diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'old/blbhm10.txt')
| -rw-r--r-- | old/blbhm10.txt | 6669 |
1 files changed, 6669 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/old/blbhm10.txt b/old/blbhm10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..cba7b3f --- /dev/null +++ b/old/blbhm10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6669 @@ +The Project Gutenberg Etext of Ballads of a Bohemian, by Service +Our 5th book by Robert W. Service. + + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the copyright laws for your country before posting these files!! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. Do not remove this. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations* + +Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and +further information is included below. We need your donations. + + +Ballads of a Bohemian + +by Robert W. Service + +July, 1997 [Etext #995] + + +The Project Gutenberg Etext of Ballads of a Bohemian, by Service +******This file should be named blbhm10.txt or blbhm10.zip****** + +Corrected EDITIONS of our etexts get a new NUMBER, blbhm11.txt. +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, blbhm10a.txt. + + + +This etext was entered manually from 2 separate editions of the original, +and electronically compared to assure the highest quality text possible, +weeding out errors that had crept into the originals. +This etext was prepared by Alan Light (alight@mercury.interpath.net). + + +We are now trying to release all our books one month in advance +of the official release dates, for time for better editing. + +Please note: neither this list nor its contents are final till +midnight of the last day of the month of any such announcement. +The official release date of all Project Gutenberg Etexts is at +Midnight, Central Time, of the last day of the stated month. A +preliminary version may often be posted for suggestion, comment +and editing by those who wish to do so. To be sure you have an +up to date first edition [xxxxx10x.xxx] please check file sizes +in the first week of the next month. Since our ftp program has +a bug in it that scrambles the date [tried to fix and failed] a +look at the file size will have to do, but we will try to see a +new copy has at least one byte more or less. + + +Information about Project Gutenberg (one page) + +We produce about two million dollars for each hour we work. The +fifty hours is one conservative estimate for how long it we take +to get any etext selected, entered, proofread, edited, copyright +searched and analyzed, the copyright letters written, etc. This +projected audience is one hundred million readers. If our value +per text is nominally estimated at one dollar then we produce $4 +million dollars per hour this year as we release sixty-four text +files per month: or 800 more Etexts in 1997 for a total of 1600. +If these reach just 10% of the computerized population, then the +total should reach 160 billion Etexts. + +The Goal of Project Gutenberg is to Give Away One Trillion Etext +Files by the December 31, 2001. [10,000 x 100,000,000=Trillion] +This is ten thousand titles each to one hundred million readers, +which is only 10% of the present number of computer users. 2001 +should have at least twice as many computer users as that, so it +will require us reaching less than 5% of the users in 2001. + + +We need your donations more than ever! + + +All donations should be made to "Project Gutenberg/CMU": and are +tax deductible to the extent allowable by law. (CMU = Carnegie- +Mellon University). + +For these and other matters, please mail to: + +Project Gutenberg +P. O. Box 2782 +Champaign, IL 61825 + +When all other email fails try our Executive Director: +Michael S. Hart <hart@pobox.com> + +We would prefer to send you this information by email +(Internet, Bitnet, Compuserve, ATTMAIL or MCImail). + +****** +If you have an FTP program (or emulator), please +FTP directly to the Project Gutenberg archives: +[Mac users, do NOT point and click. . .type] + +ftp uiarchive.cso.uiuc.edu +login: anonymous +password: your@login +cd etext/etext90 through /etext96 +or cd etext/articles [get suggest gut for more information] +dir [to see files] +get or mget [to get files. . .set bin for zip files] +GET INDEX?00.GUT +for a list of books +and +GET NEW GUT for general information +and +MGET GUT* for newsletters. + +**Information prepared by the Project Gutenberg legal advisor** +(Three Pages) + + +***START**THE SMALL PRINT!**FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS**START*** +Why is this "Small Print!" statement here? You know: lawyers. +They tell us you might sue us if there is something wrong with +your copy of this etext, even if you got it for free from +someone other than us, and even if what's wrong is not our +fault. So, among other things, this "Small Print!" statement +disclaims most of our liability to you. It also tells you how +you can distribute copies of this etext if you want to. + +*BEFORE!* YOU USE OR READ THIS ETEXT +By using or reading any part of this PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm +etext, you indicate that you understand, agree to and accept +this "Small Print!" statement. If you do not, you can receive +a refund of the money (if any) you paid for this etext by +sending a request within 30 days of receiving it to the person +you got it from. If you received this etext on a physical +medium (such as a disk), you must return it with your request. + +ABOUT PROJECT GUTENBERG-TM ETEXTS +This PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext, like most PROJECT GUTENBERG- +tm etexts, is a "public domain" work distributed by Professor +Michael S. Hart through the Project Gutenberg Association at +Carnegie-Mellon University (the "Project"). Among other +things, this means that no one owns a United States copyright +on or for this work, so the Project (and you!) can copy and +distribute it in the United States without permission and +without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth +below, apply if you wish to copy and distribute this etext +under the Project's "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark. + +To create these etexts, the Project expends considerable +efforts to identify, transcribe and proofread public domain +works. Despite these efforts, the Project's etexts and any +medium they may be on may contain "Defects". Among other +things, Defects may take the form of incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other +intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged +disk or other etext medium, a computer virus, or computer +codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment. + +LIMITED WARRANTY; DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES +But for the "Right of Replacement or Refund" described below, +[1] the Project (and any other party you may receive this +etext from as a PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext) disclaims all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including +legal fees, and [2] YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE OR +UNDER STRICT LIABILITY, OR FOR BREACH OF WARRANTY OR CONTRACT, +INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE +OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES, EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE +POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. + +If you discover a Defect in this etext within 90 days of +receiving it, you can receive a refund of the money (if any) +you paid for it by sending an explanatory note within that +time to the person you received it from. If you received it +on a physical medium, you must return it with your note, and +such person may choose to alternatively give you a replacement +copy. If you received it electronically, such person may +choose to alternatively give you a second opportunity to +receive it electronically. + +THIS ETEXT IS OTHERWISE PROVIDED TO YOU "AS-IS". NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, ARE MADE TO YOU AS +TO THE ETEXT OR ANY MEDIUM IT MAY BE ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT +LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A +PARTICULAR PURPOSE. + +Some states do not allow disclaimers of implied warranties or +the exclusion or limitation of consequential damages, so the +above disclaimers and exclusions may not apply to you, and you +may have other legal rights. + +INDEMNITY +You will indemnify and hold the Project, its directors, +officers, members and agents harmless from all liability, cost +and expense, including legal fees, that arise directly or +indirectly from any of the following that you do or cause: +[1] distribution of this etext, [2] alteration, modification, +or addition to the etext, or [3] any Defect. + +DISTRIBUTION UNDER "PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm" +You may distribute copies of this etext electronically, or by +disk, book or any other medium if you either delete this +"Small Print!" and all other references to Project Gutenberg, +or: + +[1] Only give exact copies of it. Among other things, this + requires that you do not remove, alter or modify the + etext or this "small print!" statement. You may however, + if you wish, distribute this etext in machine readable + binary, compressed, mark-up, or proprietary form, + including any form resulting from conversion by word pro- + cessing or hypertext software, but only so long as + *EITHER*: + + [*] The etext, when displayed, is clearly readable, and + does *not* contain characters other than those + intended by the author of the work, although tilde + (~), asterisk (*) and underline (_) characters may + be used to convey punctuation intended by the + author, and additional characters may be used to + indicate hypertext links; OR + + [*] The etext may be readily converted by the reader at + no expense into plain ASCII, EBCDIC or equivalent + form by the program that displays the etext (as is + the case, for instance, with most word processors); + OR + + [*] You provide, or agree to also provide on request at + no additional cost, fee or expense, a copy of the + etext in its original plain ASCII form (or in EBCDIC + or other equivalent proprietary form). + +[2] Honor the etext refund and replacement provisions of this + "Small Print!" statement. + +[3] Pay a trademark license fee to the Project of 20% of the + net profits you derive calculated using the method you + already use to calculate your applicable taxes. If you + don't derive profits, no royalty is due. Royalties are + payable to "Project Gutenberg Association/Carnegie-Mellon + University" within the 60 days following each + date you prepare (or were legally required to prepare) + your annual (or equivalent periodic) tax return. + +WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU DON'T HAVE TO? +The Project gratefully accepts contributions in money, time, +scanning machines, OCR software, public domain etexts, royalty +free copyright licenses, and every other sort of contribution +you can think of. Money should be paid to "Project Gutenberg +Association / Carnegie-Mellon University". + +*END*THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* + + + + + +Ballads of a Bohemian +Robert W. Service [British-born Canadian Poet -- 1874-1958.] + +Author of "The Spell of the Yukon", "Ballads of a Cheechako", +"Rhymes of a Red Cross Man", etc. + +[Note on text: Italicized words or phrases are marked by tildes (~). +Lines longer than 78 characters are broken (according to metre) +and the continuation is indented two spaces. Some obvious errors +may have been corrected.] + +[Note on accents: Due to the great number of French words used in this text, +accents are marked as followed: "/", "\", "^", or "," immediately *follows* +the character it accents. "Cafe/", "fe^te", "cha^teau", "garc,on", +and "me^le/e" are given without accents as they have been absorbed +into the English language. "Finiste\re", "Fourrage\re" and "mo^me" +are given without accents due to excessive repetition.] + + + + +Ballads of a Bohemian + +By Robert W. Service + + + + +CONTENTS + + + +Prelude + + + BOOK ONE + SPRING + + I + +My Garret +Julot the ~Apache~ + + II + +~L'Escargot D'Or~ +It Is Later Than You Think +Noctambule + + III + +Insomnia +Moon Song +The Sewing-Girl + + IV + +Lucille +On the Boulevard +Facility + + V + +Golden Days +The Joy of Little Things +The Absinthe Drinkers + + + BOOK TWO + EARLY SUMMER + + I + +The Release +The Wee Shop +The Philistine and the Bohemian + + II + +The Bohemian Dreams +A Domestic Tragedy +The Pencil Seller + + III + +Fi-Fi in Bed +Gods in the Gutter +The Death of Marie Toro + + IV + +The Bohemian +The Auction Sale +The Joy of Being Poor + + V + +My Neighbors + Room 4: The Painter Chap + Room 6: The Little Workgirl + Room 5: The Concert Singer + Room 7: The Coco-Fiend + + + BOOK THREE + LATE SUMMER + + I + +The Philanderer +The ~Petit Vieux~ +My Masterpiece +My Book +My Hour + + II + +A Song of Sixty-Five +Teddy Bear +The Outlaw +The Walkers + + III + +Poor Peter +The Wistful One +If You Had a Friend +The Contented Man +The Spirit of the Unborn Babe + + IV + +Finistere +Old David Smail +The Wonderer +Oh, It Is Good + + V + +I Have Some Friends +The Quest +The Comforter +The Other One +Catastrophe + + + BOOK FOUR + WINTER + + I + +Priscilla +A Casualty +The Blood-Red ~Fourragere~ +Jim + + II + +Kelly of the Legion +The Three Tommies +The Twa Jocks + + III + +His Boys +The Booby-Trap +Bonehead Bill + + IV + +A Lapse of Time and a Word of Explanation +Michael +The Wife +Victory Stuff +Was It You? + + V + +~Les Grands Mutiles~ + The Sightless Man + The Legless Man + The Faceless Man + + +L'Envoi + + + + + + --------------------- + Ballads of a Bohemian + --------------------- + + + + + +Prelude + + + +~Alas! upon some starry height, +The Gods of Excellence to please, +This hand of mine will never smite +The Harp of High Serenities. +Mere minstrel of the street am I, +To whom a careless coin you fling; +But who, beneath the bitter sky, +Blue-lipped, yet insolent of eye, +Can shrill a song of Spring; +A song of merry mansard days, +The cheery chimney-tops among; +Of rolics and of roundelays +When we were young . . . when we were young; +A song of love and lilac nights, +Of wit, of wisdom and of wine; +Of Folly whirling on the Heights, +Of hunger and of hope divine; +Of Blanche, Suzette and Celestine, +And all that gay and tender band +Who shared with us the fat, the lean, +The hazard of Illusion-land; +When scores of Philistines we slew +As mightily with brush and pen +We sought to make the world anew, +And scorned the gods of other men; +When we were fools divinely wise, +Who held it rapturous to strive; +When Art was sacred in our eyes, +And it was Heav'n to be alive. . . . + +O days of glamor, glory, truth, +To you to-night I raise my glass; +O freehold of immortal youth, +Bohemia, the lost, alas! +O laughing lads who led the romp, +Respectable you've grown, I'm told; +Your heads you bow to power and pomp, +You've learned to know the worth of gold. +O merry maids who shared our cheer, +Your eyes are dim, your locks are gray; +And as you scrub I sadly fear +Your daughters speed the dance to-day. +O windmill land and crescent moon! +O Columbine and Pierrette! +To you my old guitar I tune +Ere I forget, ere I forget. . . . + +So come, good men who toil and tire, +Who smoke and sip the kindly cup, +Ring round about the tavern fire +Ere yet you drink your liquor up; +And hear my simple songs of earth, +Of youth and truth and living things; +Of poverty and proper mirth, +Of rags and rich imaginings; +Of cock-a-hoop, blue-heavened days, +Of hearts elate and eager breath, +Of wonder, worship, pity, praise, +Of sorrow, sacrifice and death; +Of lusting, laughter, passion, pain, +Of lights that lure and dreams that thrall . . . +And if a golden word I gain, +Oh, kindly folks, God save you all! +And if you shake your heads in blame . . . +Good friends, God love you all the same.~ + + + + + + BOOK ONE + + SPRING + + + + + + I + + + + + Montparnasse, + April 1914. + +All day the sun has shone into my little attic, a bitter sunshine +that brightened yet did not warm. And so as I toiled and toiled +doggedly enough, many were the looks I cast at the three faggots I had saved +to cook my evening meal. Now, however, my supper is over, my pipe alight, +and as I stretch my legs before the embers I have at last a glow of comfort, +a glimpse of peace. + + + + +My Garret + + + +Here is my Garret up five flights of stairs; +Here's where I deal in dreams and ply in fancies, +Here is the wonder-shop of all my wares, +My sounding sonnets and my red romances. +Here's where I challenge Fate and ring my rhymes, +And grope at glory -- aye, and starve at times. + +Here is my Stronghold: stout of heart am I, +Greeting each dawn as songful as a linnet; +And when at night on yon poor bed I lie +(Blessing the world and every soul that's in it), +Here's where I thank the Lord no shadow bars +My skylight's vision of the valiant stars. + +Here is my Palace tapestried with dreams. +Ah! though to-night ten ~sous~ are all my treasure, +While in my gaze immortal beauty gleams, +Am I not dowered with wealth beyond all measure? +Though in my ragged coat my songs I sing, +King of my soul, I envy not the king. + +Here is my Haven: it's so quiet here; +Only the scratch of pen, the candle's flutter; +Shabby and bare and small, but O how dear! +Mark you -- my table with my work a-clutter, +My shelf of tattered books along the wall, +My bed, my broken chair -- that's nearly all. + +Only four faded walls, yet mine, all mine. +Oh, you fine folks, a pauper scorns your pity. +Look, where above me stars of rapture shine; +See, where below me gleams the siren city . . . +Am I not rich? -- a millionaire no less, +If wealth be told in terms of Happiness. + + + + +Ten ~sous~. . . . I think one can sing best of poverty when one is holding it +at arm's length. I'm sure that when I wrote these lines, +fortune had for a moment tweaked me by the nose. To-night, however, +I am truly down to ten ~sous~. It is for that I have stayed in my room +all day, rolled in my blankets and clutching my pen with clammy fingers. +I must work, work, work. I must finish my book before poverty crushes me. +I am not only writing for my living but for my life. Even to-day +my Muse was mutinous. For hours and hours anxiously I stared +at a paper that was blank; nervously I paced up and down my garret; +bitterly I flung myself on my bed. Then suddenly it all came. +Line after line I wrote with hardly a halt. So I made another +of my Ballads of the Boulevards. Here it is: + + + + +Julot the ~Apache~ + + + +You've heard of Julot the ~apache~, and Gigolette, his ~mome~. . . . +Montmartre was their hunting-ground, but Belville was their home. +A little chap just like a boy, with smudgy black mustache, -- +Yet there was nothing juvenile in Julot the ~apache~. +From head to heel as tough as steel, as nimble as a cat, +With every trick of twist and kick, a master of ~savate~. +And Gigolette was tall and fair, as stupid as a cow, +With three combs in the greasy hair she banged upon her brow. +You'd see her on the Place Pigalle on any afternoon, +A primitive and strapping wench as brazen as the moon. +And yet there is a tale that's told of Clichy after dark, +And two ~gendarmes~ who swung their arms with Julot for a mark. +And oh, but they'd have got him too; they banged and blazed away, +When like a flash a woman leapt between them and their prey. +She took the medicine meant for him; she came down with a crash . . . +"Quick now, and make your get-away, O Julot the ~apache~!" . . . +But no! He turned, ran swiftly back, his arms around her met; +They nabbed him sobbing like a kid, and kissing Gigolette. + +Now I'm a reckless painter chap who loves a jamboree, +And one night in Cyrano's bar I got upon a spree; +And there were trollops all about, and crooks of every kind, +But though the place was reeling round I didn't seem to mind. +Till down I sank, and all was blank when in the bleary dawn +I woke up in my studio to find -- my money gone; +Three hundred francs I'd scraped and squeezed to pay my quarter's rent. +"Some one has pinched my wad," I wailed; "it never has been spent." +And as I racked my brains to seek how I could raise some more, +Before my cruel landlord kicked me cowering from the door: +A knock . . . "Come in," I gruffly groaned; I did not raise my head, +Then lo! I heard a husky voice, a swift and silky tread: +"You got so blind, last night, ~mon vieux~, I collared all your cash -- +Three hundred francs. . . . There! ~Nom de Dieu~," said Julot the ~apache~. + +And that was how I came to know Julot and Gigolette, +And we would talk and drink a ~bock~, and smoke a cigarette. +And I would meditate upon the artistry of crime, +And he would tell of cracking cribs and cops and doing time; +Or else when he was flush of funds he'd carelessly explain +He'd biffed some bloated ~bourgeois~ on the border of the Seine. +So gentle and polite he was, just like a man of peace, +And not a desperado and the terror of the police. + +Now one day in a ~bistro~ that's behind the Place Vendo^me +I came on Julot the ~apache~, and Gigolette his ~mome~. +And as they looked so very grave, says I to them, says I, +"Come on and have a little glass, it's good to rinse the eye. +You both look mighty serious; you've something on the heart." +"Ah, yes," said Julot the ~apache~, "we've something to impart. +When such things come to folks like us, it isn't very gay . . . +It's Gigolette -- she tells me that a ~gosse~ is on the way." +Then Gigolette, she looked at me with eyes like stones of gall: +"If we were honest folks," said she, "I wouldn't mind at all. +But then . . . you know the life we lead; well, anyway I mean +(That is, providing it's a girl) to call her Angeline." +"Cheer up," said I; "it's all in life. There's gold within the dross. +Come on, we'll drink another ~verre~ to Angeline the ~gosse~." + +And so the weary winter passed, and then one April morn +The worthy Julot came at last to say the babe was born. +"I'd like to chuck it in the Seine," he sourly snarled, "and yet +I guess I'll have to let it live, because of Gigolette." +I only laughed, for sure I saw his spite was all a bluff, +And he was prouder than a prince behind his manner gruff. +Yet every day he'd blast the brat with curses deep and grim, +And swear to me that Gigolette no longer thought of ~him~. +And then one night he dropped the mask; his eyes were sick with dread, +And when I offered him a smoke he groaned and shook his head: +"I'm all upset; it's Angeline . . . she's covered with a rash . . . +She'll maybe die, my little ~gosse~," cried Julot the ~apache~. + +But Angeline, I joy to say, came through the test all right, +Though Julot, so they tell me, watched beside her day and night. +And when I saw him next, says he: "Come up and dine with me. +We'll buy a beefsteak on the way, a bottle and some ~brie~." +And so I had a merry night within his humble home, +And laughed with Angeline the ~gosse~ and Gigolette the ~mome~. +And every time that Julot used a word the least obscene, +How Gigolette would frown at him and point to Angeline: +Oh, such a little innocent, with hair of silken floss, +I do not wonder they were proud of Angeline the ~gosse~. +And when her arms were round his neck, then Julot says to me: +"I must work harder now, ~mon vieux~, since I've to work for three." +He worked so very hard indeed, the police dropped in one day, +And for a year behind the bars they put him safe away. + +So dark and silent now, their home; they'd gone -- I wondered where, +Till in a laundry near I saw a child with shining hair; +And o'er the tub a strapping wench, her arms in soapy foam; +Lo! it was Angeline the ~gosse~, and Gigolette the ~mome~. +And so I kept an eye on them and saw that all went right, +Until at last came Julot home, half crazy with delight. +And when he'd kissed them both, says he: "I've had my fill this time. +I'm on the honest now, I am; I'm all fed up with crime. +You mark my words, the page I turn is going to be clean, +I swear it on the head of her, my little Angeline." + +And so, to finish up my tale, this morning as I strolled +Along the boulevard I heard a voice I knew of old. +I saw a rosy little man with walrus-like mustache . . . +I stopped, I stared. . . . By all the gods! 'twas Julot the ~apache~. +"I'm in the garden way," he said, "and doing mighty well; +I've half an acre under glass, and heaps of truck to sell. +Come out and see. Oh come, my friend, on Sunday, wet or shine . . . +Say! -- ~it's the First Communion of that little girl of mine.~" + + + + + II + + + + + ~Chez Moi~, Montparnasse, + ~The same evening~. + +To-day is an anniversary. A year ago to-day I kicked over an office stool +and came to Paris thinking to make a living by my pen. I was twenty then, +and in my pocket I had twenty pounds. Of that, my ten ~sous~ +are all that remain. And so to-night I am going to spend them, +not prudently on bread, but prodigally on beer. + +As I stroll down the Boul' Mich' the lingering light has all +the exquisite tenderness of violet; the trees are in their first +translucent green; beneath them the lamps are lit with purest gold, +and from the Little Luxembourg comes a silver jangle of tiny voices. +Taking the gay side of the street, I enter a cafe. Although it isn't +its true name, I choose to call my cafe -- + + + + +~L'Escargot D'Or~ + + + +O Tavern of the Golden Snail! +Ten ~sous~ have I, so I'll regale; +Ten ~sous~ your amber brew to sip +(Eight for the ~bock~ and two the tip), +And so I'll sit the evening long, +And smoke my pipe and watch the throng, +The giddy crowd that drains and drinks, +I'll watch it quiet as a sphinx; +And who among them all shall buy +For ten poor ~sous~ such joy as I? +As I who, snugly tucked away, +Look on it all as on a play, +A frolic scene of love and fun, +To please an audience of One. + +O Tavern of the Golden Snail! +You've stuff indeed for many a tale. +All eyes, all ears, I nothing miss: +Two lovers lean to clasp and kiss; +The merry students sing and shout, +The nimble ~garcons~ dart about; +Lo! here come Mimi and Musette +With: "~S'il vous plait, une cigarette?~" +Marcel and Rudolf, Shaunard too, +Behold the old rapscallion crew, +With flowing tie and shaggy head . . . +Who says Bohemia is dead? +Oh shades of Murger! prank and clown, +And I will watch and write it down. + +O Tavern of the Golden Snail! +What crackling throats have gulped your ale! +What sons of Fame from far and near +Have glowed and mellowed in your cheer! +Within this corner where I sit +Banville and Coppe/e clashed their wit; +And hither too, to dream and drain, +And drown despair, came poor Verlaine. +Here Wilde would talk and Synge would muse, +Maybe like me with just ten ~sous~. +Ah! one is lucky, is one not? +With ghosts so rare to drain a pot! +So may your custom never fail, +O Tavern of the Golden Snail! + + + + +There! my pipe is out. Let me light it again and consider. +I have no illusions about myself. I am not fool enough to think I am a poet, +but I have a knack of rhyme and I love to make verses. +Mine is a tootling, tin-whistle music. Humbly and afar I follow +in the footsteps of Praed and Lampson, of Field and Riley, hoping that in time +my Muse may bring me bread and butter. So far, however, it has been +all kicks and no coppers. And to-night I am at the end of my tether. +I wish I knew where to-morrow's breakfast was coming from. +Well, since rhyming's been my ruin, let me rhyme to the bitter end. + + + + +It Is Later Than You Think + + + +Lone amid the cafe's cheer, +Sad of heart am I to-night; +Dolefully I drink my beer, +But no single line I write. +There's the wretched rent to pay, +Yet I glower at pen and ink: +Oh, inspire me, Muse, I pray, +~It is later than you think!