New poems by Madison Cawein

By forests, moonlight haunts alone,—
(Diana with her silvery fawn;)
By fields, whereon the stars are sown,—
(The wildflowers gathered of the Dawn.)

To orchards of eternal fruit,
That never mortal hand shall take;
Around whose central tree and root
Is coiled the never-sleeping Snake.

The Dragon, lost in listening, curled
Around the trunk whose fruit is gold:
The ancient wisdom of the world
Guarding the glory never old.

The one desire, that leads me now
Beyond endeavour still to try
And reach those peaks that overbrow
The islands of the sunset sky.

The purple crags, the rosy peaks
Of somewhere, nowhere; where you will;—
But the one place where Beauty speaks
With the Greek rapture on her still.

Where still she joins with old Romance
And Myth and Legend pearl-white hands,
And leads the old immortal dance
Of Song in dim immortal lands.

‘THAT NIGHT WHEN I CAME TO THE GRANGE’

The trees took on fantastic shapes
That night when I came to the grange;
The very bushes seemed to change;
This seemed a hag's head, that an ape's:
The road itself seemed darkly strange
That night when I came to the grange.

The storm had passed, but still the night
Cloaked with deep clouds its true intent,
And moody on its way now went
With muttered thunder and the light,
Torch-like, of lightning that was spent
Flickering the mask of its intent.

Like some hurt thing that bleeds to death,
Yet never moves nor heaves a sigh,
Some last drops shuddered from the sky:
The darkness seemed to hold its breath
To see the sullen tempest die,
That never moved nor heaved a sigh.

Within my path, among the weeds,
The glow-worm, like an evil eye,
Glared malice; and the boughs on high
Flung curses at me, menaced deeds
Of darkness if I passed them by:
They and the glow-worm's glaring eye.

The night-wind rose, and raved at me,
Hung in the tree beside the gate;
The gate that snarled its iron hate
Above the gravel, grindingly,
And set its teeth to make me wait,
Beside the one tree near the gate.

The next thing that I knew a bat
Out of the rainy midnight swept
An evil blow: and then there crept,
Malignant with its head held flat,
A hiss before me as I stept,
A fang, that from the midnight swept.

I drew my dagger then, the blade
That never failed me in my need;
'Twere well to be prepared; indeed,
Who knew what waited there? what shade,
Or substance, banded to impede
My entrance of which there was need.

The blade, at least, was tangible
Among the shadows I must face;
Its touch was real; and in case
Hate waylaid me, would serve me well;
I needed something in that place
Among the shadows I must face.

The dead thorn took me by surprise,
A hag-like thing with twisted clutch;
From o'er the wall I felt it touch
My brow with talons; at my eyes
It seemed to wave a knotted crutch,
A hag-like thing with twisted clutch.

A hound kept howling in the night;
He and the wind were all I heard:
The wind that maundered some dark word
Of wrong, that nothing would make right,
To every rain-drop that it stirred:
The hound and wind were all I heard.

The grange was silent as the dead:
I looked at the dark face of it:
Nowhere was any candle lit:
It looked like some huge nightmare head
With death's-head eyes. I paused a bit
To study the dark face of it.

And then I rang and knocked: I gave
The great oak door loud blow on blow:
No servant answered: wild below
The echoes clanged as in a cave:
The evil mansion seemed to know
Who struck the door with blow on blow.

Silence: no chink of light to say
That he and his were living there,
That sinful man with snow-white hair,
That creature, I had come to slay;
That wretched thing, who did not dare
Reveal that he was hiding there.

I broke my dagger on the door,
Yet woke but echoes in the hall:
Then set my hands unto the wall
And clomb the ivy as before
In boyhood, to a window tall,
That was my room's once in that hall.

At last I stood again where he,
That vile man with the sneering face,
That fiend, that foul spot on our race,
Had sworn none of our family
Should ever stand again: the place
Was dark as his own devil's face.

I stood, and felt as if some crime
Closed in on me, hedged me around:
It clutched at me from closets; bound
Its arms around me; time on time
I turned and grasped, but nothing found,
Only the blackness all around.

The darkness took me by the throat:
I could not hear but felt it hiss—
“Take this, you hound! and this! and this!”—
Then, all at once, afar, remote,
I heard a door clang.—Murder is
More cautious—yet, whose was that hiss?

Oh, for a light! The blackness jeered
And mouthed at me; its sullen face
Was as a mask on all the place,
From which two sinister sockets leered;
A death's-head, that my eyes could trace,
That stared me sullen in the face.

Then silence packed the hall and stair
And crammed the rooms from attic down,
Since that far door had clanged; its frown
Upon the darkness, everywhere,
Had settled; like a graveyard gown
It clothed the house from attic down.

And then I heard a groan—and one
Long sigh—then silence.—Who was near?
Was it the darkness at my ear
That mocked me with a deed undone?
Or was it he, who waited here,
To kill me when I had drawn near?

I drew my sword then: stood and stared
Into the night, that was a mask
To all the house, that made my task
A hopeless one. Ah! had it bared
Its teeth at me—what more to ask!—
My sword had gone through teeth and mask!

It was not fair to me; my cause!
The villain darkness bound my eyes.
Why, even the moon refused to rise.—
It might have helped me in that pause,
Before I groped the room, whose size
Seemed monstrous to my night-bound eyes.

What was it that I stumbled on?
God! for a light that I might see!—
There! something sat that stared at me—
Some loathsome, twisted thing—the spawn
Of hell and midnight.—Was it he?—
God! for a light that I might see!

And then the moon! thank Heaven! the moon
Broke through the clouds, a face chalk-white:
Now then, at last, I had a light!
And then I saw—the thing seemed hewn
From marble at the moment's sight,
Bathed in the full moon's wistful white.

He sat, or rather crouched, there—dead:
Her dagger in his heart—that girl's:
His open eyes as white as pearls—
Malignant—staring overhead:
One hand clutched full of torn-out curls.—
Her dagger in his heart—that girl's.

I knew the blade. Why, I had seen
The thing stuck in her gipsy hair,
Worn as they wear them over there
In Spain: its gold hilt crusted green
With jade-like gems of cruel glare.
She wore it in her gipsy hair.

She called it her “green wasp,” and smiled
As if of some such deed she dreamed:—
And yet to me she always seemed
A child, a little timid child,
Who at a mouse has often screamed—
And yet of deeds like this she dreamed.

Where was she now?—Some pond or pool
Would yield her body up some day.—
Poor little waif, that 'd gone astray!
And I!—oh God! how great a fool
To know so long and yet delay!—
Some pond would yield her up some day.

The world was phantomed with the mist
That night when I came from the grange.—
So, she had stabbed him. It was strange.
Who would have thought that she who kiss'd
Would kill him too!—Well, women change.—
Their curse is on the lonely grange!

THE ANGEL WITH THE BOOK

When to that house I came which, long ago,
My heart had builded of its joy and woe,
Upon its threshold, lo! I paused again,
Dreading to enter; fearing to behold
The place wherein my Love had lived of old,
And where my other self lay dead and slain.

I feared to see some shape, some Hope once dear,
Behind the arras—dead; some face of Fear,
With eyes accusing, that would sear my soul,
Taking away my manhood and my strength
With heartbreak memories. ... And yet, at length,
Again I stood within that house of dole.

Sombre and beautiful with stately things
The long hall lay; and by the stairs the wings
Of Life and Love rose marble and unmarred:
And all the walls, hung grave with tapestry,
Gesticulated sorrow; gazed at me,
Strange speculation in their dark regard.

Through one tall oriel the close of day
Glared with its crimson face and laid a ray,
A burning finger, on the stairway where
A trail of tears, as of a wounded heart,
Led to a passage with a room apart,
A room where Love had perished of despair.

Now all was empty; silent even of sighs;
And yet I felt within that room were eyes,
Unearthly eyes I dared not look upon,
That had seen God; within them hell and heaven
Of all the past. I dared not look, yet, even
As I drew back, my feet were slowly drawn

Into that room lit with those eyes. ... I saw
An Angel standing with the Book of Law;
His raiment lightening from head to feet,
And swords of flame and darkness in his eyes,
He stood, the great Book, open as the skies,
Like some great heart throbbing with rosy heat.

