The poetical works of Bayard Taylor Household Edition : with illustrations |
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 | The poetical works of Bayard Taylor |  |
105
[FIRST EVENING]
FIRST EVENING
The day had come, the day of many years.
My bud of hope, thorned round with guarding fears,
And sealed with frosts of oft-renewed delay,
Burst into sudden bloom—it was the day!
“Ernest will come!” the early sunbeams cried;
“Will come!” was breathed through all the woodlands wide;
“Will come, will come!” said cloud, and brook, and bird;
And when the hollow roll of wheels was heard
Across the bridge, it thundered, “He is near!”
And then my heart made answer, “He is here!”
My bud of hope, thorned round with guarding fears,
And sealed with frosts of oft-renewed delay,
Burst into sudden bloom—it was the day!
“Ernest will come!” the early sunbeams cried;
“Will come!” was breathed through all the woodlands wide;
“Will come, will come!” said cloud, and brook, and bird;
And when the hollow roll of wheels was heard
Across the bridge, it thundered, “He is near!”
And then my heart made answer, “He is here!”
Ernest was here, and now the day had gone
Like other days, yet wild and swift and sweet,—
And yet prolonged, as if with whirling feet
One troop of duplicated Hours sped on
And one trod out the moments lingeringly:
So distant seemed the lonely dawn from me.
But all was well. He paced the new-mown lawn,
With Edith at his side, and, while my firs
Stood bronzed with sunset, happy glances cast
On the familiar landmarks of the Past.
I heard a gentle laugh: the laugh was hers.
“Confess it,” she exclaimed, “I recognize,
No less than you, the features of the place,
So often have I seen it with the eyes
Your memory gave me: yea, your very face,
With every movement of the theme, betrayed
That here the sunshine lay, and there the shade.”
“A proof!” cried Ernest. “Let me be your guide,”
She said, “and speak not: Philip shall decide.”
To them I went, at beckon of her hand.
A moment she the mellow landscape scanned
In seeming doubt, but only to prolong
A witching aspect of uncertainty,
And the soft smile in Ernest's watching eye:
“Yonder,” she said, “(I see I am not wrong,
By Philip's face,) you built your hermit seat
Against the rock, among the scented fern,
Where summer lizards played about your feet;
And here, beside us, is the tottering urn
You cracked in fixing firmly on its base;
And here—yes, yes!—this is the very place—
I know the wild vine and the sassafras—
Where you and Philip, lying in the grass,
Disowned the world, renounced the race of men,
And you all love, except your own for him,
Until, through that, all love came back again.”
Here Edith paused; but Ernest's eyes were dim.
He kissed her, gave a loving hand to me,
And spoke: “Ah, Philip, Philip, those were days
We dare remember now, when only blaze
Far-off, the storm's black edges brokenly.
Who thinks, at night, that morn will ever be?
Who knows, far out upon the central sea,
That anywhere is land? And yet, a shore
Has set behind us, and will rise before:
A past foretells a future.” “Blessed be
That Past!” I answered, “on whose bosom lay
Peace, like a new-born child: and now, I see,
The child is man, begetting day by day
Some fresher joy, some other bliss, to make
Your life the fairer for his mother's sake.”
Like other days, yet wild and swift and sweet,—
And yet prolonged, as if with whirling feet
One troop of duplicated Hours sped on
And one trod out the moments lingeringly:
So distant seemed the lonely dawn from me.
But all was well. He paced the new-mown lawn,
With Edith at his side, and, while my firs
Stood bronzed with sunset, happy glances cast
On the familiar landmarks of the Past.
I heard a gentle laugh: the laugh was hers.
“Confess it,” she exclaimed, “I recognize,
No less than you, the features of the place,
So often have I seen it with the eyes
Your memory gave me: yea, your very face,
With every movement of the theme, betrayed
That here the sunshine lay, and there the shade.”
“A proof!” cried Ernest. “Let me be your guide,”
She said, “and speak not: Philip shall decide.”
To them I went, at beckon of her hand.
