Part 10

“Already spicewood and the sassafras, Like fragrant flames, begin To tuft their boughs with topaz, ere they spin Their beryl canopies--a glimmering mass, Mist-blurred, above the deepening grass. Already where the old beech stands Clutching the lean soil as it were with hands Taloned and twisted,--on its trunk a knot, A huge excrescence, a great fungous clot, Like some enormous and distorting wart,-- My eyes can see how, blot on beautiful blot Of blue, the violets blur through The musky and the loamy rot Of leaf-pierced leaves; and, heaven in their hue, A sunbeam at each blossom’s heart, The little bluets, crew on azure crew, Prepare their myriads for invasion too.

VII

“And in my soul I see how, soon, shall rise,-- Still hidden to men’s eyes,-- Dim as the wind that round them treads,-- Hosts of spring-beauties, streaked with rosy reds, And pale anemones, whose airy heads, As to some fairy rhyme, All day shall nod in delicate time: And now, even now, white peal on peal Of pearly bells,--that in bare boughs conceal Themselves,--like snowy music, chime on chime, The huckleberries to my gaze reveal-- Clusters, that soon shall toss Above this green-starred moss, That, like an emerald fire, gleams across This forest-side, and from its moist deeps lifts Slim, wire-like stems of seed; Or, lichen-colored, glows with many a bead Of cup-like blossoms: carpets where, I read, When through the night’s dark rifts The moonlight’s glimpsing splendor sifts, The immaterial forms With moonbeam-beckoning arms, Of Fable and Romance,-- Myths that are born of whispers of the wind And foam of falling waters, music-twinned-- Shall lead the legendary dance; The dance that never stops, Of Earth’s wild beauty on the green hill-tops.”

VIII

The youth, the beauty and disdain Of birth, death does not know, Compel my heart with longing like to pain When the spring breezes blow. The fragrance and the heat Of their soft breath, whose musk makes sweet Each woodland way, each wild retreat, Seem saying in my ear, “Hark, and behold! Before a week be gone This barren woodside and this leafless wold A million flowers shall invade With argent and azure, pearl and gold,-- Like rainbow fragments scattered of the dawn,-- Here making bright, here wan Each foot of earth, each glen and glimmering glade, Each rood of windy wood, Where late gaunt Winter stood, Shaggy with snow and howling at the sky; Where even now the Springtime seems afraid To whisper of the beauty she designs, The flowery campaign that she now outlines Within her soul; her heart’s conspiracy To take the world with loveliness; defy And then o’erwhelm the Death--that Winter throned Amid the trees,--with love that she hath owned Since God informed her from His very breath, Giving her right triumphant over Death. And, irresistible, Her heart’s deep ecstasy shall swell, Taking the form of flower, leaf, and blade, Invading every dell, And sweeping, surge on surge, Around the world, like some exultant raid, Even to the heaven’s verge. Soon shall her legions storm Death’s ramparts, planting Life’s fair standard there, The banner which her beauty hath in care, Beauty, that shall eventuate With all the pomp and pageant and the state, That are a part of power, and that wait On majesty, to which it, too, is heir.”

IX

Already bluish pink and green The bloodroot’s buds and leaves are seen Clumped in dim cirques; one from the other Hardly distinguished in the shadowy smother Of last year’s leaves blown brown between. And, piercing through the layers of dead leaves, The searching eye perceives The dog’s-tooth violet, pointed needle-keen, Lifting its beak of mottled green; While near it heaves The May-apple its umbrous spike, a ball,-- Like to a round, green bean, That folds its blossom,--topping its tight-closed parasol: The clustered bluebell near Hollows its azure ear, Low-leaning to the earth as if to hear The sound of its own growing and perfume Flowing into its bloom: And softly there The twin-leaf’s stems prepare Pale tapers of transparent white, As if to light The Spirit of Beauty through the wood’s green night.

