Masculine, bold, defy the grasses’ thralls.
Mid the white lamps of daisies did one flare
Concentrate light? Did a coarse mallow dare
To think that it might answer to the call?
Up the blue garden air a wingèd ship,
Humming with hurry, takes its zig-zag way,
Hangs for a second where the poppies’ tip
Shoots to the hare-bells, larkspurs, but to slip
Impatiently from honeyed bud and spray.
Then ardent pansies warmer purple glow;
Then poppies sigh for languor. Do they see
The yellow tulip near them suddenly grow
Quivering, tremulous? Does the tulip know
What meadow-flower sent the pollen-bee?
NO. 2--INVASION.
In wooded depths the lilies grew,
Nunlike in canopies of green.
Hanging white bells of paladin
In Gothic ferns beneath the yew--
A sanctuary, with the dew
Telling its beads by leafy screen.
And where the dandelion ranks,
Ranged Persian bright each blazing shield,
Was far away in sedgy field--
Too dense with spears of thistle hordes
To menace distant lily chords,
Or chapel treasure all unsealed;
And all day nettle airships sail,
And on the moonlight thistle swords
Leap from their scabbards, flashing towards
The priestly yew that guards the vale;
Till haughty casquéd snowdrops quail,
And violets rush borderwards.
Alas! By stealth th’ invader came,
Intrenched near lily convents, where
A startled fragrance fills the air.
Green cells are pierced by nettle spike,
And dandelions, shield and pike
Ravish white bells that rang to prayer!
NO. 3--DIPLOMATS
Archippus, ambassador
To the poppy emperor,
Enters with his wings extended,
Orange, black and samite blended,
Bows o’er cups of columbines,
And at taste of royal wines
Flashes spangled semaphore
Message--“To the end of the war.”
Philemon, black, green and pearl
Wavers to syringa whirl;
Lightly shod, his errant feet
Win the white pavilions sweet;
As he flits to salvia cells,
Dipping into ruby wells
His antennae, as he goes
Wig-wag--“Beauty has no foes.”
Then bold Turnus, amber-fanned,
Flutters to the brilliant band;
He confers with larkspur sages,
Loiters with the pansy pages,
Tells his heraldry and crest
To the rose’s burning breast;
Soon doth Turnus flutter free,
Wing-endorsing “Liberty.”
Protoparce, grey and blunt,
Enters on his stealthy hunt;
Tongue protuding from his head,
Heavy wings and brutal tread,
Bulging eyes and savage thirst,
Crime’s nocturnal deed he durst;
See him prowling, full of schemes,
Subtle midst the flower-dreams!
Valiant tulips, trust no more!
Close your helmets. This is war!
NO. 4--SPIES
Ask me no questions. Fireflies last night
Went over all the ground with searching light,
And only found that, where the peony-head
Hung erstwhile white, ’tis now disguised in red.
Tell me not why. I only know that since
I paused at gaze beneath the flowering quince,
A group of tents, some warlike grey, some white
Cover the ground, pitched in a single night.
No explanation gives me peace of mind,
When long battalioned caravans I find
Crossing my garden walk; and when I see
Under-ground trenches grow unceasingly.
Give me no reasons for squat forms that pass
Lurking at twilight near the ribbon grass.
Only the owl and I our vigil keep,
With, “Who goes there?” While flower kingdoms sleep.
NO 5--RENDEZVOUS
Like a sea-flower, seen through waves of night,
She spreads illumined petals, and her white
Mystical raying disk spills frankincense
From her stored sweet and balmy opulence.
Perfume of honey-flowers and purpled vines,
Odors of Eastern wood and Tuscan wines,
Sweetness compressed, smell of all blossoms blent,
Breath of all lilies in one lily’s scent.
What secret doth she hold? What visions stir
At the slow calm awakening of her?
Lo! To the night is all her beauty spread,
And to the encircling dark she leans her head.
