Part 11

Drouth weights the trees, and from the farm-house eaves The locust, pulse-beat of the summer day, Throbs; and the lane, that shambles under leaves Limp with the heat--a league of rutty way-- Is lost in dust; and sultry scents of hay Breathe from the panting meadows heaped with sheaves-- Now, now, O bird, what hint is there of rain, In thirsty heaven or on burning plain, That thy keen eye perceives?

III

But thou art right. Thou prophesiest true. For hardly hast thou ceased thy forecasting, When, up the western fierceness of scorched blue, Great water-carrier winds their buckets bring Brimming with freshness. How their dippers ring And flash and rumble! lavishing large dew On corn and forestland, that, streaming wet, Their hilly backs against the downpour set, Like giants, loom in view.

IV

The butterfly, safe under leaf and flower, Has found a roof, knowing how true thou art; The bumblebee, within the last half-hour, Has ceased to hug the honey to its heart; While in the barnyard, under shed and cart, Brood-hens have housed.--But I, who scorned thy power, Barometer of the birds,--like August there,-- Beneath a beech, dripping from foot to hair, Like some drenched truant, cower.

THE HARVEST MOON

I

Globed in Heav'n's tree of azure, golden mellow As some round apple hung High on Hesperian boughs, thou hangest yellow The branch-like clouds among: Within thy light a sunburnt youth, named Health, Rests 'mid the tasseled shocks, the tawny stubble; And by his side, clad on with rustic wealth Of field and farm, beneath thy amber bubble, A nut-brown maid, Content, sits smiling still: While through the quiet trees, The mossy rocks, the grassy hill, Thy silvery spirit glides to yonder mill, Around whose wheel the breeze And shimmering ripples of the water play, As, by their mother, little children may.

II

Sweet Spirit of the Moon, who walkest,--lifting, Exhaustless on thy arm, A vase of pearly fire,--through the shifting Cloud-halls of calm and storm, Pour down thy blossoms! let me hear them come, Pelting with noiseless light the twinkling thickets, Making the darkness audible with the hum Of many insect creatures, grigs and crickets: Until it seems the elves hold revelries By haunted stream and grove; Or, in the night's deep peace, The young-old presence of Earth's full increase Seems telling thee her love, Ere, lying down, she turns to rest, and smiles, Hearing thy heart beat through the myriad miles.

FIELD AND FOREST CALL

There is a field, that leans upon two hills, Foamed o'er of flowers and twinkling with clear rills; That in its girdle of wild acres bears; The anodyne of rest that cures all cares; Wherein soft wind and sun and sound are blent And fragrance--as in some old instrument Sweet chords--calm things, that nature's magic spell Distils from heaven's azure crucible, And pours on Earth to make the sick mind well. There lies the path, they say-- Come, away! come, away!

There is a forest, lying 'twixt two streams, Sung through of birds and haunted of dim dreams; That in its league-long hand of trunk and leaf Lifts a green wand that charms away all grief; Wrought of quaint silence and the stealth of things, Vague, whispering touches, gleams and twitterings, Dews and cool shadows--that the mystic soul Of nature permeates with suave control, And waves o'er Earth to make the sad heart whole. There lies the road, they say-- Come, away! come, away!

OLD HOMES

Old homes among the hills! I love their gardens, Their old rock-fences, that our day inherits; Their doors, round which the great trees stand like wardens; Their paths, down which the shadows march like spirits; Broad doors and paths that reach bird-haunted gardens.

I see them gray among their ancient acres, Severe of front, their gables lichen-sprinkled,-- Like gentle-hearted, solitary Quakers, Grave and religious, with kind faces wrinkled,-- Serene among their memory-hallowed acres.

Their gardens, banked with roses and with lilies-- Those sweet aristocrats of all the flowers-- Where Springtime mints her gold in daffodillies, And Autumn coins her marigolds in showers, And all the hours are toilless as the lilies.

I love their orchards where the gay woodpecker Flits, flashing o'er you, like a wingéd jewel; Their woods, whose floors of moss the squirrels checker With half-hulled nuts; and where, in cool renewal, The wild brooks laugh, and raps the red woodpecker.

