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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/109-0.txt b/109-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..bc4e543 --- /dev/null +++ b/109-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1237 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 109 *** + +Renascence and Other Poems + + +by + +Edna St. Vincent Millay + + + + + Contents: + + + + Renascence + All I could see from where I stood + + Interim + The room is full of you!--As I came in + + The Suicide + "Curse thee, Life, I will live with thee no more! + + God's World + O world, I cannot hold thee close enough! + + Afternoon on a Hill + I will be the gladdest thing + + Sorrow + Sorrow like a ceaseless rain + + Tavern + I'll keep a little tavern + + Ashes of Life + Love has gone and left me and the days are all alike; + + The Little Ghost + I knew her for a little ghost + + Kin to Sorrow + Am I kin to Sorrow, + + Three Songs of Shattering + + I + The first rose on my rose-tree + + II + Let the little birds sing; + + III + All the dog-wood blossoms are underneath the tree! + + The Shroud + Death, I say, my heart is bowed + + The Dream + Love, if I weep it will not matter, + + Indifference + I said,--for Love was laggard, O, Love was slow to come,-- + + Witch-Wife + She is neither pink nor pale, + + Blight + Hard seeds of hate I planted + + When the Year Grows Old + I cannot but remember + + Sonnets + + I + Thou art not lovelier than lilacs,--no, + + II + Time does not bring relief; you all have lied + + III + Mindful of you the sodden earth in spring, + + IV + Not in this chamber only at my birth-- + + V + If I should learn, in some quite casual way, + + VI Bluebeard + This door you might not open, and you did; + + + + + Renascence and Other Poems + + + + + Renascence + + + All I could see from where I stood + Was three long mountains and a wood; + I turned and looked another way, + And saw three islands in a bay. + So with my eyes I traced the line + Of the horizon, thin and fine, + Straight around till I was come + Back to where I'd started from; + And all I saw from where I stood + Was three long mountains and a wood. + Over these things I could not see; + These were the things that bounded me; + And I could touch them with my hand, + Almost, I thought, from where I stand. + And all at once things seemed so small + My breath came short, and scarce at all. + But, sure, the sky is big, I said; + Miles and miles above my head; + So here upon my back I'll lie + And look my fill into the sky. + And so I looked, and, after all, + The sky was not so very tall. + The sky, I said, must somewhere stop, + And--sure enough!--I see the top! + The sky, I thought, is not so grand; + I 'most could touch it with my hand! + And reaching up my hand to try, + I screamed to feel it touch the sky. + I screamed, and--lo!--Infinity + Came down and settled over me; + Forced back my scream into my chest, + Bent back my arm upon my breast, + And, pressing of the Undefined + The definition on my mind, + Held up before my eyes a glass + Through which my shrinking sight did pass + Until it seemed I must behold + Immensity made manifold; + Whispered to me a word whose sound + Deafened the air for worlds around, + And brought unmuffled to my ears + The gossiping of friendly spheres, + The creaking of the tented sky, + The ticking of Eternity. + I saw and heard, and knew at last + The How and Why of all things, past, + And present, and forevermore. + The Universe, cleft to the core, + Lay open to my probing sense + That, sick'ning, I would fain pluck thence + But could not,--nay! But needs must suck + At the great wound, and could not pluck + My lips away till I had drawn + All venom out.--Ah, fearful pawn! + For my omniscience paid I toll + In infinite remorse of soul. + All sin was of my sinning, all + Atoning mine, and mine the gall + Of all regret. Mine was the weight + Of every brooded wrong, the hate + That stood behind each envious thrust, + Mine every greed, mine every lust. + And all the while for every grief, + Each suffering, I craved relief + With individual desire,-- + Craved all in vain! And felt fierce fire + About a thousand people crawl; + Perished with each,--then mourned for all! + A man was starving in Capri; + He moved his eyes and looked at me; + I felt his gaze, I heard his moan, + And knew his hunger as my own. + I saw at sea a great fog bank + Between two ships that struck and sank; + A thousand screams the heavens smote; + And every scream tore through my throat. + No hurt I did not feel, no death + That was not mine; mine each last breath + That, crying, met an answering cry + From the compassion that was I. + All suffering mine, and mine its rod; + Mine, pity like the pity of God. + Ah, awful weight! Infinity + Pressed down upon the finite Me! + My anguished spirit, like a bird, + Beating against my lips I heard; + Yet lay the weight so close about + There was no room for it without. + And so beneath the weight lay I + And suffered death, but could not die. + + Long had I lain thus, craving death, + When quietly the earth beneath + Gave way, and inch by inch, so great + At last had grown the crushing weight, + Into the earth I sank till I + Full six feet under ground did lie, + And sank no more,--there is no weight + Can follow here, however great. + From off my breast I felt it roll, + And as it went my tortured soul + Burst forth and fled in such a gust + That all about me swirled the dust. + + Deep in the earth I rested now; + Cool is its hand upon the brow + And soft its breast beneath the head + Of one who is so gladly dead. + And all at once, and over all + The pitying rain began to fall; + I lay and heard each pattering hoof + Upon my lowly, thatched roof, + And seemed to love the sound far more + Than ever I had done before. + For rain it hath a friendly sound + To one who's six feet underground; + And scarce the friendly voice or face: + A grave is such a quiet place. + + The rain, I said, is kind to come + And speak to me in my new home. + I would I were alive again + To kiss the fingers of the rain, + To drink into my eyes the shine + Of every slanting silver line, + To catch the freshened, fragrant breeze + From drenched and dripping apple-trees. + For soon the shower will be done, + And then the broad face of the sun + Will laugh above the rain-soaked earth + Until the world with answering mirth + Shakes joyously, and each round drop + Rolls, twinkling, from its grass-blade top. + How can I bear it; buried here, + While overhead the sky grows clear + And blue again after the storm? + O, multi-colored, multiform, + Beloved beauty over me, + That I shall never, never see + Again! Spring-silver, autumn-gold, + That I shall never more behold! + Sleeping your myriad magics through, + Close-sepulchred away from you! + O God, I cried, give me new birth, + And put me back upon the earth! + Upset each cloud's gigantic gourd + And let the heavy rain, down-poured + In one big torrent, set me free, + Washing my grave away from me! + + I ceased; and through the breathless hush + That answered me, the far-off rush + Of herald wings came whispering + Like music down the vibrant string + Of my ascending prayer, and--crash! + Before the wild wind's whistling lash + The startled storm-clouds reared on high + And plunged in terror down the sky, + And the big rain in one black wave + Fell from the sky and struck my grave. + I know not how such things can be; + I only know there came to me + A fragrance such as never clings + To aught save happy living things; + A sound as of some joyous elf + Singing sweet songs to please himself, + And, through and over everything, + A sense of glad awakening. + The grass, a-tiptoe at my ear, + Whispering to me I could hear; + I felt the rain's cool finger-tips + Brushed tenderly across my lips, + Laid gently on my sealed sight, + And all at once the heavy night + Fell from my eyes and I could see,-- + A drenched and dripping apple-tree, + A last long line of silver rain, + A sky grown clear and blue again. + And as I looked a quickening gust + Of wind blew up to me and thrust + Into my face a miracle + Of orchard-breath, and with the smell,-- + I know not how such things can be!-- + I breathed my soul back into me. + Ah! Up then from the ground sprang I + And hailed the earth with such a cry + As is not heard save from a man + Who has been dead, and lives again. + About the trees my arms I wound; + Like one gone mad I hugged the ground; + I raised my quivering arms on high; + I laughed and laughed into the sky, + Till at my throat a strangling sob + Caught fiercely, and a great heart-throb + Sent instant tears into my eyes; + O God, I cried, no dark disguise + Can e'er hereafter hide from me + Thy radiant identity! + Thou canst not move across the grass + But my quick eyes will see Thee pass, + Nor speak, however silently, + But my hushed voice will answer Thee. + I know the path that tells Thy way + Through the cool eve of every day; + God, I can push the grass apart + And lay my finger on Thy heart! + + The world stands out on either side + No wider than the heart is wide; + Above the world is stretched the sky,-- + No higher than the soul is high. + The heart can push the sea and land + Farther away on either hand; + The soul can split the sky in two, + And let the face of God shine through. + But East and West will pinch the heart + That can not keep them pushed apart; + And he whose soul is flat--the sky + Will cave in on him by and by. + + + + + Interim + + + The room is full of you!--As I came in + And closed the door behind me, all at once + A something in the air, intangible, + Yet stiff with meaning, struck my senses sick!-- + + Sharp, unfamiliar odors have destroyed + Each other room's dear personality. + The heavy scent of damp, funereal flowers,-- + The very essence, hush-distilled, of Death-- + Has strangled that habitual breath of home + Whose expiration leaves all houses dead; + And wheresoe'er I look is hideous change. + Save here. Here 'twas as if a weed-choked gate + Had opened at my touch, and I had stepped + Into some long-forgot, enchanted, strange, + Sweet garden of a thousand years ago + And suddenly thought, "I have been here before!" + + You are not here. I know that you are gone, + And will not ever enter here again. + And yet it seems to me, if I should speak, + Your silent step must wake across the hall; + If I should turn my head, that your sweet eyes + Would kiss me from the door.--So short a time + To teach my life its transposition to + This difficult and unaccustomed key!-- + The room is as you left it; your last touch-- + A thoughtless pressure, knowing not itself + As saintly--hallows now each simple thing; + Hallows and glorifies, and glows between + The dust's grey fingers like a shielded light. + + There is your book, just as you laid it down, + Face to the table,--I cannot believe + That you are gone!--Just then it seemed to me + You must be here. I almost laughed to think + How like reality the dream had been; + Yet knew before I laughed, and so was still. + That book, outspread, just as you laid it down! + Perhaps you thought, "I wonder what comes next, + And whether this or this will be the end"; + So rose, and left it, thinking to return. + + Perhaps that chair, when you arose and passed + Out of the room, rocked silently a while + Ere it again was still. When you were gone + Forever from the room, perhaps that chair, + Stirred by your movement, rocked a little while, + Silently, to and fro. . . + + And here are the last words your fingers wrote, + Scrawled in broad characters across a page + In this brown book I gave you. Here your hand, + Guiding your rapid pen, moved up and down. + Here with a looping knot you crossed a "t", + And here another like it, just beyond + These two eccentric "e's". You were so small, + And wrote so brave a hand! + How strange it seems + That of all words these are the words you chose! + And yet a simple choice; you did not know + You would not write again. If you had known-- + But then, it does not matter,--and indeed + If you had known there was so little time + You would have dropped your pen and come to me + And this page would be empty, and some phrase + Other than this would hold my wonder now. + Yet, since you could not know, and it befell + That these are the last words your fingers wrote, + There is a dignity some might not see + In this, "I picked the first sweet-pea to-day." + To-day! Was there an opening bud beside it + You left until to-morrow?--O my love, + The things that withered,--and you came not back! + That day you filled this circle of my arms + That now is empty. (O my empty life!) + That day--that day you picked the first sweet-pea,-- + And brought it in to show me! I recall + With terrible distinctness how the smell + Of your cool gardens drifted in with you. + I know, you held it up for me to see + And flushed because I looked not at the flower, + But at your face; and when behind my look + You saw such unmistakable intent + You laughed and brushed your flower against my lips. + (You were the fairest thing God ever made, + I think.) And then your hands above my heart + Drew down its stem into a fastening, + And while your head was bent I kissed your hair. + I wonder if you knew. (Beloved hands! + Somehow I cannot seem to see them still. + Somehow I cannot seem to see the dust + In your bright hair.) What is the need of Heaven + When earth can be so sweet?--If only God + Had let us love,--and show the world the way! + Strange cancellings must ink th' eternal books + When love-crossed-out will bring the answer right! + That first sweet-pea! I wonder where it is. + It seems to me I laid it down somewhere, + And yet,--I am not sure. I am not sure, + Even, if it was white or pink; for then + 'Twas much like any other flower to me, + Save that it was the first. I did not know, + Then, that it was the last. If I had known-- + But then, it does not matter. Strange how few, + After all's said and done, the things that are + Of moment. + Few indeed! When I can make + Of ten small words a rope to hang the world! + "I had you and I have you now no more." + There, there it dangles,--where's the little truth + That can for long keep footing under that + When its slack syllables tighten to a thought? + Here, let me write it down! I wish to see + Just how a thing like that will look on paper! + + "*I had you and I have you now no more*." + + O little words, how can you run so straight + Across the page, beneath the weight you bear? + How can you fall apart, whom such a theme + Has bound together, and hereafter aid + In trivial expression, that have been + So hideously dignified?--Would God + That tearing you apart would tear the thread + I strung you on! Would God--O God, my mind + Stretches asunder on this merciless rack + Of imagery! O, let me sleep a while! + Would I could sleep, and wake to find me back + In that sweet summer afternoon with you. + Summer? 'Tis summer still by the calendar! + How easily could God, if He so willed, + Set back the world a little turn or two! + Correct its griefs, and bring its joys again! + + We were so wholly one I had not thought + That we could die apart. I had not thought + That I could move,--and you be stiff and still! + That I could speak,--and you perforce be dumb! + I think our heart-strings were, like warp and woof + In some firm fabric, woven in and out; + Your golden filaments in fair design + Across my duller fibre. And to-day + The shining strip is rent; the exquisite + Fine pattern is destroyed; part of your heart + Aches in my breast; part of my heart lies chilled + In the damp earth with you. I have been torn + In two, and suffer for the rest of me. + What is my life to me? And what am I + To life,--a ship whose star has guttered out? + A Fear that in the deep night starts awake + Perpetually, to find its senses strained + Against the taut strings of the quivering air, + Awaiting the return of some dread chord? + + Dark, Dark, is all I find for metaphor; + All else were contrast,--save that contrast's wall + Is down, and all opposed things flow together + Into a vast monotony, where night + And day, and frost and thaw, and death and life, + Are synonyms. What now--what now to me + Are all the jabbering birds and foolish flowers + That clutter up the world? You were my song! + Now, let discord scream! You were my flower! + Now let the world grow weeds! For I shall not + Plant things above your grave--(the common balm + Of the conventional woe for its own wound!) + Amid sensations rendered negative + By your elimination stands to-day, + Certain, unmixed, the element of grief; + I sorrow; and I shall not mock my truth + With travesties of suffering, nor seek + To effigy its incorporeal bulk + In little wry-faced images of woe. + + I cannot call you back; and I desire + No utterance of my immaterial voice. + I cannot even turn my face this way + Or that, and say, "My face is turned to you"; + I know not where you are, I do not know + If Heaven hold you or if earth transmute, + Body and soul, you into earth again; + But this I know:--not for one second's space + Shall I insult my sight with visionings + Such as the credulous crowd so eager-eyed + Beholds, self-conjured, in the empty air. + Let the world wail! Let drip its easy tears! + My sorrow shall be dumb! + + --What do I say? + God! God!--God pity me! Am I gone mad + That I should spit upon a rosary? + Am I become so shrunken? Would to God + I too might feel that frenzied faith whose touch + Makes temporal the most enduring grief; + Though it must walk a while, as is its wont, + With wild lamenting! Would I too might weep + Where weeps the world and hangs its piteous wreaths + For its new dead! Not Truth, but Faith, it is + That keeps the world alive. If all at once + Faith were to slacken,--that unconscious faith + Which must, I know, yet be the corner-stone + Of all believing,--birds now flying fearless + Across would drop in terror to the earth; + Fishes would drown; and the all-governing reins + Would tangle in the frantic hands of God + And the worlds gallop headlong to destruction! + + O God, I see it now, and my sick brain + Staggers and swoons! How often over me + Flashes this breathlessness of sudden sight + In which I see the universe unrolled + Before me like a scroll and read thereon + Chaos and Doom, where helpless planets whirl + Dizzily round and round and round and round, + Like tops across a table, gathering speed + With every spin, to waver on the edge + One instant--looking over--and the next + To shudder and lurch forward out of sight-- + + * * * * * + + Ah, I am worn out--I am wearied out-- + It is too much--I am but flesh and blood, + And I must sleep. Though you were dead again, + I am but flesh and blood and I must sleep. + + + + + The Suicide + + + "Curse thee, Life, I will live with thee no more! + Thou hast mocked me, starved me, beat my body sore! + And all for a pledge that was not pledged by me, + I have kissed thy crust and eaten sparingly + That I might eat again, and met thy sneers + With deprecations, and thy blows with tears,-- + Aye, from thy glutted lash, glad, crawled away, + As if spent passion were a holiday! + And now I go. Nor threat, nor easy vow + Of tardy kindness can avail thee now + With me, whence fear and faith alike are flown; + Lonely I came, and I depart alone, + And know not where nor unto whom I go; + But that thou canst not follow me I know." + + Thus I to Life, and ceased; but through my brain + My thought ran still, until I spake again: + + "Ah, but I go not as I came,--no trace + Is mine to bear away of that old grace + I brought! I have been heated in thy fires, + Bent by thy hands, fashioned to thy desires, + Thy mark is on me! I am not the same + Nor ever more shall be, as when I came. + Ashes am I of all that once I seemed. + In me all's sunk that leapt, and all that dreamed + Is wakeful for alarm,--oh, shame to thee, + For the ill change that thou hast wrought in me, + Who laugh no more nor lift my throat to sing! + Ah, Life, I would have been a pleasant thing + To have about the house when I was grown + If thou hadst left my little joys alone! + I asked of thee no favor save this one: + That thou wouldst leave me playing in the sun! + And this thou didst deny, calling my name + Insistently, until I rose and came. + I saw the sun no more.--It were not well + So long on these unpleasant thoughts to dwell, + Need I arise to-morrow and renew + Again my hated tasks, but I am through + With all things save my thoughts and this one night, + So that in truth I seem already quite + Free and remote from thee,--I feel no haste + And no reluctance to depart; I taste + Merely, with thoughtful mien, an unknown draught, + That in a little while I shall have quaffed." + + Thus I to Life, and ceased, and slightly smiled, + Looking at nothing; and my thin dreams filed + Before me one by one till once again + I set new words unto an old refrain: + + "Treasures thou hast that never have been mine! + Warm lights in many a secret chamber shine + Of thy gaunt house, and gusts of song have blown + Like blossoms out to me that sat alone! + And I have waited well for thee to show + If any share were mine,--and now I go! + Nothing I leave, and if I naught attain + I shall but come into mine own again!" + Thus I to Life, and ceased, and spake no more, + But turning, straightway, sought a certain door + In the rear wall. Heavy it was, and low + And dark,--a way by which none e'er would go + That other exit had, and never knock + Was heard thereat,--bearing a curious lock + Some chance had shown me fashioned faultily, + Whereof Life held content the useless key, + And great coarse hinges, thick and rough with rust, + Whose sudden voice across a silence must, + I knew, be harsh and horrible to hear,-- + A strange door, ugly like a dwarf.--So near + I came I felt upon my feet the chill + Of acid wind creeping across the sill. + So stood longtime, till over me at last + Came weariness, and all things other passed + To make it room; the still night drifted deep + Like snow about me, and I longed for sleep. + + But, suddenly, marking the morning hour, + Bayed the deep-throated bell within the tower! + Startled, I raised my head,--and with a shout + Laid hold upon the latch,--and was without. + + * * * * * + + Ah, long-forgotten, well-remembered road, + Leading me back unto my old abode, + My father's house! There in the night I came, + And found them feasting, and all things the same + As they had been before. A splendour hung + Upon the walls, and such sweet songs were sung + As, echoing out of very long ago, + Had called me from the house of Life, I know. + So fair their raiment shone I looked in shame + On the unlovely garb in which I came; + Then straightway at my hesitancy mocked: + "It is my father's house!" I said and knocked; + And the door opened. To the shining crowd + Tattered and dark I entered, like a cloud, + Seeing no face but his; to him I crept, + And "Father!" I cried, and clasped his knees, and wept. + Ah, days of joy that followed! All alone + I wandered through the house. My own, my own, + My own to touch, my own to taste and smell, + All I had lacked so long and loved so well! + None shook me out of sleep, nor hushed my song, + Nor called me in from the sunlight all day long. + + I know not when the wonder came to me + Of what my father's business might be, + And whither fared and on what errands bent + The tall and gracious messengers he sent. + Yet one day with no song from dawn till night + Wondering, I sat, and watched them out of sight. + And the next day I called; and on the third + Asked them if I might go,--but no one heard. + Then, sick with longing, I arose at last + And went unto my father,--in that vast + Chamber wherein he for so many years + Has sat, surrounded by his charts and spheres. + "Father," I said, "Father, I cannot play + The harp that thou didst give me, and all day + I sit in idleness, while to and fro + About me thy serene, grave servants go; + And I am weary of my lonely ease. + Better a perilous journey overseas + Away from thee, than this, the life I lead, + To sit all day in the sunshine like a weed + That grows to naught,--I love thee more than they + Who serve thee most; yet serve thee in no way. + Father, I beg of thee a little task + To dignify my days,--'tis all I ask + Forever, but forever, this denied, + I perish." + "Child," my father's voice replied, + "All things thy fancy hath desired of me + Thou hast received. I have prepared for thee + Within my house a spacious chamber, where + Are delicate things to handle and to wear, + And all these things are thine. Dost thou love song? + My minstrels shall attend thee all day long. + Or sigh for flowers? My fairest gardens stand + Open as fields to thee on every hand. + And all thy days this word shall hold the same: + No pleasure shalt thou lack that thou shalt name. + But as for tasks--" he smiled, and shook his head; + "Thou hadst thy task, and laidst it by", he said. + + + + + God's World + + + O world, I cannot hold thee close enough! + Thy winds, thy wide grey skies! + Thy mists, that roll and rise! + Thy woods, this autumn day, that ache and sag + And all but cry with colour! That gaunt crag + To crush! To lift the lean of that black bluff! + World, World, I cannot get thee close enough! + + + Long have I known a glory in it all, + But never knew I this; + Here such a passion is + As stretcheth me apart,--Lord, I do fear + Thou'st made the world too beautiful this year; + My soul is all but out of me,--let fall + No burning leaf; prithee, let no bird call. + + + + + Afternoon on a Hill + + + I will be the gladdest thing + Under the sun! + I will touch a hundred flowers + And not pick one. + + I will look at cliffs and clouds + With quiet eyes, + Watch the wind bow down the grass, + And the grass rise. + + And when lights begin to show + Up from the town, + I will mark which must be mine, + And then start down! + + + + + Sorrow + + + Sorrow like a ceaseless rain + Beats upon my heart. + People twist and scream in pain,-- + Dawn will find them still again; + This has neither wax nor wane, + Neither stop nor start. + + People dress and go to town; + I sit in my chair. + All my thoughts are slow and brown: + Standing up or sitting down + Little matters, or what gown + Or what shoes I wear. + + + + + Tavern + + + I'll keep a little tavern + Below the high hill's crest, + Wherein all grey-eyed people + May set them down and rest. + + There shall be plates a-plenty, + And mugs to melt the chill + Of all the grey-eyed people + Who happen up the hill. + + There sound will sleep the traveller, + And dream his journey's end, + But I will rouse at midnight + The falling fire to tend. + + Aye, 'tis a curious fancy-- + But all the good I know + Was taught me out of two grey eyes + A long time ago. + + + + + Ashes of Life + + + Love has gone and left me and the days are all alike; + Eat I must, and sleep I will,--and would that night were here! + But ah!--to lie awake and hear the slow hours strike! + Would that it were day again!