Part 3

The sounding Psalm that sang You Hail, Who decked my prows in gold attire, When in Your hands the sheets were fire, The sun a spreading peacock's tail.

Now be it so, since in me stays Salvation that the sails possess Under the wind the stars caress Of far beyond and other days,

And let it be Your self-same Grace In this to-day of broken shoon, The same sky, and the same round moon As when I sailed, O Rich in Grace.

COMFORTER OF THE AFFLICTED.

Ineffable souls are known to me, In houses of poor bodies pent, And sick to death with discontent, Ineffable souls are known to me;

Known to me are poor Christmas eyes, Shining out their little lights As prayers go glimmering through the nights Known to me are poor Christmas eyes

Weeping with coveting the sky Into their hands with misery meek; And feet that stumble as they seek In pilgrimage the radiant sky.

And then poor hungers too I know, Poor hungers of poor teeth upon Loaves baked an hundred years agone; And then poor thirsts I also know;

And women sweet ineffably, Who in poor, piteous bodies dwell, And very handsome men as well, But who are sick as women be.

COMFORTER OF THE AFFLICTED.

Now Winter gives me his hand to hold, I hold his hand, his hand is cold;

And in my head, afar off, blaze Old summers in their sick dog-days;

And in slow whiteness there arise Pale shimmering tents deep in my eyes

And Sicilies are in them, rows Of islands, archipelagos.

It is a voyage round about, Too swift to drive my fever out,

To all the countries where you die, Sailing the seas as years go by,

And all the while the tempest beats Upon the ships of my white sheets,

That surge with starlight on them shed, And all their swelling sails outspread.

I taste upon my lips the salt Of ocean, like the bitter malt

Drunk in the land's last orgy, when From the taverns reel the men;

And now I see that land I know: It is a land of endless snow...;

Make thou the snow less hard to bear, O Mary of good coverings, there,

And less like hares my fingers run O'er my white sheets that fever spun.

COMFORTER OF THE AFFLICTED.

I pray too much for ills of mine, O Mary, others suffer keen, Witness the little trees of green Laid where Your altar candles shine;

For all the joys of kermesse days, And all the roads that thither wend Are full of cripples without end, By night are all the kermesse ways.

And then the season grows too chill For these consumptive steeds of wood, Although the drunken organ should, Alone, keep its illusions still.

Poorer than I have more endured; Despairing of their hands and feet, Poor folks that cough and nothing eat, People too aged to be cured,

With ulcers wherein winter smarts, O Virgin, meekly, turn by turn, They come to You and candles burn, All in a nook of silvered hearts.

COMFORTER OF THE AFFLICTED.

Now is the legend revealed, And my cities also are healed,

Consoled till they love each other, Like a child that has wept, by its mother,

In the things mysterious all Of altars processional,

And now all my country is dight With dahlias and lilies white,

Your candles to glorify Mary, ere May passes by.

Lo! endless the pleasure is, May returned, and maladies

Borne to horizons blue, On vessels simple and true,

Far away, on the sea so far Hardly seen, or like dots they are.

Now, under trees, the time glides In the street where my life abides;

Mary of meek workers, steep In the May-wood my head in the sleep

And the rest that my good tools have earned; Sound mind in a sound body urned,

In a Mary-month more splendid, Because all my task is ended.

TO THE EYES.

Now, sky of azure On houses rosy, Like a child of Flanders preach The simple religion I teach, Like a sky of azure On houses rosy;

Lo, to the vexed I bring these roses, When their memory to the islands reaches, The voices that my gospel preaches, Like the gladsome text A child's talk glozes.

You people happy With very little: You women and men of my city, And of all my moments of pity, Be happy With very little;

For letters blue On pages rosy, This is all the book that I read you, Unto your pleasaunce to lead you, In a country blue Houses rosy.

TO THE MOUTH.

For, you my brothers and sisters, With me in my bark you shall go, And my cousins, the fishers, shall show Where the fin of the shoaled fishes glisters,

Whose tides the bow-nets heap, Till the baskets cry out, days and days, Darkening the blue ocean's face, As in a path crowded sheep.

You shall see my nets all swell, And St. Peter helping the fishes Which for the Fridays he wishes, Sole, flounder, mackerel.

