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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/39032-h.zip b/39032-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..2788e61 --- /dev/null +++ b/39032-h.zip diff --git a/39032-h/39032-h.htm b/39032-h/39032-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1775dc3 --- /dev/null +++ b/39032-h/39032-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,2796 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of Songs Ysame, by Annie Fellows Johnstone and Albion Fellows Bacon. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> + + p {margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + text-indent: 1.25em; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + img {border: 0;} + .tnote {border: dashed 1px; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; padding-bottom: .5em; padding-top: .5em; + padding-left: .5em; padding-right: .5em;} + ins {text-decoration:none; border-bottom: thin dotted gray;} + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + hr { margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + + table {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + .pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; + } /* page numbers */ + .copyright {text-align: center; font-size: 70%;} + .blockquot{margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%; text-align: justify;} + + .bbox {border: solid 2px; margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; padding-bottom: .5em; padding-top: .5em; + padding-left: .5em; padding-right: .5em;} + .small {font-size: 70%;} + .big {font-size: 110%;} + .adtitle2 {font-size: 150%; font-weight: bold; text-align: center;} + .adtitle {font-size: 200%; font-weight: bold; text-align: center;} + + .author {font-size: 150%; text-align: center;} + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + .chaptertitle {text-align: center; font-size: 110%; font-weight: bold; margin-bottom: 1.5em;} + + .caption {font-weight: bold; font-size: 90%;} + + .figcenter {margin: auto; text-align: center;} + + .figleft {float: left; clear: left; margin-left: 0; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: + 1em; margin-right: 1em; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .figright {float: right; clear: right; margin-left: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-top: 1em; margin-right: 0; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .unindent {margin-top: .75em; margin-left: 4em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + .right {text-align: right;} + .poem {margin-left: 30%; text-align: left;} + .poem2 {margin-left: 15%; text-align: left;} + .sig {margin-right: 40%; text-align: right;} + .place {margin-left: 30%; text-align: left;} + + + .footnotes {border: dashed 1px;} + .footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + .fnanchor {vertical-align:baseline; + position: relative; + bottom: 0.33em; + font-size: .8em; + text-decoration: none;} + .hang1 {text-indent: -3em; margin-left: 3em;} + .cap:first-letter {float: left; clear: left; margin: -0.2em 0.1em 0; margin-top: 0%; + padding: 0; line-height: .75em; font-size: 300%; text-align: justify;} + .cap {text-align: justify;} + + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Songs Ysame, by +Annie Fellows Johnston and Albion Fellows Bacon + +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: Songs Ysame + +Author: Annie Fellows Johnston + Albion Fellows Bacon + +Release Date: March 3, 2012 [EBook #39032] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SONGS YSAME *** + + + + +Produced by David Edwards, Emmy and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive) + + + + + + +</pre> + + + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_i" id="Page_i">[i]</a></span></p><div class="figcenter" style="width: 310px;"> +<img src="images/cover.jpg" width="310" height="500" alt="Cover" title="" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ii" id="Page_ii">[ii]</a></span></p> +<h1>SONGS YSAME</h1> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><div class='bbox'> +<div class='adtitle2'><div class='center'><b>Dainty Volumes of Poetry</b></div></div> + + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 25px;"> +<img src="images/booklist.png" width="25" height="27" alt="decoration" title="" /> +</div> + +<div class='center'><b>Price, per volume, $1.25</b></div> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 25px;"> +<img src="images/booklist.png" width="25" height="27" alt="decoration" title="" /> +</div> + +<div class='unindent'><br /><b>GOLDEN TREASURY OF AMERICAN SONGS AND LYRICS.</b></div> + +<div class='center'>Edited by <span class="smcap">F. L. Knowles</span>.</div> + +<div class='unindent'><br /><b>CAP AND GOWN. First Series.</b></div> + +<div class='center'>Edited by <span class="smcap">J. L. Harrison</span>.</div> + +<div class='unindent'><br /><b>CAP AND GOWN. Second Series.</b></div> + +<div class='center'>Edited by <span class="smcap">F. L. Knowles</span>.</div> + +<div class='unindent'><br /><b>SONGS YSAME.</b></div> + +<div class='center'>By <span class="smcap">Annie Fellows Johnston</span> and +<span class="smcap">Albion Fellows Bacon</span>.</div> + +<div class='unindent'><br /><b>OUT OF THE HEART.</b></div> + +<div class='center'>Edited by <span class="smcap">J. W. Chadwick</span>.</div> + + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 25px;"> +<img src="images/booklist.png" width="25" height="27" alt="decoration" title="" /> +</div> + +<div class='center'> +<span class='big'>L. C. PAGE AND COMPANY, Publishers</span><br /> +<span class='small'>(INCORPORATED)</span><br /> +196 Summer Street, Boston<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_iii" id="Page_iii">[iii]</a></span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 299px;"> +<img src="images/frontis.jpg" width="299" height="450" alt="Motherhood" title="" /> +<span class="caption">Motherhood</span> +</div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_iv" id="Page_iv">[iv]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h1>SONGS YSAME</h1> + +<div class='center'>BY<br /> +<span class='author'>ANNIE FELLOWS JOHNSTON</span><br /> +AND<br /> +<span class='author'>ALBION FELLOWS BACON</span><br /><br /><br /></div> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 214px;"> +<img src="images/titlepage.png" width="214" height="260" alt="Emblem" title="" /> +</div> + +<div class='center'><br /><br /><br /><br /> +BOSTON<br /> +L. C. PAGE AND COMPANY<br /> +<span class='small'>(INCORPORATED)</span><br /> +MDCCCXCVII<br /></div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[v]</a></span></p> + + + + +<div class='copyright'> +<i>Copyright, 1897</i>,<br /> +<span class="smcap">By L. C. Page and Company</span><br /> +<br /> +<span class='small'>(INCORPORATED)</span><br /> +<br /><br /> +<b>Colonial Press:</b><br /> + +<span class='small'>Electrotyped and Printed by C. H. Simonds & Co.</span><br /> +<span class='small'>Boston, Mass., U. S. A.</span><br /> +</div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi">[vi]</a></span></p> + + + + +<div class='center'> +TO<br /> +<br /> +<b>Our Mother</b><br /> +<span class="smcap">Mary Erskine Fellows</span><br /> +</div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[vii]</a></span></p> + + + + +<h2>CONTENTS.</h2> + + + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="Contents"> +<tr><td align='center'>ANNIE FELLOWS JOHNSTON</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'></td><td align='right'><span class='small'>PAGE</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><a name="FNanchor_A_1" id="FNanchor_A_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_A_1" class="fnanchor">[A]</a><span class="smcap">At a Tenement Window</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_53">53</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><a href="#Footnote_A_1" class="fnanchor">[A]</a><span class="smcap">At Early Candle-lighting</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_18">18</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Banditti</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_65">65</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><a name="FNanchor_B_2" id="FNanchor_B_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_B_2" class="fnanchor">[B]</a>"<span class="smcap">Bob White</span>"</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_25">25</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Echoes from Erin</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_47">47</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Elinor</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_114">114</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><a href="#Footnote_B_2" class="fnanchor">[B]</a><span class="smcap">Felipa, Wife of Columbus</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_60">60</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Interlude</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_79">79</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">In this Cradle-life of Ours</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_74">74</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">My Carol</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_71">71</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">October</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_88">88</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">On a Fly-leaf of "Afterwhiles"</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_118">118</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">On a Fly-leaf of "Flute and Violin" </span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_115">115</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Prelude (Now I Can Sing, etc.)</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_xiii">xiii</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Retrospection</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_45">45</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Spendthrift</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_67">67</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Fickle Heart</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_64">64</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Legend of the Pansies</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_102">102</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[viii]</a></span><a href="#Footnote_A_1" class="fnanchor">[A]</a><span class="smcap">Through an Amber Pane</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_50">50</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Trailing Arbutus</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_100">100</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">'Twixt Creek and Bay</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_62">62</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Voices of the Old, Old Days</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_39">39</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='center'><br />ALBION FELLOWS BACON.</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Madrigal</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_98">98</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><a name="FNanchor_C_3" id="FNanchor_C_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_C_3" class="fnanchor">[C]</a><span class="smcap">A Mood</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_101">101</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Resolve</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_123">123</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Song</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_55">55</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">An Alpine Valley</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_49">49</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">An Old-time Pedagogue</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_31">31</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">At Last</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_125">125</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">At Twilight</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_90">90</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Chiaro-Oscuro</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_120">120</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Eclipse</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_57">57</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Elizabeth</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_113">113</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Grandfather</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_27">27</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Her Title-deeds</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_34">34</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Here and There</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_75">75</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">In the Dark</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_58">58</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Inspiration</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_116">116</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Left Out</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_95">95</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Lost</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_69">69</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">May-time</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_84">84</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Married</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_108">108</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[ix]</a></span><span class="smcap">Motherhood</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_109">109</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>"<span class="smcap">Oh, Dreary Day</span>"</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_83">83</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">On a Fly-leaf of Irving</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_117">117</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Ophelia</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_111">111</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>"<span class="smcap">Our Father</span>"</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_97">97</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Prelude (We Cannot Sing, etc.)</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_xiii">xiii</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Requiem</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_112">112</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Silent Keys</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_41">41</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Spring's Cophetua</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_86">86</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Stranded</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_124">124</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Sufficiency</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_110">110</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Lighting of the Candles</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_17">17</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Milky Way</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_76">76</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Old Bell</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_106">106</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Old Church</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_29">29</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Potter's Field</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_93">93</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Prophet</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_91">91</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Robber</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_70">70</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Sea</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_107">107</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Silent Brotherhood</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_66">66</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Time o' Day</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_99">99</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Tower of Babel</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_104">104</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Winter Beauty</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_87">87</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">When Youth is Gone</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_63">63</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span class="smcap">When She Comes Home</span></td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_122">122</a></td></tr> +</table><br /><br /></div> +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_A_1" id="Footnote_A_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_A_1"><span class="label">[A]</span></a> By permission of <i>Youth's Companion</i>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_B_2" id="Footnote_B_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_B_2"><span class="label">[B]</span></a> By permission of <i>Harper's Weekly</i>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_C_3" id="Footnote_C_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_C_3"><span class="label">[C]</span></a> By permission of <i>Frank Leslie</i>.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[x]</a></span></p></div> +</div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xiii" id="Page_xiii">[xiii]</a></span></p> +<h2>PRELUDE.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +<i>WE cannot sing of life, whose years are brief,<br /> +Nor sad heart-stories tell, who know no grief,<br /> +Nor write of shipwrecks on the seas of Fate,<br /> +Whose ship from out the harbor sailed but late.<br /> +But we may sing of fair and sunny days,<br /> +Of Love that walks in peace through quiet ways;<br /> +And unto him who turns the page to see<br /> +Our simple story, haply it may be<br /> +As when in some mild day in early spring,<br /> +One through the budding woods goes wandering;<br /> +And finds, where late the snow has blown across,<br /> +Beneath the leaves, a violet in the moss.</i><br /> + + +<span style="margin-left: 2em;"><i>1887.</i></span> + + +<i>A. F. B.</i><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> +</div></div> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +<i>NOW I can sing of life, whose days are brief,<br /> +For I have walked close hand in hand with grief.<br /> +And I may tell of shipwrecked hopes, since mine<br /> +Sank just outside the happy harbor line.<br /> +But still my song is of those sunny days<br /> +When Love was with me in those quiet ways.<br /> +And unto him who turns the page to see<br /> +That day's short story, haply it may be,<br /> +The joy of those old memories he feels:<br /> +As one who through the wintry twilight steals,<br /> +And sees, across the chilly wastes of snow,<br /> +The darkened sunset's rosy afterglow.</i><br /> + + +<span style="margin-left: 2em;"><i>1892.</i></span> +<i>A. F. J.</i><br /></div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xiv" id="Page_xiv">[xiv]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span></p> +<h2>PART I.</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>SONGS YSAME</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>The Lighting of the Candles.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +WHENCE came the ember<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That touched our young souls' candles first with light;</span><br /> +In shadowy years, too distant to remember,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Where childhood merges backward into night?</span><br /> +<br /> +I know not, but the halo of those tapers<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Has ever since around all nature shone;</span><br /> +And we have looked at life through golden vapors<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Because of that one ember touch alone.</span><br /> +</div></div> + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span></p> + +<h2>At Early Candle-Lighting.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +THOSE, who have heard the whispered breath<br /> +Of Nature's secret "Shibboleth,"<br /> +And learned the pass-word to unroll<br /> +The veil that hides her inmost soul,<br /> +May follow; but this by-path leads<br /> +Through mullein stalks and jimson-weeds.<br /> +And he who scorning treads them down<br /> +Would deem but poor and common-place<br /> +Those whom he'll meet in homespun gown.<br /> +But they who lovingly retrace<br /> +Their steps to scenes I dream about,<br /> +Will find the latch-string hanging out.<br /> +With them I claim companionship,<br /> +And for them burn my tallow-dip,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">At early candle-lighting.</span><br /> +<br /> +To these low hills, around which cling<br /> +My fondest thoughts, I would not bring<br /> +An alien eye long used to sights<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span>Among the snow-crowned Alpine heights.<br /> +An eagle does not bend its wing<br /> +To low-built nests where robins sing.<br /> +Between the fence's zigzag rails,<br /> +The stranger sees the road that trails<br /> +Its winding way into the dark,<br /> +Fern-scented woods. He does not mark<br /> +The old log cabin at the end<br /> +As I, or hail it as a friend,<br /> +Or catch, when daylight's last rays wane,<br /> +The glimmer through its narrow pane<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Of early candle-lighting.