X

Why does Nature love the number five? Five-whorled leaves and five-tipped flowers?-- Haply the bee i’ the voluble rose, Laboring aye to store its hive, And humming away the long noon hours, Haply it knows as it comes and goes: Or haply the butterfly, Or moth of pansy-dye, Flitting from bloom to bloom In the forest’s violet gloom, It knows why: Or the irised fly, to whom Each bud, as it glitters near, Lends eager and ardent ear.-- And, also, tell Why Nature loves so well To prank her flowers in gold and blue. Haply the dew, That lies so close to them the whole night through, Hugged to each honeyed heart, Perhaps the dew the secret could impart: Or haply now the bluebird there that bears, Glad, unawares, God’s sapphire on its wings, The lapis-lazuli O’ the clean, clear sky, The heav’n of which he sings, Haply he, too, could tell me why: Or the maple there that swings, To the wind’s soft sigh, Its winglets, crystal red, A rainy ruby twinkling overhead: Or haply now the wind, that breathes of rain Amid the rosy boughs, it could explain: And even now, in words of mystery,-- That haunt the heart of me,-- Low-whispered, dim and bland, Tells me, but tells in vain, And strives to make me see and understand, Delaying where The feldspar fire of the violet breaks, And the starred myrtle aches With heavenly blue; and the frail windflower shakes Its trembling tresses in the opal air.

IN SOLITARY PLACES

I

The hurl and hurry of the winds of March, That tore the ash and bowed the pine and larch, And filled the night with rushings,--like the crew Of the Wild Huntsman,--and the days with hue And cry of storm, soft in the heaven’s porch Have laid them down:--loud winds, that trampled through The forests with enormous, scythe-like sweep, And from the darkened deep, The battlemented heavens, thunder-blue, Rumbled the arch, The rocking arch of all the booming oaks, With stormy chariot-spokes: Chariots, from which wild bugle-blasts they blew In warlike challenge.... Now the windflower sweet Misses the fury of their ruining feet, The trumpet-thunder of resistless flight, Crashing and vast, obliterating light; Sweeping the skeleton madness down Of last-year’s leaves; and, overhead, Hurrying the giant foliage of night, Gaunt clouds that streamed with tempest. ... Now each crown Of ancient woods, that clamored with their tread, The frenzy of their passage, stoops no more, Hearing no more their clarion-command, Their chariot-hurl and the wild whip in hand. No more, no more, The forests rock and roar And tumult with their shoutings. Hushed and still Is the green-gleaming and the sunlit hill, Along whose sides, Flushing the dewy moss and rainy grass-- Beneath the topaz-tinted sassafras, Pale, aromatic as some orient wine-- The violet fire of the bluet glides, The amaranthine flame Of sorrel and of bluebell runs; And through the drabs and duns Of rotting leaves, the moonéd celandine, Line upon lovely line, Deliberate, goldens into birth: And, ruby and rose, the moccasin-flower hides: Innumerable flowers, with which she writes her name, April, upon the page, The winter-withered parchment of old earth; Her fragrant autograph, that gives it worth And loveliness that take away its age.

II

Here where the woods are wet, The blossoms of the dog’s-tooth violet Seem meteors in a miniature firmament Of wild-flowers, where, with rainy sound and scent Of breeze and blossom, dim the April went: Their tongue-like leaves of umber-mottled green, So thickly seen, Seem dropping words of gold, Inaudible syllables of a magic old. Beside them, near the wahoo-bush and haw, Blooms the hepatica; Its slender flowers upon swaying stems Lifting chaste, solitary blooms, Astral, and twilight-colored,--frail as gems That star the diadems Of elves and sylvans, piercing pale the glooms;-- Or like the wands, the torches of the fays, That link lone, leafy ways With slim, uncertain rays:-- (The faëry people, whom no eye may see, Busy, so legend says, With budding bough and leafing tree, The blossom’s heart o’ honey and honey-sack o’ the bee, And all dim thoughts and dreams, That take the form of flowers, as it seems, And haunt the banks of greenwood streams, Showing in every line and curve, Commensurate with our love, an intimacy, A smiling confidence or sweet reserve.)

