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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/22833-8.txt b/22833-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ad99be9 --- /dev/null +++ b/22833-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2923 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Alcyone, by Archibald Lampman + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Alcyone + +Author: Archibald Lampman + +Release Date: October 2, 2007 [EBook #22833] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ALCYONE *** + + + + +Produced by Thierry Alberto, V. L. Simpson and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by the Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions +(www.canadiana.org)) + + + + + + ALCYONE + + by + + ARCHIBALD LAMPMAN + + + + + OTTAWA + JAMES OGILVY + 1899 + + + + + Edinburgh: T. and A. CONSTABLE, Printers to Her Majesty + + + + + TO THE MEMORY OF + MY FATHER + HIMSELF A POET + WHO FIRST INSTRUCTED ME + IN THE ART + OF VERSE. + + + + + CONTENTS + + + ALCYONE 1 + + IN MARCH 4 + + THE CITY OF THE END OF THINGS 5 + + THE SONG SPARROW 9 + + INTER VIAS 10 + + REFUGE 12 + + APRIL NIGHT 13 + + PERSONALITY 14 + + TO MY DAUGHTER 15 + + CHIONE 17 + + TO THE CRICKET 24 + + THE SONG OF PAN 25 + + THE ISLET AND THE PALM 27 + + A VISION OF TWILIGHT 28 + + EVENING 33 + + THE CLEARER SELF 34 + + TO THE PROPHETIC SOUL 36 + + THE LAND OF PALLAS 38 + + AMONG THE ORCHARDS 49 + + THE POET'S SONG 50 + + A THUNDERSTORM 56 + + THE CITY 57 + + SAPPHICS 60 + + VOICES OF EARTH 62 + + PECCAVI, DOMINE 63 + + AN ODE TO THE HILLS 66 + + INDIAN SUMMER 71 + + GOOD SPEECH 72 + + THE BETTER DAY 73 + + WHITE PANSIES 75 + + WE TOO SHALL SLEEP 77 + + THE AUTUMN WASTE 78 + + VIVIA PERPETUA 79 + + THE MYSTERY OF A YEAR 96 + + WINTER EVENING 97 + + WAR 98 + + THE WOODCUTTER'S HUT 103 + + AMOR VITÆ 108 + + WINTER-BREAK 110 + + + + + ALCYONE + + + In the silent depth of space, + Immeasurably old, immeasurably far, + Glittering with a silver flame + Through eternity, + Rolls a great and burning star, + With a noble name, + Alcyone! + + In the glorious chart of heaven + It is marked the first of seven; + 'Tis a Pleiad: + And a hundred years of earth + With their long-forgotten deeds have come and gone, + Since that tiny point of light, + Once a splendour fierce and bright, + Had its birth + In the star we gaze upon. + + It has travelled all that time-- + Thought has not a swifter flight-- + Through a region where no faintest gust + Of life comes ever, but the power of night + Dwells stupendous and sublime, + Limitless and void and lonely, + A region mute with age, and peopled only + With the dead and ruined dust + Of worlds that lived eternities ago. + + Man! when thou dost think of this, + And what our earth and its existence is, + The half-blind toils since life began, + The little aims, the little span, + With what passion and what pride, + And what hunger fierce and wide, + Thou dost break beyond it all, + Seeking for the spirit unconfined + In the clear abyss of mind + A shelter and a peace majestical. + For what is life to thee, + Turning toward the primal light, + With that stern and silent face, + If thou canst not be + Something radiant and august as night, + Something wide as space? + + Therefore with a love and gratitude divine + Thou shalt cherish in thine heart for sign + A vision of the great and burning star, + Immeasurably old, immeasurably far, + Surging forth its silver flame + Through eternity; + And thine inner heart shall ring and cry + With the music strange and high, + The grandeur of its name + Alcyone! + + + + + IN MARCH + + + The sun falls warm: the southern winds awake: + The air seethes upward with a steamy shiver: + Each dip of the road is now a crystal lake, + And every rut a little dancing river. + Through great soft clouds that sunder overhead + The deep sky breaks as pearly blue as summer: + Out of a cleft beside the river's bed + Flaps the black crow, the first demure newcomer. + The last seared drifts are eating fast away + With glassy tinkle into glittering laces: + Dogs lie asleep, and little children play + With tops and marbles in the sunbare places; + And I that stroll with many a thoughtful pause + Almost forget that winter ever was. + + + + + THE CITY OF THE END OF THINGS + + + Beside the pounding cataracts + Of midnight streams unknown to us + 'Tis builded in the leafless tracts + And valleys huge of Tartarus. + Lurid and lofty and vast it seems; + It hath no rounded name that rings, + But I have heard it called in dreams + The City of the End of Things. + + Its roofs and iron towers have grown + None knoweth how high within the night, + But in its murky streets far down + A flaming terrible and bright + Shakes all the stalking shadows there, + Across the walls, across the floors, + And shifts upon the upper air + From out a thousand furnace doors; + + And all the while an awful sound + Keeps roaring on continually, + And crashes in the ceaseless round + Of a gigantic harmony. + Through its grim depths re-echoing + And all its weary height of walls, + With measured roar and iron ring, + The inhuman music lifts and falls. + Where no thing rests and no man is, + And only fire and night hold sway; + The beat, the thunder and the hiss + Cease not, and change not, night nor day. + + And moving at unheard commands, + The abysses and vast fires between, + Flit figures that with clanking hands + Obey a hideous routine; + They are not flesh, they are not bone, + They see not with the human eye, + And from their iron lips is blown + A dreadful and monotonous cry; + And whoso of our mortal race + Should find that city unaware, + Lean Death would smite him face to face, + And blanch him with its venomed air: + Or caught by the terrific spell, + Each thread of memory snapt and cut, + His soul would shrivel and its shell + Go rattling like an empty nut. + + It was not always so, but once, + In days that no man thinks upon, + Fair voices echoed from its stones, + The light above it leaped and shone: + Once there were multitudes of men, + That built that city in their pride, + Until its might was made, and then + They withered age by age and died. + But now of that prodigious race, + Three only in an iron tower, + Set like carved idols face to face, + Remain the masters of its power; + And at the city gate a fourth, + Gigantic and with dreadful eyes, + Sits looking toward the lightless north, + Beyond the reach of memories; + Fast rooted to the lurid floor, + A bulk that never moves a jot, + In his pale body dwells no more, + Or mind, or soul,--an idiot! + + But sometime in the end those three + Shall perish and their hands be still, + And with the master's touch shall flee + Their incommunicable skill. + A stillness absolute as death + Along the slacking wheels shall lie, + And, flagging at a single breath, + The fires shall moulder out and die. + The roar shall vanish at its height, + And over that tremendous town + The silence of eternal night + Shall gather close and settle down. + All its grim grandeur, tower and hall, + Shall be abandoned utterly, + And into rust and dust shall fall + From century to century; + Nor ever living thing shall grow, + Or trunk of tree, or blade of grass; + No drop shall fall, no wind shall blow, + Nor sound of any foot shall pass: + Alone of its accursèd state, + One thing the hand of Time shall spare, + For the grim Idiot at the gate + Is deathless and eternal there. + + + + + THE SONG SPARROW + + + Fair little scout, that when the iron year + Changes, and the first fleecy clouds deploy, + Comest with such a sudden burst of joy, + Lifting on winter's doomed and broken rear + That song of silvery triumph blithe and clear; + Not yet quite conscious of the happy glow, + We hungered for some surer touch, and lo! + One morning we awake, and thou art here. + And thousands of frail-stemmed hepaticas, + With their crisp leaves and pure and perfect hues, + Light sleepers, ready for the golden news, + Spring at thy note beside the forest ways-- + Next to thy song, the first to deck the hour-- + The classic lyrist and the classic flower. + + + + + INTER VIAS + + + 'Tis a land where no hurricane falls, + But the infinite azure regards + Its waters for ever, its walls + Of granite, its limitless swards; + Where the fens to their innermost pool + With the chorus of May are aring, + And the glades are wind-winnowed and cool + With perpetual spring; + + Where folded and half withdrawn + The delicate wind-flowers blow, + And the bloodroot kindles at dawn + Her spiritual taper of snow; + Where the limits are met and spanned + By a waste that no husbandman tills, + And the earth-old pine forests stand + In the hollows of hills. + + 'Tis the land that our babies behold, + Deep gazing when none are aware; + And the great-hearted seers of old + And the poets have known it, and there + Made halt by the well-heads of truth + On their difficult pilgrimage + From the rose-ruddy gardens of youth + To the summits of age. + + Now too, as of old, it is sweet + With a presence remote and serene; + Still its byways are pressed by the feet + Of the mother immortal, its queen: + The huntress whose tresses, flung free, + And her fillets of gold, upon earth, + They only have honour to see + Who are dreamers from birth. + + In her calm and her beauty supreme, + They have found her at dawn or at eve, + By the marge of some motionless stream, + Or where shadows rebuild or unweave + In a murmurous alley of pine, + Looking upward in silent surprise, + A figure, slow-moving, divine, + With inscrutable eyes. + + + + + REFUGE + + + Where swallows and wheatfields are, + O hamlet brown and still, + O river that shineth far, + By meadow, pier, and mill: + + O endless sunsteeped plain, + With forests in dim blue shrouds, + And little wisps of rain, + Falling from far-off clouds: + + I come from the choking air + Of passion, doubt, and strife, + With a spirit and mind laid bare + To your healing breadth of life: + + O fruitful and sacred ground, + O sunlight and summer sky, + Absorb me and fold me round, + For broken and tired am I. + + + + + APRIL NIGHT + + + How deep the April night is in its noon, + The hopeful, solemn, many-murmured night! + The earth lies hushed with expectation; bright + Above the world's dark border burns the moon, + Yellow and large; from forest floorways, strewn + With flowers, and fields that tingle with new birth, + The moist smell of the unimprisoned earth + Comes up, a sigh, a haunting promise. Soon, + Ah, soon, the teeming triumph! At my feet + The river with its stately sweep and wheel + Moves on slow-motioned, luminous, grey like steel. + From fields far off whose watery hollows gleam, + Aye with blown throats that make the long hours sweet, + The sleepless toads are murmuring in their dream. + + + + + PERSONALITY + + + O differing human heart, + Why is it that I tremble when thine eyes, + Thy human eyes and beautiful human speech, + Draw me, and stir within my soul + That subtle ineradicable longing + For tender comradeship? + It is because I cannot all at once, + Through the half-lights and phantom-haunted mists + That separate and enshroud us life from life, + Discern the nearness or the strangeness of thy paths + Nor plumb thy depths. + I am like one that comes alone at night + To a strange stream, and by an unknown ford + Stands, and for a moment yearns and shrinks, + Being ignorant of the water, though so quiet it is, + So softly murmurous, + So silvered by the familiar moon. + + + + + TO MY DAUGHTER + + + O little one, daughter, my dearest, + With your smiles and your beautiful curls, + And your laughter, the brightest and clearest, + O gravest and gayest of girls; + + With your hands that are softer than roses, + And your lips that are lighter than flowers, + And that innocent brow that discloses + A wisdom more lovely than ours; + + With your locks that encumber, or scatter + In a thousand mercurial gleams, + And those feet whose impetuous patter + I hear and remember in dreams; + + With your manner of motherly duty, + When you play with your dolls and are wise; + With your wonders of speech, and the beauty + In your little imperious eyes; + + When I hear you so silverly ringing + Your welcome from chamber or stair. + When you run to me, kissing and clinging, + So radiant, so rosily fair; + + I bend like an ogre above you; + I bury my face in your curls; + I fold you, I clasp you, I love you. + O baby, queen-blossom of girls! + + + + + CHIONE + + + Scarcely a breath about the rocky stair + Moved, but the growing tide from verge to verge, + Heaving salt fragrance on the midnight air, + Climbed with a murmurous and fitful surge. + A hoary mist rose up and slowly sheathed + The dripping walls and portal granite-stepped, + And sank into the inner court, and crept + From column unto column thickly wreathed. + + In that dead hour of darkness before dawn, + When hearts beat fainter, and the hands of death + Are strengthened,--with lips white and drawn + And feverish lids and scarcely moving breath, + The hapless mother, tender Chione, + Beside the earth-cold figure of her child, + After long bursts of weeping sharp and wild + Lay broken, silent in her agony. + At first in waking horror racked and bound + She lay, and then a gradual stupor grew + About her soul and wrapped her round and round + Like death, and then she sprang to life anew + Out of a darkness clammy as the tomb; + And, touched by memory or some spirit hand, + She seemed to keep a pathway down a land + Of monstrous shadow and Cimmerian gloom. + + A waste of cloudy and perpetual night-- + And yet there seemed a teeming presence there + Of life that gathered onward in thick flight, + Unseen, but multitudinous. Aware + Of something also on her path she was + That drew her heart forth with a tender cry. + She hurried with drooped ear and eager eye, + And called on the foul shapes to let her pass. + + For down the sloping darkness far ahead + She saw a little figure slight and small, + With yearning arms and shadowy curls outspread, + Running at frightened speed; and it would fall + And rise, sobbing; and through the ghostly sleet + The cry came: 'Mother! Mother!' and she wist + The tender eyes were blinded by the mist, + And the rough stones were bruising the small feet. + And when she lifted a keen cry and clave + Forthright the gathering horror of the place, + Mad with her love and pity, a dark wave + Of clapping shadows swept about her face, + And beat her back, and when she gained her breath, + Athwart an awful vale a grizzled steam + Was rising from a mute and murky stream, + As cold and cavernous as the eye of death. + + And near the ripple stood the little shade, + And many hovering ghosts drew near him, some + That seemed to peer out of the mist and fade + With eyes of soft and shadowing pity, dumb; + But others closed him round with eager sighs + And sweet insistence, striving to caress + And comfort him; but grieving none the less, + He reached her heartstrings with his tender cries. + + And silently across the horrid flow, + The shapeless bark and pallid chalklike arms + Of him that oared it, dumbly to and fro, + Went gliding, and the struggling ghosts in swarms + Leaped in and passed, but myriads more behind + Crowded the dismal beaches. One might hear + A tumult of entreaty thin and clear + Rise like the whistle of a winter wind. + + And still the little figure stood beside + The hideous stream, and toward the whispering prow + Held forth his tender tremulous hands, and cried, + Now to the awful ferryman, and now + To her that battled with the shades in vain. + Sometimes impending over all her sight + The spongy dark and the phantasmal flight + Of things half-shapen passed and hid the plain. + + And sometimes in a gust a sort of wind + Drove by, and where its power was hurled, + She saw across the twilight, jarred and thinned, + Those gloomy meadows of the under world, + Where never sunlight was, nor grass, nor trees, + And the dim pathways from the Stygian shore, + Sombre and swart and barren, wandered o'er + By countless melancholy companies. + + And farther still upon the utmost rim + Of the drear waste, whereto the roadways led, + She saw in piling outline, huge and dim, + The walled and towerèd dwellings of the dead + And the grim house of Hades. Then she broke + Once more fierce-footed through the noisome press; + But ere she reached the goal of her distress, + Her pierced heart seemed to shatter, and she woke. + + It seemed as she had been entombed for years, + And came again to living with a start. + There was an awful echoing in her ears + And a great deadness pressing at her heart. + She shuddered and with terror seemed to freeze, + Lip-shrunken and wide-eyed a moment's space, + And then she touched the little lifeless face, + And kissed it, and rose up upon her knees. + + And round her still the silence seemed to teem + With the foul shadows of her dream beguiled-- + No dream, she thought; it could not be a dream, + But her child called for her; her child, her child!-- + She clasped her quivering fingers white and spare, + And knelt low down, and bending her fair head + Unto the lower gods who rule the dead, + Touched them with tender homage and this prayer: + + O gloomy masters of the dark demesne, + Hades, and thou whom the dread deity + Bore once from earthly Enna for his queen, + Beloved of Demeter, pale Persephone, + Grant me one boon; + 'Tis not for life I pray, + Not life, but quiet death; and that soon, soon! + Loose from my soul this heavy weight of clay, + This net of useless woe. + O mournful mother, sad Persephone, + Be mindful, let me go! + + How shall he journey to the dismal beach, + Or win the ear of Charon, without one + To keep him and stand by him, sure of speech? + He is so little, and has just begun + To use his feet + And speak a few small words, + And all his daily usage has been sweet + As the soft nesting ways of tender birds. + How shall he fare at all + Across that grim inhospitable land, + If I too be not by to hold his hand, + And help him if he fall? + + And then before the gloomy judges set, + How shall he answer? Oh, I cannot bear + To see his tender cheeks with weeping wet, + Or hear the sobbing cry of his despair! + I could not rest, + Nor live with patient mind, + Though knowing what is fated must be best; + But surely thou art more than mortal kind, + And thou canst feel my woe, + All-pitying, all-observant, all-divine; + He is so little, mother Proserpine, + He needs me, let me go! + + Thus far she prayed, and then she lost her way, + And left the half of all her heart unsaid, + And a great languor seized her, and she lay, + Soft fallen, by the little silent head. + Her numbèd lips had passed beyond control, + Her mind could neither plan nor reason more, + She saw dark waters and an unknown shore, + And the grey shadows crept about her soul. + + Again through darkness on an evil land + She seemed to enter but without distress. + A little spirit led her by the hand, + And her wide heart was warm with tenderness. + Her lips, still moving, conscious of one care, + Murmured a moment in soft mother-tones, + And so fell silent. From their sombre thrones + Already the grim gods had heard her prayer. + + + + + TO THE CRICKET + + + Didst thou not tease and fret me to and fro, + Sweet spirit of this summer-circled field, + With that quiet voice of thine that would not yield + Its meaning, though I mused and sought it so? + But now I am content to let it go, + To lie at length and watch the swallows pass, + As blithe and restful as this quiet grass, + Content only to listen and to know + That years shall turn, and summers yet shall shine, + And I shall lie beneath these swaying trees, + Still listening thus; haply at last to seize, + And render in some happier verse divine + That friendly, homely, haunting speech of thine, + That perfect utterance of content and ease. + + + + + THE SONG OF PAN + + + Mad with love and laden + With immortal pain, + Pan pursued a maiden-- + Pan, the god--in vain. + + For when Pan had nearly + Touched her, wild to plead, + She was gone--and clearly + In her place a reed! + + Long the god, unwitting, + Through the valley strayed; + Then at last, submitting, + Cut the reed, and made, + + Deftly fashioned, seven + Pipes, and poured his pain + Unto earth and heaven + In a piercing strain. + + So with god and poet; + Beauty lures them on, + Flies, and ere they know it + Like a wraith is gone. + + Then they seek to borrow + Pleasure still from wrong, + And with smiling sorrow + Turn it to a song. + + + + + THE ISLET AND THE PALM + + + O gentle sister spirit, when you smile + My soul is like a lonely coral isle, + An islet shadowed by a single palm, + Ringed round with reef and foam, but inly calm. + + And all day long I listen to the speech + Of wind and water on my charmèd beach: + I see far off beyond mine outer shore + The ocean flash, and hear his harmless roar. + + And in the night-time when the glorious sun, + With all his life and all his light, is done, + The wind still murmurs in my slender tree, + And shakes the moonlight on the silver sea. + + + + + A VISION OF TWILIGHT + + + By a void and soundless river + On the outer edge of space, + Where the body comes not ever, + But the absent dream hath place, + Stands a city, tall and quiet, + And its air is sweet and dim; + Never sound of grief or riot + Makes it mad, or makes it grim. + + And the tender skies thereover + Neither sun, nor star, behold-- + Only dusk it hath for cover,-- + But a glamour soft with gold, + Through a mist of dreamier essence + Than the dew of twilight, smiles + On strange shafts and domes and crescents, + Lifting into eerie piles. + + In its courts and hallowed places + Dreams of distant worlds arise, + Shadows of transfigured faces, + Glimpses of immortal eyes, + Echoes of serenest pleasure, + Notes of perfect speech that fall, + Through an air of endless leisure, + Marvellously musical. + + And I wander there at even, + Sometimes when my heart is clear, + When a wider round of heaven + And a vaster world are near, + When from many a shadow steeple + Sounds of dreamy bells begin, + And I love the gentle people + That my spirit finds therein. + + Men of a diviner making + Than the sons of pride and strife, + Quick with love and pity, breaking + From a knowledge old as life; + Women of a spiritual rareness, + Whom old passion and old woe + Moulded to a slenderer fairness + Than the dearest shapes we know. + + In its domed and towered centre + Lies a garden wide and fair, + Open for the soul to enter, + And the watchful townsmen there + Greet the stranger gloomed and fretting + From this world of stormy hands, + With a look that deals forgetting + And a touch that understands. + + For they see with power, not borrowed + From a record taught or told, + But they loved and laughed and sorrowed + In a thousand worlds of old; + Now they rest and dream for ever, + And with hearts serene and whole + See the struggle, the old fever, + Clear as on a painted scroll. + + Wandering by that grey and solemn + Water, with its ghostly quays-- + Vistas of vast arch and column, + Shadowed by unearthly trees-- + Biddings of sweet power compel me, + And I go with bated breath, + Listening to the tales they tell me, + Parables of Life and Death. + + In a tongue that once was spoken, + Ere the world was cooled by Time, + When the spirit flowed unbroken + Through the flesh, and the Sublime + Made the eyes of men far-seeing, + And their souls as pure as rain, + They declare the ends of being, + And the sacred need of pain. + + For they know the sweetest reasons + For the products most malign-- + They can tell the paths and seasons + Of the farthest suns that shine. + How the moth-wing's iridescence + By an inward plan was wrought, + And they read me curious lessons + In the secret ways of thought. + + When day turns, and over heaven + To the balmy western verge + Sail the victor fleets of even, + And the pilot stars emerge, + Then my city rounds and rises, + Like a vapour formed afar, + And its sudden girth surprises, + And its shadowy gates unbar. + + Dreamy crowds are moving yonder + In a faint and phantom blue; + Through the dusk I lean, and wonder + If their winsome shapes are true; + But in veiling indecision + Come my questions back again-- + Which is real? The fleeting vision? + Or the fleeting world of men? + + + + + EVENING + + + From upland slopes I see the cows file by, + Lowing, great-chested, down the homeward trail, + By dusking fields and meadows shining pale + With moon-tipped dandelions. Flickering high, + A peevish night-hawk in the western sky + Beats up into the lucent solitudes, + Or drops with griding wing. The stilly woods + Grow dark and deep and gloom mysteriously. + Cool night-winds creep, and whisper in mine ear + The homely cricket gossips at my feet. + From far-off pools and wastes of reeds I hear, + Clear and soft-piped, the chanting frogs break sweet + In full Pandean chorus. One by one + Shine out the stars, and the great night comes on. + + + + + THE CLEARER SELF + + + Before me grew the human soul, + And after I am dead and gone, + Through grades of effort and control + The marvellous work shall still go on. + + Each mortal in his little span + Hath only lived, if he have shown + What greatness there can be in man + Above the measured and the known; + + How through the ancient layers of night, + In gradual victory secure, + Grows ever with increasing light + The Energy serene and pure: + + The Soul, that from a monstrous past, + From age to age, from hour to hour, + Feels upward to some height at last + Of unimagined grace and power. + + Though yet the sacred fire be dull, + In folds of thwarting matter furled, + Ere death be nigh, while life is full, + O Master Spirit of the world, + + Grant me to know, to seek, to find, + In some small measure though it be, + Emerging from the waste and blind, + The clearer self, the grander me! + + + + + TO THE PROPHETIC SOUL + + + What are these bustlers at the gate + Of now or yesterday, + These playthings in the hand of Fate, + That pass, and point no way; + + These clinging bubbles whose mock fires + For ever dance and gleam, + Vain foam that gathers and expires + Upon the world's dark stream; + + These gropers betwixt right and wrong, + That seek an unknown goal, + Most ignorant, when they seem most strong; + What are they, then, O Soul, + + That thou shouldst covet overmuch + A tenderer range of heart, + And yet at every dreamed-of touch + So tremulously start? + + Thou with that hatred ever new + Of the world's base control, + That vision of the large and true, + That quickness of the soul; + + Nay, for they are not of thy kind, + But in a rarer clay + God dowered thee with an alien mind; + Thou canst not be as they. + + Be strong therefore; resume thy load, + And forward stone by stone + Go singing, though the glorious road + Thou travellest alone. + + + + + THE LAND OF PALLAS + + + Methought I journeyed along ways that led for ever + Throughout a happy land where strife and care were dead, + And life went by me flowing like a placid river + Past sandy eyots where the shifting shoals make head. + + A land where beauty dwelt supreme, and right, the donor + Of peaceful days; a land of equal gifts and deeds, + Of limitless fair fields and plenty had with honour; + A land of kindly tillage and untroubled meads, + + Of gardens, and great fields, and dreaming rose-wreathed alleys, + Wherein at dawn and dusk the vesper sparrows sang; + Of cities set far off on hills down vista'd valleys, + And floods so vast and old, men wist not whence they sprang, + + Of groves, and forest depths, and fountains softly welling, + And roads that ran soft-shadowed past the open doors, + Of mighty palaces and many a lofty dwelling, + Where all men entered and no master trod their floors. + + A land of lovely speech, where every tone was fashioned + By generations of emotion high and sweet, + Of thought and deed and bearing lofty and impassioned; + A land of golden calm, grave forms, and fretless feet. + + And every mode and saying of that land gave token + Of limits where no death or evil fortune fell, + And men lived out long lives in proud content unbroken, + For there no man was rich, none poor, but all were well. + + And all the earth was common, and no base contriving + Of money of coined gold was needed there or known, + But all men wrought together without greed or striving, + And all the store of all to each man was his own. + + From all that busy land, grey town, and peaceful village, + Where never jar was heard, nor wail, nor cry of strife, + From every laden stream and all the fields of tillage, + Arose the murmur and the kindly hum of life. + + At morning to the fields came forth the men, each neighbour + Hand linked to other, crowned, with wreaths upon their hair, + And all day long with joy they gave their hands to labour, + Moving at will, unhastened, each man to his share. + + At noon the women came, the tall fair women, bearing + Baskets of wicker in their ample hands for each, + And learned the day's brief tale, and how the fields were faring, + And blessed them with their lofty beauty and blithe speech. + + And when the great day's toil was over, and the shadows + Grew with the flocking stars, the sound of festival + Rose in each city square, and all the country meadows, + Palace, and paven court, and every rustic hall. + + Beside smooth streams, where alleys and green gardens meeting + Ran downward to the flood with marble steps, a throng + Came forth of all the folk, at even, gaily greeting, + With echo of sweet converse, jest, and stately song. + + In all their great fair cities there was neither seeking + For power of gold, nor greed of lust, nor desperate pain + Of multitudes that starve, or, in hoarse anger breaking, + Beat at the doors of princes, break and fall in vain. + + But all the children of that peaceful land, like brothers, + Lofty of spirit, wise, and ever set to learn + The chart of neighbouring souls, the bent and need of others, + Thought only of good deeds, sweet speech, and just return. + + And there there was no prison, power of arms, nor palace, + Where prince or judge held sway, for none was needed there; + Long ages since the very names of fraud and malice + Had vanished from men's tongues, and died from all men's care. + + And there there were no bonds of contract, deed, or marriage, + No oath, nor any form, to make the word more sure, + For no man dreamed of hurt, dishonour, or miscarriage, + Where every thought was truth, and every heart was pure. + + There were no castes of rich or poor, of slave or master, + Where all were brothers, and the curse of gold was dead, + But all that wise fair race to kindlier ends and vaster + Moved on together with the same majestic tread. + + And all the men and women of that land were fairer + Than even the mightiest of our meaner race can be; + The men like gentle children, great of limb, yet rarer + For wisdom and high thought, like kings for majesty. + + And all the women through great ages of bright living, + Grown goodlier of stature, strong, and subtly wise, + Stood equal with the men, calm counsellors, ever giving + The fire and succour of proud faith and dauntless eyes. + + And as I journeyed in that land I reached a ruin, + The gateway of a lonely and secluded waste, + A phantom of forgotten time and ancient doing, + Eaten by age and violence, crumbled and defaced. + + On its grim outer walls the ancient world's sad glories + Were recorded in fire; upon its inner stone, + Drawn by dead hands, I saw, in tales and tragic stories, + The woe and sickness of an age of fear made known. + + And lo, in that grey storehouse, fallen to dust and rotten, + Lay piled the traps and engines of forgotten greed, + The tomes of codes and canons, long disused, forgotten, + The robes and sacred books of many a vanished creed. + + An old grave man I found, white-haired and gently spoken, + Who, as I questioned, answered with a smile benign, + 'Long years have come and gone since these poor gauds were broken, + Broken and banished from a life made more divine. + + 'But still we keep them stored as once our sires deemed fitting, + The symbol of dark days and lives remote and strange, + Lest o'er the minds of any there should come unwitting + The thought of some new order and the lust of change. + + 'If any grow disturbed, we bring them gently hither, + To read the world's grim record and the sombre lore + Massed in these pitiless vaults, and they returning thither, + Bear with them quieter thoughts, and make for change no more.' + + And thence I journeyed on by one broad way that bore me + Out of that waste, and as I passed by tower and town + I saw amid the limitless plain far out before me + A long low mountain, blue as beryl, and its crown + + Was capped by marble roofs that shone like snow for whiteness, + Its foot was deep in gardens, and that blossoming plain + Seemed in the radiant shower of its majestic brightness + A land for gods to dwell in, free from care and pain. + + And to and forth from that fair mountain like a river + Ran many a dim grey road, and on them I could see + A multitude of stately forms that seemed for ever + Going and coming in bright bands; and near to me + + Was one that in his journey seemed to dream and linger, + Walking at whiles with kingly step, then standing still, + And him I met and asked him, pointing with my finger, + The meaning of the palace and the lofty hill. + + Whereto the dreamer: 'Art thou of this land, my brother, + And knowest not the mountain and its crest of walls, + Where dwells the priestless worship of the all-wise mother? + That is the hill of Pallas; those her marble halls! + + 'There dwell the lords of knowledge and of thought increasing, + And they whom insight and the gleams of song uplift; + And thence as by a hundred conduits flows unceasing + The spring of power and beauty, an eternal gift.' + + Still I passed on until I reached at length, not knowing + Whither the tangled and diverging paths might lead, + A land of baser men, whose coming and whose going + Were urged by fear, and hunger, and the curse of greed. + + I saw the proud and fortunate go by me, faring + In fatness and fine robes, the poor oppressed and slow, + The faces of bowed men, and piteous women bearing + The burden of perpetual sorrow and the stamp of woe. + + And tides of deep solicitude and wondering pity + Possessed me, and with eager and uplifted hands + I drew the crowd about me in a mighty city, + And taught the message of those other kindlier lands. + + I preached the rule of Faith and brotherly Communion, + The law of Peace and Beauty and the death of Strife, + And painted in great words the horror of disunion, + The vainness of self-worship, and the waste of life. + + I preached, but fruitlessly; the powerful from their stations + Rebuked me as an anarch, envious and bad, + And they that served them with lean hands and bitter patience + Smiled only out of hollow orbs, and deemed me mad. + + And still I preached, and wrought, and still I bore my message, + For well I knew that on and upward without cease + The spirit works for ever, and by Faith and Presage + That somehow yet the end of human life is Peace. + + + + + AMONG THE ORCHARDS + + + Already in the dew-wrapped vineyards dry + Dense weights of heat press down. The large bright drops + Shrink in the leaves. From dark acacia tops + The nuthatch flings his short reiterate cry; + And ever as the sun mounts hot and high + Thin voices crowd the grass. In soft long strokes + The wind goes murmuring through the mountain oaks. + Faint wefts creep out along the blue and die. + I hear far in among the motionless trees-- + Shadows that sleep upon the