Early Poems
Sonnet
If some small savor creep into my rhyme
Of the old poets, if some words I use,
Neglected long, which have the lusty thews
Of that gold-haired and earnest-hearted time,
Whose loving joy and sorrow all sublime
Have given our tongue its starry eminence,—
It is not pride, God knows, but reverence
Which hath grown in me since my childhood’s prime;
Wherein I feel that my poor lyre is strung
With soul-strings like to theirs, and that I have
No right to muse their holy graves among,
If I can be a custom-fettered slave,
And, in mine own true spirit, am not brave
To speak what rusheth upward to my tongue.
Then Thorstein looked at Hakon, where he sate,
Mute as a cloud amid the stormy hall,
And said: “O, Skald, sing now an olden song,
Such as our fathers heard who led great lives;
And, as the bravest on a shield is borne
Along the waving host that shouts him king,
So rode their thrones upon the thronging seas!”
Then the old man arose: white-haired he stood,
White-bearded, and with eyes that looked afar
From their still region of perpetual snow,
Over the little smokes and stirs of men:
His head was bowed with gathered flakes of years,
As winter bends the sea-foreboding pine,
But something triumphed in his brow and eye,
Which whoso saw it, could not see and crouch:
Loud rang the emptied beakers as he mused,
Brooding his eyried thoughts; then, as an eagle
Circles smooth-winged above the wind-vexed woods,
So wheeled his soul into the air of song
High o’er the stormy hall; and thus he sang:
“The fletcher for his arrow-shaft picks out
Wood closest-grained, long-seasoned, straight as light;
And, from a quiver full of such as these,
The wary bow-man, matched against his peers,
Long doubting, singles yet once more the best.
Who is it that can make such shafts as Fate?
What archer of his arrows is so choice,
Or hits the white so surely? They are men,
The chosen of her quiver; nor for her
Will every reed suffice, or cross-grained stick
At random from life’s vulgar fagot plucked:
Such answer household ends; but she will have
Souls straight and clear, of toughest fibre, sound
Down to the heart of heart; from these she strips
All needless stuff, all sapwood, hardens them,
From circumstance untoward feathers plucks
Crumpled and cheap, and barbs with iron will:
The hour that passes is her quiver-boy;
When she draws bow, ’tis not across the wind,
Nor ’gainst the sun, her haste-snatched arrow sings,
For sun and wind have plighted faith to her:
Ere men have heard the sinew twang, behold,
In the butt’s heart her trembling messenger!
“The song is old and simple that I sing:
Good were the days of yore, when men were tried
By ring of shields, as now by ring of gold;
But, while the gods are left, and hearts of men,
And the free ocean, still the days are good;
Through the broad Earth roams Opportunity
And knocks at every door of hut or hall,
Until she finds the brave soul that she wants.”
He ceased, and instantly the frothy tide
Of interrupted wassail roared along;
But Leif, the son of Eric, sate apart
Musing, and, with his eyes upon the fire,
Saw shapes of arrows, lost as soon as seen;
But then with that resolve his heart was bent,
Which, like a humming shaft, through many a strife
Of day and night across the unventured seas,
Shot the brave prow to cut on Vinland sands
The first rune in the Saga of the West.
’Tis good to be abroad in the sun,
His gifts abide when day is done;
Each thing in nature from his cup
Gathers a several virtue up;
The grace within its being’s reach
Becomes the nutriment of each,
And the same life imbibed by all
Makes each most individual:
Here the twig-bending peaches seek
The glow that mantles in their cheek—
Hence comes the Indian-summer bloom
That hazes round the basking plum,
And, from the same impartial light,
The grass sucks green, the lily white.
Like these the soul, for sunshine made,
Grows wan and gracile in the shade,
Her faculties, which God decreed
Various as Summer’s dædal breed,
With one sad color are imbued,
Shut from the sun that tints their blood;
The shadow of the poet’s roof
Deadens the dyes of warp and woof;
Whate’er of ancient song remains
Has fresh air flowing in its veins,
For Greece and eldest Ind knew well
That out of doors, with world-wide swell
Arches the student’s lawful cell.
Away, unfruitful lore of books,
For whose vain idiom we reject
The spirit’s mother-dialect,
Aliens among the birds and brooks,
Dull to interpret or believe
What gospels lost the woods retrieve,
Or what the eaves-dropping violet
Reports from God, who walketh yet
His garden in the hush of eve!
Away, ye pedants city-bred,
Unwise of heart, too wise of head,
Who handcuff Art with thus and so,
And in each other’s footprints tread,
Like those who walk through drifted snow;
Who, from deep study of brick walls
Conjecture of the water-falls,
By six square feet of smoke-stained sky
Compute those deeps that overlie
The still tarn’s heaven-anointed eye,
And, in your earthen crucible,
With chemic tests essay to spell
How nature works in field and dell!
Seek we where Shakspeare buried gold?
Such hands no charmed witch-hazel hold;
To beach and rock repeats the sea
The mystic Open Sesame;
Old Greylock’s voices not in vain
Comment on Milton’s mountain strain,
And cunningly the various wind
Spenser’s locked music can unbind.
In the twilight deep and silent
Comes thy spirit unto mine,
When the moonlight and the starlight
Over cliff and woodland shine,
And the quiver of the river
Seems a thrill of joy benign.
Then I rise and wander slowly
To the headland by the sea,
When the evening star throbs setting
Through the cloudy cedar tree,
And from under, mellow thunder
Of the surf comes fitfully.
Then within my soul I feel thee
Like a gleam of other years,
Visions of my childhood murmur
Their old madness in my ears,
Till the pleasance of thy presence
Cools my heart with blissful tears.
All the wondrous dreams of boyhood—
All youth’s fiery thirst of praise—
All the surer hopes of manhood
Blossoming in sadder days—
Joys that bound me, griefs that crowned me
With a better wreath than bays—
All the longings after freedom—
The vague love of human kind,
Wandering far and near at random
Like a winged seed in the wind—
The dim yearnings and fierce burnings
Of an undirected mind—
All of these, oh best belovèd,
Happiest present dreams and past,
In thy love find safe fulfilment,
Ripened into truths at last;
Faith and beauty, hope and duty
To one centre gather fast.
How my nature, like an ocean,
At the breath of thine awakes,
Leaps its shores in mad exulting
And in foamy thunder breaks,
Then downsinking, lieth shrinking
At the tumult that it makes!
Blazing Hesperus hath sunken
Low within the pale-blue west,
And with golden splendor crowneth
The horizon’s piny crest;
Thoughtful quiet stills the riot
Of wild longing in my breast.
Home I loiter through the moonlight,
Underneath the quivering trees,
Which, as if a spirit stirred them,
Sway and bend, till by degrees
The far surge’s murmur merges
In the rustle of the breeze.
There is not in this life of ours
One bliss unmixed with fears,
The hope that wakes our deepest powers
A face of sadness wears,
And the dew that showers our dearest flowers
Is the bitter dew of tears.
Fame waiteth long, and lingereth
Through weary nights and morns—
And evermore the shadow Death
With mocking finger scorns
That underneath the laurel wreath
Should be a wreath of thorns.
The laurel leaves are cool and green,
But the thorns are hot and sharp,
Lean Hunger grins and stares between
The poet and his harp;
Though of Love’s sunny sheen his woof have been,
Grim want thrusts in the warp.
And if beyond this darksome clime
Some fair star Hope may see,
That keeps unjarred the blissful chime
Of its golden infancy—
Where the harvest-time of faith sublime
Not always is to be—
Yet would the true soul rather choose
Its home where sorrow is,
Than in a sated peace to lose
Its life’s supremest bliss—
The rainbow hues that bend profuse
O’er cloudy spheres like this—
The want, the sorrow and the pain,
That are Love’s right to cure—
The sunshine bursting after rain—
The gladness insecure
That makes us fain strong hearts to gain,
To do and to endure.
High natures must be thunder-scarred
With many a searing wrong;
From mother Sorrow’s breasts the bard
Sucks gifts of deepest song,
Nor all unmarred with struggles hard
Wax the Soul’s sinews strong.
Dear Patience, too, is born of woe,
Patience that opes the gate
Wherethrough the soul of man must go
Up to each nobler state,
Whose voice’s flow so meek and low
Smooths the bent brows of Fate.
Though Fame be slow, yet Death is swift,
And, o’er the spirit’s eyes,
Life after life doth change and shift
With larger destinies:
As on we drift, some wider rift
Shows us serener skies.
And though naught falleth to us here
But gains the world counts loss,
Though all we hope of wisdom clear
When climbed to seems but dross,
Yet all, though ne’er Christ’s faith they wear,
At least may share his cross.
Farewell! as the bee round the blossom
Doth murmur drowsily,
So murmureth round my bosom
The memory of thee;
Lingering, it seems to go,
When the wind more full doth flow,
Waving the flower to and fro,
But still returneth, Marian!
My hope no longer burneth,
Which did so fiercely burn,
My joy to sorrow turneth,
Although loath, loath to turn—
I would forget—
And yet—and yet
My heart to thee still yearneth, Marian!
Fair as a single star thou shinest,
And white as lilies are
The slender hands wherewith thou twinest
Thy heavy auburn hair;
Thou art to me
A memory
Of all that is divinest:
Thou art so fair and tall,
Thy looks so queenly are,
Thy very shadow on the wall,
Thy step upon the stair,
The thought that thou art nigh,
The chance look of thine eye
Are more to me than all, Marian,
And will be till I die!
As the last quiver of a bell
Doth fade into the air,
With a subsiding swell
That dies we know not where,
So my hope melted and was gone:
I raised mine eyes to bless the star
That shared its light with me so far
Below its silver throne,
And gloom and chilling vacancy
Were all was left to me,
In the dark, bleak night I was alone!
Alone in the blessed Earth, Marian,
For what were all to me—
Its love, and light, and mirth, Marian,
If I were not with thee?
My heart will not forget thee
More than the moaning brine
Forgets the moon when she is set;
The gush when first I met thee
That thrilled my brain like wine,
Doth thrill as madly yet;
My heart cannot forget thee,
Though it may droop and pine,
Too deeply it had set thee
In every love of mine;
No new moon ever cometh,
No flower ever bloometh,
No twilight ever gloometh
But I’m more only thine.
Oh look not on me, Marian,
Thine eyes are wild and deep,
And they have won me, Marian,
From peacefulness and sleep;
The sunlight doth not sun me,
The meek moonshine doth shun me,
All sweetest voices stun me—
There is no rest
Within my breast
And I can only weep, Marian!
