ceremonial
Rigid with shadows.
The community of mountains,
Established in ancient beauty,
Are passionless and secure in death. |
20 |
Why
then does the soul hear
Circling between the summits,
That affirmation without sound,
As one mountain to another saith,
There is no death? |
25 |
III
|
|
It
was there my heart was lonely in the mountains:
For the mist had cloaked the range
Hiding the vista and the flowing sky-line;
Almost silence there, but strange—
Came a water-sound, a far-off crying; |
30 |
All
the ferns and firs
Held the mist till they could bear no more,
Then shed their store
Of tears with sudden sighing;
It was there my heart was lonely in the mountains. |
35 |
IV
|
|
Hold
thy line of song, O mountains,
Up to heaven's deep,
Marching to a soundless cadence,
On from steep to steep.
Nothing but the light and lightning |
40 |
Knows
thy song,
Naught but avalanche and tempest
And the starry throng:
Darkness nourishes and dawns renew
Thy still line of beauty in the blue. |
45 |
Beauty
born of pressure and fire,
When the molten heart of earth
Fixed its wild desire
In thy granite melody:
Silent as the end of Time, |
50 |
Silent
as Eternity,
Hold, O mountains, to the sky,
Hold thy line of song.
|
|
V
|
|
| Lifted
up from the heart of Earth, |
|
|
And
held to the skies, |
55 |
| The
purest beauty of this world |
|
|
On
the mountain lies. |
|
There, in a shrine of crystal, |
|
|
Builded
far off on the height, |
|
| Dwells
the spirit of radiant |
60 |
|
Ineffable
light. |
|
| The
glory is veiled with darkness, |
|
|
The
stars alone are aware, |
|
| Dawn
restores the wonder |
|
|
To
the trembling air. |
65 |
No
music descends with the meaning
|
|
|
Of
the mystical glow; |
|
| The
torrent dissolves in vapour, |
|
|
The
avalanche in snow; |
|
| The
pines like weary pilgrims |
70 |
|
Stand
line above line; |
|
| But
the heart of man strains onward |
|
|
To
the far off shrine. |
|
| He
would possess the secret |
|
|
Of
the light in the crystal air, |
75 |
| For
the purest beauty of this world |
|
|
He
knows is there. |
|
VI
|
|
There
are no mountains in the world
But only driving storm,
Silent, so high in air; |
80 |
In
the valley all is still—
But the fierce rush of the master-will
Of the wild tempest
Is told by the speed of the flying crowd
Of fugitive snow-flakes |
85 |
Escaping
from the under-cloud that drifts
Where the dark tree-line breaks
And merges in the upper cloud.
But now the storm is over
The mountains hold the sky, |
90 |
Their
own unconquered realm of air
In changeless majesty,
Bearing serene and unaware,
The ancient message, fresh unfurled,
Of beauty, fallen on the world |
95 |
From
vanished tempest:—Lo!
In the remote and tranquil height
Burning with pure and lonely light
The glory of the snow. |
|
VII
|
|
| All
day long the valiant mountains |
100 |
|
With
their victory won, |
|
| Stand
secure in pride and triumph |
|
|
Listening
to the sun. |
|
| All
night long the desolate mountains |
|
|
Brooding
on their scars, |
105 |
| Stand
in doubt, austere and lonely |
|
|
Listening
to the stars. |
|
Compline
|
|
WE
are resting here in the twilight,
Watching the progress of a cloudless sunset,
The colour moving away from yellow to a deeper gold.
High on the hillside
Across the sunset the telegraph wires are drawn, |
5 |
Black
on the yellow.
Upward we look through the strands
To the delicate colour infinitely beyond
At the world's end.
The swallows flash in the air |
10 |
And
light on the wires,
They range themselves there
Side by side in lines,
Forming impromptu designs,
Black on the yellow. |
15 |
An
odour rises out of the earth
From dead grass cooling in the dew,
From the fragrance of pine needles
That smouldered all day in the heat.
Love in our hearts is quiet, |
20 |
Tranquil
as light reflected in water
That trembles only when the water trembles.
As gold ages to ivory,
As up from a hidden source there wells
The fragile colour of deep-sea shells, |
25 |
Ivory
is flushed with rose
At the day's close.
And as the present sometimes calls up the past
I see the wires as the old music-staff,
Four lines and three spaces, |
30 |
The
swallows clinging there,
The notes of an ancient air,
The sunset glow—a vellum page
In an old Mass book:—
A vellum page yellow as old ivory, |
35 |
The
fading gems of a rose-window,
The odour of incense—
And a voice out of the past
Imploring in a vault of shadow—
Sancta Maria—Mater Dei |
40 |
Ora
pro nobis peccatoribus
Nunc et in hora
Mortis nostrae.
The golden melody of an old faith
Lingering ethereal in the shadow, |
45 |
The
prayer of the past—
Ora pro nobis.
Pray for us, you swallows,
Now and in the hour of our death;
Now when we are fulfilled in the promise of life |
50 |
When
love is quiet in the heart;
And when we fall like autumn leaves and their shadows;
The colour of the leaves,—the garnered beauty
of life,—
With their shadows on the future,
Falling together to the unknown— |
55 |
Ora
pro nobis.
May we remember then all of life's loveliest things,
This evening and the swallows wings,
When infinite love was reflected in the heart
And trembled only when the heart trembled.
|
60 |
We will pray for you bright swallows,
Now and in the hour of your death;
Now when you fly aloft in the dry air
Rushing together in a storm of wings,
Grasping the wires; |
65 |
And
when you fall secretly in the wilderness,
Where,—none knoweth—
Ora pro nobis.
May you remember then this northern beauty,
The pure lake surface, |
70 |
And
after a long light-day,
Wing-weary, the rest
Of a night by the nestlings and the nest.
The sunset failed in ivory and rose,
All that is left of light is the early moonlight |
75 |
That
trembles in the lake-water
Only when the water trembles;
And the lustre of life alone is left at the long
day's close,—
The radiance of love in the heart
That trembles only when the heart trembles. |
80 |
The
Dreaming Eagle
|
|
MOVELESS
is the clear air of heaven from the height
Down to the floor of the gorge where in its groove
The glacial water rushes to the sea,—
Space filled with clear moon-brilliance
And pointed with a few brave stars. |
5 |
Secure
upon his secret crag the eagle sleeps
Driven by a dream-tempest;
Beaten far off from his eyrie and his hour of rest
By the great buffet of the squall
That hurls the hard sleet on the granite; |
10 |
Blown
aslant over a desert pattern
Of jagged peaks against a brazen sky.
He wakes a moment from his dream,
Flutters the feathers on his breast,
Loosens his pinions and looks out upon the night. |
15 |
He
sees the mountain, buttressed with glaciers,
Guardian of the pass; and, clear beyond,
A few most valiant stars flashing against the moon.