shaven sod-- + The thud of dropping apples. Reach on reach + Stretch plots of perfumed orchard, where the bees + Murmur among the full-fringed golden-rod, + Or cling half-drunken to the rotting peach. + + + + + THE POET'S SONG + + I + + + There came no change from week to week + On all the land, but all one way, + Like ghosts that cannot touch nor speak, + Day followed day. + + Within the palace court the rounds + Of glare and shadow, day and night, + Went ever with the same dull sounds, + The same dull flight: + + The motion of slow forms of state, + The far-off murmur of the street, + The din of couriers at the gate, + Half-mad with heat; + + Sometimes a distant shout of boys + At play upon the terrace walk, + The shutting of great doors, and noise + Of muttered talk. + + In one red corner of the wall, + That fronted with its granite stain + The town, the palms, and, beyond all, + The burning plain, + + As listless as the hour, alone, + The poet by his broken lute + Sat like a figure in the stone, + Dark-browed and mute. + + He saw the heat on the thin grass + Fall till it withered joint by joint, + The shadow on the dial pass + From point to point. + + He saw the midnight bright and bare + Fill with its quietude of stars + The silence that no human prayer + Attains or mars. + + He heard the hours divide, and still + The sentry on the outer wall + Make the night wearier with his shrill + Monotonous call. + + He watched the lizard where it lay, + Impassive as the watcher's face; + And only once in the long day + It changed its place. + + Sometimes with clank of hoofs and cries + The noon through all its trance was stirred; + The poet sat with half-shut eyes, + Nor saw, nor heard. + + And once across the heated close + Light laughter in a silver shower + Fell from fair lips: the poet rose + And cursed the hour. + + Men paled and sickened; half in fear, + There came to him at dusk of eve + One who but murmured in his ear + And plucked his sleeve: + + 'The king is filled with irks, distressed, + And bids thee hasten to his side; + For thou alone canst give him rest.' + The poet cried: + + 'Go, show the king this broken lute! + Even as it is, so am I! + The tree is perished to its root, + The fountain dry. + + 'What seeks he of the leafless tree, + The broken lute, the empty spring? + Yea, tho' he give his crown to me, + I cannot sing!' + + + II + + + That night there came from either hand + A sense of change upon the land; + A brooding stillness rustled through + With creeping winds that hardly blew; + A shadow from the looming west, + A stir of leaves, a dim unrest; + It seemed as if a spell had broke. + + And then the poet turned and woke + As from the darkness of a dream, + And with a smile divine supreme + Drew up his mantle fold on fold, + And strung his lute with strings of gold, + And bound the sandals to his feet, + And strode into the darkling street. + + Through crowds of murmuring men he hied, + With working lips and swinging stride, + And gleaming eyes and brow bent down; + Out of the great gate of the town + He hastened ever and passed on, + And ere the darkness came, was gone, + A mote beyond the western swell. + + And then the storm arose and fell + From wheeling shadows black with rain + That drowned the hills and strode the plain; + Round the grim mountain-heads it passed, + Down whistling valleys blast on blast, + Surged in upon the snapping trees, + And swept the shuddering villages. + + That night, when the fierce hours grew long, + Once more the monarch, old and grey, + Called for the poet and his song, + And called in vain. But far away, + By the wild mountain-gorges, stirred, + The shepherds in their watches heard, + Above the torrent's charge and clang, + The cleaving chant of one that sang. + + + + + A THUNDERSTORM + + + A moment the wild swallows like a flight + Of withered gust-caught leaves, serenely high, + Toss in the windrack up the muttering sky. + The leaves hang still. Above the weird twilight, + The hurrying centres of the storm unite + And spreading with huge trunk and rolling fringe, + Each wheeled upon its own tremendous hinge + Tower darkening on. And now from heaven's height + With the long roar of elm-trees swept and swayed, + And pelted waters, on the vanished plain + Plunges the blast. Behind the wild white flash + That splits abroad the pealing thunder-crash, + Over bleared fields and gardens disarrayed, + Column on column comes the drenching rain. + + + + + THE CITY + + + Canst thou not rest, O city, + That liest so wide and fair; + Shall never an hour bring pity, + Nor end be found for care? + + Thy walls are high in heaven, + Thy streets are gay and wide, + Beneath thy towers at even + The dreamy waters glide. + + Thou art fair as the hills at morning, + And the sunshine loveth thee, + But its light is a gloom of warning + On a soul no longer free. + + The curses of gold are about thee, + And thy sorrow deepeneth still; + One madness within and without thee, + One battle blind and shrill. + + I see the crowds for ever + Go by with hurrying feet; + Through doors that darken never + I hear the engines beat. + + Through days and nights that follow + The hidden mill-wheel strains; + In the midnight's windy hollow + I hear the roar of trains. + + And still the day fulfilleth, + And still the night goes round, + And the guest-hall boometh and shrilleth, + With the dance's mocking sound. + + In chambers of gold elysian, + The cymbals clash and clang, + But the days are gone like a vision + When the people wrought and sang. + + And toil hath fear for neighbour, + Where singing lips are dumb, + And life is one long labour, + Till death or freedom come. + + Ah! the crowds that for ever are flowing-- + They neither laugh nor weep-- + I see them coming and going, + Like things that move in sleep: + + Grey sires and burdened brothers, + The old, the young, the fair, + Wan cheeks of pallid mothers, + And the girls with golden hair. + + Care sits in many a fashion, + Grown grey on many a head, + And lips are turned to ashen + Whose years have right to red. + + Canst thou not rest, O city, + That liest so wide, so fair; + Shalt never an hour bring pity, + Nor end be found for care? + + + + + SAPPHICS + + + Clothed in splendour, beautifully sad and silent, + Comes the autumn over the woods and highlands, + Golden, rose-red, full of divine remembrance, + Full of foreboding. + + Soon the maples, soon will the glowing birches, + Stripped of all that summer and love had dowered them, + Dream, sad-limbed, beholding their pomp and treasure + Ruthlessly scattered: + + Yet they quail not: Winter with wind and iron + Comes and finds them silent and uncomplaining, + Finds them tameless, beautiful still and gracious, + Gravely enduring. + + Me too changes, bitter and full of evil, + Dream by dream have plundered and left me naked, + Grey with sorrow. Even the days before me + Fade into twilight, + + Mute and barren. Yet will I keep my spirit + Clear and valiant, brother to these my noble + Elms and maples, utterly grave and fearless, + Grandly ungrieving. + + Brief the span is, counting the years of mortals, + Strange and sad; it passes, and then the bright earth, + Careless mother, gleaming with gold and azure, + Lovely with blossoms-- + + Shining white anemones, mixed with roses, + Daisies mild-eyed, grasses and honeyed clover-- + You, and me, and all of us, met and equal, + Softly shall cover. + + + + + VOICES OF EARTH + + + We have not heard the music of the spheres, + The song of star to star, but there are sounds + More deep than human joy and human tears, + That Nature uses in her common rounds; + The fall of streams, the cry of winds that strain + The oak, the roaring of the sea's surge, might + Of thunder breaking afar off, or rain + That falls by minutes in the summer night. + These are the voices of earth's secret soul, + Uttering the mystery from which she came. + To him who hears them grief beyond control, + Or joy inscrutable without a name, + Wakes in his heart thoughts bedded there, impearled, + Before the birth and making of the world. + + + + + PECCAVI, DOMINE + + + O Power to whom this earthly clime + Is but an atom in the whole, + O Poet-heart of Space and Time, + O Maker and Immortal Soul, + Within whose glowing rings are bound, + Out of whose sleepless heart had birth + The cloudy blue, the starry round, + And this small miracle of earth: + + Who liv'st in every living thing, + And all things are thy script and chart, + Who rid'st upon the eagle's wing, + And yearnest in the human heart; + O Riddle with a single clue, + Love, deathless, protean, secure, + The ever old, the ever new, + O Energy, serene and pure. + + Thou, who art also part of me, + Whose glory I have sometime seen, + O Vision of the Ought-to-be, + O Memory of the Might-have-been, + I have had glimpses of thy way, + And moved with winds and walked with stars, + But, weary, I have fallen astray, + And, wounded, who shall count my scars? + + O Master, all my strength is gone; + Unto the very earth I bow; + I have no light to lead me on; + With aching heart and burning brow, + I lie as one that travaileth + In sorrow more than he can bear; + I sit in darkness as of death, + And scatter dust upon my hair. + + The God within my soul hath slept, + And I have shamed the nobler rule; + O Master, I have whined and crept; + O Spirit, I have played the fool. + Like him of old upon whose head + His follies hung in dark arrears, + I groan and travail in my bed, + And water it with bitter tears. + + I stand upon thy mountain-heads, + And gaze until mine eyes are dim; + The golden morning glows and spreads; + The hoary vapours break and swim. + I see thy blossoming fields, divine, + Thy shining clouds, thy blessed trees-- + And then that broken soul of mine-- + How much less beautiful than these! + + O Spirit, passionless, but kind, + Is there in all the world, I cry, + Another one so base and blind, + Another one so weak as I? + O Power, unchangeable, but just, + Impute this one good thing to me, + I sink my spirit to the dust + In utter dumb humility. + + + + + AN ODE TO THE HILLS + + 'I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence + cometh my help.'--PSALM CXXI. 1. + + + Æons ago ye were, + Before the struggling changeful race of man + Wrought into being, ere the tragic stir + Of human toil and deep desire began: + So shall ye still remain, + Lords of an elder and immutable race, + When many a broad metropolis of the plain, + Or thronging port by some renownèd shore, + Is sunk in nameless ruin, and its place + Recalled no more. + + Empires have come and gone, + And glorious cities fallen in their prime; + Divine, far-echoing, names once writ in stone + Have vanished in the dust and void of time; + But ye, firm-set, secure, + Like Treasure in the hardness of God's palm, + Are yet the same for ever; ye endure + By virtue of an old slow-ripening word, + In your grey majesty and sovereign calm, + Untouched, unstirred. + + Tempest and thunderstroke, + With whirlwinds dipped in midnight at the core, + Have torn strange furrows through your forest cloak, + And made your hollow gorges clash and roar, + And scarred your brows in vain. + Around your barren heads and granite steeps + Tempestuous grey battalions of the rain + Charge and recharge, across the plateaued floors, + Drenching the serried pines; and the hail sweeps + Your pitiless scaurs. + + The long midsummer heat + Chars the thin leafage of your rocks in fire: + Autumn with windy robe and ruinous feet + On your wide forests wreaks his fell desire, + Heaping in barbarous wreck + The treasure of your sweet and prosperous days; + And lastly the grim tyrant, at whose beck + Channels are turned to stone and tempests wheel, + On brow and breast and shining shoulder lays + His hand of steel. + + And yet not harsh alone, + Nor wild, nor bitter are your destinies, + O fair and sweet, for all your heart of stone, + Who gather beauty round your Titan knees, + As the lens gathers light. + The dawn gleams rosy on your splendid brows, + The sun at noonday folds you in his might, + And swathes your forehead at his going down, + Last leaving, where he first in pride bestows, + His golden crown. + + In unregarded glooms, + Where hardly shall a human footstep pass, + Myriads of ferns and soft maianthemums, + Or lily-breathing slender pyrolas + Distil their hearts for you. + Far in your pine-clad fastnesses ye keep + Coverts the lonely thrush shall wander through, + With echoes that seem ever to recede, + Touching from pine to pine, from steep to steep, + His ghostly reed. + + The fierce things of the wild + Find food and shelter in your tenantless rocks, + The eagle on whose wings the dawn hath smiled, + The loon, the wild-cat, and the bright-eyed fox; + For far away indeed + Are all the ominous noises of mankind, + The slaughterer's malice and the trader's greed: + Your rugged haunts endure no slavery: + No treacherous hand is there to crush or bind, + But all are free. + + Therefore out of the stir + Of cities and the ever-thickening press + The poet and the worn philosopher + To your bare peaks and radiant loneliness + Escape, and breathe once more + The wind of the Eternal: that clear mood, + Which Nature and the elder ages bore, + Lends them new courage and a second prime, + At rest upon the cool infinitude + Of Space and Time. + + The mists of troublous days, + The horror of fierce hands and fraudful lips, + The blindness gathered in Life's aimless ways + Fade from them, and the kind Earth-spirit strips + The bandage from their eyes, + Touches their hearts and bids them feel and see; + Beauty and Knowledge with that rare apprise + Pour over them from some divine abode, + Falling as in a flood of memory, + The bliss of God. + + I too perchance some day, + When Love and Life have fallen far apart, + Shall slip the yoke and seek your upward way + And make my dwelling in your changeless heart; + And there in some quiet glade, + Some virgin plot of turf, some innermost dell, + Pure with cool water and inviolate shade, + I'll build a blameless altar to the dear + And kindly gods who guard your haunts so well + From hurt or fear. + + There I will dream day-long, + And honour them in many sacred ways, + With hushèd melody and uttered song, + And golden meditation and with praise. + I'll touch them with a prayer, + To clothe my spirit as your might is clad + With all things bountiful, divine, and fair, + Yet inwardly to make me hard and true, + Wide-seeing, passionless, immutably glad, + And strong like you. + + + + + INDIAN SUMMER + + + The old grey year is near his term in sooth, + And now with backward eye and soft-laid palm + Awakens to a golden dream of youth, + A second childhood lovely and most calm, + And the smooth hour about his misty head + An awning of enchanted splendour weaves, + Of maples, amber, purple and rose-red, + And droop-limbed elms down-dropping golden leaves. + With still half-fallen lids he sits and dreams + Far in a hollow of the sunlit wood, + Lulled by the murmur of thin-threading streams, + Nor sees the polar armies overflood + The darkening barriers of the hills, nor hears + The north-wind ringing with a thousand spears. + + + + + GOOD SPEECH + + + Think not, because thine inmost heart means well, + Thou hast the freedom of rude speech: sweet words + Are like the voices of returning birds + Filling the soul with summer, or a bell + That calls the weary and the sick to prayer. + Even as thy thought, so let thy speech be fair. + + + + + THE BETTER DAY + + + Harsh thoughts, blind angers, and fierce hands, + That keep this restless world at strife, + Mean passions that, like choking sands, + Perplex the stream of life, + + Pride and hot envy and cold greed, + The cankers of the loftier will, + What if ye triumph, and yet bleed? + Ah, can ye not be still? + + Oh, shall there be no space, no time, + No century of weal in store, + No freehold in a nobler clime, + Where men shall strive no more? + + Where every motion of the heart + Shall serve the spirit's master-call, + Where self shall be the unseen part, + And human kindness all? + + Or shall we but by fits and gleams + Sink satisfied, and cease to rave, + Find love but in the rest of dreams, + And peace but in the grave? + + + + + WHITE PANSIES + + + Day and night pass over, rounding, + Star and cloud and sun, + Things of drift and shadow, empty + Of my dearest one. + + Soft as slumber was my baby, + Beaming bright and sweet; + Daintier than bloom or jewel + Were his hands and feet. + + He was mine, mine all, mine only, + Mine and his the debt; + Earth and Life and Time are changers; + I shall not forget. + + Pansies for my dear one--heartsease-- + Set them gently so; + For his stainless lips and forehead, + Pansies white as snow. + + Would that in the flower-grown little + Grave they dug so deep, + I might rest beside him, dreamless, + Smile no more, nor weep. + + + + + WE TOO SHALL SLEEP + + + Not, not for thee, + Beloved child, the burning grasp of life + Shall bruise the tender soul. The noise, and strife, + And clamour of midday thou shall not see; + But wrapt for ever in thy quiet grave, + Too little to have known the earthly lot, + Time's clashing hosts above thine innocent head, + Wave upon wave, + Shall break, or pass as with an army's tread, + And harm thee not. + + A few short years + We of the living flesh and restless brain + Shall plumb the deeps of life and know the strain, + The fleeting gleams of joy, the fruitless tears; + And then at last when all is touched and tried, + Our own immutable night shall fall, and deep + In the same silent plot, O little friend, + Side by thy side, + In peace that changeth not, nor knoweth end, + We too shall sleep. + + + + + THE AUTUMN WASTE + + + There is no break in all the wide grey sky, + Nor light on any field, and the wind grieves, + And talks of death. Where cold grey waters lie + Round greyer stones, and the new-fallen leaves + Heap the chill hollows of the naked woods, + A lisping moan, an inarticulate cry, + Creeps far among the charnel solitudes, + Numbing the waste with mindless misery. + In these bare paths, these melancholy lands, + What dream, or flesh, could ever have been young? + What lovers have gone forth with linkèd hands? + What flowers could ever have bloomed, what birds have sung? + Life, hopes, and human things seem wrapped away, + With shrouds and spectres, in one long decay. + + + + + VIVIA PERPETUA + + + Now being on the eve of death, discharged + From every mortal hope and earthly care, + I questioned how my soul might best employ + This hand, and this still wakeful flame of mind, + In the brief hours yet left me for their use; + Wherefore have I bethought me of my friend, + Of you, Philarchus, and your company, + Yet wavering in the faith and unconfirmed; + Perchance that I may break into thine heart + Some sorrowful channel for the love divine, + I make this simple record of our proof + In diverse sufferings for the name of Christ, + Whereof the end already for the most + Is death this day with steadfast faith endured. + + We were in prison many days, close-pent + In the black lower dungeon, housed with thieves + And murderers and divers evil men; + So foul a pressure, we had almost died, + Even there, in struggle for the breath of life + Amid the stench and unendurable heat; + Nor could we find each other save by voice + Or touch, to know that we were yet alive, + So terrible was the darkness. Yea, 'twas hard + To keep the sacred courage in our hearts, + When all was blind with that unchanging night, + And foul with death, and on our ears the taunts + And ribald curses of the soldiery + Fell mingled with the prisoners' cries, a load + Sharper to bear, more bitter than their blows. + At first, what with that dread of our abode, + Our sudden apprehension, and the threats + Ringing perpetually in our ears, we lost + The living fire of faith, and like poor hinds + Would have denied our Lord and fallen away. + Even Perpetua, whose joyous faith + Was in the later holier days to be + The stay and comfort of our weaker ones, + Was silent for long whiles. Perchance she shrank + In the mere sickness of the flesh, confused + And shaken by our new and horrible plight-- + The tender flesh, untempered and untried, + Not quickened yet nor mastered by the soul; + For she was of a fair and delicate make, + Most gently nurtured, to whom stripes and threats + And our foul prison-house were things undreamed. + But little by little as our spirits grew + Inured to suffering, with clasped hands, and tongues + That cheered each other to incessant prayer, + We rose and faced our trouble: we recalled + Our Master's sacred agony and death, + Setting before our eyes the high reward + Of steadfast faith, the martyr's deathless crown. + + So passed some days whose length and count we lost, + Our bitterest trial. Then a respite came. + One who had interest with the governor + Wrought our removal daily for some hours + Into an upper chamber, where we sat + And held each other's hands in childish joy, + Receiving the sweet gift of light and air + With wonder and exceeding thankfulness. + And then began that life of daily growth + In mutual exaltation and sweet help + That bore us as a gently widening stream + Unto the ocean of our martyrdom. + Uniting all our feebler souls in one-- + A mightier--we reached forth with this to God. + + Perpetua had been troubled for her babe, + Robbed of the breast and now these many days + Wasting for want of food; but when that change + Whereof I spake, of light and liberty + Relieved the horror of our prison gloom, + They brought it to her, and she sat apart, + And nursed and tended it, and soon the child + Would not be parted from her arms, but throve + And fattened, and she kept it night and day. + And always at her side with sleepless care + Hovered the young Felicitas--a slight + And spiritual figure--every touch and tone + Charged with premonitory tenderness, + Herself so near to her own motherhood. + Thus lightened and relieved, Perpetua + Recovered from her silent fit. Her eyes + Regained their former deep serenity, + Her tongue its gentle daring; for she knew + Her life should not be taken till her babe + Had strengthened and outgrown the need of her. + Daily we were amazed at her soft strength, + Her pliant and untroubled constancy, + Her smiling, soldierly contempt of death, + Her beauty and the sweetness of her voice. + + Her father, when our first few bitterest days + Were over, like a gust of grief and rage, + Came to her in the prison with wild eyes, + And cried: 'How mean you, daughter, when you say + You are a Christian? How can any one + Of honoured blood, the child of such as me, + Be Christian? 'Tis an odious name, the badge + Only of outcasts and rebellious slaves!' + And she, grief-touched, but with unyielding gaze, + Showing the fulness of her slender height: + 'This vessel, father, being what it is, + An earthen pitcher, would you call it thus? + Or would you name it by some other name?' + 'Nay, surely,' said the old man, catching breath, + And pausing, and she answered: 'Nor can I + Call myself aught but what I surely am-- + A Christian!' and her father, flashing back + In silent anger, left her for that time. + + A special favour to Perpetua + Seemed daily to be given, and her soul + Was made the frequent vessel of God's grace, + Wherefrom we all, less gifted, sore athirst, + Drank courage and fresh joy; for glowing dreams + Were sent her, full of forms august, and fraught + With signs and symbols of the glorious end + Whereto God's love hath aimed us for Christ's sake. + Once--at what hour I know not, for we lay + In that foul dungeon, where all hours were lost, + And day and night were indistinguishable-- + We had been sitting a long silent while, + Some lightly sleeping, others bowed in prayer, + When on a sudden, like a voice from God, + Perpetua spake to us and all were roused. + Her voice was rapt and solemn: 'Friends,' she said, + 'Some word hath come to me in a dream. I saw + A ladder leading to heaven, all of gold, + Hung up with lances, swords, and hooks. A land + Of darkness and exceeding peril lay + Around it, and a dragon fierce as hell + Guarded its foot. We doubted who should first + Essay it, but you, Saturus, at last-- + So God hath marked you for especial grace-- + Advancing and against the cruel beast + Aiming the potent weapon of Christ's name-- + Mounted, and took me by the hand, and I + The next one following, and so the rest + In order, and we entered with great joy + Into a spacious garden filled with light + And balmy presences of love and rest; + And there an old man sat, smooth-browed, white-haired, + Surrounded by unnumbered myriads + Of spiritual shapes and faces angel-eyed, + Milking his sheep; and lifting up his eyes + He welcomed us in strange and beautiful speech, + Unknown yet comprehended, for it flowed + Not through the ears, but forth-right to the soul, + God's language of pure love. Between the lips + Of each he placed a morsel of sweet curd; + And while the curd was yet within my mouth, + I woke, and still the taste of it remains, + Through all my body flowing like white flame, + Sweet as of some immaculate spiritual thing.' + And when Perpetua had spoken, all + Were silent in the darkness, pondering, + But Saturus spake gently for the rest: + 'How perfect and acceptable must be + Your soul to God, Perpetua, that thus + He bends to you, and through you speaks his will. + We know now that our martyrdom is fixed, + Nor need we vex us further for this life.' + + While yet these thoughts were bright upon our souls, + There came the rumour that a day was set + To hear us. Many of our former friends, + Some with entreaties, some with taunts and threats, + Came to us to pervert us; with the rest + Again Perpetua's father, worn with care; + Nor could we choose but pity his distress, + So miserably, with abject cries and tears, + He fondled her and called her 'Domina,' + And bowed his agèd body at her feet, + Beseeching her by all the names she loved + To think of him, his fostering care, his years, + And also of her babe, whose life, he said, + Would fail without her; but Perpetua, + Sustaining by a gift of strength divine + The fulness of her noble fortitude, + Answered him tenderly: 'Both you and I, + And all of us, my father, at this hour + Are equally in God's hands, and what he wills + Must be'; but when the poor old man was gone + She wept, and knelt for many hours in prayer, + Sore tried and troubled by her tender heart. + + One day, while we were at our midday meal, + Our cell was entered by the soldiery, + And we were seized and borne away for trial. + A surging crowd had gathered, and we passed + From street to street, hemmed in by tossing heads + And faces cold or cruel; yet we caught + At moments from masked lips and furtive eyes + Of friends--some known to as and some unknown-- + Many veiled messages of love and praise. + The floorways of the long basilica + Fronted us with an angry multitude; + And scornful eyes and threatening foreheads frowned + In hundreds from the columned galleries. + We were placed all together at the bar, + And though at first unsteadied and confused + By the imperial presence of the law, + The pomp of judgment and the staring crowd, + None failed or faltered; with unshaken tongue + Each met the stern Proconsul's brief demand + In clear profession. Rapt as in a dream, + Scarce conscious of my turn, nor how I spake, + I watched with wondering eyes the delicate face + And figure of Perpetua; for her + We that were youngest of our company + Loved with a sacred and absorbing love, + A passion that our martyr's brotherly vow + Had purified and made divine. She stood + In dreamy contemplation, slightly bowed, + A glowing stillness that was near a smile + Upon her soft closed lips. Her turn had come, + When, like a puppet struggling up the steps, + Her father from the pierced and swaying crowd + Appeared, unveiling in his agèd arms + The smiling visage of her babe. He grasped + Her robe, and strove to draw her down. All eyes + Were bent upon her. With a softening glance, + And voice less cold and heavy with death's doom, + The old Proconsul turned to her and said: + 'Lady, have pity on your father's age; + Be mindful of your tender babe; this grain + Of harmless incense offer for the peace + And welfare of the Emperor'; but she, + Lifting far forth her large and noteless eyes, + As one that saw a vision, only said: + 'I cannot sacrifice'; and he, harsh tongued, + Bending a brow upon her rough as rock, + With eyes that struck like steel, seeking to break + Or snare her with a sudden stroke of fear: + 'Art thou a Christian?' and she answered, 'Yea, + I am a Christian!' In brow-blackening wrath + He motioned a contemptuous hand and bade + The lictors scourge the old man down and forth + With rods, and as the cruel deed was done, + Perpetua stood white with quivering lips, + And her eyes filled with tears. While yet his cries + Were mingling with the curses of the crowd, + Hilarianus, calling name by name, + Gave sentence, and in cold and formal phrase + Condemned us to the beasts, and we returned + Rejoicing to our prison. Then we wished + Our martyrdom could soon have followed, not + As doubting for our constancy, but some + Grew sick under the anxious long suspense. + Perpetua again was weighed upon + By grief and trouble for her babe, whom now + Her father, seeking to depress her will, + Withheld and would not send it; but at length + Word being brought her that the child indeed + No longer suffered, nor desired the breast, + Her peace returned, and, giving thanks to God, + All were united in new bonds of hope. + Now being fixed in certitude of death, + We stripped our souls of all their earthly gear, + The useless raiment of this world; and thus, + Striving together with a single will, + In daily increment of faith and power, + We were much comforted by heavenly dreams, + And waking visitations of God's grace. + Visions of light and glory infinite + Were frequent with us, and by night or day + Woke at the very name of Christ the Lord, + Taken at any moment on our lips; + So that we had no longer thought or care + Of life or of the living, but became + As spirits from this earth already freed, + Scarce conscious of the dwindling weight of flesh. + To Saturus appeared in dreams the space + And splendour of the heavenly house of God, + The glowing gardens of eternal joy, + The halls and chambers of the cherubim, + In wreaths of endless myriads involved + The blinding glory of the angel choir, + Rolling through deeps of wheeling cloud and light + The thunder of their vast antiphonies. + The visions of Perpetua not less + Possessed us with their homely tenderness-- + As one, wherein she saw a rock-set pool + And weeping o'er its rim a little child, + Her brother, long since dead, Dinocrates: + Though sore athirst, he could not reach the stream, + Being so small, and her heart grieved thereat. + She looked again, and lo! the pool had risen, + And the child filled his goblet, and drank deep, + And prattling in a tender childish joy + Ran gaily off, as infants do, to play. + By this she knew his soul had found release + From torment, and had entered into bliss. + + Quickly as by a merciful gift of God, + Our vigil passed unbroken. Yesternight + They moved us to the amphitheatre, + Our final lodging-place on earth, and there + We sat together at our agapé + For the last time. In silence, rapt and pale, + We hearkened to the aged Saturus, + Whose speech, touched with a ghostly eloquence, + Canvassed the fraud and littleness of life, + God's goodness and the solemn joy of death. + Perpetua was silent, but her eyes + Fell gently upon each of us, suffused + With inward and eradiant light; a smile + Played often upon her lips. + + While yet we sat, + A tribune with a band of soldiery + Entered our cell, and would have had us bound + In harsher durance, fearing our escape + By fraud or witchcraft; but Perpetua, + Facing him gently with a noble note + Of wonder in her voice, and on her lips + A lingering smile of mournful irony: + 'Sir, are ye not unwise to harass us, + And rob us of our natural food and rest? + Should ye not rather tend us with soft care, + And so provide a comely spectacle? + We shall not honour Cæsar's birthday well, + If we be waste and weak, a piteous crew, + Poor playthings for your proud and pampered beasts.' + The noisy tribune, whether touched indeed, + Or by her grave and tender grace abashed, + Muttered and stormed a while, and then withdrew. + The short night passed in wakeful prayer for some, + For others in brief sleep, broken by dreams + And spiritual visitations. Earliest dawn + Found us arisen, and Perpetua, + Moving about with smiling lips, soft-tongued, + Besought us to take food; lest so, she said, + For all the strength and courage of our hearts, + Our bodies should fall faint. We heard without, + Already ere the morning light was full, + The din of preparation, and the hum + Of voices gathering in the upper tiers; + Yet had we seen so often in our thoughts + The picture of this strange and cruel death, + Its festal horror, and its bloody pomp, + The nearness scarcely moved us, and our hands + Met in a steadfast and unshaken clasp. + + The day is over. Ah, my friend, how long + With its wild sounds and bloody sights it seemed! + Night comes, and I am still alive--even I, + The least and last--with other two, reserved + To grace to-morrow's second day. The rest + Have suffered and with holy rapture passed + Into their glory. Saturus and the men + Were given to bears and leopards, but the crowd + Feasted their eyes upon no cowering shape, + Nor hue of fear, nor painful cry. They died + Like armèd men, face foremost to the beasts, + With prayers and sacred songs upon their lips. + Perpetua and the frail Felicitas + Were seized before our eyes and roughly stripped, + And shrinking and entreating, not for fear, + Nor hurt, but bitter shame, were borne away + Into the vast arena, and hung up + In nets, naked before the multitude, + For a fierce bull, maddened by goads, to toss. + Some sudden tumult of compassion seized + The crowd, and a great murmur like a wave + Rose at the sight, and grew, and thundered up + From tier to tier, deep and imperious: + So white, so innocent they were, so pure: + Their tender limbs so eloquent of shame; + And so our loved ones were brought back, all faint, + And covered with light raiment, and again + Led forth, and now with smiling lips they passed + Pale, but unbowed, into the awful ring, + Holding each other proudly by the hand. + + Perpetua first was tossed, and her robe rent, + But, conscious only of the glaring eyes, + She strove to hide herself as best she could + In the torn remnants of her flimsy robe, + And putting up her hands clasped back her hair, + So that she might not die as one in grief, + Unseemly and dishevelled. Then she turned, + And in her loving arms caressed and raised + The dying, bruised Felicitas. Once more + Gored by the cruel beast, they both were borne + Swooning and mortally stricken from the field. + Perpetua, pale and beautiful, her lips + Parted as in a lingering ecstasy, + Could not believe the end had come, but asked + When they were to be given to the beasts. + The keepers gathered round her--even they-- + In wondering pity--while with fearless hand, + Bidding us all be faithful and stand firm, + She bared her breast, and guided to its goal + The gladiator's sword that pierced her heart. + + The night is passing. In a few short hours + I too shall suffer for the name of Christ. + A boundless exaltation lifts my soul! + I know that they who left us, Saturus, + Perpetua, and the other blessed ones, + Await me at the opening gates of heaven. + + + + + THE MYSTERY