(toss f$£" COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. After Noontide in tartans %t£% By BENJAMIN S. PARKER Author of " The Cabin in the Clearing," " Hoosier Bards," Etc. WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY EVALEEN STEIN AND E. E. EDWARDS * NICHOLSON PRINTING & MFG. COMPANY RICHMOND, INDIANA 1905 LIBRARY of CONGRESS TwoCooiss Received JAW 12 1906 Copyrigfct Entry nJUss c*~ xxc. no! v\ dS Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1905 by Benj. S. Parker in the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington & ©rwrf mag tee a Iilxtess stroll, TItb mwrnmg xrf an atixfetit Irittlr; 38itt tae is mxrrs Itian mirarte ^nxi msrtg frailr eternal gxmtfr. THIS LITTLE VOLUME TO THE FRIENDS WHOSE GENEROUS SUPPORT HAS MADE ITS PUBLICATION POSSIBLE B. 8. P. INDEX AFTER NOONTIDE AND OTHER POEMS PAGE After Noontide 1 Vanderdecken 3 In an Old Garden 6 Two Brothers of One House 9 The Rapture 12 The Man and the Desert 14 La Raquette , 18 A Tale of a Terrapin 21 Poverty Flat 25 The Beech Tree 28 The Tube Rose 32 TIMES AND SEASONS The Haunted Road 34 Loss and Gain 36 October 38 Sweet Williams and Sweet Violets 40 Morning and Evening 42 A Song for the New Year 45 An Indian Summer Day 46 The Lilac ■ 48 A Midwinter Doubt 49 SONGS OF THE HERE AND THE HEREAFTER The Star and the Clod 51 As the Mistletoe Clings to the Tree 52 Waking or Sleeping 54 viii INDEX SONGS OF THE HERE AND THE HEREAFTER — Continued page The Interpreter 55 The Singers 56 Only an Old Song 58 Regret 59 Consolation 60 Resurgam 63 The Bye and Bye 64 Shelley's Vision of Allegra 65 An Autumn Leaf 66 A Song of the Forgotten 67 A Lover's Thought of Death 68 Love Is All 70 Fact and Fable 72 Not He Who Most Believes 74 A SHEAF OF SONNETS The Dreamer 75 A Health to Ignorance 75 The Better Way 76 The Murdered Trees JJ Shakespeare jj Ariel 78 A BEVY OF BIRD SONGS The First Bluebird 79 The Maryland Yellow-Throat in the Thicket 80 The Song Sparrow on the Maple 81 The Indigo Bunting on the Blasted Tree 82 The Flicker in the Dark of the Year 83 Though Lost to Sight to Memory Dear 84 Snow Birds in Garden Closes 85 Emigrating Birds Resting by the Way 86 The Tufted Titmouse 87 The Mocking Bird's Song 89 INDEX i* RHYMES OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH PAGE An Old-Time Christmas at the Country School 91 A Baby's Come to Our House 97 Berceuse 99 The Sugar Trough Baby 100 Catching the Lark 102 Little Boy Blue in the Spring 104 A Sugar-Making Rhyme 106 Let's Sing and Jog Along 107 "The King is Dead! Long Live the King!" 109 Seek Not Evil 110 PATRIOTIC AND MEMORIAL One Hundred Years 111 Lafayette 115 Thanksgiving and Prayer 118 After Decoration 120 McKinley 122 On the Prospect of Peace 124 Adolph Thut 125 Maurice Thompson 128 Coates Kinney 129 Will Cumback 130 W. E. 131 Her Poor Thin Hands 133 NONSENSE AND DIALECT The Worm and the Woodpecker 135 The Woodpecker's Little Game 135 Gran'pa 136 Ole Man Pennypacker 136 Some Little Folks 137 Rafferty Green's Great Heart 138 Ross Martin's Hoss 139 Ca-i-phas 139 Jes' So Lazy 141 INDEX [SCELLANEOUS VERSE page Death Song of the Unsatisfied 143 Down the River 150 Massawippi 153 The Latch String 154 Mother of Melody — A Fragment 156 Content 159 Discontent 160 Content with Discontent 161 Borrowed Light 162 Indian Summer vs. the Professor 162 At Belle Air 165 SYLVAN LAOCOON 168 to 193 Song of the Oak 170 Song of Welcome 175 The Response 176 The Oak's Prayer to the Sun 178 Song 180 The Dream Bud 183 Postscript 190 AFTER NOONTIDE AND OTHER POEMS AFTER NOONTIDE AFTER NOONTIDE ^T^HE morning is over, the noon has flamed by, -*- And the shadows are reaching far into the east, And the sun in his glory descends from on high, Like Zeus from some famous Olympian feast; The man waxeth old and the memory fails, The eye loses lustre, the step is less free; A breath of the evening about him prevails With murmurs of rest in a slumber-song's key; And, now, shall the old man recoil on himself, Forgetting life's haloes, neglecting his kind, Hug his poverty close, or gloat over his pelf Till his sympathies die in a petrified mind? Or shall he toil on and find solace in cares That keep his heart warm and give life to his thought ; Or narrow his view to the petty affairs Of a fun'ral parade as the last honors sought? 'T were better, me seems, to fall dead at the plow, The sun's latest ray shining full in one's face, The soft breeze of evening caressing the brow, With peace after battle and, after toil, grace, 2 AFTER NOONTIDE Than fade into idleness droning the way To beatitudes sought through a jumble of creeds. *T were sweet to depart at the close of the day In rapture of soul or in glory of deeds ! I count that our joys when the shadows grow long In life's afternoon on ourselves must depend Far more than when morning awakes us with song, When love wins a lover and friendship a friend; For age that knows only far gleams from the past Is lonely and sad in a world that is cold, Since love's benedictions forever are cast On souls that stay young howe'er bodies grow old. God gives us the morning for pleasure, growth, gain, The evening for final maturity's dower, — The ultimate sweet'ning of heart and of brain, As fruits that mature in the Autumn's last hour, — Men wither too often before they are ripe, Grow weary of failures and yield to despair, Abandon the plow or break Pan's tuneful pipe, And sit with bowed heads in the sweet evening air. Whatever one loses, whatever he wins In the battles he wages to be and become, Now breaking the threads that adversity spins, Now broken himself by misfortune's hard sum, When evening arrives let him hold up his head With brow made serene by the peace in his breast, At one with his God, by love's urgency led, Go into the twilight and pass to his rest. AFTER NOONTIDE *VANDERDECKEN THE FLYING DUTCHMAN HpHERE, beyond the Cape of Storms, Where the breaker's voice of thunder Roars when ships are rent asunder, Through a fog of ghostly forms, — Writhing furies, flying far, Tempest-tossed and tempest-driven, Mist of sea and light of heaven Mingled in eternal war, — Sailing always without gain, Leagues on leagues, as sailors reckon, Flies the undying Vanderdecken, Toiling, powerless to attain. There the winds his course reverse — Vain is sea-craft to befriend him; Heaven has not a breath to lend him To escape its haunting curse. Back he speeds o'er India's brine, Till, on lazy sampans lying, Asians laugh to see him flying On their far horizon's line. *By permission of The Century Magazine. AFTER NOONTIDE When on deck and frozen shroud Loud the driven hailstones rattle Like quick musketry in battle, — Cloud that vanishes in cloud, — Men catch glimpses of the sail, Ages old, and rent and hoary, Of that quaint old ship of story, And cry, "Vanderdecken, hail!" When the austral tempests rave, And the sea-god's mighty sledges Pound the ragged rocks and ledges, Safe he rides the crested wave. Vainly waits the hidden reef: Born by Odin, the undaunted, Over boiling seas enchanted, Ever sails this man of grief. Swifter than the swallow's flight Down the arching seas he plunges, Where th' antarctic fog expunges All things from the chart of sight. Oft the shipwrecked sailor hears, Through dense fogs, the old blasphemer, Like some wierd, delirious dreamer, Thundering orders down the years; AFTER NOONTIDE Or discerns a ship go by, From his failing vision speeding, Whence this answer greets his pleading: "Help thou need'st not ; thou canst die !" Mocking Vanderdecken's rage, Maelstroms yawn and seas roar after — Tempests, with discordant laughter, Hurl him on from age to age. Heaven has ta'en him at his word, And his hope and his ambition, Failing always of fruition, Make the curse his curse incurred. * * * Thus this legend, quaint and old, Sailor-wrought and bard-repeated, Of the deathless, the defeated, In defeat still over-bold, Teaches how the sick soul flies, By its errors spurred and jaded, Even when lust and greed have faded With ambition's painted lies. AFTER NOONTIDE IN AN OLD GARDEN T N this old garden let me stray and dream Where sweet marjoram, sage and mint and balm With lips of fragrance whisper life's supreme Insistent story through the brooding calm, — The tale of love and love's Arcadian song, — Still chanted low among the blooming stocks Our mothers cherished, or amid this throng Of piebald pinks and crimson hollyhocks. Let strife and care beyond the latticed gate Wait with the daily dole of life and death, And all the great affairs of church and state, The warrior's rage, the things the wise man saith. The hour and place are sacred to the past, The droning bees are laden with old sweets, And these lithe shadows that the grapevines cast Are unsubstantial as a boy's conceits. Down these wide walks a hundred phantoms glide, And airy spirits idle on the wings Of wanton hopes that other years denied, — Dear tell-tale wraiths of long- forgotten things. Tansy and pennyroyal, chamomile, And "live-forever" and the mournful rue, Each in its place, recalls a mother's smile And many cordials that her skill could brew AFTER NOONTIDE 7 For the sick body or the stricken mind, Till I can feel her hand upon my brow With cooling touch, intent thereon to bind Some soothing herb whose fragrance haunts me now. This old, bent apple tree beside the wall Bears still upon its gnarled and lichened limbs Such apples as lost paradise recall In this dear paradise of matin hymns Sung by waked bird and hummed by risen bee, Where three score years ago the children found, — First joys of motherhood to bird and tree, — Some unfledged wings, a gladness green and round. Here, where its blossoms fell in rosy showers, In the sweet dapples of its swaying shade O ! happy, happy were the tardy hours That seemed to wait for rustic boy and maid. Heart answered heart, entangled in love's snare, That care and doubt and dull ambition's scorn Estranged thereafter, breaking in despair The fragile buds of life's unsullied morn. A vision rises from yon tangled mass Of berry bushes, and I see the stain Of lush ripe fruits on lips of lad and lass, Or paint therewith our castles in old Spain : 8 AFTER NOONTIDE Though Spain and Castle were but idle words To us, whose lives were by that present bound, Glad with the gladness of the fields and herds, Content as sparrows building near the ground. And things were born within this ancient pale That were to life as melody to tune, And memory clings forever to the tale Of some fair promise broken all too soon, Some sweet, frail lassie smiling in her flight Across the boundaries of our little years, As love's dear star, that lost in morning light, Leaves its far worshippers in ignorant tears. Some lusty lad with sinews tense as steel And heart as tender as a mother's, yet Strong, e'en when pulsing, for his country's weal, His life blood out where serried armies met With valor matching equal valor. Here Once more the sorrowing elder women talk Of their dead heroes and with many a tear Bedew these quaint old blossoms by the walk. And so the long hour fades, the shadows glide East, ever east, till, with a sudden gleam, The sun goes down, the silhouettes pass, the pride Of this old garden sinks into my dream. AFTER NOONTIDE TWO BROTHERS OF ONE HOUSE OpWO brothers, born upon the same demain, •*■ Had outward likeness, but their souls were far, Each from the other, as the greed of gain Is from the gladness of the morning star. One bowed himself to earth and sought its sands Of yellow metal, and, from rock and field Clawed out its wealth with eager, beastly hands And groveled, gloating o'er the princely yield. The other stood a-tiptoe on the heights And saw the seas, the continents and space All palpitant with far celestial lights, And read God's promise in the human face. The first ran through the market with the scent Of hounds in hunt, for victims, that his arts Might turn their blood to money as he went, And gleaned new thousands from the wreck of hearts. The second scattered blessings by his way And shared his little with the neediest hind, Laughed with the happy children at their play, Thanked God for love and magnified his kind, 10 AFTER NOONTIDE Sang in the clouds, or by his daily path Saw worlds develop in the sprouting grass, And heaven in all, despite the puny wrath Of little tyrants, raging as they pass. The first grew rich and prospered and knew less That wise men know, growing leaner, hour by hour, Until he saw, self gratified, distress And sorrow multiply beneath his power. Men fawned upon him most when most their hate Grew venomous within their stifled souls, And while he schemed and groveled death and fate Wrote his just sentence on their fadeless scrolls. They thrust him in the ground and reared a shaft That spoke of virtues which to him were lies, Then turned aside and in derision laughed, Saying "naught is naught when most it multiplies." But when the second brother came he wept "Alas, my brother ! he knew more than I The value of a trifle and he kept His trifle guarded, while I sought the sky "And light and law, from nebulae to man, And Mercy's guerdons, gentleness and peace; How grief may turn to joy, hate, under ban, May fade forever into love's increase." AFTER NOONTIDE 11 "He won his quest, men saw and praised his gain, Even while they cursed him; but alas, for me! Not even curses blunt the haunting pain Of one who toils for others thanklessly." Mistaken Soul! God also called him soon. No lettered stone belies his generous breast, But grass and mint with summer bloom and tune And gladness gather where his ashes rest. Swart children join the chorus echoing there. And men speak of him as an absent friend, While his freed Spirit, sweet as light and air, Grows and shall grow, a joy that may not end. The poor, first brother men no longer hate. Love for the second now his dust endears. His sordid failure, irony of fate, No more misnamed success, provoketh tears Of pitying grief from youth's indulgent eyes That often dance with joy above the page Whereon a fragment of the second lies, The gift of genius to a doubting age. 12 AFTER NOONTIDE THE RAPTURE OOMETIMES the rapture of a song ^ No mortal ever sings Has trembled Life's frail chords among And stirred the finer strings Till, for the moment, I have known A sweet and far delight, — The joy of Love's diviner tone, Low-murmured through the night; And yet, so faintly fell the sound Upon the spirit's ear, And seemed so free from vocal bound, So rounded like a sphere, So near and yet so far away, So indistinct yet plain, So like a gladness of the day, Or peace that follows pain, So ready to break forth in words, So quick, when thought essayed To capture it, among the chords, To fail and faint and fade. AFTER NOONTIDE 13 No power had I to catch, or hold The rare, elusive thing, And when, in daring overbold, I thought its joy to sing, It fled me wholly and defied All arts of speech or pen ; But when, both self and art denied, I sought for it again, And knew that I could only hear, But never might repeat The raptured tone, it sounded near And more intensely sweet. A low and loving minstrelsy, To soothe the sorrowing soul, The motive of its melody Surpasses man's control. He who would hear its tones must bind Ambition's daring wing, And list, with free and open mind, The song he may not sing. 14 AFTER NOONTIDE THE MAN AND THE DESERT A YOUNG man stood on the border land -"■ Of the zone of shifting sands and wind, Hailed the desert with beckoning hand And its problems scanned with eager mind. But — scorner of life and friend of death — The desert stood, faithless, vast and lone ; Men shrank and shriveled in her hot breath And Thirst was lord of her burning zone. She laughed at the slow-paced caravans, The awkward camels and precious freight, Their Arab masters, with futile plans For defying Nature and conq'ring fate. "I am the desert !" she cried, "and I Am mistress of sand and sun and wind; The bold invader who dares deny My power and prestige — weak, foolish, blind- "Falls on my pitiless breast to sleep And wakes no more, for the roving sands Sweep down and bury him fathoms deep With all the work of his puny hands. AFTER NOONTIDE 15 "Yet, I am the desert of many moods ; I doom the hundreds and save the scores, Oft bearing caravans, Arabs, goods, Safe to the opulent merchants' doors. "My children coax me ; I serve their greed ; They glory in me, and I in them; But thou, fair stripling, I warn thee, speed Back to the green world beyond my hem !" The stripling smiled at the Desert's wrath, But gave no answer to threat or taunt, For he knew the power of her deadly scath And durst not tempt it with idle vaunt. A vantage ground on the weary way To the Desert's heart the young man sought And found, through patience, then, day by day, With steadfast faith, at his purpose wrought. Deep into the sands, through clay and shale, His engines drove the exploring drill; The Desert's furnace, the sandstorm's hail, Were vain to conquer his conq'ring will. The engines throbbed and the drill went down, The laden camels went snarling by; Each turbaned rider, with nod and frown, Guessed and pondered and marveled why? 16 AFTER NOONTIDE The engines pulsed and the drill sank deep Into the earth's crust, hard and old, Till down where the primal fossils sleep It plunged in a fountain clear and cold. The steam pumps throbbed and the waters flowed Till the floods appeased the thirsty sands, And the great sheiks, worn from the desert road, Praised Allah's name, with uplifted hands. The moss filmed over the moistened stone, And palms upsprouted and grasses grew, Verdure leaped into the desert's zone And joy was born on the sands anew. Then came more engines and drills and wells, And further and further the waters sped Into the desert with miracles Of bloom and fruitage, and overhead The green boughs sheltered rejoicing birds And cast cool shadows where children strayed; Men builded homes, reared flocks and herds Where Mirage once her sorceries played. The strong, gray man — no stripling now — Smiles on the accomplished work and saith, "The winning is well, though small, but how Wide still remaineth the realm of death, AFTER NOONTIDE 17 "Its torturing thirst, its murd'rous sands, Its red simooms and its parching heat! The desert still laughs at my toil-worn hands; But to gain is vict'ry, to lose defeat. "The desert has lost, the gain is man's, And man shall add to what man has done, With saner efforts and wiser plans, Till the blight be conquered, the blessing won." Well, deserts and dearths and flinty crusts In this strange world are but common things. Hard knocks are needed and skillful thrusts To break them up and release the springs Of living waters that wait below To revive waste sand and withered heart; To banish the desert's reign of woe, And raptures of life and love impart. So the man must smite the desert's face And battle with her, as one to ten ; But God hath given him dower of grace, And he shall conquer through love of men. 18 AFTER NOONTIDE LA RAQUETTE SONG OF A CANADIAN SNOW SHOE CLUB ' I ^HE snow lies deep on hill and vale, The cotter spins his hamely tale Of Highland lairds and buirdly men — "When ane was fu' as guid as ten Bold Englishmen who dared assail", — Beside his ingle blaze, or casts The ''roaring stones" despite the blasts That whistle wildly by the rink Where bonnie tapers flare and wink. From yonder hill's illumined crown, On swift toboggans flashing down, The English maids and Yankee boys Go shouting their tumultuous joys, Or glide and swing or dart and sway In glittering ronds a' patiner; So come, my lads with tuques of blue, Ye brave Canadians bold and true, Your faces toward Etoile du Nord, While tramping orders waiting for, Nor long to wait, nor time to fret When we go marching en raquette! Hold high your torches all alight ! And let them flare into the night And cast our silhouettes on the snow, While merry chansons rise and flow, Such as our brave forefathers sung When first the mellow Norman tongue AFTER NOONTIDE 19 Made musical the woodland deeps Where land-locked Minas calmly sleeps; For to such notes are movements set When we -go tramping en raquette. The good wife plies the little wheel, The grand dame's turning off the heel Of Pierrot's sock; I see the light Shine from the window through the night; It twinkles like a joli star To guide me where my dear ones are. High over picket, over hedge, Along the ravine's ragged edge, We '11 march and sing and sing and march Through ranks of hemlock groves of larch, Where pine trees moan and beeches fret, As we go tramping en raquette. The demoiselle has dreamy eyes That hint of France and paradise ; The good priest wears a sable gown And shaves with care his sacred crown; The habitant, though bent and old, Still snaps his fingers at the cold, The brave old man can ne'er forget The nights he tramped it en raquette. The drifted snow obscures the roads, The bob-sleds screech beneath their loads; At touch of torches birch trees blaze And light the forest's tangled ways, 20 AFTER NOONTIDE The while we tramp, like marching men, Five miles and back, from seven to ten, And then a sip of something warm And jest and story lend their charm; But no ivrogne was ever yet U homme premier sur la raquette! And now, ye Frenchmen, bold and free, On this, our winter's night of glee, Lift high your voices, let us raise A song in our great founder's praise, For no voice ever rose in vain That sang the glory of Champlain; Then let some tearful Strophe tell How great Montcalm the patriot fell, For still Francais, as he was then, We 're, first of all, Canadienne ! To patriot airs our notes are set When we go tramping en raquette! 