~ + +Hello! there's a pregnant phrase. +Bravo! let me write it down; +Hold it with a hopeful gaze, +Gauge it with a fretful frown; +Tune it to my lyric lyre . . . +Ah! upon starvation's brink, +How the words are dark and dire: +It is later than you think. + +Weigh them well. . . . Behold yon band, +Students drinking by the door, +Madly merry, ~bock~ in hand, +Saucers stacked to mark their score. +Get you gone, you jolly scamps; +Let your parting glasses clink; +Seek your long neglected lamps: +It is later than you think. + +Look again: yon dainty blonde, +All allure and golden grace, +Oh so willing to respond +Should you turn a smiling face. +Play your part, poor pretty doll; +Feast and frolic, pose and prink; +There's the Morgue to end it all, +And it's later than you think. + +Yon's a playwright -- mark his face, +Puffed and purple, tense and tired; +Pasha-like he holds his place, +Hated, envied and admired. +How you gobble life, my friend; +Wine, and woman soft and pink! +Well, each tether has its end: +Sir, it's later than you think. + +See yon living scarecrow pass +With a wild and wolfish stare +At each empty absinthe glass, +As if he saw Heaven there. +Poor damned wretch, to end your pain +There is still the Greater Drink. +Yonder waits the sanguine Seine . . . +It is later than you think. + +Lastly, you who read; aye, you +Who this very line may scan: +Think of all you planned to do . . . +Have you done the best you can? +See! the tavern lights are low; +Black's the night, and how you shrink! +God! and is it time to go? +Ah! the clock is always slow; +It is later than you think; +Sadly later than you think; +Far, far later than you think. + + + + +Scarcely do I scribble that last line on the back of an old envelope +when a voice hails me. It is a fellow free-lance, a short-story man +called MacBean. He is having a feast of ~Marennes~ and he asks me +to join him. + +MacBean is a Scotsman with the soul of an Irishman. He has a keen, lean, +spectacled face, and if it were not for his gray hair he might be taken for +a student of theology. However, there is nothing of the Puritan in MacBean. +He loves wine and women, and money melts in his fingers. + +He has lived so long in the Quarter he looks at life from the Parisian angle. +His knowledge of literature is such that he might be a Professor, +but he would rather be a vagabond of letters. We talk shop. +We discuss the American short story, but MacBean vows +they do these things better in France. He says that some of the ~contes~ +printed every day in the ~Journal~ are worthy of Maupassant. After that +he buys more beer, and we roam airily over the fields of literature, +plucking here and there a blossom of quotation. A fine talk, vivid and eager. +It puts me into a kind of glow. + +MacBean pays the bill from a handful of big notes, and the thought +of my own empty pockets for a moment damps me. However, when we rise to go, +it is well after midnight, and I am in a pleasant daze. +The rest of the evening may be summed up in the following jingle: + + + + +Noctambule + + + +Zut! it's two o'clock. +See! the lights are jumping. +Finish up your ~bock~, +Time we all were humping. +Waiters stack the chairs, +Pile them on the tables; +Let us to our lairs +Underneath the gables. + +Up the old Boul' Mich' +Climb with steps erratic. +Steady . . . how I wish +I was in my attic! +Full am I with cheer; +In my heart the joy stirs; +Couldn't be the beer, +Must have been the oysters. + +In obscene array +Garbage cans spill over; +How I wish that they +Smelled as sweet as clover! +Charing women wait; +Cafes drop their shutters; +Rats perambulate +Up and down the gutters. + +Down the darkened street +Market carts are creeping; +Horse with wary feet, +Red-faced driver sleeping. +Loads of vivid greens, +Carrots, leeks, potatoes, +Cabbages and beans, +Turnips and tomatoes. + +Pair of dapper chaps, +Cigarettes and sashes, +Stare at me, perhaps +Desperate ~Apache\s~. +"Needn't bother me, +Jolly well you know it; +~Parceque je suis +Quartier Latin poe\te.~ + +"Give you villanelles, +Madrigals and lyrics; +Ballades and rondels, +Odes and panegyrics. +Poet pinched and poor, +Pricked by cold and hunger; +Trouble's troubadour, +Misery's balladmonger." + +Think how queer it is! +Every move I'm making, +Cosmic gravity's +Center I am shaking; +Oh, how droll to feel +(As I now am feeling), +Even as I reel, +All the world is reeling. + +Reeling too the stars, +Neptune and Uranus, +Jupiter and Mars, +Mercury and Venus; +Suns and moons with me, +As I'm homeward straying, +All in sympathy +Swaying, swaying, swaying. + +Lord! I've got a head. +Well, it's not surprising. +I must gain my bed +Ere the sun be rising; +When the merry lark +In the sky is soaring, +I'll refuse to hark, +I'll be snoring, snoring. + +Strike a sulphur match . . . +Ha! at last my garret. +Fumble at the latch, +Close the door and bar it. +Bed, you graciously +Wait, despite my scorning . . . +So, bibaciously +Mad old world, good morning. + + + + + III + + + + + My Garret, Montparnasse, + April. + + + + +Insomnia + + + +Heigh ho! to sleep I vainly try; +Since twelve I haven't closed an eye, +And now it's three, and as I lie, +From Notre Dame to St. Denis +The bells of Paris chime to me; +"You're young," they say, "and strong and free." + +I do not turn with sighs and groans +To ease my limbs, to rest my bones, +As if my bed were stuffed with stones, +No peevish murmur tips my tongue -- +Ah no! for every sound upflung +Says: "Lad, you're free and strong and young." + +And so beneath the sheet's caress +My body purrs with happiness; +Joy bubbles in my veins. . . . Ah yes, +My very blood that leaps along +Is chiming in a joyous song, +Because I'm young and free and strong. + + + +Maybe it is the springtide. I am so happy I am afraid. The sense of living +fills me with exultation. I want to sing, to dance; I am dithyrambic +with delight. + + + +I think the moon must be to blame: +It fills the room with fairy flame; +It paints the wall, it seems to pour +A dappled flood upon the floor. +I rise and through the window stare . . . +Ye gods! how marvelously fair! +From Montrouge to the Martyr's Hill, +A silver city rapt and still; +Dim, drowsy deeps of opal haze, +And spire and dome in diamond blaze; +The little lisping leaves of spring +Like sequins softly glimmering; +Each roof a plaque of argent sheen, +A gauzy gulf the space between; +Each chimney-top a thing of grace, +Where merry moonbeams prank and chase; +And all that sordid was and mean, +Just Beauty, deathless and serene. + +O magic city of a dream! +From glory unto glory gleam; +And I will gaze and pity those +Who on their pillows drowse and doze . . . +And as I've nothing else to do, +Of tea I'll make a rousing brew, +And coax my pipes until they croon, +And chant a ditty to the moon. + + + +There! my tea is black and strong. Inspiration comes with every sip. +Now for the moon. + + + +The moon peeped out behind the hill +As yellow as an apricot; +Then up and up it climbed until +Into the sky it fairly got; +The sky was vast and violet; +The poor moon seemed to faint in fright, +And pale it grew and paler yet, +Like fine old silver, rinsed and bright. +And yet it climbed so bravely on +Until it mounted heaven-high; +Then earthward it serenely shone, +A silver sovereign of the sky, +A bland sultana of the night, +Surveying realms of lily light. + + + + +Moon Song + + + +A child saw in the morning skies +The dissipated-looking moon, +And opened wide her big blue eyes, +And cried: "Look, look, my lost balloon!" +And clapped her rosy hands with glee: +"Quick, mother! Bring it back to me." + +A poet in a lilied pond +Espied the moon's reflected charms, +And ravished by that beauty blonde, +Leapt out to clasp her in his arms. +And as he'd never learnt to swim, +Poor fool! that was the end of him. + +A rustic glimpsed amid the trees +The bluff moon caught as in a snare. +"They say it do be made of cheese," +Said Giles, "and that a chap bides there. . . . +That Blue Boar ale be strong, I vow -- +The lad's a-winkin' at me now." + +Two lovers watched the new moon hold +The old moon in her bright embrace. +Said she: "There's mother, pale and old, +And drawing near her resting place." +Said he: "Be mine, and with me wed," +Moon-high she stared . . . she shook her head. + +A soldier saw with dying eyes +The bleared moon like a ball of blood, +And thought of how in other skies, +So pearly bright on leaf and bud +Like peace its soft white beams had lain; +~Like Peace!~ . . . He closed his eyes again. + +Child, lover, poet, soldier, clown, +Ah yes, old Moon, what things you've seen! +I marvel now, as you look down, +How can your face be so serene? +And tranquil still you'll make your round, +Old Moon, when we are underground. + + + + +"And now, blow out your candle, lad, and get to bed. +See, the dawn is in the sky. Open your window and let its freshness +rouge your cheek. You've earned your rest. Sleep." + +Aye, but before I do so, let me read again the last of my ~Ballads~. + + + + +The Sewing-Girl + + + +The humble garret where I dwell +Is in that Quarter called the Latin; +It isn't spacious -- truth to tell, +There's hardly room to swing a cat in. +But what of that! It's there I fight +For food and fame, my Muse inviting, +And all the day and half the night +You'll find me writing, writing, writing. + +Now, it was in the month of May +As, wrestling with a rhyme rheumatic, +I chanced to look across the way, +And lo! within a neighbor attic, +A hand drew back the window shade, +And there, a picture glad and glowing, +I saw a sweet and slender maid, +And she was sewing, sewing, sewing. + +So poor the room, so small, so scant, +Yet somehow oh, so bright and airy. +There was a pink geranium plant, +Likewise a very pert canary. +And in the maiden's heart it seemed +Some fount of gladness must be springing, +For as alone I sadly dreamed +I heard her singing, singing, singing. + +God love her! how it cheered me then +To see her there so brave and pretty; +So she with needle, I with pen, +We slaved and sang above the city. +And as across my streams of ink +I watched her from a poet's distance, +She stitched and sang . . . I scarcely think +She was aware of my existence. + +And then one day she sang no more. +That put me out, there's no denying. +I looked -- she labored as before, +But, bless me! she was crying, crying. +Her poor canary chirped in vain; +Her pink geranium drooped in sorrow; +"Of course," said I, "she'll sing again. +Maybe," I sighed, "she will to-morrow." + +Poor child; 'twas finished with her song: +Day after day her tears were flowing; +And as I wondered what was wrong +She pined and peaked above her sewing. +And then one day the blind she drew, +Ah! though I sought with vain endeavor +To pierce the darkness, well I knew +My sewing-girl had gone for ever. + +And as I sit alone to-night +My eyes unto her room are turning . . . +I'd give the sum of all I write +Once more to see her candle burning, +Once more to glimpse her happy face, +And while my rhymes of cheer I'm ringing, +Across the sunny sweep of space +To hear her singing, singing, singing. + + + + +Heigh ho! I realize I am very weary. It's nice to be so tired, +and to know one can sleep as long as one wants. The morning sunlight +floods in at my window, so I draw the blind, and throw myself on my bed. . . . + + + + + IV + + + + + My Garret, Montparnasse, + April. + +Hurrah! As I opened my eyes this morning to a hard, unfeeling world, +little did I think what a surprise awaited me. A big blue envelope +had been pushed under my door. Another rejection, I thought, +and I took it up distastefully. The next moment I was staring +at my first cheque. + +It was an express order for two hundred francs, in payment of a bit of verse. +. . . So to-day I will celebrate. I will lunch at the D'Harcourt, +I will dine on the Grand Boulevard, I will go to the theater. + +Well, here's the thing that has turned the tide for me. +It is somewhat in the vein of "Sourdough" Service, the Yukon bard. +I don't think much of his stuff, but they say he makes heaps of money. +I can well believe it, for he drives a Hispano-Suiza in the Bois +every afternoon. The other night he was with a crowd at the Dome Cafe, +a chubby chap who sits in a corner and seldom speaks. I was disappointed. +I thought he was a big, hairy man who swore like a trooper and mixed brandy +with his beer. He only drank Vichy, poor fellow! + + + + +Lucille + + + +Of course you've heard of the ~Nancy Lee~, and how she sailed away +On her famous quest of the Arctic flea, to the wilds of Hudson's Bay? +For it was a foreign Prince's whim to collect this tiny cuss, +And a golden quid was no more to him than a copper to coves like us. +So we sailed away and our hearts were gay as we gazed on the gorgeous scene; +And we laughed with glee as we caught the flea of the wolf and the wolverine; +Yea, our hearts were light as the parasite of the ermine rat we slew, +And the great musk ox, and the silver fox, and the moose and the caribou. +And we laughed with zest as the insect pest of the marmot crowned our zeal, +And the wary mink and the wily "link", and the walrus and the seal. +And with eyes aglow on the scornful snow we danced a rigadoon, +Round the lonesome lair of the Arctic hare, by the light of the silver moon. + +But the time was nigh to homeward hie, when, imagine our despair! +For the best of the lot we hadn't got -- the flea of the polar bear. +Oh, his face was long and his breath was strong, as the Skipper he says to me: +"I wants you to linger 'ere, my lad, by the shores of the Hartic Sea; +I wants you to 'unt the polar bear the perishin' winter through, +And if flea ye find of its breed and kind, there's a 'undred quid for you." +But I shook my head: "No, Cap," I said; "it's yourself I'd like to please, +But I tells ye flat I wouldn't do that if ye went on yer bended knees." +Then the Captain spat in the seething brine, and he says: "Good luck to you, +If it can't be did for a 'undred quid, supposin' we call it two?" +So that was why they said good-by, and they sailed and left me there -- +Alone, alone in the Arctic Zone to hunt for the polar bear. + +Oh, the days were slow and packed with woe, + till I thought they would never end; +And I used to sit when the fire was lit, with my pipe for my only friend. +And I tried to sing some rollicky thing, but my song broke off in a prayer, +And I'd drowse and dream by the driftwood gleam; I'd dream of a polar bear; +I'd dream of a cloudlike polar bear that blotted the stars on high, +With ravenous jaws and flenzing claws, and the flames of hell in his eye. +And I'd trap around on the frozen ground, as a proper hunter ought, +And beasts I'd find of every kind, but never the one I sought. +Never a track in the white ice-pack that humped and heaved and flawed, +Till I came to think: "Why, strike me pink! if the creature ain't a fraud." +And then one night in the waning light, as I hurried home to sup, +I hears a roar by the cabin door, and a great white hulk heaves up. +So my rifle flashed, and a bullet crashed; dead, dead as a stone fell he, +And I gave a cheer, for there in his ear -- Gosh ding me! -- a tiny flea. + +At last, at last! Oh, I clutched it fast, and I gazed on it with pride; +And I thrust it into a biscuit-tin, and I shut it safe inside; +With a lid of glass for the light to pass, and space to leap and play; +Oh, it kept alive; yea, seemed to thrive, as I watched it night and day. +And I used to sit and sing to it, and I shielded it from harm, +And many a hearty feed it had on the heft of my hairy arm. +For you'll never know in that land of snow how lonesome a man can feel; +So I made a fuss of the little cuss, and I christened it "Lucille". +But the longest winter has its end, and the ice went out to sea, +And I saw one day a ship in the bay, and there was the ~Nancy Lee~. +So a boat was lowered and I went aboard, and they opened wide their eyes -- +Yes, they gave a cheer when the truth was clear, + and they saw my precious prize. +And then it was all like a giddy dream; but to cut my story short, +We sailed away on the fifth of May to the foreign Prince's court; +To a palmy land and a palace grand, and the little Prince was there, +And a fat Princess in a satin dress with a crown of gold on her hair. +And they showed me into a shiny room, just him and her and me, +And the Prince he was pleased and friendly-like, + and he calls for drinks for three. +And I shows them my battered biscuit-tin, and I makes my modest spiel, +And they laughed, they did, when I opened the lid, + and out there popped Lucille. + +Oh, the Prince was glad, I could soon see that, and the Princess she was too; +And Lucille waltzed round on the tablecloth as she often used to do. +And the Prince pulled out a purse of gold, and he put it in my hand; +And he says: "It was worth all that, I'm told, to stay in that nasty land." +And then he turned with a sudden cry, and he clutched at his royal beard; +And the Princess screamed, and well she might -- for Lucille had disappeared. + +"She must be here," said his Noble Nibbs, so we hunted all around; +Oh, we searched that place, but never a trace of the little beast we found. +So I shook my head, and I glumly said: "Gol darn the saucy cuss! +It's mighty queer, but she isn't here; so . . . she must be on one of us. +You'll pardon me if I make so free, but -- there's just one thing to do: +If you'll kindly go for a half a mo' I'll search me garments through." +Then all alone on the shiny throne I stripped from head to heel; +In vain, in vain; it was very plain that I hadn't got Lucille. +So I garbed again, and I told the Prince, and he scratched his august head; +"I suppose if she hasn't selected you, it must be me," he said. +So ~he~ retired; but he soon came back, and his features showed distress: +"Oh, it isn't you and it isn't me." . . . Then we looked at the Princess. +So ~she~ retired; and we heard a scream, and she opened wide the door; +And her fingers twain were pinched to pain, but a radiant smile she wore: +"It's here," she cries, "our precious prize. + Oh, I found it right away. . . ." +Then I ran to her with a shout of joy, but I choked with a wild dismay. +I clutched the back of the golden throne, and the room began to reel . . . +What she held to me was, ah yes! a flea, but . . . ~it wasn't my Lucille~. + + + + +After all, I did not celebrate. I sat on the terrace of the Cafe Napolitain +on the Grand Boulevard, half hypnotized by the passing crowd. +And as I sat I fell into conversation with a god-like stranger +who sipped some golden ambrosia. He told me he was an actor +and introduced me to his beverage, which he called a "Suze-Anni". +He soon left me, but the effect of the golden liquid remained, +and there came over me a desire to write. ~C'e/tait plus fort que moi.~ +So instead of going to the Folies Berge\re I spent all evening +in the Omnium Bar near the Bourse, and wrote the following: + + + + +On the Boulevard + + + +Oh, it's pleasant sitting here, +Seeing all the people pass; +You beside your ~bock~ of beer, +I behind my ~demi-tasse~. +Chatting of no matter what. +You the Mummer, I the Bard; +Oh, it's jolly, is it not? -- +Sitting on the Boulevard. + +More amusing than a book, +If a chap has eyes to see; +For, no matter where I look, +Stories, stories jump at me. +Moving tales my pen might write; +Poems plain on every face; +Monologues you could recite +With inimitable grace. + +(Ah! Imagination's power) +See yon ~demi-mondaine~ there, +Idly toying with a flower, +Smiling with a pensive air . . . +Well, her smile is but a mask, +For I saw within her muff +Such a wicked little flask: +Vitriol -- ugh! the beastly stuff. + +Now look back beside the bar. +See yon curled and scented ~beau~, +Puffing at a fine cigar -- +~Sale espe\ce de maquereau~. +Well (of course, it's all surmise), +It's for him she holds her place; +When he passes she will rise, +Dash the vitriol in his face. + +Quick they'll carry him away, +Pack him in a Red Cross car; +Her they'll hurry, so they say, +To the cells of St. Lazare. +What will happen then, you ask? +What will all the sequel be? +Ah! Imagination's task +Isn't easy . . . let me see . . . + +She will go to jail, no doubt, +For a year, or maybe two; +Then as soon as she gets out +Start her bawdy life anew. +He will lie within a ward, +Harmless as a man can be, +With his face grotesquely scarred, +And his eyes that cannot see. + +Then amid the city's din +He will stand against a wall, +With around his neck a tin +Into which the pennies fall. +She will pass (I see it plain, +Like a cinematograph), +She will halt and turn again, +Look and look, and maybe laugh. + +Well, I'm not so sure of that -- +Whether she will laugh or cry. +He will hold a battered hat +To the lady passing by. +He will smile a cringing smile, +And into his grimy hold, +With a laugh (or sob) the while, +She will drop a piece of gold. + +"Bless you, lady," he will say, +And get grandly drunk that night. +She will come and come each day, +Fascinated by the sight. +Then somehow he'll get to know +(Maybe by some kindly friend) +Who she is, and so . . . and so +Bring my story to an end. + +How his heart will burst with hate! +He will curse and he will cry. +He will wait and wait and wait, +Till again she passes by. +Then like tiger from its lair +He will leap from out his place, +Down her, clutch her by the hair, +Smear the vitriol on her face. + +(Ah! Imagination rare) +See . . . he takes his hat to go; +Now he's level with her chair; +Now she rises up to throw. . . . +~God! and she has done it too~ . . . +Oh, those screams; those hideous screams! +I imagined and . . . it's true: +How his face will haunt my dreams! + +What a sight! It makes me sick. +Seems I am to blame somehow. +~Garcon~, fetch a brandy quick . . . +There! I'm feeling better now. +Let's collaborate, we two, +You the Mummer, I the Bard; +Oh, what ripping stuff we'll do, +Sitting on the Boulevard! + + + + +It is strange how one works easily at times. I wrote this so quickly +that I might almost say I had reached the end before I had come +to the beginning. In such a mood I wonder why everybody +does not write poetry. Get a Roget's ~Thesaurus~, a rhyming dictionary: +sit before your typewriter with a strong glass of coffee at your elbow, +and just click the stuff off. + + + + +Facility + + + +So easy 'tis to make a rhyme, +That did the world but know it, +Your coachman might Parnassus climb, +Your butler be a poet. + +Then, oh, how charming it would be +If, when in haste hysteric +You called the page, you learned that he +Was grappling with a lyric. + +Or else what rapture it would yield, +When cook sent up the salad, +To find within its depths concealed +A touching little ballad. + +Or if for tea and toast you yearned, +What joy to find upon it +The chambermaid had coyly laid +A palpitating sonnet. + +Your baker could the fashion set; +Your butcher might respond well; +With every tart a triolet, +With every chop a rondel. + +Your tailor's bill . . . well, I'll be blowed! +Dear chap! I never knowed him . . . +He's gone and written me an ode, +Instead of what I ~owed~ him. + +So easy 'tis to rhyme . . . yet stay! +Oh, terrible misgiving! +Please do not give the game away . . . +I've got to make my living. + + + + + V + + + + + My Garret + May 1914. + + + + +Golden Days + + + +Another day of toil and strife, +Another page so white, +Within that fateful Log of Life +That I and all must write; +Another page without a stain +To make of as I may, +That done, I shall not see again +Until the Judgment Day. + +Ah, could I, could I backward turn +The pages of that Book, +How often would I blench and burn! +How often loathe to look! +What pages would be meanly scrolled; +What smeared as if with mud; +A few, maybe, might gleam like gold, +Some scarlet seem as blood. + +O Record grave, God guide my hand +And make me worthy be, +Since what I write to-day shall stand +To all eternity; +Aye, teach me, Lord of Life, I pray, +As I salute the sun, +To bear myself that every day +May be a Golden One. + + + + +I awoke this morning to see the bright sunshine flooding my garret. +No chamber in the palace of a king could have been more fair. +How I sang as I dressed! How I lingered over my coffee, savoring every drop! +How carefully I packed my pipe, gazing serenely over the roofs of Paris. + +Never is the city so lovely as in this month of May, when all the trees +are in the fullness of their foliage. As I look, I feel a freshness of vision +in my eyes. Wonder wakes in me. The simplest things move me to delight. + + + + +The Joy of Little Things + + + +It's good the great green earth to roam, +Where sights of awe the soul inspire; +But oh, it's best, the coming home, +The crackle of one's own hearth-fire! +You've hob-nobbed with the solemn Past; +You've seen the pageantry of kings; +Yet oh, how sweet to gain at last +The peace and rest of Little Things! + +Perhaps you're counted with the Great; +You strain and strive with mighty men; +Your hand is on the helm of State; +Colossus-like you stride . . . and then +There comes a pause, a shining hour, +A dog that leaps, a hand that clings: +O Titan, turn from pomp and power; +Give all your heart to Little Things. + +Go couch you childwise in the grass, +Believing it's some jungle strange, +Where mighty monsters peer and pass, +Where beetles roam and spiders range. +'Mid gloom and gleam of leaf and blade, +What dragons rasp their painted wings! +O magic world of shine and shade! +O beauty land of Little Things! + +I sometimes wonder, after all, +Amid this tangled web of fate, +If what is great may not be small, +And what is small may not be great. +So wondering I go my way, +Yet in my heart contentment sings . . . +O may I ever see, I pray, +God's grace and love in Little Things. + +So give to me, I only beg, +A little roof to call my own, +A little cider in the keg, +A little meat upon the bone; +A little garden by the sea, +A little boat that dips and swings . . . +Take wealth, take fame, but leave to me, +O Lord of Life, just Little Things. + + + + +Yesterday I finished my tenth ballad. When I have done about a score +I will seek a publisher. If I cannot find one, I will earn, beg or steal +the money to get them printed. Then if they do not sell I will hawk them +from door to door. Oh, I'll succeed, I know I'll succeed. +And yet I don't want an easy success; give me the joy of the fight, +the thrill of the adventure. Here's my last ballad: + + + + +The Absinthe Drinkers + + + +He's yonder, on the terrace of the Cafe de la Paix, +The little wizened Spanish man, I see him every day. +He's sitting with his Pernod on his customary chair; +He's staring at the passers with his customary stare. +He never takes his piercing eyes from off that moving throng, +That current cosmopolitan meandering along: +Dark diplomats from Martinique, pale Rastas from Peru, +An Englishman from Bloomsbury, a Yank from Kalamazoo; +A poet from Montmartre's heights, a dapper little Jap, +Exotic citizens of all the countries on the map; +A tourist horde from every land that's underneath the sun -- +That little wizened Spanish man, he misses never one. +Oh, foul or fair he's always there, and many a drink he buys, +And there's a fire of red desire within his hollow eyes. +And sipping of my Pernod, and a-knowing what I know, +Sometimes I want to shriek aloud and give away the show. +I've lost my nerve; he's haunting me; he's like a beast of prey, +That Spanish man that's watching at the Cafe de la Paix. + +Say! Listen and I'll tell you all . . . the day was growing dim, +And I was with my Pernod at the table next to him; +And he was sitting soberly as if he were asleep, +When suddenly he seemed to tense, like tiger for a leap. +And then he swung around to me, his hand went to his hip, +My heart was beating like a gong -- my arm was in his grip; +His eyes were glaring into mine; aye, though I shrank with fear, +His fetid breath was on my face, his voice was in my ear: +"Excuse my ~brusquerie~," he hissed; "but, sir, do you suppose -- +That portly man who passed us had a ~wen upon his nose?