LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 
 
 Chap. Copyright No. 
 
 ShelL.i2^T ■ 
 
 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 
 
Poems 
 
 BY 
 
 Philip Becker Goetz 
 
 BOSTON 
 RICHARD G. BADGER ^ CO. 
 
 1898 
 
 4 
 
 MAY 
 
 ':^o-^ u^ 
 
This edition consists of 400 copies, printed 
 from type which has been distributed. 
 
 75 
 
 35-'^ 
 
 ■o-'.l' 
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1898, BY 
 PHILIP BECKER GOETZ 
 
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT 
 
 To the editors of The Independent^ The Chap-Bookj 
 The Bookman, The Overland Monthly, and The 
 Bachelor of Arts the thanks of the author are due for 
 permission to reprint some of the pieces included in 
 this volume. 
 
A PRATER 
 
 Of all the mighty dead if some elect 
 To elevate the living with high cheer y 
 Thy spirit, Keats, to me supremely dear 
 
 Preside above these altars I have decked. 
 
VARIOUS POEMS 
 
PREMONITIONS 
 
 This morn a sudden hushing in the air, 
 A softness delicate as flowing hair. 
 Odors of earth low whispering 
 The coming spring. 
 
 On bough no redbreast from his perfect throat 
 Flings richly wide his mellow, rounded note ; 
 Yet who responsive plucks the string 
 At coming spring ? 
 
 O absent spirit of awaited love. 
 All gift of earth and mortal life above 
 Art thou to whom I yearn to bring 
 Eternal spring. 
 
 I? 
 
A SUNSET 
 
 Oh did you see the sun yestreen. 
 
 Oh did you see the sun ? 
 With such a glory round his head 
 
 Some victory seemed won. 
 
 Deep in the west the field lay stretched. 
 
 Far in the west the field 
 Of melting green and saffron hues, — 
 
 The whole sky like a shield. 
 
 And everywhere were hints of war, 
 
 Lo, everywhere were hints : 
 Here shone a crimson heap of slain 
 
 And there stray scabbard-glints. 
 
 Strict sword-blades row on row were piled. 
 
 Aye, sword-blades row on row. 
 Slow dropping scarlet as they passed 
 
 With struggle's afterglow. 
 
 And not a touch of white in all. 
 
 No, not a touch of white : 
 The very essence of hard hate 
 
 Shot earthward lurid light. 
 
 When low in sea that face of fire. 
 
 Cool, low in sea that face. 
 The blood upon the blades grew black 
 
 And night stole into space. 
 
 And heaps turned gruesome grey and thick. 
 Those heaps turned gruesome grey : 
 
 O'er the dark scene like quiet nuns 
 The stars bent as to pray ! 
 i6 
 
CONFESSION 
 
 Aye, thus before his own heart had been taught 
 
 Said he : "I care not what they think or say ! " 
 And flattered judgement that his youth had brought 
 Such bravery and fierceness fearing naught. 
 
 Rebellious uttered, too, more than his mind 
 
 And from the hard road trod of many men 
 He turned him, jeering those who there could find 
 Aught lifting strife to make them strong and kind. 
 
 But with repeated failure quite to sing 
 
 The simple throbs and pieties he knew. 
 Daily he longed for what had once seemed sting. 
 The joy upon a host a cheer to fling. 
 
 17 
 
THE SEEKERS 
 
 I sought an old philosopher 
 And said to him : ** O learned sir. 
 If I be not too young to learn. 
 My spirit ardently doth yearn 
 To find what I have lost." 
 The fleshless arms he slow uncrossed. 
 His fiery eyes he glanced about. 
 Last, brooding long, he rattled out — 
 As if words were but wagon-toys. 
 Fit only for slight girls and boys 
 And much too frail his thoughts to carry — 
 •• What is your loss ? I may not tarry 
 Amid the wastes of mere discourse." 
 I answered : "I have lost the source 
 Of all my youthful faith antique. 
 I walked with wise men, yet I seek 
 More than they give. God is remote ; 
 And when I try to pray my rote, 
 I hear Him cast it echoing back, 
 I see a visage stern and black, — 
 An image of my soul. 
 Nor all : a measured dole 
 Of laws and essences they give. 
 Whereby, they say, I am to live. 
 Instead of my sweet God of old 
 Whose very human arms did hold 
 My heart with sorrow cold." 
 *<Ha ! " shrilly laughed the battered seer 
 And smacked his yellow lips so queer. 
 It seemed two rotting pages clapped 
 Their sides together. Then he rapped 
 In a strange tune upon the ground. 
 And in response with roaring sound 
 Arose in shape a common man 
 i8 
 
THE SEEKERS 
 
 On whose scalped head lay bare the plan 
 
 And movements of the brain. 
 
 Gamut of joy and pain 
 
 Him that old seer made hurry through 
 
 Until as clear as two and two 
 
 I saw all mysteries resolve. 
 
 Feelings and thoughts and whims revolve. 
 
 And aye I smiled and smiled and smiled 
 
 Who once men's powers had reviled. 
 
 But when I thought : "What have I gained? " 
 
 The wise man marked my glow had waned 
 
 And sadly counseled : " This is all 
 
 Men shall in distant ages call 
 
 The summit of experiment. 
 
 Such feats they do who long have rent 
 
 The surface of the world 
 And into chaos hurled 
 
 The hope and love of heaving breasts. 
 
 Nature and all that on it rests 
 
 Is God's brain, bared now more and more 
 
 To sight of men who eager store 
 
 The sick infinity of facts. 
 
 Nathless, God lives and breathes and acts : 
 
 He is all this and more, my child. 
 
 Be pantheist or still more wild. 
 
 His pulse-beat is as quick and sane 
 
 And generous as summer rain." 
 
 In bed asleep that night alone 
 
 I saw a sight turned me to stone : 
 
 A horrid hydra-shape through space 
 
 Stalked, headed with his worlds, a face 
 
 On each and marked with mad grimace ; 
 
 And one blazed fever through the rest 
 
 And still they smiled, heavy with pest 
 
 »9 
 
THE SEEKERS 
 
 Methought when I awoke next morn 
 A thousand years in me were born : 
 I felt the prayers of all mankind 
 Transmute my blood to wine till mind 
 It touched and, drunk with a new birth, 
 I saw the glad sun girdle earth. 
 
 ao 
 
CHILDREN 
 
 When grief hath blotted birds from out the spring. 
 Stripped trees of leaves and kept earth palled in 
 death. 
 
 Who then can of that season blithely sing 
 Of melody and color and sweet breath ? 
 
 And when the world of men becomes impure 
 And heavy eyes look not but shamed within, 
 
 I turn me to no heavenly height more sure, 
 
 God's ransom-thoughts, winged hopes from human 
 
 21 
 
THE INTRUDER 
 
 On my heart as in days of old 
 
 Lies victor my soul's one queen. 
 Summer's here and the hearth is cold. 
 Far away spreads the barren wold 
 With many a moor between. 
 
 Remember the day ? Too well — 
 
 A day in May, of all days 
 The rarest your love to tell. 
 The fairest for blush and the swell 
 
 Of breast, twin foes of delays. 
 
 Then I spake : but her brow was white. 
 
 No hint of a blush beneath ; 
 Sad she smiled with her eyes flame-bright ; 
 Near she leaned ; like a bolt fell blight : 
 
 I kept my curse in my teeth. 
 
 ** Sir Roland ? " *♦ Aye, but too true ! " 
 
 I froze. Not asking her how 
 The serpent had slimed him through 
 Her trust all virgin with dew, 
 
 I vowed myself God's hand now ! 
 
 Wassail had drenched his thin, lewd eyes 
 
 In ambush for careless prey ; 
 There I denounced him, bade him rise. 
 Swore him the vulgar carrion's prize, — 
 
 Prone dead ere another day. 
 
 With words it is briefly told 
 
 How she, loving me, bowed her down. 
 This way I am pleased to fold. 
 To kiss and to knead hands' cold. 
 
 As if — feel ! how damp yet the gown ! 
 
THE INTRUDER 
 
 Beneath the willows where they bend 
 
 Arching the stream and tremulous 
 With silver tears that sadly blend 
 With choral wave in onward wend 
 
 Like mourners — lay she, death-glut thus. 
 
 Am I to speak when they ask 
 
 Of her who was pure of sin ? 
 Never to change worn mask ? 
 Surely a pitiable task — 
 
 What ho, there ! I say, come in ! 
 
 You ? You ! by the wonder of woe. 
 
 Claiming her even in death ? 
 Through hell to your throat I go. 
 Again I will follow you — so — 
 
 Hate is my wing. Out, breath ! 
 
