Poems of Cheer

I look down the lengthening distance
   Far back to youth’s valley of hope.
How strange seemed the ways of existence,
   How infinite life and its scope!

What dreams, what ambitions came thronging
   To people a world of my own!
How the heart in my bosom was longing,
   For pleasures and places unknown.

But the hill-tops of pleasure and beauty
   Were covered with mist at the dawn;
And only the rugged road Duty
   Shone clear, as my feet wandered on.

I loved not the path and its leading,
   I hated the rocks and the dust;
But a Voice from the Silence was pleading,
   It spoke but one syllable—“Trust.”

And when on the pathway I faltered,
   And when I rebelled at my fate,
The Voice with assurance unaltered,
   Again spoke one syllable—“Wait.”

Along the hard highway I travelled
   And saw, with dim vision, how soon
The morning’s gold locks were unravelled,
   By fingers of amorous noon.

A turn in the pathway of duty—
   I stood in the perfect day’s prime,
Close, close to the hillside of beauty
   The Voice from the Silence said “Climb”

The road to the beautiful Regions
   Lies ever through Duty’s hard way.
Oh ye who go searching in legions,
   Know this and be patient to-day.

Last night I saw Helena.  She whose praise
   Of late all men have sounded.  She for whom
   Young Angus rashly sought a silent tomb
Rather than live without her all his days.

Wise men go mad who look upon her long,
   She is so ripe with dangers.  Yet meanwhile
   I find no fascination in her smile,
Although I make her theme of this poor song.

“Her golden tresses?” yes, they may be fair,
   And yet to me each shining silken tress
   Seems robbed of beauty and all lustreless—
Too many hands have stroked Helena’s hair.

(I know a little maiden so demure
   She will not let her one true lover’s hands
   In playful fondness touch her soft brown bands
So dainty-minded is she, and so pure.)

(I mind me of two tender blue eyes, hid
   So underneath white curtains, and so veiled
   That I have sometimes plead for hours, and failed
To see more than the shyly lifted lid.)

“Her perfect mouth so liked a carved kiss?”
   “Her honeyed-mouth, where hearts do, fly-like, drown?”
   I would not taste its sweetness for a crown;
Too many lips have drank its nectared bliss.

(I know a mouth whose virgin dew, undried,
   Lies like a young grape’s bloom, untouched and sweet,
   And though I plead in passion at her feet,
She would not let me brush it if I died.)

In vain, Helena! though wise men may vie
   For thy rare smile, or die from loss of it,
   Armoured by my sweet lady’s trust, I sit,
And know thou are not worth her faintest sigh.

Nothing remains of unrecorded ages
   That lie in the silent cemetery time;
Their wisdom may have shamed our wisest sages,
   Their glory may have been indeed sublime.
How weak do seem our strivings after power,
   How poor the grandest efforts of our brains,
If out of all we are, in one short hour
         Nothing remains.

Nothing remains but the Eternal Spaces,
   Time and decay uproot the forest trees.
Even the mighty mountains leave their places,
   And sink their haughty heads beneath strange seas
The great earth writhes in some convulsive spasms
   And turns the proudest cities into plains.
The level sea becomes a yawning chasm—
      Nothing remains.

Nothing remains but the Eternal Nameless
   And all-creative spirit of the Law,
Uncomprehended, comprehensive, blameless,
   Invincible, resistless, with no flaw;
So full of love it must create for ever,
   Destroying that it may create again,
Persistent and perfecting in endeavour,
   It yet must bring forth angels, after men—
      This, this remains!

I and my Soul are alone to-day,
   All in the shining weather;
We were sick of the world, and put it away,
   So we could rejoice together.

Our host, the Sun, in the blue, blue sky
   Is mixing a rare, sweet wine,
In the burnished gold of this cup on high,
   For me, and this Soul of mine.

We find it a safe and royal drink,
   And a cure for every pain;
It helps us to love, and helps us to think,
   And strengthens body and brain.

And sitting here, with my Soul alone,
   Where the yellow sun-rays fall,
Of all the friends I have ever known
   I find it the best of all.

But when I grow weary of mirth and glee,
   Of glitter, glow, and splendour,
Like a tried old friend it comes to me,
   With a smile that is sad and tender.

