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LONE STAR LYRICS 
 
 WILL P. LOCKHART 
 
 ARTletV6RITAn,1 
 
 RICHARD G. BADGER 
 
 THE GORHAM PRESS 
 BOSTON 
 
Copyright 1912 by Will P. Lockkart 
 All Rights Reserved 
 
 V 
 
 
 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 
 
 For permission to use published matter contained 
 in this work, I am gratefully indebted to Holland's 
 Magazine, Farm and Ranch, Dallas News Maga- 
 zine, as well as other publications too numerous to 
 mention, and including my home papers at McKin- 
 ney, Tex. 
 
 The Author 
 
 The Gorham Press, Boston, U. S. A. 
 £ CI A3 14 452 
 
DEDICATION 
 
 To my friends, known and unknown, is this 
 work respectfully dedicated. My contributions to 
 periodicals and newspapers have won for me kind 
 words of appreciation and approval from the former; 
 from the latter I have received scores of encouraging 
 missives. That this little volume may win for its 
 author yet a few more flowers is my dearest hope. 
 
 Will P. Lockhart 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 A Lone Star Minstrel 9 
 
 Sue and I 10 
 
 The Vampire's Clutch 11 
 
 Jot It Down 12 
 
 Tim Hannigan 13 
 
 The Vermiform 15 
 
 A Wise Decision 15 
 
 A Message 17 
 
 The Chasm 17 
 
 Gather Life's Roses 18 
 
 A Sermonette 18 
 
 Hope 20 
 
 What Have I Given? 20 
 
 Gambling With Death 21 
 
 The Gathering of the Waters 22 
 
 The Idol— Gold 23 
 
 Winter 24 
 
 The Texas Plume 25 
 
 The Man with the Pen . 26 
 
 May 26 
 
 A Cereal Story 27 
 
 Infinity 28 
 
 The Dying Day 29 
 
 Unfettered 30 
 
 Phantoms 31 
 
 Trouble With Sue 32 
 
 The Life Prisoner 33 
 
 Life's Sunset 34 
 
 Calvary 35 
 
 Tolstoy 36 
 
 My Prayer 37 
 
 A Vision. 37 
 
 5 
 
PAGE 
 
 Wail of An Old Violin 89 
 
 Lost 39 
 
 The Ways of Death 41 
 
 Sunset 42 
 
 One Soul's Desire 44 
 
 Drifting 44 
 
 Sylvia 46 
 
 The Lost Ship 47 
 
 Saint Nicholas 49 
 
 More Cruel than War 50 
 
 Life's Battle 51 
 
 The Mailed Knight 51 
 
 The Bars . 53 
 
 Soliloquy of Man in the Moon . 54 
 
 A Compromise 55 
 
 In The Gloaming 56 
 
 The Christmas Tree 57 
 
 Back to the Sod 58 
 
 The Captive 59 
 
 The Trouble in Kentucky 60 
 
 Remember 61 
 
 Forever 61 
 
 Contentment's Land 62 
 
 Wright's Rites 63 
 
 The Opinionless Man 63 
 
 Buried Hopes 65 
 
 "Mad from Life's History". 66 
 
 The Mocking Bird 66 
 
 The Phantom Years 67 
 
 A Fatal Strain .68 
 
 We are the Seekers 69 
 
 A Legal Specialist 69 
 
 Back to the Soil 70 
 
 A Literary Degenerate 71 
 
 Which? 72 
 
 Realistic 73 
 
 Rastus on the Mule 73 
 
 Duty and Pleasure 74 
 
 The Night After 75 
 
 Easter ... 76 
 
PAGE 
 
 Columbus 76 
 
 Stung 77 
 
 Christmas 78 
 
 Love's Reason 79 
 
 Loggerhead Lane 80 
 
 Old Year Farewell 81 
 
 The North Wind 81 
 
 When Ethel Sings 82 
 
 What's the Use? 88 
 
 Poems Everywhere 84 
 
 The Music of the Bells 85 
 
 A Life on the Farm 87 
 
 The Good Old Pies 88 
 
 Canute 89 
 
 The Ogre 90 
 
LONE STAR LYRICS 
 
A LONE STAR MINSTREL 
 
 Light of the Lone Star, lead me 
 
 (Dim is my pilgrim way) 
 Forth from the land of slumber — 
 
 Land of the ghosts in gray. 
 Here lies the Southland, dreaming 
 
 Under her perfumed bowers; 
 Fanned by the balmiest breezes — 
 
 Breath of a myriad flowers. 
 
 Gleam of the Lone Star, guide me. 
 
 Ghostly the castles loom; 
 Specters astalk in court and hall, 
 
 Silent, and steeped in gloom. 
 Why are the minstrels silent? 
 
 Why are the harps unswept? 
 Why hath this deadly languor 
 
 Over the Southland crept? 
 
 Beam of the Lone Star, brighten 
 
 Over our Alamo — 
 Silver the tombs of martyrs — 
 
 Touching the shafts with snow. 
 Flash from the skies that story, 
 
 All that a world should know; 
 Gleam till the Southland's glory 
 
 Rivals the sunset's glow! 
 
 Light of the Lone Star, linger. 
 
 Soon must the waking come — 
 Not with the peal of trumpet, 
 
 Not with the roll of drum; 
 Peace hath her laureled victors, 
 
 In the North, and the East to-day; 
 Why should the Southland's glory 
 
 Sleep with the ghosts in gray? 
 
SUE AND I 
 
 Altho' my Sue is such a dear 
 
 With us it's Greek and Greek; 
 Our quarrels, now, for half a year, 
 
 Have averaged three a week. 
 Now I, in my soliloquy, 
 
 Exclaim, "Aye, there's the rub"; 
 For, oh, at last, my fiancee 
 
 Has joined a Shakespear club, 
 
 "Tis Macbeth, Hamlet, Lear et al, 
 
 And other royal crooks, 
 With bits of classic f al de lal 
 
 From ajl the Avon books. 
 But, oh, ye gods, I stood aghast 
 
 When Sue had made it plain, 
 That she had chucked me in the cast, 
 
 To play the looney Dane. 
 
 Well. I succumbed, altho' I knew 
 
 I'd miss the part a mile; 
 And sure enough, my acting drew 
 
 Sue's most sarcastic smile. 
 That sneer of Sue's, oh well, in brief, 
 
 It filled my soul with rage; 
 I ranted like a Highland Chief, 
 
 Athwart the classic stage. 
 
 I made a lapsus linguae first, 
 
 When came my father's ghost; 
 My ire then from its barriers burst — 
 
 I gave the spook a roast. 
 In clownish style I "amateured" 
 
 With patience waning fast; 
 I longed to see the plot matured — 
 
 I'd murder half the cast. 
 
 I know my style was somewhat crude, 
 When, twiddling Yorick's skull, 
 10 
 
I held in drop-kick attitude, 
 
 The jester's cranial hull, 
 But filled with genius' somber gloom, 
 
 I deemed the time was ripe 
 For Hamlet's madness to assume 
 
 A really violent type. 
 
 I'm sore on Hamlet anyway, 
 
 It seems to me the churl 
 Had given the world a better play 
 
 If he had wed the girl; 
 'Tis doubtful if the crazy twain 
 
 Were suited less as mates, 
 Than are my Susan and her swain, 
 
 Of these United States. 
 
 THE VAMPIRE'S CLUTCH 
 
 I stood at eve, by a lonely grave, 
 
 In a country churchyard, old, 
 When the sun dipped low, in the ocean wave, 
 
 And the west was a sea of gold; 
 There came a woman all old and gray, 
 
 And her look was wan and wild; 
 But I heard her say, as she knelt to pray, 
 
 "I pray for my poor lost child." 
 
 And there, as the evening shadows fell, 
 
 While we stood 'neath the pale starlight, 
 Did that bent, gray mother a story tell, 
 
 Of a life and its hideous blight: 
 She told of a beautiful, wilful girl, 
 
 Who had gazed on the gilded lure, 
 That decoys to the city's maelstrom whirl 
 
 The innocent and the pure. 
 
 She told how the poor deluded one 
 Stole forth on that fateful night, 
 
 And was far away when the morning sun, 
 Shone over the mountain height. 
 11 
 
To a mighty city they traced her then, 
 But the questing was all in vain; 
 
 For guarded well is the loathsome den, 
 Where the devils of darkness reign. 
 
 But she wandered back to her mother's arms, 
 
 After long, long years had flown; 
 For woe had faded her youthful charms, 
 
 And they turned her adrift alone. 
 But Death's chill hand was upon her laid, 
 
 And she raved of the awful past — 
 But the refuge made by the sexton's spade 
 
 Now sheltered the poor outcast. 
 
 That mother's prayer, o'er a lost one there, 
 
 Hath many a counterpart; 
 For the hellish vampire of despair 
 
 Draws blood from many a heart. 
 The peace of many a home's destroyed 
 
 By the stench of his pestilent breath; 
 And, still, are the deathless souls decoyed 
 
 To a slavery worse than death, 
 
 JOT IT DOWN 
 
 If a thought is worth a penny, 
 
 Jot it down; 
 It may be a help to many, 
 
 Jot it down; 
 This will exercise your mind 
 And perhaps you soon will find 
 You've a message for mankind, 
 
 Jot it down. 
 
 If you catch a gleam of mirth, 
 
 Jot it down; 
 It may cheer this sad old earth, 
 
 Jot it down; 
 12 
 
It may travel miles and miles 
 In a dozen different styles, 
 And may win a thousand smiles, 
 Jot it down. 
 
 If you've something real pathetic, 
 
 Jot it down; 
 Something tender, sympathetic, 
 
 Jot it down; 
 Though it be devoid of art, 
 That's a matter quite apart; 
 It may melt a stony heart, 
 
 Jot it down. 
 
 If a thought will help a neighbor, 
 
 Jot it down; 
 That is worth your time and labor, 
 
 Jot it down; 
 If it makes some load the lighter; 
 If it makes some road the brighter; 
 It will surely bless the writer, 
 
 Jot it down. 
 
 TIM HANNIGAN 
 
 Tim Hannigan, lazy and shiftless was he, 
 
 And lanky and thin as a mortal can be. 
 
 His garb was a marvel — so slouchy and weird. 
 
 His face — but a tangle of straw-colored beard. 
 
 Indeed, it seemed strange that a figure so spare 
 
 Could sustain such a burden of whiskers and hair. 
 
 On a morning in spring, sunshiny and hot, 
 Tim was hoeing the corn in the newly cleared lot, 
 And soon, by his chronic affliction oppressed, 
 He threw himself down in the sunshine, to rest; 
 A stump for his pillow, the earth for his bed, 
 And for hours weary Timothy slept as the dead. 
 
 13 
 
Now hither, on business, came James Corvus Crow, 
 His wife, and two sons, walking all in a row. 
 Mr. Crow was instructing his hopefuls, that morn, 
 In the time honored practise of pulling up corn; 
 And the canny old bird turned not from his way, 
 But paused in a foot of where Hannigan lay. 
 
 Mrs. Crow, with the usual feminine screams, 
 Cawed aloud to her hubby, "Be careful there, 
 
 Jeems. " 
 Crow replied, "Now, indeed, there's nothing to 
 
 fear; 
 Tis naught but a wind-fallen scarecrow, my dear; 
 But, never in all of my life, have I seen 
 An effigy showing a figure so mean!" 
 
 "Now some of these dummies are modeled with 
 
 art — 
 The straw scarce revealed, and they don't fall 
 
 apart — 
 This insults my intelligence; such a display 
 Underestimates even the wit of a jay. 
 Bring the boys closer, Susan. Now, Jimmy and 
 
 Dan 
 This figure but poorly resembles a man; 
 To demonstrate this I will scatter the straws — " 
 And he lit into Hannigan's beard with his claws. 
 
 With a wild yell of terror, did Hannigan rise, 
 Like a rocket, released for its flight to the skies ! 
 And the crow family, filled with the wildest alarm, 
 Flew home to their tree, at the edge of the farm. 
 They settled themselves on the very top limb, 
 And the mother crow murmured, "I told you so, 
 Jim." 
 
 With crestfallen air, and a quivering beak, 
 The father sat long, ere he ventured to speak. 
 Then he said, in a whisper, as it in a daze : 
 "I have oft heard of rules, and their working both 
 ways. 
 
 14 
 
Such an artful design might the wisest befool; 
 And I never once thought of reversing the rule. 
 To work our undoing, they're changing the plan- 
 Great Macaw ! just to think that was really a man." 
 
 THE VERMIFORM 
 
 Some doctors advise us to have it removed 
 
 Because folks are living without it; 
 But we question if nature has ever approved, 
 
 And there surely is reason to doubt it. 
 Appendix — it seems there's a volume expressed 
 
 In that name, which could scarcely be apter; 
 This abridging life's tome, is uncertain at best, 
 
 And it oft means the end of the chapter. 
 
 A WISE DECISION 
 
 There once was a crow (and his color you know), 
 
 He passed for a very wise fellow; 
 He'd a smile and a word for each brother bird, 
 
 Whose plumage was brown, red or yellow; 
 
 But he'd not a kind word for his brother black- 
 bird, 
 Whom he snubbed at the slightest occasion. 
 M Why, my brothers, just see, he's as black as can 
 
 . ! )e >". 
 
 Said this crow, who'd great powers of persua- 
 sion. 
 
 But a meddlesome jay told the black-bird one day, 
 This remark of the crow, with great candor. 
 
 Said the black-bird, "I see; 'tis plain as can be, 
 I must sue that black fellow for slander. " 
 
 To a crafty jack-daw — an attorney at law — 
 Went the black-bird, for counsel applying. 
 15 
 
Said the jack-daw, "Pay me but a moderate fee, 
 And I'll prove Brother Crow is but lying. " 
 
 Court-day came at last, and attendance was vast 
 — For the jay was a great advertiser — 
 
 Winging stately and slow, came the confident 
 crow, 
 With a shrike, as his legal adviser. 
 
 On a low hanging limb where the light was but 
 dim, 
 Judge Owl, with great patience, sat waiting, 
 While Shrike and Jack-daw, arrayed books of the 
 law, 
 And the black-bird his grievance was stating. 
 
 Cried the canny old owl, with a judicial scowl, 
 When he'd heard the absurd allegation : 
 
 "Let Black-bird and Crow stand together below!" 
 And, in silence, each bird took his station 
 
 Then continued the owl, " 'Tis the bane of all 
 fowl, 
 
 Vain strife between brother, and brother; 
 This is causeless I ween, for 'tis plain to be seen, 
 
 That each bird is as black as the other. 
 
 "Tho' this action is lost, let Crow pay the cost; 
 
 'Twill teach him respect for his neighbors. 
 Messrs. Shrike and Jack-daw, you may cavil and 
 caw, 
 
 You will have but your pains for your labors." 
 
 The indignant Jack-daw 'gan to quote from the law, 
 And Shrike argued, too, for revision; 
 
 For 'twas plain as could be, that they each lost a 
 fee, 
 By His Honor's most sweeping decision. 
 