As a landbird far at sea
Doth wander through the sleet
And drooping downward wearily
Finds no rest for her feet,
So wandereth my memory
O’er the years when we did meet:
I used to say that everything
Partook a share of thee,
That not a little bird could sing,
Or green leaf flutter on a tree,
That nothing could be beautiful
Save part of thee were there,
That from thy soul so clear and full
All bright and blessèd things did cull
The charm to make them fair;
And now I know
That it was so,
Thy spirit through the earth doth flow
And face me wheresoe’er I go—
What right hath perfectness to give
Such weary weight of woe
Unto the soul which cannot live
On anything more low?
Oh leave me, leave me, Marian,
There’s no fair thing I see
But doth deceive me, Marian,
Into sad dreams of thee!
A cold snake gnaws my heart
And crushes round my brain,
And I should glory but to part
So bitterly again,
Feeling the slow tears start
And fall in fiery rain:
There’s a wide ring round the moon,
The ghost-like clouds glide by,
And I hear the sad winds croon
A dirge to the lowering sky;
There’s nothing soft or mild
In the pale moon’s sickly light,
But all looks strange and wild
Through the dim, foreboding night:
I think thou must be dead
In some dark and lonely place,
With candles at thy head,
And a pall above thee spread
To hide thy dead, cold face;
But I can see thee underneath
So pale, and still, and fair,
Thine eyes closed smoothly and a wreath
Of flowers in thy hair;
I never saw thy face so clear
When thou wast with the living,
As now beneath the pall, so drear,
And stiff, and unforgiving;
I cannot flee thee, Marian,
I cannot turn away,
Mine eyes must see thee, Marian,
Through salt tears night and day.
Poet! lonely is thy bed,
And the turf is overhead—
Cold earth is thy cover;
But thy heart hath found release,
And it slumbers full of peace
’Neath the rustle of green trees
And the warm hum of the bees,
Mid the drowsy clover;
Through thy chamber, still as death,
A smooth gurgle wandereth,
As the blue stream murmureth
To the blue sky over.
Three paces from the silver strand,
Gently in the fine, white sand,
With a lily in thy hand,
Pale as snow, they laid thee;
In no coarse earth wast thou hid,
And no gloomy coffin-lid
Darkly overweighed thee.
Silently as snow-flakes drift,
The smooth sand did sift and sift
O’er the bed they made thee;
All sweet birds did come and sing
At thy sunny burying—
Choristers unbidden,
And, beloved of sun and dew,
Meek forget-me-nots upgrew
Where thine eyes so large and blue
’Neath the turf were hidden.
Where thy stainless clay doth lie,
Blue and open is the sky,
And the white clouds wander by,
Dreams of summer silently
Darkening the river;
Thou hearest the clear water run;
And the ripples every one,
Scattering the golden sun,
Through thy silence quiver;
Vines trail down upon the stream,
Into its smooth and glassy dream
A green stillness spreading,
And the shiner, perch, and bream
Through the shadowed waters gleam
’Gainst the current heading.
White as snow, thy winding sheet
Shelters thee from head to feet,
Save thy pale face only;
Thy face is turned toward the skies,
The lids lie meekly o’er thine eyes,
And the low-voiced pine-tree sighs
O’er thy bed so lonely.
All thy life thou lov’dst its shade:
Underneath it thou art laid,
In an endless shelter;
Thou hearest it forever sigh
As the wind’s vague longings die
In its branches dim and high—
Thou hear’st the waters gliding by
Slumberously welter.
Thou wast full of love and truth,
Of forgiveness and ruth—
Thy great heart with hope and youth
Tided to o’erflowing.
Thou didst dwell in mysteries,
And there lingered on thine eyes
Shadows of serener skies,
Awfully wild memories,
That were like foreknowing;
Through the earth thou would’st have gone,
Lighted from within alone,
Seeds from flowers in Heaven grown
With a free hand sowing.
Thou didst remember well and long
Some fragments of thine angel-song,
And strive, through want of woe and wrong,
To win the world unto it;
Thy sin it was to see and hear
Beyond To-day’s dim hemisphere—
Beyond all mists of hope and fear,
Into a life more true and clear,
And dearly thou didst rue it;
Light of the new world thou hadst won,
O’erflooded by a purer sun—
Slowly Fate’s ship came drifting on,
And through the dark, save thou, not one
Caught of the land a token.
Thou stood’st upon the farthest prow,
Something within thy soul said “Now!”
And leaping forth with eager brow,
Thou fell’st on shore heart-broken.
Long time thy brethren stood in fear;
Only the breakers far and near,
White with their anger, they could hear;
The sounds of land, which thy quick ear
Caught long ago, they heard not.
And, when at last they reached the strand,
They found thee lying on the sand
With some wild flowers in thy hand,
But thy cold bosom stirred not;
They listened, but they heard no sound
Save from the glad life all around
A low, contented murmur.
The long grass flowed adown the hill,
A hum rose from a hidden rill,
But thy glad heart, that knew no ill
But too much love, lay dead and still—
The only thing that sent a chill
Into the heart of summer.
Thou didst not seek the poet’s wreath
But too soon didst win it;
Without ’twas green, but underneath
Were scorn and loneliness and death,
Gnawing the brain with burning teeth,
And making mock within it.
Thou, who wast full of nobleness,
Whose very life-blood ’twas to bless,
Whose soul’s one law was giving,
Must bandy words with wickedness,
Haggle with hunger and distress,
To win that death which worldliness
Calls bitterly a living.
“Thou sow’st no gold, and shalt not reap!”
Muttered earth, turning in her sleep;
“Come home to the Eternal Deep!”
Murmured a voice, and a wide sweep
Of wings through thy soul’s hush did creep,
As of thy doom o’erflying;
It seem’d that thy strong heart would leap
Out of thy breast, and thou didst weep,
But not with fear of dying;
Men could not fathom thy deep fears,
They could not understand thy tears,
The hoarded agony of years
Of bitter self-denying.
So once, when high above the spheres
Thy spirit sought its starry peers,
It came not back to face the jeers
Of brothers who denied it;
Star-crowned, thou dost possess the deeps
Of God, and thy white body sleeps
Where the lone pine forever keeps
Patient watch beside it.
Poet! underneath the turf,
Soft thou sleepest, free from morrow,
Thou hast struggled through the surf
Of wild thoughts and want and sorrow.
Now, beneath the moaning pine,
Full of rest, thy body lieth,
While far up is clear sunshine,
Underneath a sky divine,
Her loosed wings thy spirit trieth;
Oft she strove to spread them here,
But they were too white and clear
For our dingy atmosphere.
Thy body findeth ample room
In its still and grassy tomb
By the silent river;
But thy spirit found the earth
Narrow for the mighty birth
Which it dreamed of ever;
Thou wast guilty of a rhyme
Learned in a benigner clime,
And of that more grievous crime,
An ideal too sublime
For the low-hung sky of Time.
The calm spot where thy body lies
Gladdens thy soul in Paradise,
It is so still and holy;
Thy body sleeps serenely there,
And well for it thy soul may care,
It was so beautiful and fair,
Lily white so wholly.
From so pure and sweet a frame
Thy spirit parted as it came,
Gentle as a maiden;
Now it lieth full of rest—
Sods are lighter on its breast
Than the great, prophetic guest
Wherewith it was laden.
PRESSED IN AN OLD COPY OF SPENSER.
Who prest you here? The Past can tell,
When summer skies were bright above,
And some full heart did leap and swell
Beneath the white new moon of love.
Some Poet, haply, when the world
Showed like a calm sea, grand and blue,
Ere its cold, inky waves had curled
O’er the numb heart once warm and true;
When, with his soul brimful of morn,
He looked beyond the vale of Time,
Nor saw therein the dullard scorn
That made his heavenliness a crime;
When, musing o’er the Poets olden,
His soul did like a sun upstart
To shoot its arrows, clear and golden,
Through slavery’s cold and darksome heart.
Alas! too soon the veil is lifted
That hangs between the soul and pain,
Too soon the morning-red hath drifted
Into dull cloud, or fallen in rain!
Or were you prest by one who nurst
Bleak memories of love gone by,
Whose heart, like a star fallen, burst
In dark and erring vacancy?
To him you still were fresh and green
As when you grew upon the stalk,
And many a breezy summer scene
Came back—and many a moonlit walk;
And there would be a hum of bees,
A smell of childhood in the air,
And old, fresh feelings cooled the breeze
That, like loved fingers, stirred his hair!
Then would you suddenly be blasted
By the keen wind of one dark thought,
One nameless woe, that had outlasted
The sudden blow whereby ’twas brought.
Or were you prest here by two lovers
Who seemed to read these verses rare,
But found between the antique covers
What Spenser could not prison there:
Songs which his glorious soul had heard,
But his dull pen could never write,
Which flew, like some gold-wingèd bird,
Through the blue heaven out of sight?
My heart is with them as they sit,
I see the rosebud in her breast,
I see her small hand taking it
From out its odorous, snowy nest;
I hear him swear that he will keep it,
In memory of that blessed day,
To smile on it or over-weep it
When she and spring are far away.
Ah me! I needs must droop my head,
And brush away a happy tear,
For they are gone, and, dry and dead,
The rosebud lies before me here.
Yet is it in no stranger’s hand,
For I will guard it tenderly,
And it shall be a magic wand
To bring mine own true love to me.
My heart runs o’er with sweet surmises,
The while my fancy weaves her rhyme,
Kind hopes and musical surprises
Throng round me from the olden time.
I do not care to know who prest you:
Enough for me to feel and know
That some heart’s love and longing blest you,
Knitting to-day with long-ago.
A FRAGMENT.
The night is calm and beautiful; the snow
Sparkles beneath the clear and frosty moon
And the cold stars, as if it took delight
In its own silent whiteness; the hushed earth
Sleeps in the soft arms of the embracing blue,
Secure as if angelic squadrons yet
Encamped about her, and each watching star
Gained double brightness from the flashing arms
Of wingèd and unsleeping sentinels.
Upward the calm of infinite silence deepens,
The sea that flows between high heaven and earth,
Musing by whose smooth brink we sometimes find
A stray leaf floated from those happier shores,
And hope, perchance not vainly, that some flower
Which we had watered with our holiest tears,
Pale blooms, and yet our scanty garden’s best,
O’er the same ocean piloted by love,
May find a haven at the feet of God,
And be not wholly worthless in his sight.
O, high dependence on a higher Power,
Sole stay for all these restless faculties
That wander, Ishmael-like, the desert bare
Wherein our human knowledge hath its home,
Shifting their light-framed tents from day to day,
With each new-found oasis, wearied soon,
And only certain of uncertainty!