In scorn of peaceful things he shuts his brain
Off from the gleaming distance |
20 |
And
seeks once more the wildness of his dream.
He cares not whether mountains move or stars be
still
Content if he can fight the force that sweeps the
air
To fan his wing-gold to a fiercer flame,
If he can turn his talons closer to the rock |
25 |
And
feel upon the shoulders of his wings
The Power. |
|
A
Prairie Water Colour
|
|
BESIDE
the slew the poplars play
In double lines of silver-grey:—
A trembling in the silver trees
A shadow-trembling in the slew.
Standing clear above the hill |
5 |
The
snow-grey clouds are still,
Floating there idle as light;
Beyond, the sky is almost white
Under the pure deep zenith-blue.
Acres of summer-fallow meet |
10 |
| Acres
of growing gold-green wheat
That ripen in the heat.
Where
a disc-harrow tears the soil,
Up the long slope six horses toil,
The driver, one with the machine;— |
15 |
The
group is dimly seen
For as they go a cloud of dust
Comes like a spirit out of earth
And follows where they go.
Upward they labour, drifting slow, |
20 |
The
disc-rims sparkle through the veil;
Now upon the topmost height
The dust grows pale,
The group springs up in vivid light
And, dipping below the line of sight, |
25 |
Is
lost to view.
Yet still the little cloud is there,
All dusky-luminous in air,
Then thins and settles on the land
And lets the sunlight through. |
30 |
All
is content. The fallow field
Is waiting there till next year's yield
Shall top the rise with ripening grain,
When the green-gold harvest plain
Shall break beneath the harrow. |
35 |
Still-purple,
growing-gold they lie,
The crop and summer-fallow. The vast sky
Holds all in one pure round of blue—
And nothing moves except the play
Of silver-grey in the poplar trees |
40 |
| Of
shadow in the slew. |
|
En
Route
|
|
THE
train has stopped for no apparent reason
In the wilds;
A frozen lake is level and fretted over
With rippled wind lines;
The sun is burning in the South; the season |
5 |
Is
winter trembling at a touch of spring.
A little hill with birches and a ring
Of cedars—all so still, so pure with snow—
It seems a tiny landscape in the moon.
Long wisps of shadow from the naked birches |
10 |
Lie
on the white in lines of cobweb-grey;
From the cedar roots the snow has shrunk away,
One almost hears it tinkle as it thaws.
Traces there are of wild things in the snow—
Partridge at play, tracks of the foxes' paws |
15 |
That
broke a path to sun them in the trees.
They're going fast where all impressions go
On a frail substance—images like these,
Vagaries the unconcious mind receives
From nowhere, and lets go to nothingness |
20 |
| With
the lost flush of last year's autumn leaves. |
|
In
Algonquin Park
|
|
NESTLING
in the high woods the tranquil bay
Mirrors the margin-trees and the clear grey
Of idle clouds, moveless and clear as they.
It seems as if, with all her fears upfurled,
Ultimate peace has settled on the world. |
5 |
Springs
from the air, moved by its own volition
A silver shower, bent on some secret mission,
Murmurs her liquid secret to the trees,
Trembles it in the water and then flees,—
Leaving her light, last whisper in the brush
|
10 |
At
the cliff's edge below the pinewood. Hush!
Love looks on heaven with her tranquil eyes
Calm with the depth of all love's certainties,
And when the calm is blurred with fleeting pain
Takes the light shower of sorrow as surprise. |
15 |
Love
hears it drift from spirit shore to shore,
Trembles beneath the lash of the doubtful rain
Till it is gone,—and steadfast once again
Love looks on heaven more tranquil than before. |
|
Autumn
Evening
|
|
| GO,
lovely hour with the rushing of leaves,
With
the proud swift wind and the glory in the west,
Call the chill stars that close the autumn eves
And bring the day to rest.
Leave us the memory of the walk beside the water, |
5 |
With
the fugitive leaves rushing away from the wind,
The wild light on the towers and the eastern border
Where the stars are venturing.
Then rest in the low-lit room
By the maple-fire on the hearth |
10 |
Breathing
as if with delight in its life, and after
Music rich-motived with sighs and with laughter.
These are the real, the native things
The heart remembers;
Long after the passions of the world have taken
wings |
15 |
Memory
retrieves the whisper of fugitive leaves,
The flow of water, the flow of stars,
The fall of the wind at night-fall,
The flutter of flame on the embers,
The murmur of music. |
20 |
The
Touch of Winter
|
|
IN
the early morning with magic overnight
Frost has rimed the garden with lines of crystal
light—
All the leaning hollyhocks have beaten-silver stems,
The ruins of their seed-pods are rounded diadems,
The asters all are taken with a jewelled surprise |
5 |
Every
withered blossom has diamonds in her eyes.
In the later morning with the warm and hazy sun
The crystals, thawed and loosened, in fairly rillets
run,
The hollyhocks, unsilvered, have a brown-ivory glow,
Like little leather buttons the seed-pods show, |
10 |
The
asters all are taken with a dewy surprise,
Every withered blossom has tears in her eyes. |
|
From
the Headland
|
|
ALL
day long the stormy gulls
Fought for plunder in the bay,
Rushing down upon the floating things,
Rising swift with cries and angry wings,
Wheeling up and away. |
5 |
Tide went wandering out and tide came wandering
in
With idle fall and rise;
Nothing seemed in trouble of its breath or living
Of its death or ending,
Underneath the skies. |
10 |
All the morning long the heaven was silver
And the sun crossed over towards his rest;
And at middle afternoon the film-clouds
Seemed to come from nowhere,
Gathering in the west. |
15 |
When the sun had touched them, all the air
Flowed with colour like a chanting stream,
And a distant mountain range, revealed in gray,
Wavered like the wall transparent of a land of dream.
Then the gulls went flying singly from the bay, |
20 |
Messengers
of battle and defeat,
To a breathless waiting bird-land far away,
Beating
air with wingstroke wearily,—
Black against triumphant colour,
Black against the mountains' sheer enchantment, |
25 |
| Black
against the sea. |
|
January
Evening
|
|
ROSE-BREASTED
birds appear
In the highest branches of the winter maple
Burning all with the rose-light of the sunset.
The birds are restless in the delicate tangle of
the rose- |
|
|
branches, |
|
| Songless,
abstract as thoughts in a dream |
5 |
Of
rose-breasted birds in rose-branches of a winter
maple.
Dreamlike invocation is in the air;
The tree is Priest and Song,
Offering the birds to the Spirit of Night,
Holding aloft the fluttering sacrifice, |
10 |
Imploring
to be absolved from the faint blood-stain
In the rose-branches, and the rose-breasted birds.
Then of a sudden the birds are gone,
And the rose-light fades and is gone,
The Spirit of Night, |
15 |
Grown
manifest in cool beauty,
Absolves the maple with touches of tender silver.