And we walk together as two friends may,
   And laugh and drink God’s wine.
Oh, a royal comrade any day
   I find this Soul of mine.

Now, while thy rounded cheek is fresh and fair,
   While beauty lingers, laughing, in thine eyes,
Ere thy young heart shall meet the stranger, “Care,”
   Or thy blithe soul become the home of sighs,
Were it not kindness should I give thee rest
By plunging this sharp dagger in thy breast?
Dying so young, with all thy wealth of youth,
What part of life wouldst thou not claim, in sooth?
         Only the woe,
      Sweetheart, that sad souls know.

How slight the action!  Just one well-aimed blow
   Here, where I feel thy warm heart’s pulsing beat,
And then another through my own, and so
   Our perfect union would be made complete:
So, past all parting, I should claim thee mine.
Dead with our youth, and faith, and love divine,
Should we not keep the best of life that way?
What shall we gain by living day on day?
         What shall we gain,
      Sweetheart, but bitter pain?

[In an interview with Lawrence Barrett, he said: “The literature of the New World must look to the West for its poetry.”]

Not to the crowded East,
   Where, in a well-worn groove,
Like the harnessed wheel of a great machine,
   The trammelled mind must move—
Where Thought must follow the fashion of Thought,
Or be counted vulgar and set at naught.

Not to the languid South,
   Where the mariners of the brain
Are lured by the Sirens of the Sense,
   And wrecked upon its main—
Where Thought is rocked, on the sweet wind’s breath
To a torpid sleep that ends in death.

But to the mighty West,
   That chosen realm of God,
Where Nature reaches her hands to men,
   And Freedom walks abroad—
Where mind is King, and fashion is naught,
There shall the New World look for thought

They shall come with souls as great
   As the cradle where they were rocked;
They shall come with brows that are touched with fire
   Like the gods with whom they have walked;
They shall come from the West in royal state,
The Singers and Thinkers for whom we wait.

I set out for the Land of Content,
   By the gay crowded pleasure-highway,
With laughter, and jesting, I went
   With the mirth-loving throng for a day;
   Then I knew I had wandered astray,
For I met returned pilgrims, belated,
Who said, “We are weary and sated,
But we found not the Land of Content.”

I turned to the steep path of fame,
   I said, “It is over yon height—
This land with the beautiful name—
   Ambition will lend me its light.”
   But I paused in my journey ere night,
For the way grew so lonely and troubled;
I said—my anxiety doubled—
“This is not the road to Content.”

Then weary in body and brain,
   An overgrown path I detected,
And I said “I will hide with my pain
   In this byway, unused and neglected.”
   Lo! it led to the realm God selected
To crown with His best gifts of beauty,
And through the dark pathway of duty
I came to the land of Content.

High in the heavens I saw the moon this morning,
   Albeit the sun shone bright;
Unto my soul it spoke, in voice of warning,
   “Remember Night!”

[Read at Reunion of the G. A. T., Madison, Wis., July 4, 1872.]

After the battles are over,
   And the war drums cease to beat,
And no more is heard on the hillside
The sound of hurrying feet,
Full many a noble action,
   That was done in the days of strife
By the soldier is half forgotten,
   In the peaceful walks of life.

Just as the tangled grasses,
   In Summer’s warmth and light,
Grow over the graves of the fallen
   And hide them away from sight,
So many an act of valour,
   And many a deed sublime,
Fade from the mind of the soldier
   O’ergrown by the grass of time

Let Grant come up from the White House,
   And clasp each brother’s hand,
First chieftain of the army,
   Last chieftain of the land.
Let him rest from a nation’s burdens,
   And go, in thought, with his men,
Through the fire and smoke of Shiloh,
   And save the day again.

This silent hero of battles
   Knew no such word as defeat.
It was left for the rebels’ learning,
   Along with the word—retreat.
He was not given to talking,
   But he found that guns would preach
In a way that was more convincing
   Than fine and flowery speech

Let Sherman, the stern old General,
   Come rallying with his men;
Let them march once more through Georgia
   And down to the sea again.
Oh! that grand old tramp to Savannah,
   Three hundred miles to the coast,
It will live in the heart of the nation,
   For ever its pride and boast.