--with twilight near! + + Love has gone and left me and I don't know what to do; + This or that or what you will is all the same to me; + But all the things that I begin I leave before I'm through,-- + There's little use in anything as far as I can see. + + Love has gone and left me,--and the neighbors knock and borrow, + And life goes on forever like the gnawing of a mouse,-- + And to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow + There's this little street and this little house. + + + + + The Little Ghost + + + I knew her for a little ghost + That in my garden walked; + The wall is high--higher than most-- + And the green gate was locked. + + And yet I did not think of that + Till after she was gone-- + I knew her by the broad white hat, + All ruffled, she had on. + + By the dear ruffles round her feet, + By her small hands that hung + In their lace mitts, austere and sweet, + Her gown's white folds among. + + I watched to see if she would stay, + What she would do--and oh! + She looked as if she liked the way + I let my garden grow! + + She bent above my favourite mint + With conscious garden grace, + She smiled and smiled--there was no hint + Of sadness in her face. + + She held her gown on either side + To let her slippers show, + And up the walk she went with pride, + The way great ladies go. + + And where the wall is built in new + And is of ivy bare + She paused--then opened and passed through + A gate that once was there. + + + + + Kin to Sorrow + + + Am I kin to Sorrow, + That so oft + Falls the knocker of my door-- + Neither loud nor soft, + But as long accustomed, + Under Sorrow's hand? + Marigolds around the step + And rosemary stand, + And then comes Sorrow-- + And what does Sorrow care + For the rosemary + Or the marigolds there? + Am I kin to Sorrow? + Are we kin? + That so oft upon my door-- + *Oh, come in*! + + + + + Three Songs of Shattering + + + I + + The first rose on my rose-tree + Budded, bloomed, and shattered, + During sad days when to me + Nothing mattered. + + Grief of grief has drained me clean; + Still it seems a pity + No one saw,--it must have been + Very pretty. + + + II + + Let the little birds sing; + Let the little lambs play; + Spring is here; and so 'tis spring;-- + But not in the old way! + + I recall a place + Where a plum-tree grew; + There you lifted up your face, + And blossoms covered you. + + If the little birds sing, + And the little lambs play, + Spring is here; and so 'tis spring-- + But not in the old way! + + + III + + All the dog-wood blossoms are underneath the tree! + Ere spring was going--ah, spring is gone! + And there comes no summer to the like of you and me,-- + Blossom time is early, but no fruit sets on. + + All the dog-wood blossoms are underneath the tree, + Browned at the edges, turned in a day; + And I would with all my heart they trimmed a mound for me, + And weeds were tall on all the paths that led that way! + + + + + The Shroud + + + Death, I say, my heart is bowed + Unto thine,--O mother! + This red gown will make a shroud + Good as any other! + + (I, that would not wait to wear + My own bridal things, + In a dress dark as my hair + Made my answerings. + + I, to-night, that till he came + Could not, could not wait, + In a gown as bright as flame + Held for them the gate.) + + Death, I say, my heart is bowed + Unto thine,--O mother! + This red gown will make a shroud + Good as any other! + + + + + The Dream + + + Love, if I weep it will not matter, + And if you laugh I shall not care; + Foolish am I to think about it, + But it is good to feel you there. + + Love, in my sleep I dreamed of waking,-- + White and awful the moonlight reached + Over the floor, and somewhere, somewhere, + There was a shutter loose,--it screeched! + + Swung in the wind,--and no wind blowing!-- + I was afraid, and turned to you, + Put out my hand to you for comfort,-- + And you were gone! Cold, cold as dew, + + Under my hand the moonlight lay! + Love, if you laugh I shall not care, + But if I weep it will not matter,-- + Ah, it is good to feel you there! + + + + + Indifference + + + I said,--for Love was laggard, O, Love was slow to come,-- + "I'll hear his step and know his step when I am warm in bed; + But I'll never leave my pillow, though there be some + As would let him in--and take him in with tears!" I said. + I lay,--for Love was laggard, O, he came not until dawn,-- + I lay and listened for his step and could not get to sleep; + And he found me at my window with my big cloak on, + All sorry with the tears some folks might weep! + + + + + Witch-Wife + + + She is neither pink nor pale, + And she never will be all mine; + She learned her hands in a fairy-tale, + And her mouth on a valentine. + + She has more hair than she needs; + In the sun 'tis a woe to me! + And her voice is a string of colored beads, + Or steps leading into the sea. + + She loves me all that she can, + And her ways to my ways resign; + But she was not made for any man, + And she never will be all mine. + + + + + Blight + + + Hard seeds of hate I planted + That should by now be grown,-- + Rough stalks, and from thick stamens + A poisonous pollen blown, + And odors rank, unbreathable, + From dark corollas thrown! + + At dawn from my damp garden + I shook the chilly dew; + The thin boughs locked behind me + That sprang to let me through; + The blossoms slept,--I sought a place + Where nothing lovely grew. + + And there, when day was breaking, + I knelt and looked around: + The light was near, the silence + Was palpitant with sound; + I drew my hate from out my breast + And thrust it in the ground. + + Oh, ye so fiercely tended, + Ye little seeds of hate! + I bent above your growing + Early and noon and late, + Yet are ye drooped and pitiful,-- + I cannot rear ye straight! + + The sun seeks out my garden, + No nook is left in shade, + No mist nor mold nor mildew + Endures on any blade, + Sweet rain slants under every bough: + Ye falter, and ye fade. + + + + + When the Year Grows Old + + + I cannot but remember + When the year grows old-- + October--November-- + How she disliked the cold! + + She used to watch the swallows + Go down across the sky, + And turn from the window + With a little sharp sigh. + + And often when the brown leaves + Were brittle on the ground, + And the wind in the chimney + Made a melancholy sound, + + She had a look about her + That I wish I could forget-- + The look of a scared thing + Sitting in a net! + + Oh, beautiful at nightfall + The soft spitting snow! + And beautiful the bare boughs + Rubbing to and fro! + + But the roaring of the fire, + And the warmth of fur, + And the boiling of the kettle + Were beautiful to her! + + I cannot but remember + When the year grows old-- + October--November-- + How she disliked the cold! + + + + + Sonnets + + + I + + Thou art not lovelier than lilacs,--no, + Nor honeysuckle; thou art not more fair + Than small white single poppies,--I can bear + Thy beauty; though I bend before thee, though + From left to right, not knowing where to go, + I turn my troubled eyes, nor here nor there + Find any refuge from thee, yet I swear + So has it been with mist,--with moonlight so. + + Like him who day by day unto his draught + Of delicate poison adds him one drop more + Till he may drink unharmed the death of ten, + Even so, inured to beauty, who have quaffed + Each hour more deeply than the hour before, + I drink--and live--what has destroyed some men. + + + II + + Time does not bring relief; you all have lied + Who told me time would ease me of my pain! + I miss him in the weeping of the rain; + I want him at the shrinking of the tide; + The old snows melt from every mountain-side, + And last year's leaves are smoke in every lane; + But last year's bitter loving must remain + Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide! + + There are a hundred places where I fear + To go,--so with his memory they brim! + And entering with relief some quiet place + Where never fell his foot or shone his face + I say, "There is no memory of him here!" + And so stand stricken, so remembering him! + + + III + + Mindful of you the sodden earth in spring, + And all the flowers that in the springtime grow, + And dusty roads, and thistles, and the slow + Rising of the round moon, all throats that sing + The summer through, and each departing wing, + And all the nests that the bared branches show, + And all winds that in any weather blow, + And all the storms that the four seasons bring. + + You go no more on your exultant feet + Up paths that only mist and morning knew, + Or watch the wind, or listen to the beat + Of a bird's wings too high in air to view,-- + But you were something more than young and sweet + And fair,--and the long year remembers you. + + + IV + + Not in this chamber only at my birth-- + When the long hours of that mysterious night + Were over, and the morning was in sight-- + I cried, but in strange places, steppe and firth + I have not seen, through alien grief and mirth; + And never shall one room contain me quite + Who in so many rooms first saw the light, + Child of all mothers, native of the earth. + + So is no warmth for me at any fire + To-day, when the world's fire has burned so low; + I kneel, spending my breath in vain desire, + At that cold hearth which one time roared so strong, + And straighten back in weariness, and long + To gather up my little gods and go. + + + V + + If I should learn, in some quite casual way, + That you were gone, not to return again-- + Read from the back-page of a paper, say, + Held by a neighbor in a subway train, + How at the corner of this avenue + And such a street (so are the papers filled) + A hurrying man--who happened to be you-- + At noon to-day had happened to be killed, + I should not cry aloud--I could not cry + Aloud, or wring my hands in such a place-- + I should but watch the station lights rush by + With a more careful interest on my face, + Or raise my eyes and read with greater care + Where to store furs and how to treat the hair. + + + VI Bluebeard + + This door you might not open, and you did; + So enter now, and see for what slight thing + You are betrayed. . . . Here is no treasure hid, + No cauldron, no clear crystal mirroring + The sought-for truth, no heads of women slain + For greed like yours, no writhings of distress, + But only what you see. . . . Look yet again-- + An empty room, cobwebbed and comfortless. + Yet this alone out of my life I kept + Unto myself, lest any know me quite; + And you did so profane me when you crept + Unto the threshold of this room to-night + That I must never more behold your face. + This now is yours. I seek another place. + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Renascence and Other Poems, by +Edna St. Vincent Millay + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 109 *** diff --git a/109-h/109-h.htm b/109-h/109-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..90d5fc4 --- /dev/null +++ b/109-h/109-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,1575 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<HTML> +<HEAD> + +<META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=UTF-8"> + +<TITLE> +The Project Gutenberg E-text of Renascence and Other Poems, by Edna St. Vincent Millay +</TITLE> + +<STYLE TYPE="text/css"> +BODY { color: Black; + background: White; + margin-right: 20%; + margin-left: 20%; + font-size: medium; + font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; + text-align: justify } + +P {text-indent: 4% } + +P.noindent {text-indent: 0% } + +P.poem {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 0%; + font-size: small } + +P.transnote {font-size: small ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +P.finis { text-align: center ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + + +</STYLE> + +</HEAD> + +<BODY> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 109 ***</div> + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +Renascence and Other Poems +</H1> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +by +</H3> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +Edna St. Vincent Millay +</H2> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +Contents: +</H2> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#renascence">Renascence</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">All I could see from where I stood</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#interim">Interim</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">The room is full of you!—As I came in</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#suicide">The Suicide</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">"Curse thee, Life, I will live with thee no more!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#godsworld">God's World</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">O world, I cannot hold thee close enough!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#afternoon">Afternoon on a Hill</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">I will be the gladdest thing</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sorrow">Sorrow</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Sorrow like a ceaseless rain</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#tavern">Tavern</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">I'll keep a little tavern</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#ashes">Ashes of Life</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Love has gone and left me and the days are all alike;</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#ghost">The Little Ghost</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">I knew her for a little ghost</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#kin">Kin to Sorrow</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Am I kin to Sorrow,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#songs">Three Songs of Shattering</A><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#songs1">I</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">The first rose on my rose-tree</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#songs2">II</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Let the little birds sing;</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#songs3">III</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">All the dog-wood blossoms are underneath the tree!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#shroud">The Shroud</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Death, I say, my heart is bowed</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#dream">The Dream</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Love, if I weep it will not matter,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#indifference">Indifference</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">I said,—for Love was laggard, O, Love was slow to come,—</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#witchwife">Witch-Wife</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">She is neither pink nor pale,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#blight">Blight</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Hard seeds of hate I planted</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#year">When the Year Grows Old</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">I cannot but remember</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sonnets">Sonnets</A><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sonnets1">I</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Thou art not lovelier than lilacs,—no,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sonnets2">II</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Time does not bring relief; you all have lied</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sonnets3">III</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Mindful of you the sodden earth in spring,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sonnets4">IV</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Not in this chamber only at my birth—</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sonnets4">V</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">If I should learn, in some quite casual way,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sonnets6">VI Bluebeard</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">This door you might not open, and you did;</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="renascence"></A> +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +Renascence and Other Poems<BR> +</H1> + +<BR><BR> + +<H3> +Renascence<BR> +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +All I could see from where I stood<BR> +Was three long mountains and a wood;<BR> +I turned and looked another way,<BR> +And saw three islands in a bay.<BR> +So with my eyes I traced the line<BR> +Of the horizon, thin and fine,<BR> +Straight around till I was come<BR> +Back to where I'd started from;<BR> +And all I saw from where I stood<BR> +Was three long mountains and a wood.<BR> +Over these things I could not see;<BR> +These were the things that bounded me;<BR> +And I could touch them with my hand,<BR> +Almost, I thought, from where I stand.<BR> +And all at once things seemed so small<BR> +My breath came short, and scarce at all.<BR> +But, sure, the sky is big, I said;<BR> +Miles and miles above my head;<BR> +So here upon my back I'll lie<BR> +And look my fill into the sky.<BR> +And so I looked, and, after all,<BR> +The sky was not so very tall.<BR> +The sky, I said, must somewhere stop,<BR> +And—sure enough!—I see the top!<BR> +The sky, I thought, is not so grand;<BR> +I 'most could touch it with my hand!<BR> +And reaching up my hand to try,<BR> +I screamed to feel it touch the sky.<BR> +I screamed, and—lo!—Infinity<BR> +Came down and settled over me;<BR> +Forced back my scream into my chest,<BR> +Bent back my arm upon my breast,<BR> +And, pressing of the Undefined<BR> +The definition on my mind,<BR> +Held up before my eyes a glass<BR> +Through which my shrinking sight did pass<BR> +Until it seemed I must behold<BR> +Immensity made manifold;<BR> +Whispered to me a word whose sound<BR> +Deafened the air for worlds around,<BR> +And brought unmuffled to my ears<BR> +The gossiping of friendly spheres,<BR> +The creaking of the tented sky,<BR> +The ticking of Eternity.<BR> +I saw and heard, and knew at last<BR> +The How and Why of all things, past,<BR> +And present, and forevermore.<BR> +The Universe, cleft to the core,<BR> +Lay open to my probing sense<BR> +That, sick'ning, I would fain pluck thence<BR> +But could not,—nay! But needs must suck<BR> +At the great wound, and could not pluck<BR> +My lips away till I had drawn<BR> +All venom out.—Ah, fearful pawn!<BR> +For my omniscience paid I toll<BR> +In infinite remorse of soul.<BR> +All sin was of my sinning, all<BR> +Atoning mine, and mine the gall<BR> +Of all regret. Mine was the weight<BR> +Of every brooded wrong, the hate<BR> +That stood behind each envious thrust,<BR> +Mine every greed, mine every lust.<BR> +And all the while for every grief,<BR> +Each suffering, I craved relief<BR> +With individual desire,—<BR> +Craved all in vain! And felt fierce fire<BR> +About a thousand people crawl;<BR> +Perished with each,—then mourned for all!<BR> +A man was starving in Capri;<BR> +He moved his eyes and looked at me;<BR> +I felt his gaze, I heard his moan,<BR> +And knew his hunger as my own.<BR> +I saw at sea a great fog bank<BR> +Between two ships that struck and sank;<BR> +A thousand screams the heavens smote;<BR> +And every scream tore through my throat.<BR> +No hurt I did not feel, no death<BR> +That was not mine; mine each last breath<BR> +That, crying, met an answering cry<BR> +From the compassion that was I.<BR> +All suffering mine, and mine its rod;<BR> +Mine, pity like the pity of God.<BR> +Ah, awful weight! Infinity<BR> +Pressed down upon the finite Me!<BR> +My anguished spirit, like a bird,<BR> +Beating against my lips I heard;<BR> +Yet lay the weight so close about<BR> +There was no room for it without.<BR> +And so beneath the weight lay I<BR> +And suffered death, but could not die.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Long had I lain thus, craving death,<BR> +When quietly the earth beneath<BR> +Gave way, and inch by inch, so great<BR> +At last had grown the crushing weight,<BR> +Into the earth I sank till I<BR> +Full six feet under ground did lie,<BR> +And sank no more,—there is no weight<BR> +Can follow here, however great.<BR> +From off my breast I felt it roll,<BR> +And as it went my tortured soul<BR> +Burst forth and fled in such a gust<BR> +That all about me swirled the dust.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Deep in the earth I rested now;<BR> +Cool is its hand upon the brow<BR> +And soft its breast beneath the head<BR> +Of one who is so gladly dead.<BR> +And all at once, and over all<BR> +The pitying rain began to fall;<BR> +I lay and heard each pattering hoof<BR> +Upon my lowly, thatched roof,<BR> +And seemed to love the sound far more<BR> +Than ever I had done before.<BR> +For rain it hath a friendly sound<BR> +To one who's six feet underground;<BR> +And scarce the friendly voice or face:<BR> +A grave is such a quiet place.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The rain, I said, is kind to come<BR> +And speak to me in my new home.<BR> +I would I were alive again<BR> +To kiss the fingers of the rain,<BR> +To drink into my eyes the shine<BR> +Of every slanting silver line,<BR> +To catch the freshened, fragrant breeze<BR> +From drenched and dripping apple-trees.<BR> +For soon the shower will be done,<BR> +And then the broad face of the sun<BR> +Will laugh above the rain-soaked earth<BR> +Until the world with answering mirth<BR> +Shakes joyously, and each round drop<BR> +Rolls, twinkling, from its grass-blade top.<BR> +How can I bear it; buried here,<BR> +While overhead the sky grows clear<BR> +And blue again after the storm?<BR> +O, multi-colored, multiform,<BR> +Beloved beauty over me,<BR> +That I shall never, never see<BR> +Again! Spring-silver, autumn-gold,<BR> +That I shall never more behold!<BR> +Sleeping your myriad magics through,<BR> +Close-sepulchred away from you!<BR> +O God, I cried, give me new birth,<BR> +And put me back upon the earth!<BR> +Upset each cloud's gigantic gourd<BR> +And let the heavy rain, down-poured<BR> +In one big torrent, set me free,<BR> +Washing my grave away from me!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I ceased; and through the breathless hush<BR> +That answered me, the far-off rush<BR> +Of herald wings came whispering<BR> +Like music down the vibrant string<BR> +Of my ascending prayer, and—crash!<BR> +Before the wild wind's whistling lash<BR> +The startled storm-clouds reared on high<BR> +And plunged in terror down the sky,<BR> +And the big rain in one black wave<BR> +Fell from the sky and struck my grave.<BR> +I know not how such things can be;<BR> +I only know there came to me<BR> +A fragrance such as never clings<BR> +To aught save happy living things;<BR> +A sound as of some joyous elf<BR> +Singing sweet songs to please himself,<BR> +And, through and over everything,<BR> +A sense of glad awakening.<BR> +The grass, a-tiptoe at my ear,<BR> +Whispering to me I could hear;<BR> +I felt the rain's cool finger-tips<BR> +Brushed tenderly across my lips,<BR> +Laid gently on my sealed sight,<BR> +And all at once the heavy night<BR> +Fell from my eyes and I could see,—<BR> +A drenched and dripping apple-tree,<BR> +A last long line of silver rain,<BR> +A sky grown clear and blue again.<BR> +And as I looked a quickening gust<BR> +Of wind blew up to me and thrust<BR> +Into my face a miracle<BR> +Of orchard-breath, and with the smell,—<BR> +I know not how such things can be!—<BR> +I breathed my soul back into me.<BR> +Ah! Up then from the ground sprang I<BR> +And hailed the earth with such a cry<BR> +As is not heard save from a man<BR> +Who has been dead, and lives again.<BR> +About the trees my arms I wound;<BR> +Like one gone mad I hugged the ground;<BR> +I raised my quivering arms on high;<BR> +I laughed and laughed into the sky,<BR> +Till at my throat a strangling sob<BR> +Caught fiercely, and a great heart-throb<BR> +Sent instant tears into my eyes;<BR> +O God, I cried, no dark disguise<BR> +Can e'er hereafter hide from me<BR> +Thy radiant identity!<BR> +Thou canst not move across the grass<BR> +But my quick eyes will see Thee pass,<BR> +Nor speak, however silently,<BR> +But my hushed voice will answer Thee.<BR> +I know the path that tells Thy way<BR> +Through the cool eve of every day;<BR> +God, I can push the grass apart<BR> +And lay my finger on Thy heart!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The world stands out on either side<BR> +No wider than the heart is wide;<BR> +Above the world is stretched the sky,—<BR> +No higher than the soul is high.<BR> +The heart can push the sea and land<BR> +Farther away on either hand;<BR> +The soul can split the sky in two,<BR> +And let the face of God shine through.<BR> +But East and West will pinch the heart<BR> +That can not keep them pushed apart;<BR> +And he whose soul is flat—the sky<BR> +Will cave in on him by and by.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="interim"></A> +<H3> +Interim +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The room is full of you!—As I came in<BR> +And closed the door behind me, all at once<BR> +A something in the air, intangible,<BR> +Yet stiff with meaning, struck my senses sick!—<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Sharp, unfamiliar odors have destroyed<BR> +Each other room's dear personality.<BR> +The heavy scent of damp, funereal flowers,—<BR> +The very essence, hush-distilled, of Death—<BR> +Has strangled that habitual breath of home<BR> +Whose expiration leaves all houses dead;<BR> +And wheresoe'er I look is hideous change.<BR> +Save here. Here 'twas as if a weed-choked gate<BR> +Had opened at my touch, and I had stepped<BR> +Into some long-forgot, enchanted, strange,<BR> +Sweet garden of a thousand years ago<BR> +And suddenly thought, "I have been here before!"<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +You are not here. I know that you are gone,<BR> +And will not ever enter here again.<BR> +And yet it seems to me, if I should speak,<BR> +Your silent step must wake across the hall;<BR> +If I should turn my head, that your sweet eyes<BR> +Would kiss me from the door.—So short a time<BR> +To teach my life its transposition to<BR> +This difficult and unaccustomed key!—<BR> +The room is as you left it; your last touch—<BR> +A thoughtless pressure, knowing not itself<BR> +As saintly—hallows now each simple thing;<BR> +Hallows and glorifies, and glows between<BR> +The dust's grey fingers like a shielded light.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +There is your book, just as you laid it down,<BR> +Face to the table,—I cannot believe<BR> +That you are gone!—Just then it seemed to me<BR> +You must be here. I almost laughed to think<BR> +How like reality the dream had been;<BR> +Yet knew before I laughed, and so was still.<BR> +That book, outspread, just as you laid it down!<BR> +Perhaps you thought, "I wonder what comes next,<BR> +And whether this or this will be the end";<BR> +So rose, and left it, thinking to return.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Perhaps that chair, when you arose and passed<BR> +Out of the room, rocked silently a while<BR> +Ere it again was still. When you were gone<BR> +Forever from the room, perhaps that chair,<BR> +Stirred by your movement, rocked a little while,<BR> +Silently, to and fro...<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +And here are the last words your fingers wrote,<BR> +Scrawled in broad characters across a page<BR> +In this brown book I gave you. Here your hand,<BR> +Guiding your rapid pen, moved up and down.<BR> +Here with a looping knot you crossed a "t",<BR> +And here another like it, just beyond<BR> +These two eccentric "e's". You were so small,<BR> +And wrote so brave a hand!<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 12.5em">How strange it seems</SPAN><BR> +That of all words these are the words you chose!<BR> +And yet a simple choice; you did not know<BR> +You would not write again. If you had known—<BR> +But then, it does not matter,—and indeed<BR> +If you had known there was so little time<BR> +You would have dropped your pen and come to me<BR> +And this page would be empty, and some phrase<BR> +Other than this would hold my wonder now.<BR> +Yet, since you could not know, and it befell<BR> +That these are the last words your fingers wrote,<BR> +There is a dignity some might not see<BR> +In this, "I picked the first sweet-pea to-day."<BR> +To-day! Was there an opening bud beside it<BR> +You left until to-morrow?—O my love,<BR> +The things that withered,—and you came not back!<BR> +That day you filled this circle of my arms<BR> +That now is empty. (O my empty life!)<BR> +That day—that day you picked the first sweet-pea,—<BR> +And brought it in to show me! I recall<BR> +With terrible distinctness how the smell<BR> +Of your cool gardens drifted in with you.<BR> +I know, you held it up for me to see<BR> +And flushed because I looked not at the flower,<BR> +But at your face; and when behind my look<BR> +You saw such unmistakable intent<BR> +You laughed and brushed your flower against my lips.<BR> +(You were the fairest thing God ever made,<BR> +I think.) And then your hands above my heart<BR> +Drew down its stem into a fastening,<BR> +And while your head was bent I kissed your hair.<BR> +I wonder if you knew. (Beloved hands!<BR> +Somehow I cannot seem to see them still.<BR> +Somehow I cannot seem to see the dust<BR> +In your bright hair.) What is the need of Heaven<BR> +When earth can be so sweet?—If only God<BR> +Had let us love,—and show the world the way!<BR> +Strange cancellings must ink th' eternal books<BR> +When love-crossed-out will bring the answer right!<BR> +That first sweet-pea! I wonder where it is.<BR> +It seems to me I laid it down somewhere,<BR> +And yet,—I am not sure. I am not sure,<BR> +Even, if it was white or pink; for then<BR> +'Twas much like any other flower to me,<BR> +Save that it was the first. I did not know,<BR> +Then, that it was the last. If I had known—<BR> +But then, it does not matter. Strange how few,<BR> +After all's said and done, the things that are<BR> +Of moment.