Then, who can tell what fragrant message strays
O’er dreaming trees and sleeping, leafy ways?
To what green tent her sighing languors steal?
What thrilled suspense of waiting she doth feel?
Till--Soft! A Spirit of dim-waving wings
Floats from his moonlit forest wanderings,
And by enchantment led, there plights his troth
To the night’s Queen, a dew-crowned, milk-white Moth.
Now, while the garden drowses, and the cool
Of passing midnight deepens in the pool,
While all the flowers hang their heads, asleep--
Mysterious tryst two royal lovers keep.
The world rolls on; its load of hearts grown old;
And all the simple forms and feasts are cold.
But though men mock Love’s slowly fading wraith,
The Forest knows,--the flowers keep their Faith.
CAMOUFLAGE
Here is the waving river line, and here
A rail-road made
(And here float lilies white as those that were
Where Marsyas played.)
The thrilling sky is wild with wingéd planes
For air ship raid
(Yet--still steals up the hidden cirrus lanes
The Huntress Maid!)
The country road is gashed with lurid signs
Of commerce-gods:
(Yet bitter-sweet and seeding eglantines
Hang votive pods!)
The man who walks in front of me to work
Has pointed ears
(He speaks with modern emphasis and jerk
_So it appears_)--
But where he toils the chimneys range their pipes
In Syrinx form
(Who knows what midnight Dancing? or what types
Of dancers swarm?)
Ah! life is practical, the Moderns say
“No one escapes----”
(Ye Gods, _Who_ is that smiling such a way
Among the grapes?)
HOME-SICK
He sees the white moon climb the city skies,
Far over rank, black roofs and balconies,
And with her spectral radiance anoint
The slender lance of every steeple point.
Beneath his gaze, the brilliant streets converge,
And through the avenues the people surge.
Behind him are his walls where, numb and old
His books and pictures seem aloof and cold.
Below, he hears the gong and shout and call;
Sees the blank grief of many a plastered wall,
And bows himself upon the window sill,
In a communion motionless and still.
He leaves the temples where the merchants trade,
Leaves bright bazaar and marble collanade,
And hand and hand with the white moon he strays
Away to leafy lanes and country ways.
He vizualizes green of plashy mead
Of kneedeep grass, where lowing cattle feed,
Of orchard slope, scalloped with rosy bloom
And purple lilacs bursting into plume.
Electric beads may dot the cities plain,
But in his heart old candles flare again;
Old doors stand open, and beside old stiles
He leans, and listens as in other whiles.
So dreams; so wanders back to youth and home,
To swelling farms, to rich hill-breasted loam;
So hand in hand with the young moon he strays
Out of the city gates to the old days.
THE INTERPRETER
Last night I heard Masefield,
Heard that voice cold as a moonlit tomb
Reading old plays and masques
And gipsy drama of old England.
I saw strange eyes flickering--sad,
Set in a face recording vigils,
Moody, unfellowed prowlings
Vague contemplations and wanderings.
I saw his face, dream-magnetic,
Pale, withheld, until he told
Stories as odd as coins in a sailor’s chest;
Then mischief, like leaves danced on his brow,
And a smile like water shook on his face.
I heard the grind of creaking anchor chains
Felt ropes bruise, and felt the capstan pull,
Saw driven slanting masts, and saw the hoops
Slink as some halliard parted, and was caught.
I heard dead seamen’s lips
Recounting heaps of gold in sunken ships;
I saw the dumb eyes of pathetic women,
Horribly treated by wine-frenzied brutes.
Then as the lonely, chanting, stifled voice
Droned on, I saw heart-breaking Peace,
Green happy hedges, dreaming crofts and farms,
England--before the War!
Last night I heard Masefield.
He stood downcast on a little platform,
While I careened, helm up, full canvassed
Close-hauled on happy seas.
He stood limply on a little platform
World-blind before the rows of set, still, faces,
Absorbed in his faith of one maternal word
“Beauty.”