 But the owl interposed, saying, "Argument 
 closed. 
 Mister Clerk, strike the case from the docket. 
 To your homes now return, for this court I ad- 
 journ. " 
 And he rose from his limb like a rocket. 
 16 
 
A MESSAGE 
 
 O beauteous, golden sunset bars! 
 
 Thy radiance speaks of brighter years, 
 In glorious climes, above the stars, 
 
 Beyond this vale of woe and tears. 
 
 O glittering stars of silvery sheen, 
 Far shimmering in the azure dome! 
 
 Ye tell of grandeurs, yet unseen, 
 That clothe the soul's eternal home. 
 
 Mysterious depths, ethereal, grand, 
 Whose liquid blue infinite soars, 
 
 An amaranthine gem-swept strand; 
 Thy borders greet the heavenly shores. 
 
 All these but herald to the soul 
 
 That mortal here shall cease to roam; 
 
 Shall dwell, while endless ages roll, 
 Above the glittering stars — at home. 
 
 THE CHASM 
 
 Oh love, my love, we can never tell 
 
 Why fate has severed our lives apart. 
 Ere the sun went down and the darkness fell 
 
 It was soul to soul, it was heart to heart. 
 'Twas the sting of a lightly spoken word 
 
 That opened a rift unknown, unseen; 
 The shadows fell and the skies were blurred- 
 
 We stood with a gulf, a grave between. 
 
 I might have explained, but pride forbade 
 Till Folly gloatingly jeered — Too late. 
 
 And the chasm grew till I saw dismayed 
 That yawning gulf as the work of Fate. 
 
 And you, as you coldly turned away 
 Had never a thought within your heart 
 17 
 
That the fissure between our lives that day 
 Would widen till we were seas apart. 
 
 Why is it thus? We can never tell. 
 
 It was not your will, it was never mine. 
 Like puppets we yield to the hideous spell 
 
 And murder a love that was half divine. 
 We can never know why we did not dare 
 
 To bridge the rift ere the worst befell; 
 We can only know that the abyss there 
 
 Is wide as the gulf 'twixt heaven and hell. 
 
 GATHER LIFE'S ROSES 
 
 How oft, oh how oft o'er my heart there has 
 
 rushed 
 Regret for the years that I've squandered. 
 I sigh for youth's flowers, that I ruthlessly crushed, 
 In the paths where I heedlessly wandered. 
 
 I miss the pure blossoms of Friendship so true, 
 
 That I spurned in the gardens of Pleasure; 
 
 And now when they're withered and faded from 
 
 view, 
 In their absence their worth I can measure. 
 
 We but deepen the gloom of the dreariest day 
 When the bright happy hours we remember; 
 And sad is the heart when the bloom of life's May 
 Lies deep 'neath the snows of December. 
 
 Then cherish the flowers of life's spring while you 
 
 may, 
 Soon comes the long winter of sorrow; 
 Oh, spurn not their beauty and sweetness to-day 
 Lest you sigh for their fragrance tomorrow. 
 
 18 
 
A SERMONETTE 
 
 Want has taken none to heaven, 
 
 Wealth was never a restraint, 
 Broad-cloth never made a sinner, 
 
 Patches never made a saint; 
 And the students of the scripture 
 
 Have but studied it in vain, 
 If they fail to grasp the meaning 
 
 That the Savior makes so plain. 
 
 This the man the Savior teaches 
 
 Ne'er shall see the heavenly fold; 
 'Tis the man who worships riches 
 
 Makes an idol of his gold, 
 And they think to little purpose 
 
 And to little purpose read, 
 Who would base a soul's salvation 
 
 On temporal want and need. 
 
 Let us harmonize the scriptures; 
 
 There were patriarchs of old, 
 Who were men of vast possessions 
 
 Yet they worshipped not their gold. 
 But they praised the God who gave it, 
 
 And they used it as they should; 
 And rich and poor were members 
 
 Of a common brotherhood. 
 
 'Tis true the poor and lowly 
 
 Were the chosen ones of Christ, 
 For the rich had spurned his teaching 
 
 As a thing too dearly priced. 
 And 'twas meet that all such grovellers 
 
 Ne'er should see the heavenly fold, 
 Who had heeded not his message 
 
 And had worshipped naught but gold. 
 
 Rich and great or poor and lowly 
 All alike may seek his grace, 
 
 For the glorious gospel message 
 Was to all the human race. 
 19 
 
And its order changeth never 
 For his voice is calling still, 
 
 Grandly ringing down the ages 
 With its "Whosoever will." 
 
 HOPE 
 
 Hope springs eternal in the human breast; 
 
 Its fountain deep within the spirit lies. 
 The wretch by woes unspeakable oppressed, 
 
 Yet feels within, that mystic fountaip rise. 
 Despair may post his sentries all about, 
 
 And human succor fail to pierce the line, 
 But vainly delves the pioneer without; 
 
 He cannot sap the source of hope divine. 
 
 As, when the shallow streams of earth are spent, 
 
 The deeper waters even stronger grow, 
 Hope's healing stream, deep in the spirit pent, 
 
 Bursts forth amain, from founts we did not 
 know — 
 Nor would have known, but for the pangs extreme, 
 
 That showed us hidden depths within the soul. 
 Deep sorrow turns to Hope's perennial stream, 
 
 As helplessness implores divine control. 
 
 Hope springs eternal in the human breast. 
 
 This proves divine the origin of man. 
 The lot of dumb unreasoning brutes were best 
 
 If life were bounded by its mortal span. 
 But, oh, when darkness settles like a pall 
 
 A hand, unseen by mortal, lifts the veil; 
 And ne'er shall woe the steadfast soul enthrall, 
 
 For Hope endures; its fount will never fail. 
 
 WHAT HAVE I GIVEN? 
 
 Has the bloom of endeavor but faded away 
 'Neath the chill of adversity's blast? 
 
Then turn back life's pages, turn back day by 
 day, 
 
 Thro' the volume of years that have passed. 
 Examine your record with unbiased view; 
 
 Is it only for self you have striven? 
 Perhaps then the world is returning to you 
 
 The measure of service you've given. 
 
 Do you seek by upbraiding and bitter complaint 
 
 To convince this old world of your worth? 
 Do you pose as a martyr — a sage or a saint 
 
 111 used by the ingrates of earth? 
 Turn back, in life's ledger, the leaves of your days; 
 
 You may find that the honors are even — 
 You may find in the annals of service and praise 
 
 Full credit for all that you've given. 
 
 As we sow must we reap; and in nature's own style 
 
 The world will return what we offer. 
 'Tis measure for measure, a smile for a smile, 
 
 It is scorn, bitter scorn, for the scoffer; 
 It is honor for heroes — the earnest and true — 
 
 Who for truth against error have striven. 
 So blame not the world if it stints even you 
 
 But ask yourself, "What have I given?" 
 
 GAMBLING WITH DEATH 
 
 (The Auto Race) 
 
 A swish, a roar, one, two, three, four, 
 
 Aye, number them while you may; 
 Short is the step from the level track 
 
 To the Judgment Bar to-day. 
 Grim Death will number each dizzy lap, 
 
 For the wager with him is made 
 That Fate will allow no dire mishap 
 
 To master the skill displayed. 
 
 A swish, a roar, they pass once more; 
 We number them one, two, three; 
 21 
 
Inquire the fate of the missing "four" 
 
 Of that hurrying throng you see. 
 Score one for Death! for the word goes round, 
 
 In a murmur of awestruck tones, 
 That an ambulance soon will rid the ground 
 
 Of a bundle of shattered bones. 
 
 Mischance sp dire — 'twas a faulty tire 
 
 Set the driver's skill at naught — 
 But on with the race, all kingly sport 
 
 With danger and death is fraught. 
 Like shrieking demons they come, are gone, 
 
 Will they stand the fearful strain? 
 Can mortal redeem the deadly pawn 
 
 By the cunning of hand and brain? 
 
 A lightning swerve, at the fatal curve, 
 
 A crash of the barrier riven, 
 And into the human wall beyond 
 
 A monster of death is driven! 
 Ah, just a few more startled souls 
 
 To eternity's shore are tossed; 
 A few more names writ on the rolls 
 
 To show what the sport has cost. 
 
 We stare aghast at the barbarous past 
 
 And the bloody arena of Rome; 
 But it seems, in the twentieth century, 
 
 We've much the same, here at home. 
 Why shudder at pagan sports of old, 
 
 When life is so cheap to-day — 
 So often bartered for yellow gold, 
 
 Or a moment of vain display. 
 
 THE GATHERING OF THE WATERS 
 
 Wealth once dammed a mountain torrent 
 
 Up among the Eastern hills; 
 Fiercely, as imprisoned demons, 
 
 Raged the one-time peaceful rills; 
 
 22 
 
Till the flood of angry waters, 
 
 Swept the barrier away — 
 And the valley's humble dwellers 
 
 Died by scores that awful day. 
 
 Wealth has dammed a mightier torrent, 
 
 A resistless human tide; 
 It is thundering thro' the gorges, 
 
 Climbing up the mountain side; 
 See the mighty wall atremble, 
 
 Hear its groanings louder grow — 
 And the builders gather lilies. 
 
 In the valley down below. 
 
 THE IDOL— GOLD 
 
 The lightnings flashed round Sinai's crest, 
 Deep thunders o'er the mountain rolled; 
 
 Its heights in fearful grandeur drest, 
 Appalled the hosts of Israel's fold. 
 
 Each awestruck follower in that band, 
 Well knew this sight their eyes beheld, 
 
 Proclaimed that Israel's leader grand, 
 With Israel's God communion held; 
 
 Yet, with the quivering mount in view, 
 While yet the echoing thunders rolled; 
 
 Within the camps the clamoring grew 
 For molten images of gold. 
 
 And, man, to-day, just as of old, 
 Regarding not Jehovah's power, 
 
 Bows down and worships sordid gold, 
 Neglectful of his richer dower. 
 
 Like those rebellious Israelites, 
 
 He bows the knee at Mammon's shrine, 
 Nor lifts his eyes to grander heights, 
 
 Where shines the radiant light divine. 
 23 
 
He bows unto that idol still; 
 
 Is callous to a brother's woes; 
 Is dead to every rapturous thrill, 
 
 That love, or friendship ever knows. 
 
 The orphan's tears, the sufferer's groan, 
 Ne'er reach that adamantine heart; 
 
 It thrills to gold, and gold alone, 
 And bids the suppliant poor depart. 
 
 Mark him who makes of gold his god; 
 
 That wasted frame, that heart of stone; 
 A hideous, shrivelled, soulless clod — 
 
 'Tis thus that idol brands his own. 
 
 WINTER 
 
 Mocking-bird, mocking-bird, 
 
 Warbling so trillingly; 
 Soon will the winter come 
 
 Gloomy and drear; 
 Soon will the norther moan — 
 
 Crooning so chillingly — 
 Why to thy tropic home, 
 
 Dost thou not steer? 
 
 Mocking-bird, mocking-bird, 
 
 Singing so cheerily; 
 Why dost thou linger here? 
 
 Others have flown; 
 Southward the water-fowl 
 
 Wing now so wearily; 
 On the bleak northern mere 
 
 Winter hath blown. 
 
 Mocking-bird, mocking-bird, 
 Minstrel of mystery; 
 
 Now the gay summer hours 
 Cheer thee no more; 
 24 
 
Yet dost thou carol here, 
 Charmed with their history, 
 
 Tho' the grim winter lowers 
 Threat 'ningly o'er. 
 
 Mocking-bird, mocking-bird; 
 
 Soon my life's summer's o'er; 
 Oh, could I shun the bleak 
 
 Winter of age. 
 Yet must my spirit stay, 
 
 Prisoned here, nevermore 
 Spring's sunny land to seek — 
 
 Mute in its cage. 
 
 Mocking-bird, mocking-bird, 
 
 This would I crave of thee: 
 Teach me tlry song of cheer — 
 
 Learn me thy ways; 
 Gay are my summer hours, 
 
 Yet hath the soul of me, 
 Dreaded life's winter, drear, 
 
 AH of my days. 
 
 THE TEXAS PLUME 
 
 When spring arrayed each prairie glade 
 With sweet wildflowers abloom, 
 
 Then reared its crest, o'er all the rest, 
 The stately Texas Plume. 
 
 On graceful stems, those Lone Star gems, 
 
 Of bright vermilion hue, 
 Would bow to please each vagrant breeze, 
 
 That o'er the prairie blew. 
 
 No more 'twill blow; for years ago 
 The plowman proved its doom; 
 
 No more we'll see on glade and lea 
 The glorious Texas Plume. 
 25 
 
Oh, sweet wild flowers of childhood's hours, 
 
 I miss thy blush and bloom — 
 Yet loved I most, of all thy host, 
 
 The beauteous Texas Plume. 
 
 THE MAN WITH THE PEN 
 
 The man with the brush, and the man with the 
 pen, 
 
 Have pictured the man with the hoe, 
 As a child of despair, the abjectest of men, 
 
 Bowed down 'neath a burden of woe. 
 And the artist created his model, of course, 
 
 Which furnished the poet his theme, 
 And both being drawn from a fanciful source, 
 
 Each picture is somewhat extreme. 
 
 The man with the hoe is no longer a slave — 
 
 If, indeed, such was ever the case. 
 The people a part of their pity may save 
 
 For the painters and bards of the race. 
 The man with the hoe can now tickle the soil, 
 
 And Dame Nature smiles on her son, 
 Then laughs him a harvest, requiting his toil — 
 
 As a patron she's second to none. 
 
 If a painter I were, or a poet of note, 
 
 I would picture the man with the pen; 
 In fancy, I'd visit the place where he wrote, 
 
 High up in some garret or den; 
 I'd limn his pale features all sodden with care, 
 
 And dread of the master he serves — 
 And many, no doubt, would be moved to declare 
 
 That he the most pity deserves. 
 
 MAY 
 
 May comes tripping, lightsome, airy. 
 Like a maiden in her "teens"; 
 26 
 
Patroness of elf and fairy, 
 
 Queen of sweet pastoral scenes. 
 
 Farewell April. We are weary 
 Of capricious smiles and tears; 
 
 All our troubles, like thy bubbles, 
 Vanish when the May appears. 
 
 Queen, all nature hails thy coming; 
 
 Hear the mock-bird's welcoming song. 
 And the insect choirs are thrumming 
 
 "Welcome, welcome," all day long. 
 Hear the red bird's fluty treble, 
 
 Piping welcome from the dell; 
 Trip it over, blooming clover; 
 
 Blithesome May, we love thee well. 
 
 Ah, might many a highborn maiden 
 
 Envy thee thy witching grace; 
 Many a queen, all jewel laden, 
 
 Long thy flowery paths to trace. 
 What is fame, and what is grandeur? 
 
 Fevered dreams that fade away. 
 Pleasure's royal; let's be loyal 
 
 Subjects of the queenly May. 
 