One moment blazed the vision: then I heard,
Not with my ears, but with my soul, this word:—
“I am the Law through which Love is. Each one
Through me must win unto his heaven or hell.
I build the house in which all memories dwell.
Thy house is finished, and my task is done.”

And where the vision burned—was nothing. Fear
Bowed me to earth; for, flaming, very near,
I felt that Angel's presence, like a spell,
That turned my eyesight inward where I saw
That this was Love, whose other name is Law,
By whom was built my House of Heaven and Hell.

DREAM ROAD

I took the road again last night
On which my boyhood's hills look down;
The old road leading from the town,
The village there below the height,
Its cottage homes, all huddled brown,
Each with its blur of light.

The old road, full of ruts, that leads,
A winding streak of limestone-grey,
Over the hills and far away;
That's crowded here by arms of weeds
And elbows of railfence, asway
With flowers that no one heeds:

That's dungeoned here by rocks and trees
And maundered to by waters; there
Lifted into the free wild air
Of meadow-land serenities:
The old road, stretching far and fair
To where my tired heart sees.

That says, “Come, take me for a mile;
And let me show you mysteries:
The things the yellow moon there sees,
And those few stars that 'round her smile:
Come, take me, now you are at ease,
And walk with me a while.”

And I—I took it at its word:
And friendships, clothed in olden guise,
Walked with me; and, as I surmise,
Old dreams for twenty years unheard;
And love, who gazed into my eyes
As once when youth adored.

And voices, vocal silences;
And visions, that my youth had seen,
Slipped from each side, in silvery green,
And spoke to me in memories;
And recollections smiled between
My tear-wet face and trees.

Enchantment walked by field and farm,
And whispered me on either side;
And where the fallows broadened wide
Dim mystery waved a moon-white arm,
Or, from the woodland, moonbeam-eyed,
Beckoned a filmy form.

Spirits of wind and starlight wove
From fern to fern a drowsy dance;
Or o'er the wood-stream hung a-trance:
And from the leaves, that dreamed above,
The elfin-dew dropped many a lance
Of light and, glimmering, drove

Star-arrows through the warmth and musk,
That sparkled on the moss and loam,
And shook from bells of wildflower foam
The bee-like music of the dusk,
And rimmed with spars the lily's dome
And morning-glory's tusk.

And, soft as cobwebs, I beheld
The moths, they say that fairies use
As coursers, come by ones and twos
From stables of the blossoms belled:
While busily, among the dews,
Where croaked the toad and swelled,

The nimble spider climbed his thread,
Or diagramed a dim design,
Or flung, above, a slender line
To launder dews on. Overhead
An insect drew its dagger fine
And stabbed the stillness dead.

And there! far at the lane's dark end,
A light showed, like a glow-worm lamp:
And through the darkness, summer-damp,
An old rose-garden seemed to send
Sweet word to me—as of a camp
Of dreams around the bend.

And there a gate! whereat, mid deeps
Of honeysuckle dewiness,
She stood—whose lips were mine to press—
How long ago!—for whom still leaps
My heart with longing and, no less,
With passion here that sleeps.

The smiling face of girlhood; eyes
Of wine-warm brown; and heavy hair,
Auburn as autumn in his lair,
Took me again with swift surprise,
As oft they took me, coming there
In days of bygone ties.

The cricket and the katydid
Pierced silence with their stinging sounds;
The firefly went its golden rounds,
Where, lifting slow one sleepy lid,
The baby rosebud dreamed; and mounds
Of lilies breathed half-hid.

The white moon waded through a cloud,
Like some pale woman through a pool:
And in the darkness, close and cool
I felt a form against me bowed,
Her breast to mine; and deep and full
Her maiden heart beat loud.

I never dreamed it was a trick
That fancy played me; memory
And moonlight. ... Yet, it well may be
The old road, too, that night was quick
With dreams that were reality
To every stone and stick.

For instantly when, overhead,
The moon swam—there! where soft had gleamed
That vision, now no creature seemed—
Only a ruined house and shed.
Was it a dream the old road dreamed?
Or I—of her long dead?

THE PLACE

I

Wherein is it so beautiful?—
In all things dim and all things cool:
In silence, that is built of leaves
And wind and spray of waterfall;
And, golden as the half-ripe sheaves,
In light that is not light at all.

II

Wherein is it like joy and spring?—
In petaled musk and singing wing:
In dreams, that come like butterflies
And moths, dim-winged with downy grey;
And myths, that watch with bark-brown eyes
Beauty who sleeps beside the way.

III

Wherein, heart, is it all in all?—
In what to me did there befall:
The echo of a word once said,
That haunts it still like some sweet ghost;
Youth's rapture, bright and gold of head,
And the wild love there found and lost.

THE ROAD

Along the road I smelt the rose,
The wild-rose in its veil of rain;
And how it was, God only knows,
But with its scent I saw again
A girl's face at a window-pane,
Gazing through tears that fell like rain.
'Tis twelve years now, so I suppose.

Twelve years ago. 'Twas then I thought,
“Love is a burden bitter-sweet:
And he who runs must not be fraught:
Free must his heart be as his feet.”
Again I heard myself repeat,
“Love is a burden bitter-sweet.”
Yet all my aims had come to nought.

I smelt the rose; I felt the rain
Lonely I stood upon the road.
Of one thing only was I fain—
To be delivered of my load.—
A moment more and on I strode.
I cared not whither led the road
That led not back to her again.

THE OLD LANE

An old, lost lane;—where can it lead?—
To stony pastures, where the weed
Purples its plume, or sails its seed:
And from one knoll, the vetch makes green,
Trailing its glimmering ribbon on,
Under deep boughs, a creek is seen,
Flecked with the silver of the dawn.

An old, green lane;—where can it go?—
Into the valley—land below,
Where red the wilding lilies blow:
Where, under willows, shadowy grey,
The blue-crane wades, the heron glides;
And in each pool the minnows sway,
Twinkling their slim and silvery sides.

An old, railed lane;—where does it end?—
Beyond the log-bridge at the bend,
Towards which our young feet used to wend:
Where, 'neath a dappled sycamore,
The old mill thrashed its foaming wheel,
And, smiling, at its corn-strewn door
The miller leant all white with meal.

An old, wild lane;—I know it well:
The creek, the bridge across the dell:
The old house on the orchard-swell:
The pine-board porch above the creek,
Where oft we used to sit and dream,
Two children, fair of hair and cheek,
Dropping our flowers in the stream.

An old, old lane;—I follow it
In fancy; and, where branches knit,
Behold a boy and girl who sit

Beside the mill-dam near the mill;
Or in a flat-boat, old and worn,
Oar lilyward. I see them still—
Her dress is rent, his trousers torn.

An old, lost lane.—Come, let us find,
As here I have it in my mind,
As boyhood left it far behind!
Yes; let us follow it again,
And meet her, wild of foot and hair,
The tomboy, sweet as sun and rain,
Whom once we worshipped to despair.

A FOREST CHILD

There is a place I search for still,
Sequestered as the world of dreams,
A bushy hollow, and a hill
That whispers with descending streams,
Cool, careless waters, wandering down,
Like Innocence who runs to town,
Leaving the wildwood and its dreams,
And prattling like the forest streams.

But still in dreams I meet again
The child who bound me, heart and hand,
And led me with a wildflower chain
Far from our world, to Faeryland:

Who made me see and made me know
The lovely Land of Long-Ago,
Leading me with her little hand
Into the world of Wonderland.

The years have passed: how far away
The day when there I met the child,
The little maid, who was a fay,
Whose eyes were dark and undefiled
And crystal as a woodland well,
That holds within its depths a spell,
Enchantments, featured like a child,
A dream, a poetry undefiled.

Around my heart she wrapped her hair,
And bound my soul with lips and eyes,
And led me to a cavern, where
Grey Legend dwelt in kingly guise,

Her kinsman, dreamier than the moon,
Who called her Fancy, read her rune,
And bade her with paternal eyes
Divest herself of her disguise.

And still I walk with her in dreams,
Though many years have passed since then,
And that high hill and its wild streams
Are lost as is that faery glen.
And as the years go swiftly by
I find it harder, when I try,
To meet with her, who led me then
Into the wildness of that glen.