O, mighty humbleness that feels with awe,
Yet with a vast exulting feels, no less,
That this huge Minster of the Universe,
Whose smallest oratories are glorious worlds,
With painted oriels of dawn and sunset;
Whose carvèd ornaments are systems grand,
Orion kneeling in his starry niche,
The Lyre whose strings give music audible
To holy ears, and countless splendors more,
Crowned by the blazing Cross high-hung o’er all;
Whose organ music is the solemn stops
Of endless Change breathed through by endless Good;
Whose choristers are all the morning stars;
Whose altar is the sacred human heart
Whereon Love’s candles burn unquenchably,
Trimmed day and night by gentle-handed Peace;
With all its arches and its pinnacles
That stretch forever and forever up,
Is founded on the silent heart of God,
Silent, yet pulsing forth exhaustless life
Through the least veins of all created things.
Fit musings these for the departing year;
And God be thanked for such a crystal night
As fills the spirit with good store of thoughts,
That, like a cheering fire of walnut, crackle
Upon the hearthstone of the heart, and cast
A mild home-glow o’er all Humanity!
Yes, though the poisoned shafts of evil doubts
Assail the skyey panoply of Faith,
Though the great hopes which we have had for man,
Foes in disguise, because they based belief
On man’s endeavor, not on God’s decree—
Though these proud-visaged hopes, once turned to fly,
Hurl backward many a deadly Parthian dart
That rankles in the soul and makes it sick
With vain regret, nigh verging on despair—
Yet, in such calm and earnest hours as this,
We well can feel how every living heart
That sleeps to-night in palace or in cot,
Or unroofed hovel, or which need hath known
Of other homestead than the arching sky,
Is circled watchfully with seraph fires;
How our own erring will it is that hangs
The flaming sword o’er Eden’s unclosed gate,
Which gives free entrance to the pure in heart,
And with its guarding walls doth fence the meek.
Sleep then, O Earth, in thy blue-vaulted cradle,
Bent over always by thy mother Heaven!
We all are tall enough to reach God’s hand,
And angels are no taller: looking back
Upon the smooth wake of a year o’erpast,
We see the black clouds furling, one by one,
From the advancing majesty of Truth,
And something won for Freedom, whose least gain
Is as a firm and rock-built citadel
Wherefrom to launch fresh battle on her foes;
Or, leaning from the time’s extremest prow,
If we gaze forward through the blinding spray,
And dimly see how much of ill remains,
How many fetters to be sawn asunder
By the slow toil of individual zeal,
Or haply rusted by salt tears in twain,
We feel, with something of a sadder heart,
Yet bracing up our bruisèd mail the while,
And fronting the old foe with fresher spirit,
How great it is to breathe with human breath,
To be but poor foot-soldiers in the ranks
Of our old exiled king, Humanity;
Encamping after every hard-won field
Nearer and nearer Heaven’s happy plains.
Many great souls have gone to rest, and sleep
Under this armor, free and full of peace:
If these have left the earth, yet Truth remains,
Endurance, too, the crowning faculty
Of noble minds, and Love, invincible
By any weapons; and these hem us round
With silence such that all the groaning clank
Of this mad engine men have made of earth
Dulls not some ears for catching purer tones,
That wander from the dim surrounding vast,
Or far more clear melodious prophecies,
The natural music of the heart of man,
Which by kind Sorrow’s ministry hath learned
That the true sceptre of all power is love
And humbleness the palace-gate of truth.
What man with soul so blind as sees not here
The first faint tremble of Hope’s morning-star,
Foretelling how the God-forged shafts of dawn,
Fitted already on their golden string,
Shall soon leap earthward with exulting flight
To thrid the dark heart of that evil faith
Whose trust is in the clumsy arms of Force,
The ozier hauberk of a ruder age?
Freedom! thou other name for happy Truth,
Thou warrior-maid, whose steel-clad feet were never
Out of the stirrup, nor thy lance uncouched,
Nor thy fierce eye enticèd from its watch,
Thou hast learned now, by hero-blood in vain
Poured to enrich the soil which tyrants reap;
By wasted lives of prophets, and of those
Who, by the promise in their souls upheld,
Into the red arms of a fiery death
Went blithely as the golden-girdled bee
Sinks in the sleepy poppy’s cup of flame
By the long woes of nations set at war,
That so the swollen torrent of their wrath
May find a vent, else sweeping off like straws
The thousand cobweb threads, grown cable-huge
By time’s long gathered dust, but cobwebs still,
Which bind the Many that the Few may gain
Leisure to wither by the drought of ease
What heavenly germs in their own souls were sown;—
By all these searching lessons thou hast learned
To throw aside thy blood-stained helm and spear
And with thy bare brow daunt the enemy’s front,
Knowing that God will make the lily stalk,
In the soft grasp of naked Gentleness,
Stronger than iron spear to shatter through
The sevenfold toughness of Wrong’s idle shield.
I.
The sunset scarce had dimmed away
Into the twilight’s doubtful gray;
One long cloud o’er the horizon lay,
’Neath which, a streak of bluish white,
Wavered between the day and night;
Over the pine trees on the hill
The trembly evening-star did thrill,
And the new moon, with slender rim,
Through the elm arches gleaming dim,
Filled memory’s chalice to the brim.
II.
On such an eve the heart doth grow
Full of surmise, and scarce can know
If it be now or long ago,
Or if indeed it doth exist;—
A wonderful enchanted mist
From the new moon doth wander out,
Wrapping all things in mystic doubt,
So that this world doth seem untrue,
And all our fancies to take hue
From some life ages since gone through.
III.
The maiden sat and heard the flow
Of the west wind so soft and low
The leaves scarce quivered to and fro;
Unbound, her heavy golden hair
Rippled across her bosom bare,
Which gleamed with thrilling snowy white
Far through the magical moonlight:
The breeze rose with a rustling swell,
And from afar there came the smell
Of a long-forgotten lily-bell.
IV.
The dim moon rested on the hill,
But silent, without thought or will,
Where sat the dreamy maiden still;
And now the moon’s tip, like a star,
Drew down below the horizon’s bar;
To her black noon the night hath grown,
Yet still the maiden sits alone,
Pale as a corpse beneath a stream
And her white bosom still doth gleam
Through the deep midnight like a dream.
V.
Cloudless the morning came and fair,
And lavishly the sun doth share
His gold among her golden hair,
Kindling it all, till slowly so
A glory round her head doth glow;
A withered flower is in her hand,
That grew in some far distant land,
And, silently transfigurèd,
With wide calm eyes, and undrooped head,
They found the stranger-maiden dead.
VI.
A youth, that morn, ’neath other skies,
Felt sudden tears burn in his eyes,
And his heart throng with memories;
All things without him seemed to win
Strange brotherhood with things within,
And he forever felt that he
Walked in the midst of mystery,
And thenceforth, why, he could not tell,
His heart would curdle at the smell
Of his once-cherished lily-bell.
VII.
Something from him had passed away;
Some shifting trembles of clear day,
Through starry crannies in his clay,
Grew bright and steadfast, more and more,
Where all had been dull earth before;
And, through these chinks, like him of old,
His spirit converse high did hold
With clearer loves and wider powers,
That brought him dewy fruits and flowers
From far Elysian groves and bowers.
VIII.
Just on the farther bound of sense,
Unproved by outward evidence,
But known by a deep influence
Which through our grosser clay doth shine
With light unwaning and divine,
Beyond where highest thought can fly
Stretcheth the world of Mystery—
And they not greatly overween
Who deem that nothing true hath been
Save the unspeakable Unseen.
IX.
One step beyond life’s work-day things,
One more beat of the soul’s broad wings,
One deeper sorrow sometimes brings
The spirit into that great Vast
Where neither future is nor past;
None knoweth how he entered there,
But, waking, finds his spirit where
He thought an angel could not soar,
And, what he called false dreams before,
The very air about his door.
X.
These outward seemings are but shows
Whereby the body sees and knows;
Far down beneath, forever flows
A stream of subtlest sympathies
That make our spirits strangely wise
In awe, and fearful bodings dim
Which, from the sense’s outer rim,
Stretch forth beyond our thought and sight,
Fine arteries of circling light,
Pulsed outward from the Infinite.
A YEAR’S LIFE.
Hope first the youthful Poet leads,
And he is glad to follow her;
Kind is she, and to all his needs
With a free hand doth minister.
But, when sweet Hope at last hath fled,
Cometh her sister, Memory;
She wreathes Hope’s garlands round her head,
And strives to seem as fair as she.
Then Hope comes back, and by the hand
She leads a child most fair to see,
Who with a joyous face doth stand
Uniting Hope and Memory.
So brighter grew the Earth around,
And bluer grew the sky above;
The Poet now his guide hath found,
And follows in the steps of Love.
to volume of poems entitled
A YEAR’S LIFE.
The gentle Una I have loved,
The snowy maiden, pure and mild,
Since ever by her side I roved,
Through ventures strange, a wondering child,
In fantasy a Red Cross Knight,
Burning for her dear sake to fight.
If there be one who can, like her,
Make sunshine in life’s shady places,
One in whose holy bosom stir
As many gentle household graces—
And such I think there needs must be—
Will she accept this book from me?
Gentle, Lady, be thy sleeping,
Peaceful may thy dreamings be,
While around thy soul is sweeping,
Dreamy-winged, our melody;
Chant we, Brothers, sad and slow,
Let our song be soft and low
As the voice of other years,
Let our hearts within us melt,
To gentleness, as if we felt
The dropping of our mother’s tears.
Lady! now our song is bringing
Back again thy childhood’s hours—
Hearest thou the humbee singing
Drowsily among the flowers?
Sleepily, sleepily
In the noontide swayeth he,
Half rested on the slender stalks
That edge those well-known garden walks;
Hearest thou the fitful whirring
Of the humbird’s viewless wings—
Feel’st not round thy heart the stirring
Of childhood’s half-forgotten things?
Seest thou the dear old dwelling
With the woodbine round the door?
Brothers, soft! her breast is swelling
With the busy thoughts of yore;
Lowly sing ye, sing ye mildly,
House her spirit not so wildly,
Lest she sleep not any more.
’Tis the pleasant summertide,
Open stands the window wide—
Whose voices, Lady, art thou drinking?
Who sings the best belovèd tune
In a clear note, rising, sinking,
Like a thrush’s song in June?
Whose laugh is that which rings so clear
And joyous in thine eager ear?