 A CEREAL STORY 
 
 Unnourished, faint and fit to drop, 
 I stood before a butcher's shop. 
 Altho' my purse was nearly flat 
 I'd beard the rich aristocrat — 
 For famished weakness waxes bold, 
 And dares the scorn of rank and gold. 
 So hunger led my steps inside: 
 "My kingdom for a steak!" I cried. 
 The butcher gazed and gazed afar; 
 He puffed his fifty-cent cigar; 
 His jewelled fingers drummed his vest; 
 (A sunburst glittered on his breast) 
 Scarce glancing at my spavined purse 
 27 
 
He spoke in accents, gruff and terse: 
 
 "Think not that I'll a purse accept, 
 
 On which the pachyderm hath stept. 
 
 Go haggle with the base marines; 
 
 Thy birth-right trade for navy beans; 
 
 The porter-house that thou hast sought 
 
 By millionaires alone is bought." 
 
 As thus he spake he looked me o'er 
 
 And pointed to the open door. 
 
 "To be continued," this I wailed 
 
 As homeward thro' the dusk I trailed, 
 
 To load again my board so bleak, 
 
 With moon-shine foods from Battle Creek. 
 
 INFINITY 
 
 Infinity's types are in earth, sky and sea 
 
 Wherein nothing perishes, nothing is lost; 
 All things are dispersed, yet continue to be; 
 
 And matter is ne'er into nothingness tossed, 
 From the universe drops not a body or thought, 
 
 On the ether wave wanders the song and the 
 sigh. 
 Then why should our passing with terror be 
 fraught, 
 
 Why dream that the soul or the spirit can die? 
 
 We talk of destruction — we cannot destroy, 
 
 Let cities be razed — there is ashes or dust. 
 Ar*d vain, all in vain every plan we employ; 
 
 For matter remains — as decreed it e'er must. 
 The ashes of martyrs yet live in the clay, 
 
 The flames from the pyre in the elements roll. 
 If in some form they live, tho' our bodies decay, 
 
 Then why dream of death for the spirit or soul? 
 
 We cannot destroy, and we cannot create; 
 
 Tho' matter we fashion and mould to our will, 
 For whate'er we pattern the elements wait; 
 
 Our ruins belong to the universe still. 
 28 
 
The patriarch oak that we hew to the ground, 
 On the funeral mold of his ancestor lies; 
 
 From life-germs — the acorns — now scattered 
 aroujid 
 His kindred will spring, his descendants arise. 
 
 We question the heavens, the myriad stars, 
 
 That vast panorama the ages have seen; 
 To the far stellar field that infinity bars 
 
 We are no nearer yet than our fathers have 
 been; 
 And we question in vain, yet the glittering hosts 
 
 In the limitless blue of the ether aroll, 
 Tho' vague and unreal as intangible ghosts, 
 
 Have for aeons acknowledged a master's con- 
 trol. 
 
 Why question His power to reanimate dust 
 
 Who set for the planet its course in the sky? 
 If the grave endeth all for the guilty and just 
 
 Then why can naught else in the universe die? 
 Tho' savants and sages may teach that the grave 
 
 Is the end of existence— its ultimate goal; 
 We read in the earth, in the sky, in the wave, 
 
 That there is no death for the spirit or soul. 
 
 THE DYING DAY 
 
 The day hath been dark and dreary, 
 
 With wild ragged clouds fleeting fast. 
 They rise o'er the lurid horizon 
 
 Like unresting ghosts of the past; 
 Like misshapen goblins they glower, 
 
 As on ever changing they fly, 
 And the voice of the wind's fitful sighing 
 
 Is the dirge of a day that must die. 
 
 It must die 'neath the gloom and the darkness, 
 
 Uncheered by the sunset of gold, 
 But the wind with its sobbing and moaning 
 
 Hath its story of bitterness told. 
 29 
 
It must join other days at the gloaming, 
 In the dim misty aisles of the past, 
 
 And 'twill know but the howl of the tempest, 
 The deep dismal dirge of the blast. 
 
 No sunrise of splendor gave greeting 
 
 To the day that is dying in gloom. 
 And it knew not the brightness of noontide, 
 
 Nor the glow of earth's beauty and bloom. 
 Not a rift in the clouds at the even, 
 
 Nor a glimmer of gold in the west, 
 In the wind's moan the day's bitter sighing 
 
 At its fate is now sadly confessed. 
 
 Like a soul that is cradled in darkness, 
 
 And the clouds reaching e'en to the tomb- 
 Never knowing the sunlight of gladness, 
 
 It must thread its lone pathway of gloom. 
 And its wail is but lost in the tempest, 
 
 On the winds that so hollowly moan. 
 Then at night-fall the spirit must wander 
 
 Thro' the unlitten valley alone. 
 
 From the vale of the night we are shrinking, 
 
 And we long for the sun's latest gleam. 
 Oh, how sad would it be at Jiif e's evening, 
 
 Unlighted to cross the dread stream. 
 And we watch for the bright bow of promise, 
 
 As the clouds to the eastward are drawn; 
 May the last golden gleams of life's sunset, 
 
 Greet the light of eternity's dawn. 
 
 UNFETTERED 
 
 No more my life shall suffer loss 
 I've paid exemption's price; 
 
 My spirit freed from earthly dross 
 Mourns not the sacrifice. 
 
 Let Sorrow mock and Fortune frown, 
 Theirs is a brief control; 
 30 
 
They cannot chain my spirit down, 
 They shall not rule my sou]. 
 
 Unreasoning fear may tame the brute, 
 
 And terror chain the slave; 
 But ill doth slavish fetters suit, 
 
 The spirit of the brave. 
 I'll never yield to brute despair, 
 
 For fate hath charged the scroll, 
 With punishment too great to bear 
 
 Were I without a soul. 
 
 Let Grief proclaim his stern decrees, 
 
 No more I'll bow the knee; 
 My lips may drain the bitter lees, 
 
 My spirit shall be free. 
 Let Sorrow mock and Fortune frown, 
 
 I spurn their harsh control; 
 They cannot chain my spirit down, 
 
 They shall not rule my soul. 
 
 PHANTOMS 
 
 How oft, oh how oft do the chilling mists fall 
 Enshrouding my soul like the folds of a pall. 
 Not the wooings of spring, nor its beauty and 
 
 bloom, 
 Cap appeal to my spirit or lighten its gloom, 
 When winter's hoar vapors so frigidly roll, 
 A gray wall 'twixt me and the sun of my soul. 
 
 Each thought is distorted and magnified there; 
 Now doubt is distraction, and fear is despair; 
 Bright fancies that yesterday's splendor had 
 
 kissed 
 Are as spectral and vague as a wraith of the mist; 
 And yesterday's beautiful dreams of to-day, 
 Like a cohort of ghosts, they have faded away. 
 
 The thoughts I had clothed in a mantle of gold 
 Are as dim as the mists, as gray and as cold; 
 
 31 
 
Aye robbed of all beauty, denuded of art, 
 Just skeleton themes that are falling apart. 
 Oh vainly I've striven, and vainly I've wrought, 
 For my fancies and I, their creator, are naught. 
 
 TROUBLE WITH SUE 
 
 I'm having trouble again with Sue. 
 
 It grieved me to think my pet 
 Should change from a loving lassie true, 
 
 To a raging suffragette. 
 I scarcely slept, I was worried so, 
 
 She'd the formula all by rote — 
 Declared she'd shoulder a gun and go 
 
 To the polls and demand a vote. 
 
 I sneaked around to the hall one day 
 
 Where that Amazon tribe had met; 
 I trembled to see that fierce array 
 
 As I ogled my Sue, my pet; 
 But she waved me away with a scornful air 
 
 And I fled like a cowardly dub, 
 When a female built like a grenadier 
 
 Approached with a heavy club. 
 
 I tried to appear distraught and glum 
 
 Next eve at my darling's house; 
 In my pocket nestled — no, not a bomb — 
 
 But an artificial mouse. 
 I listened to Sue's enthused tirade 
 
 As she prated of rights redeemed; 
 The spirit Joan of France displayed 
 
 Was prosy and tame, it seemed. 
 
 Then I slyly loosed that rodent sham 
 At the feet of my valiant dear. 
 
 A glance, a leap, and sure I am 
 That 'twas six feet in the clear. 
 
 Like many a one of our well laid schemes 
 'Twas startling even to me; 
 32 
 
The ambient air was pierced with screams 
 And riddled with lingerie. 
 
 E 'er since I sprung that shabby trick 
 
 I've worshipped Sue from afar; 
 But I notice she's cut the short-hair clique 
 
 And she yet is my guiding star. 
 For pardon she yet ignores my plea 
 
 And 'tis this that makes me sad: 
 I fear she'll never make up with me 
 
 Till she tackles another fad. 
 
 THE LIFE PRISONER 
 
 Once again the shades are falling, 
 
 Twilight deepening into night; 
 Time, the laggard, slowly crawling 
 
 Seems to mock and jeer at flight. 
 Ah, where innocence and pleasure 
 
 Mourns the fleeting days and years 
 Guilt and misery will measure 
 
 ^Eons of agony and tears. 
 
 Guilty? Yes. My tortured spirit 
 
 Owns that Justice did not err, 
 Yet, did I no mercy merit? 
 
 Swiftest death were kinder far. 
 Ah, that thing misnamed compassion 
 
 Saved to me but life and breath; 
 Sought a kindlier fate to fashiqn, 
 
 Planned a hideous living death. 
 
 How I curse my fleshly being 
 
 As a traitor to my soul. 
 Stubborn health forbids the freeing 
 
 Of the mind from earth's control. 
 Years on years I here must languish; 
 
 Listen Justice ! Can you tell 
 What dark shore hath deeper anguish 
 
 Than this solitary hell? 
 33 
 
Lost to God, to earth, to heaven, 
 
 Hope a stranger to my cell; 
 Every tie of life long riven, 
 
 Fettered with the chains of Hell. 
 Hideous dreams that mock at slumber, 
 
 Ghastly forms that shock repose; 
 Thus the night hours do I number, 
 
 Harried by these phantom foes. 
 
 Ages. Yes. Remorse has brought me 
 
 Months in moments, years in hours; 
 Days, like grim decades, have taught me 
 
 Timers inquisitorial powers; 
 Taught me that the lightest breathing 
 
 Of my victim's feeblest moans, 
 Deep within my conscience seething 
 
 Shall beget a million groans. 
 
 List ye slaves of pride and passion — 
 
 Brands that set the brain aflame — 
 See what horrors death can fashion, 
 
 E'en while heart-throbs shake the frame. 
 Shun the Bacchanalian revels, 
 
 Curb the heart's impetuous pride; 
 Lest ye sink to these dark levels, 
 
 Where death's lethe is denied. 
 
 LIFE'S SUNSET 
 
 The daylight is gone, and the gloaming 
 Pauses now on the threshold of night; 
 
 And, in fancy, I'm restlessly roaming 
 Like a wraith of the vanishing light. 
 
 On the close of life's day now I ponder, 
 As the stars set their watch in the sky; 
 
 In gloom must I wearily wander 
 
 When the last gleam of sunset shall die? 
 
 Will clouds of dark portent be rising 
 And gloom be but merged into night; 
 
No last blush of sunset apprising 
 My spirit to plume for its flight? 
 
 Will mists hang above the dark river 
 Enshrouding my passage with gloom? 
 
 Will the clouds roll above me forever, 
 
 E'en rear their dark crests o'er my tomb? 
 
 But in vain is the spirit's endeavor 
 
 To pierce the inscrutable veil, 
 Which blends with the mystic Forever, 
 
 Defining mortality's pale. 
 
 But, devoutly a prayer I am breathing, 
 That the shadows may upward be rolled; 
 
 And my life with its wild tempests seething 
 Be blessed with a sunset of gold. 
 
 CALVARY 
 
 O Calvary, thou lone gray hill 
 
 Far o'er the eastern sea; 
 Thy name hath power a world to thrill 
 
 And ages point to thee. 
 
 Calvary, be thou my theme — 
 What other half so sweet — 
 
 1 lay my heart beneath thy stream, 
 All dpwn at Jesus' feet. 
 
 For there beneath an awful pall 
 That swept the very dome, 
 
 The Prince of Glory died for all, 
 Upon the cross of Rome. 
 
 The earth atremble at his groans, 
 And veiled the pitying skies; 
 
 The breezes wailed in whisp'ring tones, 
 "Behold the Savior dies." 
 
Then be my lot the smile of heaven, 
 Or yet the chastening rod> 
 
 To thee alone my praise be given 
 Thou matchless Son of God. 
 
 And perish every worldly theme, 
 
 My art forgotten be, 
 When I forget the precious stream 
 
 That flowed on Calvary. 
 
 TOLSTOY 
 
 Peace to his ashes. Now the strife is done. 
 
 The cruel warfare with the world is o'er. 
 The gentle friend of all beneath the sun 
 
 Hath sought the haven of a friendlier shore. 
 No bitter wailing of a race oppressed, 
 
 Nor clanking of Siberian exile's chain 
 Can chafe that mighty spirit, now at rest 
 
 Or animate the dead, cold form again. 
 
 He dared defend the meek and lowly slave, 
 
 The victim of a despot's blind mistrust. 
 The thousands in that horrid northern grave 
 
 The tortured victims of a doom unjust. 
 He dared upbraid the tyrant Muscovite 
 
 E'en tho' he knew how lightly life was priced; 
 With tongue and pen he battled fox the right, 
 
 And sought to trace the footsteps of the 
 Christ. 
 
 Illustrious savant of a half -tamed race, 
 
 A Titan's task he valiantly essayed; 
 And sought to found upon a barren place 
 
 The temple Justice had so long delayed. 
 But cruel as the bitter blasts that shriek 
 
 O'er frozen tundras of his northern land, 
 The Russian viewed, as fancy's wildest freak, 
 
 The cunning of the master-builder's hand. 
 36 
 
Unfinished is his task; but not in vain 
 
 The labor of his long and useful life. 
 The children of his mighty pen remain 
 
 To e'er rebuke oppression, wrong and strife. 
 True to himself; a strict exponent he 
 
 Of all that faith and self denial mean. 
 A sage of sages yet content to be 
 
 A follower of the lowly Nazarene. 
 
 MY PRAYER 
 
 Oh Spirit, if it may not be 
 
 That fate shall make my woes the fewer, 
 In every trial I'll look to thee 
 
 For strength and courage to endure; 
 For high-souled courage, ever true, 
 
 To breast the storm or dare the world; 
 For strength, the warfare to renew, 
 
 When backward by the blast I'm hurled. 
 
 Oh Spirit, I would look to thee 
 
 When rough the way, and dim the light; 
 When mortal vision faileth me 
 
 I pray thee lead my steps aright; 
 When garish death-lights falsely shine 
 
 O'er ways that honor hath not known,, 
 I pray, that by thy light divine, 
 
 The straight and narrow way be shown. 
 
