for ti& V Antoni M&m : LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. \\ S^MSvwC ^X^%^VX^i 3^ Shelf .JLp_ UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. &5\ A CLUSTER OF ROSES AND OTHER POEMS BY BERTHA MAY IVORY ANTONIA" ILLUSTRATED ST. LOUIS ENNIS PRESS 1895 27/9 I- o ILLUSTRATED BY SKETCHES SPECIALLY DESIGNED FOR THE VOLUME, BY CARL GUTHERZ, ANDRE BOWLES, PAUL E. HARNEY, GEORGE C. EICHBAUM, J. WILTON CUNNINGHAM, PAUL CORNOYER, HARRY CHASE, GEORGE W. CHAMBERS, EDWARD M. CAMPBELL, COPYRIGHT 1895 BY MRS. MARY IVORY. TO THAT HONORED FATHER, The earliest guide of her childish footsteps in the path of literature, whose reverenced memory was the beacon-light that led her bravely through its tangled ways, and TO HER MOTHER "The silver-crowned Queen of my heart," Incentive and inspiration of so many poems ; THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED By an oft-repeated wish Of The Author. PREFACE. IT has been said that a preface is permissible only when it acts as a key, opening to the reader the secret treasure-chamber of a book, or revealing to him the hidden spiritual and mental life of its author. If this be true, a preface to the poems of Bertha May Ivory is doubly justified. The noblest beauties of her Muse are veiled, and cloistered in her heart the pure ideals before whose shrines her life, like altar-lamp, burned itself out in holy, hidden service ! To lift the veil, to scale her heart's sealed gates, is the sad privilege of the writer. A study of song, be it just and generous, implies like study of the singer. The bird-song, heard from afar, delights the ear, but not until the bird flies into sight with beat of wing, and play of head, and throb of lustrous breast, does the perfect chord, the complete measure, the rhythmical full harmony, attune hearts to response. Of Bertha May Ivory, alas ! there lives to-day her song alone. Death's white wings fold the singer. Her violet eyes are closed in their last sleep; her clear-cut face, her lissome form, are hidden from our sight; her gentle voice is silent; yet Memory lives, and charms we see no more, still hold our hearts in bondage. Beautiful in flesh and spirit, brilliant alike in mind and manner, Bertha May Ivory, unlike the mis-called vast majority, was happily, even prophetically, named: "Bertha, beautiful and bright." Thus we knew her, thus we remember her; thus again we shall meet her in that better life which knows not death, — where "loved ones part no more." Bertha May Ivory was born — all too few years ago — at the beautiful City of St. Louis, Missouri ; an ideal cradle for a poet, since here the Past and Present meet and mingle, blending Reminiscence with Ambition, and haloing the cruder charms of progressive youth with grand and honored memories. Of illustrious ancestry, inheriting through her father, the late Hon. John C. Ivory, Anglo-Scotch blood of royal Stuart origin, and the tact, and grace of la belle France; from the maternal side both Irish wit and Spanish charm and beauty, — Bertha May Ivory, nevertheless, was a true viii PRE FA CE. American ; her patriotism a heritage from two great-grand-fathers and one great-great-grand-father, — distinguished officers in Washington's valiant army of the Revolution. The childhood of this apparently favored daughter of fortune was cradled in a beautiful and picturesque home, to which her reminiscent verse, " A Cluster of Roses," is our Sesame. In this paradise of poet-youth, The sun wore an added glory, And the stars shone as angel's eyes, And the moon was a symbol of Mary, Whose light led to Paradise." Knowing the gloom that overcast her after-years, one is tempted to linger with the poet-child in her heart's glad springtime, when Life was a beautiful meadow Starred with the flowers of youth." ****** "And peace and hope and gladness Shut out all shadows of care." The records of her childhood, perhaps because of its happiness, are few. Over the gray old rock of Life, smiles come and go like sunbeams. Tears alone, like storm-floods, make impress as they fall. Hence, we are con- strained to pass from the sunlit youth we knew not, to the shadowed girlhood we knew. Upon her cloudless pathway Death darkly swooped, snatching away both father and brother, and the dual blow was followed by sudden loss of all most intimately associated with the beloved dead. The delicate, sensitive young dreamer of dreams and seer of poet-visions, outcast from her Paradise of roses like Eve from Eden, found her tender youth set