Part 3

"Of Hugh her leman!--What else could be When the devil was judge 'twixt thee and me?

"He splintered my lance, and my blade he broke-- Now finish me, thou, 'neath the trysting oak!"

The shield of his foeman--a heart of white In a bath of fire--shone in the night:

The plume of his foeman, as midnight black, Blew, as he leapt on his horse's back:

Leapt and laughed as his sword he swung, Then galloped away with a laugh on his tongue....

Who is she in the gray, wet dawn, 'Mid the forest shades like a shadow wan?

Who kneels, one hand on her straining breast, One hand on the dead man's bosom pressed?

Her face is dim as the dead's; and cold As his tarnished harness of steel and gold.

O Lady Maurine! O Lady Maurine! What boots it now that regret is keen?

That his hair you smooth? that you kiss his brow, What boots it now? what boots it now?--

She has haled him under the trysting oak, The huge old oak that the creepers cloak.

She has stood him, gaunt in his battered arms, In its haunted hollow.--"Be safe from storms,"

She laughed as his cloven casque she placed On his brow, and his riven shield she braced.

Then sat and talked to the forest flowers Through the lonely term of the day's pale hours.

And stared and whispered and smiled and wept, As nearer and nearer the evening crept.

And lo, when the moon, like a great gold bloom Above the sorrowful trees did loom,

She rose up sobbing, "O moon, come see My bridegroom here in the old oak-tree!

"I have talked to the flowers all day, all day, For never a word had he to say.

"He would not listen, he would not hear, Though I wailed my longing into his ear.

"O moon, steal in where he stands so grim, And tell him I love him and plead with him.

"Soften his face, that is cold and stern, And brighten his eyes and make them burn,

"O moon, white moon, so my soul can see, Can say that they glow with love for me!"--

When the moon had set, and the woods were dark, The wild deer came, and stood as stark

As phantoms with eyes of flame; or fled Like a ghostly herd of the hunted dead.

And the strix-owl called; and the werewolf snarled; And a voice, in the boughs of the oak-tree gnarled,--

Like the whining voice of the hags that ride To the witches' Sabboth,--crooned and cried.

And wrapped in his mantle of wind and cloud, The storm-fiend stalked through the forest loud.

When she heard the dead man rattle and groan As the oak was bent and its leaves were blown,

And the lightning flickered his shimmering mail,-- Through the swirl and sweep of the rain and hail,

She seemed to hear him, who seemed to call,-- "Come hither, Maurine! the wild leaves fall!

"The wild leaves rustle, the wild leaves flee-- Come hither, Maurine, to the hollow tree!

"To the trysting tree, to the tree once green, Come hither, Maurine! come hither, Maurine!"...

They found her closed in his armored arms-- Had he claimed his bride on that night of storms?

A REED SHAKEN WITH THE WIND

I

Not for you and me the path Winding through the shadowless Fields of morning's dewiness! Where the brook that hurries hath Laughter lighter than a boy's; Where recurrent odors poise, Romp-like, with irreverent tresses, In the sun; and leaves and boughs Build a music-haunted house For the winds to hang their dresses, Whisper-silken, rustling in. Ours a path that led unto Twilight regions gray with dew; Where moon-vapors gathered thin Over acres sisterless Of all healthy beauty; where Fungus growths made sad the air As a phantom-felt caress: Under darkness and strange stars, To the sorrow-silenced bars Of a dubious forestland, Where the wood-scents seemed to stand, And the sounds on either hand, Clad like Sleep's own servitors In the shadowy livery Of the ancient House of Dreams, Which before us,--fitfully, With white intermittent gleams Of its pale-lamped windows,--shone, Echoing with the dim unknown.

II

To say to Hope,--Take all from me, And grant me naught: Take rose, and song, and melody, And word and thought: Then all my life make me her slave,-- Is all I crave.

To say to Time,--Be true to me, Nor grant me less Of loss, of grief, of memory, Of heart's distress: Then for her love set me a task, Is all I ask.

III

I came to you when eve was young: And, where the park rolled downward to The river, and among the dew, One vesper moment, lit and sung A bird, your eyes said something true, Said something to my eyes, more dear Than song the bird poured, silver-clear. How sweet it was to be with you! How, with our souls, we seemed to hear The night approaching with its stars! How calm the moon sloped up her sphere Of fire-filled pearl through passive bars Of clouds that berged the tender east! While all the dark inanimate Of Nature woke; initiate With th' moon's arrival, something ceased In Nature's soul: she stood again Another self, that seemed t' have been Dormant, suppressed and so unseen All day: a life, unknown and strange And dream-suggestive, that had lain,-- Masked on with light,--within the range Of thought, but unrevealed till now. It was the hour of love. And you, With downward eyes and pensive brow, Among the moonlight and the dew,-- Although no word of love was spoken,-- Heard the sweet night's confession broken Of something here more sweet in me: A love, depth made inaudible, Save to your soul, that answered well, With eyes replying silently.