There, at that leafy turn, Of trailered rocks, rise fronds of hart’s-tongue fern: Fronds that my fancy names Uncurling gleeds of emerald and gold, Whose feathering flames Were kindled in the musky mould, And now, as stealthy as the graying morn, Thorn upon woolly thorn, Build up, and silently unfold Faint, cool, green fires, that burn Uneagerly, and spread around An elfin light above the ground, Like that green, rayless glow A spirit, lamped with crystal, makes below In dripping caves of labyrinthine moss, Or grottoes of the weedy undertow.-- And in the underwoods, around them, toss The white-hearts with their penciled leaves, That, ’mid the shifting gleams and glooms, The interchanging shine and shade, Seem some soft garment made By visionary hands, that none perceives; Hands busy with invisible looms Of woodland shine and shade; a shadowy light, Whose figments interbraid, Carpeting the woods with colors and perfumes.-- Or, are they fragments left in flight, These flow’rs that scatter every glade With windy, rippling white, And breezy, fluttering blue, Of her wild gown that shone upon my sight, A moment, in the woods I wandered through? April’s, who fled this way? April, whom still I follow, Whom still my dreams pursue; Who leads me on by many a tangled clue Of loveliness, until in some green hollow, Born of her fragrance and her melody, But lovelier than herself and happier, too, Cradled in blossoms of the dogwood-tree, My soul shall see, White as a sunbeam in the heart of day, The infant, May.

III

Up, up, my heart! and forth where none perceives! ’Twas this which that sweet lay meant You heard in dreams. Come, let us take rich payment, For every care that grieves, From Nature’s prodigal purse. ’Twas this that May meant By sending forth the wind which round our eaves Whispered all night;--or was’t the spirit who weaves, From gold and glaucous green of early leaves, Spring’s regal raiment?-- Up, up, my heart, and forth where none perceives!

Come, let us forth, my heart, where none divines! Into far woodland places, Where we may meet the fair assembled races, Beneath the guardian pines, Of May’s first flowers.... Poppy-celandines, And starry trilliums, bugled columbines, With which her hair, her radiant hair she twines, And loops and laces.-- Come, let us forth, my heart, where none divines!

Forth, forth, my heart, and let us find our dreams, There, where they haunt each hollow! Dreams luring us with oread feet to follow, With flying feet of beams, Fleeter and lighter than the fleetest swallow: Dreams, holding us with dryad glooms and gleams, With Naiad eyes, far stiller than still streams, That have beheld and still reflect, it seems, The god Apollo.-- Forth, forth, my heart, and let us find our dreams!

Out, out, my heart, the world is white with spring. Long have our dreams been pleaders: Now let them be our firm but gentle leaders. Come, let us forth and sing Among the amber-emerald-tufted cedars, And balm-o’-Gileads, cotton-woods, a-swing Like giant censers, that, from leaf-cusps fling Balsams of gummy gold, bewildering The winds their feeders. Out, out, my heart, the world is white with spring.

Up, up, my heart, and all thy hope put on. Array thyself in splendor. Like some bright dragon-fly, some May-fly slender, The irised lamels don Of thy new armor; and, where burns the centre, Refulgent, of the opening rose of dawn, Spread thy wild wings, and, ere the hour be gone, Bright as a blast from some bold clarion, Thy Dream-world enter.-- Up, up, my heart, and all thy hope put on.

IV

And then I heard it singing, The wind that touched my hair, A song of wild expression, A song that called in session The wild-flowers sweetly swinging, The wild-flowers lightly flinging Their tresses to the air. And first, beneath a bramble arch, The bloodroot rose; each bloom a torch Of hollow snow, within which, bright, The calyx grottoed golden light.

Hepatica and bluet, And gold corydalis, Arose as to an aria; Then wild-phlox and dentaria, In rapture, ere they knew it, Trooped forward, nodding to it, Faint as a first star is.

And then a music,--to the ear Inaudible,--I seemed to hear; A symphony that seemed to rise And speak in colors to the eyes.