face to face with an unknown world of practical needs and human struggle : a bleak material world whose roses are few and far between, whose thorns are sharp and many. Bertha May Ivory won the rose-crown, but not till the thorns had wounded her. Yield her not only the laurels of the poet, but the bays of the victor. Hail to the heroine who bravely hid her wounds! Pride was hers in royal measure; but still more unquestionably the nobler traits — passionate in their intensity, of Love and Loyalty. Self-sacrifice was as nothing to her: self-immolation little. Against her natural yearnings for the leisure and luxury which were her birthright, the social sphere which was her heritage, and for whose triumphs she was irresistibly equipped ; against distaste of the Real, as slayer of the Ideal loved of poets, — against weariness of responsibilities overburdening her frail young shoulders; against difficulties and discouragements PRE FA CE. i v under which weaker souls must have fainted, she bravely battled, — enduring, resisting, conquering, not for her own sake, but for the sakes of those far dearer than herself. Her "Queen," the " brown-eyed, silver-haired " mother she idol- ized, and in whose honor some of her tenderest songs are sung ; the fair young sisters with whom more than one verse acquaints us, these were the beloved ones for whom she strove and triumphed. " Would, my own, that I could smother With my love, the pain you bear ! " Such was the ceaseless cry of her unselfish heart, the sateless desire, the single aim of her youthful life, whose loving and lavish filial, fraternal, friendly service was faithful unto death ! The true, the selfless, the heroic, these the gods love. Alas for us who mourn her, " Whom the gods love, die young." ****** The life-work of Bertha May Ivory — inasmuch as it is ended, even in its fair beginning — is difficult to review. The notes of a lark on the wing, the hues and tints of butterfly-wings in flight, — how, justly, may we judge these, hearing not the song to its end, — catching but a glance at beauties blended as they pass us? Bertha May Ivory's pen was like herself, impulsive, versatile, vivid, brilliant ! As a journalist, her career, even in its brevity, was phenomenal for youth and womanhood. Her ability was remarkable ; her promise such as years must have fulfilled. She was ready, reliable, ambitious and courageous. Much of her best work in this sphere was necessarily anonymous, and hence unrecog- nized by the public ; but the respect and support of a conservative press prove its true value, and over the signature of " Antonia" she wrote herself into the hearts of the people, her relinquished pen being missed and mourned by many an unknown friend. As a writer of sketch and short-story, she was successful in her comparatively few ventures in these directions, as only the young author "born not made," can be; as the appearance of her prose in the columns of leading magazines and prominent literary and social journals attests. Yet it is as a verse-writer, pure and simple, that we must study her most sympathetically, if we would put ourselves in touch with the heart of her life-work. It cannot be denied that the pathetic melancholy of the greater number of her poems is what first impresses us: — the desperate melancholy of Youth which knows no hope — of Innocence which holds Pain deathless, Regret eternal. But recalling her early lessons in bitter bereavement and misfortune, and the sacrificial life thereby entailed who can wonder if Youth's blithe waters swerved at their turnpoint from banks sunlit and flowered, into gloomier channels shadowed by cypress and rue? Riper life would have brought her consola- x PREFACE. tion ; recompense, if not oblivion. As it was, Death found in her chastened heart at least resignation, born of the Divine Faith whose spark burned in her pure young soul, till it flamed at last into the beacon-star which lit her way to heaven. The steps by which she mounted towards the light, are evident in her verses. Here is her midnight requiem : " Out, out, where cold winds sweep my colder soul, And knife-edged blasts cut keenly in my heart, Where shines no star above the sullen clouds, There shall I watch alone, our love depart.''' 1 And here her psalm at dawning : ' ' / am fearless of the future : With God's promise in my breast; OS < .o — < a> >» fcj £ fcj O (X > O r* o TJ -n bjO T3 r. >> £^ £3 c3 ■V 4-> C/) tuO >. rrt 'U o 4-J cz 7) 1_ c TJ o h o fc^O i. j "^ (-L •^ XJ c/) C3 jC -*— i