Part 3

"Why will they weep and not have done? Why sorrow so? and all for one, Who, they believe, hath found the best God gives to us,--and that is rest. Why grieve?--Yea, rather let them lift The voice in thanks for such a gift, That leaves the worn hands, long that wrought, And weary feet, that sought and sought, At peace; and makes what came to naught, In life, more real now than all The good men strive for here on Earth: The love they seek; the things they call Desirable and full of worth; Yea, wisdom ev'n; and, like the South, The dreams that dewed the soul's sick drouth, And heart's sad barrenness.--God's rest, With every sigh and every tear, By them who weep above me here, Despite their Faith and Hope, 's confessed A doubt; a thing to dread and fear.

"Before them peacefully I lie. But, haply, not for me they sigh, But for themselves,--their loss. The round Of daily labor still to do For them, while for myself 'tis through; And all the unknown, too, is found, The bourn for which all hopes are bound, Where dreams are all made manifest: For this they grieve, perhaps. 'Tis well; Since 'tis through grief the soul is blessed, Not joy;--and yet, we can not tell, We do not know, we can not prove, We only feel that there is love, And something we call Heaven and Hell.

"Howbeit, here, you see, I lie, As all shall lie--for all must die-- A cast-off, useless, empty shell, In which an essence once did dwell; That once, like fruit, the spirit held, And with its husk of flesh compelled: The mask of mind, the world of will, That laughed and wept and labored till The thing within, that never slept, The life essential, from it stept; The ichor-veined inhabitant Who made it all it was; in all Its aims the thing original, That held its course, like any star, Among its fellows; or a plant, Among its brother plants; 'mid whom,-- The same and yet dissimilar,-- Distinct and individual, It grew to microcosmic bloom."

These were the words the dead man said To me who stood beside the dead.

DISTANCE

I

I dreamed last night once more I stood Knee-deep on purple clover leas; Her old home glimmered through its wood Of dark and melancholy trees: And on my brow I felt the breeze That blew from out the solitude, With sounds of waters that pursued, And sleepy hummings of the bees.

II

And ankle-deep in violet blooms Methought I saw her standing there, A lawny light among the glooms, A crown of sunlight on her hair; The wood-birds, warbling everywhere, Above her head flashed happy plumes; About her clung the wild perfumes, And woodland gleams of shimmering air.

III

And then she called me: in my ears Her voice was music; and it led My sad soul back with all its fears; Recalled my spirit that had fled.-- And in my dream it seemed she said, "Our hearts keep true through all the years;" And on my face I felt the tears, The blinding tears of her long dead.

DEFICIENCY

Ah, God! were I away, away By woodland-belted hills! There might be more in this bright day Than my poor spirit thrills.

The elder coppice, banks of blooms; The spicewood brush; the field Of tumbled clover, and perfumes Hot, weedy pastures yield.

The old rail-fence, whose angles hold Bright briar and sassafras; Sweet, priceless wildflowers, blue and gold, Starred through the moss and grass.

The ragged path that winds unto Lone, bird-melodious nooks, Through brambles to the shade and dew Of rocks and woody brooks.

To see the minnows flash and gleam Like sparkling prisms; all Shoot in gray schools adown the stream Let but a dead leaf fall!

To feel the buoyance and delight Of floating, feathered seeds! Capricious wisps of wandering white Born of silk-bearing weeds.

Ah, God! were I away, away Among wild woods and birds, There were more soul in this bright day Than one could bless with words.

MIDSUMMER

The red blood stings through her cheeks and clings In their tan with a fever that lightens; And the clearness of heaven-born mountain springs In her dark eyes dusks and brightens: Her limbs are the limbs of an Atalanta who swings With the youths in the sinewy games, When the hot wind sings through the hair it flings, And the circus roars hoarse with their names, As they fly to the goal that flames.

Her voice is as deep as the waters that sweep Through the musical reeds of a river; A voice as of reapers who bind and reap, With the ring of curved scythes that quiver: A voice, singing ripe the orchards that heap With crimson and gold the ground; That whispers like sleep, till the briars weep Their berries, all ruby round, And vineyards are purple-crowned.