~" + +And then at last it dawned on me, the fellow must be mad; +And when I soothingly replied: "I do not think he had," +The little wizened Spanish man subsided in his chair, +And shrouded in his raven cloak resumed his owlish stare. +But when I tried to slip away he turned and glared at me, +And oh, that fishlike face of his was sinister to see: +"Forgive me if I startled you; of course you think I'm queer; +No doubt you wonder who I am, so solitary here; +You question why the passers-by I piercingly review . . . +Well, listen, my bibacious friend, I'll tell my tale to you. + +"It happened twenty years ago, and in another land: +A maiden young and beautiful, two suitors for her hand. +My rival was the lucky one; I vowed I would repay; +Revenge has mellowed in my heart, it's rotten ripe to-day. +My happy rival skipped away, vamoosed, he left no trace; +And so I'm waiting, waiting here to meet him face to face; +For has it not been ever said that all the world one day +Will pass in pilgrimage before the Cafe de la Paix?" + +"But, sir," I made remonstrance, "if it's twenty years ago, +You'd scarcely recognize him now, he must have altered so." +The little wizened Spanish man he laughed a hideous laugh, +And from his cloak he quickly drew a faded photograph. +"You're right," said he, "but there are traits (oh, this you must allow) +That never change; Lopez was fat, he must be fatter now. +His paunch is senatorial, he cannot see his toes, +I'm sure of it; and then, behold! that wen upon his nose. +I'm looking for a man like that. I'll wait and wait until . . ." +"What will you do?" I sharply cried; he answered me: "Why, kill! +He robbed me of my happiness -- nay, stranger, do not start; +I'll firmly and politely put -- a bullet in his heart." + +And then that little Spanish man, with big cigar alight, +Uprose and shook my trembling hand and vanished in the night. +And I went home and thought of him and had a dreadful dream +Of portly men with each a wen, and woke up with a scream. +And sure enough, next morning, as I prowled the Boulevard, +A portly man with wenny nose roamed into my regard; +Then like a flash I ran to him and clutched him by the arm: +"Oh, sir," said I, "I do not wish to see you come to harm; +But if your life you value aught, I beg, entreat and pray -- +Don't pass before the terrace of the Cafe de la Paix." +That portly man he looked at me with such a startled air, +Then bolted like a rabbit down the rue Michaudie\re. +"Ha! ha! I've saved a life," I thought; and laughed in my relief, +And straightway joined the Spanish man o'er his ~ape/ritif~. +And thus each day I dodged about and kept the strictest guard +For portly men with each a wen upon the Boulevard. +And then I hailed my Spanish pal, and sitting in the sun, +We ordered many Pernods and we drank them every one. +And sternly he would stare and stare until my hand would shake, +And grimly he would glare and glare until my heart would quake. +And I would say: "Alphonso, lad, I must expostulate; +Why keep alive for twenty years the furnace of your hate? +Perhaps his wedded life was hell; and you, at least, are free . . ." +"That's where you've got it wrong," he snarled; "the fool she took was ~me~. +My rival sneaked, threw up the sponge, betrayed himself a churl: +'Twas he who got the happiness, I only got -- the girl." +With that he looked so devil-like he made me creep and shrink, +And there was nothing else to do but buy another drink. + +Now yonder like a blot of ink he sits across the way, +Upon the smiling terrace of the Cafe de la Paix; +That little wizened Spanish man, his face is ghastly white, +His eyes are staring, staring like a tiger's in the night. +I know within his evil heart the fires of hate are fanned, +I know his automatic's ready waiting to his hand. +I know a tragedy is near. I dread, I have no peace . . . +Oh, don't you think I ought to go and call upon the police? +Look there . . . he's rising up . . . my God! + He leaps from out his place . . . +Yon millionaire from Argentine . . . the two are face to face . . . +A shot! A shriek! A heavy fall! A huddled heap! Oh, see +The little wizened Spanish man is dancing in his glee. . . . +I'm sick . . . I'm faint . . . I'm going mad. . . . + Oh, please take me away . . . +There's BLOOD upon the terrace of the Cafe de la Paix. . . . + + + + +And now I'll leave my work and sally forth. The city is ~en fete~. +I'll join the crowd and laugh and sing with the best. + + + +The sunshine seeks my little room +To tell me Paris streets are gay; +That children cry the lily bloom +All up and down the leafy way; +That half the town is mad with May, +With flame of flag and boom of bell: +For Carnival is King to-day; +So pen and page, awhile farewell. + + + + + + BOOK TWO + + EARLY SUMMER + + + + + + I + + + + + Parc Montsouris + June 1914. + + + + +The Release + + + +To-day within a grog-shop near +I saw a newly captured linnet, +Who beat against his cage in fear, +And fell exhausted every minute; +And when I asked the fellow there +If he to sell the bird were willing, +He told me with a careless air +That I could have it for a shilling. + +And so I bought it, cage and all +(Although I went without my dinner), +And where some trees were fairly tall +And houses shrank and smoke was thinner, +The tiny door I open threw, +As down upon the grass I sank me: +Poor little chap! How quick he flew . . . +He didn't even wait to thank me. + +Life's like a cage; we beat the bars, +We bruise our breasts, we struggle vainly; +Up to the glory of the stars +We strain with flutterings ungainly. +And then -- God opens wide the door; +Our wondrous wings are arched for flying; +We poise, we part, we sing, we soar . . . +Light, freedom, love. . . . Fools call it -- Dying. + + + + +Yes, that wretched little bird haunted me. I had to let it go. +Since I have seized my own liberty I am a fanatic for freedom. +It is now a year ago I launched on my great adventure. I have had hard times, +been hungry, cold, weary. I have worked harder than ever I did +and discouragement has slapped me on the face. Yet the year has been +the happiest of my life. + +And all because I am free. By reason of filthy money no one can say to me: +Do this, or do that. "Master" doesn't exist in my vocabulary. +I can look any man in the face and tell him to go to the devil. +I belong to myself. I am not for sale. It's glorious to feel like that. +It sweetens the dry crust and warms the heart in the icy wind. +For that I will hunger and go threadbare; for that I will live austerely +and deny myself all pleasure. After health, the best thing in life +is freedom. + +Here is the last of my ballads. It is by way of being an experiment. +Its theme is commonplace, its language that of everyday. +It is a bit of realism in rhyme. + + + + +The Wee Shop + + + +She risked her all, they told me, bravely sinking +The pinched economies of thirty years; +And there the little shop was, meek and shrinking, +The sum of all her dreams and hopes and fears. +Ere it was opened I would see them in it, +The gray-haired dame, the daughter with her crutch; +So fond, so happy, hoarding every minute, +Like artists, for the final tender touch. + +The opening day! I'm sure that to their seeming +Was never shop so wonderful as theirs; +With pyramids of jam-jars rubbed to gleaming; +Such vivid cans of peaches, prunes and pears; +And chocolate, and biscuits in glass cases, +And bon-bon bottles, many-hued and bright; +Yet nothing half so radiant as their faces, +Their eyes of hope, excitement and delight. + +I entered: how they waited all a-flutter! +How awkwardly they weighed my acid-drops! +And then with all the thanks a tongue could utter +They bowed me from the kindliest of shops. +I'm sure that night their customers they numbered; +Discussed them all in happy, breathless speech; +And though quite worn and weary, ere they slumbered, +Sent heavenward a little prayer for each. + +And so I watched with interest redoubled +That little shop, spent in it all I had; +And when I saw it empty I was troubled, +And when I saw them busy I was glad. +And when I dared to ask how things were going, +They told me, with a fine and gallant smile: +"Not badly . . . slow at first . . . There's never knowing . . . +'Twill surely pick up in a little while." + +I'd often see them through the winter weather, +Behind the shutters by a light's faint speck, +Poring o'er books, their faces close together, +The lame girl's arm around her mother's neck. +They dressed their windows not one time but twenty, +Each change more pinched, more desperately neat; +Alas! I wondered if behind that plenty +The two who owned it had enough to eat. + +Ah, who would dare to sing of tea and coffee? +The sadness of a stock unsold and dead; +The petty tragedy of melting toffee, +The sordid pathos of stale gingerbread. +Ignoble themes! And yet -- those haggard faces! +Within that little shop. . . . Oh, here I say +One does not need to look in lofty places +For tragic themes, they're round us every day. + +And so I saw their agony, their fighting, +Their eyes of fear, their heartbreak, their despair; +And there the little shop is, black and blighting, +And all the world goes by and does not care. +They say she sought her old employer's pity, +Content to take the pittance he would give. +The lame girl? yes, she's working in the city; +She coughs a lot -- she hasn't long to live. + + + + +Last night MacBean introduced me to Saxon Dane the Poet. +Truly, he is more like a blacksmith than a Bard -- a big bearded man +whose black eyes brood somberly or flash with sudden fire. +We talked of Walt Whitman, and then of others. + +"The trouble with poetry," he said, "is that it is too exalted. +It has a phraseology of its own; it selects themes that are quite outside +of ordinary experience. As a medium of expression it fails to reach +the great mass of the people." + +Then he added: "To hell with the great mass of the people! +What have they got to do with it? Write to please yourself, +as if not a single reader existed. The moment a man begins +to be conscious of an audience he is artistically damned. +You're not a Poet, I hope?" + +I meekly assured him I was a mere maker of verse. + +"Well," said he, "better good verse than middling poetry. +And maybe even the humblest of rhymes has its uses. Happiness is happiness, +whether it be inspired by a Rossetti sonnet or a ballad by G. R. Sims. +Let each one who has something to say, say it in the best way he can, +and abide the result. . . . After all," he went on, "what does it matter? +We are living in a pygmy day. With Tennyson and Browning +the line of great poets passed away, perhaps for ever. The world to-day +is full of little minstrels, who echo one another and who pipe away +tunefully enough. But with one exception they do not matter." + +I dared to ask who was his one exception. He answered, "Myself, of course." + +Here's a bit of light verse which it amused me to write to-day, +as I sat in the sun on the terrace of the Closerie de Lilas: + + + + +The Philistine and the Bohemian + + + +She was a Philistine spick and span, +He was a bold Bohemian. +She had the ~mode~, and the last at that; +He had a cape and a brigand hat. +She was so ~riant~ and ~chic~ and trim; +He was so shaggy, unkempt and grim. +On the rue de la Paix she was wont to shine; +The rue de la Gai^te/ was more his line. +She doted on Barclay and Dell and Caine; +He quoted Mallarme/ and Paul Verlaine. +She was a triumph at Tango teas; +At Vorticist's suppers he sought to please. +She thought that Franz Lehar was utterly great; +Of Strauss and Stravinsky he'd piously prate. +She loved elegance, he loved art; +They were as wide as the poles apart: +Yet -- Cupid and Caprice are hand and glove -- +They met at a dinner, they fell in love. + +Home he went to his garret bare, +Thrilling with rapture, hope, despair. +Swift he gazed in his looking-glass, +Made a grimace and murmured: "Ass!" +Seized his scissors and fiercely sheared, +Severed his buccaneering beard; +Grabbed his hair, and clip! clip! clip! +Off came a bunch with every snip. +Ran to a tailor's in startled state, +Suits a dozen commanded straight; +Coats and overcoats, pants in pairs, +Everything that a dandy wears; +Socks and collars, and shoes and ties, +Everything that a dandy buys. +Chums looked at him with wondering stare, +Fancied they'd seen him before somewhere; +A Brummell, a D'Orsay, a ~beau~ so fine, +A shining, immaculate Philistine. + +Home she went in a raptured daze, +Looked in a mirror with startled gaze, +Didn't seem to be pleased at all; +Savagely muttered: "Insipid Doll!" +Clutched her hair and a pair of shears, +Cropped and bobbed it behind the ears; +Aimed at a wan and willowy-necked +Sort of a Holman Hunt effect; +Robed in subtile and sage-green tones, +Like the dames of Rossetti and E. Burne-Jones; +Girdled her garments billowing wide, +Moved with an undulating glide; +All her frivolous friends forsook, +Cultivated a soulful look; +Gushed in a voice with a creamy throb +Over some weirdly Futurist daub -- +Did all, in short, that a woman can +To be a consummate Bohemian. + +A year went past with its hopes and fears, +A year that seemed like a dozen years. +They met once more. . . . Oh, at last! At last! +They rushed together, they stopped aghast. +They looked at each other with blank dismay, +They simply hadn't a word to say. +He thought with a shiver: "Can this be she?" +She thought with a shudder: "This can't be he?" +This simpering dandy, so sleek and spruce; +This languorous lily in garments loose; +They sought to brace from the awful shock: +Taking a seat, they tried to talk. +She spoke of Bergson and Pater's prose, +He prattled of dances and ragtime shows; +She purred of pictures, Matisse, Cezanne, +His tastes to the girls of Kirchner ran; +She raved of Tchaikovsky and Caesar Franck, +He owned that he was a jazz-band crank! +They made no headway. Alas! alas! +He thought her a bore, she thought him an ass. +And so they arose and hurriedly fled; +Perish Illusion, Romance, you're dead. +He loved elegance, she loved art, +Better at once to part, to part. + +And what is the moral of all this rot? +Don't try to be what you know you're not. +And if you're made on a muttonish plan, +Don't seek to seem a Bohemian; +And if to the goats your feet incline, +Don't try to pass for a Philistine. + + + + + II + + + + + A Small Cafe in a Side Street, + June 1914. + + + + +The Bohemian Dreams + + + +Because my overcoat's in pawn, +I choose to take my glass +Within a little ~bistro~ on +The rue du Montparnasse; +The dusty bins with bottles shine, +The counter's lined with zinc, +And there I sit and drink my wine, +And think and think and think. + +I think of hoary old Stamboul, +Of Moslem and of Greek, +Of Persian in coat of wool, +Of Kurd and Arab sheikh; +Of all the types of weal and woe, +And as I raise my glass, +Across Galata bridge I know +They pass and pass and pass. + +I think of citron-trees aglow, +Of fan-palms shading down, +Of sailors dancing heel and toe +With wenches black and brown; +And though it's all an ocean far +From Yucatan to France, +I'll bet beside the old bazaar +They dance and dance and dance. + +I think of Monte Carlo, where +The pallid croupiers call, +And in the gorgeous, guilty air +The gamblers watch the ball; +And as I flick away the foam +With which my beer is crowned, +The wheels beneath the gilded dome +Go round and round and round. + +I think of vast Niagara, +Those gulfs of foam a-shine, +Whose mighty roar would stagger a +More prosy bean than mine; +And as the hours I idly spend +Against a greasy wall, +I know that green the waters bend +And fall and fall and fall. + +I think of Nijni Novgorod +And Jews who never rest; +And womenfolk with spade and hod +Who slave in Buda-Pest; +Of squat and sturdy Japanese +Who pound the paddy soil, +And as I loaf and smoke at ease +They toil and toil and toil. + +I think of shrines in Hindustan, +Of cloistral glooms in Spain, +Of minarets in Ispahan, +Of St. Sophia's fane, +Of convent towers in Palestine, +Of temples in Cathay, +And as I stretch and sip my wine +They pray and pray and pray. + +And so my dreams I dwell within, +And visions come and go, +And life is passing like a Cin- +Ematographic Show; +Till just as surely as my pipe +Is underneath my nose, +Amid my visions rich and ripe +I doze and doze and doze. + + + + +Alas! it is too true. Once more I am counting the coppers, +living on the ragged edge. My manuscripts come back to me like boomerangs, +and I have not the postage, far less the heart, to send them out again. + +MacBean seems to take an interest in my struggles. I often sit in his room +in the rue Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre, smoking and sipping whisky +into the small hours. He is an old hand, who knows the market +and frankly manufactures for it. + +"Give me short pieces," he says; "things of three verses that will fill +a blank half-page of a magazine. Let them be sprightly, and, if possible, +have a snapper at the end. Give me that sort of article. +I think I can place it for you." + +Then he looked through a lot of my verse: "This is the kind of stuff +I might be able to sell," he said: + + + + +A Domestic Tragedy + + + +Clorinda met me on the way +As I came from the train; +Her face was anything but gay, +In fact, suggested pain. +"Oh hubby, hubby dear!" she cried, +"I've awful news to tell. . . ." +"What is it, darling?" I replied; +"Your mother -- is she well?" + +"Oh no! oh no! it is not that, +It's something else," she wailed, +My heart was beating pit-a-pat, +My ruddy visage paled. +Like lightning flash in heaven's dome +The fear within me woke: +"Don't say," I cried, "our little home +Has all gone up in smoke!" + +She shook her head. Oh, swift I clasped +And held her to my breast; +"The children! Tell me quick," I gasped, +"Believe me, it is best." +Then, then she spoke; 'mid sobs I caught +These words of woe divine: +"It's coo-coo-cook has gone and bought +~A new hat just like mine.~" + + + + +At present I am living on bread and milk. By doing this I can rub along +for another ten days. The thought pleases me. As long as I have a crust +I am master of my destiny. Some day, when I am rich and famous, +I shall look back on all this with regret. Yet I think I shall always +remain a Bohemian. I hate regularity. The clock was never made for me. +I want to eat when I am hungry, sleep when I am weary, +drink -- well, any old time. + +I prefer to be alone. Company is a constraint on my spirit. +I never make an engagement if I can avoid it. To do so is to put a mortgage +on my future. I like to be able to rise in the morning with the thought +that the hours before me are all mine, to spend in my own way -- +to work, to dream, to watch the unfolding drama of life. + +Here is another of my ballads. It is longer than most, +and gave me more trouble, though none the better for that. + + + + +The Pencil Seller + + + +A pencil, sir; a penny -- won't you buy? +I'm cold and wet and tired, a sorry plight; +Don't turn your back, sir; take one just to try; +I haven't made a single sale to-night. +Oh, thank you, sir; but take the pencil too; +I'm not a beggar, I'm a business man. +Pencils I deal in, red and black and blue; +It's hard, but still I do the best I can. +Most days I make enough to pay for bread, +A cup o' coffee, stretching room at night. +One needs so little -- to be warm and fed, +A hole to kennel in -- oh, one's all right . . . + +Excuse me, you're a painter, are you not? +I saw you looking at that dealer's show, +The ~crou^tes~ he has for sale, a shabby lot -- +What do I know of Art? What do I know . . . +Well, look! That David Strong so well displayed, +"White Sorcery" it's called, all gossamer, +And pale moon-magic and a dancing maid +(You like the little elfin face of her?) -- +That's good; but still, the picture as a whole, +The values, -- Pah! He never painted worse; +Perhaps because his fire was lacking coal, +His cupboard bare, no money in his purse. +Perhaps . . . they say he labored hard and long, +And see now, in the harvest of his fame, +When round his pictures people gape and throng, +A scurvy dealer sells this on his name. +A wretched rag, wrung out of want and woe; +A soulless daub, not David Strong a bit, +Unworthy of his art. . . . How should I know? +How should I know? I'm ~Strong~ -- I painted it. + +There now, I didn't mean to let that out. +It came in spite of me -- aye, stare and stare. +You think I'm lying, crazy, drunk, no doubt -- +Think what you like, it's neither here nor there. +It's hard to tell so terrible a truth, +To gain to glory, yet be such as I. +It's true; that picture's mine, done in my youth, +Up in a garret near the Paris sky. +The child's my daughter; aye, she posed for me. +That's why I come and sit here every night. +The painting's bad, but still -- oh, still I see +Her little face all laughing in the light. +So now you understand. -- I live in fear +Lest one like you should carry it away; +A poor, pot-boiling thing, but oh, how dear! +"Don't let them buy it, pitying God!" I pray! +And hark ye, sir -- sometimes my brain's awhirl. +Some night I'll crash into that window pane +And snatch my picture back, my little girl, +And run and run. . . . + I'm talking wild again; +A crab can't run. I'm crippled, withered, lame, +Palsied, as good as dead all down one side. +No warning had I when the evil came: +It struck me down in all my strength and pride. +Triumph was mine, I thrilled with perfect power; +Honor was mine, Fame's laurel touched my brow; +Glory was mine -- within a little hour +I was a god and . . . what you find me now. + +My child, that little, laughing girl you see, +She was my nurse for all ten weary years; +Her joy, her hope, her youth she gave for me; +Her very smiles were masks to hide her tears. +And I, my precious art, so rich, so rare, +Lost, lost to me -- what could my heart but break! +Oh, as I lay and wrestled with despair, +I would have killed myself but for her sake. . . . + +By luck I had some pictures I could sell, +And so we fought the wolf back from the door; +She painted too, aye, wonderfully well. +We often dreamed of brighter days in store. +And then quite suddenly she seemed to fail; +I saw the shadows darken round her eyes. +So tired she was, so sorrowful, so pale, +And oh, there came a day she could not rise. +The doctor looked at her; he shook his head, +And spoke of wine and grapes and Southern air: +"If you can get her out of this," he said, +"She'll have a fighting chance with proper care." + +"With proper care!" When he had gone away, +I sat there, trembling, twitching, dazed with grief. +Under my old and ragged coat she lay, +Our room was bare and cold beyond belief. +"Maybe," I thought, "I still can paint a bit, +Some lilies, landscape, anything at all." +Alas! My brush, I could not steady it. +Down from my fumbling hand I let it fall. +"With proper care" -- how could I give her that, +Half of me dead? . . . I crawled down to the street. +Cowering beside the wall, I held my hat +And begged of every one I chanced to meet. +I got some pennies, bought her milk and bread, +And so I fought to keep the Doom away; +And yet I saw with agony of dread +My dear one sinking, sinking day by day. +And then I was awakened in the night: +"Please take my hands, I'm cold," I heard her sigh; +And soft she whispered, as she held me tight: +"Oh daddy, we've been happy, you and I!" +I do not think she suffered any pain, +She breathed so quietly . . . but though I tried, +I could not warm her little hands again: +And so there in the icy dark she died. . . . +The dawn came groping in with fingers gray +And touched me, sitting silent as a stone; +I kissed those piteous lips, as cold as clay -- +I did not cry, I did not even moan. +At last I rose, groped down the narrow stair; +An evil fog was oozing from the sky; +Half-crazed I stumbled on, I knew not where, +Like phantoms were the folks that passed me by. +How long I wandered thus I do not know, +But suddenly I halted, stood stock-still -- +Beside a door that spilled a golden glow +I saw a name, ~my name~, upon a bill. +"A Sale of Famous Pictures," so it read, +"A Notable Collection, each a gem, +Distinguished Works of Art by painters dead." +The folks were going in, I followed them. +I stood upon the outskirts of the crowd, +I only hoped that none might notice me. +Soon, soon I heard them call my name aloud: +"A `David Strong', his ~Fete in Brittany~." +(A brave big picture that, the best I've done, +It glowed and kindled half the hall away, +With all its memories of sea and sun, +Of pipe and bowl, of joyous work and play. +I saw the sardine nets blue as the sky, +I saw the nut-brown fisher-boats put out.) +"Five hundred pounds!" rapped out a voice near by; +"Six hundred!" "Seven!" "Eight!" And then a shout: +"A thousand pounds!" Oh, how I thrilled to hear! +Oh, how the bids went up by leaps, by bounds! +And then a silence; then the auctioneer: +"It's going! Going! Gone! ~Three thousand pounds!~" +Three thousand pounds! A frenzy leapt in me. +"That picture's mine," I cried; "I'm David Strong. +I painted it, this famished wretch you see; +I did it, I, and sold it for a song. +And in a garret three small hours ago +My daughter died for want of Christian care. +Look, look at me! . . . Is it to mock my woe +You pay three thousand for my picture there?" . . . + +O God! I stumbled blindly from the hall; +The city crashed on me, the fiendish sounds +Of cruelty and strife, but over all +"Three thousand pounds!" I heard; "Three thousand pounds!" + +There, that's my story, sir; it isn't gay. +Tales of the Poor are never very bright . . . +You'll look for me next time you pass this way . . . +I hope you'll find me, sir; good-night, good-night. + + + + + III + + + + + The Luxembourg, + June 1914. + +On a late afternoon, when the sunlight is mellow on the leaves, +I often sit near the Fontaine de Medicis, and watch the children +at their play. Sometimes I make bits of verse about them, such as: + + + + +Fi-Fi in Bed + + + +Up into the sky I stare; +All the little stars I see; +And I know that God is there +O, how lonely He must be! + + Me, I laugh and leap all day, + Till my head begins to nod; + He's so great, He cannot play: + I am glad I am not God. + + Poor kind God upon His throne, + Up there in the sky so blue, + Always, always all alone . . . + "~Please, dear God, I pity You.