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Few indeed! When I can make</SPAN><BR> +Of ten small words a rope to hang the world!<BR> +"I had you and I have you now no more."<BR> +There, there it dangles,—where's the little truth<BR> +That can for long keep footing under that<BR> +When its slack syllables tighten to a thought?<BR> +Here, let me write it down! I wish to see<BR> +Just how a thing like that will look on paper!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"*I had you and I have you now no more*."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +O little words, how can you run so straight<BR> +Across the page, beneath the weight you bear?<BR> +How can you fall apart, whom such a theme<BR> +Has bound together, and hereafter aid<BR> +In trivial expression, that have been<BR> +So hideously dignified?—Would God<BR> +That tearing you apart would tear the thread<BR> +I strung you on! Would God—O God, my mind<BR> +Stretches asunder on this merciless rack<BR> +Of imagery! O, let me sleep a while!<BR> +Would I could sleep, and wake to find me back<BR> +In that sweet summer afternoon with you.<BR> +Summer? 'Tis summer still by the calendar!<BR> +How easily could God, if He so willed,<BR> +Set back the world a little turn or two!<BR> +Correct its griefs, and bring its joys again!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +We were so wholly one I had not thought<BR> +That we could die apart. I had not thought<BR> +That I could move,—and you be stiff and still!<BR> +That I could speak,—and you perforce be dumb!<BR> +I think our heart-strings were, like warp and woof<BR> +In some firm fabric, woven in and out;<BR> +Your golden filaments in fair design<BR> +Across my duller fibre. And to-day<BR> +The shining strip is rent; the exquisite<BR> +Fine pattern is destroyed; part of your heart<BR> +Aches in my breast; part of my heart lies chilled<BR> +In the damp earth with you. I have been torn<BR> +In two, and suffer for the rest of me.<BR> +What is my life to me? And what am I<BR> +To life,—a ship whose star has guttered out?<BR> +A Fear that in the deep night starts awake<BR> +Perpetually, to find its senses strained<BR> +Against the taut strings of the quivering air,<BR> +Awaiting the return of some dread chord?<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Dark, Dark, is all I find for metaphor;<BR> +All else were contrast,—save that contrast's wall<BR> +Is down, and all opposed things flow together<BR> +Into a vast monotony, where night<BR> +And day, and frost and thaw, and death and life,<BR> +Are synonyms. What now—what now to me<BR> +Are all the jabbering birds and foolish flowers<BR> +That clutter up the world? You were my song!<BR> +Now, let discord scream! You were my flower!<BR> +Now let the world grow weeds! For I shall not<BR> +Plant things above your grave—(the common balm<BR> +Of the conventional woe for its own wound!)<BR> +Amid sensations rendered negative<BR> +By your elimination stands to-day,<BR> +Certain, unmixed, the element of grief;<BR> +I sorrow; and I shall not mock my truth<BR> +With travesties of suffering, nor seek<BR> +To effigy its incorporeal bulk<BR> +In little wry-faced images of woe.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I cannot call you back; and I desire<BR> +No utterance of my immaterial voice.<BR> +I cannot even turn my face this way<BR> +Or that, and say, "My face is turned to you";<BR> +I know not where you are, I do not know<BR> +If Heaven hold you or if earth transmute,<BR> +Body and soul, you into earth again;<BR> +But this I know:—not for one second's space<BR> +Shall I insult my sight with visionings<BR> +Such as the credulous crowd so eager-eyed<BR> +Beholds, self-conjured, in the empty air.<BR> +Let the world wail! Let drip its easy tears!<BR> +My sorrow shall be dumb!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +—What do I say?<BR> +God! God!—God pity me! Am I gone mad<BR> +That I should spit upon a rosary?<BR> +Am I become so shrunken? Would to God<BR> +I too might feel that frenzied faith whose touch<BR> +Makes temporal the most enduring grief;<BR> +Though it must walk a while, as is its wont,<BR> +With wild lamenting! Would I too might weep<BR> +Where weeps the world and hangs its piteous wreaths<BR> +For its new dead! Not Truth, but Faith, it is<BR> +That keeps the world alive. If all at once<BR> +Faith were to slacken,—that unconscious faith<BR> +Which must, I know, yet be the corner-stone<BR> +Of all believing,—birds now flying fearless<BR> +Across would drop in terror to the earth;<BR> +Fishes would drown; and the all-governing reins<BR> +Would tangle in the frantic hands of God<BR> +And the worlds gallop headlong to destruction!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +O God, I see it now, and my sick brain<BR> +Staggers and swoons! How often over me<BR> +Flashes this breathlessness of sudden sight<BR> +In which I see the universe unrolled<BR> +Before me like a scroll and read thereon<BR> +Chaos and Doom, where helpless planets whirl<BR> +Dizzily round and round and round and round,<BR> +Like tops across a table, gathering speed<BR> +With every spin, to waver on the edge<BR> +One instant—looking over—and the next<BR> +To shudder and lurch forward out of sight—<BR> +</P> + +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em; letter-spacing: 2em">*****</SPAN><BR> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Ah, I am worn out—I am wearied out—<BR> +It is too much—I am but flesh and blood,<BR> +And I must sleep. Though you were dead again,<BR> +I am but flesh and blood and I must sleep.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="suicide"></A> +<H3> +The Suicide +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Curse thee, Life, I will live with thee no more!<BR> +Thou hast mocked me, starved me, beat my body sore!<BR> +And all for a pledge that was not pledged by me,<BR> +I have kissed thy crust and eaten sparingly<BR> +That I might eat again, and met thy sneers<BR> +With deprecations, and thy blows with tears,—<BR> +Aye, from thy glutted lash, glad, crawled away,<BR> +As if spent passion were a holiday!<BR> +And now I go. Nor threat, nor easy vow<BR> +Of tardy kindness can avail thee now<BR> +With me, whence fear and faith alike are flown;<BR> +Lonely I came, and I depart alone,<BR> +And know not where nor unto whom I go;<BR> +But that thou canst not follow me I know."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Thus I to Life, and ceased; but through my brain<BR> +My thought ran still, until I spake again:<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Ah, but I go not as I came,—no trace<BR> +Is mine to bear away of that old grace<BR> +I brought! I have been heated in thy fires,<BR> +Bent by thy hands, fashioned to thy desires,<BR> +Thy mark is on me! I am not the same<BR> +Nor ever more shall be, as when I came.<BR> +Ashes am I of all that once I seemed.<BR> +In me all's sunk that leapt, and all that dreamed<BR> +Is wakeful for alarm,—oh, shame to thee,<BR> +For the ill change that thou hast wrought in me,<BR> +Who laugh no more nor lift my throat to sing!<BR> +Ah, Life, I would have been a pleasant thing<BR> +To have about the house when I was grown<BR> +If thou hadst left my little joys alone!<BR> +I asked of thee no favor save this one:<BR> +That thou wouldst leave me playing in the sun!<BR> +And this thou didst deny, calling my name<BR> +Insistently, until I rose and came.<BR> +I saw the sun no more.—It were not well<BR> +So long on these unpleasant thoughts to dwell,<BR> +Need I arise to-morrow and renew<BR> +Again my hated tasks, but I am through<BR> +With all things save my thoughts and this one night,<BR> +So that in truth I seem already quite<BR> +Free and remote from thee,—I feel no haste<BR> +And no reluctance to depart; I taste<BR> +Merely, with thoughtful mien, an unknown draught,<BR> +That in a little while I shall have quaffed."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Thus I to Life, and ceased, and slightly smiled,<BR> +Looking at nothing; and my thin dreams filed<BR> +Before me one by one till once again<BR> +I set new words unto an old refrain:<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Treasures thou hast that never have been mine!<BR> +Warm lights in many a secret chamber shine<BR> +Of thy gaunt house, and gusts of song have blown<BR> +Like blossoms out to me that sat alone!<BR> +And I have waited well for thee to show<BR> +If any share were mine,—and now I go!<BR> +Nothing I leave, and if I naught attain<BR> +I shall but come into mine own again!"<BR> +Thus I to Life, and ceased, and spake no more,<BR> +But turning, straightway, sought a certain door<BR> +In the rear wall. Heavy it was, and low<BR> +And dark,—a way by which none e'er would go<BR> +That other exit had, and never knock<BR> +Was heard thereat,—bearing a curious lock<BR> +Some chance had shown me fashioned faultily,<BR> +Whereof Life held content the useless key,<BR> +And great coarse hinges, thick and rough with rust,<BR> +Whose sudden voice across a silence must,<BR> +I knew, be harsh and horrible to hear,—<BR> +A strange door, ugly like a dwarf.—So near<BR> +I came I felt upon my feet the chill<BR> +Of acid wind creeping across the sill.<BR> +So stood longtime, till over me at last<BR> +Came weariness, and all things other passed<BR> +To make it room; the still night drifted deep<BR> +Like snow about me, and I longed for sleep.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +But, suddenly, marking the morning hour,<BR> +Bayed the deep-throated bell within the tower!<BR> +Startled, I raised my head,—and with a shout<BR> +Laid hold upon the latch,—and was without.<BR> +</P> + +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em; letter-spacing: 2em">*****</SPAN><BR> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Ah, long-forgotten, well-remembered road,<BR> +Leading me back unto my old abode,<BR> +My father's house! There in the night I came,<BR> +And found them feasting, and all things the same<BR> +As they had been before. A splendour hung<BR> +Upon the walls, and such sweet songs were sung<BR> +As, echoing out of very long ago,<BR> +Had called me from the house of Life, I know.<BR> +So fair their raiment shone I looked in shame<BR> +On the unlovely garb in which I came;<BR> +Then straightway at my hesitancy mocked:<BR> +"It is my father's house!" I said and knocked;<BR> +And the door opened. To the shining crowd<BR> +Tattered and dark I entered, like a cloud,<BR> +Seeing no face but his; to him I crept,<BR> +And "Father!" I cried, and clasped his knees, and wept.<BR> +Ah, days of joy that followed! All alone<BR> +I wandered through the house. My own, my own,<BR> +My own to touch, my own to taste and smell,<BR> +All I had lacked so long and loved so well!<BR> +None shook me out of sleep, nor hushed my song,<BR> +Nor called me in from the sunlight all day long.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I know not when the wonder came to me<BR> +Of what my father's business might be,<BR> +And whither fared and on what errands bent<BR> +The tall and gracious messengers he sent.<BR> +Yet one day with no song from dawn till night<BR> +Wondering, I sat, and watched them out of sight.<BR> +And the next day I called; and on the third<BR> +Asked them if I might go,—but no one heard.<BR> +Then, sick with longing, I arose at last<BR> +And went unto my father,—in that vast<BR> +Chamber wherein he for so many years<BR> +Has sat, surrounded by his charts and spheres.<BR> +"Father," I said, "Father, I cannot play<BR> +The harp that thou didst give me, and all day<BR> +I sit in idleness, while to and fro<BR> +About me thy serene, grave servants go;<BR> +And I am weary of my lonely ease.<BR> +Better a perilous journey overseas<BR> +Away from thee, than this, the life I lead,<BR> +To sit all day in the sunshine like a weed<BR> +That grows to naught,—I love thee more than they<BR> +Who serve thee most; yet serve thee in no way.<BR> +Father, I beg of thee a little task<BR> +To dignify my days,—'tis all I ask<BR> +Forever, but forever, this denied,<BR> +I perish."<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 5em">"Child," my father's voice replied,</SPAN><BR> +"All things thy fancy hath desired of me<BR> +Thou hast received. I have prepared for thee<BR> +Within my house a spacious chamber, where<BR> +Are delicate things to handle and to wear,<BR> +And all these things are thine. Dost thou love song?<BR> +My minstrels shall attend thee all day long.<BR> +Or sigh for flowers? My fairest gardens stand<BR> +Open as fields to thee on every hand.<BR> +And all thy days this word shall hold the same:<BR> +No pleasure shalt thou lack that thou shalt name.<BR> +But as for tasks—" he smiled, and shook his head;<BR> +"Thou hadst thy task, and laidst it by", he said.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="godsworld"></A> +<H3> +God's World +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +O world, I cannot hold thee close enough!<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Thy winds, thy wide grey skies!</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Thy mists, that roll and rise!</SPAN><BR> +Thy woods, this autumn day, that ache and sag<BR> +And all but cry with colour! That gaunt crag<BR> +To crush! To lift the lean of that black bluff!<BR> +World, World, I cannot get thee close enough!<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Long have I known a glory in it all,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 5em">But never knew I this;</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 5em">Here such a passion is</SPAN><BR> +As stretcheth me apart,—Lord, I do fear<BR> +Thou'st made the world too beautiful this year;<BR> +My soul is all but out of me,—let fall<BR> +No burning leaf; prithee, let no bird call.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="afternoon"></A> +<H3> +Afternoon on a Hill +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I will be the gladdest thing<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Under the sun!</SPAN><BR> +I will touch a hundred flowers<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And not pick one.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I will look at cliffs and clouds<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">With quiet eyes,</SPAN><BR> +Watch the wind bow down the grass,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And the grass rise.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +And when lights begin to show<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Up from the town,</SPAN><BR> +I will mark which must be mine,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And then start down!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="sorrow"></A> +<H3> +Sorrow +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Sorrow like a ceaseless rain<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Beats upon my heart.</SPAN><BR> +People twist and scream in pain,—<BR> +Dawn will find them still again;<BR> +This has neither wax nor wane,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Neither stop nor start.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +People dress and go to town;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I sit in my chair.</SPAN><BR> +All my thoughts are slow and brown:<BR> +Standing up or sitting down<BR> +Little matters, or what gown<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Or what shoes I wear.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="tavern"></A> +<H3> +Tavern +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I'll keep a little tavern<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Below the high hill's crest,</SPAN><BR> +Wherein all grey-eyed people<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">May set them down and rest.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +There shall be plates a-plenty,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And mugs to melt the chill</SPAN><BR> +Of all the grey-eyed people<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Who happen up the hill.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +There sound will sleep the traveller,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And dream his journey's end,</SPAN><BR> +But I will rouse at midnight<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The falling fire to tend.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Aye, 'tis a curious fancy—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">But all the good I know</SPAN><BR> +Was taught me out of two grey eyes<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">A long time ago.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="ashes"></A> +<H3> +Ashes of Life +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Love has gone and left me and the days are all alike;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Eat I must, and sleep I will,—and would that night were here!</SPAN><BR> +But ah!—to lie awake and hear the slow hours strike!<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Would that it were day again!—with twilight near!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Love has gone and left me and I don't know what to do;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">This or that or what you will is all the same to me;</SPAN><BR> +But all the things that I begin I leave before I'm through,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">There's little use in anything as far as I can see.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Love has gone and left me,—and the neighbors knock and borrow,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And life goes on forever like the gnawing of a mouse,—</SPAN><BR> +And to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">There's this little street and this little house.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="ghost"></A> +<H3> +The Little Ghost +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I knew her for a little ghost<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That in my garden walked;</SPAN><BR> +The wall is high—higher than most—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And the green gate was locked.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +And yet I did not think of that<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Till after she was gone—</SPAN><BR> +I knew her by the broad white hat,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">All ruffled, she had on.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +By the dear ruffles round her feet,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">By her small hands that hung</SPAN><BR> +In their lace mitts, austere and sweet,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Her gown's white folds among.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I watched to see if she would stay,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">What she would do—and oh!</SPAN><BR> +She looked as if she liked the way<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I let my garden grow!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +She bent above my favourite mint<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">With conscious garden grace,</SPAN><BR> +She smiled and smiled—there was no hint<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Of sadness in her face.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +She held her gown on either side<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">To let her slippers show,</SPAN><BR> +And up the walk she went with pride,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The way great ladies go.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +And where the wall is built in new<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And is of ivy bare</SPAN><BR> +She paused—then opened and passed through<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">A gate that once was there.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="kin"></A> +<H3> +Kin to Sorrow +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Am I kin to Sorrow,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That so oft</SPAN><BR> +Falls the knocker of my door—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Neither loud nor soft,</SPAN><BR> +But as long accustomed,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Under Sorrow's hand?</SPAN><BR> +Marigolds around the step<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And rosemary stand,</SPAN><BR> +And then comes Sorrow—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And what does Sorrow care</SPAN><BR> +For the rosemary<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Or the marigolds there?</SPAN><BR> +Am I kin to Sorrow?<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Are we kin?</SPAN><BR> +That so oft upon my door—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">*Oh, come in*!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="songs"></A> +<A NAME="songs1"></A> +<H3> +Three Songs of Shattering +</H3> + +<H3> +I +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The first rose on my rose-tree<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Budded, bloomed, and shattered,</SPAN><BR> +During sad days when to me<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 5em">Nothing mattered.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Grief of grief has drained me clean;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Still it seems a pity</SPAN><BR> +No one saw,—it must have been<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 5em">Very pretty.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="songs2"></A> +<H3> +II +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Let the little birds sing;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Let the little lambs play;</SPAN><BR> +Spring is here; and so 'tis spring;—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">But not in the old way!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I recall a place<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Where a plum-tree grew;</SPAN><BR> +There you lifted up your face,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And blossoms covered you.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +If the little birds sing,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And the little lambs play,</SPAN><BR> +Spring is here; and so 'tis spring—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">But not in the old way!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="songs3"></A> +<H3> +III +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +All the dog-wood blossoms are underneath the tree!<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Ere spring was going—ah, spring is gone!</SPAN><BR> +And there comes no summer to the like of you and me,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Blossom time is early, but no fruit sets on.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +All the dog-wood blossoms are underneath the tree,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Browned at the edges, turned in a day;</SPAN><BR> +And I would with all my heart they trimmed a mound for me,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And weeds were tall on all the paths that led that way!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="shroud"></A> +<H3> +The Shroud +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Death, I say, my heart is bowed<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Unto thine,—O mother!</SPAN><BR> +This red gown will make a shroud<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Good as any other!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +(I, that would not wait to wear<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">My own bridal things,</SPAN><BR> +In a dress dark as my hair<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Made my answerings.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I, to-night, that till he came<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Could not, could not wait,</SPAN><BR> +In a gown as bright as flame<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Held for them the gate.)</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Death, I say, my heart is bowed<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Unto thine,—O mother!</SPAN><BR> +This red gown will make a shroud<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Good as any other!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="dream"></A> +<H3> +The Dream +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Love, if I weep it will not matter,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And if you laugh I shall not care;</SPAN><BR> +Foolish am I to think about it,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">But it is good to feel you there.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Love, in my sleep I dreamed of waking,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">White and awful the moonlight reached</SPAN><BR> +Over the floor, and somewhere, somewhere,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">There was a shutter loose,—it screeched!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Swung in the wind,—and no wind blowing!—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I was afraid, and turned to you,</SPAN><BR> +Put out my hand to you for comfort,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And you were gone! Cold, cold as dew,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Under my hand the moonlight lay!<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Love, if you laugh I shall not care,</SPAN><BR> +But if I weep it will not matter,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Ah, it is good to feel you there!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="indifference"></A> +<H3> +Indifference +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I said,—for Love was laggard, O, Love was slow to come,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">"I'll hear his step and know his step when I am warm in bed;</SPAN><BR> +But I'll never leave my pillow, though there be some<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">As would let him in—and take him in with tears!" I said.</SPAN><BR> +I lay,—for Love was laggard, O, he came not until dawn,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I lay and listened for his step and could not get to sleep;</SPAN><BR> +And he found me at my window with my big cloak on,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">All sorry with the tears some folks might weep!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="witchwife"></A> +<H3> +Witch-Wife +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +She is neither pink nor pale,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And she never will be all mine;</SPAN><BR> +She learned her hands in a fairy-tale,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And her mouth on a valentine.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +She has more hair than she needs;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">In the sun 'tis a woe to me!</SPAN><BR> +And her voice is a string of colored beads,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 0.5em">Or steps leading into the sea.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +She loves me all that she can,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And her ways to my ways resign;</SPAN><BR> +But she was not made for any man,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And she never will be all mine.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="blight"></A> +<H3> +Blight +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Hard seeds of hate I planted<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That should by now be grown,—</SPAN><BR> +Rough stalks, and from thick stamens<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">A poisonous pollen blown,</SPAN><BR> +And odors rank, unbreathable,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">From dark corollas thrown!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +At dawn from my damp garden<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I shook the chilly dew;</SPAN><BR> +The thin boughs locked behind me<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That sprang to let me through;</SPAN><BR> +The blossoms slept,—I sought a place<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Where nothing lovely grew.