 Oh Spirit, in the sunniest hours 
 
 'Tis most I need thy tender care. 
 The tempter lurks amid earth's flowers 
 
 Of fleeting fragrance, false as fair. 
 My soul endow with mightier powers, 
 
 I'd leave the alien paths untrod, 
 And win to those eternal bowers, 
 
 The wondrous paradise of God. 
 
 37 
 
A VISION 
 
 There came this vision on the wings of night: 
 
 A lurid canopy o'erspread the mighty vault 
 Of heaven. And Lo! appalling sight 
 
 E'en nature's very forces seemed to halt, 
 And voice the terror of inanimate things; 
 
 From far infinity there throbbed a pulsing roar — 
 An awesome rythmic beat of mighty wings — 
 
 Which deeper grew and ever nearer bore. 
 
 Then, bursting thro' the starless dome of heaven, 
 
 A form, majestic, meteor-garbed with light, 
 Swept earthward, while the startled air was 
 riven, 
 And forests trembled 'neath the stress of 
 flight. 
 Then rang o'er earth and sea a trumpet peal 
 So loud, so deep, its volume filled a world; 
 O'er quivering seas, o'er snow-capped mounts 
 areel, 
 From Pole to Pole, that awful blast was hurled. 
 
 One vast necropolis, earth seemed to be, 
 
 From age-old crypt and lone, forgotten grave 
 The ghastly tenants came. Each fathom square 
 of sea 
 
 Back to its God, some strange wild figure gave; 
 From rent mausoleums did giants of old appear, 
 
 And Egypt's mummied dead had broke the 
 thrall, 
 Their ghostly cerements mocking mortal fear, 
 
 That robed the quick with terror as a pall. 
 
 Raced lightnings o'er the earth, then fissures grew 
 From sinuous writhing seams, to gulfs ay awn; 
 Vast cities toppled, fell, and sank from view 
 'Neath rocks, and mounts, and rivers thereward 
 drawn. 
 All, all that wealth and labor e'er had wrought, 
 And all that man for centuries had planned, 
 38 
 
In one brief hour to nothingness was brought — 
 Destruction by the all-creative hand. 
 
 The drama of the centuries was o'er; 
 
 And in that realm of silence deep and dim, 
 E'en fancy ceased that abyss to explore 
 
 And paused at horror-fringed oblivion's rim. 
 A blank stupenduous vacuum, soundless, dead 
 
 A sphereless void, a waste immeasureable; 
 For land and sea, sun, moon and stars, had fled- 
 
 On earth's last scene the stygian curtains fell. 
 
 WAIL OF AN OLD VIOLIN 
 
 Ah, cruel fate, for many a year 
 
 Have I lain with untuned strings, 
 In my narrow bed in an attic drear, 
 
 'Mid dull inanimate things; 
 I am old and useless now they say — 
 
 There are none who understand, 
 That I mourn the loss of a master* gray 
 
 And the touch of a vanished hand. 
 
 I am far away from my native land, 
 
 My home o'er the dark blue wave; 
 An alien cast on a wintry strand, 
 
 Immured in a living grave. 
 I pine for my Italy far away, 
 
 And the roving care-free band; 
 I mourn the loss of a master gray 
 
 And the touch of a vanished hand. 
 
 LOST 
 
 Last night as I lay dreaming 
 Of a pledge and its redeeming, 
 Mystic pinions, swiftly winging, 
 
 Seemed to waft me o'er the miles, 
 To your lonely southern river 
 Where the weeping willows quiver 
 
When the sighing breeze is bringing 
 Greeting from the tropic isles. 
 
 There we gave each other greeting, 
 O'er and o'er again repeating, 
 Speech replete with tender phrasing, 
 As we wandered hand in hand; 
 But there seemed a sudden rigor 
 Sweeping o'er your queenly figure, 
 As you marked my pensive gazing 
 At your jeweled nuptial band. 
 
 Now your boat you would deliver 
 From its moorings by the river, 
 Stand inviting me to enter 
 
 With a nymph's bewitching grace; 
 Tho' "Beware!" my heart was crying, 
 "I am strong," was my replying. 
 Silenced thus my faithful mentor 
 At your side I took my place. 
 
 Down the current we were drifting, 
 In the golden sunlight sifting 
 Thro' the trees, where birds were trilling 
 Songs of strange, sweet melody; 
 As we gilded toward the ocean, 
 Whispered we of our devotion, 
 "We're but soul-mates" — each unwilling 
 To disown the specious plea. 
 
 On we drifted, never knowing 
 That the stream was swifter growing, 
 Nor that ragged clouds were scurrying 
 From the ocean's stormy coast; 
 Till the waters round us seething, 
 Dashing, curling, foaming, wreathing, 
 Bore our frail craft onward hurrying 
 Like a guilty, doom-swept ghost. 
 
 Lulled to sleep by dreamy motion 
 We had reached the raging ocean ! 
 40 
 
On its bosom torn and reeking, 
 
 Mountain high our bark was tossed; 
 Farther seaward we were sweeping, 
 Vain our prayers, and vain our weeping, 
 And the hurricane was shrieking, 
 Shrieking, "Lost, forever Lost!" 
 
 THE WAYS OF DEATH 
 
 Mother, now the night is falling, 
 
 On my brow death's chilling dew, 
 Let me in this hour appalling 
 
 Make one last appeal to you — 
 I that caused you shame and sorrow; 
 
 I that blanched your locks with snow, 
 Will be cold and still tomorrow — 
 
 Death has called and I must go. 
 
 Oh, that night of awful madness, 
 
 When I left you long ago — 
 Left a home of peace and gladness 
 
 For the downward path of woe — 
 Just a maiden proud and willful, 
 
 Chafing at parental law. 
 And the tempter, swift and skillful, 
 
 Wove the net without a flaw. 
 
 ThoM boasted my dominions 
 
 In the realm of gilded vice, 
 Queen of Satan's faithless minions, 
 
 Eyes of fire and heart of ice; 
 Yet in vain did jewels glitter, 
 
 Vainly flowed the sparkling wine, 
 Retribution, oh, so bitter, 
 
 Poisoned every cup of mine. 
 
 For the voice of Sinai's thunders 
 Smote the reeking plain of death, 
 
 Swept the Babylonian wonders 
 Like a fierce sirocco's breath — 
 41 
 
Swept the roseate mists of pleasure 
 From the hideous pools of slime, 
 
 Leaving sorrow without measure, 
 Dark remorse and woe and crime. 
 
 Years my power of fascination, 
 
 Like the famed Egyptian Queen's, 
 Brought me gold and adulation 
 
 From earth's heartless libertines. 
 Years I felt the deadly stinging 
 
 Rankle in my faithless breast, 
 Where the asp, Remorse, was clinging 
 
 By a Cleopatra pressed. 
 
 Swift is death for slaves of passion — 
 
 Swifter than the prairie fire. 
 Soulless pleasure seems to fashion 
 
 Deadly bolts from its desire. 
 With disease my form was shaken, 
 
 Wealth had flown, no friends were nigh : 
 I was left alone, forsaken, 
 
 And I staggered home to die. 
 
 Mother, much have you forgiven, 
 
 Yet I'd crave your future care, 
 Tho' I scorned the gifts of heaven, 
 
 God may hear a mother's prayer. 
 Then, when o'er the western ocean, 
 
 Sunset's splendor fades and dies, 
 Offer up your heart's devotion, 
 
 Kneeling where your lost one lies. 
 
 'Neath the willows lay me, mother, 
 
 Where in childhood's hours I played, 
 When, with sister and with brother, 
 
 In sweet innocence, I strayed; 
 Then the virgin sods restoring, 
 
 That the wild flowers of the glen 
 May bloom o'er my dust, imploring 
 
 Pity for a Magdalen. 
 42 
 
SUNSET 
 
 Calmly the day god has sunk to rest, 
 Gone are his banners from valley and crest, 
 Far to the westward the crimson bars 
 Greet with their blushes the silvery stars; 
 Splendors of sunset they now unfold, 
 Bathed in the glory of purple and gold. 
 
 Far realm of mystery, sunset's land, 
 Oh, could I sail to thy glittering strand 
 Through thy bright region my spirit would 
 
 stray 
 Far from life's shadows, so cold and gray. 
 Twilight but hints of the beauties untold, 
 Screened by the curtains of purple and gold. 
 
 Long I've been weary of tempests and strife, 
 Dark is my way o'er the ocean of life, 
 Chill is my soul with the mists of the deep, 
 Drifting afar where the bitter blasts sweep; 
 Oh, could my spirit its pinions unfold, 
 Soar through the gateway of purple and gold. 
 
 Father of Mercy come into my heart, 
 Bid the dark legions of sorrow depart; 
 Thine was the voice that so instantly hurled 
 Night from his throne in the new-born world. 
 "Let there be light," was thy mandate of old, 
 Forth flashed the glory of purple and gold. 
 
 See the bright cohorts are fading away, 
 On to the westward they follow the day, 
 Far o'er the ether the bright banners sweep, 
 Wave a good night and are lost in the deep; 
 Violet lines blend now with white fleecy bars 
 Pinned to the azure with glittering stars. 
 
 O'er my dark pathway may life's setting sun 
 Shed its best rays on a race nearly run; 
 
Light the dark valley as through it I go, 
 Scatter the gloom with a radiant glow; 
 Then may the brightness eternal unfold, 
 Flooding my spirit with purple and gold. 
 
 ONE SOUL'S DESIRE 
 
 I would that on the page of time 
 
 My faltering pen might trace, 
 In living fire, one thought sublime 
 
 That years would ne'er efface: 
 A song to cheer the weary soul, 
 
 When years have rolled away, 
 When Death has claimed of me his toll, 
 
 And wrapped my form in clay. 
 
 One song I'd leave when I depart, 
 
 Which, ringing down the years, 
 Might ease the sore and aching heart 
 
 And dry the mourner's tears; 
 One gem of God's eternal truth 
 
 That time nor change can dim, 
 A matin song for rosy youth, 
 
 For age a vesper hymn. 
 
 For men may come and men may go, 
 
 But truth abides for aye; 
 With age its precepts brighter grow, 
 
 And years confirm its sway. 
 But error's tinseled robes of art 
 
 Ne'er clothed a thought sublime; 
 The songs that reach a Nation's heart 
 
 Are heart-throbs set to rhyme. 
 
 DRIFTING 
 
 Love no other light has shone 
 O'er my pathway sad and lone, 
 44 
 
Since thy soul this world forsaking 
 Sought the mansions bright and fair. 
 For my spirit's earthly light 
 With thy spirit took its flight, 
 And my lonely heart is breaking 
 Underneath its weight of care. 
 
 Ten weary years have rolled 
 Since Death's angel, pallid, cold, 
 Thro' ethereal vastness winging 
 Bore thy spirit far away. 
 And I watched thy latest breath 
 With its bitterness of death, 
 For a woe so deep, so stinging, 
 Darkened Hope's eternal ray. 
 
 O'er my life path's somber way 
 Swept thy love's celestial ray 
 Like a meteor bright careering 
 O'er a midnight plain of gloom. 
 Faded then earth's brightest star, 
 When we watched thee cross the bar, 
 Growing paler, disappearing, 
 In the cold and silent tomb. 
 
 Down the current of the years, 
 Where no haven yet appears. 
 
 Now my shattered bark is drifting, 
 Only drifting with the tide. 
 To thy home beyond the skies 
 Now I raise my longing eyes, 
 
 From the gloomy shadows shifting 
 O'er life's ocean wild and wide. 
 
 When my pilgrimage is o'er 
 And I leave this lonely shore, 
 
 With Death's billows round me sweeping 
 Undismayed my soul shall be. 
 For I know that thou wilt stand 
 On the river's shining strand, 
 Thy sweet spirit vigil keeping, 
 Watching, waiting there for me. 
 45 
 
SYLVIA 
 
 Sylvia, listen to my pleading; 
 
 Low I'm bending at thy feet 
 With my heart all torn and bleeding, 
 
 Thy forgiveness to entreat; 
 I deserve thy bitter blaming, 
 
 Merit all thy with'ring scorn; 
 Only this, my heart is claiming 
 
 Pity for a life forlorn. 
 
 See me now alone, forsaken, 
 
 Crushed beneath a weight of woe, 
 With remorse my soul is shaken; 
 
 Hope hath left me long ago, 
 Left me when our ties were riven, 
 
 When the artful temptress came, 
 Masking with the smile of heaven 
 
 Hellish lust's consuming flame. 
 
 Lured away by soulless beauty, 
 
 Basking in a siren's smiles, 
 Lost to honor, lost to duty; 
 
 Ruined by a wanton's wiles, 
 Swiftly followed my undoing, 
 
 And she gloried in my shame, 
 Blamed the ardor of my wooing, 
 
 Boasted that she bore my name. 
 
 Thro' the future dark appalling 
 
 Now I stared aghast at life; 
 Oh, the awful thought of calling 
 
 Such a shameless creature 'wife' ! 
 And the years like endless ages 
 
 Dragged their tortures slowly by 
 Till at last sin's deadly wages 
 
 Severed the unholy tie. 
 
 Sylvia, as a dream of heaven, 
 Lingers in a lost one's breast. 
 
Did the love that thou hadst given 
 
 Add its sting to all the rest? 
 All too late did I awaken; 
 
 All too late I knew thy worth; 
 I'd a deathless love forsaken 
 
 For the baser things of earth. 
 
 There's for me no absolution 
 
 While I draw this falt'ring breath, 
 For a righteous retribution 
 
 Chains me to a living death. 
 Tho' my life is in its morning, 
 
 God hath blanched my locks with snow, 
 Left me here an awful warning, 
 
 Stranded on the reefs of woe. 
 
 Weep not now, thy tears are precious; 
 
 Shed them not for such as I, 
 Tho' each pearly drop is gracious, 
 
 To my soul so parched and dry, 
 For my pardon yet unspoken, 
 
 Gusheth from thy heart so pure, 
 And I know by this sweet token 
 
 That no angel e'er was truer. 
 
 Yonder now my bark is waiting; 
 
 Soon I'll sail the raging sea, 
 And my spirit's lighter freighting 
 
 Owes its parting praise to thee. 
 Yet before I cross the ocean 
 
 One more boon I'd crave of thee 
 Wh^n thou'rt breathing thy devotion, 
 
 Sylvia, sometimes pray for me. 
 
 THE LOST SHIP 
 
 'Twas a fair-haired youth on an ocean strand, 
 Who watched his vessel of Hope depart 
 
 For the golden shores of a far-off land 
 
 And the glittering ports of Fortune's mart. 
 
 47 
 
The youth was gay 
 
 With his roundelay. 
 " Bright as the morning my life will be 
 When my ship comes back to me over the sea. " 
 
 And the breezes were whispering soft and low 
 Their promises sweet, of a prosperous sail. 
 He was but a youth and he could not know 
 How the whispers of hope so often fail. 
 The morn was bright 
 And his heart was light. 
 As he glanced o'er the waters, so bold and free, 
 'Twas little he knew of life's treacherous sea. 
 
