What else for these but, where their mortal lot

Of weak existence drags rent ends, to knot

The frail unravel up!--while love (afraid

Time will increase the burthen on it laid),

Seeks consolation, that consoleth not,

In toil and prayer, waiting what none evade.

VI

THE MESSAGE

Long shadows toward the east: and in the west

A blaze of garnet sunset, wherein rolled

One cloud like some great gnarly log of gold;

Each gabled casement of the farm seemed dressed

In ghosts of roses blossoming manifest.

And she had brought his letter there to read,

There on the porch, that faced the locust glade;

To watch the summer sunset burn and fade,

And breathe the twilight scent of wood and weed,

Forget all care and her soul’s hunger feed.

And on his face her fancy mused a while:

“Dark hair, dark eyes.--And now he has a beard

Dark as his hair.”--She smiled; yet almost feared

It changed him so she could not reconcile

Her heart to that which hid his lips and smile.

Then tried to feature, but could only see

The beardless man who bent to her and kissed

Her and their child and left them to enlist:

She heard his horse grind in the gravel: he

Waved them adieu and rode to fight with Lee.

Now all around her drowsed the hushful hum

Of evening insects. And his letter spoke

Of love and longings to her: nor awoke

One echo of the bugle and the drum,

But all their future in one kiss did sum.

The stars were thick now; and the western blush

Drained into darkness. With a dreamy sigh

She rocked her chair.--It must have been the cry

Of infancy that made her rise and rush

To where their child slept, and to hug and

hush.

Then she returned. But now her ease was gone.

She knew not what, she felt an unknown fear

Press, tightening, at her heart-strings; then a tear

Scalded her eyelids, and her cheeks grew wan

As helpless sorrow’s, and her white lips drawn.

With stony eyes she grieved against the skies,

A slow, dull, aching agony that knew

Few tears, and saw no answer shining to

Her silent questions in the stars’ still eyes

“Where Peace delays and where her soldier lies.”

They could have told her. Peace was far away,

Beyond the field that belched black batteries

All the red day. ’Mid picket silences,

On woodland mosses, in a suit of gray,

Shot through the heart, he by his rifle lay.

VII

THE WOMAN ON THE HILL

The storm-red sun, through wrecks of wind and rain,

And dead leaves driven from the frantic boughs,

Where, on the hill-top, stood a gaunt, gray house,

Flashed wildest ruby on each rainy pane.

Then woods grew darker than unburdened grief;

And, crimson through the woodland’s ruin, streamed

The sunset’s glare--a furious eye, which seemed

Watching the moon rise like a yellow leaf.

The rising moon, against which, like despair,

High on the hill, a woman, darkly drawn,

The wild leaves round her, stood; with features wan,

And tattered dress and wind-distracted hair.

As still as death, and looking, not through tears,

For the young face of one she knows is lost,

While in her heart the melancholy frost

Gathers of all the unforgotten years.

What if she heard to-night a hurrying hoof,

Wild as the whirling of the withered leaf,

Bring her a more immedicable grief,

A shattered shape to live beneath her roof!

The shadow of him who claimed her once as wife;

Her lover!--no!--the wreck of all their past

Brought back from battle!--Better to the last

A broken heart than heartbreak all her life!

MOSBY AT HAMILTON

Down Loudon lanes, with swinging reins,

And clash of spur and sabre,

And bugling of the battle-horn,

Six score and eight we rode that morn,

Six score and eight of Southern born,

All tried in war’s hot labor.

Full in the sun, at Hamilton,

We met the South’s invaders;

Who, over fifteen hundred strong,

’Mid blazing homes had marched along

All night, with Northern shout and song,

To crush the rebel raiders.

Down Loudon lanes, with streaming manes,

We spurred in wild March weather;

And all along our war-scarred way

The graves of Southern heroes lay--

Our guide-posts to revenge that day,

As we rode grim together.

Old tales still tell some miracle

Of Saints in holy writing--

But who shall say why hundreds fled

Before the few that Mosby led,

Unless it was that even the dead

Fought with us then when fighting.

While Yankee cheers still stunned our ears,

Of troops at Harper’s Ferry;

While Sheridan led on his Huns,

And Richmond rocked to roaring guns,

We felt the South still had some sons

She would not scorn to bury.

THE FEUD

Rocks, trees and rocks; and down a mossy stone

The murmuring ooze and trickle of a stream

Through brambles, where the mountain spring lies lone,--

A gleaming cairngorm where the shadows dream,--

And one wild road winds like a saffron seam.

Here sang the thrush, whose pure, mellifluous note

Dropped golden sweetness on the fragrant June;

Here cat-and blue-bird and wood-sparrow wrote

Their presence on the silence with a tune;

And here the fox drank ’neath the mountain moon.

Frail ferns and dewy mosses and dark brush,--

Impenetrable briers, deep and dense,

And wiry bushes;--brush, that seemed to crush

The struggling saplings with its tangle, whence

Sprawled out the ramble of an old rail-fence.

A wasp buzzed by; and then a butterfly

In orange and amber, like a floating flame;

And then a man, hard-eyed and very sly,

Gaunt-cheeked and haggard and a little lame,

With an old rifle, down the mountain came.

He listened, drinking from a flask he took

Out of the ragged pocket of his coat;

Then all around him cast a stealthy look;

Lay down; and watched an eagle soar and float,

His fingers twitching at his hairy throat.

The shades grew longer; and each Cumberland height

Loomed, framed in splendors of the dolphin dusk.

Around the road a horseman rode in sight;

Young, tall, blond-bearded. Silent, grim, and brusque,

He in the thicket aimed--Quick, harsh, then husk,

The echoes barked among the hills and made

Repeated instants of the shot’s distress.--

Then silence--and the trampled bushes swayed:--

Then silence, packed with murder and the press

Of distant hoofs that galloped riderless.

LYNCHERS

At the moon’s down-going, let it be

On the quarry hill with its one gnarled tree.

The red-rock road of the underbrush,

Where the woman came through the summer hush.

The sumac high and the elder thick,

Where we found the stone and the ragged stick.

The trampled road of the thicket, full

Of footprints down to the quarry pool.

The rocks that ooze with the hue of lead,

Where we found her lying stark and dead.

The scraggy wood; the negro hut,

With its doors and windows locked and shut.

A secret signal; a foot’s rough tramp;

A knock at the door; a lifted lamp.

An oath; a scuffle; a ring of masks;

A voice that answers a voice that asks.

A group of shadows; the moon’s red fleck;

A running noose and a man’s bared neck.

A word, a curse, and a shape that swings;

The lonely night and a bat’s black wings.

At the moon’s down-going, let it be

On the quarry hill with its one gnarled tree.

DEAD MAN’S RUN

He rode adown the autumn wood,

A man dark-eyed and brown;

A mountain girl before him stood

Clad in a homespun gown.

“To ride this road is death for you!

My father waits you there;

My father and my brother, too--

You know the oath they swear.”

He holds her by one berry-brown wrist,

And by one berry-brown hand;

And he hath laughed at her and kissed

Her cheek the sun hath tanned.

“The feud is to the death, sweetheart:

But forward must I ride.”--

“And if you ride to death, sweetheart,

My place is by your side.”

Low hath he laughed again and kissed

And helped her with his hand;

And they have galloped into the mist

That belts the autumn land.

And they had passed by Devil’s Den,

And come to Dead Man’s Run,

When in the brush rose up two men,

Each with a levelled gun.

“Down! down! my sister!” cries the one;--

She gives the reins a twirl.--

The other shouts, “He shot my son!

And now he steals my girl!”

The rifles crack: she will not wail:

He will not cease to ride:

But, oh! her face is pale, is pale,

And the red blood stains her side.

“Sit fast, sit fast by me, sweetheart!

The road is rough to ride!”--

The road is rough by gulch and bluff,

And her hair blows wild and wide.

“Sit fast, sit fast by me, sweetheart!

The bank is steep to ride!”--

The bank is steep for a strong man’s leap,

And her eyes are staring wide.

“Sit fast, sit fast by me, sweetheart!

The Run is swift to ride!”--

The Run is swift with mountain drift,

And she sways from side to side.

Is it a wash of the yellow moss,

Or drift of the autumn’s gold,

The mountain torrent foams across

For the dead pine’s roots to hold?

Is it the bark of the sycamore,

Or peel of the white birch-tree,

The mountaineer on the other shore

Hath followed and still can see?

No mountain moss or leaves, wild rolled,

No bark of birchen-gray!--

Young hair of gold and a face death-cold

The wild stream sweeps away.

THE RAID

I

Far in the forest, where the rude road winds

Through twisted briers and weeds, stamped down and caked

With mountain mire, the clashing boughs are raked

Again with rain whose sobbing frenzy blinds.

There is a noise of winds; a gasp and gulp

Of swollen torrents; and the sodden smell

Of woodland soil, dead trees--that long since fell

Among the moss--red-rotted into pulp.

Fogged by the rain, far up the mountain glen,

Deep in a cave, an elfish wisp of light;

And stealthy shadows stealing through the night

With strong, set faces of determined men.

II

’Twixt fog and fire, in pomps of chrysoprase,

Above vague peaks, the morning hesitates

Ere, o’er the threshold of her golden gates,

Speeds the wild splendor of her chariot’s rays.

A gleaming glimmer in the sun-speared mist,

A cataract, reverberating, falls:

Upon a pine a gray hawk sits and calls,

Then soars away no bigger than a fist.

Along the wild path, through the oaks and firs,--

Rocks, where the rattler coils himself and suns,--

Big-booted, belted, and with twinkling guns,

The posse marches with its moonshiners.

THE BROTHERS

Not far from here, it lies beyond

That low-hilled belt of woods. We ’ll take

This unused lane where brambles make

A wall of twilight, and the blond

Brier-roses pelt the path and flake

The margin waters of a pond.

This is its fence--or that which was

Its fence once--now, rock rolled from rock,

One tangle of the vine and dock,

Where bloom the wild petunias;

And this its gate, the ragweeds block,

Hot with the insects’ dusty buzz.

Two wooden posts, wherefrom has peeled

The weather-blistered paint, still rise;

Gaunt things--that groan when some one tries

The gate whose hinges, rust-congealed,

Snarl open:--on each post still lies

Its carven panther with a shield.