IV

Fair you are as a rose is fair, There where the shadows dew it; And the deeps of your brown, brown hair, Soft as the cloud that lingers there With the sunset's auburn through it. Eyes of azure and throat of snow, Tell me what my heart would know!

Every dream I dream of you Has a love-thought in it, And a hope, a kiss or two, Something dear and something true, Telling me each minute, With three words it whispers clear What my heart from you would hear.

V

Junetime came: the days grew kind With increasing beauty: deep Were the nights with rest and sleep: Fair, with poppies intertwined On their blond locks, went the Hours, Sunny-hearted as the rose, Through the buds and banded flowers, Teaching them, how no one knows, Freshness, color, and perfume.-- In the window of your room Bloomed a late azalea. Pink As an egret's rosy plumes Shone its tender-tufted blooms. From your care and love, I think, Love's rose-color it did drink, Growing rosier day by day Through your 'tending hand's caress: And your own dear naturalness Had imbued it in some way. Once you gave a blossom of it, Smiling, to me when I left: Need I tell you how I love it Faded though it is now!--'Reft Of its fragrance and its color, Yet 'tis dearer now than then,--As past happiness is when Life regrets.--And dimmer, duller Though its beauty be, when I Look upon it, I recall Every part of that old wall; And the dingy window high, Where you sat and read; and all The fond love that made your face A soft sunbeam in that place: And the plant that grew this bloom Withered here, itself long dead, Makes a halo overhead There again--and through my room, Like faint whispers of perfume, Steal the words of love then said.

VI

All of my love I send to you, I send to you, On thoughts, like moths, that wend to you Out of my heart's glad garden, O'er which, its lovely warden, Your face, a lily seeming, Is dreaming.

All of my life I bring to you, I bring to you, In deeds, like birds, that wing to you Out of my soul's deep valley, O'er which, most musically, Your love, a fountain, glistens, And listens.

My love, my life, how blessed in you! How blessed in you! Whose thoughts, whose deeds find rest in you Here on my life's dark ocean, O'er which, in heavenly motion, Your soul, a star, abideth, And guideth.

VII

Where the old Kentucky wound Through the land,--its stream between Hills of primitive forest green,-- Like a goodly belt around Giant breasts of grandeur; with Many an unknown Indian myth, On the boat we steamed. The land Like an hospitable hand Welcomed us. Alone we sat On the under-deck, and saw Farm-house and plantation draw Near and vanish. 'Neath your hat Your young eyes laughed; and your hair, Blown about them by the air Of our passage, clung and curled. Music, and the summer moon; And the hills' great shadows hewn Out of silence; and the tune Of the whistle, when we whirled Round a moonlit bend in sight of Some lone landing heaped with hay Or tobacco; where the light of One dim, solitary lamp Signaled through the evening's damp: Then a bell; and, dusky gray, Shuffling figures on the shore With the cable; rugged forms On the gang-plank; backs and arms With their cargo bending o'er; And the burly mate before. Then an iron bell, and puff Of escaping steam; and out Where the stream is wheel-whipped rough; Music, and a parting shout From the shore; the pilot's bell Beating on the deck below; Then the steady, quivering, slow, Smooth advance again. Until Twinkling lights beyond us tell Of a lock or little town Clasped between a hill and hill, Where the bluegrass fields slope down.-- So we went. That summer-time Lingers with me like a rhyme Learned for dreamy beauty of Its old-fashioned faith and love, In some musing moment; sith Heart-associated with Joy that moments quiet bore, And forgotten nevermore.

VIII

Three sweet things love lives upon: Music, at whose fountain's brink Low he stoops his face to drink; Seeing, as the wave is drawn, His near image rise and sink. Three sweet things love lives upon.

Three sweet things love lives upon: Odor, whose red roses wreathe His bright brow that shines beneath; Hearing, as each bloom is blown, His soul's essence breathe and breathe. Three sweet things love lives upon.

Three sweet things love lives upon: Color, to whose rainbow he Lifts his dark eyes burningly; Feeling, as the wild hues dawn, His high immortality. Three sweet things love lives upon.

