University of Virginia Library

THE BURDEN OF EXPRESSION.

Dear Father,
The lesson which I read in all—
It thrusts its meaning on me rather,
In every rise and nobler fall—
Is nothing more than this;
By scarlet cheeks' confession
Or ballad or a kiss,
The burden of expression.
The person and the thing that court our seeing,
May nowise rot in idle rest,
But strive to utter forth their best
By simple being.
Though they may fight against the law
And never know it,
Nor sage nor poet,
And struggle on as helpless as the straw
Or feebly play
Within the energies of iron,
That do environ
And crush to better forms the foolish clay.
The sot, inmersed in sense, who rises up
With red and rheumy eyes to drink
And staggers daily on the brink
Of suicide, as 'twixt the crime and cup
He trembles;
Still in his blackest bout
Of basest orgies, lower than the beast,
Despite his hideous wallowings resembles
The maiden like a star
In brightness of her bloom tricked out
For bridal feast
With all the graces ready to her hand
And blushing over for a queen's command
Or conquest—but so far;
He seeks to say, as she, the life within
And stamp himself upon the frame external
Of the great Cosmos which he feels akin,
And like him part of the Eternal.
And in creation Thou dost dimly wreak,
Or sometimes clearly, just Thyself and speak
A word, a sentence,
Unto the listening heart
Which dwells in prayer apart;
And, lo, one hears and rushes to repentance.
The seasons,
They are Thy varying moods and modes
Which teach us more than fossil codes
The splendour of the Spirit's reasons;
And in the red leaf and the tumbling rain,
Thou art fulfilled by joy or pain
One ethical sweet moment.
The lover smarting from his loss
And groaning under the dear cross
Which carries him,
Though his poor tearful eyes are dim
And see no mercy, might have guessed the no meant
Thy mantle dashed before his gaze
And amorous grasp,
Awaking blindly but to clasp
The blessed haze.
The grim and gory
Lanes of long battle-fields where shot and shell
Have made a human hell,
That dupes turn glory;
These are Thy efforts marred by us
And mangled thus,
To show Thyself (though in distorted channels)
Written on the receptive panels
Of common Nature's canvas, wrought
Into incarnate thought.
Thy methods are not twain,
O God—O Father,
As I would call Thee rather—
Above mere bliss and pain;
The track of trial
Which purifies and moulds the penitent
In flames of self-denial,
And purpose of a self-development;
Commensal tasks and social aims,
And private claims;
The gloom of winter and blue skies of Florence,
Self-hate and self-abhorrence.
And Thou in us, O beautiful and best,
For all our carnal groping
And madness of warped will
Which cleaves to bitter dust and weds with ill,
Yet in each ray of hoping
Art manifest.
Perpetual contest of the ravening brute
Within us, chained a while but never mute,
Does not disturb the balance of all things
Which if unconscious pant
And press along a scale of many strings,
Still upward and co-operant
Somehow to some great final issue;
And foe alike and friend,
With every vital nerve and tissue
Are woven with the death and pride,
Though we see but their ragged side,
To the convincing and consummate End.