We enter; and between great rows

Of locusts winds a grass-grown road;

And at its glimmering end,--o’erflowed

With quiet light,--the white front shows

Of an old mansion, grand and broad,

With grave, Colonial porticoes.

Grown thick around it, dark and deep,

The locust trees make one vast hush;

Their brawny branches crowd and crush

Its very casements, and o’ersweep

Its rotting roofs: their tranquil rush

Haunts all its spacious rooms with sleep.

Still is it called The Locusts; though

None lives here now. A tale ’s to tell

Of some dark thing that here befell;

A crime that happened years ago,

When past its walls, with shot and shell,

The war swept on and left it so.

For one black night, within it, shame

Made revel, while, all here about,

With prayer or curse or battle-shout,

Men died and homesteads leapt in flame:

Then passed the conquering Northern rout,

And left it silent and the same.

Why should I speak of what has been?

Or what dark part I played in all?

Why ruin sits in porch and hall

Where pride and gladness once were seen;

And why beneath this lichened wall

The grave of Margaret is green.

Heart-broken Margaret! whose fate

Was sadder far than his who won

Her hand--my brother Hamilton--

Or mine, who learned to know too late;

Who learned to know, when all was done,

And naught I did could expiate.

To expiate is still my lot!--

And, like the Ancient Mariner,

To show to others how things were,

And what I am, still helps me blot

A little from that crime’s red blur,

That on my life is branded hot.

He was my only brother. She

A sister of my brother’s friend.

They met, and married in the end.

And I remember well when he

Brought her rejoicing home, the trend

Of war moved towards us sullenly.

And scarce a year of wedlock when

Its red arms tore him from his bride.

With lips by hers thrice sanctified

He left to ride with Morgan’s men.

And I--I never could decide--

Remained behind. It happened then.

Long days went by. And, oft delayed,

A letter came of loving word

Scrawled by some camp-fire, sabre-stirred,

Or by a pine-knot’s fitful aid,

When in the saddle, armed and spurred

And booted for some hurried raid.

Then weeks went by. I do not know

How long it was before there came,

Blown from the North, the clarion fame

Of Morgan, who, with blow on blow,

Had drawn a line of blood and flame

From Tennessee to Ohio.

Then letters ceased; and days went on.

No word from him. The war rolled back,

And in its turgid crimson track

A rumor grew, like some wild dawn,

All ominous and red and black,

With news of our lost Hamilton.

News hinting death or capture. Yet

No word was sure; till one day,--fed

By us,--some men rode up who said

They’d been with Morgan and had met

Disaster, and that he was dead,

My brother.--I and Margaret

Believed them. Grief was ours too:

But mine was more for her than him:

Grief, that her eyes with tears were dim:

Grief, that became the avenue

For love, who crowned the sombre brim

Of death’s dark cup with rose-red hue.

In sympathy,--unconsciously

Though it be given,--I hold, doth dwell

The germ of love that time shall swell

To blossom. Sooner then in me--

When close relations so befell--

That love should spring from sympathy.

Our similar tastes and mutual bents

Combined to make us intimates

From our first meeting. Different states

Of interest then our temperaments

Begot. Then friendship, that abates

No love, whose soul it represents.

These led to talks and dreams: how oft

We sat at some wide window while

The sun sank o’er the hills’ far file,

Serene; and of the cloud aloft

Made one vast rose; and mile on mile

Of firmament grew sad and soft.

And all in harmony with these

Dim clemencies of dusk, afar

Our talks and dreams went; while the star

Of evening brightened through the trees:

We spoke of home; the end of war;

We dreamed of life and love and peace.

How on our walks, in listening lanes

Or confidences of the wood,

We paused to hear the dove that cooed;

Or gathered wildflowers, taking pains

To find the fairest; or her hood

Filled with wild fruit that left deep stains.

No echo of the drum or fife,

No hint of conflict entered in

Our thoughts then. Will you call it sin--

Indifference to a nation’s strife?

What side might lose, what side might win,

Both immaterial to our life.

Into the past we did not look:

Beyond what was we did not dream;

While onward rolled the thunderous stream

Of war, that, in its torrent, took

One of our own. No crimson gleam

Of its wild course around us shook.

At last we knew. And when we learned

How he had fallen, Margaret

Wept; and, albeit my eyes were wet,

Within my soul I half discerned

A joy that mingled with regret,

A grief that to relief was turned.

As time went on and confidence

Drew us more strongly each to each,

Why did no intimation reach

Its warning hand into the dense

Soul-silence, and confuse the speech

Of love’s unbroken eloquence!

But, no! no hint to turn the poise,

Or check the impulse of our youth;

To chill it with the living truth

As with the awe of God’s own voice;

No hint, to make our hope uncouth;

No word, to warn us from our choice.

To me a wall seemed overthrown

That social law had raised between;

And o’er its ruin, broad and green

A path went, I possessed alone;

The sky above seemed all serene;

The land around seemed all my own.

What shall I say of Margaret

To justify her part in this?

That her young heart was never his?

But had been mine since first we met?

So would you say!--Enough it is

That when he left she loved him yet.

So passed the spring, and summer sped;

And early autumn brought the day

When she her hand in mine should lay,

And I should take her hand and wed:

And still no hint that might gainsay,

No warning word of quick or dead.

The day arrived; and with it born,

A battle, sullying the East

With boom of cannon, that increased,

And throb of musket and of horn:

Until at last, towards dusk, it ceased;

And men with faces wild and worn,

In fierce retreat, swept past; now groups;

Now one by one: now sternly white,

Or blood-stained; now with looks whose fright

Said all was lost: then sullen troops

That, beaten, still kept up the fight.--

Then came the victors: shadowy loops

Of men and horse, that left a crowd

Of officers in hall and porch....

While through the land, around, the torch

Circled, and many a fiery cloud

Marked out the army’s iron march

In furrows red that pillage plowed,

Here were we wedded.... Ask the years

How such could be, while over us

A sword of wrath swung ominous,

And on our cheeks its breath struck fierce!--

All I remember is--’t was thus;

And Margaret’s eyes were wet with tears.

No other cause my memory sees

Save this, _that_ night was set; and when

I found my home filled with armed men

With whom were all my sympathies

Of Union--why postpone it then?

So argued conscience into peace.

And then it was, when night had passed,

There came to me an orderly

With word of a Confederate spy

Just taken; who, with head downcast,

Had asked one favor, this: “That I

Would see him ere he breathed his last.”

I stand alone here. Heavily

My thoughts go back. Had I not gone,

The dead had still been dead! (for none

Had yet believed his story) he,

My dead-deemed brother, Hamilton,

Who in the spy confronted me.

O you who never have been tried,

How can you judge me!--In my place

I saw him standing,--who can trace

My heart-thoughts then!--I turned aside,

A son of some unnatural race,

And did not speak: and so he died....

In hospital or prison, when

It was he lay; what had forbid

His home return so long: amid

What hardships he had suffered, then

I dared not ask; and when I did,

Long afterwards, inquire of men,

No thing I learned. But this I feel--

He who had so returned to life

Was not a spy. Through stress and strife,--

This makes my conscience hard to heal!--

He had escaped: he sought his wife;

He sought his home that should conceal.

And Margaret! Oh, pity her!

A criminal I sought her side,

Still thinking love was justified

In all for her--whatever were

The price: a brother thrice denied,

Or thrice a brothers murderer.

Since then long years have passed away.

And through those years, perhaps, you ’ll ask

How to the world I wore my mask

Of honesty?--I can but say

Beyond my powers it was a task;

Before my time it turned me gray.

And when at last the ceaseless hiss

Of conscience drove, and I betrayed

All to her, she knelt down and prayed:

Then rose: and ’twixt us an abyss

Was opened; and she seemed to fade

Out of my life: I came to miss

The sweet attentions of a bride:

For each appealing heart’s caress

In me her heart assumed a dress

Of dull indifference; till denied

To me was all responsiveness;

And then I knew her love had died.

Ah, had she loaded me, perchance,

With wild reproach or even hate,

Such would have helped me hope and wait

Forgiveness and returned romance:

But ’twixt our souls, instead, a gate

She closed of silent tolerance.

Yet, ’t was for love of her I lent

My soul to crime.... I question me

Often, if less entirely

I’d loved her, then, in that event

She had been justified to see

The deed alone stand prominent.

The deed alone! But love records

In his own heart, I will aver,

No depth I did not feel for her

Beyond the plummet-reach of words:

And though there may be worthier,

No truer love this world affords

Than mine was, though it could not rise

Above itself. And so ’t was best,

Perhaps, that she saw manifest

The crime, so I,--as saw her eyes,--

Might see; and so, in soul confessed,

Some life atonement might devise.

Sadly my heart one comfort keeps,

That, towards her end, she took my hands

And said,--as one who understands,--

“Had I but seen!--But love that weeps

Sees only as its loss commands.”

And sighed.--Beneath this stone she sleeps.

Yes; I have suffered for that sin:

Yet in no instance would I shun

What I should suffer. Many a one,

Who heard my tale, has tried to win

Me to believe that Hamilton

It was not; and, though proven kin,

This had not saved him. Still the stain

Of the intention--had I erred

And ’t was not he--had writ the word

Red on my soul that branded Cain:

For still my error had incurred

The fact of guilt that would remain.

* * * * *

Ah, love at best is insecure,

And lives with doubt and vain regret;

And hope and faith, with faces set

Upon the past, are never sure;

And through their fever, grief, and fret

The heart may fail that should endure.

For in ourselves, however blend

The passions that make heaven and hell,

Is evil not accountable

For most the good we comprehend?

And through these two,--or ill, or well,--

Man must evolve his spiritual end.

It is with deeds that we must ask

Forgiveness: for, upon this earth,

Life walks alone from very birth

With death, hope tells us is a mask

For life beyond of vaster worth,

Where sin no more sets love a task.

EPILOGUE

_Would I could sing of joy I only

Remember as without alloy:

Of life full-filled, that once was lonely:

Of love a treasure, not a toy:

Of grief, regret but makes the keener,

Of aspiration, failure mars--

These would I sing, and sit serener.