Where fluttered the rose-breasted birds
Silver filters through the maple,
Silver water-colored from the west, |
20 |
Silver
hinting of early starlight;
Purified, the priestly maple loses his melody,
In the darkness deepening
He wraps him in silver air,
In the quiet ecstasy of silver frost and silver
starlight. |
25 |
A
Scene at Lake Manitou
|
|
IN
front of the fur-traders house at Lake Manitou
Indian girls were gathering the hay,
Half labour and half play;
So small the stony field
And light the yield |
5 |
They
gathered it up in their aprons,
Racing and chasing,
And laughing loud with the fun
Of building the tiny cocks.
The sun was hot on the rocks. |
10 |
The
lake was all shimmer and tremble
To the bronze-green islands of cedars and pines;
In the channel between the water shone
Like an inset of polished stone;
Beyond them a shadowy trace |
15 |
Of
the shore of the lake
Was lost in the veil of haze.
Above the field on the rocky point
Was a cluster of canvas tents,
Nearly deserted, for the women had gone |
20 |
Berry-picking
at dawn
With most of the children.
Under the shade of a cedar screen
Between the heat of the rock and the heat of the
sun,
The Widow Frederick |
25 |
Whose
Indian name means Stormy Sky,
Was watching her son Matanack
In the sunlight die,
As she had watched his father die in the sunlight.
Worn out with watching, |
30 |
She
gazed at the far-off islands
That seemed in a mirage to float
Moored in the sultry air.
She had ceased to hear the breath in Matanack's
throat
Or the joy of the children gathering the hay. |
35 |
Death,
so near, had taken all sound from the day,
And she sat like one that grieves
Unconscious of grief.
With a branch of poplar leaves
She kept the flies from his face, |
40 |
And
her mind wandered in space
With the difficult past
When her husband had faded away;
How she had struggled to live
For Matanack four years old; |
45 |
Triumphant
at last!
She had taught him how and where
To lay the rabbit snare,
And how to set
Under the ice, the net, |
50 |
The
habits of shy wild things
Of the forest and marsh;
To his inherited store
She had added all her lore;
He was just sixteen years old |
55 |
A
hunter crafty and bold;
But there he lay,
And his life with its useless cunning
Was ebbing out with the day.
Fitfully visions rose in her tired brain, |
60 |
Faded
away, and came again and again.
She remembered the first day
He had gone the round of the traps alone,
She saw him stand in the frosty light
Two silver-foxes over his shoulder. |
65 |
She
heard the wolves howl,
Or the hoot of a hunting owl,
Or saw in a sunlit gap
In the woods, a mink in the trap;
Mingled with thoughts of Nanabojou |
70 |
And
the powerful Manitou
That lived in the lake;
Mingled with thoughts of Jesus
Who raised a man from the dead,
So Father Pacifique said. |
75 |
Suddenly something broke in her heart.
To save him, to keep him forever!
She had prayed to their Jesus,
She had called on Mary His mother
To save him, to keep him forever! |
80 |
The
Holy Water and the Scapular!
She had used all the Holy Water
Father Pacifique had given her;
He had worn his Scapular
Always, and for months had worn hers too; |
85 |
There
was nothing more to be done
That Christians could do.
Now she would call on the Powers of the Earth and
the Air,
The Powers of the Water;
She would give to the Manitou |
90 |
That
lived in the lake
All her treasured possessions,
And He would give her the lad.
The children heard her scream,
The trader and the loafing Indians |
95 |
Saw
her rush into her tent and bring out her blankets
And throw them into the lake,
Screaming demented screams,
Dragging her treasures into the light,
Scattering them far on the water. |
100 |
First
of them all, her gramophone,
She hurled like a stone;
And they caught her and held her
Just as she swung aloft the next of her treasures
Her little hand-sewing-machine. |
105 |
They
threw her down on the rock
And five men held her until,
Not conquered by them,
But subdued by her will
She lay still. |
110 |
The trader looked at the boy,
"He's done for," he said.
He covered the head
And went down to the Post;
The Indians, never glancing, |
115 |
Afraid
of the ghost,
Slouched away to their loafing.
After a curious quiet
The girls began the play
Of gathering the last of the hay. |
120 |
She knew it was all in vain;
He was slain by the foe
That had slain his father.
She put up her hair that had fallen over her eyes,
And with movements, weary and listless, |
125 |
Tidied
her dress.
He had gone to his father
To hunt in the Spirit Land
And to be with Jesus and Mary.
She was alone now and knew |
130 |
| What
she would do:
The
Trader would debit her winter goods,
She would go into the woods
And gather the fur,
Live alone with the stir |
135 |
Alone
with the silence;
Revisit the Post,
Return to hunt in September;
So had she done as long as she could remember.
She sat on the rock beside Matanack |
140 |
Resolute
as of old,
Her strength and her spirit came back.
Someone began to hammer down at the Trader's house.
The late August air was cold
With a presage of frost. |
145 |
The
islands had lost
Their mirage-mooring in air
And lay dark on the burnished water
Against the sunset flare—
Standing ruins of blackened spires |
150 |
Charred
by the fury of fires
That had passed that way,
That
were smouldering and dying out in the West
At the end of the day. |
|
At
Gull Lake: August, 1810
|
|
GULL
LAKE set in the rolling prairie—
Still there are reeds on the shore,
As of old the poplars shimmer
As summer passes;
Winter freezes the shallow lake to the core; |
5 |
Storm
passes,
Heat parches the sedges and grasses,
Night comes with moon-glimmer,
Dawn
with the morning-star;
All proceeds in the flow of Time |
10 |
As
a hundred years ago.
Then two camps were pitched on the shore,
The clustered teepees
Of Tabashaw Chief of the Saulteaux.
And on a knoll tufted with poplars |
15 |
Two
gray tents of a trader—
Nairne of the Orkneys.
Before his tents under the shade of the poplars
Sat Keejigo, third of the wives
Of Tabashaw Chief of the Saulteaux; |
20 |
Clad
in the skins of antelopes
Broidered with porcupine quills
Coloured with vivid dyes,
Vermilion here and there
In the roots of her hair, |
25 |
A
half-moon of powder-blue
On her brow, her cheeks
Scored with light ochre streaks.
Keejigo daughter of Launay
The Normandy hunter |
30 |
And
Oshawan of the Saulteaux,
Troubled by fugitive visions
In the smoke of the camp-fires,
In the close dark of the teepee,
Flutterings of colour |
35 |
Along
the flow of the prairies,
Spangles of flower tints
Caught in the wonder of dawn,
Dreams of sounds unheard—
The echoes of echo, |
40 |
Star
she was named for
Keejigo, star of the morning,
Voices of storm—
Wind-rush and lightning,—
The beauty of terror; |
45 |
The
twilight moon
Coloured like a prairie lily,
The round moon of pure snow,
The beauty of peace;
Premonitions of love and of beauty |
50 |
Vague
as shadows cast by a shadow.