Lower, Brothers, yet more low
Weave the song in mazy twines;
She heareth now the west wind blow
At evening through the clump of pines;
O! mournful is their tune,
As of a crazèd thing
Who, to herself alone,
Is ever murmuring,
Through the night and through the day,
For something that hath passed away.
Often, Lady, hast thou listened,
Often have thy blue eyes glistened,
Where the summer evening breeze
Moaned sadly through those lonely trees,
Or with the fierce wind from the north
Wrung their mournful music forth.
Ever the river floweth
In an unbroken stream,
Ever the west wind bloweth,
Murmuring as he goeth,
And mingling with her dream;
Onward still the river sweepeth
With a sound of long-agone;
Lowly, Brothers, lo! she weepeth,
She is now no more alone;
Long-loved forms and long-loved faces
Round about her pillow throng,
Through her memory’s desert places
Flow the waters of our song.
Lady! if thy life be holy
As when thou wert yet a child,
Though our song be melancholy,
It will stir no anguish wild;
For the soul that hath lived well,
For the soul that child-like is,
There is quiet in the spell
That brings back early memories.
I.
Lift up the curtains of thine eyes
And let their light outshine!
Let me adore the mysteries
Of those mild orbs of thine,
Which ever queenly calm do roll,
Attunèd to an ordered soul!
II.
Open thy lips yet once again
And, while my soul doth hush
With awe, pour forth that holy strain
Which seemeth me to gush,
A fount of music, running o’er
From thy deep spirit’s inmost core!
III.
The melody that dwells in thee
Begets in me as well
A spiritual harmony,
A mild and blessèd spell;
Far, far above earth’s atmosphere
I rise, whene’er thy voice I hear.
Not they alone are the departed,
Who have laid them down to sleep
In the grave narrow and lonely,
Not for them only do I vigils keep,
Not for them only am I heavy-hearted,
Not for them only!
Many, many, there are many
Who no more are with me here,
As cherished, as beloved as any
Whom I have seen upon the bier.
I weep to think of those old faces,
To see them in their grief or mirth;
I weep—for there are empty places
Around my heart’s once crowded hearth;
The cold ground doth not cover them,
The grass hath not grown over them,
Yet are they gone from me on earth;—
O! how more bitter is this weeping,
Than for those lost ones who are sleeping
Where sun will shine and flowers blow,
Where gentle winds will whisper low,
And the stars have them in their keeping!
Wherefore from me who loved you so,
O! wherefore did ye go?
I have shed full many a tear,
I have wrestled oft in prayer—
But ye do not come again;
How could anything so dear,
How could anything so fair,
Vanish like the summer rain?
No, no, it cannot be,
But ye are still with me!
And yet, O! where art thou,
Childhood, with sunny brow
And floating hair?
Where art thou hiding now?
I have sought thee everywhere,
All among the shrubs and flowers
Of those garden-walks of ours—
Thou art not there!
When the shadow of Night’s wings
Hath darkened all the Earth,
I listen for thy gambolings
Beside the cheerful hearth—
Thou art not there!
I listen to the far-off bell,
I murmur o’er the little songs
Which thou didst love so well,
Pleasant memories come in throngs
And mine eyes are blurred with tears,
But no glimpse of thee appears:
Lonely am I in the Winter, lonely in the Spring,
Summer and Harvest bring no trace of thee—
Oh! whither, whither art thou wandering,
Thou who didst once so cleave to me?
And Love is gone;—
I have seen him come,
I have seen him, too, depart,
Leaving desolate his home,
His bright home in my heart.
I am alone!
Cold, cold is his hearth-stone,
Wide open stands the door;
The frolic and the gentle one
Shall I see no more, no more?
At the fount the bowl is broken,
I shall drink it not again,
All my longing prayers are spoken,
And felt, ah, woe is me, in vain!
Oh, childish hopes and childish fancies,
Whither have ye fled away?
I long for you in mournful trances,
I long for you by night and day;
Beautiful thoughts that once were mine,
Might I but win you back once more,
Might ye about my being twine
And cluster as ye did of yore!
O! do not let me pray in vain—
How good and happy I should be,
How free from every shade of pain,
If ye would come again to me!
O, come again! come, come again!
Hath the sun forgot its brightness,
Have the stars forgot to shine,
That they bring not their wonted lightness
To this weary heart of mine?
’Tis not the sun that shone on thee,
Happy childhood, long ago—
Not the same stars silently
Looking on the same bright snow—
Not the same that Love and I
Together watched in days gone by!
No, not the same, alas for me!
Would God that those who early went
To the house dark and low,
For whom our mourning heads were bent,
For whom our steps were slow;
O, would that these alone had left us,
That Fate of these alone had reft us,
Would God indeed that it were so!
Many leaves too soon must wither,
Many flowers too soon must die,
Many bright ones wandering hither,
We know not whence, we know not why,
Like the leaves and like the flowers,
Vanish, ere the summer hours,
That brought them to us, have gone by.
O for the hopes and for the feelings,
Childhood, that I shared with thee—
The high resolves, the bright revealings
Of the soul’s might, which thou gav’st me,
Gentle Love, woe worth the day,
Woe worth the hour when thou wert born,
Woe worth the day thou fled’st away—
A shade across the wind-waved corn—
A dewdrop falling from the leaves
Chance-shaken in a summer’s morn!
Woe, woe is me! my sick heart grieves,
Companionless and anguish-worn!
I know it well, our manly years
Must be baptized in bitter tears;
Full many fountains must run dry
That youth has dreamed for long hours by,
Choked by convention’s siroc blast
Or drifting sands of many cares;
Slowly they leave us all at last,
And cease their flowing unawares.
Anacreon of the meadow,
Drunk with the joy of spring!
Beneath the tall pine’s voiceful shadow
I lie and drink thy jargoning;
My soul is full with melodies,
One drop would overflow it,
And send the tears into mine eyes—
But what car’st thou to know it?
Thy heart is free as mountain air,
And of thy lays thou hast no care,
Scattering them gayly everywhere,
Happy, unconscious poet!
Upon a tuft of meadow grass,
While thy loved-one tends the nest,
Thou swayest as the breezes pass,
Unburthening thine o’erfull breast
Of the crowded songs that fill it,
Just as joy may choose to will it.
Lord of thy love and liberty,
The blithest bird of merry May,
Thou turnest thy bright eyes on me,
That say as plain as eye can say—
“Here sit we, here in the summer weather,
I and my modest mate together;
Whatever your wise thoughts may be,
Under that gloomy old pine tree,
We do not value them a feather.”
Now, leaving earth and me behind,
Thou beatest up against the wind,
Or, floating slowly down before it,
Above thy grass-hid nest thou flutterest
And thy bridal love-song utterest,
Raining showers of music o’er it,
Weary never, still thou trillest,
Spring-gladsome lays,
As of moss-rimmed water-brooks
Murmuring through pebbly nooks
In quiet summer days.
My heart with happiness thou fillest,
I seem again to be a boy
Watching thee, gay, blithesome lover,
O’er the bending grass-tops hover,
Quivering thy wings for joy.
There’s something in the apple-blossom,
The greening grass and bobolink’s song,
That wakes again within my bosom
Feelings which have slumbered long.
As long, long years ago I wandered,
I seem to wander even yet,
The hours the idle school-boy squandered,
The man would die ere he’d forget.
O hours that frosty eld deemed wasted,
Nodding his gray head toward my books,
I dearer prize the lore I tasted
With you, among the trees and brooks,
Than all that I have gained since then
From learnèd books or study-withered men!
Nature, thy soul was one with mine,
And, as a sister by a younger brother
Is loved, each flowing to the other,
Such love for me was thine.
Or wert thou not more like a loving mother
With sympathy and loving power to heal,
Against whose heart my throbbing heart I’d lay
And moan my childish sorrows all away,
Till calm and holiness would o’er me steal?
Was not the golden sunset a dear friend?
Found I no kindness in the silent moon,
And the green trees, whose tops did sway and bend,
Low singing evermore their pleasant tune?
Felt I no heart in dim and solemn woods—
No loved-one’s voice in lonely solitudes?
Yes, yes! unhoodwinked then my spirit’s eyes,
Blind leaders had not taught me to be wise.
Dear hours! which now again I over-live,
Hearing and seeing with the ears and eyes
Of childhood, ye were bees, that to the hive
Of my young heart came laden with rich prize,
Gathered in fields and woods and sunny dells, to be
My spirit’s food in days more wintery.
Yea, yet again ye come! ye come!
And, like a child once more at home
After long sojourning in alien climes,
I lie upon my mother’s breast,
Feeling the blessedness of rest,
And dwelling in the light of other times.
O ye whose living is not Life,
Whose dying is but death,
Song, empty toil and petty strife,
Rounded with loss of breath!
Go, look on Nature’s countenance,
Drink in the blessing of her glance;
Look on the sunset, hear the wind,
The cataract, the awful thunder;
Go, worship by the sea;
Then, and then only, shall ye find,
With ever-growing wonder,
Man is not all in all to ye;
Go with a meek and humble soul,
Then shall the scales of self unroll
From off your eyes—the weary packs
Drop from your heavy-laden backs;
And ye shall see,
With reverent and hopeful eyes,
Glowing with new-born energies,
How great a thing it is to be!
There’s a haven of sure rest
From the loud world’s bewildering stress
As a bird dreaming on her nest,
As dew hid in a rose’s breast,
As Hesper in the glowing West;
So the heart sleeps
In thy calm deeps,
Serene Forgetfulness!
No sorrow in that place may be,
The noise of life grows less and less:
As moss far down within the sea,
As, in white lily caves, a bee,
As life in a hazy reverie;
So the heart’s wave
In thy dim cave,
Hushes, Forgetfulness!
Duty and care fade far away
What toil may be we cannot guess:
As a ship anchored in the bay,
As a cloud at summer-noon astray,
As water-blooms in a breezeless day;
So,’neath thine eyes,
The full heart lies,
And dreams, Forgetfulness!
I.
What reck I of the stars, when I
May gaze into thine eyes,
O’er which the brown hair flowingly
Is parted maidenwise
From thy pale forehead, calm and bright,
Over thy cheeks so rosy white?
II.
What care I for the red moon-rise?
Far liefer would I sit
And watch the joy within thine eyes
Gush up at sight of it;
Thyself my queenly moon shall be,
Ruling my heart’s deep tides for me!
III.
What heed I if the sky be blue?
So are thy holy eyes,
And bright with shadows ever new
Of changeful sympathies,
Which in thy soul’s unruffled deep
Rest evermore, but never sleep.