2jC 3jC «$* NOTES TO LA RAQUETTE "Roaring Stones" — The Scotchmen in Canada play their National game, "Curling," in long rinks, built for the pur- pose, using heavy oval "curling irons" with smooth under surfaces like sadirons, in place of the original "roaring stones," used on the Scottish lakes and streams, but they still call curling the "roaring game." Ronds a patiner — pronounced Ron sau patina — Skating rinks. Etoile du Nord — pronounced Atwal du Nor — The North Star. En Raquette — pronounced ong racket, accent heavy on the last syllable — On the Snow Shoe. Pierrot — a boy's name — pronounced Pero. Joli — pronounced Zholee — Pretty. AFTER NOONTIDE 21 Habitant— Farmer, pioneer, inhabitant. Ivrogne — pronounced Evron — Drunkard. V homme premier sur la raquette— The first man upon the Snow Shoe. Francais — pronounced fransa — French. Canadienne — pronounced Canadien, accent strong on last syllable. A TALE OF A TERRAPIN I. AS a Terrapin was wandering in a garden long ago - With a dim appreciation of the blossoms there ablow, And a vaguer rumination of the wherefore, thus and so, All the world went rushing past him in a most dis- tressing way, Till, in fancy, he was racing with the chariot of the day And with busy snails and hop toads making up the world's display. Then his little eyes grew shiny with the thoughts that filled his skull As the kernel of the walnut fills its indurated hull : "How could such a hurrying fellow be morose or slow or dull?" Was the question he propounded to his inner con- sciousness, But the answer that it made him was an echo of dis- tress 22 AFTER NOONTIDE Lest his nerves be wrecked and shattered by his fright- ful eagerness. Then the old chelonian pondered on the functions of the brain And the nerves that bear its orders, carrying news of joy or pain To and from the farthest outworks of the corporal domain. "Ah!" he mused, "there may be danger, as the wise physicians tell, In the headlong pace I'm keeping in my ardor to excel :" So he dropped his mental anchor and reefed sail with- in his shell. While he rested 'neath the cover of a spreading pump- kin vine Sleep, the soother, stole upon him, with its healing anodyne, And the vine ran on and left him roasting in the sum- mer shine. When he wakened late, he started in his old, familiar way, To o'ertake the shade, but swelt'ring in the sun's too ardent ray, Sighed, "this fearful rush astounds me as it goes on night and day. "Even vines have caught the mania and desert one on the road, Soothing shades skip on before me like the swiftly hopping toad ; Oh, my nerves ! I'll ease them, spare them ! Rest is heaven and rush be blowed !" AFTER NOONTIDE 23 II. Thus, my friend, old poets linger, growing idle, pacing slow, Dreaming they no more may mingle in the mighty on- ward flow Setting seaward like a river, beat by all the storms that blow, Toil and traffic, mad ambition, war that sweeps in aw- ful wrath, Lust of glory, zeal of learning, pleasure scorning that she hath, Swirl and rend and roar about us as we tread our humble path ! Men, our brothers, crush each other, speeding to some fancied goal, Grim, old, child-devouring Chronos swallows now his children whole, Enterprise and push and hurry lash the body, goad the soul. Few may pause to hear our singing, though it voice the loving heart, Few may turn to note the pathos speaking through our homely art ; Each must bear his marching burden and in battle do his part, And we, also, O, my my singer ! friend of many happy years, Must, perforce, fall in or linger where the past its phantom rears; We must move with men of mettle or efface ourselves with tears. 24 AFTER NOONTIDE Not all vainly did the prophet mingle honor with gray hairs, But the man who shirketh labor swiftly his own shroud prepares; Idle hands of old men often sow the planted fields with tares. Wherefore, O, my friend ! the poet still must sing and seek and toil Still must keep the pace of progress, still must burn the midnight oil, Or be counted but a cumb'rer of an erstwhile fruitful soil. Age brings grace to those who grace it with fair words and gracious deeds, Just as love comes to the lover, solace to the soul that pleads, Or God's blessing to the people who relieve each other's needs. Past ambition's phrensied cohorts crowding all the battle plain, Far beyond the greedy millions lie the fadeless fields of grain, And the soul that presses to'rds them reaps, at last, their sheaves of gain. III. Let the nerveless turtle slumber, snugly hidden in his shell, While the vines and shadows pass him in life's moving miracle ; He obeys his sluggish nature, and, obeying, doeth well; AFTER NOONTIDE 25 But for man the law is action, toil to be and to attain ; Even love, of all the master, sings forever this re- frain, — "Onward, upward, loved and lover, pulsing heart and busy brain ! "Keep love's currents pure and holy, sweeten every fount of song; Through all changes, evolutions, as the mighty ages throng, Still pursue the truth forever and outstrip the ancient wrong." POVERTY FLAT SPHERE'S a funeral today down at Poverty Flat, "*" And the corpse will be borne on a dray, While the mourner-in-chief, with no crape on his hat, Walks behind in the primitive way. She was only a woman who toiled for her bread And the bread of her six "little dears ;" He is but a day-laborer who walks with bowed head In a sorrow too bitter for tears. There's small comfort today down at Poverty Flat For the six orphaned children to share, — Only one little hymn by a sister and that Only followed by one broken prayer; By one broken prayer from a mother as poor As the mother they bear to the tomb, A petition for "help still to toil and endure" And His presence to shine through the gloom. 26 AFTER NOONTIDE O ! poor are the dwellers in Poverty Flat ; And so tired are the mothers that death Comes in like a friend when their strength to combat Life's evils wears out with the breath, Then other tired mothers will add to their own The burdens the dead one has left; Though rags flutter there and few comforts are known, No orphan is wholly bereft. There's small chance for the lad reared in Poverty Flat; If in reverence for tuum he fail, The shrift is a short one through court, and all that, To State's prison bound from the jail. But they think very fast in old Poverty's row, When they see the rich villain flaunt by, Whose freedom compels e'en the dullest to know That justice can wink a blind eye. There is woe for the maiden in Poverty Flat, If there be not some angel to guard; Her's the ill-concealed shame and the fatherless brat, Or to mate with some rough, tipsy lord, While Society's gilded but rotten old ship, To the guards with her sins laden down, Glides over her sorrows and leaves her to slip Into still fouler waters and drown. The stars shall shine down on old Poverty Flat And the fruit-giving rains shall descend, AFTER NOONTIDE 27 But life will be bitter and hearts will thereat Grow hard even to'rds the one Friend Who forsakes not and sleeps not, till men will declare That nowhere on the earth could you meet With heathens whose heathenish ways could compare With the sins on old Poverty's street, Go down with your tracts to old Poverty Flat, Make a mission of it, if you must, Then go to your churches and pass round the hat, But the best thing would be to be just. — Be just in your dealings with Poverty Flat, Be just in the wages you pay, Be generous and kind, still remembering that There are hearts there that bleed every day. O, Poverty Flat, poor old Poverty Flat ! Thy "innings" have never been sung; But some Laz'rus of thine may yet bring his torn hat Full of water to cool the parched tongue Of the proud, guilty world that has mocked at thy grief, Nor paused to give ease to thy pain ; For the old, coward world has a craven's belief That nothing is sacred but gain. 28 AFTER NOONTIDE THE BEECH TREE IV /T OTTLED trunk and shining leaves, -*^" Mossy limb and lichened bark, Where light's flying shuttle weaves Golden threads in warp of dark, Still the pleasant beech tree stands, Like a gentle, genial host Welcoming with gracious hands Bird or squirrel, man or ghost. In the brown and fatty mold, Where the tree's great roots divide, Like a dead thing, as of old, Doth the leafless beechdrop bide, Curious child of woodsy gloom, Soaked so full of Sylvan shade That from stem and warty bloom Long the settler's ink was made. Give me fancy's magic power, Eyes to see and ears to hear, And the beech tree's spreading bower Holds a world within its sphere. There I love to lie and dream, As the summer day goes by, Catching glint and passing gleam, Glance of wing and blue of sky, EH O- 3 3 £- J n & org O o> 2. tr a 3 -a o" i ^ o o "I c • o AFTER NOONTIDE 29 Ghosts of red men, shades of deer, Wildwood folk of claw or wing, That once wooed or wrangled here, — Wolves that wail and birds that sing, Paroquet and porcupine, Lordly turkey, piping quail, Through a maze of shrub and vine Pass, as dreams on dreams prevail. Then on sense and soul there falls Softly, through the whisp'ring leaves, Low, ecstatic bugle calls, Such as on the golden eves Of the lover's long ago Nymph or fairy bugler blew In the sunset's after glow When the pallid moon was new, While light kirtles, pink and green, Eddy over twinkling feet, As in mists of shade and sheen Elfin lords and ladies meet, Dancing to the lilting rhyme Of the wind harp's myriad strings Deftly touched in tune and time To love's softest whisperings. Or, when sprightly summer rains Patter on its emerald tent, Running down in silvery skeins, Laughing in their merriment, 30 AFTER NOONTIDE Till the birds have silent grown, And the swollen runlets roll, Then 'tis joy to stand alone By the beech tree's mighty bole, Silent as the silent things Hidden near me, till the sun Smiles again and robin sings "Hallelujah, it is done!" Then when all the woodland wakes And renews its sylvan joys, The delirious rapture makes My old heart leap like a boy's. This benevolent, old beech, Lithe of limb and rough of burr, Shares its bounty large, with each Citizen in plume or fur; But, when Autumn frosts prevail, Barefoot boys, sun-painted brown, Its full arms with clubs assail Till the ripe nuts rattle down. Oily kernels, plump and sweet, — Bounty of the primal wood, Chipmunk's treasure, squirrel's meat, Pigeon's rapture, grouse's food, — Such the beech tree's annual gifts To its friends from near or far : Palsied be the arm that lifts Axe or saw its life to mar! AFTER NOONTIDE 31 Once we twined its slender sprays Each with each, down-trailing low, — Country boys have cunning ways Wiser people do not know, — And, thus, baby's hammock made, Sang, and swung him rock-a-by, And thereafter boy and maid Each went swinging low and high. Dear to me the storied beech With its much-initialed bark; Oh, the sermons it might preach, Oh, the mysteries vague and dark It might solve had we but ears Quick to catch its whisperings. Oh, the rapture and the tears Over long forgotten things That its old familiar form Brings me as I stand at gaze, Dreaming still through sun or storm As I dreamed in other days ! Tempest scarred and drought assailed, Bravely has the valiant tree, Over wind and fire prevailed, Saved to bird and beast and — me. 32 AFTER NOONTIDE THE TUBE ROSE ' I ^HE Tube Rose is stainless, white, And yieldeth a sweet perfume That filleth the morning light And sanctifieth the gloom That falls with the falling night On the old house, room by room. The Tube Rose is tall and straight On its stem, and holds its head Like a soul, with love elate, Uprisen above the dead; And thus doth it keep its state Till its little day has fled. Then its head bows with the seed Of fragrance and joy to come, And, as doth the wither'd weed, It sinks, with its garnered sum Of the season's hope and deed, In the brown alluvium. O, sweetly the Tube Rose dowers With fragrance our waiting souls And, purer than eve's dew-showers, Its aroma o'er us rolls, Till the incense of its flowers Each wandering heart consoles. AFTER NOONTIDE 33 Be thou as the Tube Rose, dear, Pure as the crystaline snow, Yet warmer than mercy's tear And sweeter than morn's first glow In the springtime of the year When the sap begins to flow ! Be thou as the Tube Rose when It lifteth, above the mold, Its head to the gaze of men, By its innocence made bold, And thy soul's redolence then Shall thy lover's soul enfold. TIMES AND SEASONS THE HAUNTED ROAD A HUNDRED tints adorn the maple tree, ■^^ A hundred splendors glorify the oak; But winds that wail and wander, wantonly Rush in and rend the autumn's gorgeous cloak, And strew the fragments on the haunted way Where youth and love made summer holiday. The road is haunted, when the frosts assail And brown November strides across the fields, And light and sunshine may no more avail To fright the shadows, with their shining shields, Emboldened then by every wind that grieves The misty ghosts come with the falling leaves. I know not why long-vanished forms return When red leaves fall and grass is brown and sere; I know not why the soul should doubly yearn For old companionships as fades the year, Or memory call the dead from their abode To walk again the old long-haunted road. The road is haunted, that is all I know, And every little, yellow butterfly That comes to give its dust a summer glow AFTER NOONTIDE 35 Recalls some joy of happy days gone by, Some rapture of a radiant afternoon, When love went dallying with the heart of June. Chrysanthemums still glow upon the hill, And camphor flowers defy the blighting frost ; Though many omens warn of coming ill, • And brown nuts fall when forest arms are toss't, Yet, with the brave autumnal flowers, the soul Still holds aloft dead summer's aureole, And dreams again upon the haunted road Such dreams as mortal tongue may not repeat — Such dreams as only are by love bestowed When hearts are young and summer days are sweet, And, near or far, the mellow mists arise And all things masquerade in strange disguise. The road is haunted; spirits come and go And some are glad and some are mourning shades Draped in the sable weeds of mortal woe, So sad their sadness all the air pervades: These mourn, not now, some long- forgotten crime, But that death came to them before their time. They had but tasted life and found it good, Its sours and bitters they had never known — The keen-edged anguish of ingratitude, The loss of love, the grief that maketh moan, Nor jealousy's foul breath, nor hatred's curse Nor pride that taunts you with your empty purse. 36 AFTER NOONTIDE Untaught of these, they weep, and we with them Because their mortal joys were all too brief: "Could they have lived," we sigh, "what ray, what gem Of heavenly light, what marvel, past belief, Of truth divine, each might have won for men To link the rebel world to heaven again !" The road is haunted, 'wild'ring spirits glide, Timing our footsteps, or pass on before; Some with sweet laughter, others sorrow-eyed, And some that croon forgotten love songs o'er ; The road is haunted and the world a dream When autumn's embers in the ashes gleam. LOSS AND GAIN. TVTOW the splendid apparition ^ * Of the opening joy of spring — In the sprouting grass a vision And a transport on the wing Of the dear, familiar singer Flashing by the window wide — Comes and goes, but may not linger, Backward, bashful, mystified. Many a time the wanton wooing Of the fickle April sun Is some trustful life's undoing Ere the boreal thrall is done; AFTER NOONTIDE 37 Bee and beetle, leaf and blossom, Hastening to the tender call, Blighted, dying on the bosom Of the frozen fallow fall. But all pouting moods and crosses Ravages of frosts that come, We shall count but trivial losses From the season's ample sum, When the orchards bloom in billows Pink and white, and kildeers call, Where, by marshy brooks, the willows Let their hairy catkins fall. O the doubt, the fear, the longing Of the slow, deceptive days, Ere the tides of song come thronging Down the greening forest ways, Or upon the wistful vision Spring's unfolding gladness flows Till the fitful apparition To the perfect presence grows ! Aye ! but never soul nor season Reaches its victorious day, But, for some mysterious reason, Storms have beaten round its way; Laggard frosts and early sorrows, Loss of gracious, grateful things, Preface all the great tomorrows And the joys of happy springs. 38 AFTER NOONTIDE OCTOBER TV/TONTH of the later harvests, hail! We give thee happy greeting, While yet thy softer moods prevail And all thy frowns are fleeting, For still thy fragrant breezes woo The soul from care and sorrow And gentle dews thy joys renew, Though frosts may blight tomorrow. Achievement crowns thy dreamy days And consummation beareth Her largess down thy sylvan ways Where peace with plenty fareth; An art, whose secret no man knows, Is tinting leaves and grasses And weaving out of life's dull prose A hymn that song surpasses. And though the laugh of folly fails; The shouts of children calling, The Bob White's whistling on the rails, The noise of ripe nuts falling Recall old mem'ries love held dear Through nights of storm and danger, When hearts sank low with doubt and fear And hope had grown a stranger. AFTER NOONTIDE 39 The sounds of combat are less loud, And discord's echoes fainter; The forest, like a sunset cloud, Reveals the peerless painter Where, tint with tint, Apollo's skill Compounds the rays auroral To write on wooded vale and hill The season's tale, post floral. And yet the rustle of dry leaves, The soft wind's minor measures, Are each a rune that sorrow weaves For summer's passing pleasures, To make the sybil soul aware That mating days are over, And nature, with maternal care, Maturing grain and lover, Enrobes our northern world again In rich Pomonian splendor; Yields sweeter fruits and riper men Than greener seasons render; And so our song and bloom depart With such a gentle sadness We hail October's sunny art With more than vernal gladness. And though the loved and lost return While autumn winds are sighing, And walk beside us down the burn Where wither'd leaves are flying, 40 AFTER NOONTIDE We scarcely know that they have died, As hand-in-hand together We wander on soul-satisfied Through this October weather. Our past and present strangely blend In mists of red and yellow, The was, and is, the lover, friend, Crisp youth and age grown mellow; All, all are here, and none are lost, And all are tinged with glory, The handiwork of sun and frost That ends the summer's story. SWEET WILLIAMS AND SWEET VIOLETS f~\ GLAD reminders of the past! ^-^ I greet in each dear smiling face, Some joy too crisply sweet to last, Some fleeting, but remembered grace, Till, once again a child, I hail Your presence at the wildwood's side, Your lights where thorns and brush prevail And last year's cast-off leaves abide. When sun and shadow alternate On warm south slopes where meadows yield To tangled woods, you congregate And slyly, sweetly push afield. AFTER NOONTIDE 41 Sweet williams ! — sweeter for your name, I catch your fragrance even in thought, And feel again the sudden flame Of some boy love that came to naught. O wistfully her eye of blue, The modest violet opens wide To see the earth her life renew As some waked spirit glorified, And lo ! young Iris loiters by, And she, low, hidden in the grass, Perceives and loves the wanton sly And mirrors him, as in a glass, Till May's fair children all behold The rainbow's truest tints renewed — The blue, the violet, the gold — In this wee flower by Iris woo'd. Sweet williams, blessings on your frail And fragrant heads ! In you I greet My mother's spirit ; you exhale Some blessing old, some quaint conceit, The subtle sense of unseen things My mother used to feel and know, When first the moth spread silken wings And May flowers blossomed long ago. 42 AFTER NOONTIDE Sweet williams and sweet violets Were consolation after tears; Their fragrance banished life's regrets And soothed the anguish of her years. How oft, a wistful boy, I stood And watched the rapture of her face, When these meek children of the wood Bestowed on her their joy and grace ! And so of all the flowers of spring I prize them most, and hold most dear The days when robins build and sing And wild sweet williams first appear. MORNING AND EVENING (a song of the afternoon) SING not now as I have sung ■*- In many a former day, When skies were fair and hearts were young And evening far away. But still to me the morning's song Repeats its vernal joy, And happy faces round me throng As when I was a boy. AFTER NOONTIDE 43 The song sings in the longing soul, But falls not on the ear ; Each sainted face, at thoughts control, Through many a vanished year, And past the graveyard's doubt and gloom, Comes smiling into view, And youth is sweet with morning bloom And love is lord anew. And so the heart again beats high, The rapture and the gleam Hang misty splendors in the sky And glorify the stream. Thus I re-live the olden days And join them to the new, And joys of youth, down sylvan ways, With present hope pursue. Say not, " 'Tis but an idle dream, A foolish siren's song!" I know the wood, I know the stream, I know the childish throng. I hear the manifold, sweet sounds Of echo-murmured joys, And tread the old, familiar rounds With winsome girls and boys. 44 AFTER NOONTIDE And though I know the grasses grow, Through changing sun and shade, Where these I loved so long ago By tender hands were laid, Their past is mine, as mine was theirs, And mine the cherished thought That all our pleasures, hopes and cares And youthful dreams, rewrought By love's long magic, as they glow On mem'ry's pictured wall, But bid the spirit wiser grow For love and hope and all That make each better day the best The wild'ring soul has known, And present pleasures doubly blest Through pleasures that have flown. So I re-live the olden days And join them to the new, And ancient good, through modern ways And present bliss renew. AFTER NOONTIDE 45 A SONG FOR THE NEW YEAR TDECAUSE the New Year is so new, •^ And his story all untold, We'll trust him fair for a heart that's true And love him as the old. There's a gleam of sunshine in his face, A dimpled joy in his chin; He moves on the varied curves of grace, And smiles from warmth within. But oh, my soul ! thy vanished years Were ever as brave as he ; Yet never was one without its tears, Its blight and its misery. Peace to the little loves we've loved And the loves we've cast aside, And tears for the friends our hearts approved When the years were in their pride ! Yesterdays are but yesterdays, Dim shadows upon the wall; But they live on in the soul always And the soul lives in them all. Give us new life and a larger hope And a brand new song to sing, And who shall shout for a coming pope, Or weep for a passing king? 46 AFTER NOONTIDE We make for ourselves the merry days, Love maketh the happy years, And at the parting of the ways There's naught so sweet as tears. And when the fair fields fade from sight And age-groweth short of breath, How sweetly falleth through the night The solemn joy of death! Because the new year is so new, And his story all untold, Life hails him fair and holds him true And loves him as the old, AN INDIAN-SUMMER DAY A MIST of smoke is in the air, "^^ The hills loom vaguely far away; The light seems chastened everywhere, This happy Indian-summer day. O ! sweet and strange the spell that binds Our wayward moods in gentle thrall,— The gauzy web that wreaths and winds Round naked wood and haunted hall. AFTER NOONTIDE 47 The world seems quaintly rich and old And restful in its dreamy calm; The aching heart is love-consoled In healing tides of mint and balm. Youth wanders smiling where dead leaves Lie thickly on the winding road, And dreams of love and half believes The grove the Archer god's abode. The old man totters here and there Crooning old memories softly o'er, His wrinkled face and snowy hair Touched by the light that comes no more. The dear grandmother, smiling still, Sits by her wheel that seems to say, In softest dronings, "Peace, good will I Her life's an Indian-summer day." The children's treble voices ring In mellower music through the wood, And every shy and winsome thing Has caught the season's gentler mood. All sounds are muffled, soft, subdued To some delightful minor key, E'en Bob White's shout of gratitude Comes from the cornfield dreamily. 