KLEPHTIC
“It would be strange if with such ample survival of
the ancient polytheism in modern law there were no
reminiscence of the Fauns, the Satyrs, the Pans of the
olden world."--RENNELL RODD.
Far in the mountains,
The mountains of Greece,
The cone fires burn.
Mid the pines and rocks,
And the tall shepherds wear
The curly white fleece,
And a man, with a beard,
Like a horse’s mane,
Plays a small pipe,
A carvéd pipe,
Till the goats come straggling in,
And the bees come drowsing by,
And the olives come dropping down;
And he will be playing like that,
And they will be coming like that,
Long after our solemn mummings cease
In the mountains, the mountains of Greece.
Far in the mountains,
The mountains of Greece,
The values are strange--
The worth of a tree,
The strength of a rock,
The health of a sheep,
The length of a brook,
The dip of a bird,
The wisdom of mules.
They will offer you grapes,
Or a horn-spoon of curd,
Or wine in a cup,
Or honey and bread;
And they will keep all these values,
These dear simple values
Long after our silly values cease,
In the mountains, the mountains of Greece.
In the mountains, the mountains of Greece
They lie in a cave,
And hark to wood-sounds,
Perhaps cross themselves,
Saying, aghast!
“There be wild things,
Hidden things, dread things.
Strange things, weird things, great things.”
(They quake, and are not very brave,)
But when they sleep and dream,
They dream as far as they please.
As grand and great as they please--
Of miles of red-fezzed Turks
Done to death by one Greek,
Of clouds that turn into men,
Of fountains with golden rain,
Of seas and golden ships,
Of reveling women and maids,
And hosts of little boys
Dressed in skins of fur,
Dancing and playing pipes;
And of Someone very strange,
With horns perhaps, but a smile,
A smile like hot sweet fire--
And they will be dreaming like that,
And thinking like that,
Long after our stupid teachings are dead.
Yea--Yea--Yea--
Long after we are dead,
In the mountains,
The mountains of Greece.
AT THE FEAST OF LIFE
You, who sit opposite and move your lips,
And toy with silver dish and graceful spoon,
And touch your wine-glass with reluctant sips--
Why do you pause, for it is afternoon.
What are your thoughts, that they should draw a mist
Before your sweet eyes, as the hours creep?
While others sing, and laugh and keep the feast,
A fast you keep.
Where dwells who now should come and feast with you?
Where fares he, years off--leagues off? Thirsts and prays
For the one sign to make his life come true?
For the one clue to lead him to your ways?
Will the feast last till he shall gain the halls?
Will fruits and wines still glow, will roses wait?
What if, in vain your tender name he calls--
Entering late?
If he should fail, I see you still serene,
Leaving the tables where the garlands die,
Passing the fountained courts that intervene
To the bright halls to bid the guests good-bye.
O, Proud! O, Pure! Where weary stairs ascend
I see you toil; your pallid candle shakes;
The wan rose at your bosom, as you bend,
Drops--faded flakes.
DEATH WITHIN DEATH
Thou wilt not smite him, Israfel?
Prone on his little couch he lies,
With the death-shadow in his eyes.
He thirsts, for what, I cannot tell.
Thou wilt not smite him, Israfel?
Thou must not smite him, Israfel.
For all his race throbs in his fame,
The sole hope of a noble name;
That small hand like a tinted shell
Holds high tradition, Israfel.
Thou canst not smite him, Israfel.
He turns his asking eyes on me.
I am his sun and moon and sea;
My life tides in his life-tides swell.
Thou canst not smite him, Israfel.
Since thou hast smitten, Israfel,
Know this, thy sword so bitter keen
Destroys a thing that might have been;
Yet, smiting him, it was as well
To kill my Soul, thou Israfel!