Than song among the stars._

_Would I could sing of faith unbroken;

Of heart-kept vows, and not of tears:

Of promised faith and vows love-spoken,

That have been kept through many years:

Of truth, the false but leaves the truer;

Of trust, the doubt makes doubly sure--

These would I sing, the noble doer

Whose dauntless heart is pure._

_I would not sing of time made hateful;

Of hope that only clings to hate:

Of charity, that grows ungrateful;

And pride that will not stand and wait.--_

_Of humbleness, care hath imparted;

Of resignation, born of ills,

These would I sing, and stand high-hearted

As hope upon the hills._

_Once on a throne of gold and scarlet

I touched a harp and felt it break;

I dreamed I was a king--a varlet,

A slave, who only slept to wake!--

Still on that harp my memory lingers,

While on a tomb I lean and read,

“Dust are our songs, and dust we singers,

And dust are all who heed.”_

POEMS OF LOVE

_What though I dreamed of mountain heights,

Of peaks, the barriers of the world,

Around whose tops the Northern Lights

And tempests are unfurled!_

_Mine are the footpaths leading through

Life’s lowly fields and woods,--with rifts,

Above, of heaven’s Eden blue,--

By which the violet lifts_

_Its shy appeal; and, holding up

Its chaliced gold, like some wild wine,

Along the hillside, cup on cup,

Blooms bright the celandine._

_Where soft upon each flowering stock

The butterfly spreads damask wings;

And under grassy loam and rock

The cottage cricket sings._

_Where overhead eve blooms with fire,

In which the new moon bends her bow,

And, arrow-like, one white star by her

Burns through the afterglow._

_I care not, so the sesame

I find; the magic flower there,

Whose touch unseals each mystery

In water, earth, and air._

_That in the oak tree lets me hear

Its heart’s deep speech, its soul’s dim words;

And to my mind makes crystal clear

The messages of birds._

_Why should I care, who live aloof

Beyond the din of life and dust,

While dreams still share my humble roof,

And love makes sweet my crust._

GERTRUDE

When first I gazed on Gertrude’s face,

Beheld her loveliness and grace;

Her brave gray eyes, her raven hair,

Her ways, more winsome than the spring’s;

Her smile, like some sweet flower, that flings

Its fragrance on the summer air;

And when, like some wild-bird that sings,

I heard her voice,--I did declare,--

And still declare!--there is no one,

No girl beneath the moon or sun,

So beautiful to look upon!

And to my heart, as I know well,

Nothing seems more desirable,--

Not Ophir gold, nor Orient pearls--

Than seems this jewel-girl of girls.

LOVE

For him, who loves, each mounting morn

Breathes melody more sweet than birds’;

And every wind-stirred flower and thorn

Whispers melodious words:--

Would you believe that everything

Through _her_ loved voice is made to sing?

For her, the faultless skies of day

Grow nearer in eternal blue,

Where God is felt as wind and ray,

And seen as fire and dew:--

Would you believe that all the skies

Are Heaven only through _his_ eyes?

For them, the dreams that haunt the night

With mystic beauty and romance,

Are presences of starry light,

And moony radiance:--

Would you believe this love of theirs

Could make for them a universe?

HEART OF MY HEART

I

Here where the season turns the land to gold,

Among the fields our feet have known of old,--

When we were children who would laugh and run,

Glad little playmates of the wind and sun,--

Before came toil and care and years went ill,

And one forgot and one remembered still;

Heart of my heart, among the old fields here,

Give me your hands and let me draw you near,

Heart of my heart.

II

Stars are not truer than your soul is true;

What need I more of heaven then than you?

Flowers are not sweeter than your face is sweet--

What need I more to make my world complete?

O woman nature, love that still endures,

What strength hath ours that is not born of yours?

Heart of my heart, to you, whatever come,

To you the lead, whose love hath led me home.

Heart of my heart.

STROLLERS

I

We have no castles,

We have no vassals,

We have no riches, no gems and no gold:

Nothing to ponder;

Nothing to squander--

Let us go wander

As minstrels of old.

II

You with your lute, love;

I with my flute, love,

Let us make music by mountain and sea:

You with your glances,

I with my dances,

Singing romances

Of old chivalry.

III

“Derry down derry!

Good folk, be merry!

Hither! and hearken where happiness is!

Never go borrow

Care of to-morrow,

Never go sorrow

While life hath a kiss!”

IV

Let the day gladden,

Or the night sadden,

We will be merry in sunshine or snow:

You with your rhyme, love,

I with my chime, love,

We will make Time, love,

Dance as we go.

V

Nothing is ours;

Only the flowers,

Meadows, and stars, and the heavens above:

Nothing to lie for,

Nothing to sigh for,

Nothing to die for

While still we have love.

VI

“Derry down derry!

Good folk, be merry!

Hither! and hearken a word that is sooth:--

Care ye not any,

If ye have many,

Or not a penny,

If still ye have youth!”

THE BURDEN OF DESIRE

I

In some dim way I know thereof:

A garden glows down in my heart,

Wherein I meet and often part

With many an ancient tale of love.

A Romeo garden, banked with bloom,

And trellised with the eglantine;

In which a rose climbs to a room,

A balcony one mass of vine,

Dim, haunted of perfume.

A balcony, whereon she gleams,

The soft Desire of all Dreams,

And smiles and bends like Juliet,

Year after year,

While to her side, all dewy wet,

A rose stuck in his ear,

Love climbs to draw her near.

II

And in another way I know,

Down in my soul a graveyard lies,

Wherein I meet, in ghostly wise,

With many an ancient tale of woe.

A graveyard of the Capulets,

Deep-vaulted with ancestral gloom,

Through whose dark yews the moonlight jets

On many a wildly carven tomb,

That mossy mildew frets.

A graveyard where the Soul’s Desire

Sleeps, pale-entombed; and, kneeling by her,

Love, like that hapless Montague,

Year after year,

Weary and worn and wild of hue,

Within her sepulchre,

Falls bleeding on her bier.

THE TRYST

At dusk there fell a shower:

The leaves were dripping yet:

Each fern and rain-weighed flower

Around was gleaming wet,

When, through the evening glower,

His feet towards her were set.

The dust’s damp odor sifted

Around him, cool with rain,

Mixed with the musk that drifted

From woodland and from plain,

Where white her garden lifted

Its pickets down the lane.

And there she stood! ’mid scattered

Clove-pink and pea and whorl

Of honeysuckle,--flattered

To sweetness wild,--a girl,

O’er whom the clouds hung shattered

In moonlit peaks of pearl.

She made the night completer

For him; and earth and air,

In that small spot, far sweeter

Than heaven or anywhere.--

Swift were his lips to greet her,

Her lips love lifted there.

GYPSYING

Your heart ’s a-tune with April and mine a-tune with June,

So let us go a-roving beneath the summer moon.

Oh, was it in the sunlight, or was it in the rain,

We met among the blossoms within the locust lane?

All that I can remember ’s the bird that sang aboon,

And with its music in our hearts we ’ll rove beneath the moon.

A love-word of the wind, dear, of which we ’ll read the rune,

While we two go a-roving beneath the summer moon.

A love-word of the water we ’ll often stop to hear--

The echoed words and whispers of our own hearts, my dear.

And all our paths shall blossom with wild-rose sweets that swoon,

And with their fragrance in our hearts we ’ll rove beneath the moon.

It will not be forever; yet merry goes the tune

While we two still are rovers beneath the summer moon.

A cabin, in the clearing, of flickering firelight,

When old-time lanes we strolled in the winter snows make white:

Where we can dream together above the logs and croon

The songs we sang when roving beneath the summer moon.

UNCERTAINTY

“_‘He cometh not,’ she said._”--Mariana.

It will not be to-day and yet

I think and dream it will; and let

The slow uncertainty devise

So many sweet excuses, met

With the old doubt in hope’s disguise.

The panes were sweated with the dawn;

Yet through their dimness, shriveled drawn,

The aigret of one princess-feather,

One monk’s-hood tuft with oilets wan,

I glimpsed, dead in the slaying weather.

This morning when my window’s chintz

I drew, how gray the day was!--Since

I saw him, yea, all days are gray!--

I gazed out on my dripping quince,

Defruited, torn; then turned away

To weep, but did not weep: but felt

A colder anguish than did melt

About the tearful-visaged Year!--

Then flung the lattice wide and smelt

The autumn sorrow. Rotting near

The rain-drenched sunflowers bent and bleached,

Up which the frost-nipped gourd-vines reached

And morning-glories, seeded o’er

With ashen aiglets; whence beseeched

One last bloom, frozen to the core.

The podded hollyhocks--that Fall

Had stripped of finery--by the wall

Rustled their tatters; dripped and dripped,

The fog thick on them: near them, all

The tarnished, hag-like zinnias tipped.

I felt the death and loved it: yea,

To have it nearer, sought the gray,

Chill, fading garth. Yet could not weep,

But wandered in an aimless way,

And yearned with weariness to sleep.

Mine were the fog, the frosty stalks,

The weak lights on the leafy walks,

The shadows shivering with the cold;

The breaking heart; the lonely talks;

The last, dim, ruined marigold.

But when, to-night, the moon swings low--

A great marsh-marigold of glow--

And all my garden with the sea

Moans, then, through moon and mist, I know

His ghost will come to comfort me.

LOST LOVE

I loved her madly. For--so wrought

Young Love, divining Isles of Truth

Large in the central seas of Youth--

“Love will win love,” I thought.

Once when I brought a rare wild pink

To place among her plants, the wise,

Soft lifting of her speaking eyes

Said more than thanks, I think....

She loved another.--Yes, I know

All you would say of woman. You,

Like other men, would comfort too....

But then I loved her so.

She loved another.--Ah! too well

I know the story of her soul!--

A weary tale the weary whole

Of how she loved and fell.

I loved her so!... Remembering now

My mad grief then, I wonder why

Grief never kills.... I could not die.--

She died--I know not how.

Strange, is it not? For she was dear

To me as life once.--A regret

She is now; just to make eyes wet

And bring a fullness here.

Yet, had she lived as dead in shame

As now in death, Love would have used

Pride’s pitying pencil and abused

The memory of her name.