~" + + + + +Or else, sitting on the terrace of a cafe on the Boul' Mich', +I sip slowly a Dubonnet or a Byrrh, and the charm of the Quarter possesses me. +I think of men who have lived and loved there, who have groveled and gloried, +who have drunk deep and died. And then I scribble things like this: + + + + +Gods in the Gutter + + + +I dreamed I saw three demi-gods who in a cafe sat, +And one was small and crapulous, and one was large and fat; +And one was eaten up with vice and verminous at that. + +The first he spoke of secret sins, and gems and perfumes rare; +And velvet cats and courtesans voluptuously fair: +"Who is the Sybarite?" I asked. They answered: "Baudelaire." + +The second talked in tapestries, by fantasy beguiled; +As frail as bubbles, hard as gems, his pageantries he piled; +"This Lord of Language, who is he?" They whispered "Oscar Wilde." + +The third was staring at his glass from out abysmal pain; +With tears his eyes were bitten in beneath his bulbous brain. +"Who is the sodden wretch?" I said. They told me: "Paul Verlaine." + +Oh, Wilde, Verlaine and Baudelaire, their lips were wet with wine; +Oh poseur, pimp and libertine! Oh cynic, sot and swine! +Oh votaries of velvet vice! . . . Oh gods of light divine! + +Oh Baudelaire, Verlaine and Wilde, they knew the sinks of shame; +Their sun-aspiring wings they scorched at passion's altar flame; +Yet lo! enthroned, enskied they stand, Immortal Sons of Fame. + +I dreamed I saw three demi-gods who walked with feet of clay, +With cruel crosses on their backs, along a miry way; +Who climbed and climbed the bitter steep to which men turn and pray. + + + + +And while I am on the subject of the Quarter, let me repeat this, +which is included in my Ballads of the Boulevards: + + + + +The Death of Marie Toro + + + +We're taking Marie Toro to her home in Pe\re-La-Chaise; +We're taking Marie Toro to her last resting-place. +Behold! her hearse is hung with wreaths till everything is hid +Except the blossoms heaping high upon her coffin lid. +A week ago she roamed the street, a draggle and a slut, +A by-word of the Boulevard and everybody's butt; +A week ago she haunted us, we heard her whining cry, +We brushed aside the broken blooms she pestered us to buy; +A week ago she had not where to rest her weary head . . . +But now, oh, follow, follow on, for Marie Toro's dead. + +Oh Marie, she was once a queen -- ah yes, a queen of queens. +High-throned above the Carnival she held her splendid sway. +For four-and-twenty crashing hours she knew what glory means, +The cheers of half a million throats, the ~de/lire~ of a day. +Yet she was only one of us, a little sewing-girl, +Though far the loveliest and best of all our laughing band; +Then Fortune beckoned; off she danced, amid the dizzy whirl, +And we who once might kiss her cheek were proud to kiss her hand. +For swiftly as a star she soared; she had her every wish; +We saw her roped with pearls of price, with princes at her call; +And yet, and yet I think her dreams were of the old Boul' Mich', +And yet I'm sure within her heart she loved us best of all. +For one night in the Purple Pig, upon the rue Saint-Jacques, +We laughed and quaffed . . . a limousine came swishing to the door; +Then Raymond Jolicoeur cried out: "It's Queen Marie come back, +In satin clad to make us glad, and witch our hearts once more." +But no, her face was strangely sad, and at the evening's end: +"Dear lads," she said; "I love you all, and when I'm far away, +Remember, oh, remember, little Marie is your friend, +And though the world may lie between, I'm coming back some day." +And so she went, and many a boy who's fought his way to Fame, +Can look back on the struggle of his garret days and bless +The loyal heart, the tender hand, the Providence that came +To him and all in hour of need, in sickness and distress. +Time passed away. She won their hearts in London, Moscow, Rome; +They worshiped her in Argentine, adored her in Brazil; +We smoked our pipes and wondered when she might be coming home, +And then we learned the luck had turned, the things were going ill. +Her health had failed, her beauty paled, her lovers fled away; +And some one saw her in Peru, a common drab at last. +So years went by, and faces changed; our beards were sadly gray, +And Marie Toro's name became an echo of the past. + +You know that old and withered man, that derelict of art, +Who for a paltry franc will make a crayon sketch of you? +In slouching hat and shabby cloak he looks and is the part, +A sodden old Bohemian, without a single ~sou~. +A boon companion of the days of Rimbaud and Verlaine, +He broods and broods, and chews the cud of bitter souvenirs; +Beneath his mop of grizzled hair his cheeks are gouged with pain, +The saffron sockets of his eyes are hollowed out with tears. +Well, one night in the D'Harcourt's din I saw him in his place, +When suddenly the door was swung, a woman halted there; +A woman cowering like a dog, with white and haggard face, +A broken creature, bent of spine, a daughter of Despair. +She looked and looked, as to her breast she held some withered bloom; +"Too late! Too late! . . . they all are dead and gone," I heard her say. +And once again her weary eyes went round and round the room; +"Not one of all I used to know . . ." she turned to go away . . . +But quick I saw the old man start: "Ah no!" he cried, "not all. +Oh Marie Toro, queen of queens, don't you remember Paul?" + +"Oh Marie, Marie Toro, in my garret next the sky, +Where many a day and night I've crouched with not a crust to eat, +A picture hangs upon the wall a fortune couldn't buy, +A portrait of a girl whose face is pure and angel-sweet." +Sadly the woman looked at him: "Alas! it's true," she said; +"That little maid, I knew her once. It's long ago -- she's dead." +He went to her; he laid his hand upon her wasted arm: +"Oh, Marie Toro, come with me, though poor and sick am I. +For old times' sake I cannot bear to see you come to harm; +Ah! there are memories, God knows, that never, never die. . . ." +"Too late!" she sighed; "I've lived my life of splendor and of shame; +I've been adored by men of power, I've touched the highest height; +I've squandered gold like heaps of dirt -- oh, I have played the game; +I've had my place within the sun . . . and now I face the night. +Look! look! you see I'm lost to hope; I live no matter how . . . +To drink and drink and so forget . . . that's all I care for now." + +And so she went her heedless way, and all our help was vain. +She trailed along with tattered shawl and mud-corroded skirt; +She gnawed a crust and slept beneath the bridges of the Seine, +A garbage thing, a composite of alcohol and dirt. +The students learned her story and the cafes knew her well, +The Pascal and the Panthe/on, the Sufflot and Vachette; +She shuffled round the tables with the flowers she tried to sell, +A living mask of misery that no one will forget. +And then last week I missed her, and they found her in the street +One morning early, huddled down, for it was freezing cold; +But when they raised her ragged shawl her face was still and sweet; +Some bits of broken bloom were clutched within her icy hold. +That's all. . . . Ah yes, they say that saw: her blue, wide-open eyes +Were beautiful with joy again, with radiant surprise. . . . + +A week ago she begged for bread; we've bought for her a stone, +And a peaceful place in Pe\re-La-Chaise where she'll be well alone. +She cost a king his crown, they say; oh, wouldn't she be proud +If she could see the wreaths to-day, the coaches and the crowd! +So follow, follow, follow on with slow and sober tread, +For Marie Toro, gutter waif and queen of queens, is dead. + + + + + IV + + + + + The Cafe de Deux Magots, + June 1914. + + + + +The Bohemian + + + +Up in my garret bleak and bare +I tilted back on my broken chair, +And my three old pals were with me there, + Hunger and Thirst and Cold; +Hunger scowled at his scurvy mate: +Cold cowered down by the hollow grate, +And I hated them with a deadly hate + As old as life is old. + +So up in my garret that's near the sky +I smiled a smile that was thin and dry: +"You've roomed with me twenty year," said I, + "Hunger and Thirst and Cold; +But now, begone down the broken stair! +I've suffered enough of your spite . . . so there!" +Bang! Bang! I slapped on the table bare + A glittering heap of gold. + +"Red flames will jewel my wine to-night; +I'll loose my belt that you've lugged so tight; +Ha! Ha! Dame Fortune is smiling bright; + The stuff of my brain I've sold; +~Canaille~ of the gutter, up! Away! +You've battened on me for a bitter-long day; +But I'm driving you forth, and forever and aye, + Hunger and Thirst and Cold." + +So I kicked them out with a scornful roar; +Yet, oh, they turned at the garret door; +Quietly there they spoke once more: + "The tale is not all told. +It's ~au revoir~, but it's not good-by; +We're yours, old chap, till the day you die; +Laugh on, you fool! Oh, you'll never defy + Hunger and Thirst and Cold." + + + + +Hurrah! The crisis in my financial career is over. Once more +I have weathered the storm, and never did money jingle so sweetly +in my pocket. It was MacBean who delivered me. He arrived +at the door of my garret this morning, with a broad grin of pleasure +on his face. + +"Here," said he; "I've sold some of your rubbish. They'll take more too, +of the same sort." + +With that he handed me three crisp notes. For a moment I thought +that he was paying the money out of his own pocket, as he knew +I was desperately hard up; but he showed me the letter enclosing the cheque +he had cashed for me. + +So we sought the Grand Boulevard, and I had a Pernod, which rose to my head +in delicious waves of joy. I talked ecstatic nonsense, and seemed to walk +like a god in clouds of gold. We dined on frogs' legs and Vouvray, +and then went to see the Revue at the Marigny. A very merry evening. + +Such is the life of Bohemia, up and down, fast and feast; +its very uncertainty its charm. + +Here is my latest ballad, another attempt to express +the sentiment of actuality: + + + + +The Auction Sale + + + +Her little head just topped the window-sill; +She even mounted on a stool, maybe; +She pressed against the pane, as children will, +And watched us playing, oh so wistfully! +And then I missed her for a month or more, +And idly thought: "She's gone away, no doubt," +Until a hearse drew up beside the door . . . +I saw a tiny coffin carried out. + +And after that, towards dusk I'd often see +Behind the blind another face that looked: +Eyes of a young wife watching anxiously, +Then rushing back to where her dinner cooked. +She often gulped it down alone, I fear, +Within her heart the sadness of despair, +For near to midnight I would vaguely hear +A lurching step, a stumbling on the stair. + +These little dramas of the common day! +A man weak-willed and fore-ordained to fail . . . +The window's empty now, they've gone away, +And yonder, see, their furniture's for sale. +To all the world their door is open wide, +And round and round the bargain-hunters roam, +And peer and gloat, like vultures avid-eyed, +Above the corpse of what was once a home. + +So reverent I go from room to room, +And see the patient care, the tender touch, +The love that sought to brighten up the gloom, +The woman-courage tested overmuch. +Amid those things so intimate and dear, +Where now the mob invades with brutal tread, +I think: "What happiness is buried here, +What dreams are withered and what hopes are dead!" + +Oh, woman dear, and were you sweet and glad +Over the lining of your little nest! +What ponderings and proud ideas you had! +What visions of a shrine of peace and rest! +For there's his easy-chair upon the rug, +His reading-lamp, his pipe-rack on the wall, +All that you could devise to make him snug -- +And yet you could not hold him with it all. + +Ah, patient heart, what homelike joys you planned +To stay him by the dull domestic flame! +Those silken cushions that you worked by hand +When you had time, before the baby came. +Oh, how you wove around him cozy spells, +And schemed so hard to keep him home of nights! +Aye, every touch and turn some story tells +Of sweet conspiracies and dead delights. + +And here upon the scratched piano stool, +Tied in a bundle, are the songs you sung; +That cozy that you worked in colored wool, +The Spanish lace you made when you were young, +And lots of modern novels, cheap reprints, +And little dainty knick-knacks everywhere; +And silken bows and curtains of gay chintz . . . +~And oh, her tiny crib, her folding chair!~ + +Sweet woman dear, and did your heart not break, +To leave this precious home you made in vain? +Poor shabby things! so prized for old times' sake, +With all their memories of love and pain. +Alas! while shouts the raucous auctioneer, +And rat-faced dames are prying everywhere, +The echo of old joy is all I hear, +All, all I see just heartbreak and despair. + + + + +Imagination is the great gift of the gods. Given it, one does not need +to look afar for subjects. There is romance in every face. + +Those who have Imagination live in a land of enchantment +which the eyes of others cannot see. Yet if it brings marvelous joy +it also brings exquisite pain. Who lives a hundred lives +must die a hundred deaths. + +I do not know any of the people who live around me. Sometimes I pass them +on the stairs. However, I am going to give my imagination rein, +and string some rhymes about them. + +Before doing so, having money in my pocket and seeing the prospect +of making more, let me blithely chant about + + + + +The Joy of Being Poor + + + + I + +Let others sing of gold and gear, the joy of being rich; +But oh, the days when I was poor, a vagrant in a ditch! +When every dawn was like a gem, so radiant and rare, +And I had but a single coat, and not a single care; +When I would feast right royally on bacon, bread and beer, +And dig into a stack of hay and doze like any peer; +When I would wash beside a brook my solitary shirt, +And though it dried upon my back I never took a hurt; +When I went romping down the road contemptuous of care, +And slapped Adventure on the back -- by Gad! we were a pair; +When, though my pockets lacked a coin, and though my coat was old, +The largess of the stars was mine, and all the sunset gold; +When time was only made for fools, and free as air was I, +And hard I hit and hard I lived beneath the open sky; +When all the roads were one to me, and each had its allure . . . +Ye Gods! these were the happy days, the days when I was poor. + + + II + +Or else, again, old pal of mine, do you recall the times +You struggled with your storyettes, I wrestled with my rhymes; +Oh, we were happy, were we not? -- we used to live so "high" +(A little bit of broken roof between us and the sky); +Upon the forge of art we toiled with hammer and with tongs; +You told me all your rippling yarns, I sang to you my songs. +Our hats were frayed, our jackets patched, our boots were down at heel, +But oh, the happy men were we, although we lacked a meal. +And if I sold a bit of rhyme, or if you placed a tale, +What feasts we had of tenderloins and apple-tarts and ale! +And yet how often we would dine as cheerful as you please, +Beside our little friendly fire on coffee, bread and cheese. +We lived upon the ragged edge, and grub was never sure, +But oh, these were the happy days, the days when we were poor. + + + III + +Alas! old man, we're wealthy now, it's sad beyond a doubt; +We cannot dodge prosperity, success has found us out. +Your eye is very dull and drear, my brow is creased with care, +We realize how hard it is to be a millionaire. +The burden's heavy on our backs -- you're thinking of your rents, +I'm worrying if I'll invest in five or six per cents. +We've limousines, and marble halls, and flunkeys by the score, +We play the part . . . but say, old chap, oh, isn't it a bore? +We work like slaves, we eat too much, we put on evening dress; +We've everything a man can want, I think . . . but happiness. + +Come, let us sneak away, old chum; forget that we are rich, +And earn an honest appetite, and scratch an honest itch. +Let's be two jolly garreteers, up seven flights of stairs, +And wear old clothes and just pretend we aren't millionaires; +And wonder how we'll pay the rent, and scribble ream on ream, +And sup on sausages and tea, and laugh and loaf and dream. + +And when we're tired of that, my friend, oh, you will come with me; +And we will seek the sunlit roads that lie beside the sea. +We'll know the joy the gipsy knows, the freedom nothing mars, +The golden treasure-gates of dawn, the mintage of the stars. +We'll smoke our pipes and watch the pot, and feed the crackling fire, +And sing like two old jolly boys, and dance to heart's desire; +We'll climb the hill and ford the brook and camp upon the moor . . . +Old chap, let's haste, I'm mad to taste the Joy of Being Poor. + + + + + V + + + + + My Garret, Montparnasse, + June 1914. + + + + +My Neighbors + + + + ~To rest my fagged brain now and then, + When wearied of my proper labors, + I lay aside my lagging pen + And get to thinking on my neighbors; + For, oh, around my garret den + There's woe and poverty a-plenty, + And life's so interesting when + A lad is only two-and-twenty. + + Now, there's that artist gaunt and wan, + A little card his door adorning; + It reads: "Je ne suis pour personne", + A very frank and fitting warning. + I fear he's in a sorry plight; + He starves, I think, too proud to borrow, + I hear him moaning every night: + Maybe they'll find him dead to-morrow.~ + + + + + Room 4: The Painter Chap + + + +He gives me such a bold and curious look, +That young American across the way, +As if he'd like to put me in a book +(Fancies himself a poet, so they say.) +Ah well! He'll make no "document" of me. +I lock my door. Ha! ha! Now none shall see. . . . + +Pictures, just pictures piled from roof to floor, +Each one a bit of me, a dream fulfilled, +A vision of the beauty I adore, +My own poor glimpse of glory, passion-thrilled . . . +But now my money's gone, I paint no more. + +For three days past I have not tasted food; +The jeweled colors run . . . I reel, I faint; +They tell me that my pictures are no good, +Just crude and childish daubs, a waste of paint. +I burned to throw on canvas all I saw -- +Twilight on water, tenderness of trees, +Wet sands at sunset and the smoking seas, +The peace of valleys and the mountain's awe: +Emotion swayed me at the thought of these. +I sought to paint ere I had learned to draw, +And that's the trouble. . . . + Ah well! here am I, +Facing my failure after struggle long; +And there they are, my ~croutes~ that none will buy +(And doubtless they are right and I am wrong); +Well, when one's lost one's faith it's time to die. . . . + +This knife will do . . . and now to slash and slash; +Rip them to ribands, rend them every one, +My dreams and visions -- tear and stab and gash, +So that their crudeness may be known to none; +Poor, miserable daubs! Ah! there, it's done. . . . + +And now to close my little window tight. +Lo! in the dusking sky, serenely set, +The evening star is like a beacon bright. +And see! to keep her tender tryst with night +How Paris veils herself in violet. . . . + +Oh, why does God create such men as I? -- +All pride and passion and divine desire, +Raw, quivering nerve-stuff and devouring fire, +Foredoomed to failure though they try and try; +Abortive, blindly to destruction hurled; +Unfound, unfit to grapple with the world. . . . + +And now to light my wheezy jet of gas; +Chink up the window-crannies and the door, +So that no single breath of air may pass; +So that I'm sealed air-tight from roof to floor. +There, there, that's done; and now there's nothing more. . . . + +Look at the city's myriad lamps a-shine; +See, the calm moon is launching into space . . . +There will be darkness in these eyes of mine +Ere it can climb to shine upon my face. +Oh, it will find such peace upon my face! . . . + +City of Beauty, I have loved you well, +A laugh or two I've had, but many a sigh; +I've run with you the scale from Heav'n to Hell. +Paris, I love you still . . . good-by, good-by. +Thus it all ends -- unhappily, alas! +It's time to sleep, and now . . . ~blow out the gas~. . . . + + + + + ~Now there's that little ~midinette~ + Who goes to work each morning daily; + I choose to call her Blithe Babette, + Because she's always humming gaily; + And though the Goddess "Comme-il-faut" + May look on her with prim expression, + It's Pagan Paris where, you know, + The queen of virtues is Discretion.~ + + + + + Room 6: The Little Workgirl + + + +Three gentlemen live close beside me -- +A painter of pictures bizarre, +A poet whose virtues might guide me, +A singer who plays the guitar; +And there on my lintel is Cupid; +I leave my door open, and yet +These gentlemen, aren't they stupid! +They never make love to Babette. + +I go to the shop every morning; +I work with my needle and thread; +Silk, satin and velvet adorning, +Then luncheon on coffee and bread. +Then sewing and sewing till seven; +Or else, if the order I get, +I toil and I toil till eleven -- +And such is the day of Babette. + +It doesn't seem cheerful, I fancy; +The wage is unthinkably small; +And yet there is one thing I can say: +I keep a bright face through it all. +I chaff though my head may be aching; +I sing a gay song to forget; +I laugh though my heart may be breaking -- +It's all in the life of Babette. + +That gown, O my lady of leisure, +You begged to be "finished in haste." +It gives you an exquisite pleasure, +Your lovers remark on its taste. +Yet . . . oh, the poor little white faces, +The tense midnight toil and the fret . . . +I fear that the foam of its laces +Is salt with the tears of Babette. + +It takes a brave heart to be cheery +With no gleam of hope in the sky; +The future's so utterly dreary, +I'm laughing -- in case I should cry. +And if, where the gay lights are glowing, +I dine with a man I have met, +And snatch a bright moment -- who's going +To blame a poor little Babette? + +And you, Friend beyond all the telling, +Although you're an ocean away, +Your pictures, they tell me, are selling, +You're married and settled, they say. +Such happiness one wouldn't barter; +Yet, oh, do you never regret +The Springtide, the roses, Montmartre, +Youth, poverty, love and -- Babette? + + + + + ~That blond-haired chap across the way + With sunny smile and voice so mellow, + He sings in some cheap cabaret, + Yet what a gay and charming fellow! + His breath with garlic may be strong, + What matters it? his laugh is jolly; + His day he gives to sleep and song: + His night's made up of song and folly.~ + + + + + Room 5: The Concert Singer + + + +I'm one of these haphazard chaps +Who sit in cafes drinking; +A most improper taste, perhaps, +Yet pleasant, to my thinking. +For, oh, I hate discord and strife; +I'm sadly, weakly human; +And I do think the best of life +Is wine and song and woman. + +Now, there's that youngster on my right +Who thinks himself a poet, +And so he toils from morn to night +And vainly hopes to show it; +And there's that dauber on my left, +Within his chamber shrinking -- +He looks like one of hope bereft; +He lives on air, I'm thinking. + +But me, I love the things that are, +My heart is always merry; +I laugh and tune my old guitar: +~Sing ho! and hey-down-derry.~ +Oh, let them toil their lives away +To gild a tawdry era, +But I'll be gay while yet I may: +~Sing tira-lira-lira.~ + +I'm sure you know that picture well, +A monk, all else unheeding, +Within a bare and gloomy cell +A musty volume reading; +While through the window you can see +In sunny glade entrancing, +With cap and bells beneath a tree +A jester dancing, dancing. + +Which is the fool and which the sage? +I cannot quite discover; +But you may look in learning's page +And I'll be laughter's lover. +For this our life is none too long, +And hearts were made for gladness; +Let virtue lie in joy and song, +The only sin be sadness. + +So let me troll a jolly air, +Come what come will to-morrow; +I'll be no ~cabotin~ of care, +No ~souteneur~ of sorrow. +Let those who will indulge in strife, +To my most merry thinking, +The true philosophy of life +Is laughing, loving, drinking. + + + + + ~And there's that weird and ghastly hag + Who walks head bent, with lips a-mutter; + With twitching hands and feet that drag, + And tattered skirts that sweep the gutter. + An outworn harlot, lost to hope, + With staring eyes and hair that's hoary + I hear her gibber, dazed with dope: + I often wonder what's her story.~ + + + + + Room 7: The Coco-Fiend + + + + I look at no one, me; + I pass them on the stair; + Shadows! I don't see; + Shadows! everywhere. + Haunting, taunting, staring, glaring, + Shadows! I don't care. + Once my room I gain + Then my life begins. + Shut the door on pain; + How the Devil grins! + Grin with might and main; + Grin and grin in vain; + Here's where Heav'n begins: + Cocaine! Cocaine! + + A whiff! Ah, that's the thing. + How it makes me gay! + Now I want to sing, + Leap, laugh, play. + Ha! I've had my fling! + Mistress of a king + In my day. + Just another snuff . . . + Oh, the blessed stuff! + How the wretched room + Rushes from my sight; + Misery and gloom + Melt into delight; + Fear and death and doom + Vanish in the night. + No more cold and pain, + I am young again, + Beautiful again, + Cocaine! Cocaine! + +Oh, I was made to be good, to be good, +For a true man's love and a life that's sweet; +Fireside blessings and motherhood. +Little ones playing around my feet. +How it all unfolds like a magic screen, +Tender and glowing and clear and glad, +The wonderful mother I might have been, +The beautiful children I might have had; +Romping and laughing and shrill with glee, +Oh, I see them now and I see them plain. +Darlings! Come nestle up close to me, +You comfort me so, and you're just . . . Cocaine. + + It's Life that's all to blame: + We can't do what we will; + She robes us with her shame, + She crowns us with her ill. + I do not care, because + I see with bitter calm, + Life made me what I was, + Life makes me what I am. + Could I throw back the years, + It all would be the same; + Hunger and cold and tears, + Misery, fear and shame, + And then the old refrain, + Cocaine! Cocaine! + +A love-child I, so here my mother came, +Where she might live in peace with none to blame. +And how she toiled! Harder than any slave, +What courage! patient, hopeful, tender, brave. +We had a little room at Lavilette, +So small, so neat, so clean, I see it yet. +Poor mother! sewing, sewing late at night, +Her wasted face beside the candlelight, +This Paris crushed her. How she used to sigh! +And as I watched her from my bed I knew +She saw red roofs against a primrose sky +And glistening fields and apples dimmed with dew. +Hard times we had. We counted every ~sou~, +We sewed sacks for a living. I was quick . . . +Four busy hands to work instead of two. +Oh, we were happy there, till she fell sick. . . . + +My mother lay, her face turned to the wall, +And I, a girl of sixteen, fair and tall, +Sat by her side, all stricken with despair, +Knelt by her bed and faltered out a prayer. +A doctor's order on the table lay, +Medicine for which, alas! I could not pay; +Medicine to save her life, to soothe her pain. +I sought for something I could sell, in vain . . . +All, all was gone! The room was cold and bare; +Gone blankets and the cloak I used to wear; +Bare floor and wall and cupboard, every shelf -- +Nothing that I could sell . . . except myself. + +I sought the street, I could not bear +To hear my mother moaning there. +I clutched the paper in my hand. +'Twas hard. You cannot understand . . . +I walked as martyr to the flame, +Almost exalted in my shame. +They turned, who heard my voiceless cry, +"For Sale, a virgin, who will buy?" +And so myself I fiercely sold, +And clutched the price, a piece of gold. +Into a pharmacy I pressed; +I took the paper from my breast. +I gave my money . . . how it gleamed! +How precious to my eyes it seemed! +And then I saw the chemist frown, +Quick on the counter throw it down, +Shake with an angry look his head: +"Your ~louis d'or~ is bad," he said. + +Dazed, crushed, I went into the night, +I clutched my gleaming coin so tight. +No, no, I could not well believe +That any one could so deceive. +I tried again and yet again -- +Contempt, suspicion and disdain; +Always the same reply I had: +"Get out of this. Your money's bad." + +Heart broken to the room I crept, +To mother's side. All still . . . she slept . . . +I bent, I sought to raise her head . . . +"Oh, God, have pity!" she was dead. + + That's how it all began. + Said I: Revenge is sweet. + So in my guilty span + I've ruined many a man. + They've groveled at my feet, + I've pity had for none; + I've bled them every one. + Oh, I've had interest for + That worthless ~louis d'or~. + + But now it's over; see, + I care for no one, me; + Only at night sometimes + In dreams I hear the chimes + Of wedding-bells and see + A woman without stain + With children at her knee. + Ah, how you comfort me, + Cocaine! . . . + + + + + + BOOK THREE + + LATE SUMMER + + + + + + I + + + + + The Omnium Bar, near the Bourse, + Late July 1914. + +MacBean, before he settled down to the manufacture of mercantile fiction, +had ideas of a nobler sort, which bore their fruit in a slender book of poems. +In subject they are either erotic, mythologic, or descriptive of nature. +So polished are they that the mind seems to slide over them: +so faultless in form that the critics hailed them with highest praise, +and as many as a hundred copies were sold. + +Saxon Dane, too, has published a book of poems, but he, on the other hand, +defies tradition to an eccentric degree. Originality is his sin. +He strains after it in every line. I must confess I think +much of the free verse he writes is really prose, and a good deal of it +blank verse chopped up into odd lengths. He talks of assonance and color, +of stress and pause and accent, and bewilders me with his theories. + +He and MacBean represent two extremes, and at night, as we sit +in the Cafe du Do^me, they have the hottest of arguments. +As for me, I listen with awe, content that my medium is verse, +and that the fashions of Hood, Thackeray and Bret Harte +are the fashions of to-day. + +Of late I have been doing light stuff, "fillers" for MacBean. +Here are three of my specimens: + + + + +The Philanderer + + + +Oh, have you forgotten those afternoons +With riot of roses and amber skies, +When we thrilled to the joy of a million Junes, +And I sought for your soul in the deeps of your eyes? +I would love you, I promised, forever and aye, +And I meant it too; yet, oh, isn't it odd? +When we met in the Underground to-day +I addressed you as Mary instead of as Maude. + +Oh, don't you remember that moonlit sea, +With us on a silver trail afloat, +When I gracefully sank on my bended knee +At the risk of upsetting our little boat? +Oh, I vowed that my life was blighted then, +As friendship you proffered with mournful mien; +But now as I think of your children ten, +I'm glad you refused me, Evangeline. + +Oh, is that moment eternal still +When I breathed my love in your shell-like ear, +And you