Part 2

(Then, across Long Island meadows, Darker, darker, grow the shadows: Patience, little waiting lass! Laggard minutes slowly pass; Patience, laughs the yellow fire: Homeward bound is heart's desire!)

Hark, adown the canyon street Flows the merry tide of feet; High the golden buildings loom Blazing in the purple gloom; All the town is set with stars, _Homeward_ chant the Broadway cars!

All down Thirty-second Street _Homeward, Homeward_, say the feet! Tramping men, uncouth to view, Footsore, weary, thrill anew; Gone the ringing telephones, Blessed nightfall now atones, Casting brightness on the snow Golden the train windows go.

Then (how long it seems) at last All the way is overpast. Heart that beats your muffled drum, Lo, your venturer is come! Wide the door! Leap high, O fire! Home at length is heart's desire! Gone is weariness and fret, At the sill warm lips are met. Once again may be renewed The conjoined beatitude.

PETER PAN

"The boy for whom Barrie wrote Peter Pan--the original of Peter Pan--has died in battle."

--New York Times.

And Peter Pan is dead? Not so! When mothers turn the lights down low And tuck their little sons in bed, They know that Peter is not dead....

That little rounded blanket-hill; Those prayer-time eyes, so deep and still-- However wise and great a man He grows, he still is Peter Pan.

And mothers' ways are often queer: They pause in doorways, just to hear A tiny breathing; think a prayer; And then go tiptoe down the stair.

IN HONOR OF TAFFY TOPAZ

Taffy, the topaz-colored cat, Thinks now of this and now of that, But chiefly of his meals. Asparagus, and cream, and fish, Are objects of his Freudian wish; What you don't give, he steals.

His gallant heart is strongly stirred By clink of plate or flight of bird, He has a plumy tail; At night he treads on stealthy pad As merry as Sir Galahad A-seeking of the Grail.

His amiable amber eyes Are very friendly, very wise; Like Buddha, grave and fat, He sits, regardless of applause, And thinking, as he kneads his paws, What fun to be a cat!

THE CEDAR CHEST

Her mind is like her cedar chest Wherein in quietness do rest The wistful dreamings of her heart In fragrant folds all laid apart.

There, put away in sprigs of rhyme Until her life's full blossom-time, Flutter (like tremulous little birds) Her small and sweet maternal words.

READING ALOUD

Once we read Tennyson aloud In our great fireside chair; Between the lines, my lips could touch Her April-scented hair.

How very fond I was, to think The printed poems fair, When close within my arms I held A living lyric there!

ANIMAL CRACKERS

Animal crackers, and cocoa to drink, That is the finest of suppers, I think; When I'm grown up and can have what I please I think I shall always insist upon these.

What do _you_ choose when you're offered a treat? When Mother says, "What would you like best to eat?" Is it waffles and syrup, or cinnamon toast? It's cocoa and animals that _I_ love most!

The kitchen's the cosiest place that I know: The kettle is singing, the stove is aglow, And there in the twilight, how jolly to see The cocoa and animals waiting for me.

Daddy and Mother dine later in state, With Mary to cook for them, Susan to wait; But they don't have nearly as much fun as I Who eat in the kitchen with Nurse standing by; And Daddy once said, he would like to be me Having cocoa and animals once more for tea!

THE MILKMAN

Early in the morning, when the dawn is on the roofs, You hear his wheels come rolling, you hear his horse's hoofs; You hear the bottles clinking, and then he drives away: You yawn in bed, turn over, and begin another day!

The old-time dairy maids are dear to every poet's heart-- I'd rather be the dairy _man_ and drive a little cart, And bustle round the village in the early morning blue, And hang my reins upon a hook, as I've seen Casey do.

LIGHT VERSE

At night the gas lamps light our street, Electric bulbs our homes; The gas is billed in cubic feet, Electric light in ohms.

But one illumination still Is brighter far, and sweeter; It is not figured in a bill, Nor measured by a meter.

More bright than lights that money buys, More pleasing to discerners, The shining lamps of Helen's eyes, Those lovely double burners!