Now she had found her hero,
And offered her body and spirit
With abject unreasoning passion,
As Earth abandons herself |
55 |
To
the sun and the thrust of the lightning.
Quiet were all the leaves of the poplars,
Breathless the air under their shadow,
As Keejigo spoke of these things to her heart
In the beautiful speech of the Saulteaux. |
60 |
|
The flower lives on the prairie,
The wind in the sky,
I am here my beloved;
The wind and the flower.
The crane hides in the sand-hills, |
65 |
|
Where
does the wolverine hide?
I am here my beloved,
Heart's-blood on the feathers
The foot caught in the trap.
Take the flower in your hand, |
70 |
|
The
wind in your nostrils;
I am here my beloved;
Release the captive
Heal the wound under the feathers. |
|
A storm-cloud was marching |
75 |
Vast
on the prairie,
Scored with livid ropes of hail,
Quick with nervous vines of lightning—
Twice had Nairne turned her away
Afraid of the venom of Tabashaw, |
80 |
Twice
had the Chief fired at his tents
And now when two bullets
Whistled above the encampment
He yelled "Drive this bitch to her master."
Keejigo went down a path by the lake; |
85 |
Thick
at the tangled edges,
The reeds and the sedges
Were gray as ashes
Against the death-black water;
The lightning scored with double flashes |
90 |
The
dark lake-mirror and loud
Came the instant thunder.
Her lips still moved to the words of her music,
"Release the captive,
Heal the wound under the feathers." |
95 |
At the top of the bank
The old wives caught her and cast her down
Where Tabashaw crouched by his camp-fire.
He snatched a live brand from the embers,
Seared her cheeks, |
100 |
Blinded
her eyes,
Destroyed her beauty with fire,
Screaming,
"Take that face to your lover."
Keejigo
held her face to the fury
And made no sound. |
105 |
The
old wives dragged her away
And threw her over the bank
Like a dead dog.
Then burst the storm—
The Indians' screams and the howls of the dogs |
110 |
Lost
in the crash of hail
That smashed the sedges and reeds,
Stripped the poplars of leaves,
Tore and blazed onwards,
Wasting itself with riot and tumult— |
115 |
Supreme
in the beauty of terror.
The setting sun struck the retreating cloud
With a rainbow, not an arc but a column
Built with the glory of seven metals;
Beyond in the purple deeps of the vortex |
120 |
Fell
the quivering vines of the lightning.
The wind withdrew the veil from the shrine of the
moon,
She rose changing her dusky shade for the glow
Of the prairie lily, till free of all blemish of
colour
She came to her zenith without a cloud or a star, |
125 |
A
lovely perfection, snow-pure in the heaven of midnight.
After the beauty of terror the beauty of peace.
But Keejigo came no more to the camps of her people;
Only the midnight moon knew where she felt her way,
Only the leaves of autumn, the snows of winter |
130 |
| Knew
where she lay. |
|
At
Sunset
|
|
LET
us draw closer now; the clouds are riven
With flying shadow and shafts of vivid gold,
The
dew shall fall with windfall, and in heaven
There shall be myriad starshine as of old.
Like a great nest the woodland warm and deep |
5 |
Holds
the wild lives drowsy and half at rest,
Till they are comforted with perfect sleep
When night has settled down upon the nest.
Let us tell over now in rich reflection
Our finite love treasured in Time's despite, |
10 |
Infinite
Love instinct with all perfection
Is settling close around us with the night.
Our two, wild hearts have suffered grievous things,
Let us be comforted beneath His wings. |
|
The
Faithful
|
|
WHY
stands that star so brilliant in the West,
Burning without a tremor above the shield
Of the bronze hill? Has earth begun to yield
To infinite weariness and think it best
To turn no more upon a fruitless quest, |
5 |
Only
that men may laugh and love in the sun,
Taste grief in the shadow and when all is done
Sleep and forget life's failure in long rest?
No! 'Tis the magic of that shining heart
Which has no shade of doubt, that fixed it there |
10 |
Commanding
it her purpose to fulfil,
Neither to wane, nor tremble nor depart,
Till I should know in darkness and despair
Steadfast her star of love is burning still. |
|
By
the Sea
|
|
WHY
comes this sorrow from the outer void
To check my heart with a vague agony
When it would dance in pleasure unalloyed
Or dream without desire or memory?
Thus have I known the tide turn on a bench |
5 |
Of
quiet rocks with loud, exultant sound,
The sun-warm golden seaweed toss and wrench
And triumph over them when they are drowned.
Yet would I not command the tide to be
Motionless water, nor by will restrain |
10 |
The
current of vague sorrow, nor decree
Peace to my heart from this reviving pain.
No, I would cleave it open to the core
For the remorseless surge to flood once more. |
|
Under
Stars
|
|
CAUGHT
in the dew-drop surface of the mere,
The pure, high stars pursue their primal courses,
Dwarfed to pale points of fire their ancient forces;
Where
the curved shore-line, trembling silver clear,
Meets the dark mountain shadow, the wood-seer, |
5 |
The
hermit thrush, draws from its limpid sources,
Alien to all our passions and remorses,
The song that has no yearning and no fear.
Time thus enchanted, Fate can make no move.
My heart has mirrored on this matchless night |
10 |
The
highest things that men have ever thought;
And through the tranquil silence it has caught
The terrene song of some celestial sprite,
Floating in mingled moods of death and love. |
|
On
a Drawing of a Hand
|
|
THE
flowing forms of the round arm
End in the hand's elusive charm:
The yearning eyes will linger less
Along the lines of loveliness,
Where every curve is a caress, |
5 |
Than
pore upon the shadowed place
Where Beauty holds a hidden grace
Within the hollow of the palm.
Here there is imaged the deep calm,
The perfect joy, unknown, the soul |
10 |
Longs
after, the clear Truth-in-Whole
Of Beauty, captive and concealed,
Never to be in round revealed,
Only to pursued uncaught,
Beyond dreaming, beyond thought, |
15 |
Where
Beauty leads in a caress
Along the lines of loveliness. |
|
A
Fancy
|
|
| IF
clouds were made for freighting |
|
|
The
burden of the heart, |
|
| I'd
charter one and load it |
|
|
And
send it to the mart. |
|
Where you come down at morning, |
5 |
|
Before
the heat of the day, |
|
| From
your poplars on the hillside |
|
|
To
idle an hour away. |
|
Her feathery keel all glowing |
|
|
With
the sun's last light, |
10 |
| Stars
shaken through her rigging |
|
|
With
the cool of early night. |
|
My cloud would come to harbour |
|
|
In
the airy stream, |
|
| Caught
with cables of cobweb |
15 |
| |
To
the sea-wall of dream. |
|
The mariners would lighten |
|
|
The
wealth of the hold, |
|
| With
air-drawn music, |
|
|
When
the moon was gold. |
20 |
And when the dawn was silvern |
|
|
On
poplar and pier, |
|
| The
market-folk would whisper |
|
|
"Look!