This helps me thank my God, who led

My broken life in sunlight of

This pure affection, that my love

Lives through her being dead.

OVERSEAS

_Non numero horas nisi serenas._

When fall drowns morns in mist, it seems

In soul I am a part of it;

A portion of its humid beams,

A form of fog, I seem to flit

From dreams to dreams.

An old chateau sleeps ’mid the hills

Of France: an avenue of sorbs

Conceals it: drifts of daffodils

Bloom by a ’scutcheoned gate with barbs

Like iron bills.

I pass the gate unquestioned, yet,

I feel, announced. Broad holm-oaks make

Dark pools of restless violet.

Between high bramble banks a lake,--

As in a net.

The tangled scales twist silver,--shines ...

Gray, mossy turrets swell above

A sea of leaves. And where the pines

Shade ivied walls, there lies my love,

My heart divines.

I know her window, dimly seen

From distant lanes with hawthorn hedged:

Her garden, with the nectarine

Espaliered, and the peach-tree, wedged

’Twixt walls of green.

Cool-babbling a fountain falls

From gryphons’ mouths in porphyry;

Carp haunt its waters; and white balls

Of lilies dip it that the bee

Sucks in and drawls.

And butterflies, each with a face

Of faëry on its wings, that seem

Beheaded pansies, softly chase

Each other down the gloom and gleam

Trees interspace.

And roses! roses, soft as vair,

Round sylvan statues and the old

Stone dial--Pompadours that wear

Their royalty of purple and gold

With queenly air....

Her scarf, her lute, whose ribbons breathe

The perfume of her touch; her gloves,

Modeling the daintiness they sheathe;

Her fan, a Watteau, gay with loves,

Lie there beneath

A bank of eglantines that heaps

A rose-strewn shadow.--Naïve-eyed,

With lips as suave as they, she sleeps;

The romance by her, open wide,

O’er which she weeps.

AT THE STILE

Young Harry leapt over the stile and kissed her,

Over the stile when the sun was sinking;

’T was only Carrie; just Mary’s sister!--

And love hath a way of thinking.

“Thy pail, sweetheart, I will take and carry.”

Over the stile one star hung yellow.--

“Just to the spring, my dearest Harry.”--

And Love is a heartless fellow.

“Thou saidst me ‘yea’ in an April shower

Under this tree with leaves a-quiver.”--

“I say thee nay now the cherry ’s in flower,

And love is taker and giver.”

“O false! thou art false to me, sweetheart!”--

The light in her eyes grew trist and trister:

“To thee, the stars, and myself, sweetheart,

I never was aught but Mary’s sister.

“Sweet Mary’s sister! just little Carrie!--

But what avail my words or weeping?--

Next month, perhaps, you two will marry--

And I in my grave be sleeping.”

Alone she stands ’mid the meadow millet,

Wan as the petals the wind is strewing:

Some tears in her pail as she stoops to fill it--

And love hath a way of doing.

FERN-SEED

“_We have the receipt of fern-seed; we walk invisible._”--Henry IV.

And you and I have met but thrice!--

Three times enough to make me love!--

I praised your hair once; then your glove;

Your eyes; your gown--you were like ice.

And yet this might suffice, my love,

And yet this might suffice.

I know now what it is I’ll do:

I’ll search and find the ferns that grow,

The fern-seed that the fairies know,

And sprinkle fern-seed in my shoe,

And haunt the steps of you, my dear,

And haunt the steps of you.

You ’ll see the poppy-pods dip here,

The blow-ball of the thistle slip,

And no wind breathing--but my lip

Next to your anxious cheek and ear,

To tell you I am near, my love,

To tell you I am near.

On wood-ways I will tread your gown--

You ’ll know it is no brier!--then

I’ll whisper words of love again,

And smile to see your quick face frown;

And then I ’ll kiss it down, my dear,

And then I ’ll kiss it down.

You ’ll sit at home and read or knit,

When suddenly the page is blotted--

My hands!--or all your needles knotted:

And in your rage you ’ll cry a bit:

But I--I ’ll laugh at it, my love,

But I--I ’ll laugh at it.

The secrets which you say at prayer

I too will hear; or, when you sing,

I too will sing, and whispering

Bend down and kiss your eyes and hair,

And you will know me there, my dear,

And you will know me there.

Would it were true what people say!--

Would I _could_ find that faëry seed!

Then would I win your love, indeed,

By being near you night and day:--

There is no other way, my love,

There is no other way.

PORPHYROGENITA

I

Was it when Kriemhild was queen

That we rode by ways forgotten

Through the Rhineland, dimly seen

’Neath a low moon white as cotton?

I, a knight? or troubadour?

Thou, a princess?--or a poor

Damsel of the Royal Closes?--

For, I met thee--somewhere sure!...

Was it ’mid Kriemhilda’s roses?

II

Or in Venice, by the sea?--

What romance grew up between us?

Thou, a doge’s daughter?--She,

Titian painted once as Venus?--

I, a gondolier whose barque

Glided past thy palace dark?--

Near St. Mark’s? or Casa d’Oro?--

From thy casement didst thou hark

To my barcarolle’s “_Te oro_”?

III

Klaia wast, of Egypt: yea,

Languid as its sacred lily.

Didst with me a year and day

Love upon the Isle of Philæ?

I, a priest of Isis?--Sweet,

’Neath the date-palms did we meet

By a temple’s pillared marble?

While, from its star-still retreat,

Sank the nightingale’s wild warble?

IV

Have I dreamed that I, thy slave,

From thy lattice, my sultana,

Beckoning, thy white hand did wave,

Dropped me once a rose? sweet manna

Of thy kiss warm in its heart?

That, through my Chaldæan art,

With thy Khalif’s bags of treasure,

From Damascus we did start,

Fled to some far land of pleasure?

V

Was I one? another thou?--

Let it be. What of it, dearest?--

Haply ’tis the memory now

Of these passions dead thou fearest?--

Nay! those loves are portions of,

Evolutions of this love,

Present love, where thou appearest

To combine them all and prove.

THE CASTLE OF LOVE

_He speaks_

I

Now listen! ’tis time that you knew it.--

Like the prince in the Asian tale,

I wandered on deserts that panted

With noon to a castle enchanted,

That Afrits had built in a vale;

A vale where the sunlight lay pale

As moonlight. And round it and through it

I searched and I searched. Like the tale,

II

No eunuch, black-browed as a Marid,

Prevented me. Shadows it seemed

Were the slaves there, with kohl and with henné

In eyes and on fingers; and many

The phantoms of beauty, that dreamed

Where censers of ambergris steamed.

And I came on a colonnade, quarried

From silvery marble it seemed.

III

And here, in a court, wide, estraded,

Rich tulips, like carbuncles, bloomed,

And jonquils and roses:--and lories,

And cockatoos, brilliant in glories

Of plumes, like great blossoms illumed,

Winged, splashed in a fountain perfumed:

Kept captive by network of braided,

Spun gold where stone galleries gloomed.

IV

From nipples of back-bending Peris

Of gold, glowing auburn, in rays

The odorous fountain sprang calling:

I heard through the white water’s falling,--

As soft as the zephyr that plays

With moonlight on bloom-haunted ways,--

A music; a sound, as if fairies

Touched wind-harps whose chords were of rays.

V

I followed: through corridors paneled

With sandal; through doorways deep-draped

With stuffs of Chosroës, rich-garded

With Indian gold; up the corded

Stone stairway, bronze-dragoned, wing-shaped:

Through moon-spangled hangings escaped--

’Twixt pillars of juniper channeled--

To a room constellated and draped.

VI

As in legends of witchcraft: a vassal

Of visions beholds naught yet hears

Sweet voices that call and he follows,--

So me, like the fragrance of aloes,

That chamber with song, it appears,

Surrounded; the song of the spheres ...

My soul found your soul such a castle--

Your love is the music it hears.

CONSECRATION

_She speaks._

Last night you told me, where we, parting, waited,

Of love somehow I’d known before you told.--

Long, long ago, perhaps, this love was fated,

For why was it made suddenly so old?

Is it because the love we have and cherish

Born with us seems, and as ourselves shall last?

Part of our lives, we can not let it perish

Out of our present’s future or its past?

Yet, all was changed; and, still, I did not wonder

That, robed in vaster splendor, broke the dawn:

Nor marvel that, beside my feet and under,

Each flower seemed fairer than the flower gone.

The wild bird’s silvery warble seemed completer;

A whiter magic filled the morn and noon,

And night--each night!--seemed holier grown and sweeter

With Babylonian witchcraft of the moon.--

Is love an emanation? whose ideal

Communicates its beauty?--Is it moved

Through some strange means to consecrate the real?

Making the world the worthier to be loved?

ROMANTIC LOVE

I

Is it not sweet to know?--

The moon hath told me so--

That in some lost romance, love,

Long lost to us below,

A knight with casque and lance, love,

A thousand years ago,

I kissed you from a trance, love?--

The moon hath told me so.

II

Or were it strange to wis?--

The stars have told me this--

That once a nightingale, love,

Sang on an Isle of Greece;

From whose melodious wail, love,

Its song’s wild harmonies,

Was born a spirit-woman--

Yourself! whom I, a human,

Made mine!... So goes the tale, love!--

The stars have told me this.

III

Is it not quaint to tell?--

The flowers remember well--

How once a wild-rose blew, love,

Dim in a haunted dell;

To which a bee was true, love.

The bee, so it befell,

Was _I_: the rose was _you_, love!...

The flowers remember well.

IV

To moon and flower and star

We are not what we are.--

Sometimes, from o’er that sea, love,

Whose golden sands are far,--

From shores of Destiny, love,--

The dreams that know no bar,

Will waft a truth that glistens

To Memory who listens,

Reminding you and me, love,

We are not what we are.

PASTORAL LOVE

The pied pinks tilt in the wind that worries--

Sing, Oh, the wind and the red o’ her cheek!--

And the slow sun creeps on the rye nor hurries--

And what shall a lover speak?

The toad-flax brightens the flaxen hollows--

Sing, Ay, the bloom and her yellow hair!--

And the greenwood brook a wood-way follows--

And what shall a lover dare?

The deep woods gleam that the sunlight sprinkles--

Sing, Hey, the day and her laughing eye!--

And a brown bird pipes and a wild fall tinkles--

And what may a maid reply?