Right sweet is the beat of her glowing feet, And her smile, as Heaven's, is gracious; The creating might of her hands of heat As a god's or a goddess's spacious: The odorous blood in her heart a-beat Is rich with a perishless fire; And her bosom, most sweet, is the ardent seat Of a mother who never will tire, While the world has a breath to suspire.

Wherever she fares her soft voice bears Fecundity; powers that thicken The fruits,--as the wind made Thessalian mares Of old mysteriously quicken:-- The apricots' honey, the milk of the pears, The wine, great grape-clusters hold, These, these are her cares, and her wealth she declares In the corn's long billows of gold, And flowers that jewel the wold.

So, hail to her lips, and her sun-girt hips, And the glory she wears in her tresses! All hail to the balsam that dreams and drips From her breasts that the light caresses! Midsummer! whose fair arm lovingly slips Round the Earth's great waist of green, From whose mouth's aroma his hot mouth sips The life that is love unseen, And the beauty that God may mean.

DIURNAL

I

With molten ruby, clear as wine, The East's great cup of daybreak brims; The morning-glories swing and shine; The night-dews bead their satin rims; The bees are busy in flower and vine, And load with gold their limbs.

Sweet Morn, the South A loyal lover, Kisses thy mouth, Thy rosy mouth, And over and over Wooes thee with scents of wild-honey and clover.

II

Beside the wall the roses blow That Noon's hot breezes scarcely shake; Beside the wall the poppies glow, So full of fire their deep hearts ache; The drowsy butterflies fly slow, Half sleeping, half awake.

Sweet Noontide, Rest,-- A reaper sleeping,-- His head on thy breast, Thy redolent breast, Dreams of the reaping, While sounds of the scythes all around him are sweeping.

III

Along lone paths the cricket cries, Where Night distils dim scent and dew; One mad star 'thwart the heaven flies, A glittering curve of molten blue; Now grows the big moon in the skies; The stars are faint and few.

Sweet Night, the vows Of love long taken, Against thy brows Lay their pale brows, Till thy soul is shaken Of amorous dreams that make it awaken.

THE FAMILY BURYING GROUND

A wall of crumbling stones doth keep Watch o'er long barrows where they sleep, Old, chronicled grave-stones of its dead, On which oblivion's mosses creep And lichens gray as lead.

Warm days, the lost cows, as they pass, Rest here and browse the juicy grass That springs about its sun-scorched stones; Afar one hears their bells' deep brass Waft melancholy tones.

Here the wild morning-glory goes A-rambling, and the myrtle grows; Wild morning-glories, pale as pain, With holy urns, that hint at woes, The night hath filled with rain.

Here are the largest berries seen, Rich, winey-dark, whereon the lean Black hornet sucks; noons, sick with heat, That bend not to the shadowed green The heavy, bearded wheat.

At night, for its forgotten dead, A requiem, of no known wind said, Through ghostly cedars moans and throbs, While to the starlight overhead The shivering screech-owl sobs.

CLOUDS

All through the tepid summer night The starless sky had poured a cool Monotony of pleasant rain In music beautiful.

And for an hour I sat to watch Clouds moving on majestic feet; And heard down avenues of night Their hearts of thunder beat.

Prodigious limbs, far-veined with gold, Pulsed fiery life o'er wood and plain, While, scattered, fell from giant hands The largess of the rain.

Beholding at each lightning flash Their generous silver on the sod, In meek devotion bowed, I thanked These almoners of God.

THE HERON

I

EVENING

A vein of flame, the long creek crawls Beneath dark brows of woodland walls, Red where the sunset's crimson falls. One wiry leg drawn to his breast, Neck-shrunk, at solitary rest, The heron stands among the bars.

II

NIGHT

The whimpering creek breaks on the stone, Where for a while the new moon shone With one white star and one alone. Lank haunter of lone marshy lands The melancholy heron stands, Then, clamoring, dives into the stars.