 When the twilight fell 'twas an old man there, 
 
 With thin, bent form and with locks of snow, 
 And he searched the deep with a piteous prayer 
 For his treasure ship of the long ago. 
 Oh, the bitter pain 
 Of his heart's refrain : 
 " Peaceful now would my passing be 
 If my ship would only come back to me." 
 
 O'er the waters chill now the bleak winds blow, 
 
 As the dim light fades like a specter pale, 
 And the wild waves speak in a voice of woe 
 Of the sunken rocks and the whistling gale, 
 But hope yet burned 
 In the heart that yearned, 
 And the age-dimmed eye still swept afar 
 The darkening deep o'er the moaning bar. 
 
 Then a pall surrounded the ocean's swell, 
 Like the gloomy folds of an ebon gown, 
 And the breakers are booming a funeral knell, 
 For a life-hope died when the night rushed down. 
 And the vigil's o'er 
 On the lonely shore, 
 Where the watcher's voice no more is heard, 
 With its heart-sick moan of a hope deferred. 
 
 48 
 
SAINT NICHOLAS 
 
 Oh, faith of my childhood, inspire me once more; 
 The bloom of life's morn to my nature restore; 
 From my heart charm the sorrow and sadness 
 
 away; 
 Drive out the grim spectres of death and decay, 
 And let me once more, as in childhood, believe 
 That Saint Nicholas comes on this lone Christmas 
 
 Eve. 
 
 Come, banish dull care from my world-weary 
 
 brain; 
 With childhood's illusions enchant me again; 
 Its dreams were the brightest my life hath e'er 
 
 known, 
 For the fullness of years hath but emptiness 
 
 shown. 
 'Twould cheer my sad spirit again to believe 
 That Saint Nicholas comes on this Christmas Eve, 
 
 Youth's idols are broken; to earth they were cast 
 
 And shattered by time, the gray iconoclast. 
 
 But the lore that was learned at a fond mother's 
 
 knee 
 Echoes down the dim aisles of the years unto me; 
 In childhood's bright morning she bade me believe 
 That Saint Nicholas came on each glad Christmas 
 
 Eve. 
 
 Mother, there's much that your child would forget; 
 Long years of bitterness, tinged with regret. 
 Oh, could you bridge the dark chasm for me; 
 Take me once more as a child on your knee, 
 Kiss away tears as you bid me believe 
 That Saint Nicholas comes on this lone Christmas 
 Eve. 
 
 Oh, could I forget just for one blissful day; 
 Forget that the brown locks are sprinkled with 
 gray, 
 
 49 
 
Forget that life's pathway is lonely and wild; 
 Forget I've no longer the heart of a child. 
 Oh, could I once more, as in childhood, believe 
 That Saint Nicholas comes on this lone Christmas 
 Eve! 
 
 MORE CRUEL THAN WAR 
 
 The trolley car was crowded. 
 
 I was standing in the aisle, 
 All around me lovely women 
 
 Crowned with hats of every style; 
 And the imp-invented hat pins 
 
 Seemed as numerous, indeed, 
 As the lances of the phalanx 
 
 That confronted Winkelreid. 
 
 As I parried dodging, ducking, 
 All escape to me denied, 
 
 First a lovely brunette gigged me 
 With her poniard, in the side. 
 
 Then a dashing blonde before me, 
 Laughing at some silly jest, 
 
 Tossed her head against my bosom- 
 Speared me neatly thro' the chest. 
 
 A tall and sylph-like maiden 
 
 Now demurely went to bat; 
 With the lance of a crusader 
 
 She unmoored my derby hat; 
 And she colored with displeasure 
 
 At this muttered wish of mine: 
 "Would I were a human cactus, 
 
 Or a fretful porcupine. " 
 
 Then a calm and stately matron 
 
 In arising from her seat, 
 Bayoneted me amidships — 
 
 Fairly swept me off my feet — 
 50 
 
Turned she then with chilling hauteur 
 Fixed me with a frozen stare, 
 
 As she hissed in writhing whispers, 
 "Brute, you've disarranged my hair!' 
 
 LIFE'S BATTLE 
 
 If you deem your life a failure, 
 
 Then the world adopts your view; 
 If you bury all your talents 
 
 Who will mourn their loss but you? 
 If you class yourself with weaklings 
 
 Surely none will say you nay, 
 Thinking you have found your level 
 
 There the world will let you stay. 
 
 Don't expect the world to tell you 
 
 Of your station and your worth; 
 Who should better know your value 
 
 Than yourself of all the earth? 
 Stop lamenting and repining, 
 
 If the world has used you ill 
 You've a place among the useful, 
 
 You can find it if you will. 
 
 If you'll face the world with courage 
 
 Then you'll find a helping hand; 
 Take your place among the foremost 
 
 They'll allow you room to stand. 
 Those who struggle wear the garlands, 
 
 Only cowards sit and sigh. 
 In the din of Life's great battle 
 
 Those who win are those who try. 
 
 THE MAILED KNIGHT 
 
 A Norman knight, in the days of old, 
 Through a woodland gayly dashed. 
 
 His heart was light and his eye was bold 
 
 And his armor gleamed and flashed. 
 
 51 
 
O'ertaking there on the trail so dim 
 
 A gray friar, humbly clad, 
 The knight drew rein and cried to him : 
 
 "Pray, father, why so sad? 
 
 "And what is the ghostly favor sought 
 
 This day at the shrine of prayer? 
 Methinks 'twere a blessing dearly bought 
 
 If it costs such toil and care ! 
 Thy bigotry tempteth not the strong 
 
 The idols of life to mar; 
 I worship woman and wine and song 
 
 And the glorious art of war. 
 
 "With body and limbs encased in steel 
 
 I laugh at the thought of fear, 
 And, father, it seems that you might feel 
 
 The need of a corslet here. 
 At the stream hard by did an arrow clang 
 
 Ashiver, against my mail. 
 'Twas the archer's knell that his arrow rang, 
 
 For his corpse lies on the shale. " 
 
 Said the friar: "Sir knight, peace craves no 
 shield 
 
 But the armor of truth and right. 
 I seek not fame on the battlefield 
 
 And I fear no arrow's flight. " 
 The knight, with a sneer at the priest so pale, 
 
 Cried: "Churchman, thou art daft! 
 What cobweb weave of thy ghostly mail 
 
 Will parry a clothyard shaft?" 
 
 A twang, a hiss and a line of white, 
 
 Like lighning sent from heaven, 
 And a bolt too swift for human sight 
 
 Through a joint of his gear is driven. 
 Like a mighty oak before the blast 
 
 Did the knightly figure reel, 
 Then his pondrous bulk was earthward cast 
 
 With a shivering crash of steel. 
 
The friar has knelt by the quivering clay, 
 But there's never a sign of breath; 
 
 And the face, when the helm is torn away, 
 Bears the hideous stamp of death. 
 
 For the soul that had paid ambition's cost, 
 In prayer did the father kneel; 
 
 The arms o'er the stricken bosom crossed 
 With the rasp of steel on steel. 
 
 Then the gray friar rose to go his way 
 
 And the sign of the cross he made, 
 As he gazed on the lump of lifeless clay 
 
 That death at his feet had laid. 
 Then he murmured low as he onward fared, 
 
 "What wonders doth heaven reveal; 
 Where the meek may walk with bosom bared, 
 
 Pride falleth, tho' locked in steel. " 
 
 THE BARS 
 
 'Neath the reefs, and the bars of the wild ocean 
 
 deeps, 
 Full many a storm-driven wanderer sleeps. 
 On that day of all days, shall the trumpet's shrill 
 
 blast, 
 Summon forth from the waters, a multitude vast; 
 But vaster, far vaster, when with them shall stand 
 All those who were wrecked at the bars on the 
 
 land. 
 
 There are beacons ashine o'er these bars on the 
 
 land, 
 Lights of Hell, that but lure the lost ones to its 
 
 strand, 
 And the siren that sang on the grim Lurley height, 
 Hath her counterparts here, in the creatures of 
 
 night, 
 Who croon to their victims, a strain sweet and low 
 Till the waters close o'er them — the waters of 
 
 woe, 
 
 53 
 
Oh tempests, wild tempests sweep over these bars 
 E'en when the sun shines, or in nighttime the 
 
 stars; 
 Charge not to the heavens this shipwreck of life, 
 'Tis the whirlwind of passion, of bloodshed and 
 
 strife; 
 And well the grim reefs of destruction are planned 
 For the unwary craft, on this desolate strand. 
 
 Oh the bars of the sea, and the bars of the land; 
 What a reck'ning of these shall the judgment 
 
 demand ! 
 The ocean bar makes not the spirit its toll; 
 The others make shipwreck of body and soul. 
 More treacherous far, and more dreaded to be, 
 Are the bars of the land, than the bars of the sea. 
 
 SOLILOQUY OF MAN IN THE MOON 
 
 The man in the moon, with a weary sigh, 
 
 Now shifted the load on his back; 
 Then, glancing earthward, exclaimed "O my, 
 
 There's Brown, with his almanac ! 
 "For years, and years, have I borne his blame 
 
 When seasons were dry, or wet, 
 Or forward, or late, 'twas all the same — 
 
 And he's charging me with it yet. 
 
 "When that despoiler, Jack Frost, creeps down, 
 
 (Though the rogue is no vassal of mine) 
 Then, I am held up to the world by Brown, 
 
 As despoiler of plant and vine. 
 There are Browns in the East, and Browns in the 
 West, 
 
 And Browns in the North, and South, 
 Proclaiming my works, made manifest, 
 
 By blizzard and freshet and drouth. 
 
 "And the Mistress Browns, they say I pluck 
 The feathers from off their geese; 
 54 
 
I wink at the kettle; it spoils their luck, 
 
 And the soap all turns to grease; 
 I ogle the Irish potato crops 
 
 And coax them above the ground, 
 In riotous tangle of thrifty tops, 
 
 Where there's never a tuber found. 
 
 "Now I am the moon, as my words imply, 
 
 And there's only one moon, you see, 
 But there's all sorts of weather beneath the sky, 
 
 Yet the Browns blame it all on me. 
 Oh, I sometimes laugh till I almost shake 
 
 These fagots from off my back, 
 When I think how easy it is to fake 
 
 The Browns, with an almanac!" 
 
 A COMPROMISE 
 
 All thro' that long June morning 
 
 'Neath old Sol's relentless blaze, 
 Did I sheer the old black waxy 
 
 Up against the growing maize. 
 And I twitched the cotton bell-cord 
 
 O'er old Peter's briny back 
 As I steered a double-shovel 
 
 That was sadly gone to rack. 
 
 "Four more rows," said I to Peter 
 
 As I cut him with the slack, 
 "We will finish ere we leave it, 
 
 And 'twill save our coming back." 
 But old Peter stopped and eyed me 
 
 With a look of solemn scorn, 
 And a frosty ear laid backward — 
 
 He had heard the dinner horn! 
 
 Like a statue, stood old Peter, 
 When I signalled " Go ahead, " 
 
 For the spirit of his fathers 
 
 Thro' his mulish system spread. 
 55 
 
"Get up there, " I insisted, 
 
 But his mule-ship whirled around 
 
 And began to waltz, in circles, 
 As he yanked me o'er the ground. 
 
 Vainly did I dance and holler, 
 
 Vainly did I whip and slash 
 'Round that fast increasing circle 
 
 Of green corn cut into hash. 
 I had started in to settle 
 
 Whether Pete or I should rule, 
 But each dizzy round had ended 
 
 All in favor of the mule. 
 
 So I said at last, quite calmly — 
 
 When I'd got old Pete reversed — 
 "We will settle it this evening 
 
 But we'll go to dinner first. " 
 'Twas a wise concession, worthy 
 
 Of the diplomatic school, 
 But 'twas all that saved my prestige 
 
 With that chuckle-headed mule. 
 
 IN THE GLOAMING 
 
 As I pondered, in the gloaming, 
 Came a brace of warrior cats, 
 
 With a burst of martial music 
 Keyed in divers sharps and flats; 
 
 And the yowling seemed a summons 
 To the whole grimalkin crew; 
 
 Soon around my peaceful dwelling 
 
 Raged a very Waterloo. 
 
 Every moment reinforcements 
 Were arriving with the goods; 
 
 Grizzled knights of many a battle, 
 Cats from other neighborhoods. 
 
 Baffled by the swift maneuvers 
 Of the screeching, whirling stack, 
 56 
 
I but wasted ammunition 
 
 With the household bric-a-brac. 
 
 So I charged in "Old Guard" fashion, 
 
 Shouting, "Skiddoo!" but alack! 
 Tripping o'er a gray Napoleon 
 
 Down 1 came upon my back, 
 And ere I my wits could muster, 
 
 Or arise from where I lay, 
 Charged a score of feline Bluchers 
 
 O'er my person to the fray. 
 
 In the gloaming, oh, my darling! 
 
 Stabbed with scores of bayonets 
 Wielded by the fierce grimalkins, 
 
 Barnyard rustlers; old maid's nets 
 Vainly I patroled the campus 
 
 With a trusty brick-bat drawn; 
 While I thirsted there for vengeance 
 
 Every tabby's son was gone. 
 
 THE CHRISTMAS TREE 
 
 Oh a rare old tree is the Christmas tree, 
 
 And rich is the fruit it yields; 
 Its boughs droop low with the crusted snow 
 
 Of the norther's icy shields. 
 But, blow on blow of an ax, swung low — 
 
 And the snow-clad cedar falls. 
 Oh, the fruits we'll glean, from the evergreen, 
 
 Tonight in the lighted halls! 
 
 Oh, a beautiful tree, is the Christmas tree, 
 
 All laden with the fruits of love. 
 Let loud winds call, and the white snow fall 
 
 From swift, wild clouds above. 
 Within, tonight, there is warmth and light, 
 
 There are friends, and loved ones dear; 
 No blast can chill, the peace, good will, 
 
 Aglow in each bosom here. 
 57 
 
Yet a quaint old tree, is the Christmas tree; 
 
 Some very queer fruit it bears; 
 Here, bugle and drum, and tops that hum; 
 
 There, oranges, apples and pears, 
 Sweetmeats and toys, for girls and boys, 
 
 And gifts for their elders, too; 
 A jolly Saint Nick, the fruit will pick, 
 
 Nor question just how it grew. 
 
 Yes, a bountiful tree is the Christmas tree, 
 
 When we graft in the stock, good will, 
 In plenty and peace, its yields increase, 
 
 But strife doth its harvest chill. 
 Unto each child-heart, 'twill help impart 
 
 That story, — so sweet to them, — 
 Of the gleaming star, that was seen afar, 
 
 And the manger of Bethlehem. 
 
 BACK TO THE SOD 
 
 Far from the hurry, the din and the strife, 
 Far from the city where sorrow is rife; 
 Back to the home-stead, I'm wending my way; 
 Heartsick, a wand'rer, no more will I stray. 
 Back to my old home, back to the sod, 
 Closer to nature and closer to God. 
 