A moment she the mellow landscape scanned
In seeming doubt, but only to prolong
A witching aspect of uncertainty,
And the soft smile in Ernest's watching eye:
“Yonder,” she said, “(I see I am not wrong,
By Philip's face,) you built your hermit seat
Against the rock, among the scented fern,
Where summer lizards played about your feet;
And here, beside us, is the tottering urn
You cracked in fixing firmly on its base;
And here—yes, yes!—this is the very place—
I know the wild vine and the sassafras—
Where you and Philip, lying in the grass,
106
And you all love, except your own for him,
Until, through that, all love came back again.”
Here Edith paused; but Ernest's eyes were dim.
He kissed her, gave a loving hand to me,
And spoke: “Ah, Philip, Philip, those were days
We dare remember now, when only blaze
Far-off, the storm's black edges brokenly.
Who thinks, at night, that morn will ever be?
Who knows, far out upon the central sea,
That anywhere is land? And yet, a shore
Has set behind us, and will rise before:
A past foretells a future.” “Blessed be
That Past!” I answered, “on whose bosom lay
Peace, like a new-born child: and now, I see,
The child is man, begetting day by day
Some fresher joy, some other bliss, to make
Your life the fairer for his mother's sake.”
Deeper beneath the oaks the shadows grew:
The twilight glimmer from their tops withdrew,
And purple gloomed the distant hills, and sweet
The sudden breath of evening rose, with balm
Of grassy meadows: in the upper calm
The pulses of the stars began to beat:
The fire-flies twinkled: through the lindens went
A rustle, as of happy leaves composed
To airy sleep, of drowsy petals closed,
And the dark land lay silent and content.
We, too, were silent. Ernest walked, I knew,
With me, beneath the stars of other eves:
He heard, with me, the tongues of perished leaves:
Departed suns their trails of splendor drew
Across departed summers: whispers came
From voices, long ago resolved again
Into the primal Silence, and we twain,
Ghosts of our present selves, yet still the same,
As in a spectral mirror wandered there.
Its pain outlived, the Past was only fair.
Ten years had passed since I had touched his hand,
And felt upon my lips the brother-kiss
That shames not manhood,—years of quiet bliss
To me, fast-rooted on paternal land,
Mated, yet childless. He had journeyed far
Beyond the borders of my life, and whirled
Unresting round the vortex of the world,
The reckless child of some eccentric star,
Careless of fate, yet with a central strength
I knew would hold his life in equipoise,
And bent his wandering energies, at length,
To the smooth orbit of serener joys.
Few were the winds that wafted to my nest
A leaf from him: I learned that he was blest,—
The late fulfilment of my prophecy,—
And then I felt that he must come to me,
The old, unswerving sympathy to claim;
And set my house in order for a guest
Long ere the message of his coming came.
The twilight glimmer from their tops withdrew,
And purple gloomed the distant hills, and sweet
The sudden breath of evening rose, with balm
Of grassy meadows: in the upper calm
The pulses of the stars began to beat:
The fire-flies twinkled: through the lindens went
A rustle, as of happy leaves composed
To airy sleep, of drowsy petals closed,
And the dark land lay silent and content.
We, too, were silent. Ernest walked, I knew,
With me, beneath the stars of other eves:
He heard, with me, the tongues of perished leaves:
Departed suns their trails of splendor drew
Across departed summers: whispers came
From voices, long ago resolved again
Into the primal Silence, and we twain,
Ghosts of our present selves, yet still the same,
As in a spectral mirror wandered there.
Its pain outlived, the Past was only fair.
Ten years had passed since I had touched his hand,
And felt upon my lips the brother-kiss
That shames not manhood,—years of quiet bliss
To me, fast-rooted on paternal land,
Mated, yet childless. He had journeyed far
Beyond the borders of my life, and whirled
Unresting round the vortex of the world,
The reckless child of some eccentric star,
Careless of fate, yet with a central strength
I knew would hold his life in equipoise,
And bent his wandering energies, at length,
To the smooth orbit of serener joys.
Few were the winds that wafted to my nest
A leaf from him: I learned that he was blest,—
The late fulfilment of my prophecy,—
And then I felt that he must come to me,
The old, unswerving sympathy to claim;
107
Long ere the message of his coming came.