48 AFTER NOONTIDE And when the ruddy sun goes down And from the east the hunter's moon, Wrapped in the twilight's hazy gown, Looks on the pale, dead afternoon, O'er amber seas and scarlet isles There looms, far west, an inky cloud, And wise, old crows in hurrying files To shelter flee with croakings loud. The pewees scud to bridge or byre, Brown quails slip under clust'ring brush, And Indian-summer's altar fire Dies in the snow storm's deeper hush. THE LILAC A LIGHT-HEARTED throng, in the morning of -"* May, We passed, where the lilac stood blushing with bloom, And my bonnie brunette broke me off a pink spray ; Now, fifty years later, I smell its perfume. Then the lassies ran, laughing and crying, "Oh, shame; It's a shame to be hating a young fellow so !" But I knew not the language of flowers, and the flame In my heart hope had kindled lost color and glow. AFTER NOONTIDE 49 One day, long thereafter, I stood by the bier Where the wife of my friend lay, pure, spotless and white, Yet cold as the snows, but I shed not a tear For the soul of me'd gone on a long backward flight To the old country place, with its blossoms and birds, And I saw the pink cone that she gave me again, And above the low hymn rose the petulant words Of the girls who made sport of my ignorant pain. O fragile first love, though you ever must break In the cold, cruel winds, ere life reaches its June, A lilac we'll plant for your dear, sacred sake And we'll pray that its buds may be blossoming soon. A MIDWINTER DOUBT OOME say the god was good to Philemon ^ When he transmuted him into an oak For kindly service to his godship done; And so it seems, I grant, on summer days When love and joy clasp hands in forest ways And free from cruel Winter's murderous stroke, The oak expands his shining leaves and shakes Them in the minty fragrance of the air, 50 AFTER NOONTIDE Or when some warbled concert's music makes His great top Orphic; but when, in despair And nakedness, he tosses his wide arms, Assailed by sleet, or winds that smite and rend Him, bole and branch, where find you then the charms That oakhood may to age-worn mortal lend, Or to the immortal spirit once a man? Since each man's soul, however strong and brave. Grows weary in such tumults Borean As round the oak in ruffian fury rave. SONGS OF THE HERE AND THE HEREAFTER THE STAR AND THE CLOD "AH me!" I said, "this broken clod of clay, ■^•^ So fair, so frail, is but a ruin now;" When suddenly from it there sped a ray, As from the star that shines on morning's brow. The ray rose up, self-cent'ring, till it passed, A full-orbed star, from which a mournful light Fell on the broken clay until, at last, In the far sky, the star was lost to sight. Was it sleep's vision or a waking dream That showed the star uprising from the clod It once made fair with love's immortal gleam As some rare spirit newly sent from God? Or dream, or vision, still that mystic ray In mem'ry lingers as 'twere loath to part, And sweetens sorrow, though the clod's decay And death's cold shadow chill the yearning heart. 52 AFTER NOONTIDE The clod lies broken and the star has flown, The fragments fade back to the earthy mold; The light has fled and heaven reclaimed its own, But God is good and mercies manifold, And every star in every clod may rise, When the clod breaks, to join the greater light, And love survive love's saddest sacrifice As phosphor's glow succeeds the stormy night. This broken clod that once enthroned a star, Yet prisoned it : Let mem'ry hold it dear ! No thought may rise, no vision soar so far, But this dear clay may to it reappear. The clod shall mingle with its kindred dust And pass into a thousand precious things, Yet memory shall hold in sacred trust Its pallid beauty when her soul took wings. AS THE MISTLETOE CLINGS TO THE TREE ' I ^HE mistletoe clings to the living tree And the lichen to the stone ; Thus close to the life we have cling we, And every one to his own. AFTER NOONTIDE 5& To the fading bark till the bark is dry And the sap is sinking low, And the winds that whistle and hurry by Are laden with sleet and snow. But the winds may rave and the tempests come, — Sharp spice to our Christmas cheer, — And sorrow be added to sorrow's sum At close of a luckless year; Yet closer than lichen or parasite We cleave to the things that be, Despite all the promises seers recite And visions clairvoyants see. "Is life worth living?" the doubter cries, Then calls a physician in; While the maid, betrayed, with a shot replies, And ceases to mourn or sin ; But wisdom giveth whatever she hath To the life and the love she knows, And trusteth in God for the aftermath That shall follow death's repose; And she hath fair thoughts for the Christmas time, And a tender care hath she For the love that is sweeter than song or rhyme And the greater love to be. 54 AFTER NOONTIDE WAKING OR SLEEPING TT7E wake or sleep and the world goes round " And time fareth on and on, With the daily task and the hammer's sound, And the shining share and the furrowed ground, And the wild bird's song at dawn. We sleep or wake, for the world is good And the fields are fair to see; And the maiden sings in her maidenhood, And the mother smiles, as the mother should, When the time goes happily. We wake or sleep and the endless gain Exceedeth the daily loss, And ever the pleasure is more than pain; Though cares may come and tears may stain, Yet the crown succeeds the cross. We sleep or wake and the children come With laughter and shout and song, Then pass and merge with the human sum To sew, to plow, to follow the drum, Or struggle with Mammon's throng. We wake or sleep and the hair turns gray And the heart gets sad and sore, And the tot'ring limb has a wicked way Of warning a man that his waking day Is passing to come no more. AFTER NOONTIDE 56. We sleep or wake, but God watches on, And the heavens His love declare And he cares for us, be it dusk or dawn, And we look to Him and our fears are gone With the darkness and despair. We wake or sleep, but a deeper sleep, Be it ever so short or long, Shall overtake us, but wherefore weep If the steadfast soul may its guerdon keep When the death-cold shadows throng? THE INTERPRETER TJE sings of joy who dwells with sorrow, "*"*" For sorrow is a sorry shrew, And he from joy the strength would borrow To cope with her ado ; But while he sings his lightest numbers, Through many a strain and haunting tone, Bear one sweet note that never slumbers And it is sorrow's own. Thus to the soul the truest feelings, The deepest, tenderest thoughts that come, Enlightening it with love's revealings, Distil from sorrow's sum. 56 AFTER NOONTIDE THE SINGERS XT EAR the singers singing to the list'ning earth "^ their songs Ere the morning blushes that shall gladden into day! "Hallelujah, hallelujah!" shout the tuneful throngs, "Love's Messiah sleepeth in the manger on the hay, While His star above is glowing And to Him are wise men going: Hallelujah, hallelujah ! Christ, the Lord, is born today." Hear the sacred singers in their rapture and de- light ! "Peace to earth from heaven descendeth with the child that's born : Hallelujah ! love exceedeth now the warrior's might, And good will to men extendeth with the rising morn : Hallelujah ! loud we sing it, Men and seraphs join to wing it To the world's remotest nations. Hallelujah ! Christ is born." Hear the swift, impatient singers ! brooking no de- lay, They proclaim love all triumphant over ancient wrong, AFTER NOONTIDE 57 Crying, "Beat your swords to plowshares, love is lord today, Bend your spears to sickles now and join the harvest song! Hallelujah ! Peace forever, Light and gladness fading never, For the meek the earth inherit and are, more than giants strong." Hear the song the gracious singers sang so long ago! Overbattlefields and prisons still the measures roll, Swelling ever down the ages, as they come and go : "Hallelujah! Christ is with us and the race is whole ; Whole in love's embrace supernal, Whole in peace and joy eternal ; Man shall be to man united, heart to heart and soul to soul." Trust the singers, O my brothers ! though the way is long; For the centuries are but measured school-days of the race, And though blood still flows as water and oppres- sions throng, Still the world of man moves forward to serener grace : Man shall be to man true neighbor, Honor shall join hands with labor, Peace shall reign at last, through justice, locking all in love's embrace. 58 AFTER NOONTIDE Hear the rapt, prophetic singers, there by Bethle- hem, Singing to the tribes and nations, "Christ, the Lord, is born; Bring Him gifts of myrrh and incense, gold and precious gem ; — Not the vinegar and hyssop, not the bloody thorn : Bring to Him love's coronation, Praise Him, every tribe and nation; Hallelujah, hallelujah ! Christ, the Lord, is born." ONLY AN OLD SONG /^\NLY an old song, only a love song, ^^ The song of a day long dead; But the sweet notes throng the whole night long With rain on the roof o'erhead; And the rain beats overhead, my dear, And the rain beats overhead, And the wind wails by with a note of fear As the old song falls on the ravished ear From lips, as the roses, red. Oh, the red rose blooms by the place of tombs, Where the sainted singers sleep ; A bud we may break, for the old love's sake, And the tryst of the old time keep ; AFTER NOONTIDE 59 And the tryst of the old time keep, my dear, And the tryst of the old time keep. Though the old house quake and the windows shake, Yet the song warbles on as I lie awake, And sweet are the tears I weep. Only an old song, only a love song; A song of the long ago ; A child's song sung when the years were young, And we met in the morning glow; When we met in the morning glow, my dear, When we met in the morning glow. Still it breathes delight through the starless night, But the soul responds with a feeble flight, And the oil in the lamp is low. REGRET ^HpHE bow was bent as the crescent moon, The arrow drawn to the head; When a hand released the cord a tune Rose keen as the arrow sped; The sharp note died and the arrow fled, But a wee bird fluttered and fell down dead And the wind went moaning by. 60 AFTER NOONTIDE "O, arrow, why did you smite my bird? Little bird, why must you die?" The arrow never a whisper heard, But a cloud rose in the sky, And never a muscle the warbler stirred Though a rain of tears my vision blurred As the wind went wailing by. O, long I wait by the garden gate For a song I hear no more; The mourning mate, still desolate, Repeateth some brief notes o'er — Her threnody's little score From a wee heart sadly sore — And the plaintive wind goes by. The bow hangs broken upon the wall, The arrow lies where it fell, And a dull heart-ache shall long recall That I aimed, alas ! too well ; The wind goes moaning by to tell I aimed the assassin shaft too well, For I slew him, even I. CONSOLATION TT7E who retain our fleeting mortal breath, And yet look on the awful face of death, See not beneath its cold, remorseless stare, The better purpose that is hidden there, AFTER NOONTIDE 61 Nor note its silent eloquence of rest, Peace to the soul and quiet to the breast. Death comes in cruel guise to challenge life, And with a stroke dispelleth mortal strife ; It touches fever, anguish, passion, pain, And only dust and deepest calm remain Where late they raged and in their fury wrought 111 for the body, torture to the thought, While the freed man departeth to his God To meet His smile or feel the chast'ning rod That love's conditions may require to place His soul en rapport with the soul of grace. "Cease, Optimist ! what consolation lies In death's dark deed that closes infant eyes, Or into savage silence bears away Fair youth and beauty from the light of day?" I guessed your thought before you spoke, O friend ! But think you, youth and beauty have an end Unto the youvg when death comes in between Their radiant selves and this imperfect scene, Or childhood fails the little ones that pass As morning sunlight through a darkened glass, Because we see them not, nor hear, nor know The life where unto little children go? What fatal causes born of mortal sin, Or want of wisdom bring conditions in That rend the young till death dispels their pain, If man might conquer them 'twere greatest gain. 62 AFTER NOONTIDE The world needs childhood's innocence and truth And all the marv'lous potencies of youth ; But, think you, He who heeds the sparrow's fate Hath not the soul of love to compensate The young that lose their youth while yet 'tis morn And the sweet dew is on the infant corn? The corn must grow and blossom and mature : Though children die may childhood not endure For those who go as well as those who stay And youth and beauty have their halcyon day? I know the sorrow, oft have felt the pain That comes when death cuts through the silken chain And breaks some precious pitcher at the spring, And the long anguish separations bring, And yet no child, no friend is dead to me; I count each living though I may not see One cherished face through wrath of flame, or gloom Of funeral pyre or verdure garnished tomb. If this be but a dreamer's dream 'tis sweet And has no thorns to tear my weary feet: I can accept all truth that science yields To him who toils in her delightful fields And yield no faith that brings the spirit food Since God is just and justice always good, And dusk to dawn, from rise to set of sun, Justice and mercy are forever one. A 1 AFTER NOONTIDE 63 RESURGAM UTUMN fades and for the last time Falls the robin's evening lay, Like a happy note of morning Trembling down the dying day. Fallen leaves are all around us, Memories haunt the wood and wold; Still we recognize "Resurgam" Written in the season's gold. Naught there is but hath a future, Bird or blossom, moth or bee; Has God given them the morning And denied the dawn to me? This is true, I dare not doubt it, Never was immortal curse, And the promise, the resurgam, Is to all God's universe. Though the pride of man proclaim him And his weal heaven's only care, Still within his soul, must linger Doubts that whisper low "beware!" If God counts the falling sparrows, Think you that the count is vain ? Wherefore count or men or sparrows If the dead shall dead remain? 64 AFTER NOONTIDE THE BYE AND BYE A WEE bird singeth to the soul A sad, yet hopeful lay, To sweeten sorrow's bitter dole And drive despair away; Or when the faint heart fainter grows And clouds obscure the sky, Repeats the golden note he knows Of sunshine bye and bye. His blithest call by hut or hall, His tenderest, twittered cry, Hath this refrain for mortals all : "The better, bye and bye !" O gentlest bird ! your note I've heard Through many stormy years ; It oft to hope my pulse has stirred And stilled my coward fears. Though farther far than sun or star The goal you sing may seem, No sense of distance comes to mar The magic of the dream It weaves for me, till worry free, I trust your Orphic cry, And dimly see the joy to be My kingdom bye and bye. "But wherefore ply the bye and bye For aye ? Or, tell me this : Why for the future sing or sigh And count no present bliss?" AFTER NOONTIDE 65 When thus I'd queried, softly came The answer warbled low, "Hope is a present joy, a flame That blesses with its glow ; And so I sing, head under wing, The dawn that draweth nigh, The fadeless dawn that love shall bring, The radiant bye and bye." SHELLEY'S VISION OF ALLEGRA* CHE arose from the silver sea Sweet as the morning air, And the sea imploringly Leaped up to her rippled hair, Then ran down suddenly From her white arms shining, bare, As she waved them o'er her head And beckoned with them wide; But whatever things she said In the watery murmur died; The wind sank still as the dead And the soul's sight multiplied. *The incident which suggested these lines is related of that most spiritual of poets, Percy Bysshe Shelley, and is as follows: "While out sailing one day, shortly before his death, Shelley saw a vision of Allegra, Lord Byron's daughter, rise from the sea, joyously clap her hands and beckon to him." 66 AFTER NOONTIDE In joy she clapped her hands And the soft wind stirred the sails, For the quick wind understands When joy o'er grief prevails, And the wave laughed on the sands Where it often sighs and wails, So she beckoned once and again, And sank back into the sea, And I knew the meaning then Of the message strange to me, For I saw with the spirit's ken By the light of eternity. The joy of Allegra's smile And the beckoning of her hands, And the waves that, mile on mile, Sing to the shifting sands, Woo me, win me all the while, And no one understands. AN AUTUMN LEAF IpVlP'T in the fountain of the sunshine, "^ When the sun has first arisen, A scarlet leaf from a climbing vine Falls into an old man's prison, And his faint heart feels a sudden thrill, And a strange surprise of joy, For he thinks of the scarlet oaks on the hill, And himself a little boy. AFTER NOONTIDE 67 The leaf, with the sunshine in its heart, Down fluttering seems to say, "I am of thy better life a part, A part of thy fair, young day. I'm ripened in sun and rain and frost, And whatever is fair in me, I bring to thee from a day long lost For a day that is to be." Withered by storm and blight and pain, And weakness that men call sin, The life that shall never be whole again Is touched to the sweet within By a gentler pressure than that of grief, Or the thought of prison and hate, And the old man lifts to his lips the leaf, And whispers, " 'Tis not too late." A SONG OF THE FORGOTTEN THE CRY OF AN INSECT DROWNING IN A LILY BELL T AM forgotten quite In morn's concerted praise; None miss my wayward flight In the sweet sunset rays, As I lie drowning here In the lily's golden blaze. 68 AFTER NOONTIDE O, fatal lily urn ! Wherefore should I from thee Seek once again to turn To life's inconstancy? And yet, I loved my wings, My wings so frail and free ! The poet loves his wings, His wings so frail and free! Aloft in dreams he swings And hums contentedly, I also loved my wings And song as well as he ; But now in viscous sweets Bound by my wings I lie, No more with love's conceits To soar in joy on high : Thus bound in fatal sweets Oft doth the poet die. A LOVER'S THOUGHT OF DEATH T WHO have loved the land, the sea, the dawn, The faith of woman and the strength of man ; Must I go hence and wander, lonely, on, Bewailing me that life is but a span, Or crying to the ebb-tide's seaward flow Wait, hasty waters wait, farewell dear land, I go ? AFTER NOONTIDE 69 Dearer than starlight, sweeter than the day Or all the songs of all the birds of June To me, the gentle soul, the poet's lay, The wafted incense of familiar tune From lips that sing, or mellow horns that blow : Must I discard my little raptures, when I go? More sacred than the bard's divinest thought I hold this frail humanity of ours That toils and suffers, though, perchance for naught But some frail bubbles breaking mid the flowers That fade and perish in the outer woe; And must I part with it forever as I go? Now on the tree that bears the cruel thorn The waxen buds in starry splendors break And where the mountain avalanche has torn Its ragged path the vernal greeneries wake, The glad earth smiles and minted zephyrs blow: Must I who love all love forsake my loves and go? Yes, I must go and thou shalt follow me Into the darkness, though our feet delay, And all the orchards more abundantly Shall bud and blossom when we are away, And richer fruits upon the boughs shall grow And all true love be more abounding when we go. 70 AFTER NOONTIDE Wherefore let us not murmur at our lot, Nor yet distrust the land to which we fare, Remembering that our Lord forgetteth not And every state abideth in His care. He giveth his beloved sleep and lo ! Love's star divine lights all the pathway we must go- LOVE IS ALL T WILL not hear the dying word -*" Of any friend, nor stroke the wing Of any little wounded bird. Love is the deadest thing. — Wraith-Song of Spraivoll. O ! Love, Love, Love, Has thy angel gone above? Does a shadow lie between us, Or do age and sorrow wean us From the heart of love? The grave, grave, grave, Has it made the soul a slave? Shall the senseless clods that cover Quench the fervor of the lover In the damp, cold grave? AFTER NOONTIDE 71 Ah ! no, no, no ! Through the sable halls of woe, Down the singing tides of glory, Flows the old Astrean story: "Love is all we know." O ! frail, frail, frail, The ambitions that prevail Through this evanescent being. Love is all to the All-seeing That shall never fail. Still more, more, more, May our souls go on before, And the light that is immortal Shine across the future's portal Ere we pass the door. With peace peace, peace, May the love of love increase, And the lover's silken tether Bind our willing hearts together In the bonds of peace ! Lo ! here, here, here, In an atmosphere as clear As the light the stars are breathing Rounds the world of love's bequeathing To the perfect sphere. 72 AFTER NOONTIDE It grows, grows, grows, And the oneness of it flows Through all doubt or tears or laughter, Through the here and the hereafter And through Death's repose. Oh! life, life, life, Let us learn from all thy strife For man the needful thing is Love, that servant is and king is, Linking life to life ! Dear heart, heart, heart! May the love of love impart Unto thee the perfect pleasure That has neither bound nor measure When it fills the heart. FACT AND FABLE CONTENT to know, whate'er befall, ^"^ Mid transmutation's wild alarms, The world of man, the heavens and all Are safe in everlasting arms, 'Tis joy to dream the time away, Ere lamps are lighted or the dark Has shrouded evening's latest ray, Or yet unveiled the meteor's spark, AFTER NOONTIDE 73 To swing 'twixt mortal and divine In some weird nebulae of thought, Where systems grow to love's design And suns are launched and worlds are wrought, With fancy freely wand'ring far As light may flash or spirit fly, From morning flower to evening star, From Dante's hell to Raphael's sky. Since now we know the joy of dreams And science plumes the dreamer's wings, While her enlarging glory streams O'er seas and sands and sentient things, We mock at miracles no more, Nor Sinai's tables, Delphi's shrine ; Now modern fact compounds the lore Of pagan fables, Scripts divine, The old is new, the new is old And still the ancient myths remain, And though the Pantheon's gods are mold, The mold is rich with heavenly gain. And yet we are but in the dawn Of far diviner dreams than ours, When mightiest thoughts of ages gone Shall be as buds to full-blown flowers. 