 *3 
 
RETROSPECT 
 
 Some learned eye familiar with the past 
 
 Will read a hundred years from now our time. 
 And at our acted lives cry out aghast : 
 '* Then cankered Rome was neither worst nor last ! '* 
 
 O future son, the swarthy hosts are strong 
 
 And loud the blare their trumpets brazen lip ; 
 But to that blare a silent warrior throng 
 Flung back in ruddy deeds a victor song. 
 
 24 
 
SONG 
 
 Modest a violet 
 
 Hides in a neighboring bower. 
 
 Fearing the whisper of breezes that kiss her. 
 
 Lovely in beauty's dower. 
 
 Ah me, my senses, forget ! 
 
 Blossom, of lover beware ! 
 
 Else will he wake thee some midnight and take thee 
 
 Far through the tongueless air. 
 
 25 
 
ABANDONED 
 
 *' That is your way. Now hear me mine. 
 
 For every star has eyes to see, — 
 And who says faint ones fail to shine 
 Less truelier because more fine 
 
 Across the deep to you and me ? 
 
 That she was beautiful, you owned 
 
 A moment since, I think ; and now 
 What veers you that so uncondoned 
 Dominion of her beauty falls disthroned 
 
 Through one act, thought and measured ? How ? 
 
 You say she never loved me well 
 
 Thus cruel to repudiate 
 Me, cast me out, and bid untell 
 All vows and protestations, sell 
 
 Her back her word and clear the slate. 
 
 Once, friend, I thought as now you think 
 
 Without discretion or reserve. 
 I, too, thought life's one law to shrink 
 From breaking word or loosing link 
 
 The world so gossips on. My nerve 
 
 Was sensitive as yours therein : 
 
 But the few months have changed me quite. 
 And now I know it is no sin 
 That fairer man should run and win 
 
 When me disease made hideous to sight. 
 
 z6 
 
ABANDONED 
 
 Had she (while there we leaned together 
 
 Over the prow and sealed our troth 
 Alway to speed so) meant it, whether 
 My shoe show torn or boast smooth leather ? 
 Could woman think a madder oath ? " 
 
 Those were his very words, so much 
 
 I caught of plainest utterance. 
 When turning head, he tried to touch 
 My hand, nor failed to — dead. And such 
 
 A soul to yield to such mischance ! 
 
 *7 
 
ECHO 
 
 Tricksy Echo was born 
 
 Just for teasing and mocking. 
 
 At the call of my horn 
 
 Tricksy Echo was born 
 
 And my hounds weary-worn 
 All to her went a-flocking. 
 
 Tricksy Echo was born 
 
 Just for teasing and mocking. 
 
 28 
 
THE TWO SCHOOLS 
 
 Two wise men walked in a wood. 
 
 Discoursing of beauty and good. 
 
 Talk waned ; tongues dried with thirst 
 
 And bolted their lips till first 
 
 Both drank at a lucid brook. 
 
 And as they their way re-took, 
 
 A woman appeared : 
 
 They slowly neared 
 
 And closely peered. 
 
 Nor one to the other spoke. 
 
 When lo ! she melted like smoke. 
 
 Thereupon one declared — 
 
 The elder, white-haired — 
 
 ** What woman was that, O brother ? " 
 
 *' A woman ? " replied the other, 
 
 ** I saw not a woman here," — 
 
 Ah, he was youthflal of year — 
 
 " A goddess I saw, if a seer 
 
 I be with unerring eye ! " 
 
 *• A fool's eye certainly ! " 
 
 Thus ever they held debate. 
 
 Grew thin, and at meal sat late. 
 
 Nor ever advancing 
 
 Though always enhancing 
 
 That famous walk in the wood. 
 
 Now, which of both understood ? 
 
 29 
 
WATER-LILY 
 
 A dream in a dream. 
 Fair bud of the stream 
 Near the wooing brake. 
 White petals awake 
 To the sun's first gleam. 
 
 Sleep, water and weed. 
 Sleep, mother and reed. 
 For the heart of this child 
 Is afar and wild : 
 Not of you is its need. 
 
 Sun-smile to sorrow's face 
 
 Traveled worlds in a pace : 
 
 Lo ! a visible dream that remains, 
 
 A prisoner empty of chains 
 
 At a touch from the magic mace. 
 
 And whither aspires all day 
 
 This blossom of tear and ray ? 
 
 To the parent afar. 
 
 To the central star, — 
 
 But the wave and the brake cry •* Nay ! " 
 
 30 
 
KEATS 
 
 A fragment 
 
 O poet whom Apollo taught to sing 
 
 And gave the lyre antique whose muted string 
 
 Sang never clearlier than at thy sweep 
 
 Of hand the bright, deep, mighty themes asleep 
 
 In memory and long forgot, arise 
 
 And visit with thy rare, immediate eyes. 
 
 Thy diadem of sky, thy robing air. 
 
 Thy throne of earth, and hear thy granted prayer. 
 
 The sea, awaited minstrel of thy court. 
 
 Before thee eloquently echoing 
 
 Thy long desire ! 
 
 Despite thy mortal spring 
 Thy promised gifts to ripeness learned to grow 
 Till now hope's autumn rounds th' empurpled glow 
 Of all thy wanton-clustered fancies fair. 
 Chill reason's frugal fingers, guessing where 
 Most luscious hung these arbiters of cheer. 
 Plucked prudently thy store and, marking year. 
 Finds richer to the taste of practised lip 
 Thy joy and tragedy. 
 
 Then hither trip. 
 Ye lissom Mainads of the secret dell. 
 Boon Bakchanals, and ye of steep and fell, 
 O pious guardians, the sequent host 
 Of piping Pan, and ye who bleach the coast 
 Where dulcet strains of music amorous 
 Met your forever-listening ears till thus 
 In wreck of fallen flesh, quite dissolute. 
 Yet listening still, ye dropped a prey to brute ! 
 And thou, queen vigilant, drawn from the height 
 Of heaven, snowy with erected light 
 Of contemplation, Dian, most romantic 
 Become above thy Latmian whom frantic 
 
 31 
 
KEATS 
 
 Thy virgin arms and eyes and kisses drave ; 
 
 And ye, once more devising how to save 
 
 Olumpos, Titans bent beneath the hoary 
 
 And rock-ribbed mountains, hear rehearsed your glory. 
 
 Strife and damnation, and declare if e'er 
 
 Your protest toned profounder voice than there 
 
 In his recorded guess deemed worthless care ! 
 
 32 
 
A FANTASY OF HER BIRTH- 
 DAY 
 
 Under the snow a violet 
 
 In tear-drowse lonely lay ; 
 Somebody whispered across her dream 
 
 *' A queen is born to-day." 
 
 Still she dreamed on for well she knew 
 
 Spring's word and winter's way, 
 Questioning much in her quiet heart 
 
 *« What queen is born to-day ? " 
 
 Many a winter and many a spring 
 
 Had passed or sad or gay ; 
 Fresh from the earth her children rose, — 
 
 The mother grew thin and grey. 
 
 Once in a year beneath the snow 
 
 She slowly used to say — 
 Quite to the hour she recalled her dream — 
 
 "A queen was born to-day." 
 
 After she died and they in turn. 
 
 Their children learned to pray : 
 ** Oh that we live and come to see 
 
 The queen who was born to-day ! " 
 
 One day in spring the gardener came 
 
 And took them up, while they 
 Spent not a thought of idle regret 
 
 Nor guessed how fates may play. 
 
 Then they were planted with tender care 
 
 In a house of endless May, 
 Where the showers descended and sunlight gave 
 
 In winter-time spring's own ray. 
 
 ' 33 
 
A FANTASY OF HER BIRTHDAY 
 
 All the dark season they bloomed and sang 
 
 Their purple roundelay ; 
 Oft they repeated that nursery tale 
 
 ** A queen was born to-day." 
 
 Then came a lover with heart of hope 
 
 And carried them gladly away. 
 Knowing no gift of truer delight 
 
 For his queen who was born on that day. 
 
 So when the lady of high degree 
 
 Beheld them in array, 
 *• Ah, thou hast filled my sweetest desire : 
 
 These violets to-day." 
 
 Down to the tremulous violets bowed. 
 
 She kissed them, fain to stay 
 Bosomed against the lips of the queen. 
 
 The queen who was born that day. 
 
 Lover and lady were duly wed, — 
 
 •* But the violets ? " you say. 
 Dying they smiled for they kissed and made glad 
 
 My queen who was born to-day ! 
 