Hey, the hills when the evening settles!

Oh, the heavens within her eyes!

What will he ask ’mid the dropping petals?

And what will she say with sighs?--

“Look, where the west is a blur of roses!”--

“There’s naught like the rose o’ the cheeks I see!”--

“Look, where the first star’s eye uncloses!”--

“But what of _your_ eyes, my destiny?”

ANDALIA AND THE SPRINGTIME

I

Blow, winds, and waken her!

You, who have taken her,

Never forsaken her,

Filled her with spring!

My mad and merriest

Part of the veriest

Season and cheeriest:

Blow, winds! and sing,

Birds of the spring! that taught her

Airs of the woods; this daughter

Wild of the winds, that waft her

Into my heart with laughter,

Wild as a wildwood thing.

II

She, who is fraught with it,

Thrilled with it, brought with it,

Spring!--like a thought, with it

Beautiful too!

Now like a dream of it;

Filled with the gleam of it;

Now a bright beam of it,

Piercing me through,

Sweet, with her eyes that are often

Laughter and languor; that soften

Dreamily, drowsily, slowly,

Then, on a sudden, are wholly

Dancing as dew.

III

Face,--like the sweetest of

Perfumes,--completest of

Flowers God’s fleetest of

Months ever bear!--

Listen, O lisper wind,--

Lighter and crisper wind,--

Have you a whisper, wind,

Soft as her hair?

Night and the stars did spin it;

Darkness and brightness are in it:

Let but a ray of it bind me,

Wrap it around me and wind me,

Blind as the blind are and blinder,

Yet through my heart would I find her,

Lost though I were.

OLIVIA IN THE AUTUMN

Not redder than her lips

This weather!

Not rosier two rose-hips

Together!

As she comes carolling

Down wildwood ways, where sing

The birds, and flowers swing

In many a feather.

Of her belovéd cheeks

October

Makes flame-flushed leaves, and speaks,--

Now sober,

Now wild,--its happiness

In gold, and on her dress

Lays many a bright caress

As if to robe her.

The wild-birds praise her eyes

Each hour;

Above her bend the skies

And shower

Around her, there and here,

Strays of the passing year,

Azure and gold and sere

Of weed and flower.

The wood-winds kiss her hair

And wonder

What flower blossoms there:

And, under

Its deeps of acorn-brown,

Her glory and her crown,

The sunbeams lay them down,

And dream and ponder.

And I--I take her hands,

Her lover;

And kiss her where she stands;

And over

Our heads the soft winds call,

And heav’n smiles down; and all

The golden dreams of Fall

Around us hover.

SYLVIA OF THE WOODLAND

I

O you, who know our Mays that blow

The bluets by the ways;

The Indian-pink,--whose bloom you ’d think

Was blood for some wild bee to drink,--

How--can you say--in their wise way

Is it you ’re like our Mays?--

In gleam and gloom and wild perfume

Of moods that run from shade to sun:--

While in you seems the light that dreams

In thoughts of other days.

II

Meseems some song, for which I long,

From you to me takes wing

Each time you speak; a bird, whose beak

Is in my heart; whose wildwood art

Makes every beat say “Sweet, sweet, sweet,”

And all its pulses sing.

And when I gaze upon your face,

I seem to look into a brook,

That laughs through buds and leafing woods,

Reflecting all the spring.

III

You spoke but now--and, lo! I vow,

From haunts of hart and hind

I seemed to hear Romance draw near,

White hand in hand with Song, and stand,

In some green aisle of wood, and smile,

Beguiling soul and mind:

You laugh--and, lo! I seem to go

In Mirth’s young train; and bird-songs rain

Around, above; and Joy and Love

Come dancing down the wind.

WITNESSES

I

You say I do not love you!--Tell me why,

When I have gazed a little on your face,

And then gone forth into the world of men,

A beauty, neither of the earth nor sky,

A glamour, that transforms each common place,

Attends my spirit then?

II

You say I do not love you!--Yet, I know,

When I have heard you speak and dwelt upon

Your words a while, my heart has gone away

Filled with strange music, very soft and low,

A dim companion, touching with sweet tone

The discords of the day.

III

You say I do not love you!--Yet, it seems,

When I have kissed your hand and said farewell,

A fragrance, wilder than the wood’s wild bloom,

Companions dim my soul and fills, with dreams,

The sad and sordid streets where people dwell,

Dreams of spring’s wild perfume.

A PUPIL OF PAN

My love’s adorable and wise

As heaven and the winds of spring:

Go thou and gaze into her eyes--

Such scholars of the starry skies!

--Canst marvel at the thing?

My love is like a bud that blows

With fragrant honey in its heart:

Go, watch her smile--Wouldst not suppose

She from some warm, white, serious rose

Had learned the happy art?

The thoughts she speaks are pearls unstrung

That strew her fancy’s golden floor:

Go listen--For, the woods among,

She met with Pan, when very young,

Who taught her all his lore.

LORA OF THE VALES

Lora is her name that slips

Soft as love between the lips:

You must know she is so wise

All she does is lift her eyes,--

Larkspur-blue as April skies,--

At her name--and that replies--

She ’s so wise, is Lora.

Lora is her name whose sound

Hedges all my heart around

With the gold of happiness:

When she speaks, you will confess,

Music’s self her words express,

Every vowel a caress--

She ’s so kind, is Lora.

Lora is her name that brings

Thoughts to me of morning things:

Songs of birds; of bees that creep

In the rumpled bluebells deep;

Butterflies, that, half asleep,

On some rose their vigil keep--

She ’s so young, is Lora.

Lora, lean to mine your face;

So; and round you let me lace

One firm arm, and gently woo

Your small mouth, as fresh as dew,

Till it says your heart is true,

True to me as mine to you,

Sunny-hearted Lora!

PLEDGES

I

What the May-apple or

Woodland anemone--

Star-perfect as a star--

Says to the honey-bee:

Or to the winds that woo,

Filling their hearts with dew:

What says the bluet’s blue

To the sun’s ray--do you

Know or do I?--

II

Listen, and you may hear

What the oxalis says

Into the downy ear

Of the pale moth that sways

There on its heart and drinks:

Or what the forest-pinks

Say to the dew that winks,

Butterfly-wing that blinks--

Glimmering by.

III

They say: “When April trod

By in a blowing blush,--

Wise as a word of God

Holding all Heaven a-hush,--

Singing a song of love,

We, as she passed above,

Sprang from the notes thereof,

Filling with joy each grove,

Beauty and mystery.”

ORIENTAL ROMANCE

I

Beyond lost seas of summer she

Dwelt on an island of the sea,

Last scion of that dynasty,

Queen of a race forgotten long,--

With eyes of light and lips of song,

From seaward groves of blowing lemon,

She called me in her native tongue,

Low-leaned on some rich robe of Yemen.

II

I was a king. Three moons we drove

Across green gulfs, the crimson clove

And cassia spiced, to claim her love.

Packed was my barque with gums and gold;

Rich fabrics; sandalwood, grown old

With odor; gems; and pearls of Oman,--

Than her white breasts less white and cold;--

And myrrh, less fragrant than this woman.

III

From Bassora I came. We saw

Her condor castle on a claw

Of soaring precipice, o’erawe

The surge and thunder of the spray:

Like some great opal, far away

It shone, with battlement and spire,

Wherefrom, with wild aroma, day

Blew splintered lights of sapphirine fire.

IV

Lamenting caverns, dark and deep,

That catacombed the haunted steep,

Led upward to her castle-keep ...

Fair as the moon, whose light is shed

In Ramadan, was she, who led

My love unto her island bowers,

To find her ... lying young and dead

Among her maidens and her flowers.

THE TOLLMAN’S DAUGHTER

She stood waist-deep among the briers:

Above, in twisted lengths, were rolled

The sunset’s tangled whorls of gold,

Blown from the west’s cloud-pillared fires.

And in the hush, no sound did mar,

You almost heard, o’er hill and dell,

Deep, bubbling over, star on star,

The night’s blue cisterns slowly well.

A crane, a shadowy crescent, crossed

The sunset, winging ’thwart the west;

While up the east her silver breast

Of light the moon brought, white as frost.

So have I painted her, you see,

The tollman’s daughter.--What an arm

And throat were hers! and what a form!

--Art dreams of such divinity.

What braids of night to smooth and kiss!--

There is no pigment anywhere

A man might use to picture this--

The splendor of her raven hair.

A face as beautiful and bright,

As rosy fair as twilight skies,

Lit with the stars of hazel eyes

And eyebrowed black with penciled night.

For her, I know, where’er she trod

Each dewdrop raised a looking-glass,

To catch her image, from the grass;

That wildflowers bloomed along the sod,

And whispered perfume when she smiled;

The wood-bird hushed to hear her song,

Or, heart-enamoured, tame though wild,

Before her feet flew fluttering long:

The brook went mad with melody,

Eddied in laughter when she kissed

With naked feet its amethyst--

And I--she was my world, ah me!

CREOLE SERENADE

Under moss-draped oak and pine,

Murmuring, falls the fountained stream;

In its pool the lilies shine,

Silvery, each a glimmering gleam.

Roses bloom and roses die

In the warm rose-scented dark,

Where the firefly, like an eye,

Winks and glows, a golden spark.

Amber-belted through the night

Drifts the alabaster moon,

Like a big magnolia white

On the fragrant heart of June.

With a broken syrinx there,

With bignonia overgrown,

Is it Pan in hoof and hair?--

Or his image carved from stone?

See! her casement’s jessamines part;--

Through their stars and swooning scent

Like the moon she leans. O heart,

’T is another firmament!

_Sings_:

The dim verbena drugs the dusk

With lemon odors; everywhere

Wan heliotropes breathe drowsy musk

Into the jasmine-heavy air;

The moss-rose bursts its dewy husk

And spills its attar there.

The orange at thy casement flings

Star-censers oozing rich perfumes;

The clematis, long-petaled, swings

Deep clusters of dark purple blooms;

With flowers, like moons or sylphide wings,

Magnolias light the glooms.

Awake, awake from sleep!