IN THE WOOD

The waterfall, deep in the wood,
Talked drowsily with solitude,
A soft, insistent sound of foam,
That filled with sleep the forest's dome,
Where, like some dream of dusk, she stood
Accentuating solitude.

The crickets' tinkling chips of sound
Strewed all the twilight-twinkling ground;
A whip-poor-will began to cry,
And, staggering through the sober sky,
A bat went on its drunken round,
Its shadow following on the ground.

Then from a bush, an elder-copse,
That spiced the dark with musky tops,
What seemed, at first, a shadow came
And took her hand and called her name,
And kissed her where, in starry drops,
The dew orbed on the elder-tops.

The glaucous glow of fireflies
Flickered the dusk; and fox-like eyes
Peered from the shadows; and the hush
Murmured a word of wind and rush
Of fluttering waters, fragrant sighs,
And dreams unseen of mortal eyes.

The beetle flung its burr of sound
Against the hush and clung there, wound
In night's deep mane: then, in a tree,
A grig began deliberately
To file the stillness: all around
A wire of shrillness seem unwound.

I looked for those two lovers there:
His ardent eyes, her passionate hair.
The moon looked down, slow-climbing wan
Heaven's slope of azure: they were gone:
But where they'd passed I heard the air
Sigh, faint with sweetness of her hair.

GARDEN GOSSIP

Thin, chisel-fine a cricket chipped
The crystal silence into sound;
And where the branches dreamed and dripped
A grasshopper its dagger stripped
And on the humming darkness ground.

A bat, against the gibbous moon,
Danced, imp-like, with its lone delight;
The glow-worm scrawled a golden rune
Upon the dark; and, emerald-strewn,
The firefly hung with lamps the night.

The flowers said their beads in prayer,
Dew-syllables of sighed perfume;
Or talked of two, soft-standing there,
One like a gladiole, straight and fair,
And one like some rich poppy-bloom.

The mignonette and feverfew
Laid their pale brows together:—“See!”
One whispered: “Did their step thrill through
Your roots?”—“Like rain.”—“I touched the two
And a new bud was born in me.”

One rose said to another:—“Whose
Is this dim music? song, that parts
My crimson petals like the dews?”
“My blossom trembles with sweet news—
It is the love of two young hearts.”

THE OLD GATE MADE OF PICKETS

I

There was moonlight in the garden and the chirr and chirp of crickets;
There was scent of pink and peony and deep syringa thickets,
When adown the pathway whitely, where the firefly glimmered brightly,
She came stepping, oh, so lightly,
To the old gate made of pickets.

II

There were dew and musk and murmur and a voice that hummed odd snatches
Of a song while there she hurried, through the moonlight's silvery patches,

To the rose-grown gate,—above her and her softly-singing lover,
With its blossom-tangled cover
And its weight and wooden latches.

III

Whom she met there, whom she kissed there, mid the moonlight and the roses,
With his arms who there enclosed her,—as a tiger-lily encloses
Some white moth that frailly settles on its gold and crimson petals,
Where the garden runs to nettles,
No one knows now or supposes.

IV

Years have passed since that last meeting; loves have come and loves departed:
Still the garden blooms unchanging; there is nothing broken-hearted

In its beauty, where the hours lounge with sun and moon and showers,
Mid the perfume and the flowers
As in days when those two parted.

V

Yet the garden and the flowers and the cheerily chirring crickets,
And the moonlight and the fragrance, and the wind that waves the thickets,—
They remember what was spoken, and the rose that was a token,
And the gentle heart there broken
By the old gate made of pickets.

APRILIAN

I

Come with me where April twilights
Wigwam blue the April hills;
Where the shadows and the high lights
Swarm the woods that Springtime fills.

Tents where dwell the tribes of beauty,
Tasseled scouts whose camp-fires glow
Over leagues of wild-flower booty
Rescued from the camps of snow.

II

A thousand windflowers blowing!—
They print the ways with palest pearl,
As if with raiment flowing
Here passed some glimmering girl.

A thousand bluets breaking!—
They take the heart with glad surprise,
As if some wild girl waking
Looked at you with bewildered eyes.

A thousand buds and flowers,
A thousand birds and bees:—
What spirit haunts the bowers!
What dream that no one sees!

III

Her kirtle is white as the wild-plum bloom,
Her girdle is pink as the crab;
Her face is sweet as a wood perfume
Or haw that the sunbeams stab.

Her boddice is green as the beetle's wing
That jewels the light o' the sun;
And the earth and the air around her sing
Wherever her mad feet run.

Her beautiful feet, that bloom and bud
And print with blossoms each place.—
Oh, let us follow them into the wood
And gaze on her, face to face.

A GHOST AND A DREAM

Rain will fall on the fading flowers,
Winds will blow through the dripping tree,
When Fall leads in her tattered Hours
With Death to keep them company.

All night long in the weeping weather,
All night long in the garden grey,
A ghost and a dream will talk together—
And sad are the things they will have to say:

Old sad things of the bough that's broken;
Heartbreak things of the leaf that's dead;
Old sad things no tongue hath spoken;
Sorrowful things no man hath said.

TRAMPS

Oh, roses, roses everywhere—but only one for me!
But one wild-rose for me, my boy,—your face that's like the morn's;
My rose of roses, dear my lad, my dark-eyed Romany;
The world may keep its roses now, that gave me only thorns.

Oh, song and singing everywhere; the woods are wild with song:
One simple song I knew, my lad,—you crooned it in my ears;

It cheered my way by night and day; but, oh, the way was long!
And all the hard world gave to me was evil words and sneers.

Oh, song and blossoms everywhere—and nature full of love:
But one sweet look of love was mine, and that you gave, my joy:
A look of love, a look of trust—they helped my heart enough;
They helped me bear the look of scorn, the world's black look, my boy.

Oh, spring and love are everywhere; soft breezes kiss and woo:
Your kiss was all I had, my son, to ease me of my woe:

But, oh, it helped me far, dear heart; how far I only knew:
But otherwise nor kiss nor smile, but only curse and blow.

But now I'm going to die, my boy; and now I'm going to rest;
The road was long, and tired am I; and only you will care:
Give me a kiss, O boy I bore!—I did what I thought best:
But it was bad for me, my lad; O boy whom I did bear!

“Your father?”—Ask me not of him!—He was a tramp, a thief:
And I—I was a country girl—a wayward, so they say,

They kept too strict, perhaps, you see; and he, he brought relief:
I went with him, a woman tramp, and here I am to-day.

My dream of bliss was brief, ah me! Wild spring had played its part,
A vagabond part in vagabond blood that mates with any kind.—
I woke one morn upon the straw with you upon my heart—
The man was gone, my all was gone, and shame was left behind.

Since then I've tramped the road, my lad, and faced the rain and sun;
In snow and sleet I've trudged and begged, with you hugged in my arms:

Oh, few would give a wanton work, or kindly word, dear one!
A baby at her breast, you see—they drove me from their farms.

Now you are big and strong, my boy; and you are twelve years young;
Oh, grasp your chance, when I am gone, and leave the past behind:
Perhaps by you, as 'tis your due, some fortune may be wrung
From what I missed in life and love, some good luck of some kind.

Now I am going to die, my boy; just lean me 'gainst that tree,
And dig my grave and lay me in and make no more delay;

Cut all the wildflowers down around, and throw them there, you see,
And bring a thorn and plant it here when I am laid away.

Perhaps you'll come again some day when you are big and grown,
And have a wife and boy yourself—but do not let them know!
They might not understand it, lad; so you must come alone
And tell your mother how it goes, the one who loved you so.

'Tis birds and blossoms everywhere; and now, how strange! I see
How life and love are smiling down, O face that's like the morn's!

Come! lay me in my gipsy grave you dug beneath the tree,
Away from all the roses there and deep among the thorns.

LILITH'S LOVER

“And round his heart one strangling golden hair”

I

White are thou, O Lilith! as the foam that glimmers and quivers,
Glitters and clingingly silvers and snows from the balm
Of the beautiful breasts of the nymphs of the seas and rivers
That crystal and pearl by clusters of tropical palm,
Forests of tenebrous palm.—
Once didst thou beckon and smile, O Lilith! as givers
Of heavenly gifts smile: and, lo! my heart no longer was calm.