And St. John the Evangelist Lending a hand with the sheets, At the low ebb of autumn heats, When haddocks come, says the mist.

And our women with tucked-up sleeves, Like banquets on your tables; And miracles, and fables To tell in the holy eves.

FOR THE EAR.

Then nearer and nearer yet To the sea in a golden fret,

On the dikes where the houses end, The trees to the sea-breeze that bend;

With their baptismal names anchored here, In the rivers to which they are dear,

The vessels my harbour loves best, Clustered, a choir, at their rest.

Now in their festivity, I salute you, _Anna-Marie,_

Who seem in your white sails to bear Cherubs that flit through the air;

And with joy that I scarcely can speak I see you again, _Angelique,_

You with no shrouds on your mast, Safe returned from Iceland at last.

But now, like _Gabrielle_, sing Your new sails smooth as a wing,

And weep no more, _Madeleine,_ For your nets you have lost on the main,

Since all are pardoned, even The wind, for kisses given,

So that in kisses and glee These visiting billows may be

Content with the homage they pay, High the sea, to sing the May.

TO-DAY IS THE DAY OF REST, THE SABBATH.

To-day is the day of rest, the Sabbath, A morning of sunshine, and of bees, And of birds in the garden trees, To-day is the day of rest, the Sabbath;

The children are in their white dresses, Towns are gleaming through the azure haze, This is Flanders with poplar-shaded ways, And the sea the yellow dunes caresses.

To-day is the day of all the angels: Michael with his swallows twittering, Gabriel with his wings all glittering, To-day is the day of all the angels;

Then, people here with happy faces, All the people of my country, who Departed one by one, two by two, To look at life in blue distant places;

To-day is the day of rest, the Sabbath-- The miller is sleeping in the mill-- To-day is the day of rest, the Sabbath, And my song shall now be still.

MARY, SHED YOUR HAIR.

Mary, shed Your hair, for lo! Here the azure cherubs blow,

And Jesus wakes upon Your breast; Where His rosy fingers rest;

And golden angels lay their chins Upon their breathing violins.

Now morning in the meads is green, And, Mary, look at Life's demesne:

How infinitely sweet it seems, From the forests and the streams

To roofs that cluster like an isle; And, Mary, see Your cities smile

Happy as any child at play, While from spires and steeples they

Proclaim the simple Gospel peace With their showering melodies

From the gold dawn to the sunset sky, Greeted, Mary of Houses, by

The men of Flanders loving still The brown, centennial earth they till.

And sing now, all ye merry men Who plough the glebe, sing once again

Your Flanders sweet to larks that sing With gladsome voices concerting,

And sail afar, ye ships that glass Your flags in billows green as grass,

For Jesus holds His hands above, Mary, this festival of love

Made by the sky for summer's birth, With silk and velvet covering earth.

AND MARY READS A GOSPEL-PAGE.

And Mary reads a Gospel-page, With folded hands in the silent hours, And Mary reads a Gospel-page, Where the meadow sings with flowers,

And all the flowers that star the ground In the far emerald of the grass, Tell her how sweet a life they pass, With simple words of dulcet sound.

And now the angels in the cloud, And the birds too in chorus sing, While the beasts graze, with foreheads bowed, The plants of scented blossoming;

And Mary reads a Gospel-page, The pealing hours she overhears, Forgets the time, and all the years, For Mary reads a Gospel-page;

And masons building cities go Homeward in the evening hours, And, cocks of gold on belfry towers, Clouds and breezes pass and blow.

AND WHETHER IN GRAY OR IN BLACK COPE.

And whether in gray or in black cope,-- Spider of the eve, good hope,--

Smoke ye roofs, and tables swell With meats to mouths delectable;

And while the kitchen smoke upcurls, Kiss and kiss, you boys and girls!

Night, the women, where they sit, Can no longer see to knit;

Now, like loving fingers linking, Work is done and sleep is blinking,

As balm on pious spirits drips, All tearful eyes, all praying lips,

And straw to beasts, to mankind beds Of solace for their weary heads.

Good-night! and men and women cross Arms on your souls, or hearts that toss.