</span><br /> +<br /> +As anglers sit and half in dream<br /> +Dip lazy lines into the stream,<br /> +And watch the swimming life below,<br /> +So I watch pictures come and go.<br /> +And in the flame, Alladin-wise,<br /> +See genii of the past arise.<br /> +If it be so that common things<br /> +Can fledge your fancy with fast wings;<br /> +If you the language can translate<br /> +Of lowly life, and make it great,<br /> +And can the beauty understand<br /> +That dignifies a toil-worn hand,<br /> +Look in this halo, and see how<br /> +The homely seems transfigured now<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 2em;">At early candle-lighting.</span><br /> +<br /> +A fire-place where the great logs roar<br /> +And shine across the puncheon floor,<br /> +And through the chinked walls, here and there,<br /> +The snow steals, and the frosty air.<br /> +Meager and bare the furnishings,<br /> +But hospitality that kings<br /> +Might well dispense, transmutes to gold,<br /> +The welcome given young and old.<br /> +Plain and uncouth in speech and dress,<br /> +But richly clad in kindliness,<br /> +The neighbors gather, one by one,<br /> +At rustic rout when day is done.<br /> +Vanish all else in this soft light,—<br /> +The past is ours again tonight;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">'Tis early candle-lighting.</span><br /> +<br /> +Oh, well-remembered scenes like these:<br /> +The candy-pullings, husking-bees—<br /> +The evenings when the quilting frames<br /> +Were laid aside for romping games;<br /> +The singing school! The spelling match!<br /> +My hand still lingers on the latch,<br /> +I fain would wider swing the door<br /> +And enter with the guests once more.<br /> +Though into ashes long ago<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span>That fire faded, still the glow<br /> +That warmed the hearts around it met,<br /> +Immortal, burns within me yet.<br /> +Still to that cabin in the wood<br /> +I turn for highest types of good<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">At early candle-lighting.</span><br /> +<br /> +How fast the scenes come flocking to<br /> +My mind, as white sheep jostle through<br /> +The gap, when pasture bars are down,<br /> +And pass into the twilight brown.<br /> +Grandmother's face and snowy cap,<br /> +The knitting work upon her lap,<br /> +The creaking, high-backed rocking-chair;<br /> +The <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'spining'">spinning</ins>-wheel, the big loom where<br /> +The shuttle carried song and thread;<br /> +The valance on the high, white bed<br /> +Whose folds the lavender still keep.<br /> +Oh! nowhere else such dreamless sleep<br /> +On tired eyes its deep spell lays,<br /> +As that which came in those old days<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">At early candle-lighting.</span><br /> +<br /> +A kitchen lit by one dim light,<br /> +And 'round the table in affright,<br /> +A group of children telling tales.<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span>Outside, the wind—a banshee—wails.<br /> +Even the shadows, that they throw<br /> +Upon the walls, to giants grow.<br /> +The hailstones 'gainst the window panes<br /> +Fall with the noise of clanking chains,<br /> +Till, glancing back, they almost feel<br /> +Black shapes from out the corners steal,<br /> +And, climbing to the loft o'erhead,<br /> +The witches follow them to bed.<br /> +The low flame flickers. Snuff the wick!<br /> +For ghosts and goblins crowd so thick<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">At early candle-lighting.</span><br /> +<br /> +An orchard path that tramping feet<br /> +For half a century have beat;<br /> +Here to the fields at sun-up went<br /> +The reapers. Here, on errands sent,<br /> +Small bare-feet loitered, loath to go.<br /> +Here apple-boughs dropped blooming snow,<br /> +Through garden borders gaily set<br /> +With touch-me-nots and bouncing Bet;<br /> +Here passed at dusk the harvester<br /> +With quickened step and pulse astir<br /> +At sight of some one's fluttering gown,<br /> +Who stood with sunbonnet pulled down<br /> +And called the cows. Ah, in a glance<br /> +One reads that simple, old romance<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 2em;">At early candle-lighting.</span><br /> +<br /> +One picture more. A winter day<br /> +Just done, and supper cleared away.<br /> +The romping children quiet grow,<br /> +And in the reverent silence, slow<br /> +The old man turns the sacred page,<br /> +Guide of his life and staff of age.<br /> +And then, the while my eyes grow dim,<br /> +The mother's voice begins a hymn:<br /> +"<i>Sweet hour of prayer, sweet hour of prayer<br /> +That calls me from a world of care!</i>"<br /> +What wonder from those cabins rude<br /> +Came lives of stalwart rectitude,<br /> +When hearth-stones were the altars where<br /> +Arose the vestal flame of prayer<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">At early candle-lighting.</span><br /> +<br /> +No crumbling castle walls are ours,<br /> +No ruined battlements and towers.<br /> +Our history, on callow wings,<br /> +Soared not in time of feudal kings;<br /> +No strolling minstrel's roundelay<br /> +Tells of past glory in decay,<br /> +But rugged life of pioneer<br /> +Has passed away among us here;<br /> +And as the ivy tendrils grow<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span>About the ancient turrets, so<br /> +The influence of its sturdy truth<br /> +Shall live in never-ending youth,<br /> +When simple customs of its day<br /> +Have, long-forgotten, passed away<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">With early candle-lighting.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span></p> +<h2>Bob White.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +JUST now, beyond the turmoil and the din<br /> +Of crowded streets that city walls shut in,<br /> +I heard the whistle of a quail begin:<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">"Bob White! Bob White!"</span><br /> +So faintly and far away falling<br /> +It seemed that a dream voice was calling<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">"Bob White! Bob White!"</span><br /> +How the old sights and sounds come thronging<br /> +And thrill me with a sudden longing!<br /> +<br /> +Through quiet country lanes the sunset shines.<br /> +Fence corners where the wild rose climbs and twines,<br /> +And blooms in tangled black-berry vines,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">"Bob White! Bob White!"</span><br /> +I envy yon home-going swallow,<br /> +Oh, but swiftly to rise and follow—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Follow its flight,</span><br /> +Follow it back with happy flying,<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span>Where green-clad hills are calmly lying.<br /> +<br /> +Wheat fields whose golden silences are stirred<br /> +By whirring insect wings, and naught is heard<br /> +But plaintive callings of that one sweet word,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">"Bob White! Bob White!"</span><br /> +And a smell of the clover growing<br /> +In the meadow lands ripe for mowing,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">All red and white.</span><br /> +Over the shady creek comes sailing,<br /> +Past willows in the water trailing.<br /> +<br /> +Tired heart, 'tis but in dreams I turn my feet,<br /> +Again to wander in the ripening wheat<br /> +And hear the whistle of the quail repeat<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">"Bob White! Bob White!"</span><br /> +But oh! there is joy in the knowing<br /> +That somewhere green pastures are growing,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Though out of sight.</span><br /> +And the light on those church spires dying,<br /> +On the old home meadow is lying.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span></p> +<h2>Grandfather.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +HOW broad and deep was the fireplace old,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And the great hearth-stone how wide!</span><br /> +There was always room for the old man's chair<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">By the cosy chimney side,</span><br /> +And all the children that cared to crowd<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">At his knee in the evening-tide.</span><br /> +<br /> +Room for all of the homeless ones<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Who had nowhere else to go;</span><br /> +They might bask at ease in the grateful warmth<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And sun in the cheerful glow,</span><br /> +For Grandfather's heart was as wide and warm<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">As the old fireplace, I know.</span><br /> +<br /> +And he always found at his well-spread board<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Just room for another chair;</span><br /> +There was always rest for another head<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">On the pillow of his care;</span><br /> +There was always place for another name<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">In his trustful morning prayer.</span><br /> +<br /> +Oh, crowded world with your jostling throngs!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">How narrow you grow, and small;</span><br /> +How cold, like a shadow across the heart,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Your selfishness seems to fall,</span><br /> +When I think of that fireplace warm and wide,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And the welcome awaiting all.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span></p> +<h2>The Old Church.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +CLOSE to the road it stood among the trees,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The old, bare church, with windows small and high,</span><br /> +And open doors that gave, on meeting day,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A welcome to the careless passer by.</span><br /> +<br /> +Its straight, uncushioned seats, how hard they seemed!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">What penance-doing form they always wore</span><br /> +To little heads that could not reach the text,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And little feet that could not reach the floor.</span><br /> +<br /> +What wonder that we hailed with strong delight<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The buzzing wasp, slow sailing down the aisle,</span><br /> +Or, sunk in sin, beguiled the constant fly<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">From weary heads, to make our neighbors smile.</span><br /> +<br /> +How softly from the churchyard came the breeze<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That stirred the cedar boughs with scented wings,</span><br /> +And gently fanned the sleeper's heated brow<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">Or fluttered Grandma Barlow's bonnet strings.</span><br /> +<br /> +With half-shut eyes, across the pulpit bent,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The preacher droned in soothing tones about</span><br /> +Some theme, that like the narrow windows high,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Took in the sky, but left terrestrials out.</span><br /> +<br /> +Good, worthy man, his work on earth is done;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">His place is lost, the old church passed away;</span><br /> +And with them, when they went, there must have gone<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That sweet, bright calm, my childhood's Sabbath day.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span></p> +<h2>An Old-Time Pedagogue.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +SLOWLY adown the village street<br /> +With groping cane and faltering feet,<br /> +He goes each day through cold or heat—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Old Daddy Hight.</span><br /> +His hair is scant upon his head,<br /> +His eyes are dim, his nose is red,<br /> +And yet, his mien is stern and dread—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Old Daddy Hight.</span><br /> +<br /> +The village lads his form descry<br /> +While yet afar, and boldly cry—<br /> +(For bears are scarce and rods are high)<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">"Old Daddy Hight!"</span><br /> +But when their fathers meet his glance,<br /> +They nod and smile and look askance.<br /> +He taught them once the Modoc dance—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Old Daddy Hight.</span><br /> +<br /> +How long we cling to servitude,<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span>How long we keep the schoolboy's mood!<br /> +Still seems with awful power endued—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Old Daddy Hight.</span><br /> +They feel a cringing of the knee,<br /> +Those fathers, yet, whene'er they see<br /> +Adown the walk pace solemnly—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Old Daddy Hight.</span><br /> +<br /> +Wide is his fame, of how he taught,<br /> +And how he flogged, and reckoned naught<br /> +The toils and pains that knowledge bought—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Old Daddy Hight.</span><br /> +He had no lack of "ways and means"<br /> +To track the loiterers on the greens;<br /> +He scorned all counterfeits and screens—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Old Daddy Hight.</span><br /> +<br /> +Oh, dire the day that brewed mishap!<br /> +That brought to luckless back his strap,<br /> +To hanging head his Dunce's cap—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Old Daddy Hight.</span><br /> +No blotted page dared meet his eye;<br /> +The owner quaked and wished to die,<br /> +When rod in hand, with wrath strode by—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Old Daddy Hight.</span><br /> +<br /> +He helped them up the thorny steep<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span>Of wisdom's path with pain to creep,<br /> +With vigilance that might not sleep—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Old Daddy Hight.</span><br /> +Now, down his life's long, slow decline,<br /> +He walks alone at eighty-nine—<br /> +The last of his illustrious line—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Old Daddy Hight.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span></p> +<h2>Her Title-Deeds.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +INSIDE the cottage door she sits,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Just where the sunlight, softest there,</span><br /> +Slants down on snowy kerchief's bands,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">On folded hands and silvered hair.</span><br /> +<br /> +The garden pale her world shuts in,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A simple world made sweet with thyme,</span><br /> +Where life, soft lulled by droning bees,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Flows to the mill-stream's lapsing rhyme.</span><br /> +<br /> +Poor are her cottage walls, and bare;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Too mean and small to harbor pride,</span><br /> +Yet with a musing gaze she sees<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Her broad domains extending wide.</span><br /> +<br /> +Green slopes of hills, and waving fields,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">With blooming hedges set between,</span><br /> +Through shifting veils of tender mist,<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">Smile, half revealed, a mingled scene.</span><br /> +<br /> +All hers, for lovingly she holds<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A yellow packet in her hand,</span><br /> +Whose ancient, faded script proclaims<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Her title to this spreading land.</span><br /> +<br /> +Old letters! On the trembling page<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Drop unawares, unheeded tears.</span><br /> +These are her title-deeds, her lands<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Spread through the realms of by-gone years.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span></p> +<h2>INTERLUDES.</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>Voices of the Old, Old Days.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +OH, voices of the old, old days,<br /> +Speak once again to me,<br /> +I walk alone the old, old ways<br /> +And miss your melody.<br /> +To-night I close my tired eyes<br /> +And hear the rain drip slow,<br /> +And dream a hand is on my brow<br /> +That pressed it long ago.<br /> +<br /> +My thoughts stray through the lonely night<br /> +Until I seem to see<br /> +Home faces, in the firelight,<br /> +That always smiled on me.<br /> +Those shadows dancing on the walls<br /> +Are not by embers cast,<br /> +They are the forms my heart recalls<br /> +From out the happy past.<br /> +<br /> +Forgotten is the gathering gloom,<br /> +The night's deep loneliness,<br /> +As round me in the silent room<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span>With noiseless tread they press.<br /> +Though in the dark the rain sobs on,<br /> +I heed its sound no more;<br /> +For voices of the old, old days<br /> +Are calling as of yore.<br /> +</div></div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span></p> + + + +<h2>Silent Keys.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +AS we would touch with soft caress the brow<br /> +Of one who dreams, the spell of sleep to break,<br /> +Across the yellowed keys I sweep my hand,<br /> +The old, remembered music to awake;<br /> +But something drops from out those melodies—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">There are some silent keys.</span><br /> +<br /> +So is it when I call to those I loved,<br /> +Who blessed my life with tender care and fond:<br /> +So is it with those early dreams and hopes,<br /> +Some voices answer and some notes respond,<br /> +But in the chords that I would strike, like these,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">There are some silent keys.</span><br /> +<br /> +Heart, dost thou hear not in those pauses fall<br /> +A still, small voice that speaks to thee of peace?<br /> +What though some hopes may fail, some dreams be lost,<br /> +Though sometimes happy music break and cease.<br /> +We might miss part of heaven's minstrelsies<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">But for these silent keys.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span></p> +<h2>PART II.</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>Retrospection.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +THE grandsire, in the chimney corner, takes<br /> +The almanac from its accustomed place,<br /> +And while the kettle swings upon the crane,<br /> +And firelight flickers on his wrinkled face,<br /> +Reviews the slow procession of the months;<br /> +And sees again upon the hills of green<br /> +The gypsy Springtime pitch her airy tent<br /> +Among the blossoms. Then the silver sheen<br /> +Of harvest moon shines down on rustling corn<br /> +Until the hazy air of Autumn thrills<br /> +With sound of woodman's ax and hunter's horn,<br /> +And darker shadows climb the russet hills.<br /> +<br /> +But while he ponders on the open page,<br /> +The last sand in the hour-glass slips away.<br /> +The end seems near of his long pilgrimage,<br /> +And he would call the fleeting year to stay.<br /> +But passing on, she goes—a sweet-faced nun—<br /> +To take within the Convent of the Past<br /> +The veil of silence. Then the gates swing shut,<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span>And Time, the grim old warden, bolts them fast.<br /> +No more can come again those halcyon days<br /> +The Year took with it to its dim-lit cell;<br /> +But often at the bars they stand and gaze,<br /> +When through the heart rings memory's matin-bell.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span></p> +<h2>Echoes From Erin.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +ACROSS old Purple Mountain I hear a bugle call,<br /> +And down the rocks, like water, the echoes leap and fall.<br /> +One note alone can startle the voices of the peaks,<br /> +And waken songs of Erin, whene'er the bugle speaks.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">They call and call and call,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Until the voices all</span><br /> +Ring down the dusky hollows and in the distance fall.<br /> +<br /> +Methinks, like Purple Mountain, the past will sometimes rise,<br /> +And memory's call awaken its echoing replies.<br /> +Within the tower of Shandon again the bells will sway,<br /> +And follow, with their ringing, the Lee upon its way,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">And chime and chime and chime,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Where ivy tendrils climb,</span><br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span>Till bells and river mingle to sound the silvery rhyme.<br /> +<br /> +Again the daisied grasses beside the castle walls<br /> +Will stir with softest sighing, to hear the wind's footfalls;<br /> +And through the moss-grown abbey, along Killarney's shore,<br /> +The melodies of Erin will echo evermore,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">And roll and roll and roll,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Till spirit hands shall toll</span><br /> +The music of the uplands unto the listening soul.