Book . A^^sT^ GopyiiglitN"_ J_52ji_ COPYRIGHT DEPOSlli FROM A FLAT HOUSE-TOP FROM A FLAT HOUSE-TOP BY CHARLOTTE HARDIN Boston The Four Seas Company 1920 Copyright, ip20, by The Four Seas Company The Four Seas Press Boston, Mass., U. S. A. ^- IC;^LI ©CU601037 ^ 9 TO My Mother The potter slaps the clay upon his wheel; his dreams are true, hut his hand has trembled; therefore we have left him hearing clumsy shapes and unlovely outlines. But come to the shop of the new alchemist; he has there the magic crucihle and the undying flame. Gather up the shards of your hroken vessels; in each one there lies a golden grain. Out of the hroken clay he will re- tain only what is fine ; the fragments will then he shards in truth, and the thread of gold contained in them will he returned to you as a hright elixir. For some there will be but a drop; for others, a goblet full. Some will gulp down their share and go off drunk with dreaming; others will carry the goblets home in their bosoms and sip them secretly in a quiet place. But there will he something for all; each life holds a grain of beauty. Bring them, then — your outworn loves, your dead passions, your long- past glimpses of peace ; the green of old meadows and the echoes of far-off music. They shall he returned to you re-born out of the crucible of the new alchemist. CONTENTS Page Wind Scents -13 Chanson Louis XIII 15 Musings of a Pre-Raphaelite Painter ... 17 A Bent Twig Springing Upward 19 The Dark Lover 20 The Singing Shell 21 The Giver of the Gift Divine 22 When I Went in Sandals 23 PippA IN THE Factory 24 Honey From Afar 26 The Fairy Woods . . 2.y Summer Loves 29 A Fragile Snatch of Passing Song .... 31 Anne of Geierstein 32 [9] CONTENTS Page The Blaze 33 I Lost the Colors of the Dawn 34 The Night Wind 35 To the Most Loved 36 Harp Music 37 A Fantasy of Dance — At the Orpheum . . 39 I Was the Smallest Fairy 41 The Honey Bee 43 The Lesser Loves 45 O Someone in the Deep, Deep Wood ... 46 The Refusal 47 The Sunbeam 50 Subterranean 51 Too Long I Sat at Spartan Boards .... 52 The Carpet 53 Passion in the Ballet — The Favorite Slave . 55 Caryatid — Rodin 57 From a Flat House-top 59 [10] FROM A FLAT HOUSE-TOP FROM A FLAT HOUSE-TOP WIND SCENTS The songs that the wind has sung, The scents that the wind has flung From flowers where they clung But yesterday — These are too sweet to linger or delay. The songs that haunt the past, The fragrances too faint to last — Will they never come Wearily, happily home To the flowers where they clung. To the heart of the wind that has sung. Forever to live in the air, Forever there? The dreams that are past and gone ! Is there not one That will ever come Wearily, happily home ? [13] Must they forever fade Into the passing shade With all the passing fragrance that has clung In long dead flowers, And, with the dying hours. Die with the songs the dreaming wind has sung? [14] CHANSON LOUIS XIII. Nay, I cannot love you so — Now you choose a dragging measure, Full of pauses, stepping slow At the flying heels of pleasure. Come from out your high-walled gloom, Let us make a holiday In the meadow's pleasant room Where the sliding shadows play. Here in golden splendor high Butterfly loves butterfly : Will they live and love forever? — Never, never! Still and still you sigh and plead, Still and still I love you. While the little breezes speed Butterflies above you. Still you love me, while the sun Stands so high above us : Butterflies, when day is done, Who will think to love us? While there's azure in the sky Butterfly loves butterfly. Fluttered pinions in the air Catch the sunlight, hold it there. Over the soft-lifting breeze Now the drooping branches sigh — [15] Love me now ! Beneath the trees Spread the Hghtest couch of love, But above Let there be no canopy To obscure the shining skies Or the shadows, flitting by, Of the dancing butterflies. Still and still you sigh and plead, Still and still I love you. While the little breezes speed Butterflies above you. Still you love me, while the sun Stands so high above us : Butterflies, when day is done. Who will think to love us ? [i6] MUSINGS OF A PRE-RAPHAELITE PAINTER High in the trees He balances — Gay-hearted oriole! Fluttering down Willful and leaf-light with leaves that drift, Now clear in a rift Of branch- fringed sky, Now dim on the brown Of russet bark — And hark! Rare and shy His notes begin. First sweet and thin. Held to a rippling swell that ebbs again — O for the wax that dulled the sirens' strain ! Birds and a tree-top! Such a combination Leaves far too much to the imagination. Here are my colors : how one's thoughts run riot When any noise disturbs the woodland quiet ! — What silver-gray of lichens— tiny trees That branch and fork like any forest brother ; Moist green