Old homes! old hearts! Upon my soul forever Their peace and gladness lie like tears and laughter; Like love they touch me, through the years that sever, With simple faith; like friendship, draw me after The dreamy patience that is theirs forever.

A MEMORY

Above her, pearl and rose the heavens lay: Around her, flowers scattered earth with gold, Or down the path in insolence held sway-- Like cavaliers who ride the king's highway-- Scarlet and buff, within a garden old.

Beyond the hills, faint-heard through belts of wood, Bells, Sabbath-sweet, swooned from some far-off town: Gamboge and gold, broad sunset colors strewed The purple west as if, with God imbued, Her mighty pallet Nature there laid down.

Amid such flowers, underneath such skies, Embodying all life knows of sweet and fair, She stood; love's dreams in girlhood's face and eyes, Fair as a star that comes to emphasize The mingled beauty of the earth and air.

Behind her, seen through vines and orchard trees, Gray with its twinkling windows--like the face Of calm old-age that sits and smiles at ease-- Porched with old roses, haunts of honey-bees, The homestead loomed dim in a glimmering space.

For whom she waited in the afterglow, Soft-eyed and dreamy 'mid the poppy and rose, I do not know, I do not care to know:-- It is enough I keep her picture so, Hung up, like poetry, in my life's dull prose.

A fragrant picture, where I still may find Her face untouched of sorrow or regret, Unspoiled of contact, ever young and kind, The spiritual sweetheart of my soul and mind, She had not been, perhaps, if we had met.

DOLCE FAR NIENTE

I

Over the bay as our boat went sailing Under the skies of Augustine, Far to the east lay the ocean paling Under the skies of Augustine.-- There, in the boat as we sat together, Soft in the glow of the turquoise weather, Light as the foam or a seagull's feather, Fair of form and of face serene, Sweet at my side I felt you lean, As over the bay our boat went sailing Under the skies of Augustine.

II

Over the bay as our boat went sailing Under the skies of Augustine, Pine and palm, in the west, hung, trailing Under the skies of Augustine.-- Was it the wind that sighed above you? Was it the wave that whispered of you? Was it my soul that said, "I love you"? Was it your heart that murmured between, Answering, shy as a bird unseen? As over the bay our boat went sailing Under the skies of Augustine.

III

Over the bay as our boat went sailing Under the skies of Augustine, Gray and low flew the heron, wailing Under the skies of Augustine.-- Naught was spoken. We watched the simple Gulls wing past. Your hat's white wimple Shadowed your eyes. And your lips, a-dimple, Smiled and seemed from your soul to wean An inner beauty, an added sheen, As over the bay our boat went sailing Under the skies of Augustine.

IV

Over the bay as our boat went sailing Under the skies of Augustine, Red on the marshes the day flamed, failing Under the skies of Augustine.-- Was it your thought, or the transitory Gold of the west, like a written story, Bright on your brow, that I read? the glory And grace of love, like a rose-crowned queen Pictured pensive in mind and mien? As over the bay our boat went sailing Under the skies of Augustine.

V

Over the bay as our boat went sailing Under the skies of Augustine, Wan on the waters the mist lay, veiling Under the skies of Augustine.-- Was it the joy that begot the sorrow?-- Joy that was filled with the dreams that borrow Prescience sad of a far To-morrow,-- There in the Now that was all too keen, That shadowed the fate that might intervene? As over the bay our boat went sailing Under the skies of Augustine.

VI

Over the bay as our boat went sailing Under the skies of Augustine, The marsh-hen cried and the tide was ailing Under the skies of Augustine.-- And so we parted. No vows were spoken. No faith was plighted that might be broken. But deep in our hearts each bore a token Of life and of love and all they mean, Beautiful, thornless, and ever green, From over the bay where our boat went sailing Under the skies of Augustine.

_St. Augustine, Fla., February, 1899._

THE PURPLE VALLEYS

Far in the purple valleys of illusion I see her waiting, like the soul of music, With deep eyes, lovelier than cerulean pansies, Shadow and fire, yet merciless as poison; With red lips sweeter than Arabian storax, Yet bitterer than myrrh. O tears and kisses! O eyes and lips, that haunt my soul forever!