He who hath felt Life’s mystery
Press on him like thick night,
Whose soul hath known no history
But struggling after light;—
He who hath seen dim shapes arise
In the soundless depths of soul,
Which gaze on him with meaning eyes
Full of the mighty whole,
Yet will no word of healing speak,
Although he pray night-long,
“O, help me, save me! I am weak,
And ye are wondrous strong!”—
Who, in the midnight dark and deep,
Hath felt a voice of might
Come echoing through the halls of sleep
From the lone heart of Night,
And, starting from his restless bed,
Hath watched and wept to know
What meant that oracle of dread
That stirred his being so;
He who hath felt how strong and great
This Godlike soul of man,
And looked full in the eyes of Fate,
Since Life and Thought began;
The armor of whose moveless trust
Knoweth no spot of weakness,
Who hath trod fear into the dust
Beneath the feet of meekness;—
He who hath calmly borne his cross,
Knowing himself the king
Of time, nor counted it a loss
To learn by suffering;—
And who hath worshipped woman still
With a pure soul and lowly,
Nor ever hath in deed or will
Profaned her temple holy—
He is the Poet, him unto
The gift of song is given,
Whose life is lofty, strong, and true,
Who never fell from Heaven;
He is the Poet, from his lips
To live forevermore,
Majestical as full-sailed ships,
The words of Wisdom pour.
“Hail be thou, holie hearbe,
Growing on the ground,
All in the mount Calvary
First wert thou found;
Thou art good for manie a sore,
Thou healest manie a wound,
In the name of sweete Jesus
I take thee from the ground.”
—Ancient Charm-verse.
I.
When, from a pleasant ramble, home
Fresh-stored with quiet thoughts, I come,
I pluck some wayside flower
And press it in the choicest nook
Of a much-loved and oft-read book;
And, when upon its leaves I look
In a less happy hour,
Dear memory bears me far away
Unto her fairy bower,
And on her breast my head I lay,
While, in a motherly, sweet strain,
She sings me gently back again
To by-gone feelings, until they
Seem children born of yesterday.
II.
Yes, many a story of past hours
I read in these dear withered flowers,
And once again I seem to be
Lying beneath the old oak tree,
And looking up into the sky,
Through thick leaves rifted fitfully,
Lulled by the rustling of the vine,
Or the faint low of far-off kine;
And once again I seem
To watch the whirling bubbles flee,
Through shade and gleam alternately,
Down the vine-bowered stream;
Or ’neath the odorous linden trees,
When summer twilight lingers long,
To hear the flowing of the breeze
And unseen insects’ slumberous song,
That mingle into one and seem
Like dim murmurs of a dream;
Fair faces, too, I seem to see,
Smiling from pleasant eyes at me,
And voices sweet I hear,
That, like remembered melody,
Flow through my spirit’s ear.
III.
A poem every flower is,
And every leaf a line,
And with delicious memories
They fill this heart of mine:
No living blossoms are so clear
As these dead relics treasured here;
One tells of Love, of friendship one,
Love’s quiet after-sunset time,
When the all-dazzling light is gone,
And, with the soul’s low vesper-chime,
O’er half its heaven doth out-flow
A holy calm and steady glow.
Some are gay feast-songs, some are dirges,
In some a joy with sorrow merges;
One sings the shadowed woods, and one the roar
Of ocean’s everlasting surges,
Tumbling upon the beach’s hard-beat floor,
Or sliding backward from the shore
To meet the landward waves and slowly plunge once more.
O flowers of grace, I bless ye all
By the dear faces ye recall!
IV.
Upon the banks of Life’s deep streams
Full many a flower groweth,
Which with a wondrous fragrance teems,
And in the silent water gleams,
And trembles as the water floweth,
Many a one the wave upteareth,
Washing ever the roots away,
And far upon its bosom beareth,
To bloom no more in Youth’s glad May;
As farther on the river runs,
Flowing more deep and strong,
Only a few pale, scattered ones
Are seen the dreary banks along;
And where those flowers do not grow,
The river floweth dark and chill,
Its voice is sad, and with its flow
Mingles ever a sense of ill;
Then, Poet, thou who gather dost
Of Life’s best flowers the brightest,
O, take good heed they be not lost
While with the angry flood thou fightest!
V.
In the cool grottos of the soul,
Whence flows thought’s crystal river,
Whence songs of joy forever roll
To Him who is the Giver—
There store thou them, where fresh and green
Their leaves and blossoms may be seen,
A spring of joy that faileth never;
There store thou them, and they shall be
A blessing and a peace to thee,
And in their youth and purity
Thou shalt be young forever!
Then, with their fragrance rich and rare,
Thy living shall be rife,
Strength shall be thine thy cross to bear,
And they shall be a chaplet fair,
Breathing a pure and holy air,
To crown thy holy life.
VI.
O Poet! above all men blest,
Take heed that thus thou store them;
Love, Hope, and Faith shall ever rest,
Sweet birds (upon how sweet a nest!)
Watchfully brooding o’er them.
And from those flowers of Paradise
Scatter thou many a blessèd seed,
Wherefrom an offspring may arise
To cheer the hearts and light the eyes
Of after-voyagers in their need.
They shall not fall on stony ground,
But, yielding all their hundred-fold,
Shall shed a peacefulness around,
Whose strengthening joy may not be told,
So shall thy name be blest of all,
And thy remembrance never die;
For of that seed shall surely fall
In the fair garden of Eternity.
Exult then in the nobleness
Of this thy work so holy,
Yet be not thou one jot the less
Humble and meek and lowly,
But let thine exultation be
The reverence of a bended knee;
And by thy life a poem write,
Built strongly day by day—
And on the rock of Truth and Right
Its deep foundations lay.
VII.
It is thy duty! Guard it well!
For unto thee hath much been given,
And thou canst make this life a Hell,
Or Jacob’s-ladder up to Heaven.
Let not thy baptism in Life’s wave
Make thee like him whom Homer sings—
A sleeper in a living grave,
Callous and hard to outward things;
But open all thy soul and sense
To every blessèd influence
That from the heart of Nature springs:
Then shall thy Life-flowers be to thee,
When thy best years are told,
As much as these have been to me—
Yea, more, a thousand-fold!
I.
Go from the world from East to West,
Search every land beneath the sky,
You cannot find a man so blest,
A king so powerful as I,
Though you should seek eternally.
II.
For I a gentle lover be,
Sitting at my loved-one’s side;
She giveth her whole soul to me
Without a wish or thought of pride,
And she shall be my cherished bride.
III.
No show of gaudiness hath she,
She doth not flash with jewels rare;
In beautiful simplicity
She weareth leafy garlands fair,
Or modest flowers in her hair.
IV.
Sometimes she dons a robe of green,
Sometimes a robe of snowy white,
But, in whatever garb she’s seen,
It seems most beautiful and right,
And is the loveliest to my sight.
V.
Not I her lover am alone,
Yet unto all she doth suffice,
None jealous is, and every one
Reads love and truth within her eyes,
And deemeth her his own dear prize.
VI.
And so thou art, Eternal Nature!
Yes, bride of Heaven, so thou art;
Thou, wholly lovest every creature,
Giving to each no stinted part,
But filling every peaceful heart.
“Dear Child! dear happy Girl! if thou appear
Heedless—untouched with awe or serious thought,
Thy nature is not therefore less divine:
Thou liest in Abraham’s bosom all the year;
And worship’st at the Temple’s inner shrine,
God being with thee when we know it not.”
—Wordsworth.
As through a strip of sunny light
A white dove flashes swiftly on,
So suddenly before my sight
Thou gleamed’st a moment and wert gone;
And yet I long shall bear in mind
The pleasant thoughts thou left’st behind.
Thou mad’st me happy with thine eyes,
And happy with thine open smile,
And, as I write, sweet memories
Come thronging round me all the while;
Thou mad’st me happy with thine eyes—
And gentle feelings long forgot
Looked up and oped their eyes,
Like violets when they see a spot
Of summer in the skies.
Around thy playful lips did glitter
Heat-lightnings of a girlish scorn;
Harmless they were, for nothing bitter
In thy dear heart was ever born—
That merry heart that could not lie
Within its warm nest quietly,
But ever from each full, dark eye
Was looking kindly night and morn.
There was an archness in thine eyes,
Born of the gentlest mockeries,
And thy light laughter rang as clear
As water-drops I loved to hear
In days of boyhood, as they fell
Tinkling far down the dim, still well;
And with its sound come back once more
The feelings of my early years,
And half aloud I murmured o’er—
“Sure I have heard that sound before,
It is so pleasant in mine ears.”
Whenever thou didst look on me
I thought of merry birds,
And something of spring’s melody
Came to me in thy words;
Thy thoughts did dance and bound along
Like happy children in their play,
Whose hearts run over into song
For gladness of the summer’s day;
And mine grew dizzy with the sight,
Still feeling lighter and more light,
Till, joining hands, they whirled away,
As blithe and merrily as they.
I bound a larch-twig round with flowers,
Which thou didst twine among thy hair,
And gladsome were the few, short hours
When I was with thee there;
So now that thou art far away,
Safe-nestled in thy warmer clime,
In memory of a happier day
I twine this simple wreath of rhyme.
Dost mind how she, whom thou dost love
More than in light words may be said,
A coronal of amaranth wove
About thy duly-sobered head,
Which kept itself a moment still
That she might have her gentle will?
Thy childlike grace and purity
O keep forevermore,
And as thou art, still strive to be,
That on the farther shore
Of Time’s dark waters ye may meet,
And she may twine around thy brow
A wreath of those bright flowers that grow
Where blessèd angels set their feet!
As the leaf upon the tree,
Fluttering, gleaming constantly,
Such a lightsome thing was she,
My gay and gentle Isabel!
Her heart was fed with love-springs sweet,
And in her face you’d see it beat
To hear the sound of welcome feet—
And were not mine so, Isabel?
She knew it not, but she was fair,
And like a moonbeam was her hair,
That falls where flowing ripples are
In summer evenings, Isabel!
Her heart and tongue were scarce apart,
Unwittingly her lips would part,
And love came gushing from her heart,
The woman’s heart of Isabel.
So pure her flesh-garb, and like dew,
That in her features glimmered through
Each working of her spirit true,
In wondrous beauty, Isabel!
A sunbeam struggling through thick leaves,
A reaper’s song mid yellow sheaves,
Less gladsome were;—my spirit grieves
To think of thee, mild Isabel!
I know not when I loved thee first;
Not loving, I had been accurst,
Yet, having loved, my heart will burst,
Longing for thee, dear Isabel!
