COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 CONDE BENOIST FALLEN 
 
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Class _/ r)/l.S'#? / 
 
 Book A "^ - 
 
 GopyiightN^ 
 
 COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 BY 
 
 CONDE BENOIST FALLEN 
 
 NEW YORK 
 P. J KENEDY & SONS 
 
 1915 
 

 COPYRIGHT, 1915, BY 
 CONDE BENOIST FALLEN 
 
 THE-PLIMPTON-PRESS 
 NORWOOD -MASS -U-S-A 
 
 ©GI.A420106 
 
TO THEODORA 
 
 TO thee, God's gift, in whom all gifts unite, 
 In token of thy gift of love to me. 
 Who feels that he receives unworthily, 
 I offer up this sheaf of songs, though slight 
 Their worth, and poorer still the singer be. 
 Yet Love through me a fervent message sent; 
 And I with feeble voice made faint reply, 
 As reeds to summer breezes passing by 
 Breathe out a quavering music, humbly bent 
 Beneath the song, a trembling instrument. 
 But thou, accepting these poor leafless lays, 
 Wilt make amend for all imperfectness, 
 As great ones taking in the taking bless. 
 And in receiving render highest praise. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The New Rubaiyat 1 
 
 A Song of Sixpence 19 
 
 Benediction 21 
 
 A Fable for Lydia 23 
 
 Treasure Trove 28 
 
 Life 29 
 
 Maria Immaculata 30 
 
 Love and Death 37 
 
 Ode for Georgetown University . . 47 
 
 Amaranthus 60 
 
 Youth 67 
 
 Aspiration 72 
 
 Poet and Bird 74 
 
 In Circe's Den 76 
 
 On the Death of Alfred Tennyson . 79 
 
 Arise, America! 81 
 
 The Raising of the Flag 84 
 
 The Babe of Bethlehem 88 
 
 Love Sole 90 
 
 The Burden 92 
 
 How Poets Play 93 
 
 vii 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 The Lower Bough 94 
 
 Heaven 95 
 
 Carmen Nuptiale 96 
 
 Sonnets 97 
 
 Retrogression 99 
 
 The Poet's Fane 100 
 
 The Babe 101 
 
 The Sonnet 103 
 
 Anarchy 105 
 
 Vanitas Vanitatum 106 
 
 Love's Fruit 108 
 
 March 109 
 
 April 110 
 
 Christus Triumphans Ill 
 
 Sonnet Sequence 113 
 
 The Death of Sir Launcelot ... 121 
 
 Aglae 149 
 
 The Feast of Thalarchus .... 187 
 
 Vlll 
 
THE NEW RUBAIYAT 
 
 Wisdom is easily seen by them that love her, and is found by 
 them that seek her. For she goeth about seeking such as 
 are worthy of her, and she showeth herself cheerfidly in the 
 ways, and meeteth them with all providence. . . . 
 
 WISDOM, VI. 
 
THE NEW RUBAIYAT 
 
 Old Omar, subtle weaver of the skein 
 Of doubt entangled in thy muddled brain 
 In that far East which saw thy distant day, 
 This later hour awakes thy voice again. 
 
 And in a newer tongue recasts the phrase, 
 That doubled glibly in thine olden ways 
 On life and death and those dark questionings 
 Which doubt may answer not, though doubt may 
 raise. 
 
 This newer vase that holds thine ancient wine 
 Is rich with lines as gracious as were thine, 
 As delicately graved, as featly traced 
 With clinging tendril of the worshipped vine. 
 
 Nor deem I that the pouring of thy song 
 From old to newer vessel does thee wrong; 
 For deft the hand that fashioned the new clay, 
 A master's hand, and, as a master's, strong. 
 3 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Nor strange that he should seek thine unfaith out, 
 Who felt a kindred sympathy in doubt 
 In this wild day when creeds have crumbled down, 
 Blown like the dust of simoons 'round about. 
 
 For that old plaint which sickened thy soft soul. 
 And to thy lips held up the poisoned bowl 
 Made luscious with the nectars of the sense, 
 Still sings your song and echoes all its dole. 
 
 And though his noisy doubt the newer man 
 Boast as fresh light upon the marching van 
 Of progress to the piping fife of change, 
 Your doubt was ancient ere his doubt began. 
 
 For you, as he, sang faith and unfaith's strife. 
 And he, as you, chants death the bourne of 
 
 life; 
 He now, as you a thousand years ago. 
 Into the heart of faith drives deep the knife. 
 
 Thy dubious hand upon the shifting scale 
 Touched every trembling note, drew every wail. 
 Sounded each plaint and struck each quivering 
 
 chord; 
 He now as you of old — to what avail? 
 4 
 
The NEW RUBAIYAT 
 
 As dark a riddle is that silent fate 
 To the blind sceptic of this later date, 
 As ever answered not to thy light word, 
 Who asked in dalliance at the outer gate. 
 
 For truth speaks only at the inner shrine, 
 Not in the tavern where they spill the wine; 
 Pours only through the cleansed and chastened 
 
 sense 
 The cryptic sweetness of the living vine. 
 
 To list thy lilting numbers' softened strain, 
 And hear it chiming with the rhythmed pain 
 Thy later brothers plaint on modern lutes, 
 Wakes smiling comment on their little gain. 
 
 Alas, that you in mediaeval years 
 
 Sang all their doubts, shed all their hopeless 
 
 tears, 
 Their creedless creed in all its changes rang, 
 And coined their wisdom in your shallow fears. 
 
 Science but now, they cry with echoing bruit, 
 Has plucked the higher wisdom's ripened fruit, 
 Achieved the summit of a nobler view, 
 And struck in wider knowledge deeper root. 
 5 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Yet all the garnered learning of the age 
 Has added not a tittle to your page; 
 Of that first truth and last the soul desires 
 Your word as wise as theirs, your wit as sage. 
 
 Your wit and theirs both dark as starless night, 
 Searching the universe with candle-light, 
 Agrope within the same abyss of dread. 
 Where depth grows black with depth and height 
 with height. 
 
 In vain they seek, as vain you sought, the clue. 
 Where doubt makes mocking shadows of the true. 
 Dissolves the answer in the question's breath. 
 The doubt that asks from doubt that never 
 knew. 
 
 And echo questioned back the mockery flings. 
 And doubt that asks of doubt with unfaith rings; 
 Responsive to the fingers wail the strings. 
 And as you key the patient chord, it sings. 
 
 You drew the music of your plaintive strain 
 From the sore grief of Philomel's sad pain. 
 But dashed the sweetness of her chastened song 
 With doubt, and poisoned all its balm with bane. 
 6 
 
The NEW RUBAIYAT 
 
 You sang, and sadly sweet your olden rhyme, 
 The fleeting footsteps of the phantom time, 
 The dying sweetness of the hastening rose, 
 Life's transient blush undone by death's swift 
 crime. 
 
 Yea, vanity in him, who lays up store 
 Of hope to reap his harvest on time's shore, 
 And sowing all the fields that lie around. 
 Prepares the granary and the threshing floor. 
 
 Ah, swift the courses of the rushing sun. 
 
 And changeful are the glittering hours that run 
 
 Twixt hope's first blossom and the blown 
 
 flower, 
 For evening sees not what the morn begun. 
 
 And Caesar's dust beneath a peasant's feet. 
 For wisdom's eloquence were theme replete. 
 How levelled by the sweeping scythe of time, 
 Fame and unfame in one oblivion meet. 
 
 So has the ages' wisdom ever sung. 
 And from earth's hollow glories wailing rung 
 The tribute of its dole; not new your song. 
 Nor new the lesson of your mellow tongue. 
 
 7 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Though Jamshyd long has quaffed the last black 
 
 draught, 
 And Caesar, smitten by the bitter shaft 
 That pricked his glory's bubble, heedless sleeps, 
 Their dust but shallow soil for wisdom's graft. 
 
 The rose you sing from Caesar's clay that blows 
 
 Like Caesar's glory for an instant shows. 
 
 And crumbles back to that from whence it 
 
 bloomed; 
 From dust it came and into dust it goes. 
 
 Mortal to mortal is the primal law, 
 
 Earth back to earth again the whole world's saw: 
 
 Mortality is written broad and deep. 
 
 And fools that run the easy lesson draw. 
 
 Yes, easy is the folly that seems wise. 
 And cloaks short knowledge in a long disguise; 
 Easy the truth that time is swift of flight. 
 The flower that blooms to-day, to-morrow dies. 
 
 Easy to drown, the heedless cup within. 
 The gruesome memory of the death and sin. 
 That racked the soul with their black question- 
 ings. 
 And as unbidden guests of old stalked in. 
 8 
 
The NEW RUBAIYAT 
 
 Nor you the first, nor last, to thrust them out 
 And welcome in their place a reeling rout 
 Who drink and question not, but steep in floods 
 Of mellow vintage all the ghosts of doubt. 
 
 Brief wisdom and short triumph your poor plot 
 To cheat the destiny the years allot 
 By drowning memory in a shallow cup; — 
 Though now forgetting, you are not forgot. 
 
 And while you wander in a vinous mist 
 Through roseate ways as your soft pleasures list, 
 The spinner Time still plies his tireless loom. 
 And you and Death are drawing to the tryst. 
 
 What answer then in that appointed place, 
 When he breathes cold upon your yellowing face, 
 What answer echoing from the empty cup? 
 Remorse within the lees, think you, or grace? 
 
 To-day the chosen mistress of your lot. 
 To-morrow banned and yesterday forgot: 
 Lo, YESTERDAY accuses from the dead; — 
 To-morrow beckons for to-day is not : 
 
 Fast running out the limit of your thread. 
 To-day and yesterday forever sped; 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 The whirling loom roars distantly and faint, 
 And all your years are ashes with the dead. 
 
 So careful of the present and its joys, 
 Hoarding like children all the broken toys; 
 The little wrecks now strew the dusty floor, 
 And you forgotten with your childish noise. 
 
 So careful now within your eager hands 
 That not a grain shall waste of time's swift sands - 
 The very grain you clutch has trickled through; 
 To-day holds not what yesterday demands. 
 
 To-day but borrows what to-morrow lends, 
 And pays to yesterday what now it spends, 
 And debtor still with nothing of its own 
 A bankrupt in the hands of Death it ends. 
 
 Why stake on nothingness the all you own, 
 And cast life's ashes to the whirlwind blown? 
 He loses time who builds on time alone, 
 And nothing shall be reaped from nothing sown. 
 
 What boot the pleasures of a century's run. 
 If all their sweets but end where they begun 
 In that swift nothing of an instant's flight, 
 A prize that's lost before the prize is won. 
 10 
 
The NEW RUBAIYAT 
 
 The years gone down into the gaping tomb 
 Of YESTERDAY are dream wastes in the gloom, 
 Dim wraiths of time embraced but never held, 
 Visions that stare from out an ancient room. 
 
 Sum up their all and hoard your empty gain : 
 Hope crushed by fear, joy strangled in the pain, 
 Life smote by death at every baffled turn, 
 Dying to live and then to die again. 
 
 And when upon the darkened verge you stand. 
 Where life's faint stream is lost in death's quick 
 
 sand, 
 What garnered treasure do the senses hold? 
 An eyeless skull within a fleshless hand. 
 
 Who turns all things to uses of the sense 
 Shall glean in sense his only recompense; 
 For time abused shall be by time avenged; 
 Life sown in death shall reap in impotence. 
 
 You tell us that you turned from Wisdom's door, 
 Sifting the heaped-up rubbish on the floor 
 Of learning's vestibule, but found no key; 
 And was the portal locked — are you so sure? 
 11 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Think you that thus the road to Wisdom lies, 
 And on the rungs of knowledge men may rise 
 To that pure empyrean, as small boys 
 Plant little ladders to essay the skies? 
 
 Not all the gleaning of the labouring West, 
 Nor all the knowledge of the Orient's quest 
 May scale a single inch of that far height: 
 Who seeketh not is he who seeketh best. 
 
 Knowledge may reach from shining star to star, 
 Enthroned on three-ringed Saturn sit afar. 
 And still as distant be from Wisdom's house 
 As when it beat against this lower bar. 
 
 The door to which in vain your key you plied. 
 The door you found so tightly sealed, stands wide 
 To him who bends in leal humility: 
 He enters not who walks erect in pride. 
 
 You thought to compass with your little span 
 
 The wide abysses of creation's plan. 
 
 And finite measure infinite design; 
 
 You — you would be God, who are but man. 
 
 Believe th' Omniscient, who ordained the law, 
 The end as well as the beginning saw; 
 12 
 
The NEW RUBAIYAT 
 
 Trust thou th' Omnipotent, who made the whole, 
 O'errules it all: not His, but yours the flaw. 
 
 Heaven but countersigns your own decree, 
 And as you sow your years, so shall they be : 
 This much of fate is true, that as you plant, 
 So shall you pluck the fruitage of the tree. 
 
 The daring mind that seeks to wholly sift 
 The heart of mystery, may never lift 
 The veil that hides her face from prying eyes: 
 From Wisdom's hand you cannot wrest her gift. 
 
 Who would unchastely pierce her secret pale 
 Shall find her panoplied in hardest mail; 
 Who seeks to violate her fane shall meet 
 The entrance barred and closely drawn the veil. 
 
 The gathered lightnings shall about him play. 
 And thunderous wrath shall fill his fearful way, 
 Whose lustful eye would take her face unveiled; 
 The sacrilege with blindness shall he pay. 
 
 The question put the answer comes in kind : 
 Who seeks in simple faith in faith shall find 
 The answer; but pride re-echoes pride. 
 And blind the understanding of the blind. 
 13 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Who asks of Earth shall hear of Earth reply : 
 Earth born of earth in earth again shall die; 
 A fugitive your little course you run, 
 And there return, and there forever lie. 
 
 Who asks of Heaven an unseen voice shall hear 
 Singing like chimings of the crystal sphere 
 Of interstellar spaces ringing clear: 
 There but a little while, forever here; 
 
 A little while to school the impatient soul 
 To read by faith the riddle of the scroll, 
 That Wisdom writes in hieroglyphs of time; 
 There but the lesser part, and here the whole. 
 
 For Love gazed on the Beauty of the Face 
 Of His Beloved and upward welled in grace. 
 As everlasting fountains pouring forth 
 Abundant floods make bloom a desert place. 
 
 Love in creation's wondrous mirror sought 
 To multiply the image of His Thought, 
 And pouring forth His Power upon the void, 
 In Love the likeness of His Love He wrought. 
 
 And back again as surging flames aspire 
 Creation lifts to Love's eternal fire; 
 14 
 
The NEW RUBAIYAT 
 
 Time but the rushing of her eager flight 
 Upon the outstretched pinions of desire; 
 
 Death, the instant of the journey done, 
 
 When all the courses of the way are run, 
 
 The door through which departs the passing guest, 
 
 Who goes upon the rising of the sun. 
 
 For Love devised the plan, and Love makes test 
 Of Faith to that far end that Love knows best; 
 And this the message Love by Wisdom sends: 
 In Faith abide, and leave to Love the rest. 
 
 Divorce not Reason from thy failing house 
 To make with concubines a vain carouse. 
 But take her, prudent partner of thy years, 
 To cherish chastely as a faithful spouse. 
 
 She, too, is of celestial origin. 
 And knows how close to Faith she is akin. 
 Faith, her elder sister, in whose eyes 
 Dissolves the secret, death, the riddle, sin. 
 
 For Reason, modest in her household lore. 
 Seeks not beyond the threshold of her door; 
 Diviner truths in Wisdom's utterance given, 
 Takes from the lips of Faith, and asks no more. 
 15 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 By Faith, and Faith alone in panic rout 
 The misbelieving horde is driven out, 
 Fate's nameless terror lifted from the soul, 
 Fate, the echo of the voice of doubt. 
 
 Forgetfulness in sense a sorry scheme 
 To cheat the conscience and make seem 
 The IS and IS NOT all a phantom show, 
 And time the fading shadow of a dream. 
 
 For Reason, drugged a thousand times and more, 
 A ravaged captive on the tavern floor. 
 Awakes again loathing her fallen state. 
 And clamours for her freedom at the door. 
 
 Though shamed and flouted victim of thy rape, 
 She does not die; and you may not escape 
 Her importuning voice, nor think to end 
 The issue in the lethe of the grape. 
 
 Come from the stifling tavern's baleful glare 
 Into the sunshine and the outer air. 
 With gladdened nature greeting everywhere. 
 And looking up to heaven, see, how fair! 
 
 How pure the wide savannah's vaulted sweep. 
 One sapphire flame from glowing deep to deep; 
 16 
 
The NEW RUBAIYAT 
 
 This crystal cup hold to thy crackled lip, 
 And drinking feel the freshened pulses leap. 
 
 Drink, and clear the phantoms from thy brain. 
 Cleanse from thy sluggish blood the lecherous bane 
 That poisoned all the wells of life and truth; 
 Drink! Look up! and once again be sane. 
 
 With chastened sense and in the cleaner mind 
 Look in pure nature's eyes, and you shall find 
 A secret half spelled out and half divined : 
 Within the emblem truth is not confined. 
 
 Her secret word a faint prefiguring; 
 She speaks in shadow of a higher thing. 
 Like pale penumbra of the light unseen. 
 The sun's veiled glory from an outer ring. 
 
 Within the deepened shadow's darkened plot 
 You sought the source of light and found it not; 
 Your eyes grew dim with searching in the dark, 
 And blindness out of darkness was begot. 
 
 The shadow is but shade of hidden light; 
 It is the sun by earth eclipsed makes night: 
 Heaven is gracious to our little power. 
 And her far secret tempers to our sight. 
 17 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 The need of Faith from nature's secret learn; 
 Reason from Faith and Faith from Love in turn 
 Draws life and light; in One see all else rest, 
 And in things seen the things unseen discern. 
 
 And though thy years are drawing to their close, 
 And youth and spring have faded with the rose, 
 Faith plucks the thorn of thy regret, and lo ! 
 Upon the naked stem Hope's floweret blows; 
 
 And all the garden blossoms, and the Vine 
 
 Into Love's chalice pours diviner Wine : 
 
 Faith holds the secret of the sacred sign; 
 
 Her eyes search deep and long, and make it thine. 
 
 18 
 
A SONG OF SIXPENCE 
 
 Sing a song of sixpence 
 
 And a pocket full of rye! — 
 
 There are millions in it 
 
 For one with a business eye. 
 
 Then sing a song of sixpence 
 And a pocket full of rye ! 
 
 Ho, the jingle of the sixpence! — 
 And will you sell or buy? 
 
 The world is full of sixpence, 
 The ways are strewn with rye — 
 
 And have you then no sixpence ! 
 Better by far to die. 
 
 The multitude of sixpence, 
 The plenitude of rye! — 
 
 And yet I have no sixpence; 
 How poor are you and I ! 
 
 I without a sixpence 
 
 And you without the rye — 
 Lo ! Death on a gaunt black horse 
 
 Under an ebon sky. 
 19 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 You sing a song of beauty, 
 Your heart is full of youth — 
 
 Whence have you wandered, friend, 
 Into the paths of ruth? 
 
 I have, alas! no sixpence, 
 And you, alas! no rye — 
 
 You sing of life in death. 
 Of death in life sing I! 
 
 Ho! there, on your gaunt black horse 
 
 Under the ebon sky! 
 And they sing their song of sixpence 
 
 And a pocket full of rye! 
 
 20 
 
BENEDICTION 
 
 White sail upon the distant blue 
 
 Swift flying shallop with your snowy wings, 
 Here from the shore I waft to you 
 
 A message that a poet sings. 
 
 I bless you as you fade afar 
 
 Where heaving sea and heaven merge, 
 A faintly gleaming silver star 
 
 Upon the trembling ocean's verge. 
 
 May gentle winds from spotless skies 
 And halcyon seas about you play, 
 
 And all of Heaven's guardian eyes 
 Keep myriad watch upon your way. 
 
 May dolphins spout their silvery brine 
 Before your swift melodious keel, 
 
 And whitest suns upon you shine 
 As fleckless days about you wheel. 
 
 And when the far-off headland's slope 
 Uprears its beaconed star above 
 
 And lights the haven of your hope, 
 My blessing waft you to your love. 
 21 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Oh happy be the meeting then 
 
 When heart beats joyous unto heart, 
 
 And from the deep shall draw again 
 Two gracious spirits long apart. 
 
 And may that love in blessing prove 
 Its kinship to my distant prayer; 
 
 Though all the seas be my remove, 
 Let me your blessing share. 
 
 For as I pray that blessing on 
 
 Both you and yours across the sea, 
 
 May your fair Love's sweet benison 
 In turn pour down on mine and me. 
 
 22 
 
A FABLE FOR LYDIA 
 
 Sweet Love is slain ! I saw him at your gates 
 Prostrate, ah me! upon th' ensanguined ground, 
 Slain too with his own arrow and by you ! 
 What dreadful and most clamorous deed 
 For vengeance this, Fairest Cruelty, 
 Than Artemis more cruel when she slew 
 The children of the tearful Niobe 
 Repentant of her boast. 
 
 Who would not weep 
 Save you, to see him marbled there in death, 
 His traitrous arrow in his gaping wound; 
 The crimson fountain of his streaming life 
 Poured out upon the pitying earth, his locks 
 Astray upon his alabaster brow 
 With veiled eyes beneath pale pencilled lids, 
 Eclipsed in darkness. 
 
 Woe, deep woe and pain 
 Divinely bitter in the breasts of all 
 The gods, and cloud about Olympian heights 
 Heavy with sorrow of the brooding storm; 
 23 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 And direst wrath within Olympian halls, 
 For that young Eros lies untimely dead. 
 
 Zeus lays his hand upon his thunderbolt, 
 And in the darkened caverns of his mind 
 Wrath mutters, while at the presage of his 
 
 frown 
 O'er drooping eyes glowing with pented lightnings 
 All heaven pales, and Her6 veils her face 
 With trembling hands. 
 
 Great Mulciber, aloft 
 His mighty hammer swung to smite and shatter. 
 Stands, a statued rage; Apollo starts 
 And grips his silver bow, one hand upon 
 His swiftest shaft ablaze with restless fire; 
 And by him panoplied Minerva lifts 
 Her poised spear keen with a thousand deaths. 
 While on her shield the Gorgoned locks hiss 
 
 wrath. 
 So all the gods in fair Ol3anpus' round, 
 Each in the several manners of their powers, 
 Divinely angry and divinely swift 
 To vengeance, rapt in the amazed rage 
 Of sudden harm breaking the halcyon joy 
 Of their Olympian calm, together rise 
 Threatening. 
 
 24 
 
A FABLE for LYDIA 
 
 But chief the Cytherean goddess, 
 The roses slain in either cheek, and all 
 Her loosened tresses streaming down 
 Cascaded gold in riotous neglect. 
 Lifts up her voice piercing and wailing out 
 Upon the shuddering winds that bear her grief 
 To the four ends of earth disconsolate; 
 For she is mother of young Eros dead. 
 
 And at the foot of Zeus' throne she kneels 
 With outstretched arms and slender petaled hands. 
 And prays the great Ceraunian Father thus: 
 ''Not vengeance do I seek, Thunderer, 
 Not thy red bolt upon the guilty head — 
 For what avail that now to Eros slain? — 
 Though just thy vengeance for the sacrilege — 
 But life again for Eros, life renewed, 
 Immortal save from his own arrow sent 
 By hand of mortal, who o'ercomes the god 
 Himself and slays him with the fatal shaft 
 Aimed at his conqueror : For so the Fates 
 In council sacrosanct decreed, beyond 
 Thy might to break or bend — Frown not, Zeus, 
 Father of gods and men that so I plead ! 
 But hold thy hand ! Release the eager bolt. 
 And hear me more before it be too late ! — 
 For in that far inscrutable abyss 
 25 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Of Fate, that underlies Olympus' heights 
 And all the vast foundations of the world, 
 'Twas willed of eld that only by the hand 
 That breached the fatal way of horrid death 
 To Eros' heart, could life be brought again; 
 If that same hand but pluck the arrow forth 
 And turn it on the heart that owns the hand, 
 Eros again will breathe immortal life 
 And gladden our high court with ancient joy. 
 Stay then thy hand, hurl not the dreadful bolt! 
 And seal not on the brow of Eros death 
 Forever! And in her heart that slew, the barb 
 Transfixed shall bring not death, but fairer life, 
 For fatal unto him alone alas! his shaft. 
 Straightway to earth will I with winged speed 
 And seek out her, who slew my boy and made 
 Olympus dark for all the gods, and earth 
 Disconsolate — a goddess at her feet, 
 Praying her tender pity for a god, 
 My son!" 
 
 So saying rises the mother goddess, 
 And gathering, as she rises, her unloosed locks, 
 With delicate and deftest fingers winds 
 The glittering strands in queenly coils about 
 Her head, and crowns it with their massy gold. 
 And going to the jacinth parapet 
 That rings Olympus height, where coo her doves 
 26 
 
A FABLE for LYDIA 
 
 In silvery harness to her ivory car, 
 
 Mounts, and speeding downward to the earth 
 
 Wings swiftly through the flowing air that sings 
 
 In amorous cadence through the slender spokes 
 
 Of golden wheels, and far into the deep 
 
 Of blue below sinks from the straining sight 
 
 Of all the ranged gods upon the verge 
 
 Of high Olympus, silent watching. 
 
 27 
 
TREASURE-TROVE 
 
 An evening palmer onward creeps the day 
 To seek the sanctuaried Sun's far shrine — 
 
 Pilgrim, thither bear some gift of mine 
 As treasure-trove when I shall come that way. 
 
 28 
 
LIFE 
 
 What bring you flaming Sun from out the East, 
 Birth, death, or love or hate to me this day? 
 
 What take you crimson Sun within the West? 
 What yesterday I brought and took away. 
 
MARIA IMMACULATA 
 I 
 
 How may I sing, unworthy I, 
 
 Our Lady's glorious sanctity? 
 
 She whose celestial shoon 
 
 Rest on the horned moon 
 
 In Heaven's highest galaxy; 
 
 She whom the poet sang of old 
 
 In that rare vision told 
 
 In soft Tuscan speech of gold, 
 
 The spotless spouse and mother-maid. 
 
 The goodliest sapphire in Heaven's floor inlaid, 
 
 Around whom wheels the circling flame 
 
 Of the rapt seraph breathing Mary's name. 
 
 While choir to choir replies 
 
 In growing harmonies 
 
 Through all the glowing spheres of Paradise, 
 
 Till universal Heaven's glad estate 
 
 Rings jubilation to their queen immaculate. 
 
 II 
 
 Ah me! Unworthy I to sing 
 The stainless mother of my King, 
 My King and Lord, 
 The Incarnate Word, 
 
 30 
 
MARIA IMMACULATA 
 
 Heaven itself comprest 
 
 Within her virgin breast! 
 
 How may my faltering rhyme 
 
 Sing of Eternity in time, 
 
 Omnipotence in human frailty exprest, 
 
 Our earthly garden fragrant with celestial thjnue. 
 
 What Muse, though great Urania guide her flight, 
 
 May dare the sacrosanct and awful height 
 
 Of that mysterious sublime 
 
 Within the secret counsels of the Infinite ! 
 
 Omniscience there supreme and sole 
 
 Clasps the beginning and the whole 
 
 Of Love beyond created sight, 
 
 Uncreate and quintessential light! 
 
 Before the splendor of that ray 
 
 Cherub and seraph fall away 
 
 Dazzled and broken by excess 
 
 Of overpowering blessedness, 
 
 Yet panting for the fulness of the bliss 
 
 That breathes consuming fire from Lovers un- 
 
 kenned abyss. 
 Not through that fiery sphere my way, 
 But here where shines the veiled day. 
 The flames of mystery insteeped 
 In this our mortal clay; 
 For in her maiden breast asleep 
 Lies all the Love of Heaven's deep, 
 31 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 The holy circle of her zone 
 Incarnate Love's terrestial throne. 
 
 Ill 
 
 The great archangel veils his face 
 Before her: ''Hail, full of grace!" 
 And Heaven is clasped of earth; 
 While all the circling spheres with all their choirs 
 Around her wheel seraphic fires. 
 Eden rises to its second birth; 
 Again the prime estate 
 Of man is renovate, 
 
 And all the elder worth renewed in her immacu- 
 late; 
 Virgin and spouse of Him 
 Who breathes the virtue of the Seraphim, 
 Virgin and mother of the Eternal Son, 
 Daughter, Virgin, Spouse in one! 
 The spotless mate of spotless Dove, 
 The one great miracle of God's love. 
 From all eternity the chosen bride. 
 Where Holiness untainted might abide; 
 Save only her none, none 
 Exempt from sin's dominion; 
 Save only her of Adam's race 
 Or heavenly line, none full of grace; 
 32 
 
MARIA IMMACULATA 
 
 On her alone, on her alone 
 
 The torrent of His love poured down 
 
 The deep abundance of its flood 
 
 Into the pure channels of her maidenhood, 
 
 The fleckless mirror of her grace 
 
 Reflecting all the beauty of His Face. 
 