In gentle terraces my garden fell
Down to the rolling lawn. On one side rose,
Flanking the layers of bloom, a bolder swell
With laurels clad, and every shrub that grows
Upon our native hills, a bosky mound,
Whence the commingling valleys might be seen
Bluer and lovelier through the gaps of green.
The rustic arbor which the summit crowned
Was woven of shining smilax, trumpet-vine,
Clematis, and the wild white eglantine,
Whose tropical luxuriance overhung
The interspaces of the posts, and made
For each sweet picture frames of bloom and shade.
It was my favorite haunt when I was young,
To read my poets, watch my sunset fade
Behind my father's hills, and, when the moon
Shed warmer silver through the nights of June,
Dream, as 't were new, the universal dream.
This arbor, too, was Ernest's hermitage:
Here he had read to me his tear-stained page
Of sorrow, here renewed the pang supreme
Which burned his youth to ashes: here would try
To lay his burden in the hands of Song,
And make the Poet bear the Lover's wrong,
But still his heart impatiently would cry:
“In vain, in vain! You cannot teach to flow
In measured lines so measureless a woe.
First learn to slay this wild beast of despair,
Then from his harmless jaws your honey tear!”
Down to the rolling lawn. On one side rose,
Flanking the layers of bloom, a bolder swell
With laurels clad, and every shrub that grows
Upon our native hills, a bosky mound,
Whence the commingling valleys might be seen
Bluer and lovelier through the gaps of green.
The rustic arbor which the summit crowned
Was woven of shining smilax, trumpet-vine,
Clematis, and the wild white eglantine,
Whose tropical luxuriance overhung
The interspaces of the posts, and made
For each sweet picture frames of bloom and shade.
It was my favorite haunt when I was young,
To read my poets, watch my sunset fade
Behind my father's hills, and, when the moon
Shed warmer silver through the nights of June,
Dream, as 't were new, the universal dream.
This arbor, too, was Ernest's hermitage:
Here he had read to me his tear-stained page
Of sorrow, here renewed the pang supreme
Which burned his youth to ashes: here would try
To lay his burden in the hands of Song,
And make the Poet bear the Lover's wrong,
But still his heart impatiently would cry:
“In vain, in vain! You cannot teach to flow
In measured lines so measureless a woe.
First learn to slay this wild beast of despair,
Then from his harmless jaws your honey tear!”
Hither we came. Beloved hands had graced
The table with a flask of mellow juice,
Thereto the gentle herb that poets use
When Fancy droops, and in the corner placed
A lamp, that glimmered through its misty sphere
Like moonlit marble, on a pedestal
Of knotted roots, against the leafy wall.
The air was dry, the night was calm and clear,
And in the dying clover crickets chirped.
The Past, I felt, the Past alone usurped
Our thoughts,—the hour of confidence had come,
Of sweet confession, tender interchange,
Which drew our hearts together, yet with strange
Half-dread repelled them. Seeing Ernest dumb
With memories of the spot, as if to me
Belonged the right his secrets to evoke.
And Edith's eyes on mine, consentingly,
Conscious of all I wished to know, I spoke:
“Dear Friend, one volume of your life I read
Beneath these vines: you placed it in my hand
And made it mine,—but how the tale has sped
Since then. I know not, or can understand
From this fair ending only. Let me see
The intervening chapters, dark and bright,
In order, as you lived them. Give to-night
Unto the Past, dear Ernest, and to me!”
Thus I, with doubt and loving hesitance,
Lest I should touch a nerve he fain would hide;
But he, with calm and reassuring glance,
In which no troubled shadow lay, replied:
“That mingled light and darkness are no more
In this new life, than are the sun and shade
Of painted landscapes: distant lies the shore
Where last we parted, Philip: how I made
The journey, what adventures on the road,
What haps I met, what struggles, what success
Of fame, or gold, or place, concerns you less,
Dear friend, than how I lost that sorest load
I started with, and came to dwell at last
In the House Beautiful. There but remains
A fragment here and there,—wild, broken strains
And scattered voices speaking from the Past.”