plucked at your fan as a maiden will, +And you blushed so charmingly, Guenivere? +Like a worshiper at your feet I sat; +For a year and a day you made me mad; +But now, alas! you are forty, fat, +And I think: What a lucky escape I had! + +Oh, maidens I've set in a sacred shrine, +Oh, Rosamond, Molly and Mignonette, +I've deemed you in turn the most divine, +In turn you've broken my heart . . . and yet +It's easily mended. What's past is past. +To-day on Lucy I'm going to call; +For I'm sure that I know true love at last, +And ~She~ is the fairest girl of all. + + + + +The ~Petit Vieux~ + + + +"Sow your wild oats in your youth," so we're always told; +But I say with deeper sooth: "Sow them when you're old." +I'll be wise till I'm about seventy or so: +Then, by Gad! I'll blossom out as an ancient ~beau~. + +I'll assume a dashing air, laugh with loud Ha! ha! . . . +How my grandchildren will stare at their grandpapa! +Their perfection aureoled I will scandalize: +Won't I be a hoary old sinner in their eyes! + +Watch me, how I'll learn to chaff barmaids in a bar; +Scotches daily, gayly quaff, puff a fierce cigar. +I will haunt the Tango teas, at the stage-door stand; +Wait for Dolly Dimpleknees, bouquet in my hand. + +Then at seventy I'll take flutters at roulette; +While at eighty hope I'll make good at poker yet; +And in fashionable togs to the races go, +Gayest of the gay old dogs, ninety years or so. + +"Sow your wild oats while you're young," that's what you are told; +Don't believe the foolish tongue -- sow 'em when you're old. +Till you're threescore years and ten, take my humble tip, +Sow your nice tame oats and then . . . Hi, boys! Let 'er rip. + + + + +My Masterpiece + + + +It's slim and trim and bound in blue; +Its leaves are crisp and edged with gold; +Its words are simple, stalwart too; +Its thoughts are tender, wise and bold. +Its pages scintillate with wit; +Its pathos clutches at my throat: +Oh, how I love each line of it! +That Little Book I Never Wrote. + +In dreams I see it praised and prized +By all, from plowman unto peer; +It's pencil-marked and memorized, +It's loaned (and not returned, I fear); +It's worn and torn and travel-tossed, +And even dusky natives quote +That classic that the world has lost, +The Little Book I Never Wrote. + +Poor ghost! For homes you've failed to cheer, +For grieving hearts uncomforted, +Don't haunt me now. . . . Alas! I fear +The fire of Inspiration's dead. +A humdrum way I go to-night, +From all I hoped and dreamed remote: +Too late . . . a better man must write +That Little Book I Never Wrote. + + + + +Talking about writing books, there is a queer character +who shuffles up and down the little streets that neighbor the Place Maubert, +and who, they say, has been engaged on one for years. Sometimes I see him +cowering in some cheap ~bouge~, and his wild eyes gleam at me +through the tangle of his hair. But I do not think he ever sees me. +He mumbles to himself, and moves like a man in a dream. +His pockets are full of filthy paper on which he writes from time to time. +The students laugh at him and make him tipsy; the street boys +pelt him with ordure; the better cafes turn him from their doors. +But who knows? At least, this is how I see him: + + + + +My Book + + + +Before I drink myself to death, +God, let me finish up my Book! +At night, I fear, I fight for breath, +And wake up whiter than a spook; +And crawl off to a ~bistro~ near, +And drink until my brain is clear. + +Rare Absinthe! Oh, it gives me strength +To write and write; and so I spend +Day after day, until at length +With joy and pain I'll write The End: +Then let this carcase rot; I give +The world my Book -- my Book will live. + +For every line is tense with truth, +There's hope and joy on every page; +A cheer, a clarion call to Youth, +A hymn, a comforter to Age: +All's there that I was meant to be, +My part divine, the God in me. + +It's of my life the golden sum; +Ah! who that reads this Book of mine, +In stormy centuries to come, +Will dream I rooted with the swine? +Behold! I give mankind my best: +What does it matter, all the rest? + +It's this that makes sublime my day; +It's this that makes me struggle on. +Oh, let them mock my mortal clay, +My spirit's deathless as the dawn; +Oh, let them shudder as they look . . . +I'll be immortal in my Book. + +And so beside the sullen Seine +I fight with dogs for filthy food, +Yet know that from my sin and pain +Will soar serene a Something Good; +Exultantly from shame and wrong +A Right, a Glory and a Song. + + + + +How charming it is, this Paris of the summer skies! Each morning +I leap up with joy in my heart, all eager to begin the day of work. +As I eat my breakfast and smoke my pipe, I ponder over my task. +Then in the golden sunshine that floods my little attic I pace up and down, +absorbed and forgetful of the world. As I compose I speak the words aloud. +There are difficulties to overcome; thoughts that will not fit their mold; +rebellious rhymes. Ah! those moments of despair and defeat. + +Then suddenly the mind grows lucid, imagination glows, the snarl unravels. +In the end is always triumph and success. O delectable ~me/tier~! +Who would not be a rhymesmith in Paris, in Bohemia, in the heart of youth! + +I have now finished my twentieth ballad. Five more and they will be done. +In quiet corners of cafes, on benches of the Luxembourg, on the sunny Quays +I read them over one by one. Here is my latest: + + + + +My Hour + + + +Day after day behold me plying +My pen within an office drear; +The dullest dog, till homeward hieing, +Then lo! I reign a king of cheer. +A throne have I of padded leather, +A little court of kiddies three, +A wife who smiles whate'er the weather, +A feast of muffins, jam and tea. + +The table cleared, a romping battle, +A fairy tale, a "Children, bed," +A kiss, a hug, a hush of prattle +(God save each little drowsy head!) +A cozy chat with wife a-sewing, +A silver lining clouds that low'r, +Then she too goes, and with her going, +I come again into my Hour. + +I poke the fire, I snugly settle, +My pipe I prime with proper care; +The water's purring in the kettle, +Rum, lemon, sugar, all are there. +And now the honest grog is steaming, +And now the trusty briar's aglow: +Alas! in smoking, drinking, dreaming, +How sadly swift the moments go! + +Oh, golden hour! 'twixt love and duty, +All others I to others give; +But you are mine to yield to Beauty, +To glean Romance, to greatly live. +For in my easy-chair reclining . . . +~I feel the sting of ocean spray; +And yonder wondrously are shining +The Magic Isles of Far Away. + +Beyond the comber's crashing thunder +Strange beaches flash into my ken; +On jetties heaped head-high with plunder +I dance and dice with sailor-men. +Strange stars swarm down to burn above me, +Strange shadows haunt, strange voices greet; +Strange women lure and laugh and love me, +And fling their bastards at my feet. + +Oh, I would wish the wide world over, +In ports of passion and unrest, +To drink and drain, a tarry rover +With dragons tattooed on my chest, +With haunted eyes that hold red glories +Of foaming seas and crashing shores, +With lips that tell the strangest stories +Of sunken ships and gold moidores; + +Till sick of storm and strife and slaughter, +Some ghostly night when hides the moon, +I slip into the milk-warm water +And softly swim the stale lagoon. +Then through some jungle python-haunted, +Or plumed morass, or woodland wild, +I win my way with heart undaunted, +And all the wonder of a child. + +The pathless plains shall swoon around me, +The forests frown, the floods appall; +The mountains tiptoe to confound me, +The rivers roar to speed my fall. +Wild dooms shall daunt, and dawns be gory, +And Death shall sit beside my knee; +Till after terror, torment, glory, +I win again the sea, the sea. . . .~ + +Oh, anguish sweet! Oh, triumph splendid! +Oh, dreams adieu! my pipe is dead. +My glass is dry, my Hour is ended, +It's time indeed I stole to bed. +How peacefully the house is sleeping! +Ah! why should I strange fortunes plan? +To guard the dear ones in my keeping -- +That's task enough for any man. + +So through dim seas I'll ne'er go spoiling; +The red Tortugas never roam; +Please God! I'll keep the pot a-boiling, +And make at least a happy home. +My children's path shall gleam with roses, +Their grace abound, their joy increase. +And so my Hour divinely closes +With tender thoughts of praise and peace. + + + + + II + + + + + The Garden of the Luxembourg, + Late July 1914. + +When on some scintillating summer morning I leap lightly +up to the seclusion of my garret, I often think of those lines: +"In the brave days when I was twenty-one." + +True, I have no loving, kind Lisette to pin her petticoat across the pane, +yet I do live in hope. Am I not in Bohemia the Magical, +Bohemia of Murger, of de Musset, of Verlaine? Shades of Mimi Pinson, +of Trilby, of all that immortal line of laughterful grisettes, +do not tell me that the days of love and fun are forever at an end! + +Yes, youth is golden, but what of age? Shall it too not testify +to the rhapsody of existence? Let the years between be those of struggle, +of sufferance -- of disillusion if you will; but let youth and age +affirm the ecstasy of being. Let us look forward all to a serene sunset, +and in the still skies "a late lark singing". + +This thought comes to me as, sitting on a bench near the band-stand, +I see an old savant who talks to all the children. His clean-shaven face +is alive with kindliness; under his tall silk hat his white hair falls +to his shoulders. He wears a long black cape over a black frock-coat, +very neat linen, and a flowing tie of black silk. I call him +"Silvester Bonnard". As I look at him I truly think the best of life +are the years between sixty and seventy. + + + + +A Song of Sixty-Five + + + +Brave Thackeray has trolled of days when he was twenty-one, +And bounded up five flights of stairs, a gallant garreteer; +And yet again in mellow vein when youth was gaily run, +Has dipped his nose in Gascon wine, and told of Forty Year. +But if I worthy were to sing a richer, rarer time, +I'd tune my pipes before the fire and merrily I'd strive +To praise that age when prose again has given way to rhyme, +The Indian Summer days of life when I'll be Sixty-five; + +For then my work will all be done, my voyaging be past, +And I'll have earned the right to rest where folding hills are green; +So in some glassy anchorage I'll make my cable fast, -- +Oh, let the seas show all their teeth, I'll sit and smile serene. +The storm may bellow round the roof, I'll bide beside the fire, +And many a scene of sail and trail within the flame I'll see; +For I'll have worn away the spur of passion and desire. . . . +Oh yes, when I am Sixty-five, what peace will come to me. + +I'll take my breakfast in my bed, I'll rise at half-past ten, +When all the world is nicely groomed and full of golden song; +I'll smoke a bit and joke a bit, and read the news, and then +I'll potter round my peach-trees till I hear the luncheon gong. +And after that I think I'll doze an hour, well, maybe two, +And then I'll show some kindred soul how well my roses thrive; +I'll do the things I never yet have found the time to do. . . . +Oh, won't I be the busy man when I am Sixty-five. + +I'll revel in my library; I'll read De Morgan's books; +I'll grow so garrulous I fear you'll write me down a bore; +I'll watch the ways of ants and bees in quiet sunny nooks, +I'll understand Creation as I never did before. +When gossips round the tea-cups talk I'll listen to it all; +On smiling days some kindly friend will take me for a drive: +I'll own a shaggy collie dog that dashes to my call: +I'll celebrate my second youth when I am Sixty-five. + +Ah, though I've twenty years to go, I see myself quite plain, +A wrinkling, twinkling, rosy-cheeked, benevolent old chap; +I think I'll wear a tartan shawl and lean upon a cane. +I hope that I'll have silver hair beneath a velvet cap. +I see my little grandchildren a-romping round my knee; +So gay the scene, I almost wish 'twould hasten to arrive. +Let others sing of Youth and Spring, still will it seem to me +The golden time's the olden time, some time round Sixty-five. + + + + +From old men to children is but a step, and there too, +in the shadow of the Fontaine de Medicis, I spend much of my time +watching the little ones. Childhood, so innocent, so helpless, so trusting, +is somehow pathetic to me. + +There was one jolly little chap who used to play with a large +white Teddy Bear. He was always with his mother, a sweet-faced woman, +who followed his every movement with delight. I used to watch them both, +and often spoke a few words. + +Then one day I missed them, and it struck me I had not seen them for a week, +even a month, maybe. After that I looked for them a time or two +and soon forgot. + +Then this morning I saw the mother in the rue D'Assas. +She was alone and in deep black. I wanted to ask after the boy, +but there was a look in her face that stopped me. + +I do not think she will ever enter the garden of the Luxembourg again. + + + + +Teddy Bear + + + +O Teddy Bear! with your head awry +And your comical twisted smile, +You rub your eyes -- do you wonder why +You've slept such a long, long while? +As you lay so still in the cupboard dim, +And you heard on the roof the rain, +Were you thinking . . . what has become of ~him~? +And when will he play again? + +Do you sometimes long for a chubby hand, +And a voice so sweetly shrill? +O Teddy Bear! don't you understand +Why the house is awf'ly still? +You sit with your muzzle propped on your paws, +And your whimsical face askew. +Don't wait, don't wait for your friend . . . because +He's sleeping and dreaming too. + +Aye, sleeping long. . . . You remember how +He stabbed our hearts with his cries? +And oh, the dew of pain on his brow, +And the deeps of pain in his eyes! +And, Teddy Bear! you remember, too, +As he sighed and sank to his rest, +How all of a sudden he smiled to you, +And he clutched you close to his breast. + +I'll put you away, little Teddy Bear, +In the cupboard far from my sight; +Maybe he'll come and he'll kiss you there, +A wee white ghost in the night. +But me, I'll live with my love and pain +A weariful lifetime through; +And my Hope: will I see him again, again? +Ah, God! If I only knew! + + + + +After old men and children I am greatly interested in dogs. +I will go out of my way to caress one who shows any desire to be friendly. +There is a very filthy fellow who collects cigarette stubs +on the Boul' Mich', and who is always followed by a starved yellow cur. +The other day I came across them in a little side street. +The man was stretched on the pavement brutishly drunk and dead to the world. +The dog, lying by his side, seemed to look at me with sad, imploring eyes. +Though all the world despise that man, I thought, this poor brute +loves him and will be faithful unto death. + +From this incident I wrote the verses that follow: + + + + +The Outlaw + + + +A wild and woeful race he ran +Of lust and sin by land and sea; +Until, abhorred of God and man, +They swung him from the gallows-tree. +And then he climbed the Starry Stair, +And dumb and naked and alone, +With head unbowed and brazen glare, +He stood before the Judgment Throne. + +The Keeper of the Records spoke: +"This man, O Lord, has mocked Thy Name. +The weak have wept beneath his yoke, +The strong have fled before his flame. +The blood of babes is on his sword; +His life is evil to the brim: +Look down, decree his doom, O Lord! +Lo! there is none will speak for him." + +The golden trumpets blew a blast +That echoed in the crypts of Hell, +For there was Judgment to be passed, +And lips were hushed and silence fell. +The man was mute; he made no stir, +Erect before the Judgment Seat . . . +When all at once a mongrel cur +Crept out and cowered and licked his feet. + +It licked his feet with whining cry. +Come Heav'n, come Hell, what did it care? +It leapt, it tried to catch his eye; +Its master, yea, its God was there. +Then, as a thrill of wonder sped +Through throngs of shining seraphim, +The Judge of All looked down and said: +"Lo! here is ONE who pleads for him. + +"And who shall love of these the least, +And who by word or look or deed +Shall pity show to bird or beast, +By Me shall have a friend in need. +Aye, though his sin be black as night, +And though he stand 'mid men alone, +He shall be softened in My sight, +And find a pleader by My Throne. + +"So let this man to glory win; +From life to life salvation glean; +By pain and sacrifice and sin, +Until he stand before Me -- ~clean~. +For he who loves the least of these +(And here I say and here repeat) +Shall win himself an angel's pleas +For Mercy at My Judgment Seat." + + + + +I take my exercise in the form of walking. It keeps me fit and leaves me +free to think. In this way I have come to know Paris like my pocket. +I have explored its large and little streets, its stateliness and its slums. + +But most of all I love the Quays, between the leafage and the sunlit Seine. +Like shuttles the little steamers dart up and down, weaving the water +into patterns of foam. Cigar-shaped barges stream under +the lacework of the many bridges and make me think of tranquil days +and willow-fringed horizons. + +But what I love most is the stealing in of night, when the sky takes on +that strange elusive purple; when eyes turn to the evening star +and marvel at its brightness; when the Eiffel Tower becomes +a strange, shadowy stairway yearning in impotent effort to the careless moon. + +Here is my latest ballad, short if not very sweet: + + + + +The Walkers + + + + (~He speaks.~) + +Walking, walking, oh, the joy of walking! +Swinging down the tawny lanes with head held high; +Striding up the green hills, through the heather stalking, +Swishing through the woodlands where the brown leaves lie; +Marveling at all things -- windmills gaily turning, +Apples for the cider-press, ruby-hued and gold; +Tails of rabbits twinkling, scarlet berries burning, +Wedge of geese high-flying in the sky's clear cold, +Light in little windows, field and furrow darkling; +Home again returning, hungry as a hawk; +Whistling up the garden, ruddy-cheeked and sparkling, +Oh, but I am happy as I walk, walk, walk! + + + (~She speaks.~) + +Walking, walking, oh, the curse of walking! +Slouching round the grim square, shuffling up the street, +Slinking down the by-way, all my graces hawking, +Offering my body to each man I meet. +Peering in the gin-shop where the lads are drinking, +Trying to look gay-like, crazy with the blues; +Halting in a doorway, shuddering and shrinking +(Oh, my draggled feather and my thin, wet shoes). +Here's a drunken drover: "Hullo, there, old dearie!" +No, he only curses, can't be got to talk. . . . +On and on till daylight, famished, wet and weary, +God in Heaven help me as I walk, walk, walk! + + + + + III + + + + + The Cafe de la Source, + Late in July 1914. + +The other evening MacBean was in a pessimistic mood. + +"Why do you write?" he asked me gloomily. + +"Obviously," I said, "to avoid starving. To produce something +that will buy me food, shelter, raiment." + +"If you were a millionaire, would you still write?" + +"Yes," I said, after a moment's thought. "You get an idea. It haunts you. +It seems to clamor for expression. It begins to obsess you. +At last in desperation you embody it in a poem, an essay, a story. +There! it is disposed of. You are at rest. It troubles you no more. +Yes; if I were a millionaire I should write, if it were only to escape +from my ideas." + +"You have given two reasons why men write," said MacBean: "for gain, +for self-expression. Then, again, some men write to amuse themselves, +some because they conceive they have a mission in the world; +some because they have real genius, and are conscious they can enrich +the literature of all time. I must say I don't know of any +belonging to the latter class. We are living in an age of mediocrity. +There is no writer of to-day who will be read twenty years after he is dead. +That's a truth that must come home to the best of them." + +"I guess they're not losing much sleep over it," I said. + +"Take novelists," continued MacBean. "The line of first-class novelists +ended with Dickens and Thackeray. Then followed some of the second class, +Stevenson, Meredith, Hardy. And to-day we have three novelists +of the third class, good, capable craftsmen. We can trust ourselves +comfortably in their hands. We read and enjoy them, but do you think +our children will?" + +"Yours won't, anyway," I said. + +"Don't be too sure. I may surprise you yet. I may get married +and turn ~bourgeois~." + +The best thing that could happen to MacBean would be that. +It might change his point of view. He is so painfully discouraging. +I have never mentioned my ballads to him. He would be sure +to throw cold water on them. And as it draws near to its end +the thought of my book grows more and more dear to me. +How I will get it published I know not; but I will. +Then even if it doesn't sell, even if nobody reads it, I will be content. +Out of this brief, perishable Me I will have made something concrete, +something that will preserve my thought within its dusty covers +long after I am dead and dust. + +Here is one of my latest: + + + + +Poor Peter + + + +Blind Peter Piper used to play +All up and down the city; +I'd often meet him on my way, +And throw a coin for pity. +But all amid his sparkling tones +His ear was quick as any +To catch upon the cobble-stones +The jingle of my penny. + +And as upon a day that shone +He piped a merry measure: +"How well you play!" I chanced to say; +Poor Peter glowed with pleasure. +You'd think the words of praise I spoke +Were all the pay he needed; +The artist in the player woke, +The penny lay unheeded. + +Now Winter's here; the wind is shrill, +His coat is thin and tattered; +Yet hark! he's playing trill on trill +As if his music mattered. +And somehow though the city looks +Soaked through and through with shadows, +He makes you think of singing brooks +And larks and sunny meadows. + +Poor chap! he often starves, they say; +Well, well, I can believe it; +For when you chuck a coin his way +He'll let some street-boy thieve it. +I fear he freezes in the night; +My praise I've long repented, +Yet look! his face is all alight . . . +Blind Peter seems contented. + + + + + ~A day later~. + +On the terrace of the Closerie de Lilas I came on Saxon Dane. +He was smoking his big briar and drinking a huge glass of brown beer. +The tree gave a pleasant shade, and he had thrown his sombrero on a chair. +I noted how his high brow was bronzed by the sun and there were golden lights +in his broad beard. There was something massive and imposing in the man +as he sat there in brooding thought. + +MacBean, he told me, was sick and unable to leave his room. +Rheumatism. So I bought a cooked chicken and a bottle of Barsac, +and mounting to the apartment of the invalid, I made him eat and drink. +MacBean was very despondent, but cheered up greatly. + +I think he rather dreads the future. He cannot save money, +and all he makes he spends. He has always been a rover, +often tried to settle down but could not. Now I think he wishes for security. +I fear, however, it is too late. + + + + +The Wistful One + + + +I sought the trails of South and North, +I wandered East and West; +But pride and passion drove me forth +And would not let me rest. + +And still I seek, as still I roam, +A snug roof overhead; +Four walls, my own; a quiet home. . . . +"You'll have it -- ~when you're dead~." + + + + +MacBean is one of Bohemia's victims. It is a country of the young. +The old have no place in it. He will gradually lose his grip, +go down and down. I am sorry. He is my nearest approach to a friend. +I do not make them easily. I have deep reserves. I like solitude. +I am never so surrounded by boon companions as when I am all alone. + +But though I am a solitary I realize the beauty of friendship, +and on looking through my note-book I find the following: + + + + +If You Had a Friend + + + +If you had a friend strong, simple, true, +Who knew your faults and who understood; +Who believed in the very best of you, +And who cared for you as a father would; +Who would stick by you to the very end, +Who would smile however the world might frown: +I'm sure you would try to please your friend, +You never would think to throw him down. + +And supposing your friend was high and great, +And he lived in a palace rich and tall, +And sat like a King in shining state, +And his praise was loud on the lips of all; +Well then, when he turned to you alone, +And he singled you out from all the crowd, +And he called you up to his golden throne, +Oh, wouldn't you just be jolly proud? + +If you had a friend like this, I say, +So sweet and tender, so strong and true, +You'd try to please him in every way, +You'd live at your bravest -- now, wouldn't you? +His worth would shine in the words you penned; +You'd shout his praises . . . yet now it's odd! +You tell me you haven't got such a friend; +You haven't? I wonder . . . ~What of God?