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +And there, when day was breaking,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I knelt and looked around:</SPAN><BR> +The light was near, the silence<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Was palpitant with sound;</SPAN><BR> +I drew my hate from out my breast<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And thrust it in the ground.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Oh, ye so fiercely tended,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Ye little seeds of hate!</SPAN><BR> +I bent above your growing<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Early and noon and late,</SPAN><BR> +Yet are ye drooped and pitiful,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I cannot rear ye straight!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The sun seeks out my garden,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">No nook is left in shade,</SPAN><BR> +No mist nor mold nor mildew<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Endures on any blade,</SPAN><BR> +Sweet rain slants under every bough:<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Ye falter, and ye fade.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="year"></A> +<H3> +When the Year Grows Old +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I cannot but remember<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">When the year grows old—</SPAN><BR> +October—November—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">How she disliked the cold!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +She used to watch the swallows<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Go down across the sky,</SPAN><BR> +And turn from the window<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">With a little sharp sigh.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +And often when the brown leaves<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Were brittle on the ground,</SPAN><BR> +And the wind in the chimney<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Made a melancholy sound,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +She had a look about her<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That I wish I could forget—</SPAN><BR> +The look of a scared thing<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Sitting in a net!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Oh, beautiful at nightfall<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The soft spitting snow!</SPAN><BR> +And beautiful the bare boughs<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Rubbing to and fro!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +But the roaring of the fire,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And the warmth of fur,</SPAN><BR> +And the boiling of the kettle<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Were beautiful to her!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I cannot but remember<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">When the year grows old—</SPAN><BR> +October—November—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">How she disliked the cold!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="sonnets"></A> +<A NAME="sonnets1"></A> +<H3> +Sonnets +</H3> + +<BR> + +<H3> +I +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Thou art not lovelier than lilacs,—no,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Nor honeysuckle; thou art not more fair</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Than small white single poppies,—I can bear</SPAN><BR> +Thy beauty; though I bend before thee, though<BR> +From left to right, not knowing where to go,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I turn my troubled eyes, nor here nor there</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Find any refuge from thee, yet I swear</SPAN><BR> +So has it been with mist,—with moonlight so.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Like him who day by day unto his draught<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Of delicate poison adds him one drop more</SPAN><BR> +Till he may drink unharmed the death of ten,<BR> +Even so, inured to beauty, who have quaffed<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Each hour more deeply than the hour before,</SPAN><BR> +I drink—and live—what has destroyed some men.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="sonnets2"></A> +<H3> +II +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Time does not bring relief; you all have lied<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Who told me time would ease me of my pain!</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I miss him in the weeping of the rain;</SPAN><BR> +I want him at the shrinking of the tide;<BR> +The old snows melt from every mountain-side,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And last year's leaves are smoke in every lane;</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">But last year's bitter loving must remain</SPAN><BR> +Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +There are a hundred places where I fear<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">To go,—so with his memory they brim!</SPAN><BR> +And entering with relief some quiet place<BR> +Where never fell his foot or shone his face<BR> +I say, "There is no memory of him here!"<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And so stand stricken, so remembering him!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="sonnets3"></A> +<H3> +III +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Mindful of you the sodden earth in spring,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And all the flowers that in the springtime grow,</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And dusty roads, and thistles, and the slow</SPAN><BR> +Rising of the round moon, all throats that sing<BR> +The summer through, and each departing wing,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And all the nests that the bared branches show,</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And all winds that in any weather blow,</SPAN><BR> +And all the storms that the four seasons bring.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +You go no more on your exultant feet<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Up paths that only mist and morning knew,</SPAN><BR> +Or watch the wind, or listen to the beat<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Of a bird's wings too high in air to view,—</SPAN><BR> +But you were something more than young and sweet<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And fair,—and the long year remembers you.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="sonnets4"></A> +<H3> +IV +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Not in this chamber only at my birth—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">When the long hours of that mysterious night</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Were over, and the morning was in sight—</SPAN><BR> +I cried, but in strange places, steppe and firth<BR> +I have not seen, through alien grief and mirth;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And never shall one room contain me quite</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Who in so many rooms first saw the light,</SPAN><BR> +Child of all mothers, native of the earth.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +So is no warmth for me at any fire<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">To-day, when the world's fire has burned so low;</SPAN><BR> +I kneel, spending my breath in vain desire,<BR> +At that cold hearth which one time roared so strong,<BR> +And straighten back in weariness, and long<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">To gather up my little gods and go.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="sonnets5"></A> +<H3> +V +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +If I should learn, in some quite casual way,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That you were gone, not to return again—</SPAN><BR> +Read from the back-page of a paper, say,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Held by a neighbor in a subway train,</SPAN><BR> +How at the corner of this avenue<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And such a street (so are the papers filled)</SPAN><BR> +A hurrying man—who happened to be you—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">At noon to-day had happened to be killed,</SPAN><BR> +I should not cry aloud—I could not cry<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Aloud, or wring my hands in such a place—</SPAN><BR> +I should but watch the station lights rush by<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">With a more careful interest on my face,</SPAN><BR> +Or raise my eyes and read with greater care<BR> +Where to store furs and how to treat the hair.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="sonnets6"></A> +<H3> +VI Bluebeard +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +This door you might not open, and you did;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">So enter now, and see for what slight thing</SPAN><BR> +You are betrayed.... Here is no treasure hid,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">No cauldron, no clear crystal mirroring</SPAN><BR> +The sought-for truth, no heads of women slain<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">For greed like yours, no writhings of distress,</SPAN><BR> +But only what you see.... Look yet again—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">An empty room, cobwebbed and comfortless.</SPAN><BR> +Yet this alone out of my life I kept<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Unto myself, lest any know me quite;</SPAN><BR> +And you did so profane me when you crept<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Unto the threshold of this room to-night</SPAN><BR> +That I must never more behold your face.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">This now is yours. I seek another place.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 109 ***</div> +</BODY> + +</HTML> + diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Renascence and Other Poems + +Author: Edna St. Vincent Millay + +Release Date: June 19, 2008 [EBook #109] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RENASCENCE AND OTHER POEMS *** + + + + +Produced by Alan Light. HTML version by Al Haines. + + + + + +</pre> + + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +Renascence and Other Poems +</H1> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +by +</H3> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +Edna St. Vincent Millay +</H2> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +Contents: +</H2> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#renascence">Renascence</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">All I could see from where I stood</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#interim">Interim</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">The room is full of you!—As I came in</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#suicide">The Suicide</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">"Curse thee, Life, I will live with thee no more!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#godsworld">God's World</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">O world, I cannot hold thee close enough!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#afternoon">Afternoon on a Hill</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">I will be the gladdest thing</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sorrow">Sorrow</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Sorrow like a ceaseless rain</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#tavern">Tavern</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">I'll keep a little tavern</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#ashes">Ashes of Life</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Love has gone and left me and the days are all alike;</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#ghost">The Little Ghost</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">I knew her for a little ghost</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#kin">Kin to Sorrow</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Am I kin to Sorrow,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#songs">Three Songs of Shattering</A><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#songs1">I</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">The first rose on my rose-tree</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#songs2">II</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Let the little birds sing;</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#songs3">III</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">All the dog-wood blossoms are underneath the tree!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#shroud">The Shroud</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Death, I say, my heart is bowed</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#dream">The Dream</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Love, if I weep it will not matter,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#indifference">Indifference</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">I said,—for Love was laggard, O, Love was slow to come,—</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#witchwife">Witch-Wife</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">She is neither pink nor pale,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#blight">Blight</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Hard seeds of hate I planted</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#year">When the Year Grows Old</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">I cannot but remember</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sonnets">Sonnets</A><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sonnets1">I</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Thou art not lovelier than lilacs,—no,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sonnets2">II</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Time does not bring relief; you all have lied</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sonnets3">III</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Mindful of you the sodden earth in spring,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sonnets4">IV</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Not in this chamber only at my birth—</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sonnets4">V</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">If I should learn, in some quite casual way,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#sonnets6">VI Bluebeard</A><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">This door you might not open, and you did;</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="renascence"></A> +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +Renascence and Other Poems<BR> +</H1> + +<BR><BR> + +<H3> +Renascence<BR> +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +All I could see from where I stood<BR> +Was three long mountains and a wood;<BR> +I turned and looked another way,<BR> +And saw three islands in a bay.<BR> +So with my eyes I traced the line<BR> +Of the horizon, thin and fine,<BR> +Straight around till I was come<BR> +Back to where I'd started from;<BR> +And all I saw from where I stood<BR> +Was three long mountains and a wood.<BR> +Over these things I could not see;<BR> +These were the things that bounded me;<BR> +And I could touch them with my hand,<BR> +Almost, I thought, from where I stand.<BR> +And all at once things seemed so small<BR> +My breath came short, and scarce at all.<BR> +But, sure, the sky is big, I said;<BR> +Miles and miles above my head;<BR> +So here upon my back I'll lie<BR> +And look my fill into the sky.<BR> +And so I looked, and, after all,<BR> +The sky was not so very tall.<BR> +The sky, I said, must somewhere stop,<BR> +And—sure enough!—I see the top!<BR> +The sky, I thought, is not so grand;<BR> +I 'most could touch it with my hand!<BR> +And reaching up my hand to try,<BR> +I screamed to feel it touch the sky.<BR> +I screamed, and—lo!—Infinity<BR> +Came down and settled over me;<BR> +Forced back my scream into my chest,<BR> +Bent back my arm upon my breast,<BR> +And, pressing of the Undefined<BR> +The definition on my mind,<BR> +Held up before my eyes a glass<BR> +Through which my shrinking sight did pass<BR> +Until it seemed I must behold<BR> +Immensity made manifold;<BR> +Whispered to me a word whose sound<BR> +Deafened the air for worlds around,<BR> +And brought unmuffled to my ears<BR> +The gossiping of friendly spheres,<BR> +The creaking of the tented sky,<BR> +The ticking of Eternity.<BR> +I saw and heard, and knew at last<BR> +The How and Why of all things, past,<BR> +And present, and forevermore.<BR> +The Universe, cleft to the core,<BR> +Lay open to my probing sense<BR> +That, sick'ning, I would fain pluck thence<BR> +But could not,—nay! But needs must suck<BR> +At the great wound, and could not pluck<BR> +My lips away till I had drawn<BR> +All venom out.—Ah, fearful pawn!<BR> +For my omniscience paid I toll<BR> +In infinite remorse of soul.<BR> +All sin was of my sinning, all<BR> +Atoning mine, and mine the gall<BR> +Of all regret. Mine was the weight<BR> +Of every brooded wrong, the hate<BR> +That stood behind each envious thrust,<BR> +Mine every greed, mine every lust.<BR> +And all the while for every grief,<BR> +Each suffering, I craved relief<BR> +With individual desire,—<BR> +Craved all in vain! And felt fierce fire<BR> +About a thousand people crawl;<BR> +Perished with each,—then mourned for all!<BR> +A man was starving in Capri;<BR> +He moved his eyes and looked at me;<BR> +I felt his gaze, I heard his moan,<BR> +And knew his hunger as my own.<BR> +I saw at sea a great fog bank<BR> +Between two ships that struck and sank;<BR> +A thousand screams the heavens smote;<BR> +And every scream tore through my throat.<BR> +No hurt I did not feel, no death<BR> +That was not mine; mine each last breath<BR> +That, crying, met an answering cry<BR> +From the compassion that was I.<BR> +All suffering mine, and mine its rod;<BR> +Mine, pity like the pity of God.<BR> +Ah, awful weight! Infinity<BR> +Pressed down upon the finite Me!<BR> +My anguished spirit, like a bird,<BR> +Beating against my lips I heard;<BR> +Yet lay the weight so close about<BR> +There was no room for it without.<BR> +And so beneath the weight lay I<BR> +And suffered death, but could not die.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Long had I lain thus, craving death,<BR> +When quietly the earth beneath<BR> +Gave way, and inch by inch, so great<BR> +At last had grown the crushing weight,<BR> +Into the earth I sank till I<BR> +Full six feet under ground did lie,<BR> +And sank no more,—there is no weight<BR> +Can follow here, however great.<BR> +From off my breast I felt it roll,<BR> +And as it went my tortured soul<BR> +Burst forth and fled in such a gust<BR> +That all about me swirled the dust.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Deep in the earth I rested now;<BR> +Cool is its hand upon the brow<BR> +And soft its breast beneath the head<BR> +Of one who is so gladly dead.<BR> +And all at once, and over all<BR> +The pitying rain began to fall;<BR> +I lay and heard each pattering hoof<BR> +Upon my lowly, thatched roof,<BR> +And seemed to love the sound far more<BR> +Than ever I had done before.<BR> +For rain it hath a friendly sound<BR> +To one who's six feet underground;<BR> +And scarce the friendly voice or face:<BR> +A grave is such a quiet place.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The rain, I said, is kind to come<BR> +And speak to me in my new home.<BR> +I would I were alive again<BR> +To kiss the fingers of the rain,<BR> +To drink into my eyes the shine<BR> +Of every slanting silver line,<BR> +To catch the freshened, fragrant breeze<BR> +From drenched and dripping apple-trees.<BR> +For soon the shower will be done,<BR> +And then the broad face of the sun<BR> +Will laugh above the rain-soaked earth<BR> +Until the world with answering mirth<BR> +Shakes joyously, and each round drop<BR> +Rolls, twinkling, from its grass-blade top.<BR> +How can I bear it; buried here,<BR> +While overhead the sky grows clear<BR> +And blue again after the storm?<BR> +O, multi-colored, multiform,<BR> +Beloved beauty over me,<BR> +That I shall never, never see<BR> +Again! Spring-silver, autumn-gold,<BR> +That I shall never more behold!<BR> +Sleeping your myriad magics through,<BR> +Close-sepulchred away from you!<BR> +O God, I cried, give me new birth,<BR> +And put me back upon the earth!<BR> +Upset each cloud's gigantic gourd<BR> +And let the heavy rain, down-poured<BR> +In one big torrent, set me free,<BR> +Washing my grave away from me!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I ceased; and through the breathless hush<BR> +That answered me, the far-off rush<BR> +Of herald wings came whispering<BR> +Like music down the vibrant string<BR> +Of my ascending prayer, and—crash!<BR> +Before the wild wind's whistling lash<BR> +The startled storm-clouds reared on high<BR> +And plunged in terror down the sky,<BR> +And the big rain in one black wave<BR> +Fell from the sky and struck my grave.<BR> +I know not how such things can be;<BR> +I only know there came to me<BR> +A fragrance such as never clings<BR> +To aught save happy living things;<BR> +A sound as of some joyous elf<BR> +Singing sweet songs to please himself,<BR> +And, through and over everything,<BR> +A sense of glad awakening.<BR> +The grass, a-tiptoe at my ear,<BR> +Whispering to me I could hear;<BR> +I felt the rain's cool finger-tips<BR> +Brushed tenderly across my lips,<BR> +Laid gently on my sealed sight,<BR> +And all at once the heavy night<BR> +Fell from my eyes and I could see,—<BR> +A drenched and dripping apple-tree,<BR> +A last long line of silver rain,<BR> +A sky grown clear and blue again.<BR> +And as I looked a quickening gust<BR> +Of wind blew up to me and thrust<BR> +Into my face a miracle<BR> +Of orchard-breath, and with the smell,—<BR> +I know not how such things can be!—<BR> +I breathed my soul back into me.<BR> +Ah! Up then from the ground sprang I<BR> +And hailed the earth with such a cry<BR> +As is not heard save from a man<BR> +Who has been dead, and lives again.<BR> +About the trees my arms I wound;<BR> +Like one gone mad I hugged the ground;<BR> +I raised my quivering arms on high;<BR> +I laughed and laughed into the sky,<BR> +Till at my throat a strangling sob<BR> +Caught fiercely, and a great heart-throb<BR> +Sent instant tears into my eyes;<BR> +O God, I cried, no dark disguise<BR> +Can e'er hereafter hide from me<BR> +Thy radiant identity!<BR> +Thou canst not move across the grass<BR> +But my quick eyes will see Thee pass,<BR> +Nor speak, however silently,<BR> +But my hushed voice will answer Thee.<BR> +I know the path that tells Thy way<BR> +Through the cool eve of every day;<BR> +God, I can push the grass apart<BR> +And lay my finger on Thy heart!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The world stands out on either side<BR> +No wider than the heart is wide;<BR> +Above the world is stretched the sky,—<BR> +No higher than the soul is high.<BR> +The heart can push the sea and land<BR> +Farther away on either hand;<BR> +The soul can split the sky in two,<BR> +And let the face of God shine through.<BR> +But East and West will pinch the heart<BR> +That can not keep them pushed apart;<BR> +And he whose soul is flat—the sky<BR> +Will cave in on him by and by.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="interim"></A> +<H3> +Interim +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The room is full of you!—As I came in<BR> +And closed the door behind me, all at once<BR> +A something in the air, intangible,<BR> +Yet stiff with meaning, struck my senses sick!—<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Sharp, unfamiliar odors have destroyed<BR> +Each other room's dear personality.<BR> +The heavy scent of damp, funereal flowers,—<BR> +The very essence, hush-distilled, of Death—<BR> +Has strangled that habitual breath of home<BR> +Whose expiration leaves all houses dead;<BR> +And wheresoe'er I look is hideous change.<BR> +Save here. Here 'twas as if a weed-choked gate<BR> +Had opened at my touch, and I had stepped<BR> +Into some long-forgot, enchanted, strange,<BR> +Sweet garden of a thousand years ago<BR> +And suddenly thought, "I have been here before!"<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +You are not here. I know that you are gone,<BR> +And will not ever enter here again.<BR> +And yet it seems to me, if I should speak,<BR> +Your silent step must wake across the hall;<BR> +If I should turn my head, that your sweet eyes<BR> +Would kiss me from the door.—So short a time<BR> +To teach my life its transposition to<BR> +This difficult and unaccustomed key!—<BR> +The room is as you left it; your last touch—<BR> +A thoughtless pressure, knowing not itself<BR> +As saintly—hallows now each simple thing;<BR> +Hallows and glorifies, and glows between<BR> +The dust's grey fingers like a shielded light.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +There is your book, just as you laid it down,<BR> +Face to the table,—I cannot believe<BR> +That you are gone!—Just then it seemed to me<BR> +You must be here. I almost laughed to think<BR> +How like reality the dream had been;<BR> +Yet knew before I laughed, and so was still.<BR> +That book, outspread, just as you laid it down!<BR> +Perhaps you thought, "I wonder what comes next,<BR> +And whether this or this will be the end";<BR> +So rose, and left it, thinking to return.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Perhaps that chair, when you arose and passed<BR> +Out of the room, rocked silently a while<BR> +Ere it again was still. When you were gone<BR> +Forever from the room, perhaps that chair,<BR> +Stirred by your movement, rocked a little while,<BR> +Silently, to and fro...<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +And here are the last words your fingers wrote,<BR> +Scrawled in broad characters across a page<BR> +In this brown book I gave you. Here your hand,<BR> +Guiding your rapid pen, moved up and down.<BR> +Here with a looping knot you crossed a "t",<BR> +And here another like it, just beyond<BR> +These two eccentric "e's". You were so small,<BR> +And wrote so brave a hand!<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 12.5em">How strange it seems</SPAN><BR> +That of all words these are the words you chose!<BR> +And yet a simple choice; you did not know<BR> +You would not write again. If you had known—<BR> +But then, it does not matter,—and indeed<BR> +If you had known there was so little time<BR> +You would have dropped your pen and come to me<BR> +And this page would be empty, and some phrase<BR> +Other than this would hold my wonder now.<BR> +Yet, since you could not know, and it befell<BR> +That these are the last words your fingers wrote,<BR> +There is a dignity some might not see<BR> +In this, "I picked the first sweet-pea to-day."<BR> +To-day! Was there an opening bud beside it<BR> +You left until to-morrow?—O my love,<BR> +The things that withered,—and you came not back!<BR> +That day you filled this circle of my arms<BR> +That now is empty. (O my empty life!)<BR> +That day—that day you picked the first sweet-pea,—<BR> +And brought it in to show me! I recall<BR> +With terrible distinctness how the smell<BR> +Of your cool gardens drifted in with you.<BR> +I know, you held it up for me to see<BR> +And flushed because I looked not at the flower,<BR> +But at your face; and when behind my look<BR> +You saw such unmistakable intent<BR> +You laughed and brushed your flower against my lips.<BR> +(You were the fairest thing God ever made,<BR> +I think.) And then your hands above my heart<BR> +Drew down its stem into a fastening,<BR> +And while your head was bent I kissed your hair.<BR> +I wonder if you knew. (Beloved hands!<BR> +Somehow I cannot seem to see them still.<BR> +Somehow I cannot seem to see the dust<BR> +In your bright hair.) What is the need of Heaven<BR> +When earth can be so sweet?—If only God<BR> +Had let us love,—and show the world the way!<BR> +Strange cancellings must ink th' eternal books<BR> +When love-crossed-out will bring the answer right!<BR> +That first sweet-pea! I wonder where it is.