 34 
 
THE JESTER MUSES 
 
 He had green eyes, he whom I killed for her. 
 Sometimes, scum-spots, they leer from out the pool. 
 Sometimes I feel them curse at evening's cool ; 
 But then I smile and hie to bowers of myrrh. 
 Denied not flame of two high eyes that keep 
 Me nerved the while with song I lull to sleep 
 Her kingly sire who seeks the sepulcher. 
 
 Ha ! let them hunt grim haunts beneath the wave : 
 How idle spawn the fishes in the brain 
 That hatched the filthy sin on Madelaine ! 
 How wanton, lissom eddies lick and lave 
 Those limbs of awful symmetry and grace 
 Whereon could rest (he said) no purest face 
 But learned a sudden crimson, then — a grave ! 
 
 Only God's bosom holds our secret hid : 
 He and my lady know my heart and aim. 
 Birds from the bough absolve me of my blame :; 
 I hear them glorify the deed I did. 
 And when the king looks heavy-eyed and cries. 
 •* A song, Rene ! " she hears me melodize 
 And mask in merriment as I am bid. 
 
 35 
 
A MORNING SERVICE 
 
 This morning out to early mass 
 
 I hurried all alone : 
 Of all the world not one did pass, — 
 
 My worship was mine own. 
 
 I'll never seek a better church 
 
 To mar this one I love : 
 The floor was moss, the pillars birch, 
 
 Unheld the dome above. 
 
 The choristers were strangely wild, 
 I could not catch their words ; 
 
 I sat in wonder like a child 
 Before the chanting birds. 
 
 A chipmunk stood and stared at me, — 
 I scarcely breathed a breath ; 
 
 Much peril he appeared to see 
 And trembled as at death. 
 
 I wanted so to ask his name. 
 
 This harum-scarum wight ; 
 But at that moment, scorning fame. 
 
 He scampered out of sight. 
 
 As with the singers went their song. 
 So with him hastened mirth ; 
 
 They left me to another throng. 
 These kings of early earth ! 
 
 And much I pondered what they meant 
 And what they tried to say : 
 
 Said I, '*Twas out of pure content 
 They chose that thoughtless way." 
 
 36 
 
RELIGION 
 
 If you have built your soul upon a God 
 
 Whose being starts to shade at skeptic breath. 
 No halo of all saints who there have trod 
 Shall raise you higher than your body's clod. 
 
 Some day, as hot your ardor leaps to song. 
 
 Upon your choir chill Truth will stretch a hand 
 And riotous will burst a million strong 
 Through empty aisles and chancel Ruin's throng. 
 
 Be then your God no god of yesterday 
 
 And be your temple open to the air : 
 Fear not dark conflict, greet the doubtful fray ; 
 Not one sun but a host will light your way ! 
 
 37 
 
SONG 
 
 Again is come the merry May 
 
 The merry month of flowers ; 
 And birds grow bold and dare delay 
 
 Where lovers haunt their bowers. 
 Heigho, my lassie, heigh nonny ! 
 
 Dan Cupid is come to his own ; 
 And he swears by thine eyes thou art bonny 
 
 And he swears thou shalt ne* er be alone. 
 
 I sit me here and try to think : 
 
 But oh ! the song outside ! 
 The buds join birds so very dink — 
 
 I will not be denied ! 
 Heigho, my lassie, heigh nonny ! 
 
 Dan Cupid is come to his own ; 
 And he swears by thine eyes thou art bonny 
 
 And he swears thou shalt ne* er be alone. 
 
 For it is the merry month of May 
 
 The merry month of flowers ; 
 And I have culled you this to-day 
 
 From fancy-hunted bowers. 
 Heigho, my lassie, heigh nonny ! 
 
 Dan Cupid is come to his own ; 
 And he swears by thine eyes thou art bonny 
 
 And he swears thou shalt ne* er be alone. 
 
 38 
 
THE DEAD GRANDMOTHER 
 
 She questioned never : these her hands make answer. 
 These tainted, crooked hands from earthly office. 
 Oh pass not so secure this humble pall. 
 Ye high among the high, but ere ye pass. 
 That hotter tears shall thaw your icy shrouds 
 Than here are oiFered her, be wholly sure. 
 A burial by stranger care afar 
 From home ; alone, without solicitude 
 Of children blest with breath of strenuous life. 
 Unaided, weary, weak, surviving last. 
 She yielded when the Master whispered " Come ! " 
 The calm close to the harsh, discordant theme : 
 A tragic theme — not tragic in the sudden 
 And passionate blow of hate or violence — 
 Nay, more a tragedy, more merciless. 
 It was the subtler way, less cried, more modern : 
 Obedient to live the life of failure. 
 Outliving every precious prayer and hope 
 Of womanhood ; to know to-day's gnawed heart 
 More gnawed to-morrow, and to-night's bent shoul- 
 ders 
 Awaited by a grosser cark, unseen. 
 But from the frowning past no less assured ; 
 Saddest, in brief, persistently alert 
 
 The sly and poignant thrust of daring doubt ! 
 
 She might have said : " These, issue of my life. 
 The world bequeath I, rich in naught beside." 
 But silent, ere her aged tongue had framed 
 The wish she kept in hallowed secrecy. 
 One after one, a broken rosary. 
 Downward they dropped and, like to morning dew. 
 Commingled with the flowers they grew among. 
 Thence, thence I plucked, here placed these violets, 
 Violets in the tainted, crooked hands. 
 
 39 
 
GOOD FRIDAY HYMN 
 
 That thou, O Christ, art not the same 
 For me and other men, 
 I thank thee, but not haughtily — 
 A Pharisee again. 
 
 To me the richness of thy gift 
 Seemed poor in the old phrase ; 
 And when they said ** He came to save,' 
 I turned me from their ways. 
 
 I saw no devil in the world. 
 But grand and aching gods 
 Before whom aspirations moved 
 Like Roman lictor-rods. 
 
 I saw that in thine ugly death 
 Thou hadst a word for me : 
 A breath to swell the yearning breast. 
 Desire to swim to thee. 
 
 To thee, no more high God than I 
 Save in a victor strife. 
 Sweet brother and no king at all 
 Save the one lord of life. 
 
 And if of those who kneel and preach. 
 The way I cannot see. 
 Give all thy love — thy heaven's air — 
 And the long hour with thee ! 
 
 40 
 
FAITHLESS 
 
 For this, then, once we shared the tacit pledge. 
 Laughed and discoursed and judged as full of trust 
 
 As when the gods of old swore by the sedge 
 Of Styx, made sluggish with its rapine dust ! 
 
 As if accused, yet willing to reply. 
 
 Explain my part, or, at the worst, defend, 
 
 I begged the charge and then you told the lie 
 
 And for some bauble fault changed foe from friend. 
 
 Some mitigation were in other wrong — 
 
 Unchastity, when rapid ardor rules ; 
 Or open deed that dares to face the strong, — 
 
 Heroic signal here ; there, crime of fools. 
 
 But a false friend is nature's blasphemy. 
 
 Inviting blossom venomous at heart ; 
 Beyond contempt's relief no penalty. 
 
 No ease ere sloughing of the tainted part. 
 
 41 
 
CLOWN SONG 
 
 Heigho ! and a merry heart is mine, 
 I laugh with the sheep and the kine : 
 
 When their eyes blink slow 
 
 At the creek'' s broad glow, 
 I tinkle my bells and divine. 
 
 They wonder where my lady keeps 
 
 My lady Eleanor, 
 None at the court for sennight sleeps 
 
 But tracks the winding shore. 
 Heigho ! and a merry heart is mine, 
 I laugh with the sheep and the kine : 
 
 When their eyes blink slow 
 
 At the creek's broad glow, 
 I tinkle my bells and divine. 
 
 Still track, ye fools, nor mind the fool 
 
 But ask the aged wise ; 
 And will the teaching of the school 
 
 Restore whom love denies ? 
 Heigho ! and a merry heart is mine, 
 1 laugh with the sheep and the kine : 
 
 When their eyes blink slow 
 
 At the creek's broad glow, 
 I tinkle my bells and divine. 
 
 What ! when my lady looked on him, 
 
 A youth of poor degree. 
 Who could have thought a jest so grim 
 
 He scorned her prince to be ! 
 Heigho ! and a merry heart is mine, 
 I laugh with the sheep and the kine : 
 
 When their eyes blink slow 
 
 At the creeks broad glow, 
 I tinkle my bells and divine. 
 42 
 
CLOWN SONG 
 
 Beneath the never-telling moon 
 
 Within the mere he lies : 
 Face hellward, hooded, — none too soon 
 
 To soothe her spirit eyes. 
 Heigho ! and a merry heart is mine, 
 I laugh with the sheep and the kine : 
 
 When their eyes blink slow 
 
 At the creek^s broad glow, 
 I tinkle my bells and divine. 
 