~ + + + + +To how few is granted the privilege of doing the work which lies +closest to the heart, the work for which one is best fitted. +The happy man is he who knows his limitations, yet bows to no false gods. + +MacBean is not happy. He is overridden by his appetites, +and to satisfy them he writes stuff that in his heart he despises. + +Saxon Dane is not happy. His dream exceeds his grasp. +His twisted, tortured phrases mock the vague grandiosity of his visions. + +I am happy. My talent is proportioned to my ambition. +The things I like to write are the things I like to read. +I prefer the lesser poets to the greater, the cackle of the barnyard fowl +to the scream of the eagle. I lack the divinity of discontent. + +True Contentment comes from within. It dominates circumstance. +It is resignation wedded to philosophy, a Christian quality seldom attained +except by the old. + +There is such an one I sometimes see being wheeled about in the Luxembourg. +His face is beautiful in its thankfulness. + + + + +The Contented Man + + + +"How good God is to me," he said; +"For have I not a mansion tall, +With trees and lawns of velvet tread, +And happy helpers at my call? +With beauty is my life abrim, +With tranquil hours and dreams apart; +You wonder that I yield to Him +That best of prayers, a grateful heart?" + +"How good God is to me," he said; +"For look! though gone is all my wealth, +How sweet it is to earn one's bread +With brawny arms and brimming health. +Oh, now I know the joy of strife! +To sleep so sound, to wake so fit. +Ah yes, how glorious is life! +I thank Him for each day of it." + +"How good God is to me," he said; +"Though health and wealth are gone, it's true; +Things might be worse, I might be dead, +And here I'm living, laughing too. +Serene beneath the evening sky +I wait, and every man's my friend; +God's most contented man am I . . . +He keeps me smiling to the End." + + + + +To-day the basin of the Luxembourg is bright with little boats. +Hundreds of happy children romp around it. Little ones everywhere; +yet there is no other city with so many childless homes. + + + + +The Spirit of the Unborn Babe + + + +The Spirit of the Unborn Babe peered through the window-pane, +Peered through the window-pane that glowed like beacon in the night; +For, oh, the sky was desolate and wild with wind and rain; +And how the little room was crammed with coziness and light! +Except the flirting of the fire there was no sound at all; +The Woman sat beside the hearth, her knitting on her knee; +The shadow of her husband's head was dancing on the wall; +She looked with staring eyes at it, she looked yet did not see. +She only saw a childish face that topped the table rim, +A little wistful ghost that smiled and vanished quick away; +And then because her tender eyes were flooding to the brim, +She lowered her head. . . . "Don't sorrow, dear," she heard him softly say; +"It's over now. We'll try to be as happy as before +(Ah! they who little children have, grant hostages to pain). +We gave Life chance to wound us once, but never, never more. . . ." +The Spirit of the Unborn Babe fled through the night again. + +The Spirit of the Unborn Babe went wildered in the dark; +Like termagants the winds tore down and whirled it with the snow. +And then amid the writhing storm it saw a tiny spark, +A window broad, a spacious room all goldenly aglow, +A woman slim and Paris-gowned and exquisitely fair, +Who smiled with rapture as she watched her jewels catch the blaze; +A man in faultless evening dress, young, handsome, debonnaire, +Who smoked his cigarette and looked with frank admiring gaze. +"Oh, we are happy, sweet," said he; "youth, health, and wealth are ours. +What if a thousand toil and sweat that we may live at ease! +What if the hands are worn and torn that strew our path with flowers! +Ah, well! we did not make the world; let us not think of these. +Let's seek the beauty-spots of earth, Dear Heart, just you and I; +Let other women bring forth life with sorrow and with pain. +Above our door we'll hang the sign: `~No children need apply~. . . .'" +The Spirit of the Unborn Babe sped through the night again. + +The Spirit of the Unborn Babe went whirling on and on; +It soared above a city vast, it swept down to a slum; +It saw within a grimy house a light that dimly shone; +It peered in through a window-pane and lo! a voice said: "Come!" +And so a little girl was born amid the dirt and din, +And lived in spite of everything, for life is ordered so; +A child whose eyes first opened wide to swinishness and sin, +A child whose love and innocence met only curse and blow. +And so in due and proper course she took the path of shame, +And gladly died in hospital, quite old at twenty years; +And when God comes to weigh it all, ah! whose shall be the blame +For all her maimed and poisoned life, her torture and her tears? +For oh, it is not what we do, but what we have not done! +And on that day of reckoning, when all is plain and clear, +What if we stand before the Throne, blood-guilty every one? . . . +Maybe the blackest sins of all are Selfishness and Fear. + + + + + IV + + + + + The Cafe de la Paix, + August 1, 1914. + +Paris and I are out of tune. As I sit at this famous corner the faint breeze +is stale and weary; stale and weary too the faces that swirl around me; +while overhead the electric sign of Somebody's Chocolate appears and vanishes +with irritating insistency. The very trees seem artificial, +gleaming under the arc-lights with a raw virility that rasps my nerves. + +"Poor little trees," I mutter, "growing in all this grime and glare, +your only dryads the loitering ladies with the complexions +of such brilliant certainty, your only Pipes of Pan +orchestral echoes from the clamorous cafes. Exiles of the forest! +what know you of full-blossomed winds, of red-embered sunsets, +of the gentle admonition of spring rain! Life, that would fain be a melody, +seems here almost a malady. I crave for the balm of Nature, +the anodyne of solitude, the breath of Mother Earth. Tell me, +O wistful trees, what shall I do?" + +Then that stale and weary wind rustles the leaves of the nearest sycamore, +and I am sure it whispers: "Brittany." + +So to-morrow I am off, off to the Land of Little Fields. + + + + +Finistere + + + +Hurrah! I'm off to Finistere, to Finistere, to Finistere; +My satchel's swinging on my back, my staff is in my hand; +I've twenty ~louis~ in my purse, I know the sun and sea are there, +And so I'm starting out to-day to tramp the golden land. +I'll go alone and glorying, with on my lips a song of joy; +I'll leave behind the city with its canker and its care; +I'll swing along so sturdily -- oh, won't I be the happy boy! +A-singing on the rocky roads, the roads of Finistere. + +Oh, have you been to Finistere, and do you know a whin-gray town +That echoes to the clatter of a thousand wooden shoes? +And have you seen the fisher-girls go gallivantin' up and down, +And watched the tawny boats go out, and heard the roaring crews? +Oh, would you sit with pipe and bowl, and dream upon some sunny quay, +Or would you walk the windy heath and drink the cooler air; +Oh, would you seek a cradled cove and tussle with the topaz sea! -- +Pack up your kit to-morrow, lad, and haste to Finistere. + +Oh, I will go to Finistere, there's nothing that can hold me back. +I'll laugh with Yves and Le/on, and I'll chaff with Rose and Jeanne; +I'll seek the little, quaint ~buvette~ that's kept by Mother Merdrinac, +Who wears a cap of many frills, and swears just like a man. +I'll yarn with hearty, hairy chaps who dance and leap and crack their heels; +Who swallow cupfuls of cognac and never turn a hair; +I'll watch the nut-brown boats come in with mullet, plaice and conger eels, +The jeweled harvest of the sea they reap in Finistere. + +Yes, I'll come back from Finistere with memories of shining days, +Of scaly nets and salty men in overalls of brown; +Of ancient women knitting as they watch the tethered cattle graze +By little nestling beaches where the gorse goes blazing down; +Of headlands silvering the sea, of Calvarys against the sky, +Of scorn of angry sunsets, and of Carnac grim and bare; +Oh, won't I have the leaping veins, and tawny cheek and sparkling eye, +When I come back to Montparnasse and dream of Finistere. + + + + + ~Two days later~. + +Behold me with staff and scrip, footing it merrily in the Land of Pardons. +I have no goal. When I am weary I stop at some ~auberge~; +when I am rested I go on again. Neither do I put any constraint +on my spirit. No subduing of the mind to the task of the moment. +I dream to heart's content. + +My dreams stretch into the future. I see myself a singer of simple songs, +a laureate of the under-dog. I will write books, a score of them. +I will voyage far and wide. I will . . . + +But there! Dreams are dangerous. They waste the time one should spend +in making them come true. Yet when we do make them come true, +we find the vision sweeter than the reality. How much of our happiness +do we owe to dreams? I have in mind one old chap who used to herd the sheep +on my uncle's farm. + + + + +Old David Smail + + + +He dreamed away his hours in school; +He sat with such an absent air, +The master reckoned him a fool, +And gave him up in dull despair. + +When other lads were making hay +You'd find him loafing by the stream; +He'd take a book and slip away, +And just pretend to fish . . . and dream. + +His brothers passed him in the race; +They climbed the hill and clutched the prize. +He did not seem to heed, his face +Was tranquil as the evening skies. + +He lived apart, he spoke with few; +Abstractedly through life he went; +Oh, what he dreamed of no one knew, +And yet he seemed to be content. + +I see him now, so old and gray, +His eyes with inward vision dim; +And though he faltered on the way, +Somehow I almost envied him. + +At last beside his bed I stood: +"And is Life done so soon?" he sighed; +"It's been so rich, so full, so good, +I've loved it all . . ." -- and so he died. + + + + + ~Another day~. + +Framed in hedgerows of emerald, the wheat glows with a caloric fervor, +as if gorged with summer heat. In the vivid green of pastures +old women are herding cows. Calm and patient are their faces +as with gentle industry they bend over their knitting. +One feels that they are necessary to the landscape. + +To gaze at me the field-workers suspend the magnificent lethargy +of their labors. The men with the reaping hooks improve the occasion +by another pull at the cider bottle under the stook; +the women raise apathetic brown faces from the sheaf they are tying; +every one is a study in deliberation, though the crop is russet ripe +and crying to be cut. + +Then on I go again amid high banks overgrown with fern and honeysuckle. +Sometimes I come on an old mill that seems to have been constructed +by Constable, so charmingly does Nature imitate Art. By the deserted house, +half drowned in greenery, the velvety wheel, dipping in the crystal water, +seems to protest against this prolongation of its toil. + +Then again I come on its brother, the Mill of the Wind, whirling its arms +so cheerily, as it turns its great white stones for its master, +the floury miller by the door. + +These things delight me. I am in a land where Time has lagged, +where simple people timorously hug the Past. How far away now +seems the welter and swelter of the city, the hectic sophistication +of the streets. The sense of wonder is strong in me again, +the joy of looking at familiar things as if one were seeing them +for the first time. + + + + +The Wonderer + + + +I wish that I could understand +The moving marvel of my Hand; +I watch my fingers turn and twist, +The supple bending of my wrist, +The dainty touch of finger-tip, +The steel intensity of grip; +A tool of exquisite design, +With pride I think: "It's mine! It's mine!" + +Then there's the wonder of my Eyes, +Where hills and houses, seas and skies, +In waves of light converge and pass, +And print themselves as on a glass. +Line, form and color live in me; +I am the Beauty that I see; +Ah! I could write a book of size +About the wonder of my Eyes. + +What of the wonder of my Heart, +That plays so faithfully its part? +I hear it running sound and sweet; +It does not seem to miss a beat; +Between the cradle and the grave +It never falters, stanch and brave. +Alas! I wish I had the art +To tell the wonder of my Heart. + +Then oh! but how can I explain +The wondrous wonder of my Brain? +That marvelous machine that brings +All consciousness of wonderings; +That lets me from myself leap out +And watch my body walk about; +It's hopeless -- all my words are vain +To tell the wonder of my Brain. + +But do not think, O patient friend, +Who reads these stanzas to the end, +That I myself would glorify. . . . +You're just as wonderful as I, +And all Creation in our view +Is quite as marvelous as you. +Come, let us on the sea-shore stand +And wonder at a grain of sand; +And then into the meadow pass +And marvel at a blade of grass; +Or cast our vision high and far +And thrill with wonder at a star; +A host of stars -- night's holy tent +Huge-glittering with wonderment. + +If wonder is in great and small, +Then what of Him who made it all? +In eyes and brain and heart and limb +Let's see the wondrous work of Him. +In house and hill and sward and sea, +In bird and beast and flower and tree, +In everything from sun to sod, +The wonder and the awe of God. + + + + + August 9, 1914. + +For some time the way has been growing wilder. Thickset hedges +have yielded to dykes of stone, and there is every sign that I am approaching +the rugged region of the coast. At each point of vantage I can see a Cross, +often a relic of the early Christians, stumpy and corroded. +Then I come on a slab of gray stone upstanding about fifteen feet. +Like a sentinel on that solitary plain it overwhelms me +with a sense of mystery. + +But as I go on through this desolate land these stones become +more and more familiar. Like soldiers they stand in rank, +extending over the moor. The sky is cowled with cloud, +save where a sullen sunset shoots blood-red rays across the plain. +Bathed in that sinister light stands my army of stone, +and a wind swooping down seems to wail amid its ranks. As in a glass darkly +I can see the skin-clad men, the women with their tangled hair, +the beast-like feast, the cowering terror of the night. Then the sunset +is cut off suddenly, and a clammy mist shrouds that silent army. +So it is almost with a shudder I take my last look at the Stones of Carnac. + +But now my pilgrimage is drawing to an end. A painter friend +who lives by the sea has asked me to stay with him awhile. +Well, I have walked a hundred miles, singing on the way. +I have dreamed and dawdled, planned, exulted. I have drunk buckets of cider, +and eaten many an omelette that seemed like a golden glorification of its egg. +It has all been very sweet, but it will also be sweet to loaf awhile. + + + + +Oh, It Is Good + + + +Oh, it is good to drink and sup, +And then beside the kindly fire +To smoke and heap the faggots up, +And rest and dream to heart's desire. + +Oh, it is good to ride and run, +To roam the greenwood wild and free; +To hunt, to idle in the sun, +To leap into the laughing sea. + +Oh, it is good with hand and brain +To gladly till the chosen soil, +And after honest sweat and strain +To see the harvest of one's toil. + +Oh, it is good afar to roam, +And seek adventure in strange lands; +Yet oh, so good the coming home, +The velvet love of little hands. + +So much is good. . . . We thank Thee, God, +For all the tokens Thou hast given, +That here on earth our feet have trod +Thy little shining trails of Heaven. + + + + + V + + + + + August 10, 1914. + +I am living in a little house so near the sea that at high tide +I can see on my bedroom wall the reflected ripple of the water. +At night I waken to the melodious welter of waves; or maybe +there is a great stillness, and then I know that the sand and sea-grass +are lying naked to the moon. But soon the tide returns, +and once more I hear the roistering of the waves. + +Calvert, my friend, is a lover as well as a painter of nature. He rises +with the dawn to see the morning mist kindle to coral and the sun's edge +clear the hill-crest. As he munches his coarse bread and sips his white wine, +what dreams are his beneath the magic changes of the sky! +He will paint the same scene under a dozen conditions of light. +He has looked so long for Beauty that he has come to see it everywhere. + +I love this friendly home of his. A peace steals over my spirit, +and I feel as if I could stay here always. Some day I hope that I too +may have such an one, and that I may write like this: + + + + +I Have Some Friends + + + +I have some friends, some worthy friends, +And worthy friends are rare: +These carpet slippers on my feet, +That padded leather chair; +This old and shabby dressing-gown, +So well the worse of wear. + +I have some friends, some honest friends, +And honest friends are few; +My pipe of briar, my open fire, +A book that's not too new; +My bed so warm, the nights of storm +I love to listen to. + +I have some friends, some good, good friends, +Who faithful are to me: +My wrestling partner when I rise, +The big and burly sea; +My little boat that's riding there +So saucy and so free. + +I have some friends, some golden friends, +Whose worth will not decline: +A tawny Irish terrier, a purple shading pine, +A little red-roofed cottage that +So proudly I call mine. + +All other friends may come and go, +All other friendships fail; +But these, the friends I've worked to win, +Oh, they will never stale; +And comfort me till Time shall write +The finish to my tale. + + + + +Calvert tries to paint more than the thing he sees; he tries +to paint behind it, to express its spirit. He believes that Beauty +is God made manifest, and that when we discover Him in Nature +we discover Him in ourselves. + +But Calvert did not always see thus. At one time he was a Pagan, content to +paint the outward aspect of things. It was after his little child died +he gained in vision. Maybe the thought that the dead are lost to us +was too unbearable. He had to believe in a coming together again. + + + + +The Quest + + + +I sought Him on the purple seas, +I sought Him on the peaks aflame; +Amid the gloom of giant trees +And canyons lone I called His name; +The wasted ways of earth I trod: +In vain! In vain! I found not God. + +I sought Him in the hives of men, +The cities grand, the hamlets gray, +The temples old beyond my ken, +The tabernacles of to-day; +All life that is, from cloud to clod +I sought. . . . Alas! I found not God. + +Then after roamings far and wide, +In streets and seas and deserts wild, +I came to stand at last beside +The death-bed of my little child. +Lo! as I bent beneath the rod +I raised my eyes . . . and there was God. + + + + +A golden mile of sand swings hammock-like between two tusks of rock. +The sea is sleeping sapphire that wakes to cream and crash upon the beach. +There is a majesty in the detachment of its lazy waves, +and it is good in the night to hear its friendly roar. Good, too, +to leap forth with the first sunshine and fall into its arms, +to let it pummel the body to living ecstasy and send one to breakfast +glad-eyed and glowing. + +Behind the house the greensward slopes to a wheat-field +that is like a wall of gold. Here I lie and laze away the time, +or dip into a favorite book, Stevenson's ~Letters~ or Belloc's ~Path to Rome~. +Bees drone in the wild thyme; a cuckoo keeps calling, +a lark spills jeweled melody. Then there is a seeming silence, +but it is the silence of a deeper sound. + +After all, Silence is only man's confession of his deafness. +Like Death, like Eternity, it is a word that means nothing. So lying there +I hear the breathing of the trees, the crepitation of the growing grass, +the seething of the sap and the movements of innumerable insects. +Strange how I think with distaste of the spurious glitter of Paris, +of my garret, even of my poor little book. + +I watch the wife of my friend gathering poppies in the wheat. +There is a sadness in her face, for it is only a year ago +they lost their little one. Often I see her steal away +to the village graveyard, sitting silent for long and long. + + + + +The Comforter + + + +As I sat by my baby's bed +That's open to the sky, +There fluttered round and round my head +A radiant butterfly. + +And as I wept -- of hearts that ache +The saddest in the land -- +It left a lily for my sake, +And lighted on my hand. + +I watched it, oh, so quietly, +And though it rose and flew, +As if it fain would comfort me +It came and came anew. + +Now, where my darling lies at rest, +I do not dare to sigh, +For look! there gleams upon my breast +A snow-white butterfly. + + + + +My friends will have other children, and if some day they should read +this piece of verse, perhaps they will think of the city lad +who used to sit under the old fig-tree in the garden and watch the lizards +sun themselves on the time-worn wall. + + + + +The Other One + + + +"Gather around me, children dear; +The wind is high and the night is cold; +Closer, little ones, snuggle near; +Let's seek a story of ages old; +A magic tale of a bygone day, +Of lovely ladies and dragons dread; +Come, for you're all so tired of play, +We'll read till it's time to go to bed." + +So they all are glad, and they nestle in, +And squat on the rough old nursery rug, +And they nudge and hush as I begin, +And the fire leaps up and all's so snug; +And there I sit in the big arm-chair, +And how they are eager and sweet and wise, +And they cup their chins in their hands and stare +At the heart of the flame with thoughtful eyes. + +And then, as I read by the ruddy glow +And the little ones sit entranced and still . . . +~He~'s drawing near, ah! I know, I know +He's listening too, as he always will. +He's there -- he's standing beside my knee; +I see him so well, my wee, wee son. . . . +Oh, children dear, don't look at me -- +I'm reading now for -- the Other One. + +For the firelight glints in his golden hair, +And his wondering eyes are fixed on my face, +And he rests on the arm of my easy-chair, +And the book's a blur and I lose my place: +And I touch my lips to his shining head, +And my voice breaks down and -- the story's done. . . . +Oh, children, kiss me and go to bed: +Leave me to think of the Other One. + +Of the One who will never grow up at all, +Who will always be just a child at play, +Tender and trusting and sweet and small, +Who will never leave me and go away; +Who will never hurt me and give me pain; +Who will comfort me when I'm all alone; +A heart of love that's without a stain, +Always and always my own, my own. + +Yet a thought shines out from the dark of pain, +And it gives me hope to be reconciled: +~That each of us must be born again, +And live and die as a little child; +So that with souls all shining white, +White as snow and without one sin, +We may come to the Gates of Eternal Light, +Where only children may enter in.~ + +So, gentle mothers, don't ever grieve +Because you have lost, but kiss the rod; +From the depths of your woe be glad, believe +You've given an angel unto God. +Rejoice! You've a child whose youth endures, +Who comes to you when the day is done, +Wistful for love, oh, yours, just yours, +Dearest of all, the Other One. + + + + +Catastrophe + + + + Brittany, + August 14, 1914. + +And now I fear I must write in another strain. Up to this time +I have been too happy. I have existed in a magic Bohemia, +largely of my own making. Hope, faith, enthusiasm have been mine. +Each day has had its struggle, its failure, its triumph. +However, that is all ended. During the past week we have lived breathlessly. +For in spite of the exultant sunshine our spirits have been under a cloud, +a deepening shadow of horror and calamity. . . . WAR. + +Even as I write, in our little village steeple the bells are ringing madly, +and in every little village steeple all over the land. As he hears it +the harvester checks his scythe on the swing; the clerk throws down his pen; +the shopkeeper puts up his shutters. Only in the cafes +there is a clamor of voices and a drowning of care. + +For here every man must fight, every home give tribute. +There is no question, no appeal. By heredity and discipline +all minds are shaped to this great hour. So to-morrow each man +will seek his barracks and become a soldier as completely +as if he had never been anything else. With the same docility +as he dons his baggy red trousers will he let some muddle-headed General +hurl him to destruction for some dubious gain. To-day a father, a home-maker; +to-morrow fodder for cannon. So they all go without hesitation, +without bitterness; and the great military machine that knows not humanity +swings them to their fate. I marvel at the sense of duty, the resignation, +the sacrifice. It is magnificent, it is FRANCE. + +And the Women. Those who wait and weep. Ah! to-day I have not seen one +who did not weep. Yes, one. She was very old, and she stood +by her garden gate with her hand on the uplifted latch. As I passed +she looked at me with eyes that did not see. She had no doubt +sons and grandsons who must fight, and she had good reason, perhaps, +to remember the war of ~soixante-dix~. When I passed an hour later +she was still there, her hand on the uplifted latch. + + + August 30th. + +The men have gone. Only remain graybeards, women and children. +Calvert and I have been helping our neighbors to get in the harvest. +No doubt we aid; but there with the old men and children +a sense of uneasiness and even shame comes over me. I would like to return +to Paris, but the railway is mobilized. Each day I grow more discontented. +Up there in the red North great things are doing and I am out of it. +I am thoroughly unhappy. + +Then Calvert comes to me with a plan. He has a Ford car. We will all three +go to Paris. He intends to offer himself and his car to the Red Cross. +His wife will nurse. So we are very happy at the solution, +and to-morrow we are off. + + + Paris. + +Back again. Closed shutters, deserted streets. How glum everything is! +Those who are not mobilized seem uncertain how to turn. +Every one buys the papers and reads grimly of disaster. No news is bad news. + +I go to my garret as to a beloved friend. Everything is just as I left it, +so that it seems I have never been away. I sigh with relief and joy. +I will take up my work again. Serene above the storm I will watch and wait. +Although I have been brought up in England I am American born. +My country is not concerned. + +So, going to the Do^me Cafe, I seek some of my comrades. +Strange! They have gone. MacBean, I am told, is in England. +By dyeing his hair and lying about his age he has managed to enlist +in the Seaforth Highlanders. Saxon Dane too. He has joined +the Foreign Legion, and even now may be fighting. + +Well, let them go. I will keep out of the mess. But why did they go? +I wish I knew. War is murder. Criminal folly. Against Humanity. +Imperialism is at the root of it. We are fools and dupes. +Yes, I will think and write of other things. . . . + +~MacBean has enlisted~. + +I hate violence. I would not willingly cause pain to anything breathing. +I would rather be killed than kill. I will stand above the Battle +and watch it from afar. + +~Dane is in the Foreign Legion~. + +How disturbing it all is! One cannot settle down to anything. +Every day I meet men who tell the most wonderful stories +in the most casual way. I envy them. I too want to have experiences, +to live where life's beat is most intense. But that's a poor reason +for going to war. + +And yet, though I shrink from the idea of fighting, I might in some way help +those who are. MacBean and Dane, for example. Sitting lonely in the Do^me, +I seem to see their ghosts in the corner. MacBean listening with his keen, +sarcastic smile, Saxon Dane banging his great hairy fist on the table +till the glasses jump. Where are they now? Living a life +that I will never know. When they come back, if they ever do, +shall I not feel shamed in their presence? Oh, this filthy war! +Things were going on so beautifully. We were all so happy, +so full of ambition, of hope; laughing and talking over pipe and bowl, +and in our garrets seeking to realize our dreams. Ah, these days +will never come again! + +Then, as I sit there, Calvert seeks me out. He has joined an ambulance corps +that is going to the Front. Will I come in? + +"Yes," I say; "I'll do anything." + +So it is all settled. To-morrow I give up my freedom. + + + + + + BOOK FOUR + + WINTER + + + + + + I + + + + + The Somme Front, + January 1915. + +There is an avenue of noble beeches leading to the Chateau, +and in the shadow of each glimmers the pale oblong of an ambulance. +We have to keep them thus concealed, for only yesterday morning +a Taube flew over. The beggars are rather partial to Red Cross cars. +One of our chaps, taking in a load of wounded, was chased and pelted +the other day. + +The Chateau seems all spires and towers, the glorified dream +of a Parisian pastrycook. On its terrace figures in khaki are lounging. +They are the volunteers, the owner-drivers of the Corps, +many of them men of wealth and title. Curious to see +one who owns all the coal in two counties proudly signing for his ~sou~ a day; +or another, who lives in a Fifth Avenue palace, contentedly sleeping +on the straw-strewn floor of a hovel. + +Here is a rhyme I have made of such an one: + + + + +Priscilla + + + +Jerry MacMullen, the millionaire, +Driving a red-meat bus out there -- +How did he win his ~Croix de Guerre~? +Bless you, that's all old stuff: +Beast of a night on the Verdun road, +Jerry stuck with a woeful load, +Stalled in the mud where the red lights glowed, +Prospect devilish tough. + +"Little Priscilla" he called his car, +Best of our battered bunch by far, +Branded with many a bullet scar, +Yet running so sweet and true. +Jerry he loved her, knew her tricks; +Swore: "She's the beat of the best big six, +And if ever I get in a deuce of a fix +Priscilla will pull me through." + +"Looks pretty rotten right now," says he; +"Hanged if the devil himself could see. +Priscilla, it's up to you and me +To show 'em what we can do." +Seemed that Priscilla just took the word; +Up with a leap like a horse that's spurred, +On with the joy of a homing bird, +Swift as the wind she flew. + +Shell-holes shoot at them out of the night; +A lurch to the left, a wrench to the right, +Hands grim-gripping and teeth clenched tight, +Eyes that glare through the dark. +"Priscilla, you're doing me proud this day; +Hospital's only a league away, +And, honey, I'm longing to hit the hay, +So hurry, old girl. . . . But hark!" + +Howl of a shell, harsh, sudden, dread; +Another . . . another. . . . "Strike me dead +If the Huns ain't strafing the road ahead +So the convoy can't get through! +A barrage of shrap, and us alone; +Four rush-cases -- you hear 'em moan? +Fierce old messes of blood and bone. . . . +Priscilla, what shall we do?" + +Again it seems that Priscilla hears. +With a rush and a roar her way she clears, +Straight at the hell of flame she steers, +Full at its heart of wrath. +Fury of death and dust and din! +Havoc and horror! She's in, she's in; +She's almost over, she'll win, she'll win! +~Woof! Crump!