“Let me those broken voices hear,” I said,
“And I shall know the rest.” “Well—be it so.
You, who would write ‘Resurgam’ o'er my dead,
The resurrection of my heart shall know.”
The table with a flask of mellow juice,
Thereto the gentle herb that poets use
When Fancy droops, and in the corner placed
A lamp, that glimmered through its misty sphere
Like moonlit marble, on a pedestal
Of knotted roots, against the leafy wall.
The air was dry, the night was calm and clear,
And in the dying clover crickets chirped.
The Past, I felt, the Past alone usurped
Our thoughts,—the hour of confidence had come,
Of sweet confession, tender interchange,
Which drew our hearts together, yet with strange
Half-dread repelled them. Seeing Ernest dumb
With memories of the spot, as if to me
Belonged the right his secrets to evoke.
And Edith's eyes on mine, consentingly,
Conscious of all I wished to know, I spoke:
“Dear Friend, one volume of your life I read
Beneath these vines: you placed it in my hand
And made it mine,—but how the tale has sped
Since then. I know not, or can understand
From this fair ending only. Let me see
108
In order, as you lived them. Give to-night
Unto the Past, dear Ernest, and to me!”
Thus I, with doubt and loving hesitance,
Lest I should touch a nerve he fain would hide;
But he, with calm and reassuring glance,
In which no troubled shadow lay, replied:
“That mingled light and darkness are no more
In this new life, than are the sun and shade
Of painted landscapes: distant lies the shore
Where last we parted, Philip: how I made
The journey, what adventures on the road,
What haps I met, what struggles, what success
Of fame, or gold, or place, concerns you less,
Dear friend, than how I lost that sorest load
I started with, and came to dwell at last
In the House Beautiful. There but remains
A fragment here and there,—wild, broken strains
And scattered voices speaking from the Past.”
“Let me those broken voices hear,” I said,
“And I shall know the rest.” “Well—be it so.
You, who would write ‘Resurgam’ o'er my dead,
The resurrection of my heart shall know.”
Then Edith rose, and up the terraces
Went swiftly to the house; but soon we spied
Her white dress gleam, returning through the trees,
And, softly flushed, she came to Ernest's side,
A volume in her hand. But he delayed
Awhile his task, revolving leaf by leaf
With tender interest, now that ancient grief
No more had power to make his heart afraid;
For pain, that only lives in memory,
Like battle-scars, it is no pain to show.
“Here, Philip, are the secrets you would know,”
He said: “Howe'er obscure the utterance be
The lamp you lighted in the olden time
Will show my heart's-blood beating through the rhyme:
A poet's journal, writ in fire and tears
At first, blind protestations, blinder rage,
(For you and Edith only, many a page!)
Then slow deliverance, with the gaps of years
Between, and final struggles into life,
Which the heart shrank from, as 'twere death instead.”
Then, with a loving glance towards his wife,
Which she as fondly answered, thus he read:—
Went swiftly to the house; but soon we spied
Her white dress gleam, returning through the trees,
And, softly flushed, she came to Ernest's side,
A volume in her hand. But he delayed
Awhile his task, revolving leaf by leaf
With tender interest, now that ancient grief
No more had power to make his heart afraid;
For pain, that only lives in memory,
Like battle-scars, it is no pain to show.
“Here, Philip, are the secrets you would know,”
He said: “Howe'er obscure the utterance be
The lamp you lighted in the olden time
Will show my heart's-blood beating through the rhyme:
A poet's journal, writ in fire and tears
At first, blind protestations, blinder rage,
(For you and Edith only, many a page!)
Then slow deliverance, with the gaps of years
Between, and final struggles into life,
Which the heart shrank from, as 'twere death instead.”
Then, with a loving glance towards his wife,
Which she as fondly answered, thus he read:—
THE TORSO
I
In clay the statue stood complete,As beautiful a form, and fair,
As ever walked a Roman street
Or breathed the blue Athenian air:
The perfect limbs, divinely bare,
Their old, heroic freedom kept,
And in the features, fine and rare,
A calm, immortal sweetness slept.