Again Spring walks transcendent on the mountains: The woods are hushed: the vales are full of shadows: Above the heights, steeped in a thousand splendors, Like some vast canvas of the gods, hangs burning The sunset's wild sciography: and slowly The moon treads heaven's proscenium,--night's stately White queen of love and tragedy and madness.

Again I know forgotten dreams and longings; Ideals lost; desires dead and buried Beside the altar sacrifice erected Within the heart's high sanctuary. Strangely Again I know the horror and the rapture, The utterless awe, the joy akin to anguish, The terror and the worship of the spirit.

Again I feel her eyes pierce through and through me; Her deep eyes, lovelier than imperial pansies, Velvet and flame, through which her strong will holds me, Powerless and tame, and draws me on and onward To sad, unsatisfied and animal yearnings, Wild, unrestrained--the brute within the human-- To fling me panting on her mouth and bosom.

Again I feel her lips like ice and fire, Her red lips, odorous as Arabian storax, Fragrance and fire, within whose kiss destruction Lies serpent-like. Intoxicating languors Resistlessly embrace me, soul and body; And we go drifting, drifting--she is laughing-- Outcasts of God, into the deep's abysm.

THE LAND OF ILLUSION

I

So we had come at last, my soul and I, Into that land of shadowy plain and peak, On which the dawn seemed ever about to break, On which the day seemed ever about to die.

II

Long had we sought fulfillment of our dreams, The everlasting wells of Joy and Youth; Long had we sought the snow-white flow'r of Truth, That blooms eternal by eternal streams.

III

And, fonder still, we hoped to find the sweet Immortal presence, Love; the bird Delight Beside her; and, eyed with sideral night, Faith, like a lion, fawning at her feet.

IV

But, scorched and barren, in its arid well, We found our dreams' forgotten fountain-head; And by black, bitter waters, crushed and dead, Among wild weeds, Truth's trampled asphodel.

V

And side by side with pallid Doubt and Pain, Not Love, but Grief did meet us there: afar We saw her, like a melancholy star, A pensive moon, move towards us o'er the plain.

VI

Sweet was her face as song that tells of home; And filled our hearts with vague, suggestive spells Of pathos, as sad ocean fills its shells With sympathetic moanings of the foam.

VII

She raised one hand and pointed silently, And passed; her eyes, gaunt with a thirst unslaked, Were worlds of woe, where tears in torrents ached, Yet never fell. And like a winter sea,--

VIII

Whose caverned crags are haunts of wreck and wrath, That house the condor pinions of the storm,-- My soul replied; and, weeping, arm in arm, To'ards those dim hills, by that appointed path,

IX

We turned and went. Arrived, we did discern How Beauty beckoned, white 'mid miles of flowers, Through which, behold, the amaranthine Hours Like maidens went, each holding high an urn;

X

Wherein, it seemed--drained from long chalices Of those slim flowers--they bore mysterious wine; A poppied vintage, full of sleep divine, And pale forgetting of all miseries.

XI

Then to my soul I said, "No longer weep. Come, let us drink; for hateful is the sky, And earth is full of care, and life's a lie. So let us drink; yea, let us drink and sleep."

XII

Then from their brimming urns we drank sweet must, While all around us rose-crowned faces laughed Into our own: but hardly had we quaffed When, one by one, these crumbled into dust.

XIII

And league on league the eminence of blooms, That flashed and billowed like a summer sea, Rolled out a waste of thorns and tombs; where bee And butterfly and bird hung dead in looms

XIV

Of worm and spider. And through tomb and brier, A thin wind, parched with bitter salt and sand, Went wailing as if mourning some lost land Of perished empire, Babylon or Tyre.

XV

Long, long with blistered feet we wandered in That land of ruins, through whose sky of brass Hate's harpy shrieked; and in whose iron grass The hydra hissed of undestroyable Sin.

XVI

And there at last, behold, the House of Doom,-- Red, as if Hell had glared it into life, Blood-red, and howling with incessant strife,-- With burning battlements, towered through the gloom.