wonder is here!" |
|
Then a rumour would reach you |
25 |
|
That
a cloud was at the quay, |
|
| With
a shy and subtle merchant |
|
|
And
bales from fancy free. |
|
You would come like charmed sea-water |
|
|
That
follows the mood of the moon; |
30 |
| Or
like the flow of a cadence |
|
|
In
an old, slow tune. |
|
With your delicate ivory eyelids |
|
|
Laving
the sea-green eyes, |
|
| With
the long slender fingers |
35 |
|
And
the breast of sighs; |
|
Companioned by your maidens, |
|
|
One
dark and one fair, |
|
| Theirs
would be famous beauty |
|
|
If
your beauty were not there. |
40 |
You would drift down the tangle |
|
|
And
colour of the booths; |
|
| Your
glance would drop and linger |
|
|
On
the beauties that are truths. |
|
You would pick up something tender |
45 |
|
That
in fancy you might buy, |
|
| You
would falter over something |
|
|
That
was made with a sigh. |
|
You would hesitate and ponder, |
|
|
All
fluttered and confused, |
50 |
| Then
you would choose a jewel |
|
|
And
murmur as if bemused— |
|
"I'll take this tremulous trifle |
|
|
Made
of moonlit dew." |
|
| (It
was my least of fancies |
55 |
|
Made
from the love of you.) |
|
"Go, Sorrow, find this merchant |
|
|
You
tell me is subtle and shy, |
|
| Pay
him for his frail jewel |
|
|
With
a glance of your eye; |
60 |
"Come, Joy, the booths are sultry, |
|
|
Leave
all the splendid rest, |
|
| But
catch this fluid fancy up |
|
|
And
pin it on my breast." |
|
By
the Seashore
|
|
THERE
on the desolate seashore at the end of day
Someone has lighted a fire as the tide and the sunlight
are |
|
|
ebbing
away; |
|
| The
rocks are an altar fronting the coming night and
the |
|
|
naked
shingle. |
|
| He
is burning the letters (he promised to burn them)
and |
|
|
single |
|
| He
crushes them close and lays them along the fire. |
5 |
| He
feels as if each were a martyr burning there for
a |
|
|
deathless
name, |
|
As
if he, of the faith, were a coward afraid of the
flame.
The tide flows out to a deep sea darkness,
The sunlight streams away from the deeps of midnight,
A finite sorrow is seeking the Infinite sorrow. |
10 |
Slowly he gives to the fire his desire and his
treasure;
The fire takes all with an ancient and passionate
pleasure
That eats of diverse fuel with careless grace
Be it
heart of man or leaves in an autumn place.
Men have likened desire to a fire,
|
15 |
But
it bears no final likeness to fire;
The desire of the heart leaves sorrow that lives
in a scar,
But fire when it dies is nought.
The flame flutters and vanishes.
Here and there the word 'love' shines and expires
in gold |
20 |
The
word 'forever' lives a moment in grey on the cinder,
A shrinking of all the char in a brittle heap—
It is done, nothing remains but the scar of a sorrow.
Sunlight deserts the shadow and leaves no message
at |
|
|
parting, |
|
| The
stars flock into the shadow without a greeting, |
25 |
From
the Infinite sorrow, sought and not found,
Comes no sound.
But the tide throws back a ripple
That whispers and sighs as if there was something
forgotten,
The ripple says, "Give me the embers |
30 |
| "'Tis
the sea that remembers"
The ripple plashes and whispers
"Give me the ashes
For the sea is the Mother of Sorrow"
So
the only voice is the sea's voice |
35 |
Receding
and dying in darkness.
Sorrow is answered there by the whispering, the
sighing—
"Remember—remember—remember,
The sea is the Mother of Sorrow
And She will remember." |
40 |
Enigma
|
|
SOME
men are born to gather women's tears,
To give a harbour to their timorous fears,
To take them as the dry earth takes the rain,
As the dark wood the warm wind from the plain;
Yet their own tears remain unshed, |
5 |
Their
own tumultuous fears unsaid,
And, seeming steadfast as the forest and the earth,
Shaken are they with pain.
They cry for voice as earth might cry for the sea
Or the wood for consuming fire; |
10 |
Unanswered
they remain
Subject to the sorrows of women utterly—
Heart and mind,
Subject as the dry earth to the rain
Or the dark wood to the wind. |
|
The
Bells
|
|
SLEEP
AND SLEEPLESSNESS |
|
NOT on this night of sullen rain
And on a tormented wind,
But on a bland, still night
Filled with the ancient starlight;
Then the bell notes float on the surface of silence |
5 |
Like
the fabled flower of Lotus on a stream
Whose sources are the secret wells of Sleep.
The air, like the air in a shell,
Is drowsy with murmur;
The ear in fancy hears the after-murmur of the bells |
10 |
(The
ripple around the Lotus when the stream
Is ruffled by the movement of a dream.)
The flawless night is fluent and bemused
With fusion of flower and tone and overtone.
Time is entranced,
|
15 |
Entranced
thyself and led by enchanted Sleep
Into the Country where the Real is Dream.
Not on this night of sullen rain
And a tormented wind
That torture one another; |
20 |
If
the wind screams the rain is still as death,
If the rain sobs the wild wind holds its breath;
But both conspire against the rule of silence
And the sanctuary of Sleep.
Once a clear note escaping the wind |
25 |
Calls
like a wounded bird at the window;
Once a faint note free of the rain
Falls broken on the pane.