74 AFTER NOONTIDE Though fable faintly shadowed forth The glory that today is plain, It gave to man a promise worth A thousand years of godless gain, And so I dream as shadows drift And deepen over wood and wold, And reck not which is greater gift The modern fact or fable old. NOT HE WHO MOST BELIEVES ^\TOT he who most believes is most "^ In harmony with things divine; But he who shapes, nor counts the cost, His daily life to love's design. And they who toil for souls that fail To win them back to virtue's plain Are bearers of love's holy grail And sowers of immortal gain. A creed may be a lifeless shell, The mummy of some ancient truth, But love is more than miracle And mercy hath eternal youth. A SHEAF OF SONNETS THE DREAMER T WATCHED a dreamer, on a dreamy day, Who wandered, smiling, through a vocal wood, And idly sang therein an idle lay — A song whereof he little understood, Or cared to understand, for that his dreams Had far outflown the boundaries of time, And he wrought grandly with celestial themes The while his voice droned on the shallow rhyme. It was a dual life he lived that day As joyously he sang, yet scarcely knew That he was singing in the common way That men whose words exceed their wisdom do. His song was Earth's, his radiant smile the Sky's; He was his dream, and it was paradise. A HEALTH TO IGNORANCE TT7HERE "ignorance is bliss," as sung by Pope, * And it is therefore, "folly to be wise," Let happy mortals thank their friendly skies For steadfast faith and onward-leading hope; 76 AFTER NOONTIDE Since knowledge so may be a mocking flame To wither joy or show love's deadly shame, Or bloody fiend's hand tugging at the rope Which chokes the life from some devoted heart, Or poison on a foeman's stinging dart, The swift-winged messenger of mortal woe — So here's to ignorance ! Let's boldly drink The health of ignorance, nor slyly wink At purblind Knowledge when our glasses clink For joy of knowing that we do not know. THE BETTER WAY TF, following the truth as truth was seen, "*~ With hand wide-open and with loving heart, A man has striven well to act his part In life's hard battle, then "the might have been,"- How the dull present, narrow, poor and mean, Where now elysian gladness, but for some Mistake of fickle judgment, — should not come With vain regrets and ill-concealed chagrin To murder joy and coddle hateful spleen. The man is more than wisdom, knowledge, pelf, Content with God, howe'er with his own past At variance, in thought, he finds himself, Let peace be his, and bread on waters cast, In love's benignance, feed his soul at last ! AFTER NOONTIDE 11 THE MURDERED TREES T WALK across the barren fields and weep, -*" In melancholy madness, for my trees, The great, potential trees that, rooted deep In this brown soil, were priests and prophecies To my waked youth, when in their centuried morn, By axe unscarred, untouched by red fire-blight, They cast long shadows where glad things were born To life's perennial drama of delight, — Complacent genii that through sun-kissed leaves Smiled on the cabin's children at their play. Trees, children, dreams ! how outraged nature grieves Because they are not! Yet my steps delay,- And lingering, I recall the happy scene Where they supremed it o'er a world of green. SHAKSPEARE TTOW deftly Shakspeare, in his milder moods, -■"*• Seeks out the springs of rustic happiness, Lays bare their secrets, or in Arden's woods Finds lore to make the motley jester wise And teach the great their follies to despise I How like a god's his infinite, sad stress O'er fall'n ambition's utter wretchedness! 78 AFTER NOONTIDE If Caesar bleed or young Antonius spout, Or bad King Richard rage his bad life out, Though dotard Lear go babbling his distress, Or roars the Moor with jealousy's mad pain, Or Hamlet rave and tug at Sorrow's chain — A prince divine, though twenty times insane — He dowereth each from his great soul's excess. ARIEL r^EAR, vagrant, vanishing deceiver! Still •*^ May thy deceptions be as they have been, To make men happier so to garnish ill With fancy's fragrant vines and boughs of green, That woe's hard lines may soften into smiles And fickle folly follow virtue's path To do her service, while thy song beguiles Imperial Neptune from his murd'rous wrath, Or murmurs of the wondrous sea-change wrought In ship-wrecked wand'rer by the wizard wave; Or, with a trick, though bring'st, forthwith, to nought Sedition's rage, and art no more a slave ; Be ever more thyself — the knave's despair, The lover's hope — swift spirit of the air ! A BEVY OF BIRD SONGS THE FIRST BLUE BIRD O WEETHEART ! Our locks are thin and gray, ^ Our eyes lack luster and men say "Their youth has vanished." Well-a-day, I hear a blue bird singing ! The lambs go leaping down the lane, The sunlight flickers on the pane, The guineas clank a shriller strain; I hear a blue bird singing. The children's voices clearer ring, The elm buds swell, the grasses spring And maple drops are pattering; I hear a blue bird singing. Ah ! Love was never yet so cold, So dead and cold, so dumb and old, It leapt not to the warmth untold That thrills the blue bird's singing. They call us old, who years decry, The bird sings down the cruel lie, We're young forever, you and I ; I hear a blue bird singing. 80 AFTER NOONTIDE THE MARYLAND YELLOW-THROAT IN THE THICKET npHE Yellow- throat's ecstatic song From yonder willowy thicket streams In varied mellow notes that throng Like mingling joys in happy dreams. Through many changes runs his fire Of rapt and rapid numbers round The copse's rough and ragged bound, So full of longing, sweet desire They seem like prayers of rhythmic sound, Or choral hymns of joyful thanks, Inspired by love in love's own bower, That stir the blooms on flowery banks And sanctify an idle hour. The seeker waits and watches long, And parts the greenery east and west Before the prophet of the song Reveals himself, as self-confessed, He warbles near his prim wife's nest, In varied olive-green and gold, Almost as lovely as his lay. The intruder views him, joy-consoled For toil, suspense and long delay, And, all his soul to rapture stirred, Says softly, "Now I see the bird And this is a red letter day !" AFTER NOONTIDE 81 THE SONG SPARROW ON THE MAPLE LISTEN, my child, to the song in the air ! Is it here, Is it there? Is the singer a soul, free of substance or care, A lute zephyr-stirred, or a translucent bird, That maketh no show of himself anywhere? Now high on the maple, now low on the ash ; To the thick of the beech, now it runs like a flash Of star-twinkled music, then softly away: We rise up to follow; but pause, and, delay, When down from the maple the notes ripple out, And we hail the glad singer with answering shout, As we spy him, secure on the wind-wavered limb, — A glorious, shy fellow, a vitalized hymn, A sonnet divine the Almighty has wound In a soft, vibrant spiral of manifold sound; A hair-spring of ecstacy, rapture unbound, That rewinds with the motion wherewith 'tis un- wound. I cry, "You've eluded us long, witching bird;" But the child whispers, "No ! such a thought is ab- surd; 'Twas our ears and our eyes that befooled us, the bird Was there all the while; but his song thrilled the air 82 AFTER NOONTIDE With a joy that went warbling, now here and now there ; And we'll know from this hour, when that jubilant tune We may hear in the wood, 'tis the song sparrow's rune, As with white throat expanding, brown wings edged with gray He sits a mere speck, on the high, maple spray; For he loves in dense woods to uplift his gray breast And sing his soul out near his wee wifey's nest." THE INDIGO BUNTING ON THE BLASTED TREE /^LEAR, sweet and true, ^"^ The Bunting's note Persists and clings, as doth the blue In the wee warbler's throat. You hear it ringing down the vale; You climb the hill, 'tis farther on : Where tangled brush and briars prevail And forest glories stand withdrawn In walls about a half-cleared field, That penetrating note, once more, Falls on the ear, as if to yield Some joy of sound unknown before ; AFTER NOONTIDE 83 Then, high upon a blasted tree, Contrasting with the milder blue Of heaven's o'er-arching canopy, The bird sits, sight-revealed to you; But ere you may your glass adjust To study him, he cups his wings And, with a sudden, graceful thrust Of airy motion, downward swings To where his mate, mid brush and briar, Or in some thick-set shrubbery broods : Then, finding her "all right," mounts higher Than where he sat before, the woods And open spaces ring again With song that beats like summer rain On limb and leaf 'till field and plain And woodsy copse respond "Amen !" THE FLICKER, IN THE DARK OF THE YEAR A BIRD for all seasons, he bringeth most cheer ^^ When he comes with the storm in the dark of the year And picks purple berries of ivy and clings, Like Jack Tar to his rope, to the vine as it swings, Or pluckily holds with his frost-reddened feet To the cherry-tree limb all encrusted with sleet, And we love him the more for the need he sup- plies — The example of courage, the strength to arise 84 AFTER NOONTIDE And buffet the storm with no tremor of fear And a voice that gives thanks in the dark of the year. When meadows are emerald and orchards are white The Flicker's abroad with the first gleam of light; His notes have a ring of rejoicing, his cries Are calls of affection or merry replies; Till we hail ev'ry note of his song on the fence, As he heralds the dawn with a rapture intense; Then huzza ! for the crescent he wears on his breast, His broad checkered wings and the red in his crest, For the nest and the mate that he guardeth with care, For his rockaway flight on the billowy air, And hurrah ! o'er and o'er for the courage and cheer That the brave Flicker brings in the dark of the year! 'THOUGH LOST TO SIGHT TO MEMORY DEAR" A I ^HE lark that builds by the meadow rill And sings on the meadow rails, Flies far away when the frosts distil And the wintry storm prevails ; But the happy lay of the absent lark In memory lingers long, And the windy day and the sleety dark Are cheered by his merry song. AFTER NOONTIDE 85 SNOW BIRDS, IN GARDEN CLOSES TXT HEN softly from the leaden skies " The January snows descend 'Till silence on the landscape lies And trees with their white burdens bend, While not a plume of gray nor gold, No burnished throat nor scarlet wing Appears to glorify the cold, Bald season, or to hint of spring, Then come brown flurries of trim birds In garden closes eddying 'round With fluttering joy, like hurrying words Of happy children, yet small sound Of music makes the gladness sweet ; But Nature, bountiful of charms, Has blest these wand'rers, frail and fleet, That nestle in the winter's arms And hop and hold where tempests meet In his torn beard and hoary hair, Till brush and briar and brittle weed Break with the feathered fruit they bear. Whence come the birds with merry speed, The child, untaught of books or art, Knows little, but he feels the thrills Of quick wings fluttering with his heart, 'Till youth's unsullied gladness fills His spirit with a wild desire To buffet storms and from them bring The breath that fans ambition's fire, 86 AFTER NOONTIDE Or, like our modest Winter King, Wins strength and valor for dark days, Or daring thoughts that make it gain To live when bloom and warbled praise Are lost to naked wood and plain ; And so we bless, with feeble words, The snow storm's aftermath of birds. EMIGRATING BIRDS RESTING BY THE WAY \T7HEN the Vireo May proclaimeth " And the Kinglet comes, When the purple Redbud flameth And the pheasant drums, Scores of wee birds, gay of feather, Greet us at the dawn ; Rest in pairs or grouped together By the wood or lawn ; Here today, perhaps, tomorrow On the North-bound wing, — Emigrants from whom we borrow Many a gracious thing, — Song and color, joy of motion, Faith that guides them home, Over continent and ocean, To their "Kingdom come;" — AFTER NOONTIDE 87 For we also wander longing, Led by faith or fate, To some unknown land where thronging Loves and lovers wait; Finding grace and consolation, For the journey long, In the joy of estivation And the wild bird's song. THE TUFTED TITMOUSE ^\T7HEN the tardy sun, in winter, Briefly shines — a blossom hinter — To a tune, first sweet then sweeter, Sings the Titmouse : "Peter, Peter !" And when maple sap is falling, Then he magnifies his calling, As in clearer notes repeats he : "Peter, Peter, te te, te te !" Why that silly chorus, "te te?" You may never know : discreet, he Guards his secret for his sweetheart, Whom, with many wile and neat art, Woos he, flitting, fluting, hopping, While the maple's blood is dropping, Or, when sorrowing moods deceive us, Pipes his lone song: "Grievous, grievous. 5 88 AFTER NOONTIDE Ashen-hued, but pert and showy, Crowned and tufted, what a beau he Ever is ! polite and gracious To the sex, and yet sagacious, Though for love, in peace or war, He's a very Lochinvar, While his sweetheart blithe, and chipper, Well might win the fairy's slipper. "Sugar Bird" the farmers call him, And whatever may befall him, He's a very welcome fellow When the elm puts on its yellow Veil of misty bloom, and willows Show gray catkins and the pillows Of brown mosses shoot green spangles On the ledge's ragged angles Ere the graeckel, catbird, robin, Set the vernal pulses throbbing To each wild, delirious measure, Then our "Sugar Bird" 's a treasure ; But, when April breeze and blossom Warm the blood and thrill the bosom, Their loud minstrelsies exceed him, 'Till our dull ears cease to heed him. Then to some tall tree's bole, hollow, If his flight your eyes but follow, There, the curious crowd eluding, You may find his partner brooding AFTER NOONTIDE 89 Eggs with thin shells, tinted, creamy, Lilac, rufous, hinting dreamy Forethought of the life abiding, Songless yet, within them hiding; And, forsaking each great singer, If you'll for a moment linger With your thoughts on him, you'll hear him Warbling to the wifey near him : "Peter, Peter! who is neater, Prettier, wiser or discreeter, Than you are dear heart? I greet ye: Peter, Peter, te te, te te !" THE MOCKING BIRD'S SONG T WOULD arise, if my soul were not sad, And sing with the wind in the leaves; I would be still if my heart were not glad With the joy of the long, vernal eves. And in sadness or gladness I'd shout to the madness Of the song that the Mocking Bird weaves. Into the soul comes his song like a psalm, Uplifts it and bears it away ; On the sad heart it falleth like balm ; With the glad heart it weaveth the day 90 AFTER NOONTIDE Into music and motion Of joy and devotion, Light and shadow, and ripple and play, Bubbles and breaks into beautiful things, Soars and shimmers like morning light; With breath of blossom and beat of wings ; Joy of angel, passion of sprite; With each exaltation Of song's dissipation It resolves and dissolves in delight. RHYMES OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH AN OLD-TIME CHRISTMAS AT THE COUNTRY SCHOOL TT was Christmas morn at the country school ; ■*■ There was snow on the ground, there was ice on the pool, But the master was up with the dawn that day And off to his school in the earliest gray. There was wood to split and a fire to light, The floor to sweep and the copies to write ; Some sums to do that had mocked his skill On the evening before, and many a quill From wings of the scorned domestic goose To shape into pens for the "scholars' " use. He bore a great pack, like Santa Claus, And a big-bellied basket, too, because He had things to carry no boy must see, Nor patron of high or low degree, To be deftly hidden and smuggled away By the little light of the new-born day. 92 AFTER NOONTIDE When Phoebus, winking through vapors cold, Had hung the trees with silver and gold And slyly peeped in at the schoolhouse door The room was cozy and warm once more. The pens were mended, the sums were done, The copies were written and imps of fun Were dancing a jig in the teacher's eyes As he thought of the children and their surprise, When — but whence comes this unusual din, And why do the big boys come rushing in, And the girls and wee ones tremble and wait As if for some direly impending fate? Now the fierce mob cries for a Christmas treat, For apples and cider and something sweet; But the master assumes a judicial air And hears their plea and denies their prayer. Then slyly explaining, "When pleas are lost Proceedings are taxed to the loser's cost, And so, as the matter is plain and clear, The treat is coming from you this year." "We'll take an appeal to the pond!" they cry; "We'll duck the master and freeze him dry; Break the ice again and the dose repeat And 'conquer or die' for our Christmas treat." AFTER NOONTIDE 93 They end their words with a rush, but lo ! Their sudden motion was far too slow, For the master had, with unusual care, Left the window open for sun and air Or some other purpose, and, like a flash, Leaped through the opening and made a dash Into the forests and over the hill, Scurrying away with a right good will. Some leap after him, and some to the door Turn for an exit, and soon a full score Of brawny young fellows, in brown and gray, Are chasing the teacher, who runs away. They follow and follow with laugh and shout As the master goes dodging in and out Among the trees and through tangled nooks, For the chase goes on till the hour for "books." But they cannot hem him with all their skill, For when they are swiftest, he's swifter still, While the little ones wait in trembling dread And the grown girls weep till their eyes are red, For "the master'll be drowned and froze, boo-hoo! And the boys get hung, and what'll we do?" Then the tears break out into fresher streams Mingled, at times, with hysterical screams. 94 AFTER NOONTIDE But the big boys weary and fall behind, While the master seems fresh and gaining wind, As boldly he turns him about once more And pushes amain for the schoolhouse door. "He fails, and we have him," they shout; but no; They are far too eager, their feet too slow, He's in at the door, he has seized his rod ; He's a hero now, an avenging god. As tall as the ceiling is high he seems, Undimmed and unconquered his proud eye gleams, He raps with his ruler and twice repeats, In a strong, full voice, the command, "to seats !" All weary and panting and short of breath, The boys file in, and, as quiet as death Save for the noise that their breathings impart And throbbing of many an anxious heart, They await the doom that is soon to fall From the righteous rage that involves them all ; Then, presto ! the master says, speaking low, "It is Christmas morn, as, I think, you know, "And Christmas, that cometh but once a year, Is a time for happiness, time for cheer, A time for good gifts, for the old books say That 'the good Lord Jesus was born today,' AFTER NOONTIDE 95 "And His spirit is born in our lives anew In ev'ry good work that our weak hands do. And in all things gentle and kind and pure It comes with the love that shall all endure. "Yet this 'day of days' is the day we make Our very best gifts for the dear Lord's sake, And 'give and forgive' is the thought we praise In our words and deeds on this 'day of days.' "And, I bethink me," he said, with a smile, "Of something I found this morning;" and while He stooped to remove some boards in the floor, Quick whispers were heard, then audible roar, As he drew up and displayed to their eyes A bag and a basket of marv'lous size All packed and crammed full as ever they'd hold Of apples famous and oranges gold, With candies and kisses and nuts from the South, With cakes from the baker's that melt in the mouth, And raisins and figs and a pocket of dates And other good things, and, to serve them for plates, Two quires of brown paper to make up and twirl Into full horns of plenty for each boy and girl; And last, but not least, all their hearts to delight, Two brown jugs of cider came bumping in sight. 96 AFTER NOONTIDE "Now, four of you plaintiffs who lost your bad cause, And four of you lassies, whose tears were applause, Come forward and make up and gather and fill A horn for each 'scholar,' well taxing your skill In counting and adding, from two to two score, Make each equal each and none less and none more ; And then pass them out bulging with Christmas joy To gladden the heart of each girl and each boy !" So ordered the master, and thus it was done, And faces with sunshine were now overrun ; All hearts were as thankful as hearts ever be, As morning to noon hurried on merrily, The old browny water gourd eagerly sped From lip to glad lip, still replenished and fed With a beverage fit for the gods of old, From the great jugs poured out in a flood of gold. The boys were dismissed to the woods very soon, For "town ball" was "topical" that afternoon, While a wee lassie sat in the master's seat And sang as the big girls danced "weevily wheat." Thus fared it one Christmas of long, long ago ; And now that the master is lying so low, Where birds sing above him or snows gently fall, That day of defeat seems the best day of all. AFTER NOONTIDE 97 A BABY'S COME TO OUR HOUSE A BABY'S come to our house and if he under- '^^ stands The meaning of his double chin, his little dimpled hands And his blue eyes full of laughter, as he bobbles up and down On his mother's lap so lightly, he's the happiest chap in town. It's been a score of years or so since our old house has known The cackle of a baby boy we called "our very own," And now, whene'er a baby comes a-visiting our way We're back again that minute to some old, familiar day When babies toddled round us in our little cottage home And made it richer far to us than dreams of king- dom come; But now that dreamy kingdom is not half so far away Since our's are babes no longer, out there in the eager fray. The pursuing and the doing have given them riper grace, But nothing in the universe can match a baby's face 98 AFTER NOONTIDE In kindling love's effulgent flame, where trusting souls recline, Or timing heart throbs to the lilt of melody divine. Oh ! a baby 's come to our house and a welcome rogue is he; He brings the sunshine with him and the robin's April glee ; His gurgled "google google" and the pursing of his lips Call up the fragrant clover blooms from which the wild bee sips. — What! going so soon, my fellow? and shall we frown and say "The baby 's gone from our house and dreary cold's the day?" Not so ! the spirit lingers still that lit you through the door And we shall keep and treasure it till you come back once more. if ENVOI Oh, baby swans and baby leaves are very fair to see ; But baby boys and baby girls are earth's best pro- geny; So au revoir, my bouncing lad, but quickly come again ! For baby boys, alas ! too soon, grow into common men, AFTER NOONTIDE 99 And grown-up folks are like ourselves and very humdrum things That bring no sunshine to the house such as a baby brings. BERCEUSE TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH OF NAPOLEON LEGENDRE, A CANADIAN POET r^HILD with just unfolding mind — ^ Little angel happy-eyed, Rosy dreams about thee twined, Sleep! My knees thy couch provide. Like a sweet auroral ray Purpling in the azure sky, On thy face serene as day, Seals of life immortal lie. Thy sweet eyes with laughter fill And thy lips for kisses part; Weepest thou for some slight ill, Grief yields soon to mother's art. Sweet, thy life to us is near, And, to shield thee from alarms, At the slightest breath of fear, Quick, to thee extend our arms. 100 AFTER NOONTIDE Thus along life's onward way If strength fail or friends should fly, Or should years and doubts betray, May'st thou look for help on high. Now thy silken eyelids close, Little angel happy-eyed, Rocked in rosy dreams, repose, — Sleep ! My knees thy couch provide. THE SUGAR TROUGH BABY 'T^HE mother smiled on the month-old child As she tossed him to and fro ; Then slily she said, with a wag of the head, "Now, papa, get out and go On a little tramp to the sugar camp And hunt us a sugar trough ; When one you have found with a bottom round, Strip all of the old bark off, — Ash, poplar or linn, it don't matter a pin, — Just bring it right in, be the shell thick or thin, To rock the roly-pol' baby in !" The young sire went with a mind intent On finding a leaky trough, "It will stand me in stead," to himself he said, "To carry no sound one off; Though leaky and old, 'twill a baby hold, But it won't