<br /> +</div></div> + +<div class='place'><i>Killarney, Ireland.</i></div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span></p> +<h2>An Alpine Valley.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +OH, happy valley at the mountain's feet,<br /> +If half your happiness you could but know!<br /> +Though over you a shadow always falls,<br /> +And far above you rise those heights of snow,<br /> +So far, your yearning love you may not speak<br /> +With rosy flush like some high sister peak,<br /> +Yet you may clasp its feet in fond embrace,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">And gaze up in its face.</span><br /> +<br /> +And sometimes down its slopes a wind will come<br /> +And bring a sudden, noiseless sweep of snow,<br /> +Like a soft greeting from those summits sent<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">To comfort you below.</span><br /> +<br /> +What more? Love may not ask too great a boon.<br /> +Enough to be so near, though cast so low.<br /> +Think that a sea had rolled between you twain<br /> +If careless fortune had decreed it so,<br /> +And you could only lie and look across<br /> +To distant cloudy heights and know your loss,<br /> +And see some favored valley, fair and sweet,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Heap flowers at its feet.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<div class='place'><i>Cham, Switzerland.</i></div> + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span></p> + +<h2>Through an Amber Pane.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +BY some strange alchemy that turns to gold<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The light that drops from gray and leaden skies,</span><br /> +Though heavy mists the outer world enfold,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">'Tis always sunshine where Napoleon lies.</span><br /> +No more an exile by an alien sea,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Forgetful of the banishment and bane;</span><br /> +Now lies he there, in kingly dignity,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">His tomb a Mecca shrine beside the Seine.</span><br /> +And there the pilgrim hears the story told,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">How Paris placed above her hero, dead,</span><br /> +A window that should turn to yellow gold<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The light that on his resting place is shed.</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">So on him falls, though summers wane,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">The sunshine of that amber pane.</span><br /> +<br /> +By some strange miracle, maybe divine,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The sunlight falls upon the buried past</span><br /> +And turns its water into sparkling wine,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And gilds the coin its coffers have amassed.</span><br /> +Could it have been those long-lost halcyon days<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Trailed not a cloud across our April sky?</span><br /> +Faltered we not along those untried ways?<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">Grew we not weary as the days went by?</span><br /> +Ah, yes! But unreturning feet forget<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Rough places trodden in the long ago,</span><br /> +Rememb'ring only paths with flowers beset,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">While pressing onward, wearily and slow.</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">For Memory's windows but retain</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">The sunshine of an amber pane.</span><br /> +<br /> +The little white, wind-blown anemone<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">By one round dewdrop may be fully filled,</span><br /> +And by some light-winged, passing honey-bee<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Its cup of crystal water may be spilled.</span><br /> +So does the child heart hold its happiness:<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A drop will fill it to its rosy rim.</span><br /> +It is not that these later days bring less,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That joy so rarely rises to the brim;</span><br /> +It is because the heart has deeper grown.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A fuller knowledge must its thirst assuage.</span><br /> +Perhaps we would not deem those pleasures flown<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">As bright as those which star the present age,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Had not upon them long years lain</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">The sunshine of an amber pane.</span><br /> +<br /> +The dust of dim forgetfulness piles fast<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Upon the chains that thralled us yesterday.</span><br /> +So will it be when this day, too, is past,<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">And in its arms we've seen it bear away</span><br /> +The cares that brooded in the tired brain;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The work that weighted down the weary hand;</span><br /> +The high hopes that we struggled to attain;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The problems that we could not understand.</span><br /> +Washed of its stain, bereft of any sting,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Seen through the window of the Memory,</span><br /> +Perchance, a gentler grace to it may cling<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Than we may now think possible to see.</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">For skies will gleam, though gray with rain,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Like sunshine through that amber pane.</span><br /> +<br /> +We may not stand on Patmos, and look through<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The star-hinged portals where the great pearls gleam.</span><br /> +No brush that unveiled beauty ever drew,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Save one, that caught its shadow in a dream.</span><br /> +So lest we falter, faithless and afraid,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The Merciful, remembering we are dust,</span><br /> +Reveals not heaven for which our hearts have prayed,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">But by a token teaches us to trust;</span><br /> +And day by day allows us to look through<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The window of the Memory, broad and vast,</span><br /> +(Till jasper minarets rise into view)<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Upon the happy heaven of the past;</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">And gives, till purer light we gain,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">The sunshine of that amber pane.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span></p> +<h2>At a Tenement Window.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +SOMETIMES my needle stops with half-drawn thread<br /> +(Not often though, each moment's waste means bread,<br /> +And missing stitches leave the little mouths unfed).<br /> +I look down on the dingy court below:<br /> +A tuft of grass is all it has to show,—<br /> +A broken pump, where thirsty children go.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Above, there shines a bit of sky, so small</span><br /> +That it might be a passing blue-bird's wing.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">One tree leans up against the high brick wall,</span><br /> +And there the sparrows twitter of the spring,<br /> +Until they waken in my heart a cry<br /> +Of hunger, that no bread can satisfy.<br /> +<br /> +Always before, when Maytime took her way<br /> +Across the fields, I followed close. To-day<br /> +I can but dream of all her bright array.<br /> +My work drops down. Across the sill I lean,<br /> +And long with bitter longing, for unseen<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span>Rain-freshened paths, where budding woods grow green.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The water trickles from the pump below</span><br /> +Upon the stones. With eyes half shut, I hear<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">It falling in a pool where rushes grow,</span><br /> +And feel a cooling presence drawing near.<br /> +And now the sparrows chirp again. No, hark!—<br /> +A singing as of some far meadow lark.<br /> +<br /> +It is the same old miracle applied<br /> +Unto myself, that on the mountain-side<br /> +The few small loaves and fishes multiplied.<br /> +Behold, how strange and sweet the mystery!<br /> +The birds, the broken pump, the gnarled tree,<br /> +Have brought the fullness of the spring to me.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">For in the leaves that rustle by the wall</span><br /> +All forests find a tongue. And so that grass<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Can, with its struggling tuft of green, recall</span><br /> +Wide, bloom-filled meadows where the cattle pass.<br /> +How it can be, but dimly I divine.<br /> +These crumbs, God given, make the whole loaf mine.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span></p> +<h2>A Song.</h2> + +<div class='center'> +"Home-keeping hearts are happiest."—<span class="smcap">Longfellow.</span><br /> +<br /><br /></div> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +THERE will be distant journeyings enough<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To reach that Land beyond the ether's sea,</span><br /> +To satisfy the veriest roaming heart,—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Let me stay home with thee!</span><br /> +<br /> +There will be new companionships enough<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">In that bright spirit-life. Why should we flee</span><br /> +So soon to alien hearts and stranger scenes?<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">I would stay home with thee.</span><br /> +<br /> +The heart grows homesick, thinking of the change<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">When these familiar things no more shall be;</span><br /> +When e'en the thought of them, perchance, shall fade,—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Let me stay home with thee.</span><br /> +<br /> +I would imprint upon my mind each scene,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Each meadow path, and stream, and orchard-tree,</span><br /> +Beloved since childhood, holy with our hopes,<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">Sweet with the thoughts of thee.</span><br /> +<br /> +And each dear household place, let me learn all<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">By heart, where I am wont thy form to see.</span><br /> +Who knows what things shall pass? If I may share<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A hearth in heaven with thee?</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span></p> +<h2>Eclipse.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +GOD keep us from the sordid mood<br /> +That shrinks to self-infinitude,<br /> +That sees no thing as good or grand,<br /> +That answers not the hour's demand,<br /> +And throws o'er Heaven's splendors furled<br /> +The shadow of our little world.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span></p> +<h2>In the Dark.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +HERE in the dark I lie, and watch the stars<br /> +That through the soft gloom shine like tear-bright eyes<br /> +Behind a mourner's veil. The darkness seems<br /> +Almost a vapor, palpable and dense,<br /> +In which my room's familiar outlines melt,<br /> +And all seems one black pall that folds me round.<br /> +Only a mirror glimmers through the dusk,<br /> +And on the wall a dim, uncertain square<br /> +Shows where a portrait hangs. Ah, even so<br /> +Beloved faces fade into the past<br /> +And naught remains except a space of light<br /> +To show us where they were.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 14em;">How still it seems!</span><br /> +The busy clock, whose tell-tale talk was drowned<br /> +By Day's uproarious voices, calls aloud,<br /> +Undaunted by the dark, the flight of time,<br /> +And through the halls its tones ring drearily.<br /> +The breeze on tiptoe seems to tread, as though<br /> +It were afraid to rouse the drowsy leaves.<br /> +The long, dim street is quiet. Nothing breaks<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span>The dream of Night, asleep on Nature's breast.<br /> +Hark! Some one passes. On the pavement stones<br /> +Each stealthy step gives back a muffled sound,<br /> +Till the last foot-fall seems in distance drowned.<br /> +So Death might pass, bent on his mission dread,<br /> +Adown the silent street, and none might know<br /> +What hour he passed or what he bore away.<br /> +Ah, sadder thought! So Life goes, unawares,<br /> +Noiseless and swift and resolutely on,<br /> +While the dumb world lies folded in the gloom,<br /> +Unconscious and uncaring in its sleep.<br /> +And towards the west, the stars, all silently<br /> +Like golden sands in God's great hour-glass, glide<br /> +And fall into the nether crystal globe.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span></p> +<h2>Felipa, Wife of Columbus.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +MORE than the compass to the mariner,<br /> +Wast thou, Felipa, to his dauntless soul.<br /> +Through adverse winds that threatened wreck, and nights<br /> +Of rayless gloom, thou pointed ever to<br /> +The North Star of his great ambition. He<br /> +Who once has lost an Eden, or has gained<br /> +A paradise by Eve's sweet influence,<br /> +Alone can know how strong a spell lies in<br /> +The witchery of a woman's beckoning hand.<br /> +And thou didst draw him, tide-like, higher still,<br /> +Felipa, whispering the lessons learned<br /> +From thy courageous father, till the flood<br /> +Of his ambition burst all barriers<br /> +And swept him onward to his longed-for goal.<br /> +<br /> +Before the jewels of a Spanish queen<br /> +Built fleets to waft him on his untried way,<br /> +Thou gavest thy wealth of wifely sympathy<br /> +To build the lofty purpose of his soul.<br /> +And now the centuries have cycled by,<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span>Till thou art all-forgotten by the throng<br /> +That lauds the great Pathfinder of the deep.<br /> +It matters not in that infinitude<br /> +Of space, where thou dost guide thy spirit-bark<br /> +To undiscovered lands, supremely fair.<br /> +If to this little planet thou couldst turn<br /> +And voyage, wraithlike, to its cloud-hung rim,<br /> +Thou wouldst not care for praise. And if, perchance,<br /> +Some hand held out to thee a laurel bough,<br /> +Thou wouldst not claim one leaf, but fondly turn<br /> +To lay thy tribute, also, at his feet.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span></p> +<h2>'Twixt Creek and Bay.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +'TWIXT creek and bay<br /> +We whisper to our white sails "stay!<br /> +Oh, Life, a little while delay!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">'Twixt creek and bay."</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">So loath to go</span><br /> +From these calm shallows that we know,<br /> +We fain would stay the year's swift flow,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Nor onward go</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">To banks more wide,</span><br /> +Where seaward drawings of the tide<br /> +Impel to deeper depths untried,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Where Life grows wide.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">'Twixt creek and bay—</span><br /> +The morning deepens into day,<br /> +And richer freight we bear, alway,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">When in the bay.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span></p> +<h2>When Youth is Gone.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +HOW can we know when youth is gone,—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">When age has surely come at last?</span><br /> +There is no marked meridian<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Through which we sail, and feel when past.</span><br /> +<br /> +A keener air our faces strike,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A chiller current swifter run;</span><br /> +They meet and glide like tide with tide,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Our youth and age, when youth is done.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span></p> +<h2>The Fickle Heart.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +CANST tell me, thou inconstant heart,<br /> +What like unto thou art?<br /> +A gypsy wandering up and down<br /> +Through April's green and Autumn's brown,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Until the year is spent;</span><br /> +And then, when hills are white with snow,<br /> +And brooks, ice-bound, have ceased to flow,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">No place to pitch his tent.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span></p> +<h2>Banditti.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +UPON Life's lonely highway, robber bands<br /> +Of grim-faced years seize with relentless hands<br /> +Each traveler, and wrest from out his grasp<br /> +The treasures that he fain would closer clasp.<br /> +None can escape. Each year demands its toll,<br /> +Till robbed of youth, we grope toward the goal,<br /> +Halting and blind, of all but life bereft,<br /> +And death claims that—the only boon that's left.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span></p> +<h2>The Silent Brotherhood.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +ON through the cloisters of eternity<br /> +The years, like monks, in slow procession pass,<br /> +Telling their rosary beads, the golden days,<br /> +With penance prayers of dark and dismal nights.<br /> +Hooded and cowled, with silence on they pass,<br /> +Nor will they pause until their vesper rings<br /> +A solemn curfew at the sunset hour,<br /> +When all the fires of life are buried low,<br /> +And all the worlds drop down upon their knees,<br /> +To say a last mass ere the death of Time.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span></p> +<h2>Spendthrift.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +HE was a king one time,<br /> +And they wrapped the ermine around him,<br /> +And the bells rang out when they crowned him,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Rang with a joyful chime.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">And he sat on a throne!</span><br /> +The wealth that a world could offer<br /> +Was heaped in the New Year's coffer,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">For the world was his own.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">He was a spendthrift though,</span><br /> +And the coins of his lavish giving<br /> +Were the golden moments of living,—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Coins that he squandered so.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">He is a beggar now.</span><br /> +In the night and the storm he lingers,<br /> +No gold in his prodigal fingers,—<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 3em;">King with the uncrowned brow.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Nothing to call his own!</span><br /> +His fortune scattered behind him;<br /> +Death empty-handed shall find him,—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">A New Year takes his throne.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span></p> +<h2>Lost.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +CHILDHOOD flits by with flowers in both its hands,—<br /> +We know not why it leaves, nor when it goes;<br /> +But suddenly we miss some subtle grace,<br /> +As perfume passes from a fading rose;<br /> +We scarce divine, yet somehow faintly feel<br /> +In the soft air a far-blown breath of snows.<br /> +<br /> +Straying afar, unheeded and alone<br /> +Upon life's highway 'mid the busy throng,<br /> +Swept in its eager, restless race along<br /> +To the great future, unexplored, unknown,<br /> +The little child is lost. And when with haste<br /> +The wanderer's footsteps through the streets are traced,<br /> +They find a man with features pale and stern,<br /> +But the lost child will nevermore return.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span></p> +<h2>The Robber.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +DO you know why Time flies by so slow<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">When we are sad and old?</span><br /> +Why he turns and waits as if loath to go<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">On his journey cold?</span><br /> +Because from our coffers of hope and youth,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Where we kept life's gold,</span><br /> +He has stolen our treasures all, in sooth,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">From their sacred hold.</span><br /> +He who came with a gift in hand<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Was a robber bold.</span><br /> +He whose greeting was smooth and bland<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Was a wolf in the fold.</span><br /> +And this is the reason that he goes by,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">When we're worn and old,</span><br /> +So slowly, because he can scarcely fly<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">With his weight of gold.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span></p> +<h2>My Carol.