The hours go unrecorded;
Even the death of midnight goes untolled. |
30 |
The
frantic night is full of violence and of lamentation;
Time is distraught, silence is blinded—
Blinded thyself and led by the blind ghost
Of Sleep seeking the Country he has lost. |
|
Earliest
Morning
|
|
| LITTLE
awns of sunlight, |
|
|
Dancing
on the dusky floor |
|
| Of
the world: the one bright |
|
|
Angel
at the dawn's door |
|
Holds it open to the vista |
5 |
|
Of
the grey-dew on the hills |
|
| Tranced
with memories of the misty |
|
|
Moonlight
and the whippoorwills; |
|
While in leagues of airy lightness, |
|
|
Cooled
by clear, ethereal gales, |
10 |
| The
great seraphs, dark with brightness, |
|
|
Tossing
up their whirling flails, |
|
Thresh the golden sheaf of the Sun; |
|
|
Till
the pure candescent kernel |
|
| (Multifold,
quintillion), |
15 |
|
Showers
upon the vivid, vernal. |
|
Face of the earth, so cool, so tender, |
|
|
From
the moonlight and the dew, |
|
| As
it turns through gradual splendour |
|
|
Back
to moonlight and dew. |
20 |
But as yet the awns of sunlight |
|
|
Dance
alone on the dusky floor, |
|
| Idly
drifting by the one bright |
|
|
Angel
at the dawn's door. |
|
Imogen's
Wish
|
|
| WHEN
I have spent my little life, |
|
|
I
pray you of your grace |
|
| Lay
me in some secluded spot |
|
|
A
maple-shadowed place; |
|
Where spring shall gently green the grass, |
5 |
|
Where
silver snow had lain, |
|
| Where
only tempered sun shall fall, |
|
|
After
a soothing rain. |
|
For mine own flower I would prefer, |
|
|
Leaving
the world the rest, |
10 |
| A
brood of the wood-daffodil, |
|
|
To
tremble on my breast, |
|
Then you might say if wandered there, |
|
|
Far
from your light and power, |
|
| "She
must have lived with lovely thought |
15 |
|
To
choose so pure a flower". |
|
Time
the Victor
|
|
| THE
graves are in the moonlight |
|
|
Clustered
on the hill, |
|
| The
shadows of the headstones |
|
|
Move
with the moon's will. |
|
Upon the silvered marble |
5 |
|
Are
traced in fading dust |
|
| Words
of Hope and Triumph |
|
|
Of
Sorrow and of Trust. |
|
One proclaims all virtue |
|
|
Another
prays for rest, |
10 |
| And
all declare immortal |
|
|
The
Soul upon her quest. |
|
Clouds will march with thunder, |
|
|
Moons
will glow and wane, |
|
| Men
will write their hearts out, |
15 |
|
And
ask for truth in vain; |
|
And Time the careless Victor, |
|
|
In
spite of hopes and tears |
|
| Will
crush the stones of memory |
|
|
With
the falling years. |
20 |
Spring
in the Valley
|
|
| SPRING
has caught up the eager earth |
|
|
With
her enchanted power; |
|
In
rounded drifts of ashy white
|
|
|
The
plum-trees are in flower. |
|
The light is like a fluttering bird |
5 |
|
Caught
in a cage of blue; |
|
| The
warmth is like a beating heart |
|
|
Flooding
the world through. |
|
No leaves are full upon the woods |
|
|
Only
a dream of leaves; |
10 |
| The
sun, from the hollow to the height, |
|
|
A
wave of colour weaves. |
|
Groups of black pines like builded piers |
|
|
Stand
solid in the glow, |
|
| As
if they held the shimmering tide |
15 |
|
Back
from an overflow. |
|
Only two sounds are on the air, |
|
|
A
snow-brook babbles free, |
|
| A
blue-bird tries his early note |
|
|
In
an old apple-tree. |
20 |
Under the pines, in the brown shade, |
|
|
Two
lovers are at rest; |
|
| No
thoughts disturb the pools of joy |
|
|
Tranquil
in either breast. |
|
The mist of evening in his eyes, |
25 |
|
The
dew of morns in hers, |
|
| Between
them in the fluttering light |
|
|
The
breath of beauty stirs. |
|
Twilight
|
|
| WHEN
twilight walks in the west, |
|
|
Meeting
the night with a sigh, |
|
| When
the wild bird comes to her nest |
|
|
And
a star to the open sky, |
|
Tenderness flows on the air, |
5 |
|
In
full tide deep and still; |
|
| It
frees the mind of care |
|
|
And
quiet the restless will. |
|
The soul enters her own |
|
|
Home
of delight long sought, |
10 |
| The
heaven of feeling strown |
|
|
With
nebulous stars of thought. |
|
Beauty stirs in the breast, |
|
|
Ecstasy
trembles there— |
|
| When
twilight walks in the west |
15 |
|
And
tenderness flows on the air. |
|
A
Secret
|
|
| THE
rain rustled to fall |
|
|
In
the garden by the wall, |
|
| Whispered
a secret say, |
|
|
And
rustled away. |
|
Then when the light grew stronger,
|
5 |
|
A
great rain fell |
|
| And
talked for an hour longer |
|
|
With
nothing to tell. |
|
For the rain had whispered all |
|
|
In
the garden by the wall, |
10 |
| All
it was sent to say |
|
|
Ere
the break of the day. |
|
A
Song
|
|
| MOMENTS
fall from the hour, |
|
|
Hours
from the day, |
|
| They
say as they fall, |
|
|
Flee
away—flee
away. |
|
Flee away colour of life; |
5 |
|
Action
and power |
|
| Come
quiet to end |
|
|
As
the death of a flower. |
|
Leave us beauty and love |
|
|
Longing
to stay; |
10 |
| The
moments say and the hours |
|
|
Flee
away—flee
away. |
|
Past
and Present
|
|
IT
seems how long ago
How far away it seems,
Since Time was free of delusions and of dreams,
And Life a story of enchanted hours
Told in the idiom of happy trees, |
5 |
In
the wind's idiom, and the flower's,
Natural as these.
Yet Time will linger to repeat
The murmur of a sound so moving sweet,
The shadow of a scene coloured so fair; |
10 |
Till
memory shall grow
More real than the actual day
And come to be the substance, not the show,
Of past enchantment, till that seems
Not very far away nor long ago. |
15 |
A
Group of Lyrics
|
|
I
|
|
O
WAVE that breaks far out at sea!
Too far, far off for any sound
To come to me, but only sight
Of the green curve, the crest of light
The flash—and then the level of the sea. |
5 |
O Soul that lifts this level life!
Too far, far off for any love
To come to me, but only sight
Of the great heart's motion, and the light
Of beauty—and then the level of this life. |
10 |
II
|
|
Where
there was sea the mountains stand
On rift and ridge are shells and sand
Change has enriched the moving air;
Then why should not thy lover dare
To touch thy lips and eyes divine |
15 |
And
lay his heart to thine?
Where there was land the ocean rolls
And fields are gulfed in deeps and shoals
Change has enriched the gleaming sea;
Then why not change and come to me
|
20 |
With
trembling lips and eyes divine
And lay thy heart to mine?