of mosses : deep soft velvets, these, Tipped with a jester's cap and bells of coral; And one that grows supine ; red-cupped, another : A creamy tassel fallen from the sorrel : A spreading fungus, colored orange, gold. Saffron, all shades of yellow, metal-cold, [17] Or warm with shifting sunHght — what a study Beside the toadstool pulp that quivers ruddy ! Another strain! Up, up he's borne upon his own refrain ! Rollicking tree-tops Nodding together, Gladness of bird song, Blue-skied fair weather ! What if the day stops? Days are so long! Under the warm shades Gay fancies throng. What if the day fades? After a night Tree-tops and birdsong Welcome the light — Rollicking tree-tops Nodding together, Gladness of birdsong, Blue-skied fair weather ! He's gone! Oh what a flight, imagination! Now to my moss and its configuration. [i8] A bent twig springing upward From under the weight of a bird Nods to me over the hedges That the fluttered wings have stirred. Far afield in the noontide The bird has sought his will : Still lie the fluttered hedges, And my answering heart is still. But far in the dazzling sunlight A-wing with a joyous bird, A thought of mine goes straying That my heart has never heard. [19] THE DARK LOVER When I heard rhymes of a dark lover I thought they meant his face — Browned from the sun — a gypsy rover In some far tropic place. When I first saw my own dark lover I knew they meant his eyes, Where as at night I could discover Unending mysteries. And now when love is done and over I know too true and well There's many and many a darker lover More than the rhymes can tell. [20] THE SINGING SHELL I name you, love, and all my words Are murmurous, a leafy throng : The magic of your memory Sets all my words to song. Mine but the fragile shell of verse : But hearken where, deep hid from view, The secret murmur of your life In music speaks anew. [21] THE GIVER OF THE GIFT DIVINE The giver of a tawdry gift Goes strident through the market-place, And cries his own munificence, That men may see and know his face. But when the deeper twiUght falls The giver of the gift divine Comes through the shadow of the trees And parts the tangle of the vine. And by all dim and devious ways Steals on to the Beloved's place, And leaves his offering, and flies, Lest the Beloved see his face. [22] When I went in sandals I never felt the dew; I wrapped my cloak about me And caught no hint of you. Cloakless, without sandals — The very rain seems new, And every twig that brushes me Has known the touch of you. [23] PIPPA IN THE FACTORY I who would sing a song Must turn a machine. Out in the country The world's growing green — Turn again, turn again, creaky machine! Round and round — The grass on the ground Is growing in rings, in rings, they say. For long ago when the fields were new The fairies traced them and blessed them with dew And kissed them with freshness and crowned them with green — O faster and faster, my humming machine! Hum, hum, like the bees In the locust trees Where the bunches of flowers heavy with sweet Drip through the branches to carpet my feet. And higher than all — A wanderer rare — There's a song in the sunlight, A rhyme in the air. It floats away, floats away over the green — Catch it, catch it, my whirring machine ! Sing of the sky When the ceiling is low : Sing the birds homing, Sing the night coming [24] Where night-flowers blow. Bring a soft air, Blow a sweet air Out of the open, the night's darkened green — Catch the air, hold it, Weave and enfold it — Filter the day through my dream's golden screen- O faster and faster, my happy machine! [25] HONEY FROM AFAR Here stood the miracle of lofty growth — A blossomed tree, Whose fragrant crown above the crests of green We roamed the woods to see. Here the wild bees had made a feasting-place, And led us from afar To the white circle of new-fallen blooms — Each bloom a fallen star. And now, though storms have stripped the blossomed crown, The thunder-blasted tree Still holds a life that stirs its blackened depths. Made sweet with memory. The home of bees ! The hollow tree holds sweets From many a flowered star. All the warm meadows' summer fragrances, And honey from afar. [26] THE FAIRY WOODS Ringed by the sunny-meadowed hills Where the slow cattle pass, The fairy woods have sprung to life And checked the creeping grass. Young, as the fairy world is young, The slender pine-trees grow: The wind throughout their little leaves Pipes a faint elfin flow. And the warm earth, thin-carpeted, Still knows the touch of spring. Nor through the summer quite forgets The lore of blossoming. The tiny heather-bells of pink And silvery bells of blue. Ringing on airy leafless stems. Clouded with lingering dew, Make a soft mist of lavender That floats above