XVII

And throned within sat Darkness.--Who might gaze Upon that form, that threatening presence there, Crowned with the flickering corpse-lights of Despair, And yet escape sans madness and amaze?

XVIII

And we had hoped to find among these hills The House of Beauty!--Curst, yea thrice accurst, The hope that lures one on from last to first With vain illusions that no time fulfills!

XIX

Why will we struggle to attain, and strive, When all we gain is but an empty dream?-- Better, unto my thinking, doth it seem To end it all and let who will survive:

XX

To find at last all beauty is but dust: That love and sorrow are the very same: That joy is only suffering's sweeter name: And sense is but the synonym of lust.

XXI

Far better, yea, to me it seems, to die! To set glad lips against the lips of Death-- The only thing God gives that comforteth, The only thing we do not find a lie.

THE LAST SONG

She sleeps: he sings to her: the day was long, And, tired out with too much happiness, She fain would have him sing of old Provence; Old songs, that spoke of love in such soft tones, Her restless soul was straight besieged of dreams, And her wild heart beleaguered of deep peace, And heart and soul surrendered unto sleep.-- Like perfect sculpture in the moon she lies, Its pallor on her through heraldic panes Of one tall casement's guléd quarterings.-- Beside her couch, an antique table, weighed With gold and crystal; here, a carven chair, Whereon her raiment,--that suggests sweet curves Of shapely beauty,--bearing her limbs' impress, Is richly laid: and, near the chair, a glass, An oval mirror framed in ebony: And, dim and deep,--investing all the room With ghostly life of woven women and men, And strange, fantastic gloom, where shadows move,-- Dark tapestry,--which in the gusts--that twinge A dropping cresset's slender star of light-- Seems swayed of cautious hands, assassin-like, That bide their hour.

She alone, deep-haired As golden dawn, and whiter than a rose, Divinely breasted as the Queen of Love, Lies robeless in the glimmer of the moon, Like Danaë within the golden shower. Seated beside her aromatic rest, In silence musing on her loveliness, Her knight and troubadour. A lute, aslope The curious baldric of his tunic, glints Pearl-caught reflections of the moon, that seem The voiceless ghosts of long-dead melodies. In purple and sable, slashed with solemn gold, Like stately twilight over slopes of snow, He leans above her.--

Have his hands forgot Their craft, that now they pause upon the strings? His lips, their art, that they cease, speechless there?-- His eyes are set ... What is it stills to stone His hands? his lips? and mails him, head and heel, In terrible marble, motionless and cold?-- Behind the arras, can it be he feels, Black-browed and grim, with eyes of sombre fire, Death towers above him with uplifted sword?

THE DREAM OF RODERICK

Below, the tawny Tagus swept Past royal gardens, breathing balm: Upon his couch the monarch slept; The world was still; the night was calm.

Gray, Gothic-gated, in the ray Of moonrise, tower and castle-crowned, The city of Toledo lay Beneath the terraced palace-ground.

Again, he dreamed, in kingly sport He sought the tree-sequestered path, And watched the ladies of his Court Within the marble-basined bath.

Its porphyry stairs and fountained base Shone, houried with voluptuous forms, Where Andalusia vied in grace With old Castile, in female charms.

And laughter, song, and water-splash Rang round the place, with rock arcaded, As here a breast or limb would flash Where beauty swam or beauty waded.

And then, like Venus, from the wave A maiden came, and stood below; And by her side a woman slave Bent down to dry her limbs of snow.

Then on the tesselated bank, Robed on with fragrance and with fire,-- Like some exotic flower--she sank, The type of all divine desire.

Then her dark curls, that sparkled wet, She parted from her perfect brows, And, lo, her eyes, like lamps of jet Lit in an alabaster house.

And in his sleep the monarch sighed, "Florinda!"--Dreaming still he moaned, "Ah, would that I had died, had died! I have atoned! I have atoned!"...

And then the vision changed: O'erhead Tempest and darkness were unrolled, Full of wild voices of the dead, And lamentations manifold.

And wandering shapes of gaunt despair Swept by; and faces pale with pain, Whose eyes wept blood and seemed to glare Fierce curses on him through the rain.