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +'T<ins title="Transcriber's Note: original printed in lowercase">IS</ins> the time when holly berries<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Grow red as the Yule-log's glow,</span><br /> +And hearth and hall are decked by all<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">With the green of the mistletoe.</span><br /> +Time when the joy of giving<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Is felt at each fireside,</span><br /> +And wings seek rest in the old home nest,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">For the time is Christmas-tide.</span><br /> +<br /> +Though only a carol singer<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">With nothing of gold in store,</span><br /> +And little to bring as an offering,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">I stand outside your door.</span><br /> +Open! This blessed morning<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Peace be to thee and thine!</span><br /> +Here to you all I gaily call<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A greeting from me and mine.</span><br /> +<br /> +Haply it may awaken<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Some joy that so long ago,</span><br /> +On the frosty dawn of a Christmas gone,<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">You found in your stocking toe.</span><br /> +Though but an old, old carol,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">It bears love's myrrh and gold,</span><br /> +And the frankincense of a joy intense<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That the angel hosts foretold.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span></p> +<h2>Carol.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +<i>Listen! The heralds proclaim Him!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Follow! A star leads the way!</span><br /> +Oh, joy, in the City of David<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The Christ-child reigns to-day!</span></i><br /> +</div><br /><br /></div> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +I greet you this blessed morning.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Peace be to thee and thine!</span><br /> +To the dear ones here be Christmas cheer,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And the love of me and mine.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span></p> +<h2>"In This Cradle Life of Ours."</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +THE world swings slowly back and forth,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">From dawn to dusk, from dusk to dawn,</span><br /> +And we forget the hand that rocks,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">But, cradle-like, the world swings on.</span><br /> +<br /> +A little while to stir and fret,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Or sob with trembling lip</span><br /> +Because the sunbeams we would grasp<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Through helpless fingers slip.</span><br /> +<br /> +A little while to moan, and start<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">From fevered dreams, and weep,</span><br /> +For still the cradle sways and swings<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Until we fall asleep.</span><br /> +<br /> +The broad earth's pillow is so soft<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To weary heads, and who can tell</span><br /> +But through that sleep sound lullabies<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Of the white angel, Israfel?</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span></p> +<h2>Here and There.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +HOW must they sing, those angel choirs,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Who breathe Heaven's pure, sweet air!</span><br /> +They need but waft it from their lips<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To make it music rare.</span><br /> +<br /> +Here on these chill, damp plains below,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Where stifling vapors rise,</span><br /> +We draw the heavy air of earth,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And breathe it out in sighs.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span></p> +<h2>The Milky Way.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +UP the steep heights whereon God's citadel<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Is set, the prayers of mortals to that bourne,</span><br /> +For ages toiling, in the adamant,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Across the sky a glittering path have worn.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span></p> +<h2>INTERLUDE.</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>Interlude.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +WITHIN the pauses of the anthem falls a hush,<br /> +And the deep organ's solemn voice goes on alone<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">In a low undertone,</span><br /> +As rain comes sometimes with a sudden sweeping rush,<br /> +And then is still, save that it slowly drips and falls<br /> +From leaves at intervals.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">So memory sings alone</span><br /> +Between the busy hours when comes a lull,<br /> +And naught is audible<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">But its low undertone.</span><br /> +So darkness drops between the days, an interlude<br /> +When night's low sighing stirs the sleepy solitude.<br /> +So, when the little cycle of this life is rounded,<br /> +Before the spirit enters into life unbounded,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">It waits to hear, with bated breath,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">The solemn interlude of death.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span></p> +<h2>PART III.</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>"Oh, Dreary Day!"</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +OH, dreary day, that had so late a dawn!<br /> +Oh, dreary day, so long, though early gone!<br /> +Fold thy gray mantle round thy form and go<br /> +To find the lost sun, while Night comes on,<br /> +Across the plain, with silent step and slow.<br /> +<br /> +I weary of thy dark, unsmiling mood,<br /> +I weary of thy dull disquietude,<br /> +And thy complaining voice that tells of pain,<br /> +Not with the tempest's trumpet, but subdued<br /> +In broken sentences of falling rain.<br /> +<br /> +Now, soft as household spirit, comes the Night<br /> +And draws the curtains, fanning still more bright<br /> +The cheerful fire, while for her gentle sake<br /> +The tapers burst in bloom with yellow light,<br /> +Like evening primroses just kissed awake.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span></p> +<h2>May-Time.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +THE Spring steals through the city streets,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Silent and shrinking, half afraid,</span><br /> +As if there came, from woods and fields,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Some timid, bashful, country maid.</span><br /> +<br /> +The lofty houses coldly frown,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And coldly stares the stony street;</span><br /> +But here and there from out a cleft<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">There springs a flower to kiss her feet.</span><br /> +<br /> +And here and there a crocus smiles<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A friendly greeting, or a spray</span><br /> +Of blooming lilacs, fresh and sweet,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Leans down and nods across her way.</span><br /> +<br /> +Till, reassured, she smiles and sings,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And on she passes, glad and fleet,</span><br /> +And little children at their play<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Look up to catch her glances sweet.</span><br /> +<br /> +Is it her robe's soft fluttering<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">That gently fans the passer by?</span><br /> +He only feels the freshened air,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Nor knows the gracious presence nigh.</span><br /> +<br /> +But some sweet influence he feels,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That charms care's gloomy shade away,</span><br /> +And pours into his wakened heart<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The golden gladness of the May.</span><br /> +<br /> +So, like an angel visitant,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">She glides among the haunts of men,</span><br /> +And faint hearts bound, and sad eyes smile,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Because the Spring has come again.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span></p> +<h2>Spring's Cophetua.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +SHE came with garments scant and poor and thin,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">And white feet gleaming bare;</span><br /> +With pallid smiles where April tears had been,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">And snowflakes on her hair.</span><br /> +<br /> +Oh, never—Winter thought—such gentle look<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">In all the land was seen!</span><br /> +From his gray locks the diadem he took<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">And crowned her as his queen.</span><br /> +<br /> +And now, in silken robes and gems arrayed,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Fair Spring reigns in his stead.</span><br /> +Upon his throne she sits, the beggar maid—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">"Cophetua" is dead.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span></p> +<h2>Winter Beauty.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +WHEN I go through the meadows brown,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Where stand the tall weeds, sere and dead,</span><br /> +Think you I find no beauty there,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Since Summer through the fields has fled?</span><br /> +<br /> +The edges of the frozen stream,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Whose quiet waters late were crossed</span><br /> +By shadows of the bending fern,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Are fair with fringes of the frost.</span><br /> +<br /> +Wherever cowslips crowded thick,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Or banks of buttercups would be,</span><br /> +A host of airy forms in white,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Like ghosts of flowers returned, I see.</span><br /> +<br /> +It may be clustered flakes of snow,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Or frozen dew still glistening there,</span><br /> +But still it seems as if there came<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A rare, strange odor through the air.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span></p> +<h2>October.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +ACROSS the stubble fields the lazy breezes pass,<br /> +From Autumn orchards sloping southward in the sun,<br /> +Where dropping from the low-hung branches, one by one,<br /> +The apples hide in tangles of the wind-blown grass.<br /> +A warm, sweet scent of mellow fruit fills all the air,<br /> +And faintly over hills and hollows comes the cry<br /> +Of some shrill bluejay, and his mate's far-off reply.<br /> +Like Ruth, the winds will go a-gleaning, by and by,<br /> +And garner in the leaves till all the woods are bare.<br /> +<br /> +But now my boyhood's love has come again to me,<br /> +October—in her royal red and gold arrayed!<br /> +She comes with glowing cheeks, my dusky Indian maid,<br /> +And all the world seems bright because so bright is she.<br /> +Unto her lips the wild grapes hold their spicy wine.<br /> +Persimmons, sweet and golden with an early frost,<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span>Drop at her feet; and where the narrow creek has crossed<br /> +The woods, and in the ferns and flag its way has lost,<br /> +Blood-red the corals of the dog-wood berries shine.<br /> +<br /> +And thus she comes, my Love I loved when I was young!<br /> +We wander for a little while across the hills,<br /> +And, as of old, her sunny presence warms and fills<br /> +My heart. But like a lute with one string left unstrung,<br /> +When I would sing again the song of other years,<br /> +Something is lost. The harmony is incomplete.<br /> +And though the same old melody I still repeat,<br /> +One alto note of joy is gone that made it sweet,<br /> +And something trembles in the Autumn haze like tears.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span></p> +<h2>At Twilight.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +A TINY bird flits through the twilight brown,<br /> +When sunset dreams make all the garden fair,<br /> +Whose soft notes fall into the quiet air<br /> +Like olive leaves on waters smooth dropped down.<br /> +Emblems of rest, when floods of care do cease,<br /> +Into my heart, as well, they fall and float,<br /> +An olive leaf each faint and dreamy note—<br /> +I recognize their sign, and feel at peace.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span></p> +<h2>The Prophet.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +DARKNESS and silence, such as only fall<br /> +At midnight, wrap the sleeping hamlets all;<br /> +No life in all the dim world seems to be.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Then suddenly,</span><br /> +Across the hills, far off and faint, I hear<br /> +Sound through the dark, as through a dream, the call<br /> +(How strange it seems!) of some bold chanticleer.<br /> +<br /> +(Half in my sleep I hear that clarion ring,<br /> +With distant calls, like echoes, answering;<br /> +And, as at war's alarum, soldiers leap<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">From guarded sleep</span><br /> +And seize their arms, and hasten from their tents,<br /> +So, at this sound, my drowsy senses spring,<br /> +Alert to man the mind's dark battlements.)<br /> +<br /> +To tell night's mid-hour tolls no startled bell;<br /> +Only thy voice is heard, brave sentinel,<br /> +Who, like the ancient watchman on the towers,<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 3em;">Calls forth the hours,</span><br /> +And to the wistful questioners, who see<br /> +No gleam through pain's long vigil, dost foretell<br /> +"The morning cometh," oft and cheerily.<br /> +<br /> +How canst thou know when, weary with his race,<br /> +The Day turns back, his pathway to retrace?<br /> +Canst thou the maiden Dawn's light footsteps hear,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Approaching near?</span><br /> +Or dost thou stand in converse with the skies,<br /> +And know what time she leaves her hiding-place<br /> +By joyful flashes of their starry eyes?<br /> +<br /> +Thou art a prophet, like to those of old,<br /> +Who in the darkness sat, but firm and bold<br /> +Looked with undaunted eyes towards the dim<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Horizon's rim,</span><br /> +And thrilled with faith of waiting ages born,<br /> +That soon from out the Night's strong prisonhold,<br /> +Should burst the golden glory of the Morn.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span></p> +<h2>The Potter's Field.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +JUST outside of the noisy town,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Half through thicket and wood revealed,</span><br /> +Hemmed about by a wall of stone,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wide it lieth, the Potter's Field.</span><br /> +<br /> +Brambles wander across the grass,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Vines creep over the broken wall,</span><br /> +Bindweeds blossom, and here and there<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Stands a waif of the forest tall.</span><br /> +<br /> +There no columns of gleaming white<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Mark the dust that is sacred still;</span><br /> +Swings the gate on its rusty hinge—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">All may enter and roam at will.</span><br /> +<br /> +Who should hinder the ruthless hand,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Who protect from a vagrant's tread?</span><br /> +Guard the urns of the rich and great—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">No one cares for the pauper dead!</span><br /> +<br /> +Outlawed felon and sinless child<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">All find room in the Potter's Field.</span><br /> +There lies a Judas who sold his Lord,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Here a Mary, His pity healed.</span><br /> +<br /> +Who could know of the shame and sin<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Safely under the sod concealed?</span><br /> +Weary burdens of want and grief,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Laid away in the Potter's Field.</span><br /> +<br /> +Who could guess?—for as swift and light<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">O'er it the feet of the seasons go;</span><br /> +Summer hides it with grace of flowers,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Winter spreads it with folds of snow.</span><br /> +<br /> +Rains weep over the lonely mound,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Sunlight lingers, and swift shades pass;</span><br /> +Tender hands of the gentle wind<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Smooth the knots of the tangled grass.</span><br /> +<br /> +What though hallowed by Death alone,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Rest unbroken the sod doth yield;</span><br /> +Peace is here, for His constant watch<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">God doth set o'er the Potter's Field.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span></p> +<h2>Left Out.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +WELL he knew that his clothes were poor:<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">He was common, he humbly thought;</span><br /> +Child as he was, he could understand<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Why he was slighted and never sought.</span><br /> +<br /> +Yet could he help it,—his mother gone,—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Help the weight of his father's shame?</span><br /> +Hardest sentence of childish law:<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Blaming innocence not to blame.</span><br /> +<br /> +It was hard when the children played<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">All together, to be left out,—</span><br /> +Stand aside, with a stinging sense<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">That 'twas he that they laughed about.</span><br /> +<br /> +Thoughtless children, they felt no wrong,—<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Pushed him out of the ring at play.</span><br /> +No one heard how his voice was choked,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">No one cared when he stole away.</span><br /> +<br /> +No one saw how he crept at last<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">Through the gate and the grasses deep,</span><br /> +Past the wall to a lonely grave<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Where his mother was laid asleep.</span><br /> +<br /> +Could she feel in her narrow bed,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Wee, cold hands, as they groped about—</span><br /> +Feel the tears that were dropped because<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Even her grave had left him out?</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span></p> +<h2>"Our Father."</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +I HAVE no part with all the great, proud world:<br /> +It cares not how I live, nor when I die;<br /> +But every lily smiling in the field,<br /> +And every tiny sparrow darting by,<br /> +Claims kinship with me, mortal though they be,—<br /> +The One who cares for them doth care for me.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span></p> +<h2>A Madrigal.</h2> + +<div class='chaptertitle'>WOODBINE.</div> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +THE wild bee clings to it<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Most fond and long.</span><br /> +The wild bird sings to it<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Its sweetest song.</span><br /> +The wild breeze brings to it<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A life more strong.</span><br /> +<br /> +So all things lend to thee<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Some charm, some grace.</span><br /> +The world's a friend to thee,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">In love's embrace.</span><br /> +All hearts do bend to thee,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">In thy queen's place.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span></p> +<h2>The Time o' Day.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +IF I should look for the time o' day<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">On the rose's dial red,</span><br /> +I would think it was just the sunrise hour,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">From the flush of its petals spread.</span><br /> +<br /> +And if I would tell by the lily-bell,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">I would think it was calm, white noon;</span><br /> +And the violet's blue would tell by its hue<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Of the evening coming soon.