AVATARS

I

When the moon hangs low Over an afterglow, Lilac and lily; When the stars are high, Wisps in a windless sky, Silverly stilly:--

He, who will lean, his inner ear compelling, May hear the spirit of the forest stream Its story to a wildwood flower telling, That is no flower but some ascended dream.

II

When the dawn's first lines Show dimly through the pines Along the mountain; When the stars are few, And starry lies the dew Around the fountain:--

Who will, may hear, within her leafy dwelling, The spirit of the oak-tree, great and strong, Its romance to the wildwood streamlet telling, That is no stream but some descended song.

LILLITA

Can I forget how, when you stood 'Mid orchards whence the bloom had fled, Stars made the orchards seem a-bud, And weighed the sighing boughs o'erhead With shining ghosts of blossoms dead?

Or when you bowed, a lily tall, Above your drowsy lilies, slim, Transparent pale, that by the wall Like cups of moonlight seemed to swim, Brimmed with faint fragrance to the brim?

And in the cloud that lingered low-- A silent pallor in the west-- There stirred and beat a golden glow, Like some great heart that could not rest, A heart of gold within its breast.

Your heart, your soul were in the wild: You loved to hear the whippoorwill

Lament its love, when, dewy mild, The harvest scent made musk the hill. You loved to walk, where oft had trod The red deer, o'er the fallen hush Of Fall's torn leaves, when th' ivy-tod Hung frosty by each berried bush.

Still do the whippoorwills complain Above your listless lilies, where The moonlight their white faces stain; Still flows the dreaming streamlet there, Whispering of rest an easeful air....

O music of the falling rain, At night unto her painless rest Sound sweet not sad! and make her fain To feel the wildflowers on her breast Lift moist, pure faces up again To breathe a prayer in fragrance blessed.

Thick-pleated beeches long have crossed Old, gnarly arms above her tomb, Where oft I sit and dream her ghost Smiles, like a blossom, through the gloom; Dim as a mist,--that summer lost,-- Of tangled starbeam and perfume.

MIRIAM

White clouds and buds and birds and bees, Low wind-notes, piped down southern seas, Brought thee, a rose-white offering, A flower-like baby with the spring.

She, with her April, gave to thee A soul of winsome witchery; Large, heavenly eyes and sparkling whence Shines the young mind's soft influence; Where love's eternal innocence, And smiles and tears of maidenhood, Gleam with the dreams of hope and good.

She, with the dower of her May Gave thee a nature strong to sway Man's higher feelings; and a pride Where all pride's smallness is denied. Limbs wrought of lilies; and a face Made of a rose-bloom; and the grace Of water, that thy limbs express In each chaste billow of thy dress.

She, with her dreamy June, brought down Night-deeps of hair that are thy crown; A voice like low winds musical, Or streams that in the moonlight fall O'er bars of pearl; and in thy heart,-- True gold,--she set Joy's counterpart, A gem, that in thy fair face gleams, All radiance, when it speaks or dreams; And in thy soul the jewel Truth Whose beauty is perpetual youth.

TWO DAYS

I

The slanted storm tossed at their feet The frost-nipped autumn leaves; The park's high pines were caked with sleet, And ice-spears armed the eaves. They strolled adown the pillared pines, To part where wet and twisted vines About the gate-posts blew and beat. She watched him riding through the rain Along the river's misty shore, And turned with lips that laughed disdain: "To meet no more!"

II

'Mid heavy roses weighed with dew The chirping crickets hid; I' the honeysuckle avenue Sang the green katydid. Soft southern stars smiled through the pines. Through stately windows, draped with vines, The drifting moonlight's silver blew. She stared upon a face, now dead, A soldier calm that wore; Despair sobbed on the lips that said, "To meet no more."

MOONRISE AT SEA

I

With lips that had hushed all their fury Of foam and of winds that were strewn, Of storm and of turbulent hurry, The ocean sighed; heralding soon A ship of miraculous glory, Of pearl and of fire--the moon.

II

And up from the East, with a slipping And shudder and clinging of light, With a loos'ning of clouds and a dipping, Outbound for the Havens of Night, With a silence of sails and a dripping, The vessel came, wonderful white.