 IV 
 
 She looks with human eyes 
 Into the eyes of Paradise; 
 Upon her virgin breast the Babe Divine 
 Gazes again into her eyne; 
 vanity of words to tell 
 The wonder of that spell, 
 The ravishment of bliss 
 Upwelling from the deep abyss 
 Of Love incarnate gazing in the eyes 
 Of his terrestrial paradise ! 
 See Heaven within her arms, 
 Gathered against all harms, 
 Innocence by innocence addrest. 
 Virgin love by virgin love carest. 
 The sinless mother and the sinless Son 
 For Heaven and earth to gaze upon! 
 Her living image on her knee, 
 the depths of her maternity! 
 33 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Her God, her Infant at her breast, 
 
 O Love beyond all utterance exprest, 
 
 The Eternal Word in virgin flesh made manifest! 
 
 Ye sons of Adam rejoice 
 
 With exultant voice! 
 
 Shake off your chains! Arise! 
 
 The ancient dragon has no power 
 
 O'er Jesse's virgin flower. 
 
 And stricken 'neath a maiden's sandal lies. 
 
 Nor may his venomed breath so much 
 
 As her garment's outer margin touch; 
 
 And sin's torrential flood. 
 
 That whelmed all Adam's flesh and blood, 
 
 Its loathsome stream turns back 
 
 Before her footsteps' radiant track. 
 
 VI 
 
 Rejoice, children of men! 
 Behold again 
 Your flesh rejuvenate 
 In her immaculate! 
 Rejoice with exceeding joy, 
 For in her free from sin's alloy 
 34 
 
MARIA IMMACULATA 
 
 Your renovated race 
 In plenitude of grace 
 Dare look again unshamed upon its Maker's 
 
 Face! 
 Chosen to bear the Eternal Word, 
 In her your more than dignity restored; 
 In her the more than golden worth 
 Of Eden's prime when Heaven was linked with 
 
 earth; 
 Unstained by Adam's guilty forfeiture, 
 In her your long corrupted flesh made pure; 
 For of her, flesh of flesh and bone of bone. 
 Eternal Love builds up His stainless throne! 
 
 VII 
 
 Rejoice and be glad this day! 
 In jubilation lay 
 Your tribute at her feet. 
 Spotless and most meet. 
 The mystic rose of Jesse's root. 
 To bear the heavenly fruit; 
 Wisdom's seat and Heaven's gate, 
 Our surest advocate. 
 Mother of God immaculate! 
 Be glad, Adam's clay. 
 Be glad this happy day. 
 35 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 And with accordant voice acclaim 
 
 Our spotless Lady's stainless fame; 
 
 Be ye exceeding glad and sing 
 
 The mother of our King. 
 
 And though unworthy be my strain, 
 
 She is too tender not to deign 
 
 To lend a gracious ear 
 
 To this her children's humble prayer: 
 
 Mother of Mercy, hear! 
 
 Mother whose face is likest His, 
 
 Who our Redeemer is. 
 
 Grant us one day to share 
 
 Thy happiness in gazing on His Face, 
 
 Who found thee without spot and full of grace! 
 
LOVE AND DEATH 
 
 Watcher, whose eyes are fever bright 
 With peering through the dragging night, 
 See you the coming of the hght? 
 
 Long have we waited for your word, 
 The revelation you have heard 
 From Nature's Hps, Uke voices stirred 
 
 In Memnon's image, when the ray 
 Of morning smites his wakening clay 
 To music with the coming day. 
 
 The message that we hope from thee, 
 A new evangel, that will be 
 The death of foolish mystery. 
 
 Have you not plumbed the central deep 
 Of life, and sifted all the heap 
 In jealous Nature's guarded keep; 
 
 And all her labyrinth of dread 
 Traversed with Ariadne's thread. 
 Unmindful of the quick or dead? 
 37 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 We wait to hear the secret thing 
 You've plucked from Saturn's ruby ring, 
 The stellar message that you bring 
 
 From other worlds, communicate 
 With freedom from this lower state 
 Heavy with death and black with fate. 
 
 Beneath time's leaden mantle bowed. 
 With slow step creeps the anguished crowd 
 Under a heaven dark with cloud ; 
 
 A way of toil, a path of fears 
 
 Barren with thorns and salt with tears, 
 
 How filmy our short span of years; 
 
 A gossamer athwart the face 
 
 Of upper and of nether space. 
 
 Like smoke to vanish from its place. 
 
 Grief in life's cup distills its gall; 
 The very sweets begin to pall. 
 And Death awaits to drain it all. 
 
 What joyous message yours to tell, 
 Who stand upon the pinnacle 
 Of knowledge, like a sentinel 
 38 
 
LOVE and DEATH 
 
 Upon a leaguered city's tower, 
 Awaiting rescue's golden hour 
 Against the foe's encirchng power: 
 
 See you, through shadows of the night, 
 The first faint flush of dawning Hght 
 Gleaming on armour burnished bright, 
 
 The van of armies marching down 
 To rescue of the fainting town 
 And victory's long awaited crown? 
 
 We weep, we suffer and we die; 
 Dumb is the earth and dumb the sky — 
 Feed not our hopes upon a lie! 
 
 The race you tell us is the flower 
 Of seons building with blind power 
 Up to the distant crowning hour: 
 
 I look upon the face of Death ; 
 
 And Sorrow asks with sobbing breath : 
 
 What is the foolish thing he saith? 
 
 And stricken Love with lowly head 
 Stands dumb beside the silent dead ; — 
 She heedeth not what he hath said. 
 39 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 What cares my Love for prophecy 
 Of unborn races; what to me 
 The ghostly dream of time to-be? 
 
 My Love but yesterday was born, 
 
 Blossomed a rose upon life's thorn, 
 
 And withered now, lies plucked and torn. 
 
 Why prate about millennial hours, 
 The far result of unknown powers, 
 When Death is scything 'mid the flowers? 
 
 Can you restore a single leaf 
 
 Once gathered in his crowded sheaf. 
 
 Or pluck the poisoned thorn of grief? 
 
 My love is more than love of race, 
 
 A single love for one dear face, 
 
 Now locked in Death's unloved embrace. 
 
 Upon the bier in Love's purview 
 Lies all the race Love ever knew; 
 There all the sweet in all the rue. 
 
 Love ever grows from one sole root. 
 And blossoms on a single shoot 
 Upburgeoning to perfect fruit. 
 40 
 
LOVE and DEATH 
 
 Within the heart's red garden blows 
 The splendour of its queenly rose, 
 The single blossom that it knows. 
 
 Now lies my flower in Death's cold hand, 
 Its petals scattered on the strand. 
 And all the garden choked with sand. 
 
 I stand before time's ribbed gate. 
 And wondering ask : Can love abate. 
 Is Death the final seal of fate? 
 
 Is Love but one sweet moment's bloom, 
 An instant's flash upon the gloom, 
 Then sudden ashes of the tomb? 
 
 Can you, who scan the secret ways 
 Of hidden systems through the maze 
 Of heavenly hieroglyphs ablaze 
 
 With myriad suns, — can you not read 
 Some answer in that luminous screed. 
 How Love from Death's iron bond is freed? 
 
 Or you, who search the rocky girth. 
 That ribs our ancient mother earth, 
 For traces of the primal birth; — 
 41 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 What answer to Love's questioning 
 From her dread wisdom can you wring, 
 What word to stir Hope's fluttering? 
 
 What gain to Love the garnered store 
 Of all your microscopic lore, 
 The little less or little more 
 
 Of knowledge, if it hold no key 
 
 To that abysmal mystery, 
 
 Which parteth now my love from me? 
 
 Nature you say is wheeling fast 
 Downward to that chaotic last, 
 When all the hours shall be but past, 
 
 And all time bound within its zone 
 
 Upon the void in ashes blown. 
 
 With Death sole victor on his throne. 
 
 Love turns with blinded eye away. 
 And gazing on the trestled clay. 
 Scarce knoweth now what she may say; 
 
 Her heart benumbed with some strange fear, 
 The word's hard meaning, dimly clear. 
 Sounds strange upon her anguished ear. 
 42 
 
LOVE and DEATH 
 
 I take my love's cold hand and feel 
 Its icy numbness upward steal 
 Around my heart, and there congeal 
 
 In grief's deep frost, like winter's breath 
 On some lone pool upon the heath. 
 When all the ground lies white in death. 
 
 The lips are silent whence once came 
 The softened accents of my name 
 In discreet praise or loving blame: 
 
 There where I plucked the flower of speech, 
 The crumpled petals ashening bleach, 
 Though Love in anguish now beseech 
 
 One little word, one faintest stir, 
 Like breath upon a gossamer. 
 An echo whispered to aver 
 
 That out beyond this darkened year 
 Love lives and rules a nobler sphere, 
 Though Death stand sceptered tyrant here. 
 
 Alas! no hint, no murmured sigh 
 From those pale lips to make reply, 
 That Love herself is not to die! 
 43 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Death only knows the dead are dead, 
 The body sinks, the Hfe is sped, 
 And all we knew evanished. 
 
 O hollow creed and empty boast. 
 
 That failest when Love needs thee most, 
 
 A shattered wreck on Death's iron coast. 
 
 Love craves and seeks a fuller life; 
 Though all of Nature seems at strife 
 With her, and all her ways are rife 
 
 With signs of death, as broadcast leaves 
 On barren earth when autumn grieves, 
 Love heedeth not, but still believes 
 
 Beyond the grosser evidence 
 
 Of the time-stuffed and halting sense, 
 
 She yet shall find full recompense. 
 
 And from the ashes of her grief 
 A hidden hope puts forth a leaf. 
 That yet may burgeon for the sheaf. 
 
 Which Faith shall gather in the grain, 
 Sown in the furrows of her pain 
 To ripen for the harvest's gain. 
 44 
 
LOVE and DEATH 
 
 And in that hope Death's stony face 
 Takes something of a softening grace, 
 Like light upon a barren place; 
 
 For stirring in her frosted heart, 
 Love feels the sudden pulses start, 
 New life in quickening throbbings dart 
 
 Its joyous anguish through each vein; 
 And all the winter of her pain 
 Weeps from her eyes like April rain. 
 
 A hope in death! O wondrous thing! 
 The desert's waste agreen with spring. 
 Death's very rood enblossoming! 
 
 Look up, trembling Love, and see 
 The outstretched arms of that great tree, 
 Which crowns the brow of Calvary. 
 
 Here planted in Death's bitter root 
 Upspringeth the immortal shoot 
 To bear the glorious after-fruit. 
 
 Around the blood-stained Brow entwines 
 Death's barren coronal of spines, 
 Plucked from a waste of withered vines; 
 45 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Lo, bathed within that quickening flood 
 Each sterile spike bursts into bud 
 And reddens into lustihood! 
 
 And looking now upon the bier, 
 My love no longer drops a tear, 
 For Death's vast mystery grows clear. 
 
 46 
 
ODE 
 
 [Read at the Centenary of Georgetown University, 
 February 21, 1889.] 
 
 When youth, O Ahna Mater, on the threshold 
 
 stood, 
 The hot thirst of fame within the blood, 
 And turned with longing eyes 
 To life's giant enterprise. 
 Under the gilded future's spell 
 Lightly we said farewell 
 To these dear scenes, and down yon narrow 
 
 street. 
 With throbbing heart and hastening feet, 
 Sought the jostling throng 
 That o'er life's highway streams along: 
 Lightly we went, Hope in the van, 
 While life like music ran 
 Melodiously through heart and brain, 
 Each step a victory, each moment gain. 
 Lightly we went : but laden now 
 Return with deeper love blown to full flower 
 By riper knowledge of the absent hour: 
 47 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 And on this day of days, 
 
 When Uke a hundred stars upon thy brow 
 
 Thy hundred years in splendour blaze, 
 
 Lay at thy feet the tribute of our praise. 
 
 As dew wept down on leaf and flower, when morn 
 
 Grows tremulous within the east scarce born, 
 
 Mirrors in every crystal drop the radiant sun, 
 
 A thousand lesser lights reflecting one. 
 
 Our loves receive thy love's desire. 
 
 And myriad-fold return the sacred fire. 
 
 II 
 
 From distant lands, where in soft splendour 
 
 beams 
 The Southern Cross through silent deeps of air, 
 Making a solemn glory of the night that seems 
 As though angelic choirs were chanting there; 
 From lands where winter's icy banners flare 
 Upon rude blasts blown down in roaring war 
 From solitudes beneath the polar star; 
 From lands where morning's earliest rays unbar 
 The gates of sleep to rouse the eager throng 
 With the keen note of industry's shrill song. 
 While slumbering cities into being start 
 And barter roars within the busy mart; 
 From lands where boundless prairie rolls along 
 48 
 
ODE /or GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY 
 
 In endless leagues, and towering summits leap 
 
 To cloudless heights above Pacific's deep, 
 
 Thy many sons assemble here 
 
 To greet thee in thy hundredth year 
 
 Of sweet maternity, and lay aside, 
 
 For this brief hour, the buckler and the spear. 
 
 As armed knights were wont of old to bide 
 
 The truce of God, remembering Christ had died : — 
 
 From all life's walks we come in peace arrayed; 
 
 Where feverish Commerce plies the looms of 
 
 trade 
 With ceaseless hum, and from the myriad ways 
 Of Law, whose justice-tempered aegis stays 
 And turns unbridled evil's reckless blade; 
 Where armed with new-found powers sage Galen's 
 
 art 
 Arrests the fatal flight of Death's dread dart; 
 Where on the stormy seas of high debate 
 The Nation's wisdom guides the bark of state: 
 Where sweet Religion takes sublimer part 
 And drawing with her threefold cord above 
 Leads fallen nature up to perfect Love. 
 Yet not alone thy sons that here below 
 Lift the glad voice in jubilation's song. 
 Salute thee, but where Heaven's starry bow 
 Rounds the vast firmament with fire, a throng 
 Invisible, blest spirits once among 
 49 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Thine earthly sons take up the great refrain, 
 Till all the blissful heights give back the strain, 
 That falls a benediction on thy head 
 From blessed hands of thy beloved dead; 
 And thy triumphant sons thence looking down 
 Flash on thy brow a spiritual crown, 
 A diadem of light, whose splendour rays 
 Immortal glory through eternal days! 
 
 Ill 
 
 When virgin Liberty yet stood 
 Within the dawn of maidenhood, 
 Upon these hills was fixed thy seat. 
 The home of truth, and learning's calm retreat 
 By blue Potomac's peaceful flood. 
 Scarce then had died the furious beat 
 Of rolling drum in loud alarm 
 Sounding the patriot's call to arm 
 Against the tyrant foe; 
 While yet the reeking sod was warm 
 With martyr blood spilt in the fearful throe 
 Of battle, and the trembling earth 
 Groaned in travail of a nation's birth. 
 Came the man of peace, who bore 
 The cross and laurel to the shore. 
 Where sweet Cohonguroton's waters pour, 
 50 
 
ODE /or GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY 
 
 And planted here the sacred tree. 
 And this was he 
 Of that same faith and race 
 With him who, taking up the bloodless steel 
 To make the Nation's woe or weal, 
 Alone of all the signers dared to trace 
 Not only his heroic name, but native place, 
 And with the dauntless front of Freedom's son 
 Wrote ''Carroll of Carrollton!" 
 Rejoice in thy noble stem 
 And firm foundations wrought 
 When minion foes were taught 
 How priceless is the gem 
 Of Freedom bought 
 By patriot steel in patriot hands 
 Against a narrow tyrant's slavish bands ! 
 Around thy cradle blew the trimipet blast 
 Of victory, when Liberty at last 
 Burst the chains that held her bound, 
 And all the land leaped at the glorious sound. 
 And from the dragon-jaws of Strife 
 A Nation sprang to life. 
 Strong-limbed and beautiful in power 
 Through mighty wrestling in that heavy hour! 
 Around thy cradle redolent 
 Breathed the fresh fragrance of the spring 
 Of Freedom, and its vigour blent 
 51 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 With thine own blood, and sent 
 Thy pulses dancing to the swing 
 Of music born in prophecy 
 Of all the glory yet to be! 
 
 IV 
 
 A century has rolled its solemn tide 
 Along the Nation's path, and by thy walls 
 The generations ebbed and died. 
 Fallen in the waste of time, as falls 
 Yon river to the distant sea — 
 And lo! the promise of thine infancy! 
 A stately palace rears its tower-capped height 
 Upon thy hills, truth's templed shrine, 
 Shedding, like a beacon light, 
 Its welcome rays across the brine 
 To outward speeding ships that brave 
 Midmost ocean's storm-beat wave. 
 Or homeward struggling barks that creep 
 To haven from the warring deep. 
 Beneath thy roof-tree's sheltering span, 
 Science deep in Nature's various plan 
 From lifeless dust to living man. 
 Houses all her lore; and Art with eyes. 
 Within whose depths all beauty mirrored lies 
 As in calm waters summer skies, 
 52 
 
ODE/orGEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY 
 
 Kindles at thy hearth her living flame; 
 And with thee dwells the gentle Dame, 
 Whose smile upon the exile's wandering path 
 Like light soothed time-worn Dante's bitter wrath, 
 Divine Philosophy, that strikes the trembling 
 
 strings 
 To the deep note that vibrates from the sum of 
 
 things! 
 
 '' Not all I am shall die ! '^ - li «w 
 Was the Roman poet's cry. 
 Though now no conjuring priest 
 Leads the fattened beast 
 To the smoking altar, and the pride 
 Of Rome lies buried in her dust. 
 Not all, O Bard, has died. 
 And thou hast conquered in the larger trust : 
 Here where learning holds her seat, 
 New-born generations greet 
 Thee, crowning with fresh bays 
 The triumphs of those elder days. 
 Nor thou alone of Greek or Roman line 
 Find'st here a temple and a shrine; 
 The stately Mantuan, 
 Who sang the Arms and Man, 
 Ovid, whose melting lines in amorous flow 
 53 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Like torrid rivers ran, 
 
 The silver-worded Cicero, 
 
 The buskined muse of Sophocles 
 
 And trumpet-tongued Demosthenes, 
 
 Old Homer, whose heroic strain 
 
 Bade gods and men contend on Troia's fatal 
 
 plain, — 
 All, all the mighty train, 
 Who made the heart and brain 
 Of ancient letters, and who sent, 
 As fountains of the firmament, 
 The impetuous crystal flood 
 Of their rich speech into the blood 
 Of nations yet within the womb, 
 Find here a wider reign 
 Than universal Rome could claim! 
 Ye quickening powers! no Stygian gloom 
 Can quench the vital flame 
 That breathes its glory round the classic name! 
 Not dead, but living voices of the past. 
 Not dead and to be cast 
 Like blank annals of barbarian kings 
 Into the void of forgotten things. 
 But living souls with power to reach 
 The human heart in human speech 
 And bind the generations each to each. 
 Leaping the centuries and giving breath 
 54 
 
ODE for GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY 
 
 To ancient forms snatched back from empty 
 
 death, 
 Till man in that large sjmipathy of mind 
 Begot by wide communion with his kind, 
 Across the age's broadening span 
 Responsive greets his fellow-man! 
 Not death, but life prevails, and though men's 
 
 lives 
 Drop off the stem like ripened fruit. 
 Death reaps not all, the seed survives 
 To strike in other soil the living root; 
 So generations gathering up the past, 
 Each reaps a widening profit from the last, 
 And from the seed by others sown 
 Wears the flower of wisdom as its own. 
 
 VI 
 
 Splendour of poet's song, the living light 
 Of letters across the night 
 Of ages fled. Science begirt with power 
 To build a universe from every flower 
 That blows, and Wisdom's glowing height. 
 Whence the eagle mind may gaze 
 Into the sun of truth's full blaze. 
 Are not all the glories of thy house; 
 These are thine by that high right 
 55 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Which Nature's self allows 
 To those who consecrate their days 
 To Learning's thorn-strewn ways: 
 A light of still more constant glow, 
 A flame sprung from a purer fire 
 Than aught of human can inspire, 
 Sheds its clear radiance on thy brow; 
 A glory and a light that first 
 Rose from Manresa's cave, and burst 
 In fiery splendour on a wondering world, 
 When meek Loyola's hand unfurled 
 His holy standard blazoned with the line, 
 ^'The glory be not ours, Lord, but thine!" 
 O happy issue of Pamplona's war, 
 When sank a warrior's earthly star, 
 Not quenched, but with rekindled beam to rise 
 And shed celestial fires from other skies! 
 Where Error rears its crested pride 
 Against the spotless bride 
 Of Truth, Loyola's flashing blade descends 
 Upon the mailed casque, and rends 
 The stubborn visor, laying bare 
 The serpent face that lurked in hiding there; 
 With steady front against the swarming foe 
 Manresa's knight rains down the deadly blow. 
 As on the bloody field of Tours, Martel 
 With thundering mace smote down the infidel! 
 56 
 
ODE/orGEORGETOWN UNIVERISTY 
 
 No carnal weapons wields he in his fight, 
 
 For his a spiritual sword of light, 
 
 Forged in the glowing smithies of the soul, 
 
 By Love attempered and by Truth made whole; 
 
 No carnage reddens his victorious way, 
 
 He combats to give life and not to slay. 
 
 And Uke the hero fabled to our youth. 
 
 He smites giant Error to free the princess Truth. 
 
 Still other conquests wait the black-robed knight, 
 
 In other fields to wage the sacred fight : 
 
 See Xavier come, a burning brand 
 
 Of love to distant India's sun-scorched strand. 
 
 And as a flame consumed by its own fire 
 
 His wasted frame in ardent love expire: 
 
 Beneath our skies behold Loyola's band, 
 
 When pagan night yet palled the distant land, 
 
 With martyr toil the savage waste explore 
 
 From distant Maine to far Pacific's shore, 
 
 Christ in the heart and crucifix in hand : 
 
 No terrors daunt, no lawless wild appals 
 
 Where love of souls the saintly hero calls, 
 
 But onward through the trackless waste before. 
 
 His fearless steps first tread the virgin sod. 
 
 And consecrate a new-found world to God ! 
 
 57 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 VII 
 
 These, Alma Mater, are thy bays, 
 Thy coronal of praise, 
 Wherewith thy hundred years are crowned; 
 These the morning stars that rise 
 To fill with golden light the skies 
 That circle thy first cycle round; 
 These the immortal fires that know 
 No setting in heaven's wide expanse. 
 But kindle with an ever brighter glow 
 As years in crystal floods advance : 
 We who stand upon the shore. 
 And watch the impetuous flow 
 Of time's river onward pour 
 Into the future's formless sea, 
 Dimly dream the glory yet to be; 
 As in the gateways of the morn. 
 When the waning stars are shorn 
 Of their soft splendours, day is born, 
 And the shimmering east grows white 
 With the upward creeping light 
 Against the westward flying night. 
 We divine the glory still concealed 
 By the beauty half revealed. 
 Thy hundred years upon thy cheek 
 58 
 
ODE/orGEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY 
 
 Glowing with perennial truth, 
 Sit like the first flush of youth; 
 Nor envious Time may wreak 
 His wrinkled vengeance on thy brow, 
 And his harsh furrows plough 
 To mark the rugged path 
 Of his relentless wrath. 
 
 And when our days have measured out their span 
 To the last Umit of the thread, 
 And we join Death's wan caravan 
 To the shoreless regions of the dead, 
 His dread shade shall have no power 
 To blight the blossom of the flower 
 That wreathes thy head; 
 But as the generations pass 
 Like phantoms in Time's darkened glass, 
 And ages in the ever-widening void go down, 
 From their dust shall spring fresh bays to weave 
 thy crown! 
 
 59 
 
AMARANTHUS 
 
 Sweet quiet of death, made quieter by the sound 
 
 Of murmurous leaves above these quiet graves 
 
 Far from the angry city's fretful noise 
 
 Of loud mortality forgetting death. 
 
 Here let me rest and soothe the unquiet heart 
 
 With myrrh of meditation, where they sleep, 
 
 Who sleep in patient death. How still they sleep, 
 
 Arched with the giant Hmbs of sober oaks 
 
 Fretting the liquid roof of heaven's round 
 
 With tremulous tracery of trembhng leaves just 
 
 stirred 
 By reverent winds! Smooth slopes the silken 
 
 sward 
 Soft o'er the silent host, like hope's green mantle 
 In promise of the miracle to come, 
 When at the great archangel's jubilant note 
 The battlements of death shall crumble shaken 
 
 down, 
 As those proud turrets tottering tumbled flat 
 Before the blasts of marching Israel. 
 Sweet comfort of the mourning soul, that death 
 Holds not all life within its hoary palm, 
 60 
 
AMARANTHUS 
 
 Nor hollow eyes of sightless mockery 
 The final image of the days that looked 
 Upon a living world through lucent windows, 
 And saw life smile again through other eyes 
 That love enkindled into purer light, 
 The dawning promise of a deathless day. 
 
 II 
 
 Here greatness finds its kindred clod, and fame 
 A common clay mingling with lowher names 
 Levelled by blasts of death to nothingness; 
 Here the vain lips of praise find voiceless echoes 
 In hollow chambers sounding silence back, 
 The phantom cries of images of dust; 
 And though the shouting universe should roll 
 The long reverberations of its voice 
 Through all the shaking avenues of time, 
 And the wide spaces of the firmament 
 Tremble with all their stars to that loud cry. 
 Death makes no answer from his dusty sleep. 
 
 How quiet thy rest, unheedful of the fret 
 Of time, the fiery fuming of the day, 
 The feverish fancy of the restless night 
 Eager for morn, and morn pursuing eve 
 In hope expectant of the happier hour 
 61 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 That never lights except to wing away 
 
 Again; — how quiet their changeless sleep, and 
 
 free 
 From time's illusive speed outstripping time 
 As one that runs to overtake his shadow. 
 
 Here life lays down its fardel with a smile, 
 Disrobes the chafing garments that it wore 
 Through all the noisy masquerade, and sleeps 
 Dreamless that sleep as deep as silence is, 
 And everlasting as the voiceless hills 
 That time has builded to the end of time. 
 Sweet music to the ear of meditation, 
 The mute melodious voice of sleep murmuring 
 Lethean solace to the harried soul. 
 As plash of waters to the famished ear 
 Of one athirst midst white Sahara's sands: 
 Sweet sleep that kisses out the wrinkled cares, 
 And breathes the roses' crumpled petals smooth, 
 Thy cool white hand upon my forehead lay. 
 As does a mother on her child's flushed brow, 
 Till I, too, rest in dreamless vacancy. 
 
 Ill 
 
 And wouldst thou be content, soul, to lie 
 In that deep emptiness, the wide abyss 
 62 
 
AMARANTHUS 
 
 Of death, grim depth unsoundable and void, 
 Where time embouches, and mortality, 
 Like some swift river in the salt sea's waste, 
 Pours all the gathered fulness of its course — 
 Content to lie and know not, lost to use 
 Of all the spirit's powers, and swayed 
 A weed along the slowly creeping wave 
 Of Lethe undulating heavily? 
 
 To rest were blesses, but to stagnate, woe: 
 The wearied soul craves life not death, new life, 
 The glad refreshment of the wasted powers 
 To rise again in recreated bloom, 
 As Hft the shrivelled stalks in long parched fields 
 Under the moistening kisses of the rain. 
 Abundant gladness from benignant clouds. 
 
 But when I speak to Nature of this hope, 
 Heedless her ear and dumb her stony hps. 
 Like that huge image in Egyptian sands 
 With Hdless eye in leaden speechlessness 
 Staring the crowding centuries hastening by, 
 As time were nothing and death the all of hfe: 
 Nor all the framework of this universal dust 
 Puts forth one Httle blossom of the hope 
 Of that large other Hfe beyond death's touch; 
 From dust to dust again the barren cry 
 63 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Sobbing through all the empty wastes of time, 
 While saddened Nature moans through all her 
 
 days 
 As life pours back its bloom to nothingness. 
 
 Not there the answer, not there the golden gleam 
 Of promise kindhng to the dawn of hope 
 Ushering the fulness of the day the soul 
 Awaits; but turning to the east I watch 
 With Pilate's soldiers for the coming light. 
 