II

Cruel art thou, O Lilith! as spirits that battle
In tempest and night, in ultimate realms of the Earth;
Immaterial hosts, that shimmer and shout and rattle
Elemental armour and drive, with madness and mirth,
Down from the mountains, into the sea, like cattle,
Gaunt and glacial cattle,
Congealèd thunder, the icebergs, gigantic of girth.

III

Subtle art thou, O Lilith! as the sylphids that cover
Dawn with their forms of rose, and breeze it with breasts and cheeks;

Breasts that are blossoms, and cheeks
Pearls in the morning's creeks:
And wily art thou as the dæmons of beauty that hover,
Raven of hair, in sunset, trailing its gold with streaks:
And what man, Lilith, beholding, would not yield himself thy lover?
Beautiful one, thy lover?
Die as I died, Lilith! for the love that no tongue speaks? ...

IV

Before us, behold, the long white thunder of ocean:
Around us the forest, a whispering world of trees:
Above us the glory and glitter, golden and silvery motion
Of infinite stars, O Lilith! and, arrowing out of these,

Down in my soul from these,
A sense of ancient despair, destruction, devotion,
Medusa of beauty, that slays; that is part of man's destinies.

V

O kisses, again would I die! O kisses that slew me!
O beautiful body of sin, O sin that was mine!
O splendour and whiteness of wickedness! passion that drew me,
Golden of hair that drew me,
Draw me again with thine eyes, their azure divine!
Slay me again with caresses! and let it pierce through me,
All the poignant desire that made me eternally thine.

VI

And the larvæ, the lamias, that cling to, encumber
And, bat-like, feed at the Ethiop breasts of Night,—
Swarms, like bubbles that rise from the shadowy pools of night—
Owl-eyed, hag-haired, her minions, awoke from their slumber,
And peering and whispering came, O Lilith the white! ...
But thou, with thy beautiful hair, from their hideous number,
The night of their myriad number,
Covered me, dead at thy feet, and hid me from sight.

WITCHERY

She walks the woods, when evening falls,
With spirits of the winds and leaves;
And to her side the soul she calls
Of every flower she perceives.

She walks with introspective eyes
That see not as the eyes of man,
But with the dream that in them lies,
And which no outward eyes may scan.

She sits among the sunset hills,
Or trails a silken skirt of breeze,
Then with the voice of whip-poor-wills
Summons the twilight to the trees.

Among the hollows, dim with musk,
Where wild the stream shows heels of foam,
She sows with firefly-seeds the dusk,
And leads the booming beetle home.

She blows the glow-worm lamps a-glare,
And hangs them by each way like eyes;
Then, mid the blossoms, everywhere
She rocks to sleep the butterflies.

She calls the red fox from his den,
And, hollowing to her mouth one hand,
Halloos the owlets in the glen,
And hoots awake the purple land.

The cricket knows her foot's light tread
And sings for her an elfin mass;
She puts the bumble-bee to bed,
And shakes the white moth from the grass.

And to the mud-wasps, where they top
Their cells of clay, she murmurs sleep:
She bids the toad come forth and hop,
The snail put out its horns and creep.

She taps upon the dead tree's trunk:
And 'neath the bark the worm begins;
And where the rotted wood is punk
Its twinkling web the spider spins.

She claps a night-cap of the dew
On every rosy clover-head;
And on the lily, pale of hue,
She slips a gown while still in bed.

With kisses cool of drowsy mist
She thrills each wildflower's heart with June;
And, whispering gold and amethyst,
Sighs legends to them of the moon.

She bids the black bat forth, to be
The courier of her darker moods;
She mounts the moon-imp, Mystery,
And speeds him wildly through the woods.

She crowds with ghosts the forest-walks;
And with the wind's dim words invokes
The spirit that for ever talks
Unto the congregated oaks.

She leans above the flying stream:
Her starry gaze commands it stay:
And in its lucid deeps a dream
Takes shape and glimmers on its way.

She rests upon the lichened stone,
Her moonbeam hair spread bright around:
And in the darkness, one by one,
The unborn flowers break the ground.

She lays her mouth, like some sweet word,
Against the wild-bird's nest that swings:
And in the speckled egg, that heard,
The young bird stirs its wings and sings.

In her all dreams find permanence:
All mysteries that trance the soul:
And substance, that evades the sense,
Through her wood-magic is made whole.

Oh, she is lovelier than she seems
To any one whose soul may see:
But only they who walk with dreams
Shall meet with her and know 'tis she.

THE FOREST WAY

I

I climbed a forest path and found
A dim cave in the dripping ground,
Where dwelt the spirit of cool sound,
Who wrought with crystal triangles,
And hollow foam of rippled bells,
A music of mysterious spells.

II

Where Sleep her bubble-jewels spilled
Of dreams; and Silence twilight-filled
Her emerald buckets, star-instilled,
With liquid whispers of lost springs,
And mossy tread of woodland things,
And drip of dew that greenly clings.

III

Here by those servitors of Sound,
Warders of that enchanted ground,
My soul and sense were seized and bound,
And in a dungeon deep of trees
Entranced, were laid at lazy ease,
The charge of woodland mysteries.

IV

The minions of Prince Drowsihead,
The wood-perfumes, with sleepy tread,
Tip-toed around my ferny bed:
And far away I heard report
Of one who dimly rode to Court,
The Fairy Princess, Eve-Amort.

V

Her herald winds sang as they passed;
And there her beauty stood at last,
With wild gold locks, a band held fast,
Above blue eyes, as clear as spar;
While from a curved and azure jar
She poured the white moon and a star.

HYLAS

The cuckoo-sorrel paints with pink
The green page of the meadow-land
Around a pool where thrushes drink
As from a hollowed hand.

A hill, long-haired with feathered grass
Combed by the strong incessant wind,
Looks down upon the pool's pale glass
Like some old hag gone blind.

And on a forest grey of beech,
Reserved, mysterious, deep and wild,
That whispers to itself; its speech
Like some old man's turned child.

A forest, through which something speaks
Authoritative things to man,
A something that o'erawed the Greeks,
The universal Pan.

And through the forest falls a stream
Babbling of immemorial things—
The myth, that haunts it like a dream,
The god, that in it sings.

And here it was, when I was young,—
Across this meadow, sorrel-stained,
To this green place where willows wrung
Wild hands, and beech-trees strained

Their mighty strength with winds of spring,
That clutched and tore the wild-witch hair
Of yon gaunt hill,—I heard them sing,
The hylas hidden there.

The slant gale played soft fugues of rain,
With interludes of sun between,
Where windflowers wove a twinkling chain
Through mosses grey and green.

From every coign of woodland peered
The starry eyes of Loveliness,
As reticently now she neared
Or stood in shy distress.

Then I remembered all the past—
The ancient ships, the unknown seas;
And him, like some huge, knotted mast,
My master Herakles.

Again I saw the port, the wood
Of Cyzicus; the landing there;
The pool among the reeds; and, nude,
The nymphs with long green hair,

That swarmed to clasp me when I stooped
To that grey pool as clear as glass,
And round my body wrapped and looped
Their hair, like water-grass.

Hylas, the Argonaut, the lad
Beloved of Herakles, was I—
Again with joy my heart grew sad,
Dreaming on days gone by.

Again I felt the drowning pain,
The kiss that slew me long ago;
The dripping arms drew down again,
And love cried all its woe.

The new world vanished! 'Twas the old.
Once more I knew the Mysian shore,
The haunted pool, the wood, the cold
Wild wind from sea and moor.—

And then a voice went by; 'twas his,
The Demigod's who sought me: but
Cold mouths had closed mine with a kiss
And both mine eyes were shut. ...

And had the hylas ceased to sing?
Or what?—For, lo! I stood again
Between the hill and wood; and Spring
Gazed at me through the rain.

And in her gaze I seemed to see
This was a dream she'd dreamed, not I;
A figment of a memory
That I had felt go by.