Thy balmy hair,

Unbounden, deep on deep,

Like blossoms there,--

That dew and fragrance weep,--

Will fill the night with prayer.

Awake, awake from sleep!

And dreaming here it seems to me

A dryad’s bosom grows confessed,

Nude in the dark magnolia tree,

That rustles with the murmurous West--

Or is it but some bloom I see,

White as thy virgin breast?

Through Southern heavens above are rolled

A million feverish stars, that burst,

Like gems, from out the caskets old

Of night, with fires that throb and thirst:

An oleander, showering gold,

The heav’n seems, star-immersed.

Unseal, unseal thine eyes!--

Too long her rod

Queen Mab sways o’er their skies

In realms of Nod!--

Their starry majesties

Will fill the night with God.

Unseal, unseal thine eyes!

IDEAL DIVINATION

How I have thought of her,

Her I have never seen!--

Now from a raying air

She, like the Magdalene,

Flowers--a face serene,

Radiant with raven hair.

Now in a balsam scent

Laughs from the stars that gleam;

Naked and redolent,

Bends to me breasts of beam,

Eyes that were made to dream,

Throat that the dimples dent.

Would she were real, ah me!

Would she were real and here!

And no “impossible she”!

But one to draw me near,

Hold me and name me dear!--

But, that can never be!

“Living, each learns to know

Life is not worth its pain;

Loving, each finds a woe

Or, at the end, a chain:

Fardled of hope we strain

Whither no hope may know.

“Life is too credulous

Of time that beckons on.

Memory still serves us thus--

Gauging each coming dawn

By a day dead and gone,

Day that ’s a part of us.”

So says my soul, that ’s mocked

Here of the flesh and held;

Ever rebellion rocked,

Fighting, forever quelled;

Titan-like, fate-compelled,

Yearning to rise, but locked

Supine where torrents pour

Hellward; on crags that, high,

Scarred of the thunder, gore

Heaven.... The vulture’s eye

Swims, and the harpies’ cry

Clangs through the ocean’s roar....

Then, like æolian light,

Calling, it hears her lips:

Scorched by her burning white

Splendor of arms and hips,

Slimy each horror slips

Back to its native night....

Rul’st thou some brighter star?

Inviolable queen

Of what the destinies are?

Thou, with thy light unseen

Filling my life with sheen,

Leading my soul afar!

Thou, who oft leav’st thy skies,

Comest in dreams to me,

With amaranthine eyes,

Asphodel shadowy

Hair, and mysteriously

Say’st to my heart, “Arise!

“Be not afraid to dare

All of life’s tyranny!

I will reward thee there!

There, where my love shall be

Thine to eternity!--

Only be brave and bear!”

APOCALYPSE

Before I found her I had found

Within my heart, as in a brook,

Reflections of her: now a sound

Of imaged beauty, now a look.

So when I found her, gazing in

Those Bibles of her eyes, above

All earth, I saw no word of sin;

Their holy chapters all were love.

I read them through. I read and saw

The soul impatient of the sod--

Her soul, that through her eyes did draw

Mine--to the higher love of God.

CAN I FORGET?

Can I forget how Love once led the ways

Of our two lives together, joining them;

How every hour was his anadem,

And every day a tablet in his praise!

Can I forget how, in his garden’s place,

Among the purple roses, stem to stem,

We heard the rumor of his robe’s bright hem,

And saw the aureate radiance of his face!--

Though I beheld my soul’s high dreams down-hurled,

And Falsehood sit where Truth once towered white,

And in Love’s place usurping Lust and Shame,

Though flowers be dead within the winter world,

Are flowers not there? and starless though the night,

Are stars not there, eternal and the same?

MY ROSE

There was a rose in Eden once: it grows

On Earth now, sweeter for its rare perfume:

And Paradise is poorer by one bloom,

And Earth is richer. In this blossom glows

More loveliness than old seraglios

Or courts of kings did ever yet illume:

More purity than ever yet had room

In soul of nun or saint.--O human rose!--

Who art initial and sweet period of

My heart’s divinest sentence; where I read

Love, first and last, and in the pauses, love;

Who art the dear ideal of each deed

Through which my life is strong to attain its goal,--

Set in the mystic garden of my soul!

RESTRAINT

Dear heart and love! what happiness is it

To watch the firelight’s varying shade and shine

On thy young face; and through those eyes of thine--

As through clear windows--to behold them flit,

In sumptuous chambers of thy mind’s chaste wit,

Thy soul’s fair fancies! then to take in mine

Thy hand, whose pressure brims my heart’s divine

Hushed rapture as with music exquisite!

When I remember how thy look and touch

Sway, like the moon, my blood with ecstasy,

I dare not think to what fierce heaven might lead

Thy soft embrace; or in thy kiss how much

Sweet hell,--beyond all help of me,--might be,

Where I were lost, where I were lost indeed!

IN JUNE

I

Hotly burns the amaryllis,

Starred with ruby red:

Coolly stand the snowy lilies

In the lily-bed:

Emerald gleams the wild May-apple,

’Neath its parasol,

And where gold the sunbeams dapple

Woods, and thrushes call,

Marion strolls with Moll,

Singing, “Fol-de-rol;

Fol-de, fol-de-rol.

II

“March was but a blustering liar;

April, sad as night:

May, a milkmaid from the byre,

Full of love but light.

June, sweet June!--ah! she’s My Lady,

Fair and fine and tall,

Strolling down the woodways shady--

June is best of all!

She is like my Moll!

Fol-de-rol-de-rol!

She is like sweet Moll!”

WILL O’ THE WISPS

Beyond the barley meads and hay,

What was the light that beckoned there?

That made her young lips smile and say:

“Oh, busk me in a gown of May,

And knot red poppies in my hair.”

Over the meadow and the wood

What was the voice that filled her ears?

That sent into pale cheeks the blood,

Until each seemed a wild-brier bud

Mowed down by mowing harvesters?...

Beyond the orchard, down the hill,

The water flows, the water swirls;

And there they found her past all ill,

Her pale dead face, sweet, smiling still,

The cresses caught among her curls.

At twilight in the willow glen

What sound is that the silence hears,

When deep the dusk is hushed again,

And homeward from the fields strong men

And women go, the harvesters?

One seeks the place where she is laid,

Where violets bloom from year to year--

“O sunny head! O bird-like maid!

The orchard blossoms fall and fade

And I am lonely, lonely here.”

Two stars look down upon the vale;

They seem to him the eyes of Ruth:

The low moon rises very pale

As if she, too, had heard the tale,

All heartbreak, of a maid and youth.

IN A GARDEN

The pink rose drops its petals on

The moonlit lawn, the moonlit lawn;

The moon, like some wide rose of white,

Drops down the summer night.

No rose there is

As sweet as this--

Thy mouth, that greets me with a kiss.

The lattice of thy casement twines

With jasmine vines, with jasmine vines;

The stars, like jasmine blossoms, lie

About the glimmering sky.

No jasmine tress

Can so caress

Like thy white arms’ soft loveliness.

About thy door magnolia blooms

Make sweet the glooms, make sweet the glooms;

A moon-magnolia is the dusk

Closed in a dewy husk.

However much,

No bloom gives such

Soft fragrance as thy bosom’s touch.

The flowers blooming now will pass,

And strew the grass, and strew the grass;

The night, like some frail flower, dawn

Will soon make gray and wan.

Still, still above,

The flower of

True love shall live forever, Love.

“IF I WERE HER LOVER”

I

If I were her lover,

I’d wade through the clover

Over the fields before

The gate that leads to her door;

Over the meadows,

To wait, ’mid the shadows,

The shadows that circle her door,

For the heart of my heart and more.

And there in the clover

Close by her,

Over and over

I’d sigh her:

“Your eyes are as brown

As the Night’s, looking down

On waters that sleep

With the moon in their deep” ...

If I were her lover to sigh her.

II

If I were her lover,

I’d wade through the clover

Over the fields before

The lane that leads to her door;

I’d wait, ’mid the thickets,

Or there by the pickets,

White pickets that fence in her door,

For the life of my life and more.

I’d lean in the clover--

The crisper

For the dews that are over--

And whisper:

“Your lips are as rare

As the dewberries there,

As ripe and as red,

On the honey-dew fed” ...

If I were her lover to whisper.

III

If I were her lover,

I’d wade through the clover

Over the fields before

The pathway that leads to her door;

And watch, in the twinkle

Of stars that sprinkle

The paradise over her door,

For the soul of my soul and more.

And there in the clover

I’d reach her;

And over and over

I’d teach her--

A love without sighs,

Of laughterful eyes,

That reckoned each second

The pause of a kiss,

A kiss and ... that is

If I were her lover to teach her.

NOËRA

Noëra, when sad fall

Has grayed the fallow,

Leaf-cramped the wood-brook’s brawl

In pool and shallow;

When, by the wood-side, tall

Stands sere the mallow:

Noëra, when gray gold

And golden gray

The crackling hollows fold

By every way,

Shall I thy face behold,

Dear bit of May?

When webs are cribs for dew,

And gossamers

Streak past you, silver-blue;

When silence stirs

One leaf, of rusty hue,

Among the burrs:

Noëra, thro’ the wood,

Or thro’ the grain,

Come, with the hoiden mood

Of wind and rain

Fresh in thy sunny blood,

Sweetheart, again!

Noëra, when the corn,

Heaped on the fields,

The asters’ stars adorn--

And purple shields

Of ironweeds lie torn

Among the wealds:

Noëra, haply then,

Thou being with me,

Each ruined greenwood glen

Will bud and be

Spring’s with the spring again,

The spring in thee.

Thou of the breezy tread,

Feet of the breeze:

Thou of the sunbeam head,

Heart like a bee’s:

Face like a woodland-bred

Anemone’s.

Thou to October bring

An April part!

Come, make the wild-birds sing,

The blossoms start!

Noëra, with the spring

Wild in thy heart!

Come with our golden year;

Come as its gold:

With the same laughing, clear,

Loved voice of old:

In thy cool hair one dear

Wild marigold.

AMONG THE ACRES OF THE WOOD

I

“I know, I know;

The way doth go

Athwart a greenwood glade, oh!

