University of Virginia Library

Again I felt the liquid air.
Around my hot brow circling roll
Sweet as my Saint Madonna's prayer,
Or benedictions on the soul.
Pure air, which God gives free to all,
Again I breathed without control—
Pure air, that man would fain enthral—
God's air, which man hath seized and sold
Unto his fellow-man for gold.
‘I bowed bown to the bended sky—
I tossed my two thin hands on high—
I called unto the crooked moon—
I shouted to the shining stars,
With breath and rapture uncontrolled,
Like some wild schoolboy loosed at noon,
Or comrade coming from the wars,
Hailing his companeers of old.

‘Short time for shouting or delay—
The cock is shrill, the east is gray,
Pursuit is made, I must away.
They cast me on a sinewy steed,
And bid me look to girth and guide,
A caution that is little need.
I dash the iron in his side—
Swift as a shooting-star I ride—
I turn—I see, to my dismay,
A silent rider at my side.
I glance again—it is my bride—
My love—my life—rides at my side.
By gulch and gorge and brake and all,
Swift as the shining meteors fall,
We fly, and never sound or word
But ringing mustang hoofs is heard,
And limbs of steel and lungs of steam
Could not be stronger than theirs seem.
Grandly as some joyous dream,
League on league, and hour on hour,
Far from keen pursuit, or power
Of sheriff, bailiff, high or low,
Into the bristling hills we go.
Into the snowy-haired McCloud,
White as the foldings of a shroud;
We dash into the dashing stream—
We breast the tide—we drop the rein—
We clutch the streaming, tangled mane;
Yet the silent rider at my side
Has never a sound or word replied.
Out in its foam—its snow—its roar—
Breasting away to the farther shore,
Steadily—bravely—gained at last—
Gained—where never a dastard foe
Has dared to come—or friend to go.
Pursuit is baffled and danger passed.

‘Under an oak whose wide arms were
Lifting aloft as if in prayer—
Under an oak, where the shining moon
Like feathered snow in winter noon,
Quivered, sifted, and drifted down
Over the dewy, dappled ground;
And yet she was as silent still,
A black stones toppled from the hill—
Great basalt blocks that near us lay—
And I in silence sat on one,
And she stood gazing far away—
Massive, squared, and chiselled stone,
Like columns that had toppled down
From temple dome or tower crown
Along some drifted, silent way
Of desolate and desert town
Built by the children of the sun.
And through the leaves the silver moon
Fell sifting down in silver bars
And played upon her raven hair,
And darted through like shooting-stars
That dance through all the night's sweet noon
To echoes of an unseen choir.

‘I sought to catch her to my breast
And charm her from her silent mood—
She shrank as if a beam—a breath—
Then silently before me stood—
Still—coldly—as the kiss of death.
Her face was darker than a pall—
Her presence was so grandly tall,
I would have started from the stone
Where I sat gazing up at her,
As from a form to earth unknown,
Had I possessed the power to stir.

‘“O touch me not—no more—no more,
'Tis past—and my sweet dream is o'er.
Impure! Impure! Impure!” she cried,
In words so sweetly, weirdly wild—
Like mingling of a rippling tide,
And music on the waters spilled.
“Pollution foul is on my limbs,
And poison lingers on my lips.
My red heart sickens—hot head swims—
I burn unto my finger-tips.
But you are free. Fly! Fly alone.
Yes, you will win another bride—
Will win you name, and place, and power—
And ne'er recall this face—this hour—
Save in some secret, deep regret,
Which I forgive and you'll forget—
In some far clime where nought is known
Of all that you have done or seen,
Or dearly loved, or madly lost,
Or what your life this night has cost.
Your destiny will lead you on
Where opened wide to welcome you
Rich gushing hearts and bosoms are,
And snowy arms, more purely fair,
And breasts—who dare say breasts more true
When all this dear night's deeds are done?

‘“They said you had deserted me—
Had rued you of your wood and wild.
I knew—I knew it could not be.
I trusted as a trusting child,
I crossed the bristled mountain high
That curves its rough back to the sky,
I rode the white-maned mountain flood,
And tracked, and tracked the trackless wood.
The good God led me, as before,
And brought me to your prison-door.
I heard you in the midnight call
My name in my own mountain tongue.
And yet you called so feebly wild,
I should' mistook you for a child,
Had I not known that name and tone
From all that earth has ever known.

‘“That maddened call, that fevered moan,
In that sweet mountain tongue and tone,
So thrilled my sympathetic soul,
My senses I could not control.
The keeper with his clinking-keys
I sought, implored upon my knees
That I might see you, touch your hand,
Your brow, or speak but one low word
Of comfort in your dying hour.
His red face shone, his redder eyes
Were like the fire of the skies.
He cried, but yield to my demand
And you may hold his maddened head
Until his latest breath is sped.
Again I heard your feeble moan,
I cried, And must he die alone?
I cried unto a heart of stone,
He knew he held me in his power.

‘“Ah! why the burning horrors tell?
Enough! I crept into your cell
Polluted, loathed, a hated thing,
An ashen fruit, a poisoned spring.

‘“I nursed you, lured you back to life,
And when you woke and called me wife
And love; with pale lips rife,
With love, and feeble loveliness,
I turned away, I hid my face
In mad reproach and deep distress—
In dust down in that loathsome place.

‘“And then I vowed a solemn vow
That you should live—live and be free—
And you have lived—are free, now;
But as for me,
Too slow the red sun comes to see
My life or death, or me again.
O, the peril! The deep pain
I have endured; the dark stain
That I have took on my free soul—
All, all to save you—make you free.—
The foul broad hands that here have pressed,
The drunken lips that mine caressed
Were more than mortal could endure.
But death and fire can make all pure.

‘“And yet I have not one regret
For all I suffered, or may yet
Endure or do in this dear night.
Since you have lived and now are free—
Since I have lured you back to life,
And led you safely in your flight.
And now in this, my last adieu—
The last act earth shall know of me—
I ask but this alone of you,
That you believe, ah! know me true—
Know all that I have done, or do
Is done alone for love and you.

‘“Behold this finished funeral pyre,
All ready for the form and fire,
Which these, my own hands, did prepare
For this last night; then lay me there.
I would not hide me from my God,
Or the gloom, or grandeur of the place
Beneath the cold and sullen sod,
As if I would conceal my face
In fear or shame for evil done;
Nor in a gloomy bed of clay
Would I with reptiles rot away,
But in a fiery, shining shroud
Ascend to God, a wreathing cloud
At once, and glad as gala day.”

‘She stopped—she stood—she leaned apace
Her glance and half-regretting face,
As if to yield herself to me,
And then she cried—“It cannot be,
For I have vowed a solemn vow,
O God! help me to keep it now.”

‘I sprang, with arms extended wide,
To catch her to my burning breast.
She caught a dagger from her side
And plunged it to its silver hilt
Into her hot and bursting heart,
And falling in my arms she cried:
“Yes, you may kiss me now,” and died—
Died as my soul to hers was pressed—
Died as I held her to my breast—
Died without one word or moan—
Died without a tear, or tone
Save this, “Yes, you may kiss me now.”
Fearfully she had kept her vow.