THE FURNACE

At night I opened The furnace door: The warm glow brightened The cellar floor.

The fire that sparkled Blue and red, Kept small toes cosy In their bed.

As up the stair So late I stole, I said my prayer: _Thank God for coal!_

WASHING THE DISHES

When we on simple rations sup How easy is the washing up! But heavy feeding complicates The task by soiling many plates.

And though I grant that I have prayed That we might find a serving-maid, I'd scullion all my days, I think, To see Her smile across the sink!

I wash, She wipes. In water hot I souse each dish and pan and pot; While Taffy mutters, purrs, and begs, And rubs himself against my legs.

The man who never in his life Has washed the dishes with his wife Or polished up the silver plate-- He still is largely celibate.

One warning: there is certain ware That must be handled with all care: The Lord Himself will give you up If you should drop a willow cup!

THE CHURCH OF UNBENT KNEES

As I went by the church to-day I heard the organ cry; And goodly folk were on their knees, But I went striding by.

My minster hath a roof more vast: My aisles are oak trees high; My altar-cloth is on the hills, My organ is the sky.

I see my rood upon the clouds, The winds, my chanted choir; My crystal windows, heaven-glazed, Are stained with sunset fire.

The stars, the thunder, and the rain, White sands and purple seas-- These are His pulpit and His pew, My God of Unbent Knees!

ELEGY WRITTEN IN A COUNTRY COAL-BIN

The furnace tolls the knell of falling steam, The coal supply is virtually done, And at this price, indeed it does not seem As though we could afford another ton.

Now fades the glossy, cherished anthracite; The radiators lose their temperature: How ill avail, on such a frosty night, The "short and simple flannels of the poor."

Though in the icebox, fresh and newly laid, The rude forefathers of the omelet sleep, No eggs for breakfast till the bill is paid: We cannot cook again till coal is cheap.

Can Morris-chair or papier-mâché bust Revivify the failing pressure-gauge? Chop up the grand piano if you must, And burn the East Aurora parrot-cage!

Full many a can of purest kerosene The dark unfathomed tanks of Standard Oil Shall furnish me, and with their aid I mean To bring my morning coffee to a boil.

THE OLD SWIMMER

I often wander on the beach Where once, so brown of limb, The biting air, the roaring surf Summoned me to swim.

I see my old abundant youth Where combers lean and spill, And though I taste the foam no more Other swimmers will.

Oh, good exultant strength to meet The arching wall of green, To break the crystal, swirl, emerge Dripping, taut, and clean.

To climb the moving hilly blue, To dive in ecstasy And feel the salty chill embrace Arm and rib and knee.

What brave and vanished laughter then And tingling thighs to run, What warm and comfortable sands Dreaming in the sun.

The crumbling water spreads in snow, The surf is hissing still, And though I kiss the salt no more Other swimmers will.

THE MOON-SHEEP

The moon seems like a docile sheep, She pastures while all people sleep; But sometimes, when she goes astray, She wanders all alone by day.

Up in the clear blue morning air We are surprised to see her there, Grazing in her woolly white, Waiting the return of night.

When dusk lets down the meadow bars She greets again her lambs, the stars!

SMELLS

Why is it that the poets tell So little of the sense of smell? These are the odors I love well:

The smell of coffee freshly ground; Or rich plum pudding, holly crowned; Or onions fried and deeply browned.

The fragrance of a fumy pipe; The smell of apples, newly ripe; And printers' ink on leaden type.

Woods by moonlight in September Breathe most sweet; and I remember Many a smoky camp-fire ember.

Camphor, turpentine, and tea, The balsam of a Christmas tree, These are whiffs of gramarye ... _A ship smells best of all to me!_

SMELLS (JUNIOR)

My Daddy smells like tobacco and books, Mother, like lavender and listerine; Uncle John carries a whiff of cigars, Nannie smells starchy and soapy and clean.

Shandy, my dog, has a smell of his own (When he's been out in the rain he smells most); But Katie, the cook, is more splendid than all-- She smells exactly like hot buttered toast!