II
O'er common men it towered, a god,And smote their meaner life with shame,
109
Its lifted brow was crowned with flame
And purified from touch of blame:
Yet wholly human was the face,
And over them who saw it came
The knowledge of their own disgrace.
III
It stood, regardless of the crowd,And simply showed what men might be:
Its solemn beauty disavowed
The curse of lost humanity.
Erect and proud, and pure and free,
It overlooked each loathsome law
Whereunto others bend the knee,
And only what was noble saw.
IV
The patience and the hope of yearsTheir final hour of triumph caught;
The clay was tempered with my tears,
The forces of my spirit wrought
With hands of fire to shape my thought,
That when, complete, the statue stood,
To marble resurrection brought,
The Master might pronounce it good.
V
But in the night an enemy,Who could not bear the wreath should grace
My ready forehead, stole the key
And hurled my statue from its base;
And now its fragments strew the place
Where I had dreamed its shrine might be:
The stains of common earth deface
Its beauty and its majesty.
VI
The torso prone before me lies;The cloven brow is knit with pain:
Mute lips, and blank, reproachful eyes
Unto my hands appeal in vain.
My hands shall never work again:
My hope is dead, my strength is spent:
This fatal wreck shall now remain
The ruined sculptor's monument.
1860.
ON THE HEADLAND
I sit on the lonely headland,
Where the sea-gulls come and go:
The sky is gray above me,
And the sea is gray below.
Where the sea-gulls come and go:
The sky is gray above me,
And the sea is gray below.
There is no fisherman's pinnace
Homeward or outward bound;
I see no living creature
In the world's deserted round.
Homeward or outward bound;
I see no living creature
In the world's deserted round.
I pine for something human,
Man, woman, young or old,—
Something to meet and welcome,
Something to clasp and hold.
Man, woman, young or old,—
Something to meet and welcome,
Something to clasp and hold.
I have a mouth for kisses,
But there 's no one to give and take;
I have a heart in my bosom
Beating for nobody's sake.
But there 's no one to give and take;
I have a heart in my bosom
Beating for nobody's sake.
O warmth of love that is wasted!
Is there none to stretch a hand?
No other heart that hungers
In all the living land?
Is there none to stretch a hand?
No other heart that hungers
In all the living land?
I could fondle the fisherman's baby,
And rock it into rest;
I could take the sunburnt sailor,
Like a brother, to my breast.
And rock it into rest;
I could take the sunburnt sailor,
Like a brother, to my breast.
I could clasp the hand of any
Outcast of land or sea,
If the guilty palm but answered
The tenderness in me!
Outcast of land or sea,
If the guilty palm but answered
The tenderness in me!
The sea might rise and drown me,—
Cliffs fall and crush my head,—
Were there one to love me, living,
Or weep to see me dead!
Cliffs fall and crush my head,—
Were there one to love me, living,
Or weep to see me dead!
1855.
MARAH
The waters of my life were sweet,
Before that bolt of sorrow fell;
But now, though fainting with the heat,
I dare not drink the bitter well.
Before that bolt of sorrow fell;
But now, though fainting with the heat,
I dare not drink the bitter well.
My God! shall Sin across the heart
Sweep like a wind that leaves no trace,
But Grief inflict a rankling smart
No after blessing can efface?
Sweep like a wind that leaves no trace,
But Grief inflict a rankling smart
No after blessing can efface?
110
I see the tired mechanic take
His evening rest beside his door,
And gentlier, for their father's sake,
His children tread the happy floor:
His evening rest beside his door,
And gentlier, for their father's sake,
His children tread the happy floor:
The kitchen teems with cheering smells,
With clash of cups and clink of knives,
And all the household picture tells
Of humble yet contented lives.
With clash of cups and clink of knives,
And all the household picture tells
Of humble yet contented lives.
Then in my heart the serpents hiss:
What right have these, who scarcely know
The perfect sweetness of their bliss,
To flaunt it thus before my woe?
What right have these, who scarcely know
The perfect sweetness of their bliss,
To flaunt it thus before my woe?
Like bread, Love's portion they divide,
Like water drink his precious wine,
When the least crumb they cast aside
Were manna for these lips of mine.