|
|
III
|
|
| Twilight
had formed a lovely rose, |
|
|
A
flower of film and fire; |
|
| It
seemed as if the throbbing west |
25 |
|
Had
found our heart's desire. |
|
Then Shadow, from the breathless void |
|
|
Where
rest and silence are, |
|
| Gathered
the lovely rose for Death |
|
|
And
left us with a star. |
30 |
IV
|
|
| The
rose shall fade |
|
|
The
dew shall dry |
|
| There
shall be no more sea |
|
|
And
no more sky. |
|
How swift the fatal thought |
35 |
|
Towards
the sure ending falls, |
|
| Forgetting
all the throbbing life |
|
|
Of
the sweet intervals. |
|
Yet Fate has not the power |
|
|
To
rob the rose of scent, |
40 |
| Or
steal the rapture from the hour |
|
|
Of
Love's content. |
|
The
Wise Men From the East
|
|
A
CHRISTMAS CAROL |
|
TO Bethlehem beneath the Star,
The wise men from the outlands far |
|
|
Came
clad in silk and vair; |
|
Christ
Jesus in His Mother's hold
Stared at the jewels and the gold, |
5 |
|
The
three made wondrous fair. |
|
Then first the swarthy Baltasar,
Whose glance was like a scimitar, |
|
|
Stood
forth before the rest: |
|
| Although
he bore the fragrant myrrh, |
10 |
| Christ
Jesus turned from him to her |
|
|
And
hid within her breast. |
|
Behind him was the youth Gaspar,
Who held a shining crystal jar, |
|
|
His
face was merry and red; |
15 |
Although
he bore the frankincense
And was of debonair presence, |
|
|
Christ
Jesus turned His head. |
|
The third was haughty Melchoir,
Dark with spoil of mart and war, |
20 |
|
He
bore the crusted gold; |
|
Christ
Jesus gave a cry of pain,
And looked not on them once again |
|
|
But
nestled in His fold. |
|
For they had brought Him treasure-trove, |
25 |
| But
had not any little love |
|
|
For
one they thought a King: |
|
Christ
Jesus gave to Mary then
His first mild message unto men, |
|
|
Love
is the precious thing. |
30 |
The
Spider and the Rose
|
|
FILMS
and flashes—
Music came in careless crashes
On the shore of silence.
I heard a voice declare
This is the famous Fair, |
5 |
The
Fair of Moods and Passions,
Of Follies and of Fashions
Triumphant in the sea.
Light fell with a blasting glare
There were no blue shadows there. |
10 |
Music
made the shadow;
Pouring from a grey pavilion
That sparkled with a million
Lustres, and a leader made of bones
Hurled the trombone tones |
15 |
To
the dancers far below.
All around them a gigantic,
Vast and vertical Atlantic;
Walls as clear as emerald,
Emerald hard and emerald green; |
20 |
The
bright burning fish were seen
Before a tapestry of weeds and shells,
Woven of tangled seeds and bells
Shimmering with the glamour of the sea.
Dancers under the music flail |
25 |
Whirled
and dashed along the floor;
"Wont you deign to dance with me?"
I had known that face before;
Not the Beauty I adore
I had come there to see: |
30 |
She
was gypsy-dark and free,
Naked to the waist and wild,
A changeling, a fairy child;
Spiders lived in her dusk hair,
I could see them ambushed there. |
35 |
As
we danced she bent away—
Far away, and backward bent;
Down and ever down we went,
Outcasts from a honied moon,
At the nadir of the swoon |
40 |
Her
remote and fairy features
Gleamed like some illfated creature's
Floating in a pool.
Drifting slow I heard her singing
Far, far off a silver cool |
45 |
Old
and passionless ditty
Simple with a touch of pity.
Leave the roses on the rose-tree
Day after day
Leave them, let them linger |
50 |
Till
they fade away
Let them know the joy of dying
Ungathered after all
With fragrance sighing
As they fall. |
55 |
I saw her ruby eyelids flare
Through the spider-haunted hair.
They wove her hair in subtle strands,
Linked them up with branch-like bands,
Spread the web across the lands, |
60 |
Hid
the sea and Fair.
From infinity of height
I saw white roses lie in light
On the web of woven hair:
It was changing I was ware, |
65 |
It
was nothing but a rose-tree
With its moonlight-load
Of blossom by the border of a road.
Then there fell a Shadow,
A Shadow without form, |
70 |
Like
the core of a storm.
The music stopped,
Away the dancing dropped,
The sea-wall flickered like green flame.
He was not a solid being |
75 |
That
one knows by touch or seeing,
That one calls by any name,
Just the Shadow of a feeling
Drifting down and stealing
Down the Midway. |
80 |
The
dancers rushed and crowded
Towards the Shadow that enshrouded
All the sea and air,
Their swift action was a prayer
For something precious, peerless |
85 |
That
made them fierce and fearless
Of the Shadow.
I could not hear their questions
But I swear I heard him say
"No Dancers, no, |
90 |
I'm
not taking any lives today."
Then they melted away
Like children denied,
The sea even sighed;
When the music throbbed and ached |
95 |
It
was ancient pain unslaked
Or a sorrow that had died and lived again.
Then I saw one coming through the crowd,
If a star could be a sound,
If a moving line of melody |
100 |
Could
be a woman's grace,
If a rose could be a face,
That was she, the darling Beauty
I had come there to see.
She seemed all astray |
105 |
Lost
and lonely,
To be seeking one soul only;
But she never looked my way.
Then
she floated near the Shadow
As the music-stream ran shallow, |
110 |
The
rhythm slack and meagre,
She murmured something eager,
Anxious and slow,
A question that would brook no delay;
And again I heard him say |
115 |
This
time, this way,
"No Beauty, no,
I am claiming only one life today".
Tears of wild dismay
Dashed across her vivid face; |
120 |
I
saw her anguished beauty
Move with a haunting grace
To the measure of a song I heard
Once in another place,
"Let them know the joy of dying" |
125 |
Then
a far-off call,
Like a sweeter voice replying,
"With fragrance sighing
As they fall".
O to have given something I had brought |
130 |
Pure
as gathered moonlight,
The fragrance of a thought,
Before she went away;
But the music sprang and crashed
And she winced as if lashed |
135 |
By
the trumpets stinging loud;
She was taken by the crowd.
So I only heard her murmur,
Anxious and low,
And I heard the Shadow say, |
140 |
"No
Beauty, no."
Then I thought to venture nearer,
To see the Shadow clearer,
But I found myself surrounded
With dim fringes bounded
|
145 |
By
nothing. Then a wonder!
A pigeon white as silver
Hanging on a cloud of thunder,
Hanging on the vacant air;
Not a pigeon but a hand carven fair |
150 |
Out
of ivory—
Perfect, so I dreamed, a hand
A mad princess might command
Her Chief Carver to make
For a false lover's sake. |
155 |
(She
had strangled him and cut off a hand).
The hand hung at her side,
She
played with it and cried,—
"This is good luck", she said,
"My good luck," she sighed. |
160 |
| The
ivory hand was dead
Carven without flaw,
But I shivered when I saw
That between the thumb and finger
Was
a living white rose. |
165 |
Then
I remembered:
I had lingered on the road
By a rose-tree with its load
Of blossom, and had chosen
One whose beauty was like frozen |
170 |
Moonlight;
as I plucked it
Rushed a spider from his lair;
He was armed and ambushed there
To protect the virgin rose-tree from her foes.
But I thought no more |
175 |
| When
I robbed the rose-tree of a rose
Than, "This will be a beauty
For the Beauty I adore
Who is waiting at the Fair."
I remembered
and I knew the hand was my hand, |
180 |
I
knew it by the rose,
And upon the index finger,
For a ring, the spider clinging
In malign repose.