<BR> +It seems to me I laid it down somewhere,<BR> +And yet,—I am not sure. I am not sure,<BR> +Even, if it was white or pink; for then<BR> +'Twas much like any other flower to me,<BR> +Save that it was the first. I did not know,<BR> +Then, that it was the last. If I had known—<BR> +But then, it does not matter. Strange how few,<BR> +After all's said and done, the things that are<BR> +Of moment.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">Few indeed! When I can make</SPAN><BR> +Of ten small words a rope to hang the world!<BR> +"I had you and I have you now no more."<BR> +There, there it dangles,—where's the little truth<BR> +That can for long keep footing under that<BR> +When its slack syllables tighten to a thought?<BR> +Here, let me write it down! I wish to see<BR> +Just how a thing like that will look on paper!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"*I had you and I have you now no more*."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +O little words, how can you run so straight<BR> +Across the page, beneath the weight you bear?<BR> +How can you fall apart, whom such a theme<BR> +Has bound together, and hereafter aid<BR> +In trivial expression, that have been<BR> +So hideously dignified?—Would God<BR> +That tearing you apart would tear the thread<BR> +I strung you on! Would God—O God, my mind<BR> +Stretches asunder on this merciless rack<BR> +Of imagery! O, let me sleep a while!<BR> +Would I could sleep, and wake to find me back<BR> +In that sweet summer afternoon with you.<BR> +Summer? 'Tis summer still by the calendar!<BR> +How easily could God, if He so willed,<BR> +Set back the world a little turn or two!<BR> +Correct its griefs, and bring its joys again!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +We were so wholly one I had not thought<BR> +That we could die apart. I had not thought<BR> +That I could move,—and you be stiff and still!<BR> +That I could speak,—and you perforce be dumb!<BR> +I think our heart-strings were, like warp and woof<BR> +In some firm fabric, woven in and out;<BR> +Your golden filaments in fair design<BR> +Across my duller fibre. And to-day<BR> +The shining strip is rent; the exquisite<BR> +Fine pattern is destroyed; part of your heart<BR> +Aches in my breast; part of my heart lies chilled<BR> +In the damp earth with you. I have been torn<BR> +In two, and suffer for the rest of me.<BR> +What is my life to me? And what am I<BR> +To life,—a ship whose star has guttered out?<BR> +A Fear that in the deep night starts awake<BR> +Perpetually, to find its senses strained<BR> +Against the taut strings of the quivering air,<BR> +Awaiting the return of some dread chord?<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Dark, Dark, is all I find for metaphor;<BR> +All else were contrast,—save that contrast's wall<BR> +Is down, and all opposed things flow together<BR> +Into a vast monotony, where night<BR> +And day, and frost and thaw, and death and life,<BR> +Are synonyms. What now—what now to me<BR> +Are all the jabbering birds and foolish flowers<BR> +That clutter up the world? You were my song!<BR> +Now, let discord scream! You were my flower!<BR> +Now let the world grow weeds! For I shall not<BR> +Plant things above your grave—(the common balm<BR> +Of the conventional woe for its own wound!)<BR> +Amid sensations rendered negative<BR> +By your elimination stands to-day,<BR> +Certain, unmixed, the element of grief;<BR> +I sorrow; and I shall not mock my truth<BR> +With travesties of suffering, nor seek<BR> +To effigy its incorporeal bulk<BR> +In little wry-faced images of woe.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I cannot call you back; and I desire<BR> +No utterance of my immaterial voice.<BR> +I cannot even turn my face this way<BR> +Or that, and say, "My face is turned to you";<BR> +I know not where you are, I do not know<BR> +If Heaven hold you or if earth transmute,<BR> +Body and soul, you into earth again;<BR> +But this I know:—not for one second's space<BR> +Shall I insult my sight with visionings<BR> +Such as the credulous crowd so eager-eyed<BR> +Beholds, self-conjured, in the empty air.<BR> +Let the world wail! Let drip its easy tears!<BR> +My sorrow shall be dumb!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +—What do I say?<BR> +God! God!—God pity me! Am I gone mad<BR> +That I should spit upon a rosary?<BR> +Am I become so shrunken? Would to God<BR> +I too might feel that frenzied faith whose touch<BR> +Makes temporal the most enduring grief;<BR> +Though it must walk a while, as is its wont,<BR> +With wild lamenting! Would I too might weep<BR> +Where weeps the world and hangs its piteous wreaths<BR> +For its new dead! Not Truth, but Faith, it is<BR> +That keeps the world alive. If all at once<BR> +Faith were to slacken,—that unconscious faith<BR> +Which must, I know, yet be the corner-stone<BR> +Of all believing,—birds now flying fearless<BR> +Across would drop in terror to the earth;<BR> +Fishes would drown; and the all-governing reins<BR> +Would tangle in the frantic hands of God<BR> +And the worlds gallop headlong to destruction!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +O God, I see it now, and my sick brain<BR> +Staggers and swoons! How often over me<BR> +Flashes this breathlessness of sudden sight<BR> +In which I see the universe unrolled<BR> +Before me like a scroll and read thereon<BR> +Chaos and Doom, where helpless planets whirl<BR> +Dizzily round and round and round and round,<BR> +Like tops across a table, gathering speed<BR> +With every spin, to waver on the edge<BR> +One instant—looking over—and the next<BR> +To shudder and lurch forward out of sight—<BR> +</P> + +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em; letter-spacing: 2em">*****</SPAN><BR> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Ah, I am worn out—I am wearied out—<BR> +It is too much—I am but flesh and blood,<BR> +And I must sleep. Though you were dead again,<BR> +I am but flesh and blood and I must sleep.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="suicide"></A> +<H3> +The Suicide +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Curse thee, Life, I will live with thee no more!<BR> +Thou hast mocked me, starved me, beat my body sore!<BR> +And all for a pledge that was not pledged by me,<BR> +I have kissed thy crust and eaten sparingly<BR> +That I might eat again, and met thy sneers<BR> +With deprecations, and thy blows with tears,—<BR> +Aye, from thy glutted lash, glad, crawled away,<BR> +As if spent passion were a holiday!<BR> +And now I go. Nor threat, nor easy vow<BR> +Of tardy kindness can avail thee now<BR> +With me, whence fear and faith alike are flown;<BR> +Lonely I came, and I depart alone,<BR> +And know not where nor unto whom I go;<BR> +But that thou canst not follow me I know."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Thus I to Life, and ceased; but through my brain<BR> +My thought ran still, until I spake again:<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Ah, but I go not as I came,—no trace<BR> +Is mine to bear away of that old grace<BR> +I brought! I have been heated in thy fires,<BR> +Bent by thy hands, fashioned to thy desires,<BR> +Thy mark is on me! I am not the same<BR> +Nor ever more shall be, as when I came.<BR> +Ashes am I of all that once I seemed.<BR> +In me all's sunk that leapt, and all that dreamed<BR> +Is wakeful for alarm,—oh, shame to thee,<BR> +For the ill change that thou hast wrought in me,<BR> +Who laugh no more nor lift my throat to sing!<BR> +Ah, Life, I would have been a pleasant thing<BR> +To have about the house when I was grown<BR> +If thou hadst left my little joys alone!<BR> +I asked of thee no favor save this one:<BR> +That thou wouldst leave me playing in the sun!<BR> +And this thou didst deny, calling my name<BR> +Insistently, until I rose and came.<BR> +I saw the sun no more.—It were not well<BR> +So long on these unpleasant thoughts to dwell,<BR> +Need I arise to-morrow and renew<BR> +Again my hated tasks, but I am through<BR> +With all things save my thoughts and this one night,<BR> +So that in truth I seem already quite<BR> +Free and remote from thee,—I feel no haste<BR> +And no reluctance to depart; I taste<BR> +Merely, with thoughtful mien, an unknown draught,<BR> +That in a little while I shall have quaffed."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Thus I to Life, and ceased, and slightly smiled,<BR> +Looking at nothing; and my thin dreams filed<BR> +Before me one by one till once again<BR> +I set new words unto an old refrain:<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Treasures thou hast that never have been mine!<BR> +Warm lights in many a secret chamber shine<BR> +Of thy gaunt house, and gusts of song have blown<BR> +Like blossoms out to me that sat alone!<BR> +And I have waited well for thee to show<BR> +If any share were mine,—and now I go!<BR> +Nothing I leave, and if I naught attain<BR> +I shall but come into mine own again!"<BR> +Thus I to Life, and ceased, and spake no more,<BR> +But turning, straightway, sought a certain door<BR> +In the rear wall. Heavy it was, and low<BR> +And dark,—a way by which none e'er would go<BR> +That other exit had, and never knock<BR> +Was heard thereat,—bearing a curious lock<BR> +Some chance had shown me fashioned faultily,<BR> +Whereof Life held content the useless key,<BR> +And great coarse hinges, thick and rough with rust,<BR> +Whose sudden voice across a silence must,<BR> +I knew, be harsh and horrible to hear,—<BR> +A strange door, ugly like a dwarf.—So near<BR> +I came I felt upon my feet the chill<BR> +Of acid wind creeping across the sill.<BR> +So stood longtime, till over me at last<BR> +Came weariness, and all things other passed<BR> +To make it room; the still night drifted deep<BR> +Like snow about me, and I longed for sleep.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +But, suddenly, marking the morning hour,<BR> +Bayed the deep-throated bell within the tower!<BR> +Startled, I raised my head,—and with a shout<BR> +Laid hold upon the latch,—and was without.<BR> +</P> + +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em; letter-spacing: 2em">*****</SPAN><BR> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Ah, long-forgotten, well-remembered road,<BR> +Leading me back unto my old abode,<BR> +My father's house! There in the night I came,<BR> +And found them feasting, and all things the same<BR> +As they had been before. A splendour hung<BR> +Upon the walls, and such sweet songs were sung<BR> +As, echoing out of very long ago,<BR> +Had called me from the house of Life, I know.<BR> +So fair their raiment shone I looked in shame<BR> +On the unlovely garb in which I came;<BR> +Then straightway at my hesitancy mocked:<BR> +"It is my father's house!" I said and knocked;<BR> +And the door opened. To the shining crowd<BR> +Tattered and dark I entered, like a cloud,<BR> +Seeing no face but his; to him I crept,<BR> +And "Father!" I cried, and clasped his knees, and wept.<BR> +Ah, days of joy that followed! All alone<BR> +I wandered through the house. My own, my own,<BR> +My own to touch, my own to taste and smell,<BR> +All I had lacked so long and loved so well!<BR> +None shook me out of sleep, nor hushed my song,<BR> +Nor called me in from the sunlight all day long.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I know not when the wonder came to me<BR> +Of what my father's business might be,<BR> +And whither fared and on what errands bent<BR> +The tall and gracious messengers he sent.<BR> +Yet one day with no song from dawn till night<BR> +Wondering, I sat, and watched them out of sight.<BR> +And the next day I called; and on the third<BR> +Asked them if I might go,—but no one heard.<BR> +Then, sick with longing, I arose at last<BR> +And went unto my father,—in that vast<BR> +Chamber wherein he for so many years<BR> +Has sat, surrounded by his charts and spheres.<BR> +"Father," I said, "Father, I cannot play<BR> +The harp that thou didst give me, and all day<BR> +I sit in idleness, while to and fro<BR> +About me thy serene, grave servants go;<BR> +And I am weary of my lonely ease.<BR> +Better a perilous journey overseas<BR> +Away from thee, than this, the life I lead,<BR> +To sit all day in the sunshine like a weed<BR> +That grows to naught,—I love thee more than they<BR> +Who serve thee most; yet serve thee in no way.<BR> +Father, I beg of thee a little task<BR> +To dignify my days,—'tis all I ask<BR> +Forever, but forever, this denied,<BR> +I perish."<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 5em">"Child," my father's voice replied,</SPAN><BR> +"All things thy fancy hath desired of me<BR> +Thou hast received. I have prepared for thee<BR> +Within my house a spacious chamber, where<BR> +Are delicate things to handle and to wear,<BR> +And all these things are thine. Dost thou love song?<BR> +My minstrels shall attend thee all day long.<BR> +Or sigh for flowers? My fairest gardens stand<BR> +Open as fields to thee on every hand.<BR> +And all thy days this word shall hold the same:<BR> +No pleasure shalt thou lack that thou shalt name.<BR> +But as for tasks—" he smiled, and shook his head;<BR> +"Thou hadst thy task, and laidst it by", he said.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="godsworld"></A> +<H3> +God's World +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +O world, I cannot hold thee close enough!<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Thy winds, thy wide grey skies!</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Thy mists, that roll and rise!</SPAN><BR> +Thy woods, this autumn day, that ache and sag<BR> +And all but cry with colour! That gaunt crag<BR> +To crush! To lift the lean of that black bluff!<BR> +World, World, I cannot get thee close enough!<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Long have I known a glory in it all,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 5em">But never knew I this;</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 5em">Here such a passion is</SPAN><BR> +As stretcheth me apart,—Lord, I do fear<BR> +Thou'st made the world too beautiful this year;<BR> +My soul is all but out of me,—let fall<BR> +No burning leaf; prithee, let no bird call.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="afternoon"></A> +<H3> +Afternoon on a Hill +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I will be the gladdest thing<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Under the sun!</SPAN><BR> +I will touch a hundred flowers<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And not pick one.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I will look at cliffs and clouds<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">With quiet eyes,</SPAN><BR> +Watch the wind bow down the grass,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And the grass rise.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +And when lights begin to show<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Up from the town,</SPAN><BR> +I will mark which must be mine,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And then start down!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="sorrow"></A> +<H3> +Sorrow +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Sorrow like a ceaseless rain<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Beats upon my heart.</SPAN><BR> +People twist and scream in pain,—<BR> +Dawn will find them still again;<BR> +This has neither wax nor wane,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Neither stop nor start.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +People dress and go to town;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I sit in my chair.</SPAN><BR> +All my thoughts are slow and brown:<BR> +Standing up or sitting down<BR> +Little matters, or what gown<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Or what shoes I wear.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="tavern"></A> +<H3> +Tavern +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I'll keep a little tavern<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Below the high hill's crest,</SPAN><BR> +Wherein all grey-eyed people<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">May set them down and rest.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +There shall be plates a-plenty,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And mugs to melt the chill</SPAN><BR> +Of all the grey-eyed people<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Who happen up the hill.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +There sound will sleep the traveller,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And dream his journey's end,</SPAN><BR> +But I will rouse at midnight<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The falling fire to tend.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Aye, 'tis a curious fancy—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">But all the good I know</SPAN><BR> +Was taught me out of two grey eyes<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">A long time ago.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="ashes"></A> +<H3> +Ashes of Life +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Love has gone and left me and the days are all alike;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Eat I must, and sleep I will,—and would that night were here!</SPAN><BR> +But ah!—to lie awake and hear the slow hours strike!<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Would that it were day again!—with twilight near!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Love has gone and left me and I don't know what to do;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">This or that or what you will is all the same to me;</SPAN><BR> +But all the things that I begin I leave before I'm through,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">There's little use in anything as far as I can see.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Love has gone and left me,—and the neighbors knock and borrow,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And life goes on forever like the gnawing of a mouse,—</SPAN><BR> +And to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">There's this little street and this little house.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="ghost"></A> +<H3> +The Little Ghost +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I knew her for a little ghost<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That in my garden walked;</SPAN><BR> +The wall is high—higher than most—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And the green gate was locked.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +And yet I did not think of that<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Till after she was gone—</SPAN><BR> +I knew her by the broad white hat,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">All ruffled, she had on.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +By the dear ruffles round her feet,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">By her small hands that hung</SPAN><BR> +In their lace mitts, austere and sweet,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Her gown's white folds among.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I watched to see if she would stay,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">What she would do—and oh!</SPAN><BR> +She looked as if she liked the way<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I let my garden grow!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +She bent above my favourite mint<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">With conscious garden grace,</SPAN><BR> +She smiled and smiled—there was no hint<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Of sadness in her face.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +She held her gown on either side<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">To let her slippers show,</SPAN><BR> +And up the walk she went with pride,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The way great ladies go.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +And where the wall is built in new<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And is of ivy bare</SPAN><BR> +She paused—then opened and passed through<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">A gate that once was there.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="kin"></A> +<H3> +Kin to Sorrow +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Am I kin to Sorrow,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That so oft</SPAN><BR> +Falls the knocker of my door—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Neither loud nor soft,</SPAN><BR> +But as long accustomed,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Under Sorrow's hand?</SPAN><BR> +Marigolds around the step<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And rosemary stand,</SPAN><BR> +And then comes Sorrow—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And what does Sorrow care</SPAN><BR> +For the rosemary<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Or the marigolds there?</SPAN><BR> +Am I kin to Sorrow?<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Are we kin?</SPAN><BR> +That so oft upon my door—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">*Oh, come in*!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="songs"></A> +<A NAME="songs1"></A> +<H3> +Three Songs of Shattering +</H3> + +<H3> +I +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The first rose on my rose-tree<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Budded, bloomed, and shattered,</SPAN><BR> +During sad days when to me<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 5em">Nothing mattered.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Grief of grief has drained me clean;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Still it seems a pity</SPAN><BR> +No one saw,—it must have been<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 5em">Very pretty.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="songs2"></A> +<H3> +II +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Let the little birds sing;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Let the little lambs play;</SPAN><BR> +Spring is here; and so 'tis spring;—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">But not in the old way!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I recall a place<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Where a plum-tree grew;</SPAN><BR> +There you lifted up your face,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And blossoms covered you.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +If the little birds sing,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And the little lambs play,</SPAN><BR> +Spring is here; and so 'tis spring—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">But not in the old way!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="songs3"></A> +<H3> +III +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +All the dog-wood blossoms are underneath the tree!<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Ere spring was going—ah, spring is gone!</SPAN><BR> +And there comes no summer to the like of you and me,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Blossom time is early, but no fruit sets on.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +All the dog-wood blossoms are underneath the tree,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Browned at the edges, turned in a day;</SPAN><BR> +And I would with all my heart they trimmed a mound for me,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And weeds were tall on all the paths that led that way!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="shroud"></A> +<H3> +The Shroud +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Death, I say, my heart is bowed<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Unto thine,—O mother!</SPAN><BR> +This red gown will make a shroud<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Good as any other!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +(I, that would not wait to wear<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">My own bridal things,</SPAN><BR> +In a dress dark as my hair<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Made my answerings.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I, to-night, that till he came<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Could not, could not wait,</SPAN><BR> +In a gown as bright as flame<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Held for them the gate.)</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Death, I say, my heart is bowed<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Unto thine,—O mother!</SPAN><BR> +This red gown will make a shroud<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Good as any other!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="dream"></A> +<H3> +The Dream +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Love, if I weep it will not matter,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And if you laugh I shall not care;</SPAN><BR> +Foolish am I to think about it,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">But it is good to feel you there.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Love, in my sleep I dreamed of waking,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">White and awful the moonlight reached</SPAN><BR> +Over the floor, and somewhere, somewhere,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">There was a shutter loose,—it screeched!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Swung in the wind,—and no wind blowing!—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I was afraid, and turned to you,</SPAN><BR> +Put out my hand to you for comfort,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And you were gone! Cold, cold as dew,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Under my hand the moonlight lay!<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Love, if you laugh I shall not care,</SPAN><BR> +But if I weep it will not matter,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Ah, it is good to feel you there!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="indifference"></A> +<H3> +Indifference +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I said,—for Love was laggard, O, Love was slow to come,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">"I'll hear his step and know his step when I am warm in bed;</SPAN><BR> +But I'll never leave my pillow, though there be some<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">As would let him in—and take him in with tears!" I said.</SPAN><BR> +I lay,—for Love was laggard, O, he came not until dawn,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I lay and listened for his step and could not get to sleep;</SPAN><BR> +And he found me at my window with my big cloak on,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">All sorry with the tears some folks might weep!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="witchwife"></A> +<H3> +Witch-Wife +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +She is neither pink nor pale,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And she never will be all mine;</SPAN><BR> +She learned her hands in a fairy-tale,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And her mouth on a valentine.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +She has more hair than she needs;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">In the sun 'tis a woe to me!</SPAN><BR> +And her voice is a string of colored beads,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 0.5em">Or steps leading into the sea.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +She loves me all that she can,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And her ways to my ways resign;</SPAN><BR> +But she was not made for any man,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And she never will be all mine.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="blight"></A> +<H3> +Blight +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Hard seeds of hate I planted<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That should by now be grown,—</SPAN><BR> +Rough stalks, and from thick stamens<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">A poisonous pollen blown,</SPAN><BR> +And odors rank, unbreathable,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">From dark corollas thrown!