 IV 
 
 About steep Sion's walls silence and sleep, 
 Twin sentinels, keep ghostly watch and tell 
 The shding hours through all the heavy night, 
 While Death makes lament on the icy hills, 
 And mourning bends his hooded head and moans 
 Presaging vanquishment, the mighty lord 
 Of earth and man, since closed the clanging gates 
 On guilty Adam and his weeping spouse. 
 
 Now all the heavens stoop unto the west. 
 Tremble the expectant stars with paling fires, 
 And from the awakening east the soughing winds 
 Like distant melodies come faintly up 
 The vaulted darkness of the wasting night, 
 64 
 
AMARANTHUS 
 
 And through the half-drawn portals of the dawn 
 Voices of jubilation seem to sound 
 As from a shouting multitude far off. 
 
 Lo! Death lies prostrate in his kindred dust, 
 And Pilate's soldiers by a vacant tomb ! 
 And Nature sings, for day is here, and bursts 
 Her melody from blossomed branch and floods 
 The enamelled verdure of the radiant field. 
 Pouring its amorous gladness on the air 
 In all the thousand glories of its flowers ! 
 And shines the city in the golden flood 
 Of morning, and golden all the encirchng hills; 
 And on Golgotha's brow the naked Cross 
 Glows golden with the Hght of new-born day. 
 
 For he hath risen. Lord and King of Death! 
 For he hath risen, Lord and King of Life ! 
 Rejoice, my soul, and fear not Death, who died 
 That day and fell before my Lord and King 
 Forever; rejoice, and fear not; Death is dead, 
 And everlasting Life, eternal rose, 
 Unfolds immortal petals blown by Love 
 To perfect fulness in perpetual light ! 
 
 65 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 VI 
 
 In him they sleep, who rest so quietly here, 
 
 In him to rise who sleep in patience here, 
 
 Far from the angry city's fretful noise 
 
 Of loud mortahty forgetting death : 
 
 They sleep in his great peace, the halcyon cahn 
 
 Of that deep peace the world can never give. 
 
 Blessed their sleep in Him, who slept as they 
 
 To rise again, as they in Him shall rise 
 
 To sleep no more: here let me sleep in Him, 
 
 And slipping off the weeds of time rise up 
 
 Robed by His hand in immortahty. 
 
 66 
 
YOUTH 
 
 Out of the spacious east of life 
 Streams the clear dawn of youth's fair days, 
 The matin song and gracious ways 
 Of the sweet prime whose memory plays 
 Across the soul's long gaze 
 Like far off boreal splendours rife 
 With aureoles in northern skies, 
 Where the white wold hes 
 Illimitable to heaven's mjn-iad eyes 
 In the waste night's immensities. 
 Out of those auroral hours, 
 Like perfume of far flowers 
 Borne by the flagging breeze 
 O'er intervening leas 
 Of barrenness, that fragrant prime 
 Comes borne sweet through wastes of time 
 Across wide plunging seas 
 From morn's Hesperides; 
 Ere youth with irmocence sublime 
 Had left the golden chme 
 Of his fair matin, keen to sail 
 His slender shallop to the leaping gale. 
 67 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Fair through the after years, 
 
 Across wide chasms swollen with storm 
 
 And dimmed with mists of tears, 
 
 Gleams the soft radiance of the form 
 
 That youth had builded fair 
 
 Out of the impalpable air 
 
 Of serenest hope. 
 
 Before life learned to grope 
 
 Amid the sombre bosks of melancholic care. 
 
 Whiter than the mountained snow, 
 
 Brighter than the crystal glow 
 
 Of virgin sunlight yet unkist 
 
 By grosser air to amethyst. 
 
 That lambent radiance sent 
 
 Its paradisial rays through all life's firmament: 
 
 Earth felt its lucent heat 
 
 Flood her central seat. 
 
 And her breast replete 
 
 With its soft warmth grew sweet 
 
 With fragrance of the bud 
 
 Reddening to flower upon her blood; 
 
 While from the glowing sphere 
 
 Of the overhanging year 
 
 Meting with variant sisterhood 
 
 Of changeful moons the moving season's 
 
 mood, 
 Rolled virgin hynmals all unheard, 
 68 
 
YOUTH 
 
 Save by youth's spirit stirred 
 
 To catch the diviner word 
 
 Angelically murmured; 
 
 For the heart of youth alone 
 
 May catch the ethereal tone 
 
 Of heaven's unseen zone, 
 
 Youth that looks with eyes 
 
 Seeing only paradise 
 
 In earth's wide visibilities, 
 
 Nor yet has learned the curse 
 
 That locks in death the glittering universe. 
 
 Then were all things true, 
 Time all sweets, nor any rue 
 Within Life's spacious garden grew; 
 There youth elate 
 Held royal state, 
 
 The smiling monarch of obedient fate; 
 While throned in every eye 
 Honour beamed resplendent sanctity; 
 And there Eve's gracious power, 
 The garden's golden dower, 
 As the virgin moon. 
 Night's chaste plenilune, 
 Lifts the vast sea's heaving flood. 
 Drew all life's tides to noble womanhood, 
 For all was fair and all was good. 
 69 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Reign, then, Youth's Memory; 
 
 Let me your captive be, 
 
 And reap felicity 
 
 In the far distant gleam 
 
 Of that pure matin dream 
 
 Before the hour of ruth, 
 
 When all was sooth 
 
 In one harmonious round 
 
 Of diapasoned sound 
 
 In the full orbit of unsulHed youth. 
 
 For now, alas! is lost the gift 
 
 Of paradise, and leap the swift 
 
 Raucous years headlong 
 
 Tumbled and broke among 
 
 The splintering rocks. 
 
 Where time's river shocks 
 
 Against the bitter sea 
 
 Of eternity. 
 
 I would return to thee, 
 Season of innocence 
 And that fresh joy, whence 
 Sounded clear the sweet accord 
 Of life's primeval word, 
 Deep music in far places stirred, 
 When heavenly fingers swept the trembling 
 chord 
 
 70 
 
YOUTH 
 
 For it is this 
 That makes the bliss 
 Of youth, and renders fair, 
 To the wide eyes of innocence, 
 All the ambient air 
 Of dawn in that intense 
 Clear light. 
 Burning a rose white 
 
 In the eternal morn beyond eclipse of night, 
 And, breaking through 
 The darkened circle of our blue, 
 Flashes in the eyes 
 Of youth with fires of paradise; 
 This the secret power 
 That clothes all earth with flower 
 Of beauty seen 
 Only in the sheen 
 Of that deep vision 
 Of the pure elysian, 
 Caught by the white soul of youth, 
 The unflecked mirror of the sun of truth, 
 Caught and given forth again 
 Into the bhnded eyes of men, 
 Beauty's own celestial ray 
 Blotting out the Hght of common day. 
 And showering storms of glory o'er the beaten 
 way. 
 
 71 
 
ASPIRATION 
 
 I can strike the minor chord and sing; — 
 
 Is the major chord denied? 
 I would sing with the sun, and chime with the 
 moon 
 
 As it sways the heaving tide. 
 
 I would ride upon the neck of the blast 
 
 Grasping the mane of the rack, 
 When the snorting thunder plashes his hoof 
 
 In the Hghtning's ragged track. 
 
 Or where the battle thunders its bruit, 
 
 There let the spirit pant, 
 When death and victory mingle their note 
 
 In one triumphal chant. 
 
 I would mount to the topmost peak and ken 
 
 With an eagle's sight afar, 
 Swoop to the depths and up again 
 
 Across the path of a star. 
 
 Where myriad suns comminghng blaze 
 In the marge of farthermost space, 
 
 72 
 
ASPIRATION 
 
 And system in system clangorous rolls 
 Athwart the abyss's face, 
 
 Let my soul drink in the rushing song 
 
 Of a thousand worlds in one, 
 The music of time forever dying 
 
 And time forever begun. 
 
 On the wings of morning let me rise. 
 On the plumes of evening fall, 
 
 With the orient clang at the gates of sleep. 
 With evening unfold her pall; 
 
 And with the course of the chariot sun, 
 
 Let me follow the life of man, 
 With the eye of heaven looking upon 
 
 The great and the Httle plan. 
 
 For I would sing as an Angel might chant 
 
 Of all that he sees below, 
 When he gazes down on the whirling globe 
 
 With its human ebb and flow; 
 
 And, summing up in one great chord. 
 Bring the song to a perfect close. 
 
 As Dante's diapason blooms 
 In heaven's eternal rose. 
 73 
 
POET AND BIRD 
 
 To sing a fleeting song and die! 
 
 What merit in a vagrant note 
 That flutters through an empty sky 
 
 On idly pulsing wings afloat! 
 
 Within the ocean wastes of air 
 No ear to catch its slender tone, 
 
 Along the wide savannah's glare 
 Into the seas of silence blown. 
 
 Or if some silvern drops of sound 
 
 From its slight stream should patter down 
 Upon the vast earth's glittering round, 
 
 In greening field or dusty town, 
 
 Who there would heed its fleeting dew 
 Drunk by the thirsty soil before 
 
 The sun has cUmbed the morning blue, 
 And life crept out from sleep's dim door? 
 
 Yet song is native to the bird. 
 
 That trills in heaven a buoyant stave, 
 
 Pouring his melody unheard 
 
 Upon the trembling ether's wave. 
 
 74 
 
POET and BIRD 
 
 And native, too, the poet's note, 
 
 Though none to hear the distant song 
 
 Throbbing in regions far remote 
 
 From earth and its unheedful throng. 
 
 For Beauty has a secret grace 
 
 Bestowed in soUtude alone; 
 Both bird and poet haunt the place 
 
 About the purheus of her zone; 
 
 And, winging through the higher ways 
 Close to the levels of her throne. 
 
 There catch some fragments of her lays, 
 And sing the music as their own. 
 
 75 
 
IN CIRCE'S DEN 
 
 Dullard and sot crammed full 
 Of the meat of the flesh, 
 
 Gross bulk ensnared and held 
 In the sense's mesh; 
 
 Fat chops repletely fed 
 
 On the offal heap. 
 Munching a-hungered again 
 
 In the garbage sweep; 
 
 Epicure, bellied big. 
 
 Homed in the sty; 
 Snout stale with its ancient swill, 
 
 Bleared, piggish eye; — 
 
 Push and grunt at the trough 
 
 In Circe's pen. 
 Glut and roll and wallow 
 
 And glut again! 
 
 The poet's scorn upon you 
 
 Brutes of the sty; 
 Slaves of the trough and the swill, 
 
 Wallow and die! 
 76 
 
In CIRCE'S DEN 
 
 Away! where nature is clean, 
 And breath of the breeze 
 
 Draws deep with light in the east 
 And morn in the trees ! 
 
 Flashes the gossamer thread 
 
 Pearled with the dawn; 
 Silver soft shafts of Apollo 
 
 Gleam on the lawn. 
 
 Close night's golden eyes, 
 
 Pale wanes the moon; 
 Twinkle the feet of the day 
 
 In her white shoon. 
 
 Wakens a tumult of song 
 
 In forest green glades; 
 Silent off steals the dark 
 
 Through soft melting shades. 
 
 Faint comes a wind soughing 
 
 Stirring the leaves; 
 Chequered shadow and sunshine 
 
 On the sward weaves. 
 
 Soul-stirring breath of the heaven, 
 Rich wind of the earth, 
 77 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Waking the heart to thy gladness 
 And nature to mirth; 
 
 These be the poet's dear portion 
 
 Afar from the den, 
 Where Circe sits watching her sty 
 
 And its swine, that are men. 
 
 78 
 
ON THE DEATH OF ALFRED TENNYSON 
 
 Who took the laurel from the brow 
 Of him, who uttered nothing base, 
 And ever bore it in the vase 
 
 Of purity, Master, thou, 
 
 Of virgin song, when round thee beat 
 The lustful rhjrthm of a time, 
 That welds false passion with false rhyme 
 
 Like some fierce Titan in the heat 
 
 Of unregenerate desire; 
 
 Thou, turning to sublimer spheres, 
 Made measure of the changing years 
 
 With chastest song, and, all afire 
 
 With vestal passion fed the flame 
 
 Of poesy with holy oils; 
 
 And kept unsulhed from the toils 
 Of grosser things the hallowed name 
 
 Of poet. We who love thy fame 
 And follow still thy luminous star, 
 A beacon light beyond the bar, 
 
 Pray now for thee the sweet acclaim 
 79 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Of Avalon saluting there 
 Tumultuously the pure of heart, 
 Whose song e'er scorned the baser part, 
 
 And kept the lily's whiteness fair. 
 
 80 
 
ARISE, AMERICA! 
 
 [^On the occasion of President Cleveland's Venezuelan 
 Message.]] 
 
 Arise, America! 
 Justice to freedom calls, 
 And freedom's mighty shout 
 Thunders answering out, 
 Shaking the brazen walls 
 Of a despot's quaking halls. 
 
 Arise, America! 
 Hark! Valour's quickening tread, 
 Through all your golden plain 
 Sounding from main to main. 
 Stirs e'en the glorious dead, 
 Who once for country bled. 
 
 Arise, America! 
 Rolls back time's misty night, 
 And lo ! the heroic band 
 Wrests from fell England's hand 
 Freedom's sacred right. 
 Crowned on glory's height! 
 81 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Arise, America! 
 Ours the glorious meed 
 Of freedom, heaven-sprung, 
 God's youngest gifts among, 
 Won only by the deed 
 Of heroes when they bleed. 
 
 Arise, America! 
 Ours this sacred weal 
 To guard and ever hold 
 Against or arms or gold; 
 Swear it, as we kneel, 
 By the patriot's virgin steel! 
 
 Arise, America! 
 Better the desperate clash 
 Of war and goriest fight 
 Than justice cowered by might; 
 Better than despot's lash 
 Death by the foeman's gash! 
 
 Arise, America! 
 Twice England felt our worth, 
 Twice we smote her sore 
 And hurled her from our shore; 
 Twice shrunk her pride's vast girth, 
 Till freedom strode the earth ! 
 82 
 
ARISE, AMERICA! 
 
 Arise, America! 
 Our valour still is true, 
 Our patriot blood still flows 
 Where freedom's bamier blows; 
 Nor vain shall justice sue 
 Our arms to justice due. 
 
 Arise, arise! 
 Ye sons of freedom shout 
 Till the shaking heavens reply! 
 Flash the keen steel on high. 
 Swift gleaming roundabout 
 The foeman's panic rout! 
 
 Arise ! Arise ! 
 Sacred the cause, and just, 
 God our mightiest might, 
 BattUng for the right. 
 Holding Freedom's sacred trust 
 Against a world's mad lust! 
 
 83 
 
THE RAISING OF THE FLAG 
 
 Lift up the banner of our love 
 
 To the kiss of the winds above, 
 
 The banner of the world's fair hope, 
 
 Set with stars from the azure cope, 
 
 When liberty was young. 
 
 And yet unsung 
 
 Clarioned her voice among 
 
 The trodden peoples, and stirred 
 
 The pulses with her word, 
 
 Till the swift flood red 
 
 From the quick heart sped. 
 
 Flushing valour's cheek with flame 
 
 At sounding of her august sacred name! 
 
 Lift up the banner of the stars. 
 The standard of the double bars, 
 Red with the holy tide 
 Of heroes' blood, who died 
 At the feet of liberty. 
 Shouting her battle-cry 
 Triumphantly, 
 As they fell like sickled com 
 In that first resplendent morn 
 Of freedom, glad to die 
 In the dawn of her clear eye! 
 84 
 
The RAISING of the FLAG 
 
 Lift up the flag of starry blue 
 Caught from the crystal hue 
 Of central heaven's glowing dome, 
 Where the great winds largely roam 
 In unrestrained Uberty; 
 Caught from the cerulean sea 
 Of midmost ocean tossing free, 
 Flecked with the racing foam 
 Of rushing waters, as they leap 
 Unbridled from the laughing deep 
 In the gulfs of liberty! 
 
 Lift up the banner red 
 
 With the blood of heroes shed 
 
 In victory! 
 
 Lift up the banner blue 
 
 As heaven, and as true 
 
 In constancy! 
 
 Lift up the banner white 
 
 As sea foam in the light 
 
 Of liberty; 
 
 The banner of the triple hue. 
 
 The banner of the red and white and blue, 
 
 Bright ensign of the free ! 
 
 Lift up the banner of the days to come. 
 When cease the trumpet and the rolling drum; 
 85 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 When peace in the nest of love 
 Unfolds the wings of the dove, 
 Brooding o'er the days to-be, 
 Peace born of freedom's might, 
 Peace sprung from the power of right, 
 The peace of hberty! 
 
 Lift up the flag of high emprise 
 To greet the gladdened eyes 
 Of peoples far and near, 
 The glorious harbinger 
 Of earth's wide liberties. 
 Streaming pure and clear 
 In freedom's lofty atmosphere! 
 
 Lift up our hearts to Him who made to shine 
 In heaven's arch the glorious sign 
 Of mercy's heavenly birth 
 To all the peoples of the earth. 
 The pledge of peace divine! 
 And let our glorious banner, too. 
 The banner of the rainbow's hue. 
 In heaven's wide expanse unfurled, 
 Be for a promise to the world 
 Of peace to all mankind; 
 Banner of peace and light, 
 Banner of red and blue and white, 
 86 
 
The RAISING of the FLAG 
 
 Red as the crimson blood 
 Of Christ's wide brotherhood, 
 Blue with the unchanging hope 
 Of heaven's steadfast cope, 
 White as the radiant sun 
 The whole earth shining on! 
 
 87 
 
THE BABE OF BETHLEHEM 
 
 O cruel manger, how bleak, how bleak! 
 
 For the limbs of the babe, my God; 
 Soft little limbs on the cold, cold straw; 
 
 Weep, eyes, for thy God! 
 
 Bitter ye winds in the frosty night 
 
 Upon the Babe, my God, 
 Piercing the torn and broken thatch; 
 
 Lament, O heart, for thy God! 
 
 Bare is the floor, how bare, how bare 
 For the Babe's sweet mother, my God; 
 
 Only a stable for mother and Babe; 
 How cruel thy world, my God! 
 
 Cast out, cast out, by his brother men 
 
 Unknown the Babe, my God; 
 The ox and the ass alone are there; 
 
 Soften, O heart, for thy God! 
 
 Dear little arms and sweet little hands, 
 That stretch for thy mother, my God; 
 
 Soft baby eyes to the mother's eyes; 
 Melt, heart, for thy God! 
 
The BABE oj BETHLEHEM 
 
 Waxen touches on mother's heart, 
 
 Fingers of the Babe, my God; 
 Dear baby Ups to her virgin breast, 
 
 The virgin mother of God. 
 
 The shepherds have come from the hills to adore 
 
 The Babe in the manger, my God; 
 Mary and Joseph welcome them there; 
 
 Worship, soul, thy God! 
 
 But I alone may not come near 
 
 The Babe in the manger, my God; 
 Weep for thy sins, heart, and plead 
 
 With Mary the mother of God. 
 
 May I not come, oh, just to the door, 
 
 To see the Babe, my God; 
 There will I stop, and kneel and adore, 
 
 And weep for my sins, God ! 
 
 But Mary smiles, and rising up, 
 
 In her arms the Babe, my God, 
 She comes to the door and bends her down, 
 
 With the Babe in her arms, my God! 
 
 Her sinless arms in my sinful arms 
 
 Places the Babe, my God; 
 "He has come to take thy sins away;'* 
 
 Break, heart, for thy God! 
 89 
 
LOVE SOLE 
 
 I know the shibboleth that slips 
 So oilily from unctuous lips, 
 Philanthropist to finger-tips; 
 
 The modern Pharisaic brood 
 With babble of the general good, 
 And shallow cant of brotherhood. 
 
 Theirs but the mock of love, the weed 
 And bramble of degenerate seed, 
 The face, but not the heart, indeed. 
 
 This truth is truth since man begun: 
 True love begins and ends in one; 
 The love of all is love of none. 
 
 'Tis false we love the general man; 
 True love is mightier, vaster, than 
 The fetich of the common Pan. 
 
 Centred within the single soul, 
 Love finds the cycle of its whole, 
 The first swift impulse and the goal. 
 90 
 
LOVE SOLE 
 
 Not in the blurred and vulgar mind 
 Does love its hallowed image find, 
 But in itself divinest kind. 
 
 And rooted thus in single good, 
 Scatters the blessings of its mood, 
 And blossoms unto brotherhood. 
 
 91 
 
THE BURDEN 
 
 Let night shut out the cares of day, 
 Blot out the sense of wrong, 
 
 And in the bath of slumber steep 
 The soul, till it grow strong. 
 
 Then, waking with the coming light, 
 
 Arise, and go thy way. 
 Leaving the burden to the night 
 
 That bent thee yesterday. 
 
HOW POETS PLAY 
 
 How do poets play? 
 Of their own souls 
 Making psalteries, 
 Whose music rolls 
 Toned to the vibrant ray 
 Of interstellar harmonies; 
 There lightnings involute 
 With lightnings, shoot 
 
 Athwart the flagrant spaces of the day, 
 Till sound ensheathed in sound, 
 Music in music drowned. 
 Flooding the still depths round, 
 
 Swoon in fainting silences away. 
 
 93 
 
THE LOWER BOUGH 
 
 Rest on the lower bough, 
 Whose wings are frail, 
 
 Nor seek the riotous tops 
 Lashed by the gale. 
 
 Let not ambition tempt 
 
 To flutter where 
 The eagle's iron wing 
 
 May scarcely dare. 
 
 All native to the sward 
 
 And leafy shade, 
 Thy slender treble fills 
 
 The quiet glade. 
 
 But in the upper gale 
 
 Thy little sound 
 Were Uke a rose-leaf reft 
 
 And blown around. 
 
 Or in the solitude 
 Of height on height. 
 
 The flickering of a spark 
 Within the light. 
 94 
 
HEAVEN 
 
 MOTHER 
 
 A little child, a little child 
 
 With childish prattle at my knee: 
 
 I did not know how near was Heaven, 
 And now how far is Heaven from me. 
 
 FATHER 
 
 Nay, nearer now, since Heaven holds. 
 As hostage of our plighted love, 
 
 The child that Heaven gave, and took 
 To show true Heaven is all above. 
 
 95 
 
CARMEN NUPTIALE 
 
 happiest kalend in the count of time! 
 
 1 lift my voice to sing thy golden hour: 
 Of all thy circling sisters, from the prime 
 Of Eve's chaste nuptials in the sacred bower 
 Of paradisial innocence and love, 
 
 Than none less gracious shalt thou prove. 
 
 Thy brooding moment holds all future days, 
 
 As in the tender egg of nesting dove 
 
 Lies the sweet hope to-come, warmed by soft rays 
 
 From love's own heart, and only pleased to bring 
 
 Life to its joyous spring. 
 
 Mark this most blest amongst all time's compeers; 
 
 Of past pursuit the now accomplished goal, 
 
 The happier dawn that lights the wakened soul 
 
 To vaster regions in the round of years, 
 
 To larger hopes and dearer fears; 
 
 Till love outgrows all measured marge and leaps 
 
 The rim of time to God's eternal deeps! 
 
 96 
 
SONNETS 
 
RETROGRESSION 
 
 [The United States declared war against Spain for the 
 liberation of Cuba J 
 
 We gave a solemn pledge, and called on Heaven 
 
 To hear; our arms, we swore, were Freedom's 
 own. 
 
 To Freedom consecrate, and her alone; 
 Our valour sprung from her chaste bosom, given 
 To Freedom's cause forever; and her levin 
 
 We forged upon the footsteps of her throne; 
 
 Her sword unclasping from her zone, 
 She placed within our hands, and blessed us 
 shriven. 
 
 solemn mockery of her holy trust ! 
 
 Our troth forgot and slaked our noble zeal. 
 Our brittle honour shattered in the dust! 
 A riotous people drunk with conquest's lust. 
 
 In bacchanalian rout we onward reel. 
 And 'gainst her turn her own ensanguined steel! 
 
 99 
 
THE POET'S FANE 
 
 Stop! Come not anear the poet's fane 
 Without the poet's robe of love; the spot 
 
 Is sacred, red with sanctities of pain, 
 That blossom flower-wise in a garden plot 
 
 Fed by the tilth of grief and weeping rain; 
 
 Poor flowerets dashed with sorrow's purple stain, 
 Out of love's youthful shyness first begot, — 
 Save with compassion's hand touch thou them 
 not. 
 
 But, if the mellowing grace of sympathy 
 Wells as a kindred fountain in thy heart, 
 Pour out the generous flood, — stand not apart 
 Enstranged; shower down thy golden charity, 
 And, fed by that great largess, thou shalt see 
 These drooping flowerets bloom in majesty. 
 
 100 
 
THE BABE 
 
 How strange when thou wert not, a hf e to-be ! 
 Nor ready fancy playing fondly drew 
 Thine unguessed Hneaments in shape or hue, 
 
 Wrapt in the womb of possibiHty, 
 
 Where silence brooded o'er the darkened sea 
 Rolling a soundless tide; nor hint nor clew 
 Was murmured from that voiceless deep, nor 
 blew 
 
 A message on the winds to tell of thee. 
 
 We know not whence, but like a sudden light 
 From darkness flashing out, and all aglow 
 With radiant light, thy being burst to flame! 
 But now the unseen held thee from our sight. 
 An unborn mystery, undreamed — and lo! 
 Love called, and thou didst answer to thy 
 name. 
 
 II 
 
 Sweet mystery, thou living soul with eyes 
 To gaze upon the shifting scene that plays 
 In ceaseless change about life's narrow ways, 
 101 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 And wondering gather 'neath the circling skies 
 
 The fleeting, variant image as it flies, 
 
 While time with nimble shuttle weaves the days 
 Around thine unconcerned head, and lays 
 
 His ghttering thread athwart thy destinies; 
 
 Echoes of life around thee come and go 
 Unheeded, Uke the muffled sounds that fill 
 The lonely watches of the central deep, 
 When midnight bends aloft her sable bow. 
 And feathered silence falls around, as still 
 As utter peace and quiet as dreamless sleep. 
 
 102 
 
THE SONNET 
 
 Within the sonnet's glittering limit lies 
 
 The diamond's royal fire, Wordsworthian verse 
 Wedding high thought with noble music, terse 
 
 With wisdom; there the opalescent dyes 
 
 Of love-light from a Petrarch's brimming eyes; 
 The luted plaint that chastened Dante's curse; 
 Miltonic echoes organ pealed, the nurse 
 
 Of solemn sounds brought down from midnight 
 skies. 
 
 It measures with the royal tread of kings, 
 And treasures wealth too precious to be hid 
 In wanton rhymes and idly footed hnes; 
 Or upward soaring, as an eagle, wings 
 Its way to empyrean calms amid 
 The tuneful silence of the topmost Apennines. 
 
 II 
 
 They say the sonnet is a narrow pale, 
 A little garden straitly hedged around 
 Where only slender flowerets may be found, 
 
 But no brave blossom lusty with the gale 
 103 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 And the untempered sun; and in its bound 
 Pale poets gently pipe in plaintive sound 
 The sifted sweetness of love's distant bale 
 On reeds all murmurous of the underground. 
 
 Yet trumpet tongues have found swift utterance 
 here 
 And freedom loosed her fiery-hearted levin, 
 And earth has trembled with the solemn fear 
 Of harmonies breathed from the stooping 
 
 heaven 
 E'en in this slender compass closely pent 
 A master's voice may shake the firmament! 
 
 104 
 
ANARCHY 
 
 [The Empress of Austria was assassinated by an 
 anarchist in Geneva in August, 1898.] 
 
 Red hand, black heart, beast with the dragon's 
 face; 
 
 Thou hundred-headed horror breathing death 
 And dole across the fair world's rounded space, 
 
 Blurring the wholesome sun with tainted breath. 
 
 Back to thine ancient slime, blind whelp of 
 wrath ! 
 Amid the dragons of the prime, thy place; 
 
 Thy law the lust of tooth and claw; thy path, 
 Like Lucifer's to gaping Hell's embrace ! 
 
 Black heart, red hand smiting her queenly breast, 
 Thinking in rabid rage to rend the law. 
 
 Blind as the snarling tiger in his quest 
 
 For prey; from her spent blood shall Justice 
 draw 
 
 Swift strength to hurl upon thy viper's nest 
 The outraged nations' deep anathema! 
 
 105 
 
VANITAS VANITATUM 
 
 Is life as empty as the poet sings 
 In lamentation o'er the shattered days 
 That strew the banks of time, and mark our 
 ways 
 
 With the sad wreckage of the hopeful springs, 
 
 That promised golden havens, when the wings 
 Of joy expectant flashed empurpled rays 
 Athwart the far horizon's golden haze. 
 
 And lured us on with her soft glamourings? 
 