 Oft in the dreams of a troublous sleep 
 Visions of home o'er my spirit will sweep; 
 Dreams of the days when no sinful alloy 
 Dulled the bright beams of an innocent joy; 
 Visions that beckon me back to the sod, 
 Closer to nature and closer to God. 
 
 Long hath the wooings of folly and sin, 
 Sought to allure me, my favor to win. 
 Yet thro' the years of my wanderings wild, 
 Echoed a fond mother's prayer for her child; 
 Calling her erring one back to the sod, 
 Closer to nature and closer to God. 
 
 58 
 
Mother, I come. I renounce the gay world. 
 Every fond hope from my heart it hath hurled. 
 Back to thy arms on thy bosom to sleep, 
 Saved from my sinfulness, drawn from the deep, 
 Back to my childhood's home, back to the sod. 
 Closer to nature and closer to God. 
 
 THE CAPTIVE 
 
 O, vain the striving for that goal 
 
 Which long hath mocked my heart; 
 To voice the longings of my soul 
 
 My pen hath not the art. 
 Like caged bird that beats the bars 
 
 My spirit strives for speech; 
 I seem imprisoned 'mid the stars, 
 
 Each gem beyond my reach. 
 
 Within the pent-house of my soul 
 
 A spirit longs for flight; 
 It chanteth but the captive's dole 
 
 And beats the bars of night. 
 It longeth wild and free to roam 
 
 Amid the sunlit spheres, 
 To flash athwart the azure dome 
 
 As meteor careers. 
 
 As warbler in its prison bleak, 
 
 A captive from its birth, 
 When launched upon its pinions weak, 
 
 Falls fluttering to earth, 
 'Tis thus I launch each fledgling thought 
 
 With wings untrained to flight, 
 Alone, unaided and untaught, 
 
 They sink into the night. 
 
 I languish in this cage of clay 
 
 And long for loftier spheres, 
 The dawning of a brighter day 
 
 That shines beyond the years. 
 59 
 
O, set the captive spirit free, 
 Ye strongholds of the night. 
 
 Long have I bent the suppliant knee, 
 Long have I wailed for light. 
 
 O powers of mercy, rend each bar 
 
 Or drown with blackest night 
 The radiance that shines afar 
 
 And mocks my spirit's plight. 
 Why torture helpless shackled souls 
 
 With beckoning gleam and shine 
 Of mystic realm, where ever rolls 
 
 The orb of light divine. 
 
 THE TROUBLE IN KENTUCKY 
 
 The corn's full of kernels, Kentucky is too; 
 
 And booze from these kernels, the colonels will 
 
 brew. 
 'Tis said that this liquor the Colonels distill, 
 Would make a game cock of a meek whippoorwill. 
 
 And when with this moonshine, his system's 
 
 imbued, 
 'Tis then that the Colonel remembers his feud; 
 And 'tis then the bleak soil of some neighboring 
 
 mound, 
 Earns its grim sobriquet of "The dark bloody 
 
 ground. " 
 
 If these kernels, the Colonels but made into bread 
 The feuds would die out and the hungry be fed; 
 For Colonels, well nourished and decently clad, 
 Would forget all the scraps that their grandfathers 
 had. 
 
 We may safely assert, when the feud spirit's high, 
 That 'tis naught but the spirit of corn, and of rye; 
 For o'er this broad land you may search where 
 
 you will, 
 And there's never a feud where there's never a still. 
 
 60 
 
REMEMBER 
 
 Gentle Spring, I will treasure thy bloom in my 
 heart — 
 When the bitter blasts sweep I'll remember; 
 Of each spring that I've known hath my spirit a 
 part 
 That escaped the chill winds of November. 
 
 Enshrined in my heart with thy mates, gentle 
 Spring, 
 
 Where their sisterhood hails thee a member, 
 Yet another sweet voice shall in midwinter sing 
 
 That refrain of my spirit — Remember. 
 
 When the winter days number my steps to the 
 tomb, 
 
 When I crouch o'er life's desolate embers, 
 Oh, may I thus cherish my youth's vernal bloom 
 
 In the light of a soul that remembers. 
 
 Old age, bow my form, dim my eye if you will, 
 Bleach my hair with the frosts of December, 
 
 But my dreams of the past, let me cling to them 
 still, 
 life's spring-time, oh let me remember. 
 
 FOREVER 
 
 Together we sought the bowers of spring 
 
 O'er a carpet of wild flowers straying. 
 On a green-clad bough did the mock-bird sing 
 
 And the whole world seemed a-maying. 
 I crowned your brow with the evergreen 
 
 That we found by the crystal river; 
 'Twas the coronal of my heart's own queen, 
 
 And you murmured the word — Forever. 
 
 Not a cloud swept over the summer skies 
 When with many a vow we parted. 
 
 61 
 
And the mock-bird echoed our fond goodbyes, 
 But was silent when you departed. 
 
 And the ghost of a fitful shadow fell 
 O'er the brightly sparkling river. 
 
 It seemed to be when you said farewell 
 That the soft breeze sighed — Forever. 
 
 I roamed the valley alone today 
 
 Thro' the dark and wintry weather, 
 Tho' the gloomy skies were cold and gray 
 
 And the snow lies on the heather. 
 I stood 'neath the skeleton trysting-tree, 
 
 By the darkly flowing river. 
 My hopes went drifting away to the sea, 
 
 And the bleak winds moaned — Forever. 
 
 CONTENTMENT'S LAND 
 
 Illusive, vague, mysterious land, 
 Whose green ethereal islands float 
 
 On silvery lakes. Thy elusive strand 
 Now seeming near and now remote. 
 
 Thou mirage on life's arid plain, 
 How many seek thy shores in vain. 
 
 In vain we toil through desert's sand 
 In vain the pilgrim vessel sails; 
 
 No ship has ever reached that strand 
 Nor mortal trod its peaceful vales. 
 
 Yet ever as life's path we tread 
 
 Contentment's land seems just ahead. 
 
 But ah, that beauteous phantom land; 
 
 Its shores recede as we advance, 
 And o'er the waste of burning sand 
 
 The spectral shadows shift and dance. 
 Then ghostly lurid mists arise 
 
 And hope within the bosom dies. 
 
 Then on the ear a gentle voice 
 
 Falls softly as the zephyr's breath: 
 
 m 
 
"Why make this earthly land thy choice? 
 
 Its charms but lure thy soul to death. 
 The land of sweet contentment lies 
 
 In realms of light beyond the skies. " 
 
 WRIGHT'S RITES 
 
 If Wright should meet a meteorite 
 
 On the broad aerial plain, 
 And neither turn to left or right 
 
 With his aeroplane; 
 Or if his motors failed to mote, 
 
 Or the flim-flam failed to stay, 
 Would that careering meteorite 
 
 Give Wright the right of way? 
 
 Or if the whizzle-te-whiz got gay 
 
 'Way up among the stars, 
 Climbed right up through the Milky Way 
 
 And landed Wright on Mars — 
 Then would the giant Martians there 
 
 Give Wright the right to write — 
 Would it be right for us to write 
 
 The last sad rites of Wright? 
 
 THE OPINIONLESS MAN 
 
 If you stand for the right, in its battle with wrong, 
 When the just cause is weak, and the enemy 
 
 strong; 
 If you're fearless, and dare the whole truth to 
 
 proclaim, 
 When the weak bear the brunt of unmerited 
 
 blame; 
 Then you've met with this fellow I here shall 
 
 describe — 
 You're familiar, perhaps, with all types of his 
 
 tribe — 
 He's but lightly esteemed, save by those of his clan, 
 This suave oily chap — the opinionless man. 
 
 63 
 
With his face ever wreathed in a sycophant's 
 
 smile, 
 A cherub he seems, unacquainted with guile; 
 Oh, he's far too well bred, any warmth to display, 
 As he blandly endorses each word that you say, 
 And you know, while he's sweetly agreeing with 
 
 you, 
 
 He as quickly would sanction the opposite view. 
 Ah, no great human cause, or beneficent plan, 
 Is indebted to him — the opinionless man. 
 
 If he's present when neighbors engage in debate 
 On some momentous question of church, or of 
 
 state, 
 He will placate the souls where conviction abides, 
 And will manage, somehow, to agree with both 
 
 sides. 
 He's as oil on the waters, when rages the storm; 
 And as oil is he, too, on the wave of reform — 
 Impairing its force and defeating its plan — 
 This exponent of naught — the opinionless man. 
 
 In political crises, when moments are tense, 
 This thought-acrobat will be found on the fence 
 From this vantage he studies the trend of the 
 
 tide, 
 And he always alights on the popular side; 
 All too often, alas, he's the balance of power 
 That defeats a good cause, at the very last hour. 
 When we combat the forces of clique, or of clan, 
 We must reckon with him — the opinionless man. 
 
 Perhaps we would find, if his line we could trace, 
 That it reaches clear back to the birth of our race; 
 So what's bred in the bone and admits of no cure, 
 As the adage observes, we are bound to endu,re; 
 But there's many a soul, in this land of the free, 
 Who will join in this earpest petition with me: 
 O Nature, Dame Nature, remodel the plan 
 Of this creature inane — the opinionless man! 
 
 64 
 
BURIED HOPES 
 
 When the light is flown and the bleak winds moan, 
 And the stars their vigil are keeping, 
 
 Then I wander away to the mounds of gray, 
 Where my buried hopes are sleeping. 
 
 In the desolate mold of the past so cold 
 
 There's many a life-hope lying, 
 Like the flowers of May, they faded away 
 
 While the years were swiftly flying. 
 
 In the silence deep of a world asleep 
 I walk where the cold forms slumber, 
 
 And the memories here but grow more dear 
 As the empty years I number. 
 
 Of a heavenly birth too fragile for earth, 
 Tho' with tenderness they were cherished; 
 
 From a wintry clime on the shores of Time, 
 The chill winds swept and they perished. 
 
 No sweet flower blooms on the lonely tombs 
 But the willows are o'er them weeping, 
 
 And o'er each mound in the sacred ground 
 The blight of the years is creeping. 
 
 I have laid them here as year by year 
 They passed o'er Time's swift river, 
 
 And my mortal life with its care and strife 
 Shall know them no more forever. 
 
 But my sad heart thrills and my bosom fills 
 
 With the ray of a hope supernal, 
 For the bright flowers hurled from a wintry world 
 
 May bloom on the shores eternal. 
 
 "MAD FROM LIFE'S HISTORY" 
 
 Once in the long ago 
 Her soul was pure as snow, 
 65 
 
But the tempter came despoiling, 
 
 Robbed her life of honor's crown. 
 Now she wandered on the street, 
 Shivering in the cruel sleet; 
 Shadows on her heart recoiling, 
 
 Frenzy shrieking, "Lay life down." 
 
 Like a spirit of the night 
 Or a tortured soul in flight, 
 Where the river dark was flowing, 
 
 Now her straying feet were drawn. 
 Not a pause upon the brink 
 From that cold embrace to shrink. 
 But unheeding and unknowing 
 
 To that wild black tide she's gone. 
 
 Hark! a wail of deep despair, 
 Smothered in the tempest's blare, 
 And the stream her form receiving, 
 Bears it toward a wintry sea. 
 May she not forgiveness win? 
 She was lured, then driven to sin, 
 First by blandishments deceiving, 
 Then a heartless world's decree. 
 
 THE MOCKING BIRD 
 
 There is music 'mid the flowers of the Southland's 
 bowers 
 When the mocking bird is singing to the night, 
 There's a quiver and a thrill 
 In the rhythm of his trill, 
 Trembling sweetly through the bright moon- 
 light. 
 
 All earth seems to listen when the dewdrops 
 glisten 
 And the mocking bird is singing to the night, 
 For his mystic magic bars 
 Seem to echo from the stars 
 Like a message from the realms of light. 
 
There's a softer, lighter thrum in the insects' hum 
 When the mocking bird is singing to the night. 
 And the balmy summer breeze 
 Softly steals among the trees, 
 Seems to loiter and to linger in its flight. 
 
 The gloomy whippoorwill checks his calling, 
 weird and shrill, 
 When the mocking bird is singing to the night, 
 Silent sits the solemn owl 
 Where the darker shadows scowl, 
 Such a carol puts his croaking all to flight. 
 
 The shadows lightly roll from my sad and weary 
 soul 
 When the mocking bird is singing to the night, 
 There's a world of hearty cheer 
 In his song, so bright and clear, 
 And all nature seems a-quiver with delight. 
 
 And a glimmering of rhyme with a melody sub- 
 lime 
 In the depths of my longing heart is stirred; 
 There's a noble inspiration 
 For the bards of every Nation 
 In the warble of a Texas mocking bird. 
 
 THE PHANTOM YEARS 
 
 When the moaning winds whistle a requiem 
 dreary, 
 In the night-time, when sleep from my pillow 
 is fled, 
 The phantom years pass in review sad and weary, 
 With their memory of hopes that are long ago 
 dead. 
 
 With their ghostly procession of joys and of sor- 
 rows, 
 Of friendships that perished, of woes that befell, 
 67 
 
Of the days when I dreamed of the happy tomor- 
 rows, 
 The sweet hours of childhood, remembered so 
 well. 
 
 But how few, oh, how few, of the spirit years carry 
 The memories of joy that their annals inclose; 
 
 These were cast down for Time, the gray sexton, 
 to bury, 
 While back to us stalk the weird skeleton woes. 
 
 This spectral array from the tombs of the ages, 
 A warning convey from the death reaper grim, 
 
 For they solemnly point to a life's wasted pages, 
 Then fade into shadow-land, misty and dim. 
 
 A FATAL STRAIN 
 
 Le Sport bought a puppy — the mangiest cur 
 
 That ever was shipped by express; 
 What species of canine his ancestors were, 
 
 No human could hazard a guess. 
 "Of course he's a pointer, you ignorant chaps, " 
 
 Said Le Sport to his snickering mates, 
 "I predict but a very short time will elapse 
 
 Till his stpck will be shown by his traits. " 
 
 With swiftness, indeed, with a honk and a whir, 
 
 The problem soon after was solved; 
 But it ended the earthly career of the cur 
 
 On which this grave duty devolved; 
 All lifeless he lay, for he never had moved 
 
 From the broad, even track of the wheel — 
 A significant trait that conclusively proved 
 
 He was crossed with an automobile. 
 
 WE ARE THE SEEKERS 
 
 'Tis said that once to every door 
 Comes Opportunity; 
 68 
 
If heeded not, he comes no more. 
 
 This sometimes puzzles me. 
 I often wonder who's to blame, 
 
 If, traveling o'er his route, 
 He sought my door, pronounced my name, 
 
 Some day when I was out. 
 
 If there's a tide in man's affairs, 
 
 Which, taken at the flood, 
 Will bear us from life's carking cares 
 
 O'er Fortune's seas to scud; 
 I fear I'll never travel o'er 
 
 That Eldorado route, 
 For every time I seek the shore 
 
 The tide has just gone out. 
 