MAR QUONG, CHINESE LAUNDRYMAN

I like the Chinese laundryman: He smokes a pipe that bubbles, And seems, as far as I can tell, A man with but few troubles. He has much to do, no doubt, But also much to think about.

Most men (for instance I myself) Are spending, at all times, All our hard-earned quarters, Our nickels and our dimes: With Mar Quong it's the other way-- He takes in small change every day.

Next time you call for collars In his steamy little shop, Observe how tight his pigtail Is coiled and piled on top. But late at night he lets it hang And thinks of the Yang-tse-kiang.

THE FAT LITTLE PURSE

On Saturdays, after the baby Is bathed, fed, and sleeping serene, His mother, as quickly as may be, Arranges the household routine. She rapidly makes herself pretty And leaves the young limb with his nurse, Then gaily she starts for the city, And with her the fat little purse.

She trips through the crowd at the station, To the rendezvous spot where we meet, And keeping her eyes from temptation, She avoids the most windowy street! She is off for the Weekly Adventure; To her comrade for better and worse She says, "Never mind, when you've spent your Last bit, here's the fat little purse."

Apart, in her thrifty exchequer, She has hidden what must not be spent: Enough for the butcher and baker, Katie's wages, and milkman, and rent; But the rest of her brave little treasure She is gleeful and prompt to disburse-- What a richness of innocent pleasure Can come from her fat little purse!

But either by giving or buying, The little purse does not stay fat-- Perhaps it's a ragged child crying, Perhaps it's a "pert little hat." And the bonny brown eyes that were brightened By pleasures so quaint and diverse, Look up at me, wistful and frightened, To see such a thin little purse.

The wisest of all financiering Is that which is done by our wives: By some little known profiteering They add twos and twos and make fives; And, husband, if you would be learning The secret of thrift, it is terse: Invest the great part of your earning In her little, fat little purse.

THE REFLECTION (To N. B. D.)

I have not heard her voice, nor seen her face, Nor touched her hand; And yet some echo of her woman's grace I understand.

I have no picture of her lovelihood, Her smile, her tint; But that she is both beautiful and good I have true hint.

In all that my friend thinks and says, I see Her mirror true; His thought of her is gentle; she must be All gentle too.

In all his grief or laughter, work or play, Each mood and whim, How brave and tender, day by common day, She speaks through him!

Therefore I say I know her, be her face Or dark or fair-- For when he shows his heart's most secret place I see her there!

THE BALLOON PEDDLER

Who is the man on Chestnut street With colored toy balloons? I see him with his airy freight On sunny afternoons-- A peddler of such lovely goods! The heart leaps to behold His mass of bubbles, red and green And blue and pink and gold.

For sure that noble peddler man Hath antic merchandise: His toys that float and swim in air Attract my eager eyes. Perhaps he is a changeling prince Bewitched through magic moons To tempt us solemn busy folk With meaningless balloons.

Beware, oh, valiant merchantman, Tread cautious on the pave! Lest some day come some realist, Some haggard soul and grave, A puritan efficientist Who deems thy toys a sin-- He'll stalk thee madly from behind And prick them with a pin!

LINES FOR AN ECCENTRIC'S BOOK PLATE

To use my books all friends are bid: My shelves are open for 'em; And in each one, as Grolier did, I write _Et Amicorum_.

All lovely things in truth belong To him who best employs them; The house, the picture and the song Are his who most enjoys them.

Perhaps this book holds precious lore, And you may best discern it. If you appreciate it more Than I--why don't return it!

TO A POST-OFFICE INKWELL

How many humble hearts have dipped In you, and scrawled their manuscript! Have shared their secrets, told their cares, Their curious and quaint affairs!

Your pool of ink, your scratchy pen, Have moved the lives of unborn men, And watched young people, breathing hard, Put Heaven on a postal card.

THE CRIB

I sought immortality Here and there-- I sent my rockets Into the air: I gave my name A hostage to ink; I dined a critic And bought him drink.