Like water drink his precious wine,
When the least crumb they cast aside
Were manna for these lips of mine.
I see the friend of other days
Lead home his flushed and silent bride!
His eyes are suns of tender praise.
Her eyes are stars of tender pride.
Lead home his flushed and silent bride!
His eyes are suns of tender praise.
Her eyes are stars of tender pride.
Go, hide your shameless happiness.
The demon cries, within my breast;
Think not that I the bond can bless,
Which seeing, I am twice unblest.
The demon cries, within my breast;
Think not that I the bond can bless,
Which seeing, I am twice unblest.
The husband of a year proclaims
His recent honor, shows the boy,
And calls the babe a thousand names,
And dandles it in awkward joy:
His recent honor, shows the boy,
And calls the babe a thousand names,
And dandles it in awkward joy:
And then—I see the wife's pale cheek,
Her eyes of pure, celestial ray—
The curse is choked: I cannot speak,
But, weeping, turn my head away!
Her eyes of pure, celestial ray—
The curse is choked: I cannot speak,
But, weeping, turn my head away!
1860.
THE VOICE OF THE TEMPTER
Last night the Tempter came to me, and said:“Why sorrow any longer for the dead?
The wrong is done: thy tears and groans are naught:
Forget the Past,—thy pain but lives in thought.
Night after night, I hear thy cries implore
An answer: she will answer thee no more.
Give up thine idle prayer that Death may come
And thou mayest somewhere find her: Death is dumb
To those that seek him. Live: for youth is thine.
Let not thy rich blood, like neglected wine,
Grow thin and stale, but rouse thyself, at last,
And take a man's revenge upon the Past.
What have thy virtues brought thee? Let them go,
And with them lose the burden of thy woe,
Their only payment for thy service hard:
They but exact, thou see'st, and not reward.
Thy life is cheated, thou art cast aside
In dust, the worn-out vessel of their pride.
Come, take thy pleasure: others do the same,
And love is theirs, and fortune, name, and fame!
Let not the name of Vice thine ear affright:
Vice is no darkness, but a different light,
Which thou dost need, to see thy path aright:
Or if some pang in this experience lie,
Through counter-pain thy present pain will die.
Bethink thee of the lost, the barren years,
Of harsh privations, unavailing tears,
The steady ache of strong desires restrained,
And what thou hast deserved, and what obtained:
Then go, thou fool! and, if thou canst, rejoice
To make such base ingratitude thy choice,
While each indulgence which thy brethren taste
But mocks thy palate, as it runs to waste!”
111
Alluring pictures round my prostrate head.
'Twixt sleep and waking, in my helpless ear
His honeyed voice rang musical and clear;
And half persuaded, shaken half with fear,
I heard him, till the Morn began to shine,
And found her brow less dewy-wet than mine.
1860.
EXORCISM
O tongues of the Past, be still!
Are the days not over and gone?
The joys have perished that were so sweet,
But the sorrow still lives on.
Are the days not over and gone?
The joys have perished that were so sweet,
But the sorrow still lives on.
I have sealed the graves of my hopes;
I have carried the pall of love:
Let the pains and pangs be buried as deep,
And the grass be as green above!
I have carried the pall of love:
Let the pains and pangs be buried as deep,
And the grass be as green above!
But the ghosts of the dead arise:
They come when the board is spread;
They poison the wine of the banquet cups
With the mould their lips have shed.
They come when the board is spread;
They poison the wine of the banquet cups
With the mould their lips have shed.
The pulse of the bacchant blood
May throb in the ivy wreath,
But the berries are plucked from the nightshade bough
That grows in the gardens of Death.
May throb in the ivy wreath,
But the berries are plucked from the nightshade bough
That grows in the gardens of Death.
I sleep with joy at my heart,
Warm as a new-made bride;
But a vampire comes to suck her blood,
And I wake with a corpse at my side.
Warm as a new-made bride;
But a vampire comes to suck her blood,
And I wake with a corpse at my side.
O ghosts, I have given to you
The bliss of the faded years;
The sweat of my brow, the blood of my heart,
And manhood's terrible tears!