 Now as my doleful verse you con 
 
 You'll seek this moral, please: 
 Success is rarely based upon 
 
 Uncertainties like these; 
 Too few that favoring tide have caught; 
 
 They came too late, like me, 
 And fewer still are ever sought 
 
 By Opportunity. 
 
 A LEGAL SPECIALIST 
 
 'Tain't wuth five cents," said Old Bill Jones, 
 
 "This old game laig uv mine; 
 Rumatics settled in ther bones, 
 
 En sinners kinked like twine; 
 But old Doc Dean, he seem ter think 
 
 He'll somehow pull me thru 
 En make uv this ol' knotty kink 
 
 Er laig ez good ez new." 
 
 But ah, the doctor's hope was vain; 
 
 Jones lost the worthless member. 
 He fell beneath a moving train 
 
 Sometime in last September; 
 69 
 
And now old Bill invokes a pl&gue 
 
 On Esculapian scholars, 
 For Lawyer Jinks has made that leg 
 
 Worth twenty thousand dollars. 
 
 BACK TO THE SOIL 
 
 In the maw of the city, mid squalor and vice 
 
 Pale Want lifts his skeleton hand 
 To lead unto Mammon his slaves, at a price 
 
 That is now a menace to the land. 
 There the soul is a myth, man but a machine 
 
 To earn for his masters red gold; 
 Who cares if he's broken and haggard and lean, 
 
 His life to this monster is sold. 
 
 Ah yes,he wears out, though his muscles are steeled 
 
 With the brutish alloy of despair; 
 He dies and is dumped in the grim potters' field 
 
 With never a song or a prayer. 
 Not a penny he'd saved for his children and wife; 
 
 This makes the dark picture complete : — 
 A woman unsexed by the horrors of life 
 
 And his children — Arabs of the street. 
 
 Where zephyr^ are waving the fields of grain 
 
 Out under God's bright blue sky, 
 We're free from the shackles of greed and gain, 
 
 In peace we may live and die. 
 The skeleton hand of Wa^at is stayed; 
 
 Sweet sympathy lightens our toil; 
 And a hand is stretched to the city's aid, 
 
 It is beckoning — Back to the soil. 
 
 A LITERARY DEGENERATE 
 
 Ye bards give ear to my classic wail: 
 Oh, where is the old-time Indian tale, 
 Of Demon Dick and the dusky maid; 
 70 
 
Of a sleeping camp, and a plan well laid; 
 Of an Indian Chief and a frontier scout; 
 Of the red-skins always put to rout. 
 And how, at the trusty rifle's bang, 
 Six feet in air the warrior sprang. 
 
 I would read once more of the Indian raid — 
 How the gang purloined the pale-face maid; 
 How they tethered her to a tree for keeps, 
 While the whole push slept as the dope fiend 
 
 sleeps; 
 How the hero came, with the usual "hists," 
 And cut the thongs from the maiden's wrists; 
 How he placed a tomahawk in her hand; 
 How they leisurely murdered the drowsy band. 
 
 How the grand old Chief, Afraid-of-the-Soap, 
 At the great pow-wow was the proper dope; 
 How he fired the zeal of the high-brow set, 
 With the ringing spiel of a suffragette. 
 Of Leaping Fawn, with her raven hair; 
 (Which gave no hint of the vermin there) ; 
 And how she leaped from the frowning cliff 
 'Steen thousand feet, to the boulders — biff! 
 
 Was the dusky damsel pied? Oh no. 
 There's a scout in a bark canoe below, 
 He loafed around for an hour or two 
 Till Leaping Fawn to the surface blew; 
 Then he took a cinch on a raven lock 
 And saw that her face would stop a clock. 
 And she wept and wailed as they rowed ashore 
 For she had never taken a bath before. 
 
 Those narratives only cost a dime, 
 But something was doing all the time. 
 The redskin push ki-yied and yelped 
 Till the very last buck was shot and "skelped"; 
 Like a covey of quail they went to pot 
 For the pioneers rarely missed a shot. 
 Ye strenuous bards of the camp and trail 
 Say, where, oh where is the Indian tale? 
 71 
 
WHICH? 
 
 Just a supplicant by the city street, 
 
 He was feeble and old and gray, 
 He shivered beneath the cruel sleet 
 
 In the vigorous blast that day — 
 Just a sparing mite from my little all, 
 
 And a prayer while the eye grew dim, 
 That one who noteth the sparrow's fall 
 
 Might temper the blast to him. 
 
 And another I marked in the restless throng, 
 
 He was feeble and gray and old, 
 He'd a smile for none as he passed along, 
 
 And his eye gleamed hard and cold; 
 He followed his chosen path apart 
 
 Nor hearkened to friendship's plea; 
 No message of love could reach his heart 
 
 For nothing but gold had he. 
 
 Of these twain from life's antipodes 
 
 Which hath the drearier part, 
 The homeless one in the bitter breeze, 
 
 Or he with the frozen heart? 
 To the skeleton warder grim and gaunt 
 
 Which pays the heavier toll, 
 The famishing child of temporal want 
 
 Or he with the starving soul? 
 
 REALISTIC 
 
 There's a subtle hint of a wild-rose tint 
 
 On her face as I breathe her name; 
 No hide and seek on my darling's cheek, 
 
 But the blush remains the same. 
 Oh, well I know why her cheeks now glow, 
 
 As clear as a pink sea-shell — 
 That bloom on the face of my lovely Grace 
 
 Is the best that the druggists sell. 
 
 72 
 
I would fain caress that one stray tress, 
 
 Escaped from her auburn crown; 
 But I fear me much that a clumsy touch 
 
 Might tumble the structure down. 
 To the wintfs, at last, is prudence cast, 
 
 As I voice love's ardent plea; 
 And my lips now press that shining tress 
 
 From the queue of a dead Chinee. 
 
 RASTUS ON THE MULE 
 
 Dey's er fahmin' now on papah 
 
 Whah dey uster hoe en plow, 
 En dis niggah soht o' hankahs 
 
 Foil to take er han' somehow; 
 Ef dese aggycultshul papahs 
 
 Want so uppish ez er rule, 
 Ah cud wrote er pwahf ul treatus 
 
 On de handlin' ob de mewl. 
 
 Ef dey ebbah wuz er subjec' 
 
 Dat er niggah unnerstans, 
 It's de fittin' ob de donkey 
 
 Intuh Goddermity's plans. 
 En when I wuz er pickerninny 
 
 Ef I'd only went ter school, 
 Ah might er bin perfessah 
 
 Ob de culshuah ob de mewl. 
 
 Dey's de bes of unnerstandin' 
 
 'Tween de mewl en niggah, too; 
 Each one alius know perzacly 
 
 What de udder's gwjtne ter do. 
 Fer er mewl's er knowin' crittah, 
 
 Nebbah take 'im foh er fool; 
 White man nebbah know iz bruddah 
 
 Lak er niggah knows er mewl. 
 
 73 
 
DUTY AND PLEASURE 
 
 Together, without my lone heart's door, 
 Stood Duty and Pleasure one day; 
 
 And one I must choose f orevermore, 
 And one I must send away. 
 
 I glanced at Pleasure, a winsome maid, 
 OH ripe was her beauty, and rare; 
 
 Her figure, voluptuous curves displayed, 
 And garlanded was her hair. 
 
 I could only gaze, while my senses reeled, 
 Her beauty had stormed my heart; 
 
 My choice was taken, my fate was sealed, 
 And Duty and I must part. 
 
 To Duty, so calmly standing by 
 
 I turned, I would say — depart; 
 But oh, at the glance of her tender eye, 
 
 I paused, with a throbbing heart. 
 
 To the figure, waiting so quietly there, 
 In her nun-like robes of gray, 
 The charms of Pleasure could not compare, 
 For they differed, as night from day. 
 
 'Twas the beauty of high-souled earnestness, 
 'Twas sweet as an angel's grace, 
 
 The charm of a spirit in mild duress, 
 Its shrine was her lovely face. 
 
 All crowned with a halo of silvery light, 
 Like a tall, white lily in bloom, 
 
 Did Duty await, her troth to plight, 
 Or to hear me pronounce her doom. 
 
 There seemed a charm in her gentle sway 
 That my soul could not withstand; 
 
 I promised to cherish and love for aye, 
 As I took her by the hand. 
 
 74 
 
And now, to Pleasure again I turned, 
 I must bid her to onward fare; 
 
 But, with purified vision I now discerned, 
 There was naught but a skeleton there. 
 
 THE NIGHT AFTER 
 
 'Twas the night after Christmas and all thro' the 
 
 house 
 Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse; 
 When like a grim specter bestriding the air, 
 Came prancing that equine — that fiendish night- 
 mare! 
 She'd a head like a turkey, with cranberry eyes, 
 Her coat was of feathers, her shoes were mince 
 pies. 
 
 Oh how she did curvet, and romp o'er me there; 
 No wild Spanish broncho with her could compare; 
 She loped on my chest — 'twas a vast desert plain, 
 A scorching Sahara all bordered by pain, 
 And for miles did that nag gallop o'er my physique, 
 Bestrode now it seemed, by a wild Arab sheik. 
 
 Long I squirmed 'neath the gloat of those cran- 
 berry eyes, 
 And amidships was smote by those flying mince 
 
 pies, 
 Till the lady equine took the bits in her bill, 
 Made a bolt thro' the roof — as night horses will. 
 Like the Turk, I awoke; and all thro' the house 
 Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse. 
 
 EASTER 
 
 Glorious message! "Christ is risen," 
 He has triumped o'er the tomb. 
 
 Sun of Easter's first glad morning 
 Pierced the murk of Calvary's gloom; 
 75 
 
Scattered all the dairk forebodings 
 Of the faithful few that heard; 
 
 Glorious news that shamed the doubting 
 Of a dying Savior's word. 
 
 And the message, " Christ is risen, " 
 
 Now hath power a world to thrill. 
 Now we see the man of sorrow 
 
 On that lonely Eastern hill; 
 See the crowning scene of anguish 
 
 Dimly thro' the gathering gloom; 
 Then a burst of golden sunlight, 
 
 "Christ is risen from tHe tomb." 
 
 Shout the message, "Christ is risen!" 
 
 Let the joyous anthems ring. 
 Immortality is proven, 
 
 We are children of a King! 
 As the beauteous Easter lilies 
 
 Burst the cold imprisoning sod, 
 Human clay in clay implanted 
 
 Sends its soul bloom up to God. 
 
 COLUMBUS 
 
 When o'er the seas Columbus came 
 
 And found this land of ours, 
 He later bowed beneath the blame 
 
 Of Kings and jealous powers. 
 Yet brooding there from sun to sun 
 
 Within his prison bleak 
 He doubtless felt that he had won 
 
 A triumph quite unique. 
 
 For surely, in his dreams, once more 
 He braved that frenzied band, 
 
 And showed fell mutineers the shore 
 Of this, our native land; 
 
 Once more he sailed the seas untried, 
 His hirelings mute with awe, 
 76 
 
They gazed upon the waters wide, 
 Appalled by all they saw. 
 
 Yet, firm and stanch Columbus stood 
 
 And pointed westward still; 
 He quelled the motley, craven brood 
 
 By fearless strength of will; 
 Our rugged coast burst into view — 
 
 Ah, few such triumphs know — 
 For not a man of all that crew 
 
 Could say, "I told you so." 
 
 STUNG 
 
 I sued and won the love of Sue; 
 
 This conquest seemed so easy 
 I passed her hints to name the day, 
 
 With manner light and breezy. 
 But, oh, ye gods, I did not know 
 
 How badly I was smitten, 
 Till charming Sue withdrew her hand 
 
 And left with me the mitten. 
 
 I'd often smiled when jealous swains 
 
 Were seeing green and yellow; 
 But, oh, my fowls came home to roost, 
 
 Sue's found another fellow. 
 I did not dream of such a thing. 
 
 And yet I'd this impression: 
 Her love had somehow lost its charm 
 
 By peaceable possession. 
 
 'Twas thus with me when but a tad, 
 
 That time in mem'ry lingers, 
 The only things I really craved 
 
 Were not for childish fingers; 
 But, if perchance, by hook or crook 
 
 I captured some fair token, 
 Alas, alack, the charm had fled, 
 
 My idol soon was broken. 
 77 
 
We're children of a larger growth, 
 
 For since the days of Adam 
 The luckless ones, who had not wives, 
 
 Have envied those that had 'em; 
 But, when they steal awhile away, 
 
 With bachelor chums to mingle, 
 These Benedicts will prate about 
 
 The joys of living single. 
 
 Now if I've moralized o'er much 
 
 Pray pardon the digression, 
 I'm somewhat cynical, since Sue 
 
 Has slipped from my possession. 
 I'd win her back? Not on your life! 
 
 But near the twain I'll hover, 
 And act the fool, in different ways, 
 
 To prove I didn't love her. 
 
 CHRISTMAS 
 
 On this night long ago, came the few from afar; 
 Bright was the beaming of Bethlehem's star — 
 There lay the Christ child, so low, in the stall, 
 Hailed by the wise ones as Savior of all. 
 A world now is won to their faith and their trust, 
 Tho' the magi are mould, and the manger is dust. 
 
 LOVE'S REASON 
 
 You ask me why I love you, dear, 
 
 And deem your heart so true. 
 I'd question, but in vain, I fear, 
 
 To ask the same of you. 
 I've often wondered in my heart 
 
 Why you should care for me. 
 Our views are always wide apart; 
 
 We never can agree. 
 
 Why, when we talk of "woman's rights," 
 Of literature or art, 
 
 78 
 
Opinion with conviction fights 
 When these discussions start. 
 
 'Tis then I rouse your lofty scorn, 
 I see your blue eyes flash; 
 
 Our loving seems a hope forlorn 
 When our opinions clash. 
 
 A dozen times have you returned 
 
 My gemmed betrothal band, 
 And I have oft the bauble spurned 
 
 And stamped it in the sand. 
 You'd call me back (I knew you would) ; 
 
 We penitence professed, 
 The while you wept a copious flood 
 
 Adown my fancy vest. 
 
 And now at last the day is set 
 
 (Unless we change it soon); 
 But, oh! we haven't settled yet 
 
 About the honeymoon. 
 Unfinished business that, you know; 
 
 Let's not discuss it, dear. 
 We'll ne'er agree on where to go, 
 
 And quarrel again, I fear. 
 
 Love's reasons? Do not ask me, dear. 
 
 Ask of the skies above. 
 Earth's wisest, e'en the sage and seer, 
 
 Can tell us naught of love. 
 So let's adopt the simple view, 
 
 Nor seek to reason why; 
 I love you just because 'tis you, 
 
 You love because 'tis I. 
 
 LOGGERHEAD LANE 
 
 Just a long and narrow alley 
 
 Stretched between adjoining farms, 
 
 Strewing each with tares and thistles, 
 Robbing each of beauty's charms. 
 79 
 
Even strangers knew the meaning 
 Of the weed-grown by-lane there 
 
 For the tangled maze untrodden 
 Plainly said "No thoroughfare." 
 