 La, la, what tears are these, my cap ? 
 
 Hence, frowning melancholy ! 
 Green mound to pillow summer nap. 
 
 Then wakes my humor jolly ! 
 Heigho ! and a merry heart is mine 
 I laugh with the sheep and the kine : 
 
 When their eyes blink slow 
 
 At the creek's broad glow, 
 I tinkle my bells and divine. 
 
 43 
 
REQUIESCAT 
 
 Whenever a great poet dies, straightway 
 The bardlets at his passing tinkle sobs. 
 The unclean body given to decay 
 They fain immortalize in metric lay. 
 
 Long, tireless pilgrimages, too, they make ; 
 
 Arrived at shrines, cry out "Afar, profane ! '* 
 And sanctimonious tears and sighs hold wake 
 Above the sentimental page, to tell the ache. 
 
 Ah, who of all eased living that poor hand. 
 
 Spoke needed cheer or jested not at faults ? 
 Who loved him so that as he left the land 
 He felt the tribute of a silent band ? 
 
 44 
 
COMPLAINTS 
 
 Language despaired and cried : ♦* I frame 
 Only the mind's desire. 
 I yearn to tell soul's fire. 
 Like Music's flame ! " 
 
 Knowledge proclaimed in echoing woe : 
 ** Facts are alone mine own. 
 Such rule as Love's firm throne 
 I must forego ! ' ' 
 
 45 
 
ICONOCLASM 
 
 But yesterday the altar's white was hung 
 With gay festoons by featous fingers looped. 
 
 Whereon to Phoibos of the suasive tongue 
 I paid my vow and wine I liberal stooped. 
 
 Who, then, when I her gracious favor won. 
 Had said she was not true as Stygian oath. 
 
 Him I had crushed to dust and shook to fun 
 For breezes as I cursed time's cooling sloth. 
 
 Now, Phoibos, take eternal overthrow 
 
 Of that pure faith which pious eld may choose ; 
 
 Surely thou taughtst me how to speak, to glow. 
 To win, but ne'er that subtler art — to lose ! 
 
 46 
 
A RETORT 
 
 When Pindar sang long, long ago 
 
 The victors of the course. 
 And in his pride began to show 
 
 How poor and tame the horse 
 Of every other rival bard. 
 The crowd laughed hard. 
 
 Their children, too, for centuries 
 Approved his rugged jest ; 
 
 He libeled to their blinded eyes 
 And thus one bard distressed : 
 ■ So old and copied is his verse 
 
 And never terse ! " 
 
 That silent fellow feigned to die 
 And slept in somber Egypt. 
 
 The other day a careful eye 
 Awoke him for a rescript : 
 
 Now Pindar, answer, if you please, 
 
 Bakchulides ! 
 
 47 
 
THE MAGICIAN 
 
 I LOVE one artist, him who paints the sky 
 
 Flushing now east now west with fleeting wealth. 
 No brush twice-used, no color e'er by stealth 
 
 Triumphant twice beneath that careful eye. 
 
 Spirit of peace, aye stranger to repose. 
 Unwearied by thy marvels infinite. 
 Hast thou not, too, taught melancholy night 
 
 To wear a million jewels like one rose ? 
 
 48 
 
A CONTROVERSY SETTLED 
 
 Once to bird of humble birth 
 Came a song of skies. 
 Aye he kept above the earth. 
 Ignorant he furnished mirth 
 To the very w^ise. 
 
 ** For," declared one solemnly, 
 *• Well I know his breed : 
 He's no better sired than I ; 
 So I cannot see just why 
 He the race should lead." 
 
 From his height they plucked him down. 
 
 Sought another name. 
 
 Silent, this usurped the crown. 
 
 Sagely pleading known renown, — 
 
 But that song's the same ! 
 
 49 
 
THE VENUS OF MELOS 
 
 *' O QUEEN, move not ! remain one moment more. 
 
 Arms luring so in majesty of guile ! 
 These let me fix and I have thrown the door 
 
 Of heaven wide to mortal men. You smile ? " 
 
 But never as he saw he copied true. 
 
 For never man from goddess e'er could gain 
 
 A smile, that as he wrought it, stayed nor grew 
 From tempting ease into divine disdain. 
 
 50 
 
SERENADE 
 
 (^For an air) 
 
 Hear, love, and let thine eyes 
 Open in starred surprise 
 Upon no muted string 
 Or minstrel whispering : 
 
 Softer than distant lute 
 
 Or the night-wind's low flute 
 
 I gentle dreaming bring 
 
 And with my heart I sing. 
 
 I and all songs are one. 
 They with my pulses run ; 
 I and the air to-night 
 Each breathe one wed delight. 
 
 This is the sweeter way 
 That thus remote I pray : 
 Far from thy breast of snow. 
 Close to thy soul, I know. 
 
 5» 
 
OBSCURITIES 
 
 To-day you see a rose 
 And only color glows 
 
 And speaks ; 
 To-morrow still it reigns 
 But other gifts contains 
 
 And seeks. 
 
 As for the rose your eye. 
 So for the poem try 
 
 All ways ; 
 If never twice the same. 
 To rose or eye no blame 
 
 But praise. 
 
 52 
 
TRANSLATIONS 
 
ANAKREONTIC 
 
 (^From the Greek') 
 
 Sweet is the song of Anakreon, 
 Sweet is the song of Sappho ; 
 Somebody mingle with these for me 
 Pindar's sweet song, then pour the three. 
 These would induce, I surely think. 
 E'en Dionusos to come and drink ; 
 And the sleek Paphian, too, would comply, 
 Eros along in company. 
 
 55 
 
THE CYDNUS 
 
 (^From the French of Herkdia) 
 
 Beneath the blue aglow with sunset blaze. 
 The silver trireme pales the river's black, 
 A censer's perfume trailing in its track 
 
 Mid sound of flute and flaunt of silken maze. 
 
 About the booming prow the sea-hawk plays ; 
 And, like a gull that tastes the far attack. 
 So, leaning from her shade no view to lack. 
 
 Floats Cleopatra touched with crimson rays. 
 Soon Tarsus, which the helmless warrior holds 
 Wide to the air the Lagian unfolds 
 
 Her amber arms where purple darks the rose ; 
 Her eye sees not how, near her very breath. 
 
 Dulling the gorgeous wave, in somber pose 
 Stand the divinities : Desire and Death. 
 
 56 
 
ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA 
 
 (^From the French of Heredid) 
 
 Their eyes beheld below the palace height 
 Where Egypt lay in sultry slumber deep. 
 Where o'er the Delta dark the river steep 
 
 Toward Sais or Bubastis rolls thick might. 
 
 The Roman cuirassed heavy as in fight. 
 Warrior and captive wooing infant sleep. 
 Against his victor heart felt fall and leap 
 
 Voluptuous her heart in close delight. 
 
 Moving her pale brow, wreathed with tresses brown. 
 
 Toward him whose senses her sweet perfumes drown. 
 She raised her lips and lucent orbs, and o'er 
 Her bending low, the ardent emperor 
 
 Beheld in those wide eyes, gold-starred as night. 
 
 One boundless sea where sped a fleet in flight. 
 
 57 
 
THE DEATH OF ORESTES 
 
 (SOPHOKLES: Elektra, 678 — 763) 
 KLUTAIMESTRA 
 
 But tell me truly, 
 
 stranger, quite the manner of his end. 
 
 PAIDAGOGOS 
 
 For this I was dispatched and tell thee all. 
 
 The Delphic games, the pride of common Hellas 
 
 In contest, he attended. When he heard 
 
 The clear-voiced herald cry the running-course 
 
 In order first, he entered radiant ; 
 
 And all who saw him sat in silence, awed. 
 
 His speed quite peered his beauty and he gained 
 
 The victor goals, a prize of rare esteem. 
 
 But brief to speak where glories crowd the tongue. 
 
 So many times triumphant know I none 
 
 To equal him in deeds of skill ; but this 
 
 1 know : in every contest of the five 
 
 He won the happy meed, to all proclaimed 
 An Argive named Orestes, son to him 
 Who once the famous host of Hellas called 
 Together, Agamemnon. Such his prowess. 
 Yet when a god would thwart a mortal, might 
 Avails him not. Upon another day 
 When sunrise marked the race of chariots. 
 He entered, too, amid a throng of rivals. 
 One from Achaia, one from Sparta came ; 
 Two, masters of yoked cars, were Libuans ; 
 And he, with steeds Thessalian, was fifth ; 
 The sixth came from Aitolia high-famed 
 For chestnut foals ; Magnesian the seventh ; 
 White were the horses of the eighth, by birth 
 
 58 
 
THE DEATH OF ORESTES 
 
 An Ainian ; the ninth, from Athens built 
 
 By gods ; Boiotian the tenth, the last 
 
 In number. There they stood in place assigned 
 
 Them by the judges as the lots declared. 
 