III

Then heaven and ocean were sprinkled With splendor; for every sheet And spar, and its hollow hull twinkled With mother-of-pearl. And the feet Of spirits, that followed it, crinkled The billows that under it beat.

IN NOVEMBER

No windy white of wind-blown clouds is thine! No windy white, but low and sodden gray, That holds the melancholy skies and kills The wild song and the wild-bird. Yet, ah me! Thy melancholy skies and mournful woods, Brown, sighing forests dying that I love! Thy long, dead leaves, deep, deep about my feet, Slow, dragging feet that halt or wander on; Thy deep, sweet, crimson leaves that burn and die With silent fever of the sickened wood.

I love to hear in all thy wind-swept coignes, Rain-wet and choked with bleached and ruined weeds, The withered whisper of the many leaves, That, fallen on barren ways--like fallen hopes-- Once held so high upon the Summer's heart Of stalwart trees, now seem the desolate voice Of Earth lamenting in hushed undertones Her green departed glory vanished so.

IN LATE FALL

O days, that break the wild-bird's heart, That slay the wild-bird and its songs! Why should death play so sad a part With you to whom such sweet belongs?

Why are your eyes so filled with tears, As with the rain the frozen flowers? Why are your hearts so swept with fears, Like winds among the ruined bowers?

Farewell! farewell! for she is dead, The old gray month; I saw her die: Go, light your torches round her head, The last red leaves, and let her lie.

WITH THE SEASONS

I

You will not love me, sweet, When this brief year is past; Or love, now at my feet, At other feet you'll cast, At fairer feet you'll cast. You will not love me, sweet, When this brief year is past.

II

Now 'tis the Springtime, dear, And crocus-cups hold flame, Brimmed to the pregnant year, All bashful as with shame, Who blushes as with shame. Now 'tis the Springtime, dear, And crocus-cups hold flame.

III

Soon Summer will be queen, At her brown throat one rose, And poppy-pod, and bean, Will rustle as she goes, As down the garth she goes. Soon Summer will be queen, At her brown throat one rose.

IV

Then Autumn come, a prince, A gipsy crowned with gold; Gold weight the fruited quince, Gold strew the leafy wold, The wild and wind-swept wold. Then Autumn come, a prince, A gipsy crowned with gold.

V

Then Winter will be king, Snow-driven from feet to head; No song-birds then will sing, The winds will wail instead, The wild winds weep instead. Then Winter will be king, Snow-driven from feet to head.

VI

Then shall I weep, who smiled, And curse the coming years, You and myself, and child, Born unto shame and tears, A mother's shame and tears. Then shall I weep, who smiled, And curse the coming years.

TYRANNY

What is there now more merciless Than such fast lips that will not speak; That stir not if one curse or bless A God who made them weak?

More maddening to one there is naught Than such white eyelids sealed on eyes, Eyes vacant of the thing named thought, An exile in the skies.

Ah, silent tongue! ah, dull, closed ear! What angel utterances low Have wooed you? so you may not hear Our mortal words of woe!

WHAT YOU WILL

I

When the season was dry and the sun was hot, And the hornet sucked, gaunt on the apricot, And the ripe peach dropped, to its seed a-rot, With a lean, red wasp that stung and clung: When the hollyhocks, ranked in the garden plot, More seed-pods had than blossoms, I wot, Then all had been said and been sung, And meseemed that my heart had forgot.

II

When the black grape bulged with the juice that burst Through its thick blue skin that was cracked with thirst, And the round, ripe pippins, that summer had nursed, In the yellowing leaves o' the orchard hung: When the farmer, his lips with whistling pursed, To his sun-tanned brow in the corn was immersed, Then something was said or was sung, And I remembered as much as I durst.

III

Now the sky of December gray drips and drips, And eaves of the barn the icicle tips, And the cackling hen on the snow-path slips, And the cattle shiver the fields among: Now the ears of the milkmaid the north-wind nips, And the red-chapped cheeks of the farm-boy whips, What, what shall be said or be sung, With my lips pressed warm to your lips!