With silent tears my cheeks are wet,
I would be calm, I would forget,
But thy blue eyes gaze on me yet,
When stars have risen, Isabel.
The winds mourn for thee, Isabel,
The flowers expect thee in the dell,
Thy gentle spirit loved them well;
And I for thy sake, Isabel!
The sunsets seem less lovely now
Than when, leaf checkered, on thy brow
They fell as lovingly as thou
Lingered’st till moon-rise, Isabel!
At dead of night I seem to see
Thy fair, pale features constantly
Upturned in silent prayer for me,
O’er moveless clasped hands, Isabel!
I call thee, thou dost not reply;
The stars gleam coldly on thine eye,
As like a dream thou flittest by,
And leav’st me weeping, Isabel!
I.
I seem to lie with drooping eyes,
Dreaming sweet dreams,
Half longings and half memories,
In woods where streams
With trembling shades and whirling gleams,
Many and bright,
In song and light,
Are ever, ever flowing;
While the wind, if we list to the rustling grass,
Which numbers his footsteps as they pass,
Seems scarcely to be blowing;
And the far-heard voice of Spring,
From sunny slopes comes wandering,
Calling the violets from the sleep,
That bound them under snow-drifts deep,
To open their childlike, asking eyes
On the new summer’s paradise,
And mingled with the gurgling waters—
As the dreamy witchery
Of Acheloüs’ silver-voiced daughters
Rose and fell with the heaving sea,
Whose great heart swelled with ecstasy—
The song of many a floating bird,
Winding through the rifted trees,
Is dreamily half-heard—
A sister stream of melodies
Rippled by the flutterings
Of rapture-quivered wings.
II.
And now beside a cataract
I lie, and through my soul,
From over me and under,
The never-ceasing thunder
Arousingly doth roll;
Through the darkness all compact,
Through the trackless sea of gloom,
Sad and deep I hear it boom;
At intervals the cloud is cracked
And a livid flash doth hiss
Downward from its floating home,
Lighting up the precipice
And the never-resting foam
With a dim and ghastly glare,
Which, for a heart-beat, in the air,
Shows the sweeping shrouds
Of the midnight clouds
And their wildly-scattered hair.
III.
Now listening to a woman’s tone,
In a wood I sit alone—
Alone because our souls are one;—
All around my heart it flows,
Lulling me in deep repose;
I fear to speak, I fear to move,
Lest I should break the spell I love—
Low and gentle, calm and clear,
Into my inmost soul it goes,
As if my brother dear,
Who is no longer here,
Had bended from the sky
And murmured in my ear
A strain of that high harmony,
Which they may sing alone
Who worship round the throne.
IV.
Now in a fairy boat,
On the bright waves of song,
Full merrily I float,
Merrily float along;
My helm is veered, I care not how,
My white sail bellies over me,
And bright as gold the ripples be
That plash beneath the bow;
Before, behind,
They feel the wind,
And they are dancing joyously—
While, faintly heard, along the far-off shore
The surf goes plunging with a lingering roar;
Or anchored in a shadowy cove,
Entranced with harmonies,
Slowly I sink and rise
As the slow waves of music move.
V.
Now softly dashing,
Bubbling, plashing,
Mazy, dreamy,
Faint and streamy,
Ripples into ripples melt,
Not so strongly heard as felt;
Now rapid and quick,
While the heart beats thick,
The music silver wavelets crowd,
Distinct and clear, but never loud
And now all solemnly and slow,
In mild, deep tones they warble low,
Like the glad song of angels, when
They sang good will and peace to men;
Now faintly heard and far,
As if the spirit’s ears
Had caught the anthem of a star
Chanting with his brother-spheres
In the midnight dark and deep,
When the body is asleep
And wondrous shadows pour in streams
From the twofold gate of dreams;
Now onward roll the billows, swelling
With a tempest-sound of might,
As of voices doom foretelling
To the silent ear of Night;
And now a mingled ecstasy
Of all sweet sounds it is;—
O! who may tell the agony
Of rapture such as this?
VI.
I have drunk of the drink of immortals,
I have drunk of the life-giving wine,
And now I may pass the bright portals
That open into a realm divine!
I have drunk it through mine ears
In the ecstasy of song,
When mine eyes would fill with tears
That its life were not more long;
I have drunk it through mine eyes
In beauty’s every shape,
And now around my soul it lies,
No juice of earthly grape!
Wings! wings are given to me,
I can flutter, I can rise,
Like a new life gushing through me
Sweep the heavenly harmonies!
O! I must look on that sweet face once more before I die;
God grant that it may lighten up with joy when I draw nigh;
God grant that she may look on me as kindly as she seems
In the long night, the restless night, i’ the sunny land of dreams!
I hoped, I thought, she loved me once, and yet, I know not why,
There is a coldness in her speech, and a coldness in her eye.
Something that in another’s look would not seem cold to me,
And yet like ice I feel it chill the heart of memory.
She does not come to greet me so frankly as she did,
And in her utmost openness I feel there’s something hid;
She almost seems to shun me, as if she thought that I
Might win her gentle heart again to feelings long gone by.
I sought the first spring-buds for her, the fairest and the best,
And she wore them for their loveliness upon her spotless breast,
The blood-root and the violet, the frail anemone,
She wore them, and alas! I deemed it was for love of me!
As flowers in a darksome place stretch forward to the light,
So to the memory of her I turn by day and night;
As flowers in a darksome place grow thin and pale and wan,
So is it with my darkened heart, now that her light is gone.
The thousand little things that love doth treasure up for aye,
And brood upon with moistened eyes when she that’s loved’s away,
The word, the look, the smile, the blush, the ribbon that she wore,
Each day they grow more dear to me, and pain me more and more.
My face I cover with my hands, and bitterly I weep,
That the quick-gathering sands of life should choke a love so deep,
And that the stream, so pure and bright, must turn it from its track,
Or to the heart-springs, whence it rose, roll its full waters back!
As calm as doth the lily float close by the lakelet’s brim,
So calm and spotless, down time’s stream, her peaceful days did swim,
And I had longed, and dreamed, and prayed, that closely by her side,
Down to a haven still and sure, my happy life might glide.
But now, alas! those golden days of youth and hope are o’er,
And I must dream those dreams of joy, those guiltless dreams no more;
Yet there is something in my heart that whispers ceaselessly,
“Would God that I might see that face once more before I die!”
I.
There is a light within her eyes,
Like gleams of wandering fire-flies;
From light to shade it leaps and moves
Whenever in her soul arise
The holy shapes of things she loves;
Fitful it shines and changes ever,
Like star-lit ripples on a river,
Or summer sunshine on the eaves
Of silver-trembling poplar leaves,
Where the lingering dew-drops quiver.
I may not tell the blessedness
Her mild eyes send to mine,
The sunset-tinted haziness
Of their mysterious shine,
The dim and holy mournfulness
Of their mellow light divine;
The shadow of the lashes lie
Over them so lovingly,
That they seem to melt away
In a doubtful twilight-gray,
While I watch the stars arise
In the evening of her eyes,
I love it, yet I almost dread
To think what it foreshadoweth;
And, when I muse how I have read
That such strange light betokened death—
Instead of fire-fly gleams, I see
Wild corpse-lights gliding waveringly.
II.
With wayward thoughts her eyes are bright,
Like shiftings of the northern-light,
Hither, thither, swiftly glance they,
In a mazy twining dance they,
Like ripply lights the sunshine weaves,
Thrown backward from a shaken nook,
Below some tumbling water-brook,
On the o’erarching platan-leaves,
All through her glowing face they flit,
And rest in their deep dwelling-place,
Those fathomless blue eyes of hers,
Till, from her burning soul re-lit,
While her upheaving bosom stirs,
They stream again across her face
And with such hope and glory fill it,
Death could not have the heart to chill it.
Yet when their wild light fades again,
I feel a sudden sense of pain,
As if, while yet her eyes were gleaming,
And like a shower of sun-lit rain
Bright fancies from her face were streaming,
Her trembling soul might flit away
As swift and suddenly as they.
III.
A wild, inspirèd earnestness
Her inmost being fills,
And eager self-forgetfulness,
That speaks not what it wills,
But what unto her soul is given,
A living oracle from Heaven,
Which scarcely in her breast is born
When on her trembling lips it thrills,
And, like a burst of golden skies
Through storm-clouds on a sudden torn,
Like a glory of the morn,
Beams marvellously from her eyes.
And then, like a Spring-swollen river,
Roll the deep waves of her full-hearted thought
Crested with sun-lit spray,
Her wild lips curve and quiver,
And my rapt soul, on the strong tide upcaught,
Unwittingly is borne away,
Lulled by a dreamful music ever,
Far—through the solemn twilight-gray
Of hoary woods—through valleys green
Which the trailing vine embowers,
And where the purple-clustered grapes are seen
Deep-glowing through rich clumps of waving flowers—
Now over foaming rapids swept
And with maddening rapture shook—
Now gliding where the water-plants have slept
For ages in a moss-rimmed nook—
Enwoven by a wild-eyed band
Of earth-forgetting dreams,
I float to a delicious land
By a sunset heaven spanned,
And musical with streams;—
Around, the calm, majestic forms
And god-like eyes of early Greece I see,
Or listen, till my spirit warms,
To songs of courtly chivalry,
Or weep, unmindful if my tears be seen,
For the meek, suffering love of poor Undine.
IV.
Her thoughts are never memories,
But ever changeful, ever new,
Fresh and beautiful as dew
That in a dell at noontide lies,
Or, at the close of summer day,
The pleasant breath of new-mown hay:
Swiftly they come and pass
As golden birds across the sun,
As light-gleams on tall meadow-grass
Which the wind just breathes upon.
And when she speaks, her eyes I see
Down-gushing through their silken lattices,
Like stars that quiver tremblingly
Through leafy branches of the trees,
And her pale cheeks do flush and glow
With speaking flashes bright and rare
As crimson North-lights on new-fallen snow,
From out the veiling of her hair—
Her careless hair that scatters down
On either side her eyes,
A waterfall leaf-tinged with brown
And lit with the sunrise.
V.
When first I saw her, not of earth,
But heavenly both in grief and mirth,
I thought her; she did seem
As fair and full of mystery,
As bodiless, as forms we see
In the rememberings of a dream;
A moon-lit mist, a strange, dim light,
Circled her spirit from my sight;—
Each day more beautiful she grew,
More earthly every day,
Yet that mysterious, moony hue
Faded not all away;
She has a sister’s sympathy
With all the wanderers of the sky,
But most I’ve seen her bosom stir
When moonlight round her fell,
For the mild moon it loveth her,
She loveth it as well,
And of their love perchance this grace
Was born into her wondrous face.