 And as the trumpet bronze blared signal, forth 
 
 They burst, wild shouting as they shook the reins 
 
 Over their horses. All the course was dense 
 
 With din of thundering chariots, and clouds 
 
 Of dust rolled up behind them in the air. 
 
 One cluster on they sped and every man 
 
 To pass the cars and snorting steeds of all 
 
 The others, rained his lashes till the backs 
 
 And whirling wheels foamed white from horses* 
 
 breath. 
 Orestes, driving near the final column. 
 Just grazed the nave and, slackening the right. 
 The near horse on the left he drew in check. 
 And still the chariots of all stood upright 
 Until the hard-mouthed colts from Ainia 
 Broke from control and, turning sharply round. 
 Upon the seventh course dashed full their fronts 
 On the Barkaian's car. From this mishap 
 One crashed against another, headlong hurled ; 
 And all the running-ground lay widely strewn 
 With wreck of chariots. The Athenian 
 Thus warned, with skilful rein drew off and stayed 
 His pace until the raging horses passed 
 Him by. Orestes, following, had planned 
 The last round for a dash to victory ; 
 And when he saw his one competitor. 
 With piercing shouts he thrilled his coursers* ears. 
 The yokes of both the racers held together. 
 Now one and now the other darting first. 
 Thus far the fiery youth in safety stood 
 
 59 
 
THE DEATH OF ORESTES 
 
 Upright within his upright chariot 
 
 Through all the rounds, when, loosening the rein 
 
 Upon the left just as the horse was turning. 
 
 He chanced to strike edgewise the post : the nave 
 
 Was shattered and over the rail he fell 
 
 Caught in the cutting thongs, the while his horses 
 
 Dashed madly through the middle of the course. 
 
 And when the people saw him fallen out. 
 
 Up rose a cry compassionate that one 
 
 So youthful and so glorious should meet 
 
 Such doom — now tumbled earthward and again 
 
 His limbs tossed upward. Then the charioteers 
 
 Who scarce could stop the frantic steeds, unwound 
 
 Him so o'erbloodied that no friendly eye 
 
 Beholding could have known that formless form. 
 
 Upon a pyre they placed him and forthwith 
 
 Will come the chosen Phokians who bear 
 
 The paltry ashes of that stalwart frame 
 
 Within a small bronze urn, that so this land. 
 
 His fatherland, may be his resting-place. 
 
 Such is the tale I tell, — grievous to hear. 
 
 But unto me who witnessed everything. 
 
 Most tragic of all scenes mine eyes have met. 
 
 60 
 
SONNETS 
 
A CRY 
 
 Hamid in triumph hissed : ** Stifle no cries. 
 
 Stab the full breast till white with red it pour. 
 And who are virgin, see them so no more. 
 
 Obey and fear ye not deaf Europe's eyes ! " 
 
 late-born Talos, now that none arise 
 
 To strike and overwhelm thee gorged with gore. 
 One prayer is left me though it give me o'er 
 To stare thee aye below. God ! when he dies, 
 Unsmitten by the wrath of Thy smooth hand. 
 May he not end in passive ignorance ; 
 
 But may the cursing wounds of whom he slew 
 Arraign his lying life. Be his no rue 
 Of easing penitence but in keen trance 
 Of changeless pains in hell's unrest to stand ! 
 
 EROS 
 
 Methought I wandered where above a pool 
 
 He leaned and fathomed long his own deep eyes ; 
 Methought 1 listened, too, as in this wise 
 
 He murmured low : " All subjects of my rule, 
 
 1 summon you appear ! Maid, sage, and fool. 
 
 Mirror me now your secretest surprise 
 In this my gaze." How strangely loth to rise 
 Swayed they before their lord ! some somber, cool 
 With their dead past ; decrepit with lone waiting ; 
 
 Or eyed superb with spirit's starred disdain ; 
 Or caught in wonder of love's first debating ; 
 
 Or white-haired mothers with the great, calm 
 
 look, — 
 When lo ! a blush this tameless god-cheek took : 
 He saw pale Psyche praying in mute pain. 
 
 63 
 
GUINEVERE 
 
 I WOULD thou hadst been gazing at my side 
 Upon the tragic show of Guinevere — 
 A name men uttered once and then drew near 
 
 To bless the footprint jealous earth would hide. 
 
 So marvelous the beauty they descried 
 
 In her wild eyes. Dim voices to the ear 
 And loveliness enough to start the tear 
 
 For waking hours, on easy air did ride 
 
 Enchanting, that bewildered sense despaired 
 Of finding where it most delighted stayed. 
 
 And then the May-day with the traitor queen 
 And traitor knight embalmed in budding sheen ; 
 And the strong soul of Arthur low displayed 
 
 And guilty love's rue swooning where he stared ! 
 
 IZEYL 
 
 When the prince cried the seer : " Enough of woe. 
 
 From lepers, orphaned widows, and the pain 
 
 Of earth, I turn a pauper, life to gain ! " 
 The smooth-lipped harlot swore : " He shall not go. ' * 
 Beneath the sacred bo whence afterglow 
 
 Of all the faded world and where the reign 
 
 Of saintly life began, Izeyl did chain 
 In charm his careless mind till her fair show 
 Of sin leaped covert of her lidless eyes. 
 
 He cursed her and afraid of holiness 
 
 She craved forgiveness. Sainted, for a kiss 
 She slew her princely paramour, her prize 
 
 But yesterday ; then, bloodied with no cess 
 Of scourge, kissing pure lips, died into bliss. 
 
 64 
 
KEATS DAY 
 
 The season when above the empty trees 
 The heaven seems translucent water-deeps. 
 He first saw earth, — a time when laughter sleeps 
 Among forgotten flowers or mid lees 
 Of summer's brimming stoop. Even the bees 
 Then frugal leave the fields and harvest's heaps 
 Of richness garnered lie in careful keeps 
 Against the certain need of wintry ease 
 And cheer of ingleside. Such was the time : 
 When nature grows reflective, bare of grace. 
 To ponder fresh delights of sun and shade ; 
 And so came he, the singer, sang and made 
 Old earth with beauty happy till her face 
 Changed to a Greek god's, smiling but sublime. 
 
 TWO PICTURES 
 
 Methought a seer waved to mine eyes two days. 
 
 In one, wild scenes of war where rivered gore 
 
 Ran plenteous along its human shore. 
 Next, in the lull of battles when the brays 
 Of trumps were dumb, I saw brave mothers raise 
 
 Grateful their eyes to God although no more 
 
 Those eyes would rest on the sweet sons they bore. 
 Yet scarcely had they turned to go their ways. 
 When lo ! among the dead a stir of hand ! 
 
 I nearer moved and saw it was not so : 
 
 Nay, skulking low, unscathed men were there 
 Rifling the sacred dead. That picture's glare 
 
 Froze me the cheer of patriotic glow : 
 While such men thrive, ours is a ruined land. 
 
 65 
 
SHAKSPERE 
 
 If it be poesy to phrase the wit 
 
 Of lords and ladies, clowns of all degrees ; 
 
 Betray the singing of enchanted trees 
 And on the green to charge the fairies flit ; 
 Heroic deeds to sound in surging writ 
 
 As if in battle-shock roared the huge seas ; 
 
 Down through the brimming cup the lurking lees 
 Of passion's rout to see and counterfeit ; 
 To draw with unstained eye the agonies 
 
 Of self-thrust jealousy, of love, of crime ; 
 To look lust calmly in the face, yet smile ; 
 To frame an ingrate world of measured guile. 
 
 Yet breathe secure, serene, and sweet as thyme, — 
 Then, poet, Shakspere, none to thee denies. 
 
 THIASOS 
 
 Round Ossa broods wide night. The earth and sky 
 Lie in embracing arms so calmly wed 
 That air, their common breath, with sleep is dead. 
 Along the dense, fir-scented sides forth fly. 
 Like myriad beetles, flourished flambeaux high. 
 Anon scarce heard ** lo ! lo ! " down shed 
 In showers of fierce acclaim, sea-chorals spread 
 O'erwhelming nuptial quiet, surge and die 
 In eddying weirdness. Tumult flames the peak. 
 While vine-browed, panther-girt, with goading eyes 
 Half-lidded, on they tread in drunk amaze 
 The mystic rites, cloyed tongue too steeped to 
 praise 
 Clearly the godhead. Last, satieties 
 Of sense, drowse, silence, — save one girl's quick 
 shriek. 
 