And in your dreams of white or blue, Servants near the children you;

And peace now all your life, you trees, Mills, and roofs, and brooks, and leas,

And rest you toilers all, between The woollen soft, the linen clean,

And Christs forgotten in the cold, And Magdalenes within the fold,

And Heaven far as sees the eye, At the four corners of the sky.

ANDRE FONTAINAS.

1865--.

HER VOICE.

O voice vibrating like the song of birds, O frail, sonorous voice wherein upwells Laughter more bright than ring of wedding bells, I listen to her voice more than her words.

Soul of old rebecs, spirit of harpsichords, Within her voice your soft inflection dwells; Blisses of love some ancient viol tells, Kiss snatched by lips that swift lips turn towards.

Her voice is sweetness of chaste dreams, the scent Of iris, cinnamon, and incense blent, A music drunk, a folded mountain's calm;

It is within me made of living sun, Of luminous pride and rhythms vermilion; It is the purest, the most dazzling psalm.

COPHETUA.

With right arm on the open casement rim, The negro King Cophetua, with sad mien, And eyes that do not see, looks at the green Autumnal ocean rolling under him.

His listless dream goes wandering without goal; He is not one who would be passion's slave; And no remorse, nor memory from its grave May haunt the leisure of his empty soul.

He does not hear the melancholy chaunt Of girls who beg before him, hollow, gaunt With fasting, coughing in the mellow sun,

And unawares, he knows not how it came, he feels within his hardened heart a flame, And burns his eyes at the eyes of the youngest one.

DESIRES.

What does she dream, lost in her hair's cascade, The lonely child with flowering hands as wan As garlands pale?--Of the plains of days agone With pools of water lilies, where she strayed

On paths of chance her hands with flowers arrayed, And where alms welcomed her?--And never shone As now her eyes her jewels braided on Her gowns of gold and purple and brocade.

But she sees nothing round her. In the room Amber and aromatics melt the gloom, The dusk's hot odour through the window streams;

As heavy as an opal's changing fires, Sigh in the evening mist and die desires, While naked at her glass the maiden dreams.

ADVENTURE.

Under the diadem of rustling pearls And sapphires in their grasp of gold, In yellow hair that undulatingly unfurls Over her shoulders slow and cold, And purple cloak exulting with brocade,

The Princess of the Manor's Games and Joys.

And in the jubilant noise Rivers of lightning flame unrolled, And the rich purple torch sheds its delight, And twists its rustling tresses in the night.

The Princess of the Manor's Joys Lifts in a dawn of amethysts Her tender visage that more sadly aches Than gloamings on the lunar face of lakes, With lingering smile upon her lip she lists, And casts a call into the evening mists.

In spite of omens tragical, All they who wait upon her come To lawns where sistrum, fife, and drum To revelry and dancing call.

O King! like mourning is our merry-making! Out of our arms thou hast thyself exiled, And by our kisses art no more beguiled! Our hearts for thee are aching! Thou hast fled, thou hast fled, And in the night I raise my head, And call for thee with sobs, and bosom sore! But still our festivals shall be forsaken, The mourning from our hearts shall not be taken, My fingers nevermore Shall o'er thy golden velvet tresses glide; My heavy arms shall nevermore thy neck enlace In passionate embrace Rich with the jewels of the bracelets of my pride!

Farandola and roundelay, And the mad songs of pride, In sudden waves over the threshold glide, And through the chambers sway.

Thou never shalt return from unknown lands, O King! The sceptre is fallen from thy hands, The lassitude that lulled thee in its lap Has stolen from thy proud, young years their sap, Now art thou crossing thresholds far forlorn Of mysteries and adventures luring thee Where monsters crouch beneath the twisted tree; Chimeras and the pitiless unicorn Shall belch their fire where thou thy way wouldst grope And thou shalt nevermore have my caress To soothe thee into happy heedlessness Of life, and perils of inimical hope.

O come back, ere it be too late! At evening come unto the Joys that wait, Come to the dancing and to thy Princess, Who cradled thee with kisses and with tenderness, And sweet refrains of songs. Come to thy crown and sceptre, and the throngs Of them that love thee, and the memory Of thine ancestors shall bring back to thee Forgetfulness of mad adventures in the kiss Of her who thy Princess and Sister is.

LUXURY.