MIDWINTER

The dewdrop from the rose that drips Hath not the sparkle of her lips, My lady's lips.

Than her long braids of yellow hold The dandelion hath not more gold, Her braids of gold.

The blue-bell hints not more of skies Than do the flowers of her eyes, My lady's eyes.

The sweet-pea bloom shows not more grace Of delicate pink than doth her face, My lady's face.

So, heigh-ho! then, though skies be gray, Spring blossoms in my heart to-day, This winter day!

IN THE GARDENS OF FALERINA

TO GERTRUDE

_These are the flowers I bring to thee, Heart's-ease, euphrasy and rue, Grown in my Garden of Poetry; Wear them, sweet, on thy breast for me: The first for thoughts; and the other two For spiritual vision, that's always true, So thou with thy soul mayst ever see The love in my heart I keep for thee._

THE GARDENS OF FALERINA

Her hills and vales are dimmer Than sunset's shadowy shimmer; Thin mists, that curl, of poppy and pearl, Above her bowers glimmer; And, silvered o'er with sails of faery galleys, Far off the sea gleams, glimpsed through fountained valleys.

The moon floats never higher Than one white peak of fire; And in its beams pale Beauty dreams, And Music tunes her lyre; And, Siren-like, beside the moonlit waters, Fair Fancy sits singing with Memory's daughters.

A cloud, above and under The ocean, white with wonder, Looms, starry steep; and, opening deep, Grows gold with silent thunder; Revealing far within, immeasurable, Lost Avalons of old Romance and Fable.

Ah! could my spirit shatter These bonds of flesh and matter, And, at a word, mount like a bird To her through mists that scatter; And, raimented in love and inspiration, Look down on Earth from that exalted station:

No mortal might inveigle My soul, that, like an eagle, Would soar and soar from shore to shore Of her, the rare and regal; And by her love made all a lyric rapture, A wild desire, wing far beyond all capture.

ROMANCE

Thus have I pictured her:--In Arden old A white-browed maiden with a falcon eye, And rose-flushed face, and locks of wind-blown gold, Teaching her hawks to fly.

Or, 'mid her boar-hounds, panting with the heat, In huntsman green, she sounds the hunt's wild prize, Plumed, dagger-belted, while beneath her feet The spear-pierced monster dies.

Or in Brécèliand, on some high tower, Clad soft in samite, last of her lost race, I have beheld her, lovelier than a flower, Turn from the world her face.

Or, robed in raiment of romantic lore, Like Oriana, dark of eye and hair, Riding through Realms of Legend evermore, And ever young and fair.

Or now like Bradamant, as brave as just, In complete steel, her pure face lit with scorn, At heathen castles, dens of demon lust, Winding her bugle-horn.

Another Una; and in chastity A second Britomart; in beauty far O'er her who led King Charles's chivalry And Paynim lands to war....

Now she, from Avalon's deep-dingled bowers,-- 'Mid which white stars and never-waning moons Make marriage; and dim lips of musk-mouthed flowers Sigh faint and fragrant tunes,--

Implores me follow; and, in shadowy shapes Of sunset, shows me,--mile on misty mile Of purple precipice,--all the haunted capes Of her enchanted isle.

Where, bowered in bosks and overgrown with vine, Upon a headland breasting violet seas, Her castle towers, like a dream divine, With stairs and galleries.

And at her casement, Circe-beautiful, Above the surgeless reaches of the deep, She sits, while, in her gardens, fountains lull The perfumed wind to sleep.

Or, round her brow a diadem of spars, She leans to hearken, from her raven height, The nightingales that, choiring to the stars, Haunt with wild song the night.

Or, where the moon is mirrored in the waves, To mark, deep down, the Sea King's city rolled, Wrought of huge shells and labyrinthine caves, Ribbed pale with pearl and gold.

There doth she wait forever; and the kings Of all the world have wooed her: but she cares For none but him, the Heart, that dreams and sings, That sings and dreams and dares.

THE VALLEY OF MUSIC

I