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +At dawn from my damp garden<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I shook the chilly dew;</SPAN><BR> +The thin boughs locked behind me<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That sprang to let me through;</SPAN><BR> +The blossoms slept,—I sought a place<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Where nothing lovely grew.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +And there, when day was breaking,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I knelt and looked around:</SPAN><BR> +The light was near, the silence<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Was palpitant with sound;</SPAN><BR> +I drew my hate from out my breast<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And thrust it in the ground.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Oh, ye so fiercely tended,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Ye little seeds of hate!</SPAN><BR> +I bent above your growing<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Early and noon and late,</SPAN><BR> +Yet are ye drooped and pitiful,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I cannot rear ye straight!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The sun seeks out my garden,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">No nook is left in shade,</SPAN><BR> +No mist nor mold nor mildew<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Endures on any blade,</SPAN><BR> +Sweet rain slants under every bough:<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Ye falter, and ye fade.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="year"></A> +<H3> +When the Year Grows Old +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I cannot but remember<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">When the year grows old—</SPAN><BR> +October—November—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">How she disliked the cold!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +She used to watch the swallows<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Go down across the sky,</SPAN><BR> +And turn from the window<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">With a little sharp sigh.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +And often when the brown leaves<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Were brittle on the ground,</SPAN><BR> +And the wind in the chimney<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Made a melancholy sound,</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +She had a look about her<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That I wish I could forget—</SPAN><BR> +The look of a scared thing<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Sitting in a net!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Oh, beautiful at nightfall<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The soft spitting snow!</SPAN><BR> +And beautiful the bare boughs<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Rubbing to and fro!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +But the roaring of the fire,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And the warmth of fur,</SPAN><BR> +And the boiling of the kettle<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Were beautiful to her!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I cannot but remember<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">When the year grows old—</SPAN><BR> +October—November—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">How she disliked the cold!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="sonnets"></A> +<A NAME="sonnets1"></A> +<H3> +Sonnets +</H3> + +<BR> + +<H3> +I +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Thou art not lovelier than lilacs,—no,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Nor honeysuckle; thou art not more fair</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Than small white single poppies,—I can bear</SPAN><BR> +Thy beauty; though I bend before thee, though<BR> +From left to right, not knowing where to go,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I turn my troubled eyes, nor here nor there</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Find any refuge from thee, yet I swear</SPAN><BR> +So has it been with mist,—with moonlight so.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Like him who day by day unto his draught<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Of delicate poison adds him one drop more</SPAN><BR> +Till he may drink unharmed the death of ten,<BR> +Even so, inured to beauty, who have quaffed<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Each hour more deeply than the hour before,</SPAN><BR> +I drink—and live—what has destroyed some men.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="sonnets2"></A> +<H3> +II +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Time does not bring relief; you all have lied<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Who told me time would ease me of my pain!</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I miss him in the weeping of the rain;</SPAN><BR> +I want him at the shrinking of the tide;<BR> +The old snows melt from every mountain-side,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And last year's leaves are smoke in every lane;</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">But last year's bitter loving must remain</SPAN><BR> +Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +There are a hundred places where I fear<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">To go,—so with his memory they brim!</SPAN><BR> +And entering with relief some quiet place<BR> +Where never fell his foot or shone his face<BR> +I say, "There is no memory of him here!"<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And so stand stricken, so remembering him!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="sonnets3"></A> +<H3> +III +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Mindful of you the sodden earth in spring,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And all the flowers that in the springtime grow,</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And dusty roads, and thistles, and the slow</SPAN><BR> +Rising of the round moon, all throats that sing<BR> +The summer through, and each departing wing,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And all the nests that the bared branches show,</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And all winds that in any weather blow,</SPAN><BR> +And all the storms that the four seasons bring.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +You go no more on your exultant feet<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Up paths that only mist and morning knew,</SPAN><BR> +Or watch the wind, or listen to the beat<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Of a bird's wings too high in air to view,—</SPAN><BR> +But you were something more than young and sweet<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And fair,—and the long year remembers you.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="sonnets4"></A> +<H3> +IV +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Not in this chamber only at my birth—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">When the long hours of that mysterious night</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Were over, and the morning was in sight—</SPAN><BR> +I cried, but in strange places, steppe and firth<BR> +I have not seen, through alien grief and mirth;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And never shall one room contain me quite</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Who in so many rooms first saw the light,</SPAN><BR> +Child of all mothers, native of the earth.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +So is no warmth for me at any fire<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">To-day, when the world's fire has burned so low;</SPAN><BR> +I kneel, spending my breath in vain desire,<BR> +At that cold hearth which one time roared so strong,<BR> +And straighten back in weariness, and long<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">To gather up my little gods and go.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="sonnets5"></A> +<H3> +V +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +If I should learn, in some quite casual way,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That you were gone, not to return again—</SPAN><BR> +Read from the back-page of a paper, say,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Held by a neighbor in a subway train,</SPAN><BR> +How at the corner of this avenue<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And such a street (so are the papers filled)</SPAN><BR> +A hurrying man—who happened to be you—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">At noon to-day had happened to be killed,</SPAN><BR> +I should not cry aloud—I could not cry<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Aloud, or wring my hands in such a place—</SPAN><BR> +I should but watch the station lights rush by<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">With a more careful interest on my face,</SPAN><BR> +Or raise my eyes and read with greater care<BR> +Where to store furs and how to treat the hair.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="sonnets6"></A> +<H3> +VI Bluebeard +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +This door you might not open, and you did;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">So enter now, and see for what slight thing</SPAN><BR> +You are betrayed.... Here is no treasure hid,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">No cauldron, no clear crystal mirroring</SPAN><BR> +The sought-for truth, no heads of women slain<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">For greed like yours, no writhings of distress,</SPAN><BR> +But only what you see.... Look yet again—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">An empty room, cobwebbed and comfortless.</SPAN><BR> +Yet this alone out of my life I kept<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Unto myself, lest any know me quite;</SPAN><BR> +And you did so profane me when you crept<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Unto the threshold of this room to-night</SPAN><BR> +That I must never more behold your face.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">This now is yours. I seek another place.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Renascence and Other Poems, by +Edna St. Vincent Millay + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RENASCENCE AND OTHER POEMS *** + +***** This file should be named 109-h.htm or 109-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/109/ + +Produced by Alan Light. HTML version by Al Haines. + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Renascence and Other Poems + +Author: Edna St. Vincent Millay + +Release Date: June 19, 2008 [EBook #109] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RENASCENCE AND OTHER POEMS *** + + + + +Produced by Alan Light. HTML version by Al Haines. + + + + + + + + + +Renascence and Other Poems + + +by + +Edna St. Vincent Millay + + + + + Contents: + + + + Renascence + All I could see from where I stood + + Interim + The room is full of you!--As I came in + + The Suicide + "Curse thee, Life, I will live with thee no more! + + God's World + O world, I cannot hold thee close enough! + + Afternoon on a Hill + I will be the gladdest thing + + Sorrow + Sorrow like a ceaseless rain + + Tavern + I'll keep a little tavern + + Ashes of Life + Love has gone and left me and the days are all alike; + + The Little Ghost + I knew her for a little ghost + + Kin to Sorrow + Am I kin to Sorrow, + + Three Songs of Shattering + + I + The first rose on my rose-tree + + II + Let the little birds sing; + + III + All the dog-wood blossoms are underneath the tree! + + The Shroud + Death, I say, my heart is bowed + + The Dream + Love, if I weep it will not matter, + + Indifference + I said,--for Love was laggard, O, Love was slow to come,-- + + Witch-Wife + She is neither pink nor pale, + + Blight + Hard seeds of hate I planted + + When the Year Grows Old + I cannot but remember + + Sonnets + + I + Thou art not lovelier than lilacs,--no, + + II + Time does not bring relief; you all have lied + + III + Mindful of you the sodden earth in spring, + + IV + Not in this chamber only at my birth-- + + V + If I should learn, in some quite casual way, + + VI Bluebeard + This door you might not open, and you did; + + + + + Renascence and Other Poems + + + + + Renascence + + + All I could see from where I stood + Was three long mountains and a wood; + I turned and looked another way, + And saw three islands in a bay. + So with my eyes I traced the line + Of the horizon, thin and fine, + Straight around till I was come + Back to where I'd started from; + And all I saw from where I stood + Was three long mountains and a wood. + Over these things I could not see; + These were the things that bounded me; + And I could touch them with my hand, + Almost, I thought, from where I stand. + And all at once things seemed so small + My breath came short, and scarce at all. + But, sure, the sky is big, I said; + Miles and miles above my head; + So here upon my back I'll lie + And look my fill into the sky. + And so I looked, and, after all, + The sky was not so very tall. + The sky, I said, must somewhere stop, + And--sure enough!--I see the top! + The sky, I thought, is not so grand; + I 'most could touch it with my hand! + And reaching up my hand to try, + I screamed to feel it touch the sky. + I screamed, and--lo!--Infinity + Came down and settled over me; + Forced back my scream into my chest, + Bent back my arm upon my breast, + And, pressing of the Undefined + The definition on my mind, + Held up before my eyes a glass + Through which my shrinking sight did pass + Until it seemed I must behold + Immensity made manifold; + Whispered to me a word whose sound + Deafened the air for worlds around, + And brought unmuffled to my ears + The gossiping of friendly spheres, + The creaking of the tented sky, + The ticking of Eternity. + I saw and heard, and knew at last + The How and Why of all things, past, + And present, and forevermore. + The Universe, cleft to the core, + Lay open to my probing sense + That, sick'ning, I would fain pluck thence + But could not,--nay! But needs must suck + At the great wound, and could not pluck + My lips away till I had drawn + All venom out.--Ah, fearful pawn! + For my omniscience paid I toll + In infinite remorse of soul. + All sin was of my sinning, all + Atoning mine, and mine the gall + Of all regret. Mine was the weight + Of every brooded wrong, the hate + That stood behind each envious thrust, + Mine every greed, mine every lust. + And all the while for every grief, + Each suffering, I craved relief + With individual desire,-- + Craved all in vain! And felt fierce fire + About a thousand people crawl; + Perished with each,--then mourned for all! + A man was starving in Capri; + He moved his eyes and looked at me; + I felt his gaze, I heard his moan, + And knew his hunger as my own. + I saw at sea a great fog bank + Between two ships that struck and sank; + A thousand screams the heavens smote; + And every scream tore through my throat. + No hurt I did not feel, no death + That was not mine; mine each last breath + That, crying, met an answering cry + From the compassion that was I. + All suffering mine, and mine its rod; + Mine, pity like the pity of God. + Ah, awful weight! Infinity + Pressed down upon the finite Me! + My anguished spirit, like a bird, + Beating against my lips I heard; + Yet lay the weight so close about + There was no room for it without. + And so beneath the weight lay I + And suffered death, but could not die. + + Long had I lain thus, craving death, + When quietly the earth beneath + Gave way, and inch by inch, so great + At last had grown the crushing weight, + Into the earth I sank till I + Full six feet under ground did lie, + And sank no more,--there is no weight + Can follow here, however great. + From off my breast I felt it roll, + And as it went my tortured soul + Burst forth and fled in such a gust + That all about me swirled the dust. + + Deep in the earth I rested now; + Cool is its hand upon the brow + And soft its breast beneath the head + Of one who is so gladly dead. + And all at once, and over all + The pitying rain began to fall; + I lay and heard each pattering hoof + Upon my lowly, thatched roof, + And seemed to love the sound far more + Than ever I had done before. + For rain it hath a friendly sound + To one who's six feet underground; + And scarce the friendly voice or face: + A grave is such a quiet place. + + The rain, I said, is kind to come + And speak to me in my new home. + I would I were alive again + To kiss the fingers of the rain, + To drink into my eyes the shine + Of every slanting silver line, + To catch the freshened, fragrant breeze + From drenched and dripping apple-trees. + For soon the shower will be done, + And then the broad face of the sun + Will laugh above the rain-soaked earth + Until the world with answering mirth + Shakes joyously, and each round drop + Rolls, twinkling, from its grass-blade top. + How can I bear it; buried here, + While overhead the sky grows clear + And blue again after the storm? + O, multi-colored, multiform, + Beloved beauty over me, + That I shall never, never see + Again! Spring-silver, autumn-gold, + That I shall never more behold! + Sleeping your myriad magics through, + Close-sepulchred away from you! + O God, I cried, give me new birth, + And put me back upon the earth! + Upset each cloud's gigantic gourd + And let the heavy rain, down-poured + In one big torrent, set me free, + Washing my grave away from me! + + I ceased; and through the breathless hush + That answered me, the far-off rush + Of herald wings came whispering + Like music down the vibrant string + Of my ascending prayer, and--crash! + Before the wild wind's whistling lash + The startled storm-clouds reared on high + And plunged in terror down the sky, + And the big rain in one black wave + Fell from the sky and struck my grave. + I know not how such things can be; + I only know there came to me + A fragrance such as never clings + To aught save happy living things; + A sound as of some joyous elf + Singing sweet songs to please himself, + And, through and over everything, + A sense of glad awakening. + The grass, a-tiptoe at my ear, + Whispering to me I could hear; + I felt the rain's cool finger-tips + Brushed tenderly across my lips, + Laid gently on my sealed sight, + And all at once the heavy night + Fell from my eyes and I could see,-- + A drenched and dripping apple-tree, + A last long line of silver rain, + A sky grown clear and blue again. + And as I looked a quickening gust + Of wind blew up to me and thrust + Into my face a miracle + Of orchard-breath, and with the smell,-- + I know not how such things can be!-- + I breathed my soul back into me. + Ah! Up then from the ground sprang I + And hailed the earth with such a cry + As is not heard save from a man + Who has been dead, and lives again. + About the trees my arms I wound; + Like one gone mad I hugged the ground; + I raised my quivering arms on high; + I laughed and laughed into the sky, + Till at my throat a strangling sob + Caught fiercely, and a great heart-throb + Sent instant tears into my eyes; + O God, I cried, no dark disguise + Can e'er hereafter hide from me + Thy radiant identity! + Thou canst not move across the grass + But my quick eyes will see Thee pass, + Nor speak, however silently, + But my hushed voice will answer Thee. + I know the path that tells Thy way + Through the cool eve of every day; + God, I can push the grass apart + And lay my finger on Thy heart! + + The world stands out on either side + No wider than the heart is wide; + Above the world is stretched the sky,-- + No higher than the soul is high. + The heart can push the sea and land + Farther away on either hand; + The soul can split the sky in two, + And let the face of God shine through. + But East and West will pinch the heart + That can not keep them pushed apart; + And he whose soul is flat--the sky + Will cave in on him by and by. + + + + + Interim + + + The room is full of you!--As I came in + And closed the door behind me, all at once + A something in the air, intangible, + Yet stiff with meaning, struck my senses sick!-- + + Sharp, unfamiliar odors have destroyed + Each other room's dear personality. + The heavy scent of damp, funereal flowers,-- + The very essence, hush-distilled, of Death-- + Has strangled that habitual breath of home + Whose expiration leaves all houses dead; + And wheresoe'er I look is hideous change. + Save here. Here 'twas as if a weed-choked gate + Had opened at my touch, and I had stepped + Into some long-forgot, enchanted, strange, + Sweet garden of a thousand years ago + And suddenly thought, "I have been here before!" + + You are not here. I know that you are gone, + And will not ever enter here again. + And yet it seems to me, if I should speak, + Your silent step must wake across the hall; + If I should turn my head, that your sweet eyes + Would kiss me from the door.--So short a time + To teach my life its transposition to + This difficult and unaccustomed key!-- + The room is as you left it; your last touch-- + A thoughtless pressure, knowing not itself + As saintly--hallows now each simple thing; + Hallows and glorifies, and glows between + The dust's grey fingers like a shielded light. + + There is your book, just as you laid it down, + Face to the table,--I cannot believe + That you are gone!--Just then it seemed to me + You must be here. I almost laughed to think + How like reality the dream had been; + Yet knew before I laughed, and so was still. + That book, outspread, just as you laid it down! + Perhaps you thought, "I wonder what comes next, + And whether this or this will be the end"; + So rose, and left it, thinking to return. + + Perhaps that chair, when you arose and passed + Out of the room, rocked silently a while + Ere it again was still. When you were gone + Forever from the room, perhaps that chair, + Stirred by your movement, rocked a little while, + Silently, to and fro. . . + + And here are the last words your fingers wrote, + Scrawled in broad characters across a page + In this brown book I gave you. Here your hand, + Guiding your rapid pen, moved up and down. + Here with a looping knot you crossed a "t", + And here another like it, just beyond + These two eccentric "e's". You were so small, + And wrote so brave a hand! + How strange it seems + That of all words these are the words you chose! + And yet a simple choice; you did not know + You would not write again. If you had known-- + But then, it does not matter,--and indeed + If you had known there was so little time + You would have dropped your pen and come to me + And this page would be empty, and some phrase + Other than this would hold my wonder now. + Yet, since you could not know, and it befell + That these are the last words your fingers wrote, + There is a dignity some might not see + In this, "I picked the first sweet-pea to-day." + To-day! Was there an opening bud beside it + You left until to-morrow?--O my love, + The things that withered,--and you came not back! + That day you filled this circle of my arms + That now is empty. (O my empty life!) + That day--that day you picked the first sweet-pea,-- + And brought it in to show me! I recall + With terrible distinctness how the smell + Of your cool gardens drifted in with you. + I know, you held it up for me to see + And flushed because I looked not at the flower, + But at your face; and when behind my look + You saw such unmistakable intent + You laughed and brushed your flower against my lips. + (You were the fairest thing God ever made, + I think.) And then your hands above my heart + Drew down its stem into a fastening, + And while your head was bent I kissed your hair. + I wonder if you knew. (Beloved hands! + Somehow I cannot seem to see them still. + Somehow I cannot seem to see the dust + In your bright hair.) What is the need of Heaven + When earth can be so sweet?--If only God + Had let us love,--and show the world the way! + Strange cancellings must ink th' eternal books + When love-crossed-out will bring the answer right! + That first sweet-pea! I wonder where it is. + It seems to me I laid it down somewhere, + And yet,--I am not sure. I am not sure, + Even, if it was white or pink; for then + 'Twas much like any other flower to me, + Save that it was the first. I did not know, + Then, that it was the last. If I had known-- + But then, it does not matter. Strange how few, + After all's said and done, the things that are + Of moment. + Few indeed! When I can make + Of ten small words a rope to hang the world! + "I had you and I have you now no more." + There, there it dangles,--where's the little truth + That can for long keep footing under that + When its slack syllables tighten to a thought? + Here, let me write it down! I wish to see + Just how a thing like that will look on paper! + + "*I had you and I have you now no more*." + + O little words, how can you run so straight + Across the page, beneath the weight you bear? + How can you fall apart, whom such a theme + Has bound together, and hereafter aid + In trivial expression, that have been + So hideously dignified?--Would God + That tearing you apart would tear the thread + I strung you on! Would God--O God, my mind + Stretches asunder on this merciless rack + Of imagery! O, let me sleep a while! + Would I could sleep, and wake to find me back + In that sweet summer afternoon with you. + Summer? 'Tis summer still by the calendar! + How easily could God, if He so willed, + Set back the world a little turn or two! + Correct its griefs, and bring its joys again! + + We were so wholly one I had not thought + That we could die apart. I had not thought + That I could move,--and you be stiff and still! + That I could speak,--and you perforce be dumb! + I think our heart-strings were, like warp and woof + In some firm fabric, woven in and out; + Your golden filaments in fair design + Across my duller fibre. And to-day + The shining strip is rent; the exquisite + Fine pattern is destroyed; part of your heart + Aches in my breast; part of my heart lies chilled + In the damp earth with you. I have been torn + In two, and suffer for the rest of me. + What is my life to me? And what am I + To life,--a ship whose star has guttered out? + A Fear that in the deep night starts awake + Perpetually, to find its senses strained + Against the taut strings of the quivering air, + Awaiting the return of some dread chord? + + Dark, Dark, is all I find for metaphor; + All else were contrast,--save that contrast's wall + Is down, and all opposed things flow together + Into a vast monotony, where night + And day, and frost and thaw, and death and life, + Are synonyms. What now--what now to me + Are all the jabbering birds and foolish flowers + That clutter up the world? You were my song! + Now, let discord scream! You were my flower! + Now let the world grow weeds! For I shall not + Plant things above your grave--(the common balm + Of the conventional woe for its own wound!) + Amid sensations rendered negative + By your elimination stands to-day, + Certain, unmixed, the element of grief; + I sorrow; and I shall not mock my truth + With travesties of suffering, nor seek + To effigy its incorporeal bulk + In little wry-faced images of woe. + + I cannot call you back; and I desire + No utterance of my immaterial voice. + I cannot even turn my face this way + Or that, and say, "My face is turned to you"; + I know not where you are, I do not know + If Heaven hold you or if earth transmute, + Body and soul, you into earth again; + But this I know:--not for one second's space + Shall I insult my sight with visionings + Such as the credulous crowd so eager-eyed + Beholds, self-conjured, in the empty air. + Let the world wail! Let drip its easy tears! + My sorrow shall be dumb! + + --What do I say? + God! God!