 66 
 
DEFEATED 
 
 The silvered painter at his canvas heaping 
 Hues precious, varied as if heart were young 
 Again when the near glory palsied tongue. 
 
 Toils through the day, at night-time niggard sleeping. 
 
 And silver grows to white, no longer keeping 
 Unmarked the fallows of old age. Unhung 
 But finished to the last fine touch, among 
 
 Man's masterworks it merits crown, yet reaping 
 
 No praise of man : with brush still clutched lies dead 
 The hand that wrought. O love, were it not fair 
 That God forbid to their ingratitude 
 The sun to rise revealing ? Then the rude 
 Or ignorant might less regarded stare 
 
 Or pass, the artist finding God his bread. 
 
 67 
 
FOURTEEN SONNETS FROM 
 A SEQUENCE 
 
I 
 
 I WOULD not burst the bond that makes me slave — 
 More highly slave than erstwhile proudly free — 
 Bending to you a strange and sudden knee. 
 
 Seeing you gain from me of what you gave. 
 
 So little in return. Yet would I crave 
 You call not little all the sum of me. 
 For, if my spirit win the Eye to see 
 
 It bright above the darkness of life's wave, 
 
 'Twas you glowed me the day your spirit cried 
 To me in one way none but woman knows : 
 
 The caught stare of some queen from whom we 
 stir 
 
 With sadness on our past. Thenceforth I tried 
 With pain and felt, as slowly white I rose. 
 Whatever I could grow to be, you were ! 
 
 II 
 
 There are who much delight in rhyme's array 
 Their loves' rare wit or loveliness or trait 
 Surprised in some chance way, to celebrate ; 
 
 And oft, methinks, 'twere perilous to say 
 
 Whether they prize this dream of summer day 
 For love or that love thrones their muse in state 
 And makes the true queen on the tongued queen 
 wait, — 
 
 Who erstwhile served, now crowned with lauded bay. 
 
 O love, my love, think not I honor words. 
 Fitting them featously for thee to read : 
 They honor thee and with obeisance cry 
 
 Their ever-failing due, as timorous birds 
 
 Fearful of telling quite God's wealth, man's need. 
 Low sink their sweet throats singing, and so die. 
 
 71 
 
Ill 
 
 Dazzled with day's intolerable glow 
 At set of sun from out the melting veils 
 Of gauzy pink and blue, intent on dales 
 And moors and hills and streams of earth below 
 Appears the moon. No word that mortals know 
 She deigns, but silent, as a vessel sails 
 Athwart seas strange to her untouched of gales. 
 Upward she swims ; intenser pallors grow 
 With height on height. O love, my love, of whom 
 Dream I enrapt in this wide mystery 
 
 Of coming night ? Surely thy confidant 
 Of absent summer eves hath guessed my want 
 And caught me up : swiftly with her I fly 
 Through airy oceans tossing starry spume ,! 
 
 IV 
 
 As one who through a dim cathedral vast 
 Moving at vespers hears the choir remote 
 Wafting with muted sweetness sacred rote 
 Upon untutored ear, impels more fast 
 Each wonder-winged footstep than the last 
 Until he nears them catching every note 
 No longer fused but clear, what erstwhile smote 
 As empty, now full-quickened from dead past, — 
 O love, my love, thus grew I wholly thine 
 And thus I learned interpret thee with eyes 
 Distant and doubting, ignorant of all 
 The blessed meaning now so strangely mine ; 
 And since I heard aright joy clear arise. 
 
 Guard we this gathered good lest silence fall. 
 
 72 
 
V 
 
 Methought they hung upon the outer door 
 Which welcomed me so oft, the woful sign 
 That He had visited and whispered ** Mine ! " 
 
 With unabashed and traitor footsteps o'er 
 
 The threshold traveling. Liberal store 
 
 Of bloom heaped loose or wreathed in amorous 
 
 twine 
 Seemed then to mock me and that empty shrine 
 
 Whence the still thief had swiftly stolen more 
 
 Than all earth held beside. Nor night nor day 
 
 love, my love, I moved me from the pall. 
 
 " Hear me and join me with thee " as I cried. 
 Behold ! a radiance began to sway 
 
 About us both and through it came a call : 
 Or thou didst wake or at my prayer I died. 
 
 VI 
 
 With those who image Truth quite passionless. 
 Of stillness Parian and moveless frame, 
 
 1 hold not though that chiseled death they name 
 Or stone or flesh. Beauty or Loveliness. 
 
 When that I lean to thee and to the stress 
 
 Of crying veins thou answerest *• No blame ! " 
 Then art thou Truth devoid of fatal shame. 
 
 To me surrendered white. 'Tis God's impress 
 
 From the fierce finger of His writing rage. 
 This fire outshining in the needy night. 
 And shall we disavow our ardent youth 
 
 Awake with flame to cheer deserted age ? 
 
 If not an ember of their hearts glows bright. 
 It never knew, — else died in guilty ruth. 
 
 73 
 
VII 
 
 I SOUGHT thee not for these, lips' ripeness, cheek 
 Won rosy, but the larger gift of soul 
 Each day more clearly to my welcome stole. 
 
 And quickness of a mind eager to seek 
 
 And search the goodness of the world, yet meek 
 Unto itself. Health wast thou, liberal dole 
 Of breath to straining lungs this side the goal 
 
 Toward which I doubtful pressed : just as a Greek — 
 
 In those old games Olympian beneath 
 
 Rich skies and Pheidian Zeus' s golden gaze — 
 Who, as he runs unfriended by one cheer. 
 
 Quite desperate, fear-pallid, with clenched teeth. 
 At last throws one mad look up at the maze. 
 Sees two girl-eyes and feels his god draw near ! 
 
 VIII 
 
 I CANNOT understand the mad lament. 
 
 The dead eyes and the quickly summoned knee 
 To God in curse, of him who like a sea 
 
 Beats hard the world in blind, deaf discontent 
 
 Because a woman, whom he loved and spent 
 New praises and all treasures with a free 
 And kingly largess quite beyond degree 
 
 On her fair, human qualities, has sent 
 
 Her spirit or her mind or her desire — 
 Be what it may — upon another quest 
 
 To find, create, or guess him she would choose 
 
 Above her wooers and the smiles that tire ; 
 For, loving as I love, in this I rest : 
 
 ** If she prove false, it is not I who lose ! " 
 
 74 
 
IX 
 
 Of vanished years not one would I recall. 
 Or wishing to live o'er a happiness 
 Or to amend where once I did transgress. 
 For both to me have been a present Paul, 
 More eloquent than he, to teach that all 
 
 The past with spotless skies that greet and bless. 
 With thick-heaped clouds of guilt and ruth that 
 press 
 The memory, record the rise or fall 
 Of spirit and no more. Vain are regrets ! 
 
 If years have failed to make me strong and true. 
 Surely appeal that time should slight the test. 
 And gloze me o'er, is craven and begets 
 
 Low living. They are past, thank God ! I view, 
 O love, our coming years : each one the best ! 
 
 In early autumn when the sudden eve 
 
 With chill security deposes day. 
 
 Clearer the steady stars pursue their way. 
 And crisper air makes the sunk spirit heave. 
 'Tis then that low, obscure, but skilled to weave 
 
 With magic of her beauteous disarray. 
 
 O'er city-strung horizon like a fay 
 Rises the moon ; unmarked, swift to achieve 
 And dominate the subject world she glows 
 
 A queen among her awe-struck devotees. 
 
 Her progress whiter on from height to height. 
 Ah ! such, beloved, was erstwhile our night. 
 
 So rose within our souls in silent ease 
 Our love, there rules, there whitens as it grows ! 
 
 75 
 
XI 
 
 Now guess I sad October's richest mood 
 
 When dry-veined leaves lie strewing the drained 
 
 grass 
 So thickly that when through the woods you pass 
 
 A gush of sound starts like to vessel rude 
 
 Stirring wide waters. Where the early brood 
 Learned flight and later each to fledgling lass 
 Religious paid his song and counted crass 
 
 The loveless life, here silent where they cooed 
 
 Stand the depleted trees. Hence the strange gaze 
 Of chill October when through memory 
 
 Runs pageant bloom, fruit, and too swift decay : 
 Year after year, hope, issue, disarray : 
 The radiance of love, its minstrelsy. 
 