As Sheridan went to the battle,
   When a score of miles away,
He has come to the feast and banquet,
   By the iron horse to-day.
Its pace is not much swifter
   Than the pace of that famous steed
Which bore him down to the contest
   And saved the day by his speed.

Don’t start if you hear the cannon,
   It is not the sound of doom,
It does not call to the contest—
   To the battle’s smoke and gloom.
“Let us have peace,” was spoken,
   And lo! peace ruled again;
And now the nation is shouting,
   Through the cannon’s voice, “Amen.”

O boys who besieged old Vicksburgh,
   Can time e’er wash away
The triumph of her surrender,
   Nine years ago to-day?
Can you ever forget the moment,
   When you saw the flag of white,
That told how the grim old city
   Had fallen in her might?

Come, heroes of Look Out Mountain,
   Of Corinth and Donelson,
Of Kenesaw and Atlanta,
   And tell how the day was won!
Hush! bow the head for a moment—
   There are those who cannot come.
No bugle-call can arouse them—
   No sound of fife or drum.

Oh, boys who died for the country,
   Oh, dear and sainted dead!
What can we say about you
   That has not once been said?
Whether you fell in the contest,
   Struck down by shot and shell,
Or pined ’neath the hand of sickness
   Or starved in the prison cell,

Saviours of our Republic,
   Heroes who wore the blue,
We owe the peace that surrounds us—
   And our Nation’s strength to you.
We owe it to you that our banner,
   The fairest flag in the world,
Is to-day unstained, unsullied,
   On the Summer air unfurled.

We look on its stripes and spangles,
   And our hearts are filled the while
With love for the brave commanders,
   And the boys of the rank and file.
The grandest deeds of valour
   Were never written out,
The noblest acts of virtue
   The world knows nothing about.

Brave men of a mighty army,
   We extend you friendship’s hand
I speak for the “Loyal Women,”
   Those pillars of our land.
We wish you a hearty welcome,
   We are proud that you gather here
To talk of old times together
   On this brightest day in the year.

And if Peace, whose snow-white pinions
   Brood over our land to-day,
Should ever again go from us,
   (God grant she may ever stay!)
Should our Nation call in her peril
   For “Six hundred thousand more,”
The loyal women would hear her,
   And send you out as before.

I have been across the bridges of the years.
      Wet with tears
Were the ties on which I trod, going back
      Down the track
To the valley where I left, ’neath skies of Truth,
      My lost youth.

As I went, I dropped my burdens, one and all—
      Let them fall;
All my sorrows, all my wrinkles, all my care,
      My white hair,
I laid down, like some lone pilgrim’s heavy pack,
      By the track.

As I neared the happy valley with light feet,
      My heart beat
To the rhythm of a song I used to know
      Long ago,
And my spirits gushed and bubbled like a fountain
      Down a mountain.

And we met there, in those green and verdant places,
      Smiling faces,
And sweet laughter echoed upward from the dells
      Like gold bells.
And the world was spilling over with the glory
      Of Youth’s story.

It was but a dreamer’s journey of the brain;
      And again
I have left the happy valley far behind;
      And I find
Time stands waiting with his burdens in a pack
      For my back.

As he speeds me, like a rough, well-meaning friend,
      To the end,
Will I find again the lost ones loved so well?
      Who can tell!
But the dead know what the life will be to come—
      And they are dumb!

As some dusk mother shields from all alarms
   The tired child she gathers to her breast,
The brunette Night doth fold me in her arms,
   And hushes me to perfect peace and rest.
Her eyes of stars shine on me, and I hear
Her voice of winds low crooning on my ear.
O Night, O Night, how beautiful thou art!
Come, fold me closer to thy pulsing heart.

The day is full of gladness, and the light
   So beautifies the common outer things,
I only see with my external sight,
   And only hear the great world’s voice which rings.
But silently from daylight and from din
The sweet Night draws me—whispers, “Look within!”
And looking, as one wakened from a dream,
I see what is—no longer what doth seem.

The Night says, “Child, sleep that thou may’st arise
   Strong for to-morrow’s struggle.”  And I feel
Her shadowy fingers pressing on my eyes:
   Like thistledown I float to the Ideal—
The Slumberland, made beautiful and bright
As death, by dreams of loved ones gone from sight,
O food for souls, sweet dreams of pure delight,
How beautiful the holy hours of Night!