The bliss of the faded years;
The sweat of my brow, the blood of my heart,
And manhood's terrible tears!
Take them, and be content:
I have nothing more to give:
My soul is chilled in the house of Death,
And 'tis time that I should live.
I have nothing more to give:
My soul is chilled in the house of Death,
And 'tis time that I should live.
Take them, and let me be:
Lie still in the churchyard mould,
Nor chase from my heart each new delight
With the phantom of the old!
Lie still in the churchyard mould,
Nor chase from my heart each new delight
With the phantom of the old!
1855.
SQUANDERED LIVES
The fisherman wades in the surges;
The sailor sails over the sea;
The soldier steps bravely to battle;
The woodman lays axe to the tree.
The sailor sails over the sea;
The soldier steps bravely to battle;
The woodman lays axe to the tree.
They are each of the breed of the heroes,
The manhood attempered in strife:
Strong hands, that go lightly to labor,
True hearts, that take comfort in life.
The manhood attempered in strife:
Strong hands, that go lightly to labor,
True hearts, that take comfort in life.
In each is the seed to replenish
The world with the vigor it needs,—
The centre of honest affections,
The impulse to generous deeds.
The world with the vigor it needs,—
The centre of honest affections,
The impulse to generous deeds.
But the shark drinks the blood of the fisher;
The sailor is dropped in the sea;
The soldier lies cold by his cannon;
The woodman is crushed by his tree.
The sailor is dropped in the sea;
The soldier lies cold by his cannon;
The woodman is crushed by his tree.
Each prodigal life that is wasted
In manly achievement unseen,
But lengthens the days of the coward,
And strengthens the crafty and mean.
In manly achievement unseen,
But lengthens the days of the coward,
And strengthens the crafty and mean.
The blood of the noblest is lavished
That the selfish a profit may find;
But God sees the lives that are squandered,
And we to His wisdom are blind.
That the selfish a profit may find;
But God sees the lives that are squandered,
And we to His wisdom are blind.
1855.
112
A SYMBOL
I
Heavy, and hot, and gray,
Day following unto day,
A felon gang, their blind life drag away,—
Day following unto day,
A felon gang, their blind life drag away,—
Blind, vacant, dumb, as Time,
Lapsed from his wonted prime,
Begot them basely in incestuous crime:
Lapsed from his wonted prime,
Begot them basely in incestuous crime:
So little life there seems
About the woods and streams,—
Only a sleep, perplexed with nightmare-dreams.
About the woods and streams,—
Only a sleep, perplexed with nightmare-dreams.
The burden of a sigh
Stifles the weary sky,
Where smouldering clouds in ashen masses lie:
Stifles the weary sky,
Where smouldering clouds in ashen masses lie:
The forests fain would groan,
But, silenced into stone,
Crouch, in the dull blue vapors round them thrown.
But, silenced into stone,
Crouch, in the dull blue vapors round them thrown.
O light, more drear than gloom!
Than death more dead such bloom:
Yet life—yet life—shall burst this gathering doom!
Than death more dead such bloom:
Yet life—yet life—shall burst this gathering doom!
II
Behold! a swift and silent fire
Yon dull cloud pierces, in the west,
And blackening, as with growing ire,
He lifts his forehead from his breast.
Yon dull cloud pierces, in the west,
And blackening, as with growing ire,
He lifts his forehead from his breast.
He mutters to the ashy host
That all around him sleeping lie,—
Sole chieftain on the airy coast,
To fight the battles of the sky.
That all around him sleeping lie,—
Sole chieftain on the airy coast,
To fight the battles of the sky.
He slowly lifts his weary strength,
His shadow rises on the day,
And distant forests feel at length
A wind from landscapes far away.
His shadow rises on the day,
And distant forests feel at length
A wind from landscapes far away.
III
How shall the cloud unload its thunder?
How shall its flashes fire the air?
Hills and valleys are dumb with wonder:
Lakes look up with a leaden stare.
How shall its flashes fire the air?
Hills and valleys are dumb with wonder:
Lakes look up with a leaden stare.
Hark! the lungs of the striding giant
Bellow an angry answer back!