 Alack! the mask upon the countenance 
 
 Of time to cheat us with the teasing thought, 
 
 That he abides eternally, perchance; 
 
 Till we like eager searchers, who have sought 
 
 A fleeing form through all the giddy dance, 
 Find 'neath the mask the eyes of Death in- 
 wrought. 
 
 106 
 
VANITAS VANITATUM 
 
 ir 
 
 Can it be true that time is but a breath 
 Of nothingness, a shadowy fihn that lies 
 Upon the senses steeped in carnal dyes, 
 
 That bleach before the stinging touch of death; 
 
 A moving vanity with faded wreath; 
 An empty image mirrored in the eyes, 
 As shadows in salt pools from shallow skies, — 
 
 Life a pale ghost, the grave an empty sheath? 
 
 O bitterness to sour the unfound sweet, 
 
 The sweet pursued with ever-quickening chase, 
 
 And still pursued, yet ever found more fleet; — 
 Hasten, O Soul, hasten thy hurrying pace ! — 
 Alas! thou'rt still a laggard in the race, 
 
 Though shod with lightnings were thy rushing 
 feet! 
 
 107 
 
LOVE'S FRUIT 
 
 There was a little life that beat from mine, 
 A Httle hand that clasped my hand, and eyes 
 That looked in mine with all love's mysteries, 
 So deep, so true, so tender, so divine. 
 
 That I could read therein the lucent sign 
 
 Of heavenly things that speak not human wise, 
 But find their utterance in the distant skies 
 
 Where far withdrawn God's holiest secrets shine. 
 
 And though my heart is bruised, and all my soul 
 Quivers with pain, in patience I abide 
 The grief that shadows all the world with gloom : 
 
 I know that loss and grief are not the whole 
 Of life, that Love is not Death's barren bride. 
 But bears inomortal fruit within her womb. 
 
 108 
 
MARCH 
 
 Uproarious month! Spent winter^s djdng wrath, 
 Howhng across the waste and charging down 
 Upon the groaning woodland's shrieking town, 
 
 Lashing the helpless boughs, and in thy path 
 
 Scattering thy spoils in hapless aftermath; — 
 Blow, blow thy spirit's turbulence, and frown 
 Thy darkest from the sullen skies, and crown 
 
 Thy war with all the rage that winter hath! 
 
 Thou stormy image of the turbid soul 
 Swollen with winter of its barren pride. 
 The monstrous lion of anger roaring there 
 With raucous breath and rending all the air 
 With fearful bellowings, that rush and roll 
 Mad whirlwinds heaping ruin far and wide! 
 
 109 
 
APRIL 
 
 Half fearful, half in joy, with tearful eyes 
 Thou comest little maiden, tender bride, 
 Timid but loving by the bridegroom's side, 
 
 Thy feet reluctant to the path that lies 
 
 Before thee under haK enclouded skies; 
 Yet in thy heart emboldened to confide 
 In him who leads thee as thy constant guide 
 
 To the rich blooms of love's full paradise. 
 
 Cast out all maiden fear, thou little wife; 
 The way before thee broadens into light 
 And deepens into all the flower of May; 
 With thee is promise of the coming life. 
 
 The glowing hour of Summer's rounded height, 
 The golden glory of deep Autumn's day. 
 
 110 
 
CHRISTUS TRIUMPHANS 
 I 
 
 Mors Victor 
 
 Before thy grisly front no man may stand; 
 No heart but quakes at sounding of thy feet; 
 Thy coming none may flee, though ne'er so 
 fleet, 
 And trembling earth confesses thy command. 
 From kings their crowns thou pluck'st and from 
 the hand 
 Of Power its scepter; thou mock'st the vacant 
 
 seat 
 Of Pride or Love; nor high nor low degree may 
 cheat 
 Thee of thy tribute, Lord of sea and land. 
 
 Dreadful art thou, and terrible thy power 
 Against our piteous frailty doomed to die! 
 Weakly we lift our fending hands in vain. 
 And crouching wait the inexorable hour. 
 The thunderbolt of thy dark sovereignty 
 To smite and blast us with its mighty pain! 
 Ill 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 II 
 
 Mors Vida 
 
 Babes now may smile into thy sunless eye 
 And fear thee not, prone in thy kindred dust; 
 No longer reck we thine insatiate lust 
 
 Of this our crumbhng brief mortality. 
 
 Time is our bound no more; this narrow sky 
 Metes not our vision; vaster is our trust 
 Than all the regions of thy moth and rust, 
 
 Since passing now we know we do not die. 
 
 For risen is our Christ, and with Him we; 
 And prostrate thou beside His open grave, 
 O Ancient Victor in thy first defeat 
 And everlasting! Smiling now we see 
 Thou art but shadow with a broken glaive, 
 Within thy futile hands His winding-sheet. 
 
 112 
 
SONNET SEQUENCE 
 
 I care not what the colour of her hair; 
 
 Her beauty cometh not from dark or fair: 
 
 For round her head Love's haloed glories throw 
 
 A luminous hght more soft and brilliant far 
 
 Than on the evening's front its tender star 
 
 Burns clear above the sunken sun below. 
 
 I never saw the colour of her eyes; 
 
 I only care to know that in them hes 
 
 A Umpid depth that melts before the gaze 
 
 In softer deeper Hghts expanding clear 
 
 Into the soul's intenser atmosphere; 
 
 And there I worship uttering praise 
 
 To God's high craft, that he has made to shine 
 
 Such wondrous beauty in so fair a shrine. 
 
 II 
 
 Love never jests, though in his words at times 
 He seems to laugh in folly's motley mood, 
 And like a fool makes merry with stale rhymes 
 To jangle down the plaints of soHtude. 
 113 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Alas! his mirth is but a mask to hide 
 The gnawing fire that 'neath this mummery glows; 
 Though all seem fair upon the outward side, 
 Within there dwell a host of warring woes. 
 Despair with paUid front now seeks to drive 
 Hope from the citadel, who fain would stay; 
 And so these two in war contending strive. 
 While gentle Love stands trembling at the fray: 
 Come thou, fair Queen, and end this cruelty. 
 For Love allegiance owes and pays alone to thee. 
 
 Ill 
 
 What is to love? Let Love the answer give: 
 It is to lose thyself, thyself to die, 
 And yet in dying find that thou dost live; 
 To spend thy being's breath upon a sigh. 
 And draw all joy where mostly thou dost grieve: 
 Yet in the breathing of thy hfe away 
 New life, more hfe the fond soul seems to gain; 
 And though each hope that comes, refuse to stay. 
 For all that go, a budding host remain. 
 To love is both to die and live again; 
 Unto thine other self thyself to give, 
 Surrendering all the good that thou mayst hold. 
 Losing thyself to find a hundred-fold. 
 The lesser yielding that the greater learn to live. 
 114 
 
SONNET SEQUENCE 
 
 IV 
 
 What pain for love will not the heart endure! 
 The heaviness that comes of fell despair, 
 The agony of hopes that vain allure, 
 And in the seizing vanish in thin air, 
 Like desert images unto the eyes 
 Of one, who sees a flowering paradise 
 Along a stretch of placid waters cool, 
 Where shades of palm shield off the burning ray, 
 And yielding turfs beside a limpid pool 
 Invite to rest forever and a day — 
 An empty mirage by a barren way. 
 As one all desolate in lonely lands. 
 Cries out and prays with weak upHfted hands. 
 From this sad waste to thee I cry, O Love, and 
 pray. 
 
 When she's not near, then pleasure flies my life, 
 And misery and I sit down and moan. 
 And make a sad complaint like man and wife. 
 Who bear Love's chains when Love himself has 
 
 flown. 
 And when I think of all her presence is. 
 And then do reckon all the gain I miss, — 
 115 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 The dead dull night for want of her clear eyes, 
 The scentless air for lack of her sweet breath, 
 The absent music of her fond replies, — 
 Life's emptiness is but the ghost of death. 
 An exile from the happy Hght, I brood 
 Upon the bitterness my soul now tastes, 
 In desolation worse than desert wastes 
 Or polar fields of starless solitude. 
 
 VI 
 
 What offering shall I make unto my love, 
 
 What worthy treasure hes in my slight store? 
 
 When I do count its slender contents o'er, 
 
 Alas! its poverty does only move 
 
 To tears, that I should find myself so poor: 
 
 Mine not the glory of great deeds in war, 
 
 Mine not the laurel of poetic brows. 
 
 Mine not the lustre of the civic star, 
 
 Nor any meed that sparing fame allows; — 
 
 How rich in worth is she, how poor my house! 
 
 All wealth of glorious deeds at her dear feet 
 
 I deem an offering only just and meet. 
 
 And I, grief! my empty hands uplift; 
 
 Alas! what hope may be for me who have no gift! 
 
 116 
 
SONNET SEQUENCE 
 
 VII 
 
 Enclasped in thy dear thought, sweet Love, 
 
 hold 
 Me innermost and highest influence. 
 As dwells within the rose-leaves' tender fold 
 The subtle life that breathes most sweetly thence 
 Its fragrant beauty to the raptured sense. 
 Ah, soon the gentle Hfe of flowers wiU die, 
 And into nothingness their beauties fade. 
 But Love is an eternal gift, and I 
 With it would always live, immortal made 
 In its sweet largess. Then unto thine eye 
 Let me be chiefest light, and colour give 
 To all else thou mayst see, and all delight 
 Of living make for thee; for hfe is Hght, 
 And I would be the hght that makes thee hve. 
 
 VIII 
 
 In full effulgence flood the world with light, 
 O Sun, thy fiery course soon run and die; 
 And on fleet-footed flying steps, Night, 
 Wheehng thy million fires in haste pass by; 
 Haste, Life, and breathe this fingering day away. 
 As frozen breath upon the winter air, 
 117 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 That suffers for the instant swift delay, 
 But melts ere eye has time to trace it there; 
 Or else with dreamless opiate come, O Sleep, 
 And shutting out this slow-paced lapse of things, 
 In deepest slumber this sad present steep. 
 Until the morrow all its promise brings : 
 So would I cheat slow Time, who now cheats me, 
 And holds me bond, where Love alone can make 
 me free. 
 
 IX 
 
 And why should I be born to change and chance, 
 Evil's rebuff and good things gone askance. 
 Time's tortuous doubt and Fortune's circum- 
 stance? 
 Pursuing visions Hope has made to snare, 
 Loath prisoner to watchful jailer. Care, 
 Lost victim of inquisitor, Despair! 
 In vain succession seeking permanence, 
 Emphantomed by the fleeting ghosts of sense, 
 O sUding Life, what barren recompense! 
 The Present from the Future borrowing blood, 
 The Past forever tombing present good. 
 All parts of Time a thieving brotherhood! 
 Yet let my Love but look with her bright eyes. 
 And all this desert blossoms into Paradise! 
 
 118 
 
SONNET SEQUENCE 
 
 I ask thee for thy love, but it must be 
 
 In hearts that give and take this gift most blest 
 
 Of all that dwell within the human breast, 
 
 Sweet interchange of mutual Hberty; 
 
 For love is no true gift, save it be free. 
 
 And if of freedom it be not possest, 
 
 I ask it not; for I am as a guest 
 
 Who but receives as thou mayst give to me. 
 
 Then say that we together shall abide 
 
 As host and guest within Love's sacred home, 
 
 Each gaining freedom in the other's gift, 
 
 Each jdelding up the loneliness of pride, 
 
 I never more in barren ways to roam. 
 
 And thou no more on stormy seas to drift. 
 
 XI 
 
 MIZPAH 
 
 Though Ocean 'twixt us pour its watery war, 
 And soaring mountains frowning barriers rear; 
 Though Time divide by an unceasing year, 
 And Space with all its utmost limits bar. 
 Yet in His watching ever art thou near, 
 And I from thee can never be afar. 
 119 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 And Love, that built this universal frame, 
 And thy sweet heart that beats all love for me, 
 Breathes benediction in that holiest name 
 Of love with promise of eternity. 
 So sealed by that dear bond we twain shall go, 
 Unsundered by the walls of Time and Space, 
 Together through the sounding pass of woe. 
 Till that high Love look on us face to face. 
 
 120 
 
THE DEATH OF SIR 
 LAUNCELOT 
 
 So groaned Sir Launcelot in remorseful pain, 
 Not knowing he should die a holy man.'' 
 
 TENNYSON. 
 
THE DEATH OF SIR LAUNCELOT 
 
 At Canterbury seven years a monk 
 Sir Launcelot had abode. For Arthur passed, 
 And all the goodly fellowship of knights 
 Broken and scattered through his mighty sin 
 With Guinevere, he sought to purge his guilt 
 By prayers and fasting and the biting scourge 
 Within the holy life, till chastened love, 
 Freed from the clogging dross of earthly passion. 
 Leap a shooting flame upward to Heaven. 
 
 Seven years he there abode, and ever grew 
 To holier ways in spiritual might 
 As great as erst his prowess in the lists, 
 When first amongst the knights he overthrew 
 All comers in the jousts and won the prize. 
 And there he learned the smallness of his fame 
 And all the greatness of his sin with power 
 To drag down Arthur's mighty realm to ruin. 
 And from the bitterness of that vast grief 
 He fed his soul with constant tears to bloom 
 In penitential fruits, for he was come 
 To be a holy man with gift to see 
 That time is shadow of eternity, 
 123 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 And all the uses of our mortal hours 
 
 But vanity, save as the generous seed 
 
 Sown for the reaping in high heaven's demesne. 
 
 And so Sir Launcelot waxed in holiness; 
 And from the ashes of his sinful past 
 Stirred by the ceaseless breath of penitence, 
 Blew, first, the fainting spark of higher love. 
 And last, the glowing fire, whose lambent flame 
 Eat out the grossness of the carnal will. 
 And, then, with ardent tongue aspiring leaped 
 To union with celestial fires, whence came 
 The heat and quickening of its swift desire. 
 
 And in the furnace of that inward love 
 The man was changed beyond all mortal knowing; 
 For he had dwined away to ghostliness. 
 Until the shining spirit burned and glowed 
 Through flesh and bone worn to translucency. 
 And all his face shone hke Sir Galahad's, 
 Who saw the Holy Grail, and like to hers, 
 The virgin sister of Sir Percival, 
 Who sent the deathless ardor of her eyes 
 In Galahad's, and made her virgin purpose 
 One with his virgin will, forever wed 
 To chastity and to the higher life. 
 Till caught up in an ecstasy he passed 
 124 
 
The DEATH of SIR LAUNCELOT 
 
 Beyond, in vision of the Sacred Cup. 
 
 But Launcelot came to holiness by penance, 
 
 Like stubborn ore seven times over passed 
 
 Through the refiner's fire, till it come forth 
 
 Pure golden, purged of all its earthiness 
 
 And alien dross. For many ways has God 
 
 To draw His creature to Himself, and steep 
 
 It in the gracious furnace of His love : 
 
 Some as Sir Galahad through innocence. 
 
 Whose white flower blossomed from his cradled 
 
 years, 
 Some as the holy nun through human love. 
 Which rooted first in man's frail faith withered. 
 But after grew to fruit in heavenly soil; 
 And some as Launcelot through the dolorous way 
 Of penance cleansing all the sinful past 
 With prayer and fasting, till this mortal house 
 Grow luminant with grace, and in the eyes 
 The Spirit shines with love's interior flame. 
 Like windows glowing with an inner light 
 From out an ancient hall, wherein they hold 
 High feast for coming of their absent lord, 
 After long years of exile from his hearth. 
 
 For after that great battle in the west. 
 Where Arthur smote the traitor Modred down, 
 And wounded sore was borne by Bedivere 
 125 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Down to the margin of the sleeping mere, 
 
 And went into the barge that hoved there, 
 
 And passed with those three hooded queens, who 
 
 holped 
 The fainting king unto the happy isles, 
 Sir Launcelot, heavy with the grievous word, 
 Came back from over seas, and sought the queen 
 At Almesbury, whither she had fled the wrath 
 Of Arthur, knowing not the king would come 
 To bless her with forgiveness, not to bane. 
 
 And there to be a holy nun the queen 
 Abode and clothed herself in black and white, 
 As nuns are wont, veiUng her beauty's fire 
 With weeds of penance, as evening's ardourous 
 
 star 
 Burns all enclouded in the vapourous west, 
 When heaven weeps a dying day of autumn, 
 Sinking behind grey banks of broken storm. 
 
 And hither over seas Sir Launcelot came. 
 When Arthur passed and bold Sir Gawain died; 
 And sought the queen, thinking within his heart 
 Old thoughts, that came and went and came again 
 Like sudden birds on winter's leafless boughs 
 Chattering a noisy chorus for the food 
 They find not, locked within the whitened land 
 126 
 
The DEATH 0/ S I R LAUNCELOT 
 
 Forgetful of the summer's lavishness. 
 And so the memories of the summer hours 
 Came fluttering in the winter of his grief, 
 Where all was barrenness, and found no place 
 Of solace for the bitterness of joys 
 Long past, remembered sweets but present pangs. 
 And all the glamour of his fame died out 
 Within his heart and lay in dust and ashes, 
 Like fires gone out within a wasted land. 
 And making lamentation for his sin. 
 His soul grew black as death with gathering pain 
 At seeing the vast emptiness of Hfe 
 Wrought in the vanity of things long passed; 
 And all the shadows of his vanished days 
 Trooped mockingly before him as to say: 
 ''Behold the wraiths of thine own deeds misdone, 
 And all the hollo wness of time misspent." 
 And pointing ghostly fingers at him, jeered 
 Accusingly, and beat him down in shame. 
 And what of good and pure he once had wrought 
 Drew back affrighted, wailing at the strength 
 Of evil deeds grown old with years of custom. 
 
 And so as in a swoon Sir Launcelot lay, 
 Sunk in the blackness of that ghostly night, 
 Unrecking time and all the world about: 
 And from the dripping east the sunless day 
 127 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Rose heavily, and wheeled a clouded arc 
 Through weeping skies down to the shrouded 
 
 west, 
 And sank in darkness, o'er the world's blurred 
 
 rim. 
 And the bare woodland's leafless limbs made moan 
 With requiem winds dirging the dying year, 
 That, whisthng through the empty rookeries, 
 Shrilled ghostly music in the abbey towers. 
 But Launcelot lay and heeded not, lost 
 Within the deeper night that whelmed his soul; 
 Till on the second day the abbey bell. 
 Clanging its noisy message o'er the walls, 
 With sudden onset smote his startled ear. 
 And roused his smothered soul from out its swoon, 
 While through the wakening senses poured the 
 
 tides 
 Of hfe in rushing streams of sight and sound. 
 
 Then rising up Sir Launcelot strode a pace 
 And reeled with giddiness, but onward pressed 
 And stood before the abbey's massy gates; 
 And thereon smiting with his hilted sword, 
 The startled corridors grew clamourous 
 With rephcated echoes rumbling far 
 Like distant thunder through the cloistered cells, 
 And into solemn silence died again. 
 128 
 
The DEATH of SIR LAUNCELOT 
 
 And hearing, Guinevere rose up and paused; 
 And all her heart went trembling through her 
 
 limbs; 
 But praying on high God she called to stay 
 Her weakness, and in the sacred power of prayer 
 Gathered the scattered forces of her will. 
 Resolved against herself and him, who came 
 To plead against her better self and his. 
 Once only, for a little moment swayed 
 Her resolution, when she heard the craunch 
 Of armed footsteps on the virgin flags. 
 Wavered a sudden instant, then rooted firm. 
 And Launcelot coming saw, and stood amazed. 
 Scarce knowing her; for all unlike the queen. 
 Whose beau'^y flashed of yore in Arthur's 
 
 court 
 From snowy arms of rounded perfectness 
 And shoulders purer than the Uly's glow. 
 Crowned with a wanton wealth of sunny hair 
 Above the fulness of her columned throat. 
 Her queenly stature rose before him robed 
 And veiled in solemn folds of black and white, 
 Her lustrous beauty chastened and eclipsed, 
 Yet temperately shining through her garb 
 Of soberness, as pearls a radiant moon 
 Behind a fleece of clouds illuminate 
 With hidden light. 
 
 129 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 With broken voice at first, 
 Like brooklet hesitating over flats 
 And shallows, but gathering fuller flood and depth 
 At last flows smooth and strong through widen- 
 ing fields. 
 She spake to Launcelot sunken on his knee 
 In knightly courtesy: '^ Through thee and me, 
 Sir Launcelot, all the goodliest fellowship 
 Of knights the needful world has ever seen 
 Is utterly dispersed, and Arthur's work. 
 The building of a realm of love and law. 
 Wherein the man is lord of beast and lust. 
 And Christ is King (0 bhnd was I not seeing!) 
 Is all undone; and treason, war and death 
 Have seized upon the realm and ravened it. 
 Laying the land all waste and desolate; 
 Till wolves now sniff the blackened hearth, where 
 
 men 
 Were wont to sit before their household blaze; 
 And all the fields lie choked with riotous weeds, 
 Where waxed the bearded grain laughing to 
 
 heaven 
 With plenty, sowed and reaped in Arthur's peace. 
 From shore to shore through lengthening year to 
 
 year. 
 Through me and thee hath all this ill been wrought; 
 For in our sinful love this grief has come 
 130 
 
The DEATH of SIR LAUNCELOT 
 
 Upon the land, and on us lies the dole 
 Of unpurged guilt, who sinned so easily 
 And erred so greatly, seeing now how deep 
 The wound we wrought so hghtly, and how sore 
 The hurt, whence comes confusion and the death 
 To all that Arthur built so beautiful. 
 So wit thou now, Sir Knight, my soul's sad plight, 
 And how I seek God's pardon having hope 
 In Christ's high blood for my soul's after health, 
 And yet to see His Blessed Face through grace 
 Of God when I have purged me of my sins 
 In this quiet house of prayer, and laid aside 
 The frailty of this flesh through which I sinned. 
 For well I know in heaven is many a saint. 
 Who sinned as I, yet after won the height 
 By Christ's dear mercy and his precious blood. 
 Wherefore, Sir Launcelot, I beseech thee go; 
 Leave thou me here to work my penance out. 
 That rooting up the tares of time abused, 
 I sow celestial seed for heavenly gain; 
 For well as I have loved thee sinfully. 
 My heart forbids I love thee shamefully. 
 As once I loved forgetful of my place 
 And that high destiny wherein I failed; 
 And this I pray for thy soul's health and mine. 
 Farewell! betake thee to thy realm again. 
 And guard it well from war and wrack, and there 
 131 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Take thee a wife for joy and for an heir 
 To bear thy name and do thy work hereafter; 
 Till righted be the wrong of our misliving, 
 And from the ashes of the dolorous past 
 Push forth the blossom of a fairer hour, 
 In promise of the nobler fruit to come 
 Now bUghted by the canker of our loves." 
 
 And Launcelot kneeling bowed his knightly head, 
 And felt his heart strain 'gainst his corselet's 
 
 girth, 
 Well-nigh to bursting with the swollen floods 
 Of grief surging and shocking in his ears 
 At thought of his unknightly faithlessness. 
 Made naked and ashamed by utter truth 
 Of her calm words accusing and accused. 
 And groaning answered Launcelot sore at heart: 
 ''Would ye, sweet Madame, that I go again 
 Unto my country? Nay, I never shall; 
 Nor take me there a wife; for on high God 
 I call, that I in thee have ever had 
 Mine earthly joy, and false shall never prove. 
 Now wit thee well, I make a knightly vow, 
 That ne'er again in other shall I joy; 
 But that same choice which thou hast made, I 
 
 make; 
 And hence will seek the holy life to mend 
 132 
 
The DEATH of SIR LAUNCELOT 
 
 My grievous past for Jesu's sake and health 
 
 Of mine own soul. For now I see full well 
 
 The mickle vanity of praise, and how 
 
 A summer cloudlet puffed by wanton winds 
 
 Our slender hour of fame is blown and lost 
 
 Within the endless vaultage of the skies. 
 
 No more I seek the glory of the field 
 
 Or tourney's prize, a Uttle dust of deeds 
 
 Raised by the fitful breath of jealous time 
 
 To settle back upon its native earth 
 
 In dust again beneath the heedless feet 
 
 Of men remembering not. And since, my Queen, 
 
 Ye have renounced the sounding world's rank 
 
 pomp 
 To seek the perfect way for Jesu's sake, 
 I one with thee in all that grievous past, 
 And knowing now the canker at the root 
 Of love that runneth not the course of God, 
 Must needs of right seek out the prayerful way, 
 And follow it with hope in Christ's high blood 
 Of sin forgiven and of pardon won. 
 Farewell! and I beseech thee let thy voice 
 Go up to heaven for me as mine for thee, 
 That seeing how we wronged high God together, 
 And each made other's hurt in either's love, 
 Together we may storm the citadel 
 Of His vast mercy, each in other's prayers 
 133 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Winning Christ's healing for the other's wound." 
 And saying Launcelot rose, and going passed 
 The abbey's massy gates, that closed behind, 
 And sent their muffled clang to where the queen 
 Stood, a statue marbled into grief, 
 Then like a fainting lily swayed and fell 
 Prone, till ministered by tender hands 
 Of holy women loving and beloved. 
 
 And Launcelot through the naked forest rode, 
 
 Like one who wanders witless in a dream, 
 
 Nor heeded aught the roar of lashing boughs 
 
 Tumultuous with tempestuous blasts icy 
 
 With winter and keen as fangs of famished wolves. 
 
 A day and night he rode, nor recked the way, 
 
 Till on the morning of the second sun 
 
 He chanced upon a hermitage, where dwelt 
 
 A holy man wasted with fasts and prayer. 
 
 And Launcelot there alighting knelt him down, 
 
 And crying out besought the holy man 
 
 To shrive him and assoil him, come to make 
 
 Amend to Heaven by penitence and prayer 
 
 For years of guilty love heavy with hell. 
 
 And knowing him the hermit blessed and spake 
 Large words of comfort and of Jesu's love, 
 And to his crying barkened shriving him; 
 134 
 
The DEATHo/ SIR LAUNCELOT 
 
 And bade him strip him of his shining mail; 
 And on him placed the habit of a monk, 
 The sober garment of the world of prayer, 
 And token of the will to perfect Hfe 
 In him who walks no more the paths of men 
 But treads the single way of Christ. 
 
 So dwelt 
 Sir Launcelot at the hermitage, a monk 
 In arduous striving for the perfect life. 
 And fierce at first the struggle with the flesh 
 Tyrannous with th' unbrooked sovereignty of 
 
 years. 
 And lean and hollow-eyed he waned ghost-like, 
 Wrestling against the might of evil habit 
 Grown stronger year by year as saplings grow 
 Ring by ring into the stubborn oak. 
 And beaten down a many times he rose 
 Again by strenght of prayer and penitence, 
 And slowly waxed in spiritual power. 
 Oft-times when heaven stood at middle night, 
 And all the world was laid in sleep, there came 
 Upon him half awake and half adream, 
 Soft phantoms wooing him with sensuous breath 
 To break his steadfast will and drag him down. 
 Anon Queen Guinevere bent over him 
 And swept his lips with velvet touch of hers, 
 135 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Or Vivien, her almond eyes half veiled, 
 From under drooping lids shot languorous light- 
 nings; 
 Or Queen Iseult tossing resplendent arms, 
 Her raven tresses streaming down about 
 The snowy drifts of gleaming shoulders, beckoned 
 And called with amorous parted lips breathing 
 The heavy sweetness of the ripened rose; 
 And Launcelot starting up and crying out 
 Beat 'gainst the hollow air with frantic hands, 
 And heard, or seemed to hear, a mocking laughter 
 Drifting away into the outer night 
 With muttered imprecations echoing back: 
 And on him stood great drops of agony. 
 Lest yielding, e'en in thought, he fall again 
 Into the noisome pit, whence he had toiled 
 To purer heights. And seizing on the scourge 
 That ever lay beside his hand, he smote 
 The recreant flesh and beat the lusting down. 
 And fell to prayer; till morning creeping up 
 The murmuring east noosed all the hills with Hght, 
 And wold and dale and all the shadowed woods 
 Silvered with benediction of the dawn; 
 And Launcelot, overwearied, kneeling slept. 
 And dreamed no more. And so at last he quelled 
 The flesh, and made it subject to his will, 
 As docile as his knightly charger once 
 136 
 
The DEATH of SIR LAUNCELOT 
 
 To voice and rein in joust or roaring war. 
 Thus broken was the power of hell to weave 
 Foul phantasies before his dreaming brain, 
 Wrought from the sensuous vapours of the past, 
 Like Ungering mists above a dark morass, 
 Until the sharp pure air of heaven blow 
 And drive the fetid shades away, and down 
 From crystal spaces shine the steadfast stars. 
 
