Chapter 3

Send but a song oversea for us, Heart of their hearts who are free, Heart of their singer to be for us More than our singing can be; Ours, in the tempest at error, With no light but the twilight of terror; Send us a song oversea!

Sweet-smelling of pine-leaves and grasses, And blown as a tree through and through With the winds of the keen mountain passes, And tender as sun-smitten dew; Sharp-tongued as the winter that shakes The wastes of your limitless lakes, Wide-eyed as the sea-line's blue.

O strong-winged soul with prophetic Lips hot with the bloodbeats of song, With tremor of heartstrings magnetic, With thoughts as thunders in throng, With consonant ardours of chords That pierce men's souls as with swords And hale them hearing along. --_Algernon Swinburne_

Serene, vast head, with silver cloud of hair, Lined on the purple dusk of death A stern medallion, velvet set-- Old Norseman throned, not chained upon thy chair: Thy grasp of hand, thy hearty breath Of welcome thrills me yet As when I faced thee there.

Loving my plain as thou thy sea, Facing the east as thou the west, I bring a handful of grass to thee, The prairie grasses I know the best-- Type of the wealth and width of the plain, Strong of the strength of the wind and sleet, Fragrant with sunlight and cool with rain-- I bring it, and lay it low at thy feet, Here by the eastern sea. --_Hamlin Garland_

I toss upon Thy grave, (After Thy life resumed, after the pause, the backward glance of Death; Hence, hence the vistas on, the march continued, In larger spheres, new lives in paths untrodden, On! till the circle rounded, ever the journey on!) Upon Thy grave,--the vital sod how thrilled as from Thy limbs and breast transpired, Rises the spring's sweet utterance of flowers,-- I toss this sheaf of song, these scattered leaves of love! For thee, Thy Soul and Body spent for me, --And now still living, now in love, transmitting still Thy Soul, Thy Flesh to me, to all!-- These variant phrases of the long-immortal chant I toss upon Thy grave! --_George Cabot Lodge_

I am no slender singing bird That feeds on puny garden seed! My songs are stronger than those heard In ev'ry wind-full, shallow reed! My pipes are jungle-grown and need A strong man's breath to blow them well; A strong soul's sense to solve their spell And be by their deep music stirred.

My voice speaks not, in lisping notes, The madrigals of lesser minds! My heart tones thunder from the throats Of throbbing seas and raging winds; And yet, the master-spirit finds The tenderness of mother earth Is there expressed, despite the dearth Of tinkle tunes like dancing motes!

My hand strokes not a golden lyre Threaded with silver--spider spun! The strings I strike are strands of fire, Strung from Earth's center to the Sun! Thrilled with passion, ev'ry one! With songs of forest, corn, and vine; Of rushing water, blood, and wine; Of man's conception and desire!

But listen, comrade! This I say: In all of all I give my heart! With lover's voice I bid you stay To share with me the better part Of all my days! nights! thoughts! and start With far-spread arms to welcome you, And we will shout a song so true That it shall ring for aye and aye. --_Ray Clarke Rose_

Your lonely muse, unraimented with rhyme, Her hair unfilleted, her feet unshod, Naked and not ashamed demands of God No covering for her beauty's youth or prime. Clad but with thought, as space is clad with time, Or both with worlds where man and angels plod, She runs in joy, magnificently odd, Ruggedly wreathed with flowers of every clime. And you to whom her breath is sweeter far Than choicest attar of the martyred rose More deeply feel mortality's unrest Than poets born beneath a happier star, Because the pathos of your grand repose Shows that all earth has throbbed within your breast. --_Albert Edmund Lancaster_

They say that thou art sick, art growing old, Thou Poet of unconquerable health, With youth far-stretching, through the golden wealth Of autumn, to Death's frostful, friendly cold; The never-blenching eyes, that did behold Life's fair and foul, with measureless content, And gaze ne'er sated, saddened as they bent Over the dying soldier in the fold Of thy large comrade love:--then broke the tear! War-dream, field-vigil, the bequeathëd kiss, Have brought old age to thee; yet, Master, now, Cease not thy song to us; lest we should miss A death-chant of indomitable cheer, Blown as a gale from God;--Oh, sing it thou! --_Aaron Leigh_