The world grows green on a thousand hills—
   By a thousand willows the bees are humming,
And a million birds by a million rills,
   Sing of the golden season coming.
But, gazing out on the sun-kist lea,
   And hearing a thrush and a blue-bird singing,
I feel that the summer is all for me,
   And all for me are the joys it is bringing.

All for me the bumble-bee
   Drones his song in the perfect weather;
And, just on purpose to sing to me,
   Thrush and blue-bird came North together.
Just for me, in red and white,
   Bloom and blossom the fields of clover;
And all for me and my delight
   The wild Wind follows and plays the lover.

I know I am only a speck of dust,
   An individual mite of masses,
Clinging upon the outer crust
   Of a little ball of cooling gases.
And yet, and yet, say what you will,
   And laugh, if you please, at my lack of reason,
For me wholly, and for me still,
   Blooms and blossoms the Summer season.

Nobody else has ever heard
   The story the Wind to me discloses;
And none but I and the humming-bird
   Can read the hearts of the crimson roses.
Ah, my Summer—my love—my own!
   The world grows glad in your smiling weather;
Yet all for me, and me alone,
   You and your Court came North together.

If the sad old world should jump a cog
   Sometime, in its dizzy spinning,
And go off the track with a sudden jog,
   What an end would come to the sinning,
What a rest from strife and the burdens of life
   For the millions of people in it,
What a way out of care, and worry and wear,
   All in a beautiful minute.

As ’round the sun with a curving sweep
   It hurries and runs and races,
Should it lose its balance, and go with a leap
   Into the vast sea-spaces,
What a blest relief it would bring to the grief,
   And the trouble and toil about us,
To be suddenly hurled from the solar world
   And let it go on without us.

No dark, damp tomb and no mourner’s gloom,
   No tolling bell in the steeple,
But in one swift breath a painless death
   For a million billion people.
What greater bliss could we ask than this,
   To sweep with a bird’s free motion
Through leagues of space to a resting place,
   In a vast and vapoury ocean—
To pass away from this life for aye
   With never a dear tie sundered,
And a world on fire for a funeral pyre,
   While the stars looked on and wondered?

Is it the world, or my eyes, that are sadder?
I see not the grace that I used to see
In the meadow-brook whose song was so glad, or
In the boughs of the willow tree.
The brook runs slower—its song seems lower
And not the song that it sang of old;
And the tree I admired looks weary and tired
Of the changeless story of heat and cold.

When the sun goes up, and the stars go under,
In that supreme hour of the breaking day,
Is it my eyes, or the dawn, I wonder,
That finds less of the gold, and more of the gray
I see not the splendour, the tints so tender,
The rose-hued glory I used to see;
And I often borrow a vague half-sorrow
That another morning has dawned for me.

When the heart grows weary, all things seem dreary;
When the burden grows heavy, the way seems long.
Thank God for sending kind death as an ending,
Like a grand Amen to a minor song.

Not they who know the awful gibbet’s anguish,
   Not they who, while sad years go by them, in
The sunless cells of lonely prisons languish,
   Do suffer fullest penalty for sin.

’Tis they who walk the highways unsuspected,
   Yet with grim fear for ever at their side,
Who hug the corpse of some sin undetected,
   A corpse no grave or coffin-lid can hide—

’Tis they who are in their own chambers haunted
   By thoughts that like unbidden guests intrude,
And sit down, uninvited and unwanted,
   And make a nightmare of the solitude.

I feel the stirrings in me of great things.
New half-fledged thoughts rise up and beat their wings,
And tremble on the margin of their nest,
Then flutter back, and hide within my breast.

Beholding space, they doubt their untried strength.
Beholding men, they fear them.  But at length,
Grown all too great and active for the heart
That broods them with such tender mother art,
Forgetting fear, and men, and all, that hour,
Save the impelling consciousness of power
That stirs within them—they shall soar away
Up to the very portals of the Day.

What can be said in New Year rhymes,
That’s not been said a thousand times?

The new years come, the old years go,
We know we dream, we dream we know.