I saw the Jacob’s-ladder Ring violet peal on peal Of perfume, azure-swinging; The bluebell slimly ringing Its purple chimes; and, gladder, Green note on note, the madder Bells of the Solomon’s-seal.

Now very near, now faintly lost, I saw their fragrant music tossed; Mixed dimly with white interludes Of trilliums starring cool the woods. Then choral, solitary, I saw the celandine Smite bright its golden cymbals, The starwort shake its timbrels, The whiteheart’s horns of Fairy, With many a flourish airy, Strike silvery into line.

And, lo, my soul they seemed to draw, By chords of loveliness and awe Into a Fairy world afar Where all man’s dreams and longings are.

V

And then a spirit looked down at me Out of the deeps of the opal morn: Its eyes were blue as a sunlit sea, And young with the joy of a star that has just been born: And I seemed to hear, with my soul, the rose of its cool mouth say:--

“Long I lay, long I lay, High on the Hills of the Break-of-Day, Where ever the light is green and gray, And the gleam of the moon is a silvery spray, And the stars are glimmering bubbles. Now from the Hills of the Break-of-Day I come, I come, on a rainbow ray, To laugh and sparkle, to leap and play, And blow from the face of the world away, Like mists, its griefs and troubles.”

VI

And now that the dawn is everywhere, Let us take this path through this wild, green place, Where the rattlesnake-weed shows its yellow face, And the lichens cover the rocks with lace: Where tannin-tinct is the woodland air, Let us take this path through the oaks where, thin, The low leaves whisper, “The day is fair”; And waters murmur, “Come in, come in, Where you can hark to our waterfalls, And the wind of their foam can play with your hair, And soothe away care.-- Come here, come here, where our water calls.”

Berry blossoms, that seem to flow As the winds blow, Blackberry blossoms swing and sway To and fro Along the way, Like ocean spray on a breezy day, Over the green of the grass as foam on the green of a bay, When the world is white and green with the white and the green of May.

VII

The dewberries are blooming now; The days are long, the nights are short; Each haw-tree and each dogwood bough Is bleached with bloom, and seems a part,-- Reflected palely on her brow,-- Of dreams that haunt the Year’s young heart.

But this will pass; and presently The world forget the spring that was; And underneath the wild-plum tree, ’Mid hornet hum and wild-bee’s buzz, Summer, in dreamy reverie, Will sit all warm and amorous.

Summer, with drowsy eyes and hair, Who walks the orchard aisles between; Whose hot touch tans the freckled pear, And crimsons peach and nectarine; And, in the vineyard everywhere, Bubbles with blue the grape’s ripe green.

Where now the briers blossoming are, Soon will the berries darkly glow; Then Summer pass: and star on star, Where now the grass is strewn below With petals, soon, both near and far, Will lie the obliterating snow.

VIII

But now the bluets blooming, The bluets brightly blue, O’er which the bees go booming, Drunk with the honey-dew, From wood-ways which they strew, Make eyes of love at you.... O slender Quaker-ladies, With eyes of heavenly hue, Who, where the mossy shade is, Hold quiet Quaker-meeting, Now tell me, is it true That these wild-bees are raiders? Bold gold-galloonéd raiders? Gold-belted ambuscaders?-- Or are they serenaders, Your gold-hipped serenaders, That, to your ears repeating Old ballads, come to woo, And win the hearts of you, The golden hearts of you?

And here the bells of th’ huckleberries toss, so it seems, in time, Delicate, tenderly white, thick by the wildwood way; Clusters swinging, it seems, inaudible peals of rhyme, Music visibly dropped from the virginal lips of the May, Crystally dropped, so it seems, bar upon blossoming bar, Pendent, pensively pale, star upon hollowed star.

IX

The star-flower now, that disks with gold The woodland moss, the forest grass, Already in a day is old, Already doth its beauty pass; Soon, undistinguished, with the mould ’Twill mingle and ’twill mix, alas. The bluet, too, that spreads its skies, Its little heavens, at our feet; And crowfoot-bloom, that, with soft eyes Of amber, now our eyes doth greet, Shall fade and pass, and none surmise How once they made the Maytime sweet.