IX

Memories of other days,-- Sad with whilom happiness,-- Rise before my musing gaze In the twilight.... And your dress Seems beside me, like a haze Shimmering white; as when we went 'Neath the star-strewn firmament, Love-led, with impatient feet Down the night that, summer-sweet, Sparkled o'er the lamp-lit street. Every look you gave me then Comes before my eyes again, Making music for my heart On that path where once for us Roses, red and amorous, Grew, the roses red of love: Roses, that are dead enough On that path now! whence oft start Out of recollected places, With remembered forms and faces, Dreams of love, like figures, woven In my life's dark tapestry, Beckoning, ever shadowy, To my soul still.--O'er the cloven Gulf of time I seem to hear Words once whispered in my ear, Calling--as might friends long dead, With familiar voices deep, Call to one who lies asleep, Comforting.--So was I led Backward to forgotten things, Contiguities that spread Sudden, unremembered wings: And across my mind's still blue, From the nest they fledged in, flew Dazzling shapes that passion knew.

X

Ah! over full my heart is Of sadness and of pain: As a rose-flower in the garden The dull dusk fills with rain; As a blown red rose that shivers And bows to the wind and rain.

So give me your hands and speak me As once in the days of yore, When love spoke sweetly to us, The love that speaks no more: The sound of your voice may help him To speak in my heart once more.

Ah! over grieved my soul is, And tired and sick for sleep, As a poppy-bloom that withers, Forgotten, where reapers reap: As a harvested poppy-flower That dies where reapers reap.

So bend to my face and kiss me As once in the days of yore, When the touch of your lips was magic That restored to life once more: The thought of your kiss, which awakens To life that love once more.

XI

Sitting often I have, oh! Often have desired you so-- Yearned to kiss you as I did When your love to me you gave, In the moonlight, by the wave, And a long-remembered kiss Pressed upon your mouth that chid, Then upon each eye's sweet lid-- That, all passion-shaken, I With love-language will address Each dear thing I know you by, Picture, needle-work, or frame; Each suggestive in the same Perfume of past happiness: Till, meseems, the ways we knew Now again I tread with you From the old-time tryst: and there Feel the pressure of your hair Cool and young upon my cheek, And your breath's aroma: bare On my arm your hand,--as weak As a lily on a stream:-- And once more you look at me With the sometime witchery, And again I hear you speak; And remembered ecstasy Sweeps my soul again.--I seem Dreaming.... Would I thus might dream Ever! and reality Mix itself eternally With such visions of the past, Where my soul still holds you fast!

XII

When day dies, lone, forsaken, And joy is kissed asleep; When doubt's gray eyes awaken, And love, with music taken From hearts with sighings shaken, Sits in the dusk to weep:

With ghostly-lifted finger What memory then shall rise? Of dark regret the bringer-- To tell the sorrowing singer Of days whose echoes linger, Till dawn unstars the skies.

When night is gone and, beaming, Faith journeys forth to toil; When hope's blue eyes wake gleaming, And life is done with dreaming The dreams that seem but seeming Within the world's turmoil:

Who may forget the presence Of death that walks unseen? Whose scythe casts shadowy crescents Around life's glittering essence, As lessens, slowly lessens, The space that lies between.

XIII

Bland was that October day, Calm and balmy as the spring, When we went a forest way, Under beeches, lichen-gray, To a valleyed opening; Where the purple aster flowered, And, like torches, savage-held, Red the fiery sumac towered; And, where gum-trees sentineled Vistas, robed in gold and garnet, Ripe the thorny chestnut shelled Its brown plumpness. Bee and hornet Droned around us; low the cricket, Tireless in the wood-rose thicket, Tremoloed; and, to the wind All its moon-spun silver casting, Swung the milkweed's pod, that thinned, Where a butterfly seemed pinned: And its clean flame on the sod By the fading goldenrod, Burned the white life-everlasting.-- It was not so much the time, Nor the place, nor way we went, That made all our moods to rhyme, Nor the season's sentiment, As it was the innocent Carefree childhood of our hearts, Reading each expression of Death and change as life and love: That impression joy imparts Unto others and retorts On itself, which then made glad All the sorrow of decay, As the memory of that day Makes this day of autumn sad.

XIV

The pungent-breathed petunias Hang riven of the rain; And where the tiger-lily was Now droops a tawny stain; While in the twilight's purple pause Earth dreams of heaven again.

When love sits down to sigh, Where one lies all alone Beneath the sod's green sky-- What boots it then to try, Or to atone?

With ragged petals round its pod The rain-wrecked poppy dies; And where the hectic rose did nod A crumbled crimson lies; While distant as the dreams of God The stars slip in the skies.

When love lies down to sleep, When one is dead and gone-- Within the darkness deep What boots it then to weep? All's said and done.