 But one sole victory gaineth not the walls 
 Of Heaven, where battlemented gleams afar 
 The City of the Saints ruby with love. 
 And Launcelot longing for that distant glory, 
 As keenly as of old for human fame, 
 Strove mightily in prayerful contemplation 
 To win the flashing splendour of the height. 
 
 But God, lest he should lean upon himself 
 Forgetful that the soul is tempered true 
 Only within humility's black forge 
 Under the hammer of adversity, 
 As ruddy iron under the smith's swift blows, 
 Withdrew Himself, and left him desolate. 
 And Melancholy breathed her heavy night 
 Upon his soul, and leaden weighed him down 
 To an abysmal darkness void and stern: 
 And caUing out in agony his voice 
 137 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Went from him echoless, and silence pierced 
 Him through and through like sword of ice numb- 
 ing 
 His speech and freezing all his powers of thought, 
 Save only the black memory of his sins, 
 That ever rose a creeping tide of foulness 
 To whelm him under; and isolation spread, 
 Deathlike, without the blessedness of death, 
 Innumerable spaces round about, 
 Until the universe seemed blotted out 
 Of time and place, and he, sole being plunged 
 In nothingness, shuddering in the void 
 Ravened by utter emptiness of self. 
 Then sudden seemed he snatched and lifted up 
 Within the grasping of some mighty palm. 
 And set down in a solitary waste 
 Of blackened sand and rock blasted of eld 
 By primal fires; and poured out like a pool 
 Of leaden waters lay his sluggish soul 
 Within a hollow of the barren plain. 
 So dun no star thereon could find its shadow. 
 Though all the heavens blazed with arrowy 
 
 lights. 
 A voiceless shade upon its banks he stood 
 Gazing with fearful eyes, that could not weep, 
 Upon the heavy surface of the pool. 
 That slowly stirred with sluggish undulations 
 138 
 
The DEATH of SIR LAUNCELOT 
 
 Oozing and bubbling up from slimy depths; 
 And therein creeping creatures foul with mire 
 Rose writhing twisted in a hundred knots, 
 Uncoiling serpent shapes that coiled again, 
 Flickering malignant tongues and hissing hate. 
 And from the distant gloom of circhng sands 
 Came hollow laughter, pealing mockingly. 
 And gibing voices shriUing as to say: 
 ''Behold thyself, that thinkest to take high 
 
 heaven !'' 
 And 'twixt the wriggling horror of the pool 
 And those shrill voices seemed he plunged in hell, 
 Cast out of Love and doomed of God forever. 
 Nor could his tongue find utterance, nor prayer 
 Wing upward from his heart in utter shame 
 Of his unworthiness, seeing his soul 
 Spilled out in all the foulness of his sins. 
 And so he seemed to stand eternally, 
 Helpless and hopeless, scorned of Heaven and 
 
 Hell. 
 Then sudden on the far horizon shone 
 A httle Ught that grew resplendent coming, 
 And growing flung lances of fire across 
 The sands scattering the shadows of the waste. 
 Till all the pool was silvered into white; 
 And looking, he beheld it crystal pure! 
 And all the air glowed red with crimson flame, 
 139 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 That wrapped him close and ravished him with 
 
 sweetness; 
 While round him swept the radiance of a host 
 Charging as from a leaguered city's walls 
 To rescue of a fallen knight begirt 
 By hurtling foes; and in the crystal pool 
 Behold — its gleaming towers and turrets mir- 
 rored — 
 The city of God rose-red! And all its walls 
 Were thronged with aureoled saints shouting 
 
 Hosannas, 
 And waving golden palms; and parapet 
 And base, and all the glowing space between, 
 Builded of serried ranks angehcal, 
 Arm Hnking arm and wing enfolding wing, 
 Breathed harmonies of blended canticles 
 Flaming Hke fountained fire, that spouted forth 
 Rivers of rushing melody flooding 
 Swift Hght leaping in seas of glory, 
 Till height responsive unto height trembled 
 With song of all the Sons of God crying, 
 ''Behold the Love that conquereth forever!'' 
 
 And Launcelot by that splendour pierced and 
 
 rapt. 
 Was lifted from the night of desolation. 
 And made to shine in spiritual glory 
 140 
 
The DEATH o/SIR LAUNCELOT 
 
 Upon the heights of holiness, and knew 
 His mighty sin forgiven and Heaven won 
 By utter gift of God, who casteth down 
 And lifteth up out of pure love to win 
 His creature to Himself. 
 
 And ever after 
 The vision of the City of the Saints 
 Abode within him, shining in his eyes 
 With holy flame and lighting all his face 
 With love, till they that looked upon him, mar- 
 velled. 
 And as a music playing was his presence. 
 Making glad harmonies with all about. 
 Till savage beasts ate gently from his hand, 
 And birds came fluttering round him lovingly; 
 And when he passed the rose flamed deeper red, 
 Unfolding all her heart and breathing out 
 A richer perfume to the joyous air; 
 So great was love within him shining forth. 
 
 And when Sir Bors, and others after him, 
 Came seeking Launcelot, finding him a monk 
 They marvelled greatly seeing him so changed. 
 But by the deathless fire allured, that burned 
 Celestial beacons in his eyes, and held 
 By music of his voice that seemed attuned 
 141 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 To heavenly choirs, they would not forth again 
 Into the discord of the world : and won 
 Through Launcelot to the love of higher things, 
 Abode with him and took the ashen garb 
 Of penitence; and following Christ alone 
 Strove ever for the perfect hfe; and so 
 There gathered round him seven knights, who erst 
 Had followed him and worshipped him; and now 
 They followed him no less, but worshipped God 
 Alone, by his ensample drawn and led. 
 
 And now the seventh year in heaven's orb 
 
 Had wheeled its round, since Launcelot sought 
 
 the perfect hfe; 
 And it was close upon the Easter hour, 
 When earth had cast her winter weeds aside. 
 And baring all her breast to wooing suns. 
 Felt slender flutterings of the baby spring 
 Stirring within her quickened zone, while field 
 And forest prescient of the coming hour, 
 Grew tender with the creeping sap tinging 
 The melting wold with hesitating green, 
 And softening all the boughs with timid buds. 
 And Launcelot granted by Heaven to know his 
 
 hour. 
 That he should pass at Easter-tide, calling 
 His seven brethren, spake in ghostly words 
 142 
 
The DEATH 0/ SIR LAUNCELOT 
 
 Clothed with the sad authority of death : 
 
 "Now ye who love me in the love of Christ, 
 
 Hearken my words, who am about to die; 
 
 For keen was I for earthly fame, loving 
 
 The incense glory from the lips of men, 
 
 Not knowing then the higher hfe in God, 
 
 Nor seeking Him, but serving mine own honour, 
 
 Encrowned by pride upon a throne of sand. 
 
 And lusting in the flesh I lived my life 
 
 Besottedly, and God's high purpose turned 
 
 To basest use, making of human love — 
 
 Whence flowers our kind upon the stalk of time 
 
 For God's own plucking in eternal Ufe — 
 
 A sink of passion and a pit of death. 
 
 And sinning in the flesh with one that stood 
 
 Upon the pinnacle of mortal greatness, 
 
 Made sin a brazen trumpet to the world. 
 
 Till others from our scandal drawing license 
 
 Sinned also, bUndly deeming that light fault. 
 
 Whose foulness borrowed lustre from high names. 
 
 And so the sins of many burdened me 
 
 Besides mine own, and weighed me down in 
 
 shame. 
 But God, who willeth not the sinner's death, 
 Is mighty in His Love, whose arm is mercy 
 And reacheth out to snatch us from the hell 
 Our sin has made, if we but will to come. 
 143 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 And I that hung upon the trembling brink, 
 Was plucked from those eternal gulfs of loss 
 By power of Jesu's blood spilled for us all; 
 And though unworthy, crying out was heard. 
 For marvellous the grace of God; and none 
 So low, but he may rise and Hve again. 
 Putting forth buds of righteousness by heat 
 Of that high Love faUing upon the seeds 
 Of penance sown within the furrowed fields 
 Of humbleness; for pride resisteth grace. 
 And they that will not are as barren rock. 
 Wherefore in me see God's great miracle 
 Of Jesu's love triumphant over sin; 
 For none was greater sinner in the flesh 
 Than I, whose sin was more than lust, seeing 
 It grew to be the scandal of the realm. 
 And sapped the props of Arthur's house to ruin. 
 But God encompasseth the wickedness 
 Of men, and though we break His ordinance. 
 And send sin's discord through the groaning 
 
 world, 
 And see no heaUng of the hurt in time, 
 The arms of love eternally uphold, 
 And Mercy maketh music in the heavens, 
 That girdle us arround with harmonies 
 Unheard save by the spiritual ear 
 Beyond the lagging sense's evidence. 
 144 
 
The DEATH of SIR LAUNCELOT 
 
 And he that feareth justice findeth mercy 
 
 With outstretched arms to take him to her 
 
 bosom 
 As mothers take the thirsting babe to breast; 
 But he that scorneth mercy and will not, 
 Within the hands of justice shall be held 
 Apart, eternally shut out from Love 
 Inviolate, that wooed him all in vain. 
 Wherefore that all who knew me in the weeds 
 Of worldUness, may see in me the flower 
 Of mercy burgeoning by Jesu's love, 
 I pray ye bear my body through the land. 
 When I am dead, to Joyous Gard, and there 
 Let all men come to look upon my face, 
 That seeing, they may know the ways of God, 
 And in the knowing some amend be done 
 For my great sin." And ceasing, quiet as waters 
 Flowing from shallows into deeps, his voice 
 Grew still, and o'er his face death's shadows crept 
 As dayhght waning ashens into night; 
 And breathing deep in one long-drawn sigh, 
 As sleepers breathe, his soul went gently forth. 
 
 And kneehng all his brethren prayed high God, 
 And wept for love of him, and yet withal 
 Felt gladness, knowing him a holy man. 
 And how he longed for Heaven, not fearing death. 
 145 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Then rising up, with reverent hands they placed 
 Him on a bier, and going forth took road 
 To Joyous Gard. 
 
 And it was Easter-tide, 
 And all the earth had quickened into flowers, 
 And all the air was redolent of May; 
 And cope and copse rang revelry with songs 
 Of feathered joys awaked from winter's sleep 
 By new-born suns within the tender blue 
 Of skies liquid with spring's ethereal breath. 
 And through the joyous season as they went 
 The gladness of the world lifted their hearts 
 Thinking upon their risen Lord and death 
 O'ercome by his great victory, and how 
 The man they bore had won the eternal pearl. 
 And such a fragrance from him came as seemed 
 Death had no part in him, and on his face 
 A Hght as from a lamp of holy oils 
 Burning before the body of our Lord. 
 And all their going was a sweet spring tune, 
 SweUing from earth and air and blossomed brake: 
 Above the bier carolled the wheehng birds; 
 The little creatures in the grass chorused 
 A soft insistent note, and in the fields 
 The grazing kine lifted their patient heads, 
 And lowed a mellow greeting as they passed. 
 146 
 
The DEATH o/SIR LAUNCELOT 
 
 From thorpe and town the people came and gazed 
 At them, and wondering looked upon the face 
 Of him they bore, and seeing greatly marvelled, 
 And followed reverently: so when they came 
 To Joyous Gard, the multitude had swelled 
 Unto a host, as when a people come 
 In homage of a king. And in the quire 
 They laid him down, that all might come and see. 
 And noble lords and ladies came and saw. 
 And marvelled thinking on the grace of God. 
 And many that were still in sin were changed. 
 And followed Christ thereafter. And lastly came 
 Sir Ector, Launcelot's brother, making dole; 
 But when he saw his face he wept no more. 
 And straightway casting off his sword and helm, 
 He vowed him after to the holy life. 
 
 And now twice seven days Sir Launcelot lay 
 On loft, and all the people came and saw. 
 And none that came but marvelled seeing him, 
 And all the whiles his seven brethren sang 
 And read the psalters over him and prayed, 
 Their voices going up both night and day 
 Like incense from a golden censer swung. 
 And on the fortnight came the Bishop there, 
 And praying sang a requiem over him. 
 And offered up the Holy Sacrifice 
 147 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Of Christ's own Blood and Body for his soul; 
 And when the Sacred Host was lifted up, 
 Blood red it shone, and rosy sparkles flashed 
 Through all the quire, and sounds of voices came 
 From far off like a mighty host rejoicing, 
 Then died away as of a people going 
 Within a city's gates; and fading waned 
 The rosy red upon the chancel's walls 
 Like evening's purple with the setting sun. 
 
 148 
 
AGLAE 
 
 A DRAMATIC POEM 
 
PERSONS OF THE DRAMA 
 
 Aglae, a young Roman Matron. 
 Boniface, Steward of Aglde^s Estates. 
 Cyprian, a Christian Priest. 
 Lavinia, Maid to Aglae. 
 A Band of Christians. 
 
aglAe 
 
 A DRAMATIC POEM 
 
 SCENE I 
 
 Atrium of Aglde's house in Rome. A fountain 
 playing in the centre. The Lares and Penates at 
 the entrance on either side. Present: Aglde and 
 Lavinia. Lavinia weaving. Aglde seated near hy 
 in a disconsolate attitude. Time: the beginning of 
 the fourth century. 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 Sweet mistress, thou art sad. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 'Tis strange, Lavinia: 
 I know not why, but all my soul sinks down 
 With sadness, and the spirit's airy wings, 
 That once stretched lightly in the irised sun, 
 Droop drenched and draggled now with constant 
 
 tears ! 
 Why am I sad, when all else seems so glad? 
 151 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 Tis hard sometimes to tell. 
 
 agiAe 
 
 It seems so strange 
 That I, whose years are crescent yet with youth, 
 When life and love are at their fullest tide, 
 Should feel as one whose pulses slow old age 
 Has laid his icy fingers on and chilled 
 Their ruddy currents into sluggish streams 
 Creeping through frozen channels. 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 Perchance 
 Thou'rt ill and needst the doctor's care. 
 
 aglXe 
 
 Tis not the body's ill that wounds me so, 
 But some distemper of the soul, that chills 
 And dulls the mirror of my joy. My heart 
 Is bared to autumn's melancholy winds 
 Complaining of lost summer's happiness; 
 My boughs are stripped of all their countless 
 
 blooms, 
 Whose flame once took the enamored air with 
 
 sweets, 
 
 152 
 
AGLAE 
 
 And naked of their leafy loveliness 
 
 Serve but to catch the drooping heaven's tears 
 
 And weep them to the ground. 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 Dear Mistress, this 
 Is only shadow of a httle cloud 
 From humors of thy spirits overtaxed 
 With happiness. 
 
 aglXe 
 
 Am I not rich? 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 In Rome none richer. 
 
 aglXe 
 
 Am I not loved? 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 By all, dear lady, slave and freeman, high 
 And low. Kind is thy heart and lavish too. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Withal so sad! For this I weep the more. 
 The largesses of fortune mock a heart 
 That misery holds in fee. 'Tis now a month 
 Since this strange jailer of my soul has stood 
 Cold sentinel upon my joy. Ah me! 
 Whence comes this gruesome witchery to filch 
 My happiness? 
 
 153 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 LAV INI A 
 
 Yes, Mistress, well I know; 
 For thou wert wont to brim with gayety. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 And I who never wept before now feed 
 
 On constant tears. It came not all at once 
 
 But rather stole upon me unawares, 
 
 Stealthily creeping like the salty sea 
 
 With bitter flood upon the sunny shore 
 
 Till all its pleasantness is overwhelmed. 
 
 And I, who took no count of careless time, 
 
 Save in the winged calendar of joy. 
 
 Now drag the listless days as slaves their chains 
 
 Gyred round their galled ancles. Lavinia! 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 Mistress! 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Rememberest thou that strange — 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 Yes, lady! 
 That strange old man found fainting at the door 
 By Boniface? 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 Oh, yes, quite well. 
 154 
 
AGLAE 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Dost thou recall the man? 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 Old and gaunt 
 Feeble and worn, a beggar — 
 
 AGLAE (mth a gesture of impatience) 
 
 No, not that 
 So much, for that was but the outward man; 
 But in his eyes despite his ragged woe, 
 A deep compelling calm serene as skies 
 Whose vaulted blue outspans all taint of cloud. 
 His aspect venerable, and his voice 
 Weighted with quiet authority, that seemed 
 Rooted in wisdom; strange his words; of things 
 More strange, that barbed my very heart, and 
 
 waked 
 Therein a fear I never felt before! 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 Nay, I heeded not his words, dear Mistress, 
 Nor imderstood! 
 
 AGLAE (rising and much agitated) 
 
 Within his eyes there shone 
 A sovereignty that awed the quickened soul, 
 155 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Yet merciful. He seemed to read my heart 
 As one who summons to a secret court 
 A culprit to be judged and yet to be 
 Forgiven. Me, a Roman matron too, 
 The mistress of a thousand slaves, whose word 
 Is weight of Hfe and death upon her own, 
 This ragged beggar summoned and adjudged 
 As I were meanest of them all! 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 Why, 
 Most humble was his mien and mild his speech ! 
 I heard no word against thy nobleness; 
 Thy dignity endured no smallest hurt. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Not in the outward marks that only take 
 The eye, the manner and the form of courtesy, 
 Was my nobility thus made ashamed; 
 But there, where is the proper of our pride, 
 Within the secret chambers of the soul. 
 Was I brought to my knees, a guilty thing 
 Not all condemned but somehow hoping still 
 For pardon! 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 Strange were that, indeed. Mistress! 
 How could a Roman matron's great nobility 
 Be criminal, and who her judge but Caesar? 
 156 
 
aglAE 
 
 aglXe 
 
 Thou art a simple child, Lavinia. Alas! 
 So too thought I until — (iveeping violently) 
 LAVINIA {throwing herself at Aglde's feet) 
 
 Weep not, sweet Mistress! 
 It ill becomes the summer of thine eyes 
 To see them clouded so. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Ay me! mine eyes 
 Are wells of grief for the sad heart's salt springs. 
 Yet in this weeping is a bitter ease 
 That softens, though it lessen not this woe. 
 (Enter Boniface) 
 
 BONIFACE (pausing at threshold) 
 
 (Aside) Aglde weeping! What portent in her 
 
 tears? 
 (To Aglde) Lady, I wait upon thy word. 
 
 aglXe (starting) 
 
 'Tis thou, 
 Boniface! I would speak with thee. Go, 
 Lavinia, child, and wait my further bidding. 
 
 (Exit Lavinia) 
 157 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 BONIFACE {approaching with anxious air) 
 
 Thou weep'st Aglae! My spirits take the chill 
 
 Of thy dear sorrow as the mirror dims 
 
 With sudden breath. Why droop thy spirits 
 
 so? 
 Tell me, AgUe, the secret of this grief, 
 That I may share its dolorous tenderness, 
 Or else with careful hand may hft the flower 
 From off the thorn that wounds it so? 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Ah, me! 
 How may I tell! I feel, but scarcely know. 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 Thy words were wont to be a very song; 
 Nor all the feathered music of the groves 
 Gave out more gladness to the ear. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 And now 
 
 Some nameless shadow creeps upon my soul 
 And silences its song. Alas, alas! 
 I've shpped the wonted moorings of my joy 
 And drift, a helmless and a lonely barque 
 Into the widening waste of landless seas! 
 158 
 
aglae 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 Tis but a passing shadow; some effect 
 Of weariness, that weighs thy spirits down. 
 
 aglIe 
 In vain I seek to cast the burden off. 
 Pleasure is mockery, and shows of joy 
 Are only gilded robes, all lead to one 
 Whose heart keeps fast with hidden misery. 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 Whence came this humor first? 
 aglXe 
 
 Tis hard to tell; 
 It came as winter comes in autumn's breath, 
 Gently at first, preluding deeper wrong 
 To summer's lustihood. And as the flower 
 First droops with keener nights, though all the 
 
 days 
 Be warm and tender still, upon me fell 
 The frosts that nipped the spirit's brighter bloom, 
 And plucked the petals from the stricken stalk. 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 But is no record of the hour, no touch 
 In memory of time before and after 
 To mark the sunshine from the night that glooms 
 159 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Thy skies and shrouds the image of the stars? 
 For though the day die slowly into dark, 
 Nor fixed the instant in the thickening light 
 When we may say 'tis now the night, now day 
 Is spent, yet well we know the rounded hour 
 Of perfect light from utter gloom. 
 
 aglXe 
 
 Perchance 
 That day — Dost thou remember, Boniface, 
 The stranger succored by thee at the gate 
 And given shelter? He was old and worn, 
 A Christian speaking a strange doctrine. 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 Yes, 
 
 His name was Cyprian. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Then first in all my days 
 Was I rebuked and made ashamed! 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 By Cyprian? 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 By him! 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 Dared he upbraid thee! 
 160 
 
AGLAE 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Not in words — 
 Nay, listen — thou shalt hear. Within his eye 
 There dwelt so clear a light, so deep a calm. 
 That I was drawn as one who gazes down 
 Into the ocean's depths, and sinks and sinks 
 Helpless from deep to deep. Then suddenly 
 The lambent shame rushed flaming to my brow 
 In presence of his soul, that held mine own 
 In that abyss where thought is tongueless speech, 
 Whiles all my guilt stood naked and ashamed 
 Before his questing eyes, that pitied me ! 
 He read my heart, Boniface, and saw 
 The guilty image of our love; and yet 
 He spake no word, but well I knew he knew! 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 'Twas but the flaring fancy's painted fear, 
 A little grain of conscience sputtering up 
 In love's bright fire to burn itself away 
 In that resplendent flame like sudden chaff. 
 Why conjure phantoms in the broad bright day 
 And sadden with pale ghosts the laughing hours. 
 That wheel around the golden sun and strew 
 His path with flowers? We live and love; what 
 more 
 
 161 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Is given in this narrow house of time 
 
 To mortals? Let us take and spare not — Hold 
 
 The largess of the gods. All else is folly. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Thy words were once bright fountains to my joy 
 
 And bore my spirits Ughtly up. But now, 
 
 Alas! they only feed my tears. 'Tis not 
 
 I love thee less, O Boniface, but I 
 
 Would love thee better. Love that knows its 
 
 shame 
 Is broken music on a guilty ear. 
 This knew I not before, but now I know. 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 What is this riddle? 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 None; but simple truth. 
 
 Boniface, I am ashamed ! 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 Aglde! 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 1 am all misery. I weep and weep. 
 And wonder at the ocean of my tears! 
 
 Some ghastly phantom shakes my frightened 
 
 heart, 
 A shadowy presence rather felt than seen, 
 162 
 
AGLAE 
 
 Faint syllablings like voices in far dreams, 
 Accusing whisperings that say no word, 
 Yet somehow speak a dreadful thing! 
 
 BONIFACE (aside) 
 Her humor blows a cold and heavy wind, 
 That quite congeals my nimbler spirits. How 
 Distract her mood? 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Knowest thou of Cyprian aught? 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 How may I know? A beggar at the gate 
 He came unknown and hke a beggar gone. 
 But shake thou off this heaviness; unfold 
 The crumpled petals of thy happiness 
 To brighter suns, and let them drink the mists 
 Of melancholy wept by tearful night. 
 Aglae, come; we'll fill the hours with love 
 Again, and in the crystal floods of joy 
 Drown this grim melancholy. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 No; 'tis not 
 The same. My love is heavy with strange fears 
 And cannot rise upon so fragile wings. 
 Perchance, if I might speak with him again, 
 That strange old man — 
 163 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 A ragged beggar! 
 
 aglAe 
 I know, and yet he seemed so wonderful! 
 He was as though some greater god had breathed 
 Upon his soul a more than mortal peace! 
 What are these Christians, Boniface? Knowest 
 aught about them? 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 Tis said they worship a dead god, 
 A Jewish malefactor crucified 
 By his own people long ago. Their rites, 
 I hear, are horrible. They sacrifice 
 A living babe, whose flesh their priests consume 
 Before the assembled worshippers! 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Most horrible indeed, and yet so strange! 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 A dangerous, bloody and malefic sect, 
 They secretly conspire against the life 
 Of Caesar; and when siezed and brought before 
 The Praetor, stubbornly refuse to burn 
 Incense to Caesar's statue! 
 164 
 
AGLAE 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Yet Cyprian seemed 
 Not so. Gracious and mild his mien. He spoke 
 Of peace and love to all. He said that thou, 
 Whose kindness succored him in need, would gain 
 Some precious great reward; for Christ, he said, 
 Loved the compassionate. I know not what 
 He meant, but in his words, there seemed to lurk 
 Some curious hidden sense, like a dim light 
 That makes the darkness deeper. 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 Thou art bewitched, 
 Aglde ! This strange old man has cast some spell 
 Upon thee, some strange charm brought from the 
 
 East; 
 For I have heard these Christians practise magic. 
 Their Christ, they claim, could even raise the dead, 
 And left the secret of his power to them 
 That follow him. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Perchance 'tis true, and yet 
 I cannot think of Cyprian working ill 
 To me or other. Love so clearly spake 
 From eye and mien, and rang in every word, 
 165 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 That malice surely could not mingle bane 
 With such fair honesty! 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 Rather, Aglae, 
 The subtlest poison in the rarest flowers 
 And in the precious wine the deadhest bane. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 I know not, Boniface; but this I know, 
 I am not what I was. I love thee still, 
 Yet other than I did. And all my soul 
 Is a fierce fire whose flame leaps ever up 
 Dying into the empty air and finds 
 No food for its aspiring tongue. What once 
 Was precious to my heart is ashes now 
 In that consuming heat; and I, who loved 
 The guttering raiment of the passing hour, 
 The hssome wantoness of clinging robes, 
 The fight of jewels on neck and hand and arm, 
 The careless hour of feast and mirth, the wine 
 That flamed the cheek to roses and the eye 
 To love's own splendors, I, who loved the pomp 
 Of place, the pride of power, the luxury 
 Of wealth, till time seemed all elysian joy 
 That knew no end, find now the end of all. 
 The withered chaplet of a faded feast. 
 The years fie blanched within my trembfing hands. 
 166 
 
aglAe 
 
 Save only love of thee, O Boniface, 
 My life bears now nor leaf nor bloom. 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 Some spell 
 Aglae, has enmeshed thy spirits quite; 
 Some foul, unwholesome incantation throws 
 Its fetid humors thwart thy fancy's eye. 
 'Tis most unnatural that youth and wealth, 
 Beauty and power, the very roots of love 
 And happiness, should wither in the sudden 
 And spread their branches barren to the sun. 
 And if some spell has bound thy spirits up 
 In such congeahng frost, may we not find 
 Some counter charm to melt the opposing bonds? 
 I'll seek these Christians out, and find a magic 
 To loosen all the winter of thy woe. 
 And make thee smile again. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 A little warmth 
 Stirs in the ashes at the thought ! Hasten — 
 But whither? How? 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 Most easily, I think. 
 The Christians here in Rome, so runs the rumor, 
 Made bold by Caesar's rash indulgence brave 
 The open day. I'll seek them out and learn 
 167 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Some way to wrest the secret of their skill. 
 I know one, Mineius, who, 'tis said, abjured 
 The superstition once before the Praetor. 
 Gold is his passion and will buy his tongue. 
 If fear or other thing should hold his speech. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 May the gods assist! Perchance there's hope in 
 
 this! 
 Yet am I all divided in my mind. 
 And in the feeble heart of my faint hope 
 Doubt sinks a bitter shaft. 
 
 BONIFACE 
 
 Then pluck it out! 
 And give thy fledgling chance to spread his wings ! 
 I'll go and speed with Mercury's nimble feet 
 Upon thy quest! Nay, smile again, Aglae; see 
 The sunlight on yon fountain's silvery shaft! 
 A happy augury ! Its splendor breaks 
 And dances in a thousand flying Hghts 
 About us! On thy hair and face it plays. 
 Wooing thy beauty with amorous dalUance. 
 
 Smile, 
 Aglde — now thou art thyself again! 
 Olympus would be brighter for thy smile — 
 I go to find thy happiness again! 
 
 (Exit Boniface) 
 168 
 
SCENE II 
 
 Three months* interim between first and second 
 scene. Atrium of Aglde's house in Rome. Present: 
 Aglde and Lavinia. 
 