~ right in the path. + +Little Priscilla skids and stops, +Jerry MacMullen sways and flops; +Bang in his map the crash he cops; +Shriek from the car: "Mon Dieu!" +One of the ~blesse/s~ hears him say, +Just at the moment he faints away: +"Reckon this isn't my lucky day, +Priscilla, it's up to you." + +Sergeant raps on the doctor's door; +"Car in the court with ~couche/s~ four; +Driver dead on the dashboard floor; +Strange how the bunch got here." +"No," says the Doc, "this chap's alive; +But tell me, how could a man contrive +With both arms broken, a car to drive? +Thunder of God! it's queer." + +Same little ~blesse/~ makes a spiel; +Says he: "When I saw our driver reel, +A Strange Shape leapt to the driving wheel +And sped us safe through the night." +But Jerry, he says in his drawling tone: +"Rats! Why, Priscilla came in on her own. +Bless her, she did it alone, alone. . . ." +~Hanged if I know who's right.~ + + + + +As I am sitting down to my midday meal an orderly gives me a telegram: + + ~Hill 71. Two couche/s. Send car at once.~ + +The uptilted country-side is a checker-board of green and gray, and, +except where groves of trees rise like islands, cultivated to the last acre. +But as we near the firing-line all efforts to till the land cease, +and the ungathered beets of last year have grown to seed. +Amid rank unkempt fields I race over a road that is pitted with obus-holes; +I pass a line of guns painted like snakes, and drawn by horses +dyed khaki-color; then soldiers coming from the trenches, +mud-caked and ineffably weary; then a race over a bit of road that is exposed; +then, buried in the hill-side, the dressing station. + +The two wounded are put into my car. From hip to heel +one is swathed in bandages; the other has a great white turban on his head, +with a red patch on it that spreads and spreads. They stare dully, but make +no sound. As I crank the car there is a shrill screaming noise. . . . +About thirty yards away I hear an explosion like a mine-blast, +followed by a sudden belch of coal-black smoke. I stare at it in a dazed way. +Then the doctor says: "Don't trouble to analyze your sensations. +Better get off. You're only drawing their fire." + +Here is one of my experiences: + + + + +A Casualty + + + +That boy I took in the car last night, +With the body that awfully sagged away, +And the lips blood-crisped, and the eyes flame-bright, +And the poor hands folded and cold as clay -- +Oh, I've thought and I've thought of him all the day. + +For the weary old doctor says to me: +"He'll only last for an hour or so. +Both of his legs below the knee +Blown off by a bomb. . . . So, lad, go slow, +And please remember, he doesn't know." + +So I tried to drive with never a jar; +And there was I cursing the road like mad, +When I hears a ghost of a voice from the car: +"Tell me, old chap, have I `copped it' bad?" +So I answers "No," and he says, "I'm glad." + +"Glad," says he, "for at twenty-two +Life's so splendid, I hate to go. +There's so much good that a chap might do, +And I've fought from the start and I've suffered so. +'Twould be hard to get knocked out now, you know." + +"Forget it," says I; then I drove awhile, +And I passed him a cheery word or two; +But he didn't answer for many a mile, +So just as the hospital hove in view, +Says I: "Is there nothing that I can do?" + +Then he opens his eyes and he smiles at me; +And he takes my hand in his trembling hold; +"Thank you -- you're far too kind," says he: +"I'm awfully comfy -- stay . . . let's see: +I fancy my blanket's come unrolled -- +My ~feet~, please wrap 'em -- they're cold . . . they're cold." + + + + +There is a city that glitters on the plain. Afar off we can see +its tall cathedral spire, and there we often take our wounded +from the little village hospitals to the rail-head. Tragic little buildings, +these emergency hospitals -- town-halls, churches, schools; +their cots are never empty, their surgeons never still. + +So every day we get our list of cases and off we go, a long line of cars +swishing through the mud. Then one by one we branch off +to our village hospital, puzzling out the road on our maps. +Arrived there, we load up quickly. + +The wounded make no moan. They lie, limp, heavily bandaged, +with bare legs and arms protruding from their blankets. +They do not know where they are going; they do not care. +Like live stock, they are labeled and numbered. An orderly brings along +their battle-scarred equipment, throwing open their rifles +to see that no charge remains. Sometimes they shake our hands +and thank us for the drive. + +In the streets of the city I see French soldiers wearing the ~fourragere~. +It is a cord of green, yellow or red, and corresponds to +the ~Croix de Guerre~, the ~Me/daille militaire~ and the Legion of Honor. +The red is the highest of all, and has been granted only to +one or two regiments. This incident was told to me by a man who saw it: + + + + +The Blood-Red ~Fourragere~ + + + +What was the blackest sight to me +Of all that campaign? +~A naked woman tied to a tree +With jagged holes where her breasts should be, +Rotting there in the rain.~ + +On we pressed to the battle fray, +Dogged and dour and spent. +Sudden I heard my Captain say: +"~Voila\!~ Kultur has passed this way, +And left us a monument." + +So I looked and I saw our Colonel there, +And his grand head, snowed with the years, +Unto the beat of the rain was bare; +And, oh, there was grief in his frozen stare, +And his cheeks were stung with tears! + +Then at last he turned from the woeful tree, +And his face like stone was set; +"Go, march the Regiment past," said he, +"That every father and son may see, +And none may ever forget." + +Oh, the crimson strands of her hair downpoured +Over her breasts of woe; +And our grim old Colonel leaned on his sword, +And the men filed past with their rifles lowered, +Solemn and sad and slow. + +But I'll never forget till the day I die, +As I stood in the driving rain, +And the jaded columns of men slouched by, +How amazement leapt into every eye, +Then fury and grief and pain. + +And some would like madmen stand aghast, +With their hands upclenched to the sky; +And some would cross themselves as they passed, +And some would curse in a scalding blast, +And some like children cry. + +Yea, some would be sobbing, and some would pray, +And some hurl hateful names; +But the best had never a word to say; +They turned their twitching faces away, +And their eyes were like hot flames. + +They passed; then down on his bended knee +The Colonel dropped to the Dead: +"Poor martyred daughter of France!" said he, +"O dearly, dearly avenged you'll be +Or ever a day be sped!" + +Now they hold that we are the best of the best, +And each of our men may wear, +Like a gash of crimson across his chest, +As one fierce-proved in the battle-test, +The blood-red ~Fourragere~. + +For each as he leaps to the top can see, +Like an etching of blood on his brain, +A wife or a mother lashed to a tree, +With two black holes where her breasts should be, +Left to rot in the rain. + +So we fight like fiends, and of us they say +That we neither yield nor spare. +Oh, we have the bitterest debt to pay. . . . +Have we paid it? -- Look -- how we wear to-day +Like a trophy, gallant and proud and gay, +Our blood-red ~Fourragere~. + + + + +It is often weary waiting at the little ~poste de secours~. Some of us +play solitaire, some read a "sixpenny", some doze or try to talk in bad French +to the ~poilus~. Around us is discomfort, dirt and drama. + +For my part, I pass the time only too quickly, trying to put into verse +the incidents and ideas that come my way. In this way I hope to collect +quite a lot of stuff which may some day see itself in print. + +Here is one of my efforts: + + + + +Jim + + + +Never knew Jim, did you? Our boy Jim? +Bless you, there was the likely lad; +Supple and straight and long of limb, +Clean as a whistle, and just as glad. +Always laughing, wasn't he, dad? +Joy, pure joy to the heart of him, +And, oh, but the soothering ways he had, + Jim, our Jim! + +But I see him best as a tiny tot, +A bonny babe, though it's me that speaks; +Laughing there in his little cot, +With his sunny hair and his apple cheeks. +And my! but the blue, blue eyes he'd got, +And just where his wee mouth dimpled dim +Such a fairy mark like a beauty spot -- + That was Jim. + +Oh, the war, the war! How my eyes were wet! +But he says: "Don't be sorrowing, mother dear; +You never knew me to fail you yet, +And I'll be back in a year, a year." +'Twas at Mons he fell, in the first attack; +For so they said, and their eyes were dim; +But I laughed in their faces: "He'll come back, + Will my Jim." + +Now, we'd been wedded for twenty year, +And Jim was the only one we'd had; +So when I whispered in father's ear, +He wouldn't believe me -- would you, dad? +There! I must hurry . . . hear him cry? +My new little baby. . . . See! that's him. +What are we going to call him? Why, + Jim, just Jim. + +Jim! For look at him laughing there +In the same old way in his tiny cot, +With his rosy cheeks and his sunny hair, +And look, just look . . . his beauty spot +In the selfsame place. . . . Oh, I can't explain, +And of course you think it's a mother's whim, +But I know, I know it's my boy again, + Same wee Jim. + +Just come back as he said he would; +Come with his love and his heart of glee. +Oh, I cried and I cried, but the Lord was good; +From the shadow of Death he set Jim free. +So I'll have him all over again, you see. +Can you wonder my mother-heart's a-brim? +Oh, how happy we're going to be! + Aren't we, Jim? + + + + + II + + + + + In Picardy, + January 1915. + +The road lies amid a malevolent heath. It seems to lead us +right into the clutch of the enemy; for the star-shells, +that at first were bursting overhead, gradually encircle us. +The fields are strangely sinister; the splintered trees +are like giant toothpicks. There is a lisping and a twanging overhead. + +As we wait at the door of the dugout that serves as a first-aid +dressing station, I gaze up into that mysterious dark, +so alive with musical vibrations. Then a small shadow detaches itself +from the greater shadow, and a gray-bearded sentry says to me: +"You'd better come in out of the bullets." + +So I keep under cover, and presently they bring my load. Two men +drip with sweat as they carry their comrade. I can see that they all three +belong to the Foreign Legion. I think for a moment of Saxon Dane. +How strange if some day I should carry him! Half fearfully +I look at my passenger, but he is a black man. Such things only happen +in fiction. + +This is what I have written of the finest troops in the Army of France: + + + + +Kelly of the Legion + + + +Now Kelly was no fighter; +He loved his pipe and glass; +An easygoing blighter, +Who lived in Montparnasse. +But 'mid the tavern tattle +He heard some guinney say: +"When France goes forth to battle, +The Legion leads the way. + + ~"The scourings of creation, + Of every sin and station, + The men who've known damnation, + Are picked to lead the way."~ + +Well, Kelly joined the Legion; +They marched him day and night; +They rushed him to the region +Where largest loomed the fight. +"Behold your mighty mission, +Your destiny," said they; +"By glorious tradition +The Legion leads the way. + + ~"With tattered banners flying + With trail of dead and dying, + On! On! All hell defying, + The Legion sweeps the way."~ + +With grim, hard-bitten faces, +With jests of savage mirth, +They swept into their places, +The men of iron worth; +Their blooded steel was flashing; +They swung to face the fray; +Then rushing, roaring, crashing, +The Legion cleared the way. + + ~The trail they blazed was gory; + Few lived to tell the story; + Through death they plunged to glory; + But, oh, they cleared the way!~ + +Now Kelly lay a-dying, +And dimly saw advance, +With split new banners flying, +The ~fantassins~ of France. +Then up amid the ~melee~ +He rose from where he lay; +"Come on, me boys," says Kelly, +"The Layjun lades the way!" + + ~Aye, while they faltered, doubting + (Such flames of doom were spouting), + He caught them, thrilled them, shouting: + "The Layjun lades the way!"~ + +They saw him slip and stumble, +Then stagger on once more; +They marked him trip and tumble, +A mass of grime and gore; +They watched him blindly crawling +Amid hell's own affray, +And calling, calling, calling: +"The Layjun lades the way!" + + ~And even while they wondered, + The battle-wrack was sundered; + To Victory they thundered, + But . . . Kelly led the way.~ + +Still Kelly kept agoing; +Berserker-like he ran; +His eyes with fury glowing, +A lion of a man; +His rifle madly swinging, +His soul athirst to slay, +His slogan ringing, ringing, +"The Layjun lades the way!" + + ~Till in a pit death-baited, + Where Huns with Maxims waited, + He plunged . . . and there, blood-sated, + To death he stabbed his way.~ + +Now Kelly was a fellow +Who simply loathed a fight: +He loved a tavern mellow, +Grog hot and pipe alight; +I'm sure the Show appalled him, +And yet without dismay, +When Death and Duty called him, +He up and led the way. + + ~So in Valhalla drinking + (If heroes meek and shrinking + Are suffered there), I'm thinking + 'Tis Kelly leads the way.~ + + + + +We have just had one of our men killed, a young sculptor of immense promise. + +When one thinks of all the fine work he might have accomplished, +it seems a shame. But, after all, to-morrow it may be the turn of any of us. +If it should be mine, my chief regret will be for work undone. + +Ah! I often think of how I will go back to the Quarter +and take up the old life again. How sweet it will all seem. +But first I must earn the right. And if ever I do go back, +how I will find Bohemia changed! Missing how many a face! + +It was in thinking of our lost comrade I wrote the following: + + + + +The Three Tommies + + + +That Barret, the painter of pictures, what feeling for color he had! +And Fanning, the maker of music, such melodies mirthful and mad! +And Harley, the writer of stories, so whimsical, tender and glad! + +To hark to their talk in the trenches, high heart unfolding to heart, +Of the day when the war would be over, and each would be true to his part, +Upbuilding a Palace of Beauty to the wonder and glory of Art . . . + +Yon's Barret, the painter of pictures, yon carcass that rots on the wire; +His hand with its sensitive cunning is crisped to a cinder with fire; +His eyes with their magical vision are bubbles of glutinous mire. + +Poor Fanning! He sought to discover the symphonic note of a shell; +There are bits of him broken and bloody, to show you the place where he fell; +I've reason to fear on his exquisite ear the rats have been banqueting well. + +And speaking of Harley, the writer, I fancy I looked on him last, +Sprawling and staring and writhing in the roar of the battle blast; +Then a mad gun-team crashed over, and scattered his brains as it passed. + +Oh, Harley and Fanning and Barret, they were bloody good mates o' mine; +Their bodies are empty bottles; Death has guzzled the wine; +What's left of them's filth and corruption. . . . Where is the Fire Divine? + +I'll tell you. . . . At night in the trenches, as I watch and I do my part, +Three radiant spirits I'm seeing, high heart revealing to heart, +And they're building a peerless palace to the splendor and triumph of Art. + +Yet, alas! for the fame of Barret, the glory he might have trailed! +And alas! for the name of Fanning, a star that beaconed and paled, +Poor Harley, obscure and forgotten. . . . + Well, who shall say that they failed! + +No, each did a Something Grander than ever he dreamed to do; +And as for the work unfinished, all will be paid their due; +The broken ends will be fitted, the balance struck will be true. + +So painters, and players, and penmen, I tell you: Do as you please; +Let your fame outleap on the trumpets, you'll never rise up to these -- +To three grim and gory Tommies, down, down on your bended knees! + + + + +Daventry, the sculptor, is buried in a little graveyard near one of our posts. +Just now our section of the line is quiet, so I often go and sit there. +Stretching myself on a flat stone, I dream for hours. + +Silence and solitude! How good the peace of it all seems! +Around me the grasses weave a pattern, and half hide +the hundreds of little wooden crosses. Here is one with a single name: + + AUBREY. + +Who was Aubrey I wonder? Then another: + + ~To Our Beloved Comrade.~ + +Then one which has attached to it, in the cheapest of little frames, +the crude water-color daub of a child, three purple flowers +standing in a yellow vase. Below it, painfully printed, I read: + + ~To My Darling Papa -- Thy Little Odette.~ + +And beyond the crosses many fresh graves have been dug. +With hungry open mouths they wait. Even now I can hear the guns +that are going to feed them. Soon there will be more crosses, +and more and more. Then they will cease, and wives and mothers +will come here to weep. + +Ah! Peace so precious must be bought with blood and tears. +Let us honor and bless the men who pay, and envy them +the manner of their dying; for not all the jeweled orders +on the breasts of the living can vie in glory with the little wooden cross +the humblest of these has won. . . . + + + + +The Twa Jocks + + + +Says Bauldy MacGreegor frae Gleska tae Hecky MacCrimmon frae Skye: +"That's whit I hate maist aboot fechtin' -- it makes ye sae deevilish dry; +Noo jist hae a keek at yon ferm-hoose them Gairmans are poundin' sae fine, +Weel, think o' it, doon in the dunnie there's bottles and bottles o' wine. +A' hell's fairly belchin' oot yonner, but oh, lad, I'm ettlin' tae try. . . ." +~"If it's poose she'll be with ye whateffer," + says Hecky MacCrimmon frae Skye.~ + +Says Bauldy MacGreegor frae Gleska: "Whit price fur a funeral wreath? +We're dodgin' a' kinds o' destruction, an' jist by the skin o' oor teeth. +Here, spread yersel oot on yer belly, and slither along in the glaur; +Confoond ye, ye big Hielan' deevil! Ye don't realize there's a war. +Ye think that ye're back in Dunvegan, and herdin' the wee bits o' kye." +~"She'll neffer trink wine in Dunfegan," says Hecky MacCrimmon frae Skye.~ + +Says Bauldy MacGreegor frae Gleska: "Thank goodness! the ferm-hoose at last; +There's no muckle left but the cellar, an' even that's vanishin' fast. +Look oot, there's the corpse o' a wumman, sair mangelt and deid by her lane. +Quick! Strike a match. . . . Whit did I tell ye! + A hale bonny box o' shampane; +Jist knock the heid aff o' a bottle. . . . + Haud on, mon, I'm hearing a cry. . . ." +~"She'll think it's a wean that wass greetin'," + says Hecky MacCrimmon frae Skye.~ + +Says Bauldy MacGreegor frae Gleska: + "Ma conscience! I'm hanged but yer richt. +It's yin o' thae waifs of the war-field, a' sobbin' and shakin' wi' fricht. +Wheesht noo, dear, we're no gaun tae hurt ye. + We're takin' ye hame, my wee doo! +We've got tae get back wi' her, Hecky. Whit mercy we didna get fou! +We'll no touch a drap o' that likker -- + that's hard, man, ye canna deny. . . ." +~"It's the last thing she'll think o' denyin'," + says Hecky MacCrimmon frae Skye.~ + +Says Bauldy MacGreegor frae Gleska: "If I should get struck frae the rear, +Ye'll tak' and ye'll shield the wee lassie, and rin for the lines like a deer. +God! Wis that the breenge o' a bullet? I'm thinkin' it's cracket ma spine. +I'm doon on ma knees in the glabber; I'm fearin', auld man, I've got mine. +Here, quick! Pit yer erms roon the lassie. + Noo, rin, lad! good luck and good-by. . . . +~"Hoots, mon! it's ye baith she'll be takin'," + says Hecky MacCrimmon frae Skye.~ + +Says Corporal Muckle frae Rannoch: "Is that no' a picture tae frame? +Twa sair woundit Jocks wi' a lassie jist like ma wee Jeannie at hame. +We're prood o' ye baith, ma brave heroes. We'll gie ye a medal, I think." +Says Bauldy MacGreegor frae Gleska: "I'd raither ye gied me a drink. +I'll no speak for Private MacCrimmon, but oh, mon, I'm perishin' dry. . . ." +~"She'll wush that Loch Lefen wass whuskey," says Hecky MacCrimmon frae Skye.~ + + + + + III + + + + + Near Albert, + February 1915. + +Over the spine of the ridge a horned moon of reddish hue +peers through the splintered, hag-like trees. Where the trenches are, +rockets are rising, green and red. I hear the coughing of the Maxims, +the peevish nagging of the rifles, the boom of a "heavy" +and the hollow sound of its exploding shell. + +Running the car into the shadow of a ruined house, I try to sleep. +But a battery starts to blaze away close by, and the flame +lights up my shelter. Near me some soldiers are in deep slumber; +one stirs in his sleep as a big rat runs over him, and I know by experience +that when one is sleeping a rat feels as heavy as a sheep. + +But how ~can~ one possibly sleep? Out there in the dark +there is the wild tattoo of a thousand rifles; and hark! that dull roar +is the explosion of a mine. There! the purring of the rapid firers. +Desperate things are doing. There will be lots of work for me +before this night is over. What a cursed place! + +As I cannot sleep, I think of a story I heard to-day. +It is of a Canadian Colonel, and in my mind I shape it like this: + + + + +His Boys + + + +"I'm going, Billy, old fellow. Hist, lad! Don't make any noise. +There's Boches to beat all creation, the pitch of a bomb away. +I've fixed the note to your collar, you've got to get back to my Boys, +You've got to get back to warn 'em before it's the break of day." + +The order came to go forward to a trench-line traced on the map; +I knew the brass-hats had blundered, I knew and I told 'em so; +I knew if I did as they ordered I would tumble into a trap, +And I tried to explain, but the answer came like a pistol: "Go." + +Then I thought of the Boys I commanded -- I always called them "my Boys" -- +The men of my own recruiting, the lads of my countryside; +Tested in many a battle, I knew their sorrows and joys, +And I loved them all like a father, with more than a father's pride. + +To march my Boys to a shambles as soon as the dawn of day; +To see them helplessly slaughtered, if all that I guessed was true; +My Boys that trusted me blindly, I thought and I tried to pray, +And then I arose and I muttered: "It's either them or it's you." + +I rose and I donned my rain-coat; I buckled my helmet tight. +I remember you watched me, Billy, as I took my cane in my hand; +I vaulted over the sandbags into the pitchy night, +Into the pitted valley that served us as No Man's Land. + +I strode out over the hollow of hate and havoc and death, +From the heights the guns were angry, with a vengeful snarling of steel; +And once in a moment of stillness I heard hard panting breath, +And I turned . . . it was you, old rascal, following hard on my heel. + +I fancy I cursed you, Billy; but not so much as I ought! +And so we went forward together, till we came to the valley rim, +And then a star-shell sputtered . . . it was even worse than I thought, +For the trench they told me to move in was packed with Boche to the brim. + +They saw me too, and they got me; they peppered me till I fell; +And there I scribbled my message with my life-blood ebbing away; +"Now, Billy, you fat old duffer, you've got to get back like hell; +And get them to cancel that order before it's the dawn of day. + +"Billy, old boy, I love you, I kiss your shiny black nose; +Now, home there. . . . Hurry, you devil, + or I'll cut you to ribands. . . . See . . ." +Poor brute! he's off! and I'm dying. . . . I go as a soldier goes. +I'm happy. My Boys, God bless 'em! . . . It had to be them or me. + + + + +Ah! I never was intended for a job like this. I realize it more and more +every day, but I will stick it out till I break down. To be nervous, +over-imaginative, terribly sensitive to suffering, is a poor equipment +for the man who starts out to drive wounded on the battlefield. I am haunted +by the thought that my car may break down when I have a load of wounded. +Once indeed it did, and a man died while I waited for help. +Now I never look at what is given me. It might unnerve me. + +I have been at it for over six months without a rest. When an attack +has been going on I have worked day and night, until as I drove +I wanted to fall asleep at the wheel. + +The winter has been trying; there is rain one day, frost the next. +Mud up to the axles. One sleeps in lousy barns or dripping dugouts. +Cold, hunger, dirt, I know them all singly and together. My only consolation +is that the war must soon be over, and that I will have helped. +When I have time and am not too tired, I comfort myself with scribbling. + + + + +The Booby-Trap + + + +I'm crawlin' out in the mangolds to bury wot's left o' Joe -- +Joe, my pal, and a good un (God! 'ow it rains and rains). +I'm sick o' seein' him lyin' like a 'eap o' offal, and so +I'm crawlin' out in the beet-field to bury 'is last remains. + +'E might 'a bin makin' munitions -- 'e 'adn't no need to go; +An' I tells 'im strite, but 'e arnsers, "'Tain't no use chewin' the fat; +I've got to be doin' me dooty wiv the rest o' the boys" . . . an' so +Yon's 'im, yon blob on the beet-field wot I'm tryin' so 'ard to git at. + +There was five of us lads from the brickyard; 'Enry was gassed at Bapome, +Sydney was drowned in a crater, 'Erbert was 'alved by a shell; +Joe was the pick o' the posy, might 'a bin sifely at 'ome, +Only son of 'is mother, 'er a widder as well. + +She used to sell bobbins and buttons -- 'ad a plice near the Waterloo Road; +A little, old, bent-over lydy, wiv glasses an' silvery 'air; +Must tell 'er I planted 'im nicely, + cheer 'er up like. . . . (Well, I'm blowed, +That bullet near catched me a biffer) -- I'll see the old gel if I'm spared. + +She'll tike it to 'eart, pore ol' lydy, fer 'e was 'er 'ope and 'er joy; +'Is dad used to drink like a knot-'ole, she kept the 'ome goin', she did: +She pinched and she scriped fer 'is scoolin', 'e was sich a fine 'andsome boy +('Alf Flanders seems packed on me panties) -- + 'e's 'andsome no longer, pore kid! + +This bit o' a board that I'm packin' and draggin' around in the mire, +I was tickled to death when I found it. Says I, "'Ere's a nice little glow." +I was chilled and wet through to the marrer, so I started to make me a fire; +And then I says: "No; 'ere, Goblimy, it'll do for a cross for Joe." + +Well, 'ere 'e is. Gawd! 'Ow one chinges a-lyin' six weeks in the rain. +Joe, me old pal, 'ow I'm sorry; so 'elp me, I wish I could pray. +An' now I 'ad best get a-diggin' 'is grave (it seems more like a drain) -- +And I 'opes that the Boches won't git me till I gits 'im safe planted away. + + (~As he touches the body there is a tremendous explosion. + He falls back shattered.~) + +A booby-trap! Ought to 'a known it! If that's not a bastardly trick! +Well, one thing, I won't be long goin'. Gawd! I'm a 'ell of a sight. +Wish I'd died fightin' and killin'; that's wot it is makes me sick. . . . +Ah, Joe! we'll be pushin' up dysies . . . + together, old Chummie . . . good-night! + + + + +To-day I heard that MacBean had been killed in Belgium. +I believe he turned out a wonderful soldier. Saxon Dane, too, +has been missing for two months. We know what that means. + +It is odd how one gets callous to death, a mediaeval callousness. +When we hear that the best of our friends have gone West, +we have a moment of the keenest regret; but how soon again +we find the heart to laugh! The saddest part of loss, I think, +is that one so soon gets over it. + +Is it that we fail to realize it all? Is it that it seems +a strange and hideous dream, from which we will awake and rub our eyes? + +Oh, how bitter I feel as the days go by! It is creeping more and more +into my verse. Read this: + + + + +Bonehead Bill + + + +I wonder 'oo and wot 'e was, +That 'Un I got so slick. +I couldn't see 'is face because +The night was 'ideous thick. +I just made out among the black +A blinkin' wedge o' white; +Then ~biff!