I spurned the weariness Of the flesh; Denied fatigue And began afresh-- If men knew all, How they would laugh! I even planned My epitaph....

And then one night When the dusk was thin I heard the nursery Rites begin:

I heard the tender Soothings said Over a crib, and A small sweet head.

Then in a flash It came to me That there was my Immortality!

THE POET

The barren music of a word or phrase, The futile arts of syllable and stress, He sought. The poetry of common days He did not guess.

The simplest, sweetest rhythms life affords-- Unselfish love, true effort truly done, The tender themes that underlie all words-- He knew not one.

The human cadence and the subtle chime Of little laughters, home and child and wife, He knew not. Artist merely in his rhyme, Not in his life.

TO A DISCARDED MIRROR

[Transcriber's Note: The text below was in mirrored image in the original text].

Dear glass, before your silver pane My lady used to tend her hair; And yet I search your disc in vain To find some shadow of her there.

I thought your magic, deep and bright, Might still some dear reflection hold: Some glint of eyes or shoulders white, Some flash of gowns she wore of old.

Your polished round must still recall The laughing face, the neck like snow-- Remember, on your lonely wall, That Helen used you long ago!

TO A CHILD

The greatest poem ever known Is one all poets have outgrown: The poetry, innate, untold, Of being only four years old.

Still young enough to be a part Of Nature's great impulsive heart, Born comrade of bird, beast and tree And unselfconscious as the bee--

And yet with lovely reason skilled Each day new paradise to build; Elate explorer of each sense, Without dismay, without pretence!

In your unstained transparent eyes There is no conscience, no surprise: Life's queer conundrums you accept, Your strange divinity still kept.

Being, that now absorbs you, all Harmonious, unit, integral, Will shred into perplexing bits,-- Oh, contradictions of the wits!

And Life, that sets all things in rhyme, May make you poet, too, in time-- But there were days, O tender elf, When you were Poetry itself!

TO A VERY YOUNG GENTLEMAN

My child, what painful vistas are before you! What years of youthful ills and pangs and bumps-- Indignities from aunts who "just adore" you, And chicken-pox and measles, croup and mumps! I don't wish to dismay you,--it's not fair to, Promoted now from bassinet to crib,-- But, O my babe, what troubles flesh is heir to Since God first made so free with Adam's rib!

Laboriously you will proceed with teething; When teeth are here, you'll meet the dentist's chair; They'll teach you ways of walking, eating, breathing, That stoves are hot, and how to brush your hair; And so, my poor, undaunted little stripling, By bruises, tears, and trousers you will grow, And, borrowing a leaf from Mr. Kipling, I'll wish you luck, and moralize you so:

If you can think up seven thousand methods Of giving cooks and parents heart disease; Can rifle pantry-shelves, and then give death odds By water, fire, and falling out of trees; If you can fill your every boyish minute With sixty seconds' worth of mischief done, Yours is the house and everything that's in it, And, which is more, you'll be your father's son!

TO AN OLD-FASHIONED POET

(Lizette Woodworth Reese)

Most tender poet, when the gods confer They save your gracile songs a nook apart, And bless with Time's untainted lavender The ageless April of your singing heart.

You, in an age unbridled, ne'er declined The appointed patience that the Muse decrees, Until, deep in the flower of the mind The hovering words alight, like bridegroom bees.

By casual praise or casual blame unstirred The placid gods grant gifts where they belong: To you, who understand, the perfect word, The recompensed necessities of song.

BURNING LEAVES IN SPRING

When withered leaves are lost in flame Their eddying ghosts, a thin blue haze, Blow through the thickets whence they came On amberlucent autumn days.

The cool green woodland heart receives Their dim, dissolving, phantom breath; In young hereditary leaves They see their happy life-in-death.

My minutes perish as they glow-- Time burns my crazy bonfire through; But ghosts of blackened hours still blow, Eternal Beauty, back to you!

BURNING LEAVES, NOVEMBER

These are folios of April, All the library of spring, Missals gilt and rubricated With the frost's illumining.