OF A YEAR + + + A little while, a year agone, + I knew her for a romping child, + A dimple and a glance that shone + With idle mischief when she smiled. + + To-day she passed me in the press, + And turning with a quick surprise + I wondered at her stateliness, + I wondered at her altered eyes. + + To me the street was just the same, + The people and the city's stir; + But life had kindled into flame, + And all the world was changed for her. + + I watched her in the crowded ways, + A noble form, a queenly head, + With all the woman in her gaze, + The conscious woman in her tread. + + + + + WINTER EVENING + + + To-night the very horses springing by + Toss gold from whitened nostrils. In a dream + The streets that narrow to the westward gleam + Like rows of golden palaces; and high + From all the crowded chimneys tower and die + A thousand aureoles. Down in the west + The brimming plains beneath the sunset rest, + One burning sea of gold. Soon, soon shall fly + The glorious vision, and the hours shall feel + A mightier master; soon from height to height, + With silence and the sharp unpitying stars, + Stern creeping frosts, and winds that touch like steel, + Out of the depth beyond the eastern bars, + Glittering and still shall come the awful night. + + + + + WAR + + + By the Nile, the sacred river, + I can see the captive hordes + Strain beneath the lash and quiver + At the long papyrus cords, + While in granite rapt and solemn, + Rising over roof and column, + Amen-hotep dreams, or Ramses, + Lord of Lords. + + I can hear the trumpets waken + For a victory old and far-- + Carchemish or Kadesh taken-- + I can see the conqueror's car + Bearing down some Hittite valley, + Where the bowmen break and sally, + Sargina or Esarhaddon, + Grim with war! + + From the mountain streams that sweeten + Indus, to the Spanish foam, + I can feel the broad earth beaten + By the serried tramp of Rome; + Through whatever foes environ + Onward with the might of iron-- + Veni, vidi; veni, vici-- + Crashing home! + + I can see the kings grow pallid + With astonished fear and hate, + As the hosts of Amr or Khaled + On their cities fall like fate; + Like the heat-wind from its prison + In the desert burst and risen-- + La ilàha illah 'llàhu-- + God is great! + + I can hear the iron rattle, + I can see the arrows sting + In some far-off northern battle, + Where the long swords sweep and swing; + I can hear the scalds declaiming, + I can see their eyeballs flaming, + Gathered in a frenzied circle + Round the king. + + I can hear the horn of Uri + Roaring in the hills enorm; + Kindled at its brazen fury, + I can see the clansmen form; + In the dawn in misty masses, + Pouring from the silent passes + Over Granson or Morgarten + Like the storm. + + On the lurid anvil ringing + To some slow fantastic plan, + I can hear the sword-smith singing + In the heart of old Japan-- + Till the cunning blade grows tragic + With his malice and his magic-- + Tenka tairan! Tenka tairan! + War to man! + + Where a northern river charges + By a wild and moonlit glade, + From the murky forest marges, + Round a broken palisade, + I can see the red men leaping, + See the sword of Daulac sweeping, + And the ghostly forms of heroes + Fall and fade. + + I can feel the modern thunder + Of the cannon beat and blaze, + When the lines of men go under + On your proudest battle-days; + Through the roar I hear the lifting + Of the bloody chorus drifting + Round the burning mill at Valmy-- + Marseillaise! + + I can see the ocean rippled + With the driving shot like rain, + While the hulls are crushed and crippled, + And the guns are piled with slain; + O'er the blackened broad sea-meadow + Drifts a tall and titan shadow, + And the cannon of Trafalgar + Startle Spain. + + Still the tides of fight are booming, + And the barren blood is spilt; + Still the banners are up-looming, + And the hands are on the hilt; + But the old world waxes wiser, + From behind the bolted visor + It descries at last the horror + And the guilt. + + Yet the eyes are dim, nor wholly + Open to the golden gleam, + And the brute surrenders slowly + To the godhead and the dream. + From his cage of bar and girder, + Still at moments mad with murder, + Leaps the tiger, and his demon + Rules supreme. + + One more war with fire and famine + Gathers--I can hear its cries-- + And the years of might and Mammon + Perish in a world's demise; + When the strength of man is shattered, + And the powers of earth are scattered, + From beneath the ghastly ruin + Peace shall rise! + + + + + THE WOODCUTTER'S HUT + + + Far up in the wild and wintery hills in the heart of the cliff-broken + woods, + Where the mounded drifts lie soft and deep in the noiseless solitudes, + The hut of the lonely woodcutter stands, a few rough beams that show + A blunted peak and a low black line, from the glittering waste of snow. + In the frost-still dawn from his roof goes up in the windless, + motionless air, + The thin, pink curl of leisurely smoke; through the forest white and + bare + The woodcutter follows his narrow trail, and the morning rings and + cracks + With the rhythmic jet of his sharp-blown breath and the echoing shout of + his axe. + Only the waft of the wind besides, or the stir of some hardy bird-- + The call of the friendly chickadee, or the pat of the nuthatch--is + heard; + Or a rustle comes from a dusky clump, where the busy siskins feed, + And scatter the dimpled sheet of the snow with the shells of the + cedar-seed. + Day after day the woodcutter toils untiring with axe and wedge, + Till the jingling teams come up from the road that runs by the valley's + edge, + With plunging of horses, and hurling of snow, and many a shouted word, + And carry away the keen-scented fruit of his cutting, cord upon cord. + Not the sound of a living foot comes else, not a moving visitant there, + Save the delicate step of some halting doe, or the sniff of a prowling + bear. + And only the stars are above him at night, and the trees that creak and + groan, + And the frozen, hard-swept mountain-crests with their silent fronts of + stone, + As he watches the sinking glow of his fire and the wavering flames + upcaught, + Cleaning his rifle or mending his moccasins, sleepy and slow of + thought. + Or when the fierce snow comes, with the rising wind, from the grey + north-east, + He lies through the leaguering hours in his bunk like a winter-hidden + beast, + Or sits on the hard-packed earth, and smokes by his draught-blown + guttering fire, + Without thought or remembrance, hardly awake, and waits for the storm + to tire. + Scarcely he hears from the rock-rimmed heights to the wild ravines + below, + Near and far-off, the limitless wings of the tempest hurl and go + In roaring gusts that plunge through the cracking forest, and lull, + and lift, + All day without stint and all night long with the sweep of the hissing + drift. + But winter shall pass ere long with its hills of snow and its fettered + dreams, + And the forest shall glimmer with living gold, and chime with the + gushing of streams; + Millions of little points of plants shall prick through its matted + floor, + And the wind-flower lift and uncurl her silken buds by the woodman's + door; + The sparrow shall see and exult; but lo! as the spring draws gaily on, + The woodcutter's hut is empty and bare, and the master that made it is + gone. + He is gone where the gathering of valley men another labour yields, + To handle the plough, and the harrow, and scythe, in the heat of the + summer fields. + He is gone with his corded arms, and his ruddy face, and his moccasined + feet, + The animal man in his warmth and vigour, sound, and hard, and complete. + And all summer long, round the lonely hut, the black earth burgeons and + breeds, + Till the spaces are filled with the tall-plumed ferns and the triumphing + forest-weeds; + The thick wild raspberries hem its walls, and, stretching on either + hand, + The red-ribbed stems and the giant-leaves of the sovereign spikenard + stand. + So lonely and silent it is, so withered and warped with the sun and + snow, + You would think it the fruit of some dead man's toil a hundred years + ago; + And he who finds it suddenly there, as he wanders far and alone, + Is touched with a sweet and beautiful sense of something tender and + gone, + The sense of a struggling life in the waste, and the mark of a soul's + command, + The going and coming of vanished feet, the touch of a human hand. + + + + + AMOR VITÆ + + + I love the warm bare earth and all + That works and dreams thereon: + I love the seasons yet to fall: + I love the ages gone, + + The valleys with the sheeted grain, + The river's smiling might, + The merry wind, the rustling rain, + The vastness of the night. + + I love the morning's flame, the steep + Where down the vapour clings: + I love the clouds that float and sleep, + And every bird that sings. + + I love the purple shower that pours + On far-off fields at even: + I love the pine-wood dusk whose floors + Are like the courts of heaven. + + I love the heaven's azure span, + The grass beneath my feet: + I love the face of every man + Whose thought is swift and sweet. + + I let the wrangling world go by, + And like an idle breath + Its echoes and its phantoms fly: + I care no jot for death. + + Time like a Titan bright and strong + Spreads one enchanted gleam: + Each hour is but a fluted song, + And life a lofty dream. + + + + + WINTER-BREAK + + + All day between high-curded clouds the sun + Shone down like summer on the steaming planks. + The long, bright icicles in dwindling ranks + Dripped from the murmuring eaves till one by one + They fell. As if the spring had now begun, + The quilted snow, sun-softened to the core, + Loosened and shunted with a sudden roar + From downward roofs. Not even with day done + Had ceased the sound of waters, but all night + I heard it. In my dreams forgetfully bright + Methought I wandered in the April woods, + Where many a silver-piping sparrow was, + By gurgling brooks and spouting solitudes, + And stooped, and laughed, and plucked hepaticas. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Alcyone, by Archibald Lampman + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ALCYONE *** + +***** This file should be named 22833-8.txt or 22833-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/2/8/3/22833/ + +Produced by Thierry Alberto, V. L. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Alcyone + +Author: Archibald Lampman + +Release Date: October 2, 2007 [EBook #22833] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ALCYONE *** + + + + +Produced by Thierry Alberto, V. L. Simpson and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by the Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions +(www.canadiana.org)) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<div class='titlepage'> +<h1>ALCYONE</h1> + +<p class='byline'>by<br /> +<span class='author'>ARCHIBALD LAMPMAN</span> +</p> + +<div class='publisher'> +OTTAWA<br /> +JAMES OGILVY<br /> +1899<br /> +</div> + +<p class='printer'>Edinburgh: T. and +A. <span class='smcap'>Constable</span>, Printers to Her Majesty</p> +</div> + +<div class='dedication'> +<b>TO THE MEMORY OF<br /> +MY FATHER<br /> +HIMSELF A POET<br /> +WHO FIRST INSTRUCTED ME<br /> +IN THE ART<br /> +OF VERSE.</b> +</div> + +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + +<ul class='toc'> +<li><a href='#p1'>ALCYONE <span class='ralign'>1</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p2'>IN MARCH <span class='ralign'>4</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p3'>THE CITY OF THE END OF THINGS <span class='ralign'>5</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p4'>THE SONG SPARROW <span class='ralign'>9</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p5'>INTER VIAS <span class='ralign'>10</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p6'>REFUGE <span class='ralign'>12</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p7'>APRIL NIGHT <span class='ralign'>13</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p8'>PERSONALITY <span class='ralign'>14</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p9'>TO MY DAUGHTER <span class='ralign'>15</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p10'>CHIONE <span class='ralign'>17</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p11'>TO THE CRICKET <span class='ralign'>24</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p12'>THE SONG OF PAN <span class='ralign'>25</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p13'>THE ISLET AND THE PALM <span class='ralign'>27</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p14'>A VISION OF TWILIGHT <span class='ralign'>28</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p15'>EVENING <span class='ralign'>33</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p16'>THE CLEARER SELF <span class='ralign'>34</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p17'>TO THE PROPHETIC SOUL <span class='ralign'>36</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p18'>THE LAND OF PALLAS <span class='ralign'>38</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p19'>AMONG THE ORCHARDS <span class='ralign'>49</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p20'>THE POET'S SONG <span class='ralign'>50</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p21'>A THUNDERSTORM <span class='ralign'>56</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p22'>THE CITY <span class='ralign'>57</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p23'>SAPPHICS <span class='ralign'>60</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p24'>VOICES OF EARTH <span class='ralign'>62</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p25'>PECCAVI, DOMINE <span class='ralign'>63</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p26'>AN ODE TO THE HILLS <span class='ralign'>66</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p27'>INDIAN SUMMER <span class='ralign'>71</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p28'>GOOD SPEECH <span class='ralign'>72</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p29'>THE BETTER DAY <span class='ralign'>73</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p30'>WHITE PANSIES <span class='ralign'>75</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p31'>WE TOO SHALL SLEEP <span class='ralign'>77</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p32'>THE AUTUMN WASTE <span class='ralign'>78</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p33'>VIVIA PERPETUA <span class='ralign'>79</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p34'>THE MYSTERY OF A YEAR <span class='ralign'>96</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p35'>WINTER EVENING <span class='ralign'>97</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p36'>WAR <span class='ralign'>98</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p37'>THE WOODCUTTER'S HUT <span class='ralign'>103</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p38'>AMOR VITÆ <span class='ralign'>108</span></a></li> + +<li><a href='#p39'>WINTER-BREAK <span class='ralign'>110</span></a></li> +<!-- p means poem if anyone is wondering. --> +</ul> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 1]</p> + +<h3><a name='p1' id='p1'>ALCYONE</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>In the silent depth of space,</p> +<p>Immeasurably old, immeasurably far,</p> +<p>Glittering with a silver flame</p> +<p>Through eternity,</p> +<p>Rolls a great and burning star,</p> +<p>With a noble name,</p> +<p class='in2em'>Alcyone!</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>In the glorious chart of heaven</p> +<p>It is marked the first of seven;</p> +<p>'Tis a Pleiad:</p> +<p>And a hundred years of earth</p> +<p>With their long-forgotten deeds have come and gone,</p> +<p>Since that tiny point of light,</p> +<p>Once a splendour fierce and bright,</p> +<p>Had its birth</p> +<p>In the star we gaze upon.</p> +</div> + +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 2]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>It has travelled all that time—</p> +<p>Thought has not a swifter flight—</p> +<p>Through a region where no faintest gust</p> +<p>Of life comes ever, but the power of night</p> +<p>Dwells stupendous and sublime,</p> +<p>Limitless and void and lonely,</p> +<p>A region mute with age, and peopled only</p> +<p>With the dead and ruined dust</p> +<p>Of worlds that lived eternities ago.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Man! when thou dost think of this,</p> +<p>And what our earth and its existence is,</p> +<p>The half-blind toils since life began,</p> +<p>The little aims, the little span,</p> +<p>With what passion and what pride,</p> +<p>And what hunger fierce and wide,</p> +<p>Thou dost break beyond it all,</p> +<p>Seeking for the spirit unconfined</p> +<p>In the clear abyss of mind</p> +<p>A shelter and a peace majestical.</p> +<p>For what is life to thee,</p> +<p>Turning toward the primal light,</p> +<p>With that stern and silent face,</p> +<p>If thou canst not be</p> +<p>Something radiant and august as night,</p> +<p>Something wide as space?</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 3]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Therefore with a love and gratitude divine</p> +<p>Thou shalt cherish in thine heart for sign</p> +<p>A vision of the great and burning star,</p> +<p>Immeasurably old, immeasurably far,</p> +<p>Surging forth its silver flame</p> +<p>Through eternity;</p> +<p>And thine inner heart shall ring and cry</p> +<p>With the music strange and high,</p> +<p>The grandeur of its name</p> +<p class='in2em'>Alcyone!</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 4]</p> + +<h3><a name='p2' id='p2'>IN MARCH</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>The sun falls warm: the southern winds awake:</p> +<p>The air seethes upward with a steamy shiver:</p> +<p>Each dip of the road is now a crystal lake,</p> +<p>And every rut a little dancing river.</p> +<p>Through great soft clouds that sunder overhead</p> +<p>The deep sky breaks as pearly blue as summer:</p> +<p>Out of a cleft beside the river's bed</p> +<p>Flaps the black crow, the first demure newcomer.</p> +<p>The last seared drifts are eating fast away</p> +<p>With glassy tinkle into glittering laces:</p> +<p>Dogs lie asleep, and little children play</p> +<p>With tops and marbles in the sunbare places;</p> +<p>And I that stroll with many a thoughtful pause</p> +<p>Almost forget that winter ever was.</p> +</div> +</div> + + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 5]</p> + +<h3><a name='p3' id='p3'>THE CITY OF THE END OF THINGS</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Beside the pounding cataracts</p> +<p>Of midnight streams unknown to us</p> +<p>'Tis builded in the leafless tracts</p> +<p>And valleys huge of Tartarus.</p> +<p>Lurid and lofty and vast it seems;</p> +<p>It hath no rounded name that rings,</p> +<p>But I have heard it called in dreams</p> +<p>The City of the End of Things.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Its roofs and iron towers have grown</p> +<p>None knoweth how high within the night,</p> +<p>But in its murky streets far down</p> +<p>A flaming terrible and bright</p> +<p>Shakes all the stalking shadows there,</p> +<p>Across the walls, across the floors,</p> +<p>And shifts upon the upper air</p> +<p>From out a thousand furnace doors;</p> +</div> + +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 6]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And all the while an awful sound</p> +<p>Keeps roaring on continually,</p> +<p>And crashes in the ceaseless round</p> +<p>Of a gigantic harmony.</p> +<p>Through its grim depths re-echoing</p> +<p>And all its weary height of walls,</p> +<p>With measured roar and iron ring,</p> +<p>The inhuman music lifts and falls.</p> +<p>Where no thing rests and no man is,</p> +<p>And only fire and night hold sway;</p> +<p>The beat, the thunder and the hiss</p> +<p>Cease not, and change not, night nor day.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And moving at unheard commands,</p> +<p>The abysses and vast fires between,</p> +<p>Flit figures that with clanking hands</p> +<p>Obey a hideous routine;</p> +<p>They are not flesh, they are not bone,</p> +<p>They see not with the human eye,</p> +<p>And from their iron lips is blown</p> +<p>A dreadful and monotonous cry;</p> +<p>And whoso of our mortal race</p> +<p>Should find that city unaware,</p> +<p>Lean Death would smite him face to face,</p> +<p>And blanch him with its venomed air:</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 7]</span> +<p>Or caught by the terrific spell,</p> +<p>Each thread of memory snapt and cut,</p> +<p>His soul would shrivel and its shell</p> +<p>Go rattling like an empty nut.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>It was not always so, but once,</p> +<p>In days that no man thinks upon,</p> +<p>Fair voices echoed from its stones,</p> +<p>The light above it leaped and shone:</p> +<p>Once there were multitudes of men,</p> +<p>That built that city in their pride,</p> +<p>Until its might was made, and then</p> +<p>They withered age by age and died.</p> +<p>But now of that prodigious race,</p> +<p>Three only in an iron tower,</p> +<p>Set like carved idols face to face,</p> +<p>Remain the masters of its power;</p> +<p>And at the city gate a fourth,</p> +<p>Gigantic and with dreadful eyes,</p> +<p>Sits looking toward the lightless north,</p> +<p>Beyond the reach of memories;</p> +<p>Fast rooted to the lurid floor,</p> +<p>A bulk that never moves a jot,</p> +<p>In his pale body dwells no more,</p> +<p>Or mind, or soul,—an idiot!</p> +</div> + +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 8]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>But sometime in the end those three</p> +<p>Shall perish and their hands be still,</p> +<p>And with the master's touch shall flee</p> +<p>Their incommunicable skill.</p> +<p>A stillness absolute as death</p> +<p>Along the slacking wheels shall lie,</p> +<p>And, flagging at a single breath,</p> +<p>The fires shall moulder out and die.</p> +<p>The roar shall vanish at its height,</p> +<p>And over that tremendous town</p> +<p>The silence of eternal night</p> +<p>Shall gather close and settle down.</p> +<p>All its grim grandeur, tower and hall,</p> +<p>Shall be abandoned utterly,</p> +<p>And into rust and dust shall fall</p> +<p>From century to century;</p> +<p>Nor ever living thing shall grow,</p> +<p>Or trunk of tree, or blade of grass;</p> +<p>No drop shall fall, no wind shall blow,</p> +<p>Nor sound of any foot shall pass:</p> +<p>Alone of its accursèd state,</p> +<p>One thing the hand of Time shall spare,</p> +<p>For the grim Idiot at the gate</p> +<p>Is deathless and eternal there.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 9]</p> + +<h3><a name='p4' id='p4'>THE SONG SPARROW</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Fair little scout, that when the iron year</p> +<p class='in1em'>Changes, and the first fleecy clouds deploy,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Comest with such a sudden burst of joy,</p> +<p>Lifting on winter's doomed and broken rear</p> +<p>That song of silvery triumph blithe and clear;</p> +<p class='in1em'>Not yet quite conscious of the happy glow,</p> +<p class='in1em'>We hungered for some surer touch, and lo!</p> +<p>One morning we awake, and thou art here.</p> +<p>And thousands of frail-stemmed hepaticas,</p> +<p class='in1em'>With their crisp leaves and pure and perfect hues,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Light sleepers, ready for the golden news,</p> +<p>Spring at thy note beside the forest ways—</p> +<p class='in1em'>Next to thy song, the first to deck the hour—</p> +<p class='in1em'>The classic lyrist and the classic flower.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 10]</p> + +<h3><a name='p5' id='p5'>INTER VIAS</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>'Tis a land where no hurricane falls,</p> +<p>But the infinite azure regards</p> +<p>Its waters for ever, its walls</p> +<p>Of granite, its limitless swards;</p> +<p>Where the fens to their innermost pool</p> +<p>With the chorus of May are aring,</p> +<p>And the glades are wind-winnowed and cool</p> +<p class='in2em'>With perpetual spring;</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Where folded and half withdrawn</p> +<p>The delicate wind-flowers blow,</p> +<p>And the bloodroot kindles at dawn</p> +<p>Her spiritual taper of snow;</p> +<p>Where the limits are met and spanned</p> +<p>By a waste that no husbandman tills,</p> +<p>And the earth-old pine forests stand</p> +<p class='in2em'>In the hollows of hills.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>'Tis the land that our babies behold,</p> +<p>Deep gazing when none are aware;</p> +<p>And the great-hearted seers of old</p> +<p>And the poets have known it, and there</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 11]</span> +<p>Made halt by the well-heads of truth</p> +<p>On their difficult pilgrimage</p> +<p>From the rose-ruddy gardens of youth</p> +<p class='in2em'>To the summits of age.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Now too, as of old, it is sweet</p> +<p>With a presence remote and serene;</p> +<p>Still its byways are pressed by the feet</p> +<p>Of the mother immortal, its queen:</p> +<p>The huntress whose tresses, flung free,</p> +<p>And her fillets of gold, upon earth,</p> +<p>They only have honour to see</p> +<p class='in2em'>Who are dreamers from birth.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>In her calm and her beauty supreme,</p> +<p>They have found her at dawn or at eve,</p> +<p>By the marge of some motionless stream,</p> +<p>Or where shadows rebuild or unweave</p> +<p>In a murmurous alley of pine,</p> +<p>Looking upward in silent surprise,</p> +<p>A figure, slow-moving, divine,</p> +<p class='in2em'>With inscrutable eyes.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 12]</p> + +<h3><a name='p6' id='p6'>REFUGE</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Where swallows and wheatfields are,</p> +<p class='in1em'>O hamlet brown and still,</p> +<p>O river that shineth far,</p> +<p class='in1em'>By meadow, pier, and mill:</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>O endless sunsteeped plain,</p> +<p class='in1em'>With forests in dim blue shrouds,</p> +<p>And little wisps of rain,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Falling from far-off clouds:</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I come from the choking air</p> +<p class='in1em'>Of passion, doubt, and strife,</p> +<p>With a spirit and mind laid bare</p> +<p class='in1em'>To your healing breadth of life:</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>O fruitful and sacred ground,</p> +<p class='in1em'>O sunlight and summer sky,</p> +<p>Absorb me and fold me round,</p> +<p class='in1em'>For broken and tired am I.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 13]</p> + +<h3><a name='p7' id='p7'>APRIL NIGHT</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>How deep the April night is in its noon,</p> +<p>The hopeful, solemn, many-murmured night!</p> +<p>The earth lies hushed with expectation; bright</p> +<p>Above the world's dark border burns the moon,</p> +<p>Yellow and large; from forest floorways, strewn</p> +<p>With flowers, and fields that tingle with new birth,</p> +<p>The moist smell of the unimprisoned earth</p> +<p>Comes up, a sigh, a haunting promise. Soon,</p> +<p>Ah, soon, the teeming triumph! At my feet</p> +<p>The river with its stately sweep and wheel</p> +<p>Moves on slow-motioned, luminous, grey like steel.</p> +<p>From fields far off whose watery hollows gleam,</p> +<p>Aye with blown throats that make the long hours sweet,</p> +<p>The sleepless toads are murmuring in their dream.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 14]</p> + +<h3><a name='p8' id='p8'>PERSONALITY</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>O differing human heart,</p> +<p>Why is it that I tremble when thine eyes,</p> +<p>Thy human eyes and beautiful human speech,</p> +<p>Draw me, and stir within my soul</p> +<p>That subtle ineradicable longing</p> +<p>For tender comradeship?</p> +<p>It is because I cannot all at once,</p> +<p>Through the half-lights and phantom-haunted mists</p> +<p>That separate and enshroud us life from life,</p> +<p>Discern the nearness or the strangeness of thy paths</p> +<p>Nor plumb thy depths.</p> +<p>I am like one that comes alone at night</p> +<p>To a strange stream, and by an unknown ford</p> +<p>Stands, and for a moment yearns and shrinks,</p> +<p>Being ignorant of the water, though so quiet it is,</p> +<p>So softly murmurous,</p> +<p>So silvered by the familiar moon.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 15]</p> +<h3><a name='p9' id='p9'>TO MY DAUGHTER</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>O little one, daughter, my dearest,</p> +<p class='in1em'>With your smiles and your beautiful curls,</p> +<p>And your laughter, the brightest and clearest,</p> +<p class='in1em'>O gravest and gayest of girls;</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>With your hands that are softer than roses,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And your lips that are lighter than flowers,</p> +<p>And that innocent brow that discloses</p> +<p class='in1em'>A wisdom more lovely than ours;</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>With your locks that encumber, or scatter</p> +<p class='in1em'>In a thousand mercurial gleams,</p> +<p>And those feet whose impetuous patter</p> +<p class='in1em'>I hear and remember in dreams;</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>With your manner of motherly duty,</p> +<p class='in1em'>When you play with your dolls and are wise;</p> +<p>With your wonders of speech, and the beauty</p> +<p class='in1em'>In your little imperious eyes;</p> +</div> + +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 16]</span> + +<div class='stanza'> +<p>When I hear you so silverly ringing</p> +<p class='in1em'>Your welcome from chamber or stair.</p> +<p>When you run to me, kissing and clinging,</p> +<p class='in1em'>So radiant, so rosily fair;</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I bend like an ogre above you;</p> +<p class='in1em'>I bury my face in your curls;</p> +<p>I fold you, I clasp you, I love you.</p> +<p class='in1em'>O baby, queen-blossom of girls!</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 17]</p> + +<h3><a name='p10' id='p10'>CHIONE</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Scarcely a breath about the rocky stair</p> +<p>Moved, but the growing tide from verge to verge,</p> +<p>Heaving salt fragrance on the midnight air,</p> +<p>Climbed with a murmurous and fitful surge.</p> +<p>A hoary mist rose up and slowly sheathed</p> +<p>The dripping walls and portal granite-stepped,</p> +<p>And sank into the inner court, and crept</p> +<p>From column unto column thickly wreathed.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>In that dead hour of darkness before dawn,</p> +<p>When hearts beat fainter, and the hands of death</p> +<p>Are strengthened,—with lips white and drawn</p> +<p>And feverish lids and scarcely moving breath,</p> +<p>The hapless mother, tender Chione,</p> +<p>Beside the earth-cold figure of her child,</p> +<p>After long bursts of weeping sharp and wild</p> +<p>Lay broken, silent in her agony.</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 18]</span> +<p>At first in waking horror racked and bound</p> +<p>She lay, and then a gradual stupor grew</p> +<p>About her soul and wrapped her round and round</p> +<p>Like death, and then she sprang to life anew</p> +<p>Out of a darkness clammy as the tomb;</p> +<p>And, touched by memory or some spirit hand,</p> +<p>She seemed to keep a pathway down a land</p> +<p>Of monstrous shadow and Cimmerian gloom.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>A waste of cloudy and perpetual night—</p> +<p>And yet there seemed a teeming presence there</p> +<p>Of life that gathered onward in thick flight,</p> +<p>Unseen, but multitudinous. Aware</p> +<p>Of something also on her path she was</p> +<p>That drew her heart forth with a tender cry.</p> +<p>She hurried with drooped ear and eager eye,</p> +<p>And called on the foul shapes to let her pass.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>For down the sloping darkness far ahead</p> +<p>She saw a little figure slight and small,</p> +<p>With yearning arms and shadowy curls outspread,</p> +<p>Running at frightened speed; and it would fall</p> +<p>And rise, sobbing; and through the ghostly sleet</p> +<p>The cry came: 'Mother! Mother!' and she wist</p> +<p>The tender eyes were blinded by the mist,</p> +<p>And the rough stones were bruising the small feet.</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 19]</span> +<p>And when she lifted a keen cry and clave</p> +<p>Forthright the gathering horror of the place,</p> +<p>Mad with her love and pity, a dark wave</p> +<p>Of clapping shadows swept about her face,</p> +<p>And beat her back, and when she gained her breath,</p> +<p>Athwart an awful vale a grizzled steam</p> +<p>Was rising from a mute and murky stream,</p> +<p>As cold and cavernous as the eye of death.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And near the ripple stood the little shade,</p> +<p>And many hovering ghosts drew near him, some</p> +<p>That seemed to peer out of the mist and fade</p> +<p>With eyes of soft and shadowing pity, dumb;</p> +<p>But others closed him round with eager sighs</p> +<p>And sweet insistence, striving to caress</p> +<p>And comfort him; but grieving none the less,</p> +<p>He reached her heartstrings with his tender cries.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And silently across the horrid flow,</p> +<p>The shapeless bark and pallid chalklike arms</p> +<p>Of him that oared it, dumbly to and fro,</p> +<p>Went gliding, and the struggling ghosts in swarms</p> +<p>Leaped in and passed, but myriads more behind</p> +<p>Crowded the dismal beaches. One might hear</p> +<p>A tumult of entreaty thin and clear</p> +<p>Rise like the whistle of a winter wind.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 20]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And still the little figure stood beside</p> +<p>The hideous stream, and toward the whispering prow</p> +<p>Held forth his tender tremulous hands, and cried,</p> +<p>Now to the awful ferryman, and now</p> +<p>To her that battled with the shades in vain.</p> +<p>Sometimes impending over all her sight</p> +<p>The spongy dark and the phantasmal flight</p> +<p>Of things half-shapen passed and hid the plain.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And sometimes in a gust a sort of wind</p> +<p>Drove by, and where its power was hurled,</p> +<p>She saw across the twilight, jarred and thinned,</p> +<p>Those gloomy meadows of the under world,</p> +<p>Where never sunlight was, nor grass, nor trees,</p> +<p>And the dim pathways from the Stygian shore,</p> +<p>Sombre and swart and barren, wandered o'er</p> +<p>By countless melancholy companies.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And farther still upon the utmost rim</p> +<p>Of the drear waste, whereto the roadways led,</p> +<p>She saw in piling outline, huge and dim,</p> +<p>The walled and towerèd dwellings of the dead</p> +<p>And the grim house of Hades. Then she broke</p> +<p>Once more fierce-footed through the noisome press;</p> +<p>But ere she reached the goal of her distress,</p> +<p>Her pierced heart seemed to shatter, and she woke.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 21]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>It seemed as she had been entombed for years,</p> +<p>And came again to living with a start.