Collected poems by Vachel Lindsay :: :: University of Virginia Library

This whole poem is to be read aloud, with great speed, and in one breath, as it were, as though it were one word, rather than one sentence. This, over and over, till the metrical scheme is fluid in the mind, a unit. Then, of course, read very slowly.

Splendid with many a sun-kissed wonder,
Splendid with many a swimming girl.
Oh, there is melted the heart of stone,
Fantasy, rhyme, and rhapsody ring.
From street car and Ford and yellow taxi,
Argosies crowded to shrieking capacity—
With moon-struck boy and sun-struck girl.
Tourists, residents, what you please—
From the whirling south, from the whirling north,
Bees near the hive,
Or far from home,
Dreaming of love like honeycomb.

“Barney Google” is what they sing,
“Mister Shean and Mister Gallagher,”
“Black Joe,” and “Old Kentucky Home,”
“Swing Low Sweet Chariot,” “Maryland,” “Dixie,”
“Sometimes I feel like a Mourning Dove,”
“The Pullman Porters on Parade,”
Or hear, now, my “Song of Love.”

But storms come down from the soul of the Universe,
Put the long coast in imminent jeopardy,
Despoiling felicity, quenching the ecstasy,
Hide my fantastical town from me—

426

Where every street is a valentine,
The kind we gave to love in youth
Where the lace is deep, three layers deep,
In, and in, and in you look:—
Gossamer book!
Fairy book!

Once, when such a storm was on,
When every spiritual hope seemed gone,
I was burning the world like a bridge, behind me,
I was walking in water so no one could find me—
In the edge of the waves, where the waves meet the beach—
Forest and sea waves, both within reach,
Far from my prairie home,
Far from the old hive, far from home,
Dreaming of love like honeycomb.

Twisted winds, coming down, from Heaven knows where,
Blistered feet were mine, seaweed was my hair.
Dream sea birds flew down on fanatical wings,
Flew down through tremendous red-rainbow rimmed rings.
They were speaking of glory, speaking of death,
Were shrieking creepy, fanatical things.
Many unwritten songs of mine, long forgotten,
And dim resolves, and loves forgotten
Swept in with the driftwood and foamy flakes.
Yet I said: “I will march till glory wakes,
Yet I said: “My brain with marvelling sings
That courage and sleep, courage and sleep are the principal things,”

March on, sleep-walkers, till courage comes
With invisible drums,
March, while the sad heart breaks,
Whirl on, like a leaf, then fight again—
Sleep and courage! Sleep and courage! The fate of men!

427

It was there, on the proud Spanish Trail I was walking,
And I thought of Don Ivan, my Spanish ancestor,
Friend of Columbus, and Isabel's guest,
From the stormy right
Come the green sea talking;
I was walking the Old Spanish Trail toward Biloxi,
So famous for legends of Spanish chivalry!
City of feathers, balloons and confetti,
City of hearties, of birthday parties!
Oh, streets of valentines in long lines,
Great garden of mocking-bird melody,
Oh, filagree city of fogs and mystery!
Far from the old hive, far from my home,
I was dreaming of love like honeycomb.
And startling pathways, starry-white,
Were revealed by the lightning and street light,
Revealed,
Revealed by the lightning and street light.

II

Buzzing autos, like black bees,
Like black bees,
Hurried through the magnolia trees,
Then billboards, to make nations store,
Come in the vision flashy and vain,
Washed by the midnight sea-born rain,
Washed by the midnight sea-born rain.
They went like cliffs up to the sky,
America's glories flaming high,
Festooned cartoons, an amazing mixture,
Shabby, shoddy, perverse and twistical,
Shamefully boastful,
Shyly mystical.

428

Politics, with all its tricks, both old parties in a fix!
Donkey and elephant short of breath.
La Follette scorning them half to death.

The snappy Saturday Evening Post
Displaying, and advertising most
The noisiest things from coast to coast.
Exaggerated Sunday papers,
Comic sheets like scrambled eggs,
And Andy Gump's first-reader capers,
All on those billboards to the sky.
Who put them there, in the way, and why?
Pictured skyscrapers of the night,
Marble-topped, tremendous, white!
There were Arrow-collar heroes proud,
Holding their heads above the crowd,
Looking for love like honeycomb.
There was many an ice-cream vendor,
There were business kings in a daisy chain,
Then movie queens in a daisy chain,
Sugar-faced, unlaced and slender, dreaming of love like honeycomb.

Then all the rascals of the land,
All the damned for the last ten years,
Rising from their doom with tears,
Skeletons, skeletons, leather and bone,
Each dead soul chained to a saxaphone—
Watching the roaring storm above,
Looking for honey-dreams and love.
All on those billboards to the sky,
Who put them there, in the way, and why?

Then a railroad map of the U. S. A.
Then a soul-road map of the U. S. A.

429

Showing all the flowers of the land,
But nowhere, love like honeycomb.
Only signboards, only billboards,
Washed by the midnight sea-born rain,
Washed by the midnight sea-born rain.