</span><br /> +<br /> +But when I would know by my lady's face,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">I am all perplexed the while;</span><br /> +For it's always starlight by her eyes,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And sunlight by her smile.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span></p> +<h2>Trailing Arbutus.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +THERE may be hearts that lie so deep<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">'Neath griefs and cares that weigh like drifted snow,</span><br /> +That love seems chilled in endless sleep,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And budding hopes may never dare to grow.</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Yet under all, some memory</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Trails its arbutus flowers of tender thought,—</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">All buried in the snow maybe,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Still with the sweetest fragrance fraught.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span></p> +<h2>A Mood.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +SOMETHING has made the world so changed,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Something is lost from field and sky,</span><br /> +And the earth and sun are sadly estranged,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And the songs of Nature seemed turned to a cry.</span><br /> +Yet I heard my blithe little neighbor tell<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">How fair is the spring to see.</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 6em;">Ah, well,—</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Perhaps the change is in me.</span><br /> +<br /> +Something has gone from your smile, sweetheart;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Something I miss from your look, your tone.</span><br /> +Though you stand quite near, we are still apart,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">You may clasp me close, but I feel alone.</span><br /> +Yet over and over your love you tell,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">And as you say, it must be.</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 6em;">Ah, well,—</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Perhaps the change is in me.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span></p> +<h2>The Legend of the Pansies.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +ONE night in Fairyland, when all the court<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Held carnival to welcome in the June,</span><br /> +And to the wind-harp's music, flying feet<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Were dancing on the rose leaves night had strewn;</span><br /> +The naughty Puck crept up the castle stair,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And called the sleeping princes from their bed;</span><br /> +And with their royal pages following,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Away the tricksy little fairies sped.</span><br /> +Mounted on snowy night-moths, off they raced,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Startling the gnomes, asleep within the shade</span><br /> +Of gloomy forests, with their merry cries,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">As at forbidden games all night they played.</span><br /> +But when at sunrise blew an elfin horn,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Mischievous Puck was nowhere to be seen,</span><br /> +The disobedient princes stood forlorn;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Like dew-drops fell their tears on grasses green.</span><br /> +For fairy children, not within the bounds<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Of Queen Titania's realm at morning's dawn,</span><br /> +Change into blooming flowers where they stand,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And bloom there till the summer time is gone.</span><br /> +<br /> +Now, where the little princes played all night<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 1em;">In robes of royal purple and of gold,</span><br /> +The flowers we call pansies sprang in sight,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And round them stood the little pages bold,</span><br /> +In liveries of yellow, blue, and white;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">While upward through the east the great sun rolled.</span><br /> +Then some, repentant, sadly drooped their heads;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Some turned their saucy faces to the sky;</span><br /> +But now they all alike must wait the day<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">When they can bid the summer time good-by.</span><br /> +Sometimes, when bees upon their busy rounds<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Stop to deliver some sweet message sent</span><br /> +From Fairyland, the thoughtful faces smile<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And seem to grow a little more content.</span><br /> +When cooling shadows creep along the grass,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And mother birds are twittering lullabies</span><br /> +To sleepy nestlings, then the south winds pass,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And close with fingers soft the pansies' eyes.</span><br /> +Upon the wings of dreams they're borne along<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To loving arms that rock them all the night,</span><br /> +And fairy voices soothe their sleep with song,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Till they are waked by kisses of the light.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span></p> +<h2>The Tower of Babel.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +ONCE, many centuries ago,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Men tried to build a tower so high</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">That rising upward, round on round,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4em;">Its pinnacle should reach the sky.</span><br /> +<br /> +And as they toiled and built and dreamed and planned,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">What hopes went upward with the rising stone!</span><br /> +That daring feet ere long should mount and stand<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Upon the golden stairway to the throne.</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">And then a dire confusion fell</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Upon the workers, building there.</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Men called and shouted each to each</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">With strange, uncomprehended speech,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">And what it meant no one could tell;</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">So they left building in despair.</span><br /> +<br /> +Yet in their hearts still lived the hope that they<br /> +Might scale the ramparts of the sky some day.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Sometimes our souls expand and glow</span><br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 2em;">With holy visions bright and pure;</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">But when from these deep vales below</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">We proudly try to climb and reach</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">With clumsy masonry of speech,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">And rounds of rhyme that shall endure,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">That sky-born thing, that heavenly theme,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Touched only by a prayer or dream,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">A swift confusion o'er us flies,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">And sudden chills our hands benumb.</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Our minds are blurred, our tongues are dumb,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">The vision fades away and dies.</span><br /> +<br /> +Yet still we dream that song some day may be<br /> +Rung through the arches of Eternity.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span></p> +<h2>The Old Bell.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +THE vines have grown so thick and twined so strong,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">With clinging hold, about the bell that swings</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">In the old tower, that now it never rings.</span><br /> +No one has heard its voice for seasons long.<br /> +<br /> +Sit by me on the broken belfry stair,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And I will tell the simple tale to you</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Of those whose graves through yonder arch you view,</span><br /> +Scattered about the churchyard, here and there.<br /> +<br /> +Ah me! How closely memory's tendrils twine<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">About the heart, and choke the words that spring.</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">It only throbs, the touch half-answering,</span><br /> +Like this old bell, held speechless by the vine.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span></p> +<h2>The Sea.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +FOREVER, like a heart that knows no peace,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Like one who wanders weary to and fro</span><br /> +About the earth, but finds no resting-place,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The sweeping tides of ocean ebb and flow.</span><br /> +<br /> +Like a discarded lover who entreats<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">For favor still, and will not be denied,</span><br /> +Up to the beach, with soft, caressing touch<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And tearful broken whispers, steals the tide.</span><br /> +<br /> +But still repulsed, it slow and sad withdraws,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Yet at the dear one's feet its treasures lays,</span><br /> +And turns again, to wail its sorrows out<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Through all the hopeless nights and dreary days.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span></p> +<h2>Married.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +IT is such a little while<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">From the time the fledgling tries</span><br /> +To tip from the edge of the nest to the bough,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Then lifts its wings and flies.</span><br /> +<br /> +Till it sits in its own wee nest,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Surprised out of growth or ken,</span><br /> +And half-way feels that in some strange way<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">It is learning to fly again.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span></p> +<h2>Motherhood.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +FOR two dear heads of bronze and amber,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">For baby eyes of blue and brown,</span><br /> +For two who cling, and kiss, and clamber,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And on my shoulder nestle down.</span><br /> +<br /> +All little hearts are dearer to me,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">All little faces sweet and bright,</span><br /> +All childish tears and woes undo me,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And I would heal them all to-night.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span></p> +<h2>Sufficiency.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +THE bird that sings one only strain,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To tell his passion o'er and o'er,</span><br /> +Can feel as much of joy or pain<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">As if he knew a thousand more.</span><br /> +<br /> +And thou, sweet maid, whose gentle thought<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">In smiles or tears finds present vent,</span><br /> +What feeling could thy soul be taught,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Or who has words more eloquent?</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span></p> +<h2>Ophelia.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +CALM dost thou lie in wave-swept resting-place.<br /> +No more the glances of the haughty Dane<br /> +Can fill thy gentle breast with longing vain.<br /> +The waves that stilled thy heart have drowned thy pain,<br /> +And washed the sorrow from thy sweet, pale face,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 9em;">Ophelia.</span><br /> +<br /> +Thine be the violets, but his the rue.<br /> +Though hope should sleep, and deep regret should wake,<br /> +Thy clasped hand from Death's he could not take;<br /> +The spell on those mute lips he could not break.<br /> +What more with life and love hast thou to do,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 9em;">Ophelia?</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span></p> +<h2>Requiem.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +SLEEP, thou, whom Care so long oppressed.<br /> +Care whispers by thy couch no more.<br /> +Kind Death has shut the outer door;<br /> +None can disturb thee,—sleep and rest.<br /> +<br /> +Thy hands are folded on thy breast<br /> +That throbs with Life's deep pain no more.<br /> +Though Love waits grieving by thy door,<br /> +He cannot enter,—sleep and rest.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span></p> +<h2>Elizabeth.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +ELIZABETH,<br /> +Thou comest a refreshing breath<br /> +From meadows green, where morning stays,<br /> +To those who bear the noon-tide blaze.<br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 6em;">Elizabeth,</span><br /> +Thou couldst look in the eyes of Death,<br /> +Undaunted, did he promise thee<br /> +Some bright new scene of mirth or glee.<br /> +I cannot think that time will gray<br /> +That sun-bright head, nor bear away<br /> +One dimple in those rose-cheeks hid;<br /> +Sure he were daring if he did.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span></p> +<h2>Elinor.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +IN that shadow-land, where the Sisters three<br /> +Are weaving the web of destiny,<br /> +There floated once through the fateful gloom<br /> +A thread of sunshine, that gleamed upon<br /> +The thread of a life from the distaff drawn,<br /> +And mingling, they passed to the busy loom.<br /> +The wondering Parcea looked and smiled,<br /> +As the light grew into the soul of a child,<br /> +And in and out and through devious ways,<br /> +They wove it in with the woof of days.<br /> +But they said on earth (who knew not the Fates)<br /> +"As the lily's chalice holds the dew,<br /> +So in her heart, at the morning's gates,<br /> +She caught the sunshine, when she came through."<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span></p> +<h2>On a Fly-Leaf of "Flute and Violin."</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +A MASTER-HAND hath swept<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Life's violin and flute.</span><br /> +For him they laughed and wept<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">When others found them mute.</span><br /> +<br /> +From his high altitude<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">He catches, fine and clear,</span><br /> +The notes that might elude<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">A less discerning ear.</span><br /> +<br /> +Transposing to a lower key<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">The dream-song that he hears,</span><br /> +He sets his heavenly melody<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To human smiles and tears.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span></p> +<h2>Inspiration.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +THE singer walks by wood and rill,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">By town and stately river,</span><br /> +And varied scenes his vision fill,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">And make his pulses quiver.</span><br /> +<br /> +But when his song comes borne across<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">On winds from dreamland blowing,</span><br /> +We cannot tell what mystic touch<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Has set his chimes a-going.</span><br /> +<br /> +We hear the robins in his rhyme,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">We see the orchards drifted</span><br /> +With crests of bloom that glimmer white<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">When mists of tears are lifted.</span><br /> +<br /> +A hundred tunes seem intertwined<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">To mingle in his singing,</span><br /> +When but a single rose, perhaps,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Has set his fancy winging.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span></p> +<h2>On a Fly-Leaf of Irving.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +WELCOME art thou, O singer!<br /> +If thou dost know a song<br /> +That makes the long eve shorter<br /> +Because its joys are long.<br /> +Welcome art thou, tale-bearer,<br /> +If thou canst bear away<br /> +Part of the cares that burden<br /> +The dull and dreary day.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span></p> +<h2>On a Fly-Leaf of Riley's "<ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'After-Whiles'">Afterwhiles</ins>."</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +UNTO him alone who strays<br /> +Sometimes through the yesterdays,<br /> +Lingering long in wood and field,<br /> +Is the meaning all revealed<br /> +Of these songs. Adown the rhymes<br /> +Runs a path to bygone times;<br /> +But 'tis found by those alone,<br /> +Who the fresh green hills have known,<br /> +And have felt the tender mood<br /> +Of the country solitude;<br /> +Who through lanes of pink peach blooms<br /> +Used to see the lilac's plumes<br /> +Nodding welcome by the door<br /> +Where the home-folks come no more.<br /> +Blest the singer, then, who leads<br /> +Back again through clover meads,<br /> +'Til old scenes we seem to see,<br /> +Fair as once they used to be.<br /> +Who can call from years long gone,<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span>Friends we trusted, leaned upon;<br /> +For whose sake we learned to bless<br /> +Toilworn hands and homespun dress.<br /> +As he sings of them, and thus<br /> +Wafts the pure air back to us<br /> +Of the fields, there comes again<br /> +Childhood's faith in God and man.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span></p> +<h2>Chiaro-Oscuro.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +SOMEHOW I love to look at the picture I made of her,<br /> +Work of an idle time, the summer of life's long year;<br /> +For as I stand and gaze, dreaming of those lost days,<br /> +Almost it seems to me I can see her sitting here.<br /> +<br /> +That is the way she sat, with her head a trifle raised,<br /> +Looking thoughtfully out at a scene I could never see.<br /> +Delicate color of rose dawning and dying down,<br /> +Flushing the rare sweet face as she listened or spoke to me.<br /> +<br /> +Whitest light of the sky I showered on her upturned brow,<br /> +Gathered the darkest shades and brushed them into her hair,<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span>Thinking the while I worked of the law that always sends<br /> +The deepest shadows to follow the high lights everywhere.<br /> +Now as I sit and gaze at the dream on the canvas caught,<br /> +Sadly the thought comes back, to torture with unbelief—<br /> +Why must it always be that the strong white light of love<br /> +Is followed forevermore by the deepest shadow of grief?<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span></p> +<h2>When She Came Home.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +"When she comes home again, a thousand ways<br /> +I fashion to myself the tenderness<br /> +Of my glad welcome."<br /> +<br /> +<div class='sig'><span class="smcap">Riley.</span></div><br /> +</div></div> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +"WHEN she comes home," I thought with throbbing heart,<br /> +That danced a measure to my mind's refrain.<br /> +Again from out the door I leaned and looked,<br /> +Where she should come along the leafy lane.<br /> +And then she came.—I heard the measured sound<br /> +Of slow, oncoming feet, whose heavy tread<br /> +Seemed trampling out my life. I saw her face.<br /> +Then through my brain a sudden numbness spread.<br /> +The earth seemed spun away, the sun was gone,<br /> +And time, and place, and thought. There was no thing<br /> +In all the universe, save one who lay<br /> +So still and cold and white, unanswering<br /> +Save by a graven smile my broken moan.<br /> +She had come home, yet there I knelt <i>alone</i>.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span></p> +<h2>A Resolve.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +THE fields of thought are plowed so deep,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">So carefully are tilled,</span><br /> +That all the granaries of the world<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">With plenteous store are filled.</span><br /> +Unless I deeper plow and sow,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">What sheaf, then, can I bring?