 AGLAE (holding a rose in her hand) 
 The third month gone to-day, and yet no word! 
 Were months but petals, I'd crush them as this 
 
 rose! 
 How time does rack our patience on his wheel! 
 What can delay his coming back? 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 'Twas far 
 To go, dear Mistress; over seas and mountains, 
 A rough way; Lucoe told me so. 
 For from Cilicia came she as a child. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 She said 'twas very far? 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 Truly, and hard. 
 A long and tiresome journey over sea. 
 And then great mountains bar the toilsome way. 
 169 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 'Twas many weary weeks, she said, 'twixt Rome 
 And Tarsus. 
 
 aglXe 
 ^Tis very hard to wait. 
 Each moment is a weary while, each hour 
 A lengthened anguish, and each day so brimmed 
 To overflowing with the creeping flood 
 Of endless hours to make the stagnant round, 
 'Twould seem that time had ceased to flow. 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 Think 
 Upon the journey's length, and measure time 
 By that. Mountain and river, sea and plain, 
 Make slow toil e'en for hastening feet. And then 
 The thousand various haps to make delay 
 In a long journey; on the sea the wind 
 May fall and hold the eager ship becalmed, 
 Or blustering storm may beat it baffled back, 
 Or angry torrents drown the wonted ford, 
 Or snow upon the mountain passes — 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Yes, 
 Too many far the petty hindrances 
 To pile delay a mountain high. To think 
 On these but sharpens appetite for haste. 
 And daily whets the edge of grief anew. 
 170 
 
AGLAE 
 
 This weighing all the hazards only adds 
 Fresh burdens to the staggering load I bear. 
 I conjure fears of all the thousand perils 
 That throng the hostile way and frighten hope. 
 The snows of patience cannot cool a heart 
 Afire; the ardor of my longing melts 
 Them all! 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 But this impatience wears thee out. 
 Thou'rt grown so white and thin, a Hly now 
 Would blush beside thy cheek, and zephyrs sway 
 Thee lightly as a blade of faded grass. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 A shadow of myself, I know. How soon 
 The body melts before the soul's desire ! 
 How lightly are we made ! The elements 
 That fashion our unstable frames are soft 
 And feeble, solving 'neath the touch of time 
 The ruder hand of grief or fortune's strokes 
 Like irised vapours in a biting wind. 
 I care not now as once I cared. 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 Alas! 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Nay, sigh not so, Lavinia. My woe 
 Has taught me this — one precious pearl of gain 
 171 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 From out the darkened waters of my grief — that 
 
 joy 
 Is not the body's gift, nor time may hold 
 The fee of happiness. 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 But that is hard 
 To understand; where then may be our joy? 
 
 aglXe 
 
 O who may answer that? That precious wine 
 
 Once held for me within the shallow shard 
 
 Of time, is now all spilled. This much I know, 
 
 And for the rest I only hope, blindly 
 
 Tis true, but firmly; why, I cannot tell. 
 
 But something whispers me from out my 
 
 darkness. 
 That Boniface will bring back peace and love 
 And happiness. 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 May fortune prosper him, 
 And speed him quickly home! Yet thinkest 
 
 thou 
 A relic from a Christian's body slain 
 By Caesar's law will work so fair a spell? 
 'Twould seem to me that ill would come of ill. 
 These Christians are an evil people. 
 
 172 
 
AGLAE 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Ah, yes, I know! 
 Yet Cyprian was a Christian, and he seemed 
 So gentle, kind. And Boniface declared — 
 For so did Mincius tell him, — that a cloth 
 Steeped in the blood of one who died for Christ — 
 For thus they speak — has power to cure the 
 
 sick, 
 The lame, the blind and e^en to raise the dead 
 To hf e again : I know not how, but Mincius said 
 That he had seen such marvels wrought ! 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 'Tis strange 
 To think on! Theirs must be a potent magic. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Though here in Rome the Christians go in peace, 
 'Tis known that Caesar's edict in the East 
 Pursues the obstinate, and many yield 
 Their hves for Christ their God. 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 What fools! To think 
 That men would rather yield themselves to Hades 
 Than burn a pinch of incense to Caesar's statue! 
 173 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Yet gladly do they die, 'tis said, and meet 
 The dreadful agony with smiles. Who knows 
 The secret meaning of their sacrifice? 
 Who welcome death so happily, as 'twere 
 A gift, must see beyond its bloody pale. 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 But 'tis unnatural to welcome death, 
 Save as relief from hopeless misery; 
 And when to live is still a joy, then death 
 Is horrible! 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 I know not what to think, 
 And yet I seem to half divine a meaning. 
 
 (Singing in the distance. Listening they hear it, 
 but without being able to distinguish the words,) 
 
 SONG 
 The martyr's crown is his; with Christ 
 
 Triumphant now he reigns: 
 Death he trampled under foot 
 And all its pains. 
 
 aglXe 
 He would not yield so willingly to death 
 Who had no secret stay within his soul 
 Against the pangs of nature's dissolution. 
 174 
 
AGLAE 
 
 SONG {approaching) 
 
 Death but the happy gate to life 
 
 From out this vale of tears 
 To him who, Ungering, longs for Christ's 
 
 Eternal years. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 What is this singing in the street, Lavinia? 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 ril go and see {Exit Lavinia) 
 
 aglXe 
 
 ^'In Christ's eternal years!" 
 How strange the words! How solemn, yet how 
 
 glad 
 The burden of the music. What may it be? 
 
 SONG {just outside the house) 
 
 Nor craunching rack nor flaming brand 
 
 His steadfast will can break; 
 Sweet is the body's sacrifice 
 
 For Christ's dear sake. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 '' For Christ's dear sake ! " These are the words of 
 Christians ! 
 
 175 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 SONG 
 
 The golden palm within his hand, 
 
 The sign of victory won, 
 He sits enthroned among the saints. 
 
 Clothed with the sun. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Who sings so strangely in the streets of Rome? 
 
 {Enter Lavinia.) 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 Dear lady, there wait without a band of men 
 All garbed in white, bearing a body shrouded 
 In white upon a bier, and with them Cyprian. 
 'Tis they who sing. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Cyprian! 
 
 LAVINIA 
 
 The very same. 
 He bade me tell you he would speak with you. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Yes, yes, at once! Go, bid him come! 
 
 {Exit Lavinia) 
 Cyprian! 
 How faint I grow! O who will stay me now! 
 This I have longed for all these weary months. 
 And now I fear and tremble! 
 176 
 
AGLAE 
 
 SONG 
 
 sweet the agony and trial 
 
 Sustained by love so great, 
 Beyond the power of man's weak will 
 
 And low estate. 
 
 aglXe 
 What subtle meaning in these curious words? 
 
 SONG 
 
 For Christ upon his own pours down 
 
 His all enduring grace, 
 And they that stand his witnesses 
 
 Look on His Face! 
 
 sweet beyond all sweets to die 
 When summoned at His call 
 
 Sweeter than life to die for him 
 Who died for all. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 ''Who died for all!" How strangely do I hear! 
 
 (Enter Cyprian.) 
 What mean these solemn words'' Who died for all? " 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 Christ Jesus, Lord and God. 
 177 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 aglXe 
 
 Cyprian! 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 Daughter. 
 aglXe 
 Thy words are very strange. Thou calFst me 
 daughter! 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 In Christ our Lord and God, who died for all. 
 His priest I bear His word of life to them 
 That hear me. Peace to thee, Daughter. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Strangely and yet not strangely do I hear. 
 'Tis Hke the piercing of a broken dream! 
 Some shadowy prescience taking outward shape, 
 Yet vague. Speak, Cyprian, speak. 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 Daughter, I come 
 From Tarsus. 
 
 aglXe 
 Why, 'tis thither Boniface 
 Journeyed! Hast news of him? 
 178 
 
AGLAE 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 Yes, Daughter, truly. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 I perish for it! Speak and succor me! 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 But first this golden prelude to the tale: 
 
 'Twill pave the way to happier things. Listen! 
 
 aglAe 
 With all my soul. But is he well? 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 Aye, Daughter, very well. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Fm glad, so glad! 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 He sends thee greeting, and he bade me say 
 The charm he sought is found. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 E'en now I feel 
 Its power. I'm glad, so very glad! 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 A charm 
 Beyond all charms to heal our deadUest ills. 
 179 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 But hear my tale, whose swift unfolding hke 
 
 The flaming of the dawn upon the banks 
 
 Of night, will make thy darkness Hght. 
 
 When Boniface's pity succored me some months 
 
 Agone, and thy compassion joined 
 
 Made gracious heahng of my weakened frame, 
 
 I prayed to Christ our Lord and God who died for 
 
 all. 
 To succor thee and him who succored me. 
 His servant — Nay, I know, my Daughter, all — 
 For Boniface confided all and bade 
 Me speak with thee. And passing hence I went 
 Into Cilicia, where the flock of Christ 
 Is harried by the wolves, to comfort them 
 Whom Caesar seeks to break unto his will 
 And force from their allegiance to their Lord. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 And there thou saw'st Boniface? Why comes 
 He not himself? What holds him? 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 Thou shalt hear. 
 In secret I administered to them 
 Who for their faith in Christ were seized by 
 
 Caesar; 
 For I was sent for this, and was not free 
 180 
 
AGLAE 
 
 To court the blessedness of martyrdom, 
 
 But serve the others in their need. Each day 
 
 I stood unknown, save unto them, beside 
 
 The bloody strand and saw them die for Christ 
 
 Passing unto His glory crowned saints! 
 
 One day when all the arena smoked with blood, 
 
 And many were the witnesses to Christ, 
 
 A glorious holocaust, I saw beside 
 
 The Praetor's throne, a man who watched the 
 
 scene 
 With eager eye. He paled and flushed and 
 
 trembled 
 When scourge bit bloodily or limb was wrenched 
 Upon the creaking rack or greedy fire 
 Devoured the tender flesh. But most of all 
 Upon his countenance sat wonder throned 
 To see the smiling fortitude of those 
 That thus so valiantly attested Christ; 
 For these, as feasters ever welcoming 
 The daintier bits to whet their appetites 
 For more, with constant joy embraced the pain 
 That ever brought them nearer unto Christ 
 In suffering. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 So have I heard they die 
 Whose god is Christ. But what of Boniface? 
 Why comes he not as thou hast come? 
 181 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 Be not 
 Impatient, Daughter; thou shalt know; for so 
 He bade me speak as preface to his coming. 
 That day a maiden stood before the Praetor, 
 A tender child, a virgin in her bud, 
 Slender and frail, lustrous with innocence. 
 That she served Christ her only crime, but that 
 Enough. Her angered judge, that one so young 
 And simple yielded nothing to his frown 
 And braved the utmost vengeance of his threats, 
 Ordered her stripped before the vulgar throng, 
 That shame of its bold gaze might strike its 
 
 terror 
 Unto her virgin heart and bend her to his will. 
 Forthwith the rude, impetuous, ribald hands 
 Of jesting soldiers rent her garments from her. 
 And as they stripped her of her raiment, lo! 
 As ^twere by unseen hands unloosed 
 Her coiled abundant locks shd down about her 
 Pouring their sheltering lustre to her feet; 
 Nor any eye in all that gaping crowd 
 Raped e'en a glimpse of her fair innocence. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Did not that melt the astonished Praetor's heart? 
 
 182 
 
AGLAE 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 Nay, flint struck harder, flashes angrier. 
 Enraged at thwarting of his vile intent, 
 He ordered them to brand her slender breasts 
 With irons thrice heated in the bellowsed flame, 
 But when the glowing metal white-hot touched 
 The whiter coolness of her virgin flesh 
 It paled to greyness, nor so much as seared 
 The tender skin. Whereat the Praetor wroth 
 To flercer madness, and now a panting beast 
 With jaws outstretched, balked of his prey. 
 Shrieked out to place her on the dreadful wheel 
 And tear her limb from limb. And so they seized 
 And stretched her fragile frame, hand bound ad- 
 verse 
 To hand and foot to foot, her innocence 
 Still clothed in the bright wonder of her locks, 
 Upon the ponderous machine; but at 
 The lever's turn it cracked like brittle glass. 
 And she unbruised, unscathed, rose up and cried, 
 ''Seek not my Hfe save by the sword, for so 
 My Lord and Spouse, who is in Heaven, ordains." 
 And kneeling bent and bowed her slender neck; 
 Whereat a soldier lifted up his sword 
 And smote, and so she yielded up her soul 
 And passed a glorious witness to her Lord! 
 183 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 tender child! O sweetest innocence! 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 At this the stranger by the Praetor's throne 
 Leaped forward, lifting up his hands to Heaven, 
 And cried, "O Christ accept me! I believe! 
 
 1 am a Christian; Christ alone is God!" 
 Then scourge and fire they pitilessly plied 
 To shake his constancy that stood unshaken 
 Against the fearful torture, till the day 
 Sank wearied into night more merciful. 
 
 And that same night through one a Christian 
 
 guard. 
 Admitted to the prison secretly 
 I ministered the holy rites to him. 
 The second day therefrom, they brought him forth 
 Again before the Praetor, but he stood 
 Rooted in fortitude against the storms 
 Of their balked wrath. The fire that ate his flesh 
 He smiled at; pain he welcomed joyously; 
 The rack that seemed to wrench his limbs asunder 
 He eagerly embraced, though thrice he swooned, 
 When broken nature's powers ebbed out exhausted ; 
 Yet smiled and welcomed that great agony 
 Again, as fife flowed back to consciousness; 
 184 
 
AGLAE 
 
 Till baffled by this Christian constancy, 
 
 The Praetor wearied out, commanded them 
 
 To slay him with the sword. Then with great joy. 
 
 That made a glory all about his face. 
 
 He bowed his head and yielded up his soul. 
 
 And passed, a glorious witness to his Lord. 
 
 The holy body of this saint I bring 
 
 From Tarsus — for so did Boniface request — 
 
 And this the Christian charm to heal thine ill. 
 
 {To those outside.) 
 
 Bring in the sacred burden. Its touch shall make 
 
 Thee whole again. 
 
 SONG 
 
 O sweet beyond all sweets to die 
 
 When summoned at His call, 
 Sweeter than Hfe to die for him 
 Who died for all. 
 {Christians enter hearing martyr^s body; place 
 hier down and retire to the rear.) 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 Come, Daughter, lift the cloth that yet conceals 
 The holy face of one who died for Christ, 
 And gazing on this blessed countenance 
 Thou shalt be healed forever! 
 
 {Aglde approaches and places her hand upon the 
 bier.) 
 
 185 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 Some strange unknown virtue steals upon my 
 senses! 
 
 Christian priest, beseech thy God for me ! 
 
 1 fear and yet rejoice! My soul is shaken! 
 I fear! I tremble! 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 Fear not, Daughter, but lift 
 The cloth with reverence. 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 {Lifting the cloth) Boniface ! 
 
 CYPRIAN 
 
 Tis thus he greets thee Aglae in the love of 
 Christ! 
 
 AGLAE 
 
 {Falling on her knees.) 
 
 O Christ, accept me! I believe! 
 
 186 
 
THE FEAST OF THALARCHUS 
 
PERSONiE 
 
 Thalarchus, citizen of Antioch, 
 
 Simeon, the Stylite. 
 
 Thais, an hetcera. 
 
 Xenares, slave of Thalarchus. 
 
 Antiphon, 
 
 Critias, 
 
 Charmides, 
 
 Glauco, 
 
 Hermogenes, . 
 
 guests at the Feast, 
 
 Demons, Fauns, Dryads, Naiads, Silenus, Pan, 
 Bacchus and Bacchanals. 
 
 Place, Antioch. Time, first half of fifth century. 
 
THE FEAST OF THALARCHUS 
 
 Enter Thalarchus and Xenares. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Is all prepared, Xenares? 
 
 XENARES 
 
 Ay, my lord. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 The guests all summoned? 
 
 XENARES 
 
 As thou didst bid, 'tis done. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 And Thais, too? 
 
 XENARES 
 
 My lord, she waits thee now. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Now Antioch shall boast a feast to make 
 The gorgeous riot of Nero's groaning board 
 A peasant's fare in meanness. Ay, the gods 
 Themselves, if ancient legends speak the truth, 
 189 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Shall look with jealous eye from their high seats 
 Upon its splendid prodigality. 
 For I have summoned earth and sea and air 
 To yield me of their choicest; wines than gold 
 More precious, tanged with a hundred fiery suns 
 To make the blood run wanton in the veins; 
 The rarest fish that winnow in the deep 
 To edge with novel savour palates staled 
 With years of feasting; daintiest meats unknown 
 In this our Antioch before, to spur 
 The jaded appetites of ancient revellers; 
 Succulent dishes dressed by so rare art 
 That sated gluttons shall hunger at the sight; 
 Such subtle witcheries for eye and ear 
 That they shall swoon with giddy surfeit; 
 Beauty so prodigal of all her charms 
 That Venus would stale upon the general eye; 
 Music to ravish the amazed sense 
 With sweeter melodies than Orpheus blew 
 In Pluto's ear to charm his wife from hell; 
 Ay, such a feast as eats a fortune up 
 At one swift mouthful, as death mortaUty! 
 Tis 'gainst stale Fortune's self I throw the die 
 And scorn her, having basked within her smile 
 To dull satiety; and, scorning, court 
 The oft-reputed thunders of her frown 
 In sheer despite of her long blandishments. 
 190 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 Let go what will, let come what may, I fling 
 
 Defiance in her face! Let houses, lands 
 
 And slaves and ships, the substance of my all, 
 
 Be swallowed in this prodigaHty, 
 
 As thunderous earthquake and the roaring wave 
 
 Engulf a prideful city by the sea, 
 
 That leaves no stone to mark its ancient place. 
 
 XENARES 
 
 My lord, the hour approaches for the feast. 
 Wilt robe? 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Yea, put on the festal garb, 
 The one I purchased from the Damascene, 
 The rarest tissue of the patient loom. 
 Spun from the purest wool in all the East, 
 White as the imearthed snow and delicate 
 As petals of the rose! How soft and Ught! 
 Meet for the Hmbs of the Olympian gods 
 When they recline at their ambrosial feasts! 
 How elegant in its simplicity! 
 Unblemished by the taint of broidery, 
 Yet richer by the pureness of its woof 
 Than were it gilded inches deep in gold 
 And seamed with all the pearls of gorgeous Ind. 
 Xenares, bring the Memphian jewel, too, — 
 'Twill fit with this most rich simplicity, — 
 191 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 A single stone white with Promethean flame 
 Gathered within the bosom of the earth 
 When first 'twas stolen from heaven, and angry- 
 Jove 
 Ravened the firmament with sulphurous bolts 
 Against the callous thief. Hear how I talk, 
 Xenares, babbling a fable of the gods, 
 The gruesome memory of an ancient lie 
 Spun in the nurseries of the world, when men 
 As yet were children. So my humour trips — 
 The gem! Hand it me. Zeus, how it burns! 
 White as the sun's white core, yet cold as death! 
 It was — the Jew I bought it of so said, 
 The lying trafficker — a sacred stone. 
 That once on mother Isis' holy breast 
 Burned 'neath the veil, when men yet worshipt 
 And bowed with bated breath before her shrine. 
 A pretty fable this of mother earth ; 
 The gem within her bosom 'neath the veil 
 The easy symbol of the unquarried stone 
 Within the darkness of the uncaverned soil. 
 Ere men, awakened to the lust of things, 
 Had bared her treasures to the eyes of greed. 
 Fables, fables, to hide the shamefaced truth 
 And gloze the ugliness of our own deeds. 
 Lest we grow frightened at our naked selves! 
 How prone to invent and hold ourselves excused, 
 192 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 And out of all our baser part erect 
 
 Divinities! I've had my day of faith, 
 
 And hold but wraiths of wasted dreams. I've run 
 
 The gamut up and down and down again, 
 
 To find but jangling discords at the close. 
 
 Wealth has been mine, and its sure offshoot, power, 
 
 To make men pliant to my sovereign will 
 
 And servants of my every nod. A man, 
 
 I've sated every appetite; a god, 
 
 I've bent my little world to every whim; 
 
 Yet bankrupt of all joy I end at last. 
 
 Life staled and shattered Uke a rotted gourd. 
 
 Out on it all! I'll woo me beggary now. 
 
 And from her withered womb beget the babe. 
 
 Content, to suckle at her barren breasts 
 
 And fatten on their emptiness. 
 
 'Tis said that Httle want is slender care, 
 
 And lentils feast a witless appetite. 
 
 XENARES 
 
 My lord, the guests are all arrived and wait 
 Upon thy coming. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Well, I come. Place thou 
 The chaplet on my brow, that I go crowned, 
 The sovereign of a feast beyond all dreams. 
 Ye blushes of our common clay, how wonderful! 
 193 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Ye queenly flowers, the garden's royal flame, 
 That burn like us a single hour and fade 
 To lightest ashes blown by death about 
 The careless earth, — how sweet and beautiful! 
 Ah me, how pitiful the thing called Hfe, 
 This tide of freshness quenched in salty death, 
 Whose famine ever grows the more it feeds, 
 As the waste sea upon the pleasant streams! 
 Since to that bitter end do all things flow, 
 Though ne'er so strong and beautiful. But come, 
 Let's to the feast, and in full cups deeper 
 Than memory drown this bleak philosophy. 
 
 {Exeunt Thalarchus and Xenares.) 
 Hall of feast, guests reclining, music and song as 
 Thalarchus enters. 
 
 To the feast, to the feast we come; 
 For life is now in its bloom; 
 
 Full flows the tide 
 
 As onward we glide, 
 
 Forgetful of doom. 
 
 Like petals that fall from their flowers, 
 Time scatters his rose-laden hours. 
 
 Ah, only too brief 
 
 Is the blush of the leaf 
 
 In morning's white bowers! 
 194 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 Then gather the sweets of the day; 
 To-morrow they'll have faded away; 
 
 Seize the swift bloom, 
 
 Ere the blight of the tomb, 
 
 And live while we may. 
 
 Dread are the Fates to the fearful, 
 Heavy is grief to the tearful; 
 
 But sorrow and death 
 
 And the grave's fell breath 
 
 Are mocked by the cheerful. 
 
 Ripe is the grape on the vine. 
 Ruddy the blush of the wine; 
 
 The ivy-crowned god 
 
 Shall rule with his nod 
 
 The revels divine. 
 
 Let care at the portal await. 
 An exile outside of the gate: 
 
 Bacchus alone 
 
 Shall sit on the throne. 
 
 With Venus as mate. 
 
 What heed for time and its flowing, 
 What care for hfe and its going! 
 195 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Unreef the white sail 
 To catch the full gale 
 Of love's winds a-blowing! 
 
 The goblet upfill to the brim, 
 With joy aglow to the rim: 
 
 To Venus our love 
 
 With a snow-white dove, 
 
 To Bacchus a hymn. 
 
 As gods on their thrones elate, 
 We reck not the threads of fate; 
 
 Time is our slave. 
 
 And death and the grave 
 
 But shadows that wait. 
 
 Snatch then the moment that goes 
 Blown full with life's crimson rose; 
 
 To-morrow's dim morn 
 
 Will find but the thorn 
 
 And thee — who knows? 
 
 CRITIAS 
 
 Methinks there is a discord in the song: 
 'Tis scarcely meet to dwell on death when life 
 Is at its full. And, when we feast, 'tis well 
 To think on nothing but the feasting. 
 196 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 CHARMIDES 
 
 True, 
 
 Friend Critias. 'Tis an unsavoury sauce 
 Wherewith to season mirth; I hke it not. 
 To be reminded death is at the door 
 Cripples an eager appetite. 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 Not so; 
 Ye be but poor philosophers. 'Tis this 
 That gives the zest to life, to know it ends. 
 The moiety of pleasure is pursuit. 
 The other half the cHmax of its taste 
 Subsiding in delicious ecstasy 
 Of pain. The sweet expectancy that fed 
 Your hope before this feast is half of it; 
 The other half in consummation now, 
 To end in swift satiety. But were 
 The Fates to fix your feasting here forever, 
 The wine that tingles at your lips were poison, 
 The viands that sweetly savour to the palate 
 Would grow polluted as a Harpies' feast. 
 And ye wane thinner than Tartarian shades 
 Consumed by the eternal misery 
 Of sheer monotony. No, friends, be wise; 
 Treasure the hour because it speeds; hold fast 
 The blossom because it fades; for therein lies 
 197 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 The essence of our joy, whose little power 
 
 Grasps but the moment of vicissitude, 
 
 And in the last and greatest change, 
 
 That we call death, sums all of life, and makes 
 
 It bearable. 
 
 CRITIAS 
 
 By Bacchus, Antiphon, 
 Thou reasonest well; I'll drink the deeper for't. 
 
 CHARMIDES 
 
 No, no, he argues ill : better to feast 
 Forever here, recking nor change nor death. 
 Nor that vast emptiness where Hades yawns 
 For unsubstantial shades, than sour the wine 
 By thinking on the lees that lie at bottom. 
 Think you the rose is sweeter because it fades? 
 Nay, rather were its sweetness sweeter still 
 If it but bloomed in immortahty; 
 Think you that beauty's beautiful because 
 It wrinkles into ugliness with age? 
 Is Thais' alabaster throat whiter 
 Than enskyed snow because the tawny years 
 Will yellow it? Her hps aflame with love 
 Because the envious hours will pluck their blos- 
 soms 
 And leave them pale and withered? Nay, Anti- 
 phon, 
 
 198 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 Beauty's her own essential loveliness, 
 
 And our delight because she is herself, 
 
 Nor borrows aught from time's revengeful waste. 
 
 Give me the ripened rose because it blooms, 
 
 The hour because 'tis filled with present sweets, 
 
 And Thais' lips redder than any rose. 
 
 Sweeter and dearer than Olympian bliss, 
 
 Because their luscious pastures are abloom 
 
 With living loves ripe now for gathering, 
 
 And all sufiicient in themselves to make 
 
 This single hour eternal. Ay, I'd cram 
 
 All future into one capacious now, 
 
 And this full instant, blown radiant as the sun 
 
 With joy, fashion to immortality! 
 
 CRITIAS 
 
 Well said, Charmides: come, we'll drink to it! 
 Thy argument would set all Antioch dry! 
 Ay, were the circumambient seas all wine. 
 We'd drain them clean, and make old Neptune 
 
 ride 
 On land. Come, Ganymede, fill up again! 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 Thou'rt over-young: thy tongue outruns thy wit. 
 
 CRITIAS 
 
 Thou'rt over-old: thy wit has lost its sap. 
 199 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 And thine still in the green. Be wise and learn 
 Of age, which yoked with long experience 
 Has travelled life's close orbit o'er and o'er: 
 First, childhood's giddy cycle swings its course, 
 When all existence is the moment's toy. 
 And, stayed within its sinuous channel, time 
 Goes eddying round and round with bubbling 
 
 wave. 
 The hours perennial vessels of delight 
 Gushing with joy; then youth with passionate 
 
 feet 
 Pursuing pleasure to the close, draining 
 The chalice dry, and reaping aftermaths 
 Of pain in flagging nature's ravished powers; 
 Youth spent, mid-age awakening from the 
 
 dream, 
 Plucking experience from the thorny vine 
 Of sorrow, and temperately husbanding 
 Its joys by holding passion in the leash; 
 Lastly, old age, cautious as creeping snails 
 Feeling the way, on wisdom's slow staff leans, 
 With prudence for its guide, and treads the 
 
 path 
 Of pleasure moderately, knowing the pain 
 Of haste and ruin of excess. 
 200 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 CHAKMIDES 
 
 Thy blood 
 Is thin, and wrinkled as the cheek of eld 
 Is thy philosophy, O Antiphon. 
 Thou preachest for thyself, whose narrow stream 
 Is running dry in parched and barren sands! 
 Go spout thy platitudes at funerals, 
 And in the corpse's stony ear discourse 
 Upon the vanities of Kfe. Our blood 
 Is red with lustihood, our years fuller 
 Than Amalthea's horn: we drink, we feast, 
 We die not! 
 
 CRITIAS 
 
 Come, sweet Ganymede, fill up 
 Again! I'm father Bacchus' own to-night, 
 Immortal as the gods! Fill up, I say. 
 And drown these musty arguments in wine. 
 Here's to thee, ancient Antiphon! Come, drink! 
 Warm thine old blood with bacchanahan fires; 
 Ruby the ashes of thy beard with wine. 
 And dream thou'rt young again. I'll wager now 
 Thou'st not been drunk these thirty years ! 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 Fie, boy! 
 Thou'lt feel the Furies' lash to-morrow morn. 
 201 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Thalarchus, I appeal to thee — holds not 
 My argument in reason? 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Sweet friends, 
 Let's not dispute about the festal board, 
 But all here move to music and to joy 
 Concordant as the chiming heavens sing 
 In loves harmonious. Upon the arch 
 Of time enthroned we sit as gods to-night! 
 Let not to-morrow stare with stony face 
 Upon our festival. Olympians all, 
 We'll make the old Olympian fable true; 
 Pleasure and beauty by our side, whilst Love, 
 Divinest minister, with rosy fingers 
 Enweaves his flowery chains to hold us all 
 The bonded servants of his amorous nod. 
 Thais, O lovelier than Aphrodite's self 
 Rising resplendent from the shimmering waves 
 Kissing her feet and worshipping, sing thou 
 Of love, who art his sovereign mistress now. 
 Here, boy, the chaplet and the cithara. 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 How Bacchus blossoms wanton from his lips! 
 