the moss, And surges over the faint track Where the slow cattle cross. The very wind is delicate, Fitfully, gayly bold. And delicate the streaks of sun That spread their whiter gold. [27] Now for one last long magic day I drowse in the pale sun. Another day, another year, What fairies have begun Nature will take. Her ample hand Will ripen through the earth Into a fuller richer growth This miracle of birth. But for my deep-enchanted eyes The elfin bells still blow: Forever delicate and strange The fairy woods shall grow. [28] SUMMER LOVES When I left you, Jeannie, You had grown un'.dnd ; Jeannie, Jeannie, was the tune Running in my mind. Round and round, the Uttle road Turns upon the hill : Jeannie, Jeannie, runs the song Of the mountain rill. All along the water's edge Wildf lowers are aflame: Yesterday I met a man Who told me each one's name. Sweet lavender and jewel- weed — (Another little song, Jeannie, Jeannie, followed me The water's edge along). Sun-drops, asters, goldenrod — The chorus sweeter grew — Jeannie, they were chiming in To turn the air from you ! Meadow-queen and Queen Anne's lace- It needed nothing more — I could not sing of simple Jean When queens bowed at my door! [29] Now *'J^^^^i^" follows me no more: Ten lovelier names I know; My summer loves ! I know their hearts, The warm fields where they blow. And when they lie in wintry sleep Should Jeannie prove unkind, The sweet names of my summer loves Will sing her out of mind ! [30] A fragile snatch of passing song Half heard, half guessed, Floats on the dimming twilight air. And love lies hushed at rest. Like soft rain through the tender leaves The sweet airs blend, So faint that fragrance seems to start Where sound has met its end. Unseen the rain dies in the night — Unheard, O song. Breathe through the darkness, lest love wake, And sorrow over-long. [31] ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN There was a youth who died too young, Who spent the silver of his tongue In scorn of laws and ancient days, And cut his feet on stony ways. On his last day and days before, He kept his couch, to rise no more. With all his old intentness fine Perusing "Anne of Geierstein." It was a volume old and red. His, when his little curly head Nodded above it by the flame, Long past the hour when bedtime came. Some far-off memories he sought — Some healing the old volume brought : But for me, hell's white places shine When I see "Anne of Geierstein." [32] THE BLAZE He called us in, and set ablaze At once, the fuel of his days. We cried him back, but more and more He heaped on his full lifetime's store. Wild with the glory of the blaze, He cast in all his future days To flame an aureole of red About his beauteous brow and head. And we — we cowered in the shade, And stretched our hands half out, afraid : Some thrust a hand into the blaze. But could not save his future days. All this was long ago. Our pile, With prudent care, will last awhile. We stir our comfortable blaze, And speak of wanning life's last days. But there are some whose folded hands Bear the white scars of long-spent brands These see forever the swift grace Of that bright head and beauteous face. [33] / lost the colors of the dawn : The noonday hours, wheeling by, Brought ripened fruit and golden grain And shimmer of a far hot sky. At last, at last the day was gone, The long time spent : and from the west I caught a freshened look of life And knew that dying is the best. [34] THE NIGHT WIND Only the topmost boughs are stirred, The dark leaves lie asleep. Only the spring's new branches leap To the wind's thrilling word. Unstirred Sleeps the half-withered leaf Into whose dreamings creep Faint breathings of an air too brief That died with spring. The topmost branches swing To the wind's whispering — The dark leaves lie asleep. [35] TO THE MOST LOVED Rumored upon the startled morn That saw the primal day-spring rise, And trembling with the latest dawn That stirs the still pool of the skies — Love still shall weave its mystic rune In tapestries as richly spun As when on some far golden noon The women sang to Solomon. Each poignant strain of beauty leaves Another strain unsung, untrove: My love binds up its perfect sheaves And yet remains a different love. Now, since your sheaves are bound with gold. And since your eyes reflect the spring, You link new treasure to the old. And ripened fruit to blossoming. The primal day repeats its boon, And rumored love is newly born; And through the mystic golden noon A woman sings to Solomon. [36] HARP MUSIC Behind the open golden strings Hang crimson velvet curtainings, With heavy fringe of tarnished gold To hold austere each fluted fold — Harp- strings lie open to the day, And where they will the runlets stray, Within, without the