We rise up laughing with the light,
We lie down weeping with the night.

We hug the world until it stings,
We curse it then and sigh for wings.

We live, we love, we woo, we wed,
We wreathe our brides, we sheet our dead.

We laugh, we weep, we hope, we fear,
And that’s the burden of the year.

A vision beauteous as the morn,
   With heavenly eyes and tresses streaming,
Slow glided o’er a field late shorn
   Where walked a poet idly dreaming.
He saw her, and joy lit his face,
   “Oh, vanish not at human speaking,”
He cried, “thou form of magic grace,
   Thou art the poem I am seeking.

“I’ve sought thee long!  I claim thee now—
   My thought embodied, living, real.”
She shook the tresses from her brow.
   “Nay, nay!” she said, “I am ideal.
I am the phantom of desire—
   The spirit of all great endeavour,
I am the voice that says, ‘Come higher,’
   That calls men up and up for ever.

“I am the greater, better yield,
   That leads and cheers thy farmer neighbour,
For me he bravely tills the field
   And whistles gaily at his labour.
Not thou alone, O poet soul,
   Dost seek me through an endless morrow,
But to the toiling, hoping whole
   I am at once the hope and sorrow.

“The spirit of the unattained,
   I am to those who seek to name me,
A good desired but never gained:
   All shall pursue, but none shall claim me.”

How happy they are, in all seeming,
   How gay, or how smilingly proud,
How brightly their faces are beaming,
   These people who make up the crowd!
How they bow, how they bend, how they flutter,
   How they look at each other and smile,
How they glow, and what bon mots they utter!
   But a strange thought has found me the while!

It is odd, but I stand here and fancy
   These people who now play a part,
All forced by some strange necromancy
   To speak, and to act, from the heart.
What a hush would come over the laughter!
   What a silence would fall on the mirth!
And then what a wail would sweep after,
   As the night-wind sweeps over the earth!

From broadcloth, and velvet, and laces,
   Would echo the groans of despair,
And there would be blanching of faces
   And wringing of hands and of hair.
That man with his record of honour,
   That lady down there with the rose,
That girl with Spring’s freshness upon her,
   Who knoweth the secrets of those?

Smile on, O ye maskers, smile sweetly!
   Step lightly, bow low and laugh loud!
Though the world is deceived and completely,
   I know ye, O sad-hearted crowd!
I watch you with infinite pity:
   But play on, play ever your part,
Be gleeful, be joyful, be witty!
   ’Tis better than showing the heart.

Life and I are lovers, straying
   Arm in arm along:
Often like two children Maying,
   Full of mirth and song,

Life plucks all the blooming hours
   Growing by the way;
Binds them on my brow like flowers,
   Calls me Queen of May.

Then again, in rainy weather,
   We sit vis-à-vis,
Planning work we’ll do together
   In the years to be.

Sometimes Life denies me blisses,
   And I frown or pout;
But we make it up with kisses
   Ere the day is out.

Then he always grows more zealous,
   Tender, and more true;
Loves the more for being jealous,
   As all lovers do.

Though I swear by stars above him,
   And by worlds beyond,
That I love him—love him—love him;
   Though my heart is fond;

Though he gives me, doth my lover,
   Kisses with each breath—
I shall one day throw him over,
   And plight troth with Death.

Upon the white cheek of the Cherub Year
      I saw a tear.
Alas!  I murmured, that the Year should borrow
      So soon a sorrow.
Just then the sunlight fell with sudden flame:
      The tear became
A wondrous diamond sparkling in the light—
      A beauteous sight.

Upon my soul there fell such woeful loss,
      I said, “The Cross
Is grievous for a life as young as mine.”
      Just then, like wine,
God’s sunlight shone from His high Heavens down;
      And lo! a crown
Gleamed in the place of what I thought a burden—
      My sorrow’s guerdon.

Of a thousand things that the Year snowed under—
   The busy Old Year who has gone away—
How many will rise in the Spring, I wonder,
   Brought to life by the sun of May?
Will the rose-tree branches, so wholly hidden
   That never a rose-tree seems to be,
At the sweet Spring’s call come forth unbidden,
   And bud in beauty, and bloom for me?