White bloom the wild-plums in that glade,

White as the bosom of the maid

Who, stooping, sits, and milks and sings

Among the dew-dashed clover rings,

When fades the flush, the henna blush,

The orange-glow of sunset low,

And all the winds are laid, oh!”

II

“I wot, I wot.--

And is it not

Right o’er the viney hill?--”

“Yea: where the wild-grapes mat and make

Penthouses of each bramble-brake,

And dangle plumes of fragrant blooms:

Where threads of sunbeams string the glooms

With beaded gold; and flowers unfold

Their eyes of blue;--and all night through

Sings, wildly shrill, one whippoorwill.”

III

“I ween, I ween,

The path is green

’Neath beechen boughs that let

Soft glimpses of the sapphire sky

Gleam downward like a wood-nymph’s eye:

At night one far and lambent star

Shines o’er it, like a watching Lar,

’Mid branching buds a tangled bud

Among the acres of the wood,

Where blooms the wet wild violet

And only we have, trysting, met.”

WORDS

I can not tell what I would tell thee,

What I would say, what thou shouldst hear;

Words of the soul that should compel thee,

Words of the heart to draw thee near.

For when thou smilest, thou, who fillest

My life with joy, and I would speak,

’Tis then my lips and tongue are stillest,

Knowing all language is too weak.

Look in my eyes: read there confession:

The truest love hath least of art:

Nor needs it words for its expression

When soul speaks soul and heart speaks heart.

THE SIRENS

Wail! wail! and smite your lyres’ sonorous gold,

And beckon naked beauty; luring me

With arms and breasts and hips of godly mold,

Dark, wind-wild locks seen through the surf-blown sea!

Vain all your magic! dull in unclosed ears!

Beside one voice sweet-calling o’er the foam,

That, in my heart, like some strong hand appears

To gently, firmly draw my vessel home.

WHY?

Why are the bright stars brighter after rain?

Why is strong love the stronger after pain?

Reply, reply!

Why sings the wild swan heavenliest when it dies?

Why is fair love the fairest when it flies?

Oh why! Oh why!

Why are sweet kisses sweetest when they’re dead?

Why is love loveliest when ’tis buriéd?

Reply, reply!

NOCTURNE

A disc of violet blue,

Rimmed with a thorn of fire,

The new moon hangs in a sky of dew;

And under the vines, where the sunset’s hue

Is blent with blooms, first one, then two,

Begins the crickets’ choir.

Bright blurs of golden white,

With points of pearly glimmer,

The first stars wink in the web of night;

And through the flowers the moths take flight,

In the honeysuckle-colored light,

Where the shadowy shrubs grow dimmer.

Soft through the dim and dying eve,

Sweet through the dusk and dew,

Come, while the hours their witchcraft weave,

Dim in the House of the Soul’s-sweet-leave,

Here in the pale and perfumed eve,

Here where I wait for you.

A great, dark, radiant rose,

Dripping with starry glower,

Is the night, whose bosom overflows

With the balsam musk of the breeze that blows

Into the heart, as each one knows,

Of every nodding flower.

A voice that sighs and sighs,

Then whispers like a spirit,

Is the wind, that kisses the drowsy eyes

Of the primrose open, and, rocking, lies

In the lily’s cradle, and soft unties

The rose-bud’s crimson near it.

Sweet through the deep and dreaming night,

Soft through the dark and dew,

Come, where the moments their magic write,

Deep in the Book of the Heart’s-delight,

Here in the hushed and haunted night,

Here where I wait for you.

METAMORPHOSIS

Before Love’s lofty goddess--Life hath toiled

To mold from burning dew and dewy fire--

Who kneel and worship with a heart sin-soiled,

Within the secret Temple of Desire;

Their curse is such: that, even while they pray,--

They shall not see, nor shall they know thereof!--

Their Deity is changed from fire to clay--

Lust! fashioned in the very form of Love.

AT TWENTY-ONE

The rosy hills of her high breasts,

Whereon, like misty morning, rests

The breathing lace; her auburn hair,

Wherein, a star-point sparkling there,

One jewel burns: her eyes, that keep

Recorded dreams of love and sleep:

Her mouth, with whose comparison

The richest rose were poor and wan:

Her throat, her form--what masterpiece

Of man can picture half of these!--

She comes! a classic from the hand

Of God! wherethrough I understand

What Nature means and Art and Love,

And all the immortal myths thereof.

KINSHIP

There is no flower of wood or lea,

No April flower, as fair as she:

O white anemone, who hast

The wind’s wild grace,

Know her a cousin of thy race,

Into whose face

A presence like the wind’s hath passed.

There is no flower of wood or lea,

No May-day flower, as fair as she:

O bluebell, tender with the blue

Of sapphire skies,

Thy lineage hath kindred ties

In her, whose eyes

The heaven’s own qualities imbue.

There is no flower of wood or lea,

No June-time flower, as fair as she:

Rose,--odorous with beauty of

Her lips that pressed,--

Behold thy sister here confessed!

Whose maiden breast

Is fragrant with the dreams of love.

“SHE IS SO MUCH”

She is so much to me, to me,

And, oh, I love her so,

I look into my soul and see

How comfort keeps me company

In hopes she, too, may know.

I love her, I love her, I love her,

This I know.

So dear she is to me, so dear,

And, oh, I love her so,

I listen in my heart and hear

The voice of gladness singing near

In thoughts she, too, may know.

I love her, I love her, I love her,

This I know.

So much she is to me, so much,

And, oh, I love her so,

In heart and soul I feel the touch

Of angel callers, that are such

Dreams as she, too, may know.

I love her, I love her, I love her,

This I know.

HER EYES

In her dark eyes dreams poetize;

The soul sits lost in love:

There is no thing in all the skies,

To gladden all the world I prize,

Like the deep love in her dark eyes,

Or one sweet dream thereof.

In her dark eyes, where thoughts arise,

Her soul’s soft moods I see:

Of hope and faith, that make life wise;

And charity, whose food is sighs--

Not truer than her own true eyes

Is truth’s divinity.

In her dark eyes the knowledge lies

Of an immortal sod,

Her soul once trod in angel guise,

Nor can forget its heavenly ties,

Since, there in Heaven, upon her eyes

Once gazed the eyes of God.

MESSENGERS

The wind, that gives the rose a kiss,

With murmured music of the south,

Hath kissed a sweeter thing than this;--

The wind, that gives the rose a kiss,--

Hath kissed the red rose of her mouth.

The brook, that mirrors skies and trees,

And echoes in a grottoed place,

Hath held a fairer thing than these;--

The brook, that mirrors skies and trees,

Hath held the image of her face.

O happy wind! O happy brook!

What message from her do you bear?--

“We bear from her her kiss and look--”

O happy wind! O happy brook!--

“That blessed us unaware.”

APART

I

While sunset burns and stars are few,

And roses scent the fading light;

And, like a slim urn, dripping dew,

A spirit carries through the night,

The pearl-pale moon hangs new,--

I think of you, of you.

II

While waters flow, and soft winds woo

The golden-hearted bud with sighs;

And, like a flower an angel threw,

Out of the momentary skies

A star falls, burning blue,--

I dream of you, of you.

III

While love believes and hearts are true,

So let me think, so let me dream;

The thought and dream so wedded to

Your face, that, far apart, I seem

To see each thing you do,

And be with you, with you.

THE BLIND GOD

I know not if she be unkind;

If she have faults, I do not care.

Search through the world--where will you find

A face like hers, a form, a mind?--

I love her to despair!

If she be cruel, cruelty

Is a great virtue, I will swear:

If she be proud, then pride must be

Better than all humility.--

I love her to despair!

Why speak to me of that or this?

All you may say weighs not a hair!

To me, naught but perfection is

In her, whose lips I may not kiss!--

I love her to despair!

CARA MIA

I

Sweet lips, where kisses sleep,

Soft eyes, so filled with dreams,

Waken, oh waken!

Open your blossoms deep,

Sweet lips, where kisses sleep:

Unfold your brightest beams,

Soft eyes, so filled with dreams:

Waken, oh, waken!

II

Sweet lips, that give perfume,

Soft eyes, that kindle light,

Come, let me kiss you!--

To every flower in bloom,

Sweet lips, you lend perfume!

In every star at night,

Soft eyes, you kindle light!--

Come, let me kiss you!

III

Who would not love to rest?

Who would not love to lie?

Who would not love them?

Of such sweet flowers caressed,

Who would not love to rest?

With such stars in their sky,

Who would not love to lie?

Who would not love them?

MARGERY

I

When spring is here and Margery

Goes walking in the woods with me,

She is so white, she is so shy,

The little leaves clap hands and cry--

“Perdie;

So white is she, so shy is she,

Ah me!

The maiden May hath just passed by!”

II

When summer ’s here and Margery

Goes walking in the fields with me,

She is so pure, she is so fair,

The wildflowers eye her and declare--

“Perdie!

So pure is she, so fair is she,

Just see,

Where our sweet cousin takes the air!”

III

Why is it that my Margery

Hears nothing that these say to me?

She is so good, she is so true,

My heart it maketh such ado,

Perdie!

So good is she, so true is she,

You see,

She can not hear the other two.

CONSTANCE

Beyond the orchard, in the lane,

The crested red-bird sings again--

O bird, whose song says, “Have no care,”

Should I not care when Constance there,--

My Constance with the bashful gaze,

Pink-gowned like some sweet hollyhock,--

If I declare my love, just says

Some careless thing as if in mock?

Like--“Past the orchard, in the lane,

Hark! how the red-bird sings again!”

There, while the red-bird sings his best,

His listening mate sits on the nest--

O bird, whose patience says, “All ’s well,”

How can it be with me, come, tell?

When Constance, with averted eyes,--

Soft-bonneted as some sweet-pea,--

If I talk marriage, just replies

With some such quaint irrelevancy,

As, “While the red-bird sings his best,

His loving mate sits on the nest.”

What shall I say? what can I do?

Would such replies mean aught to you,

O birds, whose music says, “Be glad”?

Have I not reason to be sad

When Constance, with demurest glance,

Her face all poppied with distress,

If I reproach her, pouts, perchance,

And answers thus in waywardness?--

“What shall I say? what can I do?

My meaning should be plain to you!”

LYDIA

When Autumn’s here and days are short,

Let Lydia laugh and, hey!