III

There were open boxes of fine cigars,
As big and bold as Pullman cars.
And on the brass-bound lids of these
Old Spain was pictured as you please.
And,
Here's the night's miracle began,
The greatest splendor known to man.

Flourishing masks and cigarettes,
Clicking their ribboned castanets,
Were Gypsies in high back combs and shawls,
Strutting through the Alhambra's halls.

Why were these billboards to the sky—
Who put them there, in the way, and why?

First I thought all the splendor had gone—
I was in darkness—I was in darkness—plunging on.
On the left were summer resort and lawn.
The flash of the trolley car,
The flash of the midnight train.
On the right—little waves, then great waves,
Then masts and shafts, then the wrecks of rafts—
Pirate ships of the Spanish main,
Then the wrecks of the Galleons of Spain.

430

Red coins, then jewels,
Drowned parrots, drowned peacocks,
Then a tolling sound, a tolling sound,
Then the wrecks of the Galleons of Spain,
Rolling by, rolling on, in the rain!
Rolling by, rolling on, in the foam!

Love calls, death cries;
Drowned pirates, drowned Spanish beauties—
Drowned Incas, then drowned Montezumas;
First friars of Quetzal, then nuns of Quetzal,
Lost faces, sweet as the honeycomb.
First friars of Christendom, then nuns of Christendom,
Lost faces, sweet as the honeycomb.
Then a tolling sound, a tolling sound—
Pirate ships of the Spanish Main,
Then the wrecks of the Galleons of Spain
Rolling by, rolling on, in the rain,
Rolling by, rolling on, in the foam.

And I said: “I will march till my soul re-awakes.”
And I said: “My mind with marvelling sings,
That ‘courage and sleep, courage and sleep, are the principal things,’”

For there came dead eagles, then dead panthers,
Then, millions of men to the edge of the sky:—
Dead Spanish Legions, from the deep-sea regions—
While increasing rain whipped the sea and the air.
Then there came a noise like a vulture crying.
Then there came a cheering, cheering sound—
Bullrings slowly whirling around,
Bullrings, bullrings, 'round and 'round,
Bullrings, bullrings, 'round and 'round.
Then waves like ponies, waves like bulls,

431

Then waves like Seminoles, waves like Negroes,
Dragging up their chains from the deep,
Singing of love like honeycomb.
Then waves like tobacco fields, waves like cornfields,
Waves like wheat fields, turning to battlefields.
Then
Round-table crusaders, then world-paraders,
Tall kings in shining silver line,
As though for a miracle and a sign,
Singing songs like Spanish wine.

Then I saw the bad Pizzaro,
Then hours of dewy jungle-glow—
Dim Peru and Mexico.
Then the wild seeker, Coronado, singing of love like honeycomb,
With all his furious train, foaming by in the rain,
Singing in eternal sleep, lifted, singing from the deep.
Then the tall town of Eldorado,
Passing by, like a fog and a shadow.

And then I saw a girl more pale
Than any fairy ever shone—
A white light in the southern night,
As cold as the north Auroral light
Reigning over the sea alone!
My heart was like a burning world,
I saw it flame above the dawn,
Her robe, her footstool and her throne!
And she was like a moon and pearl,
And like an Alabaster stone!
So far away in the utmost sky!
Her beauty like the honeycomb,
The secret love,
Glory and Fate—

432

Her wings from the earth to Heaven's gate,
A pillar in the dawn apart.

Then she was gone—the dawn was gone—
Black storm! Black storm!
And I plunged on.

Then lightning bolts across the sky,
Then a great bubble like a dome,
In whirling, whirling, whirling splendor.

Then Sancho Panza! Then Don Quixote,
He who could not know surrender,
Glory's ultimate contender,
Singing in eternal sleep,
Lifted, singing from the deep,
Singing of love like honeycomb!
Then—
Windmills, windmills, 'round and 'round,
Windmills, windmills, 'round and 'round,
Windmills, windmills, 'round and 'round!
Then a great storm, a fearful cry, a bell of doom—
A tolling sound, a tolling sound, a tolling sound.
Then the wrecks of the Galleons of Spain—
Rolling by, rolling on, in the rain,
Rolling by, rolling on, in the foam.

By these ships, on the right, were the red waves cleft,
Then, again on the left, stood the billboards there,
Queerly fine to the zenith line,
Overhead to the zenith line—
Washed by the midnight sea-born rain,
Washed by the midnight sea-born rain,
Gleaming down, as the wrecks went by.
Looking at fair, lost Spain!

433

Between these visions I plunged on,
And straight ahead came to the wonder of dawn,
In that foggy dawn, storm-washed Biloxi!
The piers were wrecks, street cars were wrecks,
Sidewalks were wrecks.
Yet straight ahead arose from the dead,
The valentine, filagree towers of mystery,
The snow-white skyscrapers of new history.

Oh, fantasy, sugar and mockery!
Oh, mocking birds in their whimsy!
Oh, pretty, lazy Biloxi,
City haughty and fair, knowing not why:—
And looking high at the mast-filled sky,
Looking up at the ghost-filled sky,
Looking at fair, lost Spain.