Will the fair green Earth, whose throbbing bosom
   Is hid like a maid’s in her gown at night,
Wake out of her sleep, and with blade and blossom
   Gem her garments to please my sight?
Over the knoll in the valley yonder
   The loveliest buttercups bloomed and grew;
When the snow has gone that drifted them under,
   Will they shoot up sunward, and bloom anew?

Under the snow lie things so cherished—
   Hopes, ambitions, and dreams of men—
Faces that vanished, and trusts that perished,
   Never to sparkle and glow again.
The Old Year greedily grasped his plunder,
   And covered it over and hurried away:
Of the thousand things that he did, I wonder
   How many will rise at the call of May?
O wise Young Year, with your hands held under
   Your mantle of ermine, tell me, pray!

Toward even, when the day leans down
   To kiss the upturned face of night,
Out just beyond the loud-voiced town
   I know a spot of calm delight.
Like crimson arrows from a quiver
   The red rays pierce the waters flowing,
   While we go dreaming, singing, rowing
To Leudemanns-on-the-River.

The hills, like some glad mocking-bird,
   Send back our laughter and our singing,
While faint—and yet more faint is heard
   The steeple bells all sweetly ringing.
Some message did the winds deliver
   To each glad heart that August night,
   All heard, but all heard not aright,
By Leudemanns-on-the-River.

How dusky were those paths that led
   Up from the river to the hall.
The tall trees branching overhead
   Invite the early shades that fall.
In all the glad blithe world, oh, never
   Were hearts more free from care than when
   We wandered through those walks, we ten,
By Leudemanns-on-the-River.

So soon, so soon, the changes came.
   This August day we two alone,
On that same river, not the same,
   Dream of a night for ever flown.
Strange distances have come to sever
   The hearts that gaily beat in pleasure,
   Long miles we cannot cross or measure—
From Leudemanns-on-the-River.

Every morning and every night
   There passes our window near the street,
A little girl with an eye so bright,
   And a cheek so round and a lip so sweet!
The daintiest, jauntiest little miss
That ever any one longed to kiss,

She is neat as wax, and fresh to view,
   And her look is wholesome, and clean, and good.
Whatever her gown, her hood is blue,
   And so we call her our “Little Blue Hood,”
For we know not the name of the dear little lass,
But we call to each other to see her pass,

“Little Blue Hood is coming now!”
   And we watch from the window while she goes by,
She has such a bonny, smooth, white brow,
   And a fearless look in her long-lashed eye!
And a certain dignity wedded to grace
Seems to envelop her form and face.

Somebody ties that hood of blue
   Under the face so fair to see,
Somebody loves her, beside we two,
   Somebody kisses her—why can’t we?
Dear Little Blue Hood fresh and fair,
Are you glad we love you, or don’t you care?

Up from the South come the birds that were banished,
   Frightened away by the presence of frost.
Back to the vale comes the verdure that vanished,
   Back to the forest the leaves that were lost.
Over the hillside the carpet of splendour,
   Folded through Winter, Spring spreads down again;
Along the horizon, the tints that were tender,
   Lost hues of Summer-time, burn bright as then.

Only the mountains’ high summits are hoary,
   To the ice-fettered river the sun gives a key.
Once more the gleaming shore lists to the story
   Told by an amorous Summer-kissed sea.
All things revive that in Winter time perished,
   The rose buds again in the light o’ the sun,
All that was beautiful, all that was cherished,
   Sweet things and dear things and all things—save one.

Life without love is a year without Summer,
   Heart without love is a wood without song.
Rise then, revive then, thou indolent comer:
   Why dost thou lie in the dark earth so long?
Rise! ah, thou can’st not! the rose-tree that sheddest
   Its beautiful leaves, in the Springtime may bloom,
But of cold things the coldest, of dead things the deadest,
   Love buried once, rises not from the tomb.
Green things may grow on the hillside and heather,
   Birds seek the forest and build there and sing.
All things revive in the beautiful weather,
   But unto a dead love there cometh no Spring.

After the May time, and after the June time,
   Rare with blossoms and perfumes sweet,
Cometh the round world’s royal noon time,
   The red midsummer of blazing heat.
When the sun, like an eye that never closes,
   Bends on the earth its fervid gaze,
And the winds are still, and the crimson roses
   Droop and wither and die in its rays.