curtained gloom. And floating through the music-room Like jets of fountain spray at play — Harp music is a run-away! Its tinkling notes disdain to hoard Their sweetness with a sounding-board; Lavish they spring from each plucked string, A fountain plume set shimmering To opalescent changes fleet: — A gay patrol rides down the street : A Spanish lover canters by: A garland from the Lorelei Flings down a handful of faint bloom — And there are flowers in the room. And if the player, wise and fair, Wear blue or green, and if her hair Be yellow — by the amber strings So easily a mermaid sings ! The notes, like pearls on golden cords. Drip from the richness of their hoards : And swift and clear, a mermaid's tear, A strange sea-sorrow, half a fear, [37] Whispers its fleeting fairy woe — A mermaid's harp might whisper so ! Harp-strings are tuned to fairy play- Harp-strings He open to the day — Harp music is a run-away ! [38] A FANTASY OF DANCE AT THE ORPHEUM Where the httle poplar-trees Two by two, in mimic state, Cast their shadows ebonese On the arching iron gate — Here, where antique vases hold Quaintest box-trees, and austere Figures of the nymphs of old From the formal hedges peer — Here two sisters, dancing slow In the twilight's dim retreat. Circle, as the shadows grow, Dip, advance on sandalled feet. Playing, at the fountain's brink, Hide and seek, to measure due: One enscarfed in lilac-pink. One enveiled in silver-blue. Pose, repose, and pirouette — Memory, enchanted muse. Weaves the gentle air's regret On a spinet worn with use. [39] Now the circling pair retreat In and out the poplar trees, Drooping o'er their sandalled feet, Blowing kisses to the breeze. Through the curtain's velvet gloom. Memory, enchanted muse. Show me still the garden's room. While a spinet worn with use Quavers from a yellowed page Its belated roundelay Of a happy Golden Age Where the gentle sisters play — Circling round the fountain's brink- Hide and seek to measure due. One enscarfed in lilac-pink. One enveiled in silver-blue. [40] / was the smallest fairy In a world unknown to men : You were a rugged giant Who lived in the Northland fen. Alone in the sunny lowlands, I spent the years at play. And listened for the thunder That came from far away — The echo of your footsteps. The far-off breaking shock : I was the snowy marble. And you, the granite rock. A hundred years of echo, And then the dreamed-of fear: I hid in the roots of grasses For I knew that you were near. The crashing of your footsteps Rolled to the lowland plain; You had come to seek the fairy. But you had come in vain. For down in the roots of grasses Your great hands could not reach : You, with your feet of thunder. And your tongue devoid of speech! [41] / trembled in my safety And yearned to your mighty sound, And longed to be held and captured Yet I lay close to the ground. And at last your raging footsteps Rolled back to the Northland fen For a hundred years of echo, And so returned again. [42] THE HONEY BEE Shall I, with such an alchemy, From unen joyed delight Transmute a richer treasury And seal it in the night? What flowers' deepest fragrances Know but my searching zest, Unspent in wanton vagrancies Upon their satin breast? For one brief day of long ago I chose the rover's pace. When spring's full pools in overflow Mirrored the world's new face. The world was new, my heart was new, And where the brown bees fly I robbed them of their honey-dew. And mocked their husbandry. With ceaseless toil unending springs Wipe out the one day's grace: The windy horn of autumn rings Through June's abandoned place. I sit beside my honey-comb And ponder every cell : The ruddy hearthstone flame of home Glows in each amber well. [43] Ah, tender hands that break the store To sweeten every sense With garnered flowers that bloomed of yore- Take your inheritance ! This is your frail life's nourishment — The richness of my years, — To stay your young astonishment And mellow all your fears. So I, with such an alchemy, From unenjoyed delight Fashion for you a treasury Against the winter's blight. My flowers' deepest fragrances Their ardors round you fling. And spend my unspent vagrancies To keep eternal spring! [44j THE LESSER LOVES. If I have loved the many loves, Nor held me unto straiter ways, O call me fickle as the sea And liken me to April days — For as the sudden shower falls From April skies of sunny hue, The lesser loves, the many loves Leave Heaven its own unclouded blue. The shallow wavelets kiss the shore And dimple in advancing bands To print a fragile memory Upon innumerable sands : But far beyond their shifting play The depths know no uncertainty : The ocean's heart forevermore Gathers a deep tranquility. O liken me to lesser waves And let me flatter every