I cannot tell how it may be,
For both, methinks, can scarce be true,
Still, as she earthly grew to me,
She grew more heavenly too;
She seems one born in Heaven
With earthly feelings,
For, while unto her soul are given
More pure revealings
Of holiest love and truth,
Yet is the mildness of her eyes
Made up of quickest sympathies,
Of kindliness and ruth;
So, though some shade of awe doth stir
Our souls for one so far above us,
We feel secure that she will love us,
And cannot keep from loving her.
She is a poem, which to me
In speech and look is written bright,
And to her life’s rich harmony
Doth ever sing itself aright;
Dear, glorious creature!
With eyes so dewy bright,
And tenderest feeling
Itself revealing
In every look and feature,
Welcome as a homestead light
To one long-wandering in a clouded night,
O, lovelier for her woman’s weakness,
Which yet is strongly mailed
In armor of courageous meekness
And faith that never failed!
VI.
Early and late, at her soul’s gate,
Sits Chastity in warderwise,
No thoughts unchallenged, small or great,
Go thence into her eyes;
Nor may a low, unworthy thought
Beyond that virgin warder win,
Nor one, whose password is not “ought,”
May go without or enter in.
I call her, seeing those pure eyes,
The Eve of a new Paradise,
Which she by gentle word and deed,
And look no less, doth still create
About her, for her great thoughts breed
A calm that lifts us from our fallen state,
And makes us while with her both good and great—
Nor is their memory wanting in our need:
With stronger loving, every hour,
Turneth my heart to this frail flower,
Which, thoughtless of the world, hath grown
To beauty and meek gentleness,
Here in a fair world of its own—
By woman’s instinct trained alone—
A lily fair which God did bless,
And which from Nature’s heart did draw
Love, wisdom, peace, and Heaven’s perfect law.
I.
I built an altar in my soul,
I builded it to one alone;
And ever silently I stole,
In happy days of long-agone,
To make rich offerings to that ONE.
II.
’Twas garlanded with purest thought,
And crowned with fancy’s flowers bright,
With choicest gems ’twas all inwrought
Of truth and feeling; in my sight
It seemed a spot of cloudless light.
III.
Yet when I made my offering there,
Like Cain’s, the incense would not rise;
Back on my heart down-sank the prayer,
And altar-stone and sacrifice
Grew hateful in my tear-dimmed eyes.
IV.
O’er-grown with age’s mosses green,
The little altar firmly stands;
It is not, as it once hath been,
A selfish shrine;—these time-taught hands
Bring incense now from many lands.
V.
Knowledge doth only widen love;
The stream, that lone and narrow rose,
Doth, deepening ever, onward move,
And with an even current flows
Calmer and calmer to the close.
VI.
The love, that in those early days
Girt round my spirit like a wall,
Hath faded like a morning haze,
And flames, unpent by self’s mean thrall,
Rise clearly to the perfect all.
I.
I cannot say a scene is fair
Because it is beloved of thee,
But I shall love to linger there,
For sake of thy dear memory;
I would not be so coldly just
As to love only what I must.
II.
I cannot say a thought is good
Because thou foundest joy in it;
Each soul must choose its proper food
Which Nature hath decreed most fit;
But I shall ever deem it so
Because it made thy heart o’erflow.
III.
I love thee for that thou art fair;
And that thy spirit joys in aught
Createth a new beauty there,
With thine own dearest image fraught;
And love, for others’ sake that springs,
Gives half their charm to lovely things.
DEDICATED TO MY FRIEND, JOHN F. HEATH.
I.
I feel the bandages unroll
That bound my inward seeing;
Freed are the bright wings of my soul,
Types of my god-like being;
High thoughts are swelling in my heart
And rushing through my brain;
May I never more lose part
In my soul’s realm again!
All things fair, where’er they be,
In earth or air, in sky or sea,
I have loved them all, and taken
All within my throbbing breast;
No more my spirit can be shaken
From its calm and kingly rest!
Love hath shed its light around me,
Love hath pierced the shades that bound me;
Mine eyes are opened, I can see
The universe’s mystery,
The mighty heart and core
Of After and Before
I see, and I am weak no more!
II.
Upward! upward evermore,
To Heaven’s open gate I soar!
Little thoughts are far behind me,
Which, when custom weaves together,
All the nobler man can tether—
Cobwebs now no more can bind me!
Now fold thy wings a little while,
My trancèd soul, and lie
At rest on this Calypso-isle
That floats in mellow sky,
A thousand isles with gentle motion
Rock upon the sunset ocean;
A thousand isles of thousand hues,
How bright! how beautiful! how rare!
Into my spirit they infuse
A purer, a diviner air;
The earth is growing dimmer,
And now the last faint glimmer
Hath faded from the hill;
But in my higher atmosphere
The sun-light streameth red and clear,
Fringing the islets still;—
Love lifts us to the sun-light,
Though the whole world would be dark;
Love, wide Love, is the one light,
All else is but a fading spark;
Love is the nectar which doth fill
Our soul’s cup even to overflowing,
And, warming heart, and thought, and will,
Doth lie within us mildly glowing,
From its own centre raying out
Beauty and Truth on all without.
III.
Each on his golden throne,
Full royally, alone,
I see the stars above me,
With sceptre and with diadem;
Mildly they look down and love me,
For I have ever yet loved them;
I see their ever-sleepless eyes
Watching the growth of destinies;
Calm, sedate,
The eyes of Fate,
They wink not, nor do roll,
But search the depths of soul—
And in those mighty depths they see
The germs of all Futurity,
Waiting but the fitting time
To burst and ripen into prime,
As in the womb of mother Earth
The seeds of plants and forests lie
Age upon age and never die—
So in the souls of all men wait,
Undyingly the seeds of Fate;
Chance breaks the clod and forth they spring,
Filling blind men with wondering.
Eternal stars! with holy awe,
As if a present God I saw,
I look into those mighty eyes
And see great destinies arise,
As in those of mortal men
Feelings glow and fade again!
All things below, all things above,
Are open to the eyes of Love.
IV.
Of Knowledge Love is master-key,
Knowledge of Beauty; passing dear
Is each to each, and mutually
Each one doth make the other clear;
Beauty is Love, and what we love
Straightway is beautiful,
So is the circle round and full,
And so dear Love doth live and move
And have his being,
Finding his proper food
By sure inseeing,
In all things pure and good,
Which he at will doth cull,
Like a joyous butterfly
Hiving in the sunny bowers
Of the soul’s fairest flowers,
Or, between the earth and sky,
Wandering at liberty
For happy, happy hours!
V.
The thoughts of Love are Poesy,
As this fair earth and all we see
Are the thoughts of Deity—
And Love is ours by our birthright!
He hath cleared mine inward sight;
Glorious shapes with glorious eyes
Round about my spirit glance,
Shedding a mild and golden light
On the shadowy face of Night;
To unearthly melodies,
Hand in hand, they weave their dance,
While a deep, ambrosial lustre
From their rounded limbs doth shine,
Through many a rich and golden cluster
Of streaming hair divine.
In our gross and earthly hours
We cannot see the Love-given powers
Which ever round the soul await
To do its sovereign will,
When, in its moments calm and still,
It re-assumes its royal state,
Nor longer sits with eyes downcast,
A beggar, dreaming of the past,
At its own palace-gate.
VI.
I too am a Maker and a Poet;
Through my whole soul I feel it and know it;
My veins are fired with ecstasy!
All-mother Earth
Did ne’er give birth
To one who shall be matched with me;
The lustre of my coronal
Shall cast a dimness over all.—
Alas! alas! what have I spoken?
My strong, my eagle wings are broken,
And back again to earth I fall!
I.
When first I saw thy soul-deep eyes,
My heart yearned to thee instantly,
Strange longing in my soul did rise;
I cannot tell the reason why,
But I must love thee till I die.
II.
The sight of thee hath well-nigh grown
As needful to me as the light;
I am unrestful when alone,
And my heart doth not beat aright
Except it dwell within thy sight.
III.
And yet—and yet—O selfish love!
I am not happy even with thee;
I see thee in thy brightness move,
And cannot well contented be,
Save thou should’st shine alone for me.
IV.
We should love beauty even as flowers—
For all, ’tis said, they bud and blow,
They are the world’s as well as ours—
But thou—alas! God made thee grow
So fair, I cannot love thee so!
The flowers and the grass to me
Are eloquent reproachfully;
For would they wave so pleasantly
Or look so fresh and fair,
If a man, cunning, hollow, mean,
Or one in anywise unclean,
Were looking on them there?
No; he hath grown so foolish-wise
He cannot see with childhood’s eyes;
He hath forgot that purity
And lowliness which are the key
Of Nature’s mysteries;
No; he hath wandered off so long
From his own place of birth,
That he hath lost his mother-tongue,
And, like one come from far-off lands,
Forgetting and forgot, he stands
Beside his mother’s hearth.
I.
I wandered down the sunny glade
And ever mused, my love, of thee;
My thoughts, like little children, played,
As gayly and as guilelessly.
II.
If any chanced to go astray,
Moaning in fear of coming harms,
Hope brought the wanderer back alway,
Safe nestled in her snowy arms.
III.
From that soft nest the happy one
Looked up at me and calmly smiled;
Its hair shone golden in the sun,
And made it seem a heavenly child.
IV.
Dear Hope’s blue eyes smiled mildly down,
And blest it with a love so deep,
That, like a nursling of her own,
It clasped her neck and fell asleep.
I.
I love the rites of England’s church;
I love to hear and see
The priest and people reading slow
The solemn Litany;
I love to hear the glorious swell
Of chanted psalm and prayer,
And the deep organ’s bursting heart,
Throb through the shivering air.
II.
Chants, that a thousand years have heard,
I love to hear again,
For visions of the olden time
Are wakened by the strain;
With gorgeous hues the window-glass
Seems suddenly to glow,
And rich and red the streams of light
Down through the chancel flow.
III.
And then I murmur, “Surely God
Delighteth here to dwell;
This is the temple of his Son
Whom he doth love so well;”
But, when I hear the creed which saith,
This church alone is His,
I feel within my soul that He
Hath purer shrines than this.
IV.
For his is not the builded church,
Nor organ-shaken dome;
In every thing that lovely is
He loves and hath his home;
And most in soul that loveth well
All things which he hath made,
Knowing no creed but simple faith
That may not be gainsaid.