THE WOOD THRUSH

Bird,—with the voice of gold,
Dropping wild bar on bar,
To which the flowers unfold,
Star upon gleaming star,
Here in the forest old:—

Bird,—with the note as clear,
Cool as a bead of dew,
To which the buds, that hear,
Open deep eyes of blue,
Prick up a rosy ear:—

Shut in your house of leaves,
Bubbles of song you blow,
Showered whence none perceives,
Taking the wood below
Till its green bosom heaves.

Music of necromance,
Circles of silvering sound,
Wherein the fairies dance,
Weaving an elfin round,
Till the whole wood's a-trance.

Till, with the soul, one hears
Footsteps of mythic things:
Fauns, with their pointed ears,
Piping to haunted springs,
And the white nymph that nears.

Dryads, that rustle from
Trunks of unclosing trees,
Glimmering shapes that come
Clothed on with bloom and breeze,
Stealthily venturesome.

Spirits of light and air,
Bodied of dawn and dusk,
Peeping from blossoms there,—
Windows of dew and musk,—
Starry with firefly hair.

Moth-winged and bee-like forms,
Rippling with flower-tints,
Waving their irised arms,
Weaving of twilight glints
Wonders and wildwood charms.

Myths of the falling foam,
Tossing their hair of spray,
Driving the minnows home,
Shepherding them the way,
Safe from the water-gnome.

Or from the streaming stone
Drawing with liquid strokes
Many a crystal tone,—
Music their joy evokes,
Filling the forest lone.

Art thou a voice or bird,
Lost in the world of trees?
Or but a dream that's heard
Telling of mysteries,
Saying an unknown word?

Art thou a sprite? or sound
Blown on a flute of fays?
Going thy wildwood round,
Haunting the woodland ways,
Making them holy ground.

Art thou a dream that Spring
Utters? a hope, her soul
Voices? whose pulses sing
On to some fairer goal,
Wild as a heart or wing.

Art thou the gold and green
Voice of the ancient wood?
Syllabling soft, between
Silence and solitude,
All that it dreams unseen...

Bird, like a wisp, a gleam,
Lo! you have led me far—
Would I were what you seem,
Or what you really are,
Bird with the voice of dream!

ONE WHO LOVED NATURE

I

He was not learned in any art;
But Nature led him by the hand;
And spoke her language to his heart
So he could hear and understand:
He loved her simply as a child;
And in his love forgot the heat
Of conflict, and sat reconciled
In patience of defeat.

II

Before me now I see him rise—
A face, that seventy years had snowed
With winter, where the kind blue eyes
Like hospitable fires glowed:

A small grey man whose heart was large,
And big with knowledge learned of need;
A heart, the hard world made its targe,
That never ceased to bleed.

III

He knew all Nature. Yea, he knew
What virtue lay within each flower,
What tonic in the dawn and dew,
And in each root what magic power:
What in the wild witch-hazel tree
Reversed its time of blossoming,
And clothed its branches goldenly
In fall instead of spring.

IV

He knew what made the firefly glow
And pulse with crystal gold and flame;
And whence the blood-root got its snow,
And how the bramble's perfume came:

He understood the water's word
And grasshopper's and cricket's chirr;
And of the music of each bird
He was interpreter.

V

He kept no calendar of days,
But knew the seasons by the flowers;
And he could tell you by the rays
Of sun or stars the very hours.
He probed the inner mysteries
Of light, and knew the chemic change
That colours flowers, and what is
Their fragrance wild and strange.

VI

If some old oak had power of speech,
It could not speak more wildwood lore,
Nor in experience further reach,
Than he who was a tree at core.

Nature was all his heritage,
And seemed to fill his every need;
Her features were his book, whose page
He never tired to read.

VII

He read her secrets that no man
Has ever read and never will,
And put to scorn the charlatan
Who botanizes of her still.
He kept his knowledge sweet and clean,
And questioned not of why and what;
And never drew a line between
What's known and what is not.

VIII

He was most gentle, good, and wise;
A simpler heart earth never saw:
His soul looked softly from his eyes,
And in his speech were love and awe.

Yet Nature in the end denied
The thing he had not asked for—fame!
Unknown, in poverty he died,
And men forget his name.

AVALON

I dreamed my soul went wandering in
An island dim with mystery;
An island that, because of sin,
No mortal eye shall ever see.

And while I walked, one came, unseen,
And gazed into my eyes: ah me!
Her presence was a rose between
The wind and me, blown dreamily.

The lily, that lifts up its dome,
A tabernacle for the bee,
A faery chapel fair as foam,
Had not her absolute purity.

The bird, that hymns the falling leaf,
That breaks its heart in melody,
Says to the soul no raptured grief
Such as her presence said to me.

That moment when I felt her eyes,
Their starry transport, instantly
I felt the indomitable skies,
With all their worlds, were less to me.

And when her hand lay in my own,
Far intimations flashed through me
Of all the loves the world has known
And given to immortality.

A look, a touch—and she was gone:
And somewhere near, but shadowy,
A voice said, “This is Avalon,
And she, thy soul's old tragedy.”

THE YARROW

I

A tortured tree in a huddled hollow,
On whose gnarled boughs three leaves are blowing:
A strip of path that the hunters follow,
That leads to fields of the wind's wild sowing,
And a rain-washed hill with the wild-thorn growing.

II

And here one day, when the sky was raining,
And the wind came sharp as an Indian-arrow,
And Winter walked on the hills complaining,
I found a blossom of summer yarrow,
In the freezing wet, where the way was narrow.

III

Its dim white umble was bravely lifted,
Defying Winter and wind and weather,
Facing the rout as they whirled and shifted,
Twisting its blossom and leaves together,
Its fern-fair leaves that were sweet as the heather.

IV

And I thought, as I saw it there so fearless,
Facing death, that was sure to follow
When the sky and the earth with white were cheerless,
And the rabbit shivered within its hollow,
That here was a weed that was worth the swallow.

V

Its fortitude and its strength reminded
My soul of the souls that are like the yarrow,
That face defeat, though its blows have blinded,
And smile, and fight, in their heart an arrow,
And fall unknown in the path that is narrow.

MIDSUMMER

I

The mellow smell of hollyhocks
And marigolds and pinks and phlox
Blends with the homely garden scents
Of onions, silvering into rods,
Of peppers, scarlet with their pods;
And,—rose of all the esculents,—
Of broad plebeian cabbages,
Breathing content and corpulent ease.

II

The buzz of wasp and fly makes hot
The spaces of the garden-plot;

And from the orchard,—where the fruit
Ripens and rounds, or, loosed with heat,
Rolls, hornet-clung, before the feet,—
One hears the veery's golden flute,
That mixes with the sleepy hum
Of bees that drowsily go and come.

III

The podded musk of gourd and vine
Embower a gate of roughest pine,
That leads into a wood where Day
Sits, leaning o'er a forest pool,
Watching the lilies opening cool,
And dragon-flies at airy play,
While, dim and near, the Quietness
Rustles and stirs her leafy dress.

IV

Far-off a cowbell clangs awake
The Noon who slumbers in the brake:
And now a pewee, plaintively,
Whistles the Day to sleep again:
A cuckoo croaks a rune for rain,
And from the ripest apple-tree
A great gold apple thuds, where, slow,
The red cock curves his neck to crow.

V

Hens cluck their broods from place to place,
While clinking home, with chain and trace,
The cart-horse plods along the road
Where Afternoon sits with his dreams:
Hot fragrance of hay-making streams
Above him, and a high-heaped load
Goes creaking by and with it, sweet,
The aromatic soul of Heat.

VI

“Coo-ee! Coo-ee!” the Evenfall
Cries, and the hills repeat the call:
“Coo-ee! Coo-ee!” and by the log
Labour unharnesses his plough,
While to the barn comes cow on cow:
“Coo-ee! Coo-ee!”—and, with his dog,
Barefooted Boyhood down the lane
“Coo-ees” the cattle home again.

WILLOW WOOD

I

Deep in the wood of willow-trees
The summer sounds and whispering breeze
Bound me as if with glimmering arms
And spells of witchcraft, sorceries,
That filled the wood with phantom forms,
And held me with their faery charms.