--God pity me! Am I gone mad + That I should spit upon a rosary? + Am I become so shrunken? Would to God + I too might feel that frenzied faith whose touch + Makes temporal the most enduring grief; + Though it must walk a while, as is its wont, + With wild lamenting! Would I too might weep + Where weeps the world and hangs its piteous wreaths + For its new dead! Not Truth, but Faith, it is + That keeps the world alive. If all at once + Faith were to slacken,--that unconscious faith + Which must, I know, yet be the corner-stone + Of all believing,--birds now flying fearless + Across would drop in terror to the earth; + Fishes would drown; and the all-governing reins + Would tangle in the frantic hands of God + And the worlds gallop headlong to destruction! + + O God, I see it now, and my sick brain + Staggers and swoons! How often over me + Flashes this breathlessness of sudden sight + In which I see the universe unrolled + Before me like a scroll and read thereon + Chaos and Doom, where helpless planets whirl + Dizzily round and round and round and round, + Like tops across a table, gathering speed + With every spin, to waver on the edge + One instant--looking over--and the next + To shudder and lurch forward out of sight-- + + * * * * * + + Ah, I am worn out--I am wearied out-- + It is too much--I am but flesh and blood, + And I must sleep. Though you were dead again, + I am but flesh and blood and I must sleep. + + + + + The Suicide + + + "Curse thee, Life, I will live with thee no more! + Thou hast mocked me, starved me, beat my body sore! + And all for a pledge that was not pledged by me, + I have kissed thy crust and eaten sparingly + That I might eat again, and met thy sneers + With deprecations, and thy blows with tears,-- + Aye, from thy glutted lash, glad, crawled away, + As if spent passion were a holiday! + And now I go. Nor threat, nor easy vow + Of tardy kindness can avail thee now + With me, whence fear and faith alike are flown; + Lonely I came, and I depart alone, + And know not where nor unto whom I go; + But that thou canst not follow me I know." + + Thus I to Life, and ceased; but through my brain + My thought ran still, until I spake again: + + "Ah, but I go not as I came,--no trace + Is mine to bear away of that old grace + I brought! I have been heated in thy fires, + Bent by thy hands, fashioned to thy desires, + Thy mark is on me! I am not the same + Nor ever more shall be, as when I came. + Ashes am I of all that once I seemed. + In me all's sunk that leapt, and all that dreamed + Is wakeful for alarm,--oh, shame to thee, + For the ill change that thou hast wrought in me, + Who laugh no more nor lift my throat to sing! + Ah, Life, I would have been a pleasant thing + To have about the house when I was grown + If thou hadst left my little joys alone! + I asked of thee no favor save this one: + That thou wouldst leave me playing in the sun! + And this thou didst deny, calling my name + Insistently, until I rose and came. + I saw the sun no more.--It were not well + So long on these unpleasant thoughts to dwell, + Need I arise to-morrow and renew + Again my hated tasks, but I am through + With all things save my thoughts and this one night, + So that in truth I seem already quite + Free and remote from thee,--I feel no haste + And no reluctance to depart; I taste + Merely, with thoughtful mien, an unknown draught, + That in a little while I shall have quaffed." + + Thus I to Life, and ceased, and slightly smiled, + Looking at nothing; and my thin dreams filed + Before me one by one till once again + I set new words unto an old refrain: + + "Treasures thou hast that never have been mine! + Warm lights in many a secret chamber shine + Of thy gaunt house, and gusts of song have blown + Like blossoms out to me that sat alone! + And I have waited well for thee to show + If any share were mine,--and now I go! + Nothing I leave, and if I naught attain + I shall but come into mine own again!" + Thus I to Life, and ceased, and spake no more, + But turning, straightway, sought a certain door + In the rear wall. Heavy it was, and low + And dark,--a way by which none e'er would go + That other exit had, and never knock + Was heard thereat,--bearing a curious lock + Some chance had shown me fashioned faultily, + Whereof Life held content the useless key, + And great coarse hinges, thick and rough with rust, + Whose sudden voice across a silence must, + I knew, be harsh and horrible to hear,-- + A strange door, ugly like a dwarf.--So near + I came I felt upon my feet the chill + Of acid wind creeping across the sill. + So stood longtime, till over me at last + Came weariness, and all things other passed + To make it room; the still night drifted deep + Like snow about me, and I longed for sleep. + + But, suddenly, marking the morning hour, + Bayed the deep-throated bell within the tower! + Startled, I raised my head,--and with a shout + Laid hold upon the latch,--and was without. + + * * * * * + + Ah, long-forgotten, well-remembered road, + Leading me back unto my old abode, + My father's house! There in the night I came, + And found them feasting, and all things the same + As they had been before. A splendour hung + Upon the walls, and such sweet songs were sung + As, echoing out of very long ago, + Had called me from the house of Life, I know. + So fair their raiment shone I looked in shame + On the unlovely garb in which I came; + Then straightway at my hesitancy mocked: + "It is my father's house!" I said and knocked; + And the door opened. To the shining crowd + Tattered and dark I entered, like a cloud, + Seeing no face but his; to him I crept, + And "Father!" I cried, and clasped his knees, and wept. + Ah, days of joy that followed! All alone + I wandered through the house. My own, my own, + My own to touch, my own to taste and smell, + All I had lacked so long and loved so well! + None shook me out of sleep, nor hushed my song, + Nor called me in from the sunlight all day long. + + I know not when the wonder came to me + Of what my father's business might be, + And whither fared and on what errands bent + The tall and gracious messengers he sent. + Yet one day with no song from dawn till night + Wondering, I sat, and watched them out of sight. + And the next day I called; and on the third + Asked them if I might go,--but no one heard. + Then, sick with longing, I arose at last + And went unto my father,--in that vast + Chamber wherein he for so many years + Has sat, surrounded by his charts and spheres. + "Father," I said, "Father, I cannot play + The harp that thou didst give me, and all day + I sit in idleness, while to and fro + About me thy serene, grave servants go; + And I am weary of my lonely ease. + Better a perilous journey overseas + Away from thee, than this, the life I lead, + To sit all day in the sunshine like a weed + That grows to naught,--I love thee more than they + Who serve thee most; yet serve thee in no way. + Father, I beg of thee a little task + To dignify my days,--'tis all I ask + Forever, but forever, this denied, + I perish." + "Child," my father's voice replied, + "All things thy fancy hath desired of me + Thou hast received. I have prepared for thee + Within my house a spacious chamber, where + Are delicate things to handle and to wear, + And all these things are thine. Dost thou love song? + My minstrels shall attend thee all day long. + Or sigh for flowers? My fairest gardens stand + Open as fields to thee on every hand. + And all thy days this word shall hold the same: + No pleasure shalt thou lack that thou shalt name. + But as for tasks--" he smiled, and shook his head; + "Thou hadst thy task, and laidst it by", he said. + + + + + God's World + + + O world, I cannot hold thee close enough! + Thy winds, thy wide grey skies! + Thy mists, that roll and rise! + Thy woods, this autumn day, that ache and sag + And all but cry with colour! That gaunt crag + To crush! To lift the lean of that black bluff! + World, World, I cannot get thee close enough! + + + Long have I known a glory in it all, + But never knew I this; + Here such a passion is + As stretcheth me apart,--Lord, I do fear + Thou'st made the world too beautiful this year; + My soul is all but out of me,--let fall + No burning leaf; prithee, let no bird call. + + + + + Afternoon on a Hill + + + I will be the gladdest thing + Under the sun! + I will touch a hundred flowers + And not pick one. + + I will look at cliffs and clouds + With quiet eyes, + Watch the wind bow down the grass, + And the grass rise. + + And when lights begin to show + Up from the town, + I will mark which must be mine, + And then start down! + + + + + Sorrow + + + Sorrow like a ceaseless rain + Beats upon my heart. + People twist and scream in pain,-- + Dawn will find them still again; + This has neither wax nor wane, + Neither stop nor start. + + People dress and go to town; + I sit in my chair. + All my thoughts are slow and brown: + Standing up or sitting down + Little matters, or what gown + Or what shoes I wear. + + + + + Tavern + + + I'll keep a little tavern + Below the high hill's crest, + Wherein all grey-eyed people + May set them down and rest. + + There shall be plates a-plenty, + And mugs to melt the chill + Of all the grey-eyed people + Who happen up the hill. + + There sound will sleep the traveller, + And dream his journey's end, + But I will rouse at midnight + The falling fire to tend. + + Aye, 'tis a curious fancy-- + But all the good I know + Was taught me out of two grey eyes + A long time ago. + + + + + Ashes of Life + + + Love has gone and left me and the days are all alike; + Eat I must, and sleep I will,--and would that night were here! + But ah!--to lie awake and hear the slow hours strike! + Would that it were day again!--with twilight near! + + Love has gone and left me and I don't know what to do; + This or that or what you will is all the same to me; + But all the things that I begin I leave before I'm through,-- + There's little use in anything as far as I can see. + + Love has gone and left me,--and the neighbors knock and borrow, + And life goes on forever like the gnawing of a mouse,-- + And to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow + There's this little street and this little house. + + + + + The Little Ghost + + + I knew her for a little ghost + That in my garden walked; + The wall is high--higher than most-- + And the green gate was locked. + + And yet I did not think of that + Till after she was gone-- + I knew her by the broad white hat, + All ruffled, she had on. + + By the dear ruffles round her feet, + By her small hands that hung + In their lace mitts, austere and sweet, + Her gown's white folds among. + + I watched to see if she would stay, + What she would do--and oh! + She looked as if she liked the way + I let my garden grow! + + She bent above my favourite mint + With conscious garden grace, + She smiled and smiled--there was no hint + Of sadness in her face. + + She held her gown on either side + To let her slippers show, + And up the walk she went with pride, + The way great ladies go. + + And where the wall is built in new + And is of ivy bare + She paused--then opened and passed through + A gate that once was there. + + + + + Kin to Sorrow + + + Am I kin to Sorrow, + That so oft + Falls the knocker of my door-- + Neither loud nor soft, + But as long accustomed, + Under Sorrow's hand? + Marigolds around the step + And rosemary stand, + And then comes Sorrow-- + And what does Sorrow care + For the rosemary + Or the marigolds there? + Am I kin to Sorrow? + Are we kin? + That so oft upon my door-- + *Oh, come in*! + + + + + Three Songs of Shattering + + + I + + The first rose on my rose-tree + Budded, bloomed, and shattered, + During sad days when to me + Nothing mattered. + + Grief of grief has drained me clean; + Still it seems a pity + No one saw,--it must have been + Very pretty. + + + II + + Let the little birds sing; + Let the little lambs play; + Spring is here; and so 'tis spring;-- + But not in the old way! + + I recall a place + Where a plum-tree grew; + There you lifted up your face, + And blossoms covered you. + + If the little birds sing, + And the little lambs play, + Spring is here; and so 'tis spring-- + But not in the old way! + + + III + + All the dog-wood blossoms are underneath the tree! + Ere spring was going--ah, spring is gone! + And there comes no summer to the like of you and me,-- + Blossom time is early, but no fruit sets on. + + All the dog-wood blossoms are underneath the tree, + Browned at the edges, turned in a day; + And I would with all my heart they trimmed a mound for me, + And weeds were tall on all the paths that led that way! + + + + + The Shroud + + + Death, I say, my heart is bowed + Unto thine,--O mother! + This red gown will make a shroud + Good as any other! + + (I, that would not wait to wear + My own bridal things, + In a dress dark as my hair + Made my answerings. + + I, to-night, that till he came + Could not, could not wait, + In a gown as bright as flame + Held for them the gate.) + + Death, I say, my heart is bowed + Unto thine,--O mother! + This red gown will make a shroud + Good as any other! + + + + + The Dream + + + Love, if I weep it will not matter, + And if you laugh I shall not care; + Foolish am I to think about it, + But it is good to feel you there. + + Love, in my sleep I dreamed of waking,-- + White and awful the moonlight reached + Over the floor, and somewhere, somewhere, + There was a shutter loose,--it screeched! + + Swung in the wind,--and no wind blowing!-- + I was afraid, and turned to you, + Put out my hand to you for comfort,-- + And you were gone! Cold, cold as dew, + + Under my hand the moonlight lay! + Love, if you laugh I shall not care, + But if I weep it will not matter,-- + Ah, it is good to feel you there! + + + + + Indifference + + + I said,--for Love was laggard, O, Love was slow to come,-- + "I'll hear his step and know his step when I am warm in bed; + But I'll never leave my pillow, though there be some + As would let him in--and take him in with tears!" I said. + I lay,--for Love was laggard, O, he came not until dawn,-- + I lay and listened for his step and could not get to sleep; + And he found me at my window with my big cloak on, + All sorry with the tears some folks might weep! + + + + + Witch-Wife + + + She is neither pink nor pale, + And she never will be all mine; + She learned her hands in a fairy-tale, + And her mouth on a valentine. + + She has more hair than she needs; + In the sun 'tis a woe to me! + And her voice is a string of colored beads, + Or steps leading into the sea. + + She loves me all that she can, + And her ways to my ways resign; + But she was not made for any man, + And she never will be all mine. + + + + + Blight + + + Hard seeds of hate I planted + That should by now be grown,-- + Rough stalks, and from thick stamens + A poisonous pollen blown, + And odors rank, unbreathable, + From dark corollas thrown! + + At dawn from my damp garden + I shook the chilly dew; + The thin boughs locked behind me + That sprang to let me through; + The blossoms slept,--I sought a place + Where nothing lovely grew. + + And there, when day was breaking, + I knelt and looked around: + The light was near, the silence + Was palpitant with sound; + I drew my hate from out my breast + And thrust it in the ground. + + Oh, ye so fiercely tended, + Ye little seeds of hate! + I bent above your growing + Early and noon and late, + Yet are ye drooped and pitiful,-- + I cannot rear ye straight! + + The sun seeks out my garden, + No nook is left in shade, + No mist nor mold nor mildew + Endures on any blade, + Sweet rain slants under every bough: + Ye falter, and ye fade. + + + + + When the Year Grows Old + + + I cannot but remember + When the year grows old-- + October--November-- + How she disliked the cold! + + She used to watch the swallows + Go down across the sky, + And turn from the window + With a little sharp sigh. + + And often when the brown leaves + Were brittle on the ground, + And the wind in the chimney + Made a melancholy sound, + + She had a look about her + That I wish I could forget-- + The look of a scared thing + Sitting in a net! + + Oh, beautiful at nightfall + The soft spitting snow! + And beautiful the bare boughs + Rubbing to and fro! + + But the roaring of the fire, + And the warmth of fur, + And the boiling of the kettle + Were beautiful to her! + + I cannot but remember + When the year grows old-- + October--November-- + How she disliked the cold! + + + + + Sonnets + + + I + + Thou art not lovelier than lilacs,--no, + Nor honeysuckle; thou art not more fair + Than small white single poppies,--I can bear + Thy beauty; though I bend before thee, though + From left to right, not knowing where to go, + I turn my troubled eyes, nor here nor there + Find any refuge from thee, yet I swear + So has it been with mist,--with moonlight so. + + Like him who day by day unto his draught + Of delicate poison adds him one drop more + Till he may drink unharmed the death of ten, + Even so, inured to beauty, who have quaffed + Each hour more deeply than the hour before, + I drink--and live--what has destroyed some men. + + + II + + Time does not bring relief; you all have lied + Who told me time would ease me of my pain! + I miss him in the weeping of the rain; + I want him at the shrinking of the tide; + The old snows melt from every mountain-side, + And last year's leaves are smoke in every lane; + But last year's bitter loving must remain + Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide! + + There are a hundred places where I fear + To go,--so with his memory they brim! + And entering with relief some quiet place + Where never fell his foot or shone his face + I say, "There is no memory of him here!" + And so stand stricken, so remembering him! + + + III + + Mindful of you the sodden earth in spring, + And all the flowers that in the springtime grow, + And dusty roads, and thistles, and the slow + Rising of the round moon, all throats that sing + The summer through, and each departing wing, + And all the nests that the bared branches show, + And all winds that in any weather blow, + And all the storms that the four seasons bring. + + You go no more on your exultant feet + Up paths that only mist and morning knew, + Or watch the wind, or listen to the beat + Of a bird's wings too high in air to view,-- + But you were something more than young and sweet + And fair,--and the long year remembers you. + + + IV + + Not in this chamber only at my birth-- + When the long hours of that mysterious night + Were over, and the morning was in sight-- + I cried, but in strange places, steppe and firth + I have not seen, through alien grief and mirth; + And never shall one room contain me quite + Who in so many rooms first saw the light, + Child of all mothers, native of the earth. + + So is no warmth for me at any fire + To-day, when the world's fire has burned so low; + I kneel, spending my breath in vain desire, + At that cold hearth which one time roared so strong, + And straighten back in weariness, and long + To gather up my little gods and go. + + + V + + If I should learn, in some quite casual way, + That you were gone, not to return again-- + Read from the back-page of a paper, say, + Held by a neighbor in a subway train, + How at the corner of this avenue + And such a street (so are the papers filled) + A hurrying man--who happened to be you-- + At noon to-day had happened to be killed, + I should not cry aloud--I could not cry + Aloud, or wring my hands in such a place-- + I should but watch the station lights rush by + With a more careful interest on my face, + Or raise my eyes and read with greater care + Where to store furs and how to treat the hair. + + + VI Bluebeard + + This door you might not open, and you did; + So enter now, and see for what slight thing + You are betrayed. . . . Here is no treasure hid, + No cauldron, no clear crystal mirroring + The sought-for truth, no heads of women slain + For greed like yours, no writhings of distress, + But only what you see. . . . Look yet again-- + An empty room, cobwebbed and comfortless. + Yet this alone out of my life I kept + Unto myself, lest any know me quite; + And you did so profane me when you crept + Unto the threshold of this room to-night + That I must never more behold your face. + This now is yours. I seek another place. + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Renascence and Other Poems, by +Edna St. Vincent Millay + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RENASCENCE AND OTHER POEMS *** + +***** This file should be named 109.txt or 109.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/109/ + +Produced by Alan Light. 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FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* + + + + + +Renascence and Other Poems by Edna St. Vincent Millay + + + + +Contents: + + + +Renascence + All I could see from where I stood + +Interim + The room is full of you! -- As I came in + +The Suicide + "Curse thee, Life, I will live with thee no more! + +God's World + O world, I cannot hold thee close enough! + +Afternoon on a Hill + I will be the gladdest thing + +Sorrow + Sorrow like a ceaseless rain + +Tavern + I'll keep a little tavern + +Ashes of Life + Love has gone and left me and the days are all alike; + +The Little Ghost + I knew her for a little ghost + +Kin to Sorrow + Am I kin to Sorrow, + +Three Songs of Shattering + +I + The first rose on my rose-tree + +II + Let the little birds sing; + +III + All the dog-wood blossoms are underneath the tree! + +The Shroud + Death, I say, my heart is bowed + +The Dream + Love, if I weep it will not matter, + +Indifference + I said, -- for Love was laggard, O, Love was slow to come, -- + +Witch-Wife + She is neither pink nor pale, + +Blight + Hard seeds of hate I planted + +When the Year Grows Old + I cannot but remember + +Sonnets + +I + Thou art not lovelier than lilacs, -- no, + +II + Time does not bring relief; you all have lied + +III + Mindful of you the sodden earth in spring, + +IV + Not in this chamber only at my birth -- + +V + If I should learn, in some quite casual way, + +VI Bluebeard + This door you might not open, and you did; + + + + + + +Renascence and Other Poems + + + + + + +Renascence + + + +All I could see from where I stood +Was three long mountains and a wood; +I turned and looked another way, +And saw three islands in a bay. +So with my eyes I traced the line +Of the horizon, thin and fine, +Straight around till I was come +Back to where I'd started from; +And all I saw from where I stood +Was three long mountains and a wood. +Over these things I could not see; +These were the things that bounded me; +And I could touch them with my hand, +Almost, I thought, from where I stand. +And all at once things seemed so small +My breath came short, and scarce at all. +But, sure, the sky is big, I said; +Miles and miles above my head; +So here upon my back I'll lie +And look my fill into the sky. +And so I looked, and, after all, +The sky was not so very tall. +The sky, I said, must somewhere stop, +And -- sure enough! -- I see the top! +The sky, I thought, is not so grand; +I 'most could touch it with my hand! +And reaching up my hand to try, +I screamed to feel it touch the sky. +I screamed, and -- lo! -- Infinity +Came down and settled over me; +Forced back my scream into my chest, +Bent back my arm upon my breast, +And, pressing of the Undefined +The definition on my mind, +Held up before my eyes a glass +Through which my shrinking sight did pass +Until it seemed I must behold +Immensity made manifold; +Whispered to me a word whose sound +Deafened the air for worlds around, +And brought unmuffled to my ears +The gossiping of friendly spheres, +The creaking of the tented sky, +The ticking of Eternity. +I saw and heard, and knew at last +The How and Why of all things, past, +And present, and forevermore. +The Universe, cleft to the core, +Lay open to my probing sense +That, sick'ning, I would fain pluck thence +But could not, -- nay! But needs must suck +At the great wound, and could not pluck +My lips away till I had drawn +All venom out. -- Ah, fearful pawn! +For my omniscience paid I toll +In infinite remorse of soul. +All sin was of my sinning, all +Atoning mine, and mine the gall +Of all regret. Mine was the weight +Of every brooded wrong, the hate +That stood behind each envious thrust, +Mine every greed, mine every lust. +And all the while for every grief, +Each suffering, I craved relief +With individual desire, -- +Craved all in vain! And felt fierce fire +About a thousand people crawl; +Perished with each, -- then mourned for all! +A man was starving in Capri; +He moved his eyes and looked at me; +I felt his gaze, I heard his moan, +And knew his hunger as my own. +I saw at sea a great fog bank +Between two ships that struck and sank; +A thousand screams the heavens smote; +And every scream tore through my throat. +No hurt I did not feel, no death +That was not mine; mine each last breath +That, crying, met an answering cry +From the compassion that was I. +All suffering mine, and mine its rod; +Mine, pity like the pity of God. +Ah, awful weight! Infinity +Pressed down upon the finite Me! +My anguished spirit, like a bird, +Beating against my lips I heard; +Yet lay the weight so close about +There was no room for it without. +And so beneath the weight lay I +And suffered death, but could not die. + +Long had I lain thus, craving death, +When quietly the earth beneath +Gave way, and inch by inch, so great +At last had grown the crushing weight, +Into the earth I sank till I +Full six feet under ground did lie, +And sank no more, -- there is no weight +Can follow here, however great. +From off my breast I felt it roll, +And as it went my tortured soul +Burst forth and fled in such a gust +That all about me swirled the dust. + +Deep in the earth I rested now; +Cool is its hand upon the brow +And soft its breast beneath the head +Of one who is so gladly dead. +And all at once, and over all +The pitying rain began to fall; +I lay and heard each pattering hoof +Upon my lowly, thatched roof, +And seemed to love the sound far more +Than ever I had done before. +For rain it hath a friendly sound +To one who's six feet underground; +And scarce the friendly voice or face: +A grave is such a quiet place. + +The rain, I said, is kind to come +And speak to me in my new home. +I would I were alive again +To kiss the fingers of the rain, +To drink into my eyes the shine +Of every slanting silver line, +To catch the freshened, fragrant breeze +From drenched and dripping apple-trees. +For soon the shower will be done, +And then the broad face of the sun +Will laugh above the rain-soaked earth +Until the world with answering mirth +Shakes joyously, and each round drop +Rolls, twinkling, from its grass-blade top. +How can I bear it; buried here, +While overhead the sky grows clear +And blue again after the storm? +O, multi-colored, multiform, +Beloved beauty over me, +That I shall never, never see +Again! Spring-silver, autumn-gold, +That I shall never more behold! +Sleeping your myriad magics through, +Close-sepulchred away from you! +O God, I cried, give me new birth, +And put me back upon the earth! +Upset each cloud's gigantic gourd +And let the heavy rain, down-poured +In one big torrent, set me free, +Washing my grave away from me! + +I ceased; and through the breathless hush +That answered me, the far-off rush +Of herald wings came whispering +Like music down the vibrant string +Of my ascending prayer, and -- crash! +Before the wild wind's whistling lash +The startled storm-clouds reared on high +And plunged in terror down the sky, +And the big rain in one black wave +Fell from the sky and struck my grave. +I know not how such things can be; +I only know there came to me +A fragrance such as never clings +To aught save happy living things; +A sound as of some joyous elf +Singing sweet songs to please himself, +And, through and over everything, +A sense of glad awakening. +The grass, a-tiptoe at my ear, +Whispering to me I could hear; +I felt the rain's cool finger-tips +Brushed tenderly across my lips, +Laid gently on my sealed sight, +And all at once the heavy night +Fell from my eyes and I could see, -- +A drenched and dripping apple-tree, +A last long line of silver rain, +A sky grown clear and blue again. +And as I looked a quickening gust +Of wind blew up to me and thrust +Into my face a miracle +Of orchard-breath, and with the smell, -- +I know not how such things can be! -- +I breathed my soul back into me. +Ah! Up then from the ground sprang I +And hailed the earth with such a cry +As is not heard save from a man +Who has been dead, and lives again. +About the trees my arms I wound; +Like one gone mad I hugged the ground; +I raised my quivering arms on high; +I laughed and laughed into the sky, +Till at my throat a strangling sob +Caught fiercely, and a great heart-throb +Sent instant tears into my eyes; +O God, I cried, no dark disguise +Can e'er hereafter hide from me +Thy radiant identity! +Thou canst not move across the grass +But my quick eyes will see Thee pass, +Nor speak, however silently, +But my hushed voice will answer Thee. +I know the path that tells Thy way +Through the cool eve