</span><br /> +So like the black-bird in the field,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">I'll eat the wheat and sing.</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span></p> +<h2>Stranded.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +WE found a wreck cast up on the shore,<br /> +Battered and bruised, and scarred and rent,<br /> +And I spoke aloud, "Here was worthless work,<br /> +And a barque unfit to the sea was sent."<br /> +<br /> +But he said, my friend, in his gentle mood,<br /> +"Nay, none may say but the barque was good,<br /> +For none can tell of the seas it sailed,<br /> +Of the waves it braved and the storms withstood."<br /> +<br /> +Then we spoke no more, but I mutely mused<br /> +And thought, oh, heart and oh, life of man<br /> +That we find wrecked! we may never know<br /> +How brave you were when your course began.<br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span></p> +<h2>At Last.</h2> + + +<div class='poem'><div class='cap'> +WHAT will you give me, O World, O World!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">If I run in the race and win?</span><br /> +Will you give me a fame that can never fade,<br /> +Will you give me a crown that will never rust,<br /> +Can you save my soul from the pall of sin,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Can you keep my heart from the dust?</span><br /> +<br /> +What will you give me, O Earth, O Earth!<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">If I fight in the fray and win?</span><br /> +More than you gave those kings, who lay<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Ages past in forgotten clay?</span><br /> +Can you give me more than the grave shuts in,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Or the years can bear away?</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Ashes to ashes, dust to dust,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Fame will fade and crowns will rust.</span><br /> +<br /> +Give me, O Earth, but your true embrace,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">When the battle is lost or won.</span><br /> +Hide me away from the day's white face,<br /> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span><span style="margin-left: 3em;">From the eye of the dazzling sun.</span><br /> +So I may lay my head on your breast,<br /> +Forget the struggle and be at rest;<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Forget the laurels that fade away,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">The love that lasts but a wild, brief day;</span><br /> +Forget it all, on your bosom pressed,<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">Forever at rest—at rest!</span><br /> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class='tnote'><h3>Transcriber's Notes:</h3> + + +<p>Corrections made are indicated by dotted lines under the text. Scroll the mouse over the word and the original text will <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'apprear'">appear</ins>.</p></div> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Songs Ysame, by +Annie Fellows Johnston and Albion Fellows Bacon + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SONGS YSAME *** + +***** This file should be named 39032-h.htm or 39032-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/9/0/3/39032/ + +Produced by David Edwards, Emmy and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + + +</pre> + +</body> +</html> diff --git a/39032-h/images/booklist.png b/39032-h/images/booklist.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..2b963fc --- /dev/null +++ b/39032-h/images/booklist.png diff --git a/39032-h/images/cover.jpg b/39032-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..962a4c7 --- /dev/null +++ b/39032-h/images/cover.jpg diff --git a/39032-h/images/frontis.jpg b/39032-h/images/frontis.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..e415ee5 --- /dev/null +++ b/39032-h/images/frontis.jpg diff --git a/39032-h/images/titlepage.png b/39032-h/images/titlepage.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..e0250e9 --- /dev/null +++ b/39032-h/images/titlepage.png diff --git a/39032.txt b/39032.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a760a76 --- /dev/null +++ b/39032.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2616 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Songs Ysame, by +Annie Fellows Johnston and Albion Fellows Bacon + +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: Songs Ysame + +Author: Annie Fellows Johnston + Albion Fellows Bacon + +Release Date: March 3, 2012 [EBook #39032] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SONGS YSAME *** + + + + +Produced by David Edwards, Emmy and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive) + + + + + + + + +[Illustration: Cover] + + + + +SONGS YSAME + + + + +Dainty Volumes of Poetry + + +[Illustration: decoration] + +Price, per volume, $1.25 + +[Illustration: decoration] + + GOLDEN TREASURY OF AMERICAN SONGS AND LYRICS. + + Edited by F. L. KNOWLES. + + CAP AND GOWN. First Series. + + Edited by J. L. HARRISON. + + CAP AND GOWN. Second Series. + + Edited by F. L. KNOWLES. + + SONGS YSAME. + + By ANNIE FELLOWS JOHNSTON and ALBION FELLOWS BACON. + + OUT OF THE HEART. + + Edited by J. W. CHADWICK. + + + L. C. PAGE AND COMPANY, Publishers + (INCORPORATED) + 196 Summer Street, Boston + +[Illustration: _Motherhood_] + + + + +SONGS YSAME + +BY ANNIE FELLOWS JOHNSTON AND ALBION FELLOWS BACON + +[Illustration] + + BOSTON + L. C. PAGE AND COMPANY + (INCORPORATED) + MDCCCXCVII + + + + + _Copyright, 1897_, + BY L. C. PAGE AND COMPANY + + (INCORPORATED) + + Colonial Press: + + Electrotyped and Printed by C. H. Simonds & Co. + Boston, Mass., U. S. A. + + + + + TO + + Our Mother + MARY ERSKINE FELLOWS + + + + +CONTENTS. + + + ANNIE FELLOWS JOHNSTON + PAGE + [A]AT A TENEMENT WINDOW 53 + [A]AT EARLY CANDLE-LIGHTING 18 + BANDITTI 65 + [B]"BOB WHITE" 25 + ECHOES FROM ERIN 47 + ELINOR 114 + [B]FELIPA, WIFE OF COLUMBUS 60 + INTERLUDE 79 + IN THIS CRADLE-LIFE OF OURS 74 + MY CAROL 71 + OCTOBER 88 + ON A FLY-LEAF OF "AFTERWHILES" 118 + ON A FLY-LEAF OF "FLUTE AND VIOLIN" 115 + PRELUDE (NOW I CAN SING, ETC.) xiii + RETROSPECTION 45 + SPENDTHRIFT 67 + THE FICKLE HEART 64 + THE LEGEND OF THE PANSIES 102 + [A]THROUGH AN AMBER PANE 50 + TRAILING ARBUTUS 100 + 'TWIXT CREEK AND BAY 62 + VOICES OF THE OLD, OLD DAYS 39 + + + ALBION FELLOWS BACON. + + A MADRIGAL 98 + [C]A MOOD 101 + A RESOLVE 123 + A SONG 55 + AN ALPINE VALLEY 49 + AN OLD-TIME PEDAGOGUE 31 + AT LAST 125 + AT TWILIGHT 90 + CHIARO-OSCURO 120 + ECLIPSE 57 + ELIZABETH 113 + GRANDFATHER 27 + HER TITLE-DEEDS 34 + HERE AND THERE 75 + IN THE DARK 58 + INSPIRATION 116 + LEFT OUT 95 + LOST 69 + MAY-TIME 84 + MARRIED 108 + MOTHERHOOD 109 + "OH, DREARY DAY" 83 + ON A FLY-LEAF OF IRVING 117 + OPHELIA 111 + "OUR FATHER" 97 + PRELUDE (WE CANNOT SING, ETC.) xiii + REQUIEM 112 + SILENT KEYS 41 + SPRING'S COPHETUA 86 + STRANDED 124 + SUFFICIENCY 110 + THE LIGHTING OF THE CANDLES 17 + THE MILKY WAY 76 + THE OLD BELL 106 + THE OLD CHURCH 29 + THE POTTER'S FIELD 93 + THE PROPHET 91 + THE ROBBER 70 + THE SEA 107 + THE SILENT BROTHERHOOD 66 + THE TIME O' DAY 99 + THE TOWER OF BABEL 104 + WINTER BEAUTY 87 + WHEN YOUTH IS GONE 63 + WHEN SHE COMES HOME 122 + +FOOTNOTES: + +[A] By permission of _Youth's Companion_. + +[B] By permission of _Harper's Weekly_. + +[C] By permission of _Frank Leslie_. + + + + +PRELUDE. + + + _WE cannot sing of life, whose years are brief, + Nor sad heart-stories tell, who know no grief, + Nor write of shipwrecks on the seas of Fate, + Whose ship from out the harbor sailed but late. + But we may sing of fair and sunny days, + Of Love that walks in peace through quiet ways; + And unto him who turns the page to see + Our simple story, haply it may be + As when in some mild day in early spring, + One through the budding woods goes wandering; + And finds, where late the snow has blown across, + Beneath the leaves, a violet in the moss._ + _1887._ _A. F. B._ + + + _NOW I can sing of life, whose days are brief, + For I have walked close hand in hand with grief. + And I may tell of shipwrecked hopes, since mine + Sank just outside the happy harbor line. + But still my song is of those sunny days + When Love was with me in those quiet ways. + And unto him who turns the page to see + That day's short story, haply it may be, + The joy of those old memories he feels: + As one who through the wintry twilight steals, + And sees, across the chilly wastes of snow, + The darkened sunset's rosy afterglow._ + _1892._ _A. F. J._ + + + + +PART I. + + + + +SONGS YSAME + + + + +The Lighting of the Candles. + + + WHENCE came the ember + That touched our young souls' candles first with light; + In shadowy years, too distant to remember, + Where childhood merges backward into night? + + I know not, but the halo of those tapers + Has ever since around all nature shone; + And we have looked at life through golden vapors + Because of that one ember touch alone. + + + + +At Early Candle-Lighting. + + + THOSE, who have heard the whispered breath + Of Nature's secret "Shibboleth," + And learned the pass-word to unroll + The veil that hides her inmost soul, + May follow; but this by-path leads + Through mullein stalks and jimson-weeds. + And he who scorning treads them down + Would deem but poor and common-place + Those whom he'll meet in homespun gown. + But they who lovingly retrace + Their steps to scenes I dream about, + Will find the latch-string hanging out. + With them I claim companionship, + And for them burn my tallow-dip, + At early candle-lighting. + + To these low hills, around which cling + My fondest thoughts, I would not bring + An alien eye long used to sights + Among the snow-crowned Alpine heights. + An eagle does not bend its wing + To low-built nests where robins sing. + Between the fence's zigzag rails, + The stranger sees the road that trails + Its winding way into the dark, + Fern-scented woods. He does not mark + The old log cabin at the end + As I, or hail it as a friend, + Or catch, when daylight's last rays wane, + The glimmer through its narrow pane + Of early candle-lighting. + + As anglers sit and half in dream + Dip lazy lines into the stream, + And watch the swimming life below, + So I watch pictures come and go. + And in the flame, Alladin-wise, + See genii of the past arise. + If it be so that common things + Can fledge your fancy with fast wings; + If you the language can translate + Of lowly life, and make it great, + And can the beauty understand + That dignifies a toil-worn hand, + Look in this halo, and see how + The homely seems transfigured now + At early candle-lighting. + + A fire-place where the great logs roar + And shine across the puncheon floor, + And through the chinked walls, here and there, + The snow steals, and the frosty air. + Meager and bare the furnishings, + But hospitality that kings + Might well dispense, transmutes to gold, + The welcome given young and old. + Plain and uncouth in speech and dress, + But richly clad in kindliness, + The neighbors gather, one by one, + At rustic rout when day is done. + Vanish all else in this soft light,-- + The past is ours again tonight; + 'Tis early candle-lighting. + + Oh, well-remembered scenes like these: + The candy-pullings, husking-bees-- + The evenings when the quilting frames + Were laid aside for romping games; + The singing school! The spelling match! + My hand still lingers on the latch, + I fain would wider swing the door + And enter with the guests once more. + Though into ashes long ago + That fire faded, still the glow + That warmed the hearts around it met, + Immortal, burns within me yet. + Still to that cabin in the wood + I turn for highest types of good + At early candle-lighting. + + How fast the scenes come flocking to + My mind, as white sheep jostle through + The gap, when pasture bars are down, + And pass into the twilight brown. + Grandmother's face and snowy cap, + The knitting work upon her lap, + The creaking, high-backed rocking-chair; + The spinning-wheel, the big loom where + The shuttle carried song and thread; + The valance on the high, white bed + Whose folds the lavender still keep. + Oh! nowhere else such dreamless sleep + On tired eyes its deep spell lays, + As that which came in those old days + At early candle-lighting. + + A kitchen lit by one dim light, + And 'round the table in affright, + A group of children telling tales. + Outside, the wind--a banshee--wails. + Even the shadows, that they throw + Upon the walls, to giants grow. + The hailstones 'gainst the window panes + Fall with the noise of clanking chains, + Till, glancing back, they almost feel + Black shapes from out the corners steal, + And, climbing to the loft o'erhead, + The witches follow them to bed. + The low flame flickers. Snuff the wick! + For ghosts and goblins crowd so thick + At early candle-lighting. + + An orchard path that tramping feet + For half a century have beat; + Here to the fields at sun-up went + The reapers. Here, on errands sent, + Small bare-feet loitered, loath to go. + Here apple-boughs dropped blooming snow, + Through garden borders gaily set + With touch-me-nots and bouncing Bet; + Here passed at dusk the harvester + With quickened step and pulse astir + At sight of some one's fluttering gown, + Who stood with sunbonnet pulled down + And called the cows. Ah, in a glance + One reads that simple, old romance + At early candle-lighting. + + One picture more. A winter day + Just done, and supper cleared away. + The romping children quiet grow, + And in the reverent silence, slow + The old man turns the sacred page, + Guide of his life and staff of age. + And then, the while my eyes grow dim, + The mother's voice begins a hymn: + "_Sweet hour of prayer, sweet hour of prayer + That calls me from a world of care!_" + What wonder from those cabins rude + Came lives of stalwart rectitude, + When hearth-stones were the altars where + Arose the vestal flame of prayer + At early candle-lighting. + + No crumbling castle walls are ours, + No ruined battlements and towers. + Our history, on callow wings, + Soared not in time of feudal kings; + No strolling minstrel's roundelay + Tells of past glory in decay, + But rugged life of pioneer + Has passed away among us here; + And as the ivy tendrils grow + About the ancient turrets, so + The influence of its sturdy truth + Shall live in never-ending youth, + When simple customs of its day + Have, long-forgotten, passed away + With early candle-lighting. + + + + +Bob White. + + + JUST now, beyond the turmoil and the din + Of crowded streets that city walls shut in, + I heard the whistle of a quail begin: + "Bob White! Bob White!" + So faintly and far away falling + It seemed that a dream voice was calling + "Bob White! Bob White!" + How the old sights and sounds come thronging + And thrill me with a sudden longing! + + Through quiet country lanes the sunset shines. + Fence corners where the wild rose climbs and twines, + And blooms in tangled black-berry vines, + "Bob White! Bob White!" + I envy yon home-going swallow, + Oh, but swiftly to rise and follow-- + Follow its flight, + Follow it back with happy flying, + Where green-clad hills are calmly lying. + + Wheat fields whose golden silences are stirred + By whirring insect wings, and naught is heard + But plaintive callings of that one sweet word, + "Bob White! Bob White!" + And a smell of the clover growing + In the meadow lands ripe for mowing, + All red and white. + Over the shady creek comes sailing, + Past willows in the water trailing. + + Tired heart, 'tis but in dreams I turn my feet, + Again to wander in the ripening wheat + And hear the whistle of the quail repeat + "Bob White! Bob White!" + But oh! there is joy in the knowing + That somewhere green pastures are growing, + Though out of sight. + And the light on those church spires dying, + On the old home meadow is lying. + + + + +Grandfather. + + + HOW broad and deep was the fireplace old, + And the great hearth-stone how wide! + There was always room for the old man's chair + By the cosy chimney side, + And all the children that cared to crowd + At his knee in the evening-tide. + + Room for all of the homeless ones + Who had nowhere else to go; + They might bask at ease in the grateful warmth + And sun in the cheerful glow, + For Grandfather's heart was as wide and warm + As the old fireplace, I know. + + And he always found at his well-spread board + Just room for another chair; + There was always rest for another head + On the pillow of his care; + There was always place for another name + In his trustful morning prayer. + + Oh, crowded world with your jostling throngs! + How narrow you grow, and small; + How cold, like a shadow across the heart, + Your selfishness seems to fall, + When I think of that fireplace warm and wide, + And the welcome awaiting all. + + + + +The Old Church. + + + CLOSE to the road it stood among the trees, + The old, bare church, with windows small and high, + And open doors that gave, on meeting day, + A welcome to the careless passer by. + + Its straight, uncushioned seats, how hard they seemed! + What penance-doing form they always wore + To little heads that could not reach the text, + And little feet that could not reach the floor. + + What wonder that we hailed with strong delight + The buzzing wasp, slow sailing down the aisle, + Or, sunk in sin, beguiled the constant fly + From weary heads, to make our neighbors smile. + + How softly from the churchyard came the breeze + That stirred the cedar boughs with scented wings, + And gently fanned the sleeper's heated brow + Or fluttered Grandma Barlow's bonnet strings. + + With half-shut eyes, across the pulpit bent, + The preacher droned in soothing tones about + Some theme, that like the narrow windows high, + Took in the sky, but left terrestrials out. + + Good, worthy man, his work on earth is done; + His place is lost, the old church passed away; + And with them, when they went, there must have gone + That sweet, bright calm, my childhood's Sabbath day. + + + + +An Old-Time Pedagogue. + + + SLOWLY adown the village street + With groping cane and faltering feet, + He goes each day through cold or heat-- + Old Daddy Hight. + His hair is scant upon his head, + His eyes are dim, his nose is red, + And yet, his mien is stern and dread-- + Old Daddy Hight. + + The village lads his form descry + While yet afar, and boldly cry-- + (For bears are scarce and rods are high) + "Old Daddy Hight!" + But when their fathers meet his glance, + They nod and smile and look askance. + He taught them once the Modoc dance-- + Old Daddy Hight. + + How long we cling to servitude, + How long we keep the schoolboy's mood! + Still seems with awful power endued-- + Old Daddy Hight. + They feel a cringing of the knee, + Those fathers, yet, whene'er they see + Adown the walk pace solemnly-- + Old Daddy Hight. + + Wide is his fame, of how he taught, + And how he flogged, and reckoned naught + The toils and pains that knowledge bought-- + Old Daddy Hight. + He had no lack of "ways and means" + To track the loiterers on the greens; + He scorned all counterfeits and screens-- + Old Daddy Hight. + + Oh, dire the day that brewed mishap! + That brought to luckless back his strap, + To hanging head his Dunce's cap-- + Old Daddy Hight. + No blotted page dared meet his eye; + The owner quaked and wished to die, + When rod in hand, with wrath strode by-- + Old Daddy Hight. + + He helped them up the thorny steep + Of wisdom's path with pain to creep, + With vigilance that might not sleep-- + Old Daddy Hight. + Now, down his life's long, slow decline, + He walks alone at eighty-nine-- + The last of his illustrious line-- + Old Daddy Hight. + + + + +Her Title-Deeds. + + + INSIDE the cottage door she sits, + Just where the sunlight, softest there, + Slants down on snowy kerchief's bands, + On folded hands and silvered hair. + + The garden pale her world shuts in, + A simple world made sweet with thyme, + Where life, soft lulled by droning bees, + Flows to the mill-stream's lapsing rhyme. + + Poor are her cottage walls, and bare; + Too mean and small to harbor pride, + Yet with a musing gaze she sees + Her broad domains extending wide. + + Green slopes of hills, and waving fields, + With blooming hedges set between, + Through shifting veils of tender mist, + Smile, half revealed, a mingled scene. + + All hers, for lovingly she holds + A yellow packet in her hand, + Whose ancient, faded script proclaims + Her title to this spreading land. + + Old letters! On the trembling page + Drop unawares, unheeded tears. + These are her title-deeds, her lands + Spread through the realms of by-gone years. + + + + +INTERLUDES. + + + + +Voices of the Old, Old Days. + + + OH, voices of the old, old days, + Speak once again to me, + I walk alone the old, old ways + And miss your melody. + To-night I close my tired eyes + And hear the rain drip slow, + And dream a hand is on my brow + That pressed it long ago. + + My thoughts stray through the lonely night + Until I seem to see + Home faces, in the firelight, + That always smiled on me. + Those shadows dancing on the walls + Are not by embers cast, + They are the forms my heart recalls + From out the happy past. + + Forgotten is the gathering gloom, + The night's deep loneliness, + As round me in the silent room + With noiseless tread they press. + Though in the dark the rain sobs on, + I heed its sound no more; + For voices of the old, old days + Are calling as of yore. + + + + +Silent Keys. + + + AS we would touch with soft caress the brow + Of one who dreams, the spell of sleep to break, + Across the yellowed keys I sweep my hand, + The old, remembered music to awake; + But something drops from out those melodies-- + There are some silent keys. + + So is it when I call to those I loved, + Who blessed my life with tender care and fond: + So is it with those early dreams and hopes, + Some voices answer