And then, it seemed, 'gainst blazing skies A necromantic tower sate, Crag-like on crags, of giant size; With adamatine wall and gate.

And from the storm a hand of might, Red-rolled in thunder, reached among The gate's huge bolts, that burst--and night Clanged ruin as its hinges swung.

Then far away a murmur trailed,-- As of sad seas on cavern'd shores,-- That grew into a voice that wailed, "They come! they come! the Moors! the Moors!"

And with deep boom of atabals And crash of cymbals and wild peal Of battle-bugles, from its walls An army rushed in glimmering steel.

And where it trod he saw the torch Of conflagration stalk the skies, And in the vanward of its march The monster form of Havoc rise.

And Paynim war-cries rent the storm, Athwart whose firmament of flame Destruction reared an earthquake form On wreck and death without a name....

And then again the vision changed: Where flows the Guadelete, see, The champions of the Cross are ranged Against the Crescent's chivalry.

With roar of trumpets and of drums They meet; and in the battle's van He fights; and, towering towards him, comes Florinda's father, Julian;

And one-eyed Taric, great in war: And where these couch their burning spears, The Christian phalanx, near and far, Goes down like corn before the shears.

The Moslem wins: the Christian flies: "Allah il Allah," hill and plain Reverberate: the rocking skies, "Allah il Allah," shout again.

And then he dreamed the swing of swords And hurl of arrows were no more; And stranger than the howling hordes Deep silence fell on field and shore.

And through the night, it seemed, he fled, Upon a white steed like a star, Across a field of endless dead, Beneath a blood-red scimitar

Of sunset: And he heard a moan, Beneath, around, on every hand-- "Accurséd! Yea, what hast thou done To bring this curse upon thy land?"

And then an awful sense of wings: And, lo! the answer--"'Twas his lust That was his crime. Behold! e'en kings Must reckon with Me. God is just."

ZYPS OF ZIRL

The Alps of the Tyrol are dark with pines, Where, foaming under the mountain spines, The Inn's long water sounds and shines.

Beyond, are peaks where the morning weaves An icy rose; and the evening leaves The golden ghosts of a thousand sheaves.

Deep vines and torrents and glimmering haze, And sheep-bells tinkling on mountain ways, And fluting shepherds make sweet the days.

The rolling mist, like a wandering fleece, The great, round moon in a mountain crease, And a song of love make the nights all peace.

Beneath the blue Tyrolean skies On the banks of the Inn, that foams and flies, The storied city of Innsbruck lies.

With its mediæval streets, that crook, And its gabled houses, it has the look Of a belfried town in a fairy book.

So wild the Tyrol that oft, 'tis said, When the storm is out and the town in bed, The howling of wolves sweeps overhead.

And oft the burgher, sitting here In his walled rose-garden, hears the clear Shrill scream of the eagle circling near.

And this is the tale that the burghers tell:-- The Abbot of Wiltau stood at his cell Where the Solstein lifts its pinnacle.

A mighty summit of bluffs and crags That frowns on the Inn; where the forest stags Have worn a path to the water-flags.

The Abbot of Wiltau stood below; And he was aware of a plume and bow On the precipice there in the morning's glow,

A chamois, he saw, from span to span Had leapt; and after it leapt a man; And he knew 'twas the Kaiser Maximilian.

But, see! though rash as the chamois he, His foot less sure. And verily If the King should miss ... "Jesu! Marie!

"The King hath missed!"--And, look, he falls! Rolls headlong out to the headlong walls. What Saint shall save him on whom he calls?

What Saint shall save him, who struggles there On the narrow ledge by the eagle's lair, With hook'd hands clinging 'twixt earth and air?

The Abbot crosses himself in dread-- "Let prayers go up for the nearly dead, And the passing-bell be tolled," he said.

"For the House of Hapsburg totters! See, How raveled the thread of its destiny, Sheer hung between cloud and rock!" quoth he.

But hark! where the steeps of the peak reply, Is it an eagle's echoing cry? And the flitting shadow, its plumes on high?

No voice of the eagle is that which rings! And the shadow, a wiry man who swings Down, down where the desperate Kaiser clings.