 Its sudden ceasing starting deep amaze. 
 
 XII 
 
 As well ask why the fragrance of the rose 
 When call her perfect pennons to the bees ; 
 Or why the ox-heart cherries staring tease 
 
 Adventured robins to our frigid close ; 
 
 Or why the orient Titan floods and glows. 
 Shaking his locks composed across long seas 
 Of calm ; or why the secret-laden breeze 
 
 Hints mystery and passes ; or why throws 
 
 Just one star red down the unmemoried track 
 Abysmal of vast space ; — as well the cause 
 Of all well-witnessed pageants ever strange. 
 As turn the force of thought on that deep change 
 When rending all once precious state and laws 
 
 The soul knows love and toward the world looks back. 
 
 76 
 
XIII 
 
 How variously are men impelled to quest ! 
 
 Some tempt the sea to dompt her empery ; 
 
 More on the land impress their energy ; 
 All enterprise in this is full confessed : 
 The sweep of power, not the ease of rest. 
 
 Some fretful few explore that filmy sky. 
 
 The human mind, with worlds beyond descry ; 
 And many, many more are sore distressed 
 That life still hides her source with placid guile. 
 
 sailing seamen and ye men of toil. 
 Ye seekers of secure authority 
 
 In air or earth, come, trust beyond your eye : 
 
 1 know where all is answered pure of soil. 
 For I have found love's white, immortal smile. 
 
 XIV 
 
 Methought we followed fast an old, old man 
 Who, hobbling forward on his staff, woke mirth 
 Scarce-held in us as, light with youth, on earth 
 We left no printed footstep. Once we ran 
 To pass before him ; but he, too, began 
 Alike to quicken pace at every birth 
 Of speed until we wondered what fresh worth 
 Those dry limbs housed. He stopped : he turned to 
 
 scan 
 Us and he smiled the smile of victors great 
 And offered me the staff whereon he leaned. 
 Proudly I waved it off and e'en again 
 Had almost thrust aside him staring, when 
 Your hand in subtler wisdom swiftly screened 
 Your eyes, and then, — your burning whisper 
 "Fate!" 
 
 11 
 
L'ENVOI 
 
 Love, I am singing my soul 
 To thee out through the night. 
 
 Hearst thou no catch of the whole 
 That I know no delight ? 
 
 Why when we tarry apart 
 
 Can we never be heard ? 
 Yet when we breathe heart to heart 
 
 Need we never a word ? 
 
 This is the wonder of all 
 
 That our lips are so wise. 
 Ever to each raising call 
 
 With no hope of surprise. 
 
 Utterance when they are far ; 
 
 But together, dumb bliss ; 
 Taking no thought why they are 
 
 And content in a kiss. 
 
 Who would know more happiness 
 With no question of goal ? 
 
 Love, I am nearing thee : yes, 
 I have sung thee my soul ! 
 
 78 
 
QUATRAINS 
 
THE MESSAGE 
 
 O EAGER bard, grasp well the dragon throat ; 
 Let not elusive Proteus master thee : 
 The joy of all the singers yet to be 
 
 Awaits within thy paean cry its note. 
 
 HYPOTHESES 
 
 The wise men dream and, waking, make us hear. 
 
 Till slowly their strange fancies draw our faith ; 
 And so in days remote, hot, bright, and sere, 
 God after god rose but to flee in fear. 
 
 INEXPRESSIBILITY 
 
 Sometimes I think there live within my mind 
 
 Two kinds of thoughts : those I may limn to you. 
 Tenant their souls in forms ; but Music's few 
 
 Are free of form, raptured and undefined. 
 
 THE ORACLE 
 
 No pallid priestess with the god a-doze 
 
 Chants me ambiguous answers from the shrine : 
 I heed but beauty whose decrees divine 
 
 Are heard in whispers lip-born of the rose. 
 
BROWNING 
 
 The dim walls loomed one rudeness in the light. 
 Gates scarce ajar. I entered hesitant : 
 What marvels grew, each more extravagant. 
 
 Thronging strange vistas on my dazzled sight ! 
 
 THE HUCKSTER 
 
 The grey, bent woman in the sunlight there 
 Will tell you, if you pause, how tired of life 
 She is ; the keen phrase strikes you like a knife : 
 
 ♦* She tires of daily death in God's sweet air." 
 
 IMMATURITY 
 
 Grey, grim, they circled pinioned Life and fain 
 
 Would know his heart. Then, radiant. Youth 
 arose 
 To testify ; but like tumultuous rain 
 They shouted all : " Tush, fool without a stain ! '* 
 
 FIRST DAY OF SPRING 
 
 As if it cannot quite be true, the breeze 
 
 Seems laughing like a half-scared little girl ; 
 O'er the hard woodland with a timid purl 
 
 Steals the scant brook beneath still drowsy trees. 
 
 82 
 
THE DECRIER 
 
 There are who think all chisels must be Greek, 
 And swear the skies to-day mere emptied bliss ; 
 
 Yet after battle will the master seek 
 
 Dumb fighter's or loud carper's brow to kiss ? 
 
 PHILLIPS BROOKS 
 
 Not like a star he dwelt apart austere. 
 
 Shining diminished through the airy deep ; 
 In midmost of the line his helm and spear 
 Made warriors of all and banished fear. 
 
 INFLUENCE 
 
 If thou, my soul, with resolution strong 
 
 Shouldst say unto thyself: " Henceforth each day 
 Will I about some spirit's height delay," 
 
 All life would rise flame-lipped with thy fresh song. 
 
 COMPENSATION 
 
 Where from beneath the sword the Gorgon head 
 Ruddied the earth, arose as from the dead 
 
 Winged Pegasus. Nor otherwise to-day : 
 Genius will spring but where a host has bled. 
 
 83 
 
THE EARLY GREEKS 
 
 They looked upon the earth with big content ; 
 Flocks sleeker never flecked an ample field. 
 Fruits gladder never from a full bough reeled 
 
 They shaped a Dian breasted opulent. 
 
 SUMMER 
 
 In halls of palest Parian mid scent 
 
 Of gathered spice she drowses languidly : 
 Roses immure her bath with every dye 
 
 While Pestilence without spares not one tent. 
 
 NAPOLEON BONAPARTE 
 
 Above the blue no saint but bowed his head 
 
 In tearful shame while earth's awed cowards hailed 
 Their chief who, smiling, saw himself in dread 
 Hedged close in hell with walls of human dead. 
 
 OUTCAST 
 
 On golden couch with storied tapestry 
 
 More wondrous lay the princes with glad cups 
 Of nectar while beyond that door to die 
 Crept scared their tattered sire. Simplicity. 
 
 84 
 
A MURDERER 
 
 Because I loved her, lies she in her shroud : 
 
 For life's too cruel blade I used another. 
 Mine is the stupid frown of all the crowd. 
 Mine is the glory her approval vowed. 
 
 A BOY-CHOIR 
 
 God sends to sorrow such apostleships — 
 These children singing in their innocence ; 
 The burning sacrifice with odors dense 
 
 Were sacrilege before these ardent lips. 
 
 SECRETS 
 
 The Earth against the Sun one night conspired 
 And told the Air she never would be bride. 
 
 Air whispered to the stars and since that hour 
 To keep their secret, all the day they hide. 
 
 CHRIST 
 
 From doubtful Pilate down to Peter's lie 
 No syllable of faith or truth for thee ; 
 But every thorn thy brow held, from its eye 
 Dropped current red that love to live mast die. 
 
A CHARITY BALL 
 
 The poor were hungry, homeless, and afraid : 
 
 The rich gave meanly for no eye beheld. 
 To-day the poor are gorged ; the rich have paid 
 Yet what a price to dance and wear brocade ! 
 
 NEMESIS 
 
 ** Op^every beaker drained I am the lees 
 
 And ere you sipped you blindly stared my menace ; 
 I brought you to your God on tardy knees : 
 In mirth remember me ! My name ? Disease." 
 
 SAVONAROLA 
 
 As once beholding Dian the divine, 
 
 Aktaion, strange to his known hounds, was torn ; 
 
 So seers, transformed beholding Truth new-born. 
 Must die while blind companions heap the pine. 
 
 LATE AUTUMN 
 
 O SEASON, somber with thy heart of ruth. 
 
 How nunlike movest thou through crimson days 
 And silver nights ! How thin thy lips where plays 
 
 In vain the once wooed smile of rounded youth ! 
 
 86 
 
A NOCTURNE 
 
 The symphony of singing spheres afloat 
 
 Upon the shoreless sea of night I hear : 
 How all imagined loveliness draws near ! 
 Soft shapes and the warm swell of mellow throat. 
 