 Every thorny bush and bramble 
 
 Told of envy and of strife, 
 Bitter words and fierce upbraidings 
 
 Ne'er forgotten during life; 
 Told of two who once were neighbors 
 
 Parted by this meager reach; 
 How this narrow strip of fallow 
 
 Mutely gauged the soul of each. 
 
 Happily such feuds are rarer, 
 
 Scarcer than they used to be. 
 Seems the world is growing better, 
 
 Fewer useless lanes we see. 
 Narrowness of souls benighted 
 
 Causes all such foolish strife; 
 Now, as jie'er before, we're learning 
 
 Of the broader, manlier life. 
 
 OLD YEAR, FAREWELL 
 
 Wild raged the icy blast 
 While his hoary spirit passed 
 O'er the bar of time's swift river, 
 There to join the spirit years. 
 And his requiem was tolled, 
 O'er hill and plain it rolled, 
 Farewell, farewell forever, 
 
 With thy pleasures and thy tears. 
 
 Then spoke the dying year: 
 " Tho' the past is fraught with fear 
 And I hear the chariots rolling 
 That proclaim the coming King, 
 Mine is but the fate of all, 
 'Tis the coronal and pall, 
 For I marked the funeral tolling 
 
 When my welcoming chimes did ring. 
 80 
 
THE NORTH WIND 
 
 Whistle! Whistle! Whistle! 
 Dreary the north wind and bitter its blast 
 
 Shrilling a chant of the long ago, 
 Calling up many a thought of the past 
 
 Breathed on the night like a dirge of woe. 
 
 Moan! Moan! Moan! 
 Sighing a requiem and chilling the soul 
 
 Piteously pleading and wailing again; 
 Dying in whispers a faraway roll 
 
 Shuddering its plaint like a mortal in pain. 
 
 Shriek! Shriek! Shriek! 
 Fiercely upbraiding in stern wrathful tones, 
 
 Madly proclaiming the wrongs of a world; 
 Telling of want and grim poverty's moans, 
 
 Wild tragic ravings defiantly hurled. 
 
 Sigh! Sigh! Sigh! 
 Soothingly now sweeps the wind spirit o'er, 
 
 Tempering with pity the chill of its breath; 
 Weepingly croons of the suffering poor, 
 
 Whisperingly gasps of the coldness of death. 
 
 WHEN ETHEL SINGS 
 
 Her voice, as yet, unspoiled by art 
 Makes captive every listener's heart. 
 And I who close my eyes and dream 
 Of warbling birds and purling stream, 
 I crave no sweeter, purer strain 
 Than that which gushes forth amain 
 When Ethel sings. 
 
 When Ethel sings 
 The neighbors ope their windows wide, 
 And passers loiter, dreamy-eyed. 
 Her sweet old songs of other days 
 81 
 
Have won for her unstinted praise; 
 But o'er and o'er, these words I've caught: 
 "Why should such genius be untaught?" 
 When Ethel sings. 
 
 (Two years later.) 
 
 When Ethel sings 
 I realize how culture mars 
 (She's aping operatic stars). 
 Her tragic tones are high and shrill 
 With many a quaver, many a trill. 
 This art, by Madame Screecher taught, 
 It seems to me, was dearly bought 
 When Ethel sings. 
 
 When Ethel sings 
 There seems a universal frown; 
 Our neighbors jerk their windows down. 
 So high the key, so weird the charm, 
 Pedestrians pause in wild alarm, 
 But ere she's finished half the score 
 They're gone; they wait for no encore 
 When Ethel sings. 
 
 WHAT'S THE USE? 
 
 Oh, how oft we're prone to linger 
 
 At the parting of the ways, 
 Where the primrose path of Pleasure 
 
 Swerves from Duty's thorny maze; 
 There, amid the flowers to ramble, 
 
 We would seek some vain excuse, 
 And we'd still the voice of Conscience 
 
 With this question: "What's the use?" 
 
 When we see the wrong prevailing 
 
 O'er the right on every hand, 
 And the wicked seem to prosper, 
 
 While they scoff at God's command; 
 82 
 
When we see the meek and lowly 
 
 But the victims of abuse, 
 Then oftentimes we murmur, 
 
 Sadly murmur, "What's the use?" 
 
 When we drain the cup of sorrow 
 
 To the bitter, bitter lees; 
 When our summer friends have left u<s 
 
 To the winter's biting breeze; 
 When the failing of each promise 
 
 Doubtings in the heart produce, 
 Then oftentimes we murmur, 
 
 Sadly murmur, "What's the use?" 
 
 When Fate, unkind and cruel, 
 
 Sends Misfortune to our door, 
 And our faith in God and heaven 
 
 Seems to mock us o'er and o'er, 
 Then the evil tempter, seeking 
 
 With the weary soul a truce, 
 Often causes us to murmur, 
 
 Sadly murmur, "What's the use?" 
 
 When the heart is torn and bleeding, 
 
 When, misjudged, misunderstood, 
 We must reap but bitter blaming 
 
 Where we've sown the seeds of good. 
 Failure, mocking each endeavor, 
 
 Seems to offer us excuse, 
 And faintheartedly we murmur, 
 
 Sadly murmur, "What's the use?" 
 
 But there surely is a reason 
 
 We shall know it by and by, 
 In the answer of the conscience 
 
 When we lay us down to die. 
 For they who've courted virtue, 
 
 Then shall seek n,o vain excuse; 
 'Tis then we'll know the answer 
 
 To our question: "What's the use?" 
 83 
 
POEMS EVERYWHERE 
 
 There are poems, poems, everywhere. 
 
 Each blade of grass, each drop of dew, 
 Each humble floweret of the dell. 
 
 A page, a volume, brings to view. 
 The stately lily of the vale, 
 
 Her queenly mate, the blushing rose, 
 Await us at the gate of morn 
 
 Their latest volumes to unclose. 
 
 There are poems, poems everywhere. 
 
 By rhythmic breeze the branches stirred, 
 Attune their mystic minor strain 
 
 To hum of bee and song of bird; 
 And all the wondrous power of God, 
 
 And all the mysteries of time, 
 Are written on this earthly scroll 
 
 In couplets of eternal rhyme. 
 
 There are poems, poems everywhere. 
 
 The rushing rill, the babbling brook 
 Will sing for us a classic lay, 
 
 While hurrying down the dinglenook; 
 For us the rugged towering oak, 
 
 In wind-coaxed whispers, sweet and low, 
 Will chant the death song of his mates 
 
 Who left him in the long ago. 
 
 There are poems, poems everywhere. 
 
 When night unveils her floating stars, 
 And sweetly breathes to us of rest 
 
 Beyond the crystal sunset bars; 
 Then, blending all in sweet accord, 
 
 It seems the sweep of angel wings 
 Might brush the vibrant harp of God 
 
 And draw sweet music from its strings. 
 
 There are poems, poems everywhere. 
 For Nature spreads her lavish store, 
 
 84 
 
A feast of song in scented bowers, 
 Rich volumes of poetic lore. 
 
 Then thro' the bright and happy hours 
 We'll strive, as did the bards of old, 
 
 To pitch our ringing songs above 
 
 The scorn of those who worship gold. 
 
 There are poems, poems everywhere. 
 
 But, ah, this fatal touch of ours 
 May cause the very thoughts we love 
 
 To droop and wither, like the flowers; 
 And when, with weary, aching brow, 
 
 We ponder o'er the written line, 
 We find too much of shallow art, 
 
 Too little of the fire divine. 
 
 THE MUSIC OF THE BELLS 
 
 On the boundless Texas prairies, 
 
 In the mornings long ago, 
 I have heard the sweetest music 
 
 Chiming silvery and low. 
 
 'Twas the music of the cowbells, 
 
 Far away in wood and glade, 
 When the Gulf breeze, northward stealing, 
 
 O'er the sea of verdure strayed. 
 
 Then, far o'er the sunlit prairies, 
 Myriad tones of sweetness stole, 
 
 Now the faintest golden tinkle, 
 Now a deep, sonorous toll. 
 
 'Twas the orchestra primeval, 
 And its distance-mellowed notes 
 
 Blended with the springtime chorus 
 From a thousand feathered throats. 
 
 Gayly decked with nature's blossoms 
 Was the smiling prairie crest, 
 85 
 
Texas Plumes of deepest crimson 
 Waving high above the rest. 
 
 And the pinks of Carolina 
 
 Carmined o'er the billowy swells, 
 Blithely dancing in the breezes 
 
 To the music of the bells. 
 
 Then how sweet to roam the prairies 
 In the rosy blush of morn, 
 
 Feeling all the wild elation 
 Of a soul to freedom born. 
 
 Lovely was the virgin bosom 
 
 Of the Lone Star's wood and glade, 
 
 But, alas! on Mammon's altar 
 Nature's beauties low were laid. 
 
 Now the spring is gray and gloomy, 
 Morning brings a solemn hush; 
 
 Gone from hedgerow and from thicket 
 Are the redbird and the thrush. 
 
 Darkly frowns the plowman's furrow, 
 Where once smiled the grassy dells, 
 
 And we hear no more the music 
 Of the sweetly chiming bells. 
 
 A LIFE ON THE FARM 
 
 Ob, who can describe it, or picture its charm, 
 
 A home in the country, a life on the farm. 
 
 There nurtured and blessed by the fruits of the 
 
 soil 
 The hand of the Master rewarding our toil, 
 We reap not the harvest of gain and of greed, 
 But the gleanings are hallowed a God-given meed. 
 
 No toll from the toil-laden masses we wring, 
 We know not the smart of grim poverty's sting. 
 
In sunshine we sow, and in sunshine we reap, 
 And snug is the hearthstone when bitter blasts 
 
 sweep. 
 We sigh not for harvests of gain and of greed, 
 For the storehouse of Nature supplies every need. 
 
 The salt of the earth are the sons of the soil, 
 For the bread of the nations is fruit of their toil. 
 Let the proud cities boast of their grandeur and 
 
 gold, 
 As a song that is sung, as a tale that is told. 
 The gold were but dross and the grandeur but 
 
 dearth 
 Should the art of the husbandman fade from the 
 
 earth. 
 
 Man made the proud city, the country is God's; 
 Man's handiwork soon molders back to the 
 
 sods; 
 But God is eternal, His glory is seen 
 In the field and the forest's perennial green, 
 Let the dying leaf fall when 'tis faded and sere, 
 When the winter is gone other leaves will appear. 
 
 Our pastoral scenes are the topics of ages, 
 The genius of bards and the wisdom of sages; 
 The greatest of earth was sent forth from the 
 
 sod 
 To enlighten mankind and to honor their God; 
 For our Maker through Nature communed with 
 
 His own, 
 And in wisdom they reaped, what in faith they 
 
 had sown. 
 
 Oh, happy and rich is the child of the soil, 
 Contentment and health the reward of his toil; 
 Just health and contentment and who can have 
 
 more, 
 Were the gold of the universe piled at his door? 
 Oh, who can describe it or picture its charm, 
 A home in the country, a life on the farm. 
 
 87 
 
THE GOOD OLD PIES 
 
 Away with printed recipes, 
 
 And formulated rules, 
 The scientific panoply 
 
 Of modern cooking schools. 
 Beneath a placid surface lie 
 
 Full many a pain and ache, 
 Oh, leaden disks, unlike the pies 
 
 That mother used to make. 
 
 We long for pie and vainly sigh 
 
 For apple, peach or quince; 
 And often we're constrained to try 
 
 A wedge of deadly mince. 
 Then when we're folded double by 
 
 That misery breeding fake, 
 We moan and babble of the pie 
 
 That mother used to make. 
 
 Grim harpies gather 'round our couch, 
 
 Wild night-mares prance and neigh; 
 Dream-goblins seem to nurse a grouch 
 
 'Gainst pastry of to-day. 
 In boyhood oft we went to rest 
 
 Chock full of mother's pie, 
 'Twas then we always slept the best 
 
 And didn't heave a sigh. 
 
 Now pies are filled with bric-a-brac 
 
 'Twixt sheets of cement spread; 
 And when you tackle one, alack, 
 
 Your peace of mind is fled. 
 Oh, pastry experts cease your clack, 
 
 Your science you've displayed. 
 Ye chemist cooks now give us back 
 
 The pies our mothers made. 
 
 88 
 
CANUTE. 
 
 "Command the sea," his courtiers cried 
 
 To Canute, called The Great, 
 And he, with swelling heart, replied, 
 
 "Bring here my chair of State." 
 The tide came whitening o'er the sand, 
 
 Swept shoreward, wild and free, 
 And Canute cried in stern command, 
 
 "Roll back thy waves, thou sea!" 
 
 Old Neptune, mastering his surprise, 
 
 Advanced with hoarser roar, 
 And lo, the King and courtiers wise 
 
 Went scampering to shore. 
 They madly raced o'er sinking sand 
 
 Where briny billows poured, 
 They reached the land a draggled band, 
 
 "Ho, ho!" old Neptune roared. 
 
 And many a man since Canute's day 
 
 Hath well rehearsed this role, 
 With sycophantic pride to play 
 
 The courtier to his soul. 
 Ambition whispers, "Leave thy sphere, 
 
 In others thou may'st rule"; 
 And he who lends a listening ear. 
 
 Like Canute, plays the fool. 
 
 THE OGRE 
 
 To a fool who dwelt in a cottage white, 
 A weird, wild thing made moan one night, 
 And the fool he fed the wand'rer well 
 For he knew not that 'twas a cub of hell. 
 
 Then it came each night thro' shine or storm, 
 For the food gave growth to its grewsome form, 
 And the fool who'd nutured thus his fall 
 Now stood aghast at the creature's call. 
 89 
 
Thro' the midnight drear he could hear its 
 
 roar 
 As it came for food to the cottage door; 
 And dark as the sleuth hounds of despair 
 Was the form of the grisly thing out there. 
 
 And the cottage walls once fair and white 
 Were marred by the hideous monster's might, 
 While the fool now made to the winds his wail, 
 "My stores of food, they fail, they fail." 
 
 And a night there came when the cot was bare, 
 No food for the hell-born vampire was there, 
 And the fool lay shivering on the floor 
 As the thing drew near to the bolted door. 
 
 Then what was a fool's last piteous prayer 
 To the Stygian beast unsated there? 
 And what was a bolt or a barricade 
 When it found no meat on the threshold laid? 
 
 One thun'drous crash like an earthquake's 
 
 shock 
 And the portals leap from the riven lock, 
 The tigerish thing that the fool had fed 
 Now bore him away in its clutches — dead. 
 
 90 
 
MAY 81 1912 
 
Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process 
 Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
 Treatment Date: Sept. 2009 
 
 PreservationTechnologies 
 
 A WORLD LEADER IN COLLECTIONS PRESERVATIOti 
 
 111 Thomson Park Drive 
 Cranberry Township, PA 16066 
 
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