and some notes respond, + But in the chords that I would strike, like these, + There are some silent keys. + + Heart, dost thou hear not in those pauses fall + A still, small voice that speaks to thee of peace? + What though some hopes may fail, some dreams be lost, + Though sometimes happy music break and cease. + We might miss part of heaven's minstrelsies + But for these silent keys. + + + + +PART II. + + + + +Retrospection. + + + THE grandsire, in the chimney corner, takes + The almanac from its accustomed place, + And while the kettle swings upon the crane, + And firelight flickers on his wrinkled face, + Reviews the slow procession of the months; + And sees again upon the hills of green + The gypsy Springtime pitch her airy tent + Among the blossoms. Then the silver sheen + Of harvest moon shines down on rustling corn + Until the hazy air of Autumn thrills + With sound of woodman's ax and hunter's horn, + And darker shadows climb the russet hills. + + But while he ponders on the open page, + The last sand in the hour-glass slips away. + The end seems near of his long pilgrimage, + And he would call the fleeting year to stay. + But passing on, she goes--a sweet-faced nun-- + To take within the Convent of the Past + The veil of silence. Then the gates swing shut, + And Time, the grim old warden, bolts them fast. + No more can come again those halcyon days + The Year took with it to its dim-lit cell; + But often at the bars they stand and gaze, + When through the heart rings memory's matin-bell. + + + + +Echoes From Erin. + + + ACROSS old Purple Mountain I hear a bugle call, + And down the rocks, like water, the echoes leap and fall. + One note alone can startle the voices of the peaks, + And waken songs of Erin, whene'er the bugle speaks. + They call and call and call, + Until the voices all + Ring down the dusky hollows and in the distance fall. + + Methinks, like Purple Mountain, the past will sometimes rise, + And memory's call awaken its echoing replies. + Within the tower of Shandon again the bells will sway, + And follow, with their ringing, the Lee upon its way, + And chime and chime and chime, + Where ivy tendrils climb, + Till bells and river mingle to sound the silvery rhyme. + + Again the daisied grasses beside the castle walls + Will stir with softest sighing, to hear the wind's footfalls; + And through the moss-grown abbey, along Killarney's shore, + The melodies of Erin will echo evermore, + And roll and roll and roll, + Till spirit hands shall toll + The music of the uplands unto the listening soul. + +_Killarney, Ireland._ + + + + +An Alpine Valley. + + + OH, happy valley at the mountain's feet, + If half your happiness you could but know! + Though over you a shadow always falls, + And far above you rise those heights of snow, + So far, your yearning love you may not speak + With rosy flush like some high sister peak, + Yet you may clasp its feet in fond embrace, + And gaze up in its face. + + And sometimes down its slopes a wind will come + And bring a sudden, noiseless sweep of snow, + Like a soft greeting from those summits sent + To comfort you below. + + What more? Love may not ask too great a boon. + Enough to be so near, though cast so low. + Think that a sea had rolled between you twain + If careless fortune had decreed it so, + And you could only lie and look across + To distant cloudy heights and know your loss, + And see some favored valley, fair and sweet, + Heap flowers at its feet. + +_Cham, Switzerland._ + + + + +Through an Amber Pane. + + + BY some strange alchemy that turns to gold + The light that drops from gray and leaden skies, + Though heavy mists the outer world enfold, + 'Tis always sunshine where Napoleon lies. + No more an exile by an alien sea, + Forgetful of the banishment and bane; + Now lies he there, in kingly dignity, + His tomb a Mecca shrine beside the Seine. + And there the pilgrim hears the story told, + How Paris placed above her hero, dead, + A window that should turn to yellow gold + The light that on his resting place is shed. + So on him falls, though summers wane, + The sunshine of that amber pane. + + By some strange miracle, maybe divine, + The sunlight falls upon the buried past + And turns its water into sparkling wine, + And gilds the coin its coffers have amassed. + Could it have been those long-lost halcyon days + Trailed not a cloud across our April sky? + Faltered we not along those untried ways? + Grew we not weary as the days went by? + Ah, yes! But unreturning feet forget + Rough places trodden in the long ago, + Rememb'ring only paths with flowers beset, + While pressing onward, wearily and slow. + For Memory's windows but retain + The sunshine of an amber pane. + + The little white, wind-blown anemone + By one round dewdrop may be fully filled, + And by some light-winged, passing honey-bee + Its cup of crystal water may be spilled. + So does the child heart hold its happiness: + A drop will fill it to its rosy rim. + It is not that these later days bring less, + That joy so rarely rises to the brim; + It is because the heart has deeper grown. + A fuller knowledge must its thirst assuage. + Perhaps we would not deem those pleasures flown + As bright as those which star the present age, + Had not upon them long years lain + The sunshine of an amber pane. + + The dust of dim forgetfulness piles fast + Upon the chains that thralled us yesterday. + So will it be when this day, too, is past, + And in its arms we've seen it bear away + The cares that brooded in the tired brain; + The work that weighted down the weary hand; + The high hopes that we struggled to attain; + The problems that we could not understand. + Washed of its stain, bereft of any sting, + Seen through the window of the Memory, + Perchance, a gentler grace to it may cling + Than we may now think possible to see. + For skies will gleam, though gray with rain, + Like sunshine through that amber pane. + + We may not stand on Patmos, and look through + The star-hinged portals where the great pearls gleam. + No brush that unveiled beauty ever drew, + Save one, that caught its shadow in a dream. + So lest we falter, faithless and afraid, + The Merciful, remembering we are dust, + Reveals not heaven for which our hearts have prayed, + But by a token teaches us to trust; + And day by day allows us to look through + The window of the Memory, broad and vast, + (Till jasper minarets rise into view) + Upon the happy heaven of the past; + And gives, till purer light we gain, + The sunshine of that amber pane. + + + + +At a Tenement Window. + + + SOMETIMES my needle stops with half-drawn thread + (Not often though, each moment's waste means bread, + And missing stitches leave the little mouths unfed). + I look down on the dingy court below: + A tuft of grass is all it has to show,-- + A broken pump, where thirsty children go. + Above, there shines a bit of sky, so small + That it might be a passing blue-bird's wing. + One tree leans up against the high brick wall, + And there the sparrows twitter of the spring, + Until they waken in my heart a cry + Of hunger, that no bread can satisfy. + + Always before, when Maytime took her way + Across the fields, I followed close. To-day + I can but dream of all her bright array. + My work drops down. Across the sill I lean, + And long with bitter longing, for unseen + Rain-freshened paths, where budding woods grow green. + The water trickles from the pump below + Upon the stones. With eyes half shut, I hear + It falling in a pool where rushes grow, + And feel a cooling presence drawing near. + And now the sparrows chirp again. No, hark!-- + A singing as of some far meadow lark. + + It is the same old miracle applied + Unto myself, that on the mountain-side + The few small loaves and fishes multiplied. + Behold, how strange and sweet the mystery! + The birds, the broken pump, the gnarled tree, + Have brought the fullness of the spring to me. + For in the leaves that rustle by the wall + All forests find a tongue. And so that grass + Can, with its struggling tuft of green, recall + Wide, bloom-filled meadows where the cattle pass. + How it can be, but dimly I divine. + These crumbs, God given, make the whole loaf mine. + + + + +A Song. + + "Home-keeping hearts are happiest."--LONGFELLOW. + + + THERE will be distant journeyings enough + To reach that Land beyond the ether's sea, + To satisfy the veriest roaming heart,-- + Let me stay home with thee! + + There will be new companionships enough + In that bright spirit-life. Why should we flee + So soon to alien hearts and stranger scenes? + I would stay home with thee. + + The heart grows homesick, thinking of the change + When these familiar things no more shall be; + When e'en the thought of them, perchance, shall fade,-- + Let me stay home with thee. + + I would imprint upon my mind each scene, + Each meadow path, and stream, and orchard-tree, + Beloved since childhood, holy with our hopes, + Sweet with the thoughts of thee. + + And each dear household place, let me learn all + By heart, where I am wont thy form to see. + Who knows what things shall pass? If I may share + A hearth in heaven with thee? + + + + +Eclipse. + + + GOD keep us from the sordid mood + That shrinks to self-infinitude, + That sees no thing as good or grand, + That answers not the hour's demand, + And throws o'er Heaven's splendors furled + The shadow of our little world. + + + + +In the Dark. + + + HERE in the dark I lie, and watch the stars + That through the soft gloom shine like tear-bright eyes + Behind a mourner's veil. The darkness seems + Almost a vapor, palpable and dense, + In which my room's familiar outlines melt, + And all seems one black pall that folds me round. + Only a mirror glimmers through the dusk, + And on the wall a dim, uncertain square + Shows where a portrait hangs. Ah, even so + Beloved faces fade into the past + And naught remains except a space of light + To show us where they were. + How still it seems! + The busy clock, whose tell-tale talk was drowned + By Day's uproarious voices, calls aloud, + Undaunted by the dark, the flight of time, + And through the halls its tones ring drearily. + The breeze on tiptoe seems to tread, as though + It were afraid to rouse the drowsy leaves. + The long, dim street is quiet. Nothing breaks + The dream of Night, asleep on Nature's breast. + Hark! Some one passes. On the pavement stones + Each stealthy step gives back a muffled sound, + Till the last foot-fall seems in distance drowned. + So Death might pass, bent on his mission dread, + Adown the silent street, and none might know + What hour he passed or what he bore away. + Ah, sadder thought! So Life goes, unawares, + Noiseless and swift and resolutely on, + While the dumb world lies folded in the gloom, + Unconscious and uncaring in its sleep. + And towards the west, the stars, all silently + Like golden sands in God's great hour-glass, glide + And fall into the nether crystal globe. + + + + +Felipa, Wife of Columbus. + + + MORE than the compass to the mariner, + Wast thou, Felipa, to his dauntless soul. + Through adverse winds that threatened wreck, and nights + Of rayless gloom, thou pointed ever to + The North Star of his great ambition. He + Who once has lost an Eden, or has gained + A paradise by Eve's sweet influence, + Alone can know how strong a spell lies in + The witchery of a woman's beckoning hand. + And thou didst draw him, tide-like, higher still, + Felipa, whispering the lessons learned + From thy courageous father, till the flood + Of his ambition burst all barriers + And swept him onward to his longed-for goal. + + Before the jewels of a Spanish queen + Built fleets to waft him on his untried way, + Thou gavest thy wealth of wifely sympathy + To build the lofty purpose of his soul. + And now the centuries have cycled by, + Till thou art all-forgotten by the throng + That lauds the great Pathfinder of the deep. + It matters not in that infinitude + Of space, where thou dost guide thy spirit-bark + To undiscovered lands, supremely fair. + If to this little planet thou couldst turn + And voyage, wraithlike, to its cloud-hung rim, + Thou wouldst not care for praise. And if, perchance, + Some hand held out to thee a laurel bough, + Thou wouldst not claim one leaf, but fondly turn + To lay thy tribute, also, at his feet. + + + + +'Twixt Creek and Bay. + + + 'TWIXT creek and bay + We whisper to our white sails "stay! + Oh, Life, a little while delay! + 'Twixt creek and bay." + + So loath to go + From these calm shallows that we know, + We fain would stay the year's swift flow, + Nor onward go + + To banks more wide, + Where seaward drawings of the tide + Impel to deeper depths untried, + Where Life grows wide. + + 'Twixt creek and bay-- + The morning deepens into day, + And richer freight we bear, alway, + When in the bay. + + + + +When Youth is Gone. + + + HOW can we know when youth is gone,-- + When age has surely come at last? + There is no marked meridian + Through which we sail, and feel when past. + + A keener air our faces strike, + A chiller current swifter run; + They meet and glide like tide with tide, + Our youth and age, when youth is done. + + + + +The Fickle Heart. + + + CANST tell me, thou inconstant heart, + What like unto thou art? + A gypsy wandering up and down + Through April's green and Autumn's brown, + Until the year is spent; + And then, when hills are white with snow, + And brooks, ice-bound, have ceased to flow, + No place to pitch his tent. + + + + +Banditti. + + + UPON Life's lonely highway, robber bands + Of grim-faced years seize with relentless hands + Each traveler, and wrest from out his grasp + The treasures that he fain would closer clasp. + None can escape. Each year demands its toll, + Till robbed of youth, we grope toward the goal, + Halting and blind, of all but life bereft, + And death claims that--the only boon that's left. + + + + +The Silent Brotherhood. + + + ON through the cloisters of eternity + The years, like monks, in slow procession pass, + Telling their rosary beads, the golden days, + With penance prayers of dark and dismal nights. + Hooded and cowled, with silence on they pass, + Nor will they pause until their vesper rings + A solemn curfew at the sunset hour, + When all the fires of life are buried low, + And all the worlds drop down upon their knees, + To say a last mass ere the death of Time. + + + + +Spendthrift. + + + HE was a king one time, + And they wrapped the ermine around him, + And the bells rang out when they crowned him, + Rang with a joyful chime. + + And he sat on a throne! + The wealth that a world could offer + Was heaped in the New Year's coffer, + For the world was his own. + + He was a spendthrift though, + And the coins of his lavish giving + Were the golden moments of living,-- + Coins that he squandered so. + + He is a beggar now. + In the night and the storm he lingers, + No gold in his prodigal fingers,-- + King with the uncrowned brow. + + Nothing to call his own! + His fortune scattered behind him; + Death empty-handed shall find him,-- + A New Year takes his throne. + + + + +Lost. + + + CHILDHOOD flits by with flowers in both its hands,-- + We know not why it leaves, nor when it goes; + But suddenly we miss some subtle grace, + As perfume passes from a fading rose; + We scarce divine, yet somehow faintly feel + In the soft air a far-blown breath of snows. + + Straying afar, unheeded and alone + Upon life's highway 'mid the busy throng, + Swept in its eager, restless race along + To the great future, unexplored, unknown, + The little child is lost. And when with haste + The wanderer's footsteps through the streets are traced, + They find a man with features pale and stern, + But the lost child will nevermore return. + + + + +The Robber. + + + DO you know why Time flies by so slow + When we are sad and old? + Why he turns and waits as if loath to go + On his journey cold? + Because from our coffers of hope and youth, + Where we kept life's gold, + He has stolen our treasures all, in sooth, + From their sacred hold. + He who came with a gift in hand + Was a robber bold. + He whose greeting was smooth and bland + Was a wolf in the fold. + And this is the reason that he goes by, + When we're worn and old, + So slowly, because he can scarcely fly + With his weight of gold. + + + + +My Carol. + + + 'TIS the time when holly berries + Grow red as the Yule-log's glow, + And hearth and hall are decked by all + With the green of the mistletoe. + Time when the joy of giving + Is felt at each fireside, + And wings seek rest in the old home nest, + For the time is Christmas-tide. + + Though only a carol singer + With nothing of gold in store, + And little to bring as an offering, + I stand outside your door. + Open! This blessed morning + Peace be to thee and thine! + Here to you all I gaily call + A greeting from me and mine. + + Haply it may awaken + Some joy that so long ago, + On the frosty dawn of a Christmas gone, + You found in your stocking toe. + Though but an old, old carol, + It bears love's myrrh and gold, + And the frankincense of a joy intense + That the angel hosts foretold. + + + + +Carol. + + + _Listen! The heralds proclaim Him! + Follow! A star leads the way! + Oh, joy, in the City of David + The Christ-child reigns to-day!_ + + + I greet you this blessed morning. + Peace be to thee and thine! + To the dear ones here be Christmas cheer, + And the love of me and mine. + + + + +"In This Cradle Life of Ours." + + + THE world swings slowly back and forth, + From dawn to dusk, from dusk to dawn, + And we forget the hand that rocks, + But, cradle-like, the world swings on. + + A little while to stir and fret, + Or sob with trembling lip + Because the sunbeams we would grasp + Through helpless fingers slip. + + A little while to moan, and start + From fevered dreams, and weep, + For still the cradle sways and swings + Until we fall asleep. + + The broad earth's pillow is so soft + To weary heads, and who can tell + But through that sleep sound lullabies + Of the white angel, Israfel? + + + + +Here and There. + + + HOW must they sing, those angel choirs, + Who breathe Heaven's pure, sweet air! + They need but waft it from their lips + To make it music rare. + + Here on these chill, damp plains below, + Where stifling vapors rise, + We draw the heavy air of earth, + And breathe it out in sighs. + + + + +The Milky Way. + + + UP the steep heights whereon God's citadel + Is set, the prayers of mortals to that bourne, + For ages toiling, in the adamant, + Across the sky a glittering path have worn. + + + + +INTERLUDE. + + + + +Interlude. + + + WITHIN the pauses of the anthem falls a hush, + And the deep organ's solemn voice goes on alone + In a low undertone, + As rain comes sometimes with a sudden sweeping rush, + And then is still, save that it slowly drips and falls + From leaves at intervals. + So memory sings alone + Between the busy hours when comes a lull, + And naught is audible + But its low undertone. + So darkness drops between the days, an interlude + When night's low sighing stirs the sleepy solitude. + So, when the little cycle of this life is rounded, + Before the spirit enters into life unbounded, + It waits to hear, with bated breath, + The solemn interlude of death. + + + + +PART III. + + + + +"Oh, Dreary Day!" + + + OH, dreary day, that had so late a dawn! + Oh, dreary day, so long, though early gone! + Fold thy gray mantle round thy form and go + To find the lost sun, while Night comes on, + Across the plain, with silent step and slow. + + I weary of thy dark, unsmiling mood, + I weary of thy dull disquietude, + And thy complaining voice that tells of pain, + Not with the tempest's trumpet, but subdued + In broken sentences of falling rain. + + Now, soft as household spirit, comes the Night + And draws the curtains, fanning still more bright + The cheerful fire, while for her gentle sake + The tapers burst in bloom with yellow light, + Like evening primroses just kissed awake. + + + + +May-Time. + + + THE Spring steals through the city streets, + Silent and shrinking, half afraid, + As if there came, from woods and fields, + Some timid, bashful, country maid. + + The lofty houses coldly frown, + And coldly stares the stony street; + But here and there from out a cleft + There springs a flower to kiss her feet. + + And here and there a crocus smiles + A friendly greeting, or a spray + Of blooming lilacs, fresh and sweet, + Leans down and nods across her way. + + Till, reassured, she smiles and sings, + And on she passes, glad and fleet, + And little children at their play + Look up to catch her glances sweet. + + Is it her robe's soft fluttering + That gently fans the passer by? + He only feels the freshened air, + Nor knows the gracious presence nigh. + + But some sweet influence he feels, + That charms care's gloomy shade away, + And pours into his wakened heart + The golden gladness of the May. + + So, like an angel visitant, + She glides among the haunts of men, + And faint hearts bound, and sad eyes smile, + Because the Spring has come again. + + + + +Spring's Cophetua. + + + SHE came with garments scant and poor and thin, + And white feet gleaming bare; + With pallid smiles where April tears had been, + And snowflakes on her hair. + + Oh, never--Winter thought--such gentle look + In all the land was seen! + From his gray locks the diadem he took + And crowned her as his queen. + + And now, in silken robes and gems arrayed, + Fair Spring reigns in his stead. + Upon his throne she sits, the beggar maid-- + "Cophetua" is dead. + + + + +Winter Beauty. + + + WHEN I go through the meadows brown, + Where stand the tall weeds, sere and dead, + Think you I find no beauty there, + Since Summer through the fields has fled? + + The edges of the frozen stream, + Whose quiet waters late were crossed + By shadows of the bending fern, + Are fair with fringes of the frost. + + Wherever cowslips crowded thick, + Or banks of buttercups would be, + A host of airy