hold sap so well." AFTER NOONTIDE 101 So a cracked trough he bore to the wee cabin door With a right smooth tale to tell Her favor to win as he'd tumble it in On the. rude puncheon floor, with satisfied grin, To rock the roly-pol' baby in. Round-bottomed, light, it careened all right, This way, that way, to and fro, Rockyty rockyty, rockyty rock, with rumble and knock Over the puncheons so long ago, Behaving so rarely and swinging so fairly On its rounded, barkless side, That the young wife smiled as she put in the child To sleep, to swing, and to ride On a furry wolfskin, with rattle and din, As she'd knit or she'd spin, with courage to win, And rock the roly-pol' babe therein. Whate'er you may say of that pioneer way Of rocking the baby, hi O, It was good as the best and had a rude zest That later day babies can't know. The mother who spun, as she rocked, thought it fun, Love made the labor so slight. The sugar trough boy was a rapture of joy, The sugar trough girl a delight. Through thick and through thin, would you have them to win, You'd better begin with a trough and wolfskin To rock your roly-pol' babies in. 102 AFTER NOONTIDE CATCHING THE LARK "When the sky falls we'll catch larks." — Old Saw. r^\ID you ever catch a lark *^ When the sky fell, boy, Did you ever catch a lark just then? If your sky never fell You've escaped very well, But you never caught a lark just then. When, a child, you plead to go To the rare and rollic show That would never come for you again ; If your father chanced to frown All the sky came rushing down, But you didn't catch your lark just then. Yes, the sky was very sweet When at fair Belinda's feet You went kneeling much as other men ; But you stumbled like a clown, And your rosy sky came down And you didn't catch your lark just then. O, the sky was high and blue, When your dream of glory flew To the zenith, but it tumbled when, Your speculations failed And your opponents prevailed, But you didn't catch your lark just then. AFTER NOONTIDE 103 Did you ever catch a lark When the sky fell, boy, Did you ever catch a lark just then? If your sky never fell You've escaped very well, But you never caught a lark just then. When the sky hung very low And there was but little glow On the mountain or the stream-born glen, And your pride dissolved in tears, There came music to your ears And the lark lit in your hand just then. How the bird came, or from where, You were wholly unaware, Or if the sky was falling when He sought you, heaven sent, But you named the bird content, And his song was in your soul just then. Did you ever catch a lark When the sky fell, boy, Did you ever catch a lark just then? If your sky never fell You've escaped very well, But you never caught a lark just then. 104 AFTER NOONTIDE LITTLE BOY BLUE IN THE SPRING ITTLE Boy Blue, come, blow your horn! 5 ^ The robin sings at blush of morn, The white flower blossoms on the thorn, The plowed lands wait the seed of corn. Little Boy Blue, come, leave your sleep, And join your comrade, sly Bo-Peep, Who hies away to herd her sheep, While sluggard dews their couches keep. Little Boy Blue, bestir, be fleet ! The orchards call, the woods are sweet, The squirrels run on nimble feet, And joy and promise lightly greet. "Good sir, I know not what you say, I hear the break of buds, the play Of sap in cells that to the day Give back the green and gracious ray." Little Boy Blue, you do but dream, Wake, wider wake ! and catch the gleam Of sunshine on the laughing stream, And guess the catbird's happy theme. So wakened, lad, what dost thou see? "A spirit in the maple tree, And note the motions fair and free, Of spring's unfolding drapery." AFTER NOONTIDE 105 Now, broad awake, what hearest thou? "The oriole singing on the bough, The milkmaid crooning to her cow, The farmer whistling at his plow." Little Boy Blue, hearest thou no more? "I hear a knocking on the door, It strikes my heart, it makes it sore; I ne'er have heard such knocks before." Little Boy Blue, arise and blow Thy horn, as ne'er before ; and know That Cupid, with his darts and bow, Hides at thy door, a stealthy foe. But if he find thee wise and ware, And fond of play and shy of care, He yet thy tender youth may spare And leave thee free as light and air. Or if thy soul be nobly wrought To some design of lofty thought, Him wilt thou conquer, bring to naught His wiles, nor perish love-distraught; For when thy will grows sure and sane, His arrow's sting shall be thy gain, And thou shalt lead him, bound in chains Of roses wound in fadeless skeins. 106 AFTER NOONTIDE Little Boy Blue, come, blow and sing Where vernal bowers are blossoming, Nor let thy vagrant fancy wing Too soon from childhood's happy spring. A SUGAR-MAKING RHYME (~\ THE singing of the sweetness, ^■^ And the sweetness of the song, At the merry sugar-making When the days are growing long! As the boiling sirup bubbles Into pimples golden-brown, And the sugar birds are warbling Where the sap is dripping down; Where, through paw-paw spiles or elder, Weep the trees their sweetness out ! For the March is marching onward And the frogs begin to shout. Every drop provokes a dimple — 'Round each dimple circles play; Thus the sap, with laugh and rimple, Falls to music all the day. On the elm the robin singeth, On the oak-top caws the crow; From tree-stump to fence-stake wingeth Mating bluebirds chanting low. AFTER NOONTIDE 107 But a merrier music ripples Round the campfire's ruddy glow, Where the boys and girls a-pulling Maple wax, as long ago. LET'S SING AND JOG ALONG T T seems a little curious, yet there isn't any doubt "*" But prosp'rous people have more ills than poor ones know about ; , One half their friends are parasites and half the other half Would cast them off, should fortune fail, and join the rabble's laugh ; Wherefore I say, though dark the day and rugged be the path, We'd better sing and jog along than stop "to nurse our wrath," We'd better toil and dig the soil than join the scowling throng — So ho, my lads ! ya ho, my lads ! let's sing and jog along ! This world's a grand and glorious world, as all of us should know, And working folks, in common clothes, are they that make it so; 108 AFTER NOONTIDE Theirs are the hands that sow the seed and bring the harvests in, And busy brains and toiling hands have little time for sin. The groveling greed that mocks at need and scorns the widow's plea Is barred from love's fraternity and toil's sublime degree, And he whose hand adorns the land can ne'er be wholly wrong — So ho, my lads ! ya ho, my lads ! let's sing and jog along! Give golden gain and high renown to men who lie and scheme, We'll envy not their joys that pass like specters in a dream ; But give us health and brawn to toil and love's benignant grace, And we will move the world along and jog it on * the race, The strong gods stand at toil's right hand and beckon me and you, And so I say: Command the way, with honest hearts and true ! Or with the spade, or with the pen 'tis glorious to be strong; — So ho, my lads ! ya ho, my lads ! let's sing and jog along ! AFTER NOONTIDE 109 "THE KING IS DEAD ! LONG LIVE THE KING!" T^AIR ladies, lords, and gentlemen," You young folks all give ear! They're bearing down the shadowed glen The frail and dying year. Now doff each hat, bow every head, And let the pageant pass, For when the midnight mass is said The sands will leave the glass, The last sands leave the glass, but then — Presto ! the sands are back again. "Fair ladies, lords, and gentlemen," Let every heart be bowed; The old year bids adieu to men, And dons his sable shroud. Now lift your youthful voices high And make the welkin ring: "The king is dead," as all must die, "Huzza! Long live the king!" "Long live the king," and long live we, And may the world wag merrily ! "Fair ladies, lords, and gentlemen," The new year speaks you fair ; There's light within his piercing ken And in his shining hair. 110 AFTER NOONTIDE There's vigor in his onward stride And glory wreathes his brow. The wide world greets him, wonder-eyed, And sings his praises, now Be yours to gather up the strands Of hope he strews with lavish hands ! SEEK NOT EVIL CEEK thou no evil for a friend, Seek thou no evil for a foe, Although you give him blow for blow In honor's cause; but still extend Some kindly thought till conflicts end; Thus shall your happiness increase, And your last days be days of peace. PATRIOTIC AND MEMORIAL ONE HUNDRED YEARS 1800-1900 Read before the Western Association of Writers at its fifteenth annual meeting at Winona Lake, Indiana, June 26, 1900. [Note — Indiana Territory was organized in the year 1800, and following that event came the marvelous de- velopment and growth of the country west of Ohio, and especially of the States of the Middle West.] O MARVEL of the world ! O hundred years, Outstretching from the splendor of the dawn, Far-flashed into the wilderness ! O tears And heart-break, toil and battle, and the drawn, Wan lips of anguish tossed on beds of pain ; The faith that failed not and the love that wrought, And hoped, and dared, and, for the future's gain, Held sacred its high trust to freedom's holy thought ! To you I fain would bring such joy of song, With notes that soar and cadences that fall, As, for a moment, to the passing throng, In breath of peaned praises might recall The story of your triumph ; I would wake, Were mine a hand like his who sought the prize At Alexander's feast, such strains as break The bonds of savage hate and lift souls to the skies. 112 AFTER NOONTIDE But turning from forbidden things, I hold That never century in any clime, Not even in Astrea's reign of gold, Or golden fable, made such march sublime As this our century in Western woods And o'er the emerald prairies vague and vast, Where reigned the savage, where the mighty floods Held all the wild land in their fluvian arms en- clasped. For here, when Freedom's flag of stars unfurled, Began to float where strong hands made a way, A little way into the untamed world Of woods and waters, there flashed in a ray, A flame auroral, that should light the pall Of savage darkness, and break in and shine Athwart the wilderness, enraying all, And leading ever on to conquests more benign. And so the thronging hosts of pioneers, Strong-armed, strong-willed, came with the flag and made The new soil richer with their blood and tears, And planted states, or drew the battle blade Against their country's foes, at freedom's cry, Till now this mighty empire of the free, This granary of the world lifts to the sky Its millions of unfettered hands rejoicingly. The tangled copse and fever-breeding marsh Gave place to fruitful field and smiling town, AFTER NOONTIDE 113 And cities rose, and babel-babblings harsh Of noisy traffic seemed intent to drown All gentler voices, until learning came And science delved, and culture's daughter, Art, Smiled radiantly as Phosphor's morning flame To gladden life and even glorify the mart. Great commonwealths, upon the parent stem, Bloomed as the first, 'till all the valley smiled, And sent its children west, to bear with them The seed of freedom to each newer wild, 'Till crossing arid waste and mountain chain, And pressing forward toward the setting sun, They planted states beside the Western Main, Nor yet have paused to count their many vict'ries won. The new land brought forth statesmen wisely great, Heroes who wrought, alike, in war and peace, Upheld the Union and conserved the State ; For truth and justice, liberty's increase Poured their best blood out on a hundred fields, That loyal Lincoln might make millions free, And with the power that youth and genius wields Healed every wounded bough on freedom's grow- ing tree. Now fire and steam and air our servants are, And that dread fluid Franklin first drew down From summer clouds repeateth, free and far, Our thoughts and voices, while from farm and town 114 AFTER NOONTIDE One long, loud pean rises to the skies Of thankful praise for all our sires have done, For mothers who to labor's high emprise Gave faith to sanctify and love for benizon. O marvel of the world ! O hundred years ! Whose sunset splendor fades along the west. Your children still press forward and earth hears Their cry of "Onward!" as each loyal breast Swells high with hope for conquests greater far, And brother cries to brother "lo, the dawn !" The age of progress rises like a star, A star, a sun, to speed the glory on and on. But sweetly still the music of the past Rings in old ears, and in old eyes the light Of other days shall linger to the last And old dreams tarry on their latest flight. They knew the story of th' embattled trees That stood like hosts of giants, unappalled To face the settlers, heard the fitful breeze Sing round the cabin in its niche green-walled. All honor be to them ! And hist'ry's muse Shall not neglect them in the greater day That hastens on, nor yet shall art refuse On speaking canvass, or in plastic clay, In bronze or marble, to repeat the tale Of those who won here, on this fruitful soil Such vict'ries as o'er death and time prevail, The heaven-born rights of man, the dignity of toil. AFTER NOONTIDE 115 O mighty land ! sprung from the wilderness, As great Minerva from the strong god's brow! O marvel of the world ! to ban or bless, The future lieth full before thee now; As thine own eagle, Jove's imperial bird, Strong-winged, well-poised, sustains his sunward flight, So be thy course on high ; though oft deferred, Still keep thy hope and faith linked to the death- less right ! LAFAYETTE He was ruled by two passions — the one for his wife, the other for freedom: and the latter was the stronger of the two. In his amorous pursuit of liberty under all her protean forms — a pursuit sometimes stern, always san- guine, and maintained through a long life — he has never been rivaled, unless it be by Mr. Gladstone, in our day. — Miss Edith Sichel's "The Household of Lafayette." 1VTOW, who is he that being in love with love, ^ With understanding and a faithful heart, Walks not with freedom, as the strong gods move, Nor counts her service love's diviner art? For love were but a base and selfish thing, Lust of the flesh, or of degraded souls A mean ambition, if it dared not fling Its own red heart on freedom's altar coals. 116 AFTER NOONTIDE The peerless Frenchman loved and loving wrought For love and freedom, which in truth are one, In that last sacred synthesis of thought When motive ripens and great deeds are done. America the grateful, though, perchance Oblivious of her own, shall ne'er forget The golden fleur-de-lis of friendly France , Nor the great soul of youthful Lafayette, — The soul of love and liberty, the soul Of hero faith that flung itself all bare Into the breach when freedom's martial roll Seemed but the echo of an old despair; — The old despair of liberty that wailed Above Athena's dead democracy, Or when proud Rome's republic, sick'ning, paled And to brute despots bent the cringing knee. He whom great Webster praised, Beranger sang And all America and freedom's own From every clime, hailed with the tocsin's clang And booming guns and bugles blithely blown, When, youth no longer smiling on his brow, He came to bask again in freedom's sun, Needs not the praise of any minstrel now — His fame secure, his fadeless glory won. AFTER NOONTIDE 117 O marvelous -fleur-de-lis of sunny France, May thy fair petals open ever more In freedom's radiance and no dark mischance Sow tares and nettles on the Gallic shore ! No more may Paris run with patriot blood While murder flaunts the name of liberty To sanctify her crimes, a foetid flood That shipwrecks hope and drowns the fleur-de-lis ! But whatsoe'er betide thee, sunny land, One name of thine is on our temple traced, One statue in love's sacred niche shall stand Till temple, love and niche shall be effaced. The name is his who, lonely, crossed the main And waked the wrath of many a little king; The form is his who broke the galling chain As France's nightingale rejoiced to sing.* Belittle him who may, in freedom's clime The radiance of his star shall never set; Like those great lights that measure space and time Shall glow for aye the name of Lafayette. *De Beranger. 118 AFTER NOONTIDE THANKSGIVING AND PRAYER (Nov. 24, A. D. 1898.) ' I ^HE nation bows before Thee, O Lord of the shore and sea ! Of suns and constellations and systems yet to be; God of the mighty universe and Lord of the guid- ing hand, Of the primal cell and the sprouting grass, bless Thou the waiting land ! We pray Thee bless the silences that fall with healing breath Where late the surly cannon were hot with hate and death, And over the ghastly trenches where fallen heroes sleep, Plant Thou the seeds of hope and love and solace those that weep ; And grant that all our victories and the glory of our ships Hold not the nation's righteousness in the thrall of a blind eclipse Till we shall pray as the Pharisee with bold, as- sertive phrase, Or put our pride in the Master's place and yield to it our praise. AFTER NOONTIDE 119 And grant us, Lord, the grace to bring to the islands in the sea The sweeter hope and the larger life that are born of liberty; And grant, we pray, that our helping hand shall a helping hand remain, And never grow heavy at greed's command to weld the oppressor's chain. And now from liberty's chosen land, where only the people reign, Remove, O Lord, the pride and hate and the love of evil gain That hunt the negro to his death and the poor man to the cell, And kindle the fires of anarchy where plenty and peace should dwell. We thank Thee, gracious Lord of all, for the blessed things that be ; For the life and light that free thought brings to make the people free ; For the will to heed a neighbor's need, or defend his righteous cause, And the grace to write on freedom's chart the codes of wiser laws. And thus, O Lord, with prayer and praise we end the rolling year, And lift our waiting hearts to Thee and feel Thy presence near 120 AFTER NOONTIDE In every loving heart that stands with outstretched arms to Thee, In the negro's hut, in the rich man's home, in the islands of the sea. AFTER DECORATION THE OLD MAN SPEAKS * I ^HE Decoration is over, mother, And the flowers wilt in the sun As the daisies did in the long swathes hid, That haying of sixty-one. Our sad thought goes with lily and rose That fade by the graves and die — Bruised and beat by the hurrying feet Of the crowds that wander by. All bruised and broken our hearts were, mother, Like the grass and blossoms today; For he was so lithe, so bonnie and blythe The morning he went away, With a smile and sigh, a tear in his eye, On his lips some words of cheer; And oh, so soon, in the heart of June, We brought him and laid him here ! We, dreaming of peace when there was no peace, And the war cloud thund'ring nigh, Still held him in fee, till the bugle's glee Rang out and the flag went by, — AFTER NOONTIDE 121 The flag went past and he followed fast, For his soul went on before, — 'Twas so long ago that we laid him low, So long — and our hearts still sore ! We have missed his help in the fields, mother, And his morning smile at the door; We have missed him long from the cherished throng And the chair that he fills no more. A letter or two and a scrap of blue, And a lock of his raven hair, And the tale is told of the things we hold From the life we used to share. Nay, mother, there's more in a safer store ; 'Tis a throne in the room of gold And a prince thereon, with the light of dawn, On a face of royal mold. And this knightly Roi is our soldier boy, And his throne room bideth fair In memory's bower in the castle tower That defieth age and care. There were thousands of sons like ours, mother, Who rallied to freedom's call, And to make men free were as brave ; but he — He was our dearest of all; * And so when they come with the throbbing drum,, Children and flags and flowers, Our lives fall back over time's dim track To that first great grief of ours. 122 AFTER NOONTIDE Oh ! long shall be wrought to the hero thought, To the love that is love alway, Wreathed blossom and bloom for our soldier's tomb; But we shall be far away Where the snow-white rose in paradise grows That mothers of heroes wear; That rose may be thine, but there's nothing fine I want but our boy up there. McKINLEY BRAVE of soul and true and strong, Yet tender as a mother's heart, He stood amidst the crowding throng Of men and nations, bore his part Among great rulers of great lands, Humbly as one who only serves — Honoring the service — from whose hands Far speeding on the quickened nerves Of freedom's millions, runs a thrill Of love fraternal, swift to bind Race unto kindred race and fill And unify the common mind For common good, till those, who, far away, Sit in the darkness, rise and greet the day. AFTER NOONTIDE 123 A shining mark for that wild rage Of anarchy that gluts its maw With patriot's blood, and mars the page That bears of liberty the law, With brutal passion's godless creed, Was he, the wise and gently great, Who, high of faith and bold of deed, Wrought for his country, tempting fate And scorning malice with love's scorn; Forgiving those who naught forgave, With face uplifted to the morn And far more glad to give than have — For he tempts fate the most who most for man Himself exposes to the wrath of clan. McKinley, honor's crown is thine, And glory sets thy star on high, With freedom's fadeless stars to shine In love's illimitable sky ! No mean assassin's coward shot May harm thee in the^ halls of fame, No foul aspersion leave one blot To dim the radiance of thy name ; Thy place is with the immortal great Of every clime and race ; thy sun, Though set, still marks high noon, thy fate Men mourn, but say, "God's will be done !" God's will be done in anarchy's surcease, In law's survival, liberty's increase. 124 AFTER NOONTIDE ON THE PROSPECT OF PEACE W AR is a demon of doubt and death, Filling the world with its poison breath. But peace is an angel that soars and sings And hovers on sweet, benevolent wings, And peace is the substance of happy things. Joy! Joy! Peace is the substance of happy things. War is a wrecker of homes and hearts, Cruel as hell are its deadly arts. But peace is a spirit with eyes to see The bountiful, beautiful years to be When love shall be mistress of land and sea Joy! Joy! Love shall be mistress of land and sea. Ring the glad bells when the war is done ! Shout, as the rust assails saber and gun, And down on the pinions of love and praise, Where the slain are sorrow to him that slays, Peace cometh again to renew her days ; Joy! Joy! Cometh again to renew her days. AFTER NOONTIDE 125 ADOLPH THUT* From Switzerland, 1861-1904 (Decoration Day, May 30, 1904.) TITELVETIA'S sons, in freedom's cause, Were ever quick to strike or bleed; Her Tell, who won the world's applause, Her martyr, Arnold Winkelried; Her men in Unterwalden vale Who backward hurled the Austrian tide ; Her modern heroes who prevail, O'er Europe's fierce imperial pride, Maintaining still the people's rights Secure among their mountain heights. And there was one, a friend of mine, A comely youth from Switzerland, His soul aflame with fire divine; Of generous heart and open hand, Who heard the bugle's pleading call When from her sorrowing soul's excess Of deadly peril, soon to fall Upon her in her nakedness, Imperilled freedom cried afar For men to fill the ranks of war. *Pronounced Thoot. 