 202 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 CRITIAS 
 
 Sweet Hebe, sit thee with me while she sings, 
 Thy Hp and mine upon the crater's rim. 
 While Venus and the god meet in the cup. 
 Hercle! thou art as lovely as Thais there, 
 Though Aphrodite envy her! Hebe 
 And Ganymede art thou in one, sweeter 
 Than Hybla's honey — 
 
 CHARMIDES 
 
 Cease, Thais begins. 
 
 THAIS (singing) 
 
 Swifter than fire 
 Is love's desire. 
 
 Sweeter than wine; 
 Stronger than hate. 
 Closer than fate 
 
 Its tendrils entwine. 
 
 Zeus' grim power 
 Stays not its soft hour, 
 
 Its sweet, sharp pain; 
 In Danae's tower 
 Falls the hot shower 
 
 Of golden rain. 
 203 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Love is a rose 
 
 That flame-like blows 
 
 In passion's breast; 
 Pluck it and hold it, 
 Softly enfold it 
 
 In love's own nest. 
 
 Thy lips are red 
 
 As the poppy's head, 
 
 Thy breath as wine; 
 Tender thine eyes 
 As midnight skies 
 
 With stars that shine. 
 
 Take me and hold me, 
 Softly enfold me, 
 
 My lips to thine, 
 As love with desire. 
 Passion with fire, 
 
 And vine with vine. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Thais, thy beauty ravishes the eye, 
 Thy song the ear. Captive thou tak'st the heart, 
 And lead'st the soul in gilded chains to love! 
 Venus were beggared of the golden prize. 
 Were Paris here to-night. 
 204 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 THAIS 
 
 And lov'st thou me, 
 Thalarchus? 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Yea, as Bacchus wine. Mars war, 
 As Jove his power, and Venus lovers! 
 
 THAIS 
 
 Ah! 
 Thou lovest as I would be loved. Pledge me 
 As Antony his Cleopatra, 
 Staking imperial Rome; and I will phght 
 As Cleopatra pledged her Antony, 
 Throwing the priceless pearl within the cup. 
 Till its dissolved beauty made the wine 
 Precious as Egypt's kingdom. See! • I fling 
 This pearl, though not so fair as Cleopatra's, — 
 Oh, would 'twere fairer by a kingdom's worth ! — 
 Into the ruby flood, and pledge our loves 
 In its quintuple wealth; though this be poor 
 Indeed beside the largess of our hearts. 
 As beggars' mites compared to Croesus' gold. 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 The very pearl himself once gave her! 
 
 205 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Fairest, touch but the wine with thy rose lips, 
 
 And it grows nectar fitter for gods than men. 
 
 Richer than all that Cleopatra ruled 
 
 Or Antony e'er flung away. I'll pledge, 
 
 Not in the fragile beauty of a pearl, — 
 
 Whose lustre, like the rainbow, melts away, 
 
 With heaven's cloudy tears, before the sun, — 
 
 But, worthier still, in the eternal fires 
 
 Of this most royal gem, that gleamed and glowed 
 
 Of yore on Mother Isis' fecund breast, 
 
 And now from thine drawing a rosier warmth, 
 
 Shall shed diviner radiance. Thais, to thee. 
 
 Empress of love, fair sovereign of our hearts! 
 
 Wear thou the stone, and in thy beauty 'twill 
 
 shine 
 More beautiful. I'll sing to thee of love. 
 
 CHARMIDES 
 
 The stone's a treble fortune! 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 Treble that, 
 Charmides! Why, 'twould buy half Antioch! 
 How she did wheedle him! His juggled wits 
 Are Uke the pearl disported in the wine. 
 206 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 Occasion ripe, she played her venture well, 
 And staked a costly hazard on the die, 
 To win most preciously. When gain's the game, 
 Bacchus is never match for Venus. 
 
 THALARCHUS (singmg) 
 
 What made the gods more fair than love? 
 What wrought the gods more rare than love? 
 
 What compare to love? 
 
 Tell me, ye who love! 
 Naught in the sea or air, Love, 
 In earth or there above, 
 
 O Love, my Love! 
 
 Sweeter than tang of wine, Love, 
 Brighter than gems that shine, Love, 
 
 Than gold more fine, O Love, 
 
 Softer than roses. Love; 
 The gods one gift divine, Love, 
 My love with thine, my Dove, 
 
 O Love, my Love! 
 
 THAIS 
 
 Sweeter than Orpheus fluted in mid-hell. 
 Thy song, Thalarchus. See, upon my breast, 
 The roseate gleam of mother Isis' stone. 
 Thou art a royal lover. 
 
 207 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 THALAKCHUS 
 
 Who but a king 
 May fitly woo the queen of love? 
 
 CRITIAS 
 
 Hebe, 
 I'll drink with thee again; sweet Hebe — 
 Why, Venus were a hag beside thee now! 
 O Bacchus is a jolly fellow! Come, 
 We'll drink to him, a jolly tipsy god! 
 Let's sing to him, let's sing, I say! 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 Thou'lt snore 
 With him under the table, Critias, 
 Before thou'lt sing. 
 
 CRITIAS 
 
 Ay, snore with him; let's snore 
 With him; a jolly tipsy god, let's snore 
 With him, I say! Hebe, I drink to thee! 
 A jolly tipsy — 
 
 (Critias falls) 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 Under the table, swine, 
 At last. The beast in man is most of him. 
 Behold, Charmides, thy philosophy, 
 208 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 Under the table. So folly clasps excess 
 About the neck, and both together drown. 
 In moderation taste the dangerous cup, 
 And therein find delight; for reason, master, 
 Holds back the foaming steeds of sense rushing 
 Headlong and bhnd along the parlous course, 
 Keener and truer for the checking hand 
 That guides them straining at the reins. 
 
 CHARMIDES 
 
 Old owl, 
 Hoot thy pragmatics to the frosty moon; 
 Bathe with cold Dian in her icy streams. 
 And nourish thy thin blood on chiccory. 
 But we live in the lusty sxm, our hearts 
 Aglow with all the blessing of the god; 
 'Tis mother Ceres stores them in the grape. 
 And father Bacchus brews them in the wine. 
 Here's rich Falernian ripe wdth Italy's tang, 
 Encasked these many years in the cool earth. 
 Mellow with her soft days, each draught a dream 
 Of golden happiness! Fill, fill again 
 And drink ! Here's to Thalarchus and his love ! 
 We're gods to-night and flout the troublous world ! 
 
 GLAUCO 
 
 Hast tasted these delicious ortolans, 
 Hermogenes? and these flamingo tongues? 
 209 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 I would I had a hundred palates now! 
 Alas, why were we made with only one! 
 
 HERMOGENES 
 
 Thou'rt crammed as full as a cock's craw, Glauco! 
 
 GLAUCO 
 
 Oh that I had a craw to stow away 
 These ortolans! The gods, Hermogenes, 
 Were jealous when they made us, else why made 
 Our small capacities all single? 
 
 HERMOGENES 
 
 True, 
 Yet thou canst eat again. 
 
 GLAUCO 
 
 But when again 
 Wilt find such feast as this! such ortolans, 
 Such mullets, all the way from Mauritania! 
 Such lampreys, luscious with ambrosial sauce, 
 As though the gods themselves were in the 
 
 kitchen! 
 Such tender mushrooms, sweeter than — 
 
 HERMOGENES 
 
 Such wines! 
 Thou hast forgot the wines! 
 210 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 GLAUCO 
 
 No, no ! drink not 
 Hermogenes, before or when thou eat'st. 
 'Tis the first canon of the feaster's art; 
 For wine thickens the nicer taste and dulls 
 The quintessential appetite, that sense. 
 That cultured sense, whose fine discernment sifts 
 The subtler flavours of the food, but has 
 No lodgment in the gross and vulgar mouth. 
 Then after thou has eat repletedly, 
 Drink to the full, and in the vintage drown 
 Thy woe, that thou canst eat no more. 
 
 HERMOGENES 
 
 Hercle! 
 See, Glauco, Thais' beauty glows revealed ! 
 Venus Epistrophia, thou art outdone! 
 
 GLAUCO 
 
 It is an art, Hermogenes, that few 
 Attain. In eating, men are mostly beasts. 
 That nice distinction which — 
 
 {Enter Bacchanalians.) 
 
 HERMOGENES 
 
 ravishment! 
 Behold Silenus and his glittering crew! 
 Evoe! Fauns and Nymphs, Dryads and Naiads, 
 211 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 With lute and Father Pan's own mellow reed, 
 With clash of cymbal and with beat of drum, 
 With ivy wreath and verdant myrtle bough, 
 With tossing arm and heaving breast! Evoe! 
 
 GLAUCO 
 
 Here, boy! That dish of lampreys I'll essay 
 Again. And put that mullet by my side. 
 Those locusts, too, place there. As I was saying, 
 That nice discernment art alone attains 
 Is won by long — 
 
 HERMOGENES 
 
 lo! Bacche! Evoe! 
 It is the ivy-crown6d god himself, 
 With all his Bacchanals! O wondrous sight! 
 Thou guttering pageant, feasting the eager eye! 
 Thou golden dream of fantasy, I leap 
 For joy! Evoe! Bacche! lo! lo! 
 
 GLAUCO 
 
 How tinsel catches a light soul! Hi, boy! 
 Bring me those ortolans Hermogenes 
 Insultingly forgets. 
 
 HERMOGENES 
 
 How they disport 
 Themselves! glorious rout! They sing, they 
 dance, 
 
 212 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS' 
 
 They shout and leap with mirth and passion! 
 
 See! 
 The Naiads to the fountains run! The Fauns 
 Pursue and seize the yielding njmaphs! Evoe! 
 
 {First Chorus of Bacchanals) 
 
 lo! Evan! 
 Clash the cjnnbal! 
 Crash the timbrel! 
 Lash the drum! 
 We come! We come! 
 lo! Evan! 
 
 Let the pipe shrill 
 Through valley and hill! 
 lo! Evan! 
 
 Silenus and Pan, 
 In the wild van, 
 
 With riot and song, 
 
 Ten thousand strong! 
 lo! Evan! 
 
 Bacchus, inspire! 
 We breathe with thy fire! 
 lo! Evan! 
 213 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 He who would stay us 
 Remember Pentheus! 
 lo! Evan! 
 
 Clash the cymbal! 
 Crash the timbrel! 
 
 Lash the drum! 
 
 We come! We come! 
 lo! Evan! 
 
 (Second Chorus of Bacchanals) 
 
 lo! Bacche! lo! 
 Twi-mothered god, 
 With ivy-wreathed rod! 
 
 lo! Bacche! lo! 
 
 Lord of the vine, 
 Life of the wine. 
 We are thine, we are thine! 
 We run and we dance. 
 We leap and we prance, 
 The green turf on; 
 White-footed Naiad, 
 Light-footed Dryad, 
 Goat-footed Faun! 
 We turn and we twirl. 
 As leaves when they whirl, 
 As swift waters swirl 
 214 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 In the eddy's embrace; 
 We twist and we spin, 
 Wind out and wind in 
 
 In the maze of the race; 
 We crouch and we spring, 
 Our arms toss and fling; 
 We shout and we sing 
 To Bacchus, our king! 
 
 With lips wide apart. 
 
 With swift beating heart, 
 Wildly we chant. 
 Heavy we pant. 
 The breath coming scant, 
 
 As we leap and we prance. 
 
 Rush back and advance. 
 As we dance, as we dance, as we dance 
 To Bacchus, our king! 
 
 THAIS 
 
 Thalarchus, thou art pale! 
 
 CHARMIDES 
 
 Critias, awake! 
 The great god Bacchus comes ! 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 Nor fire nor death 
 Could rouse him now : his wits are drowned and 
 sodden. 
 
 215 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 A DRYAD {to Aniiphon) 
 I pluck thy beard, Tithonus. 
 
 CHARMIDES 
 
 Pluck it, fair nymph; 
 Thou'lt never melt his snows; he's iced around 
 With cold discretion twenty inches thick. 
 
 DRYAD 
 
 I'll be Aurora to his ancientness; 
 
 I'll sit upon his knee and thaw him out. 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 Nay, wanton, scorch Charmides with thy flame; 
 I'm old and seasoned now these sixty years 
 I bear the buckler of experience 
 Against thy shafts. 
 
 THAIS 
 
 Thalarchus, art thou ill? 
 Thy hand is trembling, and thou spill'st the wine. 
 
 ANTIPHON (to Dryad) 
 Away, girl! The years have made me wise. 
 
 CHARMIDES 
 
 And sourer than an unripe grape. 
 216 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 DRYAD 
 
 No, no! 
 How soft the silken silver of thy beard! 
 Thy beard is older than thy face. Bacche! 
 But thou'rt not old! Thou slanderest thyself; 
 Thy skin's as soft as youth's, thine eye as clear. 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 ThouflattVstme! 
 
 DRYAD 
 
 I do but see thee close; 
 Take off thy beard, and thou'rt as young as any. 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 Now, now! dost thou say truly! 
 
 THAIS 
 
 Speak Thalarchus! 
 Like chiselled marble thou dost stand and stare! 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Where art thou, Thais? Charmides! Antiphon! 
 Where are the lights that made our banquet blaze? 
 How dim, how chill, Hke breath from sepulchres, 
 This fetid air! 
 
 THAIS 
 
 I hold thee by the hand — 
 What spell is on him? 
 
 217 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 'Tis the wine that mounts 
 His brain, and weaves the foolish phantasy. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 A mirk mist rises floating up as o'er 
 A fen, and slowly moves and curls heavy 
 And dun, yet ghastly with a bluish Ught 
 As from a dying moon — and in it, see! 
 A shadow like a giant's! 
 
 THAIS 
 
 I see naught. 
 Save feast and feasters, a round of mirth and joy, 
 A full blown rose of pleasure. Come, shake off 
 This most unnatural and deadly humour. 
 This cankerous bhght,this sick unwholesome dread 
 That nips thy valour and thy wonted charm. 
 And be thy gracious self again! 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Hear'st not 
 The rumble of vast voices gathering far. 
 Like distant thunder in the womb of wrath! 
 
 THAIS 
 
 Naught but the songs of revel and of love. 
 The joyous halloo of Bacchus and his crew, 
 218 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 The cithern's silver cadence and the lute's, 
 Free laughter and wild dalliance-echoing mirth. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Out of the muggy mist issues a stench, 
 As from a thousand rotting carcasses. 
 God! How it sickens the revolted sense! 
 
 THAIS 
 
 Nay ! 'Tis but the odor of the rose 
 That makes the air most redolently sweet; 
 And yonder font of Araby's perfumes, 
 Plashing and sparkling in its jewelled bay, 
 Casting their precious scents upon the breeze. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 The shadow deepens! See! The cloud now 
 
 swirls 
 And parts; and, topping o'er the misty rheum, 
 A lofty pillar rears its stony crest. 
 And on it, lo! the figure of a man, 
 In supphant attitude, all bent and bowed. 
 As one crushed utterly! About him swarm 
 And crowd a thousand hideous shapes, gibing 
 And threatening ! Horrible! Oh, horrible! 
 
 DEMONS 
 
 Stinking hypocrite ! Bah ! 
 Think'st thou to atone for others? 
 219 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Thy frailty bear their sins! 
 
 Bald fool on the pillar's top! 
 
 Thou leprous scab of folly! 
 
 Ha! ha! Hell shouts with laughter! 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 My God, my God! Help thou me in the trial! 
 I faint with weakness ! 
 
 DEMONS 
 
 He faints, the cowardly wretch! 
 
 A little pain, and he falls down, 
 
 Overcome. Seize him, and rack him 
 
 From head to foot. Crush him flat 
 
 With hell's full vengeance. Shoot lightnings 
 
 Through his spine, and in his eyeballs 
 
 Spit keen fire to his brain. 
 
 He'd make amends for other's sins, 
 
 Would he? and bear the penalty, — 
 
 This lump of foulness, this filthy clay, 
 
 This idiot on the pillar's top. 
 
 Unshorn, unkempt, unwashed, 
 
 Imputing sanctity to dirt! 
 
 Drivelling fanatic ! Hoary fool! 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 Upon thy merits. Lord, alone I lean : 
 I have no strength but thine. Thou didst endure, 
 220 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 Within the garden's keep, the agony 
 
 Of sin's embrace, and felt its fetid breath 
 
 Upon the mirror of thy purity; 
 
 And all the reeking tide of evil poured 
 
 Its slimy floods upon thee, stifling thee. 
 
 Till nature, pushed beyond her durance, swooned 
 
 And sweated blood through all thine aching 
 
 veins ! 
 Pour from the precious treasury of thy pain 
 Some Uttle grace to stay my impotence ! 
 Fill up my emptiness with thy vast merit; 
 For I but merit in thy merit. Lord, 
 And gain but in thy gain. 
 
 DEMONS 
 
 Craven! poltroon! He's afraid; 
 He dares not fight alone, 
 And calls for aid upon another. 
 We call upon no over-lord : 
 Our strength's our own, all undivided! 
 In independent might self-lords, 
 We bend no cringing back, 
 And hft no suppliant voice 
 Whining to the t3a'ant! 
 Upon him. Spirits of the Deep ! 
 Rend him! flay him with your teeth 
 From head to heel, till the red flesh 
 221 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Quiver and palpitate ! This 
 For the lusts of Antioch! 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 They scourged thee at thy pillar, Lord, till Thou 
 
 Didst stand in thine own blood. The knotted lash 
 
 That flaked thy flesh away — piteous sight! — 
 
 Was the red tooth of foul concupiscence; 
 
 And Thou didst stand in patience and endure, 
 
 Silent, the ravenous fang that bit and tore 
 
 Thine innocence in offering for our sins! 
 
 And from a thousand wounds thy mangled flesh 
 
 Wept bloody streams upon the guilty earth ! 
 
 By thy fierce scourging, Lord, grant me new 
 
 strength, 
 And from the vessels of thy grace fill up 
 My nothingness with power! 
 
 DEMONS 
 
 Again he seeks defence 
 
 Behind another's might. 
 
 The skulker! White-Uvered dotard! 
 
 Dastard, we spit on thee! 
 
 Hast thou not set thyself up 
 
 On this high pillar's top, 
 
 A shining mark of sanctity 
 
 For all the country round, 
 
 A protest and rebuke 
 
 222 
 
The FEAST oj THALARCHUS 
 
 To lustful Antioch! 
 And for its sins acceptest 
 The rigorous penalties; 
 Endurest wind and rain 
 And storm and cold and heat 
 For its soft luxuries; 
 Sufferest the filth and dirt 
 Of thy scab-crusted body, 
 Fouling these long and tedious years, 
 For its nice daintiness, 
 Its sensual cleanhness; 
 Bearest hunger and thirst 
 For its vile gluttonies, 
 Silence and soHtude 
 For its wild blasphemies 
 And lascivious hours; 
 The narrow prison of the pillar 
 For its licentiousness! 
 And thou'rt a saint, forsooth, 
 And workest miracles. 
 And hearest the people call thee saint, 
 And pray to thee for help 
 At thy tall pillar's base! 
 A sorry saint, indeed, 
 Who darest not own thy shadow, 
 Nor comest forth to meet a foe 
 Out of thine own valiance, 
 223 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 But, supplicating, whinest 
 A mongrel prayer to Heaven, 
 Timid and trembling! Bah! 
 Psalm-droner ! Prayer-monger! 
 Thou a saint! Ha! ha! 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 O Lord, upon thy handiwork look down 
 
 With love's forbearing eye; for I am naught 
 
 Within the searching splendour of thy sight, 
 
 Whose vision equals to thyself alone. 
 
 One Lord omnipotent and infinite. 
 
 Maker of heaven and earth through thy sole 
 
 Word! 
 Within my mother^s womb thou madest me. 
 And out of the abyss of nothingness 
 Didst give me being through very love! — O 
 
 Lord, 
 My God, let me not fail to love again! — 
 And nourished me and cherished me, a babe, 
 Who knew thee not, in helpless infancy. 
 And guided me through all the wayward years 
 Of youth, and led me wandering in the paths 
 Of sin back to the bosom of thy mercy! 
 Let me not fail, my God, nor deem myself 
 Before thee aught but thy poor creature, dust 
 And ashes in thy hand! 
 
 224 
 
The FEAST oj THALARCHUS 
 
 DEMONS 
 
 Grovellor! Abject worm, 
 In vile abasement crawling! 
 Cracked vessel of dishonour! 
 Upon him, Spirits! Befoul him 
 With utmost stench and filth! 
 Traitor to his manhood! 
 Betrayer of his sovereign will! 
 Thou mimic of a saint! 
 Thou manikin! Despiser 
 Of the sacred precious gift 
 Of freedom, kept by us alone 
 Intact against the tyrant! 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 Lord, Thou dost solicit me with love. 
 And gently knockest at my heart, calling 
 Upon me sweetly! And I may close the door 
 Against Thee, Lord, and answer not; for Thou, 
 Lord, respectest in thy handiwork 
 The gift of freedom, which Thou didst bestow 
 Upon Thy creature, who but holds as he 
 Receives from Thee. And when, O Lord, I bid 
 Thee come, moved by thy blandishment. Thou 
 
 com'st * 
 In the swift whirlwind of thy love, and snatch'st 
 225 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Me up in ecstasy, and hold's! me ravished 
 With love ! For I am thine, Lord, by right 
 Of sovereignty; and Thou art mine by might 
 Of love! Thou gavest me myself, O Lord, 
 And hold'st me in the hollow of Thy hand, 
 Suspended o'er the void of nothingness; 
 And then Thou gavest me thyself, Lord, 
 Pouring thy goodness upon me like a flood 
 Of pleasant waters on a barren plain! 
 And Thou hast bought me with a price, O Lord 
 And, in the covenant of Christ made flesh, 
 Hast pledged thyself to me, and feedest me 
 Upon thyself, till I abide in Thee, 
 And Thou in me; whereof in Thee I find 
 The fulness of all love, the round and sum 
 Of all desire! for in Thee, Lord, I am 
 And have my hfe, and move, O Lord, in Thee, 
 Who art our perfect good and perfect love, 
 First impulse and last term of liberty. 
 For I, O Lord, am as a Uttle child, 
 And Thou the eager mother of the child. 
 Who first instils in him desire to walk, 
 And leads him by the hand that he may walk, 
 Then kisses him, rewarding him, because 
 He walked, who neither had desire to walk, 
 Save through the inspiration of her love, 
 Nor yet had walked save by her guiding hand, 
 226 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 And still withal of his own motion walked; 
 
 For thine the grace, Lord, that moves, and 
 
 thine 
 The grace that aids, and thine the guerdoning 
 
 grace. 
 That crowns thy creature's free response, who 
 
 moves 
 To Thee by love divine solicited. 
 And rests in Thee by love divine rewarded. 
 
 DEMONS 
 
 Caviller ! Word-monger ! 
 Hoary sophist fouUng 
 
 Man's Umpid intelUgence with murky phrases; 
 Clouding the crystal brightness 
 Of independent reason 
 With muddy mysteries! 
 We'll teach thee proper pride 
 For the high dignity 
 Of outraged intellect 
 Betrayed and surrendered 
 By thee in shameless fear. 
 To be tramped mockingly 
 Under the Tyrant's feet! 
 Lift him in mid-air 
 By the heels and dash him down 
 Upon the rocks beneath, 
 227 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Smashing his foolish skull, 
 Scattering the muddled brains, 
 That shame the high prerogative 
 And abase the lofty puissance 
 Of man's lordly mind — 
 Rush upon him! Sweep him off! 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 My God, my God, let not the malignant host 
 Prevail! 
 
 THAIS 
 
 Of whom, Thalarchus, speakest thou? 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 There is some maggot in his overwrought brain, 
 That feeds upon his reason; let be, let be, 
 He'll mend by morning. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Like a surcharged cloud, 
 Green with the sulphurous wrath of pent hght- 
 
 nings, 
 They gather round him, ominous, muttering! 
 And now with sudden fury unleash upon him! 
 O God ! — See, they touch him not ! but break 
 Against the pillar's edge as the giant sea 
 Flinging against a beetling cliff is stayed 
 228 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 Roaring, and beaten back draws to the deep 
 Again, foaming in angry impotence! 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 Thy brows were crowned with thorns, my God, 
 
 piercing 
 Thy temples with their spikes, and all around 
 Thy head circled the barren coronal 
 Pressed by the ribald soldiers' cruel staves 
 Into the bruised flesh. This mock, Lord, 
 Thou didst endure in silent humbleness. 
 And wore this leafless diadem of pride 
 For sins of those, who insolently boast 
 The shallow plummet of their little minds 
 Sounding the muddy waters of time's sea. 
 Above the immeasurable, sacrosanct 
 Eternal Reason of their God filHng 
 The crystal oceans of the infinite. 
 Hear me, O Lord, and let thy strength be 
 
 mine! 
 Lift thou me up to thy humility, 
 Who only knows to conquer through thy pain! 
 And in the bloody wine spilled from the vine, 
 Whose bitter thorns envised thy tender brows, 
 Sustain my weakness, and thy pardon pour 
 Upon the pride of boastful Antioch ! 
 
 229 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 His prayer prevails ! Their horrid ranks repulsed, 
 Staggered and broken, scatter like thinning rack 
 Before the first keen breath of crystal winds 
 Clearing the labouring heavens. 
 
 DEMONS (retiring) 
 Not through thy might, Simeon, 
 Is our due vengeance stayed: 
 Another's power holds us, 
 Tyrannously thrusts us back. 
 Our valour undismayed 
 Yields only for the moment. 
 We'll come again new armed, 
 And crush thee flat against 
 The earth, and stamp thee down 
 Into the mire, like dung! 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 Now praise to Thee, O Lord, my God, all praise! 
 For thine the power and thine the glory. Lord, 
 Who sittest on the Cherubim, the earth 
 Thy lowly footstool and the heavens thy throne! 
 Before thy servant Thou didst hold thy shield 
 Against the demons' power, and Hell prevailed 
 
 not! 
 For who shall stand against thy might, Lord? 
 230 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 Before thy wrath the heavens are shrivelled, 
 The earth is smoke, and all the goods thereof; 
 The sun goes out in darkness, and the stars 
 Flicker and die; time like a spent breath 
 Evanishes, and space through all its utmost 
 
 bounds 
 Shrinks shuddering! Nor earth, nor heaven, nor 
 
 hell 
 May stand before thee. Lord, eterne and sole, 
 Coequal with thyself alone in being. 
 In power, in love and goodness infinite, 
 Perfect and absolute and all-sufficient 
 Within thyself who art eternal good ! 
 But thou, O Lord, wilt not destroy thy works: 
 Thou lov'st the goodly order of thy hand, 
 And out of the disorder of our sins 
 Hast drawn still sweeter harmonies of love 
 Through him thine only Son, consubstant God 
 With Thee, who stooping to our lowliness 
 Lifted our nature to thy hohness, 
 And spanned the chasm in nature and in grace, 
 Which sin had breached through all our universe; 
 And, bearing all the burden of our fault, 
 Made gracious heaUng in vicarious pain, 
 Consummate in the awful sacrifice 
 Upon Golgotha's trembhng mount, when all 
 The elements made moan, and stricken Nature, 
 231 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Sighing through all her ways, in darkness veiled 
 Her conscious eyes! Through Him, Lord, the 
 
 power, 
 By Him the victory, and unto Him 
 The glory! I but a shaken reed fearful 
 Before the blast, broken, save for thy hand 
 Sheltering thy creature's weakness in the storm. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Oh, how subhme his words, how great the power 
 Thereof, scattering the heUish crew Hke dust 
 In the whirlwind, beating their malice down 
 As the keen hail levels the boastful pride 
 Of summer fields! O mystery of pain 
 And death, that issuest in power and life, 
 Grant me to see ! Upon my purblind heart 
 Pour down thy deep irradiance, and pierce 
 The fetid exhalations of my sins. 
 That bhnd the soul's uncleansed and rheumy eye! 
 Inflame me with desire, and purge me clean 
 In penitential fires, till I, too, learn 
 To love as Simeon, a holocaust in Christ 
 For wanton Antioch's iniquities! 
 Simeon, upon thy pillar's top pray thou 
 For me, who mocked thee and thy God, and knew 
 Thee not, nor him, and knowing not, reviled 
 And called thee fool, fanatic, dotard, dolt, 
 232 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 And heaped upon thee all the ribaldry 
 
 Of the contemptuous world, the scorn of pride, 
 
 The scoff, the jest, the easy ridicule 
 
 Of sensual hearts, whose unpurged lust feeling 
 
 The secret sting of others' holiness. 
 