</p> +<p>There was an awful echoing in her ears</p> +<p>And a great deadness pressing at her heart.</p> +<p>She shuddered and with terror seemed to freeze,</p> +<p>Lip-shrunken and wide-eyed a moment's space,</p> +<p>And then she touched the little lifeless face,</p> +<p>And kissed it, and rose up upon her knees.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And round her still the silence seemed to teem</p> +<p>With the foul shadows of her dream beguiled—</p> +<p>No dream, she thought; it could not be a dream,</p> +<p>But her child called for her; her child, her child!—</p> +<p>She clasped her quivering fingers white and spare,</p> +<p>And knelt low down, and bending her fair head</p> +<p>Unto the lower gods who rule the dead,</p> +<p>Touched them with tender homage and this prayer:</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>O gloomy masters of the dark demesne,</p> +<p>Hades, and thou whom the dread deity</p> +<p>Bore once from earthly Enna for his queen,</p> +<p>Beloved of Demeter, pale Persephone,</p> +<p>Grant me one boon;</p> +<p>'Tis not for life I pray,</p> +<p>Not life, but quiet death; and that soon, soon!</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 22]</span> +<p>Loose from my soul this heavy weight of clay,</p> +<p>This net of useless woe.</p> +<p>O mournful mother, sad Persephone,</p> +<p>Be mindful, let me go!</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>How shall he journey to the dismal beach,</p> +<p>Or win the ear of Charon, without one</p> +<p>To keep him and stand by him, sure of speech?</p> +<p>He is so little, and has just begun</p> +<p>To use his feet</p> +<p>And speak a few small words,</p> +<p>And all his daily usage has been sweet</p> +<p>As the soft nesting ways of tender birds.</p> +<p>How shall he fare at all</p> +<p>Across that grim inhospitable land,</p> +<p>If I too be not by to hold his hand,</p> +<p>And help him if he fall?</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And then before the gloomy judges set,</p> +<p>How shall he answer? Oh, I cannot bear</p> +<p>To see his tender cheeks with weeping wet,</p> +<p>Or hear the sobbing cry of his despair!</p> +<p>I could not rest,</p> +<p>Nor live with patient mind,</p> +<p>Though knowing what is fated must be best;</p> +<p>But surely thou art more than mortal kind,</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 23]</span> +<p>And thou canst feel my woe,</p> +<p>All-pitying, all-observant, all-divine;</p> +<p>He is so little, mother Proserpine,</p> +<p>He needs me, let me go!</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Thus far she prayed, and then she lost her way,</p> +<p>And left the half of all her heart unsaid,</p> +<p>And a great languor seized her, and she lay,</p> +<p>Soft fallen, by the little silent head.</p> +<p>Her numbèd lips had passed beyond control,</p> +<p>Her mind could neither plan nor reason more,</p> +<p>She saw dark waters and an unknown shore,</p> +<p>And the grey shadows crept about her soul.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Again through darkness on an evil land</p> +<p>She seemed to enter but without distress.</p> +<p>A little spirit led her by the hand,</p> +<p>And her wide heart was warm with tenderness.</p> +<p>Her lips, still moving, conscious of one care,</p> +<p>Murmured a moment in soft mother-tones,</p> +<p>And so fell silent. From their sombre thrones</p> +<p>Already the grim gods had heard her prayer.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 24]</p> +<h3><a name='p11' id='p11'>TO THE CRICKET</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Didst thou not tease and fret me to and fro,</p> +<p>Sweet spirit of this summer-circled field,</p> +<p>With that quiet voice of thine that would not yield</p> +<p>Its meaning, though I mused and sought it so?</p> +<p>But now I am content to let it go,</p> +<p>To lie at length and watch the swallows pass,</p> +<p>As blithe and restful as this quiet grass,</p> +<p>Content only to listen and to know</p> +<p>That years shall turn, and summers yet shall shine,</p> +<p>And I shall lie beneath these swaying trees,</p> +<p>Still listening thus; haply at last to seize,</p> +<p>And render in some happier verse divine</p> +<p>That friendly, homely, haunting speech of thine,</p> +<p>That perfect utterance of content and ease.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 25]</p> +<h3><a name='p12' id='p12'>THE SONG OF PAN</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Mad with love and laden</p> +<p class='in1em'>With immortal pain,</p> +<p>Pan pursued a maiden—</p> +<p class='in1em'>Pan, the god—in vain.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>For when Pan had nearly</p> +<p class='in1em'>Touched her, wild to plead,</p> +<p>She was gone—and clearly</p> +<p class='in1em'>In her place a reed!</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Long the god, unwitting,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Through the valley strayed;</p> +<p>Then at last, submitting,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Cut the reed, and made,</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Deftly fashioned, seven</p> +<p class='in1em'>Pipes, and poured his pain</p> +<p>Unto earth and heaven</p> +<p class='in1em'>In a piercing strain.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 26]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>So with god and poet;</p> +<p class='in1em'>Beauty lures them on,</p> +<p>Flies, and ere they know it</p> +<p class='in1em'>Like a wraith is gone.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Then they seek to borrow</p> +<p class='in1em'>Pleasure still from wrong,</p> +<p>And with smiling sorrow</p> +<p class='in1em'>Turn it to a song.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 27]</p> +<h3><a name='p13' id='p13'>THE ISLET AND THE PALM</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>O gentle sister spirit, when you smile</p> +<p>My soul is like a lonely coral isle,</p> +<p>An islet shadowed by a single palm,</p> +<p>Ringed round with reef and foam, but inly calm.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And all day long I listen to the speech</p> +<p>Of wind and water on my charmèd beach:</p> +<p>I see far off beyond mine outer shore</p> +<p>The ocean flash, and hear his harmless roar.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And in the night-time when the glorious sun,</p> +<p>With all his life and all his light, is done,</p> +<p>The wind still murmurs in my slender tree,</p> +<p>And shakes the moonlight on the silver sea.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 28]</p> +<h3><a name='p14' id='p14'>A VISION OF TWILIGHT</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>By a void and soundless river</p> +<p class='in1em'>On the outer edge of space,</p> +<p>Where the body comes not ever,</p> +<p class='in1em'>But the absent dream hath place,</p> +<p>Stands a city, tall and quiet,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And its air is sweet and dim;</p> +<p>Never sound of grief or riot</p> +<p class='in1em'>Makes it mad, or makes it grim.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And the tender skies thereover</p> +<p class='in1em'>Neither sun, nor star, behold—</p> +<p>Only dusk it hath for cover,—</p> +<p class='in1em'>But a glamour soft with gold,</p> +<p>Through a mist of dreamier essence</p> +<p class='in1em'>Than the dew of twilight, smiles</p> +<p>On strange shafts and domes and crescents,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Lifting into eerie piles.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 29]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>In its courts and hallowed places</p> +<p class='in1em'>Dreams of distant worlds arise,</p> +<p>Shadows of transfigured faces,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Glimpses of immortal eyes,</p> +<p>Echoes of serenest pleasure,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Notes of perfect speech that fall,</p> +<p>Through an air of endless leisure,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Marvellously musical.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And I wander there at even,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Sometimes when my heart is clear,</p> +<p>When a wider round of heaven</p> +<p class='in1em'>And a vaster world are near,</p> +<p>When from many a shadow steeple</p> +<p class='in1em'>Sounds of dreamy bells begin,</p> +<p>And I love the gentle people</p> +<p class='in1em'>That my spirit finds therein.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Men of a diviner making</p> +<p class='in1em'>Than the sons of pride and strife,</p> +<p>Quick with love and pity, breaking</p> +<p class='in1em'>From a knowledge old as life;</p> +<p>Women of a spiritual rareness,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Whom old passion and old woe</p> +<p>Moulded to a slenderer fairness</p> +<p class='in1em'>Than the dearest shapes we know.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 30]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>In its domed and towered centre</p> +<p class='in1em'>Lies a garden wide and fair,</p> +<p>Open for the soul to enter,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And the watchful townsmen there</p> +<p>Greet the stranger gloomed and fretting</p> +<p class='in1em'>From this world of stormy hands,</p> +<p>With a look that deals forgetting</p> +<p class='in1em'>And a touch that understands.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>For they see with power, not borrowed</p> +<p class='in1em'>From a record taught or told,</p> +<p>But they loved and laughed and sorrowed</p> +<p class='in1em'>In a thousand worlds of old;</p> +<p>Now they rest and dream for ever,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And with hearts serene and whole</p> +<p>See the struggle, the old fever,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Clear as on a painted scroll.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Wandering by that grey and solemn</p> +<p class='in1em'>Water, with its ghostly quays—</p> +<p>Vistas of vast arch and column,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Shadowed by unearthly trees—</p> +<p>Biddings of sweet power compel me,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And I go with bated breath,</p> +<p>Listening to the tales they tell me,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Parables of Life and Death.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 31]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>In a tongue that once was spoken,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Ere the world was cooled by Time,</p> +<p>When the spirit flowed unbroken</p> +<p class='in1em'>Through the flesh, and the Sublime</p> +<p>Made the eyes of men far-seeing,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And their souls as pure as rain,</p> +<p>They declare the ends of being,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And the sacred need of pain.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>For they know the sweetest reasons</p> +<p class='in1em'>For the products most malign—</p> +<p>They can tell the paths and seasons</p> +<p class='in1em'>Of the farthest suns that shine.</p> +<p>How the moth-wing's iridescence</p> +<p class='in1em'>By an inward plan was wrought,</p> +<p>And they read me curious lessons</p> +<p class='in1em'>In the secret ways of thought.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>When day turns, and over heaven</p> +<p class='in1em'>To the balmy western verge</p> +<p>Sail the victor fleets of even,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And the pilot stars emerge,</p> +<p>Then my city rounds and rises,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Like a vapour formed afar,</p> +<p>And its sudden girth surprises,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And its shadowy gates unbar.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 32]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Dreamy crowds are moving yonder</p> +<p class='in1em'>In a faint and phantom blue;</p> +<p>Through the dusk I lean, and wonder</p> +<p class='in1em'>If their winsome shapes are true;</p> +<p>But in veiling indecision</p> +<p class='in1em'>Come my questions back again—</p> +<p>Which is real? The fleeting vision?</p> +<p class='in1em'>Or the fleeting world of men?</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 33]</p> +<h3><a name='p15' id='p15'>EVENING</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>From upland slopes I see the cows file by,</p> +<p>Lowing, great-chested, down the homeward trail,</p> +<p>By dusking fields and meadows shining pale</p> +<p>With moon-tipped dandelions. Flickering high,</p> +<p>A peevish night-hawk in the western sky</p> +<p>Beats up into the lucent solitudes,</p> +<p>Or drops with griding wing. The stilly woods</p> +<p>Grow dark and deep and gloom mysteriously.</p> +<p>Cool night-winds creep, and whisper in mine ear</p> +<p>The homely cricket gossips at my feet.</p> +<p>From far-off pools and wastes of reeds I hear,</p> +<p>Clear and soft-piped, the chanting frogs break sweet</p> +<p>In full Pandean chorus. One by one</p> +<p>Shine out the stars, and the great night comes on.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 34]</p> +<h3><a name='p16' id='p16'>THE CLEARER SELF</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Before me grew the human soul,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And after I am dead and gone,</p> +<p>Through grades of effort and control</p> +<p class='in1em'>The marvellous work shall still go on.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Each mortal in his little span</p> +<p class='in1em'>Hath only lived, if he have shown</p> +<p>What greatness there can be in man</p> +<p class='in1em'>Above the measured and the known;</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>How through the ancient layers of night,</p> +<p class='in1em'>In gradual victory secure,</p> +<p>Grows ever with increasing light</p> +<p class='in1em'>The Energy serene and pure:</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>The Soul, that from a monstrous past,</p> +<p class='in1em'>From age to age, from hour to hour,</p> +<p>Feels upward to some height at last</p> +<p class='in1em'>Of unimagined grace and power.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 35]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Though yet the sacred fire be dull,</p> +<p class='in1em'>In folds of thwarting matter furled,</p> +<p>Ere death be nigh, while life is full,</p> +<p class='in1em'>O Master Spirit of the world,</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Grant me to know, to seek, to find,</p> +<p class='in1em'>In some small measure though it be,</p> +<p>Emerging from the waste and blind,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The clearer self, the grander me!</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 36]</p> +<h3><a name='p17' id='p17'>TO THE PROPHETIC SOUL</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>What are these bustlers at the gate</p> +<p class='in1em'>Of now or yesterday,</p> +<p>These playthings in the hand of Fate,</p> +<p class='in1em'>That pass, and point no way;</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>These clinging bubbles whose mock fires</p> +<p class='in1em'>For ever dance and gleam,</p> +<p>Vain foam that gathers and expires</p> +<p class='in1em'>Upon the world's dark stream;</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>These gropers betwixt right and wrong,</p> +<p class='in1em'>That seek an unknown goal,</p> +<p>Most ignorant, when they seem most strong;</p> +<p class='in1em'>What are they, then, O Soul,</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>That thou shouldst covet overmuch</p> +<p class='in1em'>A tenderer range of heart,</p> +<p>And yet at every dreamed-of touch</p> +<p class='in1em'>So tremulously start?</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 37]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Thou with that hatred ever new</p> +<p class='in1em'>Of the world's base control,</p> +<p>That vision of the large and true,</p> +<p class='in1em'>That quickness of the soul;</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Nay, for they are not of thy kind,</p> +<p class='in1em'>But in a rarer clay</p> +<p>God dowered thee with an alien mind;</p> +<p class='in1em'>Thou canst not be as they.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Be strong therefore; resume thy load,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And forward stone by stone</p> +<p>Go singing, though the glorious road</p> +<p class='in1em'>Thou travellest alone.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 38]</p> +<h3><a name='p18' id='p18'>THE LAND OF PALLAS</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Methought I journeyed along ways that led for ever</p> +<p class='in1em'>Throughout a happy land where strife and care were dead,</p> +<p>And life went by me flowing like a placid river</p> +<p class='in1em'>Past sandy eyots where the shifting shoals make head.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>A land where beauty dwelt supreme, and right, the donor</p> +<p class='in1em'>Of peaceful days; a land of equal gifts and deeds,</p> +<p>Of limitless fair fields and plenty had with honour;</p> +<p class='in1em'>A land of kindly tillage and untroubled meads,</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Of gardens, and great fields, and dreaming rose-wreathed alleys,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Wherein at dawn and dusk the vesper sparrows sang;</p> +<p>Of cities set far off on hills down vista'd valleys,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And floods so vast and old, men wist not whence they sprang,</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 39]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Of groves, and forest depths, and fountains softly welling,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And roads that ran soft-shadowed past the open doors,</p> +<p>Of mighty palaces and many a lofty dwelling,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Where all men entered and no master trod their floors.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>A land of lovely speech, where every tone was fashioned</p> +<p class='in1em'>By generations of emotion high and sweet,</p> +<p>Of thought and deed and bearing lofty and impassioned;</p> +<p class='in1em'>A land of golden calm, grave forms, and fretless feet.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And every mode and saying of that land gave token</p> +<p class='in1em'>Of limits where no death or evil fortune fell,</p> +<p>And men lived out long lives in proud content unbroken,</p> +<p class='in1em'>For there no man was rich, none poor, but all were well.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 40]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And all the earth was common, and no base contriving</p> +<p class='in1em'>Of money of coined gold was needed there or known,</p> +<p>But all men wrought together without greed or striving,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And all the store of all to each man was his own.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>From all that busy land, grey town, and peaceful village,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Where never jar was heard, nor wail, nor cry of strife,</p> +<p>From every laden stream and all the fields of tillage,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Arose the murmur and the kindly hum of life.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>At morning to the fields came forth the men, each neighbour</p> +<p class='in1em'>Hand linked to other, crowned, with wreaths upon their hair,</p> +<p>And all day long with joy they gave their hands to labour,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Moving at will, unhastened, each man to his share.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 41]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>At noon the women came, the tall fair women, bearing</p> +<p class='in1em'>Baskets of wicker in their ample hands for each,</p> +<p>And learned the day's brief tale, and how the fields were faring,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And blessed them with their lofty beauty and blithe speech.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And when the great day's toil was over, and the shadows</p> +<p class='in1em'>Grew with the flocking stars, the sound of festival</p> +<p>Rose in each city square, and all the country meadows,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Palace, and paven court, and every rustic hall.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Beside smooth streams, where alleys and green gardens meeting</p> +<p class='in1em'>Ran downward to the flood with marble steps, a throng</p> +<p>Came forth of all the folk, at even, gaily greeting,</p> +<p class='in1em'>With echo of sweet converse, jest, and stately song.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>In all their great fair cities there was neither seeking</p> +<p class='in1em'>For power of gold, nor greed of lust, nor desperate pain</p> +<p>Of multitudes that starve, or, in hoarse anger breaking,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Beat at the doors of princes, break and fall in vain.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 42]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>But all the children of that peaceful land, like brothers,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Lofty of spirit, wise, and ever set to learn</p> +<p>The chart of neighbouring souls, the bent and need of others,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Thought only of good deeds, sweet speech, and just return.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And there there was no prison, power of arms, nor palace,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Where prince or judge held sway, for none was needed there;</p> +<p>Long ages since the very names of fraud and malice</p> +<p class='in1em'>Had vanished from men's tongues, and died from all men's care.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And there there were no bonds of contract, deed, or marriage,</p> +<p class='in1em'>No oath, nor any form, to make the word more sure,</p> +<p>For no man dreamed of hurt, dishonour, or miscarriage,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Where every thought was truth, and every heart was pure.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 43]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>There were no castes of rich or poor, of slave or master,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Where all were brothers, and the curse of gold was dead,</p> +<p>But all that wise fair race to kindlier ends and vaster</p> +<p class='in1em'>Moved on together with the same majestic tread.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And all the men and women of that land were fairer</p> +<p class='in1em'>Than even the mightiest of our meaner race can be;</p> +<p>The men like gentle children, great of limb, yet rarer</p> +<p class='in1em'>For wisdom and high thought, like kings for majesty.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And all the women through great ages of bright living,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Grown goodlier of stature, strong, and subtly wise,</p> +<p>Stood equal with the men, calm counsellors, ever giving</p> +<p class='in1em'>The fire and succour of proud faith and dauntless eyes.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And as I journeyed in that land I reached a ruin,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The gateway of a lonely and secluded waste,</p> +<p>A phantom of forgotten time and ancient doing,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Eaten by age and violence, crumbled and defaced.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 44]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>On its grim outer walls the ancient world's sad glories</p> +<p class='in1em'>Were recorded in fire; upon its inner stone,</p> +<p>Drawn by dead hands, I saw, in tales and tragic stories,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The woe and sickness of an age of fear made known.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And lo, in that grey storehouse, fallen to dust and rotten,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Lay piled the traps and engines of forgotten greed,</p> +<p>The tomes of codes and canons, long disused, forgotten,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The robes and sacred books of many a vanished creed.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>An old grave man I found, white-haired and gently spoken,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Who, as I questioned, answered with a smile benign,</p> +<p>'Long years have come and gone since these poor gauds were broken,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Broken and banished from a life made more divine.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 45]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>'But still we keep them stored as once our sires deemed fitting,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The symbol of dark days and lives remote and strange,</p> +<p>Lest o'er the minds of any there should come unwitting</p> +<p class='in1em'>The thought of some new order and the lust of change.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>'If any grow disturbed, we bring them gently hither,</p> +<p class='in1em'>To read the world's grim record and the sombre lore</p> +<p>Massed in these pitiless vaults, and they returning thither,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Bear with them quieter thoughts, and make for change no more.'</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And thence I journeyed on by one broad way that bore me</p> +<p class='in1em'>Out of that waste, and as I passed by tower and town</p> +<p>I saw amid the limitless plain far out before me</p> +<p class='in1em'>A long low mountain, blue as beryl, and its crown</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 46]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Was capped by marble roofs that shone like snow for whiteness,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Its foot was deep in gardens, and that blossoming plain</p> +<p>Seemed in the radiant shower of its majestic brightness</p> +<p class='in1em'>A land for gods to dwell in, free from care and pain.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And to and forth from that fair mountain like a river</p> +<p class='in1em'>Ran many a dim grey road, and on them I could see</p> +<p>A multitude of stately forms that seemed for ever</p> +<p class='in1em'>Going and coming in bright bands; and near to me</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Was one that in his journey seemed to dream and linger,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Walking at whiles with kingly step, then standing still,</p> +<p>And him I met and asked him, pointing with my finger,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The meaning of the palace and the lofty hill.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Whereto the dreamer: 'Art thou of this land, my brother,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And knowest not the mountain and its crest of walls,</p> +<p>Where dwells the priestless worship of the all-wise mother?</p> +<p class='in1em'>That is the hill of Pallas; those her marble halls!</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 47]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>'There dwell the lords of knowledge and of thought increasing,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And they whom insight and the gleams of song uplift;</p> +<p>And thence as by a hundred conduits flows unceasing</p> +<p class='in1em'>The spring of power and beauty, an eternal gift.'</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Still I passed on until I reached at length, not knowing</p> +<p class='in1em'>Whither the tangled and diverging paths might lead,</p> +<p>A land of baser men, whose coming and whose going</p> +<p class='in1em'>Were urged by fear, and hunger, and the curse of greed.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I saw the proud and fortunate go by me, faring</p> +<p class='in1em'>In fatness and fine robes, the poor oppressed and slow,</p> +<p>The faces of bowed men, and piteous women bearing</p> +<p class='in1em'>The burden of perpetual sorrow and the stamp of woe.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And tides of deep solicitude and wondering pity</p> +<p class='in1em'>Possessed me, and with eager and uplifted hands</p> +<p>I drew the crowd about me in a mighty city,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And taught the message of those other kindlier lands.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 48]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I preached the rule of Faith and brotherly Communion,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The law of Peace and Beauty and the death of Strife,</p> +<p>And painted in great words the horror of disunion,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The vainness of self-worship, and the waste of life.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I preached, but fruitlessly; the powerful from their stations</p> +<p class='in1em'>Rebuked me as an anarch, envious and bad,</p> +<p>And they that served them with lean hands and bitter patience</p> +<p class='in1em'>Smiled only out of hollow orbs, and deemed me mad.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And still I preached, and wrought, and still I bore my message,</p> +<p class='in1em'>For well I knew that on and upward without cease</p> +<p>The spirit works for ever, and by Faith and Presage</p> +<p class='in1em'>That somehow yet the end of human life is Peace.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 49]</p> +<h3><a name='p19' id='p19'>AMONG THE ORCHARDS</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Already in the dew-wrapped vineyards dry</p> +<p>Dense weights of heat press down. The large bright drops</p> +<p>Shrink in the leaves. From dark acacia tops</p> +<p>The nuthatch flings his short reiterate cry;</p> +<p>And ever as the sun mounts hot and high</p> +<p>Thin voices crowd the grass. In soft long strokes</p> +<p>The wind goes murmuring through the mountain oaks.</p> +<p>Faint wefts creep out along the blue and die.</p> +<p>I hear far in among the motionless trees—</p> +<p>Shadows that sleep upon the shaven sod—</p> +<p>The thud of dropping apples. Reach on reach</p> +<p>Stretch plots of perfumed orchard, where the bees</p> +<p>Murmur among the full-fringed golden-rod,</p> +<p>Or cling half-drunken to the rotting peach.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 50]</p> +<h3><a name='p20' id='p20'>THE POET'S SONG</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<h4 class='section'>I</h4> + +<div class='stanza'> +<p>There came no change from week to week</p> +<p class='in1em'>On all the land, but all one way,</p> +<p>Like ghosts that cannot touch nor speak,</p> +<p class='in3em'>Day followed day.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Within the palace court the rounds</p> +<p class='in1em'>Of glare and shadow, day and night,</p> +<p>Went ever with the same dull sounds,</p> +<p class='in3em'>The same dull flight:</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>The motion of slow forms of state,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The far-off murmur of the street,</p> +<p>The din of couriers at the gate,</p> +<p class='in3em'>Half-mad with heat;</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Sometimes a distant shout of boys</p> +<p class='in1em'>At play upon the terrace walk,</p> +<p>The shutting of great doors, and noise</p> +<p class='in3em'>Of muttered talk.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 51]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>In one red corner of the wall,</p> +<p class='in1em'>That fronted with its granite stain</p> +<p>The town, the palms, and, beyond all,</p> +<p class='in3em'>The burning plain,</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>As listless as the hour, alone,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The poet by his broken lute</p> +<p>Sat like a figure in the stone,</p> +<p class='in3em'>Dark-browed and mute.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>He saw the heat on the thin grass</p> +<p class='in1em'>Fall till it withered joint by joint,</p> +<p>The shadow on the dial pass</p> +<p class='in3em'>From point to point.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>He saw the midnight bright and bare</p> +<p class='in1em'>Fill with its quietude of stars</p> +<p>The silence that no human prayer</p> +<p class='in3em'>Attains or mars.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>He heard the hours divide, and still</p> +<p class='in1em'>The sentry on the outer wall</p> +<p>Make the night wearier with his shrill</p> +<p class='in3em'>Monotonous call.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 52]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>He watched the lizard where it lay,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Impassive as the watcher's face;</p> +<p>And only once in the long day</p> +<p class='in3em'>It changed its place.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Sometimes with clank of hoofs and cries</p> +<p class='in1em'>The noon through all its trance was stirred;</p> +<p>The poet sat with half-shut eyes,</p> +<p class='in3em'>Nor saw, nor heard.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And once across the heated close</p> +<p class='in1em'>Light laughter in a silver shower</p> +<p>Fell from fair lips: the poet rose</p> +<p class='in3em'>And cursed the hour.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Men paled and sickened; half in fear,</p> +<p class='in1em'>There came to him at dusk of eve</p> +<p>One who but murmured in his ear</p> +<p class='in3em'>And plucked his sleeve:</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>'The king is filled with irks, distressed,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And bids thee hasten to his side;</p> +<p>For thou alone canst give him rest.'</p> +<p class='in3em'>The poet cried:</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 53]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>'Go, show the king this broken lute!</p> +<p class='in1em'>Even as it is, so am I!</p> +<p>The tree is perished to its root,</p> +<p class='in3em'>The fountain dry.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>'What seeks he of the leafless tree,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The broken lute, the empty spring?</p> +<p>Yea, tho' he give his crown to me,</p> +<p class='in3em'>I cannot sing!'</p> +</div> + +<h4 class='section'>II</h4> + +<div class='stanza'> +<p>That night there came from either hand</p> +<p>A sense of change upon the land;</p> +<p>A brooding stillness rustled through</p> +<p>With creeping winds that hardly blew;</p> +<p>A shadow from the looming west,</p> +<p>A stir of leaves, a dim unrest;</p> +<p>It seemed as if a spell had broke.