Unto my heart has come that season,
   O my lady, my worshipped one,
When over the stars of Pride and Reason
   Sails Love’s cloudless, noonday sun.
Like a great red ball in my bosom burning
   With fires that nothing can quench or tame.
It glows till my heart itself seems turning
   Into a liquid lake of flame.

Sink, O my soul, in this golden glory,
   Die, O my heart, in thy rapture-swoon,
For the Autumn must come with its mournful story,
   And Love’s midsummer will fade too soon.

I saw the wild honey-bee kissing a rose
      A wee one, that grows
Down low on the bush, where her sisters above
      Cannot see all that’s done
      As the moments roll on.
Nor hear all the whispers and murmurs of love.

They flaunt out their beautiful leaves in the sun,
      And they flirt, every one,
With the wild bees who pass, and the gay butterflies.
      And that wee thing in pink—
      Why, they never once think
That she’s won a lover right under their eyes.

It reminded me, Kate, of a time—you know when!
      You were so petite then,
Your dresses were short, and your feet were so small.
      Your sisters, Maud-Belle
      And Madeline—well,
They both set their caps for me, after that ball.

Your sisters had sent you to keep me, my dear,
      Till they should appear.
Then you were dismissed like a child in disgrace.
      How meekly you went!
      But your brown eyes, they sent
A thrill to my heart, and a flush to my face.

We always were meeting some way after that.
      You hung up my hat,
And got it again, when I finished my call.
      Sixteen, and so sweet!
      Oh, those cute little feet!
Shall I ever forget how they tripped down the hall?

Shall I ever forget the first kiss by the door,
      Or the vows murmured o’er,
Or the rage and surprise of Maud-Belle?  Well-a-day,
      How swiftly time flows,
      And who would suppose
That a bee could have carried me so far away.

Across the miles that stretch between,
   Through days of gloom or glad sunlight,
There shines a face I have not seen
   Which yet doth make my world more bright.

He may be near, he may be far,
   Or near or far I cannot see,
But faithful as the morning star
   He yet shall rise and come to me.

What though fate leads us separate ways,
   The world is round, and time is fleet.
A journey of a few brief days,
   And face to face we two shall meet.

Shall meet beneath God’s arching skies,
   While suns shall blaze, or stars shall gleam,
And looking in each other’s eyes
   Shall hold the past but as a dream.

And still behind the space between,
   As back of dawns the sunbeams play,
There shines the face I have not seen,
   Whose smile shall wake my world to-day.

One leaned on velvet cushions like a queen—
   To see him pass, the hero of an hour,
Whom men called great.  She bowed with languid mien,
   And smiled, and blushed, and knew her beauty’s power.

One trailed her tinselled garments through the street,
   And thrust aside the crowd, and found a place
So near, the blooded courser’s prancing feet
   Cast sparks of fire upon her painted face.

One took the hot-house blossoms from her breast,
   And tossed them down, as he went riding by,
And blushed rose-red to see them fondly pressed
   To bearded lips, while eye spoke unto eye.

One, bold and hardened with her sinful life,
   Yet shrank and shivered painfully, because
His cruel glance cut keener than a knife,
   The glance of him who made her what she was.

Slipping away—slipping away!
Out of our brief year slips the May;
And Winter lingers, and Summer flies;
And Sorrow abideth, and Pleasure dies;
And the days are short, and the nights are long;
And little is right, and much is wrong.

Slipping away is the Summer time;
It has lost its rhythm and lilting rhyme—
For the grace goes out of the day so soon,
And the tired head aches in the glare of noon,
And the way seems long to the hills that lie
Under the calm of the western sky.

Slipping away are the friends whose worth
Lent a glow to the sad old earth:
One by one they slip from our sight;
One by one their graves gleam white;
Or we count them lost by the crueller death
Of a trust betrayed, or a murdered faith.

It is done! in the fire’s fitful flashes,
   The last line has withered and curled.
In a tiny white heap of dead ashes
   Lie buried the hopes of your world.
There were mad foolish vows in each letter,
   It is well they have shrivelled and burned,
And the ring! oh, the ring was a fetter,
   It was better removed and returned.

