As I stole out of Babylon beyond the stolid warders,
(My soul that dwelt in Babylon long, long ago!)
The sound of cymbals and of lutes, of viols and recorders,
Came up from khan and caravan, loud and low.
As I crept out of Babylon, the clangor and the babel,
The strife of life, the haggling in the square and mart,
Of the men who went in saffron and the men who went in sable,
It tore me and it wore me, yea, it wore my heart.
As I fled out of Babylon, the cubits of the towers
They seemed in very mockery to bar my way;
The incense of the altars, and the hanging-garden flowers,
They lured me with their glamour, but I would not stay.
We still flee out of Babylon, its vending and its vying,
Its crying up to Mammon, its bowing down to Baal;
We still flee out of Babylon, its sobbing and its sighing,
Where the strong grow ever stronger, and the weary fail!
We still flee out of Babylon, the feverish, the fretful,
That saps the sweetness of the soul and leaves but a rind;
We still flee out of Babylon, and fain would be forgetful
Of all within that thrall of wall threatening behind!
Oh, Babylon, oh, Babylon, your toiling and your teeming,
Your canyons and your wonder-wealth,--not for such as we!
We who have fled from Babylon contented are with dreaming,--
Dreaming of earth’s loveliness, happy to be free!
_The Bellman_ _Clinton Scollard_
“FUNERE MERSIT ACERBO”
(_Written by Giosué Carducci at the death of his little son Dante, and
addressed to his brother Dante, who had taken his own life years
before._)
O thou among the Tuscan hills asleep,
Laid with our father in one grassy bed,
Faintly, through the green sod above thy head,
Hast thou not heard a plaintive child’s voice weep?
It is my little son--at thy dark keep
He knocketh, he who wore thy name, thy dread
And sacred name; he too this life hath fled,
Whose ways, my brother, thou didst find so steep.
Among the flower-borders as he played,
By sunny, childish visions smiled upon,
The Shadow caught him to that world how other,--
Thy world long since! So now to that chill shade,
Oh, welcome him! as backward toward the sun
He turns his head, to look, and call his mother.
_The Bellman_ _Ruth Shepard Phelps_