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And then the poet turned and woke</p> +<p>As from the darkness of a dream,</p> +<p>And with a smile divine supreme</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 54]</span> +<p>Drew up his mantle fold on fold,</p> +<p>And strung his lute with strings of gold,</p> +<p>And bound the sandals to his feet,</p> +<p>And strode into the darkling street.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Through crowds of murmuring men he hied,</p> +<p>With working lips and swinging stride,</p> +<p>And gleaming eyes and brow bent down;</p> +<p>Out of the great gate of the town</p> +<p>He hastened ever and passed on,</p> +<p>And ere the darkness came, was gone,</p> +<p>A mote beyond the western swell.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And then the storm arose and fell</p> +<p>From wheeling shadows black with rain</p> +<p>That drowned the hills and strode the plain;</p> +<p>Round the grim mountain-heads it passed,</p> +<p>Down whistling valleys blast on blast,</p> +<p>Surged in upon the snapping trees,</p> +<p>And swept the shuddering villages.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>That night, when the fierce hours grew long,</p> +<p>Once more the monarch, old and grey,</p> +<p>Called for the poet and his song,</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 55]</span> +<p>And called in vain. But far away,</p> +<p>By the wild mountain-gorges, stirred,</p> +<p>The shepherds in their watches heard,</p> +<p>Above the torrent's charge and clang,</p> +<p>The cleaving chant of one that sang.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 56]</p> +<h3><a name='p21' id='p21'>A THUNDERSTORM</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>A moment the wild swallows like a flight</p> +<p>Of withered gust-caught leaves, serenely high,</p> +<p>Toss in the windrack up the muttering sky.</p> +<p>The leaves hang still. Above the weird twilight,</p> +<p>The hurrying centres of the storm unite</p> +<p>And spreading with huge trunk and rolling fringe,</p> +<p>Each wheeled upon its own tremendous hinge</p> +<p>Tower darkening on. And now from heaven's height</p> +<p>With the long roar of elm-trees swept and swayed,</p> +<p>And pelted waters, on the vanished plain</p> +<p>Plunges the blast. Behind the wild white flash</p> +<p>That splits abroad the pealing thunder-crash,</p> +<p>Over bleared fields and gardens disarrayed,</p> +<p>Column on column comes the drenching rain.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 57]</p> +<h3><a name='p22' id='p22'>THE CITY</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Canst thou not rest, O city,</p> +<p class='in1em'>That liest so wide and fair;</p> +<p>Shall never an hour bring pity,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Nor end be found for care?</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Thy walls are high in heaven,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Thy streets are gay and wide,</p> +<p>Beneath thy towers at even</p> +<p class='in1em'>The dreamy waters glide.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Thou art fair as the hills at morning,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And the sunshine loveth thee,</p> +<p>But its light is a gloom of warning</p> +<p class='in1em'>On a soul no longer free.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>The curses of gold are about thee,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And thy sorrow deepeneth still;</p> +<p>One madness within and without thee,</p> +<p class='in1em'>One battle blind and shrill.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 58]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I see the crowds for ever</p> +<p class='in1em'>Go by with hurrying feet;</p> +<p>Through doors that darken never</p> +<p class='in1em'>I hear the engines beat.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Through days and nights that follow</p> +<p class='in1em'>The hidden mill-wheel strains;</p> +<p>In the midnight's windy hollow</p> +<p class='in1em'>I hear the roar of trains.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And still the day fulfilleth,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And still the night goes round,</p> +<p>And the guest-hall boometh and shrilleth,</p> +<p class='in1em'>With the dance's mocking sound.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>In chambers of gold elysian,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The cymbals clash and clang,</p> +<p>But the days are gone like a vision</p> +<p class='in1em'>When the people wrought and sang.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And toil hath fear for neighbour,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Where singing lips are dumb,</p> +<p>And life is one long labour,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Till death or freedom come.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 59]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Ah! the crowds that for ever are flowing—</p> +<p class='in1em'>They neither laugh nor weep—</p> +<p>I see them coming and going,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Like things that move in sleep:</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Grey sires and burdened brothers,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The old, the young, the fair,</p> +<p>Wan cheeks of pallid mothers,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And the girls with golden hair.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Care sits in many a fashion,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Grown grey on many a head,</p> +<p>And lips are turned to ashen</p> +<p class='in1em'>Whose years have right to red.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Canst thou not rest, O city,</p> +<p class='in1em'>That liest so wide, so fair;</p> +<p>Shalt never an hour bring pity,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Nor end be found for care?</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 60]</p> +<h3><a name='p23' id='p23'>SAPPHICS</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Clothed in splendour, beautifully sad and silent,</p> +<p>Comes the autumn over the woods and highlands,</p> +<p>Golden, rose-red, full of divine remembrance,</p> +<p class='in4em'>Full of foreboding.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Soon the maples, soon will the glowing birches,</p> +<p>Stripped of all that summer and love had dowered them,</p> +<p>Dream, sad-limbed, beholding their pomp and treasure</p> +<p class='in4em'>Ruthlessly scattered:</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Yet they quail not: Winter with wind and iron</p> +<p>Comes and finds them silent and uncomplaining,</p> +<p>Finds them tameless, beautiful still and gracious,</p> +<p class='in4em'>Gravely enduring.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Me too changes, bitter and full of evil,</p> +<p>Dream by dream have plundered and left me naked,</p> +<p>Grey with sorrow. Even the days before me</p> +<p class='in4em'>Fade into twilight,</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 61]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Mute and barren. Yet will I keep my spirit</p> +<p>Clear and valiant, brother to these my noble</p> +<p>Elms and maples, utterly grave and fearless,</p> +<p class='in4em'>Grandly ungrieving.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Brief the span is, counting the years of mortals,</p> +<p>Strange and sad; it passes, and then the bright earth,</p> +<p>Careless mother, gleaming with gold and azure,</p> +<p class='in4em'>Lovely with blossoms—</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Shining white anemones, mixed with roses,</p> +<p>Daisies mild-eyed, grasses and honeyed clover—</p> +<p>You, and me, and all of us, met and equal,</p> +<p class='in4em'>Softly shall cover.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 62]</p> +<h3><a name='p24' id='p24'>VOICES OF EARTH</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>We have not heard the music of the spheres,</p> +<p>The song of star to star, but there are sounds</p> +<p>More deep than human joy and human tears,</p> +<p>That Nature uses in her common rounds;</p> +<p>The fall of streams, the cry of winds that strain</p> +<p>The oak, the roaring of the sea's surge, might</p> +<p>Of thunder breaking afar off, or rain</p> +<p>That falls by minutes in the summer night.</p> +<p>These are the voices of earth's secret soul,</p> +<p>Uttering the mystery from which she came.</p> +<p>To him who hears them grief beyond control,</p> +<p>Or joy inscrutable without a name,</p> +<p>Wakes in his heart thoughts bedded there, impearled,</p> +<p>Before the birth and making of the world.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 63]</p> +<h3><a name='p25' id='p25'>PECCAVI, DOMINE</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>O Power to whom this earthly clime</p> +<p class='in1em'>Is but an atom in the whole,</p> +<p>O Poet-heart of Space and Time,</p> +<p class='in1em'>O Maker and Immortal Soul,</p> +<p>Within whose glowing rings are bound,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Out of whose sleepless heart had birth</p> +<p>The cloudy blue, the starry round,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And this small miracle of earth:</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Who liv'st in every living thing,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And all things are thy script and chart,</p> +<p>Who rid'st upon the eagle's wing,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And yearnest in the human heart;</p> +<p>O Riddle with a single clue,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Love, deathless, protean, secure,</p> +<p>The ever old, the ever new,</p> +<p class='in1em'>O Energy, serene and pure.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 64]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Thou, who art also part of me,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Whose glory I have sometime seen,</p> +<p>O Vision of the Ought-to-be,</p> +<p class='in1em'>O Memory of the Might-have-been,</p> +<p>I have had glimpses of thy way,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And moved with winds and walked with stars,</p> +<p>But, weary, I have fallen astray,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And, wounded, who shall count my scars?</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>O Master, all my strength is gone;</p> +<p class='in1em'>Unto the very earth I bow;</p> +<p>I have no light to lead me on;</p> +<p class='in1em'>With aching heart and burning brow,</p> +<p>I lie as one that travaileth</p> +<p class='in1em'>In sorrow more than he can bear;</p> +<p>I sit in darkness as of death,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And scatter dust upon my hair.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>The God within my soul hath slept,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And I have shamed the nobler rule;</p> +<p>O Master, I have whined and crept;</p> +<p class='in1em'>O Spirit, I have played the fool.</p> +<p>Like him of old upon whose head</p> +<p class='in1em'>His follies hung in dark arrears,</p> +<p>I groan and travail in my bed,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And water it with bitter tears.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 65]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I stand upon thy mountain-heads,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And gaze until mine eyes are dim;</p> +<p>The golden morning glows and spreads;</p> +<p class='in1em'>The hoary vapours break and swim.</p> +<p>I see thy blossoming fields, divine,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Thy shining clouds, thy blessed trees—</p> +<p>And then that broken soul of mine—</p> +<p class='in1em'>How much less beautiful than these!</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>O Spirit, passionless, but kind,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Is there in all the world, I cry,</p> +<p>Another one so base and blind,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Another one so weak as I?</p> +<p>O Power, unchangeable, but just,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Impute this one good thing to me,</p> +<p>I sink my spirit to the dust</p> +<p class='in1em'>In utter dumb humility.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 66]</p> +<h3><a name='p26' id='p26'>AN ODE TO THE HILLS</a></h3> + +<p style='text-align:center'>'I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence +cometh my help.'—<span class='smcap'>Psalm cxxi. 1.</span></p> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Æons ago ye were,</p> +<p>Before the struggling changeful race of man</p> +<p>Wrought into being, ere the tragic stir</p> +<p>Of human toil and deep desire began:</p> +<p>So shall ye still remain,</p> +<p>Lords of an elder and immutable race,</p> +<p>When many a broad metropolis of the plain,</p> +<p>Or thronging port by some renownèd shore,</p> +<p>Is sunk in nameless ruin, and its place</p> +<p>Recalled no more.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Empires have come and gone,</p> +<p>And glorious cities fallen in their prime;</p> +<p>Divine, far-echoing, names once writ in stone</p> +<p>Have vanished in the dust and void of time;</p> +<p>But ye, firm-set, secure,</p> +<p>Like Treasure in the hardness of God's palm,</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 67]</span> +<p>Are yet the same for ever; ye endure</p> +<p>By virtue of an old slow-ripening word,</p> +<p>In your grey majesty and sovereign calm,</p> +<p>Untouched, unstirred.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Tempest and thunderstroke,</p> +<p>With whirlwinds dipped in midnight at the core,</p> +<p>Have torn strange furrows through your forest cloak,</p> +<p>And made your hollow gorges clash and roar,</p> +<p>And scarred your brows in vain.</p> +<p>Around your barren heads and granite steeps</p> +<p>Tempestuous grey battalions of the rain</p> +<p>Charge and recharge, across the plateaued floors,</p> +<p>Drenching the serried pines; and the hail sweeps</p> +<p>Your pitiless scaurs.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>The long midsummer heat</p> +<p>Chars the thin leafage of your rocks in fire:</p> +<p>Autumn with windy robe and ruinous feet</p> +<p>On your wide forests wreaks his fell desire,</p> +<p>Heaping in barbarous wreck</p> +<p>The treasure of your sweet and prosperous days;</p> +<p>And lastly the grim tyrant, at whose beck</p> +<p>Channels are turned to stone and tempests wheel,</p> +<p>On brow and breast and shining shoulder lays</p> +<p>His hand of steel.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 68]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>And yet not harsh alone,</p> +<p>Nor wild, nor bitter are your destinies,</p> +<p>O fair and sweet, for all your heart of stone,</p> +<p>Who gather beauty round your Titan knees,</p> +<p>As the lens gathers light.</p> +<p>The dawn gleams rosy on your splendid brows,</p> +<p>The sun at noonday folds you in his might,</p> +<p>And swathes your forehead at his going down,</p> +<p>Last leaving, where he first in pride bestows,</p> +<p>His golden crown.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>In unregarded glooms,</p> +<p>Where hardly shall a human footstep pass,</p> +<p>Myriads of ferns and soft maianthemums,</p> +<p>Or lily-breathing slender pyrolas</p> +<p>Distil their hearts for you.</p> +<p>Far in your pine-clad fastnesses ye keep</p> +<p>Coverts the lonely thrush shall wander through,</p> +<p>With echoes that seem ever to recede,</p> +<p>Touching from pine to pine, from steep to steep,</p> +<p>His ghostly reed.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>The fierce things of the wild</p> +<p>Find food and shelter in your tenantless rocks,</p> +<p>The eagle on whose wings the dawn hath smiled,</p> +<p>The loon, the wild-cat, and the bright-eyed fox;</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 69]</span> +<p>For far away indeed</p> +<p>Are all the ominous noises of mankind,</p> +<p>The slaughterer's malice and the trader's greed:</p> +<p>Your rugged haunts endure no slavery:</p> +<p>No treacherous hand is there to crush or bind,</p> +<p>But all are free.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Therefore out of the stir</p> +<p>Of cities and the ever-thickening press</p> +<p>The poet and the worn philosopher</p> +<p>To your bare peaks and radiant loneliness</p> +<p>Escape, and breathe once more</p> +<p>The wind of the Eternal: that clear mood,</p> +<p>Which Nature and the elder ages bore,</p> +<p>Lends them new courage and a second prime,</p> +<p>At rest upon the cool infinitude</p> +<p>Of Space and Time.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>The mists of troublous days,</p> +<p>The horror of fierce hands and fraudful lips,</p> +<p>The blindness gathered in Life's aimless ways</p> +<p>Fade from them, and the kind Earth-spirit strips</p> +<p>The bandage from their eyes,</p> +<p>Touches their hearts and bids them feel and see;</p> +<p>Beauty and Knowledge with that rare apprise</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 70]</span> +<p>Pour over them from some divine abode,</p> +<p>Falling as in a flood of memory,</p> +<p>The bliss of God.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I too perchance some day,</p> +<p>When Love and Life have fallen far apart,</p> +<p>Shall slip the yoke and seek your upward way</p> +<p>And make my dwelling in your changeless heart;</p> +<p>And there in some quiet glade,</p> +<p>Some virgin plot of turf, some innermost dell,</p> +<p>Pure with cool water and inviolate shade,</p> +<p>I'll build a blameless altar to the dear</p> +<p>And kindly gods who guard your haunts so well</p> +<p>From hurt or fear.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>There I will dream day-long,</p> +<p>And honour them in many sacred ways,</p> +<p>With hushèd melody and uttered song,</p> +<p>And golden meditation and with praise.</p> +<p>I'll touch them with a prayer,</p> +<p>To clothe my spirit as your might is clad</p> +<p>With all things bountiful, divine, and fair,</p> +<p>Yet inwardly to make me hard and true,</p> +<p>Wide-seeing, passionless, immutably glad,</p> +<p>And strong like you.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 71]</p> +<h3><a name='p27' id='p27'>INDIAN SUMMER</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>The old grey year is near his term in sooth,</p> +<p>And now with backward eye and soft-laid palm</p> +<p>Awakens to a golden dream of youth,</p> +<p>A second childhood lovely and most calm,</p> +<p>And the smooth hour about his misty head</p> +<p>An awning of enchanted splendour weaves,</p> +<p>Of maples, amber, purple and rose-red,</p> +<p>And droop-limbed elms down-dropping golden leaves.</p> +<p>With still half-fallen lids he sits and dreams</p> +<p>Far in a hollow of the sunlit wood,</p> +<p>Lulled by the murmur of thin-threading streams,</p> +<p>Nor sees the polar armies overflood</p> +<p>The darkening barriers of the hills, nor hears</p> +<p>The north-wind ringing with a thousand spears.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 72]</p> +<h3><a name='p28' id='p28'>GOOD SPEECH</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Think not, because thine inmost heart means well,</p> +<p>Thou hast the freedom of rude speech: sweet words</p> +<p>Are like the voices of returning birds</p> +<p>Filling the soul with summer, or a bell</p> +<p>That calls the weary and the sick to prayer.</p> +<p>Even as thy thought, so let thy speech be fair.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 73]</p> +<h3><a name='p29' id='p29'>THE BETTER DAY</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Harsh thoughts, blind angers, and fierce hands,</p> +<p class='in1em'>That keep this restless world at strife,</p> +<p>Mean passions that, like choking sands,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Perplex the stream of life,</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Pride and hot envy and cold greed,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The cankers of the loftier will,</p> +<p>What if ye triumph, and yet bleed?</p> +<p class='in1em'>Ah, can ye not be still?</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Oh, shall there be no space, no time,</p> +<p class='in1em'>No century of weal in store,</p> +<p>No freehold in a nobler clime,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Where men shall strive no more?</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Where every motion of the heart</p> +<p class='in1em'>Shall serve the spirit's master-call,</p> +<p>Where self shall be the unseen part,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And human kindness all?</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 74]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Or shall we but by fits and gleams</p> +<p class='in1em'>Sink satisfied, and cease to rave,</p> +<p>Find love but in the rest of dreams,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And peace but in the grave?</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 75]</p> +<h3><a name='p30' id='p30'>WHITE PANSIES</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Day and night pass over, rounding,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Star and cloud and sun,</p> +<p>Things of drift and shadow, empty</p> +<p class='in1em'>Of my dearest one.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Soft as slumber was my baby,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Beaming bright and sweet;</p> +<p>Daintier than bloom or jewel</p> +<p class='in1em'>Were his hands and feet.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>He was mine, mine all, mine only,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Mine and his the debt;</p> +<p>Earth and Life and Time are changers;</p> +<p class='in1em'>I shall not forget.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Pansies for my dear one—heartsease—</p> +<p class='in1em'>Set them gently so;</p> +<p>For his stainless lips and forehead,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Pansies white as snow.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 76]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Would that in the flower-grown little</p> +<p class='in1em'>Grave they dug so deep,</p> +<p>I might rest beside him, dreamless,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Smile no more, nor weep.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 77]</p> +<h3><a name='p31' id='p31'>WE TOO SHALL SLEEP</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Not, not for thee,</p> +<p>Beloved child, the burning grasp of life</p> +<p>Shall bruise the tender soul. The noise, and strife,</p> +<p>And clamour of midday thou shall not see;</p> +<p>But wrapt for ever in thy quiet grave,</p> +<p>Too little to have known the earthly lot,</p> +<p>Time's clashing hosts above thine innocent head,</p> +<p>Wave upon wave,</p> +<p>Shall break, or pass as with an army's tread,</p> +<p>And harm thee not.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>A few short years</p> +<p>We of the living flesh and restless brain</p> +<p>Shall plumb the deeps of life and know the strain,</p> +<p>The fleeting gleams of joy, the fruitless tears;</p> +<p>And then at last when all is touched and tried,</p> +<p>Our own immutable night shall fall, and deep</p> +<p>In the same silent plot, O little friend,</p> +<p>Side by thy side,</p> +<p>In peace that changeth not, nor knoweth end,</p> +<p>We too shall sleep.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 78]</p> +<h3><a name='p32' id='p32'>THE AUTUMN WASTE</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>There is no break in all the wide grey sky,</p> +<p>Nor light on any field, and the wind grieves,</p> +<p>And talks of death. Where cold grey waters lie</p> +<p>Round greyer stones, and the new-fallen leaves</p> +<p>Heap the chill hollows of the naked woods,</p> +<p>A lisping moan, an inarticulate cry,</p> +<p>Creeps far among the charnel solitudes,</p> +<p>Numbing the waste with mindless misery.</p> +<p>In these bare paths, these melancholy lands,</p> +<p>What dream, or flesh, could ever have been young?</p> +<p>What lovers have gone forth with linkèd hands?</p> +<p>What flowers could ever have bloomed, what birds have sung?</p> +<p>Life, hopes, and human things seem wrapped away,</p> +<p>With shrouds and spectres, in one long decay.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 79]</p> +<h3><a name='p33' id='p33'>VIVIA PERPETUA</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Now being on the eve of death, discharged</p> +<p>From every mortal hope and earthly care,</p> +<p>I questioned how my soul might best employ</p> +<p>This hand, and this still wakeful flame of mind,</p> +<p>In the brief hours yet left me for their use;</p> +<p>Wherefore have I bethought me of my friend,</p> +<p>Of you, Philarchus, and your company,</p> +<p>Yet wavering in the faith and unconfirmed;</p> +<p>Perchance that I may break into thine heart</p> +<p>Some sorrowful channel for the love divine,</p> +<p>I make this simple record of our proof</p> +<p>In diverse sufferings for the name of Christ,</p> +<p>Whereof the end already for the most</p> +<p>Is death this day with steadfast faith endured.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>We were in prison many days, close-pent</p> +<p>In the black lower dungeon, housed with thieves</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 80]</span> +<p>And murderers and divers evil men;</p> +<p>So foul a pressure, we had almost died,</p> +<p>Even there, in struggle for the breath of life</p> +<p>Amid the stench and unendurable heat;</p> +<p>Nor could we find each other save by voice</p> +<p>Or touch, to know that we were yet alive,</p> +<p>So terrible was the darkness. Yea, 'twas hard</p> +<p>To keep the sacred courage in our hearts,</p> +<p>When all was blind with that unchanging night,</p> +<p>And foul with death, and on our ears the taunts</p> +<p>And ribald curses of the soldiery</p> +<p>Fell mingled with the prisoners' cries, a load</p> +<p>Sharper to bear, more bitter than their blows.</p> +<p>At first, what with that dread of our abode,</p> +<p>Our sudden apprehension, and the threats</p> +<p>Ringing perpetually in our ears, we lost</p> +<p>The living fire of faith, and like poor hinds</p> +<p>Would have denied our Lord and fallen away.</p> +<p>Even Perpetua, whose joyous faith</p> +<p>Was in the later holier days to be</p> +<p>The stay and comfort of our weaker ones,</p> +<p>Was silent for long whiles. Perchance she shrank</p> +<p>In the mere sickness of the flesh, confused</p> +<p>And shaken by our new and horrible plight—</p> +<p>The tender flesh, untempered and untried,</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 81]</span> +<p>Not quickened yet nor mastered by the soul;</p> +<p>For she was of a fair and delicate make,</p> +<p>Most gently nurtured, to whom stripes and threats</p> +<p>And our foul prison-house were things undreamed.</p> +<p>But little by little as our spirits grew</p> +<p>Inured to suffering, with clasped hands, and tongues</p> +<p>That cheered each other to incessant prayer,</p> +<p>We rose and faced our trouble: we recalled</p> +<p>Our Master's sacred agony and death,</p> +<p>Setting before our eyes the high reward</p> +<p>Of steadfast faith, the martyr's deathless crown.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>So passed some days whose length and count we lost,</p> +<p>Our bitterest trial. Then a respite came.</p> +<p>One who had interest with the governor</p> +<p>Wrought our removal daily for some hours</p> +<p>Into an upper chamber, where we sat</p> +<p>And held each other's hands in childish joy,</p> +<p>Receiving the sweet gift of light and air</p> +<p>With wonder and exceeding thankfulness.</p> +<p>And then began that life of daily growth</p> +<p>In mutual exaltation and sweet help</p> +<p>That bore us as a gently widening stream</p> +<p>Unto the ocean of our martyrdom.</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 82]</span> +<p>Uniting all our feebler souls in one—</p> +<p>A mightier—we reached forth with this to God.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Perpetua had been troubled for her babe,</p> +<p>Robbed of the breast and now these many days</p> +<p>Wasting for want of food; but when that change</p> +<p>Whereof I spake, of light and liberty</p> +<p>Relieved the horror of our prison gloom,</p> +<p>They brought it to her, and she sat apart,</p> +<p>And nursed and tended it, and soon the child</p> +<p>Would not be parted from her arms, but throve</p> +<p>And fattened, and she kept it night and day.</p> +<p>And always at her side with sleepless care</p> +<p>Hovered the young Felicitas—a slight</p> +<p>And spiritual figure—every touch and tone</p> +<p>Charged with premonitory tenderness,</p> +<p>Herself so near to her own motherhood.</p> +<p>Thus lightened and relieved, Perpetua</p> +<p>Recovered from her silent fit. Her eyes</p> +<p>Regained their former deep serenity,</p> +<p>Her tongue its gentle daring; for she knew</p> +<p>Her life should not be taken till her babe</p> +<p>Had strengthened and outgrown the need of her.</p> +<p>Daily we were amazed at her soft strength,</p> +<p>Her pliant and untroubled constancy,</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 83]</span> +<p>Her smiling, soldierly contempt of death,</p> +<p>Her beauty and the sweetness of her voice.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Her father, when our first few bitterest days</p> +<p>Were over, like a gust of grief and rage,</p> +<p>Came to her in the prison with wild eyes,</p> +<p>And cried: 'How mean you, daughter, when you say</p> +<p>You are a Christian? How can any one</p> +<p>Of honoured blood, the child of such as me,</p> +<p>Be Christian? 'Tis an odious name, the badge</p> +<p>Only of outcasts and rebellious slaves!'</p> +<p>And she, grief-touched, but with unyielding gaze,</p> +<p>Showing the fulness of her slender height:</p> +<p>'This vessel, father, being what it is,</p> +<p>An earthen pitcher, would you call it thus?</p> +<p>Or would you name it by some other name?'</p> +<p>'Nay, surely,' said the old man, catching breath,</p> +<p>And pausing, and she answered: 'Nor can I</p> +<p>Call myself aught but what I surely am—</p> +<p>A Christian!' and her father, flashing back</p> +<p>In silent anger, left her for that time.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>A special favour to Perpetua</p> +<p>Seemed daily to be given, and her soul</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 84]</span> +<p>Was made the frequent vessel of God's grace,</p> +<p>Wherefrom we all, less gifted, sore athirst,</p> +<p>Drank courage and fresh joy; for glowing dreams</p> +<p>Were sent her, full of forms august, and fraught</p> +<p>With signs and symbols of the glorious end</p> +<p>Whereto God's love hath aimed us for Christ's sake.</p> +<p>Once—at what hour I know not, for we lay</p> +<p>In that foul dungeon, where all hours were lost,</p> +<p>And day and night were indistinguishable—</p> +<p>We had been sitting a long silent while,</p> +<p>Some lightly sleeping, others bowed in prayer,</p> +<p>When on a sudden, like a voice from God,</p> +<p>Perpetua spake to us and all were roused.</p> +<p>Her voice was rapt and solemn: 'Friends,' she said,</p> +<p>'Some word hath come to me in a dream. I saw</p> +<p>A ladder leading to heaven, all of gold,</p> +<p>Hung up with lances, swords, and hooks. A land</p> +<p>Of darkness and exceeding peril lay</p> +<p>Around it, and a dragon fierce as hell</p> +<p>Guarded its foot. We doubted who should first</p> +<p>Essay it, but you, Saturus, at last—</p> +<p>So God hath marked you for especial grace—</p> +<p>Advancing and against the cruel beast</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 85]</span> +<p>Aiming the potent weapon of Christ's name—</p> +<p>Mounted, and took me by the hand, and I</p> +<p>The next one following, and so the rest</p> +<p>In order, and we entered with great joy</p> +<p>Into a spacious garden filled with light</p> +<p>And balmy presences of love and rest;</p> +<p>And there an old man sat, smooth-browed, white-haired,</p> +<p>Surrounded by unnumbered myriads</p> +<p>Of spiritual shapes and faces angel-eyed,</p> +<p>Milking his sheep; and lifting up his eyes</p> +<p>He welcomed us in strange and beautiful speech,</p> +<p>Unknown yet comprehended, for it flowed</p> +<p>Not through the ears, but forth-right to the soul,</p> +<p>God's language of pure love. Between the lips</p> +<p>Of each he placed a morsel of sweet curd;</p> +<p>And while the curd was yet within my mouth,</p> +<p>I woke, and still the taste of it remains,</p> +<p>Through all my body flowing like white flame,</p> +<p>Sweet as of some immaculate spiritual thing.'</p> +<p>And when Perpetua had spoken, all</p> +<p>Were silent in the darkness, pondering,</p> +<p>But Saturus spake gently for the rest:</p> +<p>'How perfect and acceptable must be</p> +<p>Your soul to God, Perpetua, that thus</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 86]</span> +<p>He bends to you, and through you speaks his will.</p> +<p>We know now that our martyrdom is fixed,</p> +<p>Nor need we vex us further for this life.'</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>While yet these thoughts were bright upon our souls,</p> +<p>There came the rumour that a day was set</p> +<p>To hear us. Many of our former friends,</p> +<p>Some with entreaties, some with taunts and threats,</p> +<p>Came to us to pervert us; with the rest</p> +<p>Again Perpetua's father, worn with care;</p> +<p>Nor could we choose but pity his distress,</p> +<p>So miserably, with abject cries and tears,</p> +<p>He fondled her and called her 'Domina,'</p> +<p>And bowed his agèd body at her feet,</p> +<p>Beseeching her by all the names she loved</p> +<p>To think of him, his fostering care, his years,</p> +<p>And also of her babe, whose life, he said,</p> +<p>Would fail without her; but Perpetua,</p> +<p>Sustaining by a gift of strength divine</p> +<p>The fulness of her noble fortitude,</p> +<p>Answered him tenderly: 'Both you and I,</p> +<p>And all of us, my father, at this hour</p> +<p>Are equally in God's hands, and what he wills</p> +<p>Must be'; but when the poor old man was gone</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 87]</span> +<p>She wept, and knelt for many hours in prayer,</p> +<p>Sore tried and troubled by her tender heart.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>One day, while we were at our midday meal,</p> +<p>Our cell was entered by the soldiery,</p> +<p>And we were seized and borne away for trial.</p> +<p>A surging crowd had gathered, and we passed</p> +<p>From street to street, hemmed in by tossing heads</p> +<p>And faces cold or cruel; yet we caught</p> +<p>At moments from masked lips and furtive eyes</p> +<p>Of friends—some known to as and some unknown—</p> +<p>Many veiled messages of love and praise.</p> +<p>The floorways of the long basilica</p> +<p>Fronted us with an angry multitude;</p> +<p>And scornful eyes and threatening foreheads frowned</p> +<p>In hundreds from the columned galleries.