shore. And gather, like the ocean's heart. Depth upon depth forevermore ! [45] someone in the deep, deep wood Has set me here and there A cup of wine, a cup of dew, Bubble d with fairy air. And till I drink the last sweet drop And drain the last cup dry, I'm, driven through the deep, deep wood. And home and all goes by. [46] THE REFUSAL. I am an opening bud Beneath the sun's warm flood, A blossom for the pleasure of the sun: The inevitable rose As blindly grows, As blindly withers when his light is done. Yet when on other flowers He spends his golden hours, She lays aside her state, Not desolate : I crave another fate. Ah, think you not the spray That blooms and blooms each May Wearies of wantoning With every air of spring? Or that the cold green birth Slow-pricking through the earth Leaves many a sweeter thing Beneath the spring? Think you that I would flower To every passing shower, To every sunbeam be the answering rose? And yet — how shall I say I will not love in May? — — Here is the song they sing when winter goes : — [47] Blossom, blossom, blossom — Now I kiss your mouth — Bloom and bloom, my flower, Blossom like the South, When the wind of April Blowing over May Blows the winter branches Into rosy spray — Blows the winter fancies Far and far away. I am a closing flower. I give your love its hour. Your sun its day: No other sun shall shine On love of mine : I will not bloom and bloom to every May. The blood that sullen flows To redden beauty's rose Bears an unwilling heat Warm from its deep retreat. So many a sweeter thing Lies underneath the spring! Dim in the winter's lap. Low with the deadened sap. Unmoved of urging need, Life lies asleep in seed. Remembering No wantonness of spring. And so I too would lie [48] Soft, dreamlessly, Like any withered rose. And yet — how shall I say I should not hear in May The little song they sing when winter goes ? Blossom, blossom, blossom — Now I kiss your mouth — Bloom and bloom, my flower, Blossom like the South, When the wind of April Blowing over May, Blows the winter branches Into rosy spray — Blows the winter fancies Far and far away. [49] THE SUNBEAM You are the flight of countless wings Of gossamer and vair — A rainbow stream, a fairy shaft Through my imprisoned air. And where is now my strip of sky, My lattice-chequered tree? — O too much pain, to gather you In one bright unity! [so] SUBTERRANEAN All that sings itself to sleep In the twilight sunken deep, All that changes winter tears To hidden jewels of the years — This is all I do not live, What I could give and never give. Deepest in my soul they lie — Wings that never knew the sky. Deepest in my soul are spent Unshot arrows, bows unbent: Dimly substanced in the earth, The golden crown awaits its birth. [SI] Too long I sat at Spartan boards And drank from flagons bare, And 'Crushed the sunny-blossomed wreaths That you were used to wear. For other labor than your praise I left you for a space; And now the winds of all the world Know not your hiding place. tS2] THE CARPET Undulate, Spring before your master, Dancer ! Do you know that the new carpet Spreading its thick colors in homage at his feet Renders imperfect homage, rebels at all its edges ? — Leap in, clack the chains that weight your heavy ceinture. Flash the shining harness laced over your flesh. Lift your cinctured arms : the music rises. Wonderful, wonder,ful carpet ! Spirals of crimson awhirl Under the stamping clanking Feet of the dancing girl — Shimmering wavering parrots Clutching their perches of pearl Crushed by the crinkle-soled, pink-stained Feet of the dancing girl ! Clack, clack, The parrots are safe — They are near the centre. The weight of the harness is nothing. The body bears it lightly. Leaping in the air. [53] The drum, the drum — Spirals of bronze lead outward To the border of bursting grapes : The race begins. Be still, wreathe with your arms. Bend from your naked middle, Bend backward, brush the grapes with your fingers, Push out your breasts, nippled with cups of metal. Laced with cobweb chains of gold: The plumes of your helmet recover. Sweep forward, sweep the floor before you. Clack — the music — the grapes must be ad- ventured. Backward a step — presently you will stumble. At the corner vine meets vine Twisting together, Creeping out to the floor. Running off into air at the point. At the corner The dancer runs from the carpet Over the escaping tendrils. Plunges from the nearest window Flashing through the sunlight Into the courtyard pool: The weight of her harness drags her under. In harems too there are obsessions. [54] PASSION IN THE BALLET THE FAVORITE SLAVE He crouches in the corridor And hears upon the marble floor The men-at-arms step out, step out, The heavy cushions tossed about: And in his