II

Within the wood they laid their snare.
The invisible web was everywhere:
I felt it clasp me with its gleams,
And mesh my soul from feet to hair
In weavings of intangible beams,
Woven with dim and delicate dreams.

III

As dream by dream passed shadowy,
One came; an antique pageantry
Of Faeryland: it marched with pride
Of faery horns blown silverly
Around the Elf-prince and his bride,
Who rode on steeds of milk-white stride.

IV

Then from the shadow of a pool
The water-fays rose beautiful;
I saw them wring their long green hair,
And felt their eyes gaze emerald-cool,
And from their fresh lips, everywhere,
Their rainy laughter dew the air.

V

And through the willow-leaves I saw,
As in a crystal without flaw,

Slim limbs and faces sly of eye,
Elves, piping on gnat-flutes of straw,—
Thin as the violin of a fly,—
Or clashing cricket-cymbals by.

VI

And then I saw the warted gnomes
Creep, beetle-backed, from rocky combs,
Lamped with their jewelled talismans,
Rubies that torch their caverned homes,
Green grottoes, where their treasure-clans
Intrigue and thwart our human plans.

VII

And near them, foam-frail, flower-fair,
Sun-sylphids shook their showery hair,
And from their blossom-houses blew
Musk wood-rose kisses everywhere,
Or, prisoned in a drop of dew,
Twinkled an eye of sapphire-blue.

VIII

And imps, wasp-bodied; ouphs, that guard
The Courts of Oberon, their lord,—
Bee-bellied, hornet-headed things,—
Went by, each with his whining sword,
Fanning the heat with courier wings,
Bound on some message of the King's.

IX

And pansy-tunicked, gowned in down,
The lords and ladies of the crown,
Beautiful and bright as butterflies,
Passed, marching to some Faery Town,
While dragoned things, mailed to the eyes,
Soldiered their way in knightly wise.

X

Then, suddenly, the finger-tips,
Faint, moth-like, and the flower-lips

Of some one on my eye-lids pressed:
And as a moonbeam, silvering, slips
Out of a shadow, tangle-tressed
A Dream, I'd known, stood manifest.

XI

A Dream I'd known when but a child,
That lived within my soul and smiled
Far in the world of faery lore;
By whom my heart was oft beguiled,
And who invested sea and shore
With her fair presence evermore.

XII

She drew me in that stately band
That marched with her to Faeryland:
Again her words I understood,
Who smiling reached to me her hand,
And filled me with beatitude. ...
This happened in the willow wood.

ATTRIBUTES

I saw the daughters of the Dawn come dancing o'er the hills;
The winds of Morn danced with them, oh, and all the sylphs of air:
I saw their ribboned roses blow, their gowns of daffodils,
As over eyes of sapphire tossed the wild gold of their hair.

I saw the summer of their feet imprint the earth with dew,
And all the wildflowers open eyes in joy and wonderment:

I saw the sunlight of their hands waved at each bird that flew,
And all the birds, as with one voice, to their wild love gave vent.

“And, oh!” I said, “how fair you are! how fair! how very fair!—
Oh, leap, my heart; and laugh, my heart! as laughs and leaps the Dawn!
Mount with the lark and sing with him and cast away your care!
For love and life are come again and night and sorrow gone!”

I saw the acolytes of Eve, the mystic sons of Night,
Come pacing through the ancient wood in hoods of hodden-grey;

100

Their sombre cloaks were pinned with stars, and each one bore a light,
A moony lanthorn, and a staff to help him on his way.

I heard their mantles rustle by, their sandals' whispering, sweep,
And saw the wildflowers bow their heads and close their lovely eyes:
I saw their shadows pass and pass, and with them Dreams and Sleep,
Like children with their father, went, in dim and ghostly guise.

“And, oh!” I said, “how sad you are! how sad! how wondrous sad!
Oh, hush, my heart! be still, my heart! and, like the dark, be dumb!

101

Be as the wild-rose there that dreams the perfect hour it had,
And cares not if the day be past and death and darkness come.”

102

A SONG OF THE ROAD

I

Whatever the path may be, my dear,
Let us follow it far away from here,
Let us follow it back to Yester-Year,
Whatever the path may be:
Again let us dream where the land lies sunny,
And live, like the bees, on our hearts' old honey,
Away from the world that slaves for money—
Come, journey the way with me.

II

However the road may roam, my dear,
Through sun or rain, through green or sere,
Let us follow it back with hearts of cheer,
However the road may roam:

103

Oh, while we walk it here together,
What care we for wind and weather,
When there on the hills we'll smell the heather,
And see the lights of home!

III

Whatever the path may seem, my sweet,
Let us take it now with willing feet,
And time our steps to our hearts' glad beat,
Whatever the path may seem:
Though the road be rough that we must follow,
What care we for hill or hollow,
While here in our hearts, as high as a swallow,
We bear the same loved dream!

IV

However the road may roam, my sweet,
Let it lead us far from mart and street,
Out where the hills and the heavens meet,
However the road may roam:

104

So, hand in hand, let us go together,
And care no more for the wind and weather,
And reach at last those hills of heather,
Where gleam the lights of home.

105

THE LESSON

This is the lesson I have learned of Beauty:
Who gathers flowers finds that flowers fade:
Who sets love in his heart above his duty
Misses the part for which that love was made.

Than passion, haply, there is nothing madder:
Who plucks its red rose plucks with it a thorn:
More than soul's pain what hurt can make us sadder?
And yet of this immortal things are born.

106

VOICES

I

I heard the ancient forest talk,
(Its voice was like a wandering breeze):
It said, “Who is it comes to walk
Along my paths when, white as chalk,
The moon hangs o'er my sleeping trees?
What presence is it no one sees?”

II

And then I heard a voice reply,
That seemed far off yet very near;
It sounded from the earth and sky,
And said, “A spirit walketh here,
Whom mortals know as Awe and Fear.
Terrible and beautiful am I.”

107

III

And then I heard the meadows say,
(Their voice was as the sound of streams,
Or rain that comes from far away):
“Who sits amid us here and dreams,
When sunlight on our blossoms gleams,
And keeps us company all day?”

IV

And then I heard a voice intone,
A voice not near yet all around:
“I am that spirit, yea, thine own,
Who worketh wonders in the ground:
Some call me Love that hath no bound,
And I am beautiful alone.”

108

RAINLESS

The locust builds its arc of sound
And tops it with a spire;
The roadside leaves pant to the ground
With dust from hoof and tire.

The insects, day and night, make din,
And with the heat grow shriller;
And everywhere great spiders spin,
And crawls the caterpillar.

The wells are dry; the creeks are pools;
Weeds cram their beds with bristles;
And when a wind breathes, naught it cools,
The air grows white with thistles.

109

For months the drouth has burned and baked
The wood and field and garden;
The flower-plots are dead; and, raked,
Or mown, the meadows harden.

The Summer, sunk in godlessness,
From quarter unto quarter,
Now drags, now lifts a dusty dress,
That shows a sloven garter.

The child of Spring, it now appears,
Has turned a drab, a harlot,
Death's doxy; Death's, who near her leers
In rags of gold and scarlet

110

AFTER AUTUMN RAIN

The hillside smokes
With trailing mist around the rosy oaks;

While sunset builds
A gorgeous Asia in the west she gilds.

Auroral streaks
Sword through the heavens' Himalayan peaks:

In which, behold,
Burn mines of Indian ruby and of gold.

A moment—and
A shadow stalks between it and the land.

A mist, a breath,
A premonition, with the face of death,

111

Turning to frost
The air it breathes, like some invisible ghost.

Then, wild of hair,
Demons seem streaming to their fiery lair:

A chasm, the same
That splits the clouds' face with a leer of flame.

The wind comes up
And fills the hollow land as wine a cup.

Around and round
It skips the dead leaves o'er the forest's ground.

A myriad fays
And imps seem dancing down the withered ways.

And far and near
It makes of every bush a whisperer;

112

Telling dark tales
Of things that happened in the ghostly vales:

Of things the fox
Barks at and sees among the haunted rocks:

At which the owl
Hoots, and the wolf-hound cringes with a growl.

Now on the road
It walks like feet too weary for their load.