XV

Holding both your hands in mine, Often have we sat together, While, outside, the boisterous weather Hung the wild wind on the pine Like a black marauder, and With a sudden warning hand At the casement rapped. The night Wrote no line or glimmer of light, Starbeam-syllabled, within Her dark book of death and sin, Cloudy-chaptered tragicly.-- Looking in your eyes, ah me! Though I knew, I did not heed What the night wrote there for us, Threatening and ominous: For love helped my heart to read Forward to unopened pages Of a coming day, that held More for us than all the ages Past, that it epitomized In one sentence; where was spelled What our present realized Only--all the love that was Past and still to be for us.

XVI

'Though in the garden, gray with dew, All life lies withering, And there's no more to say or do, No more to sigh or sing, Come back with me the ways we knew When buds were opening.

Perhaps we shall not search in vain Within its wreck and gloom; 'Mid roses ruined of the rain There still may live one bloom; One flower, whose heart may still retain The long-lost soul-perfume.

And then, perhaps, will come to us The dreams we dreamed of yore; And song, who spoke so beauteous, Will speak to us once more; And love, with eyes all amorous, Will gaze as once before.

So 'though the yard is gray with dew, And flowers are withering, And there's no more to say or do, No more to sigh or sing, Come back with me the ways we knew When buds were opening.

XVII

Looking on the desolate street, Where the first snow drifts and drives, Trodden black of hurrying feet, Where the athlete storm-wind strives With each tree and dangling light,-- Centres, sphered with glittering white,-- Hissing in the dancing snow ... Backward in my mind I go To that tempest-haunted night Of two autumns past, when we, Hastening homeward, were o'ertaken Of the storm; and 'neath a tree, With its wild leaves tempest-shaken, Sheltered us in that forsaken, Sad and ancient cemetery,-- Where folk came no more to bury.-- Haggard gravestones, mossed and crumbled, Tottered round us, or o'ertumbled In their sunken graves; and some, Urned and obelisked above Iron-fenced-in tombs, stood dumb Records of forgotten love. And again I see the west Yawning inward to its core Of electric-spasmed ore, Swiftly, without pause or rest: And a great wind sweeps the dust Up abandoned sidewalks; and, In the rotting trees, the gust Shouts again--a voice that would Make its gaunt self understood Moaning over Death's lean land.-- And we sat there, hand in hand; On the granite; where we read, By the instant skies o'erhead, Something of one young and dead. Yet the words begot no fear In our souls: you leaned your cheek Smiling on mine: very near Were our lips: we did not speak.

XVIII

And suddenly alone I stood With scared eyes gazing through the wood, For some still sign of ill or good To lead me from the solitude.

The day was at its twilighting; One cloud o'erhead spread a vast wing Of rosy thunder; vanishing Behind the far hills' sullen ring.

Some stars shone timidly o'erhead; And towards the west's cadaverous red-- Like some wild dream that haunts the dead In limbo--the lean moon was led.

Upon the sad, debatable Vague lands of twilight slowly fell A silence that I knew too well, A sorrow that I can not tell.

What way to take, what path to go, Whether into the east's gray glow, Or where the west burnt red and low-- What way to choose I did not know.

So, hesitating, there I stood Lost in my soul's uncertain wood; One sign I craved of ill or good To lead me from its solitude.

XIX

It was autumn: and a night Full of whispers and of mist, With a gray moon, wanly whist, Hanging like a phantom light O'er the hills. We stood among Windy fields of weed and flower, Where the withered seed-pod hung, And the chill leaf-cricket sung. Melancholy was the hour With the mystery and loneness Of the year, that seemed to look On its own departed face-- As our love then, in its oneness, All its dead past did retrace, And from that sad moment took Presage of approaching parting.-- Sorrowful the hour and dark: Low among the trees, now darting, Now concealed, a lamp's pale spark-- Like a fen-fire--winked and lured Shut among the shadows, where All was doubtful, unassured, Immaterial; and bare Facts of unideal day Changed to substance such as dreams. And meseemed then, far away-- Farther than remotest gleams Of the stars--lost, separated, And estranged and out of reach, Grew our lives away from each, Far away as it was fated.

XX

There is no gladness in the day Now you're away; Dull is the morn, the noon is dull, Once beautiful; And when the sunset fills the skies With dusking dyes, With tired eyes and tired heart I sit alone, I sigh apart, And wish for you, For only you.

Ah! darker now the night comes on Since you are gone; Sad are the stars, the moon is sad, Once wholly glad; And when the stars and moon are set, And earth lies wet, With heart's regret and soul's hard ache, I dream alone, I lie awake, And think of you, Of only you.

These, who once spake me, speak no more, Now all is o'er; Day hath forgot the language of Its hopes of love; Night, whose sweet lips were burdensome With dreams, is dumb; Far different from what used to be With grief and loss they speak to me, They speak of you, Of only you.

XXI