</p> +<p>We were placed all together at the bar,</p> +<p>And though at first unsteadied and confused</p> +<p>By the imperial presence of the law,</p> +<p>The pomp of judgment and the staring crowd,</p> +<p>None failed or faltered; with unshaken tongue</p> +<p>Each met the stern Proconsul's brief demand</p> +<p>In clear profession. Rapt as in a dream,</p> +<p>Scarce conscious of my turn, nor how I spake,</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 88]</span> +<p>I watched with wondering eyes the delicate face</p> +<p>And figure of Perpetua; for her</p> +<p>We that were youngest of our company</p> +<p>Loved with a sacred and absorbing love,</p> +<p>A passion that our martyr's brotherly vow</p> +<p>Had purified and made divine. She stood</p> +<p>In dreamy contemplation, slightly bowed,</p> +<p>A glowing stillness that was near a smile</p> +<p>Upon her soft closed lips. Her turn had come,</p> +<p>When, like a puppet struggling up the steps,</p> +<p>Her father from the pierced and swaying crowd</p> +<p>Appeared, unveiling in his agèd arms</p> +<p>The smiling visage of her babe. He grasped</p> +<p>Her robe, and strove to draw her down. All eyes</p> +<p>Were bent upon her. With a softening glance,</p> +<p>And voice less cold and heavy with death's doom,</p> +<p>The old Proconsul turned to her and said:</p> +<p>'Lady, have pity on your father's age;</p> +<p>Be mindful of your tender babe; this grain</p> +<p>Of harmless incense offer for the peace</p> +<p>And welfare of the Emperor'; but she,</p> +<p>Lifting far forth her large and noteless eyes,</p> +<p>As one that saw a vision, only said:</p> +<p>'I cannot sacrifice'; and he, harsh tongued,</p> +<p>Bending a brow upon her rough as rock,</p> +<p>With eyes that struck like steel, seeking to break</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 89]</span> +<p>Or snare her with a sudden stroke of fear:</p> +<p>'Art thou a Christian?' and she answered, 'Yea,</p> +<p>I am a Christian!' In brow-blackening wrath</p> +<p>He motioned a contemptuous hand and bade</p> +<p>The lictors scourge the old man down and forth</p> +<p>With rods, and as the cruel deed was done,</p> +<p>Perpetua stood white with quivering lips,</p> +<p>And her eyes filled with tears. While yet his cries</p> +<p>Were mingling with the curses of the crowd,</p> +<p>Hilarianus, calling name by name,</p> +<p>Gave sentence, and in cold and formal phrase</p> +<p>Condemned us to the beasts, and we returned</p> +<p>Rejoicing to our prison. Then we wished</p> +<p>Our martyrdom could soon have followed, not</p> +<p>As doubting for our constancy, but some</p> +<p>Grew sick under the anxious long suspense.</p> +<p>Perpetua again was weighed upon</p> +<p>By grief and trouble for her babe, whom now</p> +<p>Her father, seeking to depress her will,</p> +<p>Withheld and would not send it; but at length</p> +<p>Word being brought her that the child indeed</p> +<p>No longer suffered, nor desired the breast,</p> +<p>Her peace returned, and, giving thanks to God,</p> +<p>All were united in new bonds of hope.</p> +<p>Now being fixed in certitude of death,</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 90]</span> +<p>We stripped our souls of all their earthly gear,</p> +<p>The useless raiment of this world; and thus,</p> +<p>Striving together with a single will,</p> +<p>In daily increment of faith and power,</p> +<p>We were much comforted by heavenly dreams,</p> +<p>And waking visitations of God's grace.</p> +<p>Visions of light and glory infinite</p> +<p>Were frequent with us, and by night or day</p> +<p>Woke at the very name of Christ the Lord,</p> +<p>Taken at any moment on our lips;</p> +<p>So that we had no longer thought or care</p> +<p>Of life or of the living, but became</p> +<p>As spirits from this earth already freed,</p> +<p>Scarce conscious of the dwindling weight of flesh.</p> +<p>To Saturus appeared in dreams the space</p> +<p>And splendour of the heavenly house of God,</p> +<p>The glowing gardens of eternal joy,</p> +<p>The halls and chambers of the cherubim,</p> +<p>In wreaths of endless myriads involved</p> +<p>The blinding glory of the angel choir,</p> +<p>Rolling through deeps of wheeling cloud and light</p> +<p>The thunder of their vast antiphonies.</p> +<p>The visions of Perpetua not less</p> +<p>Possessed us with their homely tenderness—</p> +<p>As one, wherein she saw a rock-set pool</p> +<p>And weeping o'er its rim a little child,</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 91]</span> +<p>Her brother, long since dead, Dinocrates:</p> +<p>Though sore athirst, he could not reach the stream,</p> +<p>Being so small, and her heart grieved thereat.</p> +<p>She looked again, and lo! the pool had risen,</p> +<p>And the child filled his goblet, and drank deep,</p> +<p>And prattling in a tender childish joy</p> +<p>Ran gaily off, as infants do, to play.</p> +<p>By this she knew his soul had found release</p> +<p>From torment, and had entered into bliss.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Quickly as by a merciful gift of God,</p> +<p>Our vigil passed unbroken. Yesternight</p> +<p>They moved us to the amphitheatre,</p> +<p>Our final lodging-place on earth, and there</p> +<p>We sat together at our agapé</p> +<p>For the last time. In silence, rapt and pale,</p> +<p>We hearkened to the aged Saturus,</p> +<p>Whose speech, touched with a ghostly eloquence,</p> +<p>Canvassed the fraud and littleness of life,</p> +<p>God's goodness and the solemn joy of death.</p> +<p>Perpetua was silent, but her eyes</p> +<p>Fell gently upon each of us, suffused</p> +<p>With inward and eradiant light; a smile</p> +<p>Played often upon her lips.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p class='in5em'>While yet we sat,</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 92]</span> +<p>A tribune with a band of soldiery</p> +<p>Entered our cell, and would have had us bound</p> +<p>In harsher durance, fearing our escape</p> +<p>By fraud or witchcraft; but Perpetua,</p> +<p>Facing him gently with a noble note</p> +<p>Of wonder in her voice, and on her lips</p> +<p>A lingering smile of mournful irony:</p> +<p>'Sir, are ye not unwise to harass us,</p> +<p>And rob us of our natural food and rest?</p> +<p>Should ye not rather tend us with soft care,</p> +<p>And so provide a comely spectacle?</p> +<p>We shall not honour Cæsar's birthday well,</p> +<p>If we be waste and weak, a piteous crew,</p> +<p>Poor playthings for your proud and pampered beasts.'</p> +<p>The noisy tribune, whether touched indeed,</p> +<p>Or by her grave and tender grace abashed,</p> +<p>Muttered and stormed a while, and then withdrew.</p> +<p>The short night passed in wakeful prayer for some,</p> +<p>For others in brief sleep, broken by dreams</p> +<p>And spiritual visitations. Earliest dawn</p> +<p>Found us arisen, and Perpetua,</p> +<p>Moving about with smiling lips, soft-tongued,</p> +<p>Besought us to take food; lest so, she said,</p> +<p>For all the strength and courage of our hearts,</p> +<p>Our bodies should fall faint. We heard without,</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 93]</span> +<p>Already ere the morning light was full,</p> +<p>The din of preparation, and the hum</p> +<p>Of voices gathering in the upper tiers;</p> +<p>Yet had we seen so often in our thoughts</p> +<p>The picture of this strange and cruel death,</p> +<p>Its festal horror, and its bloody pomp,</p> +<p>The nearness scarcely moved us, and our hands</p> +<p>Met in a steadfast and unshaken clasp.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>The day is over. Ah, my friend, how long</p> +<p>With its wild sounds and bloody sights it seemed!</p> +<p>Night comes, and I am still alive—even I,</p> +<p>The least and last—with other two, reserved</p> +<p>To grace to-morrow's second day. The rest</p> +<p>Have suffered and with holy rapture passed</p> +<p>Into their glory. Saturus and the men</p> +<p>Were given to bears and leopards, but the crowd</p> +<p>Feasted their eyes upon no cowering shape,</p> +<p>Nor hue of fear, nor painful cry. They died</p> +<p>Like armèd men, face foremost to the beasts,</p> +<p>With prayers and sacred songs upon their lips.</p> +<p>Perpetua and the frail Felicitas</p> +<p>Were seized before our eyes and roughly stripped,</p> +<p>And shrinking and entreating, not for fear,</p> +<p>Nor hurt, but bitter shame, were borne away</p> +<p>Into the vast arena, and hung up</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 94]</span> +<p>In nets, naked before the multitude,</p> +<p>For a fierce bull, maddened by goads, to toss.</p> +<p>Some sudden tumult of compassion seized</p> +<p>The crowd, and a great murmur like a wave</p> +<p>Rose at the sight, and grew, and thundered up</p> +<p>From tier to tier, deep and imperious:</p> +<p>So white, so innocent they were, so pure:</p> +<p>Their tender limbs so eloquent of shame;</p> +<p>And so our loved ones were brought back, all faint,</p> +<p>And covered with light raiment, and again</p> +<p>Led forth, and now with smiling lips they passed</p> +<p>Pale, but unbowed, into the awful ring,</p> +<p>Holding each other proudly by the hand.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Perpetua first was tossed, and her robe rent,</p> +<p>But, conscious only of the glaring eyes,</p> +<p>She strove to hide herself as best she could</p> +<p>In the torn remnants of her flimsy robe,</p> +<p>And putting up her hands clasped back her hair,</p> +<p>So that she might not die as one in grief,</p> +<p>Unseemly and dishevelled. Then she turned,</p> +<p>And in her loving arms caressed and raised</p> +<p>The dying, bruised Felicitas. Once more</p> +<p>Gored by the cruel beast, they both were borne</p> +<p>Swooning and mortally stricken from the field.</p> +<p>Perpetua, pale and beautiful, her lips</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 95]</span> +<p>Parted as in a lingering ecstasy,</p> +<p>Could not believe the end had come, but asked</p> +<p>When they were to be given to the beasts.</p> +<p>The keepers gathered round her—even they—</p> +<p>In wondering pity—while with fearless hand,</p> +<p>Bidding us all be faithful and stand firm,</p> +<p>She bared her breast, and guided to its goal</p> +<p>The gladiator's sword that pierced her heart.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>The night is passing. In a few short hours</p> +<p>I too shall suffer for the name of Christ.</p> +<p>A boundless exaltation lifts my soul!</p> +<p>I know that they who left us, Saturus,</p> +<p>Perpetua, and the other blessed ones,</p> +<p>Await me at the opening gates of heaven.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 96]</p> +<h3><a name='p34' id='p34'>THE MYSTERY OF A YEAR</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>A little while, a year agone,</p> +<p class='in1em'>I knew her for a romping child,</p> +<p>A dimple and a glance that shone</p> +<p class='in1em'>With idle mischief when she smiled.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>To-day she passed me in the press,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And turning with a quick surprise</p> +<p>I wondered at her stateliness,</p> +<p class='in1em'>I wondered at her altered eyes.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>To me the street was just the same,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The people and the city's stir;</p> +<p>But life had kindled into flame,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And all the world was changed for her.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I watched her in the crowded ways,</p> +<p class='in1em'>A noble form, a queenly head,</p> +<p>With all the woman in her gaze,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The conscious woman in her tread.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 97]</p> +<h3><a name='p35' id='p35'>WINTER EVENING</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>To-night the very horses springing by</p> +<p>Toss gold from whitened nostrils. In a dream</p> +<p>The streets that narrow to the westward gleam</p> +<p>Like rows of golden palaces; and high</p> +<p>From all the crowded chimneys tower and die</p> +<p>A thousand aureoles. Down in the west</p> +<p>The brimming plains beneath the sunset rest,</p> +<p>One burning sea of gold. Soon, soon shall fly</p> +<p>The glorious vision, and the hours shall feel</p> +<p>A mightier master; soon from height to height,</p> +<p>With silence and the sharp unpitying stars,</p> +<p>Stern creeping frosts, and winds that touch like steel,</p> +<p>Out of the depth beyond the eastern bars,</p> +<p>Glittering and still shall come the awful night.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 98]</p> +<h3><a name='p36' id='p36'>WAR</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>By the Nile, the sacred river,</p> +<p class='in1em'>I can see the captive hordes</p> +<p>Strain beneath the lash and quiver</p> +<p class='in1em'>At the long papyrus cords,</p> +<p>While in granite rapt and solemn,</p> +<p>Rising over roof and column,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Amen-hotep dreams, or Ramses,</p> +<p class='in3em'>Lord of Lords.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I can hear the trumpets waken</p> +<p class='in1em'>For a victory old and far—</p> +<p>Carchemish or Kadesh taken—</p> +<p class='in1em'>I can see the conqueror's car</p> +<p>Bearing down some Hittite valley,</p> +<p>Where the bowmen break and sally,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Sargina or Esarhaddon,</p> +<p class='in3em'>Grim with war!</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 99]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>From the mountain streams that sweeten</p> +<p class='in1em'>Indus, to the Spanish foam,</p> +<p>I can feel the broad earth beaten</p> +<p class='in1em'>By the serried tramp of Rome;</p> +<p>Through whatever foes environ</p> +<p>Onward with the might of iron—</p> +<p class='in1em'>Veni, vidi; veni, vici—</p> +<p class='in3em'>Crashing home!</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I can see the kings grow pallid</p> +<p class='in1em'>With astonished fear and hate,</p> +<p>As the hosts of Amr or Khaled</p> +<p class='in1em'>On their cities fall like fate;</p> +<p>Like the heat-wind from its prison</p> +<p>In the desert burst and risen—</p> +<p class='in1em'>La ilàha illah 'llàhu—</p> +<p class='in3em'>God is great!</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I can hear the iron rattle,</p> +<p class='in1em'>I can see the arrows sting</p> +<p>In some far-off northern battle,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Where the long swords sweep and swing;</p> +<p>I can hear the scalds declaiming,</p> +<p>I can see their eyeballs flaming,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Gathered in a frenzied circle</p> +<p class='in3em'>Round the king.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 100]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I can hear the horn of Uri</p> +<p class='in1em'>Roaring in the hills enorm;</p> +<p>Kindled at its brazen fury,</p> +<p class='in1em'>I can see the clansmen form;</p> +<p>In the dawn in misty masses,</p> +<p>Pouring from the silent passes</p> +<p class='in1em'>Over Granson or Morgarten</p> +<p class='in3em'>Like the storm.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>On the lurid anvil ringing</p> +<p class='in1em'>To some slow fantastic plan,</p> +<p>I can hear the sword-smith singing</p> +<p class='in1em'>In the heart of old Japan—</p> +<p>Till the cunning blade grows tragic</p> +<p>With his malice and his magic—</p> +<p class='in1em'>Tenka tairan! Tenka tairan!</p> +<p class='in3em'>War to man!</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Where a northern river charges</p> +<p class='in1em'>By a wild and moonlit glade,</p> +<p>From the murky forest marges,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Round a broken palisade,</p> +<p>I can see the red men leaping,</p> +<p>See the sword of Daulac sweeping,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And the ghostly forms of heroes</p> +<p class='in3em'>Fall and fade.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 101]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I can feel the modern thunder</p> +<p class='in1em'>Of the cannon beat and blaze,</p> +<p>When the lines of men go under</p> +<p class='in1em'>On your proudest battle-days;</p> +<p>Through the roar I hear the lifting</p> +<p>Of the bloody chorus drifting</p> +<p class='in1em'>Round the burning mill at Valmy—</p> +<p class='in3em'>Marseillaise!</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I can see the ocean rippled</p> +<p class='in1em'>With the driving shot like rain,</p> +<p>While the hulls are crushed and crippled,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And the guns are piled with slain;</p> +<p>O'er the blackened broad sea-meadow</p> +<p>Drifts a tall and titan shadow,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And the cannon of Trafalgar</p> +<p class='in3em'>Startle Spain.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Still the tides of fight are booming,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And the barren blood is spilt;</p> +<p>Still the banners are up-looming,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And the hands are on the hilt;</p> +<p>But the old world waxes wiser,</p> +<p>From behind the bolted visor</p> +<p class='in1em'>It descries at last the horror</p> +<p class='in3em'>And the guilt.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 102]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Yet the eyes are dim, nor wholly</p> +<p class='in1em'>Open to the golden gleam,</p> +<p>And the brute surrenders slowly</p> +<p class='in1em'>To the godhead and the dream.</p> +<p>From his cage of bar and girder,</p> +<p>Still at moments mad with murder,</p> +<p class='in1em'>Leaps the tiger, and his demon</p> +<p class='in3em'>Rules supreme.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>One more war with fire and famine</p> +<p class='in1em'>Gathers—I can hear its cries—</p> +<p>And the years of might and Mammon</p> +<p class='in1em'>Perish in a world's demise;</p> +<p>When the strength of man is shattered,</p> +<p>And the powers of earth are scattered,</p> +<p class='in1em'>From beneath the ghastly ruin</p> +<p class='in3em'>Peace shall rise!</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 103]</p> +<h3><a name='p37' id='p37'>THE WOODCUTTER'S HUT</a></h3> + +<div class='poem' +style='width:35em;'> + +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Far up in the wild and wintery hills in the heart of the cliff-broken woods,</p> +<p>Where the mounded drifts lie soft and deep in the noiseless solitudes,</p> +<p>The hut of the lonely woodcutter stands, a few rough beams that show</p> +<p>A blunted peak and a low black line, from the glittering waste of snow.</p> +<p>In the frost-still dawn from his roof goes up in the windless, motionless air,</p> +<p>The thin, pink curl of leisurely smoke; through the forest white and bare</p> +<p>The woodcutter follows his narrow trail, and the morning rings and cracks</p> +<p>With the rhythmic jet of his sharp-blown breath and the echoing shout of his axe.</p> +<p>Only the waft of the wind besides, or the stir of some hardy bird—</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 104]</span> +<p>The call of the friendly chickadee, or the pat of the nuthatch—is heard;</p> +<p>Or a rustle comes from a dusky clump, where the busy siskins feed,</p> +<p>And scatter the dimpled sheet of the snow with the shells of the cedar-seed.</p> +<p>Day after day the woodcutter toils untiring with axe and wedge,</p> +<p>Till the jingling teams come up from the road that runs by the valley's edge,</p> +<p>With plunging of horses, and hurling of snow, and many a shouted word,</p> +<p>And carry away the keen-scented fruit of his cutting, cord upon cord.</p> +<p>Not the sound of a living foot comes else, not a moving visitant there,</p> +<p>Save the delicate step of some halting doe, or the sniff of a prowling bear.</p> +<p>And only the stars are above him at night, and the trees that creak and groan,</p> +<p>And the frozen, hard-swept mountain-crests with their silent fronts of stone,</p> +<p>As he watches the sinking glow of his fire and the wavering flames upcaught,</p> +<p>Cleaning his rifle or mending his moccasins, sleepy and slow of thought.</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 105]</span> +<p>Or when the fierce snow comes, with the rising wind, from the grey north-east,</p> +<p>He lies through the leaguering hours in his bunk like a winter-hidden beast,</p> +<p>Or sits on the hard-packed earth, and smokes by his draught-blown guttering fire,</p> +<p>Without thought or remembrance, hardly awake, and waits for the storm to tire.</p> +<p>Scarcely he hears from the rock-rimmed heights to the wild ravines below,</p> +<p>Near and far-off, the limitless wings of the tempest hurl and go</p> +<p>In roaring gusts that plunge through the cracking forest, and lull, and lift,</p> +<p>All day without stint and all night long with the sweep of the hissing drift.</p> +<p>But winter shall pass ere long with its hills of snow and its fettered dreams,</p> +<p>And the forest shall glimmer with living gold, and chime with the gushing of streams;</p> +<p>Millions of little points of plants shall prick through its matted floor,</p> +<p>And the wind-flower lift and uncurl her silken buds by the woodman's door;</p> +<p>The sparrow shall see and exult; but lo! as the spring draws gaily on,</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 106]</span> +<p>The woodcutter's hut is empty and bare, and the master that made it is gone.</p> +<p>He is gone where the gathering of valley men another labour yields,</p> +<p>To handle the plough, and the harrow, and scythe, in the heat of the summer fields.</p> +<p>He is gone with his corded arms, and his ruddy face, and his moccasined feet,</p> +<p>The animal man in his warmth and vigour, sound, and hard, and complete.</p> +<p>And all summer long, round the lonely hut, the black earth burgeons and breeds,</p> +<p>Till the spaces are filled with the tall-plumed ferns and the triumphing forest-weeds;</p> +<p>The thick wild raspberries hem its walls, and, stretching on either hand,</p> +<p>The red-ribbed stems and the giant-leaves of the sovereign spikenard stand.</p> +<p>So lonely and silent it is, so withered and warped with the sun and snow,</p> +<p>You would think it the fruit of some dead man's toil a hundred years ago;</p> +<p>And he who finds it suddenly there, as he wanders far and alone,</p> +<p>Is touched with a sweet and beautiful sense of something tender and gone,</p> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 107]</span> +<p>The sense of a struggling life in the waste, and the mark of a soul's command,</p> +<p>The going and coming of vanished feet, the touch of a human hand.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 108]</p> +<h3><a name='p38' id='p38'>AMOR VITÆ</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I love the warm bare earth and all</p> +<p class='in1em'>That works and dreams thereon:</p> +<p>I love the seasons yet to fall:</p> +<p class='in1em'>I love the ages gone,</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>The valleys with the sheeted grain,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The river's smiling might,</p> +<p>The merry wind, the rustling rain,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The vastness of the night.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I love the morning's flame, the steep</p> +<p class='in1em'>Where down the vapour clings:</p> +<p>I love the clouds that float and sleep,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And every bird that sings.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I love the purple shower that pours</p> +<p class='in1em'>On far-off fields at even:</p> +<p>I love the pine-wood dusk whose floors</p> +<p class='in1em'>Are like the courts of heaven.</p> +</div> +<span class='pagenum'>[Pg. 109]</span> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I love the heaven's azure span,</p> +<p class='in1em'>The grass beneath my feet:</p> +<p>I love the face of every man</p> +<p class='in1em'>Whose thought is swift and sweet.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>I let the wrangling world go by,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And like an idle breath</p> +<p>Its echoes and its phantoms fly:</p> +<p class='in1em'>I care no jot for death.</p> +</div> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>Time like a Titan bright and strong</p> +<p class='in1em'>Spreads one enchanted gleam:</p> +<p>Each hour is but a fluted song,</p> +<p class='in1em'>And life a lofty dream.</p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class='pagenum'>[Pg. 110]</p> +<h3><a name='p39' id='p39'>WINTER-BREAK</a></h3> + +<div class='poem'> +<div class='stanza'> +<p>All day between high-curded clouds the sun</p> +<p>Shone down like summer on the steaming planks.</p> +<p>The long, bright icicles in dwindling ranks</p> +<p>Dripped from the murmuring eaves till one by one</p> +<p>They fell. As if the spring had now begun,</p> +<p>The quilted snow, sun-softened to the core,</p> +<p>Loosened and shunted with a sudden roar</p> +<p>From downward roofs. Not even with day done</p> +<p>Had ceased the sound of waters, but all night</p> +<p>I heard it. In my dreams forgetfully bright</p> +<p>Methought I wandered in the April woods,</p> +<p>Where many a silver-piping sparrow was,</p> +<p>By gurgling brooks and spouting solitudes,</p> +<p>And stooped, and laughed, and plucked hepaticas.</p> +</div> +</div> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Alcyone, by Archibald Lampman + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ALCYONE *** + +***** This file should be named 22833-h.htm or 22833-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/2/8/3/22833/ + +Produced by Thierry Alberto, V. L. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Alcyone + +Author: Archibald Lampman + +Release Date: October 2, 2007 [EBook #22833] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ALCYONE *** + + + + +Produced by Thierry Alberto, V. L. Simpson and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by the Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions +(www.canadiana.org)) + + + + + + ALCYONE + + by + + ARCHIBALD LAMPMAN + + + + + OTTAWA + JAMES OGILVY + 1899 + + + + + Edinburgh: T. and A. CONSTABLE, Printers to Her Majesty + + + + + TO THE MEMORY OF + MY FATHER + HIMSELF A POET + WHO FIRST INSTRUCTED ME + IN THE ART + OF VERSE. + + + + + CONTENTS + + + ALCYONE 1 + + IN MARCH 4 + + THE CITY OF THE END OF THINGS 5 + + THE SONG SPARROW 9 + + INTER VIAS 10 + + REFUGE 12 + + APRIL NIGHT 13 + + PERSONALITY 14 + + TO MY DAUGHTER 15 + + CHIONE 17 + + TO THE CRICKET 24 + + THE SONG OF PAN 25 + + THE ISLET AND THE PALM 27 + + A VISION OF TWILIGHT 28 + + EVENING 33 + + THE CLEARER SELF 34 + + TO THE PROPHETIC SOUL 36 + + THE LAND OF PALLAS 38 + + AMONG THE ORCHARDS 49 + + THE POET'S SONG 50 + + A THUNDERSTORM 56 + + THE CITY 57 + + SAPPHICS 60 + + VOICES OF EARTH 62 + + PECCAVI, DOMINE 63 + + AN ODE TO THE HILLS 66 + + INDIAN SUMMER 71 + + GOOD SPEECH 72 + + THE BETTER DAY 73 + + WHITE PANSIES 75 + + WE TOO SHALL SLEEP 77 + + THE AUTUMN WASTE 78 + + VIVIA PERPETUA 79 + + THE MYSTERY OF A YEAR 96 + + WINTER EVENING 97 + + WAR 98 + + THE WOODCUTTER'S HUT 103 + + AMOR VITAE 108 + + WINTER-BREAK 110 + + + + + ALCYONE + + + In the silent depth of space, + Immeasurably old, immeasurably far, + Glittering with a silver flame + Through eternity, + Rolls a great and burning star, + With a noble name, + Alcyone! + + In the glorious chart of heaven + It is marked the first of seven; + 'Tis a Pleiad: + And a hundred years of earth + With their long-forgotten deeds have come and gone, + Since that tiny point of light, + Once a splendour fierce and bright, + Had its birth + In the star we gaze upon. + + It has travelled all that time-- + Thought has not a swifter flight-- + Through a region where no faintest gust + Of life comes ever, but the power of night + Dwells stupendous and sublime, + Limitless and void and lonely, + A region mute with age, and peopled only + With the dead and ruined dust + Of worlds that lived eternities ago. + + Man! when thou dost think of this, + And what our earth and its existence is, + The half-blind toils since life began, + The little aims, the little span, + With what passion and what pride, + And what hunger fierce and wide, + Thou dost break beyond it all, + Seeking for the spirit unconfined + In the clear abyss of mind + A shelter and a peace majestical. + For what is life to thee, + Turning toward the primal light, + With that stern and silent face, + If thou canst not be + Something radiant and august as night, + Something wide as space? + + Therefore with a love and gratitude divine + Thou shalt cherish in thine heart for sign + A vision of the great and burning star, + Immeasurably old, immeasurably far, + Surging forth its silver flame + Through eternity; + And thine inner heart shall ring and cry + With the music strange and high, + The grandeur of its name + Alcyone! + + + + + IN MARCH + + + The sun falls warm: the southern winds awake: + The air seethes upward with a steamy shiver: + Each dip of the road is now a crystal lake, + And every rut a little dancing river. + Through great soft clouds that sunder overhead + The deep sky breaks as pearly blue as summer: + Out of a cleft beside the river's bed + Flaps the black crow, the first demure newcomer. + The last seared drifts are eating fast away + With glassy tinkle into glittering laces: + Dogs lie asleep, and little children play + With tops and marbles in the sunbare places; + And I that stroll with many a thoughtful pause + Almost forget that winter ever was. + + + + + THE CITY OF THE END OF THINGS + + + Beside the pounding cataracts + Of midnight streams unknown to us + 'Tis builded in the leafless tracts + And valleys huge of Tartarus. + Lurid and lofty and vast it seems; + It hath no rounded name that rings, + But I have heard it called in dreams + The City of the End of Things. + + Its roofs and iron towers have grown + None knoweth how high within the night, + But in its murky streets far down + A flaming terrible and bright + Shakes all the stalking shadows there, + Across the walls, across the floors, + And shifts upon the upper air + From out a thousand furnace doors; + + And all the while an awful sound + Keeps roaring on continually, + And crashes in the ceaseless round + Of a gigantic harmony. + Through its grim depths re-echoing + And all its weary height of walls, + With measured roar and iron ring, + The inhuman music lifts and falls. + Where no thing rests and no man is, + And only fire and night hold sway; + The beat, the thunder and the hiss + Cease not, and change not, night nor day. + + And moving at unheard commands, + The abysses and vast fires between, + Flit figures that with clanking hands + Obey a hideous routine; + They are not flesh, they are not bone, + They see not with the human eye, + And from their iron lips is blown + A dreadful and monotonous cry; + And whoso of our mortal race + Should find that city unaware, + Lean Death would smite him face to face, + And blanch him with its venomed air: + Or caught by the terrific spell, + Each thread of memory snapt and cut, + His soul would shrivel and its shell + Go rattling like an empty nut. + + It was not always so, but once, + In days that no man thinks upon, + Fair voices echoed from its stones, + The light above it leaped and shone: + Once there were multitudes of men, + That built that city in their pride, + Until its might was made, and then + They withered age by age and died. + But now of that prodigious race, + Three only in an iron tower, + Set like carved idols face to face, + Remain the masters of its power; + And at the city gate a fourth, + Gigantic and with dreadful eyes, + Sits looking toward the lightless north, + Beyond the reach of memories; + Fast rooted to the lurid floor, + A bulk that never moves a jot, + In his pale body dwells no more, + Or mind, or soul,--an idiot! + + But sometime in the end those three + Shall perish and their hands be still, + And with the master's touch shall flee + Their incommunicable skill. + A stillness absolute as death + Along the slacking wheels shall lie, + And, flagging at a single breath, + The fires shall moulder out and die. + The roar shall vanish at its height, + And over that tremendous town + The silence of eternal night + Shall gather close and settle down. + All its grim grandeur, tower and hall, + Shall be abandoned utterly, + And into rust and dust shall fall + From century to century; + Nor ever living thing shall grow, + Or trunk of tree, or blade of grass; + No drop shall fall, no wind shall blow, + Nor sound of any foot shall pass: + Alone of its accursed state, + One thing the hand of Time shall spare, + For the grim Idiot at the gate + Is deathless and eternal there. + + + + + THE SONG SPARROW + + + Fair little scout, that when the iron year + Changes, and the first fleecy clouds deploy, + Comest with such a sudden burst of joy, + Lifting on winter's doomed and broken rear + That song of silvery triumph blithe and clear; + Not yet quite conscious of the happy glow, + We hungered for some surer touch, and lo! + One morning we awake, and thou art here. + And thousands of frail-stemmed hepaticas, + With their crisp leaves and pure and perfect hues, + Light sleepers, ready for the golden news, + Spring at thy note beside the forest ways-- + Next to thy song, the first to deck the hour-- + The classic lyrist and the classic flower. + + + + + INTER VIAS + + + 'Tis a land where no hurricane falls, + But the infinite azure regards + Its waters for ever, its walls + Of granite, its limitless swards; + Where the fens to their innermost pool + With the chorus of May are aring, + And the glades are wind-winnowed and cool + With perpetual spring; + + Where folded and half withdrawn + The delicate wind-flowers blow, + And the bloodroot kindles at dawn + Her spiritual taper of snow; + Where the limits are met and spanned + By a waste that no husbandman tills, + And the earth-old pine forests stand + In the hollows of hills. + + 'Tis the land that our babies behold, + Deep gazing when none are aware; + And the great-hearted seers of old + And the poets have known it, and there + Made halt by the well-heads of truth + On their difficult pilgrimage + From the rose-ruddy gardens of youth + To the summits of age. + + Now too, as of old, it is sweet + With a presence remote and serene; + Still its byways are pressed by the feet + Of the mother immortal, its queen: + The huntress whose tresses, flung free, + And her fillets of gold, upon earth, + They only have honour to see + Who are dreamers from birth. + + In her calm and her beauty supreme, + They have found her at dawn or at eve, + By the marge of some motionless stream, + Or where shadows rebuild or unweave + In a murmurous alley of pine, + Looking upward in silent surprise, + A figure, slow-moving, divine, + With inscrutable eyes. + + + + + REFUGE + + + Where swallows and wheatfields are, + O hamlet brown and still, + O river that shineth far, + By meadow, pier, and mill: + + O endless sunsteeped plain, + With forests in dim blue shrouds, + And little wisps of rain, + Falling from far-off clouds: + + I come from the choking air + Of passion, doubt, and strife, + With a spirit and mind laid bare + To your healing breadth of life: + + O fruitful and sacred ground, + O sunlight and summer sky, + Absorb me and fold me round, + For broken and tired am I. + + + + + APRIL NIGHT + + + How deep the April night is in its noon, + The hopeful, solemn, many-murmured night! + The earth lies hushed with expectation; bright + Above the world's dark border burns the moon, + Yellow and large; from forest floorways, strewn + With flowers, and fields that tingle with new birth, + The moist smell of the