Shuffling the leaves,
With stormy sighs, onward it plods and heaves;

Till in the hills
Among the red death there itself it kills.

And with its death
Earth, so its seems, draws in a mighty breath.

113

And,—like a clown
Who wanders lost upon a haunted down,

Turns towards the east,
Fearful of coming goblin or of beast,

And sees a light,—
The jack-o'-lantern moon,—glow into sight.

114

SEASONS

I

I heard the forest's green heart beat
As if it heard the happy feet
Of one who came, like young Desire:
At whose fair coming birds and flowers
Sprang up, and Beauty, filled with fire,
Touched lips with Song amid the bowers,
And Love led on the dancing Hours.

II

And then I heard a voice that rang,
And to the leaves and blossoms sang:—
“My child is Life: I dwell with Truth:
I am the Spirit glad of Birth:
I bring to all things joy and youth:
I am the rapture of the Earth.
Come look on me and know my worth.”

115

III

And then the woodland heaved a sigh,
As if it saw a shape go by—
A shape of sorrow or of dread,
That seemed to move as moves a mist,
And left the leaves and flowers dead,
And with cold lips my forehead kissed,
While phantoms all around held tryst.

IV

And then I heard a voice that spoke
Unto the fading beech and oak:—
“I am the Spirit of Decay,
Whose child is Death, that means relief:
I breathe—and all things pass away:
I am Earth's glory and its grief.
Come look on me: thy time is brief.”

116

GARDEN AND GARDENER

To weed the Garden of the Mind
Of all rank growths of doubt and sin,
And let faith's flowers thrive and win
To blossom; and, through faith, to find
That lilies, too, can toil and spin,

And roses work for good and right;
That even the frailest flower that fills
A serious purpose, as God wills,
Is all man needs to give him light,
Is all he needs for all his ills.

117

Here is a Garden gone to flowers
While one beside it runs to weeds—
Yet both were sown with similar seeds:
What was it? Did the World, or Hours,
Bring forth according to their needs?

Or was it that the Gardener
Neglected one? or did not care
What growths matured to slay and snare?
Thinking, whatever might occur,
Labour, perhaps, would manage there.

But Labour looked and took his ease,
Saying, “To-morrow I will do;
Will weed my Garden.”—And in view
Of all that work sat down at peace,
Waiting for something to ensue.

118

Whose fault?—The Gardener's?—Haply no,
He sowed with fairest flowers the soil.—
And yet, whence came the weeds that spoil?
—From Heaven! brought by winds that blow.—
God give us all the gift to toil!

119

A PRAYER FOR OLD AGE

I

These are the things which I would ask of Time:
When I am old,
Never to feel in soul doubt's spiritual rime;
The heart grow cold
With self; but in me that which warms my time.

II

Never to feel the drouth, the dearth that kills,
Before one dies,
Of mind, full-flowering on thought's fertile hills;
But, in my skies,
The falcon, Fancy, that no season kills.

120

III

Never to see the shadow at my door,
Nor fear its fall;
But wait serenely, whether rich or poor,
Nor care at all,
So Love sits with me at my open door.

IV

Never to have a dream I dreamed destroyed:
And towards the last
Live o'er again all that I have enjoyed,—
The happy Past,—
Through these, the dreams, no time has yet destroyed.

121

V

Never to lose my love for lowly things;
To feel the need
For simple beauty still: each bird that sings,
Each flower and weed
That looks its message of unguessed-at things.

VI

Never to lose my faith in Nature, God:
But still to find
Worship in trees; religion in each sod;
And in the wind
Sermons that breathe the universal God.

122

VII

Never to age in mind; much less in heart;
But keep them young
With song, glad song, that still shall have its part,—
Sung or unsung,—
Within the inmost temple of my heart.

VIII

That I may lose not all my trust in men!
And, through it, grow
Nearer to Heaven and God: and softly then
Meet Death and know
He has no terrors for my soul. Amen.

123

THE SHADOW

I

Mother, mother, what is that gazing through the darkness?
What is that that looks at me with its awful eyes?
Tell me, mother, what it is, freezing me to starkness?
Through the house it seems to go with its icy sighs,—
What is that, oh, what is that, mother, in the darkness?

II

Child, my child! my little child! 'tis a waving willow,
That the night wind bows and sways near the window-pane:

124

Here's my breast, my little son.—Let it be your pillow.
Have no fear, love, in my arms. Go to sleep again.
Go to sleep and turn your face from the windy willow.

III

Mother, mother, what is that? going round and round there?
Round the house and at the door stops and turns the knob.
Hold me close, O mother love! keep me from that sound there!—
Hear it how it's knocking now?—Don't you hear it sob?—
Guard me from the ghostly thing that goes round and round there.

125

IV

Child, my child! my little child! 'tis the wind that wanders:
'Tis the wandering wind that knocks, crying at the door.
Hark no more and heed no more what the night wind maunders.—
Rest your head on mother's heart, list its faery lore.
Go to sleep and have no fear of the wind that wanders.

V

Mother, mother, look and see! what is that that stands there?
With its lantern face and limbs, mantled all in black!

126

Gaunt and grim and horrible with its knuckled hands there!
Now before me! now beside me! now behind my back!
Mother! mother! face it now! ask it why it stands there!

VI

Child, my child! my little child! 'tis a shadow only!
Shadow of the lamp-shade here near your little bed!
No! it will not come again when the night lies lonely.
Sleep, oh, sleep, my little son. See! the thing is fled.
Mother will not leave her boy with that shadow only. ...

127

VII

Will he live? or will he die? Answer, fearful Shadow!
O thou Death who hoverest near, hold thy hands away!—
Oh, that night were past and light lay on hill and meadow!—
Does he sleep? or is he dead?—God! that it were day!
Light to help my love to fight with that crouching shadow!

128

NIGHT AND RAIN

The night has set her outposts there
Of wind and rain;
And to and fro, with ragged hair,
At intervals they search the pane.

The fir-trees, creepers redly climb,—
That seem to bleed,—
Like old conspirators in crime,
Drip, whispering of some desperate deed.

'Tis as if wild skirts, flying fast,
Besieged the house;
The wittol grass, bent to the blast,
Whines as if witches held carouse.

129

And now dark feet steal to the door
And tap and tip,
Shuffle, and then go on once more—
The eaves keep a persistent drip.

And then a skurry, and a bound;—
Wild feet again?—
A wind-wrenched tree that to the ground
Sweeps instantly its weight of rain.

What is it, finger on its lip,
That up and down
Treads, with dark raiment all a-drip,
Trailing a tattered leaf of gown?

“O father, I am frightened! See!
There, at the pane!”—
“Hush! hush! my child, 'tis but a tree
That tosses in the wind and rain.”

130

A rumble, as it were, of hoofs,
And hollow call:
“O father, what rolls on the roofs,
That sounds like some dark funeral?”

“Hush! hush! my child; it is the storm;
The autumn wind.”—
“But, father, see! what is that form?
There! wild against the window-blind.”

“It is the firelight in the room.”—
The father sighed.—
And then the child: “'Twas dark as doom,
And had the face of her who died.”

131

HAUNTERS OF THE SILENCE

There are haunters of the silence, ghosts that hold the heart and brain:
I have sat with them and hearkened; I have talked with them in vain:
I have shuddered from their coming, yet have run to meet them there,
And have cursed them and have blessed them and have loved them to despair.

At my door I see their shadows; in my walks I meet their ghosts;
Where I often hear them weeping or sweep by in withered hosts:

132

Perished dreams, gone like the roses, crumbling by like autumn leaves;
Phantoms of old joys departed, that the spirit eye perceives.

Oft at night they sit beside me, fix their eyes upon my face,
Demon eyes that burn and hold me, in whose deeps my heart can trace
All the past; and where a passion,—as in Hell the ghosts go by,—
Turns an anguished face toward me with a love that cannot die.

In the night-time, in the darkness, in the blackness of the storm,
Round my fireplace there they gather, flickering form on shadowy form:

133

In the daytime, in the noontide, in the golden sunset glow,
On the hilltops, in the forests, I have met them walking slow.