X

But the crowfoot-bloom still trails its gold Along the edges of the oak-wood old; And there, where spreads the pond, still white are seen The lilies islanded between The pads’ round archipelagoes of green; The jade-dark pads that pave The water’s wrinkled wave; In which the vireo and the sparrow lave Their fluttered breasts and wings, Preening their backs, with many twitterings, With necks the moisture streaks; Then dipping deep their beaks, To which the beaded coolness clings, They bend their mellow throats And let the freshness trickle into notes.

And now you hear The red-capped woodpecker rap near; And now that acrobat, The yellow-breasted chat, Calls high and clear, Chuckling his grotesque music from Some bough that he hath clomb. And now, and now, Upon another bough, Hark how the honey-throated thrush Scatters the forest’s listening hush With notes of limpid harmony, Taking the woods with witchery-- Or is ’t a spirit, none can see. Hid in the top of some old tree, Who, in his house of leaves, of haunted green, Keeps trying, silver-sweet, his sunbeam flute serene?

XI

And then as I listened I seemed to see, Out of the sunset’s ruin of gold, A presence, a spirit, look down at me, With eyes that were grave with the grief of a world grown old; And I seemed to hear, with my soul, the flame of its sad mouth sigh:

“Now good-by, now good-by. Down to the Caves of the Night go I; Where a shadowy couch of the purple sky, That the moon and the starlight curtain high, Is spread for my joy and sorrow: Down to the Caves of the Night go I, Where side by side with mystery And all the Yesterdays I’ll lie; And where from my body, before I die, Will be born the young To-morrow.”

XII

And here where the dusk steals on, you see, Violet-mantled, from tree to tree, The milkwort’s spike of lavender hue,-- Of rosy blue,-- Tipped by the weight of a passing bee,-- Nods like a goblin night-cap, slim, sedate, That night shall tassel with the dew, Beneath a canopy of rose and rue. And as the purple state Of twilight crowds the sunset’s crimson gate, Now one, now two, Drifting the oaks’ dark vistas through, The screech-owl’s cry of “Who, oh, who, Who stays so late?” Drops like a challenge down to you. The silence deepens; it seems so still, That, if you laid to the tree your ear, You too might hear Its great roots growing into the hill; Or there on the twig of the oak-tree tall, The gray-green egg in the gray-green gall Split, and the little round worm and white, That grows to a gnat in a summer night, Uncurl in its nest as it dreams of flight. In the heart of the weed that grows near by,-- If you laid your ear To a leaflet near,-- You too might hear, if you, too, would try, The little gray worm, that becomes a fly A gray wood-fly, a rainbowed fly, As it feels a yearning for wings within, Minute of movement, steadily,-- As a leaf-bud pushes from forth a tree,-- Under the milk of its larval skin, The outward pressure of wings begin.

Far off a vesper-sparrow lifts its song, Lost in the woods that now are beryl-wan; The path is drowned in dusk, is almost gone, Where now a fox or rabbit steals along: Dark is each vine-roofed hollow where, withdrawn, The creek-frog sounds his guttural gong, Like some squat dwarf or gnome, Seated upon his temple’s oozy dome, Summoning the faithful unto prayer, Muezzin-like, the worshipers of the moon, The insect people of the earth and air, Who join him in his twilight tune.

Along the path, where the lizard hides, An instant shadow, the spider glides; The hairy spider, that haunts the way, Crouching black by its earth-bored hole, An insect ogre, that lairs with the mole, Hungry, seeking its insect prey, Fast to follow and swift to slay.-- And over your hands and over your face The cobweb brushes its phantom lace: And now, from many a stealthy place, Woolly-winged and gossamer-gray, The forest moths come fluttering, Marked and mottled with lichen hues, Seal-soft umbers and downy blues, Dark as the bark to which they cling.

XIII