Straightway ’t is May-day in my heart,

And blossoms strew the way.

When Summer ’s here and days are long,

Let Lydia sigh and, ho!

December’s fields I walk among,

And shiver in the snow.

No matter what the seasons are,

My Lydia is so dear,

My heart admits no calendar

Of Earth when she is near.

HELEN

Heaped in raven loops and masses

Over temples smooth and fair,

Have you marked it, as she passes,

Night and starlight mingled there,--

Braided strands of midnight air,--

Helen’s hair?

Deep with dreams and moony mazes

Of the thought that in them lies,

Have you seen them, as she raises

Them in question or surprise,--

Two gray gleams of daybreak skies,--

Helen’s eyes?

Fresh as dew and honied wafters

Of a music sweet that slips,

Have you marked them, brimmed with laughter’s

Song and sunshine to their tips,--

Blossoms whence the perfume drips,--

Helen’s lips?

He who sees her needs must love her:

But, beware, whoe’er thou art!

Lest like me thou shouldst discover

Nature overlooked one part,

In this masterpiece of art--

Helen’s heart.

MIGNON

Oh, Mignon’s mouth is like a rose,

A red, red rose, that half uncurls

Sweet petals o’er a crimson bee:

Or like a shell, that, opening, shows

Within its rosy curve white pearls,

White rows of pearls,

Is Mignon’s mouth that smiles at me.

Oh, Mignon’s eyes are like blue gems,

Two azure gems that gleam and glow,

Soft sapphires set in ivory:

Or like twin violets, whose stems

Bloom blue beneath the covering snow,

The lidded snow,

Are Mignon’s eyes that laugh at me.

O mouth of Mignon, Mignon’s eyes!

O eyes of violet, mouth of fire!--

Within which lies all ecstasy

Of tears and kisses and of sighs:--

O mouth, O eyes, and O desire,

O love’s desire,

Have mercy on the soul of me!

TRANSUBSTANTIATION

I

A sunbeam and a drop of dew

Lay on a red rose in the South:

God took the three and made her mouth,

Her sweet, small mouth,

So red of hue,--

The burning baptism of His kiss

Still fills my heart with heavenly bliss.

II

A dream of truth and love come true

Slept on a star in daybreak skies:

God mingled these and made her eyes,

Her dear, clear eyes,

So gray of hue,--

The high communion of His gaze

Still fills my soul with deep amaze.

LOVE AND A DAY

I

In girandoles of gladioles

The day had kindled flame;

And Heaven a door of gold and pearl

Unclosed, whence Morning,--like a girl,

A red rose twisted in a curl,--

Down sapphire stairways came.

Said I to Love: “What must I do?

What shall I do? what can I do?”

Said I to Love: “What must I do,

All on a summer’s morning?”

Said Love to me: “Go woo, go woo.”

Said Love to me: “Go woo.

If she be milking, follow, O!

And in the clover hollow, O!

While through the dew the bells clang clear,

Just whisper it into her ear,

All on a summer’s morning.”

II

Of honey and heat and weed and wheat

The day had made perfume;

And Heaven a tower of turquoise raised,

Whence Noon, like some pale woman, gazed--

A sunflower withering at her waist--

Within a crystal room.

Said I to Love: “What must I do?

What shall I do? what can I do?”

Said I to Love: “What must I do,

All in the summer nooning?”

Said Love to me: “Go woo, go woo.”

Said Love to me: “Go woo.

If she be ’mid the rakers, O!

Among the harvest acres, O!

While every breeze brings scents of hay,

Just hold her hand and not take ‘nay,’

All in the summer nooning.”

III

With song and sigh and cricket cry

The day had mingled rest;

And Heaven a casement opened wide

Of opal, whence, like some young bride,

The Twilight leaned, all starry eyed,

A moonflower on her breast.

Said I to Love: “What must I do?

What shall I do? what can I do?”

Said I to Love: “What must I do,

All in the summer gloaming?”

Said Love to me: “Go woo, go woo.”

Said Love to me: “Go woo,

Go meet her at the trysting, O!

And ’spite of her resisting, O!

Beneath the stars and afterglow,

Just clasp her close and kiss her--so,

All in the summer gloaming.”

LOVE IN A GARDEN

I

Between the rose’s and the canna’s crimson,

Beneath thy window in the night I stand;

The jeweled dew hangs little stars, in rims, on

The white moonflowers; each a spirit hand

That points the path to mystic Shadowland.

Awaken, sweet and fair!

And add to night thy grace!

Suffer its loveliness to share

The white moon of thy face,

The dark cloud of thy hair.

Awaken, sweet and fair!

II

A moth, like down, swings on th’ althea’s pistil,--

Ghost of a tone that haunts its bell’s deep dome;--

And in the August-lily’s cone of crystal

A firefly hangs the lantern of a gnome,

Green as a gem that gleams through hollow foam.

Approach! the moment flies!

O sweetheart of the South!

Come! mingle with night’s mysteries

The red rose of thy mouth,

The dark stars of thine eyes.--

Approach! the moment flies!

III

Dim through the dusk, like some unearthly presence,

The night-song silvers of a dreaming bird;

And with it borne, faint on a breeze-blown essence,

The rainy whisper of a fountain’s heard--

As if young lips had breathed a perfumed word.

How long, my love, my bliss!

How long must I await

With night--that all impatience is--

Thy greeting at the gate,

And at the gate thy kiss?

How long, my love, my bliss!

FLORIDIAN

I

The cactus and the aloe bloom

Beneath the window of your room;

That window where, at evenfall,

Beneath the twilight’s first pale star,

You linger, tall and spiritual,

And hearken my guitar.

It is the hour

When every flower

Is wooed of moth or bee--

Would, would you were the flower, dear,

And I the moth to draw you near,

To draw you near to me,

My dear,

To draw you near to me!

II

The jasmine and bignonia spill

Their balm about your windowsill;

That sill where, when magnolia-white,

In foliage mists, the moon hangs far,

You lean with bright deep eyes of night,

And hearken my guitar.

It is the hour

When from each flower

The wind woos essences--

Would, would you were the flower, love,

And I the wind to breathe above,

To breathe above and kiss,

My love,

To breathe above and kiss!

WHEN SHIPS PUT OUT TO SEA

I

It’s “Sweet, good-by,” when pennants fly

And ships put out to sea;

It ’s a loving kiss, and a tear or two

In an eye of brown or an eye of blue:--

And you’ll remember me,

Sweetheart,

And you’ll remember me.

II

It’s “Friend or foe?” when signals blow

And ships sight ships at sea;

It’s “Clear for action! and man the guns!”

As the battle nears and the battle runs;--

And you’ll remember me,

Sweetheart,

And you’ll remember me.

III

It’s deck to deck, and wrath and wreck,

When ships meet ships at sea;

It’s scream of shot and shriek of shell,

And hull and turret a roaring hell;--

And you’ll remember me,

Sweetheart,

And you’ll remember me.

IV

It’s doom and death, and pause a breath,

When ships go down at sea;

It’s hate is over and love begins,

And war is cruel whoever wins;--

And you’ll remember me,

Sweetheart,

And you’ll remember me.

A CHRISTMAS CATCH

When roads are mired with ice and snow,

And the air of morn is crisp with rime;

When the holly hangs by the mistletoe,

And bells ring in the Christmas-time:--

It’s--Saddle, my Heart! and ride away

To the sweet-faced girl with eyes of gray!

Who waits with a smile for the gifts you bring--

A man’s strong love and a wedding-ring--

It’s--Saddle, my Heart, and ride!

When vanes veer north and storm-winds blow,

And the sun at noon is a blur o’erhead;

When the holly hangs by the mistletoe,

And the Christmas service is sung and said:--

It’s--Come, O my Heart, and wait a while,

Where the organ peals, in the altar aisle,

For the gifts that the church now gives to you--

A woman’s hand and a heart that’s true.

It’s--Come, O my Heart, and wait!

When rooms gleam warm with the fire’s glow,

And the sleet raps sharp on the window-pane:

When the holly hangs by the mistletoe,

And Christmas revels begin again:--

It’s--Home, O my Heart, and love, at last!

And her happy breast to your own held fast:

A song to sing and a tale to tell,

A good-night kiss and all is well.

It’s--Home, O my Heart, and love!

A SONG FOR YULE

I

Sing, Hey, when the time rolls round this way,

And bells peal out, _’Tis Christmas Day_!

The world is better then by half,

For joy, for joy:

In a little while you will see it laugh--

For a song’s to sing and a glass to quaff,

My boy; my boy.

So here ’s to the man who never says nay!--

Sing, Hey, a song of Christmas Day!

II

Sing, Ho, when roofs are white with snow,

And homes are hung with mistletoe:

Old Earth is not half bad, I wis--

What cheer! what cheer!

How it ever seemed sad the wonder is--

With a gift to give and a girl to kiss,

My dear; my dear.

So here ’s to the girl who never says no!

Sing, Ho, a song of the mistletoe!

III

No thing in the world to the heart seems wrong

When the soul of a man walks out with song;

Wherever they go, glad hand in hand,

And glove in glove,

The round of the land is rainbow-spanned,

And the meaning of life they understand

Is love; is love.

Let the heart be open, the soul be strong,

And life will be glad as a Christmas song.

CHORDS

I

When love delays, when love delays and joy

Steals like a shadow o’er the happy hills;

When hope is gone; and no to-morrow fills

The promise of to-day; still I employ

My soul with thoughts of thee,

Who ’rt not for me, for me!

When love delays, when love delays and song

Aches at wild lips, unutterable, as the sound

Of ocean strives, within the shell’s mouth bound;

And hope is gone for ever, slain of wrong;

Still in my heart one word

Keeps calling like a bird.

When love delays, when love delays and sleep

Seals tired eyelids,--like the sound of foam,

Heard ’mid familiar flowers far from home,--

When hope lies dead; in dreams, in dreams I keep

Feeling thy lips’ sweet touch,--

And, oh! it is too much!

When love delays, when love delays and sorrow

Drinks her own tears that add but to her thirst;

When song and sleep and love itself seem curst,

And hope lies dead; still, still I dream to-morrow

Will bring some word of cheer

From thee who art not here.