There are haunters of the silence, ghosts that hold the brain and heart:
In the mansion of my being they have placed a room apart:
There I hear their spectre raiment, see their shadows on the floor,
Where the raven, Sorrow, darkens Love's pale image o'er my door.

134

SOUNDS AND SIGHTS

Little leaves, that lean your ears
From each branch and bough of spring,
What is that your rapture hears?
Song of bird or flight of wing,
All so eager, little ears?

“Hush, oh, hush! Oh, don't you hear
Steps of beauty drawing near?
Neither flight of bee nor bird—
Hark! the steps of Love are heard!” ...

Little buds, that crowd with eyes
Every bush and every tree,
What is this that you surmise?
What is that which you would see,
So attentive, little eyes?

135

“Look, oh, look! Oh, can't you see
Loveliness camps 'neath each tree?
See her hosts and hear them sing,
Marching with the maiden Spring!”

136

FROST IN MAY

March set heel upon the flowers,
Trod and trampled them for hours:
But when April's bugles rang,
Up their starry legions sprang,
Radiant in the sun-shot showers.

April went her frolic ways,
Arm in arm with happy days:
Then from hills that rim the west,
Bare of head and bare of breast,
May, the maiden, showed her face.

137

Then, it seemed, again returned
March, the iron-heeled, who turned
From his northward path and caught
May about the waist, who fought
And his fierce advances spurned.

What her strength and her disdain
To the madness in his brain!
He must kiss her though he kill;
Then, when he had had his will,
Go his roaring way again.

Icy grew her finger-tips,
And the wild-rose of her lips
Paled with frost: then loud he laughed,
Left her, like a moonbeam-shaft,
Shattered, where the forest drips. ...

138

Mourn for her, O honey-bees!
Mourn, O buds upon the trees!
Birds and blossoms, mourn for May!
Mourn for her, then come away!
Leave her where her flowers freeze.

Leave her. Nothing more may save.
Leave her in her wildwood grave.
Nothing now will waken her,
Loved and lost, and lovelier
For the kiss that wild March gave.

139

IN THE STORM

I

Over heaven clouds are drifted;
In the trees the wind-witch cries;
By her sieve the rain is sifted,
And the clouds at times are rifted
By her mad broom as she flies.—
Love, there's lightning in the skies,
Swift, as, in your face uplifted,
Leaps the heart-thought to your eyes.

Little face, where I can trace
Dreams for which those eyes are pages,
Whose young magic here assuages
All the heart-storm and alarm.

140

II

Now the thunder tramples slowly,
Like a king, down heaven's arc;
And the clouds, like armies wholly
Vanquished, break; and, white as moly,
Sweeps the queen moon on the dark.—
Love, a bird wakes; is't the lark?—
Sweet as in your bosom holy
Sings the heart that now I hark.

All my soul that song makes whole,
That young song I hear it singing,
Calm and peace for ever bringing
To my heart's storm and alarm.

141

ROSE AND LEAF

All the roses now are gone,
All their glories shed:
Here's a rose that grows not wan,
Rose of love to wear upon
Your fair breast instead.

Everywhere sere leaves are seen
Golden, red and grey:
Here's a leaf for ever green,
Leaf of truth to hold between
Your white hands alway.

142

Here's my leaf and here's my rose.
Take them. They are yours.
In my garden nothing grows,
Garden of my heart, God knows,
That as long endures.

143

‘SOME RECKON TIME BY STARS’

Some reckon time by stars,
And some by hours:
Some measure days by dreams,
And some by flowers:
My heart alone records
My days and hours.

Some have a dial, a clock
That strikes a bell:
Some keep a calendar
To con and spell:
But I—I have my love,
Infallible.

144

My heart is clock enough:
It beats for her.
Both day and night it makes
A happy stir:
It keeps the time quite true
With throbs for her.

The only calendar,
That marks my seasons,
Is that sweet face of hers,
Her moods and reasons,
Wherein no record is
Of winter seasons.

145

DRAGON-SEED

Ye have ploughed the field like cattle,
Ye have sown the dragon-seed,—
Are ye ready now for battle?—
For fighters are what we need.
Have ye done with taking and giving?
The old gods, Give and Take?—
Then into the ranks of the living,
And fight for the fighting's sake.

Let who will thrive by cunning,
And lies be another's cure;
But girdle your loins for running,
And the goal of Never Sure.

146

Enough of idle shirking!
Though you hate like death your part
There is nothing helps like working
When you work with all your heart.

For the world is fact, not fiction,
And its battle is not with words;
And what helps is not men's diction,
But the temper of their swords.
For what each does is measure
Of that he is, I say:
And not by the ranks of Leisure
Is the battle won to-day.

147

LINCOLN

(1809—February 12—1909)

I

Yea, this is he, whose name is synonym
Of all that's noble, though but lowly born;
Who took command upon a stormy morn
When few had hope.—Although uncouth of limb,
Homely of face and gaunt, but never grim,
Beautiful he was with that which none may scorn—
With love of God and man and things forlorn,
And freedom mighty as the soul in him.
Large at the helm of State he leans and looms
With the grave, kindly look of those who die
Doing their duty. Staunch, unswervingly
Onward he steers beneath portentous glooms,
And overwhelming thunders of the sky,
Till, safe in port, he sees a people free.

148

II

Safe from the storm; the harbour-lights of Peace
Before his eyes; the burden of dark fears
Cast from him like a cloak; and in his ears
The heart-beat music of a great release,
Captain and pilot, back upon the seas,
Whose wrath he'd weathered, back he looks with tears,
Seeing no shadow of the Death that nears,
Stealthy and sure, with sudden agonies.
So let him stand, brother to every man,
Ready for toil or battle; he who held
A Nation's destinies within his hand:
Type of our greatness; first American,
By whom the hearts of all men are compelled,
And with whose name Freedom unites our Land.

149

III

He needs no praise of us, who wrought so well,
Who has the Master's praise; who at his post
Stood to the last. Yet, now, from coast to coast,
Let memory of him peal like some great bell.
Of him as woodsman, workman let it tell!
Of him as lawyer, statesman, without boast!
And for what qualities we love him most,
And recollections that no time can quell.
He needs no praise of us, yet let us praise,
Albeit his simple soul we may offend,
That liked not praise, being most diffident.
Still let us praise him, praise him in such ways
As his were, and in words, that shall transcend
Marble, and outlast any monument.

150

POE

(1809—January 19—1909)

Upon the summit of his Century
He reared a Palace of enduring Art,
From whose wild windows never more depart
Beauty's pale light and starry fantasy:
Within is music, sobbing ceaselessly;
And phantom terror, spectres of the heart,
And ghosts of grief and love that ever start
From haunted places, fleeing what none may see.
Around its towers the bird, that never dies,
Circles; the tempest beats with black alarm
On one red window where, beyond the storm,
The Lord of that high Palace dreams and sighs,
His Soul, with its Despair, a kingly form,
And Death with infinite pity in his eyes.

151

MRS. BROWNING

O voice of ecstasy and lyric pain,
Divinely throated and divinely heard
Among old England's songsters! Sprite or bird,
Haunting the woods of song with raptured strain!
In whose wild music Love is born and slain.
And young Desire cries ever a battle word,
And Passion goes, ready with kiss or sword,
To make us captive or set free again.
Above the flowery meads of English song,
Enchantment-sweet, her golden numbers pour,
Commanding and compelling, like Desire!—
O nightingale and lark, how o'er the throng
Of all thy sister singers thou dost soar,
Filled with seraphic love and Sapphic fire!

University of Virginia Library

THE MISTY MID-REGION

HESPERIAN

(PROEM)

‘THAT NIGHT WHEN I CAME TO THE GRANGE’

THE ANGEL WITH THE BOOK

DREAM ROAD

THE PLACE

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THE ROAD

THE OLD LANE

A FOREST CHILD

IN THE WOOD

GARDEN GOSSIP

THE OLD GATE MADE OF PICKETS

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APRILIAN

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A GHOST AND A DREAM

TRAMPS

LILITH'S LOVER

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WITCHERY

THE FOREST WAY

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HYLAS

THE WOOD THRUSH

ONE WHO LOVED NATURE

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AVALON

THE YARROW

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MIDSUMMER

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WILLOW WOOD

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