V.
His church is universal Love,
And whoso dwells therein
Shall need no customed sacrifice
To wash away his sin;
And music in its aisles shall swell,
Of lives upright and true,
Sweet as dreamed sounds of angel-harps
Down-quivering through the blue.
VI.
They shall not ask a litany,
The souls that worship there,
But every look shall be a hymn,
And every word a prayer;
Their service shall be written bright
In calm and holy eyes,
And every day from fragrant hearts
Fit incense shall arise.
The pretty things that others wear
Look strange and out of place on me,
I never seem dressed tastefully,
Because I am not fair;
And, when I would most pleasing seem,
And deck myself with joyful care,
I find it is an idle dream,
Because I am not fair.
If I put roses in my hair,
They bloom as if in mockery;
Nature denies her sympathy,
Because I am not fair;
Alas! I have a warm, true heart,
But when I show it people stare;
I must forever dwell apart,
Because I am not fair.
I am least happy being where
The hearts of others are most light,
And strive to keep me out of sight,
Because I am not fair;
The glad ones often give a glance,
As I am sitting lonely there,
That asks me why I do not dance—
Because I am not fair.
And if to smile on them I dare,
For that my heart with love runs o’er,
They say: “What is she laughing for?”—
Because I am not fair;
Love scorned or misinterpreted—
It is the hardest thing to bear;
I often wish that I were dead,
Because I am not fair.
In joy or grief I must not share,
For neither smiles nor tears on me
Will ever look becomingly,
Because I am not fair;
Whole days I sit alone and cry,
And in my grave I wish I were—
Yet none will weep me if I die,
Because I am not fair.
My grave will be so lone and bare,
I fear to think of those dark hours,
For none will plant it o’er with flowers,
Because I am not fair;
They will not in the summer come
And speak kind words above me there;
To me the grave will be no home,
Because I am not fair.
Nearer to thy mother-heart,
Simple Nature, press me,
Let me know thee as thou art,
Fill my soul and bless me!
I have loved thee long and well,
I have loved thee heartily;
Shall I never with thee dwell,
Never be at one with thee?
Inward, inward to thy heart,
Kindly Nature, take me,
Lovely even as thou art,
Full of loving make me!
Thou knowest naught of dead-cold forms,
Knowest naught of littleness,
Lifeful Truth thy being warms,
Majesty and earnestness.
Homeward, homeward to thy heart,
Dearest Nature, call me;
Let no halfness, no mean part,
Any longer thrall me!
I will be thy lover true,
I will be a faithful soul,
Then circle me, then look me through,
Fill me with the mighty Whole.
All things are sad:—
I go and ask of Memory,
That she tell sweet tales to me
To make me glad;
And she takes me by the hand,
Leadeth to old places,
Showeth the old faces
In her hazy mirage-land;
O, her voice is sweet and low,
And her eyes are fresh to mine
As the dew
Gleaming through
The half-unfolded Eglantine,
Long ago, long ago!
But I feel that I am only
Yet more sad, and yet more lonely!
Then I turn to blue-eyed Hope,
And beg of her that she will ope
Her golden gates for me;
She is fair and full of grace,
But she hath the form and face
Of her mother Memory;
Clear as air her glad voice ringeth,
Joyous are the songs she singeth,
Yet I hear them mournfully;—
They are songs her mother taught her,
Crooning to her infant daughter,
As she lay upon her knee.
Many little ones she bore me,
Woe is me! in by-gone hours,
Who danced along and sang before me,
Scattering my way with flowers;
One by one
They are gone,
And their silent graves are seen,
Shining fresh with mosses green,
Where the rising sunbeams slope
O’er the dewy land of Hope.
But, when sweet Memory faileth,
And Hope looks strange and cold;
When youth no more availeth,
And Grief grows over bold;—
When softest winds are dreary,
And summer sunlight weary,
And sweetest things uncheery
We know not why:—
When the crown of our desires
Weighs upon the brow and tires,
And we would die,
Die for, ah! we know not what,
Something we seem to have forgot,
Something we had, and now have not;—
When the present is a weight
And the future seems our foe,
And with shrinking eyes we wait,
As one who dreads a sudden blow
In the dark, he knows not whence;—
When Love at last his bright eye closes,
And the bloom upon his face,
That lends him such a living grace,
Is a shadow from the roses
Wherewith we have decked his bier,
Because he once was passing dear;—
When we feel a leaden sense
Of nothingness and impotence,
Till we grow mad—
Then the body saith,
“There’s but one true faith;
All things are sad!”
Pleasant thoughts come wandering,
When thou art far, from thee to me;
On their silver wings they bring
A very peaceful ecstasy,
A feeling of eternal spring;
So that Winter half forgets
Everything but that thou art,
And, in his bewildered heart,
Dreameth of the violets,
Or those bluer flowers that ope,
Flowers of steadfast love and hope,
Watered by the living wells,
Of memories dear, and dearer prophecies,
When young spring forever dwells
In the sunshine of thine eyes.
I have most holy dreams of thee,
All night I have such dreams;
And, when I awake, reality
No whit the darker seems;
Through the twin gates of Hope and Memory
They pour in crystal streams
From out an angel’s calmèd eyes,
Who, from twilight till sunrise,
Far away in the upper deep,
Poised upon his shining wings,
Over us his watch doth keep,
And, as he watcheth, ever sings.
Through the still night I hear him sing,
Down-looking on our sleep;
I hear his clear, clear harp-strings ring,
And, as the golden notes take wing,
Gently downward hovering,
For very joy I weep;
He singeth songs of holy Love,
That quiver through the depths afar,
Where the blessèd spirits are,
And lingeringly from above
Shower till the morning star
His silver shield hath buckled on
And sentinels the dawn alone,
Quivering his gleamy spear
Through the dusky atmosphere.
Almost, my love, I fear the morn,
When that blessèd voice shall cease,
Lest it should leave me quite forlorn,
Stript of my snowy robe of peace;
And yet the bright reality
Is fairer than all dreams can be,
For, through my spirit, all day long,
Ring echoes of that angel-song
In melodious thoughts of thee;
And well I know it cannot die
Till eternal morn shall break,
For, through life’s slumber, thou and I
Will keep it for each other’s sake,
And it shall not be silent when we wake.
I.
Our fathers fought for Liberty,
They struggled long and well,
History of their deeds can tell—
But did they leave us free?
II.
Are we free from vanity,
Free from pride, and free from self,
Free from love of power and pelf,
From everything that’s beggarly?
III.
Are we free from stubborn will,
From low hate and malice small,
From opinion’s tyrant thrall?
Are none of us our own slaves still?
IV.
Are we free to speak our thought,
To be happy, and be poor,
Free to enter Heaven’s door,
To live and labor as we ought?
V.
Are we then made free at last
From the fear of what men say,
Free to reverence To-day,
Free from the slavery of the Past?
VI.
Our fathers fought for liberty,
They struggled long and well,
History of their deeds can tell—
But ourselves must set us free.
I.
Why mourn we for the golden prime
When our young souls were kingly, strong, and true?
The soul is greater than all time,
It changes not, but yet is ever new.
II.
But that the soul is noble, we
Could never know what nobleness had been;
Be what ye dream! and earth shall see
A greater greatness than she e’er hath seen.
III.
The flower pines not to be fair,
It never asketh to be sweet and dear,
But gives itself to sun and air,
And so is fresh and full from year to year.
IV.
Nothing in Nature weeps its lot,
Nothing, save man, abides in memory,
Forgetful that the Past is what
Ourselves may choose the coming time to be.
V.
All things are circular; the Past
Was given us to make the Future great;
And the void Future shall at last
Be the strong rudder of an after fate.
VI.
We sit beside the Sphinx of Life,
We gaze into its void, unanswering eyes,
And spend ourselves in idle strife
To read the riddle of their mysteries.
VII.
Arise! be earnest and be strong!
The Sphinx’s eyes shall suddenly grow clear,
And speak as plain to thee ere long,
As the dear maiden’s who holds thee most dear.
VIII.
The meaning of all things in us—
Yea, in the lives we give our souls—doth lie;
Make, then, their meaning glorious
By such a life as need not fear to die!
IX.
There is no heart-beat in the day,
Which bears a record of the smallest deed,
But holds within its faith alway
That which in doubt we vainly strive to read.
X.
One seed contains another seed,
And that a third, and so for evermore;
And promise of as great a deed
Lies folded in the deed that went before.
XI.
So ask not fitting space or time,
Yet could not dream of things which could not be;
Each day shall make the next sublime,
And Time be swallowed in Eternity.
XII.
God bless the Present! it is all;
It has been Future, and it shall be Past;
Awake and live! thy strength recall,
And in one trinity unite them fast.
XIII.
Action and Life—lo! here the key
Of all on earth that seemeth dark and wrong;
Win this—and, with it, freely ye
May enter that bright realm for which ye long.
XIV.
Then all these bitter questionings
Shall with a full and blessèd answer meet;
Past worlds, whereof the Poet sings,
Shall be the earth beneath his snow-white fleet.
Go little book! the world is wide,
There’s room and verge enough for thee;
For thou hast learned that only pride
Lacketh fit opportunity,
Which comes unbid to modesty.
Go! win thy way with gentleness:
I send thee forth, my first-born child,
Quite, quite alone, to face the stress
Of fickle skies and pathways wild,
Where few can keep them undefiled.
Thou earnest from a poet’s heart,
A warm, still home, and full of rest;
Far from the pleasant eyes thou art
Of those who know and love thee best,
And by whose hearthstones thou wert blest.
Go! knock thou softly at the door
Where any gentle spirits bin,
Tell them thy tender feet are sore,
Wandering so far from all thy kin,
And ask if thou may enter in.
Beg thou a cup-full from the spring
Of Charity, in Christ’s dear name;
Few will deny so small a thing,
Nor ask unkindly if thou came
Of one whose life might do thee shame.
We all are prone to go astray,
Our hopes are bright, our lives are dim;
But thou art pure, and if they say,
“We know thy father, and our whim
He pleases not,”—plead thou for him.
For many are by whom all truth,
That speaks not in their mother-tongue,
Is stoned to death with hands unruth,
Or hath its patient spirit wrung
Cold words and colder looks among.
Yet fear not! for skies are fair
To all whose souls are fair within;
Thou wilt find shelter everywhere
With those to whom a different skin
Is not a damning proof of sin.
But, if all others are unkind,
There’s one heart whither thou canst fly
For shelter from the biting wind;
And, in that home of purity,
It were no bitter thing to die.