~ I guess I got 'im ~crack~ -- +The man I killed last night. + +I wonder if account o' me +Some wench will go unwed, +And 'eaps o' lives will never be, +Because 'e's stark and dead? +Or if 'is missis damns the war, +And by some candle light, +Tow-headed kids are prayin' for +The Fritz I copped last night. + +I wonder, 'struth, I wonder why +I 'ad that 'orful dream? +I saw up in the giddy sky +The gates o' God agleam; +I saw the gates o' 'eaven shine +Wiv everlastin' light: +And then . . . I knew that I'd got mine, +As 'e got 'is last night. + +Aye, bang beyond the broodin' mists +Where spawn the mother stars, +I 'ammered wiv me bloody fists +Upon them golden bars; +I 'ammered till a devil's doubt +Fair froze me wiv affright: +To fink wot God would say about +The bloke I corpsed last night. + +I 'ushed; I wilted wiv despair, +When, like a rosy flame, +I sees a angel standin' there +'Oo calls me by me name. +'E 'ad such soft, such shiny eyes; +'E 'eld 'is 'and and smiled; +And through the gates o' Paradise +'E led me like a child. + +'E led me by them golden palms +Wot 'ems that jeweled street; +And seraphs was a-singin' psalms, +You've no ideer 'ow sweet; +Wiv cheroobs crowdin' closer round +Than peas is in a pod, +'E led me to a shiny mound +Where beams the throne o' God. + +And then I 'ears God's werry voice: +"Bill 'agan, 'ave no fear. +Stand up and glory and rejoice +For 'im 'oo led you 'ere." +And in a nip I seemed to see: +Aye, like a flash o' light, +~My angel pal I knew to be +The chap I plugged last night.~ + +Now, I don't claim to understand -- +They calls me Bonehead Bill; +They shoves a rifle in me 'and, +And show me 'ow to kill. +Me job's to risk me life and limb, +But . . . be it wrong or right, +This cross I'm makin', it's for 'im, +The cove I croaked last night. + + + + + IV + + + + +A Lapse of Time and a Word of Explanation + + + + The American Hospital, Neuilly, + January 1919. + +Four years have passed and it is winter again. Much has happened. +When I last wrote, on the Somme in 1915, I was sickening with typhoid fever. +All that spring I was in hospital. + +Nevertheless, I was sufficiently recovered to take part +in the Champagne battle in the fall of that year, and to "carry on" +during the following winter. It was at Verdun I got my first wound. + +In the spring of 1917 I again served with my Corps; but on the entry +of the United States into the War I joined the army of my country. +In the Argonne I had my left arm shot away. + +As far as time and health permitted, I kept a record of these years, +and also wrote much verse. All this, however, has disappeared +under circumstances into which there is no need to enter here. +The loss was a cruel one, almost more so than that of my arm; +for I have neither the heart nor the power to rewrite this material. + +And now, in default of something better, I have bundled together +this manuscript, and have added to it a few more verses, written in hospitals. +Let it represent me. If I can find a publisher for it, ~tant mieux~. +If not, I will print it at my own cost, and any one who cares for a copy +can write to me -- + + Stephen Poore, + 12 ~bis~, Rue des Petits Moineaux, + Paris. + + + + +Michael + + + +"There's something in your face, Michael, I've seen it all the day; +There's something quare that wasn't there when first ye wint away. . . ." + +"It's just the Army life, mother, the drill, the left and right, +That puts the stiffinin' in yer spine and locks yer jaw up tight. . . ." + +"There's something in your eyes, Michael, an' how they stare and stare -- +You're lookin' at me now, me boy, as if I wasn't there. . . ." + +"It's just the things I've seen, mother, the sights that come and come, +A bit o' broken, bloody pulp that used to be a chum. . . ." + +"There's something on your heart, Michael, that makes ye wake at night, +And often when I hear ye moan, I trimble in me fright. . . ." + +"It's just a man I killed, mother, a mother's son like me; +It seems he's always hauntin' me, he'll never let me be. . . ." + +"But maybe he was bad, Michael, maybe it was right +To kill the inimy you hate in fair and honest fight. . . ." + +"I did not hate at all, mother; he never did me harm; +I think he was a lad like me, who worked upon a farm. . . ." + +"And what's it all about, Michael; why did you have to go, +A quiet, peaceful lad like you, and we were happy so? . . ." + +"It's thim that's up above, mother, it's thim that sits an' rules; +We've got to fight the wars they make, it's us as are the fools. . . ." + +"And what will be the end, Michael, and what's the use, I say, +Of fightin' if whoever wins it's us that's got to pay? . . ." + +"Oh, it will be the end, mother, when lads like him and me, +That sweat to feed the ones above, decide that we'll be free. . . ." + +"And when will that day come, Michael, and when will fightin' cease, +And simple folks may till their soil and live and love in peace? . . ." + +"It's coming soon and soon, mother, it's nearer every day, +When only men who work and sweat will have a word to say; +When all who earn their honest bread in every land and soil +Will claim the Brotherhood of Man, the Comradeship of Toil; +When we, the Workers, all demand: `What are we fighting for?' . . . +Then, then we'll end that stupid crime, that devil's madness -- War." + + + + +The Wife + + + +"Tell Annie I'll be home in time +To help her with her Christmas-tree." +That's what he wrote, and hark! the chime +Of Christmas bells, and where is he? +And how the house is dark and sad, +And Annie's sobbing on my knee! + +The page beside the candle-flame +With cruel type was overfilled; +I read and read until a name +Leapt at me and my heart was stilled: +My eye crept up the column -- up +Unto its hateful heading: ~Killed~. + +And there was Annie on the stair: +"And will he not be long?" she said. +Her eyes were bright and in her hair +She'd twined a bit of riband red; +And every step was daddy's sure, +Till tired out she went to bed. + +And there alone I sat so still, +With staring eyes that did not see; +The room was desolate and chill, +And desolate the heart of me; +Outside I heard the news-boys shrill: +"Another Glorious Victory!" + +A victory. . . . Ah! what care I? +A thousand victories are vain. +Here in my ruined home I cry +From out my black despair and pain, +I'd rather, rather damned defeat, +And have my man with me again. + +They talk to us of pride and power, +Of Empire vast beyond the sea; +As here beside my hearth I cower, +What mean such words as these to me? +Oh, will they lift the clouds that low'r, +Or light my load in years to be? + +What matters it to us poor folk? +Who win or lose, it's we who pay. +Oh, I would laugh beneath the yoke +If I had ~him~ at home to-day; +One's home before one's country comes: +Aye, so a million women say. + +"Hush, Annie dear, don't sorrow so." +(How can I tell her?) "See, we'll light +With tiny star of purest glow +Each little candle pink and white." +(They make mistakes. I'll tell myself +I did not read that name aright.) +Come, dearest one; come, let us pray +Beside our gleaming Christmas-tree; +Just fold your little hands and say +These words so softly after me: +"God pity mothers in distress, +And little children fatherless." + +~"God pity mothers in distress, +And little children fatherless."~ + + . . . . . + +What's that? -- a step upon the stair; +A shout! -- the door thrown open wide! +My hero and my man is there, +And Annie's leaping by his side. . . . +The room reels round, I faint, I fall. . . . +"O God! Thy world is glorified." + + + + +Victory Stuff + + + +What d'ye think, lad; what d'ye think, +As the roaring crowds go by? +As the banners flare and the brasses blare +And the great guns rend the sky? +As the women laugh like they'd all gone mad, +And the champagne glasses clink: +Oh, you're grippin' me hand so tightly, lad, +I'm a-wonderin': what d'ye think? + +D'ye think o' the boys we used to know, +And how they'd have topped the fun? +Tom and Charlie, and Jack and Joe -- +Gone now, every one. +How they'd have cheered as the joy-bells chime, +And they grabbed each girl for a kiss! +And now -- they're rottin' in Flanders slime, +And they gave their lives -- for ~this~. + +Or else d'ye think of the many a time +We wished we too was dead, +Up to our knees in the freezin' grime, +With the fires of hell overhead; +When the youth and the strength of us sapped away, +And we cursed in our rage and pain? +And yet -- we haven't a word to say. . . . +We're glad. We'd do it again. + +I'm scared that they pity us. Come, old boy, +Let's leave them their flags and their fuss. +We'd surely be hatin' to spoil their joy +With the sight of such wrecks as us. +Let's slip away quietly, you and me, +And we'll talk of our chums out there: +~You with your eyes that'll never see, +Me that's wheeled in a chair.~ + + + + +Was It You? + + + +"Hullo, young Jones! with your tie so gay +And your pen behind your ear; +Will you mark my cheque in the usual way? +For I'm overdrawn, I fear." +Then you look at me in a manner bland, +As you turn your ledger's leaves, +And you hand it back with a soft white hand, +And the air of a man who grieves. . . . + +~"Was it you, young Jones, was it you I saw +(And I think I see you yet) +With a live bomb gripped in your grimy paw +And your face to the parapet? +With your lips asnarl and your eyes gone mad +With a fury that thrilled you through. . . . +Oh, I look at you now and I think, my lad, +Was it you, young Jones, was it you?~ + +"Hullo, young Smith, with your well-fed look +And your coat of dapper fit, +Will you recommend me a decent book +With nothing of War in it?" +Then you smile as you polish a finger-nail, +And your eyes serenely roam, +And you suavely hand me a thrilling tale +By a man who stayed at home. + +~"Was it you, young Smith, was it you I saw +In the battle's storm and stench, +With a roar of rage and a wound red-raw +Leap into the reeking trench? +As you stood like a fiend on the firing-shelf +And you stabbed and hacked and slew. . . . +Oh, I look at you and I ask myself, +Was it you, young Smith, was it you?~ + +"Hullo, old Brown, with your ruddy cheek +And your tummy's rounded swell, +Your garden's looking jolly ~chic~ +And your kiddies awf'ly well. +Then you beam at me in your cheery way +As you swing your water-can; +And you mop your brow and you blithely say: +`What about golf, old man?' + +~"Was it you, old Brown, was it you I saw +Like a bull-dog stick to your gun, +A cursing devil of fang and claw +When the rest were on the run? +Your eyes aflame with the battle-hate. . . . +As you sit in the family pew, +And I see you rising to pass the plate, +I ask: Old Brown, was it you?~ + +"Was it me and you? Was it you and me? +(Is that grammar, or is it not?) +Who groveled in filth and misery, +Who gloried and groused and fought? +Which is the wrong and which is the right? +Which is the false and the true? +The man of peace or the man of fight? +Which is the ME and the YOU?" + + + + + V + + + + +~Les Grands Mutiles~ + + + +~I saw three wounded of the war: +And the first had lost his eyes; +And the second went on wheels and had +No legs below the thighs; +And the face of the third was featureless, +And his mouth ran cornerwise. +So I made a rhyme about each one, +And this is how my fancies run.~ + + + + + The Sightless Man + + + +Out of the night a crash, +A roar, a rampart of light; +A flame that leaped like a lash, +Searing forever my sight; +Out of the night a flash, +Then, oh, forever the Night! + +Here in the dark I sit, +I who so loved the sun; +Supple and strong and fit, +In the dark till my days be done; +Aye, that's the hell of it, +Stalwart and twenty-one. + +Marie is stanch and true, +Willing to be my wife; +Swears she has eyes for two . . . +Aye, but it's long, is Life. +What is a lad to do +With his heart and his brain at strife? + +There now, my pipe is out; +No one to give me a light; +I grope and I grope about. +Well, it is nearly night; +Sleep may resolve my doubt, +Help me to reason right. . . . + + (~He sleeps and dreams.~) + +I heard them whispering there by the bed . . . +Oh, but the ears of the blind are quick! +Every treacherous word they said +Was a stab of pain and my heart turned sick. +Then lip met lip and they looked at me, +Sitting bent by the fallen fire, +And they laughed to think that I couldn't see; +But I felt the flame of their hot desire. +He's helping Marie to work the farm, +A dashing, upstanding chap, they say; +And look at me with my flabby arm, +And the fat of sloth, and my face of clay -- +Look at me as I sit and sit, +By the side of a fire that's seldom lit, +Sagging and weary the livelong day, +When every one else is out on the field, +Sowing the seed for a golden yield, +Or tossing around the new-mown hay. . . . + +Oh, the shimmering wheat that frets the sky, +Gold of plenty and blue of hope, +I'm seeing it all with an inner eye +As out of the door I grope and grope. +And I hear my wife and her lover there, +Whispering, whispering, round the rick, +Mocking me and my sightless stare, +As I fumble and stumble everywhere, +Slapping and tapping with my stick; +Old and weary at thirty-one, +Heartsick, wishing it all was done. +Oh, I'll tap my way around to the byre, +And I'll hear the cows as they chew their hay; +There at least there is none to tire, +There at least I am not in the way. +And they'll look at me with their velvet eyes +And I'll stroke their flanks with my woman's hand, +And they'll answer to me with soft replies, +And somehow I fancy they'll understand. +And the horses too, they know me well; +I'm sure that they pity my wretched lot, +And the big fat ram with the jingling bell . . . +Oh, the beasts are the only friends I've got. +And my old dog, too, he loves me more, +I think, than ever he did before. +Thank God for the beasts that are all so kind, +That know and pity the helpless blind! + +Ha! they're coming, the loving pair. +My hand's a-shake as my pipe I fill. +What if I steal on them unaware +With a reaping-hook, to kill, to kill? . . . +I'll do it . . . they're there in the mow of hay, +I hear them saying: "He's out of the way!" +Hark! how they're kissing and whispering. . . . +Closer I creep . . . I crouch . . . I spring. . . . + + (~He wakes.~) + +Ugh! What a horrible dream I've had! +And it isn't real . . . I'm glad, I'm glad! +Marie is good and Marie is true . . . +But now I know what it's best to do. +I'll sell the farm and I'll seek my kind, +I'll live apart with my fellow-blind, +And we'll eat and drink, and we'll laugh and joke, +And we'll talk of our battles, and smoke and smoke; +And brushes of bristle we'll make for sale, +While one of us reads a book of Braille. +And there will be music and dancing too, +And we'll seek to fashion our life anew; +And we'll walk the highways hand in hand, +The Brotherhood of the Sightless Band; +Till the years at last shall bring respite +And our night is lost in the Greater Night. + + + + + The Legless Man + + + + (~The Dark Side~) + +~My mind goes back to Fumin Wood, and how we stuck it out, +Eight days of hunger, thirst and cold, mowed down by steel and flame; +Waist-deep in mud and mad with woe, with dead men all about, +We fought like fiends and waited for relief that never came. +Eight days and nights they rolled on us in battle-frenzied mass! +"Debout les morts!" We hurled them back. By God! they did not pass.~ + +They pinned two medals on my chest, a yellow and a brown, +And lovely ladies made me blush, such pretty words they said. +I felt a cheerful man, almost, until my eyes went down, +And there I saw the blankets -- how they sagged upon my bed. +And then again I drank the cup of sorrow to the dregs: +Oh, they can keep their medals if they give me back my legs. + +I think of how I used to run and leap and kick the ball, +And ride and dance and climb the hills and frolic in the sea; +And all the thousand things that now I'll never do at all. . . . +~Mon Dieu!~ there's nothing left in life, it often seems to me. +And as the nurses lift me up and strap me in my chair, +If they would chloroform me off I feel I wouldn't care. + +Ah yes! we're "heroes all" to-day -- they point to us with pride; +To-day their hearts go out to us, the tears are in their eyes! +But wait a bit; to-morrow they will blindly look aside; +No more they'll talk of what they owe, the dues of sacrifice +(One hates to be reminded of an everlasting debt). +It's all in human nature. Ah! the world will soon forget. + +~My mind goes back to where I lay wound-rotted on the plain, +And ate the muddy mangold roots, and drank the drops of dew, +And dragged myself for miles and miles when every move was pain, +And over me the carrion-crows were retching as they flew. +Oh, ere I closed my eyes and stuck my rifle in the air +I wish that those who picked me up had passed and left me there.~ + + + (~The Bright Side~) + +Oh, one gets used to everything! +I hum a merry song, +And up the street and round the square +I wheel my chair along; +For look you, how my chest is sound +And how my arms are strong! + +Oh, one gets used to anything! +It's awkward at the first, +And jolting o'er the cobbles gives +A man a grievous thirst; +But of all ills that one must bear +That's surely not the worst. + +For there's the cafe open wide, +And there they set me up; +And there I smoke my ~caporal~ +Above my cider cup; +And play ~manille~ a while before +I hurry home to sup. + +At home the wife is waiting me +With smiles and pigeon-pie; +And little Zi-Zi claps her hands +With laughter loud and high; +And if there's cause to growl, I fail +To see the reason why. + +And all the evening by the lamp +I read some tale of crime, +Or play my old accordion +With Marie keeping time, +Until we hear the hour of ten +From out the steeple chime. + +Then in the morning bright and soon, +No moment do I lose; +Within my little cobbler's shop +To gain the silver ~sous~ +(Good luck one has no need of legs +To make a pair of shoes). + +And every Sunday -- oh, it's then +I am the happy man; +They wheel me to the river-side, +And there with rod and can +I sit and fish and catch a dish +Of ~goujons~ for the pan. + +Aye, one gets used to everything, +And doesn't seem to mind; +Maybe I'm happier than most +Of my two-legged kind; +For look you at the darkest cloud, +Lo! how it's silver-lined. + + + + + The Faceless Man + + + +~I'm dead.~ +Officially I'm dead. Their hope is past. +How long I stood as missing! Now, at last + I'm dead. +Look in my face -- no likeness can you see, +No tiny trace of him they knew as "me". +How terrible the change! +Even my eyes are strange. +So keyed are they to pain, +That if I chanced to meet +My mother in the street +She'd look at me in vain. + +When she got home I think she'd say: +"I saw the saddest sight to-day -- +A ~poilu~ with no face at all. +Far better in the fight to fall +Than go through life like that, I think. +Poor fellow! how he made me shrink. +No face. Just eyes that seemed to stare +At me with anguish and despair. +This ghastly war! I'm almost cheered +To think my son who disappeared, +My boy so handsome and so gay, +Might have come home like him to-day." + +I'm dead. I think it's better to be dead +When little children look at you with dread; +And when you know your coming home again +Will only give the ones who love you pain. +Ah! who can help but shrink? One cannot blame. +They see the hideous husk, not, not the flame +Of sacrifice and love that burns within; +While souls of satyrs, riddled through with sin, +Have bodies fair and excellent to see. +~Mon Dieu!~ how different we all would be +If this our flesh was ordained to express +Our spirit's beauty or its ugliness. + +(Oh, you who look at me with fear to-day, +And shrink despite yourselves, and turn away -- +It was for you I suffered woe accurst; +For you I braved red battle at its worst; +For you I fought and bled and maimed and slew; + For you, for you! +For you I faced hell-fury and despair; +The reeking horror of it all I knew: +I flung myself into the furnace there; +I faced the flame that scorched me with its glare; +I drank unto the dregs the devil's brew -- +Look at me now -- for ~you~ and ~you~ and ~you~. . . .) + + . . . . . + +I'm thinking of the time we said good-by: +We took our dinner in Duval's that night, +Just little Jacqueline, Lucette and I; +We tried our very utmost to be bright. +We laughed. And yet our eyes, they weren't gay. +I sought all kinds of cheering things to say. +"Don't grieve," I told them. "Soon the time will pass; +My next permission will come quickly round; +We'll all meet at the Gare du Montparnasse; +Three times I've come already, safe and sound." +(But oh, I thought, it's harder every time, +After a home that seems like Paradise, +To go back to the vermin and the slime, +The weariness, the want, the sacrifice. +"Pray God," I said, "the war may soon be done, +But no, oh never, never till we've won!") + +Then to the station quietly we walked; +I had my rifle and my haversack, +My heavy boots, my blankets on my back; +And though it hurt us, cheerfully we talked. +We chatted bravely at the platform gate. +I watched the clock. My train must go at eight. +One minute to the hour . . . we kissed good-by, +Then, oh, they both broke down, with piteous cry. +I went. . . . Their way was barred; they could not pass. +I looked back as the train began to start; +Once more I ran with anguish at my heart +And through the bars I kissed my little lass. . . . + +Three years have gone; they've waited day by day. +I never came. I did not even write. +For when I saw my face was such a sight +I thought that I had better . . . stay away. +And so I took the name of one who died, +A friendless friend who perished by my side. +In Prussian prison camps three years of hell +I kept my secret; oh, I kept it well! +And now I'm free, but none shall ever know; +They think I died out there . . . it's better so. + +To-day I passed my wife in widow's weeds. +I brushed her arm. She did not even look. +So white, so pinched her face, my heart still bleeds, +And at the touch of her, oh, how I shook! +And then last night I passed the window where +They sat together; I could see them clear, +The lamplight softly gleaming on their hair, +And all the room so full of cozy cheer. +My wife was sewing, while my daughter read; +I even saw my portrait on the wall. +I wanted to rush in, to tell them all; +And then I cursed myself: "You're dead, you're dead!" +God! how I watched them from the darkness there, +Clutching the dripping branches of a tree, +Peering as close as ever I might dare, +And sobbing, sobbing, oh, so bitterly! + +But no, it's folly; and I mustn't stay. +To-morrow I am going far away. +I'll find a ship and sail before the mast; +In some wild land I'll bury all the past. +I'll live on lonely shores and there forget, +Or tell myself that there has never been +The gay and tender courage of Lucette, +The little loving arms of Jacqueline. + +A man lonely upon a lonely isle, +Sometimes I'll look towards the North and smile +To think they're happy, and they both believe +I died for France, and that I lie at rest; +And for my glory's sake they've ceased to grieve, +And hold my memory sacred. Ah! that's best. +And in that thought I'll find my joy and peace +As there alone I wait the Last Release. + + + + + +L'Envoi + + + +~We've finished up the filthy war; +We've won what we were fighting for . . . +(Or have we? I don't know). +But anyway I have my wish: +I'm back upon the old Boul' Mich', +And how my heart's aglow! +Though in my coat's an empty sleeve, +Ah! do not think I ever grieve +(The pension for it, I believe, +Will keep me on the go). + +So I'll be free to write and write, +And give my soul to sheer delight, +Till joy is almost pain; +To stand aloof and watch the throng, +And worship youth and sing my song +Of faith and hope again; +To seek for beauty everywhere, +To make each day a living prayer +That life may not be vain. + +To sing of things that comfort me, +The joy in mother-eyes, the glee +Of little ones at play; +The blessed gentleness of trees, +Of old men dreaming at their ease +Soft afternoons away; +Of violets and swallows' wings, +Of wondrous, ordinary things +In words of every day. + +To rhyme of rich and rainy nights, +When like a legion leap the lights +And take the town with gold; +Of taverns quaint where poets dream, +Of cafes gaudily agleam, +And vice that's overbold; +Of crystal shimmer, silver sheen, +Of soft and soothing nicotine, +Of wine that's rich and old, + +Of gutters, chimney-tops and stars, +Of apple-carts and motor-cars, +The sordid and sublime; +Of wealth and misery that meet +In every great and little street, +Of glory and of grime; +Of all the living tide that flows -- +From princes down to puppet shows -- +I'll make my humble rhyme. + +So if you like the sort of thing +Of which I also like to sing, +Just give my stuff a look; +And if you don't, no harm is done -- + +In writing it I've had my fun; +Good luck to you and every one -- +And so + Here ends my book.~ + + + + + +[End of text.] + + + + + +Notes. + + + +While `Stephen Poore' is a fictional character, he is real enough +in some ways. Robert Service was himself in the Ambulance Corps, +and his descriptions of `Bohemia' of this day, and the emergence of war, +bear striking similarities to the case of Alan Seeger -- and, no doubt, +a great many other `war poets' of the "Great War". It has been said +that every section of the trench had its own poet, and many of them, +such as Wilfred Owen, Siegfried Sassoon, and Robert Graves, +became famous for their poetry of the war. This book, in its way, +presents a striking picture of the effect of the war on Europe -- +though it stops short of showing just how great the effect was. + +I hope you enjoyed Service's references to himself in the text, +as "Sourdough Service" -- but they should not be taken too seriously. + +The names of two great Russian composers, Tchaikovsky and Stravinsky, +were originally spelled Tschaikowsky and Stravinski +in "The Philistine and the Bohemian". These composers were contemporaries +of the author, and due to the difficulty of transliterating +from the Russian (Cyrillic) alphabet to the Roman Alphabet, +hampered by different uses of Roman letters in various European languages, +it is not until fairly recently that the current spellings have taken hold -- +and their grip is not yet firm. A couple of other names +were given incorrectly in the same poem: Mallarme/ was spelled with one L, +and E. Burne-Jones (a pre-Raphaelite painter and associate of Rossetti) +was given as F. B. Jones. These names are corrected in this text, +as is Synge, given as Singe in the original ("L'Escargot D'Or"). + +The Introduction to Alan Seeger's Poems, written by William Archer, +is included in the Project Gutenberg edition of Seeger's Poems, +if you feel inclined to compare and contrast the cases. + +If you enjoy Service's style of poetry, I would like to recommend to you +the works of A. B. `Banjo' Paterson, an Australian poet, +author of `The Man from Snowy River' and `Waltzing Matilda'. +His style and his sense of humour are similar. Several of his works +are available from Project Gutenberg. + + + Alan R. Light, Monroe, North Carolina, June 1997. + + + +This list of books written by Robert Service is probably incomplete, +possibly incorrect, but may serve as a starting point for those interested +in his works. + + + +Novels: + The Trail of '98 -- A Northland Romance (1910) + The Pretender + The Poisoned Paradise + The Roughneck + The Master of the Microbe + The House of Fear (1927) + +Autobiography: + + Ploughman of the Moon (1945) | A two-volume + Harper of Heaven (1948) | autobiography. + +Miscellaneous: + Why Not Grow Young + +Verse: +* The Spell of the Yukon (1907) a.k.a. Songs of a Sourdough +* Ballads of a Cheechako (1909) +[Note: A Sourdough is an old-timer, while a Cheechako is a newbie.] +* Rhymes of a Rolling Stone (1912) +* Rhymes of a Red Cross Man (1916) +* Ballads of a Bohemian (1921) + Bar-room Ballads (1940) + The Complete Poems (The first 6 books) + Songs of a Sunlover + Rhymes of a Roughneck + Lyrics of a Low Brow + Rhymes of a Rebel + The Collected Poems + Songs For My Supper (1953) + Rhymes For My Rags (1956) + +* Books marked by an asterisk are presently online. + + + + +About the Author + + + +Robert William Service was born 16 January 1874 in Preston, England, +but also lived in Scotland before emigrating to Canada in 1894. +Service went to the Yukon Territory in 1904 as a bank clerk, +and became famous for his poems about this region, which are mostly +in his first two books of poetry. He wrote quite a bit of prose as well, +and worked as a reporter for some time, but those writings are not nearly +as well known as his poems. He travelled around the world quite a bit, +and narrowly escaped from France at the beginning of the Second World War, +during which time he lived in Hollywood, California. +He died 11 September 1958 in France. + +Incidentally, he played himself in a movie called "The Spoilers", +starring John Wayne and Marlene Dietrich. + + + + + +End of this Project Gutenberg Etext of Robert Service's Ballads of a Bohemian + |