But ah, is it done?  In the embers
   Where letters and tokens were cast,
Have you burned up the heart that remembers,
   And treasures its beautiful past?
Do you think in this swift reckless fashion
   To ruthlessly burn and destroy
The months that were freighted with passion,
   The dreams that were drunken with joy?

Is it done? is the life drama ended?
   You have put all the lights out, and yet,
Though the curtain, rung down, has descended,
   Can the actors go home and forget?
Ah, no! they will turn in their sleeping
   With a strange restless pain in their hearts,
And in darkness, and anguish, and weeping,
   Will dream they are playing their parts.

Somebody said, in the crowd, last eve,
   That you were married, or soon to be.
I have not thought of you, I believe,
   Since last we parted.  Let me see:
Five long Summers have passed since then—
   Each has been pleasant in its own way—
And you are but one of a dozen men
   Who have played the suitor a Summer day.

But, nevertheless, when I heard your name,
   Coupled with some one’s, not my own,
There burned in my bosom a sudden flame,
   That carried me back to the day that is flown.
I was sitting again by the laughing brook,
   With you at my feet, and the sky above,
And my heart was fluttering under your look—
   The unmistakable look of Love.

Just for the moment I thought you mine—
   Loving me, wooing me, as of old.
The tale remembered seemed half divine—
   Though I held it lightly enough when told.
The past seemed fairer than when it was near,
   As “blessings brighten when taking flight;”
And just for the moment I held you dear—
   When somebody mentioned your name last night.

In a garb that was guiltless of colours
   She stood, with a dull, listless air—
A creature of dumps and of dolours,
   But most undeniably fair.

The folds of her garment fell round her,
   Revealing the curve of each limb;
Well proportioned and graceful I found her,
   Although quite alarmingly slim.

From the hem of her robe peeped one sandal—
   “High art” was she down to her feet;
And though I could not understand all
   She said, I could see she was sweet.

Impressed by her limpness and languor,
   I proffered a chair near at hand;
She looked back a mild sort of anger—
   Posed anew, and continued to stand.

I then, in a strain quite poetic,
   Begged her gaze on the bow in the sky,
She looked—said its curve was “æsthetic.”
   But the “tone was too dreadfully high.”

Her lovely face, lit by the splendour
   That glorified landscape and sea,
Woke thoughts that were daring and tender:
   Did her thoughts, too, rest upon me?

“Oh, tell me,” I cried, growing bolder,
   “Have I in your musings a place?”
“Well, yes,” she said over her shoulder:
   “I was thinking of nothing in space.”

SUNDAY

Lie still and rest, in that serene repose
That on this holy morning comes to those
Who have been burdened with the cares which make
The sad heart weary and the tired head ache.
      Lie still and rest—
   God’s day of all is best.

MONDAY

Awake! arise!  Cast off thy drowsy dreams!
Red in the East, behold the Morning gleams.
“As Monday goes, so goes the week,” dames say.
Refreshed, renewed, use well the initial day.
      And see! thy neighbour
   Already seeks his labour.

Another morning’s banners are unfurled—
Another day looks smiling on the world.
It holds new laurels for thy soul to win;
Mar not its grace by slothfulness or sin,
      Nor sad, away,
   Send it to yesterday.

WEDNESDAY

Half-way unto the end—the week’s high noon.
The morning hours do speed away so soon!
And, when the noon is reached, however bright,
Instinctively we look toward the night.
      The glow is lost
   Once the meridian cross’d.

THURSDAY

So well the week has sped, hast thou a friend,
Go spend an hour in converse.  It will lend
New beauty to thy labours and thy life
To pause a little sometimes in the strife.
      Toil soon seems rude
   That has no interlude.

From feasts abstain; be temperate, and pray;
Fast if thou wilt; and yet, throughout the day,
Neglect no labour and no duty shirk:
Not many hours are left thee for thy work—
      And it were meet
   That all should be complete.

SATURDAY

Now with the almost finished task make haste.
So near the night thou hast no time to waste.
Post up accounts, and let thy Soul’s eyes look
For flaws and errors in Life’s ledger-book.
      When labours cease,
   How sweet the sense of peace!