AT THE FLOWER-SHOW
A rosy haze misted the air, perfume
Of flower-flesh, like flesh of white younglings,
Fresh from a cool brook-bathing; gorse and broom,
Spotted hibiscus, purple cyclamen-wings.
Nimbus and halo floated in dewy gloom;
Quirled chaliced orchids, jasmine’s jewelled strings
Sprayed in warm aisles, in odorous room on room.
So quietly the human throng moved by,
It had seemed tranced, and even the dullest face
Was wistful, pensive, reverent of eye
Wandering the trellised paths with dreamy pace;
And there were soft communings, whispers shy--
Lovers at ease, seeing the leaves embrace.
Thus was it that I witnessed rivalry,
And rose-lipped envy in this blossom place.
“We are the most like you,” the young girls said.
“Our bodies satin smooth have vernal dowers;
Our hair gleams gold, our cheeks are sunshine fed;
Like bud and calyx are our hidden powers.”
Then was I, listening, rare astonished,
Hearing disclaimer from the iris towers,
Seeing demure, bright rose and lily head.
“_You are not very like us_,” sighed the flowers.
Then there came women made of night and stars,
Women of dusky eye and cirrus tress
From whom men rush to wreckage and to wars,
Frenzied of their inscrutable caress.
“We are like you,” they said, “competitors
For admiration; yea, in perfumed bowers”
Negation from green-hooded councilors,
“_You are not like us_,” soft condemned the flowers.
And then there drifted by hard graceless forms,
Dull, rayless eyes, that looked, yet had no sense
Of umbelled mysteries, of disks, and norms
Of myriad seed-cells, witherings recompense;
Unapprehending, they, of shining swarms,
Of pollen flight from downcast petal showers,
Nor guessed the Spell in seed-pod multiforms.
“_These surely are not like us_” breathed the flowers.
Then came an old woman, worn and sorrow-wise.
Creeping in slow persistance like a vine;
And there were wells of light within her eyes;
Her hair was milk-weed white. By every sign
Of age, dried stalk of past fecundities.
She was the silvern wraith of fair Design.
“Yea, richly did I spend Life’s vivid hours;
Mine has been Love and many children mine.”
“_Verily, Sweet, thou’rt like us_,” smiled the flowers!
TALISMANS
Just now the Mother left me, and I stand
Holding her trove, a sheaf of shining curl--
All that is left of “Once a little girl,”
Alive and warm and glowing in my hand.
Like to a Seer gazing into space,
I muse upon this silken treasure, where
The coiled lights quicken, and I see the fair
Woman-ward leaning of a childish face.
I see that face gaze down the crowded years,
Quite unamazed, unchanged through all the stir
To find the deep maternal heart of Her,
Who gazes back all undeterred by tears.
I see the child eyes give their radiant speech
Once more to mother-eyes that never failed;
I see a heart that never yet has quailed
Answer those eyes over the long years’ reach....
The Winter sun goes down; quick chills the air
Outside my window.... While the West grows old,
I stand in Sanctuary, for I hold
Undying Faith, enshrined in golden hair.
SUBLIMINAL
I should like to be very lonely indeed--
Much lonelier than I am;
With humbleness, like the humbleness of a weed,
And simplicity like the sun, and no other need
But to hold me free of pose and pretence and sham.
And then I should like to think such silent things,
As only the flowers think;
I should want the whole world to be greenly a wall of shine,
And I, leaning over, swimming in dreams of mine,
As a flower floats over a brink.
I should like to be very lonely indeed--
So the world would draw around me,
Like a green cave flower lit, echo and shadow keyed,
With a door that to naught but a path of clouds would lead,
Or the bed in a blossoming tree.
And then I would pipe my thoughts so shyly out,
And watch them dance, dryad dressed;
I would talk to a bit of moss or an acorn sprout;
I should drink all the stars and follow the darkness out,
And bathe in the Sea of the West!