unimprisoned earth + Comes up, a sigh, a haunting promise. Soon, + Ah, soon, the teeming triumph! At my feet + The river with its stately sweep and wheel + Moves on slow-motioned, luminous, grey like steel. + From fields far off whose watery hollows gleam, + Aye with blown throats that make the long hours sweet, + The sleepless toads are murmuring in their dream. + + + + + PERSONALITY + + + O differing human heart, + Why is it that I tremble when thine eyes, + Thy human eyes and beautiful human speech, + Draw me, and stir within my soul + That subtle ineradicable longing + For tender comradeship? + It is because I cannot all at once, + Through the half-lights and phantom-haunted mists + That separate and enshroud us life from life, + Discern the nearness or the strangeness of thy paths + Nor plumb thy depths. + I am like one that comes alone at night + To a strange stream, and by an unknown ford + Stands, and for a moment yearns and shrinks, + Being ignorant of the water, though so quiet it is, + So softly murmurous, + So silvered by the familiar moon. + + + + + TO MY DAUGHTER + + + O little one, daughter, my dearest, + With your smiles and your beautiful curls, + And your laughter, the brightest and clearest, + O gravest and gayest of girls; + + With your hands that are softer than roses, + And your lips that are lighter than flowers, + And that innocent brow that discloses + A wisdom more lovely than ours; + + With your locks that encumber, or scatter + In a thousand mercurial gleams, + And those feet whose impetuous patter + I hear and remember in dreams; + + With your manner of motherly duty, + When you play with your dolls and are wise; + With your wonders of speech, and the beauty + In your little imperious eyes; + + When I hear you so silverly ringing + Your welcome from chamber or stair. + When you run to me, kissing and clinging, + So radiant, so rosily fair; + + I bend like an ogre above you; + I bury my face in your curls; + I fold you, I clasp you, I love you. + O baby, queen-blossom of girls! + + + + + CHIONE + + + Scarcely a breath about the rocky stair + Moved, but the growing tide from verge to verge, + Heaving salt fragrance on the midnight air, + Climbed with a murmurous and fitful surge. + A hoary mist rose up and slowly sheathed + The dripping walls and portal granite-stepped, + And sank into the inner court, and crept + From column unto column thickly wreathed. + + In that dead hour of darkness before dawn, + When hearts beat fainter, and the hands of death + Are strengthened,--with lips white and drawn + And feverish lids and scarcely moving breath, + The hapless mother, tender Chione, + Beside the earth-cold figure of her child, + After long bursts of weeping sharp and wild + Lay broken, silent in her agony. + At first in waking horror racked and bound + She lay, and then a gradual stupor grew + About her soul and wrapped her round and round + Like death, and then she sprang to life anew + Out of a darkness clammy as the tomb; + And, touched by memory or some spirit hand, + She seemed to keep a pathway down a land + Of monstrous shadow and Cimmerian gloom. + + A waste of cloudy and perpetual night-- + And yet there seemed a teeming presence there + Of life that gathered onward in thick flight, + Unseen, but multitudinous. Aware + Of something also on her path she was + That drew her heart forth with a tender cry. + She hurried with drooped ear and eager eye, + And called on the foul shapes to let her pass. + + For down the sloping darkness far ahead + She saw a little figure slight and small, + With yearning arms and shadowy curls outspread, + Running at frightened speed; and it would fall + And rise, sobbing; and through the ghostly sleet + The cry came: 'Mother! Mother!' and she wist + The tender eyes were blinded by the mist, + And the rough stones were bruising the small feet. + And when she lifted a keen cry and clave + Forthright the gathering horror of the place, + Mad with her love and pity, a dark wave + Of clapping shadows swept about her face, + And beat her back, and when she gained her breath, + Athwart an awful vale a grizzled steam + Was rising from a mute and murky stream, + As cold and cavernous as the eye of death. + + And near the ripple stood the little shade, + And many hovering ghosts drew near him, some + That seemed to peer out of the mist and fade + With eyes of soft and shadowing pity, dumb; + But others closed him round with eager sighs + And sweet insistence, striving to caress + And comfort him; but grieving none the less, + He reached her heartstrings with his tender cries. + + And silently across the horrid flow, + The shapeless bark and pallid chalklike arms + Of him that oared it, dumbly to and fro, + Went gliding, and the struggling ghosts in swarms + Leaped in and passed, but myriads more behind + Crowded the dismal beaches. One might hear + A tumult of entreaty thin and clear + Rise like the whistle of a winter wind. + + And still the little figure stood beside + The hideous stream, and toward the whispering prow + Held forth his tender tremulous hands, and cried, + Now to the awful ferryman, and now + To her that battled with the shades in vain. + Sometimes impending over all her sight + The spongy dark and the phantasmal flight + Of things half-shapen passed and hid the plain. + + And sometimes in a gust a sort of wind + Drove by, and where its power was hurled, + She saw across the twilight, jarred and thinned, + Those gloomy meadows of the under world, + Where never sunlight was, nor grass, nor trees, + And the dim pathways from the Stygian shore, + Sombre and swart and barren, wandered o'er + By countless melancholy companies. + + And farther still upon the utmost rim + Of the drear waste, whereto the roadways led, + She saw in piling outline, huge and dim, + The walled and towered dwellings of the dead + And the grim house of Hades. Then she broke + Once more fierce-footed through the noisome press; + But ere she reached the goal of her distress, + Her pierced heart seemed to shatter, and she woke. + + It seemed as she had been entombed for years, + And came again to living with a start. + There was an awful echoing in her ears + And a great deadness pressing at her heart. + She shuddered and with terror seemed to freeze, + Lip-shrunken and wide-eyed a moment's space, + And then she touched the little lifeless face, + And kissed it, and rose up upon her knees. + + And round her still the silence seemed to teem + With the foul shadows of her dream beguiled-- + No dream, she thought; it could not be a dream, + But her child called for her; her child, her child!-- + She clasped her quivering fingers white and spare, + And knelt low down, and bending her fair head + Unto the lower gods who rule the dead, + Touched them with tender homage and this prayer: + + O gloomy masters of the dark demesne, + Hades, and thou whom the dread deity + Bore once from earthly Enna for his queen, + Beloved of Demeter, pale Persephone, + Grant me one boon; + 'Tis not for life I pray, + Not life, but quiet death; and that soon, soon! + Loose from my soul this heavy weight of clay, + This net of useless woe. + O mournful mother, sad Persephone, + Be mindful, let me go! + + How shall he journey to the dismal beach, + Or win the ear of Charon, without one + To keep him and stand by him, sure of speech? + He is so little, and has just begun + To use his feet + And speak a few small words, + And all his daily usage has been sweet + As the soft nesting ways of tender birds. + How shall he fare at all + Across that grim inhospitable land, + If I too be not by to hold his hand, + And help him if he fall? + + And then before the gloomy judges set, + How shall he answer? Oh, I cannot bear + To see his tender cheeks with weeping wet, + Or hear the sobbing cry of his despair! + I could not rest, + Nor live with patient mind, + Though knowing what is fated must be best; + But surely thou art more than mortal kind, + And thou canst feel my woe, + All-pitying, all-observant, all-divine; + He is so little, mother Proserpine, + He needs me, let me go! + + Thus far she prayed, and then she lost her way, + And left the half of all her heart unsaid, + And a great languor seized her, and she lay, + Soft fallen, by the little silent head. + Her numbed lips had passed beyond control, + Her mind could neither plan nor reason more, + She saw dark waters and an unknown shore, + And the grey shadows crept about her soul. + + Again through darkness on an evil land + She seemed to enter but without distress. + A little spirit led her by the hand, + And her wide heart was warm with tenderness. + Her lips, still moving, conscious of one care, + Murmured a moment in soft mother-tones, + And so fell silent. From their sombre thrones + Already the grim gods had heard her prayer. + + + + + TO THE CRICKET + + + Didst thou not tease and fret me to and fro, + Sweet spirit of this summer-circled field, + With that quiet voice of thine that would not yield + Its meaning, though I mused and sought it so? + But now I am content to let it go, + To lie at length and watch the swallows pass, + As blithe and restful as this quiet grass, + Content only to listen and to know + That years shall turn, and summers yet shall shine, + And I shall lie beneath these swaying trees, + Still listening thus; haply at last to seize, + And render in some happier verse divine + That friendly, homely, haunting speech of thine, + That perfect utterance of content and ease. + + + + + THE SONG OF PAN + + + Mad with love and laden + With immortal pain, + Pan pursued a maiden-- + Pan, the god--in vain. + + For when Pan had nearly + Touched her, wild to plead, + She was gone--and clearly + In her place a reed! + + Long the god, unwitting, + Through the valley strayed; + Then at last, submitting, + Cut the reed, and made, + + Deftly fashioned, seven + Pipes, and poured his pain + Unto earth and heaven + In a piercing strain. + + So with god and poet; + Beauty lures them on, + Flies, and ere they know it + Like a wraith is gone. + + Then they seek to borrow + Pleasure still from wrong, + And with smiling sorrow + Turn it to a song. + + + + + THE ISLET AND THE PALM + + + O gentle sister spirit, when you smile + My soul is like a lonely coral isle, + An islet shadowed by a single palm, + Ringed round with reef and foam, but inly calm. + + And all day long I listen to the speech + Of wind and water on my charmed beach: + I see far off beyond mine outer shore + The ocean flash, and hear his harmless roar. + + And in the night-time when the glorious sun, + With all his life and all his light, is done, + The wind still murmurs in my slender tree, + And shakes the moonlight on the silver sea. + + + + + A VISION OF TWILIGHT + + + By a void and soundless river + On the outer edge of space, + Where the body comes not ever, + But the absent dream hath place, + Stands a city, tall and quiet, + And its air is sweet and dim; + Never sound of grief or riot + Makes it mad, or makes it grim. + + And the tender skies thereover + Neither sun, nor star, behold-- + Only dusk it hath for cover,-- + But a glamour soft with gold, + Through a mist of dreamier essence + Than the dew of twilight, smiles + On strange shafts and domes and crescents, + Lifting into eerie piles. + + In its courts and hallowed places + Dreams of distant worlds arise, + Shadows of transfigured faces, + Glimpses of immortal eyes, + Echoes of serenest pleasure, + Notes of perfect speech that fall, + Through an air of endless leisure, + Marvellously musical. + + And I wander there at even, + Sometimes when my heart is clear, + When a wider round of heaven + And a vaster world are near, + When from many a shadow steeple + Sounds of dreamy bells begin, + And I love the gentle people + That my spirit finds therein. + + Men of a diviner making + Than the sons of pride and strife, + Quick with love and pity, breaking + From a knowledge old as life; + Women of a spiritual rareness, + Whom old passion and old woe + Moulded to a slenderer fairness + Than the dearest shapes we know. + + In its domed and towered centre + Lies a garden wide and fair, + Open for the soul to enter, + And the watchful townsmen there + Greet the stranger gloomed and fretting + From this world of stormy hands, + With a look that deals forgetting + And a touch that understands. + + For they see with power, not borrowed + From a record taught or told, + But they loved and laughed and sorrowed + In a thousand worlds of old; + Now they rest and dream for ever, + And with hearts serene and whole + See the struggle, the old fever, + Clear as on a painted scroll. + + Wandering by that grey and solemn + Water, with its ghostly quays-- + Vistas of vast arch and column, + Shadowed by unearthly trees-- + Biddings of sweet power compel me, + And I go with bated breath, + Listening to the tales they tell me, + Parables of Life and Death. + + In a tongue that once was spoken, + Ere the world was cooled by Time, + When the spirit flowed unbroken + Through the flesh, and the Sublime + Made the eyes of men far-seeing, + And their souls as pure as rain, + They declare the ends of being, + And the sacred need of pain. + + For they know the sweetest reasons + For the products most malign-- + They can tell the paths and seasons + Of the farthest suns that shine. + How the moth-wing's iridescence + By an inward plan was wrought, + And they read me curious lessons + In the secret ways of thought. + + When day turns, and over heaven + To the balmy western verge + Sail the victor fleets of even, + And the pilot stars emerge, + Then my city rounds and rises, + Like a vapour formed afar, + And its sudden girth surprises, + And its shadowy gates unbar. + + Dreamy crowds are moving yonder + In a faint and phantom blue; + Through the dusk I lean, and wonder + If their winsome shapes are true; + But in veiling indecision + Come my questions back again-- + Which is real? The fleeting vision? + Or the fleeting world of men? + + + + + EVENING + + + From upland slopes I see the cows file by, + Lowing, great-chested, down the homeward trail, + By dusking fields and meadows shining pale + With moon-tipped dandelions. Flickering high, + A peevish night-hawk in the western sky + Beats up into the lucent solitudes, + Or drops with griding wing. The stilly woods + Grow dark and deep and gloom mysteriously. + Cool night-winds creep, and whisper in mine ear + The homely cricket gossips at my feet. + From far-off pools and wastes of reeds I hear, + Clear and soft-piped, the chanting frogs break sweet + In full Pandean chorus. One by one + Shine out the stars, and the great night comes on. + + + + + THE CLEARER SELF + + + Before me grew the human soul, + And after I am dead and gone, + Through grades of effort and control + The marvellous work shall still go on. + + Each mortal in his little span + Hath only lived, if he have shown + What greatness there can be in man + Above the measured and the known; + + How through the ancient layers of night, + In gradual victory secure, + Grows ever with increasing light + The Energy serene and pure: + + The Soul, that from a monstrous past, + From age to age, from hour to hour, + Feels upward to some height at last + Of unimagined grace and power. + + Though yet the sacred fire be dull, + In folds of thwarting matter furled, + Ere death be nigh, while life is full, + O Master Spirit of the world, + + Grant me to know, to seek, to find, + In some small measure though it be, + Emerging from the waste and blind, + The clearer self, the grander me! + + + + + TO THE PROPHETIC SOUL + + + What are these bustlers at the gate + Of now or yesterday, + These playthings in the hand of Fate, + That pass, and point no way; + + These clinging bubbles whose mock fires + For ever dance and gleam, + Vain foam that gathers and expires + Upon the world's dark stream; + + These gropers betwixt right and wrong, + That seek an unknown goal, + Most ignorant, when they seem most strong; + What are they, then, O Soul, + + That thou shouldst covet overmuch + A tenderer range of heart, + And yet at every dreamed-of touch + So tremulously start? + + Thou with that hatred ever new + Of the world's base control, + That vision of the large and true, + That quickness of the soul; + + Nay, for they are not of thy kind, + But in a rarer clay + God dowered thee with an alien mind; + Thou canst not be as they. + + Be strong therefore; resume thy load, + And forward stone by stone + Go singing, though the glorious road + Thou travellest alone. + + + + + THE LAND OF PALLAS + + + Methought I journeyed along ways that led for ever + Throughout a happy land where strife and care were dead, + And life went by me flowing like a placid river + Past sandy eyots where the shifting shoals make head. + + A land where beauty dwelt supreme, and right, the donor + Of peaceful days; a land of equal gifts and deeds, + Of limitless fair fields and plenty had with honour; + A land of kindly tillage and untroubled meads, + + Of gardens, and great fields, and dreaming rose-wreathed alleys, + Wherein at dawn and dusk the vesper sparrows sang; + Of cities set far off on hills down vista'd valleys, + And floods so vast and old, men wist not whence they sprang, + + Of groves, and forest depths, and fountains softly welling, + And roads that ran soft-shadowed past the open doors, + Of mighty palaces and many a lofty dwelling, + Where all men entered and no master trod their floors. + + A land of lovely speech, where every tone was fashioned + By generations of emotion high and sweet, + Of thought and deed and bearing lofty and impassioned; + A land of golden calm, grave forms, and fretless feet. + + And every mode and saying of that land gave token + Of limits where no death or evil fortune fell, + And men lived out long lives in proud content unbroken, + For there no man was rich, none poor, but all were well. + + And all the earth was common, and no base contriving + Of money of coined gold was needed there or known, + But all men wrought together without greed or striving, + And all the store of all to each man was his own. + + From all that busy land, grey town, and peaceful village, + Where never jar was heard, nor wail, nor cry of strife, + From every laden stream and all the fields of tillage, + Arose the murmur and the kindly hum of life. + + At morning to the fields came forth the men, each neighbour + Hand linked to other, crowned, with wreaths upon their hair, + And all day long with joy they gave their hands to labour, + Moving at will, unhastened, each man to his share. + + At noon the women came, the tall fair women, bearing + Baskets of wicker in their ample hands for each, + And learned the day's brief tale, and how the fields were faring, + And blessed them with their lofty beauty and blithe speech. + + And when the great day's toil was over, and the shadows + Grew with the flocking stars, the sound of festival + Rose in each city square, and all the country meadows, + Palace, and paven court, and every rustic hall. + + Beside smooth streams, where alleys and green gardens meeting + Ran downward to the flood with marble steps, a throng + Came forth of all the folk, at even, gaily greeting, + With echo of sweet converse, jest, and stately song. + + In all their great fair cities there was neither seeking + For power of gold, nor greed of lust, nor desperate pain + Of multitudes that starve, or, in hoarse anger breaking, + Beat at the doors of princes, break and fall in vain. + + But all the children of that peaceful land, like brothers, + Lofty of spirit, wise, and ever set to learn + The chart of neighbouring souls, the bent and need of others, + Thought only of good deeds, sweet speech, and just return. + + And there there was no prison, power of arms, nor palace, + Where prince or judge held sway, for none was needed there; + Long ages since the very names of fraud and malice + Had vanished from men's tongues, and died from all men's care. + + And there there were no bonds of contract, deed, or marriage, + No oath, nor any form, to make the word more sure, + For no man dreamed of hurt, dishonour, or miscarriage, + Where every thought was truth, and every heart was pure. + + There were no castes of rich or poor, of slave or master, + Where all were brothers, and the curse of gold was dead, + But all that wise fair race to kindlier ends and vaster + Moved on together with the same majestic tread. + + And all the men and women of that land were fairer + Than even the mightiest of our meaner race can be; + The men like gentle children, great of limb, yet rarer + For wisdom and high thought, like kings for majesty. + + And all the women through great ages of bright living, + Grown goodlier of stature, strong, and subtly wise, + Stood equal with the men, calm counsellors, ever giving + The fire and succour of proud faith and dauntless eyes. + + And as I journeyed in that land I reached a ruin, + The gateway of a lonely and secluded waste, + A phantom of forgotten time and ancient doing, + Eaten by age and violence, crumbled and defaced. + + On its grim outer walls the ancient world's sad glories + Were recorded in fire; upon its inner stone, + Drawn by dead hands, I saw, in tales and tragic stories, + The woe and sickness of an age of fear made known. + + And lo, in that grey storehouse, fallen to dust and rotten, + Lay piled the traps and engines of forgotten greed, + The tomes of codes and canons, long disused, forgotten, + The robes and sacred books of many a vanished creed. + + An old grave man I found, white-haired and gently spoken, + Who, as I questioned, answered with a smile benign, + 'Long years have come and gone since these poor gauds were broken, + Broken and banished from a life made more divine. + + 'But still we keep them stored as once our sires deemed fitting, + The symbol of dark days and lives remote and strange, + Lest o'er the minds of any there should come unwitting + The thought of some new order and the lust of change. + + 'If any grow disturbed, we bring them gently hither, + To read the world's grim record and the sombre lore + Massed in these pitiless vaults, and they returning thither, + Bear with them quieter thoughts, and make for change no more.' + + And thence I journeyed on by one broad way that bore me + Out of that waste, and as I passed by tower and town + I saw amid the limitless plain far out before me + A long low mountain, blue as beryl, and its crown + + Was capped by marble roofs that shone like snow for whiteness, + Its foot was deep in gardens, and that blossoming plain + Seemed in the radiant shower of its majestic brightness + A land for gods to dwell in, free from care and pain. + + And to and forth from that fair mountain like a river + Ran many a dim grey road, and on them I could see + A multitude of stately forms that seemed for ever + Going and coming in bright bands; and near to me + + Was one that in his journey seemed to dream and linger, + Walking at whiles with kingly step, then standing still, + And him I met and asked him, pointing with my finger, + The meaning of the palace and the lofty hill. + + Whereto the dreamer: 'Art thou of this land, my brother, + And knowest not the mountain and its crest of walls, + Where dwells the priestless worship of the all-wise mother? + That is the hill of Pallas; those her marble halls! + + 'There dwell the lords of knowledge and of thought increasing, + And they whom insight and the gleams of song uplift; + And thence as by a hundred conduits flows unceasing + The spring of power and beauty, an eternal gift.' + + Still I passed on until I reached at length, not knowing + Whither the tangled and diverging paths might lead, + A land of baser men, whose coming and whose going + Were urged by fear, and hunger, and the curse of greed. + + I saw the proud and fortunate go by me, faring + In fatness and fine robes, the poor oppressed and slow, + The faces of bowed men, and piteous women bearing + The burden of perpetual sorrow and the stamp of woe. + + And tides of deep solicitude and wondering pity + Possessed me, and with eager and uplifted hands + I drew the crowd about me in a mighty city, + And taught the message of those other kindlier lands. + + I preached the rule of Faith and brotherly Communion, + The law of Peace and Beauty and the death of Strife, + And painted in great words the horror of disunion, + The vainness of self-worship, and the waste of life. + + I preached, but fruitlessly; the powerful from their stations + Rebuked me as an anarch, envious and bad, + And they that served them with lean hands and bitter patience + Smiled only out of hollow orbs, and deemed me mad. + + And still I preached, and wrought, and still I bore my message, + For well I knew that on and upward without cease + The spirit works for ever, and by Faith and Presage + That somehow yet the end of human life is Peace. + + + + + AMONG THE ORCHARDS + + + Already in the dew-wrapped vineyards dry + Dense weights of heat press down. The large bright drops + Shrink in the leaves. From dark acacia tops + The nuthatch flings his short reiterate cry; + And ever as the sun mounts hot and high + Thin voices crowd the grass. In soft long strokes + The wind goes murmuring through the mountain oaks. + Faint wefts creep out along the blue and die. + I hear far in among the motionless trees-- + Shadows that sleep upon the shaven sod-- + The thud of dropping apples. Reach on reach + Stretch plots of perfumed orchard, where the bees + Murmur among the full-fringed golden-rod, + Or cling half-drunken to the rotting peach. + + + + + THE POET'S SONG + + I + + + There came no change from week to week + On all the land, but all one way, + Like ghosts that cannot touch nor speak, + Day followed day. + + Within the palace court the rounds + Of glare and shadow, day and night, + Went ever with the same dull sounds, + The same dull flight: + + The motion of slow forms of state, + The far-off murmur of the street, + The din of couriers at the gate, + Half-mad with heat; + + Sometimes a distant shout of boys + At play upon the terrace walk, + The shutting of great doors, and noise + Of muttered talk. + + In one red corner of the wall, + That fronted with its granite stain + The town, the palms, and, beyond all, + The burning plain, + + As listless as the hour, alone, + The poet by his broken lute + Sat like a figure in the stone, + Dark-browed and mute. + + He saw the heat on the thin grass + Fall till it withered joint by joint, + The shadow on the dial pass + From point to point. + + He saw the midnight bright and bare + Fill with its quietude of stars + The silence that no human prayer + Attains or mars. + + He heard the hours divide, and still + The sentry on the outer wall + Make the night wearier with his shrill + Monotonous call. + + He watched the lizard where it lay, + Impassive as the watcher's face; + And only once in the long day + It changed its place. + + Sometimes with clank of hoofs and cries + The noon through all its trance was stirred; + The poet sat with half-shut eyes, + Nor saw, nor heard. + + And once across the heated close + Light laughter in a silver shower + Fell from fair lips: the poet rose + And cursed the hour. + + Men paled and sickened; half in fear, + There came to him at dusk of eve + One who but murmured in his ear + And plucked his sleeve: + + 'The king is filled with irks, distressed, + And bids thee hasten to his side; + For thou alone canst give him rest.' + The poet cried: + + 'Go, show the king this broken lute! + Even as it is, so am I! + The tree is perished to its root, + The fountain dry. + + 'What seeks he of the leafless tree, + The broken lute, the empty spring? + Yea, tho' he give his crown to me, + I cannot sing!' + + + II + + + That night there came from either hand + A sense of change upon the land; + A brooding stillness rustled through + With creeping winds that hardly blew; + A shadow from the looming west, + A stir of leaves, a dim unrest; + It seemed as if a spell had broke. + + And then the poet turned and woke + As from the darkness of a dream, + And with a smile divine supreme + Drew up his mantle fold on fold, + And strung his lute with strings of gold, + And bound the sandals to his feet, + And strode into the darkling street. + + Through crowds of murmuring men he hied, + With working lips and swinging stride, + And gleaming eyes and brow bent down; + Out of the great gate of the town + He hastened ever and passed on, + And ere the darkness came, was gone, + A mote beyond the western swell. + + And then the storm arose and fell + From wheeling shadows black with rain + That drowned the hills and strode the plain; + Round the grim mountain-heads it passed, + Down whistling valleys blast on blast, + Surged in upon the snapping trees, + And swept the shuddering villages. + + That night, when the fierce hours grew long, + Once more the monarch, old and grey, + Called for the poet and his song, + And called in vain. But far away, + By the wild mountain-gorges, stirred, + The shepherds in their watches heard, + Above the torrent's charge and clang, + The cleaving chant of one that sang. + + + + + A THUNDERSTORM + + + A moment the wild swallows like a flight + Of withered gust-caught leaves, serenely high, + Toss in the windrack up the muttering sky. + The leaves hang still. Above the weird twilight, + The hurrying centres of the storm unite + And spreading with huge trunk and rolling fringe, + Each wheeled upon its own tremendous hinge + Tower darkening on. And now from heaven's height + With the long roar of elm-trees swept and swayed, + And pelted waters, on the vanished plain + Plunges the blast. Behind the wild white flash + That splits abroad the pealing thunder-crash, + Over bleared fields and gardens disarrayed, + Column on column comes the drenching rain. + + + + + THE CITY + + + Canst thou not rest, O city, + That liest so wide and fair; + Shall never an hour bring pity, + Nor end be found for care? + + Thy walls are high in heaven, + Thy streets are gay and wide, + Beneath thy towers at even + The dreamy waters glide. + + Thou art fair as the hills at morning, + And the sunshine loveth thee, + But its light is a gloom of warning + On a soul no longer free. + + The curses of gold are about thee, + And thy sorrow deepeneth still; + One madness within and without thee, + One battle blind and shrill. + + I see the crowds for ever + Go by with hurrying feet; + Through doors that darken never + I hear the engines beat. + + Through days and nights that follow + The hidden mill-wheel strains; + In the midnight's windy hollow + I hear the roar of trains. + + And still the day fulfilleth, + And still the night goes round, + And the guest-hall boometh and shrilleth, + With the dance's mocking sound. + + In chambers of gold elysian, + The cymbals clash and clang, + But the days are gone like a vision + When the people wrought and sang. + + And toil hath fear for neighbour, + Where singing lips are dumb, + And life is one long labour, + Till death or freedom come. + + Ah! the crowds that for ever are flowing-- + They neither laugh nor weep-- + I see them coming and going, + Like things that move in sleep: + + Grey sires and burdened brothers, + The old, the young, the fair, + Wan cheeks of pallid mothers, + And the girls with golden hair. + + Care sits in many a fashion, + Grown grey on many a head, + And lips are turned to ashen + Whose years have right to red. + + Canst thou not rest, O city, + That liest so wide, so fair; + Shalt never an hour bring pity, + Nor end be found for care? + + + + + SAPPHICS + + + Clothed in splendour, beautifully sad and silent, + Comes the autumn over the woods and highlands, + Golden, rose-red, full of divine remembrance, + Full of foreboding. + + Soon the maples, soon will the glowing birches, + Stripped of all that summer and love had dowered them, + Dream, sad-limbed, beholding their pomp and treasure + Ruthlessly scattered: + + Yet they quail not: Winter with wind and iron + Comes and finds them silent and uncomplaining, + Finds them tameless, beautiful still and gracious, + Gravely enduring. + + Me too changes, bitter and full of evil, + Dream by dream have plundered and left me naked, + Grey with sorrow. Even the days before me + Fade into twilight, + + Mute and barren. Yet will I keep my spirit + Clear and valiant, brother to these my noble + Elms and maples, utterly grave and fearless, + Grandly ungrieving. + + Brief the span is, counting the years of mortals, + Strange and sad; it passes, and then the bright earth, + Careless mother, gleaming with gold and azure, + Lovely with blossoms-- + + Shining white anemones, mixed with roses, + Daisies mild-eyed, grasses and honeyed clover-- + You, and me, and all of us, met and equal, + Softly shall cover. + + + + + VOICES OF EARTH + + + We have not heard the music of the spheres, + The song of star to star, but there are sounds + More deep than human joy and human tears, + That Nature uses in her common rounds; + The fall of streams, the cry of winds that strain + The oak, the roaring of the sea's surge, might + Of thunder breaking afar off, or rain + That falls by minutes in the summer night. + These are the voices of earth's secret soul, + Uttering the mystery from which she came. + To him who hears them grief beyond control, + Or joy inscrutable without a name, + Wakes in his heart thoughts bedded there, impearled, + Before the birth and making of the world. + + + + + PECCAVI, DOMINE + + + O Power to whom this earthly clime + Is but an atom in the whole, + O Poet-heart of Space and Time, + O Maker and Immortal Soul, + Within whose glowing rings are bound, + Out of whose sleepless heart had birth + The cloudy blue, the starry round, + And this small miracle of earth: + + Who liv'st in every living thing, + And all things are thy script and chart, + Who rid'st upon the eagle's wing, + And yearnest in the human heart; + O Riddle with a single clue, + Love, deathless, protean, secure, + The ever old, the ever new, + O Energy, serene and pure. + + Thou, who art also part of me, + Whose glory I have sometime seen, + O Vision of the Ought-to-be, + O Memory of the Might-have-been, + I have had glimpses of thy way, + And moved with winds and walked with stars, + But, weary, I have fallen astray, + And, wounded, who shall count my scars? + + O Master, all my strength is gone; + Unto the very earth I bow; + I have no light to lead me on; + With aching heart and burning brow, + I lie as one that travaileth + In sorrow more than he can bear; + I sit in darkness as of death, + And scatter dust upon my hair. + + The God within my soul hath slept, + And I have shamed the nobler rule; + O Master, I have whined and crept; + O Spirit, I have played the fool. + Like him of old upon whose head + His follies hung in dark arrears, + I groan and travail in my bed, + And water it with bitter tears. + + I stand upon thy mountain-heads, + And gaze until mine eyes are dim; + The golden morning glows and spreads; + The hoary vapours break and swim. + I see thy blossoming fields, divine, + Thy shining clouds, thy blessed trees-- + And then that broken soul of mine-- + How much less beautiful than these! + + O Spirit, passionless, but kind, + Is there in all the world, I cry, + Another one so base and blind, + Another one so weak as I? + O Power, unchangeable, but just, + Impute this one good thing to me, + I sink my spirit to the dust + In utter dumb humility. + + + + + AN ODE TO THE HILLS + + 'I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence + cometh my help.'