O pure heart singer of the human frame Divine, whose poesy disdains control Of slavish bonds! each poem is a soul, Incarnate born of thee, and given thy name. Thy genius is unshackled as a flame That sunward soars, the central light its goal; Thy thoughts are lightnings, and thy numbers roll In Nature's thunders that put art to shame. Exalter of the land that gave thee birth, Though she insult thy grand gray years with wrong Of infamy, foul-branding thee with scars Of felon-hate, still shalt thou be on earth Revered, and in Fame's firmament of song Thy name shall blaze among the eternal stars! --_Leonard Wheeler_

O Titan soul, ascend your starry steep, On golden stair, to gods and storied men! Ascend! nor care where thy traducers creep. For what may well be said of prophets, when A world that's wicked comes to call them good? Ascend and sing! As kings of thought who stood On stormy heights, and held far lights to men, Stand thou, and shout above the tumbled roar, Lest brave ships drive and break against the shore. What though thy sounding song be roughly set? Parnassus' self is rough! Give thou the thought, The golden ore, the gems that few forget; In time the tinsel jewel will be wrought. Stand thou alone, and fixed as destiny, An imaged god that lifts above all hate; Stand thou serene and satisfied with fate; Stand thou as stands the lightning-riven tree, That lords the cloven clouds of gray Yosemite. Yea, lone, sad soul, thy heights must be thy home; Thou sweetest lover! love shall climb to thee Like incense curling some cathedral dome, From many distant vales. Yet thou shalt be, O grand, sweet singer, to the end alone. But murmur not. The moon, the mighty spheres, Spin on alone through all the soundless years; Alone man comes on earth; he lives alone; Alone he turns to front the dark unknown. --_Joaquin Miller_

I knew there was an old, white-bearded seer Who dwelt among the streets of Camden town; I had the volumes which his hand wrote down-- The living evidence we love to hear Of one who walks reproachless, without fear. But when I saw that face, capped with its crown Of snow-white almond-buds, his high renown Faded to naught, and only did appear The calm old man, to whom his verses tell, All sounds were music, even as a child; And then the sudden knowledge on me fell, For all the hours his fancies had beguiled, No verse had shown the Poet half so well As when he looked into my face and smiled. --_Linn Porter_

Friend Whitman! wert thou less serene and kind, Surely thou mightest (like the bard sublime), Scorned by a generation deaf and blind, Make thine appeal to the avenger TIME; For thou art none of those who upward climb, Gathering roses with a vacant mind. Ne'er have thy hands for jaded triflers twined Sick flowers of rhetoric and weeds of rhyme. Nay, thine hath been a Prophet's stormier fate. While LINCOLN and the martyr'd legions wait In the yet widening blue of yonder sky, On the great strand below them thou art seen, Blessing, with something Christ-like in thy mien, A sea of turbulent lives, that break and die. --_Robert Buchanan_

Darkness and death? Nay, Pioneer, for thee The day of deeper vision has begun; There is no darkness for the central sun Nor any death for immortality. At last the song of all fair songs that be, At last the guerdon of a race well run, The upswelling joy to know the victory won, The river's rapture when it finds the sea. Ah, thou art wrought in an heroic mould, The Modern Man upon whose brow yet stays A gleam of glory from the age of gold-- A diadem which all the gods have kissed. Hail and farewell! Flower of the antique days, Democracy's divine protagonist. --_Francis Howard Williams_

Tranquil as stars that unafraid Pursue their way through space, Vital as light, unhoused as wind, Unloosed from time and place;

Solemn as birth, and sane as death, Thy bardic chantings move; Rugged as earth, and salt as sea, And bitter-sweet as love. --_May Morgan_

One master poet royally her own, Begot of Freedom, bore our Western World: A poet, native as the dew impearl'd Upon her grass; a brother, thew and bone, To mountains wild, vast lakes and prairies lone; One, life and soul, akin to speech unfurl'd, And zeal of artisan, and song not curl'd In fronded forms, or petrified in tone. High latitudes of thought gave breath to him; The paps he suck'd ran not false shame for milk; No bastard he! but virile truth in limb And soul. A Titan mocking at the silk That bound the wings of song. A tongue of flame, Whose ashes gender an immortal name. --_Joseph W. Chapman_