of every day; +God, I can push the grass apart +And lay my finger on Thy heart! + +The world stands out on either side +No wider than the heart is wide; +Above the world is stretched the sky, -- +No higher than the soul is high. +The heart can push the sea and land +Farther away on either hand; +The soul can split the sky in two, +And let the face of God shine through. +But East and West will pinch the heart +That can not keep them pushed apart; +And he whose soul is flat -- the sky +Will cave in on him by and by. + + + + +Interim + + + +The room is full of you! -- As I came in +And closed the door behind me, all at once +A something in the air, intangible, +Yet stiff with meaning, struck my senses sick! -- + +Sharp, unfamiliar odors have destroyed +Each other room's dear personality. +The heavy scent of damp, funereal flowers, -- +The very essence, hush-distilled, of Death -- +Has strangled that habitual breath of home +Whose expiration leaves all houses dead; +And wheresoe'er I look is hideous change. +Save here. Here 'twas as if a weed-choked gate +Had opened at my touch, and I had stepped +Into some long-forgot, enchanted, strange, +Sweet garden of a thousand years ago +And suddenly thought, "I have been here before!" + +You are not here. I know that you are gone, +And will not ever enter here again. +And yet it seems to me, if I should speak, +Your silent step must wake across the hall; +If I should turn my head, that your sweet eyes +Would kiss me from the door. -- So short a time +To teach my life its transposition to +This difficult and unaccustomed key! -- +The room is as you left it; your last touch -- +A thoughtless pressure, knowing not itself +As saintly -- hallows now each simple thing; +Hallows and glorifies, and glows between +The dust's grey fingers like a shielded light. + +There is your book, just as you laid it down, +Face to the table, -- I cannot believe +That you are gone! -- Just then it seemed to me +You must be here. I almost laughed to think +How like reality the dream had been; +Yet knew before I laughed, and so was still. +That book, outspread, just as you laid it down! +Perhaps you thought, "I wonder what comes next, +And whether this or this will be the end"; +So rose, and left it, thinking to return. + +Perhaps that chair, when you arose and passed +Out of the room, rocked silently a while +Ere it again was still. When you were gone +Forever from the room, perhaps that chair, +Stirred by your movement, rocked a little while, +Silently, to and fro. . . + +And here are the last words your fingers wrote, +Scrawled in broad characters across a page +In this brown book I gave you. Here your hand, +Guiding your rapid pen, moved up and down. +Here with a looping knot you crossed a "t", +And here another like it, just beyond +These two eccentric "e's". You were so small, +And wrote so brave a hand! + How strange it seems +That of all words these are the words you chose! +And yet a simple choice; you did not know +You would not write again. If you had known -- +But then, it does not matter, -- and indeed +If you had known there was so little time +You would have dropped your pen and come to me +And this page would be empty, and some phrase +Other than this would hold my wonder now. +Yet, since you could not know, and it befell +That these are the last words your fingers wrote, +There is a dignity some might not see +In this, "I picked the first sweet-pea to-day." +To-day! Was there an opening bud beside it +You left until to-morrow? -- O my love, +The things that withered, -- and you came not back! +That day you filled this circle of my arms +That now is empty. (O my empty life!) +That day -- that day you picked the first sweet-pea, -- +And brought it in to show me! I recall +With terrible distinctness how the smell +Of your cool gardens drifted in with you. +I know, you held it up for me to see +And flushed because I looked not at the flower, +But at your face; and when behind my look +You saw such unmistakable intent +You laughed and brushed your flower against my lips. +(You were the fairest thing God ever made, +I think.) And then your hands above my heart +Drew down its stem into a fastening, +And while your head was bent I kissed your hair. +I wonder if you knew. (Beloved hands! +Somehow I cannot seem to see them still. +Somehow I cannot seem to see the dust +In your bright hair.) What is the need of Heaven +When earth can be so sweet? -- If only God +Had let us love, -- and show the world the way! +Strange cancellings must ink th' eternal books +When love-crossed-out will bring the answer right! +That first sweet-pea! I wonder where it is. +It seems to me I laid it down somewhere, +And yet, -- I am not sure. I am not sure, +Even, if it was white or pink; for then +'Twas much like any other flower to me, +Save that it was the first. I did not know, +Then, that it was the last. If I had known -- +But then, it does not matter. Strange how few, +After all's said and done, the things that are +Of moment. + Few indeed! When I can make +Of ten small words a rope to hang the world! +"I had you and I have you now no more." +There, there it dangles, -- where's the little truth +That can for long keep footing under that +When its slack syllables tighten to a thought? +Here, let me write it down! I wish to see +Just how a thing like that will look on paper! + +"*I had you and I have you now no more*." + +O little words, how can you run so straight +Across the page, beneath the weight you bear? +How can you fall apart, whom such a theme +Has bound together, and hereafter aid +In trivial expression, that have been +So hideously dignified? -- Would God +That tearing you apart would tear the thread +I strung you on! Would God -- O God, my mind +Stretches asunder on this merciless rack +Of imagery! O, let me sleep a while! +Would I could sleep, and wake to find me back +In that sweet summer afternoon with you. +Summer? 'Tis summer still by the calendar! +How easily could God, if He so willed, +Set back the world a little turn or two! +Correct its griefs, and bring its joys again! + +We were so wholly one I had not thought +That we could die apart. I had not thought +That I could move, -- and you be stiff and still! +That I could speak, -- and you perforce be dumb! +I think our heart-strings were, like warp and woof +In some firm fabric, woven in and out; +Your golden filaments in fair design +Across my duller fibre. And to-day +The shining strip is rent; the exquisite +Fine pattern is destroyed; part of your heart +Aches in my breast; part of my heart lies chilled +In the damp earth with you. I have been torn +In two, and suffer for the rest of me. +What is my life to me? And what am I +To life, -- a ship whose star has guttered out? +A Fear that in the deep night starts awake +Perpetually, to find its senses strained +Against the taut strings of the quivering air, +Awaiting the return of some dread chord? + +Dark, Dark, is all I find for metaphor; +All else were contrast, -- save that contrast's wall +Is down, and all opposed things flow together +Into a vast monotony, where night +And day, and frost and thaw, and death and life, +Are synonyms. What now -- what now to me +Are all the jabbering birds and foolish flowers +That clutter up the world? You were my song! +Now, let discord scream! You were my flower! +Now let the world grow weeds! For I shall not +Plant things above your grave -- (the common balm +Of the conventional woe for its own wound!) +Amid sensations rendered negative +By your elimination stands to-day, +Certain, unmixed, the element of grief; +I sorrow; and I shall not mock my truth +With travesties of suffering, nor seek +To effigy its incorporeal bulk +In little wry-faced images of woe. + +I cannot call you back; and I desire +No utterance of my immaterial voice. +I cannot even turn my face this way +Or that, and say, "My face is turned to you"; +I know not where you are, I do not know +If Heaven hold you or if earth transmute, +Body and soul, you into earth again; +But this I know: -- not for one second's space +Shall I insult my sight with visionings +Such as the credulous crowd so eager-eyed +Beholds, self-conjured, in the empty air. +Let the world wail! Let drip its easy tears! +My sorrow shall be dumb! + +-- What do I say? +God! God! -- God pity me! Am I gone mad +That I should spit upon a rosary? +Am I become so shrunken? Would to God +I too might feel that frenzied faith whose touch +Makes temporal the most enduring grief; +Though it must walk a while, as is its wont, +With wild lamenting! Would I too might weep +Where weeps the world and hangs its piteous wreaths +For its new dead! Not Truth, but Faith, it is +That keeps the world alive. If all at once +Faith were to slacken, -- that unconscious faith +Which must, I know, yet be the corner-stone +Of all believing, -- birds now flying fearless +Across would drop in terror to the earth; +Fishes would drown; and the all-governing reins +Would tangle in the frantic hands of God +And the worlds gallop headlong to destruction! + +O God, I see it now, and my sick brain +Staggers and swoons! How often over me +Flashes this breathlessness of sudden sight +In which I see the universe unrolled +Before me like a scroll and read thereon +Chaos and Doom, where helpless planets whirl +Dizzily round and round and round and round, +Like tops across a table, gathering speed +With every spin, to waver on the edge +One instant -- looking over -- and the next +To shudder and lurch forward out of sight -- + + * * * * * + +Ah, I am worn out -- I am wearied out -- +It is too much -- I am but flesh and blood, +And I must sleep. Though you were dead again, +I am but flesh and blood and I must sleep. + + + + +The Suicide + + + +"Curse thee, Life, I will live with thee no more! +Thou hast mocked me, starved me, beat my body sore! +And all for a pledge that was not pledged by me, +I have kissed thy crust and eaten sparingly +That I might eat again, and met thy sneers +With deprecations, and thy blows with tears, -- +Aye, from thy glutted lash, glad, crawled away, +As if spent passion were a holiday! +And now I go. Nor threat, nor easy vow +Of tardy kindness can avail thee now +With me, whence fear and faith alike are flown; +Lonely I came, and I depart alone, +And know not where nor unto whom I go; +But that thou canst not follow me I know." + +Thus I to Life, and ceased; but through my brain +My thought ran still, until I spake again: + +"Ah, but I go not as I came, -- no trace +Is mine to bear away of that old grace +I brought! I have been heated in thy fires, +Bent by thy hands, fashioned to thy desires, +Thy mark is on me! I am not the same +Nor ever more shall be, as when I came. +Ashes am I of all that once I seemed. +In me all's sunk that leapt, and all that dreamed +Is wakeful for alarm, -- oh, shame to thee, +For the ill change that thou hast wrought in me, +Who laugh no more nor lift my throat to sing! +Ah, Life, I would have been a pleasant thing +To have about the house when I was grown +If thou hadst left my little joys alone! +I asked of thee no favor save this one: +That thou wouldst leave me playing in the sun! +And this thou didst deny, calling my name +Insistently, until I rose and came. +I saw the sun no more. -- It were not well +So long on these unpleasant thoughts to dwell, +Need I arise to-morrow and renew +Again my hated tasks, but I am through +With all things save my thoughts and this one night, +So that in truth I seem already quite +Free and remote from thee, -- I feel no haste +And no reluctance to depart; I taste +Merely, with thoughtful mien, an unknown draught, +That in a little while I shall have quaffed." + +Thus I to Life, and ceased, and slightly smiled, +Looking at nothing; and my thin dreams filed +Before me one by one till once again +I set new words unto an old refrain: + +"Treasures thou hast that never have been mine! +Warm lights in many a secret chamber shine +Of thy gaunt house, and gusts of song have blown +Like blossoms out to me that sat alone! +And I have waited well for thee to show +If any share were mine, -- and now I go! +Nothing I leave, and if I naught attain +I shall but come into mine own again!" +Thus I to Life, and ceased, and spake no more, +But turning, straightway, sought a certain door +In the rear wall. Heavy it was, and low +And dark, -- a way by which none e'er would go +That other exit had, and never knock +Was heard thereat, -- bearing a curious lock +Some chance had shown me fashioned faultily, +Whereof Life held content the useless key, +And great coarse hinges, thick and rough with rust, +Whose sudden voice across a silence must, +I knew, be harsh and horrible to hear, -- +A strange door, ugly like a dwarf. -- So near +I came I felt upon my feet the chill +Of acid wind creeping across the sill. +So stood longtime, till over me at last +Came weariness, and all things other passed +To make it room; the still night drifted deep +Like snow about me, and I longed for sleep. + +But, suddenly, marking the morning hour, +Bayed the deep-throated bell within the tower! +Startled, I raised my head, -- and with a shout +Laid hold upon the latch, -- and was without. + + * * * * * + +Ah, long-forgotten, well-remembered road, +Leading me back unto my old abode, +My father's house! There in the night I came, +And found them feasting, and all things the same +As they had been before. A splendour hung +Upon the walls, and such sweet songs were sung +As, echoing out of very long ago, +Had called me from the house of Life, I know. +So fair their raiment shone I looked in shame +On the unlovely garb in which I came; +Then straightway at my hesitancy mocked: +"It is my father's house!" I said and knocked; +And the door opened. To the shining crowd +Tattered and dark I entered, like a cloud, +Seeing no face but his; to him I crept, +And "Father!" I cried, and clasped his knees, and wept. +Ah, days of joy that followed! All alone +I wandered through the house. My own, my own, +My own to touch, my own to taste and smell, +All I had lacked so long and loved so well! +None shook me out of sleep, nor hushed my song, +Nor called me in from the sunlight all day long. + +I know not when the wonder came to me +Of what my father's business might be, +And whither fared and on what errands bent +The tall and gracious messengers he sent. +Yet one day with no song from dawn till night +Wondering, I sat, and watched them out of sight. +And the next day I called; and on the third +Asked them if I might go, -- but no one heard. +Then, sick with longing, I arose at last +And went unto my father, -- in that vast +Chamber wherein he for so many years +Has sat, surrounded by his charts and spheres. +"Father," I said, "Father, I cannot play +The harp that thou didst give me, and all day +I sit in idleness, while to and fro +About me thy serene, grave servants go; +And I am weary of my lonely ease. +Better a perilous journey overseas +Away from thee, than this, the life I lead, +To sit all day in the sunshine like a weed +That grows to naught, -- I love thee more than they +Who serve thee most; yet serve thee in no way. +Father, I beg of thee a little task +To dignify my days, -- 'tis all I ask +Forever, but forever, this denied, +I perish." + "Child," my father's voice replied, +"All things thy fancy hath desired of me +Thou hast received. I have prepared for thee +Within my house a spacious chamber, where +Are delicate things to handle and to wear, +And all these things are thine. Dost thou love song? +My minstrels shall attend thee all day long. +Or sigh for flowers? My fairest gardens stand +Open as fields to thee on every hand. +And all thy days this word shall hold the same: +No pleasure shalt thou lack that thou shalt name. +But as for tasks --" he smiled, and shook his head; +"Thou hadst thy task, and laidst it by", he said. + + + + +God's World + + + +O world, I cannot hold thee close enough! + Thy winds, thy wide grey skies! + Thy mists, that roll and rise! +Thy woods, this autumn day, that ache and sag +And all but cry with colour! That gaunt crag +To crush! To lift the lean of that black bluff! +World, World, I cannot get thee close enough! + + +Long have I known a glory in it all, + But never knew I this; + Here such a passion is +As stretcheth me apart, -- Lord, I do fear +Thou'st made the world too beautiful this year; +My soul is all but out of me, -- let fall +No burning leaf; prithee, let no bird call. + + + + +Afternoon on a Hill + + + +I will be the gladdest thing + Under the sun! +I will touch a hundred flowers + And not pick one. + +I will look at cliffs and clouds + With quiet eyes, +Watch the wind bow down the grass, + And the grass rise. + +And when lights begin to show + Up from the town, +I will mark which must be mine, + And then start down! + + + + +Sorrow + + + +Sorrow like a ceaseless rain + Beats upon my heart. +People twist and scream in pain, -- +Dawn will find them still again; +This has neither wax nor wane, + Neither stop nor start. + +People dress and go to town; + I sit in my chair. +All my thoughts are slow and brown: +Standing up or sitting down +Little matters, or what gown + Or what shoes I wear. + + + + +Tavern + + + +I'll keep a little tavern + Below the high hill's crest, +Wherein all grey-eyed people + May set them down and rest. + +There shall be plates a-plenty, + And mugs to melt the chill +Of all the grey-eyed people + Who happen up the hill. + +There sound will sleep the traveller, + And dream his journey's end, +But I will rouse at midnight + The falling fire to tend. + +Aye, 'tis a curious fancy -- + But all the good I know +Was taught me out of two grey eyes + A long time ago. + + + + +Ashes of Life + + + +Love has gone and left me and the days are all alike; + Eat I must, and sleep I will, -- and would that night were here! +But ah! -- to lie awake and hear the slow hours strike! + Would that it were day again! -- with twilight near! + +Love has gone and left me and I don't know what to do; + This or that or what you will is all the same to me; +But all the things that I begin I leave before I'm through, -- + There's little use in anything as far as I can see. + +Love has gone and left me, -- and the neighbors knock and borrow, + And life goes on forever like the gnawing of a mouse, -- +And to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow + There's this little street and this little house. + + + + +The Little Ghost + + + +I knew her for a little ghost + That in my garden walked; +The wall is high -- higher than most -- + And the green gate was locked. + +And yet I did not think of that + Till after she was gone -- +I knew her by the broad white hat, + All ruffled, she had on. + +By the dear ruffles round her feet, + By her small hands that hung +In their lace mitts, austere and sweet, + Her gown's white folds among. + +I watched to see if she would stay, + What she would do -- and oh! +She looked as if she liked the way + I let my garden grow! + +She bent above my favourite mint + With conscious garden grace, +She smiled and smiled -- there was no hint + Of sadness in her face. + +She held her gown on either side + To let her slippers show, +And up the walk she went with pride, + The way great ladies go. + +And where the wall is built in new + And is of ivy bare +She paused -- then opened and passed through + A gate that once was there. + + + + +Kin to Sorrow + + + +Am I kin to Sorrow, + That so oft +Falls the knocker of my door -- + Neither loud nor soft, +But as long accustomed, + Under Sorrow's hand? +Marigolds around the step + And rosemary stand, +And then comes Sorrow -- + And what does Sorrow care +For the rosemary + Or the marigolds there? +Am I kin to Sorrow? + Are we kin? +That so oft upon my door -- + *Oh, come in*! + + + + +Three Songs of Shattering + + + + I + + + +The first rose on my rose-tree + Budded, bloomed, and shattered, +During sad days when to me + Nothing mattered. + +Grief of grief has drained me clean; + Still it seems a pity +No one saw, -- it must have been + Very pretty. + + + + + II + + + +Let the little birds sing; + Let the little lambs play; +Spring is here; and so 'tis spring; -- + But not in the old way! + +I recall a place + Where a plum-tree grew; +There you lifted up your face, + And blossoms covered you. + +If the little birds sing, + And the little lambs play, +Spring is here; and so 'tis spring -- + But not in the old way! + + + + + III + + + +All the dog-wood blossoms are underneath the tree! + Ere spring was going -- ah, spring is gone! +And there comes no summer to the like of you and me, -- + Blossom time is early, but no fruit sets on. + +All the dog-wood blossoms are underneath the tree, + Browned at the edges, turned in a day; +And I would with all my heart they trimmed a mound for me, + And weeds were tall on all the paths that led that way! + + + + +The Shroud + + + +Death, I say, my heart is bowed + Unto thine, -- O mother! +This red gown will make a shroud + Good as any other! + +(I, that would not wait to wear + My own bridal things, +In a dress dark as my hair + Made my answerings. + +I, to-night, that till he came + Could not, could not wait, +In a gown as bright as flame + Held for them the gate.) + +Death, I say, my heart is bowed + Unto thine, -- O mother! +This red gown will make a shroud + Good as any other! + + + + +The Dream + + + +Love, if I weep it will not matter, + And if you laugh I shall not care; +Foolish am I to think about it, + But it is good to feel you there. + +Love, in my sleep I dreamed of waking, -- + White and awful the moonlight reached +Over the floor, and somewhere, somewhere, + There was a shutter loose, -- it screeched! + +Swung in the wind, -- and no wind blowing! -- + I was afraid, and turned to you, +Put out my hand to you for comfort, -- + And you were gone! Cold, cold as dew, + +Under my hand the moonlight lay! + Love, if you laugh I shall not care, +But if I weep it will not matter, -- + Ah, it is good to feel you there! + + + + +Indifference + + + +I said, -- for Love was laggard, O, Love was slow to come, -- + "I'll hear his step and know his step when I am warm in bed; +But I'll never leave my pillow, though there be some + As would let him in -- and take him in with tears!" I said. +I lay, -- for Love was laggard, O, he came not until dawn, -- + I lay and listened for his step and could not get to sleep; +And he found me at my window with my big cloak on, + All sorry with the tears some folks might weep! + + + + +Witch-Wife + + + +She is neither pink nor pale, + And she never will be all mine; +She learned her hands in a fairy-tale, + And her mouth on a valentine. + +She has more hair than she needs; + In the sun 'tis a woe to me! +And her voice is a string of colored beads, + Or steps leading into the sea. + +She loves me all that she can, + And her ways to my ways resign; +But she was not made for any man, + And she never will be all mine. + + + + +Blight + + + +Hard seeds of hate I planted + That should by now be grown, -- +Rough stalks, and from thick stamens + A poisonous pollen blown, +And odors rank, unbreathable, + From dark corollas thrown! + +At dawn from my damp garden + I shook the chilly dew; +The thin boughs locked behind me + That sprang to let me through; +The blossoms slept, -- I sought a place + Where nothing lovely grew. + +And there, when day was breaking, + I knelt and looked around: +The light was near, the silence + Was palpitant with sound; +I drew my hate from out my breast + And thrust it in the ground. + +Oh, ye so fiercely tended, + Ye little seeds of hate! +I bent above your growing + Early and noon and late, +Yet are ye drooped and pitiful, -- + I cannot rear ye straight! + +The sun seeks out my garden, + No nook is left in shade, +No mist nor mold nor mildew + Endures on any blade, +Sweet rain slants under every bough: + Ye falter, and ye fade. + + + + +When the Year Grows Old + + + +I cannot but remember + When the year grows old -- +October -- November -- + How she disliked the cold! + +She used to watch the swallows + Go down across the sky, +And turn from the window + With a little sharp sigh. + +And often when the brown leaves + Were brittle on the ground, +And the wind in the chimney + Made a melancholy sound, + +She had a look about her + That I wish I could forget -- +The look of a scared thing + Sitting in a net! + +Oh, beautiful at nightfall + The soft spitting snow! +And beautiful the bare boughs + Rubbing to and fro! + +But the roaring of the fire, + And the warmth of fur, +And the boiling of the kettle + Were beautiful to her! + +I cannot but remember + When the year grows old -- +October -- November -- + How she disliked the cold! + + + + +Sonnets + + + + I + + + +Thou art not lovelier than lilacs, -- no, + Nor honeysuckle; thou art not more fair + Than small white single poppies, -- I can bear +Thy beauty; though I bend before thee, though +From left to right, not knowing where to go, + I turn my troubled eyes, nor here nor there + Find any refuge from thee, yet I swear +So has it been with mist, -- with moonlight so. + +Like him who day by day unto his draught + Of delicate poison adds him one drop more +Till he may drink unharmed the death of ten, +Even so, inured to beauty, who have quaffed + Each hour more deeply than the hour before, +I drink -- and live -- what has destroyed some men. + + + + + II + + + +Time does not bring relief; you all have lied + Who told me time would ease me of my pain! + I miss him in the weeping of the rain; +I want him at the shrinking of the tide; +The old snows melt from every mountain-side, + And last year's leaves are smoke in every lane; + But last year's bitter loving must remain +Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide! + +There are a hundred places where I fear + To go, -- so with his memory they brim! +And entering with relief some quiet place +Where never fell his foot or shone his face +I say, "There is no memory of him here!" + And so stand stricken, so remembering him! + + + + + III + + + +Mindful of you the sodden earth in spring, + And all the flowers that in the springtime grow, + And dusty roads, and thistles, and the slow +Rising of the round moon, all throats that sing +The summer through, and each departing wing, + And all the nests that the bared branches show, + And all winds that in any weather blow, +And all the storms that the four seasons bring. + +You go no more on your exultant feet + Up paths that only mist and morning knew, +Or watch the wind, or listen to the beat + Of a bird's wings too high in air to view, -- +But you were something more than young and sweet + And fair, -- and the long year remembers you. + + + + + IV + + + +Not in this chamber only at my birth -- + When the long hours of that mysterious night + Were over, and the morning was in sight -- +I cried, but in strange places, steppe and firth +I have not seen, through alien grief and mirth; + And never shall one room contain me quite + Who in so many rooms first saw the light, +Child of all mothers, native of the earth. + +So is no warmth for me at any fire + To-day, when the world's fire has burned so low; +I kneel, spending my breath in vain desire, +At that cold hearth which one time roared so strong, +And straighten back in weariness, and long + To gather up my little gods and go. + + + + + V + + + +If I should learn, in some quite casual way, + That you were gone, not to return again -- +Read from the back-page of a paper, say, + Held by a neighbor in a subway train, +How at the corner of this avenue + And such a street (so are the papers filled) +A hurrying man -- who happened to be you -- + At noon to-day had happened to be killed, +I should not cry aloud -- I could not cry + Aloud, or wring my hands in such a place -- +I should but watch the station lights rush by + With a more careful interest on my face, +Or raise my eyes and read with greater care +Where to store furs and how to treat the hair. + + + + + VI Bluebeard + + + +This door you might not open, and you did; + So enter now, and see for what slight thing +You are betrayed. . . . Here is no treasure hid, + No cauldron, no clear crystal mirroring +The sought-for truth, no heads of women slain + For greed like yours, no writhings of distress, +But only what you see. . . . Look yet again -- + An empty room, cobwebbed and comfortless. +Yet this alone out of my life I kept + Unto myself, lest any know me quite; +And you did so profane me when you crept + Unto the threshold of this room to-night +That I must never more behold your face. + This now is yours. I seek another place. + + +End of the Project Gutenberg Etext of Renascence and Other Poems + + + + diff --git a/old/old/ednam10.zip b/old/old/ednam10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..9cb6a2d --- /dev/null +++ b/old/old/ednam10.zip |