--PSALM CXXI. 1. + + + AEons ago ye were, + Before the struggling changeful race of man + Wrought into being, ere the tragic stir + Of human toil and deep desire began: + So shall ye still remain, + Lords of an elder and immutable race, + When many a broad metropolis of the plain, + Or thronging port by some renowned shore, + Is sunk in nameless ruin, and its place + Recalled no more. + + Empires have come and gone, + And glorious cities fallen in their prime; + Divine, far-echoing, names once writ in stone + Have vanished in the dust and void of time; + But ye, firm-set, secure, + Like Treasure in the hardness of God's palm, + Are yet the same for ever; ye endure + By virtue of an old slow-ripening word, + In your grey majesty and sovereign calm, + Untouched, unstirred. + + Tempest and thunderstroke, + With whirlwinds dipped in midnight at the core, + Have torn strange furrows through your forest cloak, + And made your hollow gorges clash and roar, + And scarred your brows in vain. + Around your barren heads and granite steeps + Tempestuous grey battalions of the rain + Charge and recharge, across the plateaued floors, + Drenching the serried pines; and the hail sweeps + Your pitiless scaurs. + + The long midsummer heat + Chars the thin leafage of your rocks in fire: + Autumn with windy robe and ruinous feet + On your wide forests wreaks his fell desire, + Heaping in barbarous wreck + The treasure of your sweet and prosperous days; + And lastly the grim tyrant, at whose beck + Channels are turned to stone and tempests wheel, + On brow and breast and shining shoulder lays + His hand of steel. + + And yet not harsh alone, + Nor wild, nor bitter are your destinies, + O fair and sweet, for all your heart of stone, + Who gather beauty round your Titan knees, + As the lens gathers light. + The dawn gleams rosy on your splendid brows, + The sun at noonday folds you in his might, + And swathes your forehead at his going down, + Last leaving, where he first in pride bestows, + His golden crown. + + In unregarded glooms, + Where hardly shall a human footstep pass, + Myriads of ferns and soft maianthemums, + Or lily-breathing slender pyrolas + Distil their hearts for you. + Far in your pine-clad fastnesses ye keep + Coverts the lonely thrush shall wander through, + With echoes that seem ever to recede, + Touching from pine to pine, from steep to steep, + His ghostly reed. + + The fierce things of the wild + Find food and shelter in your tenantless rocks, + The eagle on whose wings the dawn hath smiled, + The loon, the wild-cat, and the bright-eyed fox; + For far away indeed + Are all the ominous noises of mankind, + The slaughterer's malice and the trader's greed: + Your rugged haunts endure no slavery: + No treacherous hand is there to crush or bind, + But all are free. + + Therefore out of the stir + Of cities and the ever-thickening press + The poet and the worn philosopher + To your bare peaks and radiant loneliness + Escape, and breathe once more + The wind of the Eternal: that clear mood, + Which Nature and the elder ages bore, + Lends them new courage and a second prime, + At rest upon the cool infinitude + Of Space and Time. + + The mists of troublous days, + The horror of fierce hands and fraudful lips, + The blindness gathered in Life's aimless ways + Fade from them, and the kind Earth-spirit strips + The bandage from their eyes, + Touches their hearts and bids them feel and see; + Beauty and Knowledge with that rare apprise + Pour over them from some divine abode, + Falling as in a flood of memory, + The bliss of God. + + I too perchance some day, + When Love and Life have fallen far apart, + Shall slip the yoke and seek your upward way + And make my dwelling in your changeless heart; + And there in some quiet glade, + Some virgin plot of turf, some innermost dell, + Pure with cool water and inviolate shade, + I'll build a blameless altar to the dear + And kindly gods who guard your haunts so well + From hurt or fear. + + There I will dream day-long, + And honour them in many sacred ways, + With hushed melody and uttered song, + And golden meditation and with praise. + I'll touch them with a prayer, + To clothe my spirit as your might is clad + With all things bountiful, divine, and fair, + Yet inwardly to make me hard and true, + Wide-seeing, passionless, immutably glad, + And strong like you. + + + + + INDIAN SUMMER + + + The old grey year is near his term in sooth, + And now with backward eye and soft-laid palm + Awakens to a golden dream of youth, + A second childhood lovely and most calm, + And the smooth hour about his misty head + An awning of enchanted splendour weaves, + Of maples, amber, purple and rose-red, + And droop-limbed elms down-dropping golden leaves. + With still half-fallen lids he sits and dreams + Far in a hollow of the sunlit wood, + Lulled by the murmur of thin-threading streams, + Nor sees the polar armies overflood + The darkening barriers of the hills, nor hears + The north-wind ringing with a thousand spears. + + + + + GOOD SPEECH + + + Think not, because thine inmost heart means well, + Thou hast the freedom of rude speech: sweet words + Are like the voices of returning birds + Filling the soul with summer, or a bell + That calls the weary and the sick to prayer. + Even as thy thought, so let thy speech be fair. + + + + + THE BETTER DAY + + + Harsh thoughts, blind angers, and fierce hands, + That keep this restless world at strife, + Mean passions that, like choking sands, + Perplex the stream of life, + + Pride and hot envy and cold greed, + The cankers of the loftier will, + What if ye triumph, and yet bleed? + Ah, can ye not be still? + + Oh, shall there be no space, no time, + No century of weal in store, + No freehold in a nobler clime, + Where men shall strive no more? + + Where every motion of the heart + Shall serve the spirit's master-call, + Where self shall be the unseen part, + And human kindness all? + + Or shall we but by fits and gleams + Sink satisfied, and cease to rave, + Find love but in the rest of dreams, + And peace but in the grave? + + + + + WHITE PANSIES + + + Day and night pass over, rounding, + Star and cloud and sun, + Things of drift and shadow, empty + Of my dearest one. + + Soft as slumber was my baby, + Beaming bright and sweet; + Daintier than bloom or jewel + Were his hands and feet. + + He was mine, mine all, mine only, + Mine and his the debt; + Earth and Life and Time are changers; + I shall not forget. + + Pansies for my dear one--heartsease-- + Set them gently so; + For his stainless lips and forehead, + Pansies white as snow. + + Would that in the flower-grown little + Grave they dug so deep, + I might rest beside him, dreamless, + Smile no more, nor weep. + + + + + WE TOO SHALL SLEEP + + + Not, not for thee, + Beloved child, the burning grasp of life + Shall bruise the tender soul. The noise, and strife, + And clamour of midday thou shall not see; + But wrapt for ever in thy quiet grave, + Too little to have known the earthly lot, + Time's clashing hosts above thine innocent head, + Wave upon wave, + Shall break, or pass as with an army's tread, + And harm thee not. + + A few short years + We of the living flesh and restless brain + Shall plumb the deeps of life and know the strain, + The fleeting gleams of joy, the fruitless tears; + And then at last when all is touched and tried, + Our own immutable night shall fall, and deep + In the same silent plot, O little friend, + Side by thy side, + In peace that changeth not, nor knoweth end, + We too shall sleep. + + + + + THE AUTUMN WASTE + + + There is no break in all the wide grey sky, + Nor light on any field, and the wind grieves, + And talks of death. Where cold grey waters lie + Round greyer stones, and the new-fallen leaves + Heap the chill hollows of the naked woods, + A lisping moan, an inarticulate cry, + Creeps far among the charnel solitudes, + Numbing the waste with mindless misery. + In these bare paths, these melancholy lands, + What dream, or flesh, could ever have been young? + What lovers have gone forth with linked hands? + What flowers could ever have bloomed, what birds have sung? + Life, hopes, and human things seem wrapped away, + With shrouds and spectres, in one long decay. + + + + + VIVIA PERPETUA + + + Now being on the eve of death, discharged + From every mortal hope and earthly care, + I questioned how my soul might best employ + This hand, and this still wakeful flame of mind, + In the brief hours yet left me for their use; + Wherefore have I bethought me of my friend, + Of you, Philarchus, and your company, + Yet wavering in the faith and unconfirmed; + Perchance that I may break into thine heart + Some sorrowful channel for the love divine, + I make this simple record of our proof + In diverse sufferings for the name of Christ, + Whereof the end already for the most + Is death this day with steadfast faith endured. + + We were in prison many days, close-pent + In the black lower dungeon, housed with thieves + And murderers and divers evil men; + So foul a pressure, we had almost died, + Even there, in struggle for the breath of life + Amid the stench and unendurable heat; + Nor could we find each other save by voice + Or touch, to know that we were yet alive, + So terrible was the darkness. Yea, 'twas hard + To keep the sacred courage in our hearts, + When all was blind with that unchanging night, + And foul with death, and on our ears the taunts + And ribald curses of the soldiery + Fell mingled with the prisoners' cries, a load + Sharper to bear, more bitter than their blows. + At first, what with that dread of our abode, + Our sudden apprehension, and the threats + Ringing perpetually in our ears, we lost + The living fire of faith, and like poor hinds + Would have denied our Lord and fallen away. + Even Perpetua, whose joyous faith + Was in the later holier days to be + The stay and comfort of our weaker ones, + Was silent for long whiles. Perchance she shrank + In the mere sickness of the flesh, confused + And shaken by our new and horrible plight-- + The tender flesh, untempered and untried, + Not quickened yet nor mastered by the soul; + For she was of a fair and delicate make, + Most gently nurtured, to whom stripes and threats + And our foul prison-house were things undreamed. + But little by little as our spirits grew + Inured to suffering, with clasped hands, and tongues + That cheered each other to incessant prayer, + We rose and faced our trouble: we recalled + Our Master's sacred agony and death, + Setting before our eyes the high reward + Of steadfast faith, the martyr's deathless crown. + + So passed some days whose length and count we lost, + Our bitterest trial. Then a respite came. + One who had interest with the governor + Wrought our removal daily for some hours + Into an upper chamber, where we sat + And held each other's hands in childish joy, + Receiving the sweet gift of light and air + With wonder and exceeding thankfulness. + And then began that life of daily growth + In mutual exaltation and sweet help + That bore us as a gently widening stream + Unto the ocean of our martyrdom. + Uniting all our feebler souls in one-- + A mightier--we reached forth with this to God. + + Perpetua had been troubled for her babe, + Robbed of the breast and now these many days + Wasting for want of food; but when that change + Whereof I spake, of light and liberty + Relieved the horror of our prison gloom, + They brought it to her, and she sat apart, + And nursed and tended it, and soon the child + Would not be parted from her arms, but throve + And fattened, and she kept it night and day. + And always at her side with sleepless care + Hovered the young Felicitas--a slight + And spiritual figure--every touch and tone + Charged with premonitory tenderness, + Herself so near to her own motherhood. + Thus lightened and relieved, Perpetua + Recovered from her silent fit. Her eyes + Regained their former deep serenity, + Her tongue its gentle daring; for she knew + Her life should not be taken till her babe + Had strengthened and outgrown the need of her. + Daily we were amazed at her soft strength, + Her pliant and untroubled constancy, + Her smiling, soldierly contempt of death, + Her beauty and the sweetness of her voice. + + Her father, when our first few bitterest days + Were over, like a gust of grief and rage, + Came to her in the prison with wild eyes, + And cried: 'How mean you, daughter, when you say + You are a Christian? How can any one + Of honoured blood, the child of such as me, + Be Christian? 'Tis an odious name, the badge + Only of outcasts and rebellious slaves!' + And she, grief-touched, but with unyielding gaze, + Showing the fulness of her slender height: + 'This vessel, father, being what it is, + An earthen pitcher, would you call it thus? + Or would you name it by some other name?' + 'Nay, surely,' said the old man, catching breath, + And pausing, and she answered: 'Nor can I + Call myself aught but what I surely am-- + A Christian!' and her father, flashing back + In silent anger, left her for that time. + + A special favour to Perpetua + Seemed daily to be given, and her soul + Was made the frequent vessel of God's grace, + Wherefrom we all, less gifted, sore athirst, + Drank courage and fresh joy; for glowing dreams + Were sent her, full of forms august, and fraught + With signs and symbols of the glorious end + Whereto God's love hath aimed us for Christ's sake. + Once--at what hour I know not, for we lay + In that foul dungeon, where all hours were lost, + And day and night were indistinguishable-- + We had been sitting a long silent while, + Some lightly sleeping, others bowed in prayer, + When on a sudden, like a voice from God, + Perpetua spake to us and all were roused. + Her voice was rapt and solemn: 'Friends,' she said, + 'Some word hath come to me in a dream. I saw + A ladder leading to heaven, all of gold, + Hung up with lances, swords, and hooks. A land + Of darkness and exceeding peril lay + Around it, and a dragon fierce as hell + Guarded its foot. We doubted who should first + Essay it, but you, Saturus, at last-- + So God hath marked you for especial grace-- + Advancing and against the cruel beast + Aiming the potent weapon of Christ's name-- + Mounted, and took me by the hand, and I + The next one following, and so the rest + In order, and we entered with great joy + Into a spacious garden filled with light + And balmy presences of love and rest; + And there an old man sat, smooth-browed, white-haired, + Surrounded by unnumbered myriads + Of spiritual shapes and faces angel-eyed, + Milking his sheep; and lifting up his eyes + He welcomed us in strange and beautiful speech, + Unknown yet comprehended, for it flowed + Not through the ears, but forth-right to the soul, + God's language of pure love. Between the lips + Of each he placed a morsel of sweet curd; + And while the curd was yet within my mouth, + I woke, and still the taste of it remains, + Through all my body flowing like white flame, + Sweet as of some immaculate spiritual thing.' + And when Perpetua had spoken, all + Were silent in the darkness, pondering, + But Saturus spake gently for the rest: + 'How perfect and acceptable must be + Your soul to God, Perpetua, that thus + He bends to you, and through you speaks his will. + We know now that our martyrdom is fixed, + Nor need we vex us further for this life.' + + While yet these thoughts were bright upon our souls, + There came the rumour that a day was set + To hear us. Many of our former friends, + Some with entreaties, some with taunts and threats, + Came to us to pervert us; with the rest + Again Perpetua's father, worn with care; + Nor could we choose but pity his distress, + So miserably, with abject cries and tears, + He fondled her and called her 'Domina,' + And bowed his aged body at her feet, + Beseeching her by all the names she loved + To think of him, his fostering care, his years, + And also of her babe, whose life, he said, + Would fail without her; but Perpetua, + Sustaining by a gift of strength divine + The fulness of her noble fortitude, + Answered him tenderly: 'Both you and I, + And all of us, my father, at this hour + Are equally in God's hands, and what he wills + Must be'; but when the poor old man was gone + She wept, and knelt for many hours in prayer, + Sore tried and troubled by her tender heart. + + One day, while we were at our midday meal, + Our cell was entered by the soldiery, + And we were seized and borne away for trial. + A surging crowd had gathered, and we passed + From street to street, hemmed in by tossing heads + And faces cold or cruel; yet we caught + At moments from masked lips and furtive eyes + Of friends--some known to as and some unknown-- + Many veiled messages of love and praise. + The floorways of the long basilica + Fronted us with an angry multitude; + And scornful eyes and threatening foreheads frowned + In hundreds from the columned galleries. + We were placed all together at the bar, + And though at first unsteadied and confused + By the imperial presence of the law, + The pomp of judgment and the staring crowd, + None failed or faltered; with unshaken tongue + Each met the stern Proconsul's brief demand + In clear profession. Rapt as in a dream, + Scarce conscious of my turn, nor how I spake, + I watched with wondering eyes the delicate face + And figure of Perpetua; for her + We that were youngest of our company + Loved with a sacred and absorbing love, + A passion that our martyr's brotherly vow + Had purified and made divine. She stood + In dreamy contemplation, slightly bowed, + A glowing stillness that was near a smile + Upon her soft closed lips. Her turn had come, + When, like a puppet struggling up the steps, + Her father from the pierced and swaying crowd + Appeared, unveiling in his aged arms + The smiling visage of her babe. He grasped + Her robe, and strove to draw her down. All eyes + Were bent upon her. With a softening glance, + And voice less cold and heavy with death's doom, + The old Proconsul turned to her and said: + 'Lady, have pity on your father's age; + Be mindful of your tender babe; this grain + Of harmless incense offer for the peace + And welfare of the Emperor'; but she, + Lifting far forth her large and noteless eyes, + As one that saw a vision, only said: + 'I cannot sacrifice'; and he, harsh tongued, + Bending a brow upon her rough as rock, + With eyes that struck like steel, seeking to break + Or snare her with a sudden stroke of fear: + 'Art thou a Christian?' and she answered, 'Yea, + I am a Christian!' In brow-blackening wrath + He motioned a contemptuous hand and bade + The lictors scourge the old man down and forth + With rods, and as the cruel deed was done, + Perpetua stood white with quivering lips, + And her eyes filled with tears. While yet his cries + Were mingling with the curses of the crowd, + Hilarianus, calling name by name, + Gave sentence, and in cold and formal phrase + Condemned us to the beasts, and we returned + Rejoicing to our prison. Then we wished + Our martyrdom could soon have followed, not + As doubting for our constancy, but some + Grew sick under the anxious long suspense. + Perpetua again was weighed upon + By grief and trouble for her babe, whom now + Her father, seeking to depress her will, + Withheld and would not send it; but at length + Word being brought her that the child indeed + No longer suffered, nor desired the breast, + Her peace returned, and, giving thanks to God, + All were united in new bonds of hope. + Now being fixed in certitude of death, + We stripped our souls of all their earthly gear, + The useless raiment of this world; and thus, + Striving together with a single will, + In daily increment of faith and power, + We were much comforted by heavenly dreams, + And waking visitations of God's grace. + Visions of light and glory infinite + Were frequent with us, and by night or day + Woke at the very name of Christ the Lord, + Taken at any moment on our lips; + So that we had no longer thought or care + Of life or of the living, but became + As spirits from this earth already freed, + Scarce conscious of the dwindling weight of flesh. + To Saturus appeared in dreams the space + And splendour of the heavenly house of God, + The glowing gardens of eternal joy, + The halls and chambers of the cherubim, + In wreaths of endless myriads involved + The blinding glory of the angel choir, + Rolling through deeps of wheeling cloud and light + The thunder of their vast antiphonies. + The visions of Perpetua not less + Possessed us with their homely tenderness-- + As one, wherein she saw a rock-set pool + And weeping o'er its rim a little child, + Her brother, long since dead, Dinocrates: + Though sore athirst, he could not reach the stream, + Being so small, and her heart grieved thereat. + She looked again, and lo! the pool had risen, + And the child filled his goblet, and drank deep, + And prattling in a tender childish joy + Ran gaily off, as infants do, to play. + By this she knew his soul had found release + From torment, and had entered into bliss. + + Quickly as by a merciful gift of God, + Our vigil passed unbroken. Yesternight + They moved us to the amphitheatre, + Our final lodging-place on earth, and there + We sat together at our agape + For the last time. In silence, rapt and pale, + We hearkened to the aged Saturus, + Whose speech, touched with a ghostly eloquence, + Canvassed the fraud and littleness of life, + God's goodness and the solemn joy of death. + Perpetua was silent, but her eyes + Fell gently upon each of us, suffused + With inward and eradiant light; a smile + Played often upon her lips. + + While yet we sat, + A tribune with a band of soldiery + Entered our cell, and would have had us bound + In harsher durance, fearing our escape + By fraud or witchcraft; but Perpetua, + Facing him gently with a noble note + Of wonder in her voice, and on her lips + A lingering smile of mournful irony: + 'Sir, are ye not unwise to harass us, + And rob us of our natural food and rest? + Should ye not rather tend us with soft care, + And so provide a comely spectacle? + We shall not honour Caesar's birthday well, + If we be waste and weak, a piteous crew, + Poor playthings for your proud and pampered beasts.' + The noisy tribune, whether touched indeed, + Or by her grave and tender grace abashed, + Muttered and stormed a while, and then withdrew. + The short night passed in wakeful prayer for some, + For others in brief sleep, broken by dreams + And spiritual visitations. Earliest dawn + Found us arisen, and Perpetua, + Moving about with smiling lips, soft-tongued, + Besought us to take food; lest so, she said, + For all the strength and courage of our hearts, + Our bodies should fall faint. We heard without, + Already ere the morning light was full, + The din of preparation, and the hum + Of voices gathering in the upper tiers; + Yet had we seen so often in our thoughts + The picture of this strange and cruel death, + Its festal horror, and its bloody pomp, + The nearness scarcely moved us, and our hands + Met in a steadfast and unshaken clasp. + + The day is over. Ah, my friend, how long + With its wild sounds and bloody sights it seemed! + Night comes, and I am still alive--even I, + The least and last--with other two, reserved + To grace to-morrow's second day. The rest + Have suffered and with holy rapture passed + Into their glory. Saturus and the men + Were given to bears and leopards, but the crowd + Feasted their eyes upon no cowering shape, + Nor hue of fear, nor painful cry. They died + Like armed men, face foremost to the beasts, + With prayers and sacred songs upon their lips. + Perpetua and the frail Felicitas + Were seized before our eyes and roughly stripped, + And shrinking and entreating, not for fear, + Nor hurt, but bitter shame, were borne away + Into the vast arena, and hung up + In nets, naked before the multitude, + For a fierce bull, maddened by goads, to toss. + Some sudden tumult of compassion seized + The crowd, and a great murmur like a wave + Rose at the sight, and grew, and thundered up + From tier to tier, deep and imperious: + So white, so innocent they were, so pure: + Their tender limbs so eloquent of shame; + And so our loved ones were brought back, all faint, + And covered with light raiment, and again + Led forth, and now with smiling lips they passed + Pale, but unbowed, into the awful ring, + Holding each other proudly by the hand. + + Perpetua first was tossed, and her robe rent, + But, conscious only of the glaring eyes, + She strove to hide herself as best she could + In the torn remnants of her flimsy robe, + And putting up her hands clasped back her hair, + So that she might not die as one in grief, + Unseemly and dishevelled. Then she turned, + And in her loving arms caressed and raised + The dying, bruised Felicitas. Once more + Gored by the cruel beast, they both were borne + Swooning and mortally stricken from the field. + Perpetua, pale and beautiful, her lips + Parted as in a lingering ecstasy, + Could not believe the end had come, but asked + When they were to be given to the beasts. + The keepers gathered round her--even they-- + In wondering pity--while with fearless hand, + Bidding us all be faithful and stand firm, + She bared her breast, and guided to its goal + The gladiator's sword that pierced her heart. + + The night is passing. In a few short hours + I too shall suffer for the name of Christ. + A boundless exaltation lifts my soul! + I know that they who left us, Saturus, + Perpetua, and the other blessed ones, + Await me at the opening gates of heaven. + + + + + THE MYSTERY OF A YEAR + + + A little while, a year agone, + I knew her for a romping child, + A dimple and a glance that shone + With idle mischief when she smiled. + + To-day she passed me in the press, + And turning with a quick surprise + I wondered at her stateliness, + I wondered at her altered eyes. + + To me the street was just the same, + The people and the city's stir; + But life had kindled into flame, + And all the world was changed for her. + + I watched her in the crowded ways, + A noble form, a queenly head, + With all the woman in her gaze, + The conscious woman in her tread. + + + + + WINTER EVENING + + + To-night the very horses springing by + Toss gold from whitened nostrils. In a dream + The streets that narrow to the westward gleam + Like rows of golden palaces; and high + From all the crowded chimneys tower and die + A thousand aureoles. Down in the west + The brimming plains beneath the sunset rest, + One burning sea of gold. Soon, soon shall fly + The glorious vision, and the hours shall feel + A mightier master; soon from height to height, + With silence and the sharp unpitying stars, + Stern creeping frosts, and winds that touch like steel, + Out of the depth beyond the eastern bars, + Glittering and still shall come the awful night. + + + + + WAR + + + By the Nile, the sacred river, + I can see the captive hordes + Strain beneath the lash and quiver + At the long papyrus cords, + While in granite rapt and solemn, + Rising over roof and column, + Amen-hotep dreams, or Ramses, + Lord of Lords. + + I can hear the trumpets waken + For a victory old and far-- + Carchemish or Kadesh taken-- + I can see the conqueror's car + Bearing down some Hittite valley, + Where the bowmen break and sally, + Sargina or Esarhaddon, + Grim with war! + + From the mountain streams that sweeten + Indus, to the Spanish foam, + I can feel the broad earth beaten + By the serried tramp of Rome; + Through whatever foes environ + Onward with the might of iron-- + Veni, vidi; veni, vici-- + Crashing home! + + I can see the kings grow pallid + With astonished fear and hate, + As the hosts of Amr or Khaled + On their cities fall like fate; + Like the heat-wind from its prison + In the desert burst and risen-- + La ilaha illah 'llahu-- + God is great! + + I can hear the iron rattle, + I can see the arrows sting + In some far-off northern battle, + Where the long swords sweep and swing; + I can hear the scalds declaiming, + I can see their eyeballs flaming, + Gathered in a frenzied circle + Round the king. + + I can hear the horn of Uri + Roaring in the hills enorm; + Kindled at its brazen fury, + I can see the clansmen form; + In the dawn in misty masses, + Pouring from the silent passes + Over Granson or Morgarten + Like the storm. + + On the lurid anvil ringing + To some slow fantastic plan, + I can hear the sword-smith singing + In the heart of old Japan-- + Till the cunning blade grows tragic + With his malice and his magic-- + Tenka tairan! Tenka tairan! + War to man! + + Where a northern river charges + By a wild and moonlit glade, + From the murky forest marges, + Round a broken palisade, + I can see the red men leaping, + See the sword of Daulac sweeping, + And the ghostly forms of heroes + Fall and fade. + + I can feel the modern thunder + Of the cannon beat and blaze, + When the lines of men go under + On your proudest battle-days; + Through the roar I hear the lifting + Of the bloody chorus drifting + Round the burning mill at Valmy-- + Marseillaise! + + I can see the ocean rippled + With the driving shot like rain, + While the hulls are crushed and crippled, + And the guns are piled with slain; + O'er the blackened broad sea-meadow + Drifts a tall and titan shadow, + And the cannon of Trafalgar + Startle Spain. + + Still the tides of fight are booming, + And the barren blood is spilt; + Still the banners are up-looming, + And the hands are on the hilt; + But the old world waxes wiser, + From behind the bolted visor + It descries at last the horror + And the guilt. + + Yet the eyes are dim, nor wholly + Open to the golden gleam, + And the brute surrenders slowly + To the godhead and the dream. + From his cage of bar and girder, + Still at moments mad with murder, + Leaps the tiger, and his demon + Rules supreme. + + One more war with fire and famine + Gathers--I can hear its cries-- + And the years of might and Mammon + Perish in a world's demise; + When the strength of man is shattered, + And the powers of earth are scattered, + From beneath the ghastly ruin + Peace shall rise! + + + + + THE WOODCUTTER'S HUT + + + Far up in the wild and wintery hills in the heart of the cliff-broken + woods, + Where the mounded drifts lie soft and deep in the noiseless solitudes, + The hut of the lonely woodcutter stands, a few rough beams that show + A blunted peak and a low black line, from the glittering waste of snow. + In the frost-still dawn from his roof goes up in the windless, + motionless air, + The thin, pink curl of leisurely smoke; through the forest white and + bare + The woodcutter follows his narrow trail, and the morning rings and + cracks + With the rhythmic jet of his sharp-blown breath and the echoing shout of + his axe. + Only the waft of the wind besides, or the stir of some hardy bird-- + The call of the friendly chickadee, or the pat of the nuthatch--is + heard; + Or a rustle comes from a dusky clump, where the busy siskins feed, + And scatter the dimpled sheet of the snow with the shells of the + cedar-seed. + Day after day the woodcutter toils untiring with axe and wedge, + Till the jingling teams come up from the road that runs by the valley's + edge, + With plunging of horses, and hurling of snow, and many a shouted word, + And carry away the keen-scented fruit of his cutting, cord upon cord. + Not the sound of a living foot comes else, not a moving visitant there, + Save the delicate step of some halting doe, or the sniff of a prowling + bear. + And only the stars are above him at night, and the trees that creak and + groan, + And the frozen, hard-swept mountain-crests with their silent fronts of + stone, + As he watches the sinking glow of his fire and the wavering flames + upcaught, + Cleaning his rifle or mending his moccasins, sleepy and slow of + thought. + Or when the fierce snow comes, with the rising wind, from the grey + north-east, + He lies through the leaguering hours in his bunk like a winter-hidden + beast, + Or sits on the hard-packed earth, and smokes by his draught-blown + guttering fire, + Without thought or remembrance, hardly awake, and waits for the storm + to tire. + Scarcely he hears from the rock-rimmed heights to the wild ravines + below, + Near and far-off, the limitless wings of the tempest hurl and go + In roaring gusts that plunge through the cracking forest, and lull, + and lift, + All day without stint and all night long with the sweep of the hissing + drift. + But winter shall pass ere long with its hills of snow and its fettered + dreams, + And the forest shall glimmer with living gold, and chime with the + gushing of streams; + Millions of little points of plants shall prick through its matted + floor, + And the wind-flower lift and uncurl her silken buds by the woodman's + door; + The sparrow shall see and exult; but lo! as the spring draws gaily on, + The woodcutter's hut is empty and bare, and the master that made it is + gone. + He is gone where the gathering of valley men another labour yields, + To handle the plough, and the harrow, and scythe, in the heat of the + summer fields. + He is gone with his corded arms, and his ruddy face, and his moccasined + feet, + The animal man in his warmth and vigour, sound, and hard, and complete. + And all summer long, round the lonely hut, the black earth burgeons and + breeds, + Till the spaces are filled with the tall-plumed ferns and the triumphing + forest-weeds; + The thick wild raspberries hem its walls, and, stretching on either + hand, + The red-ribbed stems and the giant-leaves of the sovereign spikenard + stand. + So lonely and silent it is, so withered and warped with the sun and + snow, + You would think it the fruit of some dead man's toil a hundred years + ago; + And he who finds it suddenly there, as he wanders far and alone, + Is touched with a sweet and beautiful sense of something tender and + gone, + The sense of a struggling life in the waste, and the mark of a soul's + command, + The going and coming of vanished feet, the touch of a human hand. + + + + + AMOR VITAE + + + I love the warm bare earth and all + That works and dreams thereon: + I love the seasons yet to fall: + I love the ages gone, + + The valleys with the sheeted grain, + The river's smiling might, + The merry wind, the rustling rain, + The vastness of the night. + + I love the morning's flame, the steep + Where down the vapour clings: + I love the clouds that float and sleep, + And every bird that sings. + + I love the purple shower that pours + On far-off fields at even: + I love the pine-wood dusk whose floors + Are like the courts of heaven. + + I love the heaven's azure span, + The grass beneath my feet: + I love the face of every man + Whose thought is swift and sweet. + + I let the wrangling world go by, + And like an idle breath + Its echoes and its phantoms fly: + I care no jot for death. + + Time like a Titan bright and strong + Spreads one enchanted gleam: + Each hour is but a fluted song, + And life a lofty dream. + + + + + WINTER-BREAK + + + All day between high-curded clouds the sun + Shone down like summer on the steaming planks. + The long, bright icicles in dwindling ranks + Dripped from the murmuring eaves till one by one + They fell. As if the spring had now begun, + The quilted snow, sun-softened to the core, + Loosened and shunted with a sudden roar + From downward roofs. Not even with day done + Had ceased the sound of waters, but all night + I heard it. In my dreams forgetfully bright + Methought I wandered in the April woods, + Where many a silver-piping sparrow was, + By gurgling brooks and spouting solitudes, + And stooped, and laughed, and plucked hepaticas. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Alcyone, by Archibald Lampman + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ALCYONE *** + +***** This file should be named 22833.txt or 22833.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/2/8/3/22833/ + +Produced by Thierry Alberto, V. L. 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