126 AFTER NOONTIDE How readily he joined the ranks For this, his second Switzerland, And sought no honors, titles, thanks ; But simply for the right to stand : How cheerily he marched and sang, Or bore a fainting comrade's pack, Or while the camp with murmurs rang Wrote jolly, hopeful letters back To friends at home, a few remain Who know, and count the knowledge gain. He shared in Shiloh's bloody fight And passed, unwounded, through the fray, And, with long rows of dead in sight, Wrote home the tale of that sad day, Then turned to care for wounded men, And toiled for days where mercy led, And there contagion seized him when His hand wrought most for those who bled, And he, who fain in battle's van Had fallen, died a plague-struck man. We brought him home. In sylvan shade We laid his mortal body down, Where wild birds sang and blossoms made The summer sweet. And now, from town, When gray men come with wreath and bloom, Or children pass with flags in hand, They decorate the humble tomb Of Adolph Thut from Switzerland, There in his sylvan, sweet repose, Remember him with wreath and rose. AFTER NOONTIDE 127 Oh, warm and true the kindly heart Which beat in that young Switzer's breast ! He chose with freedom's own his part And loved her rural children best. Though widely taught in Europe's schools, He turned with open mind to ours, And, while a stranger to our rules, Submitted to the peaceful powers Where women teach and women rule And sail the pleasant ship of school. Because he longed for wider range Than his beloved valley gave, And dreamed of regions new and strange, Where maids are fair and men are brave ; Because he loved the cheerful farm And rustic toils and rural ways, He fled from a profession's charm — If charm it hath — to spend his days In this fair, growing, hopeful west, Upon the farm — of dreams his best. He came to us for peace, found war And shrank not from it, so he died For freedom ; died for us and for The world's wide future. Eagle-eyed And hopeful — from his own afar — He gave himself for strangers, yet He first had won our love. No bar Of time can make our souls forget Our gallant Swiss boy, loyal, brave, Asleep there in his lowly grave. 128 AFTER NOONTIDE MAURICE THOMPSON r\ MANY-STRINGED and marv'lous lute, ^^ Whose chords his lightest breath could sway, Since thy great Master lieth mute With naught his prophet lips may say — How fares he now men call him dead, Who left earth's happiness to know The springs of joy, by wisdom fed, That flow with ever-deep'ning flow? And thou, low-lying, cold and still, Whose fingers straying o'er the wires Of song's immortal harp could thrill The soul with love's celestial fires, Know'st thou, though heads are bowed in grief And hearts are bleeding now for thee, That many an old and sweet belief Sings to them through the melody Of some remembered song of thine, That, like a far prophetic voice, Fore-sings the perfect song, divine, And bids the sorrowing soul rejoice, — Rejoice for one who lived his days So blamelessly and wrought so well And loved so greatly that his lays Renewed love's moving miracle? AFTER NOONTIDE 129 And now, O friend, "Hail and farewell !" In heaven howe'er thy stature grow, While we mid sun and shadows dwell, To thy old self our love shall flow. COATES KINNEY n T^INNEY is dead!" Far-called the speaking ■^ wires On that sad day when passed his lofty soul ; But he lives on, so brightly burn the fires He kindled ere fame wove her aureole For his clear brow, or bowed her stately head Before his splendid majesty of song. While many mourn the mortal man as dead, The wiser few his virile strains prolong. Longfellow, Bryant, Whittier, Lowell, — four, — Add Kinney, — five — and fill the shining scroll* Of our great bards who learned to sing and soar E'er civil war had called its martial roll Or poured its red libations for our sins. He lingered latest, singing to the last With such full utterance as the strong soul wins When mighty issues in the molds are cast, — *Coates Kinney was less prolific and more chary of publication than either of the four great New England poets; but a careful and unbiased study of his verse will certainly reveal that in quality much of his poetry meas- ures up to their best. 130 AFTER NOONTIDE The mold of seething thought, the mold of war, Of freedom's progress, of a nation's fate, When man contends with man, as Zeus with Thor Might have contended in some mythic state. He sang of love, the future hope of man, — An endless progress from this mortal strife, Eternity from time's contracted span, And death transmuted into radiant life; Then, in his singing robes, he took his flight Into the silence as into the dawn, And, we who heard him singing through the night, Still hear his numbers ringing on and on. WILL CUMBACK /^HILD of the free and open mind, ^^ Who loved so generously thy kind, And revelled in life's ardent flow, The morning's rapture, evening's glow, — Holding thy friends as something more Than shadows on a barren shore — And wrought for man so long and well, Why hast thou fled our Israel, — Favored of nature, blest of art; — As one who journeys far apart From kith and kin, why wand'rest thou From thy home land of here and now? AFTER NOONTIDE 131 O, brother mine ! thy paradise Was here at home among thy friends : Is it but transferred to the skies Where no grief comes, no rapture ends? A soft voice answers, "Even so, To bliss above, from bliss below, He journeys far, but you that stay Behind him for a month, a day, A half score years, perchance, may know That where he goeth you shall go." Though he may never more return, With great, warm heart and ringing speech To solace sorrowing souls that yearn; To please, convince, inspire or teach, Or send mirth's happy, jovial sound The friendly banquet's table round. His spirit, haunting mem'ry's bower, Shall gladden many a sombre hour When skies are sullen, winters grim, As, faring on, we go to him. W. E. A MAN WHO FOLLOWED HIS CONVICTIONS OF RIGHT AND DUTY A STRONG man has fallen, *•*• A true man from us gone ; A brave man passed, calling To his fellow-men "On!" 132 AFTER NOONTIDE His Master he followed, To his praise be it said, On the highway of faith, Where his own conscience led. For salvation of man He contended with men, Dared to differ with friends, As one lone man to ten, And seriously sober, Unselfishly wrought For pure lives, happy homes And love-sanctified thought. O ! naught that is greater May a mortal man do Than, in love, the way marked By his conscience pursue. So he followed his light, Thus he lived out his day: May grass grow and rose bloom Long and well o'er his clay! His Lord home has called him, And, in hope, we may cry To his soul, onward marching, Au revoir! not good-bye! AFTER NOONTIDE 133 HER POOR, THIN HANDS [An aged pioneer and minister of the gospel who had been a farmer, and, with his wife, in their youthful days, experienced the exacting toils of farm and home building in the wilderness, said to a friend, one day dur- ing her last illness, "I take her poor, thin hands in mine and think how hard, yet cheerfully, they have toiled for me, and it almost breaks my heart.] TAKE her poor, thin hands in mine, And think how gladly through the years, They toiled for me and made no sign Of quick impatience; and the tears Rise to my eyes and I can see, As thought runs back on time's dead sands, How well they wrought for love and me; — Her saintly hands, her fair, white hands ! — Dear, winsome hands ! Dear, eager hands ! O, swiftly sure in life's young morn, You joined with mine where new, brown lands Were waiting for the seed of corn. With home to build and fields to clear, And sums to solve at love's commands, You shirked no toil, nor counselled fear, O, strong, yet fair, caressing hands ! A woman's hands, a wife's dear hands ! Directed by a wife's fond heart, The gray-haired husband understands How loyally they've done their part. 134 AFTER NOONTIDE He knows, beyond what tongue may speak How, more than triple iron bands, They've held his soul from sin — those weak, Yet brave, determined, helping hands. O, beautiful in perfect mold, These poor, thin hands were long ago ; And yet today they have and hold More that is fair to me, I know, Than e'er before, or so it seems. Youth gave the buds, but age expands Love's harvests in the sunset gleams That glorify these thin, white hands. O, God ! I pray Thee once again, Rain blessings down on her dear head, And hold these hands, that suffer pain, In Thine own hand, as when we wed In life's young morn and vowed to Thee Our lives, our loves, our herds and lands, All that we were, or hoped to be — My own strong arms and her fair hands. I praise Thee, Lord, for many gifts Thy gracious bounty doth provide; But, as each passing shadow lifts, Far more for her, my youth's fair bride — Fairer today — than aught save love, Thy love, that over all expands, And bids me hope in heaven above To hold again her precious hands. E. Stein Now on the dead tree's hollow bole The gay woodpecker plies his bill, And " rat tat tat" his martial roll Rings bravely over field and hill ; His quaint call echoes loudly now, And now he rides the waves of light, A swinging dory, whose red prow Tilts up and down in zig-zag flight. NONSENSE AND DIALECT THE WORM AND THE WOODPECKER A WOODPECKER pecked on a hickory limb, "^^ And a chuckle-head worm hurried out, For a strange curiosity whispered to him : "Go V see what that fool bird's about." Alas, for the folly that takes for a fool Every creature it don't comprehend, For it brings, in this world, I am told, as a rule, A full peck of woe in the end. THE WOODPECKER'S LITTLE GAME Another version ' I ^HE woodpecker drums on the mulberry limb, *■ "Rat-ta-tat-tat ! Rat-ta-tat-tat !" And the chuckle-head worm, as he listens to him, Says, "What's he at? What is he at?" Then he wriggles out through the bark to see, Rat-ta-tat-tat ! Rat-ta-tat-tat ! And the woodpecker gobbles him up with glee, And flyeth away to another tree, Where another fool worm will wish to see What he is at with his "rat-ta-tat-tat !" 136 AFTER NOONTIDE GRANTA MY ma say, one day to me : "Wen we get's old as gran'pa, we May be crippled an' worthless as he." 'Least that's w'at I telled gran'pa; Nen he jes shooked, worst I ever saw, An' cried. Nen I fink some, an' say: "Gran'pa, I dess 'twant dat way, W'at my ma say ; she say : 'Ef we Get's old as gran'pa we'll be helpless as he.' That's diffunt, gran'pa, diffunt as can be !" Nen gran'pa he laugh an' rattle his crutch, An' he say : "Not much, my chile, not much !" OLE MAN PENNY PACKER OLE man Penny Packer, He chews terbacker An' he smokes a pipe an' eats snuff: Seems like he can't get enough Terbacker, an' it jes runs in streaks Down his beard an' paints his cheeks All brown an' yeller. He's a cross ole feller, An' he don't smell sweet; 'Spect he's purt' nigh smoked meat! AFTER NOONTIDE 137 SOME LITTLE FOLKS HT^HE very least little boy ever I knew Was so little he rocked in his grandmother's shoe; And he gurgled "goo goo ! Pray, what shall I do, But suck my thumb blue And rock the day through in my grandmother's shoe?" The we-est of wee girls I ever did see, She swung in an oriole's nest on a tree, And she said: "Look at me! It's nice as can be To see-saw and saw-see And swing in an oriole's nest on a tree." The smallest old man in the world, I suppose, Is the little old chap who lays down for a doze With his head on his toes And his toes in his nose, While he cuddles so close That there's nobody knows his bald head from his toes. The tiniest old woman the world ever saw Was that little old gentleman's mother-in-law; Loud she cackled : "Ha, ha, I'm a mother-in-law, Proud as ever you saw And my home is a polly-pod's pod, ha ha !" 138 AFTER NOONTIDE RAFFERTY GREEN'S GREAT HEART T^ AFFERTY GREEN was the rarest man ! ^^- Rafferty Green, Rafferty Green! His great heart grew on the onion plan, — The center good as ever was seen, Which soon another layer bound, And another layer cased it round While others, succeeding others, found Room to grow sweeter and crisper, too, Than even the core had dared to do ; Then others and others, all good and sound, Kept making the heart of old Rafferty Green Greater than it before had been, Till winey wags, when gay and mellow, Sang "Rafferty Green's a jolly good fellow!" And a "jolly good fellow" in truth was he As ever you saw, or ever you'll see. But alas, alas ! 'tis a bitter fate That a good thing, even, may grow too great; So Rafferty Green laid down and died, And the neighbors came and looked and sighed, For the outer layer of his old, brown skin Barely covered the heart within, And the wise, old doctor, with nodding head, In learned lingo discoursed and said : "Alium cepa cardium est Causa primus of this man's rest." AFTER NOONTIDE 139 ROSS MARTIN'S HOSS TDOSS Ross Martin hed an' ole fool hoss, -*"^ One eye knocked out an' de yuther one blin' ; Ringbone an' spavin made de ole hoss cross, Nen de ole hoss got wrong in his min', An' he'd think criss-cross 'cause he couldn't see Ross ; Nen w'en Ross were drivin' de hoss 'long de road His cross-criss thinker got to goin' criss-cross, Twell he were Ross an' de hoss were de load; Nen de ole hoss whinney like he gwine ter laugh An' won't pull no more, — he's de boss hot hoss — He back up de buggy an' snap off de shaf 'Cause he think 'at he's ridin' an' whippin'-up Ross, Twell buggy, Ross an' hoss all rolled, criss-cross, Off bridge, an' nen — they'd a fun'ral for Ross. CA-I-PHAS GIN de lad er Scriptah name ■*" To lif 'im up an' bring 'im fame, An' now he's jes about de same, — Ez full er tricks, ez fon' er game Ez any common niggah ; But someway, I's jes stuck to deaf, Soul an' body, haht an' bref, Till dere is mos' nuffin' er me lef But jes love er de boy heself, Ez fuh ez I can figgah ; 140 AFTER NOONTIDE Dis winsome boy, Ca-i-phas ! Dis dancin', laughin', singin' lad, Dis Jubah-pattin', go-show-mad Mockin' bird dat makes me glad, Dis honey-bee, Ca-i-phas ! Ca-i-phas, oh, Ca-i-phas ! De jub'lee lad, Ca-i-phas ! Dis red-co' watahmillion chile Dat show his white teef w'en he smile, Dis coal-black swan, Ca-i-phas ! I'se 'fraid he's nebah gwine ter reach De solemncolly grace ter preach De gospil, er ter even teach De piccaroons de propah speech ; Dis rompin', cairless niggah ! I'd mos' jump right up to de skies Ter see 'im jes once lookin' wise, An' hear 'im sortah solemnize His darkey titter, lak he'll s'prise His ma, w'en he gets biggah ; Dis mamma-boy, Ca-i-phas ! Dis long-leg, banjo-pickin' coon, What dance all night an' sleep at noon, Dis bunch er quills brim full er tune, Dis idle-wind Ca-i-phas ! Ca-i-phas, oh, Ca-i-phas! Black buttahfly, Ca-i-phas ! Dis greedy, apple-dumplin' lout What tu'ns my ole haht inside out, Dis angel-voiced Ca-i-phas ! AFTER NOONTIDE 141 JES' SO LAZY JES let me hev my big, ahm chaiah Wid de rockahs on, w'en de sky am faiah, Out en de shade en de summah time, W'en de bee 's en de blossom an' de goa'd-vine climb ; Er befo' de iiah w'en de win' gwine blow An' de momicle in de merc'ry's low An' I kin doze an' nod an' be Ez happy ez er coon en a hollah tree, — Ercause I's jes so lazy; So lazy, O, so lazy ! Den de days run pas' Like shaddahs on de grass, An' I jes soaks en lazy. Now Dinah nebbah will unnerstan' Wat lazy means to er lazy man, She's er hustlin' ooman w'at keeps things neat, An' close to weah an' things to eat ; But she 'sturbs me; wants me bring her tub An' fetch de watah an' hope her rub, Put out de washin' an' do de chores ; How I gwine heah, w'en I nods an' snores, Ercause I's jes so lazy? So lazy, O, so lazy! De possum dream in de ole gum log An' pays no 'tention to de barkin' dog, But cuirls up still an' lazy. J 142 AFTER NOONTIDE Dat noxious Dinah am jes de beat ! She says, "Yo'll work or yo' shant eat !" How I gwine work w'en de win' gwine blow Or de sun gwine shine, er hit rain er snow; Ef de noon's too hot, er de mornin' cool? Dinah mus'n't tek me foh nobody's fool, An' de ole rockin' chaiah he says, says he, "Set down, ole man, an' snooze wid me, Ercause yo's jes' so lazy, So lazy, O, so lazy ! Nebbah yo' min' w'at dat niggah say, An' she'll fotch de dinnah roun' yo' way Ef yo'll jes' cling to lazy !" MISCELLANEOUS VERSE DEATH SONG OF THE UNSATISFIED [When these stanzas were written, at a time when wild theories, revolutionary vagaries and corporate greed seemed even more immediately to threaten the peace and happiness of the country than at present, they were credited to that class of thinkers who believe themselves and their theories to be neglected and forgotten. This was done because those who assume that attitude are prone to exaggerate the real or imaginary evils of the present. The serious purpose of the lines, however, lies in their contention that no social, political, nor econom- ical panacea or nostrum can, by its enactment into law, make a people prosperous and happy, nor supersede char- acter, individual, state and racial, in the wise government of the world.] ET us depart for so it seemeth well : ^ To us the hosts of the forgotten call ; And wheresoe'er their shades may rove or dwell From human thought exiled, forgotten all, We pass to join them in their lost estate And share their joy or mingle in their grief, — We who have striven so long and fall so late, And find, at last, our longest day too brief. We tempted fate upon her hardest side And strove at once for mercy and for art ; We wept when truth was scourged and crucified, Or felt the pangs that rent a brother's heart ; 144 AFTER NOONTIDE And so we fell and failure sealed our lips, And wrote across our aching brows her name, Then bore us gently on her finger tips Far from the noisy rabble's wild acclaim. But, ere we came, we heard the demagogue, Who, tossing comets o'er the galaxy, And raging ever like the three-mouthed dog, Raves at old order, roars of things to be : And him the people heartened with great noise, As he proclaimed all history a lie And hist'ry's muse a vixen with coarse voice, And nothing true of all but anarchy ; And so we came, at last unto the place Where now we wait, and, waiting hear the cry Of the forgotten dead, that call through space To the forgotten who are yet to die ; And here we paused, and here we laughed and sung As though the world were happy, joy our own, And here, the heart directing still the tongue, Has given our notes the morning's mellow tone; For the forgotten loves as well his lay As loves the butterfly his gaudy wing, And here, where failure bears her gentle sway, There's naught for us to do but dream and sing. Back among men who are remembered still, Resounds the clash of arms, the rage and stress Where ancient good contends with modern ill, And ancient ill parades in modern dress. AFTER NOONTIDE 145 The alchemyst's old bubbles, blown afar, Across the centuries, are hailed again As new discoveries, and the argent star Outshines the sun to youth's dilated ken, And men run clamoring for a trick of law To make the tinker's pewter more than gold, Make thorns bear figs, and brambles grapes, or draw Plenty's millennium from the coiner's mold. Pale science sits beside her midnight lamp And proves the demagogue a Janus still ; But list the roar from yonder mighty camp, Where ignorance asserts her solemn will ! Men fall before him there and kiss his feet And speed him as their new-found Spartacus, — For to the living humbug is so sweet, Were humbug dead they soon would come to us. So let the living wrangle out their days, The unforgotten strut across the stage, Machinery and mules produce the plays That once taxed Shakespeare's art and Garrick's rage; Society rhymers, in sweet swallowtails, In ices flavored up to scandal's taste Deal out such song as in their world prevails With shoddy purples, diamonds of paste. No more, O friends, with them may we contend; It were unseemly for our ancient trills To vex the air in which their voices blend Ground smooth and fine on their scholastic mills. 