forms in white, + Like ghosts of flowers returned, I see. + + It may be clustered flakes of snow, + Or frozen dew still glistening there, + But still it seems as if there came + A rare, strange odor through the air. + + + + +October. + + + ACROSS the stubble fields the lazy breezes pass, + From Autumn orchards sloping southward in the sun, + Where dropping from the low-hung branches, one by one, + The apples hide in tangles of the wind-blown grass. + A warm, sweet scent of mellow fruit fills all the air, + And faintly over hills and hollows comes the cry + Of some shrill bluejay, and his mate's far-off reply. + Like Ruth, the winds will go a-gleaning, by and by, + And garner in the leaves till all the woods are bare. + + But now my boyhood's love has come again to me, + October--in her royal red and gold arrayed! + She comes with glowing cheeks, my dusky Indian maid, + And all the world seems bright because so bright is she. + Unto her lips the wild grapes hold their spicy wine. + Persimmons, sweet and golden with an early frost, + Drop at her feet; and where the narrow creek has crossed + The woods, and in the ferns and flag its way has lost, + Blood-red the corals of the dog-wood berries shine. + + And thus she comes, my Love I loved when I was young! + We wander for a little while across the hills, + And, as of old, her sunny presence warms and fills + My heart. But like a lute with one string left unstrung, + When I would sing again the song of other years, + Something is lost. The harmony is incomplete. + And though the same old melody I still repeat, + One alto note of joy is gone that made it sweet, + And something trembles in the Autumn haze like tears. + + + + +At Twilight. + + + A TINY bird flits through the twilight brown, + When sunset dreams make all the garden fair, + Whose soft notes fall into the quiet air + Like olive leaves on waters smooth dropped down. + Emblems of rest, when floods of care do cease, + Into my heart, as well, they fall and float, + An olive leaf each faint and dreamy note-- + I recognize their sign, and feel at peace. + + + + +The Prophet. + + + DARKNESS and silence, such as only fall + At midnight, wrap the sleeping hamlets all; + No life in all the dim world seems to be. + Then suddenly, + Across the hills, far off and faint, I hear + Sound through the dark, as through a dream, the call + (How strange it seems!) of some bold chanticleer. + + (Half in my sleep I hear that clarion ring, + With distant calls, like echoes, answering; + And, as at war's alarum, soldiers leap + From guarded sleep + And seize their arms, and hasten from their tents, + So, at this sound, my drowsy senses spring, + Alert to man the mind's dark battlements.) + + To tell night's mid-hour tolls no startled bell; + Only thy voice is heard, brave sentinel, + Who, like the ancient watchman on the towers, + Calls forth the hours, + And to the wistful questioners, who see + No gleam through pain's long vigil, dost foretell + "The morning cometh," oft and cheerily. + + How canst thou know when, weary with his race, + The Day turns back, his pathway to retrace? + Canst thou the maiden Dawn's light footsteps hear, + Approaching near? + Or dost thou stand in converse with the skies, + And know what time she leaves her hiding-place + By joyful flashes of their starry eyes? + + Thou art a prophet, like to those of old, + Who in the darkness sat, but firm and bold + Looked with undaunted eyes towards the dim + Horizon's rim, + And thrilled with faith of waiting ages born, + That soon from out the Night's strong prisonhold, + Should burst the golden glory of the Morn. + + + + +The Potter's Field. + + + JUST outside of the noisy town, + Half through thicket and wood revealed, + Hemmed about by a wall of stone, + Wide it lieth, the Potter's Field. + + Brambles wander across the grass, + Vines creep over the broken wall, + Bindweeds blossom, and here and there + Stands a waif of the forest tall. + + There no columns of gleaming white + Mark the dust that is sacred still; + Swings the gate on its rusty hinge-- + All may enter and roam at will. + + Who should hinder the ruthless hand, + Who protect from a vagrant's tread? + Guard the urns of the rich and great-- + No one cares for the pauper dead! + + Outlawed felon and sinless child + All find room in the Potter's Field. + There lies a Judas who sold his Lord, + Here a Mary, His pity healed. + + Who could know of the shame and sin + Safely under the sod concealed? + Weary burdens of want and grief, + Laid away in the Potter's Field. + + Who could guess?--for as swift and light + O'er it the feet of the seasons go; + Summer hides it with grace of flowers, + Winter spreads it with folds of snow. + + Rains weep over the lonely mound, + Sunlight lingers, and swift shades pass; + Tender hands of the gentle wind + Smooth the knots of the tangled grass. + + What though hallowed by Death alone, + Rest unbroken the sod doth yield; + Peace is here, for His constant watch + God doth set o'er the Potter's Field. + + + + +Left Out. + + + WELL he knew that his clothes were poor: + He was common, he humbly thought; + Child as he was, he could understand + Why he was slighted and never sought. + + Yet could he help it,--his mother gone,-- + Help the weight of his father's shame? + Hardest sentence of childish law: + Blaming innocence not to blame. + + It was hard when the children played + All together, to be left out,-- + Stand aside, with a stinging sense + That 'twas he that they laughed about. + + Thoughtless children, they felt no wrong,-- + Pushed him out of the ring at play. + No one heard how his voice was choked, + No one cared when he stole away. + + No one saw how he crept at last + Through the gate and the grasses deep, + Past the wall to a lonely grave + Where his mother was laid asleep. + + Could she feel in her narrow bed, + Wee, cold hands, as they groped about-- + Feel the tears that were dropped because + Even her grave had left him out? + + + + +"Our Father." + + + I HAVE no part with all the great, proud world: + It cares not how I live, nor when I die; + But every lily smiling in the field, + And every tiny sparrow darting by, + Claims kinship with me, mortal though they be,-- + The One who cares for them doth care for me. + + + + +A Madrigal. + +WOODBINE. + + + THE wild bee clings to it + Most fond and long. + The wild bird sings to it + Its sweetest song. + The wild breeze brings to it + A life more strong. + + So all things lend to thee + Some charm, some grace. + The world's a friend to thee, + In love's embrace. + All hearts do bend to thee, + In thy queen's place. + + + + +The Time o' Day. + + + IF I should look for the time o' day + On the rose's dial red, + I would think it was just the sunrise hour, + From the flush of its petals spread. + + And if I would tell by the lily-bell, + I would think it was calm, white noon; + And the violet's blue would tell by its hue + Of the evening coming soon. + + But when I would know by my lady's face, + I am all perplexed the while; + For it's always starlight by her eyes, + And sunlight by her smile. + + + + +Trailing Arbutus. + + + THERE may be hearts that lie so deep + 'Neath griefs and cares that weigh like drifted snow, + That love seems chilled in endless sleep, + And budding hopes may never dare to grow. + Yet under all, some memory + Trails its arbutus flowers of tender thought,-- + All buried in the snow maybe, + Still with the sweetest fragrance fraught. + + + + +A Mood. + + + SOMETHING has made the world so changed, + Something is lost from field and sky, + And the earth and sun are sadly estranged, + And the songs of Nature seemed turned to a cry. + Yet I heard my blithe little neighbor tell + How fair is the spring to see. + Ah, well,-- + Perhaps the change is in me. + + Something has gone from your smile, sweetheart; + Something I miss from your look, your tone. + Though you stand quite near, we are still apart, + You may clasp me close, but I feel alone. + Yet over and over your love you tell, + And as you say, it must be. + Ah, well,-- + Perhaps the change is in me. + + + + +The Legend of the Pansies. + + + ONE night in Fairyland, when all the court + Held carnival to welcome in the June, + And to the wind-harp's music, flying feet + Were dancing on the rose leaves night had strewn; + The naughty Puck crept up the castle stair, + And called the sleeping princes from their bed; + And with their royal pages following, + Away the tricksy little fairies sped. + Mounted on snowy night-moths, off they raced, + Startling the gnomes, asleep within the shade + Of gloomy forests, with their merry cries, + As at forbidden games all night they played. + But when at sunrise blew an elfin horn, + Mischievous Puck was nowhere to be seen, + The disobedient princes stood forlorn; + Like dew-drops fell their tears on grasses green. + For fairy children, not within the bounds + Of Queen Titania's realm at morning's dawn, + Change into blooming flowers where they stand, + And bloom there till the summer time is gone. + + Now, where the little princes played all night + In robes of royal purple and of gold, + The flowers we call pansies sprang in sight, + And round them stood the little pages bold, + In liveries of yellow, blue, and white; + While upward through the east the great sun rolled. + Then some, repentant, sadly drooped their heads; + Some turned their saucy faces to the sky; + But now they all alike must wait the day + When they can bid the summer time good-by. + Sometimes, when bees upon their busy rounds + Stop to deliver some sweet message sent + From Fairyland, the thoughtful faces smile + And seem to grow a little more content. + When cooling shadows creep along the grass, + And mother birds are twittering lullabies + To sleepy nestlings, then the south winds pass, + And close with fingers soft the pansies' eyes. + Upon the wings of dreams they're borne along + To loving arms that rock them all the night, + And fairy voices soothe their sleep with song, + Till they are waked by kisses of the light. + + + + +The Tower of Babel. + + + ONCE, many centuries ago, + Men tried to build a tower so high + That rising upward, round on round, + Its pinnacle should reach the sky. + + And as they toiled and built and dreamed and planned, + What hopes went upward with the rising stone! + That daring feet ere long should mount and stand + Upon the golden stairway to the throne. + + And then a dire confusion fell + Upon the workers, building there. + Men called and shouted each to each + With strange, uncomprehended speech, + And what it meant no one could tell; + So they left building in despair. + + Yet in their hearts still lived the hope that they + Might scale the ramparts of the sky some day. + + Sometimes our souls expand and glow + With holy visions bright and pure; + But when from these deep vales below + We proudly try to climb and reach + With clumsy masonry of speech, + And rounds of rhyme that shall endure, + That sky-born thing, that heavenly theme, + Touched only by a prayer or dream, + A swift confusion o'er us flies, + And sudden chills our hands benumb. + Our minds are blurred, our tongues are dumb, + The vision fades away and dies. + + Yet still we dream that song some day may be + Rung through the arches of Eternity. + + + + +The Old Bell. + + + THE vines have grown so thick and twined so strong, + With clinging hold, about the bell that swings + In the old tower, that now it never rings. + No one has heard its voice for seasons long. + + Sit by me on the broken belfry stair, + And I will tell the simple tale to you + Of those whose graves through yonder arch you view, + Scattered about the churchyard, here and there. + + Ah me! How closely memory's tendrils twine + About the heart, and choke the words that spring. + It only throbs, the touch half-answering, + Like this old bell, held speechless by the vine. + + + + +The Sea. + + + FOREVER, like a heart that knows no peace, + Like one who wanders weary to and fro + About the earth, but finds no resting-place, + The sweeping tides of ocean ebb and flow. + + Like a discarded lover who entreats + For favor still, and will not be denied, + Up to the beach, with soft, caressing touch + And tearful broken whispers, steals the tide. + + But still repulsed, it slow and sad withdraws, + Yet at the dear one's feet its treasures lays, + And turns again, to wail its sorrows out + Through all the hopeless nights and dreary days. + + + + +Married. + + + IT is such a little while + From the time the fledgling tries + To tip from the edge of the nest to the bough, + Then lifts its wings and flies. + + Till it sits in its own wee nest, + Surprised out of growth or ken, + And half-way feels that in some strange way + It is learning to fly again. + + + + +Motherhood. + + + FOR two dear heads of bronze and amber, + For baby eyes of blue and brown, + For two who cling, and kiss, and clamber, + And on my shoulder nestle down. + + All little hearts are dearer to me, + All little faces sweet and bright, + All childish tears and woes undo me, + And I would heal them all to-night. + + + + +Sufficiency. + + + THE bird that sings one only strain, + To tell his passion o'er and o'er, + Can feel as much of joy or pain + As if he knew a thousand more. + + And thou, sweet maid, whose gentle thought + In smiles or tears finds present vent, + What feeling could thy soul be taught, + Or who has words more eloquent? + + + + +Ophelia. + + + CALM dost thou lie in wave-swept resting-place. + No more the glances of the haughty Dane + Can fill thy gentle breast with longing vain. + The waves that stilled thy heart have drowned thy pain, + And washed the sorrow from thy sweet, pale face, + Ophelia. + + Thine be the violets, but his the rue. + Though hope should sleep, and deep regret should wake, + Thy clasped hand from Death's he could not take; + The spell on those mute lips he could not break. + What more with life and love hast thou to do, + Ophelia? + + + + +Requiem. + + + SLEEP, thou, whom Care so long oppressed. + Care whispers by thy couch no more. + Kind Death has shut the outer door; + None can disturb thee,--sleep and rest. + + Thy hands are folded on thy breast + That throbs with Life's deep pain no more. + Though Love waits grieving by thy door, + He cannot enter,--sleep and rest. + + + + +Elizabeth. + + + ELIZABETH, + Thou comest a refreshing breath + From meadows green, where morning stays, + To those who bear the noon-tide blaze. + + Elizabeth, + Thou couldst look in the eyes of Death, + Undaunted, did he promise thee + Some bright new scene of mirth or glee. + I cannot think that time will gray + That sun-bright head, nor bear away + One dimple in those rose-cheeks hid; + Sure he were daring if he did. + + + + +Elinor. + + + IN that shadow-land, where the Sisters three + Are weaving the web of destiny, + There floated once through the fateful gloom + A thread of sunshine, that gleamed upon + The thread of a life from the distaff drawn, + And mingling, they passed to the busy loom. + The wondering Parcea looked and smiled, + As the light grew into the soul of a child, + And in and out and through devious ways, + They wove it in with the woof of days. + But they said on earth (who knew not the Fates) + "As the lily's chalice holds the dew, + So in her heart, at the morning's gates, + She caught the sunshine, when she came through." + + + + +On a Fly-Leaf of "Flute and Violin." + + + A MASTER-HAND hath swept + Life's violin and flute. + For him they laughed and wept + When others found them mute. + + From his high altitude + He catches, fine and clear, + The notes that might elude + A less discerning ear. + + Transposing to a lower key + The dream-song that he hears, + He sets his heavenly melody + To human smiles and tears. + + + + +Inspiration. + + + THE singer walks by wood and rill, + By town and stately river, + And varied scenes his vision fill, + And make his pulses quiver. + + But when his song comes borne across + On winds from dreamland blowing, + We cannot tell what mystic touch + Has set his chimes a-going. + + We hear the robins in his rhyme, + We see the orchards drifted + With crests of bloom that glimmer white + When mists of tears are lifted. + + A hundred tunes seem intertwined + To mingle in his singing, + When but a single rose, perhaps, + Has set his fancy winging. + + + + +On a Fly-Leaf of Irving. + + + WELCOME art thou, O singer! + If thou dost know a song + That makes the long eve shorter + Because its joys are long. + Welcome art thou, tale-bearer, + If thou canst bear away + Part of the cares that burden + The dull and dreary day. + + + + +On a Fly-Leaf of Riley's "Afterwhiles." + + + UNTO him alone who strays + Sometimes through the yesterdays, + Lingering long in wood and field, + Is the meaning all revealed + Of these songs. Adown the rhymes + Runs a path to bygone times; + But 'tis found by those alone, + Who the fresh green hills have known, + And have felt the tender mood + Of the country solitude; + Who through lanes of pink peach blooms + Used to see the lilac's plumes + Nodding welcome by the door + Where the home-folks come no more. + Blest the singer, then, who leads + Back again through clover meads, + 'Til old scenes we seem to see, + Fair as once they used to be. + Who can call from years long gone, + Friends we trusted, leaned upon; + For whose sake we learned to bless + Toilworn hands and homespun dress. + As he sings of them, and thus + Wafts the pure air back to us + Of the fields, there comes again + Childhood's faith in God and man. + + + + +Chiaro-Oscuro. + + + SOMEHOW I love to look at the picture I made of her, + Work of an idle time, the summer of life's long year; + For as I stand and gaze, dreaming of those lost days, + Almost it seems to me I can see her sitting here. + + That is the way she sat, with her head a trifle raised, + Looking thoughtfully out at a scene I could never see. + Delicate color of rose dawning and dying down, + Flushing the rare sweet face as she listened or spoke to me. + + Whitest light of the sky I showered on her upturned brow, + Gathered the darkest shades and brushed them into her hair, + Thinking the while I worked of the law that always sends + The deepest shadows to follow the high lights everywhere. + Now as I sit and gaze at the dream on the canvas caught, + Sadly the thought comes back, to torture with unbelief-- + Why must it always be that the strong white light of love + Is followed forevermore by the deepest shadow of grief? + + + + +When She Came Home. + + "When she comes home again, a thousand ways + I fashion to myself the tenderness + Of my glad welcome." + + RILEY. + + + "WHEN she comes home," I thought with throbbing heart, + That danced a measure to my mind's refrain. + Again from out the door I leaned and looked, + Where she should come along the leafy lane. + And then she came.--I heard the measured sound + Of slow, oncoming feet, whose heavy tread + Seemed trampling out my life. I saw her face. + Then through my brain a sudden numbness spread. + The earth seemed spun away, the sun was gone, + And time, and place, and thought. There was no thing + In all the universe, save one who lay + So still and cold and white, unanswering + Save by a graven smile my broken moan. + She had come home, yet there I knelt _alone_. + + + + + + +A Resolve. + + + THE fields of thought are plowed so deep, + So carefully are tilled, + That all the granaries of the world + With plenteous store are filled. + Unless I deeper plow and sow, + What sheaf, then, can I bring? + So like the black-bird in the field, + I'll eat the wheat and sing. + + + + +Stranded. + + + WE found a wreck cast up on the shore, + Battered and bruised, and scarred and rent, + And I spoke aloud, "Here was worthless work, + And a barque unfit to the sea was sent." + + But he said, my friend, in his gentle mood, + "Nay, none may say but the barque was good, + For none can tell of the seas it sailed, + Of the waves it braved and the storms withstood." + + Then we spoke no more, but I mutely mused + And thought, oh, heart and oh, life of man + That we find wrecked! we may never know + How brave you were when your course began. + + + + +At Last. + + + WHAT will you give me, O World, O World! + If I run in the race and win? + Will you give me a fame that can never fade, + Will you give me a crown that will never rust, + Can you save my soul from the pall of sin, + Can you keep my heart from the dust? + + What will you give me, O Earth, O Earth! + If I fight in the fray and win? + More than you gave those kings, who lay + Ages past in forgotten clay? + Can you give me more than the grave shuts in, + Or the years can bear away? + + Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, + Fame will fade and crowns will rust. + + Give me, O Earth, but your true embrace, + When the battle is lost or won. + Hide me away from the day's white face, + From the eye of the dazzling sun. + So I may lay my head on your breast, + Forget the struggle and be at rest; + Forget the laurels that fade away, + The love that lasts but a wild, brief day; + Forget it all, on your bosom pressed, + Forever at rest--at rest! + + + * * * * * + +Transcriber's Notes: + +Varied hyphenation retained. + +Page 21, "spining" changed to "spinning" (The spinning-wheel, the big) + +Page 71, in original, first word of poem is not all-capped. This was +changed to match rest of the form of the book. + +Page 118, "After-Whiles" changed to "Afterwhiles" (Riley's +"Afterwhiles") + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Songs Ysame, by +Annie Fellows Johnston and Albion Fellows Bacon + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SONGS YSAME *** + +***** This file should be named 39032.txt or 39032.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/9/0/3/39032/ + +Produced by David Edwards, Emmy and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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