Thou lover of the cosmos vague and vast, In which thy virile mind would penetrate Unto the rushing, primal springs of fate, Ruling alike the future, present, past: Now, having breasted waves beyond death's blast, New Neptune's steeds saluted, white and great, And entered through the glorious Golden Gate. And gained the fair celestial shores at last, Still worship'st thou the Ocean? thou that tried To comprehend its mental roar and surge, Its howling as of victory and its dirge For continents submerged by shock and tide. By that immortal ocean now what cheer? Do crews patrol and save the same as here? --_Edward S. Creamer_

All hail to thee! WALT WHITMAN! Poet, Prophet, Priest! Celebrant of Democracy! At more than regal feast To thee we offer homage, and with our greenest bay We crown thee Poet Laureate on this thy natal day. We offer choice ascription--our loyal tribute bring, In this the new Olympiad in which thou reignest king. POET of the present age, and of æons yet to be, In this the chosen homestead of those who would be free-- Free from feudal usage, from courtly sham and cant; Free from kingcraft, priestcraft, with all their rot and rant! PROPHET of a race redeemed from all conventual thrall, Espouser of equal sexship in body, soul, and all! PRIEST of a ransom'd people, endued with clearer light; A newer dispensation for those of psychic sight. We greet thee as our mentor, we meet thee as our friend, And to thy ministrations devotedly we lend The aid that comes from fealty which thou hast made so strong, Thro' touch of palm, and glint of eye, and spirit of thy song. We magnify thy mission, we glorify thy aim, Unfalteringly adhered to through ill-report and blame-- The fretting of the groundlings, the fumings of the pit, The jibes and jeers and snarls and sneers which men mistake for wit. We knew the rising splendor of thy sun could never wane Until, the earth encompass'd, it sank in dazzling flame. In faith assured we waited as in patience thou didst wait, Knowing full well the answer must sooner come or late. And come it has, sufficingly, the discord disappears Until today again is heard the music of the spheres Proclaiming thee the well-beloved, peer of the proudest peers. --_Henry L. Bonsall_

He fell asleep when in the century's skies The paling stars proclaimed another day-- He, genial still, amidst the chill and gray, With smiling lips and trustful, dauntless eyes; He, the Columbus of a vast emprise, Whose realization in the future lay; He, who stepped from the well-worn, narrow way To walk with Poetry in larger guise. And fortunate, despite of transient griefs, The years announce him in a new born age; The ship of his fair fame, past crags and reefs, Sails bravely on, and less and less the rage Of gainsaying winds becomes; while to his phrase The world each day gives ampler heed and praise! --_William Struthers_

Here health we pledge you in one draught of song, Caught in this rhymster's cup from earth's delight, Where English fields are green the whole year long-- The wine of might, That the new-come spring distills, most sweet and strong, In the viewless air's alembic, that's wrought too fine for sight. Good health! we pledge, that care may lightly sleep, And pain of age be gone for this one day, As of this loving cup you take, and, drinking deep, Are glad at heart straightway To feel once more the friendly heat of the sun Creative in you (as when in youth it shone), And pulsing brainward with the rhythmic wealth Of all the summer whose high minstrelsy Shall soon crown field and tree, To call back age to youth again, and pain to perfect health. --_Ernest Rhys_

I loaf and invite my soul And what do I feel? An influx of life from the great central power That generates beauty from seedling to flower. I loaf and invite my soul And what do I hear? Original harmonies piercing the din Of measureless tragedy, sorrow and sin. I loaf and invite my soul And what do I see? The temple of God in the perfected man. Revealing the wisdom and end of earth's plan. --_Elizabeth Porter Gould_

He passed amid the noisy throngs, His elbow touched with theirs; They grumbled at their petty wrongs, Their woes and cares;

They asked if "Princeton stood to win"; Or what they should invest; They told with gusto and with grin Some futile jest.

They jostled him and passed him by, Nor slacked their eager pace; They did not mark that noble eye, That noble face.

So carelessly they let him go, His mien they could not scan,-- Thinker whom all the world would know, Our greatest man. _Max J. Herzberg_

Here ends this book written by Henry Eduard Legler, arranged in this form by Laurence C. Woodworth, Scrivener, and printed for the Brothers of the Book at the press of The Faithorn Company, Chicago, 1916.

_Incipit Vita Nova_