146 AFTER NOONTIDE Now poetry is wrought on diagrams, Light on the circle, heavy on the square, And where our ancient critics hurled their "damns !" These moderns plumb and measure and despair. The learned professor talks and talks and talks, Then talks some more and thinks he runs the age; But the grim delegate who walks and walks, Knows that the earth is his fat heritage ; Yet capital holds him in sure control, Laughs at his rage and pacifies the mob ; Old common sense seems dead as any sole That ever felt the sea's tumultuous throb. Now graceless greed comes in with swollen pride, A blind sow gorging on the unctuous swill, With her large farrow ever at her side, Sired by "Great Lust of Gain" and for their fill Contending each with each 'till one, more wise Than all the others, thus suggests a Trust : "Let's form a stomach of sufficient size And all the world's good things into it thrust." And lo ! the cheated masses bow assent Till public robbery wears a smiling face, And many people hail the great event, As Greed uplifted in the market place On golden pedestal, with song and shout, Commands men's worship with the dollar mark She bears en tablet on her hideous snout, While virtue hides her sorrows in the dark. AFTER NOONTIDE 147 And thus they drift, while toiling science waves Her marv'lous lamp above their puny bands : Earth, water, lightning; light, heat, air, as slaves, Are swift to execute her strange commands : The elements are chained for many a need, And things grow cheap and cheapen many men, Who crush each other in their cruel greed, Or rend their hair and rave with voice and pen For government to seize all things and stand The one sole arbiter of human fate, To sink ambition in the common sand, Make all men small and all of equal weight. Have they forgotten Jehovah and his law Whch made each soul the monarch of its own, That thus they seek to cast in one great maw, Hungrier than hell and wider than its zone, All good, all ill, all hope and happiness, All individual effort, thought and skill, All powers that ban, all energies that bless, And make them subject to its one strong will? Have they forgotten the Christ who taught men love And brotherhood and purity of heart, — The individual soul, whose strength may move Mountains for good and hallow every art, When thus they dream and murmur and conspire To sink the man and bring the despot in, And smother down the old Promethean fire That flames wherever men aspire and win? 148 AFTER NOONTIDE Let them forget, if so forget they must, But the forgotten never can forget; We lived when hope ran tingling through our dust And stars shone fairest when the sun was set, And though with all forgotten things we pass, We pass as individuals, one by one, Not crammed and molded in some pasty mass By force so blind it sees and cares for none. All evolutions, all estates were ours : From dust of stars, from protoplasmic cells, From all that was before us came our powers, The will that wields, the wisdom that compels ; By these we rose, and God forgetteth not, Nor nature, nor the protean soul of man That lives for seons ; men may scheme and plot, But still one purpose runs through all life's plan;, We may not guess its scope nor read its signs Wisely or well, as in our blinding flight, We speed like couriers down the battle lines Where darkness strives forever with the light. Of this, at least, the humblest may be sure And with it the forgotten die content, Only the true and wholesome shall endure, And beauty's dower was never vainly spent, While art that gently leads to nature's soul, Down to her germs and upward to her God, Shall come into her own as ages roll, As dreamers dream and patient toilers plod.. AFTER NOONTIDE 149 Let us depart ! for us there breathes not now The grateful fragrance of the spicy dawn, When the fresh earth, that opens to the plow, Speaks the full harvest. After we have gone There shall be birds and blossoms and good cheer As we have known them, and the great world move From its brief madness and full sane and clear The mind of man shall seek the heart of love. We are forgotten ! better thus to be Than to be hated into deathless fame ! With us shall sleep love's greater progeny, — Wisdom too wise to seek an earthly name, Grace that would shrink from glory's brazen gaze, And virtue that would never soil its wings For all the splendors of earth's splendid days, The joys of conqu'rors or the crowns of kings. Let us be gone ! for so it seemeth best, Since times are changed and men are changed and all Love's many voices call us to our rest, For the forgotten nothing shall recall Back to the poignancy of joy or pain, And we who toiled so long and fall so late, Lone stragglers, lost upon the battle plain, Pause now no more to rail at men or fate. 150 AFTER NOONTIDE DOWN THE RIVER evalyn's song of faith ' I ^HE river is wide and deep And flows with a ceaseless flow, — With a mighty swell and sweep That grow as the great floods grow; Yet once, to its fountain head, I came, on a far-gone day, Where it crept, a silv'ry thread, Through mosses and laughed away. And they launched my little boat On a ripple of the rill, When a cry rose from my throat Like an insect's wailing shrill ; But a smile of morning lay On the prow of the tiny shell, And the lark, at break of day, Sang "Sailor, you're sailing well !" Now whisp'ring reeds by the shore Are higher than meadow grass, And the meadow moths no more Fly over us as we pass Where King Fisher woos his bride And plumeth his shining crest, By swamps where the lithe snakes glide And the great heron builds her nest. AFTER NOONTIDE 151 The river leads on, I know, To a vague and unknown sea, And I may not choose, but go Where its swift wave beareth me; Yet back at its primal springs, Where the mint and mallow bloom, I have felt the stir of wings That bear the sweet haw's perfume. The drone of the summer bee, The fragrance that new hay yields Come down the wide stream to me From the far-off harvest fields ; But the old, sweet days are gone, And the river bears my boat, To the salt tides, faring on, Of the chartless seas remote. My boat is the frailest shell, And the waves are dark and cold And never were words to tell The mysteries that they hold, — The sorrow, the bliss, the pain Of things that are and to be When I shall cry out in vain To shore from a shoreless sea. Oh ! never shall I return To the wild rose and the thorn, Where the wahoo blossoms burn And the robin sings at morn ; 152 AFTER NOONTIDE Yet the wild-rose-odor clings And is of my being part, And the long-dead robin sings With the rapture in my heart. And ever I dream and float On the river wide and deep, And rock in my fragile boat And sing and laugh and sleep; While the vistas open wide And the misty azure lies Athwart the shore and the tide Like a vale of paradise; For the helm a pilot holds, And the tiller him obeys Through the mystery that enfolds And the doubts of weary days ; And the fragrance of his breath Is sweet as the morning air, And he sings "there is no death On the wave nor anywhere." He upholds the sinking heart As the boat and waters move, For the magic of his art Is the miracle of love. On the sky and the welt'ring tide And the far-receding shore The mirage and myst'ry bide ; But the davs are dark no more. AFTER NOONTIDE 153 MASSAWIPPI* T STAND upon the spruce-crowned hill -*- And gaze on Massawippi's wave Once more, in thought, and feel the thrill Of laughing waters as they lave Far-winding shores of serpentine, And note the terraces of green That rise beyond, height after height, Or in my boat, with silent flight, Thread long, sweet avenues of light And watch the shim'ring wavelets break Like folds of some great spotted snake Against the parti-colored shores Whereon the molten sunlight pours. What human interests round me throng, What dreams of romance, shreds of song Come whisp'ring with the lisp and sigh Of waves that mirror cloud and sky, While many a smiling face appears . I looked on there in other years ! One rare, brave soul, my thoughts recall Who loved the sweet lake best of all, Whose rapt enthusiasm drew Strong inspiration from the view. * One of the most picturesque of Canadian lakes. Its sylvan beauty appealed so strongly to the late Mrs. Mary Hartwell Catherwood that she bestowed its musical name upon the Indian girl who was one of the heroines in her "Romance of Dollard." 154 AFTER NOONTIDE She said, "God made its mile on mile Of glorious beauty by His smile !" And, after, wed its Indian name, Linked with her own, to fairest fame. THE LATCH-STRING T^ROM the wooden latch on the cabin door, When the string hung free on the outer side, Its meaning was "Welcome to rich or poor !" Who should seek to enter and there abide In the settler's bounty and cheer to share. "Come in and find shelter," the latch-string said, "And food, if content with our daily fare, A seat by the fire and a pallet bed, And a pipe to smoke, when your nag's been fed; But offer no money for fee or fare Or your welcome may prove an angry glare ! The latch-string is never a tavern sign ; The settler is gen'rous, but don't incline To brook such an insult from squire or lout When a welcome hangs with his latch-string out.' "When the string of the latch is drawn inside, Whatever you do, for your dear life's sake, Be ready to answer from whence you ride ; Let your voice ring clearly, make no mistake ; But with quick halloo, shout aloud your name, Say why belated and whither you wend, AFTER NOONTIDE 155 For the settler is kindly of heart, though game, And, finding you fair, will be your friend ; Whatever he hath he will share with you ; His heart is large and his sympathies true ; He's tears for misfortune and scorn for greed, And his hand is open to succor need. The string of his latch is but drawn inside Protection and safety to there provide For his dearest ones, and his rifles stand Well loaded and primed for his steady hand ; But come, when no lurking foe is about, And you'll find his latch-string hanging out." When "welcome !" hung with the string o' the latch At the cabin's door in the early time, Then people were friendly and quick to catch A true heart's pulse in the jangle or chime Of echoes discordant that tune or break Life's tenderest chords, when the world is young And man is bravest for woman's sake, While words are few on the faltering tongue, The stranger was met with a warm, true hand When he journeyed into the wild, free land. He proffered no coin for his fare, but brought Fresh news from the great world's contending thought, And, if for the children, from legend's store, With tales of adventure and fairy lore, He came not a welcome in zest could match His welcome that hung with the string o' the latch. 156 AFTER NOONTIDE MOTHER OF MELODY— A FRAGMENT T^AIR Mother of Melody, daughter of silence, ■*" With voice first endowed in the nebulous glimmer That rose o'er the worlds when the torch of Aurora Flashed far through the fogs to dispel the foul vapors That wrapped worlds and systems in darkness and dolor, When, softly from chaos uprose thy glad numbers With first whisp'ring stars of the morning celestial Ere broke the full chorus of stellarine music To waken the worlds, in the far spaces thronging, To life and life's consciousness, breaking in glory. Fair poesy owns thee, dear mother, forever, And laughs on thy lap through the clustering ages Or stands on thy shoulders upreaching to heaven. O Mother of Melody, all the worlds, songless And loveless, awaited thy measures and motions, Inflection and cadence and monotone, voicing The throbs and pulsations of being's beginning, With far, faint foreseeings of future progressions Upbuilding in splendor the dream of the morning. Dear Mother of Melody, down through the ages Of man and his savagery, man and his longings For manifold mast'ry of worlds and conditions, For thought upward soaring to seize the immortal AFTER NOONTIDE 157 As prize of the mortal ; to thee has he given His soul's rarest gifts and, in raptured submission, Has marched to thy measures through battle and danger ; In torture of spirit, defied hell or heaven, In worship of Janus or Moloch or Mammon, With passion infatuate, worshipping Venus, Or in thy clear harmonies hearing the Master, Following the dear Nazarene by still waters Where weary souls rest in the evergreen pastures. Rapt Mother of Melody, silent no longer, The multitudes come to thee, as through the spaces The dawn first approached thee, intent but to hear thee And bring thee the sunlight of first recognition : Now each comes with phormix, with harp or with cymbal, With horns mellow blowing, strings twanging, lutes sighing, Or voices keyed high to their own aspirations ; Peace, war, love, hate, passion, or mixing and mingling Of all to some vision of riches, power, glory, In one mighty blare of a multiform discord. O Mother of Melody, vexed with our noises, Long'st thou for the silence, or for the low voices, Untaught of man's vanity, free from his vices His wars and contentions, his selfish ambitions; There still is the midnight in star-lighted pastures 158 AFTER NOONTIDE Far off from the tumults of hot, fev'rish cities ; There yet is the robin that heralds the morning With raptures of thankfulness, greeting Aurora; There still is the child on the lap of its mother, Low gurgling and cooing in innocent measures As sweet to the ear as the rustle and murmur Along the green ranks of the maize, or the break- ing Of buds when young April first calls up the blos- soms From winter's long slumbers ; there yet are the whispers Of prayer to the Father of mercies uncounted From spirits contrited and broken by sorrow Made pure by love's precious libations as dewdrops Englobed from the breath of sweet waters unsul- lied. Mother of Melody, though we do wrong to thee, With babblings discordant thy great spirit vexing, Yet ever to thee, on knees bended, we offer The homage of souls thou hast won and uplifted, And most when thy numbers voiced full adoration To Him the All-father who wrought thee and gave thee The marvel euphonian of rhythmical measures, And us the great joy of a sweet emulation Which, through all our failures, awakens the latent Desires of our hearts for that heavenly music Which fails not and palls not through ages un- ending. AFTER NOONTIDE 159 CONTENT A LIGHTER heart than mine may beat ■^^ A gladder measure than I know; A wiser head may find the sweet, Deep hidden in the gall of woe; But I, who am but common clay, Touched by each petty joy or pain, Find all too brief life's little day To force from grief her hidden gain, And therefore take my joys on trust And draw on hope for unseen things, Or smile above the common dust That time has wrought of clowns and kings. One man grasps power and loses peace, Another laughs to hide his tears ; Men follow men like sheep or geese In quaint processions down the years, While here or there a genius lights The way across the barren plain, And hero souls assail the heights That others have assailed in vain ; But I who have not strength to scale The frozen peaks nor wings to soar, Must find my raptures in the vale, In wood and field my varied store. 160 AFTER NOONTIDE DISCONTENT TDUT though I hug content and make It virtue to consort with peace, Let me not make the old mistake That bade each high ambition cease, Nor frown on god-like discontent That breaks the tyrant's cank'ring chain, And storms each buttressed battlement That ignorance rears in toil and pain To guard the sanctity of kings In greed's blood-spattered palaces, Or dares to crush the evil things That swarm where lust or malice is. Ambition such as this may be Contented with the humblest flower, Or happy in the wild bird's glee, December's snow or April's shower. It's discontent is with the crude, The base, the tyrannous, the wrong; For love it leaps in gratitude ; For liberty it dares be strong; And sweet to it the mountain height, The heather and the glacial stream, Or some low valley of delight Where lovers stray and poets dream. AFTER NOONTIDE 161 CONTENT WITH DISCONTENT ' I ^HOUGH one may smile and live, content With what of good or ill befall, And hold his spirit's fire unspent Till roused by duty's bugle call, No pauper soul, no ingrate mind Is his because he loveth peace And cherishes and trusts his kind For present good and love's increase ! Divine is noble discontent ! And yet content is sweeter far, The holiest, purest sentiment, The friend of peace, the foe of war ! But, yield it all and it may lead To stagnant stream and sodden land, Where no resolve matures in deed, Where heaven is lost and hell is banned; Where weal nor woe may no man find ; But languid winds with poppied breath Arachnian webs of stupor wind That bind all things in living death. Wherefore, content with discontent That wars on tyranny and wrong, May one not take love's sacrament And join in peace's sacred song? 162 AFTER NOONTIDE BORROWED LIGHT 'TVHERE is not a mote in the sunshine, Nor a planet in the sky That doth not glow with a borrowed light, And the grandest man on the greatest height Shines forth, as the moth and planet shine, With a light that passeth by, Or falls from a world on high, Evolved from a thought divine, And flames upon him a golden zone — Him cent'ring in glory men think his own. INDIAN SUMMER VS. THE PROFESSOR /^VNE learned professor, wise sais-tout ^-^ From out his mighty box of knowledge, Has had a recent overflow Of wisdom at his famous college, And argued Indian summer off The chart of facts, with pond'rous reason, Made all her happy days a scoff, And said, in terms, "there's no such season." In vain, round the horizon's rim, The smoke of mouldering fires arises, In vain the ruddy sun grows dim, When mist and haze work their surprises ; AFTER NOONTIDE 163 In vain the ripe leaves patter down To form rich carpets, red and yellow; "Fair Indian summer's lost her crown," Avers this dapper college fellow. O wise sais-tout, our hearts are sad; Add no more dead weights to our crosses ! We're neither good nor very bad, But wherefore multiply our losses? Take what you must, but spare our dreams — Each dear old dream and rare illusion — When mystery-haunted woods and streams With summer crown the fall's conclusion ! We know each tinge and fairy tint, The fleeting thrills, the old sensations, Each tender, melancholy hint And all the season's indications; We watch the mellow, dying blaze That seeks to warm the chill newcomer, But wherefrom comes this golden haze If there's no good, old Indian summer? Where now the feasts of Harvest Home, The festivals and friendly meetings, The welcomes given to those who roam, The honest Indian summer greetings? How fares it with "the hunter's moon," That blushed above the hunt's confusion, Since learning, in time's afternoon, Declares her reign a cheap illusion? 164 AFTER NOONTIDE No more the stag shall flee, at morn, Before the bowman's sly approaches; No more the driver wind his horn, Nor speed, through golden dust, his coaches; No more shall come the cavalcade When Indian summer weddings flourish, Since this learned pedagogue has made Such debris of the dreams we cherish. Professor — let me speak it low — It seems to me, with all your graces, You know too much that isn't so And bank too much on commonplaces. The Indian summer's more than dream ; Your logic wrongs both fact and reason; Go walk by field and wood and stream And learn, for once, there's such a season ! Fragrance of spice, pawpaws and mints Await your doubting, blunted senses ; Through many a maze of varied tints The wahoo flames by crooked fences, The turkeys gobble, guineas clack And boys go whistling lover's ditties, While farmer lads come trooping back From books or desks in tiresome cities. You might as well come say to these, "Henceforth there'll be no Indian summer !" As overturn a hive of bees And hope to dodge each angry hummer! AFTER NOONTIDE 165 In practice, either enterprise Might peril much your beauty's blossom, And 'twould be far more worldly wise To play the season's silent 'possum. Old Indian summer, dreamy, rare, With nuts and golden pippins mellow, Is just about as fair and square A deal as e'er was dealt a fellow; And you, dear Doctor Know-it-all, Go to, with all your fierce negation ! Old Indian summer's got the call On muscle, mind and inclination. Her reign, it may be short or long, But she's a queen to all conditions ; Unto her shrine the people throng, Enjoy her raptures and provisions ; The hunter's priestess, farmer's friend; To praise her every one has reason, And he was born to some bad end Who scowls and storms, "there's no such sea- son !" AT BELLE AIR T WANDERED down the winding road "*" By the old place at Belle Air, Where youth and innocence abode And hearts were light as air ; 166 AFTER NOONTIDE Where the sun rose up and the sun went down, And the days were fair and sweet, In the summer's green or the autumn's brown, Or the winter's storm and sleet ; For that was in the old, old time, — The old time, long ago, When the pulses beat to the happy rhyme Of a song we used to know, — A wordless song that seemed to float From the stellar worlds above And sing, through its ev'ry silver note, Of love, love, love. I walked again the old road-way, — By the place of tombstones white That stand where children used to play, — And it palsied me with fright To see their names on the pitiless stones And read of their sleep below With dead men's dust and decaying bones, — The children that loved me so ! — O death is strong; but love lives long, And death himself shall die, And the old, old song of the childish throng Be sung in the bye and bye When death lies cold in barren mold That naught into life may move, While seraphs tune their harps of gold To love, love, love. AFTER NOONTIDE 167 The year grows old and on his hair Are the signs of coming snows, Yet blossoms linger here and there — Belated pink and rose; — But over the woodland path no more Do the children come and go, For the school is gone with its dreams of lore And the light in the west is low; So I see but the headstones, ghastly white, Where the loved and lost repose, And the little church that athwart the light Its quiet shadow throws : O shadow, shadow of faith or creed That lieth the graves above, The children's song tells greater need Of love, love, love ! A SYLVAN LAOCOON A BRAVE young oak was my Laocoon, **■■*" His head upraised to those imperial heights Where the great tulip tree its creamy flowers Unfolds. His trunk, though lithe, was strong and straight, His branches sinewed like an athlete's limbs ; His leaves were glossy-green till autumn days Of mellow sunshine, following frosty nights, Matured them into gold and crimson, tinged By darker shades, whereon the sombre browns Encroached each day until the ribald winds Stripped off his finery, leaving rags alone, — Brown rags of leaves, — to cling and flutter on And dance with winter's ruffian storms, when all Their fair companions slumbered in the mold. Deep in the soil and reaching freely forth For food and drink, — the sap that circulates To bole and branch and farthest cloister'd bud, — My young oak sent his burrowing roots to hold His swelling trunk and coronet of leaves And freights of acorns upright, staunch and sure As doth the sailor's tarred and knotted ropes Sustain the ship's masts when the welt'ring seas Are lashed to fury by stampeding winds. AFTER NOONTIDE 169 And my Laocoon, though proud and strong, Was generous to all the weaker world Of shrub and flower and conscious, moving things, The birds sang in his top and he was glad ; The squirrels munched his acorns and he smiled; The red deer sought his shadow and he shook His greenery with flutterings of delight, And when brown Bruin rubbed his hirsute back Against his roughened bark, he laughed outright And tossed his great arms to the nocturne breeze. Frail hair-ferns nestled in the shelt'ring clefts Made by the great roots parting from his bole And spreading outward like the tentacles Of octopi that sein the swarming seas; And scores of wild herbs, such as love the shade, And shrink from open field and garden close, Shared his large bounty and rejoiced to feast Their starry eyes upon his majesty. Such things he cherished ; but the mob of trees Which crowded on him found him overlord And strenuous master of his own domain ; And many an eager rival pined and died For want of foods his harvesters secured, Or, when the July sun — a Vulcan's forge — Went flaming through the brazen afternoons, Perished of thirst while my Laocoon Was well supplied by his far-reaching roots That sucked up moisture through their spongioles — 170 AFTER NOONTIDE Ten thousand little sponges, open-mouthed, To serve their lord and keep his arteries full ; — Meanwhile the wee things clust'ring at his base Lived out their little lives, matured their seeds, And wrought their purpose in his gracious shade. II How chanced it so I know not ; but there came A wandering minstrel from a neighboring town, Who loved the woods and magnified the oak, Yet thought of woods and oak as servitors Of man and his ambitions, nothing more. While resting in Laocoon's shade he sang A song for him wherein he boasted much Of man and his achievements in the earth, And praised the oak, his ally and his friend, In measured words of little pith, whereto My brave oak, through his myriad murm'ring leaves Responded softly with a song of oaks, — A lay, the untaught minstrel later wrought Into a cruder language of his own : Song of the Oak I'm an oak ! and I feel in my sap the commotion Of old seismic change, as when mountains arose And continents sank in the depths of the ocean, While the volcanoes flamed in their red over- flows. AFTER NOONTIDE 171 I came from a race that is older than history, — A race that sprang forth when the primeval dark Was chased by the sun from the infant world's mystery, Ere Noah went voyaging about in the ark. I'm an oak! and the oaks knew the monsters gi- gantic When great Irish elks and huge mastodons grew : They were helpers of men in that period romantic When Jason went oaring his Argo canoe. They dwelt with strange gods beyond Israel or Edom, And Egypt and Isis were younger than they Were when Moses was leading the tribes out to freedom, Or Confucius taught wisdom to ancient Cathay. I'm an oak ! in my bole is the strength of a giant, — Of Samson, or Theseus, or great Hercules. The oaks were crowned kings ere the cyclops de- fiant, Or centaurs had ravished the lands by the seas, And I smile when I think that in far dreamy ages Old Philemon, perchance, may have started my line Of the family glorious, as told in the pages Of myth books and pantheons and legends divine. 