Hurling the hair from his brows defiant,
Crushing the laggards along his track.
Bellow an angry answer back!
Hurling the hair from his brows defiant,
Crushing the laggards along his track.
Now his step, like a battling Titan's,
Scales in flame the hills of the sky:
Struck by his breath, the forest whitens;
Fluttering waters feel him nigh!
Scales in flame the hills of the sky:
Struck by his breath, the forest whitens;
Fluttering waters feel him nigh!
Stroke on stroke of his thunder-hammer—
Sheets of flame from his anvil hurled—
Heaven's doors are burst in the clamor:
He alone possesses the world!
Sheets of flame from his anvil hurled—
Heaven's doors are burst in the clamor:
He alone possesses the world!
IV
Drowned woods, shudder no more:
Vexed lakes, smile as before:
Hills that vanished, appear again:
Rise for harvest, prostrate grain!
Vexed lakes, smile as before:
Hills that vanished, appear again:
Rise for harvest, prostrate grain!
Shake thy jewels, twinkling grass:
Blossoms, tint the winds that pass:
Sun, behold a world restored!
World, again thy sun is lord!
Blossoms, tint the winds that pass:
Sun, behold a world restored!
World, again thy sun is lord!
Thunder-spasms the waking be
Into Life from Apathy:
Life, not Death, is in the gale,—
Let the coming Doom prevail!
Into Life from Apathy:
Life, not Death, is in the gale,—
Let the coming Doom prevail!
1859.
Thus far he read: at first with even tone,Still chanting in the old, familiar key,—
That golden note, whose grand monotony
Is musical in poets' mouths alone,—
But broken, as he read, became the chime.
To speak, once more, in Grief's forgotten tongue,
And feel the hot reflex of passion flung
Back on the heart by every pulse of rhyme
113
More calm than his. With many a tender break
Of voice, a dimness of the haughty eye,
And pause of wandering memory, he read;
While I, with folded arms and downcast head,
In silence heard each blind, bewildered cry.
Thus far had Ernest read: but, closing now
The book, and lifting up a calmer brow,
“Forgive me, patient God, for this!” he said:
“And you forgive, dear friend, and dearest wife,
If I have marred an hour of this sweet life
With noises from the valley of the Dead.
Long, long ago, the Hand whereat I railed
In blindness gave me courage to subdue
This wild revolt: I see wherein I failed:
My heart was false, when most I thought it true,
My sorrow selfish, when I thought it pure.
For those we lose, if still their love endure
Translation to that other land, where Love
Breathes the immortal wisdom, ask in heaven
No greater sacrifice than we had given
On earth, our love's integrity to prove.
If we are blest to know the other blest,
Then treason lies in sorrow. Vainly said!
Alone each heart must cover up its dead;
Alone, through bitter toil, achieve its rest:
Which I have found—but still these records keep,
Lest I, condemning others, should forget
My own rebellion. From these tares I reap,
In evil days, a fruitful harvest yet.
“But 't is enough, to-night. Nay, Philip, here
A chapter closes. See! the moon is near:
Your laurels glitter: come, my darling, sing
The hymn I wrote on such a night as this!”
Then Edith, stooping first to take his kiss,
Drew from its niche of woodbine her guitar,
With chords prelusive tuned a slackened string,
And sang, clear-voiced, as some melodious star
Were dropping silver sweetness from afar:
God, to whom we look up blindly,
Look Thou down upon us kindly:
We have sinned, but not designedly.
Look Thou down upon us kindly:
We have sinned, but not designedly.
If our faith in Thee was shaken,
Pardon Thou our hearts mistaken,
Our obedience reawaken.
Pardon Thou our hearts mistaken,
Our obedience reawaken.
We are sinful, Thou art holy:
Thou art mighty, we are lowly:
Let us reach Thee, climbing slowly.
Thou art mighty, we are lowly:
Let us reach Thee, climbing slowly.
Our ingratitude confessing,
On Thy mercy still transgressing,
Thou dost punish us with blessing!
On Thy mercy still transgressing,
Thou dost punish us with blessing!
| The poetical works of Bayard Taylor | |