THE WALLED CITY
Here is the mass, you see it astray and astruggle,
Deafened with noise, pushing and jestling along;
Pleasure and envy and greed, in a feverish juggle,
Outside the City of Song.
There are the Vapid, watching their hookah’s smoke-bubble;
There are the slothful, drunk at the wells of wrong;
At a scarlet booth is a Gypsy pleasing the rabble.
Outside the City of Song.
Here are the credulous, cheated to death by a thimble;
Here are the hungry stumbling on to the gong;
Here stands a lover grasping a treacherous symbol,
Outside the City of Song.
Whirl of pretense, of gilding, of tinsel, of glitter;
Strange that its patter and laughter can keep up so long;
Echo on echo of mocking and cat-call and twitter,
Outside the City of Song.
Long is the road, that they travel and know not the turning;
Black is the pit at the end, and the fear and the wrong;
But bitterest, blackest, their last inescapable yearning
For the lost City of Song.
While in its courts, where the fountains leap up to the zenith,
Dreamers and poets and lovers go all the day long,
Dazzled, and raptured with pondering all that it meaneth,
To dwell in the City of Song.
ON LILY STREET, NANTUCKET
On Lily Street, where drowsy crickets hum,
And two and two the summer lovers come,
Straying so happily their island paths,
Where the white candle flickers at a low-hung door,
I see soft hooded figures cross a bit of moor--
Hurrying, eager, they--
To hear you play.
Now as the moonlight slants on whitened roof,
And old New England still gives austere proof
Of bygone things in narrowed window glass,
The guests sit quiet in the panelled rooms
Content with half lights and half tinted glooms,
Because they know that they--
Shall hear you play.
And I who lean upon the leafy sill
Feel moonlight dreaming change to vagrom thrill,
And looking forth as on some lantern screen,
See, flitting o’er the stark old house-wall nigh.
Soft shadows of your vivid melody.
So--in an eerie way
I hear you play.
Till, on the house wall opposite my place
I see wild Carmen’s bright poinsettia face;
I see Grieg’s “Day break,” streaming up the sky.
Upon the old Nantucket houses blank
I watch Tannhouser’s Pilgrims climb in solemn rank,
--Past windows grey--the while you play.
Long on the bare screen grieves the “Butterfly.”
Then, as her Oriental sorrows die,
Forth doth the “Earl King” ride;
The Schumann “Warum” drops its pensive leaves,
Macdowell’s “Sea” its toppling billow heaves,
Chaminades, “Dancing Fay”
Trips, as you play.
But ere your noble hands have given their gift
Down on the town, the bells of Curfew drift,
The candle gutters at the low-hung door.
Yet, see; from this low window where I muse,
All Lily Street doth spectrally suffuse,
Glimmers each tiny pane.
You call it “moonlight,” but I think that they
The old Nantucketers, long passed away
Peer forth to hear you play!
THE “BLIND” ROAD, NANTUCKET
If you would find
Peace, and a lightened load,
And wells of delicate, salt, sweet-fern air,
And tranquil lines around you every where,
Follow the “blind” Rut Road.
It leads to liberties of yellow gorse,
To secret heather and to banks of bay;
It winds along the ocean, and its course
Is wet with wild sea-spray.
It leads along the swamps, where honey-ball
Hangs scented globes, where clethra scatters sweet,
By holly hedge, where pheasants thread the tall
Indigo plant, or flying sea-gulls meet.
It leads away from every fret and jar,
From everything that hurts and stings and tries;
Through green dwarf-pines, and hills of cinnebar,
Marshaling grasses up to windswept skies.
If you would find
Rest and forgetfulness and all things new,
Take the Rut Road, and it will bring to you
All dear forgotten things, things you see through,
But that this road holds sacred, being “blind.”
THE END OF THE SEASON--NANTUCKET
The hotel building sees its doom, aghast,
And all its windows fix in sullen stare,
For no girl-voices ring on sunset air,
And no bright-breasted youth goes speeding past.