172 AFTER NOONTIDE I'm an oak ! and old minstrels and poets come sing- ing Among my green leaves when the zephyrs are free: From Homer to Burns their sweet numbers are ringing Through centuries of whispering oak leaves to me. The Druids of old wrought their wild divinations In dark oaken bowers, and, I feel in my veins The rhythmical pulse of their weird incantations That moaned like the desolate winds of the plains. I'm an oak ! and my ancestors grew by the ocean, Gave their strength to old galleys and great ships that sailed, And felt in their sap the salt waves' every motion, When summer skies smiled, or the storm winds prevailed ; And my strength is as theirs, under new world con- ditions, It shouts in my branches, makes val'rous my soul, Inspires me and thrills me until the old visions Of conquest and glory in dreams o'er me roll. I'm an oak ! and the oaks love the wilderness voices, The mad shouts of the storm in the forest, the roar AFTER NOONTIDE 173 Of fire in the pines, or when April rejoices The low laugh of glad waters that ripple and pour. We're kings of the wildwood, we reign o'er the fountain Where oak leaves lie thick on the life-giving wave ; We tower in our pride at the foot of the mountain, Or we trail our gray moss o'er the wanderer's grave. I'm an oak! and the oak tree is gentle and tender To every frail creature that bows at his feet, And justice or service to man I would render Yield my limbs to hang rogues on, give mercy a seat. I have shelter and food for the Lord's own anointed Be they insects, or mortals, or gods overthrown ; But I stand for my rights, as my author appointed, And flourish or fall in defense of my own. The village minstrel listened, much confused, And when the oak had finished, murmur'd low "The tree outboasts me ! Being but a tree ; I did not think a tree could feel so much, Nor know so many things that mortals feel;" Then bowed his head and wander'd musing on Intent to think the boastful ballad out And sing it in his rude vernacular. > 174 AFTER NOONTIDE III One soft spring day, up-peeping through the mold Among the wind flowers at the young oak's feet, There came a strange plant-baby to unfold Its tender buds, beseeching warmth and light And whisp'ring faintly as such new-born things May lisp and whisper with their protean tongues: "I am a vine-child longing for the heights Where first the morning sunlight strikes the wood, For the clear air, the free and open sky, Concave and gemmed with palpitating stars ; But being a vine I cannot stand alone Like yonder poplar, or this strong, young oak That shelters my frail life ; nor can I be More than a sprawling, mildewed, helpless thing, Encumb'ring earth and lost to my divine Inheritances in the upper world, Unless you lend me of your strength, great oak, And take me by the hands that I may mount Along your mighty bole and decorate Your lofty crown with twining spray and flower; For I shall bear such fruitage as may make Your grand tiara richer than a god's, And render yonder lordly tulip tree Plain and old-fashioned, by comparison ; And yet I shall be but an humble vine, Too weak to injure, too proud to forsake, And all my growing glory may be yours ; But I may see the sky, the sun, the stars, Breathe the high air and serve you, and, therein Attain my heritage as my reward. AFTER NOONTIDE 175 And my Laocoon looked down, well pleased And deeply touched by all the vine had said, Charmed by her graceful form and flatt'ring speech, And more than won by her sweet promises, Till all his treehood into rapture ran, And murmuring, through his unsheathing buds, As zephyr's voice his sylvan welcome rose In answer to the vine and floated out Athwart the forest, upward toward the sky, Or lisped its burden till the birds and bees And clustering green'ry quenched their noise to hear. The words were wedded to a woodsy air Such as none but the forest minstrels know. Song of Welcome Little vine, frail, fairy vine, May my rugged strength be thine ! To my rough bark cleave and cling, Round my lithe arms twine and spring High and higher from mold and clod, Till a high arboreal god I shall stand enwreathed by thee Through a green eternity ! Little vine, confiding vine, 'Round my strength thy beauty twine! I will lift thee to thy place, Thou my coronet shall grace ! 176 AFTER NOONTIDE I, a king, grow straight and strong; Thou art nature's sylvan song, And thy living rhyme shall be All I'll crave from poesy. Little vine, aspiring vine, Never more in grief repine ! There is vigor in my arms To protect from all that harms ; There is firmness in my bole To uphold my aureole, Which my pretty vine shall be, Crown of my divinity ! The infant vine assumed a lovelorn air, Leaned her wee head, in hood of velvet green ; Toward the young oak outstretched a tiny hand And her response to sylvan music sang: The Response I shall not grow weary ascending As the days and the years wander by ! A grateful heart's love is unending, And a faithful heart's hope cannot die. From thy loftiest spray trailing over, When my long upward-reaching shall end, I'll whisper my love to my lover, — My lover, my liege lord and friend, — AFTER NOONTIDE 177 I'll smile through green leaf and brown berry And rejoice in the rain or the sun, And dance with the wind and be merry For the joy of the quest I have won. So I lose myself once and forever, To find all my glory in thine, And nothing from thee shall dissever The close-clinging love of thy vine. And my young oak was happy with his vine, Rejoiced to see her pretty leaves unfold, Spring after spring, her slender stem arise And her soft tentacles reach out and up And grasp his bark or some down-drooping spray, Twine gently round and harden in their hold Till winter's storms might sooner rend his limbs Than break one clasp of his ascending vine Wherewith she clung to him and mounted up To her high destiny anear the clouds. IV If those quick changes into living wires Of grasping fingers, which at first were soft And gentle as an infant's playful touch, Disturbed the oak he gave no outward sign ; But vine and oak were one in the new joy Of their uniquely strange companionship. And when the vine attained to his great crown 178 AFTER NOONTIDE Of spreading boughs and leaped from limb to limb, And over-ran them, flaunting glossy leaves From every verdant branch, festooning each With curious, pendant flowers, or when the frosts Autumnal touched the softer greens and turned Them into flame, hung there her clustering fruit, In brown and purple globes, rare jewels for His lofty diadem, his joy was full And to the sun his soul o'erflowed in prayer : "Father of light And yielder of good, Who shall affright, When thou in thy might, Dispenseth a flood Of love and delight ! "Father benign ! Hear thou my prayer; To my beautiful vine Give tenderest care ! As she seeketh divine Light high in the air, Give tenderest care !" And now there came a hundred forms of life To him, for shelter, where one came before. His arbored top was populous with wings ; Birds sang and insects hummed for him all day, And meek-eyed creatures found his matted bower A safe asylum from the huntsman's gun. AFTER NOONTIDE 179 The oriole swung her hammock where the vine Spanned some clear space, and hung vibrating there, While her companion of the golden breast Sang out his soul to cheer her brooding days. The squirrel mother built her nest of leaves, Where interlacing vines and twigs converged, And reared her frisky young, the robin came To sing his raptured welcome to the dawn From highest spray, or speed the parting day When paradise went smiling down the west. There noisy blackbirds clung on April morns And shouted wildly to the unfolding buds, Or some lone eagle folded weary wings And in a silence, ominous, surveyed The varied scene ; and many small birds came With warblings sweetly clear and musical As ever charmed the soul of tree or vine, Or fell upon the duller ears of man. And my Laocoon forgot his fears, — If fears he'd cherished, — and rejoicing bore His twining, clinging vine on willing arms ; Glad in his strength, to bear the burden up ; Rejoiced with all the thronging visitors Through summer days, and, in the winter's gloom, Sang martial airs with wand'ring warrior winds. At length the vine outreached his highest leaf And hung her banners out in triumph there To catch the breeze in that unshadowed light, 180 AFTER NOONTIDE The highest and most graceful plume the oak, Her humble servant, now bore in his crown, Through sun or starshine. She had won her place, — The goal for which her young ambition yearned. Thence looking up she felt the ardent sun Smile on her leaf and thrill her mounting sap, And for a day's space she was satisfied And whispered softly to the zephyr's kiss, A pean to victory such as mortals raise, Who, helped to power by stronger, better men, Are swollen with pride and arrogate the fame, The guerdons and the glory to themselves : Song I was lowest of the lowly, Child of the earthly mold, Yet have arisen slowly, Pinched by the wintry cold, Beaten by winds that whistle Near to the old brown earth, Neighbor to wort and thistle, Was I, e'en from my birth. Fearless of storms, ascending Day by day I grew; Upward with strain unending Did I my way pursue, AFTER NOONTIDE 181 Till now, in the air of morning, I flaunt my leaves on high, With flower and fruit adorning The arch of the sober sky. Sister of star and sunbeam, Mistress of wood and field, In joy of hope and day dream, Great is the power I wield ; I shall mount higher, higher, And reach up to the sun ; In the warmth of his kindly fire Shall my quest and crown be won. How puny the oak tree seemeth, Claiming me as his crown, When glory round me beameth And jealous worlds look down ! I have yielded enough of graces To earthly mold and tree, — Since now the loftiest place is, By naught, too high for me. V Deem not the vine a cruel ingrate, thus To make the oak her victim in return For his large bounty, that had said : "Arise, Upon my strength and glorify the world Of sylvan gladness with thy trailing grace:' 182 AFTER NOONTIDE She was not loveless and ingratitude Had little part in her ambitious schemes, Her thought and speech were born of hard, cold facts Of structure, impulse and environment, That work out destiny for tree and vine As well as history for men and states. She, having caught the oak in her embrace, Might not release him though she felt the clasp Of her contracting coils, her smothering leaves Securely dominating trunk and branch And overmastering his vitality. What her soul felt for him man may not know, Since vegetation speaks through leaf and flower, Fruit, color, tint and fragrance, or the grace, Of combinations such as we perceive, On blooming prairies, fields of waving grain, Or where wild buttercups and daisies meet. We feel the subtle force, infinite stress Of this plant language, but discover not Its finer meanings, nor interpret such As we may blindly guess, in human speech ; But once my village bard, in waking dream, Passed through a garden breaking into bloom And heard its genii chant a curious song, — An artless medley in the warp of which They wove the clumsy language wherewith men Have sought to voice the speech of color, tint, AFTER NOONTIDE 183 And varied form in blossom, bud and leaf And so translate them to the yearning soul. And after searching many "Floral Guides" And sundry ornate "Languages of Flowers" Rich in quotations from bucolic bards, My village laureate thus translated parts Of many things the prattling genii sang: The Dream Bud When the Dream Bud breaks and the blossom blows, There's nobody tells you, for nobody knows What the mad soul does, where the glad soul goes When the Dream Bud breaks and the blossom blows. When the Dream Bud bursts and the red flower waves, Then the love born in heaven, is the love that saves, In the wild rush of feeling that the heart enslaves, When the soul is on fire and the red flower waves. When the Dream Bud opes and the white -flower blooms, There are quaint marvels woven in the dream god's looms, From the soft sunlight sifted through the trailing plumes Of the red-wanded willows when the white flower blooms. 184 AFTER NOONTIDE When the Dream Bud yields and the blue flower springs, Then truth is the homage that false heart brings, And love is the idyl that the scorner sings When faith is an anchor and the blue flower springs. When the Dream Bud blows and the mixed flower shows, How the sick soul tosses, how the mad world goes; How the loud laughter lapses, how the hot tear flows, Through the heights and the depths when the mixed flower shows ! When the Dream Bud parts for the passion flower, There is woe in the trail of the flying hour, And a storm of sorrow is the midnight's dower When the wild winds wail for the passion flower. When the Dream Bud spreads and the lilac springs, One maiden, only one, has the hidden wings, And the first lover loved is a king of kings, When the brown thrush warbles and the lilac springs. When the Dream Bud blooms in a cup of flame, Then the trumpet flower is the trump of fame, And the wide world trembles at the awesome name Of the dream-drunken sleeper with his cup of flame. AFTER NOONTIDE 185 When the Dream Bud dies and the blossoms fail, Then never does a bark on the dream sea sail, And no knight ever rides for the holy grail, When the toadstools cluster and the blossoms fail. When the Dream Bud breaks and the blossom blows, There's nobody tells you, for nobody knows, What the mad soul does, where the glad soul goes When the Dream Bud breaks and the blossom blows. VI A day's contentment for the victor vine, Joy of achievement, promise of repose, And then the world-old story! All content With world conditions being ever child Of discontent's fair daughter, hope, first born Of minist'ring divinities, save love. When her brief heyday with content had passed, And still the aspiring force urged on and on And up and up, when she no more could rise, — Since neither beam of sun nor star might lift Her helpless weight on high in that clear air; — And by the strong, resistless force compelled To live by growth, or of stagnation die, She vainly sought to overleap the space That opened blue between the oak's high crown And any neighboring tree that beckoned her. 186 AFTER NOONTIDE Outworn by failure, sorrowing, perhaps, Because she'd found no ladder to the stars, She turned about (it was her destiny) Caught twig, then branch, once more, and circled round Her benefactor's head, ran here and there, And knit and tangled all his leafy crown In closely clinging nets of living wire, As some great spider knits the wayside weeds Together with his countless silv'ry threads And smothers them in shrouds of gossamer. And my young oak ! ill fared it then with him ! His burden grew upon him day by day; First he grew weary, next, he felt the force Of hugging coil and grasping tentacle; His joys decreased and sorrows multiplied, His blighted acorns prematurely fell, And then the vine grew hateful to his soul. At length he raged for freedom and invoked The aid of savage winds and swelled his bole, And, with the roaring storm, his great arms lashed, In phrensy screamed, and shook from root to crown Till all the forest trembled and great boughs Were torn from the surrounding trees, and he Was scarred and maimed by many an ugly wound; And yet the vine clung and her python coils Crushed through his bark and choked his mighty limbs, And all his strength was powerlesss to shake off AFTER NOONTIDE 187 The hateful thing that bound him as with thongs Of wire annealed, that might not yield nor break. Meanwhile the vine's roots, permeating all The oak's domain of soil, robbed him of food And drink ; her leaves consumed the vital breath That heaven, before, had yielded unto him, Till my strong conqu'ror, who defied the mob Of crowding trees and sent them down to death, In turn, was disinherited and made Untimely victim of a sure decline. One mighty limb, whose branches upward rose, Above all others, felt the python clasp And multiplying burden of the vine So weighing on it, choking back its sap And shutting off the sunlight from its leaves, That like a prisoner in a dungeon chained, It pined and sickened, till its upper half — The half that was the monarch's crown and pride- Died utterly ; its leaves and light spra}^s fell, And where the glory rose, some sapless prongs Alone remained, from which the bark fell off; The flaunting vine slipped down a little way And, bare and white, the lifeless stumps arose Like splintered antlers of some titan elk ; Wherefrom the sentinel crow surveyed the scene To spy out danger for his clam'rous brood ; The great woodpecker, he the pec-bois- grand, The pileate, who shuns our naked fields Repeated there his quaintly ringing cry Or on their white crusts beat his loud tattoo. 188 AFTER NOONTIDE A cruel wound, received in that first strife, Became a cankering sore and eat its way Into his trunk, with rust and rot until The worms and insects, multiplying, wrought A cavern in his citadel of strength Wherein the raccoon reared her saucy young. But my Laocoon gave little heed To bird or beast; his broken spirit failed, And he grew sadder, weaker day by day; Yet often, summoning his failing strength, Cried to the storm wind : "Let us rend again !" And battled vainly to unleash himself. Thus sorrow followed sorrow and his soul Knew all that tree may know of worldly woe, And all the stings wherewith ingratitude Afflicts the life of any sylvan thing Were felt by him until the stormy end Came in the tumult of the battle's rage. 'Twas near the close of one unhappy day When all his being into protest ran, And protest into wildest fury grew : The southwest wind came fiercely howling on : The oak cried to him : "Now you give me joy ! I hold my arms up in their cruel bonds, And pray you blow upon them, blow your worst, And let me lend my strength that we may shake The hateful vine away, or I may break, And, breaking, end my woes, and happily, If this relentless vine may die with me." AFTER NOONTIDE 189 Then the wind caught his mighty top and blew The clust'ring vines out like a bellying sail ; But they clung fast and all the oak top roared And shook and bowed before the dreadful blast For one brief moment, then with loud report The great trunk broke and branching limb and vine Were swept off by the furious gale and borne, Lightly as zephyrs bear the children's kites, So far away, beyond the great oak's stump — Left standing there alone in death — the vine Was torn from her strong moorings in the soil And vine and limb and leafy spray were blent In one rude sylvan tragedy, and there Was silence after for the wind had passed. The sun flamed through the opening in the bower On fallen branch and vine and withered them. The startled birds and animals, bereft Of home and shelter, fled the mournful scene ; But sweet peace came and spread her noiseless wing Above the ruin, and green strangers grew Beneath the wreckage ; but the wood was changed, And never more to be as it had been. Next morn my village bard came, saw and wept; But when the sun rose smiling, dried his tears And in low improvisitation sang: 190 AFTER NOONTIDE The proud head has fallen, The glory is over, The life-story ended, The loved and the lover, In one ruin blended, Lie hopelessly fallen, The drama is over! The anguish is over, And dead the ambitions That led to the sorrow ! Here's peace to old visions ! We'll sigh not tomorrow For dreams that are over, Nor fallen ambitions. Postscript When years had passed the rhymer came again To walk alone, not lonely, through the wood And note the changes time had wrought therein. Lured by the bluebird's call, the sparrow's lay He sought the warblers where the great oak's top With its encumbering vine lay mold'ring low. The birds flew on into the denser shades; But there he found the ginseng's pretty leaf; Nearby the trilium showed its purple bloom And, frankly bold, "J ac k>iri-the-pulpit" held His long-lipped pitcher upward to the light, And to the visitor's inquiring gaze, In his sharp tongue, up-speaking, thus replied : AFTER NOONTIDE 191 "Seek not a moral here, for there is none ! We greenly growing things may hist'ry make In our short day of changing shade and sun ; But spin no morals e'en for virtue's sake. "What happens here, where each with each must strive Is but old nature's way of settling things, And only the best fitted may survive, Be they weak plants or forest lords and kings. But which is fittest, we may never know, Sometimes the oak survives, sometimes the vine, Both fail at others, and to ruin go, That from their mold we- weaker things may twine, Or lift our heads up, on our slender stalks, That each may have his day, sometime, some- where. What learnest thou from all thy woodland walks, Exceeding this, of victory, hope, despair? "But art!" you cry; I nothing know of art; I teach but hist'ry, in my humble way; Its facts are facts ; each actor has his part In life or death ; each has his little day. Blame not the rampant vine, blame not the oak, The briar, the thorn, the thistle or the weed; Each works the will of Him whose mandate spoke It into life, be it of grace or greed. 192 AFTER NOONTIDE "Of man I speak not ; art he hath, and mind Beyond the great earth's rim to take his way, And he may morals in a brush heap find; I only know each creature hath his day, His little span of sunshine, starshine, shade, His later silhouettes of deeper grief, — When springs arrive or cruel frosts invade — If bud or blossom, ripened fruit or leaf." "But I would fain think," cried the wand'ring bard, "The ruined oak and vine are fitting types Of man and woman, when ill-mated, each Led by some force more dominant than love To tower, or climb and fill his little world With individual glory and renown." "I told you, I of mortals naught might say," — Retorted then the fiery pulpiteer, — "But this I'll venture now, if so I may With naught from my temerity to fear: Your borrowed moral's, but a dotard's croak, Some old rake's scandal, mumbled o'er his wine, Since man is not and never was an oak, And, truce to fable, woman's not a vine." The poet, turning on his ready heel, Without an uttered protest, walked away, But whispered humbly to his manuscript: AFTER NOONTIDE 193 "Go forth my little scroll and tell thy tale, If any care to heed it ; though it fail Of such sensations as a tale must yield To touch the pulse of thousands, it may wield A gentler influence o'er the calmer few, At once, more lasting, more serenely true Than might prevail through greater art or be Wedded to fame through mortal chivalry; For morals are not wanting in its play Of sylvan story, either grave or gay : With heart to feel and open eyes to see, He who may read this woodland tragedy May find its morals sure without the aid Of chart or index, and, be unafraid Of criticism, such as just expressed ; Jack-in-the-pulpit's but a weed at best !" IS 1906 V 015 87 ' Jl ^|