How vain are songs! Can they be worth the hymn To your ecstatic eyes of mine that swim? The noblest song of man no bosom stirs, Weak are sonorous words, but conquerors Are ye, glances of amber and of fire, Lips you, and clinging kisses slow to tire That in my soul are scorching! You that dare Leap out of longing, kisses! And you hair Of virgin gold that glints like noonday suns! And marble whiteness where, like lava, runs Your wild blood, snow and brazier!-- Here I lie Your slave for ever, at your feet I die In sleepful spasms that the senses cloy, And the slow languor of the tasted joy; Mad with your velvety and waxen flesh That holds my soul and body in its mesh; I love you, I am poured out at your feet, Your hands are with lascivious jasmine sweet, Your beauty blooms for me! In my embrace I feel your life blowing upon my face, And entering into me! Your blinding eyes Thrill me with raptures of that Paradise Whose rubies bleed, whose yellow topazes Sleep in the sloth of sensualities, And where the limitless horizons hide Our Hell of luxuries grated round with pride. I love thee, though the kisses of thy teeth, Cunning to bite in their red vulva sheath, Have the allure of Lamias that enslave With luxury swift and cruelty suave. Through tortures from your native Orient swim Ineffably pure o'er peaceful lakes the slim Swans of your voice white in their wildering And subtle scents of snow, and on their wing Bear me towards the hope your bright eyes beam. Now let me lie upon your breasts and dream. Say nothing! Let us sleep in our blue bower Under the tufted pleasures of the hour, By the night's tranquil torpor lulled and kissed ... Already yon far dawn of amethyst Dyes the deep heavens, and the moon at rest Upon her soft cloud cushions hath caressed With argent light the forest's idle trance, And starred the stream with eyes that gleam and glance!

And now the dawn is on our pillow--hide Your eyes--I shiver--they are haggard, wide!

SEA-SCAPE.

Under basaltic porticoes of calm sea-caves, Heavy with alga and the moss of fucus gold, In the occult, slow shaking of sea-waves, Among the alga in proud blooms unfold The cups of pride of silent, slender gladioles....

The mystery wherein dies the rhythm of the waves In gleams of kisses long and calm unrolls, And the red coral whereon writhes the alga cold Stretches out arms that bleed with calm flowers, and beholds Its gleams reflected in the rest of waves.

Now here you stand in gardens flowered with alga, cold In the nocturnal, distant song of waves, Queen whose calm, pensive looks are glaucous gladioles, Raising above the waves their light-filled bowls, Among the alga on the coral where the ocean rolls.

A PROPITIOUS MEETING.

Propitious dawn smiles on him wandering And fretful in the evil forest deeps; The heavy night's long, bitter rumour sleeps; The sun's clear song makes the horizon ring.

The scent of sage and thyme is as a sting Unto his jaded sense, the wind that sweeps The blue sea round the promontory steeps Freshens with hope his fate's proud blossoming.

The glory of Joy into his soul returns, And his heroic dream leaps up and burns, Even as this dawn's far-flung vermilion,

And lo! at the horizon, very calm, Pacing their steeds, and holding out their palm, The Kings he deemed dead marching in the sun.

THE HOURS.

The tiring hour that weeps, And the young hour gay with sun, Hour after hour creeps, Hours after hours run Along the river banks.

This is an hour of dawn that vapour cloaks. Yonder a thread, so it would seem, Stretches a bridge across the stream. Shadow follows shadow, the mist chokes The water sleepy as a moat's, A tug smokes, And drags its heavy, grating chain, And drags its train Of ghostlike boats, Walls of black Along a hidden track Towards the arches blear Where now they disappear.

Like sudden palms of gold, Three sunbeams glide To where the waters hide, And all along the river in the cold Life is again begun, With all its joys Of toil and noise Awakening in the quivering, crimson sun.

The hour is rising radiant with mirth, Beaming smiles down on the earth, O festival of light! Here is life that smiles upon its toil, And with high forehead makes the night recoil Towards the sun in heavens bright With strength and with delight.

Life quickens on faces Mad and fervent zest. To live! is when the hot blood races And swells the breast, And makes the words leap out in ready throng! Life is to be alone and strong, And master of one's fate! Ye floods of purple pour in state, Ripen the morn, and roll men's blood along!