Then the whole Fair's evil riot |
180 |
Fell
into a fatal quiet
To hearken while I questioned
And to hear the Shadow say,—
"Yea—you who robbed the rose-tree
You must come today." |
185 |
Darkness in a rain of ashes
Broken through with films and flashes,
Dancers wrenched apart and flying,
Music
blown away and dying
With the roar of the falling sea.
|
190 |
Then
the Beauty I adore
Rushing from the ruined Fair
Paused a moment in her flight,
Frantic when she saw me there,
Whispering, faint and brokenhearted, |
195 |
"I
had sought you everywhere",
Kissed me once before we parted
On the forehead and the hair. |
|
The
Nightwatchman
|
|
ONE
of my father's flock was Alfred Mee,
To my young mind a man of mystery;
His habits and appearance were so strange,
Unusual, and far beyond my range;
He slept throughout the day and worked at night; |
5 |
So
I would wait all breathless for the sight
Of the tall, fragile form of Mister Mee,
The afternoons that we were asked for tea.
A shadow—he was always clad in gray—
His face and hands were pallid like dry clay, |
10 |
Hair
shaggy, dark and sleepless-looking eyes
That blinked at light; then the enormous size
Of the long hand that bore the curious thing
That charmed and held me—a great mourning-ring
Of heavy gold surrounding a black stone |
15 |
That
made a blot upon the skin and bone
Of his long finger. (Mistress Mee's aside
"'Twas give him by his sister when she died").
His wife, he always called her Mistress Mee,
Unlike her husband as she well could be, |
20 |
Was
bustling, bright, and sure and serviceable
As water in a river or a well;
With a large bosom and a florid face
She was the happy genius of the place.
She never called him Alfred, Alf. or Dear, |
25 |
But
always mister Mee. With slow, and queer
And sleep-like motion he would range
About the little garden, vague and strange.
I watched
him wander with a kind of awe,
For floating round his cloudy form I saw |
30 |
The
foundry where he worked as nightwatchman,
The sprawling buildings, the bewildering plan
Of corridors, and workshops, and machines,
Where I was led and lectured on the scenes
By daylight; but the moulding-shop by far |
35 |
Was
weirdest; no clanging noises there to jar
But only space, and gloom in the raftered roof,
Grey light through grimy panes almost sun-proof,
With flags of cobwebs hanging in many a shred,
Laden with dust, and all the shadowy shed |
40 |
Filled
with the smell of the charred moulding-earth
On a cool air; I thought it must be worth
Millions to be a man like Mister Mee
To watch for fires and thieves and tramps and be
Alone all night, wandering about, to hark |
45 |
For
noise, and eat at midnight in the dark.
My fears
were draped around the lean pale head
That peered amongst the flowers, and my dread
Of darkness and of every frightening thing
Was focused on the solemn mourning-ring. |
50 |
His garden-gem I never can forget—
The hen-and-chickens in the border set
And over them the clubs of mignonette;
Rooted in stones upon a sunny slope,
Sweetest of all sweet things the heliotrope; |
55 |
Spears
of dust-purple lavender,
And
many another flower to make a blur
Of colour and design, of dark and light,
In memory now a tangle of scent and sight;
And plants of pungent leaf, and one of those |
60 |
Weird
Mister Mee would crush beneath my nose
And say, "Now sniff this hard and you will
be
Someday a tall and strong OLD MAN like me".
Then Mistress Mee would laugh and say, "For
sure
O Mister Mee, you are a perfect cure:" |
65 |
A
pair of garden scissors he would bring
In the lean hand that wore the mourning-ring,
And the pale fingers would disturb and cull
Of all the blossoms the most beautiful;
When they were blended into a bouquet |
70 |
He'd
drift along the path and dreamily say,
"Take these to Mother when you go away."
But to my timid heart the day was rife
With shadows from his other hidden life,
And as he floated about and came and went, |
75 |
Flower-scent
was mingled with the acrid scent
Of the burnt soil; and close, a paler man
Clad in blue overalls, bearing a can
Of secret food, near him there seemed to lurk;
(Thus had I seen him slouching to his work). |
80 |
When the time came, in the crab-apple shade
Kind Mistress Mee would have the table laid,
Spreading a dainty, checkered linen cover
And smothering it with wonder-things all over,
Silver and glass and china, blue and gold, |
85 |
Things
that were frail and precious I was told,
Brought from a distant land that she called "Home".
Cool
milk for drink and honey in the comb,
Thin bread-and-butter, and flour-dusted scones,
Rich damson plums, preserved without the stones, |
90 |
Luscious
soft-custard in long glasses shrined,
Light layer-cake with lemon jelly lined.
"Now sit you down and eat, my duckies, do
Never dont stop until you're rightly through."
None of these dainties Mister Mee would eat |
95 |
| He
sat apart upon a garden-seat.
From Mistress Mee, "He's breakfasted before,"
Breakfast! on what strange food at that uncanny
hour?
Then after tea I had to stand and say,
"It
was a summer evening", Casabianca, |
100 |
And,
"I remember," out of Ingoldsby,
Enjoyed with many a chuckle by Mister Mee.
Then she would say, "Now Mister Mee repeat
Sexton's Lament, and give the lambs a treat".
Then he would murmur, as if under a spell, |
105 |
Sexton's
Lament in which he bade farewell
To the crypt, the graves, the belfry and the bell.
"He made it up himself" (whispered aside),
She
smoothed her satin apron in her pride.
Even as we looked he vanished out of sight |
110 |
And
went away to stay awake all night.
Then we must go and bare our gifts away—
The flowers for Mother, Mistress Mee would say,
"Now take this to your Auntie", a small
pot
Of bear's grease, scented sweet with bergamot. |
115 |
Why have I dreamed and started up this show
Of things that happened many a year ago?
For gentle, buxom Mistress Mee is gone
All her treasures to the four winds strown;
And Mister Mee they found one morning dead |
120 |
Clutching
his lantern in the moulding-shed.
Searching a desk for treasure I unbound
An old portfolio and there I found
Written with formal flourish on a half
Sheet of blue note-paper this EPITAPH. |
125 |
Kind friend pause here a moment for you see
The humble grave of MR. ALFRED MEE.
He was nightwatchman in a moulding-shop
And died resigned but full of hope.
He often mentioned in his quiet way |
130 |
That
when he got to heaven he would say
To some great herald-angel—HARK—
I wish you'd put me in the dark.
I cannot bear this glaring light
For down below I turned the day to night, |
135 |
I
kept a watch for fires and wicked men
And up in heaven I'd do that work again.
You hope he got his wish? then do agree
To say a prayer for him where'er you be
For when you pray for him you pray for ME. |
140 |
Who wrote the lines and are they on the stone
Where Mister and Mistress Mee lie all alone?
Someday I must adventure to the spot
And search amid the maples for their plot;
When I approach the headstone I should hope |
145 |
To
know it by the scent of heliotrope,
And rooted firm within their tiny span,
To find the pungent herb that's called OLD MAN. |
|
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