 CLEOPATRA 
 
 Whether she blush or brave, — in each, doom still ; 
 
 Whether she love or hate, no less her power ! 
 
 Such thrall I live, I pray her brows to lower. 
 Her lidded lightning blast, be that her will. 
 
 SOULLESS 
 
 ** How comes it in thy Hell, O Prince," I said, 
 
 " With mortal frame immortal thus they writhe ? " 
 " 1 cannot torture what before was dead : — 
 These had no souls, for flesh thrived in their stead ! ' ' 
 
 SONG 
 
 When all the moods had mated, two remained ; 
 Sly Venus smiled upon their destiny 
 That jocund Joy with grey-eyed Grief ally : 
 
 Over her court their child hath long since reigned. 
 
 87 
 
FIRST SNOWFLAKES 
 
 A BAND of sly assassins palely drest 
 
 They steal as wooers at rude Winter's hest. 
 
 And, spying where each latest flower lingers. 
 Dissolve their icy daggers in her breast. 
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 
 
 Destiny framed a human truth and gave 
 
 A voice that men might once again believe ; 
 She led him to the nation's brimming grave. 
 And there he bowed to death to loose the slave. 
 
 SPOILS 
 
 What have we later fighters won from these 
 
 The mighty dead who strew the field of time ? 
 From carcasses beyond fame's feared degrees 
 Here but a helm or bright cuirass we seize. 
 
 AN EVENING SKY 
 
 To far horizon strand one amber sea 
 
 Wherein lie moored long, blue-hulled ships of mist. 
 Whence, bolder than his mates, yon warrior. 
 
 Leaps with white spear and targe of amethyst. 
 
 88 
 
PRIORITY 
 
 Where one has walked whose prints with time are 
 grown 
 To sacred dimness, shall no other follow ? 
 That were to fill eternal one dark throne 
 And stamp all men apostate save the drone. 
 
 DAWN 
 
 Between the dark-twined sea and sky a line 
 Of faintest blue and grey ; then dies the grey ; 
 Blue purples ; purple trembles rose, — 'tis day : 
 
 The drowsy sun wakes like thick-beakered wine. 
 
 ALEXANDER POPE 
 
 He never missed through careless aim his mark. 
 Although that mark might be the heart of lark ; 
 
 Much, too, he charmed with chiseled wit the 
 world — 
 Yet art can spare the best paroemiarch. 
 
 METHODS 
 
 Some polish phrases till full featously 
 
 They throw their brightness on a world of eyes. 
 While others hide in them a strong surprise : 
 
 And if both gems have hearts, why this loud cry ? 
 
 89 
 
THE BROOK 
 
 ** Why hurry so through glades of peaceful sleep ? 
 
 The night is thick and none would blame thy 
 drowse," — 
 
 ** Breathless I hurry from my mountain-house : 
 For scranny ghosts their half-seen vigils keep." 
 
 PLACATION 
 
 Oh that this yearning soul I might at will 
 
 Transmute and yield it to our ugly god : 
 My clay-cupped all, libating I would spill 
 If for that price beauty the world should fill. 
 
 CIRCE 
 
 I HAVE no potency, no Colchian art, 
 
 I wave no spells as bards delight to sing : 
 One glance from me on who would be my king 
 
 Shapes him in form the beast he was in heart. 
 
 A DREAM 
 
 I STOOD upon a height steep out the deep 
 
 And scanned the fathoms of the death beneath. 
 When horror snake-like stole with icy creep : 
 I saw her die and to her dared not leap. 
 
 90 
 
LULL 
 
 We hear no more the songs of health and joy. 
 Our sickling verses chant of doleful death ; 
 
 And yet methinks I feel the subtle hope 
 
 That the glad gods ere speaking pause for breath. 
 
 MUSIC 
 
 God said unto Himself the seventh day : 
 ** Now all is done, I might again begin : 
 Such sweetness unexpressed yet lives within 
 
 My soul ; but let them guess in some fine way ! " 
 
 ANONYMOUS 
 
 He craved not gladness, wealth, or fame with days 
 To live upon men's lips in lukewarm praise : 
 
 But only that somewhere afar from him 
 Some silent soul might bless his lifted lays. 
 
 FANCIES 
 
 As bubbles boat the air with idle oar. 
 
 Born of your words my dreams outsmile the sun ; 
 
 One frown from you would shipwreck every one,- 
 Then be not rude as tempest-gods of yore ! 
 
 91 
 
ORPHEUS 
 
 From out this fatal lyre so long asleep 
 
 I rouse the chord that tempted me one glance 
 To her. O gods ! that moan, that formless leap. 
 Those stubborn stones that followed me like sheep ! 
 
 THE WORSHIPER 
 
 Sometimes thou art not beautiful to me. 
 
 Sometimes the summer of thine eyes is gone. 
 Sometimes thy threat of night forbids my dawn ; 
 Yet, ever — thus, or thus — I know but thee. 
 
 MYSTERY 
 
 (^A Painting') 
 
 Two stood upon the bridge above the roar 
 
 Of moonlit sea in passionate discourse . . . 
 Another night : a nude girl and no more — 
 A wave-tossed bauble dead upon the shore. 
 
 TO A PIANIST 
 
 Like an impassioned song-bird in a throe 
 Of joy, tossing to air fine tones of fire. 
 
 So sways the master with his melody 
 
 And we who hear are dumb in strange desire. 
 
 92 
 
MEDEA 
 
 He cannot flee : the moment I divine 
 His vassalage grows sick free to depart. 
 His lying lips that night shall taste mine art, — 
 
 One kiss deny all sip of others' wine. 
 
 IMPROVISING 
 
 A KINGLY city far from haunt of men 
 
 Thy fingers have enchanted in my mind ; 
 So in the times antique, the story ran. 
 Old Thebes rose when Amphion's lay began. 
 
 AFFINITY 
 
 Surrendered each to each, heart to heart won, 
 I marvel God may never let them guess 
 That once they clung just thus in dumb caress. 
 
 When worlds were night before the cheering sun. 
 
 REMEMBRANCE 
 
 Let me not slight thee. Earth, when in the fold 
 
 Of spirit gladness I essay the air 
 With wing of confidence ; still let me hold 
 Dear converse with all bloom above my mold. 
 
 93 
 
UNSPOKEN 
 
 I MOVED amid the shades in Paradise 
 
 And one addressed me with her dawning eyes : 
 
 " Once in the world above we met and passed ; 
 
 In silence loved we : now no eve our last." 
 
 THE METAPHYSICIAN 
 
 He played the god — our late philosopher. 
 
 Teaching and practising serenity. 
 To hate or love was equally to err ; 
 And yet he had his passion, too, — to die ! 
 
 SYMPATHY 
 
 I KNOW not how it is that you are here : 
 I never prayed, I think, that you appear ; 
 
 I know but this that where you are and move. 
 Masks are in vain and life becomes sincere. 
 
 EUMENIDES 
 
 All kindred gods have crumbled into dust. 
 
 Though latest born of that once teeming womb. 
 We yet abide who shall not taste a tomb — 
 
 Of passion, gold, and fame the lashing lust. 
 
 9+ 
 
THE IRONY OF FAME 
 
 How sad that not the plumes we love the best 
 Adorn our helms ! Despite our later blame 
 (Sweet sonneteer whose one joke spreads your 
 name) 
 
 Mayhap great Homer vied in village jest. 
 
 A STUDY BY CHOPIN 
 
 Down would I hurl thee, horrid dream ! Wilt chase 
 My senses from me in the restful night ? 
 "Spectral I body all thy sins to light ! " . . . 
 
 I fear thee not : 'tis day, — ah, God's the praise ! 
 
 THE PRIESTESS 
 
 Her voice is as a bell that bids to prayer. 
 
 Yet will she have no worshiper respond : 
 Austerer than a god's her templed air 
 And the fierce glory of her shaken hair. 
 
 APOCALYPSE 
 
 I stood above the wide sepulchral night 
 
 Where lay abhorred the earth, a nameless corse : 
 Fierce meteors afar stared toward the sight. 
 Slowly approached, then, shrieking, fled in fright. 
 
 95 
 
THE POET'S IVORDS 
 
 The children of his fancy we pass by 
 
 For they are mendicants most humbly sprung; 
 Tet, orphaned, they above our buried lie 
 
 Shall reign in purple Truth forever young. 
 
 96 
 
PRINTED BY J. FRANK FACEY AT 
 THE GORHAM PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, 
 FOR THE PUBUSHERS, RICHARD G. 
 BADGER AND COMPANY, BOSTON