ecstasy he hears A step approach. The darkness clears, The key has turned, the curtain falls, And in his ecstasy he crawls Over the squares of black and white, And sees — and crouches at the sight — Her long slim flanks, her crimson vest. Her bright head with bright metal dressed. He flinches from her lowered gaze And waits : the languid music stays. Upon his knee, upon his feet, — He hears a reedy summons sweet. His fingers at her ankles cling, His fingers at her sandal-string — In measured time, to measured beat. Pluck at the bangles of her feet. Now, as the horns cry out "Arise !" His hands caress her flattened thighs, And, led by flutes, slip up her arms — In measure to her measured charms. [55] Too long, too long the flutes delay ! Should but a single viol play — A spring of tightened muscle — then — Her lips ! — The flutes begin again. The time has changed. A beating doom Throbs from the 'cello. In the room The master stands. The drums begin — The men-at-arms step in, step in. The thunder breaks — Now, viols, now! — His lips leap writhing to her brow — Death, or a darkened corridor Unchains the mimic from the floor, From the cold music's meted strain — Approach, conceded with a chain. [S6] CARYATID RODIN My hands hold up my breasts, Push up my crushed shoulder — How shall I bear this weight? (I have asked you only for bread). You have cut me with knives, You have lashed my skin with fine long whips of thread; There is no breath in my throat. (I have not asked for the wine.) I had thought of knives that would sunder bonds, But your knives have cut my flesh. I had thought to toss aside this rock, To stretch out my arms, to breathe deep and full. I would cast on my tunic and be with the others under the broad shade-tree. Is this not for me? Then hold back your knives, Cast aside the lashes. (I ask no longer for bread.) Give me strength. Let me bear up the rock Insensate as its bulk. Let me become as my burden. [57] Give me strength — The strength of stone — To strain eternally, Without desire, Without dream. [58] FROM A FLAT HOUSE-TOP 1. Finally away from the people, Finally alone in the dark, High up on the roof With my tree close to me ! Now the tears can flow, Now arms can be stretched out to the sky. The heart can break in sobs. O at last to be Free alike from life and immortality! To hear no more voices Save the gentle voice of the wind Stirring the leaves — To whisper to the stars, And droop, mysterious and silent. In the still heat of noon: To have no more kisses. But the slipping touch of the rain : And to feel no more the vagueness of longing, But to suffer patiently through drought! O my tree ! At last, at last to be Free alike from life and immortality! [59] II. In winter we buy warmth, In summer, ice. Who can change the seasons? Love, that I would flee. Love watches for me in the door-ways, Dogging my footsteps ; His hands are hot upon me. O neighbor woman, You who are longing for love, Lay your cold hands on my forehead: Stretch out your cold hands to love, Entreat him, and he will leave us ; And you, who hate peace. Shall be at peace. — But how shall I avoid the door- ways? [60] III. On the roof next to mine My neighbor plays the mandoUn; But his wife does not sing. Such a Httle space Ues between us, Not enough to hold a tree: — A thin black shaft of deepest night, Easily stepped over. But insurmountable without a prelude. Lacking the prelude, The player lacks a voice. And my voice is silent. Is your silent wife beside you, neighbor? Send her down into the street. And I will step over the well of night And lend you what you need: — I will lend you my voice first. t6i] IV. I will not meet you on the street — Your mandolin, your mandolin Can tell me all I long to know, A little truth, and lies too sweet To verify upon the street. Upon the street your mouth is cold, Your eyes are weary in the light, Your voice is harsher than the fall Of tinkling music in the night. Be voice as soft as voice can be. It cannot murmur like my tree. Ah, could I step across the night An apparition to your sight — Your mouth might smile less wearily. And something in you answer me Unlike the man I will not meet Upon the street. Your mandolin's faint tinkle thin Can tell me all I long to know — A Httle truth, and lies too sweet To verify upon the street. [62] V. Tree that I must leave! I have come at last To tell you three things : — There are other roofs under the stars — There are men whose eyes are not weary- And there is a love whose hands Are cool as night's dripping fountains. Now all the words that I have spoken Into the darkness Vanish with the night wind : — There is but one word That stars the universe. O my tree! At last, at last to be Made free of life and immortality! [63] 015 873 477 1