The wise Have never lived and do not know what joys Are in mad battle, carnage and great noise, When courage with courage vies. The wise Are they who when the cautious eve creeps on to night Exile themselves from the festival of light Weeping its tears of proud gold on the river, O'er the lamp-lit book to shiver. To live Is better, and to ring one's heel On the floor of a palace won by crimsoned steel, Or underneath a charger's hoofs to tread The grass of roads down-trodden by the fugitive Foe who has dyed them red.

But the young hour gay with sun, The tiring hour that weeps, Hour after hour creeps Hours after hours run Along the river banks.

Now cooler are noon's beams, O dreams reposed with languor and with ease, The waters creep, O calm dreams! Upon the moss in shade of elms and alder-trees The peaceful fishers sleep; A long thread swims upon the dying stream. In the foliage never a shiver, The sun darts never a beam, All is dumb. The earth around, the meadows and the river, And the air with sunshine numb, And the forest with its leafy houses, Everywhere all action drowses, And the earth hesitates with indecision, A smoker's vague vision.

The only wisdom is to live The hours of the river, sleeping on its slopes. Why should we madly follow fugitive Inclement pride and crumbling hopes Along the precipices of the heavy night, That swallows up all ruined light? No! to live Is to follow all the river's turnings, Sailing one's life with dreams and yearnings, With prow set to the Orient of oblivion, To conquer all the sea and all the isles that smile, That no discoverer will ever set foot on Save he who kept desire a virgin, all the while, O dream!

The young hour gay with sun, The tiring hour that weeps, Hour after hour creeps, Hours after hours run, Along the river banks.

AWAKE

Awake! It is a joy among hibernal hours To plunge into the pane the hoar-frost flowers; Behold: the petals glittering on the pane Open their wings that dream would follow fain.

Awake, and revel in the dawn's pure joys, And smile upon the time the sun becalms: In the bright garden, save in dream, no noise But a long imagined shivering, O palms!

Come, and behold my love, as ever of old, Make the vast silence flower lit by thy glance, Glad with its peaceful pinions to enfold Our passion soothed with rich remembrance.

LIFE IS CALM.

Life is calm, Even as this evening of sweet summer, now The bird is silent on the bough, That bends above the river, Whose reeds no longer quiver; And the pacific night and wise Sleeps without a shudder under cloudless skies.

Life is calm! It is your face, O sister dear, At happiness scarce smiling here, Life is your face, dear sister, So calm; As life is and your happiness, Your face is cloudless, calm, and passionless.

Even the river hushes Between its banks, among its rushes; One by one fall flowers; Silent, gentle eventide, Life is calm where waters glide; By waters where the happiness that lies Smiling, sister, in the tender flashing of your eyes, Is wondering at the waters, and the evenings, and the hours.

FRONTISPIECE.

The gems that ivories clip, And chrysoberyls puerile, Mingling their gleams, beguile The dole of the black tulip;

The fountain weeps in the old Garden o'er flowers sad, Which by the dawn are clad In amethyst and in gold:

In the boxwood shadow lingers, In sentimental _fetes,_ The _chevalier_, and awaits The princess whose pale fingers Are flowers that bring relief Unto her languorous grief.

INVITATION.

The ruby my vow desires For your beauty smiling kind Is surely incarnadined By a limpid mirror's fires.

Ice with the flame interchanges, And your eyes hard with dignity Bruise the sobbed longing to be A bauble your hand arranges.

But remember the waters yonder Cradle the vessels that wander To the isle in the bright future hidden,

And come while the winter is dark, To sail our adventurous bark Madly o'er oceans forbidden.

TO THE POLE.

Through fogs impassible that freeze the soul, And under torpor-laden skies of gray, If none can ever open out a way To the icy horror of the reachless Pole,

Yet those who died or shall die striving thither, In faith of victory and glory of dream, Have known the rapturous pride of conquest gleam, Brief flower of hope that never grief shall wither.

But thou, long cheated by the immutable thirst Of being loved, hast too, too well rehearsed The vanity of combats sterile all,

And dost with bitter, pitiless irony see Those who go following ghosts that ever flee Sink in the chasm where thyself didst fall.

PAUL GERARDY.

1870--.

SHE.