 As the sharp thorn beneath the rose, resents 
 
 The silent imputation of its guilt. 
 
 And brooking not the impeachment of its shame, 
 
 With pitchy tongue envenomed in foul hates. 
 
 Spits out the bawdy mockeries of its filth 
 
 Upon the hlies of love's sanctities. 
 
 Simeon, pray for me, whose sins thou takest 
 In suffering upon the pillar's height, 
 
 Under the pitiless sun, the icy stars. 
 
 In pangs of nature and assaults of hell; 
 
 Pray thou for me, who from the depths below 
 
 Cries out in agonies of shame and calls 
 
 In Christ's dear name for mercy and for pardon! 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 1 hear a voice as of one calling out 
 
 And beating at the gates of mercy! Lord, 
 Hear him and open unto him! 
 
 THAIS 
 
 His madness now addresses? 
 233 
 
 Who is't 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 One, Simeon, 
 They call the Stylite, an idiot monk, who lives 
 Upon a pillar's top near Antioch, 
 Some twenty miles beyond the city's gates. 
 
 THAIS 
 
 I've heard the rumour of this strange disease. 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 Lord, by thy bloody sweat, have mercy. Lord! 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 Under the subtle witchery of the wine 
 
 This monkish madness has seized upon his wits, 
 
 And holds his fancy : it will pass anon. 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 By thy red scourging at the pillar, Lord, 
 Have mercy! Let his cry come unto Thee! 
 
 CHAKMIDES 
 
 Heed not Thalarchus, Thais: to-morrow's morn 
 Will see his health restored. — Come, I pledge 
 Thy beauty in this draught! 
 
 THAIS 
 
 I'll drink with thee! 
 Let Bacchus blow the fire and Venus lead! 
 234 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 Hearken unto Thy creature's cry, Lord! 
 Gird not the bowels of mercy up, but hear! 
 For Thou has said. Whoso shall knock, to him 
 Shall it be opened. By the clotted thorns 
 About thy brow, the raillery and the mock 
 Of Pilate's soldiers spitting on Thee, Lord, 
 Incline unto thy creature's lowliness, 
 Who cries to thee from out the depths, and calls 
 Unto the ear of thy compassion. Lord; 
 For Thou didst take our frailty on thyself 
 In pity of our sins. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Blessed be thou, 
 O Simeon, thrice blessed thou who pray'st 
 For me sunk in the foulness of my sins! 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 Thou wilt not, Lord, refuse a contrite heart; 
 And Thou didst pardon Mary Magdalene, 
 Who wept her sorrow on thy sacred feet, 
 And him who cried to Thee beside thy cross; 
 And Thou didst heal the lepers of their sores, 
 Till they were fair to look upon; and him 
 That lay asick of bed, thou didst unloose 
 Of all his sins and bid him rise and walk; 
 235 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 For thou didst come with healing in thy hands 
 And mercy unto life again for them 
 That would arise from out their sinfulness 
 To walk with thee. 
 
 DEMONS {in distance) 
 
 He's winning Thalarchus from us! 
 Let him not prevail! Curse him! 
 Were't not for the Despot's power, 
 Who tyrannously holds us back, 
 We'd snatch and hft his colunm 
 In mid-air, and dash it to earth 
 And smash it, and him with it, 
 Who now, on his filthy eerie 
 Of vantage, drones his prayers 
 To listening Heaven against 
 Our valour and our might! 
 We ask but a fair field 
 To smite him down and crush him! 
 This vagabond of sanctity! 
 Let him go back to his cell 
 And mumble his unctuous prayers 
 In secret to his fattened God. 
 Hate seize us and rack us 
 At mention of that name! 
 Let him not stand conspicuous 
 Upon the pillar's top before 
 236 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 The people, to seduce them 
 From their soft Hving 
 And mellowed luxuries 
 By his austere ensample 
 Of dire mortification 
 And penance vicarious! 
 'Tis against the cloister's rule: 
 Why do they tolerate it? 
 But we'll o'ercome him yet: 
 ' Hell's not easily foiled! 
 We have an arrow left 
 In our quiver to pierce him. 
 Ha! ha! we know a way 
 To snare this filthy bird, 
 And drag him from his nest. 
 Ha! ha! we'll show him yet 
 The craft of independent 
 Intellect he so derides 
 And flouts in abject obeisance 
 To the Tyrant he worships! Ha! ha! 
 We know a way to hme him! 
 We'll double on the ancient fox 
 Before he runs to earth again! 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 Let him not perish, Lord, who calls on Thee! 
 As Thou didst suffer Simon to take Thy cross 
 237 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Upon the heavy way to Calvary, 
 Though asking not, yet after bearing gladly, — 
 Suffer Thy creature now who pleads with thee, 
 To share its burden humbly. Lord, with thee, 
 And out of the vast fulness of thy love 
 Draw balm and healing for his sinful hurts. 
 On me, O Lord, the creature of thy hand, 
 Who am as nothing in thy sight, the least 
 Of those who serve Thee, of infirmities 
 Full as a sieve of meshes holding nought, — 
 On me, O Lord, the fellow of his hour, 
 His country, and his city, pour the pain 
 Of his offending, till thy justice shifts 
 Her beam and balances her scale again 
 In full amend of penance done. And this, 
 Lord, prostrate before thee in the dust 
 Of mine unworthiness, mote in the breath 
 Of thine infinitude, I humbly pray 
 Out of the preciousness of Christ's spent blood. 
 Which purchased us with ransom infinite, 
 Eternal price of Adam's and our sin! 
 
 DEMONS (approaching) 
 
 Woe! woe! we're overcome. 
 Routed by Simeon's prayer! 
 Great is his hoUness, 
 That conquereth our might, 
 
 238 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 Lords of the deep with power 
 O'er hell's dominion wide; 
 Spirits of darkness knowing 
 The potent secrets of nature, 
 Seducing the lordly race 
 Of men to open rebellion 
 Against their Maker. Woe! woe! 
 Our pride is fallen, our boast 
 Is broken, crushed down flat 
 By Simeon's might in prayer. 
 Woe to us, woe ! Keener 
 Than pangs of hell the shame 
 Of defeat by Simeon brought 
 Upon our puissant ranks 
 Broken against the rampart 
 Of his potent prayer, 
 As the dusty simoon breaks 
 Against the bulwarked mountain! 
 Woe! woe! O shameful woe! 
 Hate unto him forever! 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 Bear down upon me, Lord, bear down and plunge 
 Me in the abyss of emptiness, whence I 
 Was drawn by Thee, the creature of thy love! 
 The clamour of hell is but a noisy wind 
 Before Thee, vain as froth upon the wave. 
 239 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 The arrow of their hate they aim at Thee, 
 I but the seeming mark. For Thine, O Lord, 
 The power that scatters them; and they, O Lord, 
 As I, are but the creatures of thy breath. 
 Hardened against Thee in their pride, envious 
 Of man whom thou hast made to fill their place. 
 And I am but an empty vessel filled 
 With the omnipotence of prayer, which Thou 
 In largess of thy love hast poured in me; 
 And sufferest me to use against their power, 
 Whose damning praise is but the silken snare 
 Of flattery, with which bold Satan once 
 Essayed to take the soul of Christ himself! 
 And Christ's the glory sole against the power 
 Of hell broken by him forever! 
 
 DEMONS (on right side, disguised now as Angels of 
 
 Light) 
 Hail, Simeon, victor o'er the hellish host! 
 By Heaven sent, we come to solace thee 
 With happy tidings and assurance glad 
 Of Heaven's high approval. Thou hast fought 
 The goodly fight and won. Hail to thee, saint! 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 Now praise to Jesus Christ alone! To Him 
 The glory, whose right hand of power reaches 
 To midmost hell! 
 
 240 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 DEMONS {on left side, undisguised) 
 Why speaks he the Terrible Name, 
 That makes all hell shudder 
 Unto its deepest deeps! 
 Curse it! curse it! curse it! 
 
 DEMONS {on right side) 
 Rest thee, Simeon; for thou hast earned thy meed. 
 Behold the raging elements repressed, 
 Which hell with mahce vain against thee roused. 
 And all the air that lately shook with storm 
 And roared, rent with the crackUng thunderbolt, 
 Slumbers in mellow quiet and breathes soft balm. 
 Down from the glowing arches of the night, 
 Peace, doveUke on her rediscovered nest. 
 In feathery silence droops, and dreaming broods; 
 Tender as mothers' eyes upon their babes. 
 And pure, the ghmmering ardour of the stars 
 Falls on the shadowed earth and wearied men 
 Sunk in the bath of slumber after toil, 
 To wake upon the coming morn refreshed 
 Against the burden of the hastening day. 
 All nature sleeps and rests, drawing new hfe 
 From the deep fountains of repose; for so 
 The wisdom of the Maker foreordained. 
 Dividing night from day. Rest thee, and sleep, 
 O holy Simeon, while we watch and guard. 
 241 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 The rounded beauty of the night, thy hand, 
 
 Lord, in the beginning builded up. 
 
 And jQxed the pillars of the firmament, 
 
 And gave their motions to the wheeling stars, 
 
 Making thy glory manifest on high : 
 
 Thy word uttered above the void brought forth 
 
 The solid earth and all that hve thereon. 
 
 The circling seas and all that swim therein, 
 
 The hquid air and all that fly therein. 
 
 Each in its place and moving in its sphere 
 
 With variant note blending concordant song. 
 
 And making in the conched ear of Heaven 
 
 Vast harmony. And so the whole round world 
 
 And the respondent heavens, Lord, utter 
 
 Thy glory and make manifest thy praise! 
 
 For thine the gentle silence of the night. 
 
 And thine the softness of the balmy air, 
 
 And thine the sweet refreshment of repose 
 
 And strength renewed in man and beast and 
 
 fowl; 
 And thine the glory of the golden morn. 
 And all the splendour of the rising sun 
 Shedding the benediction of its hght 
 Upon the waking world. 
 
 242 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 DEMONS {on right side) 
 
 Nay, holy man, 
 Rest thee; and whilst thou slumberest, drawing 
 New vigour from the crystal fonts of sleep, 
 We'll raise on high the hymn of praise. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Simeon, 
 Pray thou for me, and at the feet of Christ 
 Make intercession for my grievous sins ! 
 
 DEMONS (on right side) 
 
 Thou'rt wearied, Simeon, and thy force is spent. 
 The very desert sleeps, and darkness shrouds 
 The land heavy with silence, wooing all 
 To rest. Deep is the shadow of the night. 
 And nature yields responsive to the law 
 Ordained in the beginning. Spent art thou 
 With battling 'gainst the routed hosts of hell. 
 And all thy racked and bruised frame leaden 
 With weight of toil drags down thy spirit worn 
 With unremitted prayer against thy foe. 
 Respite thy vigilance and prayerful might; 
 And to great nature's hest surrendering. 
 In due obedience to its Maker's law. 
 In slumber steep thy flagging powers, and rest. 
 243 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Simeon, Simeon, pray thou for me whose heart 
 Is withered with his sins! 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 The night hath past 
 The middle heavens two hours and more: 'tis late. 
 I go. Farewell, good friends. 
 
 CHARMIDES 
 
 Love knows no hour: 
 I stay with thee, Thais, be it night or day. 
 
 THAIS 
 
 Now is the ripened hour of revel. Stay, 
 O Antiphon, and drink with me! I touch 
 Thy goblet with my hps. Wilt not refuse 
 My pledge! 
 
 ANTIPHON 
 
 I yield the golden moment, Thais, 
 And staying court the precious, sweet delay. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Simeon, Simeon, pray thou for me whose soul 
 Lies in the darkness of its evil days! 
 244 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 Let him not perish, Lord, whose voice I hear 
 
 Out of the night in supplication raised ! 
 
 Renew his heart, and thy refreshment pour 
 
 Upon his bruised spirit crying out ! 
 
 If Thou, O Lord, wilt mark iniquities, 
 
 Lord, who shall stand? Spare us, and gather not 
 
 Our sins against the day of wrath, but hear, 
 
 O Lord, and let our prayer come unto thee! 
 
 Thy mercy. Lord is even above thy works; 
 
 And thou hast made thy mercy manifest 
 
 In Christ, who stood for our iniquities, 
 
 And took our sins away! Have mercy, Lord, 
 
 And by Christ's blood hearken unto our cry! 
 
 DEMONS {on left side) 
 
 Confusion upon him! Tempt him! 
 Let him not escape! Tempt him! 
 
 DEMONS (on right side) 
 
 Heaven commend thy vigilance, saint, 
 And we but tried thee for the Lord. The voice 
 Thou hearest crying is the voice of one 
 Who prays in Antioch, by Heaven's power 
 Permitted through the thick and heavy night 
 To see thee on the pillar's top, and, touched 
 245 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 By grace at sight of thee, cries out for pardon. 
 The ways of Heaven are merciful, nor time 
 Nor place resists the beating floods of grace 
 Poured from the copious fountains of its love : 
 E'en in the midst of riot and of sin 
 The impetuous tide of mercy snatches him, 
 And bears him to the deeps of love beyond. 
 And Heaven, to solace thee in recompense 
 Of all thou hast endured and overcome. 
 Puts back the murky curtain of the dark, 
 And suffers thee to look upon the scene: 
 Behold Thalarchus and the wanton feast, 
 Where thou hast conquered and beat back the 
 
 lords 
 Of hell! Look, Simeon, and rejoice! 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Pray, pray, 
 O Simeon; for my heart is dust, my soul 
 Ashes, and all my years but bitterness! 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 The Lord will water thee and make thee sprout; 
 For He is Lord of love. Mighty His power, 
 That overcometh death and puts down sin 
 Under his feet! How wonderful thy ways, 
 O Lord, and no man knoweth them; for who 
 Hath been thy counsellor? For of thee. Lord, 
 246 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 And by thee are all things, and in thee all, 
 Who are from the beginning sole, and are 
 Eternal term unto thyself alone! 
 Praise ye the Lord, ye heavenly creatures, praise! 
 Ye Cherubim and Seraphim and Powers 
 And all Angelic Hierarchies ranged 
 In flaming choirs, and all ye blessed hosts 
 And saints that bask within his beam eterne. 
 Ye spotless lihes of Christ's fruitful love, — 
 Praise ye the Lord through all your ringing ranks ! 
 And thou, whose virgin flesh didst bear His Son, 
 Alone of Adam's race untouched of sin. 
 Co-worker in Redemption's plan by grace 
 Of Him who had regard for thy humility, 
 And Ufted thee above all creatures else 
 In Heaven's celestial ranks or on the earth 
 Unto that dignity of motherhood 
 So sacrosanct that none save Him alone 
 May comprehend the height and depth and term 
 Of its exalted holiness, — praise ye 
 The Lord! Rejoice and be glad with me 
 Who, falling down before His Face, lift up 
 My voice and cry out in exceeding joy. 
 Seeing this marvel of the Lord's right hand! 
 For wonderful the starry heavens above, 
 The unseen fountains of the crystal sea. 
 The far foundations of the fixed earth, 
 247 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 The little things and great of all that is, 
 
 The tiny creature floating in the light, 
 
 The spaces of the yawning universe, 
 
 And time's wide tract from utmost shore to shore 
 
 Of his eternity so wonderful 
 
 And beautiful in number, weight, and measure, 
 
 Balanced within his all-sustaining hand. 
 
 And moving in the order of his power 
 
 To that ordained and harmonious end 
 
 Set in His wisdom for their perfect close, — 
 
 Praise ye the Lord for these His mighty works. 
 
 But praise ye more beyond all praise of words. 
 
 Beyond all utterance of human tongue. 
 
 Beyond the vastest reach of angel's thought, 
 
 That mystery of grace and farthest love. 
 
 Touching the sinner's hard averted will. 
 
 Subduing pride and melting all the soul 
 
 To tears, till it incHne to him again; 
 
 And spurning all its hated servitude. 
 
 Inviolate of all constraint, rises 
 
 Enfranchised from its reeking bed of sin 
 
 And freely answers to the call of Love ! 
 
 O wondrous miracle, O mystery 
 
 Of Love beyond all knowing! Praise ye 
 
 The Lord, ye hills and mountains, valleys and 
 
 plains, 
 earth and heaven, and ye shining stars, 
 248 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 Ye blessed hosts of happiness, ye Powers, 
 Ye Dominations, Angels and Archangels, 
 Till all the universe of high and low 
 Trembling, responsive with the harmony 
 In circling joy about the throne of Love, 
 Sing in the sweUing chorus of its praise, 
 Hosanna to the Lord! Hosanna! Hosanna! 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 O waters of great joy upon my soul, 
 Refreshing all my faintness! On the wings 
 Of morning am I Hf ted up ! balm 
 Of healing to my wounded spirit! Simeon, 
 Thy words are holy courage in my heart! 
 
 DEMONS {on left side) 
 
 Confusion on him! Tempt him! 
 He prays hke a mighty fountain 
 Leaping to Heaven — tempt him! 
 Ye sluggish spirits, shame 
 On your vaunted cunning, boasters! 
 Shall it be said in hell 
 That this broken and wasted fool 
 Worsted the high intelUgence 
 Of pure spirits heaven-born. 
 Though cast out by the Tjrant 
 By sheer force — shame us not! 
 249 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Make no delay! Tempt him! 
 
 And in this subtle net 
 
 Drag him from his high perch! 
 
 DEMONS {on right side) 
 
 Thy prayers have wrenched Thalarchus from the 
 
 grip 
 Of hell e'en midst the orgies of the feast! 
 Upon thy victory feed thine eager soul; 
 For Heaven vouchsafes this sweet reward. Be- 
 hold 
 The banquet's vast luxuriance scattered 
 By prodigality with wanton hands 
 Careless of use. The enamoured heavy air, 
 Pregnant with perfume of a thousand flowers, 
 Falling in flaky rain from unseen hands, 
 Melts all the soul to indolence, and soothes 
 The swooning sense; the fountains plash and 
 
 murmur 
 In dreamy rhythm on the drowsy ear, 
 Blending with throbbing music soft and low, 
 Whose gentle cadences, from fretted string 
 And oaten stop blowing its mellow sound. 
 Mingle their dulcet harmonies, steaUng 
 Into the brain and mellowing the spirit 
 To sensuous languors. See, around about 
 A thousand lamps, feeding on scented oils 
 250 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 In jewelled transparencies encaged, throw out 
 Their irised radiance, shedding warmth and light 
 Upon the gleaming marbles of the hall, 
 Teeming with mirth and revelry and love. 
 Rest thee, O Simeon, a Uttle moment here; 
 And let thy wearied eye, that naught beholds 
 Save bhnding leagues of sandy wastes stretching 
 Beneath the beating glare of desert suns. 
 Couch now an instant on the mellow scene. 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 Bleak were thy hills, O Judah, when He came, 
 My Lord and God, unsheltered from the winds, 
 Save for the lonely stable's broken thatch; 
 And for his tender limbs the manger's straw, 
 Cropped by the dumb, unconscious brutes, that 
 
 shared 
 His lowliness. Cast out by men, he found 
 Rude habitation with the beasts alone; 
 Nor light nor warmth diffused their tenderness 
 Around, nor ministrant were servile hands 
 In purple and fine linen to array 
 His innocence. He came unto his own. 
 And they received him not, and knew him not, 
 Rejected and despised of men. O Lord, 
 My God, e'en in the cradle thou didst choose 
 The way of sorrow, and, a babe, espouse 
 251 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 The bitter bride of poverty, to point 
 The way of those vv^ho love. O Holy Babe, 
 So low in thy humility that man, 
 By thine ensample, may be Ufted up, 
 Raise us from out this slough of wantoness, 
 And by the desolation of thy crib 
 Forgive us this our sin's luxurious ease! 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 O Christ, thy poverty be mine! 
 
 DEMONS {on right side) 
 The savour of rare viands rise up to whet 
 The appetite, and moist the wrinkled Up 
 Of hunger with sharp longing. 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 Thou, O Lord, 
 Didst fast within the desert forty days, 
 And Satan tempted thee! 
 
 DEMONS (on right side) 
 
 Thy throat is parched. 
 And all thy tongue aflame with thirst; for dry 
 And hot the air under the desert sun, 
 And small the share of water brought to thee 
 By thy forgetful brethren of the cells. 
 Packed in its snowy bed the crater stands. 
 And cool the wine upon the crackled Up; 
 252 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 Refreshing is the sweet, red draught charging 
 The feverish veins with ruddy life again. 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 When thou, O Lord, upon thy cross didst cry, 
 "I thirst," they gave thee vinegar and gall. 
 
 DEMONS {on right side) 
 Thou'rt ever mindful, Simeon, of thy Lord; 
 And valorous art thou in thy vigilance. 
 All heaven rejoices in thy holiness. 
 Thalarchus thou hast won by dint of prayer 
 Accepting all the burden of his sins. 
 For this high Heaven permitted the assault 
 Of hell to-night to try thy fortitude; 
 And gloriously hast thou conquered, Simeon. 
 And now let not thy charity wane cold; 
 But as the imperial sun in heaven's high arch. 
 Whose glowing eye looks down upon the earth's 
 Outstretched demesne from morn's to eve's red 
 
 marge. 
 And sheds celestial heats on all alike, 
 So let the furnace of thy saintly love 
 Beam down its radiance on all sinners here. 
 Have pity on them, Simeon, and draw from 
 
 Heaven, 
 Through the vicarious offering of thyself, 
 Pardon and mercy. Heaven will hear; for what 
 253 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 More grateful in heaven's eye, after the Lord's 
 Own sacrifice, the source and root of all. 
 Than the abandonment of utter love 
 Making atonement for another's sin? 
 For greater love than that a man lay down 
 His Ufe for other, no man hath. 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 Yea, Lord, 
 Thy life Thou didst lay down for each and all. 
 Thy love immeasurable, and as thy love 
 Thy sacrifice. And Thou wast hfted up 
 To draw all things to Thee, and, drawing, win 
 The hearts of men to sacrifice of self. 
 And lose themselves in love of Thee, to find 
 Themselves in Thee transfigured! I, O Lord, 
 Seek only Thee, and them in Thee, and Thee 
 In them, whom Thou hast bought with a great 
 
 price! 
 Thou callest them, Lord: grant them to hear! 
 And in thy mercy lift them up ! 
 
 DEMONS {on right side) 
 
 Simeon, 
 Behold Thais, the chiefest sinner here. 
 Steeped in the slumber of the wine! Pray thou 
 For her, a sinful daughter of weak Eve. 
 Let not such beauty be the prey of hell ! 
 254 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 Not Eve herself came from her Maker's hand 
 More fair. Slipped from the fillet's amorous 
 
 clasp, 
 Her locks, like silken gold from looms of light. 
 Shower down a streaming glory gleaming about 
 The whiteness of her shoulder's ivory arch. 
 As star-shafts on the billow's crested foam; 
 Her lips incarnadine, her flushed cheek — 
 
 SIMEON 
 
 They gashed thy hands and feet with nails, O 
 
 Lord, 
 And, lifting up thy heavy gibbet, plunged 
 It in its earthy socket shuddering, 
 Tearing thy tender, gaping wounds anew. 
 And racking all thy jarred and bruised frame 
 With sudden agony! Pierce me, Lord, 
 With that fierce pain, and rack this recreant 
 
 flesh. 
 The weak inheritance of Adam's sin. 
 That through thy merit I may somewise share 
 With thee the dire atonement of her sin ! 
 
 DEMONS {on left side) 
 
 He escapes ! Confusion and shame ! 
 He escapes! 
 
 255 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 DEMONS (on right side, throwing off disguise) 
 
 We are baffled! 
 The T3rrant suffers us not 
 To gain one slightest foothold 
 Within the circle of his soul! 
 
 DEMONS (on left side) 
 Upon him! Seize him! 
 Tear him! Smash his pillar! 
 
 DEMONS (on right side) 
 Unleash your pent rage hke hail! 
 Assault him and crush him! Come! 
 Let all rush on hke furious fire! 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 All hell vomits itself upon him! Lord, 
 Thy servant guard! Portentous they loom, 
 
 monstrous, 
 In size giants, in shape most horrible; 
 With eyes of fire and \vide outstretching vans 
 With flaming hghtnings veined, onward they 
 
 sweep, 
 As though to engulf the world in heUish storm! 
 But no! See, Heaven forbids! They sway! 
 
 They stop ! 
 And now as swollen clouds, pregnant with death, 
 256 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 Meeting an adverse wind, are stayed and blown 
 
 back, 
 Their dreadful host, sullen and muttering, 
 Recede before the breath of Heaven! And, lo! 
 They melt away into the empty air! 
 {Enter Xenares) 
 
 XENARES 
 
 My lord, the night is dying in the west, 
 
 And dawn appears. The guests are gone, save 
 
 those 
 Who he here drowned in wine. The air is dank 
 With poisonous humours of the heavy morn, 
 And thou art pale. Wilt go within? 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 'Tis gone! 
 Evanished! gracious vision by Heaven 
 vouchsafed ! 
 
 XENARES 
 
 What, my lord? 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 The wonder of it! 
 
 XENARES 
 
 My lord, 
 Wilt come within? 'Tis damp : thou'rt ill. 
 257 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 I am, 
 Xenares, ill and well. 
 
 XENARES 
 
 How's that, my lord? 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 111 with the past, and well with what's to come. 
 
 XENARES 
 
 My lord, I do not understand. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Last night 
 Thou saw'st me ill. 
 
 XENARES 
 
 Nay, my good lord, never 
 Did health mantle more ruddy in thy cheek, 
 Nor shine so proudly in thine eye. 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Yet was I ill; 
 Sick unto death ! Ill in the lustful riot 
 Of misspent days, those precious pearls of time, 
 Which I, with wanton and regardless hand, 
 Flung on the dung-heaps of this wasteful world; 
 But now, Xenares, well in the high hope 
 258 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 Of Simeon's prayers and mine own penitence 
 Rooted within the rich, most precious earth 
 Of Christ's vast charity. 
 
 XENARES 
 
 May't please thee, sir. 
 To go within? 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 No, Xenares — hear me : 
 Of all my goods take inventory: pay 
 What I may owe out of my fortune's wreck, 
 Reserving for thyself a moiety 
 To keep thee from the fangs of beggary. 
 What may remain, give to the poor. To-day 
 I manumit thee : thou art free. I know 
 Thy worth and honest heart, and so repose 
 My trust. I go from Antioch. 
 
 XENARES 
 
 Indeed, 
 My lord, thou'rt very ill. I pray thee — 
 
 THALARCHUS 
 
 Nay, 
 Be not thus urgent. Hence I go forever. 
 I've quitted me the burden of this world. 
 The brave apparel of its swelling pride 
 I here discard, resigning all its pomp, 
 259 
 
COLLECTED POEMS 
 
 Its purfled show, and strutting pageantry. 
 
 And I, who clothed me in its trumperies, 
 
 And waxed on all its fustianed vanities 
 
 As flaunting weeds upon the mucky earth, 
 
 These many and gross years, pitiless 
 
 Now scythe the rank and vicious growth, whose 
 
 bane 
 So long infected all the blood, and killed 
 The tender shoots of virtue in the soul. 
 Behold, Xenares, how the sober dawn. 
 In ghostly vapours creeping up the east, 
 Unmasks the glamour of the dying night, 
 And on the sodden ashes of our feast. 
 That flamed in furious riot this little while. 
 Spreads pale and gray as ghastly death 
 Upon the face of one who yields his soul. 
 So pass the sudden heats of time, the lusts 
 Of appetite, the hunger of possession. 
 Ambition's passion, love's desire, — all, 
 Yes, all that men, unrecking lower things 
 By higher lights, set heart upon below. 
 Mere bavin for the fiery tongue of change. 
 Scarce kindled ere in ashes! I've seen 
 This night, Xenares, through high Heaven's 
 
 mercy. 
 That which has shaken all my soul and torn 
 From out its ancient roots my tree of life 
 260 
 
The FEAST of THALARCHUS 
 
 To plant anew in other soil, with hope 
 
 Of fruit celestial ! For now I know, 
 
 My soul illumined by that kindly beam, 
 
 The deep philosophy of poverty, 
 
 The wealth of having naught, the precious gain 
 
 Of self-surrender, riches infinite. 
 
 Out of the nothingness of this base earth 
 
 Transmuted in th' alembic of God's love! 
 
 'Tis this I seek. Farewell: I go, 
 
 Xenares, and return no more. 
 
 XENARES 
 
 My lord, my lord! 
 
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