Ruthless, we destroy these treasures, Set the torch with hand profane-- Gone, like Alexandrian vellums, Like the books of burnt Louvain!

Yet these classics are immortal: O collectors, have no fear, For the publisher will issue New editions every year.

A VALENTINE GAME

(_For Two Players_)

They have a game, thus played: He says unto his maid _What are those shining things_ _So brown, so golden brown?_ And she, in doubt, replies _How now, what shining things_ _So brown?_

But then, she coming near, To see more clear, He looks again, and cries (All startled with surprise) _Sweet wretch, they are your eyes,_ _So brown, so brown!_

The climax and the end consist In kissing, and in being kissed.

FOR A BIRTHDAY

At two years old the world he sees Must seem expressly made to please! Such new-found words and games to try, Such sudden mirth, he knows not why, So many curiosities!

As life about him, by degrees Discloses all its pageantries He watches with approval shy At two years old.

With wonders tired he takes his ease At dusk, upon his mother's knees: A little laugh, a little cry, Put toys to bed, then "seepy-bye"-- The world is made of such as these At two years old.

KEATS

(1821-1921)

When sometimes, on a moony night, I've passed A street-lamp, seen my doubled shadow flee, I've noticed how much darker, clearer cast, The full moon poured her silhouette of me.

Just so of spirits. Beauty's silver light Limns with a ray more pure, and tenderer too: Men's clumsy gestures, to unearthly sight, Surpass the shapes they show by human view.

On this brave world, where few such meteors fell, Her youngest son, to save us, Beauty flung. He suffered and descended into hell-- And comforts yet the ardent and the young.

Drunken of moonlight, dazed by draughts of sky, Dizzy with stars, his mortal fever ran: His utterance a moon-enchanted cry Not free from folly--for he too was man.

And now and here, a hundred years away, Where topless towers shadow golden streets, The young men sit, nooked in a cheap café, Perfectly happy ... talking about Keats.

TO H. F. M.

A SONNET IN SUNLIGHT

This is a day for sonnets: Oh how clear Our splendid cliffs and summits lift the gaze-- If all the perfect moments of the year Were poured and gathered in one sudden blaze, Then, then perhaps, in some endowered phrase My flat strewn words would rise and come more near To tell of you. Your beauty and your praise Would fall like sunlight on this paper here.

Then I would build a sonnet that would stand Proud and perennial on this pale bright sky; So tall, so steep, that it might stay the hand Of Time, the dusty wrecker. He would sigh To tear my strong words down. And he would say: "That song he built for her, one summer day."

QUICKENING

Such little, puny things are words in rhyme: Poor feeble loops and strokes as frail as hairs; You see them printed here, and mark their chime, And turn to your more durable affairs. Yet on such petty tools the poet dares To run his race with mortar, bricks and lime, And draws his frail stick to the point, and stares To aim his arrow at the heart of Time.

Intangible, yet pressing, hemming in, This measured emptiness engulfs us all, And yet he points his paper javelin And sees it eddy, waver, turn, and fall, And feels, between delight and trouble torn, The stirring of a sonnet still unborn.

AT A WINDOW SILL

_To write a sonnet needs a quiet mind...._ I paused and pondered, tried again. _To write...._

Raising the sash, I breathed the winter night: Papers and small hot room were left behind. Against the gusty purple, ribbed and spined With golden slots and vertebræ of light Men's cages loomed. Down sliding from a height An elevator winked as it declined.

Coward! There is no quiet in the brain-- If pity burns it not, then beauty will: Tinder it is for every blowing spark. Uncertain whether this is bliss or pain The unresting mind will gaze across the sill From high apartment windows, in the dark.

THE RIVER OF LIGHT

I. Broadway, 103rd to 96th.

Lights foam and bubble down the gentle grade: Bright shine chop sueys and rôtisseries; In pink translucence glowingly displayed See camisole and stocking and chemise. Delicatessen windows full of cheese-- Above, the chimes of church-bells toll and fade-- And then, from off some distant Palisade That gluey savor on the Jersey breeze!