The latticed roses and the phlox have cast
Their petals upon paths where lovers dreamed,
And grey old streets, where gauzy figures streamed,
Settle to lamp-lit quietness at last.
Yet there is endless romance on the moor;
The hawks o’er wine-red hollows stretch their wings,
Wild ducks loop Autumnward in ranging strings,
And swallows balance round time-silvered door;
High looms the bluff in castle like contour,
And wear the beach the full white breasts of dunes
Nourish sky-silence, while the sea communes
With shells, a-quiver to the foam’s allure.
MOVING MILESTONES--NANTUCKET
Midnight, Black, and a wild sea of stars,
A gold-white surf of stars whose sparkling foam
Breaks into waves on occult ether bars,
Where star-tides have their deep eternal home.
All night the solemn Wonder sweeps me by;
Arcturus, Vega, Spica cross the sky
On one fixed path, by laws that do not change,
Unfailing while all other laws derange.
Midnight, black; and a wild horde of fears,
The brains half-knowledge and the hearts fierce pride
Questions me cold and distant to my tears;
Yet on my thought the old true Visions glide--
Tenderness, Truth, Unselfishness; their lights
Travel the wastes and glimmer on the heights.
So may I keep my way, whose avatars
Gave me a path that leads beyond the Stars.
SOURCE
“If Beauty grows old, share it before it be gone, and if
it abides, why fear to give away what thou dost keep?”
By the Alpheus, where the reeds are blown
Aslant by winds that flick the tawny current,
There runs a path that is all overgrown
With low dwarf oaks and many a vine deterrent,
Which leads past grain and broad mulberry trees
To soft Olympia’s cool sanctities.
There, where the cypress makes a trancelike shade,
White pillars gleam, and floors of old mosaic,
Hold gemmy moss and tender bud and blade,
In hints of bygone Pyrrhic and Trochic--
In those fresh petal rhythms which Nature keeps
Like poems living where the poet sleeps.
And all about the place the Games go on.
The buoyant clouds fly swift to wingéd races;
One tall fir gives an Ode to Marathon,
And down the temple paths young sunlight paces;
And that strange rare Perfection, that is Greece,
Here holds its happy spell of calm and Peace.
Dreaming Olympia, whose footpaths take
Their secret way to temple and by column,
Thou art so far away. The blue daybreak
Is all war-reddened now, and the Vow solemn;
Yet, incandescent in those aisles of pines,
Thy same still tranquil beauty grayly shines.
And this is well, for after all the pain,
And all the hate, and all the human blunder,
How we shall need to bathe us once again
In baths of pure Greek beauty! Ah! the wonder
Hellas has ever held! Shall we not need
That wonder to rebuke our shame and greed?
Sylvan Olympia, keep the untouched dream
For years to come and for a noble future!
Bind all thy classic pathways to one Theme
Of Soaring Youth and starward high adventure!
So shall thy dusks, when wistful feet come roaming;
Mean always--world-pain healed, and spirits homing.
Typographical errors corrected by the etext transcriber:
Marks and the Palazzo Guistizia=>
Marks and the Palazzo Giustizia
{pg 13}
Giutsizia=>
Giustizia
{pg 19}
a wierd insistence=>
a weird insistence
{pg 20}
seista-hour=>
siesta-hour
{pg 22}
Wecome forestiere=>
Welcome forestiere
{pg 26}
war corrspondent=>
war correspondent
{pg 28}
scientic ways=>
scientific ways
{pg 47}
sends ship and men=>
sends ships and men
{pg 47}
fluttering Guidecca=>
fluttering Giudecca
{pg 60}
And gobules=>
And globules
{pg 76}
habors of the sky=>
harbors of the sky
{pg 76}
lilting rythm=>
lilting rhythm
{pg 99}
snowdorps quail=>
snowdrops quail
{pg 103}
Much lonlier=>
Much lonelier
{pg 119}