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THOREAU'S
FLUTE
[A POEM BY]
LOUISA M. ALCOTT
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THE ORIOLE PRESS








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[A POEM BY]
LOUISA M. ALCOTT
PUBLISHED AND PRINTED B
THE ORIOLE PRESS
BERKELEY HEIGHTS, N. J.
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CQ  I WENT to the woods because I wished to live
deliberately to front only the essential fa&s of life &
see if I could learn what it had to teach, & not, when
I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not
wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor
did I wish to pracice resignation unless it was quite
necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the
marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Sparta-like as
to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad
swathe and shave close, to drive life into a corner, &
reduce it to its lowest terms, and if it proved to be
mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the World; or
if it were sublime, to know it by experience & be able
to give a true account of it in my next excursion...
HENRY DAVID THOREAU








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THOREAU'S FLUTE
By LOUISA M. ALCOTT
Wh7e, sighing, said, "Our Pan is dead;
9fis pipe hangs mute beside the river;c4round it wistful sunbeams quiver,,But Music's airy voice is fled.
Spring mourns as for untimely froft;
c-?he bluebird chants a requiem;
c'he -willow-blossom "waits for him; -
cihe Genius of the -wood is lost."




4(   THOREAU'S            FLUTE       )
'hen from the flute, untouched by hands,
C^here came a low, harmonious breath:
" 'or such as he there is no death;W3is life the eternal life commands;
c7,bove man's aims his nature rose:
Che 'wisdom of a juft content
c.Made one small spot a continent,
c7,nd tuned to poetry Xife's prose.
" Vaunting the hills, the Aream, the -wild,
Swallow and afer, lake and pine,
C'o him grew human or divine, -
Yit mates for this large-hearted child
Such homage GNjature ne'er forgets,
cAnd yearly on the coverlid
"'eath 'which her darling lieth hid
CZq)ill 'write his name in violets.




-<ý( THOREAU'S FLUTE
CZ;o him no -vain regrets belong,
C(Ohose soul, that finer in-trument,
9ave to the -world no poor lament,,
ýBut 'wood-notes ever sweet and Itrong.
o lonely friend! he 31i11 'will be
c54 potent presence, though unseen,'e&teadfaAft, sagacious, and serene:
S3eek not for him, - he is -with thee."
September, 1863




THOREAU'S FLUTE a poem by
Louisa M. Alcott was first published in the
"Atlantic Monthly," September, 1863; it is
now reprinted in this format for private distribution with the compliments of Jo s E P H
IS HILL, founder and director of the Oriole
Press. %  Hand-set with the Cloister Old
Style casted by the American Type Founders.
Edition limited to friends and followers of
Thoreau's trends of life.


DECEMBER, 1950
















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